Though they may lack other quahties, these reflections possess one merit which cannot be questioned; it is quite evident that they are inspired by a passionate love of truth. Love of truth has become a rare enough quality; the members of the Bloc despise it profoundly; official Socialists regard it as having anarchical tendencies; poUticians and their haingers-on cannot sufficiently insult the wretched people who prefer truth to the dehghts of * Some Belgian comrades have been offended by these innocent jokes, which nevertheless I retain here; Belgian Socialism is best known in France through Vandevelde, one of the most useless creatures that ever existed, who not being able to console himself for having been born in a country too small to give scope to his genius, came to Paris and gave lectures on all kinds of subjects, and who can be reproached, among other things, for having made an enormous profit on a very small intellectual capital. I have already said what I think of him in the Introduction d I'iconomie moderne, pp. 42-49.
JO /REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE power. But there are still some honest people left in France, and it is for them alone that I have always written.
The greater my experience the more I have recognised that in the study of historical questions a passion for truth is worth more than the most learned methodologies; it enables one to break through conventional wrappings, to penetrate to the foundations of things, and to grasp reality. There has never been a great historian who has not been altogether carried along by this passion; and looking at this matter closely, one sees that it is this passion which has given rise to so many happy intuitions.
I do not claim that I have, in this book, said everything that there is to say about violence, and still less to have produced a systematic theory of violence. I have merely reunited and revised a series of articles which appeared in an Italian review, // Divenire sociale} a review which maintains, on the other side of the Alps, the good fight against the exploiters of popular creduHty. The articles were written without any fixed plan; I have not tried to rewrite them, because I did not know how to set about giving a didactic appearance to such an exposition; it even seemed to me better to preserve their imtidy arrangement, since in that form they will perhaps more easily awake thought. We should always be careful in opening up a little-known subject, not to trace its boundaries too rigorously, for in this way the door is closed to the many new facts which arise from unforeseen circumstances. Time after time the theorists of Socialism have been embarrassed by contemporary history. They had constructed magnificent formulas, clear-cut and * The last four chapters have been much more developed than they were in the Italian text. I have thus been able to give more space to philosophic considerations The Italian articles have been collected in a brochure under the title Lo Sciopero generaU e la violenza with a preface by Enrico Leone.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST PUBLICATION j/ symmetrical, but they could not make them fit the facts. Rather than abandon their theories, they preferred to declare that the most important facts were mere anomalies, which science must ignore if it is to obtain a real understanding of the whole.
CHAPTER I 1. War of the poorer groups against the rich groups — Opposition of democracy to the division into classes — Methods of buying social peace — The corporative mind.
II. Illusions relating to the disappearance of violence — The mechanism of conciliation and the encouragement which it gives to strikers — Influence of fear on social legislation and its consequences.
I Everybody complains that discussions about Socialism are generally exceedingly obscure. This obscurity is due, for the most part, to the fact that contemporary Socialists use a terminology which no longer corresponds to their ideas. The best known among the people who call themselves revisionists do not wish to appear to be abandoning certain phrases, which have served for a very long time as a label to characterise Socialist literature. When Bernstein, perceiving the enormous contradiction between the language of social democracy and the true nature of its activity, urged his German comrades to have the courage to appear what they were in reality,^ and to revise a doctrine that had become mendacious, there was a tmiversal outburst of indignation at his audacity; arid 1 Bernstein complains of the pettifoggery and cant which reigns among the social democrats {Socialisme thiorique et socicUdimocratie pratique, French translation, p. 277). He addresses these words from Schiller to social democracy: " Let it dare to appear what it is " 5* the refomiists themselves were not the least eager of the defenders of the ancient formula. I remember hearing well-known French Socialists say that they found it easier to accept the tactics of Millerand than the arguments of Bernstein.
This idolatry of words plays a large part in the history of all ideologies; the preservation of a Marxist vocabulary by people who have become completely estranged from the thought of Marx constitutes a great misfortime for Socialism. The expression " class war," for example, is employed in the most improper manner; and imtil a precise meaning can be given to this term, we must give up all hope of a reasonable exposition of Socialism.
A. To most people the class war is the principle of Socialist tactics. That means that the Socialist party founds its electoral successes on the clashing of interests which exist in an acute state between certain groups, and that, if need be, it would undertake to make this hostility still more acute; their candidates ask the poorest and most numerous class to look upon themselves as forming a corporation, and they offer to become the advocates of this corporation; they promise to use their influence as representatives to improve the lot of the disinherited. Thus we are not very far from what happened in the. Greek states; Parliamentary Socialists are very much akin to the demagogues who clamoured constantly for the abolition of debts, and the division of landed property, who put all public charges upon the rich, and invented plots in order to get large fortimes confiscated. " In the democracies in which the crpwd is above the law," says Aristotle, " the demagogues, by their continual attacks upon the rich, always divide the city into two camps...the oligarchs should abandon all swearing of oaths Uke those they swear to-day; for there are cities in which they have taken this oath — I will be the constant enemy of the people, and I will do them all the evil that lies in my power." 1 Here, certainly, is a war between two classes as clearly defined as it can be; but it seems to me absurd to assert that it was in this way that Marx understood the class war, which, according to him, was the essence of Socialism.
I beHeve that the authors of the French law of August II, 1848, had their heads full of these classical reminiscences when they decreed punishment against all those who, by speeches and newspaper articles, sought " to trouble the public peace by stirring up hatred and contempt amongst the citizens." The terrible insurrection of the month of June was just over, and it was firmly believed that the victory of the Parisian workmen would have brought on, if not an attempt to put commimism into practice, at least a series of formidable requisitions on the rich in favour of the poor; it was hoped that an end would be put to civil wars by increasing the difficulty of propagating doctrines of hatred, which might raise the proletariat against the middle class.
Nowadays Parliamentary Socialists no longer entertain the idea of insurrection; if they still occasionally speak of it, it is merely to give themselves airs of importance; they teach that the ballot-box has replaced the gun; but the means of acquiring power may have changed without there being any change of mental attitude. Electoral literature seems inspired by the purest demagogic doctrines; Socialism makes its appeal to the discontented without troubling about the place they occupy in the world of production; in a society as complex as ours, and as subject to economic upheavals, there is an enormous number of discontented people in all classes — that is why Socialists are often found in places where one would least expect to meet them. Parliamentary Socialism speaks as many languages as it has types of clients. It makes CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE jj its appeal to workmen, to small employers of labour, to peasants; and in spite of Engels, it aims at reaching the farmers; ^ it is at times patriotic; at other times it declares against the Army. It is stopped by no contradiction, experience having shown that it is possible, in the course of an electoral campaign, to group together forces which, according to Marxian conceptions, should normally be antagonistic. Besides, cannot a Member of Parhament be of ser\Tice to electors of every economic situation?
In the end the term " proletariat " became synonymous with oppressed; and there are oppressed in all classes: ^ German Socialists have taken a great interest in the adventures of the Princess of Cobiu-g.' One of our most distinguished reformers, Henri Turot, for a long time one of the editors of the Petite Repuhlique^ and mimicipal coimcillor of Paris, has written a book on the " proletariat of love," by which title he designates the lowest class of prostitutes. If one of these da}^ the suffrage is granted to women, he will doubtless be called upon > Engels. La Question agraire et le sociaJisme. Critique du programme du parti ouvrier franf/ii^. translated in the Mouvement sociaJiste. October 15, 1900, p. 453. It has often been pointed out that certain Socialist candidates had separate bills for the town and the country.
' Hampered by the monopoly of the licensed stockbrokers {agents de change), the other brokers {coitlissiers) of the Bourse thus form a financial proletariat, and among them more than one Socialist admirer of Jaur^s may be found. [Trans. Note. — The coulissiers are only allowed to deal in certain markets — the Kaffir, Argentine, etc. They are constantly conducting press campaigns against the privileged brokers. Many of them are naturalised German Jews, and the licensed brokers utilise this fact in defending their own position.]
• The SociaUst deputy Sudekum, the best-dressed man in Berlin, played a large part in the abduction of the Princess of Coburg; let us hope that he had no financial interest in this affaire. At that time he represented Jaurds's newspaper at Berlin.
* H. Turot was for some considerable time one of the editors of the nationalist paper L' Eclair, and of the Petite Republique at the same time. When Judet took over the management of U Eclair he dismissed his Socialist contributor.
E S6 REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE to draw up a statement of the claims of this special proletariat.
B. Contemporary democracy in France finds itself somewhat bewildered by the tactics of the class war. This explains why ParHamentary Socialism does not mingle with the main body of the parties of the extreme left.
In order to understand this situation, we must remember the important part played by revolutionary war in our history; an enormous nimiber of our poHtical ideas originated from war; war presupposes the union of national forces against the enemy, and our French historians have alwa5rs severely criticised those insurrections which hampered the defence of the country. It seems that our democracy is harder on its rebels than monarchies are; the Vend^ens are still denounced daily as infamous traitors. All the articles pubUshed by Cl^menceau to combat the ideas of Herve are inspired by the purest revolutionary tradition, and he says so himself clearly: "I stand by and shall always stand by the old-fashioned patriotism of our fathers of the Revolution," and he scoffs at people who would " suppress international wars in order to hand us over in peace to the amenities of civil war" (Aurore, May 12, 1905).
For some considerable time the Republicans denied 1 that there was any struggle between the classes in France;:| they had so great a horror of revolt that they would not 1 recognise the facts. Judging all things from the abstract \ point of view of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, they said that the legislation of 1789 had been created in order to abolish all distinction of class in law; for that reason they were opposed to proposals for social legislation, which, nearly always, reintroduced the idea of class, and distinguished certain groups of citizens as being unfitted. for the use of liberty. '* The revolution was supposed to have suppressed class distinction,*' wrote Joseph Reinach sadly in the Matin of April 19, 1895; " but they spring up again at every step...It is necessary to point out these aggressive returns of the past, but they must not be allowed to pass unchallenged; they must be resisted." * Electoral dealing led many Republicans to recognise that the Socialists obtain great successes by utilising the passions of jealousy, of deception, or of hate, which exist in the world; thenceforward they became aware of the class war, and many have borrowed the jargon of the Parliamentary Socialists: in this way the party that is called Radical SociaHst came into being. Cl^menceau asserts even that he knows moderates who became SociaUsts in twenty-four hours. " In France," he says, " the Socialists that I know* are excellent Radicals who, thinking that social reforms do not advance quickly enough to please them, conceive that it would be good tactics to claim the greater in order to get the less. How many names and how many secret avowals I could quote to support what I say! But that would be useless, for nothing could be less mysterious" (Aurore, August 14, L6on Bourgeois — ^who was not willing to adapt himself completely to the new methods, and who, for that reason perhaps, left the Chamber of Deputies for the Senate — said, at the congress of his party in July 1905: " The class war is a fact, but a cruel fact. I do not believe that it is by prolonging this war that the solution of the problem will be attained; I believe that the solution rather hes in its suppression; men must be brought to look upon themselves as partners in the same work." It would therefore seem to be a question of creating social peace by legislation, thus * J. Reinach, Dimagogues et socialistes, p. 198. ■ Clemenceau knows the Socialists in Parliament exceedingly well, and from long experience.
\ jS /REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE demonstrating to the poor that the Government has no greater care than that of improving their lot, and by imposing the necessary sacrifices on people who possess a fortune judged to be too great for the harmony of the classes.
CapitaHst society is so rich, and the future appears to it in such optimistic colours, that it endures the most frightful burdens without complaining overmuch: in America politicians waste large taxes shamelessly; in Europe, the expenditure in military preparation increases every year; ^ social peace might very well be bought by a few supplementary sacrifices.* Experience shows that the middle classes allow themselves to be plundered quite easily, provided that a little pressure is brought to bear, and that they are intimidated by the fear of revolution; that party will possess the future which can most skilfully manipulate the spectre of revolution; the radical party is beginning to understand this; but, however clever its clowns may be, it will have some difliculty in finding any who can dazzle the big Jew^ bankers as well as Jaures and his friends do.
C. The Syndicalist organisation gives a third value to the class war. In each branch of industry employers and workmen form antagonistic groups, which have continual discussions, which negotiate and make agreements. Socialism brings along its terminology of class » At The Hague Conference the German delegate declared that his country bore the expense of armed peace with ease; L^on Bourgeois held that France bore " quite as lightly the personal and financial obUgations which the national defence imposed on its citizens." Ch. Guieysse, who quotes this speech, thinks that the Tsar had asked for the limitation of military expenditure because Russia was not rich enough yet to maintain herself at the level of the great capitalist countries {La France ei la paix armie, p. 45).
3 That is why Bhand told, on June 9, 1907, his constituents at Saint-Etienne that the Republic had made a sacred pledge to the workers about old-age pensions.
CLASS IVAR AND VIOLENCE jp war, and thus complicates conflicts which might haye remained of a purely private order; corporative exclusivehess, which resembles the local or the racial spirit, is thereby consolidated, and those who represent it Hke to imagine that they are accomplishing a higher duty and are doing excellent work for Socialism.
It is well known that htigants who are strangers in a town are generally very badly treated by the judges of commercial courts sitting there, who try to give judgment in favour of their fellow -townsmen. Railway companies pay fantastic prices for pieces of ground, the value of which is fixed by juries recruited from among the neighbouring landowners. I have seen Italian sailors overwhelmed with fines, for pretended infractions of the law, by the fishing arbitrators with whom they had come to compete on the strength of ancient treaties. Many workmen are in the same way inchned to assert that in all their contests with the employers, the worker has morality and justice on his side; I have heard the secretary of a syndicate (so fanatically a reformer as distinct from a revolutionary that he denied the oratorical talent of Guesde) declare that nobody had class feeling so strongly developed as he had, — because he argued in the way I have just indicated, — ^and he concluded that the revolutionaries did not possess the monopoly of the just conception of the class war.
It is quite understandable that many people have considered this corporative spirit as no better than the parish spirit, and also that they should have attempted to destroy it by employing methods very analogous to those which have so much weakened the jealousies which formerly existed in France between the various provinces. A more general culture and the intermixing with people of another region rapidly destroy provincialism: would it not be possible to destroy the corporative feeling by frequently bringing the important men in the sjudicates 6o /REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE into connection with the employers, and by furnishing them with opportunities of taking part in discussions of a general order in mixed commissions? Experience has shown that this is feasible.
The efforts which have been made to remove the causes of hostility which exist in modem society have undoubtedly had some effect, although the peacemakers may be much deceived about the extent of their work. By ishowing a few of the of&cials of the syndicates that the middle classes are not such terrible men as they had believed, by loading them with poHteness in commissions set up in ministerial of&ces or at the MusSe social, and by giving them the impression that there is a natural and Republican equity, above class prejudices and hatreds, it has been foimd possible to change the attitude of a few former revolutionaries.* These conversions of a few of their old chiefs have caused great confusion in the mind of the working classes; the former enthusiasm of more than one Socialist has given place to discomragement; many working men have wondered whether the trades imion organisation was not becoming a kind of poUtics, a means of getting on.
But simultaneously with this evolution, which filled the heart of the peacemakers with joy, there was a recrudescence of the revolutionary spirit in a large section of the proletariat. Since the Republican Government and the philanthropists have taken it into their heads to exterminate Socialism by developing social legislation, 1 In the matter of social " clowneries " there are very few new things under the sun. Aristotle had already laid down the rules of social peace: he says that demagog " should in their harangues appear to be concerned only with the u erest of the rich, just as in oHgarchies the government should only s em to have in view the interests of the people " {loc. cit). That is text which should be inscribed on the door of the offices of the Directi«a du Travail.
CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE 6i and by moderating the resistance of the employers in strikes, it has been observed that, more than once, the conflicts have become more acute than formerly.^ This is often explained away by saying that it was an accident, the result simply of the survival of old usages; people Uke to lull themselves with the hope that everything will go perfectly well on the day when manufacturers have a better understanding of the usages of social peace.* I beUeve, on the contrary, that we are in the presence! of a phenomenon which flows quite naturally from the I conditions in which this pretended pacification is carried j out.
I observe, first of all, that both the theories and action of the peacemakers are founded on the notion of duty,, and that duty is something entirely indefinite — ^while law seeks rigid definition. This difference is due to the fact that the latter finds a real basis in the economics of production, while the former is foimded on sentiments of resignation, goodness, and of sacrifices; and who can judge whether the man who submits to duty has been sufficiently resigned, sufficiently good, sufficiently self-sacrificing? The Christian is convinced that he will never succeed in doing all that the gospel enjoins on him; when he is free from economic ties (in a monastery) he invents all sorts of pious obUgations, so that he may bring his life nearer to that of Christ, who loved men to such an extent that he accepted an ignominious fate that they might be redeemed.
In the economic world everybody limits his duty by > his imwillingness to give up certain profits. While the j employer will be always convinced that he has done the I * Cf. G. Sorel, Insegnamenti sodali, p. 343.
* In his speech of May 11, 1907, Jaurds said that nowhere had there been such violence as there was in England during the period when both the employers and Government refused to recognise the trade unions. " They have given way; there is now vigorous and strong action, but which is at the same time legal, firm, and wise."
\ whole of his duty, the worker will be of a contrary opinion, and no argument could possibly settle the matter: the first will believe that he has been heroic, and the second will treat this pretended heroism as shameful exploitation.
Our great pontiffs of duty refuse to look upon a contract to work as being of the nature of a sale; nothing is so simple as a sale; nobody troubles himself to find out whether the grocer or his customer is right when they do not agree on the price of cheese; the ciistomer goes where he can buy more cheaply, and the grocer is obUged to change his prices when his customers leave him. But when a strike takes place it is quite another thing. All the well-intentioned people, all the " progressives " and the friends of the Republic, begin to discuss which of the two parties is in the right: to he in the right is to have accomplished one's whole social duty. Le Play has given much advice on the means of organising labour with a view to the strict fulfilment of duty; but he could not fix the extent of the mutual obligations; he left it to the tact of each, to the just estimation of the duties attaching to one's place in the social hierarchy, to the master's intelligent appreciation of the real needs of the workmen.^ The employers generally agree to discuss disputes on these lines; to the claims of the workers they reply that they have already reached the limit of possible concessions— while the philanthropists wonder whether the seUing price will not permit of a slight rise in wages. Such a discussion presupposes that it is possible to ascertain the exact extent of a man's social duty, and i what sacrifices an employer must continue to make in / order to carry out the duties of his social position. As there is * Le Play, Organisation du travail, chap. ii. § 21. According to this writer, more attention should be paid to moral forces than to the systems that are invented in order to regulate wages in a more or less automatic manner.
CLASS WAR AND VIOLENCE 6$ no process of reasoning which can resolve such a problem, wiseacres suggest recourse to arbitration; Rabelais would have suggested recourse to the chance of the dice. When the strike is important, deputies loudly demand an inquiry, with the object of discovering whether the industrial leaders are properly fultilling their dniies as good masters.
Certain results are obtained in this way — which nevertheless seem absurd — because on the one hand the large employers of labour have been brought up with religious, philanthropic, and ci\ac ideas; ^ and on the other hand because they cannot show themselves too stubborn, when certain demands are made by p)eople occupying a high position in the country. Concihators stake their vanity on succeeding, and they would be extremely hurt if industrial leaders prevented them from making social peace. The workmen are in a much more favourable position, because the prestige of the peacemakers is v^ery much less with them than with the capitalists; the latter give way, therefore, much more easily than the workers, in order to allow these well-intentioned folk the glory of ending the confhct. It is noticeable that these proceedings very rarely succeed when the matter is in the hands of workmen who have become hch: Hterary, moral, or sociological considerations have very Httle effect upon people bom outside the ranks of the middle classes.
People who are called upon to intervene in disputes in this way are misled by what they have seen of certain secretaries of syndicates, whom they find much less irreconcilable than they expected, and who seem to them to be ripe for a recognition of the idea of social peace. In the course of conciHation meetings more than one revolutionary has shown that he aspires to become a member of the middle class, and there are many intelligent, 1 About the forces which tend to maintain sentiments of moderation, cf. Insegnanitnti sociaJi, part iii. chap. v.
people who imagine that socialistic and revolutionary conceptions are only accidents that might be avoided by estabUshing better relations between the classes. They beUeve that the working-class world looks at the economic question entirely from the standpoint of duty, and they imagine that harmony would be estabHshed if a better social education were given to the citizens.
Let us see what influences are behind the other movement that tends to make conflicts more acute.
Workmen quickly perceive that the labour of conciliation or of arbitration rests on no economico- judicial basis, and their tactics have been conducted — ^instinctively perhaps — ^in accordance with this datum. Since the feelings, and, above all, the vanity of the peacemakers are in question, a strong appeal must be made to their imaginations, and they must be given the idea that they have to accomphsh a titanic task: demands are piled up, therefore, figures fixed in a rather haphazard way, and there are no scruples about exaggerating them; often the success of the strike depends on the cleverness with which a syndicaUst (who thoroughly understands the spirit of social diplomacy) has been able to introduce claims, in themselves very minor, but capable of giving the impression that the employers are not fulfilling their social duty. It often happens that writers who concern themselves with these questions are astonished that several days pass before the strikers have settled what exactly they have to demand, and that in the end demands are put forward which had not been mentioned in the course of the preceding negotiations. This is easily understood when we consider the bizarre conditions under which the discussion between the interested parties is carried on.
I am surprised that there are no strike professionals who would undertake to draw up Usts of the workers* claims; they would obtain all the more success in conciliation councils as they would not let themselves be dazzled by fine words so easily as the workers' delegates.^ When the strike is finisjied the workmen do not forget that the employers at first declared that no concession was possible; they are led thus to the belief that the employers are either ignorant or Uars. This result is not conducive to the development of social peace!
So long as the workers submitted without protest to the exactions of the employers, they believed that the will of their masters was completely dominated by economic necessities; they perceived, after the strike, that this necessity is not of a very rigid kind, and that if energetic pressure from below is brought to bear on the masters, the latter will find some means of hberating themselves from the pretended fetters of economic necessity; thus within practical limits capitalism appears to the workers to be unfettered, and they reason as if it were entirely so. What in their eyes restrains this liberty is not the necessities of competition but the ignorance of the employers. Thus is introduced the notion of the. inexhaustibility of production, which is one of the postu- 11 lates of the theory of class war in the Socialism of Marx.* * J Why then speak of social duty? Duty has some meaning in a society in which all the parts are intimately connected and responsible to one another; but if capitalism is inexhaustible, joint responsibility is no longer foimded on economic realities, and the workers think they would be dupes if they did not demand all they can obtain; they look upon the employer as an adversary with whom one comes to terms after a war. Social duty no more exists than does international duty.
* The French law of December 27, 1892, seems to have foreseen this possibility; it lays down that delegates on conciliation boards should be chosen among the interested parties; it thus keeps out these professionals whose presence would render the prestige of the authorities and of philajithropists precarious.
These ideas are somewhat confused, I admit, in many minds; but they exist in a much more stable manner than the partisans of social peace imagine; the latter are deluded by appearances, and never penetrate to the hidden roots of the existing tendencies of Socialism.
Before passing to other considerations, it must be noticed that our Latin countries present one great obstacle to the formation of social p)eace; the classes are more sharply separated by external characteristics than they are in Saxon countries; these separations very much embarrass Syndicalist leaders when they abandon their former manners and take up a position in the official or philanthropic circles.^ These circles have welcomed them with great pleasure, since it has been perceived that the gradual transformation of trades union officials into members of the middle classes might produce excellent results; but their comrades distrust them. In France this distrust has become much more definite since a great number of anarchists have entered the Syndicalist movement; because the anarchist has a horror of everj'thing which recalls the proceedings of pohticians — a class of people devoured by the desire to climb into superior classes, and having already the capitahst mind while yet poor. 2 Social pohtics have introduced new elements which must now be taken into accoimt. First of all, it must be 1 Everybody who has seen trades union leaders close at hand is struck with the extreme diderence which exists between France and England from this point of view; the English trades union leaders rapidly become gentlemen, without anybody blaming them for it (P. de Rousiers. Le Trade-unionisme en AngUUrre, p. 309 and p. 322). While correcting this proof, I read an article by Jacques Bardaux, pointing out that a carpenter and a miner had been made knights by Edward VII. [Dehats, December 16, 1907).
• Some years ago Arsene Dumont invented the term social capillarity to express the slow chmbing of the classes. If Syndicalism submitted to the induence of the pacinsts, it would be a powerful agent of social capillarity.
noticed that the workers count to-day in the world by the same right as the different productive groups which demand to be protected; they must be treated with solicitude just as the vine-growers or the sugar manufacturers.^ There is nothing settled about Protectionism; the custom duties are fixed so as to satisfy the desires of very influential people who wish to increase their incomes; social politics proceed in the same manner. The Protectionist Government professes to have knowledge which permits it to judge what should be granted to each group so as to defend the producers without injuring the consimiers; similarly, in social politics it declares, that it will take into consideration the interests of the employers and those of the workers.