ENGELS TO CONRAD SCHMIDT
IN ZURICH
London, 4 February 1892
Dear Schmidt,
On the strength of your letter of 12 December we drank a toast on the 19th of the same month to you and your young wife and on the following day, Sunday, after we had had a meal with the Avelings, this was solemnly affirmed by us all in a fine 1868 port. I trust you are now comfortably settled in Zurich and have found that living with another is preferable to living alone.
Very many thanks for your anti-Wolf article.[1] However it also compelled me to read Wolfs opus[2] which I had quietly laid aside in my bookcase against a rainy day. Since the chap takes the view that the sole purpose of the German language is to conceal the emptiness of his mind, the perusal of this rubbish has been something of a job, though one soon discovers the void that lies behind it. You have stated the main points quite correctly and lucidly and were perfectly right to ignore the unessentials, all of which were put in, of course, simply for the purpose of getting the reader so snarled up that he overlooks the chief flaw. That the man has an aptitude for economic folly amounting to genius I already knew, having read an article of his in the Neue Freie Presse in which he seeks to put the Viennese bourgeois into an even worse state of confusion that they are in already. But this time he has exceeded even my expectations.
Let us reduce his argument to mathematical terms: C,, C2, two aggregate capitals whose respective variable components = v1; v2, and whose respective quantities of surplus value = s, and s2. Given an equal rate of profit for both (profit and surplus value being provisionally taken to be equal), it may therefore be said that
C 1:C 2 = s 1:s 2, therefore — = —.
S[
S2
On this assumption we must now establish the necessary rate of surplus value, i. e. we multiply one side of the equation by v. / v1 = 1 and the other by v2 / v2 = 1; thus
CjVj. = C2V2 = C\
Xi =
S i î x ^
SlV,
S2V2
\ 1
S'1
V2
S 2'
If we bring the respective factors over to the other side of the equation, thereby inverting the fraction, we have
V^-1
S i
v_-?
Si
V^i
\~s->
Si
ST
— x—= — x —
or
—:— = —:—,
\1
v2
v2
v't
\t v2
Vi v2
or, in order to produce Wolfs equal rate of profit, the rates of surplus value must be in proportion to the respective aggregate capitals divided by their respective variable components. If they are not, Wolfs equal rate of profit falls to the ground. But that they 1. can be and 2. always must be — this was the economic fact that it was up to Mr Wolf to prove. Instead he gives us a deduction in which the point to be proved appears as an assumption. For the equation of the rate of surplus value as set forth is simply another form of the equation of the equal rate of profit.
Example: C, = 100, v, = 40, s, = 10
C 2 = 100, v2 = 10, s 2 = 10
Cj
C 2
S[
s 2
100 100
10 10
,.,
.
.
— • — = —:—
which is correct.
40
10
40 10
Now it really seems to me that you go a bit too far when you claim absolute uniformity of rates of surplus value for large-scale production as a whole. The economic levers which impose uniformity upon the rate of profit are, I think, much stronger and more rapid in their effect than those whose pressure equalises the rates of surplus value. However the tendency is there and the differences are negligible in practice. All economic laws are, in the end, merely the expression of mutually incompatible tendencies which gradually assert themselves.
Mr. J. Wolf is in for a pleasant surprise when the turn of the preface to Volume III[3] comes round.
I'm extraordinarily glad that you have made such an encouraging start as a lecturer and trust it will so continue. It will give particular pleasure to Mr Wolf—serve him right.
It's certainly a very good thing that some of those student gentlemen of yours who have looked askance at the transactions of the party should now be resuming their studies. The more they learn, the more tolerant they will be towards people who hold really responsible positions and try to fill them conscientiously, and in time they will also probably realise that, if an important goal is to be attained and the immense army necessary to its attainment kept together, they must concentrate on the main issue and not allow themselves to be led astray by irrelevant squabbles. They may also discover that the 'education', by which they set so much store vis-à-vis the working man, still leaves a great deal to be desired and that the working man already possesses instinctively, 'immediately' à la Hegel, what they could only din into themselves at the cost of much toil. But the shameful business of Jungen at Erfurt was truly deplorable[4] and their newspaper,[5] from what I have seen of it, is no more than a feeble imitation of the anarchist autonomy over here.
If you become 'bogged down' in Hegel, do not be discouraged; six months later you will discover firm stepping-stones in that self-same bog and be able to get across it without trouble. In Hegel the coherent sequence of stages in the development of a notion is part of the system, of what is transient, and I consider that this is where he is at his weakest — if also at his wittiest for at every difficult point he has recourse to a witticism: positive and negative fall to the ground and hence lead on to the category ground[6] (Encyklopädie[7] ). Obviously this would require a different rendering for each language. Try translating the sequence in the Lehre vom Wesen into another language and you'll find the transitions for the most part impossible. Many regards from
Yours,
F. Engels
- ↑ Engels means Conrad Schmidt's article 'Noch einmal das Rätsel der Durchschnitts profitrate' in Jahrbücher für Nationalökonomie und Statistik, 3. Folge, 2. Bd., Jena 1891. Schmidt had enclosed a copy of the article in his letter to Engels of 12 December 1891. Engels gives a critical analysis of Julius Wolfs article in his preface to Vol. III of Capital (see present edition, Vol. 37, Part I).
- ↑ J. Wolf, Das Rätsel der Durchschnittsprofitrate bei Marx.
- ↑ of Capital
- ↑ The Erfurt Congress of the Social-Democratic Party of Germany met from 14 to 21 October 1891. It was attended by 258 delegates. The congress was preceded by a sharp ideological struggle between the party's revolutionary hard core and the Right- and Left-wing opportunists, who had stepped up their activities and created the atmosphere of a party crisis in German Social-Democracy. There had been sharp debates at meetings and in the press on the party's programme and tactics, set off by the public pronouncements of Georg von Vollmar, leader of the Bavarian Social-Democrats, who sought to impose an opportunist reformist tactics and lead the party away from class proletarian positions (see Note 270). Vollmar's campaign provided a pretext for fresh attacks on the party (summer and autumn 1891) by the Jungen, a petty-bourgeois semi-anarchist opposition group within German Social-Democracy formed in 1890. Their stronghold being the Social-Democratic organisation of Berlin, they were also known as the Berlin opposition. The group's specific character was determined by students and young literati claiming the role of the party's theoreticians and leaders. Foremost among them were Paul Ernst, Hans Müller, Paul Kampflfmeyer, Bruno Wille, Karl Wilderberger and Wilhelm Werner. The Jungen ignored the fact that the repeal of the Anti-Socialist Law had changed the conditions the party was operating in. They denied the need to employ legal forms of struggle, opposed Social-Democracy's participation in parliamentary elections and use of the parliamentary platform and demagogically accused the party and its Executive of protecting the interests of the petty bourgeoisie, of opportunism and of violating party democracy. The leaders of the Berlin opposition levelled especially fierce attacks at the party's leaders— Bebel and Liebknecht. The sectarian anarchist activities of the Jungen held a grave danger to the party's unity. The paramount task facing the Erfurt Congress was to overcome the crisis in the party and consolidate its ranks. The congress discussed the report of the party Executive, the activities of Social-Democratic deputies in the Reichstag, the party's tactics, the draft of its new programme, and various organisational questions. The ideological struggle continued at the congress too, especially over party tactics. A report on this issue was presented by Bebel. He — in his report and speeches — as well as other speakers (above all Singer, Liebknecht and Fischer) gave a resolute rebuff both to the Left and to the Right opportunist elements. By a majority vote the congress endorsed Bebel's draft resolution on tactics. It pointed out that the main objective of the working-class movement was the conquest of political power by the proletariat and that this end would be attained not through a chance concatenation of circumstances but through persevering work with the masses and skillful employment of every form and method of proletarian class struggle. The resolution emphasised that the German Social-Democratic Party was a fighting party employing the traditional revolutionary tactics. Vollmar and his supporters, finding themselves in isolation, were forced to retreat. The congress expelled two leaders of the Jungen — Werner and Wilderberger — from the party for their splitting activities and slander; a number of other Jungen leaders announced their resignation from the party and walked out of the congress. The main achievement of the congress was the adoption of a new programme for German Social-Democracy. A report on it was presented by Liebknecht. The Erfurt Programme being essentially Marxist, was an important step forward compared with the Gotha Programme. The Lassallean reformist dogmas had been dropped. The new programme scientifically substantiated the inevitability of the collapse of capitalism and its replacement with socialism, and pointed out that, in order to be able to restructure society along socialist lines, the proletariat must win political power. At the same time, the programme had serious shortcomings, the principal one being its failure to state that the dictatorship of the proletariat was the instrument of the socialist transformation of society. Also missing were propositions concerning the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a democratic republic, the remoulding of Germany's political system and other important matters. In this respect, the criticisms made by Engels in A Critique of the Draft Social-Democratic Programme of 1891 (see present edition, Vol. 27, pp. 217-34) also apply to the version of the programme adopted in Erfurt. The resolutions of the Erfurt congress showed that Marxism had firmly taken root in Germany's working-class movement.
- ↑ In late March 1890 the Jungen, a group of Berlin Social-Democrats, including Max Schippel, published an appeal under the title 'Was soil am 1. Mai geschehen?', urging the workers to hold a strike on the 1st of May. The appeal reflected the specific attitude of the Jungen, crystallised in 1890, as a petty-bourgeois semi-anarchist opposition group within the German Social-Democracy. The hard core of the group was made up of students and young literati (hence the group's name) who claimed the role of the party's theoreticians and leaders. Paul Ernst, Paul Kampffmeyer, Hans Müller, Bruno Wille and others were the group's ideologues. The Jungen ignored the change in the conditions for the party's activity after the repeal of the Anti-Socialist Law. They denied the need for using legal forms of struggle, opposed participation in parliamentary elections and the use of the parliamentary platform by the Social-Democrats and demagogically accused the party and its Executive of opportunism, violation of party democracy and promotion of the interests of the petty bourgeoisie. In October 1891 the Erfurt Congress expelled some of the opposition leaders from the party. A reply to the above-mentioned appeal of the Jungen was given on the party's behalf by the Social-Democratic parliamentary group in a statement entitled, 'An die Arbeiter und Arbeiterinnen Deutschlands!' (adopted in Halle on 13 April 1890).
- ↑ A pun in the original: zu Grunde gehen—to perish; Grund—ground.
- ↑ G. W. F. Hegel, Encyclopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse, Theil 1: Die Logik, § 120.