[236]
It is, then, a matter of more than ordinary interest to study the principles of the economic system, whose leading advocate at present is the favorite counsellor of the most powerful statesman of modern times. This is the system of the so-called professorial socialists9, or socialists of the chair.
In the ordinary or vulgar signification of the term professorial socialists are not socialists at all; in the strict sense of the word they are. They recognize the existence of a social problem, and hold that the co-operation of government is necessary to its solution. They believe that man, associated with his fellows in the state, has duties to perform which, single and alone, he is unable to fulfil. They point to the fact that all civilized10 governments are, even at present, more or less socialistic. Sanitary11 legislation, governmental inspection12 of buildings, the legal limitation of a day’s labor, the prohibition13 of work on Sunday, the regulations respecting the labor of women and children, temperance laws, state control and management of railroads, the post-office, and other like arrangements, are socialistic in their nature.[199] These matters are not left to individual initiative and private competition. The state—in a certain sense, even now, the highest and most majestic14 of co-operative associations—steps in and attempts to do for the citizens what it is supposed they could not do for themselves without the help of such a union as government represents. It is sought to give, as it were, a divine sanction[237] to this kind of socialism, by calling to mind the strong socialistic tinge15 of the Mosaic16 legislation. Of such character were the laws compelling the return of land in the year of jubilee17, of which one had been forced to dispose by reason of poverty, the setting free of slaves at the same time, the forgiveness of debt, and the prohibition of interest in passages like the following: “And if thy brother be waxen poor and fallen in decay with thee, then thou shalt relieve him.... Take thou no usury18 (=interest) of him or increase; but fear thy God, that thy brother may live with thee.”[200]
The party of professorial socialists was formed ten years ago in Germany. They received their name from an opponent, a clever newspaper writer. He also called them “sweet-water” socialists, but the first name is their ordinary designation, and they do not, as a rule, object to it. Some of them have sought to give the word socialist1 an honorable and respected meaning by avowing19 themselves unreservedly socialists on all occasions. Others think that the prejudice against the name is so strong that they only injure themselves thereby20. They are, in the narrowest sense, all university professors of political economy, though there is no reason why the name should not be extended so as to include others who hold similar views.
The scientific leader of the party is its most radical21 member, Adolf Wagner, the Berlin professor. Other prominent members are Gustav Schmoller, recently professor in Strassburg, now, likewise, professor in Berlin, and Brentano, professor in Breslau, lately transferred, I am told, to Strassburg. Adolf Held, the late young and talented professor in Bonn, and later in[238] Berlin, did not hesitate to speak of himself as a professorial socialist. Although John Stuart Mill died before this school of political economists22 became known, his views and tendencies as regards social questions were so much in accord with theirs that he can properly enough be ranked among them. It must be remembered that Mill placed no limit to state activity save the general good, and declared that all the difficulties of even communism would be but as dust in the balance if he were called upon to choose between that system and a continuance of our present economic life without improvement.
Perhaps, to-day, no professorial socialist could give a better statement of his own aims and desires than Mill’s description of the views and expectation of himself and his wife some thirty years ago. “While we repudiated,” says Mill, “with the greatest energy, that tyranny of society over the individual which most socialistic systems are supposed to involve, we yet looked forward to a time when society will no longer be divided into the idle and the industrious23; when the rule that they who do not work shall not eat will be applied24, not to paupers25 only, but impartially26 to all; when the division of the produce of labor, instead of depending, as in so great a degree it now does, on the accident of birth, will be made by concert on an acknowledged principle of justice; and when it will no longer either be, or be thought to be, impossible for human beings to exert themselves strenuously27 in procuring28 benefits which are not to be exclusively their own, but to be shared with the society they belong to. The social problem of the future we considered to be how to unite the greatest individual liberty of action with a common ownership[239] in the raw material of the globe, and an equal participation29 of all in the benefits of combined labor.” This is, I must remark in passing, an extreme position. The professorial socialists are not accustomed to express themselves in favor of carrying socialism so far, and I believe Mill does it nowhere else. “We had not the presumption,” continues Mill, “to suppose that we could already foresee by what precise form of institutions these objects could most effectually be attained30, or at how near or how distant a period they would become practicable. We saw clearly that to render any such social transformation31 either possible or desirable an equivalent change of character must take place both in the uncultivated herd32 who now compose the laboring33 masses and in the immense majority of their employers. Both these classes must learn by practice to labor and combine for generous, or, at all events, for public and social purposes, and not, as hitherto, solely34 for narrowly interested ones. But the capacity to do this has always existed in mankind, and is not, nor is ever likely to be, extinct. Education, habit, and the cultivation35 of the sentiments will make a common man dig or weave for his country as readily as fight for his country. True enough, it is only by slow degrees, and a system of culture prolonged through successive generations, that men in general can be brought up to this point. But the hinderance is not in the essential condition of human nature.” Ruskin expresses the thought that one ought to be as ready to give money as life for one’s country when he says: “I will tell you, good reader, what would have seemed Utopian on the side of evil instead of good: that ever men should have come to value their money so much more than their lives, that if[240] you call upon them to become soldiers, and take chance of a bullet through their heart, and of wife and children being left desolate36, for their pride’s sake, they will do it gayly; but if you ask them, for their country’s sake, to spend a hundred pounds without security of getting back a hundred and five, they will laugh in your face.”[201]
The German professorial socialists held a meeting in Eisenach in October, 1872, and founded the “union for Social Politics.” They hoped, by means of an organization holding yearly meetings, to be able to exercise greater influence on legislation and public opinion. Their proceedings37 were published in Leipsic, in 1873, under the title “Transactions of the union for Social Politics,” and reports of meetings which have since been held have been published at the same place under the same title.
They discussed such questions as joint-stock companies, insurance, savings-banks, and factory legislation, including the prohibition of labor on Sunday and protection of women and children in factories. Their negative work consisted in combating the empty abstractions of the English free-trade school, or, as they call it, the Manchester school. They accused the Manchester men of lacking all appreciation38 for the higher duties of the state or the ethical39 side of economic life, and of having no warmth of heart for the interests of the lower classes. The professorial socialists endeavored, on the other hand, to reconcile the laborers40 and social democrats41 to society by recognizing and favoring what might be called their just demands.
The difference between professorial socialists and[241] other professors of political economy in Germany is one of degree. The former emphasize more strongly the beneficial effects of governmental intervention42, and believe that the state has not as yet gone nearly far enough in recognizing its duties towards the weak and poor and in regulating the distribution of wealth.[202] They regard political economy as, first and foremost, an ethical science. To them the state is, above all things, a moral person. It is, indeed, necessary to obtain a clear understanding of their conception of the state before it is possible to comprehend their teachings. They regard the state as something sacred and divine, holding that it arises out of the essential characteristics of the human nature given us by God. They have a reverence43 for state obligations which reminds one of the doctrines of the ancient Greeks and of the heroic self-sacrifice of Socrates, who considered it his duty to obey the laws, even when they ordered his death. They consider that the rights of the state spring from a higher source than a social contract, either implicit44 or explicit45, of the citizens with one another. The state stands above the citizens as the Church above its members. Humanity, in their opinion, progresses, and ever must progress, through Church and state. They see God in both. They know nothing of any civilization in the past apart from the state, and are able to imagine none in the future existing outside of such a social organism. In this spirit Professor Schmoller defines the state as the grandest moral institution for the education and development of the human race.
[242]
The socialists of the chair deprecate any attempt to separate political economy from the higher ideal side of our nature. They do not believe that in business or anywhere should man be governed solely by selfish motives46.
In practical politics they reject decidedly violent change, but advocate a gradual and peaceful development. Some of them do not expect that their ideal will be realized for a thousand years to come.
Wagner believes that he has discovered a law according to which the functions of government are constantly increasing—in many places, even in spite of theory. According to him, government in all civilized countries is uninterruptedly taking upon itself new duties. The post-office, education, the telegraph, railroads, and the care of forests are examples. The increase in state business in England, e.g., may be seen from the fact that the expenses of government were forty times as great in 1841 as in 1685, although the population had little more than trebled its numbers.[203] If it can be shown that Wagner’s theory is really a law, and that the apparent proofs of it are not merely temporary social phenomena47, it will at once be admitted that it is of the highest importance. Its operation would, of itself, establish the socialistic state, since, if government continually absorbs private business, there will, in the end, be only state business. In this socialistic state there would be the same differences in rank as at present between the different governmental employees. At the top of the social ladder[243] there would still be an emperor, and at the bottom ordinary laborers, steadily48 employed in the service of the state, as, e.g., the workmen on the state railroads now.
At present things are moving pretty rapidly in Germany towards the accomplishment49 of Wagner’s ideal, if we may suppose that expressed by his law. In fact, since Bismarck is said to value him highly, it is not impossible that he may have considerable to do with directing the economic policy of Germany. He has always been a strong advocate of state railways, the compulsory50 insurance of laborers by the state, and the tobacco monopoly. What may be the ultimate results of the changes taking place in Germany it is far too early to say.
The leading ideas of the professorial socialists may be best learned from a little work by Professor Gustav Schmoller, entitled “A Few Fundamental Principles of Law and Political Economy.”[204] It is an open letter, addressed to Professor von Treitschke, a Prussian of the Buncombe type, who, with a very insufficient51 study of their writings, had the rashness to attack the professorial socialists in his “Socialism and Those Who Favor It” (“Der Socialismus und seine G?nner”). Von Treitschke is generally regarded as having fared ill in this encounter. As Schmoller pointed52 out, those whom he attacked had spent more years in the study of economic questions than he had weeks.
But one of the most interesting features of this new school of political economy, altogether apart from the correctness of its other doctrines, is its repudiation[244] of selfishness, or self-interest, as it is more euphemistically called, as a sufficient guide in economic matters. The necessity of Christian53 self-denial and self-sacrifice is emphasized by its adherents54. They attack what they call the mammonism of the Manchester school, and elevate man, not wealth, to the central position in economic science. “The starting-point, as well as the object-point, of our science is man” (Roscher). All hope of resolving “the social question” without a moral and intellectual elevation55 of mankind is abandoned. The Christian religion is assigned an important work in this field, and political economy becomes a Christian science. To see the leaders of economic thought, starting with anything rather than religious predilections56, gradually forced to this position, may indeed be styled a triumph of Christianity.
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1
socialist
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| n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的 | |
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chancellor
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| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
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doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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professes
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| 声称( profess的第三人称单数 )； 宣称； 公开表明； 信奉 | |
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tariff
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| n.关税，税率；(旅馆、饭店等)价目表，收费表 | |
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labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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repudiates
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| v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的第三人称单数 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务） | |
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formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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socialists
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| 社会主义者( socialist的名词复数 ) | |
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civilized
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| a.有教养的，文雅的 | |
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sanitary
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| adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的 | |
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inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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prohibition
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| n.禁止；禁令，禁律 | |
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majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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tinge
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| vt.(较淡)着色于，染色；使带有…气息；n.淡淡色彩，些微的气息 | |
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mosaic
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| n./adj.镶嵌细工的，镶嵌工艺品的，嵌花式的 | |
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jubilee
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| n.周年纪念；欢乐 | |
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usury
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| n.高利贷 | |
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avowing
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| v.公开声明，承认( avow的现在分词 ) | |
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thereby
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| adv.因此，从而 | |
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radical
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| n.激进份子，原子团，根号；adj.根本的，激进的，彻底的 | |
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economists
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| n.经济学家，经济专家( economist的名词复数 ) | |
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industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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applied
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| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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paupers
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| n.穷人( pauper的名词复数 )；贫民；贫穷 | |
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impartially
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| adv.公平地，无私地 | |
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strenuously
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| adv.奋发地，费力地 | |
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procuring
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| v.（努力）取得， （设法）获得( procure的现在分词 )；拉皮条 | |
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participation
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| n.参与，参加，分享 | |
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attained
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| （通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况） | |
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transformation
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| n.变化；改造；转变 | |
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herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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laboring
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| n.劳动，操劳v.努力争取(for)( labor的现在分词 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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proceedings
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| n.进程，过程，议程；诉讼(程序)；公报 | |
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appreciation
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| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
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ethical
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| adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的 | |
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laborers
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| n.体力劳动者，工人( laborer的名词复数 )；（熟练工人的）辅助工 | |
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41
democrats
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| n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 ) | |
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intervention
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| n.介入，干涉，干预 | |
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43
reverence
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| n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬 | |
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44
implicit
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| a.暗示的，含蓄的，不明晰的，绝对的 | |
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explicit
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| adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的 | |
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46
motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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47
phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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48
steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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49
accomplishment
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| n.完成，成就，（pl.）造诣，技能 | |
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50
compulsory
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| n.强制的，必修的；规定的，义务的 | |
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51
insufficient
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| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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52
pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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adherents
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| n.支持者，拥护者( adherent的名词复数 )；党羽；徒子徒孙 | |
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55
elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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56
predilections
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| n.偏爱，偏好，嗜好( predilection的名词复数 ) | |
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