The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-01-24

b O O K S
Blind Leaders of the Blind

. 4
SOCIAL PROBLEM. BY P. j.
Proudhon. Edited by Henry Co.
hen. Vanguard Press. Fifty cents.
THE best review of this book has
L already been written. It was writ
ten over 70 years ago by Karl Marx
in his THE Poverty of Philosophy"
reply to the philosophy of Pow
erty" of M. Proudhon.
Proudhon's solution of the social
problem is the solution" of the petty
bourgeoisie who, Mortified by the Eek
| cesses" of capitalism, insists on a
radical" reform which will eliminate
all the "bad" features and leave only
the "good," the natural" features of
capitalism-private property, Gin
I diyidual initiative"-in other words,
leave the capitalist system intact.
/ Concretelv, Proudhon's solution" was
the establishment of a society of
small producers freed from the yoke
of the luxurious" banks by system
| of free credit C'The Bank of the Peo-
| ple,R Mutual Banking"). This is the
paradise Of the petty artisan but it
has nothing whatever in common with
the ideals and aspirations of the revo-
lutionary proletarian.
/ Engels characterized Proudhon's
solution very aptly as "the utopia
of the little man. whose honest labor
even when it is only that of his
workmen or that of his apprentices
loses every day more and more of its
value thru the competition of great
industry and of machinery"
1t is our opinion that Proudhon has
been greatly overrated by historians
of socialist thought, He was not
original WITNESS the English social
lists Hopkins, Thompson, Edmonds,
and especially Bray, all before Proud
hon); he was densely ignorant of
economics which he continually con-
fused with moral and philosophical
considerations; as a philosopher he
was very nearly joke-Marx jest
ingly points out that the philosophers
thought Proudhon a good economist
but poor philosopher while the econ
omists praised his philosophy but ridi-
culed his economics; to say that he
was revolutionist is ridiculous. He
continually preached class collabora-
| ton and submission, and had not the
faintest idea of the historical role of
the revolutionary proletariat. Yet
Proudhon reflected a certain stage of
1 the development of the proletariat in
Franco certain very immature
tstage-and he and his teachings ex-
ercised considerable influence over
certain sections of the French prole-
tariat for some time. Therefore his
works and his ideas are of Importance
to us but their content and their his
torical role can only be ineligible to
us today if they are interpreted from
the Marxist standpoint.
Unfortunately, however, the "edi-
tor" of this is precisely Of type who
should never have been chosen for so
delicate a task. AS far as | can see
from his preface and his notes he
shared all of Preudhon's old illusions
and none of his good points. His
economic ideas are so quaint as to be
Ilaughable. His knowledge of Marx
ism is fairly represented in this de-
licious quotation: "Thus we find Karl
Marx spending his time studying in
the British Museum and predicting a
new society in which the state would
be everything"
His socialism" is Interestingly de-
picted in his objections to the work
ers taking hold of the means of pro-
duetion,p to the cooperative owner
ship Of capital: at is limitation of
liberty, and thus undesirable politi
cally; and, as the ownership of capt.
tai is not the cause of exploitation. it
| is unnecessary economically" Finally,
for his keen understanding of the
class forces at work in society: "We
have now learned that people are very
much alike, irrespective of the class
to which they belong" To have such
a person edit and explain Proudhon's
writings is verify the blind leading
the blind
WILL HERBERG.