F. Engels, Works, Second Russian Edition, time 
Vol. 44, Moscow, 1977 

a On the fighting at Montebello, Palestro, Magenta and Solferino see this volume, 
pp- 338-40, 360-63, 368-71, 372-79, 392-95, 396-99, 400-03.— Ed. 
-* b See this volume, pp. 407-09, 412-14, 416-20,and also Engels’ letter to Marx of 
July 14, 1859 (present edition, Vol. 40).— Ed. 

617 

Karl M ais 

[ON THE DIVISION OF LABOUR] 

..forming a [social whole. My labour thus appears as an 
independent part of all social labour. The various kinds of labour 
represent various parts of social labour, and taken together all 
appear thus as the division of labour, and through exchange they 
constitute a whole, mutually supplementary parts, links in a system 
of social labour.... 

In this division of labour which is manifested in exchange of the 
various kinds of useful labour, two things are to be distinguished. 

First: What here relates the various kinds of labour to one 
another is their variety, and not their sameness, their manifoldness, 
and not their unity. The division of social labour is an aggregate of 
manifold kinds of labour, which are mutually supplementary 
precisely through their difference, their variety. 

The shoemaker wants to exchange the bootmaking labour 
contained in boots for bread, tea, sugar, coal, meat, clothes, a hat, 
etc., that is, for the baker’s labour, the labour of the tea-grower, 
the labour of the sugar-refiner, the labour of the butcher, the 
labour of the tailor, the labour of the hat-maker, and so on. He 
exchanges his labour for that of the others because the kinds of 
labour performed by the others are different from his, and 
therefore satisfy needs which his own labour does not satisfy; they 
are realised in means of subsistence in which his own labour is not 
realised. If the others’ labour were of the same kind as his own, 
he would not need it, and would not exchange his labour for 
theirs. Hence, the kinds of labour are exchanged for one another, 
insofar as they are useful labour, because they are different from one 
another, to the extent that they differ from one another and belong 
to different systems of human needs. 

Second: If I myself performed all the kinds of labour which I 
need in order to live, consequently produced all my means of 
subsistence myself, then I would not need the labour of others and 
would not exchange my kinds of labour for those of others, who 
would likewise themselves perform all the kinds of labour 
necessary for their sustenance. If I not only made boots, but also 
baked my own bread, brewed my own beer, grew my own wheat, 
wove my own garments, I would not have to exchange my 
bootmaking labour for baker’s, beer-brewer’s, peasant’s, weaver’s 
labour. 

My labour is one-sided; but it satisfies a social need, the need of 
other members of society. I could not perform exclusively this 
one-sided labour if I did not know that other members of society 
perform other necessary kinds of labour and thereby complement 
mine. Labour for the satisfaction of a social need is thus exclusive 
labour of separate definite individuals who make it their profes- 
sion.