A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism
V.I. Lenin

Source: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1897/econroman/index.htm

V. I. Lenin

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

The Swiss economist Sismondi (J.-C.-L. Simonde de Simondi), who wrote at
the beginning of the present century, is of particular interest in
considering a solution of the general economic problems which are now
coming to the forefront with particular force in Russia. If we add to this
that Sismondi occupies a special place in the history of political
economy, in that he stands apart from the main trends, being an ardent
advocate of small-scale production and an opponent of the supporters and
ideologists of large scale enterprise (just like the present-day Russian
Narodniks), the reader will understand our desire to outline the main
features of Sismondi’s doctrine and its relation to other
trends—both contemporary and subsequent—in economic science. A
study of Sismondi is today all the more interesting because last year
(1896) an article in Russkoye Bogatstvo also expounded his
doctrine (B. Ephrucy: “The Social and Economic Views of Simonde de
Sismondi,” Russkoye Bogatstvo , 1896, Nos. 7 and

8). [1]

The contributor to Russkoye Bogatstvo states at the very outset
that no writer has been “so wrongly appraised” as Sismondi,
who, he alleges, has been “unjustly” represented, now as a
reactionary, then as a utopian. The very opposite is true. Precisely this appraisal of Sismondi is quite correct. The article in Russkoye Bogatstvo , while it gives an accurate and detailed
account of Sismondi’s views, provides a completely incorrect picture of his theory, [2] idealises the very points of it in
which he comes closest to the Narodniks, and ignores and
misrepresents his attitude to subsequent trends in economic
science. Hence, our exposition and analysis of Sismondi’s
doctrine will at the same time be a criticism of Ephrucy’s
article.

## Chapter I

## The Economic Theories of Romanticism

The distinguishing feature of Sismondi’s theory is his doctrine of
revenue, of the relation of revenue to production and to the
population. The title of Sismondi’s chief work is: Nouveaux
principes d’économie politique ou de la richesse dans ses
rapports avec la population (Seconde édition. Paris, 1827, 2
vol. The first edition was published in 1819)— New Principles of
Political Economy, or Wealth in Relation to Population . This subject
is almost identical with the problem known in Russian Narodnik literature
as the “problem of the home market for capitalism.” Sismondi
asserted that as a result of the development of large-scale enterprise and
wage-labour in industry and agriculture, production inevitably outruns
consumption and is faced with the insoluble task of finding consumers;
that it cannot find consumers within the country because it converts the
bulk of the population into day labourers, plain workers, and creates
unemployment, while the search for a foreign market becomes increasingly
difficult owing to the entry of new capitalist countries into the world
arena. The reader will see that these are the very same problems that
occupy the minds of the Narodnik economists headed by Messrs, V. V. and

N. —on. [8] Let us, then, take a closer look at
the various points of Sismondi’s argument and at its scientific significance.

## I

## Does the Home Market Shrink Because of the Ruination of the Small Producers?

Unlike the classical economists, who in their arguments had in mind the
already established capitalist system and took the existence of the
working class as a matter of course and self-evident, Sismondi
particularly emphasises the ruination of the small producer—the
process which led to the formation of the working class. That Sismondi
deserves credit for pointing to this contradiction in the capitalist
system is beyond dispute; but the point is that as an economist he failed
to understand this phenomenon and covered up his inability to
make a consistent analysis of it with “pious wishes.” In
Sismondi’s opinion, the ruination of the small producer proves that
the home market shrinks.

“If the manufacturer sells at a cheaper price,” says Sismondi
in the chapter on “How Does the Seller Enlarge His Market?”
(ch. III, livre IV, t. 1, p. 342 et suiv .), [3] “he will sell more, because the others will
sell less. Hence, the manufacturer always strives to save something on
labour, or on raw. materials, so as to be able to sell at a lower price
than his fellow manufacturers. As the materials themselves are products of
past labour, his saving, in the long run, always amounts to the
expenditure of a smaller quantity of labour in the production of the same
product.” “True, the individual manufacturer tries to expand
production and not to reduce the number of his workers. Let us assume that
he succeeds, that he wins customers away from his competitors by reducing
the price of his commodity. What will be the ‘national result’
of this? . . . The other manufacturers will introduce the same methods of
production as he employs. Then some of them will, of course, have to
discharge some of their workers to the extent that the new machine
increases the productive power of labour. If consumption remains at the
same level, and if the same amount of labour is performed by one-tenth of
the former number of hands, then the income of this section of the working class will be curtailed by nine-tenths, and all forms of
its consumption will be reduced to the same extent. . . . The result of
the invention—if the nation has no foreign trade, and if consumption
remains at the same level—will consequently be a loss for all, a
decline in the national revenue, which will lead to a decline in general
consumption in the following year” (I, 344). “Nor can it be
other wise: labour itself is an important part of the revenue”
(Sismondi has wages in mind), “and therefore the demand for labour
cannot be reduced without making the nation poorer. Hence, the expected
gain from the invention of new methods of production is nearly always
obtained from foreign trade” (I, 345).

The reader will see that in these words he already has before him all that
so-familiar “theory” of “the shrinkage of the home market” as a consequence of the development of capitalism, and of
the consequent need for a foreign market. Sismondi very frequently reverts
to this idea, linking it with his theory of crises and his population
“theory”; it is as much the key point of his doctrine as it is of
the doctrine of the Russian Narodniks.

Sismondi did not, of course, forget that under the new relationships,
ruination and unemployment are accompanied by an increase in
“commercial wealth” that the point at issue was the development of large-scale production, of capitalism. This he understood
perfectly well and, in fact, asserted that it was the growth of capitalism
that caused the home market to shrink: “Just as it is not a matter
of indifference from the standpoint of the citizens’ welfare whether
the sufficiency and consumption of all tend to be equal, or whether a
small minority has a superabundance of all things, while the masses are
reduced to bare necessities, so these two forms of the distribution of
revenue are not a matter of indifference from the view point of the
development of commercial wealth ( richesse commerciale ). [4] Equality in consumption must always
lead to the expansion of the producers’ market, and inequality, to
the shrinking of the market ” ( de le [ le marché ] resserrer toujours davantage ) (I, 357).

Thus, Sismondi asserts that the home market shrinks owing to the
inequality of distribution inherent in capitalism, that the market must be
created by equal distribution. But how can this take place when there is commercial , to which Sismondi imperceptibly passed (and he could
not do otherwise, for if he had done he could not have argued about the market )?  This is something he does not investigate. How does he
prove that it is possible to preserve equality among the producers if
commercial wealth exists, i.e., competition between the individual
producers? He does not prove it at all. He simply decrees that that is
what must occur. Instead of further analysing the contradiction he rightly
pointed to, he begins to talk about the undesirability of contradictions
in general. “It is possible that when small-scale agriculture is
superseded by large-scale and more capital is invested in the land a
larger amount of wealth is distributed among the entire mass of
agriculturists than previously” . . . (i.e., “it is possible” that the home market, the dimension of which is determined
after all by the absolute quantity of commercial wealth , has
expanded—expanded along with the development of capitalism?). . . . “But for the nation, the consumption of one
family of rich farmers plus that of fifty families of poor day labourers
is not equal to the consumption of fifty families of peasants, not one of
which is rich but, on the other hand, not one of which lacks (a moderate)
a decent degree of prosperity” ( une honnête aisance )
(I, 358). In other words: perhaps the development of capitalist farming
does create a home market for capitalism. Sismondi was a far too
knowledgeable and conscientious economist to deny this fact; but—but
here the author drops his investigation, and for the “nation”
of commercial wealth directly substitutes a “nation” of
peasants. Evading the unpleasant fact that refutes his petty-bourgeois
point of view, he even forgets what he himself had said a little earlier,
namely, that the “peasants” became “farmers” thanks to the development of commercial wealth, “The first
farmers,” he said, “were simple labourers. . . . They did not
cease to be peasants. . . . They hardly ever employed day labourers to
work with them, they employed only servants ( des domestiques ),
always chosen from among their equals, whom they treated as equals, ate with them at the same table . . . constituted one class of
peasants” (I, 221). So then, it all amounts to this, that these
patriarchal muzhiks, with their patriarchal servants, are much more to the
author’s liking, and he simply turns his back on the changes which
the growth of “commercial wealth” brought about in these
patriarchal relationships.

But Sismondi does not in the least intend to admit this. He continues to
think that he is investigating the laws of commercial wealth and,
forgetting the reservations he has made, bluntly asserts:

“Thus, as a result of wealth being concentrated in the hands of a
small number of proprietors, the home market shrinks increasingly (!), and industry is increasingly compelled to look for foreign markets,
where great revolutions ( des grandes revolutions ) await
it” (1, 361). “Thus, the home market cannot expand except
through national prosperity” (I, 362). Sismondi has in mind the
prosperity of the people, for he had only just admitted the possibility of
“national” prosperity under capitalist farming.

As the reader sees, our Narodnik economists say the same thing word for
word.

Sismondi reverts to this question again at the end of his work, in Book
VII On the Population , chapter VII; “On the Population
Which Has Become Superfluous Owing to the Invention of Machines.”

“The introduction of large-scale farming in the countryside has in
Great Britain led to the disappearance of the class of peasant farmers
( fermiers paysans ), who worked themselves and nevertheless
enjoyed a moderate prosperity; the population declined considerably, but
its consumption declined more than its numbers. The day labourers who do
all the field work, receiving only bare necessities, do not by any means
give the same encouragement to urban industry as the rich peasants gave
previously” (II, 327). “Similar changes also took place among
the urban population. . . . The small tradesmen, the small manufacturers
disappear, and one big entrepreneur replaces hundreds of them who, taken
all together, were perhaps not as rich as he. Nevertheless, taken together
they were bigger consumers than he. The luxury he indulges in encourages
industry far less than the moderate prosperity of the hundred households he has superseded”
( ibid .).

The question is: what does Sismondi’s theory that the home market
shrinks with the development of capitalism amount to? To the fact that its
author, who had hardly attempted to look at the matter squarely, avoided
analysing the conditions that belong to capitalism (“commercial
wealth” plus large-scale enterprise in industry and agriculture, for
Sismondi does not know the word “capitalism.” Identity of
concepts makes this use of the term quite correct, and in future we shall
simply say “capitalism”), and replaced an analysis by his own
petty-bourgeois point of view and his own petty-bourgeois utopia. The
development of commercial wealth and, consequently, of competition, he
says, should leave intact the average, uniform peasantry, with its
“moderate prosperity” and its patriarchal relations with its
farm servants.

It goes without saying that this innocent desire remained the exclusive
possession of Sismondi and the other romanticists among the
“intelligentsia"; and that day after day it came into increasing
conflict with the reality that was developing the contradictions of which
Sismondi was not yet able to gauge the depth.

It goes without saying that theoretical political economy, which in its
further

development [5] joined that of the classical economists, established precisely what Sismondi wanted to deny—that
the development of capitalism in general, and of capitalist farming in
particular, does not restrict the home market, but creates it. The development of capitalism proceeds simultaneously with the
development of commodity economy, and to the extent that domestic
production gives way to production for sale, while the handicraftsman is
superseded by the factory, a market is created for capital . The
“day labourers” who are pushed out of agriculture by the
conversion of the “peasants” into “farmers” provide labour-power for capital, and the farmers are purchasers of the
products of industry, not only of articles of consumption (which were
formerly produced by the peasants at home, or by village artisans), but also of instruments of production,
which could not remain of the old type after small farming had been
superseded by large-scale farming. [6] The last point is worth emphasising, for it is the one that Sismondi
particularly ignored when, in the passage we have quoted, he talked about
“consumption” by peasants and farmers as if only personal consumption (the consumption of bread, clothing, etc.)
existed and as if the purchase of machines, implements, etc., the erection
of buildings, warehouses, factories, etc., were not also consumption,
except that it is of a different kind, i.e., productive
consumption , consumption by capital and not by people. And again we
must note that it is precisely this mistake, which, as we shall soon see,
Sismondi borrowed from Adam Smith, that our Narodnik economists took over
in

toto. [7]

## Notes

[1] Ephrucy died in 1897. An obituary was published in Russkoye Bogatstvo , March 1897.
— Lenin

[2] It is quite true that Sismondi was not a socialist, as Ephrucy states at
the beginning of his article, repeating what was said by Lippert
— Lenin (see Handwörterbuch der
Staatswissenschaften , V. Band, Artikel “Sismondi” von
Lippert, Seite 678) ( Dictionary of Political Science , Vol. V,
article by Lippert entitled “Sismondi,”
p. 678.— Ed .).
— Lenin

[3] All subsequent quotations, unless otherwise stated, are
taken from the above-mentioned edition of Nouveaux
Principes .
— Lenin

[4] Italics here and elsewhere are
ours, unless otherwise stated.
— Lenin

[5] This refers to
Marxism. (Author’s footnote to the 1908 edition.— Ed .)
— Lenin

[6] Thus, simultaneously the elements of both variable capital (the
“free” worker) and constant capital are formed; the means of
production from which the small producer is freed pertain to the
latter.
— Lenin

[7] Ephrucy says nothing at all concerning this part of Sismondi’s
doctrine—the shrinking of the home market as a result of the
development of capitalism. We shall see again and again that he left out
what is most typical of Sismondi’s viewpoint and of the
attitude of Narodism towards his doctrine.
— Lenin

[8] V. V . (pseudonym of V. P. Vorontsov) and N.-on
(pseudonym of N. F. Danielson) were ideologists of liberal
Narodism of the 1880s and 1890s.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## II

## Sismondi’s Views On National Revenue And Capital

The arguments adduced by Sismondi to prove that capitalism is impossible
and that it cannot develop are not confined- to this. He also drew the
same conclusions from his revenue theory. It must be said that Sismondi
took over in its entirety Adam Smith’s labour theory of value and
three forms-of revenue: rent, profit and wages. Here and there he even
attempts to group together the first two forms of revenue and contrast
them to the third: thus, he sometimes combines them and opposes them to
wages (I, 104-05); sometimes he even uses the term mieux-value (surplus-value) to describe them (I, 103). We must not, however,
exaggerate the importance of this terminology as, we think, Ephrucy does
when he says that “Sismondi’s theory  stands close to the theory of surplus-value” ( Russkoye
Bogatstvo , No. 8, p. 41). Properly speaking, Sismondi did not advance
a single step beyond Adam Smith, who also said that rent and profit are
“deductions from the produce of labour,” the share of the
value which the worker adds to the product (see An Inquiry into the
Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations , Russian translation by
Bibikov, Vol. I, chap. VIII: “Of the Wages of Labour,” and
chap. VI: “Of the Component Parts of the Price of Commodities”). Nor
did Sismondi go further than this. But he tried to link up this division
of the newly-created product into surplus-value and wages with the theory
of the social revenue, the home market and the realisation of the product
in capitalist-society. These attempts are extremely important for an
appraisal of Sismondi’s scientific significance, and for an
understanding of the connection between his doctrine and that of the
Russian Narodniks. It is therefore worth while analysing them in greater
detail.

In everywhere pushing into the forefront the question of revenue, of its
relation to production, to consumption and to the population, Sismondi was
also naturally obliged to analyse the theoretical basis of the concept
“revenue.” And so at the very beginning of his work we find
three chapters devoted to the question of revenue (l. II,
ch. IV-VI). Chapter IV, entitled “How Revenue Originates from
Capital,” deals with the difference between capital and
revenue. Sismondi begins straight away to deal with this subject in
relation to the whole of society. “Inasmuch as each works for
all,” he says, “what is produced by all must be consumed by
all. . . . The difference between capital and revenue is material for
society” (I, 83). But Sismondi has a feeling that this “material” difference is not as simple for society as
it is for the individual entrepreneur, “We are approaching,”
he makes the reservation, “the most abstract and most difficult
problem of political economy. The nature of capital and that of revenue
are constantly interwoven in our minds: we see that what is revenue
for one becomes capital for another , and the same object, in passing
from hand to hand, successively acquires different names” (I, 84),
i.e., is called “capital” at one moment and “revenue” at another. “But to confuse them,”
asserts Sismondi, “is ruinous” ( leur confusion est ruineuse ,
p. 477). “The task of distinguishing between the capital and revenue
of society is as important as it is difficult” (I, 84).

The reader has probably noticed wherein lies the difficulty which Sismondi
speaks of: if the revenue of the individual entrepreneur is his profit,
which he spends on various kinds of articles of consumption, [1] and if the revenue of the individual worker
is his wages, can these two forms of revenue be added together to form the
“revenue of society”? What, then, about those capitalists and
workers who produce machines, for example? Their product exists in a form
that cannot be consumed (i.e., consumed personally). It cannot be added to
articles of consumption. These products are meant to serve as
capital. Hence, while being the revenue of their producers (that
is, that part which is the source of profit and wages) they become the capital of their purchasers. How can we straighten out this
confusion, which prevents us from defining the concept of social revenue?

As we have seen, Sismondi merely approached the question and at once
shrank from it, limiting himself to stating the “difficulty.”
He says plainly that “usually, three kinds of revenue are
recognised: rent, profit and wages” (I, 85), and then goes on to
expound Adam Smith’s doctrine concerning each. The question of the
difference between the capital and the revenue of society remained
unanswered. The exposition now proceeds without any strict division
between social revenue and individual revenue. But Sismondi reverts once
again to the question he abandoned. He says that, as there are different
kinds of revenue, so there are “different kinds of wealth” (1,
93), namely, fixed capital —machines, implements, etc., circulating capital — which, unlike the former, is consumed
quickly and changes its form (seed, raw materials, wages) and, lastly, revenue from capital , which is consumed without being
reproduced. Here it is not important to us that Sismondi repeats all the
mistakes Adam Smith made in the theory of fixed and circulating capital,
that he confuses these categories, which belong to the process of circulation, with the categories which spring
from the process of production (constant and variable capital). What
interests us is Sismondi’s theory of revenue. And on this question,
he draws the following conclusion from the division of wealth into three
kinds that has just been made.

“It is important to note that these three kinds of wealth go
similarly into consumption; for everything that has been produced is of
value to man only insofar as it serves his needs, and these needs are
satisfied only by consumption. But fixed capital serves this purpose
indirectly ( d’une manière indirecte ); it is consumed slowly, helping man to reproduce what serves for his consumption”
(I, 94-95), whereas circulating capital (Sismondi already identifies it
with variable capital) is converted into the “ worker’s
consumption fund ” (I, 95). It follows, therefore, that, as distinct
from individual consumption, there are two kinds of social
consumption . These two kinds differ very greatly. What matters, of
course, is not that fixed capital is consumed slowly, but that it is
consumed without forming revenue (a consumption fund) for any
class of society, that it is not used personally, but productively. But
Sismondi fails to see this, and realising that he has again strayed from
the

path [2] in quest of the difference between social capital and revenue, he helplessly exclaims: “This
movement of wealth is so abstract, it requires such considerable
attention to grasp it fully ( pour le bien saisir ), that we deem it useful to take the simplest example” (I,
95). And indeed, he does take the “simplest” example: a single farmer ( un fermier solitaire )
harvested a hundred sacks of wheat; part of the wheat he
consumed himself, part went for sowing, and part was consumed by
the workers he hired. Next year he harvested two hundred
sacks. Who is to consume them? The farmer’s family cannot
grow so quickly. Using this extremely ill-chosen example to show
the difference between fixed capital (seed), circulating capital (wages) and the farmer’s
consumption fund, Sismondi says:

“We have seen three kinds of wealth in an individual family; let us
now examine each kind in relation to the whole nation and see how the
national revenue can result from this distribution” (I, 97). But all
he says after this is that in society, too, it is necessary to reproduce
the same three kinds of wealth: fixed capital (and Sismondi emphasises
that a certain amount of labour has to be expended on it, but he does not
explain how fixed capital will exchange for the articles of consumption
required by both the capitalists and the workers engaged in this
production); then come raw materials (Sismondi isolates these especially);
then the workers’ maintenance and the capitalists’ profit. This is all we get from chapter IV. Obviously, the question of the
national revenue remained open, and Sismondi failed to analyse, not only
distribution, but even the concept of revenue. He immediately
forgets the theoretically extremely important reference to the need to
reproduce also the fixed capital of society; and in his next chapter, in
speaking of the “distribution of the national revenue among the
different classes of citizens” (ch. V), he goes straight on to speak
of three kinds of revenue and, combining rent and profit, he says that the
national revenue consists of two parts: profit from wealth (i.e., rent and
profit in the proper sense) and the workers’ means of subsistence
(I, 104-05). He says, moreover, that:

“Similarly, the annual product, or the result of all the work done
by the nation during the year, consists of two parts: one is . . . the
profit that comes from wealth; the other is the capacity to work ( la
puissance de travailler ) which is assumed to equal the part of wealth
for which it is exchanged, or the means of subsistence of those who
work. . . . Thus, the national revenue and the annual product balance each
other and represent equal magnitudes. The entire annual product is
consumed in the course of the year, but partly by the workers, who, giving
their labour in exchange, turn the product into capital and reproduce it,
and partly by the capitalists, who, giving their revenue in exchange,
destroy it” (I, 105).

Thus, Sismondi simply thrusts aside the question of distinguishing between
national capital and revenue, which he himself so definitely considered to
be extremely important and difficult, and forgets entirely what he had
said a few pages previously! And then he does not see that by thrusting
this question aside, he reduced the problem to utter absurdity: how can
the annual product be to tally consumed by the workers and capitalists in
the shape of revenue, if production needs capital, or, to be more exact,
means and instruments of production? They have to be produced, and they
are produced every year (as Sismondi himself has only just admitted). And
now all these instruments of production, raw materials, etc., are suddenly
discarded and the “difficult” problem of the difference
between capital and revenue is settled by the absolutely incongruous
assertion that the annual product equals the national revenue.

This theory, that the entire product of capitalist society consists of two
parts—the workers’ part (wages, or variable capital, to use
modern terminology) and the capitalists’ part (surplus-value), is
not peculiar to Sismondi. It does not belong to him. He borrowed it in its
entirety from Adam Smith, and even took a step backward from it. The whole
of subsequent political economy (Ricardo, Mill, Proudhon and Rodbertus)
repeated this mistake, which was disclosed only by the author of Capital , in Part III of Volume II. We shall expound the
principles underlying his views later on. At present let us observe that
this mistake is repeated by our Narodnik economists. It is of special
interest to compare them with Sismondi, because they draw from this
fallacious theory the very same conclusions that Sismondi himself drew [3] :

the conclusion that surplus-value cannot be realised in capitalist
society; that social wealth cannot be expanded; that the foreign market
must be resorted to because surplus-value cannot be realised
within the country; and lastly, that crises occur because the product, it
is alleged, cannot be realised through consumption by the workers and the
capitalists.

## Notes

[1] To be more exact: that part of profit which is not
used for accumulation.
— Lenin

[2] Sismondi had only just separated capital from revenue . The first goes to production, the second to
consumption. But we are talking about society, and society also
“consumes” fixed capital. The distinction drawn falls to the
ground, and the social-economic process which transforms “capital
for one” into “revenue for another” remains unexplained.— Lenin — Lenin

[3] And which were prudently avoided by the
other economists who repeated Adam Smith ‘s mistake.
— Lenin

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## III

## Sismondi’s Conclusions From the Fallacious Theory of Two Parts of the Annual Product in Capitalist Society

To give the reader an idea of Sismondi’s doctrine as a whole, we
shall first state the most important conclusions which he draws from this
theory, and then deal with the manner in which his chief error is
rectified in Marx’s Capital .

First of all, Sismondi draws from Adam Smith’s fallacious theory the
conclusion that production must correspond to consumption, that production
is determined by revenue. He goes on reiterating this “truth”
(which proves his complete inability to understand the nature of
capitalist production) throughout the whole of his next chapter, chapter
VI: “The Mutual Determination of Production by Consumption, and
Expenditure by Revenue.” Sismondi directly applies the ethics of the
frugal peasant to capitalist society, and sincerely believes that in this
way he has corrected Adam Smith’s doctrine. At the very beginning of
his work, when speaking about Adam Smith in the introductory part (Book I, History of Science ), he says that he “supplements”
Smith with the proposition that “consumption is the sole aim of
accumulation” (I, 51). “Consumption,” he says, “determines reproduction” (I, 119-20), “the national
expenditure must regulate the national revenue” (I, 113), and the
whole of the work is replete with similar assertions. Two more
characteristic features of Sismondi’s doctrine are directly
connected with this: firstly, disbelief in the development of capitalism,
failure to understand that it causes an ever-increasing growth of the
productive forces and denial that such growth is possible—in exactly
the same way as the Russian romanticists “teach” that capitalism leads to a waste of labour, and so forth.

“Those who urge unlimited production are mistaken,” says
Sismondi (I, 121). Excess of production over revenue causes
over-production (I, 106). An increase in wealth is beneficial only
“when it is gradual, when it is proportionate to itself, when none
of its parts develops with excessive rapidity” (I, 409). The good
Sismondi thinks that “disproportionate” development is not development (as our Narodniks
also do); that this disproportion is not a law of the present system of
social economy, and of its development, but a “mistake” of the
legislator, etc.; that in this the European governments are artificially
imitating England, a country that has taken the wrong path. [1] Sismondi wholly denies the proposition which the classical economists
advanced, and which Marx’s theory wholly accepted, namely, that
capitalism develops the productive forces. In fact, he goes to the length
of regarding all accumulation as being possible only “little by
little,” and is quite unable to explain the process of accumulation. This is the second highly characteristic feature of his
views. The way he argues about accumulation is extremely amusing:

“In the long run, the total product of a given year always exchanges
only for the total product of the preceding year” (I, 121). Here
accumulation is wholly denied: it follows that the growth of social wealth
is impossible under capitalism. The Russian reader will not be very much
surprised by this assertion, because he has heard the same thing from
Mr. V. V. and from Mr. N.-on. But Sismondi, was, after all, a disciple of
Adam Smith. He has a feeling that he is saying something utterly
incongruous, and he wants to correct himself:

“If production grows gradually,” he continues, “then annual exchange causes only a slight loss ( une petite perte ) each
year, while at the same time improving the conditions for the future
( en même temps qu’elle bonifie la condition future ). If this loss is slight and well distributed, every body will
bear it without complaint. . . . If, however, the discrepancy between the
new production and the preceding one is great, capital perishes ( sont
entamés ), suffering is caused, and the nation retrogresses
instead of progressing” (I, 121). It would be difficult to formulate
the fundamental thesis of romanticism and of the petty-bourgeois view of
capitalism more vividly and more plainly than is done in the above tirade. The more rapid the process of accumulation, i.e., the
excess of production over consumption, the better, taught the classical
economists, who, though they were not clear about the process of the
social production of capital, and though they were unable to free
themselves from Adam Smith’s mistaken view that the social product
consists of two parts, nevertheless advanced the perfectly correct idea
that production creates a market for itself and itself determines
consumption. And we know also that Marx’s theory, which recognised
that the more rapid the growth of wealth, the fuller the development of
the productive forces of labour and its socialisation, and the better
the position of the worker , or as much better as it can be under the
present system of social economy, took over this view of accumulation from
the classical economists. The romanticists assert the very opposite, and
base all their hopes on the feeble development of capitalism; they call
for its retardation .

Further, the failure to understand that production creates a market for
itself leads to the doctrine that surplus-value cannot be
realised. “From reproduction comes revenue, but production in
itself is not yet revenue : it acquires this name” ( ce
nom ! Thus the difference between production, i.e., the product, and
revenue lies only in the word!) “and functions as such ( elle
n’opère comme telle ) only after it is realised, after each article produced finds a consumer who has the need or the desire for
it” ( qui en avait le besoin ou le désir ) (I, 121). Thus, the identification of revenue with “production”
(i.e., with all that is produced) leads to the identification of
realisation with personal consumption. Sismondi has already
forgotten that the realisation of such products as, for example, iron,
coal, machines, etc., the realisation of means of production in general,
takes place in a different way, although he had been very close to this
idea earlier. The identification of realisation with personal consumption naturally leads to the doctrine that it is surplus-value that the capitalists cannot realise, because, of
the two parts of the social product, wages are realised through
workers’ consumption. And indeed, Sismondi reached this conclusion
(subsequently amplified in greater detail by Proudhon and constantly
repeated by our Narodniks). In controversy with MacCulloch, Sismondi makes the allegation
that the latter (in expounding Ricardo’s views) does not explain the
realisation of profit. MacCulloch had said that, with the division of
social labour, one branch of production provides a market for another: the
producers of bread realise their commodities in the product of the
producers of clothing and vice versa. [2] “The author,” says Sismondi, “presupposes labour without
profit ( un travail sans bénéfice ), reproduction which
only replaces the workers’ consumption” (II, 384, Sismondi’s italics) . . . “he leaves nothing for the master
. . . we are investigating what becomes of the excess of the
workers’ production over their consumption” ( ibid .). Thus, we find that this first romanticist already makes
the very definite statement that the capitalists cannot realise
surplus-value. From this proposition Sismondi draws the further
conclusion—again the very same as that drawn by the
Narodniks—that the very conditions of realisation make it
necessary for capitalism to have a foreign market . “As
labour itself is an important component of revenue, the demand for labour
cannot be reduced without making the nation poorer. Hence, the expected
gain from the invention of new methods of production nearly always relates
to foreign trade ” (I, 345). “The nation which is the first to make some discovery is able, for a considerable time, to expand
its market in proportion to the number of hands that are released by each
new invention. It employs them forthwith to produce that larger quantity
of products which its invention enables it to produce more cheaply. But at
last the time will come when the whole civilised world forms a single
market, and it will no longer be possible to acquire new purchasers in any
new nation. Demand in the world market will then be a constant
( précise ) quantity, for which the different industrial nations will compete against each other. If one nation supplies
a larger quantity of products, it will do so to the detriment of
another. The total sales cannot be increased except by an increase in
general prosperity, or by the transfer of commodities, formerly the
exclusive possession of the rich, to the sphere of consumption by the
poor” (II, 316). The reader will see that Sismondi presents the very
doctrine that our romanticists have learned so well, namely, that the
foreign market provides the way out of the difficulty of
realising the product in general, and surplus-value in particular.

Lastly, this same doctrine that national revenue and national production
are identical led to Sismondi’s theory of crises. After what has
been said above, we need scarcely quote from the numerous passages in
Sismondi’s work which deal with this subject. His theory that
production must conform to revenue naturally led to the view that crises
are the result of the disturbance of this balance, the result of an excess
of production over consumption. It is evident from the passage just quoted
that it is this discrepancy between production and consumption that
Sismondi regarded as the main cause of crises; and in the forefront he
placed the underconsumption of the masses of the people, the workers. This
explains why Sismondi’s theory of crises (which Rodbertus also
adopted) is known in economic science as an example of the theories which
ascribe crises to underconsumption ( Unterkonsumption ).

## Notes

[1] See for example, II, 456-57, and many other passages. Later we shall quote
specimens of them, and the reader will see that even in their mode of
expression our romanticists, like Mr. N.-on, differ in no way from
Sismondi.— Lenin — Lenin

[2] See supplement to Nouveaux Principes, 2nd ed., Vol. II:
“Eclaircissements relatifs à la balance des consommations avec
les productions” (“Explanations Relative to the Balance of
Consumption and Production.”— Ed .), where Sismondi translates and disputes the essay by Ricardo’s disciple (MacCulloch)
published in the Edinburgh Review entitled “An Inquiry into
the Question as to Whether the Power to Consume Always Grows in Society
Simultaneously with the Power to

Produce.” [3] — Lenin

[3] Lenin refers to MacCulloch’s polemical article
“Mr. Owen’s Plans for Relieving the National Distress,”
published anonymously in 1819 in The Edinburgh Review (Vol. XXXII), to which Sismondi replied. The The Edinburgh Review or
Critical Journal was a scientific, literary and political journal
that appeared from 1802 to 1929.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## IV

## Wherein Lies the Error of Adam Smith’s and Sismondi’s Theories of National Revenue?

What is the fundamental error that led Sismondi to all these conclusions?

Sismondi took over his theory of national revenue and of its division into
two parts (the workers’ and the capitalists’) bodily from Adam
Smith. Far from adding anything to Adam Smith’s theses, he even took
a step backward and omitted Adam Smith’s attempt (albeit
unsuccessful) to substantiate this proposition theoretically. Sismondi
appears not to notice how this theory contradicts that of production in
general. Indeed, according to the theory which deduces value from labour,
the value of a product consists of three components: the part which
replaces the raw materials and instruments of labour (constant capital),
the part which replaces wages, or the maintenance of the workers (variable
capital), and “surplus-value” (Sismondi calls it mieux-value ). Such is the analysis of the individual product in
terms of value made by Adam Smith and repeated by Sismondi. The question
is: how can the social product, which is the sum-total of individual products, consist only of the two latter parts? What
has be come of the first part—constant capital? As we have seen,
Sismondi merely beat about the bush on this question, but Adam Smith gave
an answer to it. He asserted that this part exists independently only in
the individual product. If, however, we take the aggregate social product,
this part, in its turn, resolves itself into wages and surplus-value—of precisely those capitalists who produce this
constant capital.

But in giving this answer Adam Smith did not explain why, when resolving
the value of constant capital, say of machines, he again leaves out the
constant capital, i.e., in our example, the iron out of which the machines
are made, or the instruments used up in the process, etc.? If the value of
each product includes the part which replaces constant capital (and all
economists agree that it does) then the exclusion of that part from any
sphere of social production whatever is quite arbitrary. As the author of Capital pointed out, “when Adam Smith says that the
instruments of labour resolve themselves into wages and profit, he forgets
to add: and into that constant capital which is used up in their
production. Adam Smith simply sends us from Pontius to Pilate, from one
line of production to another, from another to a third,” [3] failing to notice that this shifting about does not alter the problem in
the least. Smith’s answer (accepted by all the subsequent political
economists prior to Marx) is simply an evasion of the problem, avoidance
of the difficulty. And there is in deed a difficulty here. It lies in that
the concepts of capital and revenue cannot be directly transferred from
the individual product to the social product. The economists admit this when
they say that from the social point of view what is “capital for one
becomes revenue for another” (see Sismondi, as quoted above). This
phrase, however, formulates the difficulty but does not
solve

it. [1]

The solution is that when examining this question from the social point of
view, we must no longer speak of products in general, irrespective of
their material forms. Indeed, we are discussing the social revenue, i.e.,
the product which becomes available for consumption. But surely not all
products can be consumed through personal consumption : machines,
coal, iron, and similar articles are not consumed personally, but
productively. From the individual entrepreneur’s point of view this
distinction was superfluous: when we said that the workers would consume
variable capital, we assumed that on the market they would acquire
articles of consumption with the money the capitalist had paid them, the
money which he, the capitalist, had received for the machines made by the
workers. Here the exchange of machines for bread does not interest us. But
from the social point of view, this exchange cannot be assumed :
we cannot say that the entire capitalist class which produces machines,
iron, etc., sells these things, and in this way realises them. The whole
question is how realisation takes place— that is , the replacement of all parts of the social product. Hence, the point of
departure in discussing social capital and revenue—or, what is the
same thing, the realisation of the product in capitalist
society—must be the distinction between two entirely different types
of social product: means of production and articles of consumption . The former can be consumed only productively, the latter
only personally. The former can serve only as capital, the latter
must become revenue, i.e., must be destroyed in consumption by the workers
and capitalists. The former go entirely to the capitalists, the latter are
shared between the workers and the capitalists.

Once this difference is understood and we rectify the error made by Adam
Smith, who left its constant part (i.e., the part which replaces constant
capital) out of the social product, the question of the realisation of the
product in capitalist society becomes clear. Obviously, we cannot speak of
wages being realised through consumption by the workers, and surplus-value
through consumption by the capitalists, and nothing more . [2] The workers can consume wages and capitalists surplus-value only when the
product consists of articles of consumption, i.e., only in one department
of social production. They cannot “consume” the product which
consists of means of production: this must be exchanged for articles
of consumption . But for which part (in terms of value) of the
articles of consumption can they exchange their product?  Obviously, only
for the constant part (constant capital), since the other two
parts constitute the consumption fund of the workers and capitalists who
produce articles of consumption. By realising the surplus-value and wages
in the industries which produce means of production, this exchange thereby
realises the constant capital in the industries which produce articles of
consumption. Indeed, for the capitalist who manufactures, say, sugar, that
part of the product which is to replace constant capital (i.e., raw
materials, auxiliary materials, machines, premises, etc.) exists in the
shape of sugar . To realise this part, he must receive corresponding means of production in return for it. The
realisation of this part will therefore consist in exchanging the article of consumption for products which serve as means of
production . Now the realisation of only one part of the social
product, namely, the constant capital in the department which manufactures means of production, remains
unexplained. This is partially realised by part of the product going back
again into production in its natural form (for example, part of the coal
produced by a mining firm is used to produce more coal; the grain obtained
by farmers is used for seed, and so forth); and partly it is realised by
exchange between individual capitalists in the same department: for
example, coal is needed for the production of iron, and iron is needed for
the production of coal. The capitalists who produce these two products
realise by mutual exchange that part of their respective products which
replaces their constant capital.

This analysis (which, we repeat, we have summarised in the most condensed
form for the reason given above) solved the difficulty which all the
economists felt when they formulated it in the phrase: “capital for
one becomes revenue for another.” This analysis revealed the utter
fallacy of reducing social production solely to personal consumption.

We can now proceed to examine the conclusions drawn by Sismondi (and the
other romanticists) from his fallacious theory. But first let us quote the
opinion of Sismondi expressed by the author of the above analysis, after a
most detailed and comprehensive examination of Adam Smith’s theory,
to which Sismondi added absolutely nothing, merely leaving out Adam
Smith’s attempt to justify his contradiction:

“Sismondi, who occupies himself particularly with the relation of
capital to revenue, and in actual fact makes the peculiar formulation of
this relation the differentia specifica of his Nouveaux
Principes , did not say one scientific word” (author’s italics), “did not contribute one iota to the
clarification of the problem” ( Das Kapital , II, S. 385,
1-te

Auflage). [4]

## Notes

[1] We give here only the gist of the new theory which provides this
solution, leaving ourselves free to present it in greater detail
elsewhere. See Das Kapital , II. Band, III, Abschnitt. [5] (For
a more detailed exposition, see The Development of Capitalism, chap. I.) [6] — Lenin

[2] That is just how our Narodnik economists Messrs. V. V. and N.-on
reason. Above we deliberately dealt in great detail with Sismondi’s
wandering around the question of productive and personal consumption, of
articles of consumption and means of production (Adam Smith came even
closer to distinguishing between them than Sismondi did). We wanted to
show the reader that the classical representatives of this
fallacious theory felt that it was unsatisfactory, saw the
contradiction in it, and made attempts to extricate themselves. But our
“original” theoreticians not only see nothing and feel nothing, but know nothing about either the theory or the history of the
question they prate about so zealously.
— Lenin

[3] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. II, Moscow, 1957, p. 373;
Vol. III, Moscow 1959, p. 821.

[5] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. II, Moscow, 1957, pp. 351-523.

[6] In the 1897 and 1898 editions Lenin referred to
M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky’s Industrial Crises , Part II. In the
1908 edition Lenin introduced a change by referring instead to his own
book, The Development of Capitalism in Russia , which appeared in
1899 (see present edition, Vol. 3).

[4] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. II, Moscow, 1957, p. 391.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## V

## Accumulation in Capitalist Society

The first erroneous conclusion from the fallacious theory relates to
accumulation. Sismondi did not in the least understand capitalist
accumulation, and in his heated controversy on this subject with Ricardo truth was really on the side of
the latter. Ricardo asserted that production creates a market for itself,
whereas Sismondi denied this, and based his theory of crises on this
denial. True, Ricardo was also unable to correct the above-mentioned
fundamental mistake of Adam Smith, and, therefore, was unable to solve the
problem of the relation between social capital and revenue and of the
realisation of the product (nor did Ricardo set himself these problems);
but he instinctively characterised the quintessence of the bourgeois mode
of production by noting the absolutely indisputable fact that accumulation
is the excess of production over revenue. From the viewpoint of the modern
analysis that is how matters stand. Production does indeed create a market
for itself: production needs means of production, and they constitute a
special department of social production, which occupies a certain section
of the workers, and produces a special product, realised partly within
this same department and partly by exchange with the other department,
which produces articles of consumption. Accumulation is indeed the excess
of production over revenue (articles of consumption). To expand production
(to “accumulate” in the categorical meaning of the term) it is
first of all necessary to produce means of production, [1] and for this it is consequently necessary to expand that department of
social production which manufactures means of production, it is necessary to draw into it workers who immediately present a demand for
articles of consumption , too . Hence, “consumption” develops after “accumulation,” or after “production”; strange
though it may seem, it cannot be otherwise in capitalist society. Hence,
the rates of development of these two departments of capitalist production
do not have to be proportionate, on the contrary, they must inevitably be
disproportionate. It is well known that the law of development of capital
is that constant capital grows faster than variable capital, that is to say, an ever larger share of
newly-formed capital is turned into that department of the social economy
which produces means of production. Hence, this department necessarily
grows faster than the department which manufactures articles of
consumption, i.e., what takes place is exactly that which Sismondi
declared to be “impossible,” “dangerous,” etc. Hence, products for personal consumption occupy an ever-diminishing
place in the total mass of capitalist output. And this fully corresponds
to the historical “mission” of capitalism and to its specific
social structure: the former is to develop the productive forces of
society (production for production); the latter precludes their
utilisation by the mass of the population.

We can now fully appraise Sismondi’s view of accumulation. His
assertion that rapid accumulation leads to disaster is absolutely
wrong and is solely the result of his failure to understand accumulation,
as are his repeated statements and demands that production must not
outstrip consumption, because consumption determines production. Actually,
the very opposite is the case, and Sismondi simply turns his back on
reality in its specific, historically determined form and substitutes
petty-bourgeois moralising for an analysis. Particularly amusing are
Sismondi’s attempts to clothe this moralising in a “scientific” formula. “Messrs. Say and Ricardo,”
he says in his preface to the second edition of Nouveaux
Principes , “came to believe . . . that consumption had no other
limits than those of production, whereas actually it is limited by
revenue. . . . They should have warned producers that they must count only
on consumers who have a revenue” (I, XIII). [2] Nowadays, such naïveté only raises a smile. But are not the
writings of our contemporary romanticists, like Messrs. V.V. and N.-on,
replete with the same sort of thing? “Let the banking entrepreneurs
ponder well”... over whether they will find a market for their
commodities (II, 101-02). “When it is assumed that the aim of society is to increase wealth,
the aim is always sacrificed for the means” (II, 140). “If,
instead of expecting an impetus from the demand created by labour”
(i.e., an impetus to production from the workers’ demand for
products), “we expect it to come from preceding production, we shall
be doing almost the same thing as we would do to a clock if, instead of
turning back the wheel that carries the chain ( la roue qui porte la
chainette ), we turn back another wheel—we would thereby break
the whole machine and stop it” (II, 454). Sismondi says that. Let us
now hear what Mr. Nikolai-on has to say. “We have overlooked the
factors due to which this development” (i.e., the development of
capitalism) “is taking place; we have also forgotten the aim of all
production . . . an extremely fatal blunder. . .” (N.-on, Sketches on Our Post-Reform Social Economy , 298). Both these
authors talk about capitalism, about capitalist countries; both reveal
their complete inability to understand the essence of capitalist
accumulation. But would one believe that the latter is writing seventy
years after the former?

An example which Sismondi quotes in chapter VIII: “The Results of
the Struggle to Cheapen Production” (Book IV, Of Commercial
Wealth ) vividly demonstrates how failure to understand capitalist
accumulation is linked up with the error of reducing all production to the
production of articles of consumption.

Let us assume, says Sismondi, that the owner of a manufactory has a
circulating capital of 100,000 francs, which brings him 15,000, of which
6,000 represent interest on capital and are paid to the capitalist, and
9,000 constitute the profit obtained by the manufacturer as the
entrepreneur. Let us assume that he employs the labour of 100 workers,
whose wages total 30,000 francs. Further, let there be an increase in
capital, an expansion of production (“accumulation”). Instead of 100,000
francs the capital will be=200,000 francs invested in fixed capital and
200,000 francs in circulating capital, making a total of 400,000 francs;
profit and interest=32,000 + 16,000 francs, for the rate of interest has
dropped from 6% to 4%. The number of workers employed has doubled, but
wages have dropped from 300 francs to 200 francs, hence, making a total of 40,000 francs. Thus, production has grown fourfold. [3] And
Sismondi counts up the results: “revenue,” or “consumption,” in the first case amounted to 45,000 francs
(30,000 wages + 6,000 interest + 9,000 profit); it is now 88,000 francs
(40,000 wages + 16,000 interest + 32,000 profit). “Production has
increased fourfold,” says Sismondi, “but consumption has not
even doubled. The consumption of the workers who made the machines
should not be counted . It is covered by the 200,000 francs which have been used for this purpose; it is already included in the
accounts of another manufactory, where the facts will be the same”
(I, 405-06).

Sismondi’s calculation shows a diminution of revenue with an
increase in production. The fact is indisputable. But Sismondi does not
notice that the example he gives defeats his own theory of the realisation
of the product in capitalist society. Curious is his observation that the
consumption of the workers who made machines “should not be
counted.” Why not? Because, firstly, it is covered by the
200,000 francs. Thus, capital is transferred to the department which
manufactures means of production —this Sismondi does not
notice. Hence, the “home market,” which “shrinks,” as Sismondi says, does not consist solely of articles of consumption, but
also of means of production . These means of production constitute
a special product which is not “realised” by personal consumption ; and the more rapidly accumulation proceeds,
the more intense, consequently, is the development of that department of
capitalist production which manufactures products not for personal but for
productive consumption. Secondly, answers Sismondi, it is the workers of
the other manufactory, where the facts will be the same ( où les
mêcmes faits pourront se représenter ). As you see, Sismondi repeats Adam Smith in sending the reader “from
Pontius to Pilate.” But this “other manufactory” also consumes constant capital , and its production also provides a
market for that department of capitalist production which manufactures
means of production! However much we shift the question from one
capitalist to another, and then to a third—this department does not
disappear, and the “home market” does not reduce itself just
to articles of consumption. Therefore, when Sismondi says that “this
calculation refutes . . . one of the axioms that has been most insisted
upon in political economy, namely, the freer competition, the more
profitable the development of industry” (I, 407), he does not notice
that “this calculation” also refutes what he himself says. It
is an undisputed fact that by displacing workers the introduction of
machines worsens their conditions; and it is indisputably to
Sismondi’s credit that he was one of the first to point to this. But
this does not in the least prevent his theory of accumulation and of the
home market from being absolutely incorrect. His own calculation clearly
indicates the very phenomenon which Sismondi not only denied but even
turned into an argument against capitalism, when he said that accumulation
and production must correspond to consumption, otherwise a crisis will
ensue. His calculation shows, precisely, that accumulation and production outstrip consumption, and that it cannot be otherwise, for
accumulation takes place mainly through means of production which do not
enter into “consumption.” What seemed to Sismondi to be simply
an error, a contradiction in Ricardo’s doctrine—that accumulation is excess of production over revenue—actually
corresponds in full to reality and expresses the contradiction inherent in
capitalism. This excess is necessary for all accumulation, which
opens a new market for means of production without correspondingly
expanding the market for articles of consumption , and even
contracting this market . [4] Furthermore, in rejecting the theory of the advantages of free competition, Sismondi
does not notice that, together with groundless optimism, he throws
overboard the undoubted truth that free competition develops the
productive forces of society , as is again evident from his own
calculation. (Properly speaking, this is only another way of expressing
the same fact that a special department of industry is created which
manufactures means of production, and that this department develops with
particular rapidity.) This development of the productive forces of society
without a corresponding development of consumption is, of course, a
contradiction, but the sort of contradiction that exists in reality, that
springs from the very nature of capitalism, and that cannot be brushed
aside by means of sentimental phrases.

But this is just how the romanticists try to brush it aside. And to give
the reader no grounds for suspecting us of levelling unsupported charges
against contemporary economists in connection with the mistakes of such an
“obsolete” author as Sismondi, let us quote a little sample of
the writings of that “modern” author Mr. N.-on. On page 242 of
his Sketches he discusses the development of capitalism in the
Russian flour-milling industry. Referring to the appearance of large steam
flour-mills with improved implements of production (since the seventies
about 100 million rubles have been spent on reconstructing the flour
mills) and with a more than twofold increase in the productivity of
labour, the author describes this phenomenon as follows: “the
flour-milling industry has not developed, it has merely become
concentrated in large enterprises”; he then applies this description to all industries (p. 243) and draws the conclusion that “in
all cases without exception, a mass of workers are displaced and find no
employment” (243), and that “capitalist production has developed at the expense of the people’s consumption”
(241). We ask the reader: does this argument differ in any way from
Sismondi’s argument just quoted? This “modern” author registers two facts, those very facts which, as we have seen, were used by
Sismondi, and brushes both these facts aside with exactly the same
sentimental phrase. Firstly, the example he gives shows that capitalism
develops through the means of production. This means that capitalism
develops the productive forces of society. Secondly, his example shows that this
development proceeds along the specific road of contradictions that is
typical of capitalism: there is a development of production (an
expenditure of 100 million rubles constitutes a home market for products
realised by non-personal consumption) without a corresponding development
of consumption (the people’s food deteriorates), i.e., what we have
is production for the sake of production. And Mr. N.-on thinks that this
contradiction will vanish from life if he, with old Sismondi’s
naïvetée, presents it merely as a contradiction in doctrine,
merely as “a fatal blunder”: “we have forgotten the aim of
production”!! What can be more characteristic than the phrase: “has
not developed, it has merely become concentrated”? Evidently,
Mr. N.-on knows of a capitalism in which development could proceed
otherwise than by concentration . What a pity he has not
introduced us to this “original” capitalism, which was unknown
to all the political economists who preceded him!

## Notes

[1] We would remind the reader how Sismondi approached this; he distinctly
singled out these means of production for an individual family and tried
to do the same for society, too. Properly speaking it was Smith who
“approached,” and not Sismondi, who only related what Smith
had said.
— Lenin

[2] As we know, on this question (as to whether production creates a market
for itself) the modern theory fully agrees with the classical economists,
who answered this question in the affirmative, in opposition to
romanticism, which answered it in the negative. “ The real
barrier of capitalist production is capital itself ” ( Das Kapital , III, I, 231). [5] — Lenin

[3] “The first result of competition,” says Sismondi, ... — Lenin

[4] From the above analysis it automatically follows that such a case is also
possible, depending upon the proportion in which the new capital is
divided up into a constant and a variable part, and the extent to which
the diminution of the relative share of the variable capital affects the
old industries.
— Lenin

[5] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. III, Moscow, 1959, p. 245.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## VI

## The Foreign Market As the “Way Out of the Difficulty” of Realising Surplus-Value

Sismondi’s next error, which springs from his fallacious theory of
social revenue and the product in capitalist society, is his doctrine that
the product in general, and surplus-value in particular, cannot possibly
be realised, and that consequently it is necessary to find a foreign
market. As regards the realisation of the product in general, the
foregoing analysing shows that the “impossibility” is due
entirely to the mistaken exclusion of constant capital and means of
production. Once this error is corrected, the “impossibility”
vanishes. The same, however, must be said in particular about
surplus-value: this analysis explains how it too is realised. There are no
reasonable grounds whatever for separating surplus-value from the total
product so far as its realisation is concerned. Sismondi’s (and our
Narodniks’) assertion to the contrary is simply a misunderstanding
of the fundamental laws of realisation in general, an inability to divide the product into three (and not two)
parts in terms of value, and into two kinds in terms of material form
(means of production and articles of consumption). The proposition that
the capitalists cannot consume surplus-value is merely a vulgarised
repetition of Adam Smith’s perplexity regarding realisation in
general. Only part of the surplus-value consists of articles of
consumption; the other part consists of means of production (for example,
the surplus-value of the ironmaster). The “consumption” of this latter surplus-value is effected by applying it to
production ; the capitalists, however, who manufacture products in the
shape of means of production do not consume surplus-value, but constant capital obtained by exchange with other
capitalists. Hence, the Narodniks too, in arguing that surplus-value
cannot be realised, ought logically to admit that constant capital also cannot be realised—and in this way they would
safely go back to Adam. . . . It goes without saying that such a return to
the “father of political economy” would be a gigantic step
forward for writers who present us with old errors in the guise of truths
they have “arrived at by themselves.” . . .

But what about the foreign market? Do we deny that capitalism needs a
foreign market? Of course not. But the question of a foreign market has absolutely nothing to do with the question of realisation , and
the attempt to link them into one whole merely expresses the romantic wish
to “retard” capitalism, and the romantic inability to think
logically. The theory which has explained the question of realisation has
proved this up to the hilt. The romanticist says: the capitalists cannot
consume surplus-value and therefore must dispose of it abroad. The
question is: do the capitalists supply foreigners with products gratis, or
do they throw them into the sea? They sell them—hence, they receive
an equivalent; they export certain kinds of products—hence, they
import other kinds. If we speak of the realisation of the social product,
we thereby exclude the circulation of money and assume only the exchange
of products for products, since the problem of realisation consists in
analysing the replacement of all parts of the social product in
terms of value and in terms of material form. Hence, to commence the
argument about realisation and to end it by saying that they “will market the product for
money” is as ridiculous as answering the question about realising
constant capital in the shape of articles of consumption by saying:
“they will sell.” This is simply a gross logical blunder:
people wander away from the question of the realisation of the aggregate
social product to the view point of the individual entrepreneur, who has
no other interest than that of “selling to the foreigner.” To
link foreign trade, exports, with the question of realisation means
evading the issue, merely shifting it to a wider field, but
doing nothing towards clearing it up . [1] The problem of realisation will not be made one iota clearer if, instead
of the market of one country, we take the market of a certain group of
countries. When the Narodniks assert that the foreign market is “the
way out of the difficulty” [2] which capitalism raises for itself in the realisation of
the product, they merely use this phrase to cover up the sad fact that for
them “the foreign market” is “the way out of the difficulty” into which they fall owing to their failure to
understand theory. . . . Not only that. The theory which links the foreign
market with the problem of the realisation of the aggregate social product
not only reveals a failure to understand this realisation, but, in
addition, reveals an extremely superficial understanding of the
contradictions inherent in this realisation . “The workers will
consume wages, but the capitalists cannot consume surplus-value.”
Ponder over this “theory” from the point of view of the
foreign market. How do we know that “the workers will consume
wages”? What grounds have we for thinking that the products intended by
the entire capitalist class of a given country for consumption by all the
workers of that country will really equal their wages in value and will replace them, that there will be no need for a foreign market for these products? There are absolutely no grounds for thinking so, and actually it
is not so at all. Not only the products (or part of the products) which
replace surplus-value, but also those which replace variable capital; not
only products which replace variable capital, but also those which replace
constant capital (forgotten by our “economists” who also
forget their kinship . . . with Adam); not only products that serve as
articles of consumption but also those that serve as means of
production—all these products are realised in the same way, in the
midst of “difficulties,” in the midst of continuous fluctuations, which become increasingly violent as capitalism grows, in
the midst of fierce competition, which compels every entrepreneur
to strive to expand production unlimitedly, to go beyond the bounds of the
given country, to set out in quest of new markets in countries not yet
drawn into the sphere of capitalist commodity circulation. This brings us
to the question of why a capitalist country needs a foreign
market. Certainly not because the product cannot be realised at all under
the capitalist system. That is nonsense. A foreign market is needed
because it is inherent in capitalist production to strive for unlimited expansion —unlike all the old modes of production,
which were limited to the village community, to the patriarchal estate, to
the tribe, to a territorial area, or state. Under all the old economic
systems production was every time resumed in the same form and on the same
scale as previously; under the capitalist system, however, this resumption
in the same form becomes impossible , and unlimited expansion, perpetual progress, becomes the law of production. [3]

Thus, different conceptions of realisation (more exactly, the
understanding of it, on the one hand, and complete misunderstanding of it
by the romanticists, on the other) lead to two diametrically opposite
views on the significance of the foreign market. For some (the
romanticists), the foreign market is an indication of the
“difficulty” which capitalism places in the way of social development. For others, on the contrary, the foreign market shows
how capitalism removes the difficulties of social development
provided by history in the shape of various barriers—communal,
tribal, territorial and national. [4]

As you see, the difference is only one of the “point of
view.”. . . Yes, “only”! The difference between the romanticist
judges of capitalism and the others is, in general, “only” one
of the “point of view,”—“only” that some judge from the
rear, and the others from the front, some from the viewpoint of a system
which capitalism is destroying, the others from the viewpoint of a system
which capitalism is creating. [5]

The romanticists’ wrong understanding of the foreign market usually
goes hand in hand with references to the “specific features”
of the international position of capitalism in the given country, to the
impossibility of finding markets, etc.; the object of all these arguments
is to “dissuade” the capitalists from seeking foreign markets. Incidentally, we are not being exact in saying
“references,” for the romanticist gives us no actual analysis
of the country’s foreign trade, of its progress in the sphere of new
markets, its colonisation, etc. He has no interest whatever in studying
the actual process and in explaining it; all he wants is a moral
condemnation of this process . So that the reader can convince himself
of the complete identity between this moralising of contemporary Russian
romanticists and that of the French romanticist, we shall quote some
specimens of the latter’s arguments. We have already seen how
Sismondi warned the capitalists that they would find no market. But this
is not all he asserted. He also claimed that “the world market is
already sufficiently supplied” (II, 328) and argued that it was
impossible to proceed along the capitalist path, that it was necessary to
choose another path. . . . He assured the British employers that
capitalism would not be able to give jobs to all the agricultural
labourers displaced by capitalist farming (I, 255-56). “Will those
to whom the agriculturists are sacrificed derive any benefit from it? Are not the agriculturists the nearest and
most reliable consumers of English manufactures? The cessation of their
consumption would strike industry a blow more fatal than the closing of
one of the biggest foreign markets” (I, 256). He assured English
farmers that they would not be able to withstand the competition of the
poor Polish peasant, whose grain costs him almost nothing (II, 257) and
that they were menaced by the even more frightful competition of Russian
grain from the Black Sea ports. He exclaimed: “The Americans are
following the new principle: to produce without calculating the market
( produire sans calculer le marché ), and to produce as much
as possible,” and here is “the characteristic feature of
United States’ trade, from one end of the country to the
other—an excess of goods of every kind over what is needed for
consumption . . . constant bankruptcies are the result of this excess of
commercial capital which cannot be exchanged for revenue” (I,
455-56). Good Sismondi! What would he say about present-day
America—about the America that has developed so enormously, thanks
to the very “home market” which, according to the romanticists’ theory, should have “shrunk”!

## Notes

[1] This is so clear that even Sismondi was conscious of the need to disregard
foreign trade in analysing realisation. “To trace these calculations
more exactly,” he says on the point about production corresponding
to consumption “and to simplify the question, we have hitherto
completely excluded foreign trade; we have presupposed an isolated nation;
human society itself is such an isolated nation, and whatever relates to a
nation without foreign trade is equally true of the human race” (I,
115).
— Lenin

[2] N.-on,
p. 205.
— Lenin

[3] Cf. Sieber, David Ricardo , etc .,
St. Petersburg, 1885, p. 466, footnote.
— Lenin

[4] Cf. later: Rede
über die Frage des Freihandels (Karl Marx, On Free
Trade.—Ed .)
— Lenin

[5] I am speaking here only of the appraisal of capitalism and not of an
understanding of it. In the latter respect the romanticists, as we have
seen, stand no higher than the classical economists.
— Lenin

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## VII

## Crises

Sismondi’s third mistaken conclusion, drawn from the wrong theory
which he borrowed from Adam Smith, is the theory of crises.
Sismondi’s view that accumulation (the growth of production in
general) is determined by consumption, and his incorrect explanation of
the realisation of the aggregate social product (which he reduces to the
workers’ share and the capitalists’ share of revenue)
naturally and inevitably led to the doctrine that crises are to be
explained by the discrepancy between production and consumption. Sismondi
fully agreed with this theory. It was also adopted by Rodbertus, who
formulated it somewhat differently: he explained crises by saying that
with the growth of production the workers’ share of the product
diminishes, and wrongly divided the aggregate social product, as Adam
Smith did, into wages and “rent” (according to his terminology
“rent” is surplus-value, i.e., profit and ground-rent together). The scientific analysis of
accumulation in capitalist society [1] and of the realisation of the product
undermined the whole basis of this theory, and also indicated that it is
precisely in the periods which precede crises that the workers’
consumption rises, that underconsumption (to which crises are allegedly
due) existed under the most diverse economic systems, whereas crises are
the distinguishing feature of only one system—the capitalist system.
This theory explains crises by another contradiction, namely, the
contradiction between the social character of production (socialised by
capitalism) and the private, individual mode of appropriation. The
profound difference between these theories would seem to be self-evident,
but we must deal with it in greater detail because it is the Russian
followers of Sismondi who try to obliterate this difference and
to confuse the issue. The two theories of which we are speaking give
totally different explanations of crises. The first theory explains crises
by the contradiction between production and consumption by the working
class; the second explains them by the contradiction between the social
character of production and the private character of appropriation. Consequently, the former sees the root of the phenomenon outside of production (hence, for example, Sismondi’s
general attacks on the classical economists for ignoring consumption and
occupying themselves only with production); the latter sees it precisely
in the conditions of production.  To put it more briefly, the former
explains crises, by underconsumption ( Unterkonsumption ), the
latter by the anarchy of production.  Thus, while both theories explain
crises by a contradiction in the economic system itself, they
differ entirely on the nature of the contradiction, But the question is:
does the second theory deny the fact of a contradiction between production
and consumption, does it deny the fact of underconsumption? Of course not . It
fully recognises this fact, but puts it in its proper, subordinate, place
as a fact that only relates to one department of the whole of capitalist
production. It teaches us that this fact cannot explain crises, which are
called forth by another and more profound contradiction that is
fundamental in the present economic system, namely, the contradiction
between the social character of production and the private character of
appropriation. What, then, should be said of those who, while they adhere
essentially to the first theory, cover this up with references to the
point that the representatives of the second theory note the existence of
a contradiction between production and consumption?  Obviously, these
people have not pondered over the essence of the difference
between the two theories, and do not properly understand the second
theory. Among these people is, for example, Mr. N.-on (not to speak of
Mr. V. V.). That they are followers of Sismondi has already been indicated
in our literature by Mr. Tugan-Baranovsky ( Industrial Crises ,
p. 477, with the strange reservation relative to Mr. N.-on:
“evidently”). But in talking about “the shrinking of the home
market” and “the decline in the people’s consuming capacity” (the central points of his views), Mr. N.-on,
nevertheless, refers to the representatives of the second theory who note the fact of the contradiction between production and
consumption, the fact of underconsumption. It goes without saying that
such references merely reveal the ability, characteristic in general of
this author, to cite inappropriate quotations and nothing more. For
example, all readers who are familiar with his Sketches will, of
course, remember his “citation” of the passage where it says
that “the labourers as buyers of commodities are important for the
market. But as sellers of their own commodity—labour-power—capitalist society tends to keep them
down to the minimum price” ( Sketches , p.  178), and they
will also remember that Mr. N.-on wanted to deduce from this both
“the shrinkage of the home market” ( ibid ., p. 203 et . al .) and crises (p. 298 et . al .).
But while quoting this passage (which, as we have explained, proves
nothing), our author, moreover, leaves out the end of the
footnote from which his quotation was taken. This quotation was from a note inserted in the manuscript of Part II of Volume II of Capital . It was inserted “for
future amplification” and the publisher of the manuscript put it in
as a footnote . After the words quoted above, the note goes on to say:
“However, this pertains to the next part ,” [2] i.e., to the third
part. What is this third part?  It is precisely the part which contains a
criticism of Adam Smith’s theory of two parts of the aggregate
social product (together with the above-quoted opinion about Sismondi),
and an analysis of “the reproduction and circulation of the
aggregate social capital,” i.e., of the realisation of the
product. Thus, in confirmation of his views, which are a repetition of
Sismondi’s, our author quotes a note that pertains “to the
part” which refutes Sismondi: “to the part” in which it
is shown that the capitalists can realise surplus-value, and that
to introduce foreign trade in an analysis of realisation is absurd....

Another attempt to obliterate the difference between the two theories and
to defend the old romanticist nonsense by referring to modern theories is
contained in Ephrucy’s article. Citing Sismondi’s theory of
crises, Ephrucy shows that it is wrong ( Russkoye Bogatstvo ,
No. 7, p. 162); but he does so in an extremely hazy and contradictory
way. On the one hand, he repeats the arguments of the opposite theory and
says that national demand is not limited to articles of direct
consumption. On the other hand, he asserts that Sismondi’s
explanation of crises “points to only one of the many circumstances
which hinder the distribution of the national product in conformity with
the demand of the population and with its purchasing power.” Thus,
the reader is invited to think that the explanation of crises is to be
found in “distribution,” and that Sismondi’s mistake was
only that he did not give a full list of the causes which hinder this
distribution!  But this is not the main thing . “Sismondi,”
says Ephrucy, “did not confine himself to the above-mentioned
explanation. Already in the first edition of Nouveaux Principes we find a highly enlightening chapter entitled ‘De la connaissance
du

marché.’ [3] In this chapter Sismondi reveals to us the main causes that disturb the
balance between production and consumption” (note this!) “with
a clarity that we find among only a few economists” ( ibid .). And quoting the passages which say that the manufacturer
cannot know the market, Ephrucy says: “Engels says almost the same
thing” (p. 163), and follows this up with a quotation saying that
the manufacturer cannot know the demand. Then, quoting some more passages
about “other obstacles to the establishment of a balance between
production and consumption” (p. 164), Ephrucy assures us that
“these give us the very explanation of crises which is becoming
increasingly predominant”! Nay, more: Ephrucy is of the opinion that
“on the question of the causes of crises in the national economy, we
have every right to regard Sismondi as the founder of the views which were
subsequently developed more consistently and more clearly”
(p. 168).

But by all this Ephrucy betrays a complete failure to understand the
issue! What are crises? Overproduction, the production of commodities
which cannot be realised, for which there is no demand. If there is no
demand for commodities, it shows that when the manufacturer produced them
he did not know the demand. The question now arises: is this indication of
the condition which makes crises possible an explanation of the crises?
Did Ephrucy really not understand the difference between stating the
possibility of a phenomenon and explaining its inevitability? Sismondi
says: crises are possible, because the manufacturer does not know the
demand; they are inevitable, because under capitalist production there can
be no balance between production and consumption (i.e., the product cannot
be realised). Engels says: crises are possible, because the manufacturer
does not know the demand; they are inevitable, but certainly not because
the product cannot be realised at all. For it is not true: the product can
be realised. Crises are inevitable because the collective character of
production comes into conflict with the individual character of
appropriation. And yet we find an economist who assures us that Engels
says “almost the same thing”; that Sismondi gives the “very
same explanation of crises”! “I am therefore surprised,”
writes Ephrucy, “that Mr. Tugan-Baranovsky . . . lost sight of this most important and valuable point in Sismondi’s
doctrine” (p. 168).  But Mr. Tugan-Baranovsky did not lose sight of anything. [4] On the contrary, he pointed very exactly to the
fundamental contradiction to which the new theory reduces matters (p. 455 et . al .), and explained the significance of Sismondi,
who at an earlier stage indicated the contradiction which reveals itself
in crises, but was unable to give it a correct explanation
(p. 457—Sismondi, before Engels, pointed to the fact that crises
spring from the contemporary organisation of the economy;
p. 491—Sismondi expounded the conditions which make crises possible,
but “not every possibility becomes a fact”). Ephrucy, however,
completely misunderstood this, and after lumping everything together he is
“surprised” that what he gets is confusion!
“True,” says the economist of Russkoye Bogatstvo , “we do not find Sismondi using the terms which have now received
universal right of citizenship, such as ‘anarchy of production,’ ‘unplanned production’
( Planlosigkeit ); but the substance behind these terms is noted
by him quite clearly” (p. 168). With what ease the modern
romanticist restores the romanticist of former days! The problem is
reduced to one of a difference in terms! Actually, the problem boils down
to the fact that Ephrucy does not understand the meaning of the terms he
repeats. “Anarchy of production,” “unplanned production”—what do these expressions tell us? They tell us about
the contradiction between the social character of production and the
individual character of appropriation. And we ask every one who is
familiar with the economic literature we are examining: did Sismondi, or
Rodbertus, recognise this contradiction? Did they deduce crises from this
contradiction? No, they did not, and could not do so, because neither
of them had any understanding of this contradiction . The very idea
that the criticism of capitalism cannot be based on phrases about universal prosperity, [5] or about the fallacy of “circulation left to itself,” [6] but must be based on the character of the
evolution of production relations, was absolutely alien to them.

We fully understand why our Russian romanticists exert every effort to
obliterate the difference between the two theories of crises mentioned. It
is because fundamentally different attitudes towards capitalism are most
directly and most closely linked with the theories mentioned Indeed, if we
explain crises by the impossibility of realising products, by the
contradiction between production and consumption, we are thereby led to
deny reality, the soundness of the path along which capitalism is
proceeding; we proclaim this path to be a “false one,” and go
out in quest of “different paths.” In deducing crises from
this contradiction we are bound to think that the further it develops the more difficult will be the way out of the contradiction. And
we have seen how Sismondi, with the utmost naïveté, expressed
exactly this opinion when he said that if capital accumulated slowly it
was tolerable; but if it accumulated rapidly, it would become
unbearable.—On the other hand, if we explain crises by the
contradiction between the social character of production and the
individual character of appropriation, we thereby recognise that the
capitalist road is real and progressive and reject the search for
“different paths” as nonsensical romanticism. We thereby
recognise that the further this contradiction develops the easier will be the way out of it, and that it is the development of this system
which provides the way out.

As the reader sees, here, too, we meet with a difference in “points
of view.” . . .

It is quite natural that our romanticists should seek theoretical confirmation of their views. It is quite natural that their
search should lead them to the old rubbish which Western Europe has
discarded long, long ago. It is quite natural that, feeling this to be so,
they should try to renovate this rubbish, some times by actually
embellishing the romanticists of Western Europe, and at others by
smuggling in romanticism under the flag of inappropriate and garbled
citations. But they are profoundly mistaken if they think that this sort
of smuggling will remain unexposed.

With this we bring to a close our exposition of Sismondi’s basic theoretical doctrine, and of the chief theoretical
conclusions he drew from it; but we must make a slight addition, again
relating to Ephrucy. In his other article about Sismondi (a continuation
of the first), he says: “Still more interesting (than the theory on
revenue from capital) are Sismondi’s views on the different kinds of
revenue” ( Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8, p. 42). Sismondi, he
says, like Rodbertus, divides the national revenue into two parts:
“one goes to the owners of the land and instruments of production,
the other goes to the representatives of labour” ( ibid .).
Then follow passages in which Sismondi speaks of such a division, not only
of the national revenue, but of the aggregate product: “The annual
output, or the result of all the work done by the nation during the year,
also consists of two parts,” and so forth ( Nouveaux
Principes , I, 105, quoted in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8, p.
43). “The passages we have quoted,” concludes our economist,
“clearly show that Sismondi fully assimilated (!) the very same
classification of the national revenue which plays such an important role
in the works of the modern economists, namely, the division of the
national revenue into revenue from labour and non-labour
revenue— arbeitsloses Einkommen . Although, generally speaking, Sismondi’s views on the subject of revenue are not always
clear and definite, we nevertheless discern in them a consciousness of the
difference that exists between private revenue and national revenue”
(p. 43).

The passage quoted, say we in answer to this, clearly shows that Ephrucy
has fully assimilated the wisdom of the German textbooks, but in spite of
that (and, perhaps, just because of it), he has completely overlooked the
theoretical difficulty of the question of national revenue as distinct from individual
revenue. Ephrucy expresses himself very carelessly. We have seen that in
the first part of his article he applied the term “modern
economists” to the theoreticians of one definite school. The reader
would be right in thinking that he is referring to them this time too.
Actually, however, the author has something entirely different in mind. It
is now the German Katheder

Socialists [7] who figure as the modern economists.
The author’s defence of Sismondi consists in closely identifying his
theory with theirs. What is the theory of these “modern”
authorities that Ephrucy quotes? That the national revenue is divided into
two parts.

But this is the theory of Adam Smith and not of the “modern
economists”! In dividing revenue into wages, profit and rent (Book I, chap.
VI of The Wealth of Nations ; Book II, chap. II), Adam Smith
opposed the two latter to the former precisely as non-labour revenue; he
called them both deductions from the produce of labour (Book I,
chap. VIII) and challenged the opinion that profit is also wages for a
special kind of labour (Book I, chap. VI). Sismondi, Rodbertus and the
“modern” authors of German textbooks simply repeat
Smith’s doctrine. The only difference between them is that Adam
Smith was aware that he was not quite successful in his efforts to
separate the national revenue from the national product; he was aware that
by excluding constant capital (to use the modern term) from the national
product after having included it in the individual product, he was
slipping into a contradiction. The “modern” economists,
however, in repeating Adam Smith’s mistake, have merely clothed his
doctrine in a more pompous phrase (“classification of the national
revenue”) and lost the awareness of the contradiction which brought Adam
Smith to a halt. These methods may be scholarly, but they are not in the
least scientific.

## Notes

[1] The mistaken conception of “accumulation of individual
capital” held by Adam Smith and the economists who came after him is
connected with the theory that the total product in capitalist economy
consists of two parts. It was they who taught that the accumulated part of
profit is spent entirely on wages, whereas actually it is spent on: 1)
constant capital and 2) wages.  Sismondi repeated this mistake of the
classical economists as well.
— Lenin

[2] Das
Kapital , II. Band,

S. 304. [8] Russ. trans., p. 232. Our italics.
— Lenin

[3] “About
Knowledge of the Market.”— Ed .

[4] In The
Development of Capitalism (pp. 16 and 19) (see present edition, Vol.
3, The Development of Capitalism in Russia , chap. I , section
VI.— Ed .) I have already noted Mr. Tugan-Baranovsky’s inexactitudes and errors which subsequently led him to go right over to the
camp of the bourgeois economists. (Author’s footnote to the 1908
edition.— Ed .)
— Lenin

[5] Cf. Sismondi, loc. cit.,
I, 8.
— Lenin

[6] Rodbertus.
Incidentally, let us mention that Bernstein, who in general is restoring
the prejudices of bourgeois political economy, has introduced confusion
into this problem too by asserting that Marx’s theory of crises does
not differ very much from the theory of Rodbertus ( Die Voraussetzungen,
etc . Stuttg. 1899, S. 67) (E. Bernstein, The Premises of Socialism
and the Tasks of Social-Democracy . Stuttgart, 1899, p.
67.— Ed .), and that Marx contradicts himself by recognising
the ultimate cause of crises to be the limited consumption of the masses.
(Author’s footnote to the 1908 edition.— Ed .)
— Lenin

[8] 

[7] Katheder-Socialists —representatives of a trend in bourgeois
political economy of the 1870s and 1880s who, under the guise of socialism,
advocated bourgeois-liberal reformism from university chairs.
( Katheder in German). The fear aroused among the exploiting
classes by the spread of Marxism in the working-class movement and the
growth of that movement brought Katheder-Socialism into being; it united
the efforts of bourgeois ideologists to find fresh means of keeping the
working people in subjugation.

Among the Katheder-Socialists were A. Wagner, G. Schmoller,
L. Brentano, and V. Sombart who asserted that the bourgeois state is above
classes, can reconcile mutually hostile classes, and can gradually
introduce “socialism” without affecting the interests of the
capitalists but at the same time taking the demands of the working people
as far as possible Into consideration. They suggested the legalisation of
police-regulated wage-labour, and the revival of the medieval guilds. Marx
and Engels exposed Katheder-Socialism, showing how essentially reactionary
it was. Lenin called the Katheder-Socialists the bed bugs of
“police-bourgeois university science” who hated Marx’s revolutionary teachings. In Russia the views of the Katheder-Socialists.
were advocated by the “legal Marxists.”

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## VIII

## Capitalist Rent and Capitalist Overpopulation

We continue our survey of Sismondi’s theoretical views. All his
chief views, those which distinguish him from all other economists, who
have already examined. The others either do not play such an important role in his general theory, or are
deduced from the preceding ones.

Let us note that Sismondi, like Rodbertus, did not agree with
Ricardo’s theory of rent. While not advancing a theory of his own,
he tried to shake Ricardo’s theory with arguments that were, to say
the least, feeble. In this he acts as the pure ideologist of the small
peasant; it is not so much a refutation of Ricardo as a complete rejection
of the application of the categories of commodity economy and of
capitalism to agriculture. In both respects his point of view is extremely
characteristic of the romanticists. Chapter XIII of

Book III [1] deals with “Mr. Ricardo’s ground-rent theory.” Stating
at once that Ricardo’s doctrine completely contradicts his own
theory, Sismondi advances the following objections: the general level of
profit (on which Ricardo’s theory is based) is never established,
there is no free movement of capital in agriculture. In agriculture we
must discern the intrinsic value of the product ( la valeur
intrinsèque ), which does not depend upon market fluctuations
and provides the-owner with a “net product” ( produit net ), the “labour of nature” (I, 306). “The labour
of nature is a power, the source of the net product of the land regarded
intrinsically” ( intrinsèquement ) (I, 310). “We regarded rent ( le fermage ), or more correctly, the net product,
as originating directly from the land for the owner’s benefit; it
takes no share either from the farmer or the consumer” (I, 312). And this repetition of the old physiocratic
prejudices concludes with the moral: “In general, in political
economy, one should guard against ( se défier ) absolute
assumptions, as well as against abstractions” (1, 312)1 There is
really nothing to examine in such a “theory,” since
Ricardo’s brief remark about the “labour of nature” is more than enough. [2] It is simply a refusal to analyse and a gigantic step back compared with
Ricardo. Here, too, the romanticism of Sismondi is quite clearly revealed,
for he hastens to condemn the process, but is afraid to touch it with an
analysis. Note that he does not deny the fact of agriculture developing on
capitalist lines in England, of the peasants there being displaced by
capitalist farmers and day labourers, and of things developing in the same
direction on the Continent. He simply turns his back on these facts (which
he was in duty bound to examine since he was discussing capitalist
economy) and prefers talking sentimentally of the advantages of the
patriarchal system of exploiting the land. Our Narodniks behave in exactly
the same way: none of them have attempted to deny the fact that commodity
economy is penetrating into agriculture, that it must produce a radical
change in the social character of agriculture; but at the same time none
of them, in discussing the capitalist economy, raise the question of the
growth of commercial farming, preferring to make shift with moralising
about “people’s production.” Since we are confining ourselves for the moment to an analysis of Sismondi’s theoretical
economy, we shall postpone a more detailed examination of this
“patriarchal exploitation” to a later occasion.

Another theoretical point around which Sismondi’s exposition
revolves is the doctrine of population. Let us note Sismondi’s attitude towards the Malthusian theory, and towards
the surplus population created by capitalism.

Ephrucy assures us that Sismondi agrees with Malthus only on the point
that the population can multiply with exceeding rapidity, and be the cause
of terrible suffering. “Beyond this they are poles apart. Sismondi
puts the whole population problem on a socio-historical basis”
( Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 7, p. 148). In this formula, too,
Ephrucy completely obscures Sismondi’s characteristic (namely,
petty-bourgeois) point of view and his romanticism.

What does this mean—“to put the population problem on a
socio-historical basis”? It means studying the law of population of each
historical system of economy separately, and studying its connection and
interrelation with the given system. Which system did Sismondi study? The
capitalist system. Thus, the contributor to Russkoye Bogatstvo assumes that Sismondi studied the capitalist law of population. There is a
grain of truth in this assertion but only a grain . And as Ephrucy
did not think of trying to discover what was lacking in Sismondi’s
argument about population, and as Ephrucy asserts that “here
Sismondi is the predecessor of the most outstanding modern economists” [3] (p. 148), the result is exactly the same sort of embellishment of the
petty-bourgeois romanticist as we saw in respect of the questions of
crises and of national revenue. Wherein lies the similarity between
Sismondi’s doctrine and the new theory on these problems? In that
Sismondi indicated the contradictions inherent in capitalist
accumulation. This similarity Ephrucy noted. Wherein lies the difference
between Sismondi’s doctrine and the new theory?  Firstly, in that it
did not advance the scientific analysis of these contradictions one iota,
and in some respects even took a step back compared with the classical
economists; and secondly, in that he covered up his own inability to make
an analysis (partly his unwillingness to do so) with petty-bourgeois
moralising about the need for balancing national revenue with expenditure, production with consumption, and so forth. This
difference Ephrucy did not note on a single one of the points
mentioned, and thereby totally misrepresented Sismondi’s real
significance and his relation to the modern theory. We see exactly the
same thing on the present problem. Here, too, the similarity between
Sismondi’s view and the modern theory is limited to an indication of the contradiction . And here, too, the difference lies
in the absence of a scientific analysis and in the substitution of
petty-bourgeois moralising for the analysis. Let us explain this.

The development of capitalist machine industry since the end of the last
century led to the formation of a surplus population, and political
economy was confronted with the task of explaining this
phenomenon. Malthus, as we know, tried to explain it by attributing it to
natural-historical causes; he denied absolutely that it sprang from a
certain, historically determined system of social economy and simply shut
his eyes to the contradictions revealed by this fact. Sismondi indicated
these contradictions and the displacement of the population by
machines. This is indisputably to his credit, for in the period in which
he wrote this was new. But let us see what his attitude towards this fact
was.

In Book VII ( On the Population ), chapter VII speaks particularly
“on the population which has become superfluous owing to the
invention of machines.” Sismondi states that “machines displace men” (p. 315, II, VII), and at once asks whether the
invention of machines is a boon or a bane to a nation. It goes without
saying that the “answer” to this question for all countries
and all times whatever, and not for a capitalist country, is a most
meaningless piece of banality: it is a boon when “consumers’
demand exceeds the population’s means of production” ( les
moyens de produire de la population ) (II, 317), and a bane
“when production is quite sufficient for consumption.” In
other words: Sismondi notes the contradiction, but this merely serves as a
pretext for arguing about some abstract society in which there are no
longer any contradictions, and to which the ethics of the thrifty peasant
can be applied! Sismondi makes no attempt to analyse this contradiction,
to examine how it arises, what it leads to, etc., in the existing
capitalist society. On the contrary, he uses this contradiction merely as material
for his moral indignation against such a contradiction. Beyond this the
chapter tells us absolutely nothing about this theoretical problem, and
contains nothing but regrets, complaints and innocent wishes. The
displaced workers were consumers . . . the home market shrinks . . . as
regards the foreign market, the world is already sufficiently supplied
. . . if the peasants were moderately prosperous, this would be a better
guarantee of a market . . . there is no more amazing and terrible example
than England, which is being followed by the Continental
countries—such is the moralising we get from Sismondi, instead of an
analysis of the phenomenon! His attitude towards the subject is exactly
the same as that of our Narodniks. The Narodniks also confine themselves
to stating the fact of a surplus population, and use it merely as a reason
to voice lamentations about and complaints against capitalism (cf. N.-on,
V. V., and others). Sismondi makes no attempt even to analyse the relation
between this surplus population and the requirements of capitalist
production, neither do our Narodniks ever set themselves such a problem.

The scientific analysis of this contradiction revealed the absolute
falsity of this method. The analysis showed that surplus population, being
undoubtedly a contradiction (along with surplus production and surplus
consumption) and being an inevitable result of capitalist accumulation, is
at the same time an indispensable component part of the
capitalist machine. [4] The further large-scale industry develops the greater is the fluctuation in the demand for workers, depending upon
whether there is a crisis or a boom in national production as a whole, or
in any one branch of it. This fluctuation is a law of capitalist
production, which could not exist if there were no surplus
population (i.e., a population exceeding capitalism’s average demand for workers) ready at any given moment to provide
hands for any industry, or any factory. The analysis showed that a surplus
population is formed in all industries into which capitalism penetrates
and in agriculture as well as in industry—and that the surplus
population exists in different forms.  There are three chief forms [5] : Floating overpopulation . To this
category belong the unemployed workers in industry. As industry
develops their numbers inevitably grow. 2) Latent overpopulation . To this category belong the rural
population who lose their farms with the development of
capitalism and are unable to find non-agricultural employment. This population is always ready to provide hands for
any factory. 3) Stagnant overpopulation . It has “extremely irregular” employment, under conditions
below the average level. [8] To this category belong, mainly, people who work at home for manufacturers
and stores, including both rural and urban inhabitants. The sum-total of
all these strata of the population constitutes the relative surplus
population , or reserve army . The latter term distinctly
shows what population is referred to. They are the workers needed by
capitalism for the potential expansion of enterprises, but who
can never be regularly employed.

Thus, on this problem, too, theory arrived at a conclusion diametrically
opposed to that of the romanticists. For the latter, the surplus
population signifies that capitalism is impossible, or a
“mistake.” Actually, the opposite is the case: the surplus population, being a necessary concomitant of
surplus production, is an indispensable attribute to the capitalist
economy, which could neither exist nor develop without it . Here
too Ephrucy totally misrepresented the issue by saying nothing about this
thesis of the modern theory.

A mere comparison of these two points of view is sufficient to enable one
to judge which of them our Narodniks adhere to. The chapter from
Sismondi’s work dealt with above could with every right figure in
Mr. N.-on’s Sketches on Our Post-Reform Social Economy .

While noting the formation of a surplus population in post-Reform Russia,
the Narodniks have never raised the issue of capitalism’s need of a
reserve army of workers. Could the railways have been built if a permanent
surplus population had not been formed? It is surely known that the demand
for this type of labour fluctuates greatly from year to year. Could
industry have developed without this condition? (In boom periods it needs
large numbers of building workers to erect new factories, premises,
warehouses, etc., and all kinds of auxiliary day labour, which constitutes
the greater part of the so-called outside non-agricultural employments.)
Could the capitalist farming of our outlying regions, which demands
hundreds of thousands and millions of day labourers, have been created
without this condition? And as we know, the demand for this kind of labour
fluctuates enormously. Could the entrepreneur lumber merchants have hewn
down the forests to meet the needs of the factories with such phenomenal
rapidity if a surplus population had not been formed? (Lumbering like
other types of hired labour in which rural people engage is among the
occupations with the lowest wages and the worst conditions.)  Could the
system, so widespread in the so-called handicraft industries, under which
merchants, mill owners and stores give out work to be done at home in both
town and country, have developed without this condition? In all these
branches of labour (which have developed mainly since the Reform) the
fluctuation in the demand for hired labour is extremely great. Yet the
degree of fluctuation in this demand determines the dimensions of the
surplus population needed by capitalism. The Narodnik economists have nowhere shown that they are familiar with
this law. We do not, of course, intend to make an examination of the
substance of these problems here. [6] This does not enter into our task. The subject of our article is
West-European romanticism and its relation to Russian
Narodism. In this case, too, this relation is the same as in all
the preceding cases: on the subject of surplus population, the
Narodniks adhere entirely to the viewpoint of romanticism, which
is diametrically opposite to that of the modern theory. Capitalism gives no employment to displaced workers,
they say. This means that capitalism is impossible, a “mistake,” etc. But it does not “mean”
that at all. Contradiction does not mean impossibility ( Widerspruch is not the same as Widersinn ). Capitalist accumulation, i.e., real production for the sake
of production, is also a contradiction. But this does not
prevent it from existing and from being the law of a definite
system of economy. The same must be said of all the other
contradictions of capitalism. The Narodnik argument we have
quoted merely “means” that the Russian intelligentsia have become deeply imbued with the vice of using
empty phrases to get over all these contradictions.

Thus, Sismondi contributed absolutely nothing to the theoretical analysis
of overpopulation. But how did he regard it? His view is a queer
combination of petty-bourgeois sentiment and Malthusianism. “The
great vice of the present social organisation,” says Sismondi,
“is that a poor man can never know what demand for labour he can
count upon” (II, 261), and Sismondi sighs for the times when
“the village shoemaker” and the small peasant knew the exact
amount of their revenues. “The more a poor man is bereft of all
property, the more is he in danger of falling into error concerning his
revenue and of contributing to the formation of a population
( contribuer à accroître une population . . .) which, being out of proportion to the demand for labour, will not find means of
subsistence” (II, 263-64). You see: this ideologist of the petty
bourgeoisie is not satisfied with wanting to retard the whole of social
development for the sake of preserving the patriarchal relationships of a semi-barbarous
population. He is ready to prescribe any device you please for crippling
human nature, as long as it helps to preserve the petty bourgeoisie. Here
are several more excerpts, which leave no doubt about this last point:

The weekly payment of wages at the factory to the semi-pauperised worker
has accustomed the latter to look no further into the future than the next
Saturday: “this has blunted his moral qualities and sense of
sympathy” (II, 266), which, as we shall see in a moment, consist of
“connubial prudence”! . . . “The more his family becomes a
burden upon society the more it will grow; and the nation will suffer
( gémira ) from the burden of a population which is out of
proportion ( disproportionnée ) to its means of subsistence” (II, 267). Preserve small property at all
costs—such is Sismondi’s slogan—even at the cost of reducing the standard of living and of distorting human nature! And
Sismondi, who, with the air of a statesman, has told us when an increase
in the population is “desirable,” devotes a special chapter to
attacking religion for having failed to condemn “imprudent”
marriages. Once his ideal—the petty bourgeois—is affected,
Sismondi becomes more Malthusian than Malthus himself. “Children who
are born only for poverty are also born only for vice,” says
Sismondi, admonishing religion. “Ignorance in matters concerning the
social system has induced them” (the representatives of religion)
“to strike chastity from the list of virtues that are proper to
marriage, and has been one of the constantly operating causes which
destroy the naturally established balance between the population and its
means of subsistence” (II, 294). “Religious morality should
teach people that having produced a family, it is their duty to live no
less chastely with their wives than celibates with women who do not be
long to them” (II, 298). And Sismondi, who, in general, lays claim
to the title not only of a theoretician in political economy, but also to
that of wise administrator, immediate, proceeds to calculate that
“producing a family” requires “in general, and on the average, three births,” and he advises the government “not to
deceive the people with the hope of an independent status which will
permit them to raise a family when that illusory institution ( cet établissement
illusoire ) leaves them at the mercy of suffering, poverty and
death” (II, 299). “When the social organisation did not
separate the labouring class from the class which owned some property,
public opinion alone was enough to avert the scourge ( le
fléau ) of poverty. For the agriculturist to sell the heritage
of his fathers and for the artisan to squander his small capital has
always been regarded as something shameful. . . . But under the system at
present prevailing in Europe . . . people who are condemned never to
possess any property can feel no shame what ever at being reduced to
pauperism” (II, 306-07). It would be difficult to express more
vividly the stupidity and hard-heartedness of the small proprietor! Here
Sismondi changes from the theoretician into the practical counsellor, who
preaches the morals which, we know, are practised with such success by the
French peasant. This is not only Malthus, but Malthus deliberately cut to
the measure of the petty bourgeois. Reading these chapters of
Sismondi’s, one cannot help recalling the passionately angry
invective of Proudhon, who argued that Malthusianism was the preaching of
the connubial practice of . . . a certain unnatural vice. [7]

## Notes

[1] His very system of exposition is characteristic: Book III treats of
“territorial wealth” ( richesse territoriale ), of wealth in the shape of land, i.e., of agriculture. The next book, Book IV,
treats of “commercial wealth” ( de la richesse commerciale ), of industry and commerce. As though the produce of the
land, and land itself, have not also become commodities under the rule of
capitalism!  For this reason, there is no harmony between these two
books. Industry is dealt with only in its capitalist form as it existed in
Sismondi’s time. Agriculture, however, is described in the form of a
motley enumeration of all sorts of systems of exploiting the land:
patriarchal, slave, half-crop, corvée , quit-rent, capitalist
farming and emphyteutic (the granting of land on a perpetual hereditary
lease). The result is utter confusion: the author gives us neither a
history of agriculture, for all these “systems” are unconnected, nor an analysis of agriculture under capitalist economy
although the latter is the real subject of his work, and though he speaks
of industry only in its capitalist form.
— Lenin

[2] Ricardo, Works, Sieber’s (Russian) translation, p. 35:
“Does nature do nothing for man in manufactures?  Are the powers of
wind and water, which move our machinery, and assist navigation, nothing?
The pressure of the atmosphere and the elasticity of steam, which enable
us to work the most stupendous engines—are they not the gifts of
nature? To say nothing of the effects of the matter of heat in softening
and melting metals, of the decomposition of the atmosphere in the process
of dyeing and fermentation. There is not a manufacture which can be
mentioned, in which nature does not give her assistance to man, and give
it too, generously and gratuitously.”
— Lenin

[3] Incidentally, we make the reservation that we cannot know for certain whom
Ephrucy has in mind when he speaks of “the most Outstanding modern
economist,” the representative of a certain school which is
absolutely alien to romanticism, or the author of the bulkiest Handbuch.
— Lenin

[4] As far as we know, this point of view about the surplus population was
first expressed by Engels in Die Lage der arbeitenden Klasse in
England (1845) ( The Condition of the Working Class in
England.—Ed .). After describing the ordinary industrial cycle
of English industry the author says:

“From this it is clear that English manufacture must have, at all times save the
brief periods of highest prosperity, an unemployed reserve army of
workers, in order to be able to produce the masses of goods required by
the market in the liveliest months. This reserve army is larger or
smaller, according as the state of the market occasions the employment of
a larger or smaller proportion of its members. And if at the moment of
highest activity of the market the agricultural districts . . . and the
branches least affected by the general prosperity temporarily supply to
manufacture a number of workers, these are a mere minority, and these too
belong to the reserve army, with the single difference that the prosperity
of the moment was required to reveal their connection with it.” [9]

It is important to note in the last words that the part of the agricultural population which turns temporarily to industry is
regarded as belonging to the reserve army. This is precisely what the
modern theory has called the latent form of the surplus
population (see Marx’s Capital ). [10] — Lenin

[5] Cf. Sieber’s David Ricardo, etc ., pp. 552-53. St. Petersburg,
1885.
— Lenin

[6] That
is why we do not deal here with the very original circumstance
that Narodnik economists, as grounds for not counting all these very numerous workers, advanced the fact that they are
not registered.
— Lenin

[7] See
supplement to the Russian translation of Malthus’ Essay on Population (Bibikov’s translation,
St. Petersburg, 1868). Excerpt from Proudhon’s essay On Justice .
— Lenin

[9] Marx and Engels, On Britain , Moscow 1953, p. 119.

[10] Karl
Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow 1958, p. 642.

[8] Karl      Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow, 1958, p. 643.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## IX

## Machines in Capitalist Society

Related to the problem of surplus population is that of the
significance of machines in general.

Ephrucy dilates upon Sismondi’s “brilliant observations”
concerning machines, and asserts that “to regard him as an opponent
of technical improvements is unjust” (No. 7, p. 155), that
“Sismondi was not an enemy of machines and inventions” (p. 156). “Sismondi repeatedly stressed the idea that machines and
inventions are not in themselves harmful to the working class, but become
so only because of the conditions of the existing system of economy, under
which an increase in the productivity of labour leads neither to an increase in
working class consumption nor to a reduction of working hours”
(p. 155).

All these observations are quite correct. But again, this appraisal of Sismondi is a wonderfully vivid revelation of how the
Narodnik absolutely failed to understand the romanticist , to
understand the point of view on capitalism specific to romanticism, and the radical difference between this point of view and
that of scientific theory. The Narodnik could not understand this, because
Narodism itself has not gone beyond romanticism. But while
Sismondi’s observations concerning the contradictory nature of the
capitalist employment of machines marked a great step forward in the
1820s, it is quite unpardonable today to confine oneself to such a
primitive criticism and not to see its narrow petty-bourgeois character.

In this respect (i.e., in respect of the difference between
Sismondi’s doctrine and the modern theory) [1] Ephrucy keeps firmly to his own
ground. He cannot even present the problem. He says that Sismondi saw the
contradiction, and rests content with that; as if history had not shown
the most diverse ways and means of criticising the contradictions of
capitalism. In saying that Sismondi did not regard machines as being
harmful in themselves, but harmful in their operation under the present
social system, Ephrucy does not even see what a primitive, superficially
sentimental point of view he expresses in this one argument
alone. Sismondi did indeed inquire: are machines harmful, or not? And he
“answered” the question with the maxim: machines are useful
only when production is commensurate with consumption (cf. quotations in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 7, p. 156). After all that has been said
above, there is no need for us to prove here that such an
“answer” is nothing more nor less than substituting a petty-bourgeois utopia for a scientific analysis of capitalism. Sismondi
cannot be blamed for not having made such an analysis. Historical services
are not judged by the contributions historical personalities did not
make in respect of modern requirements, but by the new contributions they did make as
compared with their predecessors. Here, however, we are judging neither
Sismondi nor his primitive, sentimental point of view, but the economist
of Russkoye Bogatstvo , who to this day does not understand the
difference between this point of view and the modern one. He does not
understand that to bring out this difference he should not have asked
whether Sismondi was an enemy of machines or not, but whether Sismondi
understood the significance of machines under the capitalist system,
whether he understood the role played by machines as a factor of
progress under this system ? Had the economist of Russkoye
Bogatstvo done that, he might have noted that Sismondi, owing to his petty-bourgeois , utopian point of view, could not
even raise such questions, and that what distinguishes the new theory
is that it does raise and answer them. In that case Ephrucy might have
understood that by substituting the question of the conditions under which
machines can, in general, be “profitable” and “useful” for that of the historical role played by machines in
existing capitalist society, Sismondi naturally arrived at the theory that
capitalism and the capitalist employment of machines were
“dangerous” and urged the necessity of “retarding,” “moderating” and
“regulating” the growth of capitalism, and, as a consequence,
he became a reactionary . The fact that Sismondi’s doctrine
fails to understand the historical role of machines as a factor of
progress is one of the reasons for the modern theory regarding it as reactionary .

We shall not here, of course, expound the modern theory (i.e.,
Marx’s theory) of machine production. We refer the reader to, say,
the above-mentioned study by N. Sieber, chapter X: “Machines and
Large-Scale Industry,” and particularly chapter XI: “An
Examination of the Theory of Machine

Production.” [2] We shall merely give the gist of it in briefest outline. It boils down to
two points: first, to a historical analysis, which established the place
machine production occupies as one of the stages in the development of capitalism, and the
relation of machine industry to the preceding stages (capitalist simple
co-operation and capitalist manufacture); secondly, to an analysis of the
part played by machines under capitalist economy, and in particular, to an
analysis of the changes which machine industry effects in all the
conditions of life of the population. On the first point, the theory
established that machine industry is only one stage (namely, the highest)
of capitalist production, and showed how it arose out of manufacture. On
the second point, the theory established that machine industry marks
gigantic progress in capitalist society not only because it increases the
productive forces enormously and socialises labour throughout society, [3] but also because it destroys the manufactory division of labour, compels
the workers to go from occupations of one kind to others, completes the
destruction of backward patriarchal relationships, particularly in the
rural

districts, [4] and gives a most powerful impetus to the progress of society, both for the
reasons stated and as a consequence of the concentration of the industrial
population. This progress, like the progress capitalism makes in every
other field, is accompanied by the “progress” of contradictions, i.e., by their intensification and expansion.

Perhaps the reader will ask: what interest is there in examining
Sismondi’s views on such a universally known question and in such a
brief reference to the modern theory, with which everybody is
“familiar,” and with which everybody “agrees”?

Well, to see what this “agreement” looks like we shall take
Mr. N.-on, the most prominent Narodnik economist, who claims that he
strictly applies the modern theory. In his Sketches , it will be
remembered, Mr. N.-on sets himself as one of his special tasks the study
of the capitalisation of the Russian textile industry, the characteristic feature of which is
precisely that it employs machines on the biggest scale.

The question is: what is Mr. N.–on’s point of view on this subject:
the point of view of Sismondi (whose view point, as we have seen, he
shares on very many aspects of capitalism), or the point of view of modern
theory? Is he, on this important subject, a romanticist or . . . a realist [5] ?

We have seen that the first thing that distinguishes the modern theory is
that it is based on a historical analysis of the development of machine
industry from capitalist manufacture. Did Mr. N.-on raise the problem of
the development of Russian machine industry? No. True, he did say that it
was preceded by work in the home for the capitalist, and by the
hand-labour “factory” [6] but he not only failed to explain the relation of machine industry to the
preceding stage, he even failed to “notice” that it was wrong
in scientific terminology to apply the term factory to the preceding stage (production by hand in the home or in the
capitalist’s workshop), which should undoubtedly be described as capitalist manufacture . [7]

Let the reader not think that this “omission” is unimportant. On the contrary, it is of enormous importance. Firstly,
Mr. N.-on thereby identifies capitalism with machine industry . This is a gross mistake. What constitutes the importance of
the scientific theory is that it cleared up the real place of machine
industry as one of the stages of capitalism. If Mr. N.-on shared
the point of view of this theory , could he have depicted the growth and
victory of machine industry as “ the struggle between two economic forms ”: between some unknown “form based on the
peasantry’s ownership of instruments of production” [8] and “capitalism” (pp. 2, 3, 66, 198 et al .), whereas,
in fact, we see a struggle between machine industry and capitalist
manufacture ? Mr. N.-on says not a word about this struggle ;
although this replacement of one form of capitalism by another took place, on his own showing, precisely in the textile industry, the
sphere of his special study (p. 79), Mr. N.-on misrepresented it, calling
it the replacement of “people’s production” by “capitalism.” Is it not evident that at bottom the problem of
the actual development of machine industry did not interest him
in the least, and that the term “people’s production” covers up a utopia entirely to the taste of Sismondi? Secondly, if
Mr. N.-on had raised the question of the historical development of Russian
machine industry, could he have spoken of “implanting capitalism” (pp. 331, 283, 323 et al .), basing his case on
facts of governmental support and assistance—facts which have also
occurred in Europe? The question is: is he copying Sismondi who also
talked in exactly th3 same way about “implanting,” or is he
copying the representative of the modern theory who studied the
replacement of manufacture by machine industry? Thirdly, if Mr. N.-on had
raised the problem of the historical development of the forms of
capitalism in Russia (in the textile industry), could he have ignored the
existence of capitalist manufacture in the Russian “handicraft industries” [9] ?

And if he had really followed theory and attempted to apply a
scientific analysis to at least a small corner of this production—which is also “people’s production”—what would have become of
this picture of Russian social economy, daubed in cheap and inartistic
Suzdal style, which depicts a nebulous “people’s production” and an isolated from it “capitalism” which
embraces only a “handful” of workers (p. 326 et al .)?

To sum up: On the first point which distinguishes the modern theory of
machine industry from the romantic theory, Mr. N.–on can on no
account be regarded as a follower of the former, for he does not even
realise the need to present the question of the rise of machine industry
as a special stage of capitalism, and is silent about the
existence of capitalist manufacture, the stage of capitalism which
preceded that of the machines. Instead of an historical analysis, he palms
off the utopia of “people’s production.”

The second point relates to the modern theory of the changes brought about
in social relations by machine industry. Mr. N.–on did not even attempt
to examine this problem. He complained a great deal about capitalism and
deplored the appearance of the factory (exactly as Sismondi did), but he
did not even attempt to study the change in social conditions brought
about by the factory. [10] To do that it would have been necessary to compare machine
industry with the preceding stages, which Mr. N.–on does not refer to. Similarly, the viewpoint of the modern theory
on machines as a factor of progress in present-day capitalist society is also totally alien to him. Here, too,
he did not even present the question, [11] nor could he do so, for this question can arise only
out of a historical study of the replacement of one form of
capitalism by another, whereas according to Mr. N.–on “capitalism”
tout

court [12] replaces ... “people’s production.”

If, on the basis of Mr. N.–on’s “study” of the capitalisation of the
textile industry in Russia, we were to ask: how does Mr. N.–on
regard machines?–we could receive no other reply than that with which we are already familiar from
Sismondi’s work. Mr. N.–on admits that machines increase the
productivity of labour (not to do so is more than he dare!)–just as
Sismondi did. Mr. N.–on says that it is not machines that are harmful,
but the capitalist employment of them–just as Sismondi did. Mr. N.–on
believes that in introducing machines “we” have lost sight of the fact
that production must correspond to “the people’s consuming
capacity”–just as Sismondi did.

And that is all. Mr. N.–on does not believe anything more. He will not
hear of the problems that have been raised and solved by modern theory,
because he did not even attempt to examine either the historical
succession of different forms of capitalist production in Russia (using,
say, the example of the textile industry that he chose), or the role of
machines as a factor of progress under the present capitalist
system.

Thus, on the question of machines–this supremely important question of
theoretical political economy–Mr. N.–on also shares Sismondi’s point of
view, Mr. N.–on argues exactly like a romanticist, which, of
course, does not prevent him from quoting and quoting.

This applies not to the example of the textile industry alone, but to all
Mr. N.–on’s arguments. Take, say, the above-mentioned example of the
flour-milling industry. Mr. N.–on pointed to the introduction of machines
only as an excuse for the sentimental lamentation that this increase in
the productivity of labour did not correspond to the “people’s consuming
capacity.” As regards the changes in the social system which machine
industry introduces in general (and has actually introduced in Russia), he
did not even think of analysing them. The question of whether the
introduction of these machines is a progressive step in present-day
capitalist society is something quite incomprehensible to him. [13]

What we have said about Mr. N.–on applies a fortiori [14] to the other Narodnik economists: on the question of machines, Narodism to
this day adheres to the viewpoint of petty-bourgeois romanticism and
replaces an economic analysis by sentimental wishes.

## Notes

[1] We have already repeatedly seen that Ephrucy tried everywhere to
draw this comparison between Sismondi and the modern theory.
— Lenin

[2] “To tell the truth,” says Sieber at the beginning of this
chapter, “the theory of machines and of large-scale industry
outlined here, represents such an inexhaustible source of new thinking and
original research, that if anybody took it into his head to weigh up the
relative merits of this theory in full he would have to write almost a
whole book on this subject alone” (p. 473)
— Lenin

[3] Comparing “associated labour” in the village community and in
capitalist society that has machine industry, Sieber quite rightly
observes “There is approximately the same difference between the
‘component’ of a village community and the
‘component’ of society with machine production as there is,
for example, between the unit 10 and the unit 100’ (p. 495)
— Lenin

[4] Sieber, op . cit ., p. 467.
— Lenin

[5] The word “realist” was used here instead of the word Marxist exclusively for censorship reasons. For the same reason,
instead of referring to Capital , we referred to Sieber’s
book, which summarised Marx’s Capital . (Author’s footnote to the 1908 edition.— Ed .)
— Lenin

[6] P. 108. Quoted from Statistical Returns for Moscow Gubernia ,
Vol. VII, Part III, p. 32 (the statisticians here summarise Korsak’s Forms of Industry ): “Since 1822 the very organisation of
industry has undergone a complete change—instead of being
independent handicraft producers, the peasants are becoming merely the
performers of several operations of large-scale factory production and
only receive wages.”
— Lenin

[7] Sieber quite rightly indicated that the ordinary terminology (factory,
works, etc.) is unsuitable for scientific research, and urged the need for
drawing a distinction between machine industry and capitalist manufacture:
p. 474.
— Lenin

[8] N.-on, p. 322. Does this differ even one iota from Sismondi’s
idealisation of patriarchal peasant economy?
— Lenin

[9] We assume that there is no need here to prove this commonly known fact. It
is sufficient to recall the Pavlovo metalworkers, the Bogorodsk leather
and the Kimry boot and shoe trade, the hat making district of Molvitino,
the Tula accordion and samovar trades, the Krasnoye Selo and Rybnaya
Sloboda jewelry trade, the Semyonov spoon trade, the horn trade in
“Ustyanshchina,” the felt trade in Semyonov Uyezd, Nizhni-Novgorod Gubernia, etc. We are quoting from memory; if we made an
investigation of handicraft industries, we could prolong this list to
infinity.
— Lenin

[10] We ask the reader not to forget that the scientific meaning of this term
is not the same as the ordinary one. Science limits its application
exclusively to large-scale machine industry.
— Lenin

[11] As has been done, for example, by A. Volgin, The Substantiation of
Narodism in the Works of Mr. Vorontsov (V.V.). St. Petersburg, 1896.
— Lenin

[12] Simply. –Ed.
— Lenin

[13] The text contains an outline criticism of Mr. N.–on’s views based on
Marx’s theory; this I subsequently completed in The Development of
Capitalism. (Author’s footnote to the 1908 edition. –Ed. )
— Lenin

[14] All the more. –Ed.
— Lenin

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## X

## Protection

The last theoretical problem that interests us in Sismondi’s system
of views is that of protection. No little space is devoted to this problem
in Nouveaux Principes , but there it is examined mostly from the
practical aspect, in connection with the anti-Corn-Laws movement in
Britain. We shall examine this latter problem later on, for it includes
other, broader problems. What interests us here at the moment is only
Sismondi’s point of view on protection. What is of interest
in this problem is not a new economic concept of Sismondi’s, that
has not been discussed, but his understanding of the relation between
“economics” and the “superstructure.” Ephrucy assures the readers of Russkoye Bogatstvo that Sismondi was
“one of the first and most talented forerunners of the modern
historical school,” that he was “opposed to the isolation of
economic phenomena from all other social factors.” “The view
is expressed in the works of Sismondi that economic phenomena must not be
isolated from other social factors, that they must be studied in
connection with facts of a socio-political character” ( Russkoye
Bogatstvo , No. 8, pp. 38-39). Well, we shall see from the example we
have taken, how Sismondi understood the connection between economic and
socio-political phenomena.

“The prohibition of imports,” says Sismondi in the chapter
“Of Customs” (1. IV, ch. XI), “is as unwise and as ruinous as the prohibition of exports: it was invented in order to give
the nation manufacture, something it did not yet possess; and it cannot be
denied that for nascent industry it is on a par with the most powerful
encouragement bonus. This manufacture produces, perhaps, scarcely
one-hundredth part of a certain kind of goods consumed by the nation: one
hundred buyers will have to compete with each other to obtain commodities from the sole vendor, and the ninety-nine
to whom he refuses to sell will have to make shift with contraband
goods. In that case, the nation’s loss will be equal to one hundred,
and its gain equal to one. No matter how much the nation may gain from
this new manufacture, there can be no doubt that this gain will be too
small to justify such great sacrifice. One could always find less wasteful
means of stimulating such manufacture to activity” (I, 440-41).

You see how simply Sismondi solves this problem: protection is
“unwise” because the “nation” stands to lose by it!

What “nation” does our economist speak of? What economic
relations does he connect the given socio-political fact with? He takes no
definite relations, he argues in general , about a nation as
it should be , according to his conception of what should
be . And as we know, this conception of what should be is based on the
exclusion of capitalism and on the reign of small independent production.

But it is utterly absurd to associate a socio-political factor which
belongs to a given economic system, and to it alone, with some imaginary
system. Protection is a “socio-political factor” of capitalism, but Sismondi does not associate it with capitalism, he
associates it with some nation in general (or with a nation of
small independent producers). He could, perhaps, have associated
protection with, say, the Indian village community, and have obtained a
still more striking example of its “folly” and “ruination”; but this “folly” would again have been that
of his association and not of protection. Sismondi makes a childish
calculation to show that protection is profitable to a very few at the
expense of the masses. There is no need to do so, for this is already
evident from the very concept protection (whether it takes the form of a
direct subsidy or the form of eliminating foreign competitors makes no
difference). That protection expresses a social contradiction is beyond
dispute. But are there no contradictions in the economic life of the
system which created protection? On the contrary, it is full of
contradictions, and Sismondi himself indicated these contradictions
throughout his book. Instead of deducing this contradiction from
those of the economic system which he himself indicated, Sismondi ignores economic contradictions and reduces his argument to
totally meaningless “innocent wishes.” Instead of associating
this institution which, according to him, benefits a small group, with the
position occupied by this group in the country’s economy, and with
the interests of this group, he associates it with the abstract principle
of the “common weal.” We see, therefore, that, contrary to
Ephrucy’s assertion, Sismondi does isolate economic phenomena from the rest (by regarding protection apart from the economic
system) and has no conception of the connection between economic
and socio-political facts. The tirade we have quoted contains all that he, as a theoretician, could contribute to the problem of protection:
all the rest is merely a paraphrase of this. “It is doubtful whether
governments fully realise what price they pay for this gain” (the
development of manufacture) “and what frightful sacrifices they
impose upon the consumers” (I, 442-43). “The governments of
Europe wanted to violate nature” ( faire violence à la nature ). Which nature? Is it the nature of capitalism that
protection “violates”? “The nation was forced, in a way
( en quelque sorte ), into false activity” (I, 448). “Some governments have gone to the length of paying their
merchants in order to enable them to sell more cheaply; the stranger this
sacrifice and the more it contradicts the simplest calculation, the more
it is ascribed to high politics. . . . The government pays its merchants
at the expense of its subjects” (I, 421), and so on and so
forth. This is the kind of argument Sismondi treats us to! In other parts
of his work, as if drawing the conclusion from these arguments, he calls
capitalism “artificial” and “implanted” (I, 379, opulence factice ), “a hothouse product” (II, 456)
and so forth . Starting out by substituting innocent wishes for an
analysis of the given contradictions, he reaches the point of positively
distorting reality to suit those wishes. According to him capitalist
industry, which is so zealously “supported,” is feeble,
without a basis, and so forth, it does not play a predominant role in the
country’s economy and, consequently , this predominant role
is played by small scale production, and so forth. The undoubted and
indisputable fact that protection was created only by a definite economic
system, and by the definite contradictions of that system, that it expresses the real interests of a real class, which plays
the predominant role in the national economy, is reduced to
nothing, even to its opposite, by means of a few sentimental phrases! Here
is another specimen (concerning the protection of agriculture—I,
265, chapter on the Corn Laws):

“The English would have us believe that their big farms are the only
means of improving agriculture, that is to say, of providing themselves
with a greater abundance of agricultural produce at a cheaper
price—actually, however, they do the opposite, they produce at a
higher price.”. . .

This passage, which so strikingly reveals the romanticist way of arguing
that the Russian Narodniks have taken over in its entirety, is wonderfully
characteristic! The development of capitalist farming and the technical
progress connected with it are depicted as a deliberately introduced
system: the English (i.e., the English economists) would have us believe
that this system is the only means of improving agriculture. Sismondi
wants to say that “there could be” other means of improving
agriculture besides capitalist farming, i.e., again “there could
be” in some abstract society, but not in the real society of a
definite historical period, in the “society” based on commodity production of which the English economists speak, and of which
Sismondi too should have spoken. “Improvement of agriculture, that is to say , providing themselves’’ (the nation?)
“with a greater abundance of produce.” Not “that is to say,” at all. Improvement of agriculture and improved food for the
masses are by no means the same thing; that the two will not coincide, is
not only possible, it is inevitable under the economic system which
Sismondi so zealously wants to avoid. For example, an increase in potato
cultivation may signify an increase in labour productivity in agriculture
(introduction of root crops) and an increase in surplus-value,
simultaneously with a deterioration of the workers’ food. It is
another example of the habit of the Narodnik—that is to say, the
romanticist—to dismiss the contradictions of real life with phrases.

“Actually,” continues Sismondi, “these farmers, who are
so rich, so intelligent and so much supported ( secondés ) by all scientific progress, and whose horses are so fine, whose hedges so
solid and whose fields so thoroughly cleared of weeds, cannot compete
against the wretched Polish peasant, ignorant, crushed by slavery, who
seeks consolation only in drink, and whose agriculture is still in the
infant stage of the art. The corn harvested in central Poland, after
paying freight for many hundreds of leagues by river, by land and by sea,
and after paying import duties amounting to 30 and 40 per cent ad
valorem , is still cheaper than the corn of the richest counties of
England” (I, 265). “The English economists are amazed at this
contrast.” They refer to taxes and so forth. But this is not the
point. “The system of exploitation itself is bad, it rests on a
dangerous foundation. . . . Lately, all writers have presented this system
as an object worthy of our admiration, but we, on the contrary, must study
it well in order to avoid imitating it” (I, 266).

Really, how infinitely naïve is this romanticist, who presents
English capitalism (commercial farming) as a mistaken system of the
economists, who imagines that the “amazement” of the economists who shut their eyes to the contradictions of commercial farming
is a sufficiently strong argument against the farmers! How
superficial is his understanding; instead of seeking an explanation of
economic processes in the interests of different groups, he looks for it
in the errors of economists, authors and governments! Good Sismondi wants
to prick the conscience of the English and also of the continental farmers
and put them to shame in order to discourage them from “imitating” such “bad” systems!

Do not forget, incidentally, that this was written seventy years ago, that
Sismondi was witnessing the first steps of these, as yet, totally new
phenomena. His naïiveté is excusable, for even the classical economists (his contemporaries) no less naïvely regarded
these new phenomena as the product of the eternal and natural qualities of
human nature. But, we ask, have our Narodniks added even one original word
to Sismondi’s arguments in their “objections” to capitalism developing in Russia?

Thus, Sismondi’s arguments about protection show that the historical
point of view was totally alien to him. Indeed, he argues quite abstractly, exactly like the eighteenth-century
philosophers and economists, differing from them only in proclaiming the
society of small independent producers and not bourgeois society to be
normal and natural. Hence, he understands nothing of the connection
between protection and a definite economic system; and he disposes of this
contradiction in the socio-political sphere with sentimental phrases about
“the false,” “the perilous,” the mistaken, the unwise, etc., similar to those with which he disposed of the
contradictions in economic life. Hence, he draws an extremely superficial
picture of the matter and presents the problem of protection and Free
Trade as one of the “wrong” or the “right” path (i.e., to use his terminology, the problem of capitalism, or the
non-capitalist path).

Modern theory has fully exposed these delusions, by revealing the
connection between protection and a definite historical system of social
economy, between protection and the interests of the predominant class in
that system which enjoy the support of governments. It showed that
protection or Free Trade is an issue between entrepreneurs
(sometimes between the entrepreneurs of different countries, sometimes
between different factions of entrepreneurs in a given country).

Comparing these two points of view on protection with the attitude towards
it adopted by the Narodnik economists, we find that here too they fully
share the romanticist viewpoint and associate protection not with a
capitalist country, but with some abstraction, with “consumers” tout court, and proclaim it to be the
“mistaken” and “unwise” support of “hothouse” capitalism, and so forth. On the subject, for
example, of duty-free imports of agricultural machines, which cause
conflict between industrial and agricultural entrepreneurs, the Narodniks, of course , stand solidly for the agricultural
. . . entrepreneurs. We do not want to say that they are wrong. But it is
a question of fact, a question concerning the present historical moment, a
question as to which faction of the entrepreneurs expresses the more
general interests of the development of capitalism. Even if the Narodniks
are right, it is certainly not because the imposition of customs duties
signifies “artificial” “support for capitalism,” whereas the
lifting of such duties signifies support for an “age-old”
people’s industry, but simply because the development of
agricultural capitalism (which needs machines), by accelerating the
extinction of medieval relationships in the rural districts and the
creation of a home market for industry, signifies a wider, freer and more
rapid development of capitalism in general.

We foresee one objection to this classing of the Narodniks with the
romanticists on this question. It will probably be said that here it is
necessary to make special mention of Mr. N.–on, who, after all, openly
says that the problem of Free Trade and protection is a capitalist
problem, and says so more than once, and who even “quotes.”. . . Yes, yes, Mr. N.–on even quotes! But if we are
shown this passage from his Sketches we shall cite other
passages in which he proclaims that to give support to capitalism is
to “implant” it (and this in his “Summary and
Conclusions”! pp. 331, 323 and also 283), and states that the
encouragement of capitalism is “a fatal blunder” because
“we have overlooked,” “we have forgotten,” “our minds have been obscured,” and so forth (p. 298. Compare
this with Sismondi!). How can this be reconciled with the assertion that
support for capitalism (with export bonuses) is “one of the numerous
contradictions with which our economic life teems; [1] this one,
like all the rest, owes its existence to the form which all
production is assuming” (p. 286)? Note: all production ! We ask any impartial person: what is the point
of view of this author, who proclaims support of “ the form which all production is assuming ” to be a
“blunder”? Is it the point of view of Sismondi, or of scientific theory? Here, too (as on the subjects we examined
above), Mr. N.–on’s “quotations” turn out to be irrelevant, clumsy interpolations, which do not in the least
express a real conviction that these “quotations” are applicable to Russian reality. Mr. N.–on’s
“quotations” from modern theory are window-dressing and can only mislead the reader. It is an awkwardly worn
“realist” costume under which the thoroughbred romanticist hides. [2]

## Notes

[1] In the same way as Sketches “teem” with exhortations
to “us,” with the exclamations “we,” and similar phrases, which ignore these contradictions.
— Lenin

[2] We have a suspicion that Mr. N.–on regards these “quotations”
as a talisman which protects him from all criticism. It is difficult
otherwise to explain the fact that, on hearing from Messrs. Struve and
Tugan-Baranovsky that his doctrine had been compared with
Sismondi’s, Mr. N.–on, in one of his articles in Russkoye
Bogatstvo (1894, No. 6, p. 88), “quoted” the opinion of a
representative of the modern theory who describes Sismondi as a
petty-bourgeois reactionary and utopian. [3] Evidently, he is profoundly
convinced that by means of such a “quotation” he “refuted” the comparison made between himself and Sismondi.
— Lenin

[3] 

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## XI

## Sismondi’s Place in the History of Political Economy

We are now familiar with all of Sismondi’s main propositions
relating to economic theory. Summing up, we see that, everywhere, Sismondi
remains absolutely true to himself, that his point of view remains
unchanged. On the one hand, on all points he differs from the classical
economists in that he indicates the contradictions of capitalism. On the
other hand, on no point is he able (or willing) to extend the analysis of
the classical economists, and therefore confines himself to a sentimental
criticism of capitalism from the viewpoint of the petty bourgeois. This
substitution of sentimental complaints and lamentations for a scientific
analysis results in his conception being extremely superficial. Modern
theory accepted his references to the contradictions of capitalism,
subjected them to a scientific analysis, and on all points reached
conclusions which radically differ from Sismondi’s, and for that
reason lead to a diametrically opposite point of view concerning
capitalism.

In A Critique of Some of the Propositions of Political Economy ( Zur Kritik , [7] Russ. trans., Moscow, 1896) Sismondi’s
place in the history of the science is described as follows:

“Sismondi is no longer labouring under Boisguillebert’s idea
that labour which creates exchange value is adulterated by money; but just as Boisguillebert denounced money, so does Sismondi
denounce large industrial capital” (p. 36).

The author wants to say: Just as Boisguillebert superficially regarded
barter as a natural system and was up in arms against money, which was to
him an “extraneous element” (p. 30, ibid .), so
Sismondi regarded small-scale production as a natural system and was up in
arms against big capital, which he regarded as an extraneous
element. Boisguillebert did not understand the inseparable and natural
connection between money and commodity exchange, did not understand that
he was contrasting two forms of “bourgeois labour” as extraneous elements ( ibid ., pp. 30-31). Sismondi failed to
understand the inseparable and natural connection between big capital and
small independent production, failed to understand that these are two
forms of commodity economy. Boisguillebert “is up in arms against
bourgeois labour in one form while, utopian-like, he praises it in
another” ( ibid .). Sismondi is up in arms against big capital, i.e., against commodity economy in one form, its most developed
form, while, utopian-like, he praises the small producer (especially the
peasantry), i.e., commodity economy in another form, its rudimentary form.

“In Ricardo,” continues the author of the Critique , “political economy reached its climax, after recklessly drawing its
ultimate conclusions, while Sismondi supplemented it by impersonating its
doubts” (p. 36).

Thus, the author of the Critique reduces the significance of
Sismondi to the fact that he raised the question of the
contradictions of capitalism, and thereby set the task of making a further
analysis. The author we have quoted regards all the independent views of
Sismondi, who also wanted to answer this question, as unscientific and superficial, and as reflecting his reactionary
petty-bourgeois point of view (see the above-quoted opinions, and one
quoted below in connection with a “quotation” by Ephrucy).

Comparing Sismondi’s theory with Narodism, we find on nearly all
points (except his repudiation of Ricardo’s theory of rent and his
Malthusian admonitions to the peasants) an astonishing similarity, which
sometimes goes as far as identity of terms. The Narodnik economists fully
share Sismondi’s point of view. We shall be still more convinced of this later, when we pass from theory to Sismondi’s
views on practical problems.

And lastly, as regards Ephrucy, on no point has he given a correct
appraisal of Sismondi. Pointing to Sismondi’s emphasis on, and
condemnation of, the contradictions of capitalism, Ephrucy was quite
unable to understand either the sharp difference between his theory and
the theory of scientific materialism, or that the romanticist and
scientific points of view on capitalism are diametrically opposite. The
fellow feeling of the Narodnik for the romanticist, their touching
unanimity, prevented the author of the essays in Russkoye
Bogatstvo from correctly characterising this classical representative
of romanticism in economic science.

We have just quoted the opinion on Sismondi that “he impersonated
the doubts” of classical political economy.

But Sismondi did not think of confining himself to this role (which gives
him an honourable place among the economists). As we have seen, he tried
to solve the doubts, but did so very unsuccessfully. Not only that. His
accusation against the classical economists and their science was not that
they halted before an analysis of the contradictions, but that they
employed wrong methods. “The old science does not teach us either to
understand or avert” new disasters (I, XV), says Sismondi in the
preface to the second edition of his book, and he does not explain this
fact by indicating that the analysis made by this science is incomplete
and inconsistent but by claiming that it “plunged into abstractions” (I, 55: the new disciples of Adam Smith in England
plunged [ se sont jetés ] into abstractions, forgetting about
“man”) and was “proceeding along a wrong path” (II, 448). What is the charge levelled by Sismondi against the classical
economists which permits him to draw this conclusion?

“The economists, the most celebrated of them, devoted too little
attention to consumption and to the market” (I, 124).

This accusation has been repeated innumerable times since Sismondi’s
day. It has been deemed necessary to separate “consumption”
from “production” as a special department of the science; it
has been said that production depends upon natural laws, whereas consumption is determined by distribution, which
depends upon the will of man, and so on, and so forth. It is common
knowledge that our Narodniks hold the same views and put distribution in
the

forefront. [1]

What meaning is there to this accusation? It is based solely on an
extremely unscientific conception of the very subject of political
economy. Its subject is not by any means “the production of material
values,” as is often claimed (that is the subject of technology),
but the social relations between men in production. Only by interpreting
“production” in the former sense can one separate “distribution” from it, and when that is done, the
“department” of production does not contain the categories of
historically determined forms of social economy, but categories that
relate to the labour process in general: usually, such empty banalities
merely serve later to obscure historical and social conditions. (Take, for
example, the concept of capital.) If, however, we consistently regard
“production” as social relations in production, then both
“distribution” and “consumption” lose all independent significance. Once relations in production have been
explained, both the share of the product taken by the different classes
and, consequently, “distribution” and “consumption” are thereby explained. And vice versa,
if production relations remain unexplained (for example, if the process of the production of the
aggregate social capital is not understood), all arguments about
consumption and distribution turn into banalities, or innocent, romantic
wishes. Sismondi was the originator of such arguments. Rodbertus also
talked a lot about the “distribution of the national product,”
and Ephrucy’s “modern” authorities even formed special “schools,” one of the principles of which was to pay special
attention to distribution. [2] But none of these theoreticians of
“distribution” and “consumption” were able to solve even the fundamental problem of the difference between social
capital and social revenue; all continued to grope in the contradictions
before which Adam Smith had come to a halt. [3] The problem was solved only by the
economist who never singled out distribution, and who protested most
vigorously against the “vulgar” arguments about “distribution” (cf. Marx’s criticism of the Gotha
Programme quoted by P. Struve in his Critical Remarks , p. 129,
epigraph to chapter IV). [8] Not only that. The very solution of the problem
consisted of an analysis of the reproduction of social capital. The author did not make a special problem of either consumption
or distribution, but both were fully explained after the analysis of production had been carried to its conclusion.

“... Scientific analysis of the capitalist mode of production
demonstrates . . . that the distribution relations essentially coincident
with these production relations are their opposite side, so that both
share the same historically transitory character.” “The wage presupposes wage-labour, and
profit—capital. These definite forms of distribution thus presuppose
definite social characteristics ( Charaktere ) of production
conditions, and definite social relations of production agents. The
specific distribution relations are thus merely the expression of the
specific historical production relations.”. . . “Every form of
distribution disappears with the specific form of production from which it
is descended and to which it corresponds.”

“The view which regards only distribution relations as historical,
but not production relations, is, on the one hand, solely the view of the
initial, but still handicapped (inconsistent, befangen) criticism of
bourgeois economy. On the other hand, it rests on the confusion and
identification of the process of social production with the simple
labour-process, such as might even be performed by an abnormally isolated
human being without any social assistance. To the extent that the
labour-process is solely a process between man and Nature, its simple
elements remain common to all social forms of development. But each
specific historical form of this process further develops its material
foundations and social forms” ( Capital , Vol. III, 2, pp. 415, 419 and 420, German original). [9]

Sismondi was no more fortunate in attacks of another sort against the
classical economists, attacks which occupy still more space in his Nouveaux Principes . “The new disciples of Adam Smith in
England plunged into abstractions, forgetting about man. . .” (I,
55). For Ricardo “wealth is everything and men nothing” (II,
331). “They” (the economists who advocate Free Trade)
“often sacrifice men and real interests to an abstract theory”
(II, 457), and so forth.

How old these attacks are, and yet how new! I have in mind their renewal
by the Narodniks, who have made such a noise over the frank admission that
the capitalist development of Russia is her real, actual and inevitable
development. Have they not repeated the same thing in different keys when
shouting about “apologetics of the money power,” about “social-bourgeois character,” and so forth? [10] The remark addressed
to the sentimental critics of capitalism in general is applicable to them
to an even greater extent than to Sismondi: Man schreie nicht
zu sehr über den Zynismus ! Der Zynismus liegt in der Sache , nicht in den Worten , welche die Sache bezeichnen ! But do not make an outcry at the
cynicism of it. The cynicism is in the facts and not in the words which
express the facts. [11] “To an even greater extent,” we say. This is because the
West-European romanticists did not have before them a scientific analysis
of the contradictions of capitalism, because they were the first to
indicate these contradictions, because they denounced (in “plaintive
words,” incidentally) the people who did not see these contradictions.

Sismondi violently attacked Ricardo for drawing all the conclusions from
his observations and study of bourgeois society with ruthless frankness:
he noted frankly both the existence of production for production and the
transformation of labour-power into a commodity similar to any other
commodity and the fact that the net revenue, that is, the amount of
profit, is the only thing of importance to “society. [4] But Ricardo spoke
the absolute truth: actually every thing is exactly as he
says . If this truth seemed to Sismondi to be a “base truth,” he should not have sought for the causes of this baseness in
Ricardo’s theory at all, and should not have directed his attacks at
“abstractions”; the exclamations he addressed to Ricardo belong
entirely to the sphere of “the deception which exalts us.”

Well, what about our modern romanticists? Do they think of denying the
reality of the “money power”? Do they think of denying that this
power is omnipotent not only among the industrial population, but also
among the agricultural population of any “village community”
and of any remote village you like? Do they think of denying that there is
a necessary connection between this fact and commodity economy?
They have not even attempted to subject this to doubt. They simply try not
to talk of it. They are afraid of calling things by their real names.

We fully understand their fear: the frank admission of reality would
completely cut the ground from under the sentimental (Narodnik) criticism
of capitalism. It is not surprising that they so ardently rush into battle
before they have had time to clean the rusty weapon of romanticism. It is
not surprising that they are unscrupulous in their methods and want to
present hostility towards sentimental criticism as hostility
towards criticism in general. After all, they are fighting for their right
to existence.

Sismondi even tried to elevate his sentimental criticism to the plane of a special method of social science . We have already seen that he
did not reproach Ricardo with bringing his objective analysis to a halt
when faced with the contradictions of capitalism (such a reproach would
have been justified), but reproached him for the objectivity of
his analysis. Sismondi said that Ricardo “forgets about man.”
In his preface to the second edition of Nouveaux Principes we
find the following tirade:

“I deem it necessary to protest against the customary methods, so
often superficial, so often false, of judging a work relating to the
social sciences. The problem which they have to solve is incomparably more
complex than all the problems of the natural sciences; at the same time it
appeals as much to the heart as it does to the mind” (I, XVI). How
familiar to the Russian reader is this idea of contrasting the natural
sciences to the social sciences, and of the latter appealing to the “heart”! [5] Sismondi here expresses the very ideas which were to be “newly discovered” several decades later in
the far east of Europe by the “Russian school of sociologists”
and figure as a special “subjective method in sociology.”
. . . Sismondi, like our native sociologists, of course appeals “to
the heart as well as to the mind.” [6] But we have already seen that on all the most
important problems, the “heart” of the petty bourgeois triumphed over the “mind” of the economist theoretician.

## Notes

[1] It goes without saying that Ephrucy did not miss the opportunity to praise
Sismondi for this as well. “The important thing in Sismondi’s
doctrine,” we read in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8, p. 56
“is not so much the various special measures which he proposed, as
the general spirit which permeates the whole of his system. Contrary to
the classical school, he lays special emphasis on the interests of
distribution and not on those of production.” In spite of his
repeated “references” to the “modern” economists, Ephrucy did not under stand their theory at all, and continued to busy
himself with the sentimental nonsense which distinguishes the primitive
critique of capitalism. Here, too, our Narodnik wants to save himself by
comparing Sismondi with “many prominent representatives of the
historical school”; and so you see, “Sismondi went further”
( ibid .), and Ephrucy is quite content with that! “Went
further—than the German professors—what more do you want? Like
all the Narodniks, Ephrucy tries to lay the main emphasis on the point
that Sismondi criticised capitalism. The economist of Russkoye
Bogatstvo evidently has no idea that capitalism can be criticised in
different ways, that it can be criticised from both the sentimental and
the scientific point of view.
— Lenin

[2] Ingram quite rightly likens Sismondi to the
“Katheder-Socialists” (p. 212, A History of Political
Economy , Moscow, 1891) when he naïvely observed: “. . .We
are ready (!!) to admit Sismondi’s view of the state as a
power. . . charged also with the mission of extending the benefits of the
social union and of modern progress as widely as possible through all
classes of the community” (215). What profundity distinguishes these
“views” of Sismondi’s we have already seen in the case of protection.
— Lenin

[3] See, for example, R. Meyer’s article “Income” in Handwörterbuch der Staatswissenschaft (Russian translation
in the collection of articles entitled Promyshlennost [ Industry ] ), which reveals the hopeless conclusion in the
arguments of the “modern” German professors on this subject. It is curious that R. Meyer, who refers directly to Adam Smith
and mentions in his bibliography the very chapters of Volume II
of Capital which contain a complete refutation of Smith, makes no
mention of this in the text.
— Lenin

[4] Ephrucy, for example, repeats with an important air Sismondi’s
sentimental phrases about an increase in the net revenue of the
entrepreneur not being a gain for the national economy, and so forth and
reproaches him merely for having “realised” this “not quite clearly yet” (p. 43, No. 8).

Would you not like to compare with this the results of the
scientific analysis of capitalism:

The gross income (Roheinkommen) of society consists of wages +
profit + rent. The net income (Reineinkommen) is surplus-value.

“Viewing the income of the whole society, national income consists of
wages plus profit plus rent, thus, of the gross income. But even this is
an abstraction to the extent that the entire society, on the basis of
capitalist production, bases itself on the capitalist stand-point and
thereby considers only the income resolved into profit and rent as net
income” (III, 2, 375–76). [12]

Thus, the author fully sides with Ricardo and his definition of the “net
income” of “society,” sides with the very definition which evoked
Sismondi’s “celebrated objection” ( Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8,
p. 44): “What? Wealth is everything and men nothing?” (II, 331). In modern
society–yes, certainly.
— Lenin

[5] “Political economy is not simply a science of calculation
( n’est pas une science de calcul ) but a moral science. . . . It achieves its object only when the feelings, needs, and
passions of men are taken into consideration” (I, 313). These
sentimental phrases which Sismondi and the Russian sociologists of the
subjective school who utter exactly the same exclamations regard as new
conceptions of social science actually show that criticism of the
bourgeoisie was still in an infantile primitive state. Does not a
scientific analysis of contradictions, while remaining a strictly
objective “calculation,” provide firm ground for understanding
“the feelings, needs and passions,” and the passions not of
“men” in general—that abstraction to which both the romanticist and the Narodnik ascribe a specifically petty-bourgeois
content—but of the men of definite classes ?  The point is,
however, that Sismondi could not theoretically refute the
economists and therefore confined himself to sentimental
phrases. “Utopian dilettantism was forced to make theoretical
concessions to any more or less learned defender of the bourgeois
order. In order to allay the consciousness of his own impotence that was
rising within him, the utopian consoled himself by reproaching his
opponents with objectivity: let us admit that you are more learned than I,
but in return I am kinder” (Beltov,

p. 43). [13] — Lenin

[6] As if the “problems” which arise from the natural
sciences do not also appeal to the “heart”!
— Lenin

[7] Zur Kritik —initial words of the title of Marx’s Zur Kritik der politischen Ökonomie . Lenin cites passages
from P. P. Rumyantsev’s Russian translation of this book published
in 1896 (K. Marx, Zur Kritik der politischen Ökonomie ,
Moskau-Leningrad, 1934, S 49).

[8] Karl Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme . Marx and Engels, Selected Works , Vol. II, Moscow, 1958, pp. 24-25.

In the 1897 and 1898 editions Lenin, in view of the censorship, did not refer directly
to Marx, but to Struve. In the 1908 edition, however, he referred to
Marx’s Critique of the Gotha Programme . This correction has
been made in the present edition.

[9] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. III, Moscow, 1959, pp. 856, 860, 861.

[10] Lenin refers to Narodnik polemical articles directed against the Marxists:
N. F. Danielson, “An Apology for Money Power as a Sign of the
Times,” published under the pseudonym Nikolai-on in Russkoye
Bogatstvo , No. 1-2, 1895; V. P. Vorontsov, “German
Social-Democratism and Russian Bourgeoisism,” published under the
pseudonym V. V. in the newspaper Nedelya ( Week ), Nos. 47-49, 1894.

[11] Karl Marx, Poverty of Philosophy , Moscow, p. 55.

[12] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. III, Moscow, 1959, p. 819.

[13] G. V. Plekhanov (n. Beltov), The Development of the Monist
View of History , Moscow, 1956, p. 60.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## Postscript [1]

That the appraisal given here of the sentimental Sismondi in relation to
scientifically “objective” Ricardo is correct, is fully
confirmed by the opinion Marx expressed in the second volume of Theories of Surplus-Value , which appeared in 1905 ( Theorien
über den Mehrwert , II. B., I. Th., S. 304
u. ff. “Bemerkungen über die Geschichte der Entdeckung des
sogenannten Ricardoschen

Gesetzes”). [2] Contrasting Malthus as a wretched plagiarist, a paid advocate of the rich and a shameless sycophant, to
Ricardo as a man of science, Marx said:

“Ricardo regards the capitalist mode of production as the most
advantageous for production in general, as the most advantageous for the
creation of wealth, and for his time Ricardo is quite right. He wants production for the sake of production , and he is right. To object
to this, as Ricardo’s sentimental opponents did, by pointing to the
fact that production as such is not an end in itself, means to forget that
production for the sake of production is nothing more nor less than the
development of the productive forces of mankind, i.e., the development
of the wealth of human nature as an end in itself . If this end is set
up in contrast to the welfare of individuals, as Sismondi did, it is
tantamount to asserting that the development of the whole human race must
be retarded for the sake of ensuring the welfare of individuals,
that, consequently, no war, we shall say for example, can be waged,
because war causes the death of individuals. Sismondi is right only in
opposition to those economists who obscure this antagonism, deny
it” (S. 309). From his point of view Ricardo has every right to put
the proletarians on a par with machines, with commodities in capitalist
production. “ Es ist dieses stoisch , objektiv , wissenschaftlich ,” “this is stoicism, this is
objective, this is scientific” (S. 313). It goes without saying that
this appraisal applies only to a definite period, to the very beginning of
the nineteenth century.

## Notes

[1] This postscript was written
for the 1908 edition.— Ed .

[2] Theories of Surplus-Value , Vol. II, Part I, p. 304, et seq . “Notes on the History of the Discovery of
the So-called Ricardian

Law.” [3] — Ed .

[3] Karl Marx, Theorien über den Mehrwert , Bd. I,
Hb. 2, S. 304, 1923. For pages cited here see pp. 309 and 313.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## III

## The Problem of the Growth of the Industrial Population At the Expense of the Agricultural Population

Let us return to Sismondi. In addition to his idealisation of the petty
bourgeoisie, in addition to his romanticist failure to understand how,
under the present social system of economy, the “peasantry” is
transformed into a petty bourgeoisie, he holds an extremely characteristic view about the diminution of the agricultural population to the advantage
of the industrial population. It is common knowledge that this
phenomenon—one of the most striking manifestations of a
country’s capitalist development—is observed in all civilised
countries, and also in

Russia. [1]

Sismondi, an outstanding economist of his time, must, of course, have seen
this fact. He openly records it, but fails completely to understand the
necessary connection between it and the development of capitalism (to put
it even more generally: between it and the division of social labour, the
growth of commodity economy called forth by this phenomenon). He simply condemns it as a defect in the “system.”

After pointing to the enormous progress made by English agriculture,
Sismondi says:

“While admiring the carefully cultivated fields, we must look at the
people who cultivate them; they constitute only half the number to be seen
in France on an equal area. Some economists regard this as again; in my
opinion it is a loss” (I, 239).

We can understand why the ideologists of the bourgeoisie regarded this
thing as a gain (we shall soon see that such is also the view of
the scientific critique of capitalism): in this way they formulated the
growth of bourgeois wealth, commerce and industry. While hastening to condemn this phenomenon, Sismondi forgets to think about its
causes.

“In France and in Italy,” he says, “where, it is calculated, four-fifths of the population belong to the agricultural
class, four-fifths of the nation will have the national bread to eat, no
matter what the price of foreign grain may be” (I, 264). Fuit
Troja ! is what can be said of this. There are now no countries (even the most highly agricultural) which are
not entirely dependent upon the price of grain , i.e., upon world
capitalist production of grain.

“If a nation cannot increase its commercial population except by
demanding from each a larger amount of work for the same pay, it must fear
an increase in its industrial population” (I, 322). As the reader
sees, this is merely kind advice devoid of all sense and meaning, for here
the concept “nation” is based on the artificial exclusion of
the antagonisms between the classes which constitute this
“nation.” As always, Sismondi simply wriggles out of these antagonisms by means of the well-meaning wish that . . . there
should be no antagonisms.

“In England, agriculture employs only 770,199 families, commerce and
industry employ 959,632, the other estates in society 413,316. It is truly
frightful ( effrayante ) that such a large proportion of the
population, out of a total of 2,143,147 families, or 10,150,615 persons,
exists on commercial wealth. Happily, France is still far from having such
an enormous number of workers depending upon luck in a remote
market” (I, 434). Here Sismondi even seems to forget that this
“happiness” is due entirely to the lag in France’s capitalist development.

Depicting the changes in the existing system which are “desirable” from his point of view (we shall discuss these
later), Sismondi says that “the result” (of reforms to suit
the romantic taste) “would undoubtedly be that more than one country
living merely by industry would have to successively close down many
workshops, and that the urban population, which had increased excessively,
would rapidly decline, whereas the rural population would begin to
grow” (II, 367).

This example brings out in particular relief the helplessness of the
sentimental criticism of capitalism and the impotent vexation of the petty
bourgeois! Sismondi simply complains [2] that things are going one way and not
another. His grief at the destruction of the Eden of the rural
population’s patriarchal dullness and downtrodden condition is so great that our economist does not even discern why it takes place. He
therefore overlooks the fact that the increase in the industrial
population is necessarily and inseverably connected with commodity economy
and capitalism. Commodity economy develops to the degree that the social
division of labour develops. And the division of labour means precisely
that one industry after another, one form of processing the raw product
after another, separates from agriculture, becomes independent,
and consequently gives rise to an industrial population. Therefore, to
discuss commodity economy and capitalism and ignore the law of the
relative growth of the industrial population, means to have no notion
whatever of the fundamental characteristics of the present system of social economy.

“It is in the nature of capitalist production to continually reduce
the agricultural population as compared with the non-agricultural, because
in industry (in the strict sense) the increase of constant capital in
relation to variable capital goes hand in hand with an absolute increase,
though relative decrease, [3] in variable capital; on the other hand, in
agriculture the variable capital required for the exploitation of a
certain plot of land decreases absolutely; it can thus only increase to
the extent that new land [4] is taken into cultivation, but this again
requires as a prerequisite a still greater growth of the non-agricultural
population” (III, 2, 177). [10]

On this point modern theory takes a view diametrically opposite to that of
romanticism with its sentimental complaints. When we understand that something is inevitable, we naturally
adopt a totally different attitude towards it and are able to appraise its
different aspects. The phenomenon we are now discussing is one of the most
profound and most general of the contradictions of the capitalist
system. The separation of town from country, their oppositeness, and the
exploitation of the countryside by the town—these universal
concomitants of developing capitalism—are a necessary product of the
preponderance of “commercial wealth” (to use Sismondi’s
term) over “territorial wealth” (agricultural wealth). Therefore, the predominance of the town over the countryside
(economically, politically, intellectually, and in all other respects) is
a universal and inevitable thing in all countries where there is commodity
production and capitalism, including Russia: only sentimental romanticists
can bewail this. Scientific theory, on the contrary, points to the progressive aspect given to this contradiction by large-scale
industrial capital. “Capitalist production, by collecting the
population in great centres, and causing an ever-increasing preponderance
of town population . . . concentrates the historical motive-power of society” [11] ( die geschichtliche Bewegungskraft der

Gesellschaft ). [5] If the predominance of the town is inevitable, only the attraction of the population to the
towns can neutralise (and, as history shows, does in fact neutralise) the
one-sided character of this predominance. If the town necessarily gains
itself a privileged position, leaving the village subordinate,
undeveloped, helpless and downtrodden, only the influx of the village
population into the towns, only this mingling and merging of the
agricultural with the non-agricultural population, can lift the rural
population out of its helplessness. Therefore, in reply to the reactionary
complaints and lamentations of the romanticists, modern theory indicates exactly how this narrowing of the gap between the conditions of life of
the agricultural and of the non-agricultural population creates the
conditions for eliminating the antithesis between town and country.

The question now is: what is the point of view of our Narodnik economists
on this problem? Undoubtedly, that of the sentimental romanticist. Far
from understanding that the growth of the industrial population is necessary under the present system of social economy, they even try to close their eyes to the phenomenon itself, like the bird
which hides its head under its wing. As was to be expected, no answer was
forthcoming to P. Struve’s statement that Mr. N.–on, in his
arguments about capitalism, commits a gross error when he asserts that
there is an absolute diminution of variable capital ( Critical
Remarks , p. 255), and that it is absurd to contrast Russia with the
West in respect of the former’s smaller percentage of industrial
population and at the same time to ignore the growth of this percentage as
a result of the development of capitalism [6] ( Sozialpolitisches Centralblatt , [12] 1893, No. 1). While
constantly harping upon the specific features of Russia, the Narodnik
economists have not even been able to present the problem of the actual
specific features of the formation of an industrial population in
Russia, [7] to which we briefly referred above. Such is the Narodniks’ theoretical attitude towards this problem. Actually, however,
when the Narodniks, untrammelled by theoretical doubts, discuss the
conditions of the peasants in the post-Reform countryside, they admit that
the peasants who are ousted from agriculture migrate to the towns and to
factory areas, but they confine themselves to bewailing this state of
affairs, just as Sismondi bewailed it. [8] They do not notice at all either
the economic or (what is perhaps more important) the moral and educational significance
of the profound change that has taken place in the conditions of life of
the masses of the population in post-Reform Russia—a process which,
for the first time, has disturbed the peasantry’s settled life,
their position of being tied to their localities, given them mobility, and
narrowed the gap between the agricultural and non-agricultural labourers,
the rural and the urban workers. [9] All they have derived from it is an occasion
for sentimental-romanticist lamentations.

## Notes

[1] The percentage of the urban population in European Russia has been growing
in the post-Reform period. Here we must confine ourselves merely to
pointing to this most commonly known symptom, although it expresses the
phenomenon far from completely , in that it does not include
important features specific to Russia as compared with Western
Europe. This is not the place to examine these specific features (the
peasants’ lack of freedom of movement, the existence of industrial
and factory villages, internal colonisation of the country, and so forth).
— Lenin

[2] “Ultimately . . . this form of Socialism” (namely the trend of
petty-bourgeois criticism, of which Sismondi was the head) “ended in
a miserable fit of the blues.” [13] — Lenin

[3] From this the reader can judge the wit of Mr. N.–on who, in his Sketches , without ceremony transforms the relative decrease of
variable capital and of the number of workers into an absolute one, and
from this draws a host of the absurdest conclusions concerning the
“shrinking” of the home market, and so forth.
— Lenin

[4] It was this condition that we had in mind when we said that the internal
colonisation of Russia hindered the manifestation of the law of the
greater growth of the industrial population. It is enough to recall the
difference between Russia’s long-settled central areas, where the
industrial population grew not so much in the towns as in the factory
villages and townships, and, say, Novorossiya, which has been settled in
the post-Reform period, and where the towns are growing at a pace
comparable with that of America. We hope to deal with this problem in
greater detail elsewhere.
— Lenin

[5] Cf. also the particularly striking characterisation of the progressive
role played by industrial centres in the intellectual development of the
population in Die Lage der arbeitenden Klasse in England, 1845 . [14] That the recognition of
this role did not prevent the author of The Condition of the
Working Class in England from profoundly understanding the
contradiction manifested in the separation of town from country,
is proved by his polemical book against Düring. [15] — Lenin

[6] Let the reader recall that this is the mistake made by Sismondi
when he said that “happily” eighty per cent of the population
of France were agricultural, as if this was a specific feature of some
“people’s production,” and so forth, and not a reflection of lag in capitalist development.
— Lenin

[7] Cf. Volgin, The Substantiation of Narodism in the Works of
Mr. Vorontsov . St. Petersburg, 1896, pp. 215-16.
— Lenin

[8] In fairness, however, it must be said that Sismondi observes the growth of
the industrial population in several countries, and recognises its
universal nature and reveals here and there an understanding of the fact
that this is not merely some “anomaly,” and so forth, but a
profound change in the people’s conditions of life—a change
which admittedly has something good in it. At all events the following
observation of his on the harmfulness of the division of labour reveals
views far more profound than those of Mr. Mikhailovsky, for example, who
invented a general “formula of progress,” instead of analysing
the definite forms assumed by the division of labour in different
formations of social economy and at different periods of development.

“Although the uniformity of the operations to which all the
workers’ activities in the factories are reduced must obviously harm
their mental development (intelligence), nevertheless, it must be said in
fairness that according to the observations of the best judges the
manufactory workers in England are superior in intelligence education and
morals to the agricultural workers” ( ouvriers des champs )
(1, 397). And Sismondi indicates the cause of this: Vivant sans cesse
ensemble, moins épuisés par la latigue et pouvant se livrer
davantage à la conversation, les idées ont circulé plus rapidement entre eux (Living constantly together, they are
less fatigued, and having greater opportunities of conversing with each
other ideas have spread more rapidly among them.— Ed .). But,
he adds in a melancholy tone aucun attachement à l’ordre
établi (they display no attachment to the established order.— Ed .).
— Lenin

[9] The forms assumed by this process are also different in the central parts
of European Russia as compared with the border regions It is mainly agricultural workers from the central black-earth gubernias and
partly non-agricultural workers from the industrial gubernias who
migrate to the border regions , where they spread their knowledge
of “their trades” and “implant” industry among the purely agricultural population. The migrants from the industrial
region are non-agricultural workers, part of whom scatter to
all parts of Russia but most of whom stream into the metropolitan cities
and the large industrial centres; and this industrial current, if one may
so express it, is so strong, that it creates a shortage of agricultural workers, who migrate to the industrial
gubernias (Moscow, Yaroslavl and other gubernias) from the central
black-earth gubernias. See S. A. Korolenko, Hired Labour, etc .
— Lenin

[13] Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party . Selected
Works , Vol.  I, Moscow, 1958, p. 57.

[10] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. III, Moscow, 1959, p. 622.

[11] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow, 1958, p. 505.

[14] Marx and Engels, On Britain , Moscow, 1953, pp. 1-336.

[15] Frederick Engels, Anti-Dühring , Moscow, 1954, pp. 402-14.

[12] Sozialpolitisches Centralblatt ( Central Social-Political
Sheet )—organ of the Right wing of German
Social-Democracy. First appeared in 1892.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## IV

## Practical Proposals of Romanticism

We shall now endeavour to sum up Sismondi’s point of view on
capitalism (a task which, as the reader remembers, Ephrucy, too, set
himself) and examine the practical programme of romanticism.

We have seen that Sismondi’s merit lay in his being one of the first to point to the contradictions of capitalism. But in pointing to
them he not only made no attempt to analyse them and explain their origin,
development and trend, but even regarded them as unnatural, or mistaken
digressions from the normal. He naïvely protested against these
“digressions” with moralising phrases, denunciations, advice
to eliminate them, and so forth, as if these contradictions did not
express the real interests of real groups of the population
occupying a definite place in the general system of social economy of the
present day. This is the most outstanding feature of romanticism—to
regard antagonism of interests (which is deeply rooted in the very system
of social economy) as a contradiction or an error of doctrine, system,
even of measures, and so forth. Here the narrow outlook of the Kleinburger , [1] who stands aloof from developed
contradictions and occupies an intermediary, transitional position between
the two poles, is combined with a naïve idealism—we are almost
ready to say a bureaucratic outlook—which attributes the existence
of a social system to the opinions of men (especially of the powers that
be) and not vice versa. We shall quote examples of all Sismondi’s
arguments of this kind.

“In forgetting men for the sake of things, has not England
sacrificed the aim to the means?

“The example of England is all the more striking in that this nation
is free, enlightened and well governed, and that all her misfortunes are
due solely to her pursuit of a wrong economic line” (I,
p. IX). In general Sismondi uses England as an example to frighten the
Continent with—just like our romanticists, who imagine that they are
contributing something new and not the oldest kind of rubbish.

“In drawing my readers’ attention to England, I wanted to show
. . . the history of our own future, if we continue to act on the
principles she has followed” (I, p. XVI).

“... The Continental countries deem it necessary to follow England
in her career of manufacture” (II, 330). “There is no more
astonishing, no more frightful spectacle than that presented by
England” (II, 332). [2] “It must not be forgotten that wealth is merely that which
represents ( n’est que la représentation ) the pleasures and amenities of life” (here wealth in general is
substituted for bourgeois wealth!), “and to create artificial wealth
and thereby doom a nation to all that which actually represents poverty
and suffering, means taking the name for the thing itself”
( prendre le mot pour la chose ) (I, 379).

“... As long as nations followed only the dictates (commands,
indications) of nature and enjoyed the advantages provided by climate,
soil, location and the possession of raw materials, they did not place
themselves in an unnatural position ( une position forcée ), they did not seek apparent wealth ( une
opulence apparente ) which for the masses becomes real poverty”
(I, 411). Bourgeois wealth is only apparent wealth!! “It is
dangerous for a nation to close its doors to foreign trade: this compels
the nation to engage, in a way ( en quelque sorte ) in false
activity , which leads to its ruin” (I,

448) [3]

“... Wages contain a necessary part which must sustain the life,
strength and health of those who receive them. . . . Woe to the government
that encroaches upon this part—it sacrifices everything (il sacrifie
tout ensemble)—men, and hope of future wealth. . . . This difference
enables us to understand how wrong is the policy of those governments
which have reduced the wages of the working classes to the limit required
to increase the net revenues of factory owners, merchants and property
owners” (II, 169). [4] “The time has come at last to ask: whither are we going?’l
( où l’on veut aller ) (II, 328).

“Their separation” (the separation of the property owning
class from the working people), “the antagonism of their interests,
is the result of the present-day artificial organisation which we have
given human society. . . . The natural order of social progress did not by
any means tend to separate men from things, or wealth from labour; in the
rural districts the property owner could remain a tiller of the soil; in
the towns the capitalist could remain an artisan; the separation of the
working class from the leisured class was not absolutely indispensable for
the existence of society, or for production; we introduced it for the
greatest benefit of all; it devolves upon us ( il nous appartient )
to regulate it so that this benefit may be really achieved” (II,
348).

“Having been put in opposition to each other, the producers”
(i.e., the masters and the workers) “were compelled to proceed along
a path diametrically opposed to the interests of society. . . . In this constant struggle to reduce wages, the public
interest, in which, however, all participate, in forgotten by all”
(II, 359-60). And this too is preceded by mention of the paths bequeathed
by history: “At the beginning of social life every man possesses
capital , through which he applies his labour, and nearly all artisans
live on a revenue consisting equally of profit and wages” (II, 359). [5]

Enough, it seems.... We can be certain that a reader who is familiar
neither with Sismondi nor with Mr. N.–on will find it difficult to say
which of the points of view of the two romanticists, the one in the
footnote or the one in the text, is the more primitive and naïve.

Sismondi’s practical proposals, to which he devoted so much space in
his Nouveaux Principes , fully conform to this.

The difference between us and Adam Smith, says Sismondi in the very first
book of his work, is that “we nearly always , call for that very
governmental interference which Adam Smith rejected” (I,
52). “The state does not rectify distribution” (I, 80). . . . “The legislator could ensure the poor man some guarantees
against universal competition” (I, 81). “Production must be
commensurate with social revenue, and those who encourage unlimited
production without taking the trouble to ascertain what this revenue is,
are pushing the nation to ruin, though they think they are opening to it
the road to wealth ( le chemin des richesses )” (I, 82). “When the progress of wealth is gradual
( gradué ), when it is proportionate to itself, when none of
its parts develops with excessive rapidity, it disseminates universal
prosperity. . . Perhaps it is the duty of governments to restrain
( ralentir !!) this movement in order to regulate it” (I,
409-10).

Of the enormous historical importance of the development of the productive
forces of society, which takes place precisely through these
contradictions and disproportions, Sismondi has not the faintest idea!

“If the government exercises a regulating and moderating influence
upon the pursuit of wealth, it can be infinitely beneficial” (I, 413). “Some of the measures to regulate trade
which are nowadays condemned by public opinion, although meriting
condemnation as a stimulus to industry, may, perhaps, be justified as a
curb” (I, 415).

These arguments of Sismondi’s already reveal his astonishing lack of
historical sense: he has not the faintest idea that liberation from
medieval regulation constituted the entire historical significance of the
period contemporary to him. He does not realise that his arguments bring
grist to the mill of the defenders of the ancien régime ,
who at that time were still so strong even in France, not to speak of the
other countries of the West-European continent where they ruled. [6]

Thus, the starting-point of Sismondi’s practical proposals
is—tutelage, restraint, regulation.

This point of view follows quite naturally and inevitably from the whole
of Sismondi’s range of ideas. He lived at the very time when
large-scale machine industry was taking its first steps on the European
continent, when there began that sharp and abrupt change of all social
relations under the influence of machines (note, under the influence of
machine industry, and not of “capitalism” in general), [7] a change which is
known in economic science as the industrial revolution . [8] Here is how it is described by one of
the first economists able fully to appreciate the profundity of the
revolution which created modern European societies in place of the
patriarchal semi-medieval societies:

“Such, in brief, is the history of English industrial development in
the past sixty years” (this was written in 1844), “a history
which has no counterpart in the annals of humanity. Sixty, eighty years
ago, England was a country like every other, with small towns, few and
simple industries, and a thin but proportionally large agricultural
population. Today it is a country like no other, with a capital
of two and a half million inhabitants; with vast manufacturing cities;
with an industry that supplies the world, and produces almost everything
by means of the most complex machinery; with an industrious, intelligent,
dense population, of which two-thirds are employed in trade and commerce,
and composed of classes wholly different; forming, in fact, with other
customs and other needs, a different nation from the England of those
days. The industrial revolution is of the same importance for England as
the political revolution for France, and the philosophical revolution for
Germany; and the difference between England in 1760 and in 1844 is at
least as great as that between France, under the ancien régime and
during the revolution of

July.” [9]

This was the complete “break-up” of all the old, deep rooted
relationships, whose economic basis had been small production. Naturally,
with his reactionary, petty-bourgeois point of view, Sismondi could not
understand the significance of this “break-up.” Naturally, he
first of all, and most of all, wished, urged, pleaded, demanded that this
“break-up should be stopped.” [10] ]

But how should this “break-up be stopped”? First of all, of
course, by supporting the people’s . . . that is to say,
“patriarchal production,” the peasantry and small farming in
general. Sismondi devotes a whole chapter (t. II, l. VII, ch. VIII) to the
subject of “how the government should protect the population from
the consequences of competition.”

“In relation to the agricultural population, the government’s
general task is to ensure those who work ( à ceux qui travaillent ) a part of the property, or to support
( favoriser ) what we have called patriarchal agriculture in preference to all other
kinds” (II, 340).

“A Statute of Elizabeth, which was disregarded, prohibited the
building of cottages [11] in England unless each was allotted a
four-acre plot of land. Had this law been obeyed, no day labourer could
have married without receiving a cottage , [12] and no cottager [13] would have been reduced to extreme poverty. This would
have been a step forward (c’est quelque chose), but it would not
have been enough; under the English climate, the peasant population would
have lived in want on four acres per family. Today, most of the English cottagers have only one and a half to two acres of land, for which they
pay a fairly high rent. . . . The law should compel . . . the landlord,
when he distributes his field among many cottagers , [14] to give each one enough land to live
on” (II, 342–43). [15]

The reader will see that the proposals of romanticism are absolutely identical with the proposals and programme of the Narodniks: they
too ignore actual economic development, and in the epoch of
large-scale machine industry, fierce competition and conflict of interests they fatuously presume the
preservation of conditions which reproduce the patriarchal conditions of
the hoary past.

## Notes

[1] Petty
bourgeois.— Ed .

[2] To show clearly the relation between European and Russian
romanticism we shall quote, in footnotes, passages from
Mr. N.–on. “We have refused to learn the lesson taught us by the
course of economic development of Western Europe. We have been so dazzled
by the brilliance of the development of capitalism in England, and we are
so astonished by the immeasurably more rapid development of capitalism in
the American States,” etc. (323). As you see, even
Mr. N.–on’s expressions are not distinguished for their novelty! He
is “astonished” by the same thing that “astonished” Sismondi at the beginning of the century.
— Lenin

[3] “. . . The economic path we have pursued for the past thirty years
has been a wrong one” (281). . . . “We have too long identified the interests of capitalism with those of the national
economy—an extremely fatal blunder. . . . The apparent results of the protection of industry . . . have obscured our
vision to such a degree that we have totally lost sight of the
popular-social aspect . . . we have lost sight of the price paid for this
development, we have forgotten the aim of all production”
(298)—except capitalist production!

“Disdain for one’s own past . . . the implanting of capitalism”
. . . (283). . . . “We . . . have resorted to all means to implant
capitalism”. . . (323). . . . “We have overlooked”
. . . ( ibid .).
— Lenin

[4] “. . . We
have not hindered the development of the capitalist forms of
production in spite of the fact that they are based upon the
expropriation of the peasantry” (323).
— Lenin

[5] “Instead of
adhering firmly to our age-old traditions; instead of developing
the principle of a close tie between the means of production and
the direct producer . . . instead of increasing the productivity
of its ( the peasantry ’s) labour by concentrating the means of production in its hands . . . instead of that, we
have taken the absolutely opposite path” (322-23). “We have mistaken the development of capitalism
for the development of the whole of people’s production
. . . we have overlooked the fact that the development of one . . . can only proceed at the expense of the other”
(323). Our italics.
— Lenin

[6] Ephrucy discerned
“civic courage” in these regrets and longings of
Sismondi (No. 7, p. 139). So the expression of sentimental
longings calls for civic courage!! Open any high-school textbook
on history and you will read that in the first quarter of the
nineteenth century the West-European countries were organised on
lines which the science of constitutional law designates by the
term: Polizeistaat (police state.— Ed .). You will read that the historical
task not only of that quarter, but also of the subsequent
quarter of the century, was to combat it. You will understand
then that Sismondi’s point of view smacks of the dull-wittedness of the small French peasant of the Restoration
period; that Sismondi exemplifies the combination of petty-bourgeois sentimental romanticism with phenomenal civic
immaturity.
— Lenin

[7] Capitalism in
England dates not from the end of the eighteenth century but
from a far earlier period.
— Lenin

[8] These words are in English in the original.— Ed .

[9] Engels, Die Lage der arbeitenden Klasse in

England . [16] — Lenin

[10] We make so bold as
to hope that Mr. N.–on will not resent our borrowing this
expression from him (p. 345), as we think it extremely apt and
characteristic.
— Lenin

[11] These words are in English in the original.— Ed .

[12] These words are in English in the original.— Ed .

[13] These words are in English in the original.— Ed .

[14] These words are in English in the original.— Ed .

[15] “Adhere to
our age-old traditions;” (is it not patriotism?)
“. . . develop our inherited principle of close connection
between the means of production and the direct producers”. . . (Mr. N.–on, 322). “We have turned from the
path we have followed for many centuries we have begun to
eliminate production based on the close connection between the
direct producer and the means of production, on the close
connection between agriculture and manufacturing industry, and
have based our economic policy on the principle of developing
capitalist production, which is based on the alienation of the
means of production from the direct producers, with all its
accompanying disasters, from which Western Europe is now
suffering” (28l). Let the reader compare this with the above-quoted view of the “West Europeans” themselves
on these “disasters from which Western Europe is suffering,” and so forth “The principle . . . of
allotting land to the peasants or . . . providing the producers
with implements of labour” (p. 2) . . .  “the-age old foundations of the people’s life”
(75). . . . “Hence we have in these figures” (i e., figures showing “the minimum amount of land needed under
present economic conditions to ensure the material security of
the rural population”) “one of the elements for the solution of the economic problem, but only one of the
elements” (65). As you see the West-European romanticists
were no less fond than the Russian of seeking in “age-old
traditions” “sanctions for people’s production.
— Lenin

[16] Marx and Engels, On Britain , Moscow, 1953, pp. 49-50.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## V

## The Reactionary Character of Romanticism

It goes without saying that Sismondi could not but realise how actual development was proceeding. Therefore, in demanding
“encouragement for small farming” (II, 355), he plainly said
that it was necessary “to direct agriculture along a road
diametrically opposite to that which it is following in England
today” (II, 354–55). [1] “Happily, England possesses means for doing a great deal for her
rural poor by dividing among them her vast common lands ( ses immenses
communaux ). . . . If her common lands were divided up into free
allotments ( en propriêtês franches ) of twenty to thirty acres they” (the English) “would see the revival of
that proud and independent class of countrymen, the yeomanry , [2] whose almost complete extinction they now
deplore” (II, 357-58).

The “plans” of romanticism are depicted as very easily realisable—precisely because they ignore real interests, and this is
the essence of romanticism. “Such a proposal” (to allot small
plots of land to day labourers and to impose the duty of guardianship over
the latter upon the landowners) “will probably rouse the indignation
of the big landowners, who alone enjoy legislative power today in England;
nevertheless, it is a just one. . . . The big landowners alone need the
services of day labourers; they created them—let them, therefore,
maintain them” (II, 357).

One is not surprised to read such naïve things written at the
beginning of the century: the “theory” of romanticism conforms
to the primitive state of capitalism in general, which conditioned such a
primitive point of view. At that time there was still conformity between
the actual development of capitalism—the theoretical conception of it—and
the attitude towards capitalism, and Sismondi, at all events, appears as a
writer who is consistent and true to himself.

“We have already shown,” says Sismondi, “the protection
that this class” (i.e., the class of artisans) “once found in
the establishment of guilds and corporations ( des jurandes et des
maïtrises ). . . . We are not proposing that their strange and
restrictive organisation should be restored. . . . But the legislator
should set himself the aim of increasing the reward for industrial labour,
of extricating those engaged in industry from the precarious
( prêcaire ) position in which they are living and, finally,
of making it easier for them to acquire what they call a status [3] ( un êtat ). . . . Today, the workers are born and die
workers, whereas formerly, the status of worker was merely the preliminary
stage, the first rung to a higher status. It is this ability to advance
( cette facultê progressive ) that it is important to restore. Employers must be given an incentive to promote their workers to
a higher status; to arrange it so that a man who hires himself to work in
a manufactory shall actually start by working simply for wages, but that
he should always have the hope, provided his conduct is good, of sharing
in the profits of the enterprise” (II, 344-45).

It would be difficult to express the viewpoint of the petty bourgeois more
strikingly! The guilds are Sismondi’s ideal, and the reservation he
makes about the undesirability of restoring them obviously means only that
the principle, the idea of the guilds should be taken (exactly as the
Narodniks want to take the principle, the idea of the village community,
and not the contemporary fiscal association called the village community)
and that its monstrous medieval features should be discarded. The
absurdity of Sismondi’s plan is not his wholesale defence of the
guilds, nor his wanting to restore them in their entirety—he did not
set out to do that. The absurdity lies in his making his model an association which arose out of the local artisans’ narrow,
primitive need for organisation, and wanted to apply this yardstick, this
model, to capitalist society, whose organising, socialising element is large-scale machine industry, which breaks down
medieval barriers and obliterates differences of place, origin and
trade. Appreciating the need for association, for organisation in general,
in one form or another, the romanticist takes as a model the association
which satisfied the narrow need for organisation in patriarchal, immobile
society, and wants to apply it to a totally transformed society, a society
with a mobile population, and with labour socialised within the bounds not
of a village community, or a corporation, but of a whole country, and even
beyond the bounds of a single country. [4]

It is this mistake that quite justly earns for the romanticist the
designation of reactionary , although this term is not used to
indicate a desire simply to restore medieval institutions, but the attempt
to measure the new society with the old patriarchal yardstick, the desire
to find a model in the old order and traditions, which are totally
unsuited to the changed economic conditions.

Ephrucy understood nothing of this circumstance. He understood the
characterisation of Sismondi’s theory as reactionary in the crude,
vulgar sense. Ephrucy was abashed. . . . What do you mean? he argued, how
can Sismondi be called a reactionary when he plainly says that he does not
want to restore the guilds? And Ephrucy decided that it was unfair to “accuse” Sismondi of being
“retrogressive,” that, on the contrary, Sismondi’s attitude “to the guild organisation was correct” and that he
“fully appreciated its historical importance” (No. 7, p. 147),
as has been proved, he says, by the historical researches of such and such
professors into the good sides of the guild organisation.

Quasi-scientific writers often possess an amazing ability not to see the
wood for the trees! Sismondi’s point of view on the guilds is
characteristic and important precisely because he links his practical
proposals with them. [5] That is why his theory is described as reactionary . But Ephrucy begins to talk without rhyme or reason
about modern historical works on the guilds!

The result of these inappropriate and quasi-scientific arguments was that
Ephrucy by-passed the very substance of the question, namely: is it or is
it not fair to describe Sismondi’s theory as reactionary? He
overlooked the very thing that is most important—Sismondi’s point of view . “I have been accused,” says Sismondi,
“of being an enemy of social progress in political economy, a
partisan of barbarous and coercive institutions. No, I do not want what
has already been, but I want something better than the present. I can not
judge the present otherwise than by comparing it with the past, but I am
far from wishing to restore the old ruins when I refer to them in order to
demonstrate the eternal needs of society” (II, 433). The wishes of the romanticists are very good (as are those of the
Narodniks). Their recognition of the contradictions of capitalism places
them above the blind optimists who deny the existence of these
contradictions. And it is not because he wanted to return to the Middle
Ages that he was regarded as a reactionary, but because, in his practical
proposals, he “compared the present with the past” and not
with the future; because he “demonstrated the eternal needs of society” [6] by referring to “ruins” and not by referring to the trends of modern development; It was this petty-bourgeois viewpoint
of Sismondi’s which sharply distinguishes him from the other
authors, who also demonstrated, in his time and after, the “eternal needs of society,” that
Ephrucy failed to understand.

This mistake of Ephrucy’s was due to the very same narrow
interpretation of the terms “petty-bourgeois” doctrine and
“reactionary” doctrine referred to above in connection with
the first of these terms. They by no means imply the selfish greed of the
small shopkeeper, or a desire to halt social development, to turn back:
they simply indicate the given author’s mistaken point of
view, his limited understanding and narrow outlook, which prompt the
choice of means (for the achievement of very good aims) that cannot be
effective in practice, and that can satisfy only the small producer or be
of service to the defenders of the past. Sismondi, for example, is not at
all a fanatical advocate of small proprietorship . He understands
the need for organisation and for association no less than our
contemporary Narodniks do. He expresses the wish that “half the
profits” of industrial enterprises should be “distributed
among the associated workers” (II, 346). He openly advocates a
“system of association” under which all the “achievements of production benefit the one engaged in it”
(II, 438). In speaking of the relation between his doctrine and the
doctrines, then well known, of Owen, Fourier, Thompson and Muiron,
Sismondi says: “I, like they, want to see association instead of
mutual opposition among those who produce a given article in common. But I
do not think that the means which they proposed for the achievement of
this object could ever lead to it” (II, 365).

The difference between Sismondi and these authors is precisely one of viewpoint . It is quite natural, therefore, that Ephrucy, who does
not understand this viewpoint, should completely misinterpret
Sismondi’s attitude to these authors.

“That Sismondi exercised too little influence upon his contemporaries,” we read in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8,
p. 57, “that the social reforms he proposed were not put into
effect, is due mainly to the fact that he was a long way ahead of his
time. He wrote at a time when the bourgeoisie was enjoying its
honeymoon. . . . Naturally, under these circumstances, the voice of a man
who was demanding social reforms could not but remain a voice crying in
the wilderness. But we know that posterity has not treated him much better. This, perhaps,
is due to Sismondi’s having been, as we have already said above, an
author who wrote in a transitional period; although he wanted big changes,
he could not completely discard the past. Moderate people therefore
thought he was too radical, whereas in the opinion of the representatives
of more extreme trends, he was too moderate.”

Firstly, to say that Sismondi was “ahead of his time” with the
reforms he proposed indicates a complete misunderstanding of the very
substance of the doctrine of Sismondi, who himself stated that he compared
the present with the past. One must indeed be infinitely short-sighted (or
in finitely partial to romanticism) to overlook the general spirit and
general significance of Sismondi’s theory only because Sismondi
favoured factory legislation, [7] and so forth.

Secondly, Ephrucy thus assumes that the difference between Sismondi and
the other authors is only in the degree of radicalness of the
reforms they proposed: they went further, but he did not entirely discard
the past.

That is not the point. The difference between Sismondi and these authors
is a much deeper one—it is not that some went further and others
were

timid, [8] but that they regarded the very character of reforms from two diametrically opposite points of view. Sismondi demonstrated the
“eternal needs of society.” So, too, did these authors. Sismondi was a utopian, he based his proposals on an abstract
idea and not on real interests. So were these authors; they also based
their plans on an abstract idea. But it was the character of
their respective plans that differed entirely, because they regarded modern economic development, which presented the question of
“eternal needs,” from diametrically opposite angles. The authors referred to anticipated the future; with the foresight
of genius they divined the trend that would be taken by the
“break-up” which the machine industry of that period was
effecting before their eyes. They looked in the direction in which
development was in fact proceeding; they, indeed, were ahead of
that development. Sismondi, however, turned his back on this
development; his utopia did not anticipate the future, but restored the
“stopping the break-up,” that very “break-up” from which the authors mentioned deduced their utopias. [9] That is why
Sismondi’s utopia is regarded—and quite rightly—as reactionary. The grounds for this characterisation, we repeat once again, are merely that Sismondi did not understand the progressive
significance of that “break-up” of the old semi-medieval,
patriarchal social relations in the West European countries which at the
end of last century large-scale machine industry began to effect.

This specific viewpoint of Sismondi’s can be discerned even in his
arguments about “association” in general. “I want,” he says, “the ownership of the manufactories ( la
propriêtê des manufactures ) to be shared among a large
number of medium capitalists, and not concentrated in the hands of one man
who owns many millions. . .” (II, 365). The viewpoint of the petty
bourgeois is still more strikingly reflected in the following utterance:
“Not the poor class, but the day-labourer class should be abolished;
it should be brought back to the propertied class” (II, 308) To be
“ brought back ” to the propertied class—these words express the sum and substance of Sismondi’s doctrine!

It goes without saying that Sismondi himself must have felt that his fine
wishes were impracticable, he must have been conscious that they were incompatible with the contemporary conflict
of interests. “The task of reuniting the interests of those who
associate in the same process of production ( qui concourent à la
même production ). . . is undoubtedly a difficult one, but I do
not think this difficulty is as great as is supposed” (II, 450). [10] The consciousness of
this incompatibility of his desires and aspirations and the actual
conditions and their development naturally stimulates the desire to prove
that it is “not yet too late. . . to go back,” and so forth. The romanticist tries to base himself upon the undeveloped
state of the contradictions of the existing system, upon the backwardness of the country. “The nations have won a system
of freedom into which we have entered” (this refers to the fall of
feudalism); “but at the time they destroyed the yoke that they had
borne for so long, the labourers ( les hommes de peine ) were not
bereft of all property. In the rural districts they possessed land for a
half share in the crops, were chinsh peasants ( censitaires ), [17] and tenant farmers
( ils se trouverent associês à la propriêtê du sol ). In the towns, as members of corporations and trade guilds
( mêtiers ) which they formed for mutual protection, they
were independent tradesmen ( ils se trouverent associês à la
propriêtê de leur industrie ). Only in our days, only in
the most recent times ( c’est dans ce moment même ) is the progress of wealth and competition breaking up all these
associations. But this break-up ( rêvolution ) is not yet half
accomplished” (II, 437).

“True, only one nation is in this unnatural position today; only in
one nation do we see this permanent contrast between apparent wealth
( richesse apparente ) and the frightful poverty of a tenth of the
population, which is forced to live on public charity. But this nation, so
worthy of emulation in other respects, so dazzling even in its errors,
has, by its example, tempted all the statesmen of the Continent. And if
these reflections cannot now benefit her, I shall at least, I think,
render a service to mankind and to my fellow countrymen by pointing to the danger of the path she is following, and by
showing from her own experience that to base political economy on the
principle of unrestricted competition means to sacrifice the interests of
mankind to the simultaneous operation of all personal passions” (II, 368). [11] That is
how Sismondi concludes his Nouveaux Principes .

The general significance of Sismondi and of his theory was distinctly
formulated by Marx in the following comment, which first outlines the
conditions of West-European economic life that gave rise to such a theory
(and did so exactly at the time when capitalism was only just beginning to
create large-scale machine industry there), and then gives an appraisal of it. [12] “The medieval burgesses and the small peasant proprietors were the
precursors of the modern bourgeoisie. In those countries which are but
little developed, industrially and commercially, these two classes still
vegetate side by side with the rising bourgeoisie.

“In countries where modern civilisation has become fully developed,
a new class of petty bourgeois has been formed, fluctuating between
proletariat and bourgeoisie and ever renewing itself as a supplementary
part of bourgeois society. The individual members of this class, however,
are being constantly hurled down into the proletariat by the action of
competition, and, as modern industry develops, they even see the moment
approaching when they will completely disappear as an independent section
of modern society, to be replaced, in manufactures, agriculture and
commerce, by overlookers, bailiffs and shopmen.

“In countries like France, where the peasants constitute far more
than half of the population, it was natural that writers who sided with
the proletariat against the bourgeoisie should use, in their criticism of
the bourgeois regime, the standard of the peasant and petty bourgeois, and
from the standpoint of these intermediate classes should take up the cudgels for the working class. Thus arose petty-bourgeois
Socialism. Sismondi was the head of this school, not only in France but
also in England.

“This doctrine dissected with great acuteness the contradictions in
the conditions of modern production. It laid bare the hypocritical
apologies of economists. It proved, incontrovertibly, the disastrous
effects of machinery and division of labour; the concentration of capital
and land in a few hands; overproduction and crises; it pointed out the
inevitable ruin of the petty bourgeois and peasant, the misery of the
proletariat, the anarchy in production, the crying inequalities in the
distribution of wealth, the industrial war of extermination between
nations, the dissolution of old moral bonds, of the old family relations,
of the old nationalities. [13] “In its positive aims, however, this form of Socialism aspires
either to restoring the old means of production and of exchange, and with
them the old property relations, and the old society, or to cramping the
modern means of production and of exchange, within the framework of the
old property relations that have been, and were bound to be, exploded by
those means. In either case, it is both reactionary and utopian.

“Its last words are: corporate guilds for manufacture; patriarchal
relations in agriculture.” [14]

We tried to prove that this description is correct as we examined each
separate item of Sismondi’s doctrine. Here let us merely note the
curious trick employed by Ephrucy to crown all the blunders he made in his
exposition, criticism and appraisal of romanticism. The reader will
remember that at the very beginning of his article (in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 7), Ephrucy stated that it was
“unfair” and “incorrect” to include Sismondi among the reactionaries and utopians ( loc . cit ., p. 138). To
prove this thesis Ephrucy firstly contrived to say nothing at all about
the main thing—the connection between Sismondi’s point of view
and the position and interests of a special class in capitalist society,
the small producers; secondly, in examining the various tenets of
Sismondi’s theory Ephrucy in part presented his attitude to modern
theory in a totally wrong light, as we have shown above, and in part,
simply ignored the modern theory and defended Sismondi with references to
German scholars who “went no further” than Sismondi; thirdly
and lastly, Ephrucy was pleased to sum up his appraisal of Sismondi in the
following way: “Our (!)  opinion of the importance of Simonde de
Sismondi,” he says, “we can (!!) sum up in the following
words” of a German economist ( Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8,
p. 57), and then follows the passage indicated above, i.e., only a
part of the characterisation given by that economist; but the part
which explains the connection between Sismondi’s theory and a
special class in modern society, and the part where the final conclusion
is drawn that Sismondi is reactionary and utopian, are omitted! More than
that. Ephrucy did not confine himself to taking a fragment of the
comment, which gives no idea of the comment as a whole , and
thereby presenting this economist’s attitude towards Sismondi in a
totally wrong light; he tried, further, to embellish Sismondi, while
pretending that he was merely conveying the opinion of that economist.

“Let us add to this,” says Ephrucy, “that in some of his
theoretical views, Sismondi is the predecessor of the most outstanding
modern

economists [15] :

let us recall his views on revenue from capital and on crises, his
classification of national revenue, and so forth” ( ibid .). Thus, instead of supplementing this German
economist’s reference to Sismondi’s merits with the same
economist’s reference to Sismondi’s petty-bourgeois point of
view, and to the reactionary character of his utopia, Ephrucy supplements
the list of Sismondi’s merits with precisely those parts of his
theory (such as his “classification of the national revenue”) which , in
the opinion of this same economist, contain not a single scientific
word .

We may be told: Ephrucy may not in the least share the opinion that the
explanation of economic doctrines must be sought in economic reality; he
may be profoundly convinced that A. Wagner’s theory of the
“classification of the national revenue” is the “most outstanding” theory. We are quite willing to believe this. But what
right had he to flirt with the theory which the Narodnik gentlemen are so
fond of saying they “agree” with, when in fact, he completely
misunderstood that theory’s attitude to Sismondi, and did everything
possible (and even impossible) to present this attitude in a totally wrong
light?

We would not have devoted so much space to this question had it concerned
only Ephrucy—an author whose name we meet in Narodnik literature
perhaps for the first time. It is not Ephrucy’s personality, nor
even his views, that are important for us, but the Narodniks’
attitude in general towards the theory of the famous German economist
which , they claim , they agree with . Ephrucy is by no means an exception. On the contrary, his is quite a typical case, and
to prove this we have throughout drawn a parallel between Sismondi’s
viewpoint and theory and Mr. N.-on’s viewpoint and theory. [16] The similarity
proved to be complete: the theoretical views, the viewpoint regarding
capitalism, and the character of the practical conclusions and proposals
of both authors proved to be identical . And as Mr. N.-on’s
views may be described as the last word in Narodism, we have a right to
conclude that the economic theory of the Narodniks is but a Russian
variety of European romanticism .

It goes without saying that Russia’s specific historic and economic
features, on the one hand, and her incomparably greater backwardness, on
the other, lend Narodism particularly marked distinctive features. But
these distinctions are no more than those between varieties within the
same species and, therefore, do not disprove the similarity between
Narodism and petty-bourgeois romanticism.

Perhaps the most outstanding and striking distinction is the effort the
Narodnik economists make to disguise their romanticism by stating that
they “agree” with modern theory and by referring to it as often as possible, although this theory sharply disapproves of
romanticism and has grown up in the course of a fierce struggle against
petty-bourgeois doctrines of every variety.

The analysis of Sismondi’s theory is of special interest precisely
because it provides an opportunity to examine the general methods used in wearing this disguise.

We have seen that both romanticism and the modern theory indicate the same contradictions existing in contemporary social
economy. The Narodniks take advantage of this when they point to the fact
that modern theory recognises the contradictions which manifest themselves
in crises, in the quest for a foreign market, in the growth of production
simultaneously with a decline in consumption, in protective tariffs, in
the harmful effects of machine industry, and so on, and so forth. And the
Narodniks are quite right: modern theory does indeed recognise all
these contradictions, which romanticism also recognised. But the
question is: has a single Narodnik ever asked wherein lies the difference
between the scientific analysis of these contradictions, which reduces
them to the different interests that spring from the present system of
economy, and the utilisation of these references to contradictions merely
in order to utter good wishes? No, we do not find a single Narodnik who
has examined this question of the difference between the modern theory and
romanticism. The Narodniks likewise utilise their references to
contradictions merely in order to utter good wishes.

The next question is: has a single Narodnik ever asked wherein lies the
difference between the sentimental criticism of capitalism and the
scientific, dialectical criticism of it? Not one of them has raised this
question of the second major difference between modern theory and
romanticism. Not one of them has considered it necessary to use the
present development of social and economic relations as the criterion of
his theories (yet it is the application of this criterion that constitutes the chief distinguishing
feature of scientific criticism).

And the last question is: has a single Narodnik ever asked wherein lies
the difference between the viewpoint of romanticism, which idealises small
production and bewails the “break-up” of its foundations by
“capitalism,” and the viewpoint of the modern theory, which
takes large-scale capitalist machine production as its point of departure
and proclaims this “break-up of foundations” to be progressive? (We employ this generally accepted Narodnik term. It vividly
describes the process of change in social relations resulting from the
influence of large-scale machine industry which everywhere , and
not only in Russia, has taken place with an abruptness and sharpness that
have astonished public opinion.) Again no. Not a single Narodnik has asked
himself this question, not one of them has attempted to apply to the
Russian “break-up” those yardsticks which made people acknowledge the West-European “break up” as progressive. They
all weep about the foundations, advise that this break-up be stopped, and
assure us through their tears that this is the “modern theory.”. . .

The comparison of Sismondi’s theory and their “theory,”
which they have presented as a new and independent solution of the problem
of capitalism based on the last word of West European science and life,
clearly demonstrates to what a primitive stage of the development of
capitalism and public thought the origin of that theory belongs. But the
point is not that this theory is old. There are quite a few very old
European theories that would be very new for Russia. The point is that
even when that theory appeared , it was a petty-bourgeois and
reactionary theory .

## Notes

[1] Cf. Mr. V.V.’s Narodnik programme “to drag history
along another line.” Cf. Volgin, loc . cit ., p. 181.
— Lenin

[2] The word is in English in the
original. – Ed .
— Lenin

[3] Author’s italics.
— Lenin

[4] An exactly similar mistake is made by the Narodniks in relation to another
association ( the village community ), which satisfied the narrow
need of association of local peasants linked to each other by the joint
ownership of land, pastures, etc. (but chiefly by the joint rule of the
landlords and bureaucrats), but which does not in any way satisfy the
needs of the commodity economy and capitalism that breaks down all local,
social-estate and other such barriers and introduces a profound economic
antagonism of interests within the village community. The need
for association, for organisation, has not diminished in capitalist
society; on the contrary in has grown immeasurably. But it is utterly
absurd to use the old yardstick for the purpose of satisfying this need of
the new society. This new society is already demanding, firstly, that the
association shall not be according to locality, social estate, or other
such category; secondly, that its starting-point shall be the difference
in status and interests that has been created by capitalism and by the
differentiation of the peasantry. Local, social-estate association, on the
other hand, which links together peasants who differ sharply from each
other in economic status and interests, now, because of its compulsory
nature , becomes harmful for the peasants themselves and for
social development as a whole.
— Lenin

[5] See above, at least the title of the chapter from which we quoted the
arguments about the guilds (quoted also by Ephrucy: p 147).
— Lenin

[6] The fact that he demonstrated the existence of these needs places
him, we repeat, far above the narrow-minded bourgeois economists.
— Lenin

[7] But even on this subject Sismondi was not “ahead” of his day
for he merely approved of what was already being practised in England, but
was unable to understand the connection that existed between these changes
and large-scale machine industry and the progressive historical work it
was doing.
— Lenin

[8] We do not wish to say that there is no difference in this respect between
the authors referred to, but it does not explain the point and
misrepresents the relation between Sismondi and the other authors: it is
made to appear that they held the same point of view and differed only in
the radicalness and consistency of the conclusions they drew. But the
point is not that Sismondi “did not go” so far , but that he “went” back , whereas the other
authors referred to “went” forward .
— Lenin

[9] “Robert Owen,” says Marx, “the father of Co-operative
Factories and Stores, but who. . . in no way shared the illusions of his
followers with regard to the bearing ( Tragweite ) of these
isolated elements of transformation, not only practically made the factory
system the sole foundation of his experiments, but also declared that
system to be theoretically the starting-point of the ‘social revolution.’” [18] — Lenin

[10] “The task which Russian society has to fulfil is becoming more and
more complicated every day. Capitalism is extending its conquests day
after day. . .” ( ibid .).
— Lenin

[11] “Russian society has to fulfil a great task, one that is extremely
difficult but not impossible—to develop the productive forces of the
population in such a form as to benefit not an insignificant minority, but
the entire people” (N.-on, 343).
— Lenin

[12] Cf. quotations in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 8, p. 57, and also
Mr. N.-on’s article in Russkoye Bogatstvo , No. 6, p. 94.
— Lenin

[13] Ephrucy quotes this passage in No. 8 of Russkoye Bogatstvo , p. 57
(from the beginning of this paragraph).
— Lenin

[14] Cf. Russkoye Bogatstvo, 1894, No. 6, p. 88, article referred to. In the
translation of this passage Mr. N.-on is guilty of two mistranslations and
of one omission. Instead of “petty-bourgeois” and “petty-peasant” he translates “narrow-burgher and
“narrow-peasant.” Instead of “cudgels for the workers” he translates “cudgels for the people,”
although in the original we have the word Arbeiter . (In the
English translation of 1888, authorized by Engels, it is “working
class.” – Ed .) He omitted the words: “were bound to be exploded” ( gesprengt werden mussten ). [19] — Lenin

[15] Such as Adolph Wagner?— K. T .
— Lenin

[16] Mr. V. V., another Narodnik economist, is quite in accord with Mr. N.-on
on the extremely important questions referred to above, and differs from
him only in that his point of view is even more primitive.
— Lenin

[18] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow, 1956, pp. 503-04.

In the 1897 and 1898 editions, because of the censorship, Lenin replaced the words
social revolution” ( der sozialen Revolution ) by the words
“social transformation.” In the 1908 edition Lenin translated
the words as “social revolution.” This correction has been
made in the present edition.

[17] Chinsh peasants —those entitled to the hereditary possession
of the land in perpetuity, and who had to pay an almost fixed quit-rent,
known as chinsh . In tsarist Russia, the chinsh system operated mainly in Poland, Lithuania, Byelorussia, and the Black Sea
littoral of the Ukraine.

[19] Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party . Selected
Works , Vol.  I, Moscow, 1958, p. 57.

## A Characterisation of Economic Romanticism

### (SISMONDI and OUR NATIVE SISMONDISTS)

## VI

## Corn Tariffs in England as Appraised by Romanticism and by Scientific Theory

We shall supplement our comparison between the theory of the romanticism
on the main points of contemporary economics and the modern theory with a
comparison between their treatment of a certain practical problem. Such a
comparison will be all the more interesting because, on the one hand, this practical problem is one of the biggest, most fundamental
problems of capitalism, and on the other hand, because the two most
outstanding exponents of these hostile theories have expressed their
opinion on this subject.

We are referring to the Corn Laws in England and their repeal. [11] In the second quarter of the present century this problem deeply
interested not only English but also Continental economists; they all
realised that this was by no means a specific problem relating to tariff
policy, but the general problem of Free Trade, of free competition, of the
“destiny of capitalism.” It was a matter of crowning the
edifice of capitalism by giving full effect to free competition; of
clearing the road for the completion of that “break-up” which
large-scale machine industry began in England at the end of the last
century; of removing the obstacles that were hindering this
“break-up” in agriculture . It was in this way that the two Continental economists of whom we intend to speak
viewed the problem.

In the second edition of his Nouveaux Principes Sismondi added a
chapter specially devoted to “laws governing trade in grain”
(l. III, ch. X).

First of all, he emphasises the urgency of the problem: “Half the
English people today are demanding the repeal of the Corn Laws, demanding
it with extreme irritation against those who support them; but the other
half are demanding that they be retained, and cry out indignantly against
those who want them repealed” (I, 251).

In examining the problem, Sismondi points out that the interests of the
English farmers demanded corn tariffs to ensure them a remunerating price . [1] The interests of the manufacturers,
however, demanded the repeal of the Corn Laws, because the manufactories
could not exist without foreign markets, and the further development of
English exports was being retarded by the laws, which restricted imports:
“The manufactory owners added that the glut in the market was the
result of these same Corn Laws; that wealthy people on the Continent could
not buy their goods because they could not find a market for their
corn” (I, 254). [2] “The opening of the market to foreign corn will probably ruin the
English landowners and reduce all rents to an infinitely low price. This,
undoubtedly, is a great calamity, but it is not an injustice” (I,
254). And Sismondi proceeds to argue in the naîvest manner that the
revenues of the landowners should be commensurate with the service
( sic !!) they render “society” (capitalist?), and so forth “The farmers,” continues Sismondi, “will withdraw
their capital, or part at least, from agriculture.”

This argument of Sismondi’s (and he contents himself with this
argument) reveals the main flaw in romanticism, which does not pay
sufficient attention to the process of economic development that is
actually taking place. We have seen that Sismondi himself points to the
gradual development and growth of capitalist farming in England. But he
hastens to denounce this process instead of studying its causes. It is
only this haste, the desire to thrust his innocent wishes upon history,
that can explain the fact that Sismondi overlooks the general trend of
capitalist development in agriculture and the inevitable acceleration
of this process with the repeal of the Corn Laws, i.e., the
capitalist progress of agriculture instead of its decline, which Sismondi
prophesies.

But Sismondi remains true to himself. He had no sooner approached the
contradiction inherent in this capitalist process than he immediately set
about naîvely “refuting” it in his endeavour to prove at
all costs that the path being followed by the “English fatherland” was a wrong one.

“What will the day labourer do?... Work will stop, the fields will
be converted into pastures.... What will become of the 540,000 families
who will be denied work? [3] Even assuming that they will be fit for any kind of industrial work, is there, at the
present time, an industry capable of absorbing them?. . . Can a government
be found that will voluntarily subject half the nation it governs to such
a crisis?. . . Will those to whom the agriculturists are thus sacrificed
benefit by it to any extent?  After all, these agriculturists are the
nearest and most reliable consumers of English manufactures. The cessation
of their consumption would strike industry a blow more fatal than the
closing of one of the biggest foreign markets” (255-56). The
notorious “shrinking of the home market” appears upon the
scene. “How much will the manufactories lose by the cessation of the
consumption of the whole class of English agriculturists, who constitute
nearly half the nation? How much will the manufactories lose by the
cessation of the consumption of wealthy people, whose revenues from
agriculture will be almost wiped out?” (267). The romanticist moves
heaven and earth to prove to the manufacturers that the contradictions
inherent in the development of their industry, and of their wealth, merely
express their error, their short-sightedness. And to “convince” the manufacturers of the “danger” of
capitalism, Sismondi dilates on the threatening competition of Polish and
Russian grain (pp. 257-61). He resorts to every possible argument; he even
wants to touch the pride of English men. “What will become of
England’s honour if the Emperor of Russia is in a position, whenever
be wishes, to obtain some concession or other from her, to starve her by
closing the Baltic ports?” (268). Let the reader recall how Sismondi
tried to prove that the “apologists of the money power” were
wrong, by contending that it was quite easy to cheat when
selling. . . . Sismondi wants to “refute” the theoretical
interpreters of capitalist farming by arguing that the rich farmers cannot
withstand the competition of the wretched peasants (quoted above), and in
the end arrives at his favourite conclusion, evidently convinced that he
has proved that the path being followed by the “English fatherland” is a
“wrong one.” “The example of England shows us that this
practice” (the development of money economy, to which Sismondi
contrasts I’habitude de se fournir soi-même , “the habit of providing for oneself”) “is not without
its dangers” (263). “The very system of economy” (namely, capitalist farming) “is bad, rests on a dangerous
foundation, and this is what one should try to change” (266).

The concrete problem evoked by the conflict of definite interests in a
definite system of economy is thus submerged in a flood of innocent
wishes! But the interested parties themselves raised the issue so sharply
that to confine oneself to such a “solution” (as romanticism
does on all other problems) became utterly impossible.

“But what is to be done?” Sismondi asks in despair. “Open England’s ports, or close them? Doom the
manufacturing or the rural workers of England to starvation and death? It
is, indeed, a dreadful question; the position in which the English Cabinet
finds itself is one of the most delicate that statesmen can possibly
face” (260). And Sismondi again and again reverts to the
“general conclusion” that the system of capitalist farming is
“dangerous,” that it is “dangerous to subordinate the whole of agriculture to a system of speculation.” But “how it
is possible, in England, to take measures, effective but at the same time
gradual, such as would raise the significance ( remettraient en
honneur ) of the small farms, when one half of the nation, employed
in the manufactories, is suffering hunger and the measures they demand
doom the other half of the nation, engaged in agriculture, to
starvation—I do not know. I think the Corn Laws should be
considerably amended; but I advise those who are demanding their complete
repeal to study the following problems carefully” (267)—then
follow the old complaints and apprehensions about the decline of
agriculture, the shrinking of the home market, and so forth.

Thus, at the very first impact with reality, romanticism suffered utter
fiasco. It was obliged to issue to itself a testimonium
paupertatis and itself acknowledge receipt of it. Recall how easily
and simply romanticism “solved” all problems in “theory”! Protection is unwise, capitalism is a fatal blunder, the
road England has taken is wrong and dangerous, production must keep in step with consumption, while industry
and commerce must keep in step with agriculture, machines are advantageous
only when they lead to a rise in wages or to a reduction of the working
day, means of production should not be alienated from the producer,
exchange must not run ahead of production, must not lead to speculation,
and so on, and so forth. Romanticism countered every contradiction with an
appropriate sentimental phrase, answered every question with an
appropriate innocent wish, and called the sticking of these labels upon
all the facts of current life a “solution” to the problems. It
is not surprising that these solutions were so charmingly simple and easy:
they ignored only one little circumstance—the real interests, the
conflict of which constituted the contradiction. And when the development
of this contradiction brought the romanticist face to face with one of
these particularly violent conflicts, such as was the struggle between the
parties in England that preceded the repeal of the Corn Laws, our
romanticist lost his head altogether. He felt perfectly at ease in the
haze of dreams and good wishes, he so skilfully composed maxims applicable
to “society” in general (but inapplicable to any historically
determined system of society); but when he dropped from his world of
fantasy into the maelstrom of real life and conflict of interests, he did
not even have a criterion of how concrete problems are to be solved. The
habit of advancing abstract propositions and of reaching abstract
solutions reduced the problem to the bare formula: which part of the
population should be ruined—the agricultural or the manufacturing?
And, of course, the romanticist could not but conclude that neither part
should be ruined, that it was necessary to “turn from the
path” . . . but the real contradictions encompassed him so tightly
that he was unable to ascend again into the haze of good wishes, and the
romanticist was obliged to give an answer . Sismondi even gave two
answers: first—“I do not know”; second—“on the one hand, it
cannot but be recognised; on the other hand, it must be admitted.” [12]

On January 9, 1848, Karl Marx delivered a “speech on Free

Trade” [4] at a public meeting in Brussels. Unlike the romanticists, who declared that “political economy is not a science
of calculation, but a science of morality,” he took as the point of
departure of his exposition precisely the plain and sober calculation
of interests . Instead of regarding the problem of the Corn Laws as
one concerning a “system” chosen by a nation or as one of
legislation (as Sismondi looked upon it), the speaker began by presenting
it as a conflict of interests between manufacturers and landowners, and
showed how the English manufacturers tried to raise the issue as the
affair of the entire nation, tried to assure the workers that they were
acting in the interests of the national welfare. Unlike the romanticists,
who had presented the problem in the shape of the considerations which a
legislator must have in mind when carrying out the reform, the speaker
reduced the problem to the conflict between the real interests of the
different classes of English society. He showed that the entire problem
sprang from the necessity of cheapening raw materials for the
manufacturers. He described the distrust of the English workers who
regarded “these self-sacrificing gentlemen, Bowring, Bright and
their colleagues, as their worst enemies. . . .”

“The manufacturers build great palaces at immense expense, in which
the Anti-Corn-Law

League [13] takes up, in some respects, its official residence; they send an army of missionaries to all corners of England to
preach the gospel of Free Trade; they have printed and distributed gratis
thousands of pamphlets to enlighten the worker upon his own interests,
they spend enormous sums to make the press favourable to their cause; they
organise a vast administrative system for the conduct of the Free Trade
movement, and they display all their wealth of eloquence at public
meetings. It was at one of these meetings that a worker cried out:
‘If the landlords were to sell our bones, you manufacturers would be
the first to buy them in order to put them through a steam-mill and make
flour of them.’ The English workers have very well understood the
significance of the struggle between the landlords and the industrial
capitalists. They know very well that the price of bread was to be reduced in order to
reduce wages, and that industrial profit would rise by as much as rent
fell.”

Thus the very presentation of the problem is quite different from
that of Sismondi. The aims the speaker set himself were, firstly, to
explain the attitude of the different classes of English society towards
the problem from the angle of their interests; and secondly, to throw
light on the significance of the reform in the general evolution of the
English social economy.

The speaker’s views on this last point coincide with those of
Sismondi in that he, too, does not see in this a particular problem, but
the general one of the development of capitalism in general, of
“Free Trade” as a system. “The repeal of the Corn Laws in England is the greatest triumph of Free Trade in the nineteenth century.” [14] “. . . By the repeal of the Corn Laws,
free competition, the present social economy is carried to its extreme point.” [5] Hence, the issue presents itself to these
authors as a question of whether the further development of capitalism
is desirable or should be retarded, whether “different paths” should be sought, and so forth. And we know that their
affirmative answer to this question was indeed the solution of the general
fundamental problem of the “destiny of capitalism” and not of
the specific problem of the Corn Laws in England, for the point of view
established here was also applied much later in relation to other
countries The authors held such views in the 1840s in relation to Germany,
and in relation to

America, [6] and declared that free competition was progressive for that country; with respect to Germany one of them
wrote, as late as the sixties, that she suffered not only from capitalism,
but also from the insufficient development of capitalism.

Let us return to the speech we have been dealing with. We pointed to the
fundamentally different point of view of the speaker, who reduced the
problem to one of the interests of the different classes in English
society. We see the same profound difference in his presentation of the
purely theoretical problem of the significance of the repeal of the Corn
Laws to the social economy. For him it is not the abstract question of
which system England should adopt, what path she should choose
(as the question is put by Sismondi, who forgets that England has a past
and a present, which already determine that path). No, he forthwith
presents the question on the basis of the present-day social and
economic system ; he asks himself: what must be the next step in the development of this system following the repeal of the Corn Laws?

The difficulty involved in this question was that of determining how the
repeal of the Corn Laws would affect agriculture , for as regards
industry its effect was clear to everybody.

To prove that this repeal would benefit agriculture as well, the Anti-Corn-Law

League [7] offered a prize for the three best essays on the beneficial effect the repeal of the Corn Laws
would have upon English agriculture. The speaker briefly outlined the
views of the three prize-winners, Hope, Morse, and Greg, and at once
singled out the last-named, whose essay most scientifically and most
strictly followed the principles laid down by classical political economy.

Writing mainly for big farmers, Greg, himself a big manufacturer, showed
that the repeal of the Corn Laws would thrust the small farmers out of
agriculture and they would turn to industry, but it would benefit the big
farmers who would be able to rent land on longer leases, invest more
capital in the land, employ more machines and get along with less labour,
which was bound to become cheaper with the fall in the price of corn. The
landlords, however, would have to be content with a lower rent because
land of poorer quality would drop out of cultivation, as it would be unable to withstand
the competition of cheap imported grain.

The speaker proved to be quite right in regarding this forecast and this
open defence of capitalism in agriculture as the most scientific. History
has confirmed his forecast. “The repeal of the Corn Laws gave a
marvellous impulse to English agriculture. . . . A positive decrease of
the agricultural population went hand in hand with increase of the area
under cultivation, with more intensive cultivation, unheard-of
accumulation of the capital incorporated with the soil, and devoted to its
working, an augmentation in the products of the soil without parallel in
the history of English agriculture, plethoric rent-rolls of landlords, and
growing wealth of the capitalist farmers. . . . Greater outlay of capital
per acre, and, as a consequence, more rapid concentration of farms, were
essential conditions of the new method.” [8]

But the speaker, of course, did not confine himself to recognising
Greg’s arguments as being the most correct. Coming from the mouth of
Greg, they were the reasoning of a Free Trader who was discussing English
agriculture in general, and was trying to prove that the repeal of the
Corn Laws would benefit the nation as a whole. After what we have said
above it is evident that these were not the views of the speaker.

He explained that a reduction in the price of corn, so glorified by the
Free Traders, meant an inevitable reduction in wages, the cheapening of
the commodity “labour” (more exactly: labour-power); that the
drop in the price of corn would never be able to compensate the workers
for the drop in wages, firstly, because with the drop in the price of corn
it would be more difficult for the worker to save on the consumption of
bread with a view to buying other articles; secondly, because the progress
of industry cheapens articles of consumption, substituting spirits for
beer, potatoes for bread, cotton for wool and linen, and, by all this,
lowering the worker’s standard of requirements and living.

Thus we see that apparently the speaker establishes the elements
of the problem just as Sismondi does: he too admits that the
ruination of the small farmers and the impoverishment of the workers in
industry and agriculture will be the inevitable consequences of Free
Trade. It is here that our Narodniks, who are also distinguished for their
inimitable skill in “citing,” usually stop quoting “excerpts,” and with complete satisfaction declare that they
fully “agree.” But these methods merely show that they do not
understand, firstly, the tremendous difference in the presentation of the
problem, which we indicated above; secondly, they overlooked the fact that it is only here that the radical difference between the new
theory and romanticism begins : the romanticist turns from the
concrete problems of actual development to dreams, whereas the realist
takes the established facts as his criterion in definitely solving the
concrete problem.

Pointing to the forthcoming improvement in the conditions of the workers
the speaker went on to say:

“Thereupon the economists will tell you:

“’Well, we admit that competition among the workers, which
will certainly not have diminished under Free Trade, will very soon bring
wages into harmony with the low price of commodities. But, on the other
hand, the low price of commodities will increase consumption, the larger
consumption will require increased production, which will be followed by a
larger demand for hands, and this larger demand for hands will be followed
by a rise in wages.’ “The whole line of argument amounts to this: Free Trade
increases productive forces . If industry keeps growing, if wealth, if
the productive power, if, in a word, productive capital increases the
demand for labour, the price of labour, and consequently the rate of
wages, rise also. The most favourable condition for the worker is the
growth of capital . This must be admitted . [9] If capital remains stationary,
industry will not merely remain stationary but will decline and in this
case the worker will be the first victim. He goes to the wall before the
capitalist. And in the case where capital keeps growing, in the
circumstances which we have said are the best for the worker, what will be
his lot? He will go to the wall just the same. . . .” And quoting
data given by English economists the speaker went on to explain in detail
how the concentration of capital increases the division of labour, which
cheapens labour-power by substituting unskilled for skilled labour, how
the machines oust the workers, how big capital ruins the small
industrialists and small rentiers and leads to the intensification of
crises, which still further increase the number of unemployed. The
conclusion he drew from his analysis was that Free Trade signifies nothing
but freedom for the development of capital.

Thus, the speaker was able to find a criterion for the solution of the
problem which at first sight seemed to lead to the hopeless dilemma that
brought Sismondi to a halt: both Free Trade and its restraint equally lead
to the ruin of the workers. The criterion is the development of the
productive forces . It was immediately evident that the problem was
treated from the historical angle: instead of comparing capitalism with
some abstract society as it should be (i.e., fundamentally with a utopia),
the author compared it with the preceding stages of social
economy, compared the different stages of capitalism as they successively
replaced one another, and established the fact that the productive
forces of society develop thanks to the development of capitalism . By
applying scientific criticism to the arguments of the Free Traders he was
able to avoid the mistake usually made by the romanticists who, denying that the arguments
have any importance, “throw out the baby with the bath water”; he
was able to pick out their sound kernel, i.e., the undoubted fact of
enormous technical progress. Our Narodniks, with their characteristic wit,
would, of course, have concluded that this author, who had so openly taken the side of big capital against the small producer , was an
“apologist of money power,” the more so that he was addressing
continental Europe and applying the conclusions he drew from English life
to his own country, where at that time large scale machine industry was
only taking its first timid steps. And yet, precisely this example (like a
host of similar examples from West-European history) could help them study
the thing they are not at all able to understand (perhaps they do not wish
to do so?), namely, that to admit that big capital is progressive as
compared with small production, is very, very far from being
“apologetics.”

It is sufficient to recall the above-quoted chapter from Sismondi and this
speech to be convinced that the latter is superior both from the
standpoint of theory and of hostility towards every kind of
“apologetics.” The speaker described the contradictions that
accompany the development of big capital much more exactly, fully,
straightforwardly and frankly than the romanticists ever did. But he never
descended to uttering a single sentimental phrase bewailing this
development. He never uttered a word anywhere about a possibility of
“diversion from the path.” He understood that by means of such
phrases people merely cover up the fact that they themselves are
“diverting” from the problem reality confronts them with,
i.e., a certain economic reality, a certain economic development and
certain interests that spring from this development.

The above-mentioned fully scientific criterion enabled him to solve this
problem while remaining a consistent realist.

“Do not imagine, gentlemen,” said the speaker, “that in
criticising freedom of trade we have the least intention of defending the
system of protection.” And he went on to point out that under the
contemporary system of social economy both Free Trade and protection
rested on the same basis, briefly referred to the “breaking-up” process of the old economic life and of the old semi-patriarchal relationships in
West-European countries carried through by capitalism in England and on
the Continent, and indicated the social fact that under certain conditions
Free Trade hastens this “break-up.” [10] And he concluded with
the words: “It is in this sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in
favour of Free

Trade.” [15]

## Notes

[1] These words are in English in the
original. – Ed .
— Lenin

[2] One-sided as may be this explanation given by the English
manufacturers, who ignore the deeper causes of crises and their
inevitability when the expansion of the market is slight, it,
nevertheless, undoubtedly contains the absolutely correct idea
that the realisation of the product by its sale abroad demands, on the whole , corresponding imports from abroad.

We bring this explanation of the English manufacturers to the
notice of those economists who brush aside the problem of the
realisation of the product in capitalist society with the
profound remark: “They will sell abroad.”
— Lenin

[3] To “prove” the unsoundness of capitalism, Sismondi
forthwith makes an approximate calculation (such as our Russian
romanticist, Mr. V. V., for example, is so fond of doing). Six
hundred thousand families, he says, are engaged in agriculture. When the fields are converted into pastures, no
more than a tenth of this number will be “wanted.”
. . . The less the understanding of the process in all its
complexity shown by this author, the more eagerly he resorts to
childish “rule of thumb” calculations.
— Lenin

[4] “Discours sur la libre-êchange.” [16] We are using the German translation: “Rede über die Frage des
Freihandels.”
— Lenin

[5] Die Lage der
arbeitenden Klasse in England (1845). [17] This work was written from exactly the same point of view before the
repeal of the Corn Laws (1846), whereas the speech dealt with in the text
was delivered after they were repealed. But the difference in
time is of no importance to us: it is sufficient to compare the
above-quoted arguments of Sismondi, advanced in 1827, with this speech of
1848 to see the complete identity of the elements of the problem in the cases of both authors. The idea of comparing Sismondi with a later
German economist was borrowed by us from Handwörterbuch der
Staatswissenschaften , B. V., Art. “Sismondi” von Lippert,
Seite 679. The parallel he drew was of such thrilling interest that
Mr. Lippert’s exposition at once lost all its woodenness . ..  that
is to say, “objectivity,” and became interesting, vivacious,
and even fervid.
— Lenin

[6] Cf. Neue

Zeit , [18] the recently discovered articles of Marx in Westphäilisches

Dampfboot . [19] — Lenin

[7] These words are in English in the original. – Ed .
— Lenin

[8] This was written in

1867. [20] To explain the rise in rents, one must bear in
mind the law established by the modern analysis of differential rent,
namely, that a rise in rent is possible simultaneously with a
reduction in the price of corn . “When the English corn duties
were abolished in 1846 the English manufacturers believed that they had
thereby turned the landowning aristocracy into paupers. Instead, they
became richer than ever. How did this occur? Very simply. In the first
place, the farmers were now compelled by contract to invest
£12 per acre annually instead of £8. And, secondly, the landlords, being strongly
represented in the Lower House too, granted themselves a large government
subsidy for drainage projects and other permanent improvements of their
land. Since no total displacement of the poorest soil took place, but
rather, at worst, it became employed for other purposes—and mostly
only temporarily—rents rose in proportion to the increased
investment of capital, and the landed aristocracy consequently was better
off than ever before” ( Das Kapital , III, 2, 259). [21] — Lenin

[9] Our italics.
— Lenin

[10] This progressive significance of the repeal of the Corn Laws was also
clearly indicated by the author of “Die Lage” even before
the repeal took place ( loc . cit .,

p. 179) [22] and he
specially stressed the influence it would have upon the consciousness of
the producers.
— Lenin

[11] The Corn Laws, which were introduced in England in 1815, established high
tariffs on imported corn, and at times prohibited corn imports. They
enabled the big landowners to increase grain prices on the home market and
to secure enormous rents. They also strengthened the political position of
the landed aristocracy. There was a fierce and protracted struggle between
the big landowners and the bourgeoisie over the Corn Laws which ended in
their repeal in 1846.

[12] ” On the one hand , it cannot hut be recognised , on the other hand , it must be admitted ”—an
ironical expression used by M. Y. Saltykov-Shchedrin in his stories
“The Diary of a Provincial in St. Petersburg” and “Funeral.”

[16] Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy , Moscow, pp. 234-53.

[13] The Anti-Corn-Law League (this term is in English in the original) was
founded in 1838 by the textile manufacturers Cobden and Bright. Its
headquarters were in Manchester, the centre of the Free-Trade movement.

The Anti-Corn-Law League, as its name indicates, fought to secure the
repeal of the Corn Laws, and stood for Free Trade, demagogically asserting
that it would improve the workers’ standard of living, although
reduced corn prices could only result in reduced wages for the workers and
increased profits for the capitalists. The conflict over this issue
between the industrial bourgeoisie and the landed aristocracy ended in the
repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846. Marx’s views on the anti-Corn-Law
movement are given in his speech “On Free Trade” (see Appendix
to The Poverty of Philosophy by Karl Marx, Moscow, pp. 234-53).

[14] Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy , Moscow, p. 234.

[17] Marx and Engels, On Britain , Moscow, 1953, p. 303.

[18] Die Neue Zeit ( New Times )—theoretical journal of
German Social-Democracy. Appeared in Stuttgart from 1883 to 1923. Prior to
October 1917 was edited by K. Kautsky, then by H. Cunow. In 1885-95,
articles by K. Marx and F. Engels appeared in its columns. Engels
frequently made suggestions to the editors of Die Neue Zeit , and
severely criticised them for departing from Marxism. The journal also
published articles by F. Mehring, P. Lafargue, G. V. Plekhanov, and other
leading figures of the international working-class movement. In the late
1890s the journal made a practice of publishing articles by
revisionists. During the First World War (1914-18) the journal adopted a
centrist, Kautskian position in support of the social-chauvinists.

[19] The articles mentioned by V. I. Lenin are: “The Anti-Kriege
Circular” by K. Marx and F. Engels, and chapter IV, Vol. II of German Ideology , both of which appeared in Das
Westphälische Dampfboot for July 1846 and August-September 1847,
while extracts from them were reprinted in Nos. 27 and 28 of Die Neue
Zeit , 1895-96 (MEGA, Erste Abteilung, Band 6, S. 10, 11, 12, 13; Band
5, S. 500, 501, 502).

Das Westphälische Dampfboot ( Westphalian
Steamer )—a monthly magazine, organ of one of the trends of
petty-bourgeois German, or “true,” socialism; was edited by
O. Lüning in Bielefeld and Paderborn (Germany) from January 1845 to
March 1848.

[20] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow, 1958, pp. 677-78.

[21] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. III, Moscow, 1959, p. 709.

[22] Marx and Engels, On Britain , Moscow. 1953. pp. 302-03.

[15] Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy , Moscow, p. 253.

For censorship reasons Lenin changed (or excluded) words from the section
of Marx’s “On Free Trade” cited here. Thus, he translated the words
“hastens the social revolution” as “hastens this ‘break-up’\thinspace” and the
phrase “in this revolutionary sense alone” as “in this sense alone.”