V. I. Lenin

Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, Moscow, Volume 2, pp. 355-458 (The Handicraft Census of 1894-95 in Perm Gubernia, Article One).
URL: https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1897/handicraft/1i.htm
Translated: authentic published CW translation (NOT machine-translated)

## ARTICLE ONE

## (I. General Data.—II.The “Handicraftsman” and Wage-Labour.—III.“Communal-Labour Continuity”)

Perm scientific societies, assisted by the Zemstvo, have undertaken the preparation of an extensive handbook for the 1896 Exhibition in Nizhni-Novgorod under the general title: A Survey of Perm Territory . Enough material has been collected to fill well over three thousand pages, and the whole edition is to consist of eight volumes. As was to be expected, the work was not completed in time for the exhibition, and so far only the first volume, a sketch of the handicraft industries of the gubernia, [1] has been published. For the novelty, wealth and fulness of the material on which it is based, the Sketch is a work of outstanding interest. The material was obtained through a special handicraft census financed by the Zemstvo and taken in 1894-95. This was a house-to-house census, each householder being questioned individually. The information was collected by the Zemsky Nachalniks. [5] The programme of this house-to-house investigation was very broad, embracing the members of the families of master handicraftsmen, the wage-labour employed by them, agriculture, information on the purchase of raw materials, the technique of production, distribution of work according to the months of the year, sale of products, dates on which the establishments were founded, and the indebtedness of handicraftsmen. As far as we are aware, this is perhaps the first time such abundant information has been published in our literature. But to whom much is given, much is required. The very wealth of the material entitles us to demand its thorough analysis by the investigators, but the Sketch is a long way from meeting this demand. Both in the tabulated data and in the method of grouping and analysing them there are many gaps, which the present author has had in part to fill by selecting material from various parts of the book and computing the appropriate data.

Our purpose is to acquaint the reader with the material of the census, the methods by which it has been analysed, and the conclusions to be drawn from the data relative to the economic realities of our “handicraft industries.” We underscore the words “economic realities,” because we only deal with what exists in reality, and why that reality is what it is, and not something else. As to extending the conclusions drawn from the data on Perm Gubernia to “our handicraft industries” in general, the reader will see from what follows that such an extention is quite legitimate, for the forms of “handicraft industry” in Perm Gubernia are exceedingly varied and embrace every possible form ever mentioned in the literature on the subject.

But there is one request we must earnestly make, namely, that the reader draw the strictest possible distinction between two aspects of the following commentary: the study and analysis of the actual facts, on the one hand, and the discussion of the Narodnik views held by the authors of the Sketch, on the other.

## I

## General Data

The handicraft census of 1894-95 embraced 8,991 families (excluding the families of wage-workers) in all uyezds of the gubernia, or, in the opinion of the investigators, about 72 per cent of the total number of Perm handicraftsmen; other data point to the existence of 3,484 families more. The basic division according to type adopted in the Sketch is as follows: two groups of handicraftsmen are distinguished (indicated in the tables by the Roman numerals I and II): those who have a farm (I) and those who have not (II); then three sub-groups of each group (Arabic numerals 1, 2 and 3): 1) those who produce for the market; 2) those who work to order for private customers, and 3) those who work to order for buyers-up. In the last two sub-groups the raw material is usually supplied by the customer or the buyer-up. Let us take a look at this method of classifying. The division of handicraftsmen into those who farm land and those who do not is, of course, a sound and necessary method. The large number of landless handicraftsmen in Perm Gubernia, frequently concentrated in industrial settlements, has led the authors to stick to this classification and to use it in the tables. We learn, for example, that 6,638 persons, or one-third of the total number of handicraftsmen (19,970 working members of families and wage-workers in 8,991 establishments) do not farm land. [2] This fact alone shows the fallacy of the common assumptions and assertions that the connection between handicraft industry and agriculture is universal; this connection is sometimes stressed as a specifically Russian feature. If we exclude the rural (and urban) artisans who have been wrongly classed as “handicraftsmen,” we find that 2,268 of the remaining 5,566 families, or over two-fifths of the total number of industrialists working for the market, are landless. Unfortunately, even this basic classification is not adhered to consistently in the Sketch . Firstly, it is applied only to master craftsmen, no similar data being given for wage-workers. This omission is due to the fact that, in general, the census registered only the establishments, the owners, and ignored the wage-workers and their families. In place of these terms, the Sketch employs the very inaccurate expression “families engaged in handicraft industries.” This is inaccurate because families whose members are employed by handicraftsmen as wage-workers are no less “engaged in handicraft industries” than the families which hire them. The absence of house-to-house information on the families of wage-workers (who constitute one-fourth of the total number of workers) is a grave omission in the census. This omission is highly characteristic of the Narodniks, who at once adopt the viewpoint of the small producer and leave wage-labour in the shade. Below we shall find frequent gaps of this kind in the information on wage-workers, but for the moment let us confine ourselves to the remark that although the absence of information on wage-workers’ families is a common feature of the literature on handicrafts, there are exceptions. In the Moscow Zemstvo statistics one occasionally comes across systematic information on wage-workers’ families, and even more so in the well-known inquiry of Messrs. Kharizomenov and Prugavin, Industries of Vladimir Gubernia , which contains house-to-house censuses that register wage-workers’ families on a par with those of masters. Secondly, by including the mass of landless industrialists under the heading of handicraftsmen, the investigators naturally removed the grounds for the common, although absolutely incorrect, method of excluding the urban industrialists from this category. And, indeed, we find that the 1894-95 census includes one town—Kungur (p. 33 of the tables)—but only one . No explanation is given in the Sketch , and it remains a mystery why the census was taken for one town only, and why this particular town was chosen—whether by chance or for some sound reason. This causes no little confusion, and seriously detracts from the value of the general data. On the whole, therefore, the handicraft census repeats the usual Narodnik mistake of separating the country (“handicraftsmen”) from the town, although often enough an industrial district embraces a town and the surrounding villages. It is high time to abandon this distinction, which is due to prejudice and an exaggeration of outdated divisions into social estates.

We have already referred on several occasions to rural and urban artisans, sometimes excluding them from the number of handicraftsmen, and sometimes not. The fact is that these fluctuations are characteristic of all literature on “handicraft” industries, and demonstrate the unsuitability of a term like “handicraftsman” for the purposes of scientific investigation. The generally accepted opinion is that only those who work for the market, the commodity producers, should be regarded as handicraftsmen; but in practice it would be hard to find all investigation of the handicraft industries in which artisans, that is, producers who work for private customers (2nd sub-group in the Sketch ) are not counted as handicraftsmen. Both in the Transactions of the Commission of Inquiry into the Handicraft Industry and the Industries of Moscow Gubernia you will find artisans classed as “handicraftsmen.” We consider it useless to argue about the meaning of the word “handicraft,” for, as we shall see later, there is no form of industry (except perhaps machine industry) which has not been included under this traditional term, a term that is absolutely useless for scientific investigation. It is certain that a strict distinction must be made between commodity producers who work for the market (1st sub-group) and artisans who fulfil the orders of private customers (2nd sub-group), because of the complete difference in the social and economic significance of these forms of industry. The attempts made in the Sketch to obliterate this distinction (cf. pp. 13 and 177) are very unsuccessful; far more correct is the remark made in another Zemstvo statistical publication on the Perm handicraftsmen to the effect that “the artisans have very few points of contact with the sphere of handicraft industry—fewer than the latter has with factory industry.” [3] Both factory industry and the 1st sub-group of “handicraftsmen” relate to commodity production , which is non-existent in the 2nd sub-group. A no less strict distinction must be made in the case of the 3rd sub-group, the handicraftsmen who work for buyers-up (and manufacturers) and who differ essentially from those of the first two sub-groups. It would be desirable for all investigators of so-called “handicraft” industry to adhere strictly to this division and use precise political-economic terminology, instead of assigning an arbitrary meaning to colloquial terms.

The following table shows the division of the “handicraftsmen” into groups and sub-groups:

Before proceeding to draw conclusions from these figures, let us recall that the town of Kungur was included in Group II, which thus consists of a mixture of urban and rural industrialists. We see from the table that although there is a preponderance of agriculturists (Group I) among the rural industrialists and artisans, they are more backward in the development of forms of industry than those who do not cultivate the land (Group II). Among the former primitive artisanship is far more prevalent than production for the market. The greater development of capitalism among the non-agriculturists is shown by the larger proportion of establishments employing wage-workers, of the wage-workers themselves, and of handicraftsmen who work for buyers up. It may therefore be concluded that the tie with agriculture tends to preserve the more backward forms of industry, and vice versa, that the development of capitalism in industry leads to a break with agriculture. Unfortunately, exact information on this subject is not available, and we have perforce to content ourselves with indirect indications. For example, the Sketch tells us nothing about the division of the rural population of Perm Gubernia into agriculturists and landless people, and so we cannot determine in which of these categories the industries are most developed. There is a similar neglect of the highly interesting question of the territorial distribution of industry (the investigators were in possession of the most exact information on this point, for each village separately), of the concentration of industrialists in the non-agricultural, factory, or trade and industrial settlements generally, of the centres of each branch of industry, and of the spread of the industries from these centres to the surrounding villages. If we add to this that the household statistics showing when the establishments were founded (see § III below) provided an opportunity to determine how the industries developed, that is, whether they spread from the centres to the surrounding villages or vice versa, whether they spread mostly among agriculturists or non-agriculturists, etc., then one cannot help regretting the inadequate analysis of the data. The only information we are able to obtain concerns the distribution of industries by uyezds. To acquaint the reader with these figures we shall group the uyezds as suggested in the Sketch (p. 31): 1) the five “uyezds where the proportion of handicraftsmen working for the market is largest and where, simultaneously, the development of handicraft industry is relatively high”; 2) the five “uyezds where the development of the handicraft industry is relatively weak, and where the handicraftsmen working for the market predominate”; 3) the two “uyezds where it is also at a low level, but where the majority often consists of handicraftsmen who fulfil orders for private customers.” Summarising the principal data for these groups of uyezds we get the following table (see p. 364).

This table enables us to draw the following interesting conclusions. The more highly rural industry is developed in a group of uyezds, 1) the smaller the proportion of rural artisans, i.e., artisan production is to a greater extent replaced by commodity production; 2) the larger the proportion of handicraftsmen who belong to the non-agricultural population, and 3) the more marked the development of capitalist relations and the larger the proportion of dependent handicraftsmen. In the third group of uyezds the rural artisans predominate (77.7 % of all the handicraftsmen); in this case agriculturists predominate (only 5.7% are non-agriculturists) and capitalism is poorly developed: only 7.2% are wage-workers and only 2.7% of the handicraftsmen’s families work for buyers-up, i.e., a total of only 9.9% are dependent handicraftsmen. In the second group of uyezds, on, the contrary, commodity production predominates and is already eliminating handicraft: only 32.5% are artisans. The percentage of handicraftsmen engaged in agriculture drops from 94.3% to 66.2%, the proportion of wage-workers increases more than fourfold—from 7.2% to 32.1%; there is an increase, although not so large, in the proportion of family workers who work for buyers-up, so that the aggregate proportion of dependent handicrafts men is 38.4%, or nearly two-fifths of the total. Lastly, in the first group of uyezds, natural artisan production is still further eliminated by commodity production and employs only one-fifth of the total number of “handicraftsmen” (21.8%), and at the same time the number of non-agricultural industrialists increases to 42.1%; the proportion of wage-workers drops somewhat (from 32.1% to 26%), but on the other hand there is an enormous increase in the proportion of family workers dependent on buyers-up, namely, from 6.3% to 27.4%, so that the aggregate number of dependent handicraftsmen is more than half the total—53.4%. The district with the largest (absolute and relative) number of “handicraftsmen” is the one where capitalism is most developed: the growth of commodity production forces artisan production into the background, leads to the development of capitalism and to the transfer of industries to non-agriculturists, in other words, to the separation of industry from agriculture (or, perhaps, to the concentration of industries among the non-agricultural population). The reader may doubt whether it is right to regard capitalism as being more developed in the first group of uyezds, where there are fewer wage-workers than in the second, but where more handicraftsmen work for buyers-up. Domestic industry, it may be objected, is a lower form of capitalism. But we shall see below that many of these buyers-up are manufacturers who own large capitalist establishments. Here domestic industry is an adjunct of the factory , and signifies a higher degree of concentration of production and capital (some of the buyers-up have 200, 500, even 1,000 persons and more, working for them), a higher degree of division of labour, and, consequently, a more highly developed form of capitalism. This form is to the small workshop of the owner who employs wage-workers as capitalist manufacture is to capitalist simple co-operation.

The figures quoted are sufficient to refute the attempt of the compilers of the Sketch to draw a fundamental contrast between “the handicraft form of production” and “capitalist production”—an assertion which repeats the traditional prejudice of all the Russian Narodniks, headed by Messrs. V. V. and N.-on. The Perm Narodniks assume that the “basic difference” between these two forms is that under handicraft production “labour owns both the instruments and materials of production and all the fruits of labour in the shape of the produce of production” (p. 3). We are now in a position to declare quite emphatically that this is false. Even if we include artisans among the handicraftsmen the majority of them do not fit this definition : this applies, firstly, to the wage-workers, and they represent 25.3%; secondly, to family workers who work for buyers-up, for they own neither the materials of production nor the fruits of their labour, but are merely paid wages—and they constitute 20.8%; and, thirdly, to the family workers of the first and second sub-groups who employ wage-workers, for they own the “fruits” of other labour in addition to their own. They probably constitute about 10% (1,691 of the 6,645 establishments in the first and second sub-groups, or 25.4%, employ wage-workers; in the 1,691 establishments there are probably not less than 2,000 family workers). And so we already have 25.3% + 20.8% + 10% = 56.1% of the “handicraftsmen,” or more than half, who do not fit this definition. In other words, even in a remote and economically backward gubernia like Perm, the “handicraftsmen” who either hire themselves out or hire others, who exploit or are exploited, are already preponderant today . But it would be far more correct for such a computation to exclude artisan production and to take commodity production alone. Artisan production is such an archaic form of industry that even among our native Narodniks, who have repeatedly proclaimed that backwardness is Russia’s good fortune ( ä la Messrs. V. V., Yuzhakov and Co.), there has not been a single one who has frankly and openly risked defending it and proclaiming it a “pledge” of his ideals. Artisan production in Perm Gubernia is still very widespread as compared with Central Russia: we need only mention the dyeing industry, for instance. This is a purely artisan industry for the dyeing of peasant homespuns, which in less out-of-the-way parts of Russia have long been superseded by factory-made prints. But even in Perm Gubernia artisan production has been pushed far into the background: even in rural industry, only 29.5%, or less than one-third, of the producers are artisans. If we exclude the artisans, then, we get 14,401 persons who work for the market; of these, 29.3% are wage-workers and 29.5% family workers who work for buyers-up, in other words, 58.8% are dependent “handicraftsmen,”’while another 7% or 8% are small masters employing wage-workers. Thus, about 66%, or nearly two-thirds , of the “handicraftsmen” have two fundamental points of similarity , and not of difference, with capitalism: firstly, they are all commodity producers, and capitalism is nothing but commodity production developed to the full; secondly, the specifically capitalist relations of the purchase and sale of labour-power apply to a large number of them. The compilers of the Sketch try hard to assure the reader that for “weighty” reasons, wage-labour in “handicraft” production has a significance all of its own. We shall examine these assurances and the examples they quote in their proper place (§ VII). Here it will be enough to mention that wherever commodity production prevails and wage-labour is not casually but systematically employed, we have all the features of capitalism. One may say that it is undeveloped, embryonic, that it possesses specific forms, but it is a distortion of the truth to assume a “basic difference” when in reality there is a basic similarity .

Let us, incidentally, mention one other distortion. On p. 5 of the Sketch it is said that “the products of the handicraftsman . . . are made from materials that are chiefly procured locally.” But the Sketch itself provides us with the data to check this point, it shows how the distribution of handicraftsmen engaged in processing livestock produce compares with the distribution of livestock and agricultural produce in the uyezds of the gubernia, how the distribution of those who process plant products compares with the distribution of forests; and how the distribution of those engaged in metal-working compares with the distribution of the pig-iron and malleable iron produced in the gubernia. This comparison shows that 68.9% of the handicraftsmen engaged in processing livestock products are concentrated in three uyezds, which account for only 25.1% of the livestock population, and only 29.5% of the cultivated area. In other words, we find that the very contrary of the above assertion is true, and the Sketch itself at this point declares that “the high degree of development of the industries engaged in processing livestock produce is chiefly dependent on raw materials brought from outside—for instance, in the Kungur and Ekaterinburg uyezds on the raw hides dressed by the local leather factories and handicraft tanneries, from which the material for the boot industry, the principal handicraft in these uyezds, is obtained” (24-25). Hence, handicraft industry in these parts is based not only on the large turnover of the local capitalist leather merchants, but also on semi-manufactures obtained from factory owners, i.e., handicraft industry is a sequel or adjunct to developed commodity circulation and to capitalist leather establishments. “In Shadrinsk Uyezd, the raw material brought from outside is wool, which furnishes the material for the chief industry of the uyezd—the making of felt boots.” Further, 61.3% of the handicraftsmen engaged in processing plant produce are concentrated in four uyezds. Yet these four uyezds contain only 20.7% of the total forest area of the gubernia. On the other hand, in the two uyezds where 51.7% of the forest area is concentrated, there are only 2.6% of the handicraftsmen engaged in processing plant produce (p. 25). In other words, here too we find the contrary to be the case, and here too the Sketch states that the raw material is brought from outside (p. 26). [4] Hence, we observe the very interesting fact that a deep-rooted commodity circulation precedes the development of the handicraft industries (and is a condition for their development). This fact is very important, for it shows, firstly, that commodity economy is long established, handicraft industry being only one of its elements; it shows also how absurd it is to depict our handicraft industry as a sort of tabula rasa still “able” to take a different path. The investigators report, for example, that “handicraft industry” in Perm Gubernia “continues to reflect the influence of those means of communication which determined the commercial and industrial physiognomy of the area not only in the pre-railway days, but even in pre-Reform days” (p. 39). Actually, the town of Kungur was the road junction in the Cis-Urals area: through it passes the Siberian highway which connects Kungur with Ekaterinburg, with branches to Shadrinsk; another commercial highway from Kungur, that of Blagodatnaya Gora, connects the town with Osa. Lastly, the Birsk highway connects Kungur with Krasnoufimsk. “We thus find that the handicraft industry of the gubernia became concentrated in districts around the highway junctions: in the Cis-Urals area—in the uyezds of Kungur, Krasnoufimsk and Osa and in the Trans-Urals area—in the uyezds of Ekaterinburg and Shadrinsk” (p. 39). Let us remind the reader that it is these five uyezds that constitute the group that is first in its development of handicraft industry, and that 70% of the total number of handicraftsmen are concentrated in them. Secondly, this fact shows us that the “organisation of exchange” in handicraft industry, about which the handicraft friends of the muzhik chatter so frivolously, has already been created and by none other than the Russian merchant class itself. Later on we shall find much to confirm this. Only in the third category of handicraftsmen (those who process metal) do we find that the distribution of raw material production and its processing by handicraftsmen correspond: 70% of this category of handicraftsmen are concentrated in the four uyezds producing 70.6% of the total pig-iron and malleable iron. But here the raw material is itself a product of the large-scale metallurgical industry, which, as we shall see, has its “own views” on the “handicraftsman.”

## II

## The “Handicraftsman” and Wage-Labour

Let us now summarise the data on wage-labour in the handicraft industries of Perm Gubernia. Without repeating the absolute figures already cited, let us confine ourselves to indicating the most interesting percentages:

We thus see that the percentage of wage-workers is higher among the non-agriculturists than among the agriculturists, and that the difference is chiefly accounted for by the second sub-group: among the farming artisans the proportion of wage-workers is 14.1%, and among the non-agriculturists it is 29.3%, or over twice as high. In the other two sub-groups, the proportion of wage-workers in Group II is slightly higher than in Group I. It has already been said that this results from capitalism being less developed among the agricultural population. Of course, the Perm Narodniks, like all other Narodniks, declare this to be of advantage to the agriculturists. We shall not, at this point, enter into a controversy on the general subject of whether the under-development and backwardness of the given social and economic relations may be regarded as an advantage; we shall merely say that the figures we quote below will show that this is an advantage that gives the agriculturists low earnings.

It is interesting to note that insofar as the employment of wage-labour is concerned the difference between the groups is less than the difference between the sub-groups of the same group . In other words, the economic structure of the industry (artisans—commodity producers—workers for buyers-up) has a greater influence on the extent to which wage-labour is employed than the existence or absence of ties with agriculture. For example, the small agriculturist commodity producer is more akin to the small non-agriculturist commodity producer than to the agriculturist artisan. The proportion of wage-workers in the first sub-group is 29.4% in Group I and 31.2% in Group II, whereas in the second sub-group of Group I it is only 14.1%. Similarly, the agriculturist who works for a buyer-up is more akin to the non-agriculturist who does the same (23.2% and 27.4% wage-workers respectively) than to the agriculturist artisan. This shows us that the general prevalence of capitalist commodity relations in the country tends to reduce to one level the agriculturist and the non-agriculturist engaged in industry. This levelling process is brought out even more saliently by the data on the incomes of handicraftsmen. The second sub-group, as we have said, is an exception; but if, instead of the figures showing the percentage of wage-workers, we take the average number of wage-workers per establishment, we shall find that the agriculturist artisans are more akin to the non-agriculturist artisans (0.23 and 0.43 wage-workers per establishment respectively) than to the agriculturists in the other sub-groups. The average number of workers per establishment among the artisans of both groups is almost the same (1.7 and 1.8), whereas in the sub-groups of each group this average differs very considerably (Group I—2.6 and 1.7; Group II—2.5 and 1.8).

The average figures per establishment in each sub-group also reveal the interesting fact that the number is lowest among the artisans of both groups: 1.7 and 1.8 workers per workshop respectively. This means that production is most scattered among artisans, the individual producers are most isolated, and co-operation in production least practised. First place in this respect is held by the first sub-group of each group, that is, by the small masters who produce for the market. The number of people engaged in the workshops in these sub-groups is the largest (2.6 and 2,5 persons); here handicraftsmen with big families are the most numerous (20.3% and 18.5% have 3 or more workers in the family; the third sub-group of Group I—20.9%—is something of an exception); at the same time the employment of wage-labour is the largest (0.75 and 0.78 wage-workers per workshop); and there is also the largest proportion of big establishments (2.0% and 1.3% of establishments employ six or more wage-workers). Consequently, co-operation in production is here most widespread, because of the most extensive employment of wage-labour, and of members of the family (1.8 and 1.7 family workers per establishment; the third sub-group of Group I, with 1.9 persons, is something of an exception).

This latter circumstance brings us to the highly important question of the relation between family labour and wage-labour employed by “handicraftsmen,” a relation which prompts us to doubt the correctness of the prevailing Narodnik doctrine that wage-labour in handicraft production merely “supplements” family labour. The Perm Narodniks support this view when they argue on p. 55 that “the identification of the interests of the handicraftsmen with those of the kulaks” is refuted by the fact that the most prosperous handicraftsmen (Group I) have the largest number of family workers, whereas “if the handicraftsman were prompted solely by the profit motive, the sole incentive of the kulak, and not by the desire to consolidate and develop his establishment with the aid of all the members of his family, we should expect the proportion of members of the family who devoted their labours to production to be smallest in this sub-group of establishments” (?!). A strange conclusion!How can any conclusion regarding the role of “personal participation in work” (p. 55) be drawn if nothing is said about wage-labour? If the prosperity of handicraftsmen with large families did not indicate kulak tendencies, we should find among them the lowest proportion of wage-workers, the lowest proportion of establishments employing them, the lowest proportion of establishments with a large number of workers (more than five), and the smallest average number of workers per establishment. Actually, however, the most prosperous handicraftsmen (first sub-group) hold first , and not last place in all these respects , and this despite the fact that they have the largest families and the largest number of family workers, and constitute the largest proportion of handicraftsmen with three or more family workers!Clearly, the facts point to the very opposite of what the Narodniks would have them mean: the handicraftsman does, in fact, strive for profit, and by kulak methods; he takes advantage of his greater prosperity (one of the conditions for which is the possession of a large family) to employ wage-labour on a larger scale. Having a larger number of family workers than the other handicraftsmen he uses this to oust the others by hiring the largest number of workers. “Family co-operation, “about which Mr. V. V. and the other Narodniks speak so unctuously (cf. Handicraft Industries , I, p.14), is a guarantee of the development of capitalist co-operation. This, of course, will seem a paradox to the reader who is used to Narodnik prejudices; but it is a fact. To obtain precise data on this subject, one should know not only the distribution of the establishments according to the number of family and of wage-workers (which is given in the Sketch ), but also according to the combination of family and wage-labour. The house-to-house returns furnished every opportunity of making such a combination , of calculating the number of establishments in each category employing one, two, etc., wage-workers and classifying them according to the number of family workers. Unfortunately, this was not done. In order to make up for this omission, if only partially, let us turn to the work already mentioned, Handicraft Industries , where we do find combined tables of establishments classified according to the number of family and wage-workers. The tables are given for five industries, embracing a total of 749 establishments with 1,945 workers ( op . cit ., 1, pp. 59, 78 and 160; III, pp. 87 and 109). In order to analyse these data with reference to the problem we are now considering, namely, the relation between family labour and wage-labour, we must divide all the establishments into groups according to the total number of workers (for it is the total number of workers which shows the size of the workshop and the degree of co-operation in production), and determine the role of family labour and wage-labour in each group. Let us take four groups: 1) establishments with one worker; 2) establishments with two to four workers; 3) establishments with five to nine workers, and 4) establishments with ten or more workers. This division according to the total number of workers is all the more necessary, as the establishments with one worker and those with ten, for example, obviously represent entirely different economic types; to combine them and strike “averages” would be utterly absurd as we shall see later in the case of the figures given in the Sketch . Grouping the data as indicated, we get the following table:

These detailed figures fully confirm the proposition advanced above, which seemed so paradoxical at first glance, i.e., the larger the total number of workers in an establishment, the larger the number of family workers employed in it, and the more extensive, consequently, the “family co-operation”; but, at the same time, capitalist co-operation also increases, and does so far more rapidly. Despite the fact that they have a large number of family workers, the more prosperous handicraftsmen employ many additional wage-workers. “Family co-operation” is thus the pledge and foundation of capitalist co-operation .

Let us examine the data of the 1894-95 census relating to family and wage-labour. The establishments are divided according to the number of family workers as follows:

The preponderance of one-man establishments should be noted: they constitute more than half the total. Even if we were to assume that all the establishments that combine family labour with wage-labour have no more than one family worker each, we would still find that 2,5000 of them would be run by one man. These are the representatives of the most scattered producers, representatives of the most disunited small workshops—a disunity that is generally characteristic of the much-vaunted “people’s production.” Let us take a glance at the opposite pole, the largest workshops:

TRAPPED INSIDE JPEG: wage-workers [1]

Thus we see that the “small” establishments of the handicraftsmen sometimes attain imposing dimensions: nearly one-fourth of the total number of wage-workers is concentrated in the 85 largest establishments; on an average, each such establishment employs 14.6 wage-workers. These handicraftsmen are already employers, owners of capitalist establishments. [2] Co-operation on capitalist lines is widely employed in them: with 15 workers per establishment, division of labour is possible on a fairly extensive scale, there is a big saving on premises and tools, of which a larger quantity and greater variety can be used. Their purchase of raw material and the sale of the product are necessarily conducted on a large scale; this considerably reduces the cost of raw material and its delivery, facilitates sales, and makes proper commercial relations possible. When we come to consider the data on incomes we shall find confirmation of this in the 1894-95 census. At the moment it will be sufficient to mention these generally-known theoretical propositions. It should, therefore, be clear that the technical and economic features of these establishments also differ radically from those of the one-man workshops, and it is really astonishing that the Perm statisticians should nevertheless have decided to combine them and compute general “averages” from them. It may be said a priori that such averages will be absolutely fictitious, and that the analysis of the household statistics, in addition to dividing the handicraftsmen into groups and sub-groups, should also have divided them into categories based upon the number of workers per establishment (both family and wage-workers). Unless such a division is made, there can be no question of obtaining accurate data on incomes, or on the conditions of purchase of raw material and sale of products, or on the technique of production, or on the relative status of the wage-worker and the owner of the one-man establishment, or on the relation between the big and small workshops—all of which are items of the highest importance for a study of the economics of “handicraft industry.” The Perm investigators endeavour, of course, to underrate the importance of the capitalist workshops. If there are establishments with five or more family workers, they argue, that means that competition between the “capitalist” and the “handicraft form of production” ( sic !) can only have significance when the number of wage-workers exceeds five per establishment, and such establishments constitute only 1% of the total. The argument is purely artificial: in the first place, establishments with five family workers and five wage-workers are a pure abstraction, resulting from an inadequate analysis of the facts, for wage-labour is combined with family labour. An establishment with three family workers will, by hiring another three workers, have more than five workers and, compared with the one-man establishments, will occupy an exceptional competitive position. Secondly, if the statisticians really wanted to investigate the question of “competition” between the various establishments, dividing them according to the number of wage-workers they employ, why did they not make use of the data of the house to-house census? Why did they not group the establishments according to the number of workers and show the size of their incomes? Would it not have been more appropriate for statisticians who had such rich material at their disposal to make a real study of the facts, instead of treating the reader to all sorts of stuff of their own invention and hastily abandoning facts in order to “do battle” with the adversaries of Narodism?

“... From the standpoint of the supporters of capitalism, this percentage may, perhaps, be considered sufficient ground for the prediction that the handicraft form must inevitably degenerate into the capitalist form; but in this respect it does not actually represent an alarming symptom at all, especially in view of the following circumstances. . .” (p. 56).

Charming, is it not? Instead of taking the trouble to sift the available material for precise data on the capitalist establishments, the authors combined them with the one-man establishments and then began to controvert imaginary “predictors”!—We do not know what these “supporters of capitalism” who are so repugnant to the Perm statisticians are likely “to predict,” but for our part we can only say that all these phrases merely cover an attempt to evade the facts. And the facts show that there is no special “handicraft form of production” (that is an invention of “handicraft” economists), that the small commodity producers give rise to large capitalist establishments (in the tables we found a handicraftsman employing 65 wage-workers!—p. 169), and that it was the investigators’ duty to group the data in such a way that we could examine this process and compare the various establishments insofar as they approximate capitalist enterprises. The Perm statisticians not only failed to do this themselves, but even deprived us of the opportunity of doing so, for in the tables all the establishments in a given sub-group are lumped together so that it is impossible to separate the factory owner from the one-man producer. The compilers cover up the omission with meaningless aphorisms. The large establishments, you see, constitute only 1% of the total, so that if they are excluded, the conclusions based on the remaining 99% will not be affected (p. 56). But this one per cent, this one-hundredth part, is not commensurate with the others! One large establishment is equal to more than 15 establishments of the one-man producers who account for over 30 “hundredths” (of the total number of establishments)! This calculation relates to the number of workers. And if we take the gross output, or net income, we shall find that one large establishment is not equal to 15, but perhaps to 30 other establishments. [3] One-fourth of all the wage-workers is concentrated in this “one-hundredth” of the establishments, an average of 14.6 workers per establishment. To give the reader some idea of the significance of this latter figure, let us take the figures given for Perm Gubernia in the Collection of Data on Factory Industry in Russia (published by the Department of Commerce and Manufactures). As the figures vary considerably from year to year, we shall take the average for seven years (1885-91). The result for Perm Gubernia is 885 “factories and works” (as understood by the official statistics), with an aggregate output of 22,645,000 rubles and a total of 13,006 wage-workers, which gives us an “average” of 14.6 workers per factory.

In confirmation of their opinion that the large establishments are of no great significance, the compilers of the Sketch refer to the fact that very few (8%) of the number of wage-workers employed by the handicraftsmen are employed by the year, the majority being piece-workers (37%), seasonal workers (30%) and day labourers (25%, p. 51). The piece-workers “usually work in their own homes with their own implements and maintain themselves,” while the day labourers are engaged “temporarily,” like agricultural labourers. That being the case, “we cannot regard the relatively large number of wage-workers as unquestionable proof that these establishments are of the capitalist type” (56). . . . “It is our conviction that neither the piece-workers, nor the day labourers in general constitute the cadres of a working class similar to the West-European proletariat; only those who work regularly throughout the year can form these cadres.”

All praise to the Perm Narodniks for their interest in the relation between the Russian wage-workers and the “West-European proletariat.” The question is an interesting one, there’s no gainsaying that! Nevertheless, from statisticians we would have preferred to hear statements based on fact, and not on “conviction.” For, after all, the mere utterance of one’s “conviction” will not always convince others. . . . Would it not have been better to give more facts, instead of telling the reader about the “convictions” of Mr. X or Mr. Y? How incredibly few facts on the position of the wage-workers, working conditions, working hours in the establishments of various size, the families of the wage-workers, etc., are given in the Sketch . If the only purpose of the argument on the difference between the Russian workers and the West-European proletariat was to hide this omission, we should have to retract our praise. . . .

All we learn about wage-workers from the Sketch is their division into four categories: annual, seasonal, piece and day workers. To get some idea of these categories, we have to turn to the data scattered throughout the book. The number of workers in each category and their earnings are given for 29 industries (out of 43). In these 29 industries there are 4,795 wage-workers, earning a total of 233,784 rubles. In all the 43 industries, there are 4,904 wage-workers with aggregate earnings amounting to 238,992 rubles. Thus, our summary embraces 98% of the wage-workers and their earnings. Here, en regard , [4] are the figures of the Sketch [5] and of our summary:

TRAPPED INSIDE JPEG: wage-workers [6]

In the Sketch summary there are either mistakes or misprints. But that is by the way. The point of chief interest is the data on earnings. The earnings of the piece-workers, of whom the Sketch says that “essentially, piece-work is the nearest stage on the road to economic independence” (p. 51—also, no doubt, “according to our conviction”?), are considerably lower than those of the worker employed by the year. If the statement of the statisticians that the master usually finds board for the annual worker, whereas the piece-worker has to find his own, is based on fact and not merely on “conviction,” the difference will be even greater. The Perm master handicraftsmen have chosen a queer way to place their workers on the “road to independence”! It consists in lowering wages . . . . The fluctuations in the working season, as we shall see, are not big enough to explain this difference. Further, it is very interesting to note that a day labourer’s earnings equal 66.7% of an annual worker’s. Hence, each day labourer is occupied on an average for about eight months in the year. Obviously, it would be far more correct to refer to this as a “temporary” diversion from industry (if the day labourers are really diverted from industry of their own accord, and not because the master does not furnish them with work), than as the “predominance of the seasonal element in wage-labour” (p 52).

## III

## “Communal-Labour Continuity”

The data collected by the handicraft census which indicate the foundation dates of practically all the establishments investigated are of great interest. Here are the general data on the subject:

Thus, we see that the post-Reform period has stimulated a big development in handicraft industry. It seems the conditions favouring this development have been and are operating with ever-growing force as time goes on, since each succeeding decade has witnessed the opening of more and more establishments. This fact is clear evidence of the intensity with which the development of commodity production, the separation of agriculture from industry, and the growth of commerce and industry in general are proceeding among the peasantry. We say “separation of agriculture from industry,” for this separation begins earlier than the separation of the agriculturists from the industrialists: every enterprise which produces for the market gives rise to exchange between agriculturists and industrialists. Hence, the appearance of such an enterprise implies that the agriculturists cease to produce articles in their homes and purchase them in the market, and to make such purchases the peasant has to sell agricultural produce. The growing number of commercial and industrial establishments thus implies a growing social division of labour, the general basis of commodity economy and of capitalism. [1]

The opinion has been expressed in Narodnik literature that the rapid development of small production in industry since the Reform is not a phenomenon of a capitalist nature. The argument is that the growth of small production proves its strength and vitality, as compared with large-scale production (Mr. V. V.). This argument is absolutely false. The growth of small production among the peasantry signifies the appearance of new industries, the conversion of new branches of raw material processing into independent spheres of industry, progress in the social division of labour, the initial process of capitalist development, while the swallowing-up of small by large establishments implies a further step forward by capitalism, leading to the triumph of its higher forms. The spread of small establishments among the peasantry extends commodity economy and prepares the ground for capitalism (by creating petty masters and wage-labourers), while the swallowing-up of small establishments by manufactories and factories implies that big capitalism is utilising ground that has been prepared. The simultaneous existence of these two, seemingly contradictory, processes in one country actually has nothing contradictory in it: it is quite natural that in a more developed part of the country, or in a more developed sphere of industry, capitalism should progress by drawing small handicraftsmen into the mechanised factory, while in more remote regions, or in backward branches of industry, the process of capitalist development is only in its initial stage and manifests itself in the appearance of new branches and new industries. Capitalist manufacture “conquers but partially the domain of national production, and always rests on the handicrafts of the town and the domestic industry of the rural districts as its ultimate basis ( Hintergrund ). If it destroys these in one form, in particular branches, at certain points, it calls them up again elsewhere. . .” ( Das Kapital , I 2 , S. 779). [2]

The figures showing the dates the establishments were founded are also inadequately treated in the Sketch : all the information given is for uyezds, and not for groups or sub-groups; nor is there any other grouping (according to size of establishment, whether located in the centre of the industry or in the surrounding villages, etc.). Although they did not analyse the census data in accordance with their own system of groups and sub-groups, the Perm Narodniks here too found it necessary to treat the reader to sermons that are amazing for their ultra-Narodnik unctuousness and . . . absurdity. The Perm statisticians have made the discovery that in the “handicraft form of production” there prevails a specific “form of continuity” of establishments, namely, “communal-labour continuity,” whereas the system that prevails in capitalist industry is “property-inheritance continuity,” and that “communal-labour continuity organically converts the wage-worker into an independent master” ( sic !), which finds expression in the fact that when the owner of an establishment dies and there are no family workers among the heirs, the industry passes to another family, “perhaps to that of a wage-worker employed in the very same establishment,” and also in the fact that “community land tenure guarantees the labour industrial independence of both the owner of a handicraft industrial establishment and his wage-worker” (pp. 7, 68, et al .).

We have no doubt that this “communal-labour principle of continuity in the handicraft industries,” as invented by the Perm Narodniks, will occupy a fitting place in the history of literature, alongside the sentimental theory of “people’s production” propounded by Messrs. V. V., N.-on, and others. Both theories are of the same mould, both embellish and distort the truth with the help of Manilovian phrases. Everybody knows that the establishments, materials, tools, etc., of the handicraftsmen are private property which is transmitted by inheritance , and not by some sort of communal law; that the village community in no way guarantees independence even in agriculture, let alone industry, and that the same economic struggle and exploitation goes on within the community as outside it. What has been turned into the special theory of the “communal-labour principle” is the simple fact that the small master, owning very little capital, has to work himself, and that the wage-worker may become a master (if he is thrifty and abstemious, of course); examples of this are cited in the Sketch on p. 69. . . . All the theoreticians of the petty bourgeoisie have always consoled themselves with the fact that in small production a worker may become a master, and none of their ideals have ever gone beyond the conversion of the workers into small masters. The Sketch even makes an attempt to cite “statistical data confirming the principle of communal-labour continuity” (45). These data relate to the tanning industry. Out of 129 establishments, 90 (i.e., 70%) have been founded since 1870; yet in 1869 there were 161 handicraft tanneries (according to the “list of inhabited places”), while in 1895 there were 153. That is to say, tanneries have been transferred from some families to others—and this is regarded as the “principle of communal-labour continuity.” It would be absurd, of course, to argue against this anxiety to detect some special “principle” in the fact that small establishments are easily opened and just as easily shut down, freely pass from one hand to another, and so on. Let us only add, with regard to the tanning industry in particular, that, firstly, the dates of origin of the establishments indicate that this industry developed far more slowly than the other industries, and that, secondly, it is absolutely useless to compare 1869 with 1895, for the term “handicraft tannery” is constantly confused with the term “leather factory.” In the 1860s the overwhelming majority of the “leather factories” in Perm Gubernia (according to the factory statistics) had an output valued at less than 1,000 rubles (see the Ministry of Finance Yearbook , Part I, St. Petersburg, 1869. Tables and notes); in the 1890s establishments with an output of less than 1,000 rubles were, on the one hand, excluded from the list of factories, and the list of “handicraft tanneries,” on the other, happened to include many establishments with an output of over 1,000 rubles, some even with an out put of 5,000 rubles, 10,000 rubles and more ( Sketch , p. 70, and pp. 149 and 150 of the tables). What is the use of comparing data for 1869 and 1895 when no definite distinction is made between handicraft and factory-type tanneries? Thirdly, even if it were true that the number of tanneries has decreased, might this not mean that many small establishments have been closed down and that larger establishments have been gradually opened in their place? Are we to believe that such a “change” also confirms the “principle of communal-labour continuity”?

And the crowning incongruity is that all this sugary talk about the “communal-labour principle,” the “guarantee of communal-labour independence,” and the like, refers to the tanning industry, where the agriculturist handicraftsmen represent the purest type of petty bourgeois (see below), an industry which is highly concentrated in three large establishments (factories) that have been included in the list side, by side with the one-man handicraft and artisan establishments. Here are the figures showing this concentration:

In all, there are 148 establishments in this industry. Workers: 267 family + 172 wage-workers = 439; aggregate output = 151,022 rubles; net income = 26,207 rubles. Among these establishments there are 3 with 0 family workers + 65 wage-workers = 65. Value of output = 44,275 rubles; net income = 3,391 rubles (p. 70 of the text, and pp. 149 and 150 of the tables).

In other words, in three establishments out of 148 (“only 2.1%,” as the Sketch reassuringly puts it—p. 76) there is a concentration of nearly one-third of the total output of the “handicraft tanning industry,” yielding their owners thousands of rubles of income without their taking any part in production. We shall encounter many similar incongruities in relation to other industries, too. But in describing this industry, the authors of the Sketch paused, by way of exception, to discuss the three establishments mentioned. With regard to one of them we are told that the owner (an agriculturist!) “is apparently occupied exclusively in commerce, having his leather shops in the village of Beloyarskoye and the city of Ekaterinburg” (pp.76-77). This is a specimen of how capital invested in production combines with capital invested in commerce—a fact that should be noted by the authors of the Sketch , who depict “kulakdom” and commercial operations as something adventitious, divorced from production! In another establishment, the family consists of five males, not one of whom works at the trade “the father is engaged in commercial operations connected with his industry, and the sons (varying in age from 18 to 53), all of them educated, have apparently taken to other and more congenial pursuits than transferring hides from one vat to another and washing them” (p. 77). The authors magnanimously concede that these establishments are “capitalist in character”—“but how far the future of these enterprises is ensured on the principle of transmission as inherited property is a question to which only the future can give its decisive answer” (76). How profound! “The future is a question to which only the future can give an answer.” The sacred truth! But does it warrant a distortion of the present?

## Notes

[1] A Survey of Perm Territory . A Sketch of the State of Handicraft Industry in Perm Gubernia . Published out of funds provided by the Perm Gubernia Zemstvo. Perm, 1896, pp. II + 365 + 232 pp. of tables, 16 diagrams and a map of Perm Gubernia. Price: 1 ruble 50 kopeks.— Lenin

[2] Actually, more than one-third are landless, for the census covered only one town. But of that more anon.— Lenin

[3] The Handicraft Industries of Perm Gubernia at the Siberian-Urals Science and Industry Exhibition in Ekaterinburg , 1887, by Y. Krasnoperov, in three parts, Perm, 1888-89, Part I, p. 8. We shall quote from this valuable publication, briefly referring to it as Handicraft Industries and indicating the part and the page.— Lenin

[4] These two types of handicraftsmen—those processing livestock and plant produce—make up 33% + 28% = 61% of the total number. Metal working engages 25% of the handicraftsmen (p. 20).— Lenin

[5] In 1889 the tsarist government introduced the administrative post of Zemsky Nachalnik in order to increase the power of the landlords over the peasants. The Zemsky Nachalniks were appointed from among the local landed nobility, and were given enormous power, not only administrative but also juridical, over the peasants, including the right to have peasants arrested and flogged.

[1] Computed from the data in the Sketch (p. 54 and total number of wage-workers).— Lenin

[2] The overwhelming majority of our “factories” (so called in the official statistics), actually 15,000 out of 23,000, employ less than 16 workers. See Directory of Factories for 1890 .— Lenin

[3] We shall presently give data showing the distribution of establishments according to net income. We learn that the aggregate net income of 2,376 establishments with the lowest income (up to 50 rubles) = 77,900 rubles, while that of 80 establishments with the highest income = 83,150 rubles. The average per “establishment,” therefore, is 32 rubles and 1,039 rubles respectively.— Lenin

[4] For purposes of comparison.— Ed .

[5] P. 50. The Sketch does not summarise the figures for earnings.— Lenin

[6] The earnings of an annual worker are taken as 100.— Lenin

[1] Consequently, if Mr. N.-on’s attacks on the “separation of industry from agriculture” were not the platonic lamentations of a romanticist, he should also bewail the appearance of every handicraft establishment.— Lenin

[2] Karl Marx, Capital , Vol. I, Moscow, 1958, p. 748.