Socialism and the Social Movement in the 19th Century

by Werner Sombart

This internal and external unification, which is the product of the last decade, I might specify as the third stage in the development of the social movement; and then the second stage would be the complete saturation of the German social democracy with the Marxian spirit. This political party becomes thereby the organ through which those ideas spread into other lands.

In Germany there has grown into recognition a social movement which, at the beginning, was conducted in the spirit of both Marx and Lassalle, but which soon came under the control of pure Marxism. I recall the following stages of development. When thirty-two years ago the deadly bullet struck Lassalle in Geneva, that man was removed who alone had represented the German working-men's movement; and what he left behind was next to nothing. His "Working-Men's Union" numbered only four thousand six hundred and ten members at the moment when he closed his eyes. So also immediately after Lassalle's death the agitation was nothing more than a useless and petty strife. It was a coterie rather than a social party. Thus the field in Germany was open for the development of a new social-democratic movement from another source. This was started in 1864 by Wilhelm Liebknecht, who came to Germany as the direct envoy of Karl Marx, and with strong belief in his ideas; the purpose was to establish the working-men's movement upon a basis other than that of Lassalle. He won to this cause the youthful energy of the master-turner August Bebel, who, at the age of twenty-four, was already the leader of a number of working-men's unions which had been until that time in advanced radicalism. These are the organisations, you know, which in the year 1868, in Nuremberg, seceded from Schulze to Marx. Fourteen thousand working men were represented. The resolution through which this transfer was accomplished was drawn by Liebknecht and was inspired by the Marxian spirit. Thus in 1868 a new social party was formed in Germany which took the name of the Social-Democratic Working-Men's Party, and which, after the congress in Eisenach, stood for a time alone as the so-called "Honorables," until in the year 1875 the union of the Lassalle and the Bebel faction was accomplished in Gotha. Since that time, as you know, the one "Social-Democratic Party" exists. It is significant that the present union rests upon a compromise between Lassalle and Marx, but is really directed by the Marxists, who step by step have won control in the party. The "Gotha" programme remained as the platform of the movement in Germany for sixteen years; and not until the year 1891 was it replaced by a new platform, the "Erfurt" programme, which now constitutes the confession of faith of the Social-Democratic movement in Germany. It is pervaded by a strongly Marxian spirit and contains essentially only a statement of Marxian doctrines in accordance with the spirit of the age. Let me in a few words present merely the lines of thought in this programme. It begins with the phrases:

"The economic development of middle-class society leads by a necessity of nature to the extinction of that economic order, production on a small scale, which rests upon the private ownership of the workman in his means of production. It separates the workman from his means of production, and changes him into a possessionless proletarian; while the instruments of production become the monopoly of a small number of capitalists and landowners, etc."

As you see, this programme proceeds from the fundamental thought that economic development completes itself in a specific way; hence follow all the other matters with which the programme deals. This special Marxian thought, that an economic evolution is involved, has become the central point of the Erfurt programme. It shows, further, how out of the economic development a conflict emerges in the form of class strife; and then it concludes that only a change to communal ownership of the means of production can quiet this conflict. The party for which the platform was created takes hold of the communistic thought of the Erfurt programme in this sense, that the duty of a political party can only be to bring to the consciousness of the workman the existing economic revolution.

These are the words: "To bring this warfare of the working classes to consciousness and unity, to show the natural and necessary goal—that is the duty of the Social-Democratic Party." This is the point that is especially important for us—the German agitation becomes completely saturated, rapidly and uninterruptedly, with Marxian ideas, and thus this spirit spreads gradually into other lands.

If you now ask me how this gradual extension of the Marxian system and in connection with it the unification of the Marxian movement are shown, the following, points seem to me of especial importance. In 1873 the "International" came to an end. It seemed as if, with it, the internationalisation of the social movement in like manner had ceased. But for about a decade past we have had again general and formal "International Working-Men's Congresses." The year 1889 opened the series with a working-men's congress in Paris, again at a world's exposition. Here again, in a new and freer form, this idea of the old "International" arises, and in a much larger form than the old international working-men's associations had ever realised it. For these former international working-men's associations had been really only a combination of a number of representatives and secretaries. The masses scarcely stood upon paper. The congresses which now again the world of working men have created rest upon a much broader basis, in my opinion, since, in spite of all "exclusions" and factional strife, these international meetings represent a real combination of working men conscious of their aim and organised for it—a fact which we can no longer hide from ourselves, since the old English trade-unions have become represented at the congresses. Thus the international congresses now include the so-called "socialists" and the trade unions as well. In spite of all differences of opinion on certain points, at these congresses there is such expression of internationality and solidarity on the part of the proletariat as was never approached by any of the meetings of the old "International." And it is certainly not by chance that the pictures of Marx and Engels look down upon these new unions of the international proletariat.

But let us now look at a number of evidences, which make clear to us that the movements of different lands approach more and more to a unanimity resting upon the leading thoughts of the Marxian programme. There is first the important fact to remember that the French, originally uneconomic in temperament, have now begun effectively the trade-union agitation. The creation of Bourses du Travail prove how earnestly this part of the social movement is cultivated by the French. Through the agitation of class strife, the general movement towards such associations receives a new impulse. And as the French, inclined to revolutionary and political agitation, begin to become economic, we see on the other side the very important fact that the English working-man recedes step by step from his purely trade-union "Manchester" platform.

I have never believed what some years ago was announced to the world, in connection with a snap resolution of a working-men's congress, that the English trade-unions would go over to the socialistic camp with torch and trumpet. Such decisive changes in social life are not accomplished in that way; there is needed a slow ripening. And the proceedings of the London congress in this year (1896) prove how much antipathy yet exists between the English trade-unions and certain elements of Continental socialism. But in spite of all these tendencies the fact remains that the English working-men's movement approaches the Continental on important points; that is, it has at least begun to be socialistic in aim and political in the means used. That an "Independent Working-Men's Party" as yet plays no rôle in England proves for the present nothing. The peculiar conditions of English party life make a representation of the working men in Parliament unnecessary under the circumstances. But who can doubt, in view of the proceedings of the last decade, that the English trade-unions, even the older ones, stretch out the hand more than formerly towards the door-latch of legislation? Let me remind you of the fact that with small, though deeply interested, minorities the trade unions have written upon their programme a legal work-day of eight hours. Also, in spite of much limitation and qualification, the resolution of the English working-men in the year 1894 remains—the communisation of the English means of production, at least the most important of them, as the object of their agitation. Is that anything other than a conversion of the English working-men's association?

In Germany we find that the normal line, upon which the social movement in all nations begins to arrange itself, was nearly reached at the start. It was only necessary to throw off some of Lassalle's peculiar ideas, those revolutionary notions which arose here and there about the year 1870, and especially to give broader play to the trade-union movement, in order to reach the "minimum programme" of all social agitation. This programme is, to repeat concisely:—the object of the social movement is the communisation of the means of production in its largest technical development upon a democratic basis; the means of reaching this aim is the struggle of classes; this has two equally justifiable forms, the economic—which finds its expression in the trade-union movement, the political—which finds its expression in representation in Parliament. The formulation of this proposition is the specific service of Karl Marx, as we have seen; and for this reason I think I am warranted in speaking of the whole social movement of our time as infused with the Marxian spirit. For it is not unknown to you that the social agitation in lands of later capitalistic development—Italy, Austria, and Russia—has been from the beginning in accordance with the thought of that platform.

If in any such way I think that I see a unification of the social movement, that does not mean that I see a machine-like uniformity of this movement in the different lands. I am not blind to the innumerable diversities which are developed by the various nations, and which are revealed every moment. I have attempted to show to you how absolutely necessary these national peculiarities are, and to a certain degree always will be—because of historic tradition and difference of national character. So when I speak of a unity, I only mean, as I have already often said, a tendency to this which struggles to assert itself in spite of national disposition. The social agitation will always retain a double tendency, a centripetal and a centrifugal. The former, arising from the uniformity of capitalistic development and from the similarity of original causes, tends towards conformity; the latter, the product of national differences and of manifold causes, tends to divergence.