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14 - Comsumption and Production - The Conquest of Bread · Philosophy and Faith

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  Speaker 1: Chapter fourteen, Consumption and Production, looking at society in its
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  Speaker 1: political organization from a different standpoint than that of authoritarian schools,
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  Speaker 1: where we start from a free individual to reach a
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  Speaker 1: free society, instead of beginning by the state to come
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  Speaker 1: down to the individual. We follow the same method in
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  Speaker 1: economic questions. We study the needs of individuals and the
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  Speaker 1: means by which they satisfy them, before discussing production, exchange, taxation, government,
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  Speaker 1: et cetera. To begin with The difference may appear trifling,
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  Speaker 1: but in reality it upsets official political economy. If you
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  Speaker 1: open the works of any economist, you will find that
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  Speaker 1: he begins with production, the analysis of means employed nowadays
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  Speaker 1: for the creation of wealth, division of labor, manufacture, machinery,
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  Speaker 1: accumulation of capital. From Adam Smith to Marx all have
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  Speaker 1: proceeded along these lines. Only in the latter parts of
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  Speaker 1: their books do they treat a consumption, that is to say,
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  Speaker 1: of the means necessary to satisfy the needs of individuals.
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  Speaker 1: And moreover, they can find themselves to explaining how riches
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  Speaker 1: are divided among those who vie with one another for
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  Speaker 1: their possession. Perhaps you will say this is logical. Before
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  Speaker 1: satisfying needs, you must create the wherewithal to satisfy them.
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  Speaker 1: But before producing anything, must you not feel the need
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  Speaker 1: of it? Is it not necessity that first drove man
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  Speaker 1: to hunt, to raise cattle, to cultivate land, to make implements,
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  Speaker 1: and later on to invent machinery. Is it not the
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  Speaker 1: study of needs that should govern production. It would therefore
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  Speaker 1: be quite as logical to begin by considering needs, and
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  Speaker 1: afterwards to discuss the means of production in order to
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  Speaker 1: satisfy these needs. This is precisely what we mean to do.
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  Speaker 1: But as soon as we look at it from this
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  Speaker 1: point of view, political economy entirely changes its aspect. It
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  Speaker 1: ceases to be a simple description of facts and becomes
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  Speaker 1: a science. I find it as the study of the
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  Speaker 1: needs of humanity and the means of satisfying them with
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  Speaker 1: the least possible waste of human energy. Its true name
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  Speaker 1: should be physiology of society. It constitutes a parallel science
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  Speaker 1: to the physiology of plants and animals, which also is
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  Speaker 1: the study of the needs of plants and animals and
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  Speaker 1: the most advantageous ways of satisfying them. In the series
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  Speaker 1: of social sciences, the economy of human societies takes the
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  Speaker 1: place occupied in the series of biological sciences by the
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  Speaker 1: physiology of organic bodies. We say here are human beings
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  Speaker 1: united in a society, all feel the need of living
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  Speaker 1: in healthy houses. The savage's hut no longer satisfies them.
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  Speaker 1: They require a more or less comfortable, solid shelter. The
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  Speaker 1: question is then, whether man's capacity for production being given,
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  Speaker 1: every man can have a house of his own, and
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  Speaker 1: what is hindering him from having it? And we are
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  Speaker 1: soon convinced that every family in Europe could perfectly wan
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  Speaker 1: all have a comfortable house, such as are built in England,
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  Speaker 1: in Belgium, or in Pullman City or else in equivalent
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  Speaker 1: set of rooms. A certain number of days work would
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  Speaker 1: suffice to build a pretty little airy house, well fitted
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  Speaker 1: up and lighted by gas. But nine tenths of Europeans
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  Speaker 1: have never possessed a healthy house, because at all times
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  Speaker 1: common people have had to work day after day to
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  Speaker 1: satisfy the needs of their rulers, and have never had
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  Speaker 1: the necessary leisure or money to build, or to have
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  Speaker 1: built the home of their dreams. And they can have
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  Speaker 1: no houses and will inhabit hovels as long as present
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  Speaker 1: conditions remain unchanged. As you see we proceed. Contrary to
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  Speaker 1: economists who immortalize the so called laws of production and
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  Speaker 1: recogning up the number of houses built every year, demonstrate
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  Speaker 1: by statistics that the new built houses not sufficing to
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  Speaker 1: meet all demands. Nine tenths of Europeans must live in
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  Speaker 1: hovels us pass on to food. After having enumerated the
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  Speaker 1: benefits accruing from the division of labor, economists tell us
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  Speaker 1: the division of labor requires that some men should work
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  Speaker 1: at agriculture and others at manufacture, farmers producing so much factories,
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  Speaker 1: so much exchange being carried on in such a way.
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  Speaker 1: They analyze the sale, the profit, the net gain or
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  Speaker 1: the surplus value, the wages, the taxes, banking, and so on.
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  Speaker 1: But after having followed them so far, we are none
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  Speaker 1: the wiser. And if we ask them, how is it
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  Speaker 1: that millions of human beings are in want of bread
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  Speaker 1: when every family could grow sufficient wheat to feed ten,
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  Speaker 1: twenty and even one hundred people annually, they answer us
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  Speaker 1: by droning the same anthem division of labor, wages, surplus value, capital,
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  Speaker 1: et cetera, arriving at the same conclusion that production is
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  Speaker 1: insufficient to satisfy all needs. A conclusion, which, if true,
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  Speaker 1: does not answer the question can or cannot man by
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  Speaker 1: labor produce the bread he needs? And if he cannot,
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  Speaker 1: what is hindering him? Here are three fifty million Europeans.
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  Speaker 1: They need so much bread, so much meat, wine, milk, eggs,
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  Speaker 1: and butter every year. They need so many houses, so
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  Speaker 1: much clothing. This is the minimum of their needs. Can
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  Speaker 1: they produce all this? And if they can, will there
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  Speaker 1: then be left sufficient leisure for art, science, and amusement,
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  Speaker 1: in a word, for everything that is not comprised in
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  Speaker 1: the category of absolute necessities. If the answer is in
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  Speaker 1: the affirmative, what hinders them going ahead? What must they
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  Speaker 1: do to remove obstacles? Is time needed? Let them take it?
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  Speaker 1: But let us not lose sight of the aim of production,
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  Speaker 1: the satisfaction of needs. If the most imperious needs of
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  Speaker 1: man remain unsatisfied, what must he do to increase the
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  Speaker 1: productivity of his work? And is there no other cause?
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  Speaker 1: Might it not be the production having lost sight of
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  Speaker 1: the needs of man, has strayed in an absolutely wrong direction,
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  Speaker 1: and that its organization is at fault. And as we
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  Speaker 1: can prove that such is the case, let us see
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  Speaker 1: how to reorganize production so as to really satisfy all needs.
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  Speaker 1: This seems to us the only right way of facing things,
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  Speaker 1: the only way that would allow of political economy becoming
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  Speaker 1: a science, the science of social physiology. It is evident
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  Speaker 1: that when this science will treat of production as it
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  Speaker 1: is at present, carried on by civilized nations, by Hindu communes,
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  Speaker 1: or by savages, it will hardly state facts otherwise than
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  Speaker 1: the economists state them. Now, that is to say, as
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  Speaker 1: a simple descriptive chapter analogous to descriptive chapters of zoology
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  Speaker 1: and botany. But if this chapter were written to throw
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  Speaker 1: light on the economy of energy necessary to satisfy human needs,
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  Speaker 1: the chapter would gain in precision as well as in
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  Speaker 1: descriptive value. It would clearly prove the frightful waste of
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  Speaker 1: human energy under the present system, and would, as we do,
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  Speaker 1: that as long as this system exists, the needs of
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  Speaker 1: humanity will never be satisfied. The point of view we
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  Speaker 1: see would be entirely changed. Behind the loom that weaves
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  Speaker 1: so many yards of cloth, behind the steel plate perforator,
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  Speaker 1: and behind the safe in which dividends are hoarded, we
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  Speaker 1: should see man the artisan of production. More often than
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  Speaker 1: not excluded from the feast he has prepared for others.
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  Speaker 1: We should also understand that the standpoint being wrong, so
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  Speaker 1: called laws of value in exchange are but a very
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  Speaker 1: false explanation of events as they happen nowadays, and that
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  Speaker 1: things will come to pass very differently when production is
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  Speaker 1: organized in such a manner as to meet all needs
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  Speaker 1: of society. There is not one single principle of political
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  Speaker 1: economy that does not change its aspect if you look
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  Speaker 1: at it from our point of view. Take, for instance,
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  Speaker 1: over production, a word which every day re echoes in
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  Speaker 1: our ears. Is there a single economist, academician, or candidate
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  Speaker 1: for academical honors who has not supported arguments proving that
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  Speaker 1: economic crises are due to overproduction, that at a given moment,
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  Speaker 1: more cotton, more cloth, more watches are produced than are needed.
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  Speaker 1: Have not men accused of rapacity the capitalists who are
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  Speaker 1: obstinately bent on producing more than can possibly be consumed.
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  Speaker 1: But on careful examination all these reasonings prove unsound. In fact,
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  Speaker 1: is there a commodity among those in universal use which
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  Speaker 1: is produced in greater quantity than need be? Examine one
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  Speaker 1: by one all commodities sent out by countries exporting on
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  Speaker 1: a large scale, and you will see that nearly all
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  Speaker 1: are produced in insufficient quantities for the inhabitants of the
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  Speaker 1: countries exporting them. It is not a surplus of wheat
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  Speaker 1: that the Russian peasants send to Europe. The most plentiful
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  Speaker 1: harvests of wheat and rye in European Russia only yield
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  Speaker 1: enough for the population, and as a rule, the peasant
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  Speaker 1: de rives himself with what he actually needs when he
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  Speaker 1: sells his wheat or rie to pay his rent and taxes.
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  Speaker 1: It is not a surplus of coal that England sends
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  Speaker 1: to the four corners of the globe, because only three
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  Speaker 1: quarters of a ton per head of population annually remain
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  Speaker 1: for home domestic consumption, and millions of Englishmen are deprived
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  Speaker 1: of fire in the winter, or have only just enough
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  Speaker 1: to boil a few vegetables. In fact, setting aside useless luxuries,
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  Speaker 1: there is an England which exports more than any other country,
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  Speaker 1: but a single commodity in universal use, cottons, whose production
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  Speaker 1: is sufficiently great to perhaps exceed the needs of the community. Yet,
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  Speaker 1: when we look upon the rags that pass for wearing
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  Speaker 1: apparel worn by over a third of the inhabitants of
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  Speaker 1: the United Kingdom. We are led to ask ourselves whether
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  Speaker 1: the cottons exported would not, within a trifle, suit the
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  Speaker 1: real needs of the population. As a rule, it is
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  Speaker 1: not a surplus that is exported, though it may have
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  Speaker 1: been so originally a fable of the barefootg the shoemaker,
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  Speaker 1: is as true of nations as it was formerly of artisans.
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  Speaker 1: We export the necessary commodities, and we do so because
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  Speaker 1: the workmen cannot buy with their wages what they have
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  Speaker 1: produced and pay besides the rent and interest to the
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  Speaker 1: capitalist and the banker. Not only does the ever growing
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  Speaker 1: need of comfort remain unsatisfied, but strict necessaries are often wanting.
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  Speaker 1: Surplus production does therefore not exist, at least not in
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  Speaker 1: the sense which is given to it by the theorists
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  Speaker 1: of political economy. Taking another point, all economists tell us
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  Speaker 1: that there is a well proved law man produces more
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  Speaker 1: than he consumes. After he has lived on the proceeds
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  Speaker 1: of its toil, there remains a surplus. Thus, a family
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  Speaker 1: of cultivators produces enough to feed several families, and so forth.
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  Speaker 1: For us, this oft repeated sentence has no sense if
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  Speaker 1: it meant that each generation leaves something to future generations,
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  Speaker 1: it would be true. Thus, for example, a farmer plants
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  Speaker 1: a tree that will live may be for thirty, forty
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  Speaker 1: or one hundred years, and whose fruits will still be
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  Speaker 1: gathered by the farmer's grandchildren. Or he clears a few
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  Speaker 1: acres of virgin soil, and we say that the heritage
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  Speaker 1: of future generations has been increased by that much roads, bridges, canals,
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  Speaker 1: his house, and his furniture are so much wealth bequeathed
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  Speaker 1: to succeeding generations. But this is not what is meant.
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  Speaker 1: We are told that the cultivator produces more than he
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  Speaker 1: need consume. Rather, should they say that the state, having
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  Speaker 1: always taken from him a large share of his produce
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  Speaker 1: for taxes, the priest for tithe, and the landlord for rent.
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  Speaker 1: A whole class of men has been created, who formerly
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  Speaker 1: consumed what they produced, save what was set aside for
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  Speaker 1: unforeseen accidents or expenses incurred in the aforestation, roads, et cetera,
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  Speaker 1: but who day to day are compelled to live very
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  Speaker 1: poorly from hand to mouth, the remainder having been taken
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  Speaker 1: from them by the state, the landlord, the priest, and
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  Speaker 1: the usurer. Let us also observe that if the needs
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  Speaker 1: of the end of it or our starting point, we
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  Speaker 1: cannot fail to reach communism, an organization which enables us
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  Speaker 1: to satisfy all needs in the most thorough and economical way.
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  Speaker 1: While if we start from our present method of production,
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  Speaker 1: an aim at gain and surplus value without taking into
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  Speaker 1: account if production corresponds to the satisfaction of needs, we
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  Speaker 1: necessarily arrive at capitalism or at most collectivism, both being
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  Speaker 1: but diverse forms of our wages system. In fact, when
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  Speaker 1: we consider the needs of the individual and society in
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  Speaker 1: the means which man has resorted to in order to
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  Speaker 1: satisfy them during his varied phases of development, we are
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  Speaker 1: convinced of the necessity of systematizing our efforts instead of
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  Speaker 1: producing haphazard as we do nowadays. It grows evident that
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  Speaker 1: the appropriation by a few of all riches not consumed
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  Speaker 1: and transmitted from one generation to another is not in
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  Speaker 1: the general interest. We can state as a fact that
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  Speaker 1: owing to these methods, the needs of three quarters of
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  Speaker 1: societiety are not satisfied, and that the present waste of
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  Speaker 1: human strength is the more useless and the more criminal.
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  Speaker 1: We discover, moreover, that the most advantageous use of all
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  Speaker 1: commodities would be for each of them to go first
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  Speaker 1: for satisfying those needs which are the most pressing. That
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  Speaker 1: in other words, the so called value of use in
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  Speaker 1: a commodity does not depend on a single whim, as
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  Speaker 1: has often been affirmed, but on the satisfaction it brings
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  Speaker 1: to real needs. Communism, that is to say, an organization
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  Speaker 1: which would correspond to a view of consumption production in
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  Speaker 1: exchange taken as a whole, therefore becomes the logical consequence
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  Speaker 1: of the comprehension of things, the only one, in our opinion,
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  Speaker 1: that is really scientific. A society that will satisfy the
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  Speaker 1: needs of all, and which will now know how to
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  Speaker 1: organize production, will also have to make a clean sweep
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  Speaker 1: of several prejudices concerning industry, and first of all, of
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  Speaker 1: the theory often preached by economists, the division of labor theory,
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  Speaker 1: which we are going to discuss in the next chapter.
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  Speaker 1: End of Chapter fourteen,