Werner Sombart

“ I said that the social movement has, as its supporters, the modern proletariat, a class of free, lifelong wage-workers. The first condition of its existence is the rise of this class itself. Every social class is the result, the expression, of some specific form of production; the proletariat, of that form of production which we are accustomed to call capitalistic. The history of the rise of the proletariat is also the history of capitalism. ”

“ All ferments and boils there, all bubbles and breaks out uninterruptedly since the "glorious" revolution of the previous century. Parties are in a state of constant flux; a movement divides itself into countless factions. With haste and pressure single acts fall over one another. Parliamentary struggle is set aside, now by bloody street fights, now by conspiracy, now by assassination. To understand clearly this general characteristic, which runs to-day in the very blood of the French proletariat, but which is becoming modified, we must go back to the earlier decades. ”

“ Thus the existence of capitalism is the necessary preliminary condition of the proletariat, and so of the modern social movement.
But how stands it with the proletariat? What are the conditions under which the working-class lives? And how has it come to pass that out of these conditions those particular tendencies and demands have arisen which, as we shall find, have come out of this proletariat? Usually, when one is asked concerning the characteristics of the modern proletariat, the first answer is—the great misery in which the masses are sunk. ”

“ The warming sun must shed its beams, if all is not to go under and become darkened—with danger of the annihilation of all life. The word of the dying St. Simon, with which he took departure from his favourite scholar Rodriguez, is eternally true: "Never forget, my friend, that a man must have enthusiasm in order to accomplish great things." When this idealism and enthusiasm disappear [152] from a movement, when its impetus is lost, when it passes into a littleness of opportunism, into an emptiness of small politics, it dies like a body without life. ”

“ So we see on the one side the exertion of the community for wealth, power, recognition; and on the other side the same exertion, by the individual, after power, wealth, honour. These, as it seems to me, are the two matters which in fact fill all history. For history begins as this antithesis unfolds itself. It is merely a figure of speech, and you must not be shocked by the harsh expression, as I say that human history is a fight either for food division, or for feeding-place, upon our earth. These are both great contradictions which constantly emerge, which invariably control mankind. ”

“ Further, I have always the impression that the French people stand even to-day under the influence, perhaps we may say the ban, of their "glorious" revolution. The influence of such an event—the most tremendous drama of history—cannot in one hundred years disappear from a people. So I think that this nervosity, if I may so express it, which clings to all public life in France, may be, in large part, a heritage from those terrible years of general overthrow, an inheritance that has been most carefully fostered in less glorious revolutions since then—ah, how many! ”

“ If we would put "world history" into a single phrase we shall be obliged, I think, to say that [2] there is an antithesis around which the whole history of society turns, as around two poles: social and national—using the word national in the widest meaning. Humanity develops itself into communities, and then these communities fight and compete with each other; but always within the community the individual begins to strive for elevation over others, in order, as Kant once expressed it, to make distinction of rank among his fellows, whom he does not like, from whom, however, he cannot escape. ”

“ If we present to ourselves first the real meaning of the movements of 1789 and 1793, the great French Revolution, it is clear even to those of limited vision that the revolution of 1789 was purely a middle-class movement, and indeed carried on by the higher part of the middle-class. It is the struggle of the upper middle-class for the recognition of its rights, and for relief from the privileges of the ruling class of society—from the fetters in which it had been held by feudal powers. ”

“ But that is not the most important point, when we ask after the essential conditions of existence of the proletariat. It is much more characteristic that in the moment when great masses sink into misery, upon the other side, shining like a fairy's creation, the millionaire arises. It is the contrast between the comfortable villa and elegant equipage of the rich, the magnificent stores, the luxurious restaurants [11] which the workman passes as he goes on his way to his manufactory or workshop in the dreary part of the city; it is the contrast in condition which develops hate in the masses. ”

“ If I now, after having sketched the fundamental ideas of Owen's system, may attempt to condense the essence of the so-called utopian socialism into a few sentences, I would specify this as essential: Owen and the others are primarily socialists because their starting-point is proletarian criticism. They draw this immediately out of spheres in which capitalism asserts itself, out of the manufactory as Owen, out of the counting-house as Fourier. ”

“ Now shall we who do not stand in the ranks of those who struggle for the new social order, shall we who only tremble for the permanence of that which seems to us necessary for the upholding of our civilisation—shall we be greatly pained and troubled at the present condition of things as thus shown?
I think it hardly necessary to excite ourselves over the "dangers" of any socialistic order of society in the future. We who know that all social order is only the expression of specific economic relations can face what comes with indifference ”

“ I cannot see why this should be the heritage of a particular class. It is a foolish idea that such a feeling may, or can, die out in the great masses of men, so long as there are lands and peoples with their own languages and songs.
Quite different is nationalism—the intelligent presentation, if I may so express it, of national opinion, especially in opposition and enmity to other nations. The modern proletariat does not simply refuse to share this feeling; it actually fights against it. ”

“ I think that the old proverb is true as applied even to social strife, "Πόλεμος πατὴρ πάντων." It is only through struggle that the most beautiful flowers of human existence bloom. It is only struggle that raises the great masses of the common people to a higher level of humanity. Whatever of culture is now forced upon the masses comes to them through struggle; the only warrant for the hope that they can be developed into new and higher forms of culture lies in the fact that they must rise through their efforts, that step by step they must fight for their rights. ”

“ The time of surprise, of carrying through a revolution by a small minority at the head of ignorant masses, is passed. For a complete overthrow of the social organisation the masses themselves must be concerned, they must understand what they do, why they take part. The history of the last fifty years has taught this to us. But through this teaching the masses are learning what is to be done, and that long and patient work is needed, and that it is just this work which we now urge forward with such success that our opponents are brought to confusion. ”

“ But I place it in the antecedent history, because I miss in it the clear programme of the proletarian-social movement, a clearly defined aim towards which it works. The only programme of the Chartist movement is the charter, which contains no true socialistic postulates, but only a collection of parliamentary reforms. It is nothing other than a platform upon which a man stands because he knows nothing better; a programme that had been taken up by the radical middle-class democracy. ”

“ These men know that politics and trade unions are like the right and left legs upon which the proletariat marches; that political part-taking is needed in order to obtain influence upon legislation; that economic organisation is needed in order to discipline and educate the masses. The only question can be now as to the degree, the more or less, of the one or the other form of social agitation;—always within the limits of legal agitation on the part of the working men. ”

“ We all know how the middle-class agitation of the year 1848 in Germany failed, and sought the protection of the Prussian bayonet from the "gens mal intentionnés"—the well-known undercurrent of democracy present in every civil revolution. Civic pride and defiance fell at that moment, as always, when the spectre of social revolution appeared on the horizon—witness the law against the socialists. Thus was the bridge between the proletarian agitation and civic opposition even at that early time broken, soon to be entirely destroyed. ”

“ As we turn to the proletariat itself and ask after its fate,—perhaps up to the middle of our century,—we find a precursor of the social movement which everywhere—that is, in all lands controlled by the capitalistic economy—exhibits the same marks and is uniformly characterised in the following way: where the movement of the masses stands out clearly and conscious of its aim, it is not proletarian; where it is proletarian, it is not clear and conscious of its aim. ”

“ And it is certainly one of the most unpleasant traits of many of the modern representatives of the proletarian movement, that in the dusty atmosphere of common politics they have lost their enthusiasm and have sunk to the level of political malcontents.
But on the other side, we must not confuse idealism with fantasy or utopism. Enthusiasm for an object should be combined with common sense. In the one is warmth, in the other clearness; in the one lies the ideal, in the other the programme, that will offer ways and means for reaching the end. ”

“ Where now the proletariat fights for itself and represents its own interests we discern at first mere muttered, inarticulate sounds; and it takes long for these tones to rise to cries, for these cries to grow to general demands, and to become crystallised into programmes. The first proletarian agitations—movements of the unhappy, deeply buried mass—are, according to Carlyle's word, like the movements of Enceladus, who as he quivers in his pain causes an earthquake. ”

“ Only thus could the social-political realism, which heretofore has been proclaimed in a limited way, now arise as the principle of the whole social movement.
It is this social-political realism which gives the finishing stroke to all utopism and revolutionism. The insurrectionists in Lyons and the Chartist revolutionaries were both utopists—for they shed their blood and yet only strengthened the reaction. The Putschists, Clubists, and Blanquists were utopists, who through conspiracies and street riots would through all time control economic development. ”

“ Patriotism, the love of the Fatherland, is indeed a feeling that unconsciously and without effort is held fast in our hearts, and exists therein like love of home and of family. It is an aggregation of impressions, of memories, over which we have no control. It is that indefinable power exercised upon our souls by the sound of the mother tongue, by the harmony of the national song, by many peculiar customs and usages, by the whole history and poetry of the home land. ”

“ And if a man reaches the conclusion that in agrarian development no tendency to production on a large scale exists, but that here operation on a large scale is not at all the highest form of management, then we see before us the decisive question—Shall we now be democratic in the sense of allowing production on a small scale in this sphere and thus change our programme and desert the communistic ideal; or shall we remain proletarian, hold fast to the communistic ideal and exclude this class from our movement? ”

“ If we look at this system as a whole, we find as the starting-point a criticism of existing social circumstances in a proletarian community. We find, further, as the basis upon which the system stands, the social philosophy of the eighteenth century. We see, as its demands, the overthrow of the capitalistic economy and the replacing of private production by communal operation. We find, finally, as the means for accomplishing this, as the roadway that leads to the object desired, the enlightenment of mankind. ”

“ Under the compulsion of competition, lashed by the passion of accumulation which enters with it into modern history, this class has wrought into reality for us those fairy tales of the Thousand and One Nights, those wonders in which daily we rejoice, as through the streets or the industrial expositions of our great cities we stroll, as we talk with the antipodes, as we sail in floating palaces over the ocean, or bask in the glory of our luxurious parlours. ”

“ Who, caring at all about what is going on in these days, has not noticed the many contradictions which are now apparent in the great social movement? Even the inexperienced observer, or he who stands too near to real life to have free and wide outlook, will easily see behind these contradictions a tendency towards a unity of effort. Now that we have obtained a right understanding of this we shall, I hope, do justice to these differences, these contradictions—we shall be able to comprehend them in their essence and necessity. ”