Freeland: A Social Anticipation | Page 3

social arrangements are the necessary result of the human struggle for existence when the productiveness of labour was such that a single worker could produce, by the labour of his own hands, more than was indispensable to the sustenance of his animal nature, but not enough to enable him to satisfy his higher needs. With only this moderate degree of productiveness of labour, the exploitage of man by man was the only way by which it was possible to ensure to individuals wealth and leisure, those fundamental essentials to higher culture. But as soon as the productiveness of labour reaches the point at which it is sufficient to satisfy also the highest requirements of every worker, the exploitage of man by man not only ceases to be a necessity of civilisation, but becomes an obstacle to further progress by hindering men from making full use of the industrial capacity to which they have attained.
For, as under the domination of exploitage the masses have no right to more of what they produce than is necessary for their bare subsistence, demand is cramped by limitations which are quite independent of the possible amount of production. Things for which there is no demand are valueless, and therefore will not be produced; consequently, under the exploiting system, society does not produce that amount of wealth which the progress of science and technical art has made possible, but only that infinitely smaller amount which suffices for the bare subsistence of the masses and the luxury of the few. Society wishes to employ the whole of the surplus of the productive power in the creation of instruments of labour--that is, it wishes to convert it into capital; but this is impossible, since the quantity of utilisable capital is strictly dependent upon the quantity of commodities to be produced by the aid of this capital. The utilisation of all the proceeds of such highly productive labour is therefore dependent upon the creation of a new social order which shall guarantee to every worker the enjoyment of the full proceeds of his own work. And since impartial investigation further shows that this new order is not merely indispensable to further progress in civilisation, but is also thoroughly in harmony with the natural and acquired characteristics of human society, and consequently is met by no inherent and permanent obstacle, it is evident that in the natural process of human evolution this new order must necessarily come into being.
When I placed this conclusion before the public four years ago, I assumed, as something self-evident, that I was announcing a doctrine which was not by any means an isolated novelty; and I distinctly said so in the preface to the 'Laws of Social Evolution.' I fully understood that there must be some connecting bridge between the so-called classical economics and the newly discovered truths; and I was convinced that in a not distant future either others or myself would discover this bridge. But in expounding the consequences springing from the above-mentioned general principles, I at first allowed an error to escape my notice. That ground-rent and undertaker's profit--that is, the payment which the landowner demands for the use of his land, and the claim of the so-called work-giver to the produce of the worker's labour--are incompatible with the claim of the worker to the produce of his own labour, and that consequently in the course of social evolution ground-rent and undertaker's profit must become obsolete and must be given up--this I perceived; but with respect to the interest of capital I adhered to the classical-orthodox view that this was a postulate of progress which would survive all the phases of evolution.
As palliation of my error I may mention that it was the opponents of capital themselves--and Marx in particular--who confirmed me in it, or, more correctly, who prevented me from distinctly perceiving the basis upon which interest essentially rests. To tear oneself away from long-cherished views is in itself extremely difficult; and when, moreover, the men who attack the old views base their attack point after point upon error, it becomes only too easy to mistake the weakness of the attack for impregnability in the thing attacked. Thus it happened with me. Because I saw that what had been hitherto advanced against capital and interest was altogether untenable, I felt myself absolved from the task of again and independently inquiring whether there were no better, no really valid, arguments against the absolute and permanent necessity of interest. Thus, though interest is, in reality, as little compatible with associated labour carried on upon the principle of perfect economic justice as are ground-rent and the undertaker's profit, I was prevented by this fundamental error from arriving at satisfactory views concerning the constitution and character of the future forms of organisation based upon the