of the humanists; like the Reformation, revolutionary syndicalism may prove abortive, if it loses, as did the latter, the sense of its own originality; it is this which gives such great interest to inquiries on proletarian violence.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION 1 The reflections that I submit to the readers of the Mouve- ment Socialistc on the subject of violence have been inspired by some simple observations about very evident facts, which play an increasingly marked role in the history of contemporary classes.
For a long time I had been struck by the fact that the normal development of strikes is accompanied by an important series of acts of violence; ^ but certain learned sociologists seek to disguise a phenomenon that every one who cares to use his eyes must have noticed. Revolu- tionary syndicalism keeps alive in the minds of the masses the desire to strike, and only prospers when important strikes, accompanied by violence, take place. Socialism tends to appear more and more as a theory of revolutionary syndicalism — or rather as a philosophy of modem history, in as far as it is under the influence of this syndicalism. It follows from these incontestable data, that if we desire to discuss Sociahsm with any benefit, we must first of all investigate the functions of violence in actual social conditions.^ * These Reflections were first published in the Mouvement Socialiste (first six months, 1906).
* Cf. " Les Greves " in the Science sociale, October-November 1900. ' In the Insegnamenti sociali della economia contemporanea (written in 1903, but not pubhshed till 1906) I had already, but in a very in- adequate manner, pointed out what seemed to me to be the function of violence, in maintaining the division between the proletariat and the middle classes (pp. 53-55).
44 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE I do not believe that this question has yet been approached with the care it admits of; I hope that these reflections will lead a few thinkers to examine the problems of proletarian violence more closely. I cannot too strongly recommend this investigation to the new school which, inspired by the principles of Marx rather than by the formulas taught by the ofl&cial proprietors of Marxism, is about to give to SociaHst doctrines a sense of reaUty and a gravity which it certainly has lacked for several years. Since the new school calls itself Marxist, syndicaHst, revolutionary, it should have nothing so much at heart as the investigation of the exact historical significance of the spontaneous movements which are being produced in the working classes, movements which may possibly ensure that the future direction of social development will conform to Marx's ideas.
Socialism is a philosophy of the history of contemporary institutions, and Marx has alwa3rs argued as a philosopher of history when he was not led away by personal polemics to write about matters outside the proper scope of his own system.
The Socialist imagines, then, that he has been trans- ported into a very distant future, so that he can consider actual events as elements of a long and completed develop- ment, and he can attribute to them the colour that they might take for a future philosopher. Such a procedure certainly presupposes a considerable use of hypothesis; but without certain hypotheses about the future there can be no social philosophy, no reflection on evolution, j and no important action in the present even. The object of this study is a more thorough investigation of customs, and not a discussion of the merits or faults of certain important people. I want to find out how the feelings by which the masses are moved form themselves into groups; all the discussions of the moraUsts about the motives for the actions of prominent men, and all psycho- INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION 45 logical analyses of character are, then, quite secondary in importance, and even altogether negUgible.
It seems, however, that it is more difi&cult to reason in this way, when we are concerned with acts of violence, than with any other set of circumstances. That is due to our habit of looking on conspiracy as the typical example of violence, or as the anticipation of a revolution; we are thus led to ask ourselves whether certain criminal acts could not be considered heroic, or at least meritorious, if we were to take into accoimt the happy consequences for their fellow-citizens anticipated by the perpetrators, as the result of their crimes. Certain individual criminal attempts have rendered such great services to democracy that the latter has often consecrated as great men those who, at the peril of their lives, have tried to rid it of its enemies; it has done this the more readily since these great men were no longer living when the hour for dividing the spoils of victory arrived, and we know that the dead obtain admiration more easily than the living.
Each time an outrage occurs, the doctors of the ethico- social sciences, who swarm in journalism, indulge in reflections on the question, Can the criminal act be excused, or sometimes even justified, from the point of view of the highest justice? Then there is an irruption into the democratic press of that casuistry for which the Jesuits have so many times been reproached.
I think it may be useful here to mention a note on the assassination of the Grand Duke Sergius which appeared in HumanitS of Febniary 18, 1905; the author was not one of those vulgar members of the Bloc whose inteUigence is hardly superior to that of a negrito, he was one of the leading Ughts of the State universities: Lucien Herr is one of those who ought to know what they are talking about. The title Just Reprisals warns us that the question is to be treated from a high ethical standpoint; it is the 46 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE judgment of the world ^ which is about to be pronounced. The author scrupulously endeavours to assign the responsi- bility, calculates the equivalence which ought to exist between a crime and its expiation, goes back to the original misdeeds which have engendered this series of acts of violence in Russia; all this is a philosophy of history strictly in accordance with the pure principles of I the Corsican vendetta. Carried away by the lyricism of his subject, Lucien Herr concludes in the style of a prophet: " The battle will go on in this way, in suffering and in blood, abominable and odious, till that predestined day, which cannot be far off, when the throne itself, the homicidal throne, the throne which heaps up so many crimes, will fall down into the ditch that has to-day been dug for it." This prophecy has not yet been realised, but the true character of all great prophecies is never to be realised; the homicidal throne is much more secure than the cash- box of Humanite. But, after all, w^hat can we learn from all this?
It is not the business of the historian to award prizes for virtue, to propose the erection of statues, or to establish any catechism whatever; his business is to understand what is least individual in the course of events; the questions which interest the chroniclers and excite novelists are those which he most willingly leaves on one side. And so I am not at all concerned to justify the perpetrators of violence, but to inquire into the function of violence of the working classes in contemporary SociaHsm.
It seems to me that the problem of violence has been very badly formulated by many Socialists; as a proof of this, I instance an article published in the Socialiste on October 21, 1905, by Rappoport. The author, who has written a book on the philosophy of history,^ ought, it 1 This expression is not too strong, seeing that the author's studies have been mainly confined to Hegel.
^ Ch. Rappoport, La Philosophic de i'histoire comme sciefice de Vivolution.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION 47 seems to me, to have discussed the question by examining the remoter consequences of these events; but, on the con- trary, he considered them under their most immediate, most paltry, and, consequently, least historical aspect. Accord- ing to him, syndicalism tends necessarily to opportimism, and as this law does not Seem to be verified in France, he adds: " If in some Latin countries it assumes revolutionary attitudes, that is mere appearance. It shouts louder, but that is always for the purpose of demanding reforms inside the framework of existing society. It is a meliorism by blows, but it is always meliorism."
Thus there would be two kinds of meliorism: the one patronised by the Musee Social, the Direction du Travail, and Jaurds, which would work with the aid of maxims, half-Ues, and supphcation to eternal justice; the other proceeds by blows — the latter being the only one that is within the scope of imeducated people who have not yet been enlightened by a knowledge of advanced social economics. These worthy people, democrats devoted to the cause of the Rights of man and the Duties of the informer, sociologist members of the Bloc, think that violence will disappear when popular education becomes more advanced; they recommend, then, a great increase in the numbers of courses and lectures; they hope to overturn revolutionary s>TidicaHsm by the breath of the professors. It is very strange that a revolutionary like Rappoport should agree with these worthy progressives * and their acolytes in their estimate of the meaning of syndicalism; this can only be explained by admitting that even for the best-informed Socialists the problems of violence still remain very obscure.
To examine the effects of violence it is necessary to start from its distant consequences and not from its immediate results. We should not ask whether it is more or less directly advantageous for contemporary * See note p. 13. Trans, 4S REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE workmen than adroit diplomacy would be, but we should inquire what will result from the introduction of violence into the relations of the proletariat with society. We are not comparing two kinds of reformism, but we are endeavouring to find out what contemporary violence is in relation to the future social revolution.
Many will reproach me for not having given any information which might be useful for tactical purposes; no formulas, no recipes. What then was the use of writing at all? Clear-headed people will say that these studies are addressed to men who Hve outside the reahties of everyday life and outside the true movement — that is, outside editors* offices, parliamentary lobbies, and the ante -chambers of the Socialist financiers. Those who have become scientists merely by coming into contact with Belgian sociology will accuse me of having a meta- physical rather than a scientific mind.^ These are opinions which will scarcely touch me, since I have never paid any attention to the views of people who think vulgar stupidity the height of wisdom, and who admire above all men who speak and write without thinking.
Marx also was accused by the great lords of positivism of having, in Capital, treated economics metaphysically; they were astonished " that he had confined himself to a mere critical analysis of actual facts, instead of formulat- ing receipts." * This reproach does not seem to have moved him very much; moreover, in his preface to his book, he had warned the reader that he would not determine the social position of any particular country, and that he would confine himself to an investigation of the laws of capitalist production, ** the tendencies working with iron necessity towards inevitable results." ^ * This expectation has been realised; for in a speech in the Chambre des Deputes on May ii, 1907, Jaur^s called me " the metaphysician of Syndicalism," doubtless ironically, * Capital, Eng. trans., p. xxvi. » Loc. cit. p. xvii.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION 49 One does not need a great knowledge of history to perceive that the mystery of historical development is only inteUigible to men who are far removed from super- ficial distm'bances; the chroniclers and the actors of the drama do not see at all, what, later on, will be regarded as fimdamental; so that one might formulate this \ apparently paradoxical rule, "It is necessary to be out- side in order to see the inside/* When we apply these principles to contemporary events we nm the risk of being taken for metaphysicians, but that is of no importance, for this time we are not at Brussels savez-vous, sais-tu, pour unefois. * If we are dissatisfied with the uns5^tematic views formed by common sense, we must follow a method altogether opposed to that of the sociologists, who found their reputation amongst stupid people by means of insipid and confused chatter; we must firmly resolve to ignore immediate applications, and think only of elaborating generalisations and concepts; it is necessary to set aside all the favomite preoccupations of the politicians. I hope that in the end it will be recognised that I have never broken this rule.
Though they may lack other quahties, these reflections possess one merit which cannot be questioned; it is quite evident that they are inspired by a passionate love of truth. Love of truth has become a rare enough quality; the members of the Bloc despise it profoundly; official Socialists regard it as having anarchical tendencies; poUticians and their haingers-on cannot sufficiently insult the wretched people who prefer truth to the dehghts of * Some Belgian comrades have been offended by these innocent jokes, which nevertheless I retain here; Belgian Socialism is best known in France through Vandevelde, one of the most useless creatures that ever existed, who not being able to console himself for having been born in a country too small to give scope to his genius, came to Paris and gave lectures on all kinds of subjects, and who can be reproached, among other things, for having made an enormous profit on a very small intellectual capital. I have already said what I think of him in the Introduction d I'iconomie moderne, pp. 42-49.
JO /REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE power. But there are still some honest people left in France, and it is for them alone that I have always written.
The greater my experience the more I have recognised that in the study of historical questions a passion for truth is worth more than the most learned methodologies; it enables one to break through conventional wrappings, to penetrate to the foundations of things, and to grasp reality. There has never been a great historian who has not been altogether carried along by this passion; and looking at this matter closely, one sees that it is this passion which has given rise to so many happy intuitions.
I do not claim that I have, in this book, said every- thing that there is to say about violence, and still less to have produced a systematic theory of violence. I have merely reunited and revised a series of articles which appeared in an Italian review, // Divenire sociale} a review which maintains, on the other side of the Alps, the good fight against the exploiters of popular creduHty. The articles were written without any fixed plan; I have not tried to rewrite them, because I did not know how to set about giving a didactic appearance to such an exposi- tion; it even seemed to me better to preserve their imtidy arrangement, since in that form they will perhaps more easily awake thought. We should always be careful in opening up a little-known subject, not to trace its boundaries too rigorously, for in this way the door is closed to the many new facts which arise from unforeseen circumstances. Time after time the theorists of Socialism have been embarrassed by contemporary history. They had constructed magnificent formulas, clear-cut and * The last four chapters have been much more developed than they were in the Italian text. I have thus been able to give more space to philosophic considerations The Italian articles have been collected in a brochure under the title Lo Sciopero generaU e la violenza with a preface by Enrico Leone.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION j/ symmetrical, but they could not make them fit the facts. Rather than abandon their theories, they pre- ferred to declare that the most important facts were mere anomalies, which science must ignore if it is to obtain a real understanding of the whole.
CHAPTER I CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE 1. War of the poorer groups against the rich groups — Opposition of democracy to the division into classes — Methods of buying social peace — The corporative mind.
II. Illusions relating to the disappearance of violence — The mechan- ism of conciliation and the encouragement which it gives to strikers — Influence of fear on social legislation and its con- sequences.
I Everybody complains that discussions about Socialism are generally exceedingly obscure. This obscurity is due, for the most part, to the fact that contemporary Socialists use a terminology which no longer corresponds to their ideas. The best known among the people who call themselves revisionists do not wish to appear to be abandoning certain phrases, which have served for a very long time as a label to characterise Socialist literature. When Bernstein, perceiving the enormous contradiction between the language of social democracy and the true nature of its activity, urged his German comrades to have the courage to appear what they were in reality,^ and to revise a doctrine that had become mendacious, there was a tmiversal outburst of indignation at his audacity; arid 1 Bernstein complains of the pettifoggery and cant which reigns among the social democrats {Socialisme thiorique et socicUdimocratie pratique, French translation, p. 277). He addresses these words from Schiller to social democracy: " Let it dare to appear what it is " 5* CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE 53 the refomiists themselves were not the least eager of the defenders of the ancient formula. I remember hearing well-known French Socialists say that they found it easier to accept the tactics of Millerand than the arguments of Bernstein.
This idolatry of words plays a large part in the history of all ideologies; the preservation of a Marxist vocabulary by people who have become completely estranged from the thought of Marx constitutes a great misfortime for Socialism. The expression " class war," for example, is employed in the most improper manner; and imtil a precise meaning can be given to this term, we must give up all hope of a reasonable exposition of Socialism.
A. To most people the class war is the principle of Socialist tactics. That means that the Socialist party founds its electoral successes on the clashing of interests which exist in an acute state between certain groups, and that, if need be, it would undertake to make this hostility still more acute; their candidates ask the poorest and most numerous class to look upon themselves as forming a corporation, and they offer to become the advocates of this corporation; they promise to use their influence as representatives to improve the lot of the disinherited. Thus we are not very far from what happened in the. Greek states; Parliamentary Socialists are very much akin to the demagogues who clamoured constantly for the abolition of debts, and the division of landed property, who put all public charges upon the rich, and invented plots in order to get large fortimes confiscated. " In the democracies in which the crpwd is above the law," says Aristotle, " the demagogues, by their continual attacks upon the rich, always divide the city into two camps...the oligarchs should abandon all swearing of oaths Uke those they swear to-day; for there are cities in which they have taken this oath — I will be the constant enemy of the J4 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE people, and I will do them all the evil that lies in my power." 1 Here, certainly, is a war between two classes as clearly defined as it can be; but it seems to me absurd to assert that it was in this way that Marx understood the class war, which, according to him, was the essence of Socialism.
I beHeve that the authors of the French law of August II, 1848, had their heads full of these classical reminis- cences when they decreed punishment against all those who, by speeches and newspaper articles, sought " to trouble the public peace by stirring up hatred and con- tempt amongst the citizens." The terrible insurrection of the month of June was just over, and it was firmly believed that the victory of the Parisian workmen would have brought on, if not an attempt to put commimism into practice, at least a series of formidable requisitions on the rich in favour of the poor; it was hoped that an end would be put to civil wars by increasing the difficulty of propagating doctrines of hatred, which might raise the proletariat against the middle class.
Nowadays Parliamentary Socialists no longer enter- tain the idea of insurrection; if they still occasionally speak of it, it is merely to give themselves airs of import- ance; they teach that the ballot-box has replaced the gun; but the means of acquiring power may have changed without there being any change of mental attitude. Electoral literature seems inspired by the purest demagogic doctrines; Socialism makes its appeal to the discontented without troubling about the place they occupy in the world of production; in a society as complex as ours, and as subject to economic upheavals, there is an enormous number of discontented people in all classes — that is why Socialists are often found in places where one would least expect to meet them. Parliamentary Socialism speaks as many languages as it has types of clients. It makes CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE jj its appeal to workmen, to small employers of labour, to peasants; and in spite of Engels, it aims at reaching the farmers; ^ it is at times patriotic; at other times it declares against the Army. It is stopped by no con- tradiction, experience having shown that it is possible, in the course of an electoral campaign, to group together forces which, according to Marxian conceptions, should normally be antagonistic. Besides, cannot a Member of Parhament be of ser\Tice to electors of every economic situation?
In the end the term " proletariat " became synony- mous with oppressed; and there are oppressed in all classes: ^ German Socialists have taken a great interest in the adventures of the Princess of Cobiu-g.' One of our most distinguished reformers, Henri Turot, for a long time one of the editors of the Petite Repuhlique^ and mimicipal coimcillor of Paris, has written a book on the " proletariat of love," by which title he designates the lowest class of prostitutes. If one of these da}^ the suffrage is granted to women, he will doubtless be called upon > Engels. La Question agraire et le sociaJisme. Critique du programme du parti ouvrier franf/ii^. translated in the Mouvement sociaJiste. October 15, 1900, p. 453. It has often been pointed out that certain Socialist candidates had separate bills for the town and the country.
' Hampered by the monopoly of the licensed stockbrokers {agents de change), the other brokers {coitlissiers) of the Bourse thus form a financial proletariat, and among them more than one Socialist admirer of Jaur^s may be found. [Trans. Note. — The coulissiers are only allowed to deal in certain markets — the Kaffir, Argentine, etc. They are constantly conducting press campaigns against the privileged brokers. Many of them are naturalised German Jews, and the licensed brokers utilise this fact in defending their own position.]
• The SociaUst deputy Sudekum, the best-dressed man in Berlin, played a large part in the abduction of the Princess of Coburg; let us hope that he had no financial interest in this affaire. At that time he represented Jaurds's newspaper at Berlin.
* H. Turot was for some considerable time one of the editors of the nationalist paper L' Eclair, and of the Petite Republique at the same time. When Judet took over the management of U Eclair he dismissed his Socialist contributor.
E S6 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE to draw up a statement of the claims of this special proletariat.
B. Contemporary democracy in France finds itself somewhat bewildered by the tactics of the class war. This explains why ParHamentary Socialism does not mingle with the main body of the parties of the extreme left.
In order to understand this situation, we must remember the important part played by revolutionary war in our history; an enormous nimiber of our poHtical ideas originated from war; war presupposes the union of national forces against the enemy, and our French historians have alwa5rs severely criticised those insurrec- tions which hampered the defence of the country. It seems that our democracy is harder on its rebels than monarchies are; the Vend^ens are still denounced daily as infamous traitors. All the articles pubUshed by Cl^menceau to combat the ideas of Herve are inspired by the purest revolutionary tradition, and he says so himself clearly: "I stand by and shall always stand by the old-fashioned patriotism of our fathers of the Revolu- tion," and he scoffs at people who would " suppress international wars in order to hand us over in peace to the amenities of civil war" (Aurore, May 12, 1905).
For some considerable time the Republicans denied 1 that there was any struggle between the classes in France;:| they had so great a horror of revolt that they would not 1 recognise the facts. Judging all things from the abstract \ point of view of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, they said that the legislation of 1789 had been created in order to abolish all distinction of class in law; for that reason they were opposed to proposals for social legislation, which, nearly always, reintroduced the idea of class, and distinguished certain groups of citizens as being unfitted. for the use of liberty. '* The revolution CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE 37 was supposed to have suppressed class distinction,*' wrote Joseph Reinach sadly in the Matin of April 19, 1895; " but they spring up again at every step...It is necessary to point out these aggressive returns of the past, but they must not be allowed to pass un- challenged; they must be resisted." * Electoral dealing led many Republicans to recognise that the Socialists obtain great successes by utilising the passions of jealousy, of deception, or of hate, which exist in the world; thenceforward they became aware of the class war, and many have borrowed the jargon of the Parliamentary Socialists: in this way the party that is called Radical SociaHst came into being. Cl^menceau asserts even that he knows moderates who became SociaUsts in twenty-four hours. " In France," he says, " the Socialists that I know* are excellent Radicals who, thinking that social reforms do not advance quickly enough to please them, conceive that it would be good tactics to claim the greater in order to get the less. How many names and how many secret avowals I could quote to support what I say! But that would be useless, for nothing could be less mysterious" (Aurore, August 14,