by Andreas Peglau
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The condition of the working class
After spending 21 months in Great Britain researching industrial development and its consequences, Engels published his book The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1845. It contains harrowing accounts of the living conditions of the English proletariat. Engels writes of the dwellings in the London district of St. Giles, saying that
„the filth and dilapidation exceed all imagination – there is hardly a window pane intact, the walls are crumbling, the doorposts and window frames are broken and loose, the doors are nailed together from old boards or do not exist at all – here in this thieves‘ quarter, doors are not even necessary because there is nothing to steal. Piles of dirt and ashes lie everywhere, and the dirty liquids poured out in front of the doors collect in stinking puddles. This is where the poorest of the poor live, the lowest-paid workers […]“.[1]
Engels quotes the following about Bethnal Green, another district: „Not one family man in ten in the whole neighbourhood has any clothes other than his work clothes, and those are as poor and ragged as possible; indeed, many have no other blanket at night than these rags, and nothing to sleep on but a sack of straw and shavings.“[2]
Engels read in the newspaper how the body of 45-year-old Ann Galway had been found in November 1843: she had
„lived with her husband and 19-year-old son in a small room in which there was neither bedstead nor bedding nor any other furniture. She lay dead next to her son on a pile of feathers scattered over her almost naked body, for there was neither blanket nor bed sheet. The feathers stuck so firmly to her entire body that the doctor could not examine the body before it had been cleaned, and then he found her completely emaciated and covered with bites from vermin. Part of the floor in the room had been torn open, and the hole was used by the family as a toilet.“[3]
Even this misery could be exacerbated. For in „London, fifty thousand people get up every morning without knowing where they will lay their heads the following night“. Added to this were hunger and disease: „During my stay in England, at least twenty to thirty people died directly of starvation in the most appalling circumstances,“ and many more indirectly, „as the continuing lack of adequate food caused fatal diseases and thus carried off its victims […]“.[4]
Passages from Capital complete this picture. Marx goes on to say that in Manchester, „the average life expectancy of the wealthy class is 38, that of the working class only 17 years […]. In Liverpool, it is 35 years for the former and 15 for the latter.“[5] He commented on child labour „in the glassworks“ with the words:
„Apart from the exertion of lifting and carrying, such a child marches in the huts that make bottles and flint glass […] 15 to 20 (English) miles in 6 hours! And the work often lasts 14 to 15 hours! […] Mr White gives examples of a boy working 36 hours straight; others where 12-year-old boys work until 2 a.m. and then sleep in the hut until 5 a.m. (3 hours!) to start the day’s work all over again!“[6]
And he cites a report on the fate of „many thousands of these helpless little creatures“ who had previously been snatched from their parents:
„Overseers were appointed to supervise their work. It was in the interest of these slave drivers to work the children to the utmost […]. They were driven to death by excessive work … they were whipped, chained and tortured with the most exquisite refinement of cruelty; in many cases they were starved to the bone while the whip kept them working … Yes, in some cases they were driven to suicide! … The beautiful and romantic valleys of Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire and Lancashire, hidden from public view, became gruesome wastelands of torture and – often murder! … The profits of the manufacturers were enormous.“[7]
So what was usually the basis for being a successful capitalist and prevailing over the competition, according t[8] ? Contempt for humanity, a willingness to be cruel, to humiliate, harm, maim and kill individuals of all ages on a massive scale, and thus: massive personal guilt. Did Marx seriously believe that a „natural historical process“ made this inevitable – and thereby also erased this guilt?
The example of Robert Owen shows that there were people who were not prepared to become guilty in this way. (And whoever is reading this right now can ask themselves whether they would be prepared to do so.) Owen also proved that economic efficiency and humane treatment of workers could be reconciled without going bankrupt or falling victim to social ostracism. If most capitalists did not follow this path, or probably did not even consider it, then this could certainly not be explained by economic necessity.[9] Then what?
I mean: with the typical psychological damage caused by authoritarian upbringing and socialisation. Oppressed children develop justified anger and understandable hatred towards their oppressive educators. Since these feelings cannot be expressed, they build up and become destructive. When, as adults, they are offered opportunities to vent these pent-up feelings on weaker individuals, preferably in a socially acceptable manner, for example as police officers, soldiers, successful politicians or entrepreneurs, they often find it difficult to resist this temptation.
In this understanding, capitalism – like any oppressive order – is an expression of mass psychic disorders brought about by socialisation. Exacerbated by social crises, these disorders can escalate into violent excesses such as fascism.[10]
Marx and Engels did not have access to these insights, which were only later elaborated in detail by Wilhelm Reich.[11] But they too were confronted with the question of what motivates people.
Empty heads
In 1843/44, Marx had noted: „To be radical is to grasp things at their root. But for humans, the root is the human being itself.“[12] As early as 1845, in the manuscripts for The German Ideology, Marx and Engels reduced what was important about „real individuals“ and their living conditions to „the physical [!] organisation of these individuals & their relationship to the rest of nature,“ „the physical constitution of human beings, […] the geological, oro-hydrographical,[13] climatic & other conditions“.[14] One could „distinguish human beings from animals by consciousness, by religion, by whatever else one wants.“[15] Consciousness is here degraded to one distinguishing feature among many, placed on the same level as religion, which Marx and Engels fought against as irrational. In truth, humans „began to differ from animals as soon as they began to produce their food, a step that was conditioned by their physical organisation“.[16]
What „people say, imagine, picture“ are, on the other hand, „fog formations in the brain […], necessary sublimations of their material, empirically verifiable life process linked to material conditions“. Morality, religion, ideology and the corresponding „forms of consciousness“ possess neither „independence“ nor „history“ nor „development“.[17] „For me […] the ideal is nothing other than the material translated and implemented in the human mind,“ Marx then informed his readers in the second edition of Capital.[18] For him, this human mind was apparently – apart from animal instincts – initially empty, in any case carrying nothing spiritual, psychological or „ideal“ within it. He seemed to assume that we are born without any inner criteria for what we need on a psychosocial level and what harms us, without any need for emotional and physical closeness, for communication, without intellect, curiosity, creativity, without the prerequisites for self-organisation:[19] blank sheets of paper on which „the material“, especially the relations of production, somehow write the text.
If this were true, infants would be antisocial, robotic beings who perceived their mothers exclusively as providers of physical needs.[20] We would thus come into the world more pitiful than plants, whose internal structure and development plan not only enables them to flourish under favourable circumstances, but also to actively seek what they need to live: light, water, nutrients, appropriate proximity or distance to conspecifics.[21]
But if humans were so emotionally and mentally empty, unmotivated and aimless, where would the drive for their development come from, according to the theory of Marx and Engels?
In short: from „outside“.
Human-creating work
Although they hardly dealt with individual life stories, Marx and Engels did comment on the background of the origin and development of humanity.
In 1845, they interpreted the act of procreation as „the production of life“ and claimed that „the division of labour […] was originally nothing more than the division of labour in the sexual act“.[22] Sexual intercourse as work – wherever the two young men looked, they saw one thing above all else: economics. In Capital, Marx wrote:
„The use and creation of tools, although already present in embryonic form in certain animal species, characterise the specifically human labour process, and [Benjamin] Franklin therefore defines man as ‚a toolmaking animal‘.“[23]
In 1876, Engels developed a related idea in a fragment published posthumously as part of The Descent of Man.[24] By „work,“ he meant the activity that began „with the manufacture of tools,“ more specifically tools „for hunting and fishing, the former also serving as weapons.“ This work was the
„first fundamental condition of all human life, to such an extent that we must say, in a certain sense, that it created man himself. […] Work first, and then language[25] – these are the two most essential drives under whose influence the brain of an ape gradually developed into the far larger and more perfect brain of a human being, despite all similarities.“[26]
Perhaps Engels wondered why, if „work“ had such enormous power, it did not at least transform all primates into humans. In any case, he made the additional assumption that the starting point was a „monkey race“ that was „far ahead of all others in intelligence and adaptability.“[27] In doing so, however, he speculated about the mental and spiritual prerequisites for human development that already existed before „work“ and without which „work“ could not have brought about any change.
Contradicting the dominant role of „labour“ was Engels‘ statement that when „these apes“ began „to wean themselves from the aid of their hands in walking on level ground and to adopt a more and more upright gait […], the decisive step was taken for the transition from ape to man“[28] – thus entirely without labour. Instead of „work first,“ he should have said: intelligence, adaptability and upright gait first![29]
Based on the knowledge of the time, Engels assumed that only „hundreds of thousands of years […] had passed“ before „a society of humans emerged from the pack of tree-climbing apes.“[30] According to current research, the development of humans (and other modern primates) began six to seven million years ago. The earliest known fossil of the genus Homo, and thus the first sign of a human society, has been dated to 2.8 million years ago.[31] The oldest evidence of tool making that can be reliably attributed to the genus Homo dates back 2.6 million years.[32] This means that up to 4.4 million years of „humanisation“ had taken place by then, for which there is, at least so far, no evidence of „work“ in Engels‘ sense. The use of weapons for hunting has only been documented for the last 500,000 years.[33] Modern humans, Homo sapiens[34] – a term introduced by Carl von Linné in 1758 – have apparently been fully developed for 200,000 to 300,000 years.
Engels also distinguished humans from animals in other ways. When the latter „exert a lasting influence on their environment“, this happens unintentionally and is „something accidental for these animals themselves“. Animals „merely use external nature“ and bring about
„changes in it simply by their presence; humans make it serve their purposes through their changes, dominate it. And that is the ultimate, essential difference between humans and other animals, and it is again work that brings about this difference.“[35]
Research has now shown that various animal species use tools in a planned manner,[36] thus changing nature not only through their „presence“. Without showing any tendency towards humanisation, great apes also appear to manufacture some of their tools themselves[37] – which means that the criterion of tool manufacture for differentiating between humans and animals is also likely to be obsolete. Quite apart from the question of why the planned use of existing materials as tools cannot also be classified as „work“: why should anyone produce something that nature provides them with without any effort?[38]
If work had such an intense influence, it would have to do so permanently. Accordingly, Engels believed that the „further development“ caused by work had continued „on a grand scale“ after the completion of human evolution.[39] However, to this day, „populations, e.g. in South America, Australia and Africa, have remained at a ‚pre-modern level‘ in terms of their social constitution, including the level of development of their tools and means of communication […]. The factor of labour has not been able to develop further here.“[40] In my opinion, this is not covered by Engels‘ qualification that „further development“ was „interrupted in places […] by local and temporal decline“.[41]
Much of what Engels presented as factual statements were, in any case, assumptions.[42] In 2020, anthropologist David Graeber and archaeologist David Wengrow recapitulated that even today there are „hardly any finds“ available for our prehistory:
„There are […] thousands of years for which the only available evidence of hominid activity consists of a single tooth or perhaps a few flint flakes. […] What did these early human societies look like? We should at least be honest at this point and admit that we have no idea. […] For most periods, we don’t even know what humans looked like below the larynx, let alone their pigmentation, diet and all the rest.“[43]
The first „direct evidence of what we today […] call ‚culture‘ dates back no more than 100,000 years.“ It is only in the last 50,000 years that such evidence has gradually become more common.[44] And it is only in the last 5,000 years or so that more complex descriptions have been left to us in written languages.[45] Even if we assume not seven but only six million years since the beginning of human evolution, this means that for at least 5.9 million years, or approximately 98 per cent of that time, no verifiable statements can be made about social, political and economic issues.[46]
As mentioned, Engels assumed a period of only hundreds of thousands of years. But even with this calculation, the vast majority of human history would remain in the dark. And in 1876, archaeology had far fewer finds to present than it does today.
What Engels apparently did was to project his and Marx’s ideas about „labour“ and the primacy of economics into the distant past – with arguments that were already quite dubious in his own time. To this end, he personified „labour“ and endowed it with an almost magical power, which once again made a closer look at human motives and psychosocial circumstances – seemingly – unnecessary.
This approach was not specific to Engels.
*
Continue reading in Part 5: What is „capital“?/ The animated monster
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Sources of the entire text (mostly in German).
German version of part 4.
Notes
[1] Engels 1962c, p. 260.
[2] Ibid., p. 262.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid. p. 258.
[5] Marx 2021, p. 671.
[6] Ibid., p. 279.
[7] Ibid., p. 786. Simon (1925, pp. 9–12) also describes the „large-scale murder of children“ (ibid., p. 9, footnote 2).
[8] The living and working conditions of large sections of the European proletariat improved significantly in the 20th century. However, this did not mean the end of exploitation and oppression, and it came at the expense of the environment, future generations and the „Third World“. Today, children are mainly exploited for profit in the „global South“: according to current estimates, 160 million girls and boys are affected by child labour and „have to work under conditions that deprive them of their basic rights and opportunities“ (https://www.unicef.de/informieren/aktuelles/blog/-/kinderarbeit-fragen-und-antworten/275272).
[9] Even luxury purchases such as a third sailing yacht cannot be classified as an expression of economic constraints or as measures to increase profits. Where so much material surplus is available, it could always be used for the benefit of the exploited without being exposed to the „punishment of ruin“. If capitalists prefer to squander this money, this cannot be explained economically or by the teachings of Marx and Engels – but possibly by the unconscious urge to compensate for ingrained inferiority complexes.
[10] In 2017, I put it this way: „Authoritarian, emotion-suppressing socialisation is […] not a sufficient condition for fascist degeneration, but it is a necessary prerequisite. We are therefore dealing here with what is probably the most important condition for the emergence of fascist, destructive social systems. If we could ensure that this type of socialisation no longer took place, these systems would also cease to exist. Mentally healthy people do not want or tolerate oppression, especially when it is exercised as brutally as in fascism. There can be no destructive social system without people who have been made destructive!“ (Peglau 2017b, p. 110).
[11] See Reich 2020; Peglau 2019b, 2022.
[12] Marx 1976a, p. 385.
[13] Concerning the course of mountains and waters.
[14] Marx/Engels 2017, p. 8. They thus defined the important external conditions quite broadly, almost ecologically. From 1873 onwards, Engels (1962b) returned to this idea more strongly (cf. Krätke 2020, pp. 35–39).
[15] Marx/Engels 2017, p. 8.
[16] Ibid.
[17] Ibid., p. 136.
[18] Marx 2021, p. 27. However, human minds are themselves material, so that material influences act both outside and inside the individual. And what was meant by „the ideal“: spirit, psyche, character, personality, thoughts, feelings? Brodbeck (2018, p. 10) classifies Marx’s quoted sentence as „crude materialism“ and asks: „What ‚material‘ is ‚translated‘ here into language, and ultimately into ‚ideas‘ […]? According to Marx, matter has ‚properties‘, and it is precisely these ‚properties of things‘ […] that are supposed to ‚imprint‘ themselves on the brain. So are properties themselves ‚matter‘?“
[19] In self-organisation, a system is shaped by its own internal drive. Ancient philosophers already pondered this idea, and in the 18th and 19th centuries, Kant and Schelling explored it in greater depth (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selbstorganisation, cf. Sandkühler 2021, pp. 2428–2433).
[20] Dornes 2018, for example, demonstrates how false this assumption would be. Even though childhood had not yet been intensively researched in 1844, Marx was able to test his views based on his own childhood and his daughter, who was born in 1844.
[21] See Wohlleben 2015.
[22] Marx/Engels 2017, pp. 28, 31. Engels (1975b, p. 68) would later expand the concept of class in a similarly generous manner, claiming that men and women had been opposed to each other as „classes“ since the introduction of monogamy.
[23] Marx 2021, p. 194.
[24] Engels 1962b. He wrote that the entire collection of manuscripts still needed to be „heavily revised“. In 1925, it was published in the USSR as Dialectics of Nature: a book „that Engels never wrote“ (Krätke 2020, p. 35, see also Kangal 2022).
[25] Engels (1962b, p. 447) also states that „the nascent humans came to the point where they had something to say to each other. The need created its own organ: the undeveloped larynx of the ape slowly but surely transformed.“ Although Engels identified a communicative need, i.e. something psychological, as the cause, he went on to claim that this development was solely due to work – as if humans had not always had many other reasons to communicate. Recent research suggests that the larynx only enabled spoken language around 250,000 years ago, more than two million years after the first documented use of tools – and that the mother-child relationship was of great importance for language development. It has also been proven that some animals have language skills and that great apes in particular can learn to communicate with humans using sign language without „work“, only with training (Zimmer 2003, pp. 110–116, 176ff.).
[26] Engels 1962b , p. 447.
[27] Ibid., p. 449.
[28] Ibid., p. 444.
[29] Hunt (2021, p. 384) points out that Engels‘ prioritisation of work „contradicted Darwin’s more cerebral idea“ that the growth of the brain and intelligence preceded the learning of upright walking.
[30] Engels 1962b, p. 448.
[31] Villmoare et al. 2015.
[32] https://www.archaeologie.bl.ch/entdecken/fundstelle/55/die-aeltesten-werkzeuge-der-menschheit/ There are now artefacts that are as old as 3.3 million years. Since they cannot be matched with fossils, it is unclear whether they belong to the Australopithecines or the genus Homo (Harmand et al. 2015).
[33] https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/mensch/fruehmenschen-jagten-schon-vor-500000-jahren-mit-stein-speerspitzen-a-867412.html However, this only means that there is no evidence to date that tools were not used for hunting before this time.
[34] Engels does not use this term in his fragment.
[35] Engels 1962b, p. 451f. Hunting weapons dating back 300,000 years are „undoubtedly authentic“ (Kuckenburg 2022, p. 79).
[36] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werkzeuggebrauch_bei_Tieren#N%C3%BCsseknacken_mit_Hammer_und_Amboss. Engels also acknowledges that animals are capable of intentional behaviour, but not of intentional tool use.
[37] The earliest finds to date are 4,300 years old (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primatenarch%C3%A4ologie, https://www.sueddeutsche.de/wissen/evolution-die-affen-archaeologen-1.164575). If great apes were already making tools seven million years ago, it is possible that early humans also possessed this ability from the outset and did not have to „work“ to acquire it.
[38] Engels‘ view also suggests that as long as humans lived nomadically, for example, on what nature provided them in abundance, they were not yet human. For they only consumed – they did not produce. See, in contrast, Scott 2019, p. 22; Graeber/Wengrow 2021, pp. 473–476; Ryan/Jethá 2016, pp. 201–204, 236–239. Marx (1983b, p. 384) recognised in 1857/58 that that „migration“ was „the first form of existence, not that the tribe settles in a particular place, but that it grazes on what it finds [!]“: Later (Marx 1983a, p. 856), he stated that at the „beginning of society […] there are no produced means of production yet“.
[39] Engels 1962b, p. 448.
[40] Witzgall 2021, p. 7. Since hunter-gatherer societies in particular can also be understood as a successful model (Scott 2019; Ryan/Jetha 2016, pp. 177–244; Graeber/Wengrow 2022, pp. 473–476), maintaining a particular type of economy should not simply be dismissed as an inability to develop or stagnation – just as economic progress should not automatically be regarded as something good for humanity.
[41] Engels 1962b, p. 448.
[42] Or rather, the adoption of assumptions made by other authors. For lasting insights into Engels‘ fragment, see Kuckenburg 2022, pp. 138–159. Marx (2021, pp. 534f.) also presented assumptions about the „beginnings of culture“ as proven facts.
[43] Graeber/Wengrow 2022, p. 96, 98.
[44] Ibid., pp. 100f. The oldest known cave painting is currently 45,000 years old (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%B6hlenmalerei).
[45] Scott 2019, p. 20.
[46] Nevertheless, such statements are often made, mostly on the basis of questionable hypotheses, such as that humans lived 100,000 years ago in the same way as „primitive peoples“ observed today.