Socialism as it is

by William English Walling

Edward Bernstein, while representing as a rule only the ultra-moderate element of the Party, expresses on this question the views of the majority as well. "Social Democracy," he says, "cannot further its work better than by taking its stand unreservedly on the theory of democracy." And he adds that in practice it has always favored coöperation with all the exploited, even if "its literary advocates have often acted otherwise, and still often do so to-day."

Not many years ago, it is true, there was still a great deal of talk in Germany about the desirability of a "dictatorship of the proletariat," the term "proletariat" being used in its narrow sense. That is, as soon as the working class (in this sense) became a political majority, it was to make the government embody its will without reference to other classes—it being assumed that the manual laborers will only demand justice for all men alike, and that it was neither safe nor necessary to consult any of the middle classes. And even to-day in France much is said by the "syndicalists" and others as to the power of well-organized and determined minorities in the time of revolution—it being assumed, again, that such minorities will be successful only in so far as they stand for a new social principle, to the ultimate interest of all (see [Chapter V]). It cannot be questioned that in these schemes the majority is not to be consulted. But they are far less widely prevalent than they were a generation ago.

The pioneer of "reformist" Socialism in Germany (Bernstein) correctly defines democracy, not as the rule of the majority, but as "an absence of class government." "This negative definition has," he says, "the advantage that it gives less room than the phrase 'government by the people' to the idea of oppression of the individual by the majority, which is absolutely repugnant to the modern mind. To-day we find the oppression of the minority by the majority 'undemocratic,' although it was originally held up to be quite consistent with government by the people.... Democracy is in principle the suppression of class government, though it is not yet the actual suppression of classes."[213]

Democracy, as we have hitherto known it, opposes class government, but countenances the existence of classes. Socialism insists that as long as social classes exist, class government will continue. The aim of Socialism, "the end of class struggles and class rule," is not only democratic, but the only means of giving democracy any real meaning.

"It is only the proletariat" (wage earners), writes Kautsky, "that has created a great social ideal, the consummation of which will leave only one source of income, i.e. labor, will abolish rent and profit, will put an end to class and other conflicts, and put in the place of the class struggle the solidarity of man. This is the final aim and goal of the class struggle by the Socialist Party. The political representatives of the class interests of the proletariat thus become representative of the highest and most general interests of humanity."[214]

It is expected that nearly all social classes, though separated into several groups to-day, will ultimately be thrown together by economic evolution and common interests into two large groups, the capitalists and their allies on the one side, and the anti-capitalists on the other. The final and complete victory of the latter, it is believed, can alone put an end to this great conflict. But in the meanwhile, even before our capitalist society is overthrown and class divisions ended, the very fusing together of the several classes that compose the anti-capitalist party is bringing about a degree of social harmony not seen before.

Already the Socialists have succeeded in this way in harmonizing a large number of conflicting class interests. The skilled workingmen were united for the first time with the unskilled when the latter, having been either ignored or subordinated in the early trade unions, were admitted on equal terms into the Socialist parties. Then the often extremely discontented salaried and professional men of small incomes, having been won by Socialist philosophy, laid aside their sense of superiority to the wage earners and were absorbed in large numbers. Later, many agricultural laborers and even agriculturists who did all their own work, and whose small capital brought them no return, began to conquer their suspicion of the city wage workers. And, finally, many of those small business men and independent farmers, the larger part of whose income is to be set down as the direct result of their own labor and not a result of their ownership of a small capital, or who feel that they are being reduced to such a condition, are commencing in many instances to look upon themselves as non-capitalists rather than capitalists—and to work for equality of opportunity through the Socialist movement.

The process of building up a truly democratic society has two parts: first, the organization and union in a single movement of all classes that stand for the abolition of classes, and class rule; and second, the overthrow of those social elements that stand in the way of this natural evolution, their destruction and dissolution as classes, and the absorption of their members by the new society as individuals.

It becomes of the utmost importance in such a vast struggle, on the one hand, that no classes that are needed in the new society shall be marked for destruction, and on the other that the movement shall not lean too heavily or exclusively on classes which have very little or too little constructive or combative power. What, then, is the leading principle by which the two groups are to be made up and distinguished? Neither the term "capitalist classes" nor the term "working classes" is entirely clear or entirely satisfactory.

Mr. Roosevelt, for example, gives the common impression when he accuses the Socialists of using the term "working class" in the narrow sense and of taking the position that "all wealth is produced by manual workers, that the entire product of labor should be handed over to the laborer."[215] I shall show that Socialist writers and speakers, even when they use the expression "working class," almost universally include others than the manual laborers among those they expect to make up the anti-capitalistic movement.