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Guild

Socialists.

as the guild socialist movement. It obtained its idea from the mediæval guild in which the employer and the employee worked side by side. The idea of the guild socialists is that every industry shall be organized into guilds. These guilds will be composed of the workers both of hand and brain; that gradually the workers will get control of all industry; they do not go to the extreme of the anarchists in that they do not favor the abolition of the state. They separate state from economic action. The soviets of the Russian Revolution are forms of syndicalism and also are somewhat similar to the ideas of the guild socialists. According to the guild socialists each

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factory would be organized into unions and then the districts would be organized into larger unions and in the third place there would be the whole industry organized into what are known as National Guilds. This movement, as most of these movements, has not originated among the labor class. It has been originated mainly by intellectual leaders of the middle class. 3 The guild socialists are not as extreme as the syndicalists. They would retain the present form of society but gradually organize all professions and trades into guilds. There would be teachers' guilds, lawyers' guilds, shoemakers' guilds, etc.

Two other methods of reform which are more moderate than

3 For discussion of guild socialism see Cole, G. D. H., Self-Government in Industry; Cole, G. D. H., Labor in the Commonwealth; a list of books on the National Guild Movement may be found in the Survey 41: 643 (Feb. 1, 1919.)

those already described and which do not plan the destruction of private property are the single tax and coöperative movements. The single tax movement as a modern movement may be said The Singleto have its origin in the influence of Henry George, the Taxers. author of "Poverty and Progress." He believed that the private ownership of land was the cause of a great many of our social ills and he advocated the seizure through taxation of the rental value which land obtains as a result of the increase in population. He claimed that the value of land was due to society and he developed what was known as the unearned increment of land, meaning by this that a great part of the increase in value of land is due to something that the owner does not have any part in. He said if society would tax this unearned increase in the value of land it would bring more land into production and cause a greater need for labor; that a great many of the ills of modern society are due to land speculation.

Cooperation.

Still another method of reform that has been advocated is what is known as Coöperation. The coöperative movement originated in England in the early nineteenth century among a group of workers who wished to reduce the cost of living. They established a store in which the stock was owned by the workers themselves. This movement looks upon society from the consumer's viewpoint rather than the producer's. The idea is to eliminate the middleman, to sell from producer to consumer direct. This movement has spread all over the civilized world. In England today there are fifteen hundred societies and three and one half million of share holders with $1,000,000,000 of annual trade. They have coöperative retail stores, coöperative wholesale societies and even engage in manufacturing. 5

The Develop

racy.

Political democracy has been a very slow and arduous process. During the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the movement which led to representation by the people in Parliament had its beginnings in European countries, particularly in England ment of Indusand France, and this popular share in the government trial Democwas not firmly established in continental European countries until the middle of the nineteenth century. Since the evolution of political democracy has been of such a gradual growth, it must be expected that the development of industrial democracy will be also step by step. In so far as the socialist and labor parties recognize the fact that all social progress takes time, and in so 4 For a good discussion of the coöperative movement, see Harris, The Hope of the Consumer.

This movement has grown more rapidly in European countries because the development of retail stores, such as the department store, has not shown such progress as it has in the United States.

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SEVERAL BLOCKS OF THESE MODEL DWELLINGS ARE ERECTED IN OLD STREET, LONDON. GARDENS ARE ARRANGED BETWEEN THE BLOCKS OF BUILDINGS WHICH ARE MARVELLOUS EXAMPLES OF FORETHOUGHT AND SKILLFUL ARCHITECTURE.

far as they are adapting their programs to this idea, they have been assisting in its advancement; in so far as they have been attempting to hasten the process by radical measures, they have been delaying the movement. It must be understood, then, that industrial democracy is in the process of development. In every country in the Western World the liberal element has been increasing its power. Trades unions have developed and have become a recognized machinery in industrial society. Labor parties have been established and labor members have been chosen to the legislative bodies of various European countries.

In the future, that nation which appeals to the social consciousness of its people; which can bring about coöperation between labor and capital; which can develop as far as possible democratic machinery in industry thus harmonizing the relations between capital and labor, this nation will be the nation which will win in the struggle for economic advancement. This is as much a spiritual question, a question of social attitude, as it is one of material and economic advancement. When this shall have been done, then it may be said that a great step has been made toward human brotherhood. 6

In spite of the adverse criticism of the socialists and other advocates of radical social changes, wonderful progress has been made toward the betterment of the lot of all classes, and the development of the feeling of our common kindredship. James Bryce, the celebrated English publicist describes the growing development of the feeling of a common unity in the following words: "The world is becoming one in an altogether new sense. . . More than four centuries ago the discovery of America marked the first step in the process by which the European races have now gained dominion over nearly the whole earth... As the world has been narrower through the Progress. new forces science has placed at our disposal. . . the movements of politics, of economics, of thought, in each of their regions, become more closely interwoven. . . Whatever happens in any part of the globe has now a significance for every other part. World History is tending to become one History.

International

The period from 1871-1914 has been styled the period of the armed peace. It was marked by the series of alliances described in previous chapters of this work. During this period military expenses increased with a rapidity greater than the rapid progress of science.

As an illustration of the more scientific attitude now being taken in regard to industrial questions, the recent adoption of the idea of a social survey by the new republic of Czecho-Slovakia is noteworthy. Representatives have been sent to various countries to study what is being done in social, technical and educational fields. These are styled "social welfare attachés." Cf. The Survey, June 11, 1921.

The more the methods of war were perfected, the more costly war became. The burdens of the armed peace were of two kinds, personal and budgetary. The armies of the five great powers in Europe marshalled during times of peace over 4,000,000 men. The French budget prior to 1914 cost $240 annually for each man in the army, not including the cost of food and military materials. The German budget for the year 1913 was over $450,000,000 for the army alone. During the recent war, France lost by the invasion 90 per cent. of her iron ore, 50 per cent. of her coal, 83 per cent. of her foundries, 80 per cent. of the woolen industry. Twenty-seven thousand, seven-hundred and sixtythree factories were destroyed or the materials carried away. The national debt of France increased from $6,400,000,000 to $33,600,000,000 with an annual interest of $1,680,000,000. The national debt of Great Britain increased from less than four billion to about forty billions of dollars.

Although this period may be characterized as the period of the armed peace, more has been done to lessen the evils of and to abolish war than in any other period in the world's history. Over thirty international agreements have been made in regard to matters of common interest as postage, telegraphs, navigation, commerce, sanitation, railways, copyrights, insurance, fisheries, prisons, slave and liquor traffic and labor relations. International associations of various kinds have been formed and methods of arbitration have been established. In our chapters on the League of Nations, we have described the steps by which methods are being taken to mitigate the evils and to abolish war itself as far as possible. All these are paths leading to a wider conception of the common brotherhood of humanity. SUGGESTED READINGS

Hayes, A Political and Social History of Modern Europe, II, Ch. 21.
Schapiro, Modern and Contemporary European History, Ch. 24, 25, 26.
Turner, Europe since 1870, Ch. 19.

For bibliography of cooperation, see Monthly Labor Review, Oct. 1920, 166-167. For an interesting account of the attempts of workingmen to learn more about social and economic questions see Education in Great Britain, the Workers' Education Movement, U. S. Dept. of Education Bulletin, 271. This discusses adult working classes in Great Britain and the United States. A brief article will be found in the Survey, Nov. 13, 1921, 253. The same number of the Survey discusses the movement in Czecho-Slovakia and the New Germany. The National Guild Movement is discussed in the Monthly Labor Review, July 1919, 24-32; also in Cole, G. D. H. Social Theory. For syndicalism, see Russell, Bertrand, Political Ideals.

For a good, safe account of industrial democracy, see Commons, John R., Industrial Good Will.

For criticism of social reforms, see Leacock, Stephen, The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice; Todd, A. J., Theories of Social Progress; Todd, A. J., Scientific Spirit and Social Work; Camerford, Frank, The New World; Hapgood, Norman, The Advancing Hour.

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