Book: Freeland

T >> Theodor Hertzka >> Freeland




The committee were prepared for this demand, and had no difficulty in
dispelling the fears thus expressed. In the first place, the timid members
were made to understand that to continue production as the common
undertaking of the whole community after the Society, as such, had settled
in Freeland, would be sheer Communism. The 200 pioneers of the first
expedition, and the 260 of the second, were simply functionaries appointed
by the Society, whose relation to the Society was not altered in the least
by the fact that they were at the Kenia, while the committee were in
Europe. The pioneers were well aware of this before they left the Old
World. But the case was different with all who now came to the settlement.
Those who came now were not the officials, but the members of the Society;
they did not come to do something at the bidding of the Society, but to
work on their own account on the basis of the Society's principles of
organisation. We had therefore no further right to utilise the first comers
for the benefit of those who came after them. Even if we had such a right,
it would be a fatal mistake to exercise it. For those that came now were no
longer the carefully selected small band with whom we formerly had to do,
but persons who, though influenced by one great common idea, were yet a
thoroughly heterogeneous crowd accidentally thrown together, whom it would
be a very dangerous experiment to entrust with an anti-egoistic system of
production. The first 400 were--at least, in their character of
workers--mainly men of one mould, similar in their capacities and in their
requirements; the few leaders found ready obedience because no one
questioned their intellectual superiority, and chiefly because every one
who took part in the two expeditions was, as it were, pledged beforehand to
obedience. The new-comers, on the contrary, were persons of very various
capacities, and still more diverse in their requirements: there were among
them women and old persons, fathers with numerous children. There might
also be among them--and this was the greatest danger--ambitious persons, to
whom one could not assign the right place because their capacities would
not be known, and who would certainly refuse to obey.

Thus, Communism would most probably in a very short time produce universal
dissatisfaction, and that would lead to chaos. Consequently we had as
little power as we had right to introduce it. But we had not the least
occasion to do so. Why should not that take place at once which must take
place sooner or later--namely, the organisation of free labour, with all
the profits taken by the workers themselves? Because there was not yet
enough human material for the organisation of all the branches of industry?
What necessity was there to organise all branches at once; and, on the
other hand, what certainty was there that it would be possible or useful to
do so in the course of several weeks or months? To take an example: there
were several weavers among us, for whom at present there were no
companions, and who therefore were not in a position to start their
industry with reasonable hopes of success. What was there to prevent these
weavers, in the meantime, from engaging in some other occupation; and who
would guarantee that a little later on there would be weavers enough to set
up a factory; and that, should such a factory be set up, the conditions of
the settlement would be such as to make weaving sufficiently profitable to
justify the carrying of it on? And while it was admitted that there would
be at first more such torsos--such insufficient fragments--of future
branches of industry than there would be later on, this inconvenience was
more than counterbalanced by the fact that it was easier to begin a new
organisation among a small than among a large number of men. In every
respect it appeared advisable at once to organise production upon the basis
of free individual action. Of course it did not follow that the committee
did not possess, not merely the right, but also the duty, of making all the
provision in its power to facilitate and promote the work of organisation.
They would not confine themselves to the work of smoothing the way for the
members of the Society, but would utilise their knowledge and experience in
pointing out to the members the best way. They would assume no compelling
authority, but claimed to be the best--because the best-informed--advisers
of the members. Further, there was no doubt that the whole of the hitherto
acquired property, whether derived from the contributions of the members or
created in Freeland, since it belonged to the whole community and not to
the individual members, was at the disposal of the committee, and that the
committee would make a legitimate use of this its responsibility. The
members might therefore rest assured that no one should be left uncared for
or exposed to blind accident. The committee would act as advisers and
helpers to anyone who wished for their advice and help, not only now, but
at any time. In truth, what the committee purposed to do--conformably to
the Society's programme--differed from the above-mentioned demands in only
two points. The committee offered their advice, whilst they were asked to
command and to allow no scope to other and probably, in many points, better
counsel; and they offered both advice and help in the interest of each
separate individual, whilst they were asked to act in the interest of the
whole community alone.

These explanations gave general satisfaction, and afterwards, when those
detailed regulations had been decided upon which were partly in
contemplation and partly already in operation for the establishment of the
new forms of organisation, the last remnant of fear and hesitation
vanished.

The fundamental feature of the plan of organisation adopted was unlimited
publicity in connection with equally unlimited freedom of movement.
Everyone in Freeland must always know what products were for the time being
in greater or less demand, and in what branch of production for the time
being there was a greater or less profit to be made. To the same extent
must everyone in Freeland always have the right and the power--so far as
his capabilities and his skill permitted--to apply himself to those
branches of production which for the time being yield the largest revenue,
and to this end all the means of production and all the seats of production
must be available to everyone. The measures required, therefore, must first
of all have regard to these two points. A careful statistical report had to
register comprehensively and--which is the chief point--with as much
promptitude as possible every movement of production on the one hand and of
consumption on the other, as well as to give universal publicity to the
movement of prices of all products. In view of the great practical
importance of this system of public advertisement, care would have to be
taken to exclude deception or unintentional errors--a problem which, as
what follows will show, was solved in the most perfect yet simple manner.

And in order that the knowledge thus made common to everyone may be
actually and profitably made use of by everyone--which is possible only
when everyone is placed in a position to apply his capabilities to those
among the branches of labour in which he is skilled, and which for the time
being yield the highest revenue--provision must be made that everyone shall
always be able to obtain possession of the requisite means of production.
Of these means of production there are two classes--the powers of nature
and capital. Without these means of production, the most exact information
as to which are the branches of labour whose products are in greatest
demand, and which, therefore, yield the highest profits, would be of as
little use as the most perfect skill in such branches of production. A man
can utilise his power to labour only when he has command both of the
materials and forces supplied by nature, and of the appropriate instruments
and machines; and if he is to compete with his fellow-workers he must
possess both classes of the means of production as fully and as completely
as they. In order to grow wheat, a man must not only have land at his
command, but he must have land that is equally good for growing wheat as is
the land of the other wheat-growers, otherwise he will labour with less
profit and possibly with actual loss. And possession of the most fertile
land will not make the work possible, or at any rate equally profitable,
unless the worker possesses the requisite agricultural implements, or if he
possesses them in a less degree than his competitors.

Then as to capital: the Free Society undertook to place it at the disposal
of everyone who wished for it, and that without interest, on condition that
it was reimbursed out of the proceeds of production within a period the
length of which was to be determined by the nature of the proposed
investment. As the instruments of labour and the other capitalistic aids to
labour could be provided to any amount and of any quality, one part of the
problem was thereby solved.

The case was different with the natural powers, as representative of which
we will take the land with which those powers are bound up. No one has
produced the land, therefore no one has a claim of ownership upon it, and
everyone has a right to use it. But not merely has no one produced the
land, no one can produce it; the land, therefore, exists in a limited
quantity, and, moreover, the existing land is not all of the same quality.
Now, in spite of all this, how is it possible to satisfy everyone's claim
not merely to land, but to produce-bearing land?

In order to make this clear, the third and, in reality, most fundamental
predicate of economic justice must be expounded. When every worker is
promised the undiminished produce of his own labour, it is necessarily
assumed that the worker himself is the sole and exclusive producer of the
whole of this produce. But this he was, by no means, according to the old
economic system. The worker as such produced only a part of the product,
while another part was produced by the employer, whether he was landowner,
capitalist, or undertaker. Without the organising disciplinary influence of
the latter the toil of the worker would have been fruitless, or at least
much less fruitful; formerly the worker supplied merely the power, while
the organising mind was supplied by the employer.

It is not implied by this that the more intellectual element in the work of
production was formerly to be found exclusively or necessarily on the side
of the employer: the technicians and directors who superintend the great
productive establishments belong essentially to the wage-earners; and it
will be readily admitted that in many cases the higher intelligence is to
be found not in the employers, but in the workers. Nevertheless, in all
cases where a number of workers have had to be brought together and
accustomed to work in common, this work of organising has been the business
of the employer. Hitherto the worker has been able to produce for himself
only in isolation; whenever a number had to be brought together, in one
enterprise, a 'master' has been necessary, a master who with the
whip--which may be made either of thongs or of the paragraphs in a set of
factory regulations--has kept the rebellious together, and _therefore_--not
because of his higher intelligence--has swept the profits into his own
pocket, leaving to the workers, whether they belonged to the proletariat or
to the so-called intelligent classes, only so much as sufficed to sustain
them. Hitherto the workers have made no attempt to unite their productive
labours without a master, as free, self-competent men, and not as servants.
The employment of those powerful instruments and contrivances which science
and invention have placed in the hands of men, and which so indefinitely
multiply the profits of human activity, presupposes the united action of
many; and hitherto this united action has been taken only hand in hand with
servitude. The productive associations of a Schulze-Delitzsch and others
have effected no change in the real character of servitude; they have
merely altered the name of the masters. In these associations there are
still the employers and the workers; to the former belongs the profit, the
latter receive stall and manger like the biped beasts of burden of the
single employer or of the joint-stock societies whose shareholders do not
happen to be workers. In order that labour may be free and
self-controlling, the workers must combine as such, and not as small
capitalists; they must not have over them any employer of any land or any
name, not even an employer consisting of an association of themselves. They
must organise themselves as workers, and only as such; for only as such
have they a claim to the full produce of their labour. This organisation of
work without the slightest remnant of the old servile relationship to an
employer of some kind or other, is the fundamental problem of social
emancipation: if this problem be successfully solved, everything else will
follow of itself.

But this organisation was not nearly so difficult as it appears to be at
first sight. The committee started from the principle that the right forms
of the organisation of free labour were best found through the free
co-operation of all those who shared in this organisation. No special
difficulties were discovered in this. The questions which had to be dealt
with were of the simplest nature. For example: in order to set up an
iron-works, it was not at all necessary that the workers should all
understand the whole mechanism of the manufacture of iron. Two things only
were necessary--first, that the men should know what sort of persons they
ought to set at the head of their factory; and, secondly, that on the one
hand they should give those persons sufficient authority properly to
control the work, and, on the other hand, they should reserve to themselves
sufficient authority to hold the reins of their undertaking in their own
hands. Doubtless, very serious mistakes might be made in the organisation
of the managing as well as of the overlooking organs--there might be a
serious misproportion in the powers conferred. But the previously mentioned
unlimited publicity of all productive operations, which on other grounds
also would be demanded in the interest of the commonwealth, materially
lightened the task of the associations of workers; and as all the members
of each such productive association had in this decisive point exactly the
same interests, and their whole attention was always directed to these
interests, they learnt with remarkable speed to correct the mistakes they
had made, so that after a few months the new apparatus worked tolerably
well, and in a remarkably short time reached a high degree of perfection.
From the beginning there was nothing left to desire in the industry and
diligence of all the associates--a fact which might have been anticipated
in view of the full play given to self-interest as well as of the incessant
mutual encouragement and control of men who had equal rights and were
equally interested.

The committee therefore drew up a 'Model Statute' for the use of the
associations, not at all anticipating that it would really be preserved as
a model, but merely for the sake of making a beginning and of providing a
formula which the associations might use as the skeleton of the schemes of
organisation that their experience would enable them to devise. As a matter
of fact this 'Model Statute,' which was at first accepted almost unaltered
by all the associations, was in less than twelve months so much altered and
enlarged that little more than the leading principles of its original form
remained. These, however, were the following:

1. Admission into every association is free to everyone, whether a member
of any other association or not; and any member can leave any association
at any time.

2. Every member has a claim upon such a share of the net profits of the
association as is proportionate to the amount of work he has contributed.

3. Every member's contribution of work shall be measured by the number of
hours he has worked; the older members receiving more than those who have
joined the association later, in the proportion of a premium of _x_ per
cent. for every year of seniority. Also, a premium can be contracted for,
in the way of free association, for skilled labour.

4. The labour contribution of superintendents or directors shall, according
to a voluntary arrangement with every individual concerned, be reckoned us
equal to a certain number of hours of work per day.

5. The profits of the association shall be calculated at the end of every
year of business, and, after deducting the repayment of capital and the
taxes paid to the Freeland commonwealth, divided. During each year the
members shall receive, for every hour of work or of reckoned work, advances
equal to _x_ per cent. of the net profits of the previous year.

6. The members shall, in case of the dissolution or liquidation of on
association, be liable for the contracted loan in equal proportions; which
liability, so far as regards the still outstanding amount, attaches also to
newly entering members. When a member leaves, his liability for the already
contracted loan shall not cease. This liability for the debts of the
association shall, in case of dissolution or liquidation, be in proportion
to the claim of the liable member upon the existing property.

7. The highest authority of the association is the general meeting, in
which every member possesses an equal active and passive vote. The general
meeting carries its motions by a simple majority of votes; a majority of
three-fourths is required for the alteration of statutes, dissolution, or
liquidation.

8. The general meeting exercises its rights either directly as such, or
through its elected functionaries, who are responsible to it.

9. The management of the business of the association is placed in the hands
of a directorate of _x_ members, elected for _x_ years by the general
meeting, but their appointment can be at any time rescinded. The
subordinate business functionaries are nominated by the directorate; but
the fixing of the salaries--measured in hours of work--of these
functionaries is the business of the general assembly on the proposition of
the directorate.

10. The general meeting annually elects a council of inspection consisting
of _x_ members, to inspect the books and take note of the manner in which
the business is conducted, and to furnish periodical reports.

It will strike the reader at once that only with reference to the possible
dissolution of an association (section 6) is there a mention of what should
apparently be regarded as the principal thing--namely, of the 'property' of
the associations and of the claims of the members upon this property. The
reason of this is that any 'property' of the association, in the ordinary
sense, does not exist. The members, it is true, possess the right of
usufruct of the existing productive capital; but as they always share this
right with every newly entering member, and are themselves bound to the
association by nothing except their interest in the profits of their
labour, so there can be no property-interest in the association so long as
they are carrying on their work. And, in fact, that which everyone can use
cannot constitute property, however useful it maybe. There are no
proprietors--merely usufructuaries of the association's capital. And should
it be thought that this is in contradiction to the obligation to reimburse
the loaned productive capital of the associations, it ought not to be
overlooked that even this repayment of capital--except in the already
mentioned case of a liquidation--is done by the members merely in their
capacity of usufructuaries of the means of production. As the reimbursed
capital is derived from the profits, and these are divided among the
members in proportion to each one's contribution of work, every member
contributes to the reimbursement in proportion to the amount of work he
does. And when the subject is looked at more closely it will be seen that
the repayments are ultimately derived from the consumers of the commodities
produced by the associations; they form, of course, a part of the cost of
production, and must necessarily be covered by the price of the product.
That this shall take place fully and universally is ensured with infallible
certainty by the free mobilisation of labour. A production in which these
repayments were not completely covered by the price of the commodities
produced would fail to attract labour until the diminished supply of the
commodities had produced the requisite rise in price. When the repayments
have all been made, this part of the cost of production ceases; the
association capital may be regarded as amortised, and the prices of the
commodities produced sink--again under the influence of the free
mobilisation of labour; so that the members of the association individually
profit as little by the employment of burdenless capital as they suffered
before by the liquidation of their burden. Profit and loss are always
distributed--still thanks to the mobilisation of labour--equally among all
the workers of Freeland.

Thus it is seen that, in consequence of this simple and infallibly
operative arrangement, productive capital is, strictly speaking, as
ownerless as the land; it belongs to everyone, and therefore to no one. The
community of producers supplies it and employs it, and it does both in
exact proportion to the amount of work contributed by each individual; and
payment for the expenditure is made by the community of consumers--again by
each one in exact proportion to the consumption of each individual.

That an absolute and universally uniform level of profits should result
from this absolutely free mobility of labour neither was expected, nor has
it been attained. Often the inequality is not discovered until the
balance-sheets are drawn up, and therefore cannot until then be removed by
the ebb and flow of labour. But, besides this, there is an important and
continuous difference of gains--a difference which it is impossible to
equalise, and which has its intrinsic foundation in the difference in the
amount of effort and inconvenience involved in engaging in the different
branches of labour. Certainly it is not the same in Freeland as in other
parts of the world, where only too often the burden of labour is in inverse
ratio to its profitableness; with us difficult, burdensome, unpleasant
kinds of labour must without exception obtain larger gains than the easier
and more agreeable--so far as the latter do not demand special
skill--otherwise everyone would at once forsake the former and apply
themselves to the latter. Moreover, the premium allowed to the older
members in section 3--which varies in different associations from one to
three per cent. for each year, and therefore, in cases of long-continued
labour, amounts to a very respectable sum, and is intended to attach the
proved veteran of labour to the undertaking--prevents an absolute
equalisation of gains even in associations of exactly similar constitution.

Section 5 of the statutes requires a brief explanation. In the first year,
the calculation of the advances to be made to the association members could
not, of course, be based upon the net profits of the previous year, and the
committee therefore suggested a fixed sum of one shilling per hour. This
strikingly high rate will perhaps excite surprise, particularly in view of
the scale of prices that prevailed at the Kenia; and it may reasonably be
asked whence the committee derived the courage to hope for such a high rate
of profits as would justify the payment of such an advance. But this
valuation was not recklessly made, it was in truth the expression of
extreme prudence. The results of the associated productive labour hitherto
in operation had actually been much more favourable. The corn industry, for
example, had yielded a gross return of a little over 41,000 cwt. of
different cereals for a total expenditure of 44,500 hours of labour. The
average price of these cereals in Eden Vale at that time was not quite 3s.
per cwt., as we had grown more than we needed, and the export through
Mombasa yielded only 3s. on account of the still very primitive means of
transport. We had therefore, in round figures, agricultural produce worth
6000£. The cost of producing this was: materials 400£, amortisation of
invested capital (implements and cattle) 300£; so that 5,300£ remained as
net profit. As a tax to cover all those expenses which, in accordance with
our programme, had to be incurred by the commonwealth, and which will be
spoken of further on, not less than thirty-five per cent. was set aside.
Thus a round sum of 3,400£ remained as disposable profit. Divided by the
44,500 hours of labour, this gave 1s. 6d. for each hour. This was also
approximately the average profit of the other kinds of production, so far
as it was possible to assess it in the absence of a general market at the
Kenia. Thus it could be assumed with the utmost confidence that, had we
been able to control the prices of all commodities by means of supply and
demand, there would either have been paid, or might have been assessed, at
least a price equivalent to that which produced the agricultural profit.
For we could at once have produced--as far as our supply of labour
went--and disposed of cereal crops valued at 3s. per cwt. at Eden Vale;
therefore, in the period of work through which we had already passed
everyone was able to earn at least 1s. 6d. by one hour's labour. But, as
will presently be seen, we were entering upon the next period of work with
much improved means; therefore, apart from unforeseen contingencies, the
productiveness of our labour must very considerably increase, so that, in
granting an advance of one shilling for each hour of labour, we calculated
that we were advancing scarcely the half of the actual earnings--an
assumption that was fully borne out by the result. In later seasons it
became the practice of most associations to make the advance as much as
ninety per cent. of the net profits of the previous year.

Copyright (c) 2007. knowncrafts.net. All rights reserved.