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Socialism: Utopian and Scientific

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This pamphlet was selected by Marx and Engels from Engel's large book _Anti-Duhring_ Along with the Communist Manifesto, Socialist Scientific and Utopian constitutes the basic foundation, the easy to understand, exciting to read, and profound primer for the revolutionary working class point of view, scientific socialism that Marx and Engels founded. It links their political and philosophic views in a clear and concise and very readable booklet.

Engels provides not simply a discussion of utopian socialism and its differences with scientific socialism, but does it in a way that outlines why the ruling capitalist class of modern society will not cede power to working people peacefully, why this society is so forcefully organized to preserve the exploitation and oppression working people, women, oppressed peoples, and the former colonial countries face at the hands of the big business interests of the US, Europe, and Japan.

I might add that one of the unexpected joys of reading this and the rest of Anti-Duhring is that despite the philosophical and political rigor and seriousness, Engels is always able to put in a little humor and a little wit.

While this book is not always available on Amazon, it is always available from BooksfromPathfinder, an Amazon Z store that you can get to by clicking on New and Used further up this page!

This work is a very basic intro to dialectical materialism and historical materialism. It should be looked at again with fresh eyes, as the utter catastrophe for humanity that CAPITALISM is has become obvious for all. Too many people today are not using a scientific methodology to look at historical experience and today's reality. Venus Project? "Socially responsible corporations?" -- it was all tried before, and summed up brilliantly in this pamplet. Robert Owens came up against the fact that the STATE (the government, it's courts, police and all its armed forces) is not a neutral body standing above classes, but in fact is controlled and serves the dominate class of society, which today continues to be the capitalist class (and many have documented who the individuals are in these classes in the US and other countries today.)
The fact that today, the economy of the world is dominated by finance capital and monopolies that spread across the world (while still rooted in individual nations and protected by national armies, CIA's, etc)is a natural and inevitable product of the workings of the "free market" competition of capital.
I recommend also looking at Lenin's "Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism" and Bob Avakian's "Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy" for some other basic explanations of why these Utopian schemes are doomed to failure, and why proletarian revolution can enable us to embark on the road out of this. Also see Raymond Lotta's work on both today's economic crisis and the historical experience of socialism.

If you are looking for a book to bolster your defense of, or attack upon, socialism, this is not the book for you. Instead, this short read provides an easy introduction into the development of Socialism, from its idealistic early proponents to those later in the 19th century attempting to define a more realistic socialism.

While Engels provides an overview of the "superiority" of socialism over capitalism, his arguments helped me to understand the motivation for socialism, rather than providing a rigorous defense.

As a libertarian, I don't agree with Engels that the capitalist exploits the wage laborer -- I think the stronger argument can be made that the capitalist enables the wage laborer -- but Engels does present his position clearly.

If you are looking for a good, short introduction to socialism, this is the book for you.

This is the best text to read for those seek an acquaintance with Marxism, and is the book most often recommended on introductory courses. It is simultaneously more detailed and easier to read than the "Communist Manifesto".

Engels begins with the eighteenth century philosophers who "prepared men's minds for the coming revolution and for whom Reason became the sole measure of everything." He then proceeds to examine the work of three men he dubs "Utopian" socialists - St. Simon, Fourier and Owen - who advanced beyond the philosophers in seeing the need for economic as well as political equality. However, says Engels, they shared the same error in supposing mankind can be liberated by truth and reason. St. Simon's error was to divide warring classes into workers and "idlers". Fourier brilliantly satirized the bourgeoisie but was unable to fully understand capitalism. Robert Owen came to desire a communistic society but wrongly thought it could be achieved by co-operatives. All Utopian socialists failed to understand historical processes.

All this is an introduction to one of Engels' favourite hobby-horses - so-called scientific socialism, which Engels said was given a boost by the 1831 working class rising in Lyons and the peak of the Chartist movement in England between 1838 and 1842. These showed there was no chance of a harmony of interest between the classes and "it was seen that all past history, with the exception of the primitive stages, was the history of class struggles." Of course, it was only Marx who had made the key discoveries. Engels writes:
"These two great discoveries, the materialist conception of history, and the revelation of the secret of capitalist production through surplus value, we owe to Marx. With these discoveries socialism became a science."

The materialist conception of history sees economic relationships as the key shaper of historical events. In Marxism, the all-important economic structure, or "foundation", of society determines the "superstructure" of ideas, morals, religion, institutions etc. In its extreme form historical materialism is completely deterministic, and in this form it is open to serious objections. Though Marx and Engels probably did not do enough to disown the enthusiasm for determinism of their supporters it is clear they meant something less. Later Engels was to write that economics "is in the last resort decisive" but adds that "the various elements of the superstructure...exert an influence of the historical struggles, and in many instances determine their form." The problem for the reader is to know what "in the last resort" actually means. How much can be reduced to economics? For example, Marx may have been right to suppose the bourgeoisie saw religion as useful "opium of the people" but it is hard to believe that the religious impulse itself is artificially manufactured.

The second strand in "scientific socialism" is the labour theory of value, which asserts that labour is not paid the full value of its product - the difference between the wage and the value of the workers' labour being profit. From this dubious proposition an edifice is built to demonstrate that (scientifically speaking) revolution is inevitable, to be followed by a classless society without political authority. The labour theory of value means that profit is by definition exploitation. The nature of capitalism means constant competition with wages driven down to subsistence level, and when they can fall no further capitalists turn to machines, which create a "reserve army of the unemployed". Wages become so low that not all the goods produced can be purchased, i.e. over-production. This leads to trade cycles of booms and slumps and ever-deepening crises. The constant competition also means that over time the number of firms is reduced with a tendency towards a few large firms, which is an inherent contradiction within capitalism, and both Engels and Marx are keen to identify such "contradictions" as part of the dialectical process they see operating. Not surprisingly, they think all this breeds alienation among the proletariat. Eventually revolution in the most advanced capitalist states will overthrow the bourgeoisie and usher in a classless society. However, capitalism has not seen society divided into just two classes and the proletariat has not sunk into the pitiful state predicted.

After the revolution political authority will disappear for only administrative functions will remain. Engels has a great deal to say about this, though not as much as Lenin. He writes about the workers seizing control of the bourgeois state and in a well-known passage concludes with the following words:
"The first act by virtue of which the state really constitutes itself the representative of the whole of society - the taking possession of the means of production in the name of society - this is, at the same time, its last independent act as a state. State interference in social relations becomes, in one domain after another, superfluous, and then dies out of itself; the government of persons is replaced by the administration of things, and by the processes of production. The state is not `abolished'. It dies out."

Here Engels makes a distinction between government and politics on the one hand, and administration on the other. Marx and Engels believed that all important disagreements between people would disappear along with classes, and any remaining disagreements could be settled amicably. The only remaining authority would be that necessary to organise industry. Boundless optimism is expressed about man's qualities under these circumstances, and most people today concede Marx's contention that human nature is not fixed but alters with the social and economic conditions of the age.

But is human nature quite as pliable as Marx and Engels supposed? And even if we lived in a world without private property would all the issues at the heart of British politics today disappear? This seems unlikely given debates about health, education, the environment, agriculture and moral issues such as abortion and animal rights.

Interesting. I read somewhere that Engels was actually the better writer of the Marx/Engels team. Does that make Engels the Garfunkel, or Simon? I don't know. But this was fun to read and interesting. So much passion.