Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution



Peter Kropotkin

1902



CHAPTER 8



MUTUAL AID AMONGST OURSELVES 

(continued)







Labour-unions grown after the destruction of the guilds by the

State. -- Their struggles. -- Mutual Aid in strikes. --

Co-operation. -- Free associations for various purposes. --

Self-sacrifice. -- Countless societies for combined action under

all possible aspects. -- Mutual Aid in slum-life. -- Personal

aid.







    When we examine the every-day life of the rural populations



of Europe, we find that, notwithstanding all that has been done



in modern States for the destruction of the village community,



the life of the peasants remains honeycombed with habits and



customs of mutual aid and support; that important vestiges of the



communal possession of the soil are still retained; and that, as



soon as the legal obstacles to rural association were lately



removed, a network of free unions for all sorts of economical



purposes rapidly spread among the peasants -- the tendency of



this young movement being to reconstitute some sort of union



similar to the village community of old. Such being the



conclusions arrived at in the preceding chapter, we have now to



consider, what institutions for mutual support can be found at



the present time amongst the industrial populations.



    For the last three hundred years, the conditions for the



growth of such institutions have been as unfavourable in the



towns as they have been in the villages. It is well known,



indeed, that when the medieval cities were subdued in the



sixteenth century by growing military States, all institutions



which kept the artisans, the masters, and the merchants together



in the guilds and the cities were violently destroyed. The



self-government and the self-jurisdiction of both, the guild and



the city were abolished; the oath of allegiance between



guild-brothers became an act of felony towards the State; the



properties of the guilds were confiscated in the same way as the



lands of the village communities; and the inner and technical



organization of each trade was taken in hand by the State. Laws,



gradually growing in severity, were passed to prevent artisans



from combining in any way. For a time, some shadows of the old



guilds were tolerated: merchants' guilds were allowed to exist



under the condition of freely granting subsidies to the kings,



and some artisan guilds were kept in existence as organs of



administration. Some of them still drag on their meaningless



existence. But what formerly was the vital force of medieval life



and industry has long since disappeared under the crushing weight



of the centralized State.



    In Great Britain, which may be taken as the best illustration



of the industrial policy of the modern States, we see the



Parliament beginning the destruction of the guilds as early as



the fifteenth century; but it was especially in the next century



that decisive measures were taken. Henry the Eighth not only



ruined the organization of the guilds, but also confiscated their



properties, with even less excuse and manners, as Toulmin Smith



wrote, than he had produced for confiscating the estates of the



monasteries.1 Edward the Sixth completed his work,2 and



already in the second part of the sixteenth century we find the



Parliament settling all the disputes between craftsmen and



merchants, which formerly were settled in each city separately.



The Parliament and the king not only legislated in all such



contests, but, keeping in view the interests of the Crown in the



exports, they soon began to determine the number of apprentices



in each trade and minutely to regulate the very technics of each



fabrication -- the weights of the stuffs, the number of threads



in the yard of cloth, and the like. With little success, it must



be said; because contests and technical difficulties which were



arranged for centuries in succession by agreement between



closely-interdependent guilds and federated cities lay entirely



beyond the powers of the centralized State. The continual



interference of its officials paralyzed the trades; bringing most



of them to a complete decay; and the last century economists,



when they rose against the State regulation of industries, only



ventilated a widely-felt discontent. The abolition of that



interference by the French Revolution was greeted as an act of



liberation, and the example of France was soon followed



elsewhere.



    With the regulation of wages the State had no better success.



In the medieval cities, when the distinction between masters and



apprentices or journeymen became more and more apparent in the



fifteenth century, unions of apprentices (Gesellenverbände),



occasionally assuming an international character, were opposed to



the unions of masters and merchants. Now it was the State which



undertook to settle their griefs, and under the Elizabethan



Statute of 1563 the Justices of Peace had to settle the wages, so



as to guarantee a "convenient" livelihood to journeymen and



apprentices. The Justices, however, proved helpless to conciliate



the conflicting interests, and still less to compel the masters



to obey their decisions. The law gradually became a dead letter,



and was repealed by the end of the eighteenth century. But while



the State thus abandoned the function of regulating wages, it



continued severely to prohibit all combinations which were



entered upon by journeymen and workers in order to raise their



wages, or to keep them at a certain level. All through the



eighteenth century it legislated against the workers' unions, and



in 1799 it finally prohibited all sorts of combinations, under



the menace of severe punishments. In fact, the British Parliament



only followed in this case the example of the French



Revolutionary Convention, which had issued a draconic law against



coalitions of workers-coalitions between a number of citizens



being considered as attempts against the sovereignty of the



State, which was supposed equally to protect all its subjects.



The work of destruction of the medieval unions was thus



completed. Both in the town and in the village the State reigned



over loose aggregations of individuals, and was ready to prevent



by the most stringent measures the reconstitution of any sort of



separate unions among them. These were, then, the conditions



under which the mutual-aid tendency had to make its way in the



nineteenth century.



    Need it be said that no such measures could destroy that



tendency? Throughout the eighteenth century, the workers' unions



were continually reconstituted.3 Nor were they stopped by the



cruel prosecutions which took place under the laws of 1797 and



1799. Every flaw in supervision, every delay of the masters in



denouncing the unions was taken advantage of. Under the cover of



friendly societies, burial clubs, or secret brotherhoods, the



unions spread in the textile industries, among the Sheffield



cutlers, the miners, and vigorous federal organizations were



formed to support the branches during strikes and



prosecutions.4 The repeal of the Combination Laws in 1825 gave



a new impulse to the movement. Unions and national federations



were formed in all trades.5 and when Robert Owen started his



Grand National Consolidated Trades' Union, it mustered half a



million members in a few months. True that this period of



relative liberty did not last long. Prosecution began anew in the



thirties, and the well-known ferocious condemnations of 1832-1844



followed. The Grand National Union was disbanded, and all over



the country, both the private employers and the Government in its



own workshops began to compel the workers to resign all



connection with unions, and to sign "the Document" to that



effect. Unionists were prosecuted wholesale under the Master and



Servant Act -- workers being summarily arrested and condemned



upon a mere complaint of misbehaviour lodged by the master.6



Strikes were suppressed in an autocratic way, and the most



astounding condemnations took place for merely having announced a



strike or acted as a delegate in it -- to say nothing of the



military suppression of strike riots, nor of the condemnations



which followed the frequent outbursts of acts of violence. To



practise mutual support under such circumstances was anything but



an easy task. And yet, notwithstanding all obstacles, of which



our own generation hardly can have an idea, the revival of the



unions began again in 1841, and the amalgamation of the workers



has been steadily continued since. After a long fight, which



lasted for over a hundred years, the right of combining together



was conquered, and at the present time nearly one-fourth part of



the regularly-employed workers, i.e. about 1,500,000, belong to



trade unions.7



    As to the other European States, sufficient to say that up to



a very recent date, all sorts of unions were prosecuted as



conspiracies; and that nevertheless they exist everywhere, even



though they must often take the form of secret societies; while



the extension and the force of labour organizations, and



especially of the Knights of Labour, in the United States and in



Belgium, have been sufficiently illustrated by strikes in the



nineties. It must, however, be borne in mind that, prosecution



apart, the mere fact of belonging to a labour union implies



considerable sacrifices in money, in time, and in unpaid work,



and continually implies the risk of losing employment for the



mere fact of being a unionist.8 There is, moreover, the



strike, which a unionist has continually to face; and the grim



reality of a strike is, that the limited credit of a worker's



family at the baker's and the pawnbroker's is soon exhausted, the



strike-pay goes not far even for food, and hunger is soon written



on the children's faces. For one who lives in close contact with



workers, a protracted strike is the most heartrending sight;



while what a strike meant forty years ago in this country, and



still means in all but the wealthiest parts of the continent, can



easily be conceived. Continually, even now, strikes will end with



the total ruin and the forced emigration of whole populations,



while the shooting down of strikers on the slightest provocation,



or even without any provocation,9 is quite habitual still on



the continent.



    And yet, every year there are thousands of strikes and



lock-outs in Europe and America -- the most severe and protracted



contests being, as a rule, the so-called "sympathy strikes,"



which are entered upon to support locked-out comrades or to



maintain the rights of the unions. And while a portion of the



Press is prone to explain strikes by "intimidation," those who



have lived among strikers speak with admiration of the mutual aid



and support which are constantly practised by them. Every one has



heard of the colossal amount of work which was done by volunteer



workers for organizing relief during the London dock-labourers'



strike; of the miners who, after having themselves been idle for



many weeks, paid a levy of four shillings a week to the strike



fund when they resumed work; of the miner widow who, during the



Yorkshire labour war of 1894, brought her husband's life-savings



to the strike-fund; of the last loaf of bread being always shared



with neighbours; of the Radstock miners, favoured with larger



kitchen-gardens, who invited four hundred Bristol miners to take



their share of cabbage and potatoes, and so on. All newspaper



correspondents, during the great strike of miners in Yorkshire in



1894, knew heaps of such facts, although not all of them could



report such "irrelevant" matters to their respective papers.10



    Unionism is not, however, the only form in which the worker's



need of mutual support finds its expression. There are, besides,



the political associations, whose activity many workers consider



as more conducive to general welfare than the trade-unions,



limited as they are now in their purposes. Of course the mere



fact of belonging to a political body cannot be taken as a



manifestation of the mutual-aid tendency. We all know that



politics are the field in which the purely egotistic elements of



society enter into the most entangled combinations with



altruistic aspirations. But every experienced politician knows



that all great political movements were fought upon large and



often distant issues, and that those of them were the strongest



which provoked most disinterested enthusiasm. All great



historical movements have had this character, and for our own



generation Socialism stands in that case. "Paid agitators" is, no



doubt, the favourite refrain of those who know nothing about it.



The truth, however, is that -- to speak only of what I know



personally -- if I had kept a diary for the last twenty-four



years and inscribed in it all the devotion and self-sacrifice



which I came across in the Socialist movement, the reader of such



a diary would have had the word "heroism" constantly on his lips.



But the men I would have spoken of were not heroes; they were



average men, inspired by a grand idea. Every Socialist newspaper



-- and there are hundreds of them in Europe alone -- has the same



history of years of sacrifice without any hope of reward, and, in



the overwhelming majority of cases, even without any personal



ambition. I have seen families living without knowing what would



be their food to-morrow, the husband boycotted all round in his



little town for his part in the paper, and the wife supporting



the family by sewing, and such a situation lasting for years,



until the family would retire, without a word of reproach, simply



saying: "Continue; we can hold on no more!" I have seen men,



dying from consumption, and knowing it, and yet knocking about in



snow and fog to prepare meetings, speaking at meetings within a



few weeks from death, and only then retiring to the hospital with



the words: "Now, friends, I am done; the doctors say I have but a



few weeks to live. Tell the comrades that I shall be happy if



they come to see me." I have seen facts which would be described



as "idealization" if I told them in this place; and the very



names of these men, hardly known outside a narrow circle of



friends, will soon be forgotten when the friends, too, have



passed away. In fact, I don't know myself which most to admire,



the unbounded devotion of these few, or the sum total of petty



acts of devotion of the great number. Every quire of a penny



paper sold, every meeting, every hundred votes which are won at a



Socialist election, represent an amount of energy and sacrifices



of which no outsider has the faintest idea. And what is now done



by Socialists has been done in every popular and advanced party,



political and religious, in the past. All past progress has been



promoted by like men and by a like devotion.







    Co-operation, especially in Britain, is often described as



"joint-stock individualism"; and such as it is now, it



undoubtedly tends to breed a co-operative egotism, not only



towards the community at large, but also among the co-operators



themselves. It is, nevertheless, certain that at its origin the



movement had an essentially mutual-aid character. Even now, its



most ardent promoters are persuaded that co-operation leads



mankind to a higher harmonic stage of economical relations, and



it is not possible to stay in some of the strongholds of



co-operation in the North without realizing that the great number



of the rank and file hold the same opinion. Most of them would



lose interest in the movement if that faith were gone; and it



must be owned that within the last few years broader ideals of



general welfare and of the producers' solidarity have begun to be



current among the co-operators. There is undoubtedly now a



tendency towards establishing better relations between the owners



of the co-operative workshops and the workers.



    The importance of co-operation in this country, in Holland



and in Denmark is well known; while in Germany, and especially on



the Rhine, the co-operative societies are already an important



factor of industrial life.11 It is, however, Russia which



offers perhaps the best field for the study of cooperation under



an infinite variety of aspects. In Russia, it is a natural



growth, an inheritance from the middle ages; and while a formally



established co-operative society would have to cope with many



legal difficulties and official suspicion, the informal



co-operation -- the artél -- makes the very substance of Russian



peasant life. The history of "the making of Russia," and of the



colonization of Siberia, is a history of the hunting and trading



artéls or guilds, followed by village communities, and at the



present time we find the artél everywhere; among each group of



ten to fifty peasants who come from the same village to work at a



factory, in all the building trades, among fishermen and hunters,



among convicts on their way to and in Siberia, among railway



porters, Exchange messengers, Customs House labourers, everywhere



in the village industries, which give occupation to 7,000,000 men



-- from top to bottom of the working world, permanent and



temporary, for production and consumption under all possible



aspects. Until now, many of the fishing-grounds on the



tributaries of the Caspian Sea are held by immense artéls, the



Ural river belonging to the whole of the Ural Cossacks, who allot



and re-allot the fishing-grounds -- perhaps the richest in the



world -- among the villages, without any interference of the



authorities. Fishing is always made by artéls in the Ural, the



Volga, and all the lakes of Northern Russia. Besides these



permanent organizations, there are the simply countless temporary



artéls, constituted for each special purpose. When ten or twenty



peasants come from some locality to a big town, to work as



weavers, carpenters, masons, boat-builders, and so on, they



always constitute an artél. They hire rooms, hire a cook (very



often the wife of one of them acts in this capacity), elect an



elder, and take their meals in common, each one paying his share



for food and lodging to the artél. A party of convicts on its way



to Siberia always does the same, and its elected elder is the



officially-recognized intermediary between the convicts and the



military chief of the party. In the hard-labour prisons they have



the same organization. The railway porters, the messengers at the



Exchange, the workers at the Custom House, the town messengers in



the capitals, who are collectively responsible for each member,



enjoy such a reputation that any amount of money or bank-notes is



trusted to the artél-member by the merchants. In the building



trades, artéls of from 10 to 200 members are formed; and the



serious builders and railway contractors always prefer to deal



with an artél than with separately-hired workers. The last



attempts of the Ministry of War to deal directly with productive



artéls, formed ad hoc in the domestic trades, and to give them



orders for boots and all sorts of brass and iron goods, are



described as most satisfactory; while the renting of a Crown iron



work, (Votkinsk) to an artél of workers, which took place seven



or eight years ago, has been a decided success.



    We can thus see in Russia how the old medieval institution,



having not been interfered with by the State (in its informal



manifestations), has fully survived until now, and takes the



greatest variety of forms in accordance with the requirements of



modern industry and commerce. As to the Balkan peninsula, the



Turkish Empire and Caucasia, the old guilds are maintained there



in full. The esnafs of Servia have fully preserved their medieval



character; they include both masters and journeymen, regulate the



trades, and are institutions for mutual support in labour and



sickness;12 while the amkari of Caucasia, and especially at



Tiflis, add to these functions a considerable influence in



municipal life.13







    In connection with co-operation, I ought perhaps to mention



also the friendly societies, the unities of oddfellows, the



village and town clubs organized for meeting the doctors' bills,



the dress and burial clubs, the small clubs very common among



factory girls, to which they contribute a few pence every week,



and afterwards draw by lot the sum of one pound, which can at



least be used for some substantial purchase, and many others. A



not inconsiderable amount of sociable or jovial spirit is alive



in all such societies and clubs, even though the "credit and



debit" of each member are closely watched over. But there are so



many associations based on the readiness to sacrifice time,



health, and life if required, that we can produce numbers of



illustrations of the best forms of mutual support.



    The Lifeboat Association in this country, and similar



institutions on the Continent, must be mentioned in the first



place. The former has now over three hundred boats along the



coasts of these isles, and it would have twice as many were it



not for the poverty of the fisher men, who cannot afford to buy



lifeboats. The crews consist, however, of volunteers, whose



readiness to sacrifice their lives for the rescue of absolute



strangers to them is put every year to a severe test; every



winter the loss of several of the bravest among them stands on



record. And if we ask these men what moves them to risk their



lives, even when there is no reasonable chance of success, their



answer is something on the following lines. A fearful snowstorm,



blowing across the Channel, raged on the flat, sandy coast of a



tiny village in Kent, and a small smack, laden with oranges,



stranded on the sands near by. In these shallow waters only a



flat-bottomed lifeboat of a simplified type can be kept, and to



launch it during such a storm was to face an almost certain



disaster. And yet the men went out, fought for hours against the



wind, and the boat capsized twice. One man was drowned, the



others were cast ashore. One of these last, a refined coastguard,



was found next morning, badly bruised and half frozen in the



snow. I asked him, how they came to make that desperate attempt?"



I don't know myself," was his reply." There was the wreck; all



the people from the village stood on the beach, and all said it



would be foolish to go out; we never should work through the



surf. We saw five or six men clinging to the mast, making



desperate signals. We all felt that something must be done, but



what could we do? One hour passed, two hours, and we all stood



there. We all felt most uncomfortable. Then, all of a sudden,



through the storm, it seemed to us as if we heard their cries --



they had a boy with them. We could not stand that any longer. All



at once we said, "We must go!" The women said so too; they would



have treated us as cowards if we had not gone, although next day



they said we had been fools to go. As one man, we rushed to the



boat, and went. The boat capsized, but we took hold of it. The



worst was to see poor drowning by the side of the boat, and we



could do nothing to save him. Then came a fearful wave, the boat



capsized again, and we were cast ashore. The men were still



rescued by the D. boat, ours was caught miles away. I was found



next morning in the snow."



    The same feeling moved also the miners of the Rhonda Valley,



when they worked for the rescue of their comrades from the



inundated mine. They had pierced through thirty-two yards of coal



in order to reach their entombed comrades; but when only three



yards more remained to be pierced, fire-damp enveloped them. The



lamps went out, and the rescue-men retired. To work in such



conditions was to risk being blown up at every moment. But the



raps of the entombed miners were still heard, the men were still



alive and appealed for help, and several miners volunteered to



work at any risk; and as they went down the mine, their wives had



only silent tears to follow them -- not one word to stop them.



    There is the gist of human psychology. Unless men are



maddened in the battlefield, they "cannot stand it" to hear



appeals for help, and not to respond to them. The hero goes; and



what the hero does, all feel that they ought to have done as



well. The sophisms of the brain cannot resist the mutual-aid



feeling, because this feeling has been nurtured by thousands of



years of human social life and hundreds of thousands of years of



pre-human life in societies.



    "But what about those men who were drowned in the Serpentine



in the presence of a crowd, out of which no one moved for their



rescue?" it may be asked. "What about the child which fell into



the Regent's Park Canal -- also in the presence of a holiday



crowd -- and was only saved through the presence of mind of a



maid who let out a Newfoundland dog to the rescue?" The answer is



plain enough. Man is a result of both his inherited instincts and



his education. Among the miners and the seamen, their common



occupations and their every-day contact with one another create a



feeling of solidarity, while the surrounding dangers maintain



courage and pluck. In the cities, on the contrary, the absence of



common interest nurtures indifference, while courage and pluck,



which seldom find their opportunities, disappear, or take another



direction. Moreover, the tradition of the hero of the mine and



the sea lives in the miners' and fishermen's villages, adorned



with a poetical halo. But what are the traditions of a motley



London crowd? The only tradition they might have in common ought



to be created by literature, but a literature which would



correspond to the village epics hardly exists. The clergy are so



anxious to prove that all that comes from human nature is sin,



and that all good in man has a supernatural origin, that they



mostly ignore the facts which cannot be produced as an example of



higher inspiration or grace, coming from above. And as to the



lay-writers, their attention is chiefly directed towards one sort



of heroism, the heroism which promotes the idea of the State.



Therefore, they admire the Roman hero, or the soldier in the



battle, while they pass by the fisherman's heroism, hardly paying



attention to it. The poet and the painter might, of course, be



taken by the beauty of the human heart in itself; but both seldom



know the life of the poorer classes, and while they can sing or



paint the Roman or the military hero in conventional



surroundings, they can neither sing nor paint impressively the



hero who acts in those modest surroundings which they ignore. If



they venture to do so, they produce a mere piece of



rhetoric.14



    The countless societies, clubs, and alliances, for the



enjoyment of life, for study and research, for education, and so



on, which have lately grown up in such numbers that it would



require many years to simply tabulate them, are another



manifestation of the same everworking tendency for association



and mutual support. Some of them, like the broods of young birds



of different species which come together in the autumn, are



entirely given to share in common the joys of life. Every village



in this country, in Switzerland, Germany, and so on, has its



cricket, football, tennis, nine-pins, pigeon, musical or singing



clubs. Other societies are much more numerous, and some of them,



like the Cyclists' Alliance, have suddenly taken a formidable



development. Although the members of this alliance have nothing



in common but the love of cycling, there is already among them a



sort of freemasonry for mutual help, especially in the remote



nooks and corners which are not flooded by cyclists; they look



upon the "C.A.C." -- the Cyclists' Alliance Club -- in a village



as a sort of home; and at the yearly Cyclists' Camp many a



standing friendship has been established. The Kegelbrüder, the



Brothers of the Nine Pins, in Germany, are a similar association;



so also the Gymnasts' Societies (300,000 members in Germany), the



informal brotherhood of paddlers in France, the yacht clubs, and



so on. Such associations certainly do not alter the economical



stratification of society, but, especially in the small towns,



they contribute to smooth social distinctions, and as they all



tend to join in large national and international federations,



they certainly aid the growth of personal friendly intercourse



between all sorts of men scattered in different parts of the



globe.



    The Alpine Clubs, the Jagdschutzverein in Germany, which has



over 100,000 members -- hunters, educated foresters, zoologists,



and simple lovers of Nature -- and the International



Ornithological Society, which includes zoologists, breeders, and



simple peasants in Germany, have the same character. Not only



have they done in a few years a large amount of very useful work,



which large associations alone could do properly (maps, refuge



huts, mountain roads; studies of animal life, of noxious insects,



of migrations of birds, and so on), but they create new bonds



between men. Two Alpinists of different nationalities who meet in



a refuge hut in the Caucasus, or the professor and the peasant



ornithologist who stay in the same house, are no more strangers



to each other; while the Uncle Toby's Society at Newcastle, which



has already induced over 260,000 boys and girls never to destroy



birds' nests and to be kind to all animals, has certainly done



more for the development of human feelings and of taste in



natural science than lots of moralists and most of our schools.



    We cannot omit, even in this rapid review, the thousands of



scientific, literary, artistic, and educational societies. Up



till now, the scientific bodies, closely controlled and often



subsidized by the State, have generally moved in a very narrow



circle, and they often came to be looked upon as mere openings



for getting State appointments, while the very narrowness of



their circles undoubtedly bred petty jealousies. Still it is a



fact that the distinctions of birth, political parties and creeds



are smoothed to some extent by such associations; while in the



smaller and remote towns the scientific, geographical, or musical



societies, especially those of them which appeal to a larger



circle of amateurs, become small centres of intellectual life, a



sort of link between the little spot and the wide world, and a



place where men of very different conditions meet on a footing of



equality. To fully appreciate the value of such centres, one



ought to know them, say, in Siberia. As to the countless



educational societies which only now begin to break down the



State's and the Church's monopoly in education, they are sure to



become before long the leading power in that branch. To the



"Froebel Unions" we already owe the Kindergarten system; and to a



number of formal and informal educational associations we owe the



high standard of women's education in Russia, although all the



time these societies and groups had to act in strong opposition



to a powerful government.15 As to the various pedagogical



societies in Germany, it is well known that they have done the



best part in the working out of the modern methods of teaching



science in popular schools. In such associations the teacher



finds also his best support. How miserable the overworked and



under-paid village teacher would have been without their



aid!16



    All these associations, societies, brotherhoods, alliances,



institutes, and so on, which must now be counted by the ten



thousand in Europe alone, and each of which represents an immense



amount of voluntary, unambitious, and unpaid or underpaid work --



what are they but so many manifestations, under an infinite



variety of aspects, of the same ever-living tendency of man



towards mutual aid and support? For nearly three centuries men



were prevented from joining hands even for literary, artistic,



and educational purposes. Societies could only be formed under



the protection of the State, or the Church, or as secret



brotherhoods, like free-masonry. But now that the resistance has



been broken, they swarm in all directions, they extend over all



multifarious branches of human activity, they become



international, and they undoubtedly contribute, to an extent



which cannot yet be fully appreciated, to break down the screens



erected by States between different nationalities.



Notwithstanding the jealousies which are bred by commercial



competition, and the provocations to hatred which are sounded by



the ghosts of a decaying past, there is a conscience of



international solidarity which is growing both among the leading



spirits of the world and the masses of the workers, since they



also have conquered the right of international intercourse; and



in the preventing of a European war during the last quarter of a



century, this spirit has undoubtedly had its share.



    The religious charitable associations, which again represent



a whole world, certainly must be mentioned in this place. There



is not the slightest doubt that the great bulk of their members



are moved by the same mutual-aid feelings which are common to all



mankind. Unhappily the religious teachers of men prefer to



ascribe to such feelings a supernatural origin. Many of them



pretend that man does not consciously obey the mutual-aid



inspiration so long as he has not been enlightened by the



teachings of the special religion which they represent, and, with



St. Augustin, most of them do not recognize such feelings in the



"pagan savage." Moreover, while early Christianity, like all



other religions, was an appeal to the broadly human feelings of



mutual aid and sympathy, the Christian Church has aided the State



in wrecking all standing institutions of mutual aid and support



which were anterior to it, or developed outside of it; and,



instead of the mutual aid which every savage considers as due to



his kinsman, it has preached charity which bears a character of



inspiration from above, and, accordingly, implies a certain



superiority of the giver upon the receiver. With this limitation,



and without any intention to give offence to those who consider



themselves as a body elect when they accomplish acts simply



humane, we certainly may consider the immense numbers of



religious charitable associations as an outcome of the same



mutual-aid tendency.







    All these facts show that a reckless prosecution of personal



interests, with no regard to other people's needs, is not the



only characteristic of modern life. By the side of this current



which so proudly claims leadership in human affairs, we perceive



a hard struggle sustained by both the rural and industrial



populations in order to reintroduce standing institutions of



mutual aid and support; and we discover, in all classes of



society, a widely-spread movement towards the establishment of an



infinite variety of more or less permanent institutions for the



same purpose. But when we pass from public life to the private



life of the modern individual, we discover another extremely wide



world of mutual aid and support, which only passes unnoticed by



most sociologists because it is limited to the narrow circle of



the family and personal friendship.17



    Under the present social system, all bonds of union among the



inhabitants of the same street or neighbourhood have been



dissolved. In the richer parts of the large towns, people live



without knowing who are their next-door neighbours. But in the



crowded lanes people know each other perfectly, and are



continually brought into mutual contact. Of course, petty



quarrels go their course, in the lanes as elsewhere; but



groupings in accordance with personal affinities grow up, and



within their circle mutual aid is practised to an extent of which



the richer classes have no idea. If we take, for instance, the



children of a poor neighbourhood who play in a street or a



churchyard, or on a green, we notice at once that a close union



exists among them, notwithstanding the temporary fights, and that



that union protects them from all sorts of misfortunes. As soon



as a mite bends inquisitively over the opening of a drain --



"Don't stop there," another mite shouts out, "fever sits in the



hole!" "Don't climb over that wall, the train will kill you if



you tumble down! Don't come near to the ditch! Don't eat those



berries -- poison! you will die." Such are the first teachings



imparted to the urchin when he joins his mates out-doors. How



many of the children whose play-grounds are the pavements around



"model workers' dwellings," or the quays and bridges of the



canals, would be crushed to death by the carts or drowned in the



muddy waters, were it not for that sort of mutual support. And



when a fair Jack has made a slip into the unprotected ditch at



the back of the milkman's yard, or a cherry-cheeked Lizzie has,



after all, tumbled down into the canal, the young brood raises



such cries that all the neighbourhood is on the alert and rushes



to the rescue.



    Then comes in the alliance of the mothers. "You could not



imagine" (a lady-doctor who lives in a poor neighbourhood told me



lately) "how much they help each other. If a woman has prepared



nothing, or could prepare nothing, for the baby which she



expected -- and how often that happens! -- all the neighbours



bring something for the new-comer. One of the neighbours always



takes care of the children, and some other always drops in to



take care of the household, so long as the mother is in bed."



This habit is general. It is mentioned by all those who have



lived among the poor. In a thousand small ways the mothers



support each other and bestow their care upon children that are



not their own. Some training -- good or bad, let them decide it



for themselves -- is required in a lady of the richer classes to



render her able to pass by a shivering and hungry child in the



street without noticing it. But the mothers of the poorer classes



have not that training. They cannot stand the sight of a hungry



child; they must feed it, and so they do. "When the school



children beg bread, they seldom or rather never meet with a



refusal"  -- a lady-friend, who has worked several years in



Whitechapel in connection with a workers' club, writes to me. But



I may, perhaps, as well transcribe a few more passages from her



letter: --







    "Nursing neighbours, in cases of illness, without any shade



of remuneration, is quite general among the workers. Also, when a



woman has little children, and goes out for work, another mother



always takes care of them.



    "If, in the working classes, they would not help each other,



they could not exist. I know families which continually help each



other -- with money, with food, with fuel, for bringing up the



little children, in cases of illness, in cases of death.



    "'The mine' and 'thine' is much less sharply observed among



the poor than among the rich. Shoes, dress, hats, and so on, --



what may be wanted on the spot -- are continually borrowed from



each other, also all sorts of household things.



    "Last winter the members of the United Radical Club had



brought together some little money, and began after Christmas to



distribute free soup and bread to the children going to school.



Gradually they had 1,800 children to attend to. The money came



from outsiders, but all the work was done by the members of the



club. Some of them, who were out of work, came at four in the



morning to wash and to peel the vegetables; five women came at



nine or ten (after having done their own household work) for



cooking, and stayed till six or seven to wash the dishes. And at



meal time, between twelve and half-past one, twenty to thirty



workers came in to aid in serving the soup, each one staying what



he could spare of his meal time. This lasted for two months. No



one was paid."







    My friend also mentions various individual cases, of which



the following are typical: --







    "Annie W. was given by her mother to be boarded by an old



person in Wilmot Street. When her mother died, the old woman, who



herself was very poor, kept the child without being paid a penny



for that. When the old lady died too, the child, who was five



years old, was of course neglected during her illness, and was



ragged; but she was taken at once by Mrs. S., the wife of a



shoemaker, who herself has six children. Lately, when the husband



was ill, they had not much to eat, all of them.



    "The other day, Mrs. M., mother of six children, attended



Mrs. M--g throughout her illness, and took to her own rooms the



elder child.... But do you need such facts? They are quite



general.... I know also Mrs. D. (Oval, Hackney Road), who has a



sewing machine and continually sews for others, without ever



accepting any remuneration, although she has herself five



children and her husband to look after.... And so on."







    For every one who has any idea of the life of the labouring



classes it is evident that without mutual aid being practised



among them on a large scale they never could pull through all



their difficulties. It is only by chance that a worker's family



can live its lifetime without having to face such circumstances



as the crisis described by the ribbon weaver, Joseph Gutteridge,



in his autobiography.18 And if all do not go to the ground in



such cases, they owe it to mutual help. In Gutteridge's case it



was an old nurse, miserably poor herself, who turned up at the



moment when the family was slipping towards a final catastrophe,



and brought in some bread, coal, and bedding, which she had



obtained on credit. In other cases, it will be some one else, or



the neighbours will take steps to save the family. But without



some aid from other poor, how many more would be brought every



year to irreparable ruin!19



    Mr. Plimsoll, after he had lived for some time among the



poor, on 7s. 6d. a week, was compelled to recognize that the



kindly feelings he took with him when he began this life "changed



into hearty respect and admiration" when he saw how the relations



between the poor are permeated with mutual aid and support, and



learned the simple ways in which that support is given. After a



many years' experience, his conclusion was that" when you come to



think of it, such as these men were, so were the vast majority of



the working classes."20 As to bringing up orphans, even by the



poorest families, it is so widely-spread a habit, that it may be



described as a general rule; thus among the miners it was found,



after the two explosions at Warren Vale and at Lund Hill, that



"nearly one-third of the men killed, as the respective committees



can testify, were thus supporting relations other than wife and



child." "Have you reflected," Mr. Plimsoll added, "what this is?



Rich men, even comfortably-to-do men do this, I don't doubt. But



consider the difference." Consider what a sum of one shilling,



subscribed by each worker to help a comrade's widow, or 6d. to



help a fellow-worker to defray the extra expense of a funeral,



means for one who earns 16s. a week and has a wife, and in some



cases five or six children to support.21 But such



subscriptions are a general practice among the workers all over



the world, even in much more ordinary cases than a death in the



family, while aid in work is the commonest thing in their lives.



    Nor do the same practices of mutual aid and support fail



among the richer classes. Of course, when one thinks of the



harshness which is often shown by the richer employers towards



their employees, one feels inclined to take the most pessimist



view of human nature. Many must remember the indignation which



was aroused during the great Yorkshire strike of 1894, when old



miners who had picked coal from an abandoned pit were prosecuted



by the colliery owners. And, even if we leave aside the horrors



of the periods of struggle and social war, such as the



extermination of thousands of workers' prisoners after the fall



of the Paris Commune -- who can read, for instance, revelations



of the labour inquest which was made here in the forties, or what



Lord Shaftesbury wrote about "the frightful waste of human life



in the factories, to which the children taken from the



workhouses, or simply purchased all over this country to be sold



as factory slaves, were consigned"22  -- who can read that



without being vividly impressed by the baseness which is possible



in man when his greediness is at stake? But it must also be said



that all fault for such treatment must not be thrown entirely



upon the criminality of human nature. Were not the teachings of



men of science, and even of a notable portion of the clergy, up



to a quite recent time, teachings of distrust, despite and almost



hatred towards the poorer classes? Did not science teach that



since serfdom has been abolished, no one need be poor unless for



his own vices? And how few in the Church had the courage to blame



the children-killers, while the great numbers taught that the



sufferings of the poor, and even the slavery of the negroes, were



part of the Divine Plan! Was not Nonconformism itself largely a



popular protest against the harsh treatment of the poor at the



hand of the established Church?



    With such spiritual leaders, the feelings of the richer



classes necessarily became, as Mr. Pimsoll remarked, not so much



blunted as "stratified." They seldom went downwards towards the



poor, from whom the well-to-do-people are separated by their



manner of life, and whom they do not know under their best



aspects, in their every-day life. But among themselves  --



allowance being made for the effects of the wealth-accumulating



passions and the futile expenses imposed by wealth itself --



among themselves, in the circle of family and friends, the rich



practise the same mutual aid and support as the poor. Dr. Ihering



and L. Dargun are perfectly right in saying that if a statistical



record could be taken of all the money which passes from hand to



hand in the shape of friendly loans and aid, the sum total would



be enormous, even in comparison with the commercial transactions



of the world's trade. And if we could add to it, as we certainly



ought to, what is spent in hospitality, petty mutual services,



the management of other people's affairs, gifts and charities, we



certainly should be struck by the importance of such transfers in



national economy. Even in the world which is ruled by commercial



egotism, the current expression, "We have been harshly treated by



that firm," shows that there is also the friendly treatment, as



opposed to the harsh, i.e. the legal treatment; while every



commercial man knows how many firms are saved every year from



failure by the friendly support of other firms.



    As to the charities and the amounts of work for general



well-being which are voluntarily done by so many well-to-do



persons, as well as by workers, and especially by professional



men, every one knows the part which is played by these two



categories of benevolence in modern life. If the desire of



acquiring notoriety, political power, or social distinction often



spoils the true character of that sort of benevolence, there is



no doubt possible as to the impulse coming in the majority of



cases from the same mutual-aid feelings. Men who have acquired



wealth very often do not find in it the expected satisfaction.



Others begin to feel that, whatever economists may say about



wealth being the reward of capacity, their own reward is



exaggerated. The conscience of human solidarity begins to tell;



and, although society life is so arranged as to stifle that



feeling by thousands of artful means, it often gets the upper



hand; and then they try to find an outcome for that deeply human



need by giving their fortune, or their forces, to something



which, in their opinion, will promote general welfare.



    In short, neither the crushing powers of the centralized



State nor the teachings of mutual hatred and pitiless struggle



which came, adorned with the attributes of science, from obliging



philosophers and sociologists, could weed out the feeling of



human solidarity, deeply lodged in men's understanding and heart,



because it has been nurtured by all our preceding evolution. What



was the outcome of evolution since its earliest stages cannot be



overpowered by one of the aspects of that same evolution. And the



need of mutual aid and support which had lately taken refuge in



the narrow circle of the family, or the slum neighbours, in the



village, or the secret union of workers, re-asserts itself again,



even in our modern society, and claims its rights to be, as it



always has been, the chief leader towards further progress. Such



are the conclusions which we are necessarily brought to when we



carefully ponder over each of the groups of facts briefly



enumerated in the last two chapters.









Notes

1 Toulmin Smith, English Guilds, London, 1870, Introd. p. xliii.



2 The Act of Edward the Sixth -- the first of his reign --

ordered to hand over to the Crown "all fraternities,

brotherhoods, and guilds being within the realm of England and

Wales and other of the king's dominions; and all manors, lands,

tenements, and other hereditaments belonging to them or any of

them" (English Guilds, Introd. p. xliii). See also Ockenkowski's

Englands wirtschaftliche Entwickelung im Ausgange des

Mittelalters, Jena, 1879, chaps. ii-v.



3 See Sidney and Beatrice Webb, History of Trade-Unionism,

London, 1894, pp. 21-38.



4 See in Sidney Webb's work the associations which existed at

that time. The London artisans are supposed to have never been

better organized than in 181O-20.



5 The National Association for the Protection of Labour included

about 150 separate unions, which paid high levies, and had a

membership of about 100,000. The Builders' Union and the Miners'

Unions also were big organizations (Webb, l.c. p. 107).



6 I follow in this Mr. Webb's work, which is replete with

documents to confirm his statements.



7 Great changes have taken place since the forties in the

attitude of the richer classes towards the unions. However, even

in the sixties, the employers made a formidable concerted attempt

to crush them by locking out whole populations. Up to 1869 the

simple agreement to strike, and the announcement of a strike by

placards, to say nothing of picketing, were often punished as

intimidation. Only in 1875 the Master and Servant Act was

repealed, peaceful picketing was permitted, and "violence and

intimidation" during strikes fell into the domain of common law.

Yet, even during the dock-labourers' strike in 1887, relief money

had to be spent for fighting before the Courts for the right of

picketing, while the prosecutions of the last few years menace

once more to render the conquered rights illusory.



8 A weekly contribution of 6d. out of an 18s. wage, or of 1s.

out of 25s., means much more than 9l. out of a 300l. income: it

is mostly taken upon food; and the levy is soon doubled when a

strike is declared in a brother union. The graphic description of

trade-union life, by a skilled craftsman, published by Mr. and

Mrs. Webb (pp. 431 seq.), gives an excellent idea of the amount

of work required from a unionist.



9 See the debates upon the strikes of Falkenau in Austria before

the Austrian Reichstag on the 10th of May, 1894, in which debates

the fact is fully recognized by the Ministry and the owner of the

colliery. Also the English Press of that time.



10 Many such facts will be found in the Daily Chronicle and

partly the Daily News for October and November 1894.



11 The 31,473 productive and consumers' associations on the

Middle Rhine showed, about 1890, a yearly expenditure of

18,437,500l.; 3,675,000l. were granted during the year in loans.



12 British Consular Report, April 1889.



13 A capital research on this subject has been published in

Russian in the Zapiski (Memoirs) of the Caucasian Geographical

Society, vol. vi. 2, Tiflis, 1891, by C. Egiazaroff.



14 Escape from a French prison is extremely difficult;

nevertheless a prisoner escaped from one of the French prisons in

1884 or 1885. He even managed to conceal himself during the whole

day, although the alarm was given and the peasants in the

neighbourhood were on the look-out for him. Next morning found

him concealed in a ditch, close by a small village. Perhaps he

intended to steal some food, or some clothes in order to take off

his prison uniform. As he was lying in the ditch a fire broke out

in the village. He saw a woman running out of one of the burning

houses, and heard her desperate appeals to rescue a child in the

upper storey of the burning house. No one moved to do so. Then

the escaped prisoner dashed out of his retreat, made his way

through the fire, and, with a scalded face and burning clothes,

brought the child safe out of the fire, and handed it to its

mother. Of course he was arrested on the spot by the village

gendarme, who now made his appearance. He was taken back to the

prison. The fact was reported in all French papers, but none of

them bestirred itself to obtain his release. If he had shielded a

warder from a comrade's blow. he would have been made a hero of.

But his act was simply humane, it did not promote the State's

ideal; he himself did not attribute it to a sudden inspiration of

divine grace; and that was enough to let the man fall into

oblivion. Perhaps, six or twelve months were added to his

sentence for having stolen -- "the State's property" -- the

prison's dress.



15 The medical Academy for Women (which has given to Russia a

large portion of her 700 graduated lady doctors), the four

Ladies' Universities (about 1,000 pupils in 1887; closed that

year, and reopened in 1895), and the High Commercial School for

Women are entirely the work of such private societies. To the

same societies we owe the high standard which the girls' gymnasia

attained since they were opened in the sixties. The 100 gymnasia

now scattered over the Empire (over 70,000 pupils), correspond to

the High Schools for Girls in this country; all teachers are,

however, graduates of the universities.



16 The Verein für Verbreitung gemeinnütslicher Kenntnisse,

although it has only 5,500 members, has already opened more than

1,000 public and school libraries, organized thousands of

lectures, and published most valuable books.



17 Very few writers in sociology have paid attention to it. Dr.

Ihering is one of them, and his case is very instructive. When

the great German writer on law began his philosophical work, Der

Zweck im Rechte ("Purpose in Law"), he intended to analyze "the

active forces which call forth the advance of society and

maintain it," and to thus give "the theory of the sociable man."

He analyzed, first, the egotistic forces at work, including the

present wage-system and coercion in its variety of political and

social laws; and in a carefully worked-out scheme of his work he

intended to give the last paragraph to the ethical forces -- the

sense of duty and mutual love -- which contribute to the same

aim. When he came, however, to discuss the social functions of

these two factors, he had to write a second volume, twice as big

as the first; and yet he treated only of the personal factors

which will take in the following pages only a few lines. L.

Dargun took up the same idea in Egoismus und Altruismus in der

Nationalökonomie, Leipzig, 1885, adding some new facts. Büchner's

Love, and the several paraphrases of it published here and in

Germany, deal with the same subject.



18 Light and Shadows in the Life of an Artisan. Coventry, 1893.



19 Many rich people cannot understand how the very poor can help

each other, because they do not realize upon what infinitesimal

amounts of food or money often hangs the life of one of the

poorest cLasses. Lord Shaftesbury had understood this terribLe

truth when he started his Flowers and Watercress Girls' Fund, out

of which loans of one pound, and only occasionally two pounds,

were granted, to enable the girls to buy a basket and flowers

when the winter sets in and they are in dire distress. The loans

were given to girls who had "not a sixpence," but never failed to

find some other poor to go bail for them. "Of all the movements I

have ever been connected with," Lord Shaftesbury wrote, "I look

upon this Watercress Girls' movement as the most successful....

It was begun in 1872, and we have had out 800 to 1,000 loans, and

have not lost 50l. during the whole period.... What has been lost

-- and it has been very little, under the circumstances -- has

been by reason of death or sickness, not by fraud" (The Life and

Work of the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, by Edwin Hodder, vol.

iii. p. 322. London, 1885-86). Several more facts in point in Ch.

Booth's Life and Labour in London, vol. i; in Miss Beatrice

Potter's "Pages from a Work Girl's Diary" (Nineteenth Century,

September 1888, p. 310); and so on.



20 Samuel Plimsoll, Our Seamen, cheap edition, London, 1870, p.

110.



21 Our Seamen, u.s., p. 110. Mr. Plimsoll added: "I don't wish

to disparage the rich, but I think it may be reasonably doubted

whether these qualities are so fully developed in them; for,

notwithstanding that not a few of them are not unacquainted with

the claims, reasonable or unreasonable, of poor relatives, these

qualities are not in such constant exercise. Riches seem in so

many cases to smother the manliness of their possessors, and

their sympathies become, not so much narrowed as -- so to speak

-- stratified: they are reserved for the sufferings of their own

class, and also the woes of those above them. They seldom tend

downwards much, and they are far more likely to admire an act of

courage... than to admire the constantly exercised fortitude and

the tenderness which are the daily characteristics of a British

workman's life" -- and of the workmen all over the world as well.



22 Life of the Seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, by Edwin Hodder,

vol. i. pp. 137-138.







Return to Table of Contents

To Conclusion

Marked-up by the 

Anarchy Archives