describe systematically the main relations of the industrial mechanism.
They showed what were the main functions which it, in fact, discharges.
Their theory was sufficient to expose many errors, especially those
which arise from looking solely at one part of a complex process, and
neglecting the implied reactions. It enabled them to point out the
inconsistencies and actual contradictions involved in many popular
arguments, which are still very far from being destroyed. Their main
error--apart from any particular logical slips--was, namely, that when
they had laid down certain principles which belong properly to the
prolegomena of the science, and which are very useful when regarded as
providing logical tests of valid reasoning, they imagined that they had
done a great deal more, and that the desired science was actually
constituted. They laid down three or four primary axioms, such as the
doctrine that men desire wealth, and fancied that the whole theory
could be deduced from them. This, if what I have said be true, was
really to misunderstand what they were really doing. It was to suppose
that you could obtain a description of social phenomena without
examining the actual structure of society; and was as erroneous as to
suppose that you could deduce physiological truths from a few general
propositions about the mechanical relations of the skeleton. Such
criticisms have been made by the historical school of Economists; and
I, at least, can fully accept their general view. I quite agree that
the old assumptions of the older school were frequently unjustifiable;
nor can I deny that they laid them down with a tone of superlative
dogmatism, which was apt to be very offensive, and which was not
justified by their position. Moreover, I entirely agree that the
progress of economic science, and of all other moral sciences, requires
a historical basis; and that we should make a very great blunder if we
thought that the creation of an economic man would justify us in
dispensing with an investigation of concrete facts, both of the present
day and of earlier stages of industrial evolution. But to this there is
an obvious qualification. What do we mean by investigating facts? It
seems to be a very simple rule, but it leads us at once to great
difficulties. So, as Mill and later writers have very rightly asked,
how are we to settle even the most obvious questions in inquiries
where, for obvious reasons, we cannot make experiments, and where we
have not such a set of facts as would spontaneously give us the truths
which we might seek by experiment? Take, as Mill suggested, such a
question as free trade. We cannot get two countries alike in all else,
and differing only in respect to their adoption or rejection of a
protective tariff. Anything like a thoroughgoing system of free trade
has been tried in England alone; and the commercial prosperity of the
country since its adoption has been affected by innumerable conditions,
so that it is altogether impossible to isolate the results which are to
be attributed to the negative condition of the absence of protection.
Briefly, the result is that the phenomena with which we have to deal
are so complex, and our power of arranging them so as to unravel the
complexity is so limited, that the direct method of observation breaks
down altogether. Mill confessed the necessity of applying a different
method, which he described with great ability, and which substantially
amounts to the method of the older Economists. If, with some writers of
the historical school, we admit the objections which apply to this
method, we seem to be reduced to a hopeless state of uncertainty. A
treatise on Political Economy becomes nothing but a miscellaneous
collection of facts, with no definite clue or uniform method of
reasoning. I must beg, in conclusion, to indicate what, so far as I can
guess, seems to be the view suggested in presence of this difficulty.
If I am asked whether Political Economy, understood, for example, as
Mill understood it, is to be regarded as a science, I should have to
admit that I could not simply reply, Yes. To say nothing of any errors
in his logic, I should say that I do not believe that it gives us
sufficient guidance even in regard to economic phenomena. We could not,
that is, deduce from the laws accepted by Economists the necessary
working of any given measure--say, the effect of protection or free
trade, or, still more, the making of a poor-law system. Such problems
involve elements of which the Economist, purely as an Economist, is an
incompetent judge; and the further we get from those questions in which
purely economical considerations are dominant, towards those in which
other factors become relevant,--from questions as to currency, for
example, to questions as to the relations of capitalists and
labourers,--the greater the inadequacy of our methods. But I also hold
that Political Economists may rightly claim a certain scientific
character for their speculations. If their ultimate aim is to frame a
science of economics which shall be part of the science--not yet
constituted--of sociology, then I should say that what they have really
done--so far as they have reasoned accurately--has been to frame an
essential part of the prolegomena to such a science. The "laws" which
they have tried to formulate are not laws which, even if established,
would enable us to predict the results of any given action; but they
are laws which would have to be taken into account in attempting any
such prediction. And this is so, I think, because the laws are
descriptions--within limits accurate descriptions--of actually existing
facts as to the social mechanism. They are not mere abstract
hypotheses, in the sense sometimes attached to that phrase; but
accounts of the plan upon which the industrial arrangements of
civilised countries are, as a matter of fact, constructed. Such a
classification and systematic account of facts is, as I should suggest,
absolutely necessary for any sound historical method. Facts are not
simply things lying about, which anybody can pick up and describe for
the mere pains of collecting them. We cannot even see a fact without
reflection and observation and judgment; and to arrange them in an
order which shall be both systematic and fruitful, to look at them from
that point of view in which we can detect the general underlying
principles, is, in all cases, an essential process before we can begin
to apply a truly historical method. Anything, it is said, may be proved
by facts; and that is painfully true until we have the right method of
what has been called "colligating" facts. The Catholic and the
Protestant, the Conservative and the Radical, the Individualist and the
Socialist, have equal facility in proving their own doctrines with
arguments, which habitually begin, "All history shows". Printers should
be instructed always to strike out that phrase as an erratum; and to
substitute, "I choose to take for granted". In order to judge between
them we have to come to some conclusion as to what is the right method
of conceiving of history, and probably to try many methods before
reaching that which arranges the shifting and complicated chaos of
phenomena in something like an intelligible order. A first step and a
necessary basis, as I believe, for all the more complex inquiries will
have to be found by disentangling the various orders of laws (if I may
so speak), and considering by themselves those laws of industrial
growth which are nearest to the physical sciences in certain respects,
and which, within certain limits, can be considered apart, inasmuch as
they represent the working of forces which are comparatively
independent of forces of a higher order. What I should say for
Political Economists is that they have done a good deal in this
direction; that they have explained, and, I suppose, with considerable
accuracy, what is the actual nature of the industrial mechanism; that
they have explained fairly its working in certain cases where the
economic are practically also the sole or dominant motives; and that
they have thus laid down certain truths which require attention even
when we take into account the play of other more complex and, as we
generally say, higher motives. We may indeed hope and believe that
society will ultimately be constituted upon a different system; and
that for the organisation which has spontaneously and unconsciously
developed itself, another will be substituted which will correspond
more closely to some principles of justice, and give freer scope for
the full development of the human faculties. That is a very large
question: I only say that, in any case, all genuine progress consists
in a development of institutions already existing, and therefore that a
full understanding of the working of the present system is essential to
a rational consideration of possible improvements. The Socialist may
look forward to a time--let us hope that it may come soon!--when nobody
will have any grievances. But his schemes will be the better adapted
for the realisation of his hopes in proportion as he has fully
understood what is the part played by each factor of the existing
system; what is its function, and how that function may be more
efficiently discharged by any substitute. Only upon that condition can
he avoid the common error of inventing some scheme which is in
sociology what schemes for perpetual motion are in mechanics; plans for
making everything go right by condemning some existing portion of the
system without fully understanding how it has come into existence, and
what is the part which it plays in the whole. I think myself that a
study of the good old orthodox system of Political Economy is useful in
this sense, even where it is wrong; because at least it does give a
system, and therefore forces its opponents to present an alternative
system, instead of simply cutting a hole in the shoe when it pinches,
or striking out the driving wheel because it happens to creak
unpleasantly. And I think so the more because I cannot but observe that
whenever a real economic question presents itself, it has to be argued
on pretty much the old principles, unless we take the heroic method of
discarding argument altogether. I should be the last to deny that the
old Political Economy requires careful revision and modification, and
equally slow to deny that the limits of its applicability require to be
carefully defined. But, with these qualifications, I say, with equal
conviction, that it does lay down principles which require study and
consideration, for the simple reason that they assert the existence of
facts which are relevant and important in all the most vitally
interesting problems of to-day.
THE MORALITY OF COMPETITION.
When it has occurred to me to say--as I have occasionally said--that,
to my mind, the whole truth lies neither with the individualist nor
with his antagonist, my friends have often assured me that I was
illogical. Of two contradictory principles, they say, you must take
one. There are cases, I admit, in which this remark applies. It is
true, or it is not true, that two and two make four. We cannot, in
arithmetic, adopt Sir Roger de Coverley's conciliatory view, that there
is much to be said on both sides. But this logical rule supposes that,
in point of fact, the two principles apply to the same case, and are
mutually exclusive. I also think that the habit of taking for granted
that social problems are reducible to such an alternative, is the
source of innumerable fallacies. I hold that, as a rule, any absolute
solution of such problems is impossible; and that a man who boasts of
being logical, is generally announcing his deliberate intention to be
one-sided. He is confusing the undeniable canon that of two
contradictory propositions one must be true, with the assumption that
two propositions are really contradictory. The apparent contradiction
may be illusory. Society, says the individualist, is made up of all its
members. Certainly: if all Englishmen died, there would be no English
race. But it does not follow that every individual Englishman is not
also the product of the race. Society, says the Socialist, is an
organic whole. I quite admit the fact; but it does not follow that, as
a whole, it has any qualities or aims independent of the qualities and
aims of the constituent parts. Metaphysicians have amused themselves,
in all ages, with the puzzle about the many and the one. Perhaps they
may find contradictions in the statement that a human society is both
one and many; a unit and yet complex; but I am content to assume that
unless we admit the fact, we shall get a very little way in sociology.
Society, we say, is an organism. That implies that every part of a
society is dependent upon the other parts, and that although, for
purposes of argument, we may find it convenient to assume that certain
elements remain fixed while others vary, we must always remember that
this is an assumption which, in the long run, never precisely
corresponds to the facts. We may, for example, in economical questions,
attend simply to the play of the ordinary industrial machinery, without
taking into account the fact that the industrial machinery is
conditioned by the political and ecclesiastical constitution, by the
whole social order, and, therefore, by the acceptance of corresponding
ethical, or philosophical or scientific creeds. The method is
justifiable so long as we remember that we are using a logical
artifice; but we blunder if we take our hypothesis for a full statement
of the actual facts. We are then tempted, and it is, perhaps, the
commonest of all sources of error in such inquiries, to assume that
conditions are absolute which are really contingent; or, to attend only
to the action, without noticing the inevitable reactions of the whole
system of institutions. And I would suggest, that from this follows a
very important lesson in such inquiries. To say that this or that part
of a system is bad, is to say, by implication, that some better
arrangement is possible consistently with our primary assumptions. In
other words, we cannot rationally propose simply to cut out one part of
a machine, dead or living, without considering the effect of the
omission upon all the other dependent parts. The whole system is
necessarily altered. What, we must therefore ask, is the tacit
implication as well as what is the immediate purpose of a change? May
not the bad effect be a necessary part of the system to which we also
owe the good; or necessary under some conditions? It is always,
therefore, a relevant question, what is the suggested alternative? We
can then judge whether the removal of a particular evil is or is not to
be produced at a greater cost than it is worth; whether it would be a
process, say, of really curing a smoky chimney or of stopping the
chimney altogether, and so abolishing not only the smoke but the fire.
I propose to apply this to the question of "competition". Competition
is frequently denounced as the source of social evils. The complaint is
far from a new one. I might take for my text a passage from J. S.
Mill's famous chapter on the probable future of the labouring classes.
Mill, after saying that he agrees with the Socialists in their
practical aims, declares his utter dissent from their declamations
against competition. "They forget," he says, "that where competition is
not, monopoly is; and that monopoly, in all its forms, is the taxation
of the industrious for the support of indolence, if not of plunder."
That suggests my question: If competition is bad, what is good? What is
the alternative to competition? Is it, as Mill says, monopoly, or is
any third choice possible? If it is monopoly, do you defend monopoly,
or only monopoly in some special cases? I opened, not long ago, an old
book of caricatures, in which the revolutionary leader is carrying a
banner with the double inscription, "No monopoly! No competition!" The
implied challenge--how can you abolish both?--seemed to me to require a
plain answer. Directly afterwards I then took up the newspaper, and
read the report of an address upon the prize-day of a school. The
speaker dwelt in the usual terms upon the remorseless and crushing
competition of the present day, which he mentioned as an incitement to
every boy to get a good training for the struggle. The moral was
excellent; but it seemed to me curious that the speaker should be
denouncing competition in the very same breath with proofs of its
influence in encouraging education. When I was a lad, a clever boy and
a stupid boy had an equal chance of getting an appointment to a public
office. The merit which won a place might be relationship to a public
official, or perhaps to a gentleman who had an influence in the
constituency of the official. The system was a partial survival of the
good old days in which, according to Sam Weller, the young nobleman got
a position because his mother's uncle's wife's grandfather had once
lighted the King's pipe. The nobleman, I need hardly add, considered
this as an illustration of the pleasant belief, "Whatever is, is
right". As we had ceased to accept that opinion in politics, offices
were soon afterwards thrown open to competition, with the general
impression that we were doing justice and opening a career to merit.
That the resulting system has grave defects is, I think, quite
undeniable; but so far as it has succeeded in determining that the men
should be selected for public duty, for their fitness, and for nothing
else, it is surely a step in advance which no one would now propose to
retrace. And yet it was simply a substitution of competition for
monopoly. As it comes into wider operation, some of us begin to cry out
against competition. The respectable citizen asks, What are we to do
with our boys? The obvious reply is, that he really means, What are we
to do with our fools? A clever lad can now get on by his cleverness;
and of course those who are not clever are thrust aside. That is a
misfortune, perhaps, for them; but we can hardly regard it as a
misfortune for the country. And clearly, too, pressure of this kind is
likely to increase. We have come to believe that it is a main duty of
the nation to provide general education. When the excellent Miss Hannah
More began to spread village schools, she protested warmly that she
would not teach children anything which would tend to make the poor
discontented with their station. They must learn to read the Bible, but
she hoped that they would stop short of such knowledge as would enable
them to read Tom Paine. Now, Hannah More deserves our gratitude for her
share in setting the ball rolling; but it has rolled far beyond the
limits she would have prescribed. We now desire not only that every
child in the country should be able to acquire the elements of learning
at least; but, further, we hope that ladders may be provided by which
every promising child may be able to climb beyond the elements, and to
acquire the fullest culture of which his faculties are capable. There
is not only no credit at the present day in wishing so much, but it is
discreditable not to do what lies in one's power to further its
accomplishment. But, then, is not that to increase enormously the field
of competition? I, for example, am a literary person, after a fashion;
I have, that is, done something to earn a living by my pen. I had the
advantage at starting of belonging to the small class which was well
enough off to send its children to the best schools and universities.
That is to say, I was one of the minority which had virtually a
monopoly of education, and but for that circumstance I should in all
probability have taken to some possibly more honest, but perhaps even
worse paid, occupation. Every extension of the margin of education,
everything which diffuses knowledge and intellectual training through a
wider circle, must increase the competition among authors. If every man
with brains, whether born in a palace or a cottage is to have a chance
of making the best of them, the capacity for authorship, and therefore
the number of competitors, will be enormously spread. It may also, we
will hope, increase the demand for their work. The same remark applies
to every profession for which intellectual culture is a qualification.
Do we regret the fact? Would we sentence three-quarters of the nation
to remain stupid, in order that the fools in the remaining quarter may
have a better chance? That would be contrary to every democratic
instinct, to the highest as well as the lowest. But if I say, every
office and every profession shall be open to every man; success in it
shall depend upon his abilities and merits; and, further, every child
in the country shall have the opportunity of acquiring the necessary
qualifications, what is that but to accept and to stimulate the spirit
of competition? What, I ask, is the alternative? Should people be
appointed by interest? Or is nobody to be anxious for official or
professional or literary or commercial success, but only to develop his
powers from a sense of duty, and wait till some infallible observer
comes round and says, "Friend, take this position, which you deserve"?
Somehow I do not think that last scheme practicable at present. But,
even in that case, I do not see how the merits of any man are to be
tested without enabling him to prove by experiment that he is the most
meritorious person; and, if that be admitted, is not every step in
promoting education, in equalising, therefore, the position from which
men start for the race, a direct encouragement to competition?