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machinery of battle would alter the facts out of which the battle develops: and the substitution of political for economic machinery would be merely such a change; the outward expression would be different, not the inward realities. The relations between men and men considered on a business footing as profit and loss transactions are already, indeed, regulated to some extent by the State, as we saw when we considered the connexion of law and economic bargaining. To prevent the higgling of the market, and to transfer all such disputes to deliberative assemblies is only to concentrate in one sphere an indispensable aspect of society's life. The precise demarcation between the political pull of forces and economic contracting may vary from period to period in countless ways. And it may readily be admitted in favour of political action, that as fellow-citizens men feel a wider and closer common brotherhood than they usually do as buyer and seller: consequently that the legislature has often salved wounds inflicted by the undue asperities of economic warfare. The Marxian view that political power must necessarily be the shadow of economic is pessimistic exaggeration: and through the further control and humanizing of the market by the State we may see some chance of establishing a more refined and balanced civilization than has yet appeared. But the possibility of checking the one machine by the other only remains if the entire work of the one is not thrown on to the other, which must then adapt itself to its new functions, and lose such impartiality and singleness of purpose as it has retained in spite of economic pressure.

§ 4. The Comparative Value of Different
Forms of Society

THE State, then, unless the word is used as a synonym for Society in the widest and loosest sense, is not the only form of social organization, and its chief claim to be considered the most important is that it in some measure comprises the others within its unity, defines their relations, and fixes their limits. Society in various aspects is essential to human life, and even the contemplative side of personality may find in friends and fellowworkers a needed education and stimulus. But in reflection on Aristotle's famous doctrine, that the State exists in the first instance to secure life, but finally to secure the good life, we may be inclined in the light of the above discussion to demand something more definite. The maintenance of life and its necessary material foundations is largely the work of an economic association, in which each man plays his part for himself, barters his labour for the labour of others, and only unthinkingly, and as it were by accident, serves a common end at all. The good life, so far as its practical side is concerned, finds its outlet chiefly in the intimacies of the family or of friendship, in devotion to some restricted number of fellow-beings in whom the narrow range of our powers finds more than enough to occupy their attention: so far as it is contemplative it is essentially individual, the thought of this or that thinker, aided by teachers or associates, but in the last resort lonely and self-supported. Thus both the lower and the higher functions of Aristotle's State are really carried on largely by other forms of association. As citizens, in the narrow sense, men are seldom consciously and directly playing a part

in economic life. As citizens, they are seldom so close to one another, so much moved by common impulses and desires as they could be in their home or even their clubs. Political philosophy has been too proud to speak much of clubs, and even the family has been subordinated to a minor though responsible position in the State as probably the best or most useful machinery for recruiting its members. The view taken here is entirely at variance with this exaltation of the legislative authority. It sees a necessity for co-ordination which none of the subordinate groups can satisfy by itself. It sees a blindness in economic individualism which works out better in many ways than its critics will allow, but requires the control of some more intelligent power than the law of supply and demand. It sees side by side with the devotion of special affection the danger of narrow partiality. It sees in the vision of the artist and the insight of the scientist something which, by common action, may be taken more deeply than ever yet into the common heritage of humanity. In all this it finds a programme for the State sufficient to engross centuries of political work, an importance in the State that no other organization possesses. But the State would not have this importance unless its range were limited, unless its task were to co-ordinate other forms of social life, not to supersede them. Nor is the progress of humanity merely to be attained by better regulation of subordinate societies. It depends also on an ennobling and enriching of the individual life of these narrow groups. Let me give one illustration. To separate the economic structure of society from what may be called associations for ethical purposes was admitted to be abstract and inexact. The family taken as a type of the latter can also be

regarded for certain purposes at least as the true economic unit. Similarly the unity of interest, sentiment or class feeling, that has been noticed as one of the most practical forces in developing human loyalty, finds its expression not merely in clubs and private friendships but in professional federations. These federations in turn may sustain not merely the economic status of their members, nor even their brotherly feeling, but also their professional pride as craftsmen. It is, of course, an unreal abstraction to regard work as simply the sacrifice a man endures for a reward, though it is true that as the reward ceases to be important to a man, the economist gradually loses interest in him.

Accordingly, a professional association may in various ways encourage or enable men to find the pleasure of selfexpression in their work that the artist within them demands. For these ends the worker must understand the methods of production, and in some ways control them. The self-governing workshop would be superior to the disciplined discontent of many efficient factories to-day, not merely because the workers revolted less against their fortunes, against the economic terms at which they were engaged, but because then the energies of creative skill could unfold under conditions which the creators themselves approved. In the work of the Trade Union this renewal of the responsible artist is as valid and important an aim as the mere raising of wages or shortening of hours. Within the Trade Union again the questions of central and subordinate organizations recurs. Just as the State has been debarred by the above discussion from swallowing up the groups it ought to reconcile, so the Union finds a necessity at once for a great central organization to give it fighting strength,

and for a detailed organization based on craft or locality1 to develop the more intimate ties above described. On the success of the Unions in such tasks the future of the Labour Movement largely depends. But whether they perform their work well or ill, it will always be impossible for any trade Guild or professional society to avoid being far more than a bargaining confederation: just as it is impossible for the economic man to avoid being also a kinsman or friend and even an artist. Thus the infusion of the spirit of the higher social groupings into the lower becomes an aim of progressive action no less than a better co-ordination of societies within the State.

VII

THE DISTINCTIVE NATURE

OF THE STATE

1. Its Part in the Present

IT has been seen that human personality develops its full excellence not merely in the 'State' nor even in 'society generally', but in various forms of association differing widely in purpose and intimacy. Why is it then that the State has absorbed so much attention from students of these subjects? The reason is chiefly that they have been attracted by the conflict between individual will and law, by the problem whether resistance to law can be justified, or on what ground obedience must be demanded. Sovereign power resides in the legislative authority of the State proper, and political writers,

1 See Mr. Cole's work, The World of Labour.

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