Читать книгу The Complete Works of Malatesta Vol. III - Errico Malatesta - Страница 34

Translated from “L’istruzione superiore e l’Anarchia,”

L’Agitazione (Ancona) 1, no. 5 (April 12, 1897).

A republican friend sends us the following question and tells us, almost like throwing down a gauntlet, that there is no way of coming up with a satisfactory answer:

“In anarchy, everybody will be out to achieve the highest degree of education. How are you going to provide jobs for everybody if, say, 90 in every 100 individuals manage to reach the top level of education?”

The question seems somewhat of an embarrassment to our friend because he no doubt supposes that in anarchy men will continue to be divided, like they are today, into manual workers, who bear the entire burden of material production, and doctors, men of letters, etc., who have a monopoly on higher education and who would think themselves humiliated if they had to turn their hand to productive toil—not to mention, since they do not come into it, those who do nothing at all, neither with their hands nor with their brain. If that were the case, then, plainly, once economic privilege had been done away with and everyone been accorded the right and the wherewithal to pursue studies, everybody would become scientists and artists, and there would be nobody left to produce life’s necessities, or there would be only those few whom nature has made ill-disposed or ill-equipped for study. Given the dividing line between manual labor and intellectual labor, the fact is that the latter holds out the prospect of greater satisfaction and affords a moral pre-eminence that no one would willingly forego. Therefore, economic privilege would be a social necessity, a means of preventing too many people from turning towards study and away from material production.

But this problem evaporates the moment one considers that in anarchy, or, more broadly, under socialism, which is to say, an egalitarian society in which everyone would have the means to work and to study, everybody would, of necessity, have to take part in essential production, and everybody would be, as the saying goes, simultaneously toilers by brawn and toilers by brain.

And, far from being a snag in socialism, this is instead one of its great blessings, even for those who think they have an interest in preserving the existing state of affairs, because they will find here the way of committing themselves entirely to study.

For the sake of his full development, in order to fully savor the strength and health his body has to offer, man needs all his organs to function in harmony—his muscles as well as his brains. As witness the gymnastic exercises through which the rich burn off the muscular energy that they are not willing, capable, or able to employ in pleasant productive toil.

True, there are jobs that are onerous and repugnant and that could not readily be compared to some enjoyable, salubrious sports exercise. But the drawbacks would soon be reduced if everybody had to do their part. When the architect has to climb the bricklayer’s scaffolding and the mining engineer dig the coal and the physician remake his patients’ beds, oh, then we will see lots of ways devised of making work hygienic, easy, and pleasant—ways never even considered at present or which, if discovered, are not employed because those who organize and oversee the work and who have the means, the time, and requisite expertise are not the ones who do the work, so they do not feel its irritations and dangers.

Besides, what a boost science and art will receive once all men are in a position to contribute towards their advancement! Will not scientists and artists—apart from the fact that today they, too, often live in poverty—enjoy greater satisfaction if they can live in a brotherhood of equals, free of nightmarish indebtedness to the suffering endured by the bulk of producers for their pleasures and their wealth, instead of being privileged types, afflicted (if they have a heart) by the sight of other people’s wretchedness and tormented by remorse over the privileges they have enjoyed, loners in the midst of a crowd that does not know how to appreciate their efforts, forced to suffer the foolish pretensions of wealthy patrons?

Is our republican friend satisfied?

Once everyone is educated, everybody will work because, in the worst case scenario, nobody will be so stupid as to work for someone who is a do-nothing and an oppressor as well. And education will no longer be used to lord over and exploit the people, and will instead be a source of delights and wealth for everyone.

And now, with our friend’s permission, let us ask a question.

Republicans are not in favor of common property, but say they want equality all the same. They say that, adopting their approach—capital partnered with labor, etc.—poverty would be abolished and everyone would have the opportunity to educate themselves. Isn’t that right? So how would they resolve the snags that they throw in our faces? Would they hold poverty in reserve to prevent too many people from educating themselves? In which case, are we not right when we declare that the republic, in preserving the initial privilege, would still amount to a system of privilege?