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very superficial opinions upon the Socialist activity of the other nations, being ignorant and misinformed. It is interesting to note that the Neue Zeit has taken up the discussion of French and Italian syndicalism only after the publication of several articles by Michels and Sombart in some radical papers in which they pointed out the significance of this new departure of the movement of the workingmen.

Michels' first work, mentioned in footnote,* is a revised edition of a series of articles which he published in the Archiv für Sozialwissenschaft. This is a very profound monograph of Italian socialism. It replaces the unscientific volume of Angiolini (Cinquant'anni di socialismo in Italia. Firenze. 1903) and puts into relief those aspects of socialism which are to be found especially in Italy.

Michels tries to ascertain the part that the proletarian, the middleclass and the intellectual elements play in the Socialist movement. In order to come to a conclusion, he goes back to the beginnings of the movement, to the Internationale; he investigates the origin of the leaders, classifies the dues-paying members and analyzes the statistics of the Parliamentary elections. His conclusion is that notwithstanding that the number of the Socialist vote falls behind the total number of the proletarian and proletaroid voters, in others words, Italian socialism has not thus far conquered all the proletarian elements, the proletarians are in the majority in the Italian Socialist party. However, there are many proletaroid elements in the party like small land-owners, state employees, teachers, etc. Further, there are party members from among the small middle-class, from the intellectuals and the employees of private enterprises. The leaders are almost exclusively from the bourgeoisie. In other words, it is evident that the Italian Socialist party is neither an association of people who hold the same ideal nor the representative body of a single class.

This is the most important conclusion of Michels' book. It contains very important data to the psychology of the Socialist parties and of all parties in general. It has been conclusively proven that a very significant percentage of the three and one-quarter million German Socialist voters is non-proletarian. We have no data as to the French Socialist party. However, we know that the intellectuals predominate in leadership and that a great number of the true proletarians, the syndicalists, do not identify themselves with the party. Many farming elements belong to the

Reviews of Dr. Robert Michels' "Il proletario e la borghesia nel movimento socialista Italiano. Saggio de zcienza sociografico-politica, Torino. 1908," and of his "Die Entwickelung der Theorien in modernen Sozialismus Italiens.. In Ferri, Die revolutionare Methods. Leipzig. 1908."

Austrian Socialist party. All this goes to show that the four greatest European Socialist parties do not represent that unity of elements that the popular Socialist theory claims.

The characteristic feature of the so-called modern movement of the workingmen-a term which the German Marxists have originated— is that the Socialists organize in the form of a political party, that socialism is represented by a political party. This is the way theory and practice become one. This is the only form in which socialism and the working class can unite, because a party is nothing else but the political representative of the economic movement of a class. Therefore the Socialist party cannot be merely the representative body of the working class, opposing the other parties as the representative bodies of other classes. And now it becomes evident, in one country after the other, that, while on the one hand, large strata of the economically organized working class are not represented by the, Socialist party, on the other hand, large strata of the members of the Socialist parties do not belong to the working class. In other words, the supposed identity of unity of party and class is not at all so evidently clear as is generally believed.

Within the limits of a review, we cannot give all the conclusions deriving from the above facts. We want to point out only the salient conclusions—namely, if party and class are not the two manifestations of the same social formation and if socialism is the inevitable ideology of the working class, then the party cannot cover the content of socialism and the means and ways to the practical realization of socialism are by no means exhausted with those offered by the platform of the modern Socialist parties. In other words, if the Socialist parties want to become the representative bodies of the whole working class, and only of the working class, then they must make very essential revisions in their current theories and general practice.

It has long been felt that there is some trouble in the Socialist parties and that the reality is not in harmony with the theories. All those struggles which, for the past decade, sail under the names of reformism, revisionism, revolutionism, back to Kant, back to Marx, are nothing but manifestations of this inner dissonance. These struggles have many interesting episodes, hidden threads and entangled knots which will perhaps be disentangled only in the remote future.

The best parts in Michels' book are where he speaks about the part which the Intellectuals play in the Italian Socialist movement. From his introduction to Ferri's leaflet we see that the Italian Socialist theories are entirely the product of the Intellectuals; they were the first propagators of socialism and even to-day most of the official propagandists, the journalists, the editors of the reviews, are Intellectuals.

Since 1870 only six real workers were members of the Socialist parliamentary group, while, since 1900, there were never less than nine university professors in parliament. Among the twenty-four Socialists who were sent to parliament at the last elections, we find ten university professors, six lawyers, three doctors, etc., but not a single workingman. However, the target of all inner feud in the Socialist movement is the Intellectuals. They are the source of all the troubles, just as is the fact in Germany.

It is entertaining to read the sketch of all these struggles. The intransigents* led by Ferri, a university professor, tried to drive from the party, with the aid of the workers, all the party members who were not of a proletarian origin or those who had a university education. While the leader of the reformists, Turati, the son of a Governor and a lawyer, answers in a pamphlet stating that the revolutionary intellectuals are of petit-bourgeois origin, who, because they could not make a career, have left their class and joined the growing socialist movement. He appealed to the workingmen to throw over their vain and impotent leaders who do not know the real needs of the workers. The situation became more curious when the syndicalists of the party group, led by a university professor and an ex-lieutenant of the army, Arturo Labriola and Walter Mocchi, began to aim even more pointedly at the intellectuals. In consequence thereof the adherents of Ferri and Turati made peace. It seemed that the whole crisis of Italian socialism was due to the intellectuals.

Michels energetically refutes the idea that all the trouble came from the relatively small number of the intellectuals. He very interestingly explains those race-psychological causes which make the great group of Italian intellectuals more sympathetic toward socialism than, for instance, the German intellectuals, who are still on the intellectual level of the medieval caste system. Michels proves that the intellectuals derive hardly any or no material benefits at all from joining the socialist movement. The members of Parliament do not receive a salary. The party employs only a few paid officials and only one or two party papers are paying their contributors. In innumerable cases the bourgeois socialists proved to be more proletarian in their spirit than the socialists who are born proletarians. He quotes Labriola who is forced to confess that among the intellectuals of the party there are many "who have a really heroic character, who are noble and spirited organizers and unselfish

*A term used in Europe for the "uncompromising" or "irreconcilable" wing of the socialists, corresponding pretty nearly to what in America we call "impossibilists."-Editor.

humanists, who do not derive any material benefits or only a ridiculously small compensation for an incredible amount of activity and sacrifice.

"The great moral beauty of Italian socialism would perish," says Michels, "if the intellectuals were driven from the movement. On the contrary, a purely proletarian movement would fall an easy prey to corruption. A workingman leader," he continues, "would not save the party from corruption in the field of theories and even less so in the field of practice."

We have said in our study that in the Italian Internationale the bourgeois elements have given a more splendid proof of their political honesty than any number of proletarian leaders. The same thing holds good of other movements. In France, in 1848, among fourteen worker members of Parliament not less than ten have betrayed their class.

The more exclusive a movement of the workers is, the easier it is penetrated by corruption. The purely proletarian movement led by Fribourg and Tolain, under Napoleon III, the Trade Union movement of the United States, which is bought and sold by its famed bosses, are not conclusive proofs of the notion that only the hand of the laborer may keep clean his party."

Michels finds the solution in syndicalism. However, he criticizes very sharply the Italian syndicalist movement and its youthful immaturity. The future of socialism is syndicalism, which is not merely proletarian but also revolutionary socialist, which unites the class with the ideal but does not exclude the intellectuals without whom it cannot fulfill its great theoretical, scientific and moral duties.

Michels covers such a great mass of data that it is impossible to speak of it all within the limits of a review. We have not mentioned many questions about which he has new things to say. There are very interesting chapters in which he explains the relations of the proletarians. of the farms to the socialist party, the antagonism between socialists and anarchists and the psychology of the Italian bourgeoisie as against that of the German.

Translated by ODIN POR, Florence, Italy.

BY CLARENCE S. DARROW

[graphic]

HE season of the "hold up man" and the "anti-hold up man" is once more at hand. This period comes annually at the same time of year, just after the flower show, the horse show, and along with the college foot ball games. It begins with the season of gaiety, when the days grow short and the nights grow long, when the first sharp, tingling frost of winter drives the people off the streets and huddles them around their fires, and when the price of coal goes up.

The season of the "hold up man" will wane as the winter gaieties fade away-soon after lent-when the nights again grow short and the days grow long, when the price of coal goes down and the sun comes back once more and warms the poor and homeless, without money and without price.

Lawyers, mayors, doctors and policemen freely give their advice as to the best way to treat the "hold up man." There is scarcely a topic of the day in which all classes of society so generally agree-one remedy is prescribed by all-more police, more revolvers, more clubs, more jails-this is the remedy for the "hold up man." One able lawyer advises every citizen to carry a revolver and to shoot at every suspected hold upto aim at the abdomen, presumably the most fatal spot-why the "hold up man" should be treated differently from other men who transgress the moral law is not quite clear. If all sinners were to be shot at sight few would be left to bury the dead. A doctor, generally humane and wise, declares that the mayor is responsible for all the hold up men, that there is no excuse for a burglary on "Maple street," and some other street. What the residents of these streets have done to exempt them from the hold up man is not made clear.

It has not occurred to any of these eminent people to find the cause for the "hold up man," and yet most of them know that nothing in this world exists without a cause.

Of course no one but a crank or a fanatic could find any necessary connection between the brilliant costumes of the horse show, the cold blasts of winter, the price of coal and the hold up man, yet after all many men whom the world has called wise-and even orthodox-have associated these causes and brought not only arguments but long tables

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