Letter: A Critic of Marx’s Economic Theories (1943)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1943 issue of the Socialist Standard

Editorial Committee, Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Dear Sirs,

In the “Socialist Standard” for June 1943 I find the following explanation of how the worker is said to be exploited under capitalism : “The worker is not paid for the produce of his work for the whole duration of the day. In a working day of eight hours a worker may receive wages equivalent to, say, four hours’ produce of his work. The other four hours are given free to the capitalist. It is thus that the worker is exploited under capitalism. Were he paid for the full produce of his eight hours’ work there would be no profits for the capitalist class.”

It is surprising that a paper such as the “Socialist Standard,” which adopts such a scientific attitude to many of life’s problems, should be found in the year 1943 preaching this exploded and ridiculous fallacy of Marx. There is a case for Socialism—many will say a very strong case—but it is not to be found in the Marxian doctrines of value and surplus-value, the absurdities of which have been exposed by Socialists and non-Socialists alike.

Profit may, under certain circumstances, be robbery, but it is not robbery simply as profit. As Arnold Lunn has said, profit is merely a form of payment, and the fact that in certain cases there may be excessive profit is no more an argument against profit than the fact that in certain cases there may be excessive payment for labour would be an argument against wages. The illustration given in the “Socialist Standard” assumes that the only element entering into production is labour, and entirely ignores all other factors. But surely the contribution of capital and directive ability cannot be thus ignored. If I build a boat and lend it to a friend to go fishing, and if my friend catches ten fish and gives me five of them for the use of my capital (the boat), in what respect am I robbing him ? My capital was a necessary contribution to the final result. And if I am able to direct him to the place where he will catch the most fish because I have devoted lengthy study to the fishing ground, am I not to be rewarded for my contribution? Or let me use another illustration. The firm of Brown & Company print and publish a book, employing a certain number of men in doing so. Smith & Company in the next street do likewise, employing the same number of men. But the sales of the first book amount to 100,000 copies, while those of the second book reach several times that number. The profits in each case are different, but the labour employed is the same. Is it not clear that not labour alone, but the manner in which it is directed determines the difference ? The compositors on the first book no doubt worked as hard as those on the second. They put in the same number of hours. But in setting the type they formed different words. These were the words of the authors. And one was more successful than the other. Not labour alone, therefore, but how it is directed and the part that capital plays in the final result must be considered. Your contributor considers labour only.

I have said that Socialists and anti-Socialists alike have riddled the Marxian doctrine through and through. Permit me to append a few opinions.

“Upon Marx’s theory of value and surplus value it is not necessary to spend much time. It has not stood the test of criticism; it is out of harmony with the facts; and it is far from self-consistent.” “The Marxian theory of value seems clearly untenable not less on theoretic grounds than from an analysis of the facts of business.” (Prof. H. J. Laski : “Karl Marx.”) 

“A mass of congealed fallacies.” (Prof. Flint : “Socialism.”) 

“The greatest intellectual mare’s nest of the century which has just ended.” (W. H. Mallock : “A Critical Examination of Socialism.”) 

“Rests upon superstition and upon a wholly superficial misconception of facts.” (Dr. A. Schaffle: “The Impossibility of Social Democracy.”) 

“The widespread acceptance of it among the labouring classes is doubly mischievous. On the one hand, it makes their justified resentment at the working of the economic order take the form of denouncing one definite alleged injustice; and this gives heat rather than light to their examination of schemes of reform. On the other hand, it exasperates those whom they attack by the injustice of the particular allegation.” (“The Labour Theory of Value in Karl Marx,” H. W. B. Joseph.)

Dr. A. D. Lindsay describes the doctrine as “indefensible,” and Bertrand Russell describes it as “not a contribution to economic theory as much as a translation of hatred into abstract terms and mathematical formulae.” Sidney Webb (“The Decay of Capitalist Civilisation“) says that “the theoretic mistakes of Marx are as patent nowadays as the mistakes of Moses.”

Prof. Hearnshaw (“Survey of Socialism”) makes the following criticism : “The Labour theory of value involves two propositions, both of which are entirely untenable. The first is that the cost of production is the only determinant of value; the second that the only active element in production is labour, and that consequently the wage of labour is the only justifiable element in determining cost of production. The first proposition wholly ignores the vital factor of demand as a determinant of value; the second wholly ignore all the factors of production except labour. . . . And yet this fake and now abandoned and derelict theory has been made for more than a quarter of a century (1867-94) on the one hand the chief weapon of the Marxian attack upon capitalism, and on the other hand the corner-stone of the Marxian economic structure.”

Prof. Flint, in his instructive work “Socialism,” states that : “The view of Marx is undoubtedly erroneous. Profits are derivable from all the factors of production, and not merely from labour. . . . Profit and loss in business are not proportional to what Marx calls the variable capital but to the total capital employed in it. To maintain the reverse implies blindness to the most obvious and indubitable facts of industrial and commercial life.”

Finally (for I cannot claim too great a portion of your space), let me quote the words of the veteran European Socialist, Max Beer (“The Life and Teaching of Karl Marx”) : 

“It is impossible to set aside the view that Marx’s theory of value and surplus value has rather the significance of a political and social slogan than of an economic truth. It is for Marx the basis of the class struggle of the workers against the middle class, just as Ricardo’s theory of rent was the basis of the class struggle of the bourgeoisie against the aristocracy, or as the doctrines of the social contract and of the natural rights of man formed the basis of the struggle of the middle class against aristocracy and divine right. Such militant philosophies need not in themselves be true, only they must accord with the sentiments of the struggling mass. It is with such philosophical fictions that history works. Marx’s theory of value explains neither the vast and unparalleled accumulation of wealth nor the movement of prices during the last sixty years. Wealth, measured in values, has, in the last few decades, increased by many times the increase in living labour power. In this connection the old formula: Wealth increases in geometrical, living labour-power in arithmetical progression. The greatest difficulty in Marx is that the inventors and discoverers, the chemists and physicists, the pioneers and organisers of industry and agriculture, are not regarded by him as creators of surplus values. Thinkers, who by chemical researches or discoveries double the productive capacity of the soil and conjure forth values in millions from the waste products of industry; physicists who place new resources of power and new means of production at the disposal of mankind and multiply the productivity of labour; organisers who co-ordinate the forces of production and introduce new methods of working—all this creative and directive work demanding, as it often does, an infinite amount of intensive intellectual effort, is not considered to increase the total sum of exchange values of the nation.”

In this letter I have confined myself to Marx’s theories of value and surplus-value. For a devastating exposure of the fallacies underlying Marx’s dialectical materialism I refer your readers to Max Eastman’s interesting book, “Marxism : Is it Science ?”—where the author proves that it is not.

Yours faithfully,

H.W. Henderson

Reply—An unconvincing appeal to authority

Our correspondent’s criticisms can be divided conveniently into two parts : (1) an appeal to authority; and (2) an attempt to show where Marx’s theories are wrong.

The appeal to authority calls to witness 13 individuals who have given it as their opinion that Marxian doctrines are absurd.

Let us say straight away that this kind of dispute cannot finally be settled by an appeal to authority; if it could many economic theories once backed by distinguishes economists would not have had to be abandoned later—for example, the mid-nineteenth century economists who held that a reduction of hours of work or the prohibition of child labour would bankrupt the manufacturers, and were therefore impracticable. The logical structure of a theory may be examined to see if it contains flaws, but the final test lies in the realm of experience. Does the theory explain what it sets out to explain ? Is it found to be in accordance with the facts?

Now let us examine these quoted authorities and the basis of their authority.

Our critic, seeing that Marx is repudiated by 13 more or less well-known writers, regards the sum of their 13 opinions as being more weighty than the words of Marx. Is there justification for this? Who are these people? Out of the whole 13, apart from Schaffle, who once had a considerable reputation as an economist, none of them have standing as economists. They comprise historians, writers on philosophy and political science, a mathematician (Russell), authorities on public administration, and several distinguished literary men who have written on a wide range of political and social questions—e.g., Shaw, Mallock and Eastman.

If this economic question could be decided by an appeal to economic authority, then Marx’s opinion is worth more than the rest of them put together. He spent far more time on painstaking study of economic theories and the workings of capitalism than any of them. He had an advantage possessed by none, that of having as his close collaborator Frederick Engels, who was not only a distinguished student of economics in his own right, but was intimately acquainted with the working of capitalism through being first an employee, then director of his father’s Manchester textile business. If it is an appeal to authority that is needed, then Marx and Engels have every claim to be treated as vastly superior to most of the 13, and in some degree superior to all of them.

There are other weaknesses in the appeal. If the 13 speak as experts when they say Marx is wrong, why cannot they agree on where he is wrong and on what is right ? They not only disagree with each other, but some of them deny the right of others to be regarded as useful or reliable witnesses at all. Is Shaw plus Mallock any weightier than either of them alone ? Not if we recall what they said about each other. (For the evidence see “Socialism and Superior Brains,” by G. B. Shaw.) Shaw charged Mallock with “rustic ignorance” of economics; declared that “any Socialist over the age of six could knock Mr. Mallock into a cocked hat ; said that Mallock’s “practical ignorance of society” was so incredible that he found it difficult to persuade his fellow Fabians that Mallock really believed what he wrote; and held him up as proof that “even the cleverest man will believe anything he wishes to believe, in spite of all the facts and all the text-books in the world.”

Mallock retorted that Shaw had entirely misrepresented his views, had obviously not read his book, and that “Mr. Shaw writes about myself very much as a man would write who mistook the Book of Genesis for the Koran.”

Now see where the appeal to authority gets us. If Shaw is an authority then Mallock is a rustic ignoramus about economics, and if Mallock is an authority Shaw is incompetent and untrustworthy.

Other similar illustrations could be given, as, for example, the statement made by Laski when reviewing the Webbs’ “Soviet Communism,” that in this book they had “a mood of ecstatic acceptance which makes them blind to facts which it is simply not possible to deny” Manchester Guardian, November 4, 1941).

Another weakness is that the long list of 13 is largely a duplication. Laski (who is not an economist) acknowledged when he wrote “Communism” (Home University Press, 1927) that in his chapter on Marxian economics he was indebted to Lindsay. A. D. Lindsay (also not an economist) in his book “Karl Marx’s Capital” (Oxford University Press, 1925, p. 53) admitted that though he differed widely from H. W. B. Joseph, he had “been greatly helped by his demonstration … of the indefensibility of doctrines often ascribed to Marx.” So Lindsay stands on Joseph’s shoulders and Laski stands on Lindsay’s, and Joseph anyway is not an economist but primarily a writer and lecturer on philosophy.

Next it could be shown, if space permitted, that many of the 13 put themselves out of court by rejecting Marx’s theories without knowing what they are. Earlier this year Shaw, in an article “What would Marx say about Beveridge,” declared that “Marx’s attempt to measure value by abstract labour-power can lead only to nonsense and bankruptcy.” Now this is not what Marx attempted to do. He expressly and clearly showed that value is determined by the amount of labour socially necessary for its production. When Shaw’s attention was drawn to his error in confusing “labour” with “labour-power” he stuck to his error and claimed that Marx really meant labour-power (Plebs, July, 1943). It would be easy to demolish anyone’s theories if we are permitted to re-write them to suit ourselves.

Then let us glance at Laski. In his “Communism” (p. 95) he assures us that, according to the Marxian theory of value, “we can measure the amount of ‘labour power’ in each man’s effort and so determine scientifically how he ought to be paid” (our italics). This may be Laski’s theory; it certainly isn’t Marx’s.

Laski evidently borrowed it from Lindsay, who wrote : “The labour theory of value … is primarily interested in what a man ought to get in reward for his labour . . .” (Lindsay, “Karl Marx’s Capital,” p. 61.)

This is not true, as any serious student of Marx knows. Marx was not concerned with how a worker “ought to be paid,” but with explaining how, under capitalism, he is paid. Laski is equally wide of the mark when he says (p. 116) that for Marx “Commodities have also an inherent value, which is what they would obtain in exchange where society was properly organised.” Laski ought to know that for Marx the aim was Socialism, a system of society in which there would be neither commodity production nor the system of wage-labour.

Is it then seriously suggested that these gentlemen, who do not know what Marx’s theories are, shall be regarded as good judges of the soundness of these theories?

Edgar Hardcastle

(To be continued.)

Lights of Other Days. (1920)

Book Review from the April 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Pioneers of Land Reform, with an introduction by M. Beer, author of "A History of British Socialism." London: Bell & Sons, Ltd. Bohn's Popular Library. Social Economic Section.

The above work comprises three essays; the first, "The Real Rights of Man," by Thomas Spence, published in 1793; the second, "An Essay on the Right of Property in Land," by William Ogilvie, 1789; the third: "Agrarian Justice," Thomas Paine, 1795-6.

Messrs Bell are to be complimented on the tasteful manner in which they have presented these three essays to the public interested in social studies. The volume is a handy size, artistically bound, with clear type on a good paper, and is sold at a reasonable price—a combination not often achieved in the publishing world to-day.

The essays themselves are well worth preserving if only because they exhibit the social problem as it appeared to men of intelligence and sincerity before modern Socialism exposed the real nature of capitalism and revealed the futility of reform.

It was natural that men should see injustice in the extensive ownership of land before they observed the same injustice in the ownership of machines, mills, and other instruments of production. On page 6 Spence says : "It is plain that the land or earth, in any country or neighbourhood, with everything in or on the same, or pertaining thereto, belongs at all times to the living inhabitants of the said country or neighbourhood in an equal manner."

In his day capitalist industry had already reached the stage where, through division of labour, there were nearly always more workers on the labour market than were required in manufacture, the result being, as now, competition for jobs, which kept wages low. In addition, however, the assizes had the power to fix wages, so that, even when there was a demand for workers, wages could not rise above subsistence level.

These early fruits of the capitalist system— unemployment, low wages, and a general wretchedness of condition of the working class —were viewed by the "pioneers" from the standpoint of the prevailing notions of private property. Private property in land, or the means of wealth production, had, up till that time, not been questioned or challenged. The scientific age had only just begun. The stage where men analyse and sift the symptoms from the essentials, and discovering the cause of abnormal conditions to be fundamental, prescribe fundamental changes, had not been reached. Science was in its teens, feeling its way toward maturity. And social science was the most backward of all, because men do not begin to investigate the basis of their relations with one another until scientific methods in other spheres have demonstrated the necessity for its application.

Spence and Ogilvie wrote when men still living could remember the later enclosures of land that followed the break-up of the Feudal system. They actually lived in the period often described as that of the industrial revolution— the second half of the eighteenth century— when machine industry had its birth. Thus their ideas naturally reverted to the conditions that had so recently been swept away. They asserted that only by laws which would give to every man the right to occupy land sufficient for his requirements could poverty be abolished. Ogilvie's essay on "The Rights of Property in Land" is an exhaustive and detailed plan for giving every man this privilege. Subsequent history has shown that such a plan would have been futile. large capital outlay is just as necessary in agriculture to-day as in manufacture. The man who can neither buy nor hire machinery is a slave to the soil. The first bad harvest flings him into the grip of the moneylenders; and if he is lucky, after long days of drudgery and nights of anxiety he may be able to -pay the interest and live as well as the artisan.

In most European countries a far greater proportion of the workers have been peasant-proprietors than in England, but it has not saved them from the poverty and wretchedness incidental to capitalism everywhere. The small holder cannot hope to compete with the big capitalists ; their position becomes more precarious and their condition more wretched with every advance in machinery and large-scale production.

Tom Paine and Thomas Spence were something more than "pioneers of land reform." Paine is much better known for his splendid efforts against dogma and superstition. Spence was a leader in all working-class movements of his day against capitalist oppression. ''He took part in all revolutionary movements, and was twice imprisoned, for altogether seventeen months," says Mr. Beer. In their day private ownership of land appeared to be the cause of poverty, because the worker had no means of living except by submitting to the manufacturers' conditions, In our day agriculture is not to be distinguished from any other subject of capitalist enterprise. Every industry has been capitalised, and is under the control of capitalists. The next step is the socialisation of industries and their control by the people.

F. Foan

Sir Ray Lankester and Karl Marx. (1929)

From the September 1929 issue of the Socialist Standard

The death of Sir Edwin Ray Lankester called forth the following letter, written by Max Beer and published in the Daily Herald on August 20th :—

  It may interest your readers to learn that Sir E. Ray Lankester was, at the beginning of the 'eighties, an admirer of Karl Marx.
  In the archives of the German Social Democracy there are some letters of his to the author of Das Kapital. He was one of the dozen mourners who, in March, 1883, followed the hearse of Marx from Haverhill to Highgate Cemetery.

As others see us (1966)

From the January 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

Working class history, or Labour History at it has come to be known, has had something of a boom in recent years especially as to the origins of the Labour Party, a period during which the Socialist Party also came into existence. Yet in this boom literature references to the Socialist Party, other than footnotes as to its formation, arc surprisingly sparse. There is hardly any discussion as to why those who founded our party felt obliged to leave the Social Democratic Federation. It is always a temptation for small groups like ourselves to see behind such things a "conspiracy of silence" so we must be wary of drawing any rash conclusions.

Yet this consideration alone does not seem adequate to explain the lack of any serious study of the Socialist Party by British Labour historians. Most of those who go into this field do so because they have political leanings in this direction; most are members of the Labour Party and a not inconsiderable minority arc associated with the so-called Communist Party. Nearly all of them must be aware of the Socialist Party and of its criticisms of these two parties which are at the same time criticisms of their own political positions. Here perhaps we can find the source of the unorganised, but still very real, bias against the Socialist Party in this quarter, a bias which becomes obvious when they do condescend to mention us. It is more than an accident that the only historian so far to have done a scholarly study of our party comes not from Britain but from Japan.

Max Beer and G. D. H. Cole were pioneers in this field of Labour history and it is interesting to compare what they said with later writers. Beer wrote in 1919 that the members of the Socialist Party “with much perseverance and self-sacrifice have been disseminating Marx's views on economics and political class warfare". The Socialist Party, he wrote, “was very active in spreading Marxist theories and it opposed all other political parties, whether they were calling themselves Socialist or Labour. It emphasised the importance of proletarian political action on strictly revolutionary lines". Cole wrote dial in the eyes of the Socialist Party 

political action as practised by the other Socialist bodies was mere reformism, but it was also of the opinion that Trade Union action was doomed to futility as long as the capitalist system remained in being. Strictly revolutionary political action alone would help the workers and the only activity that was justifiable under existing conditions was the persistent education of the working class for its revolutionary task.

Compare these honest and more or less correct attempts to explain our views with the following offered by the "communist" historians. Morton and Tate, in their The British Labour Movement. 1770-1920 (1956):

In I905 another split took place in the SDF, when part of the membership this time mainly centred in London formed the Socialist Party of Great Britain, a body so sectarian that it adjured both politics and trade union action, believing that socialism would come when everyone was converted. Fifty years later it was still a tiny sect, mainly concerned with echoing propaganda hostile to the Soviet Union.

This view of us as a socialist sect trying to convert the world to a particular brand of socialism has been deliberately fostered by the so-called Communist Party. One of the first to refer to the Socialist Party as a sect was the leading "communist" Tom Bell in his autobiography Pioneering Days (1941). Hobsbawm provides a variation on the same theme in his Labouring Men (1965) where the Socialist Party is a “conventicle". T. A. Jackson in his autobiography Solo Trumpet (1953), refused to mention the Socialist Party by name despite his being one of the original members. But the mysterious “Imperialist" group he mentions be was associated with was in fact the Socialist Party.

The one scholarly examination of the founding of the Socialist Party is by C. Tsuzuki in an article, “The Impossibiist Revolt in Britain", in the International Review of Social History (1956). Those who left the SDF to form the Socialist Labour Party and the Socialist Party were called Impossiblists because they were said to have held that any improvement of the lot of the working class under capitalism was “impossible". Tsuzuki's article is mainly historical but does to a certain extent discuss the issues involved. He also mentions that the Socialist Party still exists As he wrote in another of his works, H. M. Hyndman and British Socialism (1961), the Socialist Party "refused to accept any programme of palliatives and was thus in the strictest tense 'impossiblist'—as indeed it remains today". Tsuzuki, unlike Morton, Tate and Hobsbawm, at least tries to keep his own views and the facts apart. No asides about “sects" and “conventicles" appear in his writings.

Unfortunately the view of the Socialist Party as a sect out to convert the world has spread from “communist" books to other fields. Thus H. G. Nicolas in The British General Election of 1950 (1951) at which we contested two seats wrote:

Less sullied even than the ILP by the contamination of practical politics was the “SPGB”—the Socialist Party of Great Britain. This was a group of non-violent Marxists, who preached an undiluted gospel of class struggle and poured an equal contempt on every other party, including Labour and the Communists . . . Their propaganda had the austere purity of perfectionism, offering, as they truly said, no vote-catching promises Their candidates had the self-effacing devotion of members of a monastic order.

and again J. P. M. Millar in The Nature of Politics (1962):

Small parties, and parties in their early stages of growth, are often lofty in their aims and united in purpose. Some remain so; these we may call sectarian or interest parties, maintaining a narrow but consistent concern, from which they are not deflected by electoral considerations The Socialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB) and its associated parties in other countries provide a clear example. Such parties put doctrinal considerations above all others They insist that the gospel must not be diluted by considering other peoples opinions. They are not daunted by smallness and ineffectiveness, arguing either that everyone will come round to their views in the end. or that mankind is, in general, too stupid to see what is good for it. In this they are very much akin to minor Christian sects.

The view of the Socialist Party as a sect persists to such an extent that it is worth looking into the matter in more detail. In the early days of the socialist movement the phrase “socialist sect" was used to refer to groups of Utopian socialists like the followers of Saint Simon and Robert Owen. These groups did resemble religious sects in that they set out to convert people to their ideal system; they had no understanding of the social world and tended to ignore politics and the struggle of the working class. What Marx did was to turn the theory of socialism from such Utopianism into a science: socialism was the next stage in the evolution of human society and would be realised as a result of the struggle of the working class to free itself from wage-slavery. The Socialist Party has always accepted Marxian, or scientific, socialism so that it is only by distortion that we can be likened to the old Utopian socialist sects. Wc do not “adjure politics and trade union action" as Morton and Tate claim. On the contrary we hold that all such actions should be based on a recognition of the class struggle. Wc argue that at the present time all that socialists can do is to help the working class come to see that only through socialism can their social problems be solved or, as G. D. H. Cole put our position, the only activity that is justifiable under existing conditions is "the persistent education of the working class for its revolutionary task".

“Sectarian" is a "communist" swear word. Lenin held that the function of a party of socialists was to try to lead the working class; to take up any demand that happened to be popular and to try to win power with the support of such discontented workers. This view, though quite at variance with the view of scientific socialism that the workers must free themselves, does provide a new definition of “sectarian", namely a group of socialists who stand aside from the so-called day-to-day struggle and thus give up all chance of using popular discontent to get political power. Since we have never had this as our aim, considering ourselves not as a “vanguard" but rather as an instrument which the working class can use, this reproach is pointless. We are not Leninists or Bolsheviks and it doesn't matter to us if we are criticized for not acting as such! The term "sectarian" is a red-herring and a convenient excuse for not considering the real issue: can capitalism be made to benefit the working class?

As an organisation which contests elections we qualify as a minor political party and so are subject to study from this angle too In the Political Quarterly (July-Sept., 1962) Nicolas Harman discusses the Socialist Party in an article, "Minor Political Parties in Britain". This article, though a genuine attempt to examine our views, still misunderstands them. For some reason, perhaps because of his own views, Harman tries to express our aim not in terms of the abolition of capitalism and the establishment of socialism but rather of "the dissolution of the State" which gives our views an anarchist slant. Thus Harman says we argue that the Russian revolution was not a socialist revolution because “it preserved the structure of the State in the form of state capitalism".

Again, "all leadership leads to dictatorship; only by persuasion and education can the abolition of the State he brought about". The Socialist Party, he says, "continues its uncompromising path, not advocating any reforms short of the establishment of socialism by persuasion of a majority of the people". George Thayer in his very superficial book, The British Political Fringe (1965), also puts over our views as if we think that socialism will come purely because of our educational efforts. The Socialist Party, he writes. believes that

only through the education of the working classes will pure Marxist Socialism be achieved. It does not imply that capitalism and the parliamentary system can he reformed. Capitalism must be destroyed, it believes. but only when the working classes have a "conscious understanding and desire for Socialism". At that time, capitalism will peacefully disappear and Socialism will take its place . . . They keep on struggling . . . secure in the belief that when their brand of Socialism arrives they will have properly educated the working classes not only to accept its arrival but to welcome it as well.

Both Harman and Thayer misunderstand our position and make us out to hold views which would justly lay us open to the charge of being a mere sect—that we are out to convert the world to our “brand of Socialism". Perhaps some of our activities might suggest, to a superficial observer, such an interpretation. Still those who fancy themselves fit to write books should take the trouble to go beyond mere appearances. They have no real excuse for misunderstanding us especially as they arc given literature to read which clearly explains the theory behind our practice. As Marxists, wc accept the validity of historical materialism and do not subscribe to any facile theory of social change.

Before summing up, we must mention the not unfriendly reference to us in A Faith to Fight For (1964) by Eric Deakins. The author, a member of the Labour Party, does discuss our view that "socialism will only come about when the workers recognise that it is in their economic interest to create a Socialist society”. What is important about this book is that it represents a breakthrough: our views are actually discussed in a.serious book on politics. Wc can only hope that Deakins has set a precedent.

Adam Buick

Marx in Miniature. (1921)

Book Review from the November 1921 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Life and Teaching of Karl Marx. By M. Beer. National Labour Press, Ltd. 3s. 6d. net.

As an example of stern compression and yet lucid exposition of Marx's teachings, this little book deserves high praise. In 132 pages of fair-sized type there is given a sketch of the life of Marx, his development in knowledge and thought, his work in the various movements of the Working Class, his theories of history and class struggles, and his economic discoveries. In addition, a brief account of the Hegelian Philosophy, so far as it deals with the Dialectic, is placed in 19 pages of the Introduction. Marx's connection and debt to this school of philosophy is well shown.

After so clear a summary of Marx's economic theories, it is astounding to find the following statements by M. Beer on page 130:

"Marx's theory of value explains neither the vast and unparalleled accumulation of wealth nor the movement of prices during the last sixty years. Wealth, measured in values, has, in the last few decades, increased by many times the increase in living labour power. In this connection the old formula can be reversed: wealth increases in geometrical, living labour power in arithmetical progression. The greatest difficulty in Marx is that inventors and discoverers, the chemists and physicists, the pioneers and organisers of industry and agriculture are not regarded by him as creators of surplus value. Thinkers who, by chemical researches and discoveries, double the productive capacity of the soil and conjure forth values in millions from the waste products of industry; physicists who place new sources of power and means of production at the disposal of mankind and multiply the productivity of labour; organisers who co-ordinate new methods of working—all this creative and directive work demanding, as it often does, an infinite amount of intensive intellectual effort, is not considered to have increased the total sum of exchange values of the nation."

How familiar, even stale, all this reads to the student of Marx. How long, for instance, is it since W. H. Mallock said very similar things and tried to  justify the Capitalists' ownership of wealth by claiming that it was due to the wonderful intellectual endowment "of the Few."

And in another respect M. Beer is like Mallock and Co.—he is unable to give any alternative explanation. Nay, more; he does not even attempt to demonstrate or prove his case—he merely states it and passes on. Fortunately, there is one author who has met the objection of M. Beer that "creative and directive work" does not count in the theory of value. This author says:

"All combined labour on a large scale requires more or less a directing authority in order to secure the harmonious working of the individual activities, and to perform the general functions that have their origin in the action of the combined organism, as distinguished from the action of its separate organs. A single violin player is his own conductor; an orchestra requires a separate one."

Further on the same author says:

"As co-operation extends its scale this despotism takes forms peculiar to itself. Just as at first the capitalist is relieved from actual labour as soon as his capital has reached that minimum amount with which capitalist production, as such, begins, so now he hands over the work of direct and constant supervision of the individual workman and groups of workmen to a special kind of wage labourer."

This author's name is Karl Marx, and the quotations will be found on pages 321 and 322 of "Capital" (Sonnenschein Ed.). It is the wage-labourer who provides exchange value, and, as here seen, the organisers, chemists, physicists, etc., are but "special kinds of wage-labourers."

In the matter of prices, Marx was always careful to point out that, while he assumed free and full competition among the Capitalists in working out his theory, the factor of monopoly would make an important difference. This is seen to-day where combinations or trusts exist. Here prices are fixed by what "the market will bear," though the latter will sometimes be affected by the competition of substitutes. The Standard Oil Trust has a practical monopoly of petroleum oils used in Australia; but local substitutes act to keep down the price of petroleum to a certain level. But even in these cases the difference between price and value, and the enormous profits made by many Trusts, are only explainable by Marxian laws—no other explanation fits the facts. Strange to relate, after all the shortcomings of the Marxian theory which M. Beer has discovered, he says:

"However, as far as the distribution of products is concerned, Marx's theory is, generally speaking, correct." -Page 130.

This admission knocks out so much of his previous statement, that one wonders why either—or both—were made.

The charge of three shillings and sixpence net for a 132 pages pamphlet in paper covers is ridiculously high. In view of the usefulness of the work, the price should be reduced to bring it within the reach of the mass of the workers.

J. Fitzgerald