Quick viewing(Text Mode)

The French Revolution and the Origins of Socialism: the Case of Early French Socialism

The French Revolution and the Origins of Socialism: the Case of Early French Socialism

THE FRENCH AND THE ORIGINS OF : THE CASE OF EARLY FRENCH SOCIALISM Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021

DAVID W. LOVELL*

The origins of particular ideas or systems of ideas are difficult, if not im- possible, to establish with . Nevertheless, we regularly employ more or less useful operating assumptions about them. In considering Socialism, for example, the case for Mosaic provenance is rightly over- whelmed by the popularity of attributing its emergence to the combined effects of the French and Industrial .1 Illuminating as the latter formula may be it is, beyond a certain point, unhelpful. The historical sym- metry of the coalescing of exemplar with proletarian , which it suggests, underpins the self-image of only one (albeit the predominant) current of Socialism, the Marxist. This formula also tends to dim our appreciation of the diversity and complexity of Socialism, especially of its earliest currents; its different developments in France and England, in particular;2 and the minutiae of the Revolutionary legacies and their mode of transmission. As the grand Marxian synthesis unravels, pur- suing such details may allow a better view of Socialism itself. Explanations of the French Revolutionary heritage of Socialism can be grouped into two (not necessarily exclusive) types.3 First is the claim that the example of radical oppositional groups and plots during the later phases of the Revolution fed directly into Socialism. Thus the

* The author is Senior Lecturer in the Department of , Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia. He wishes to thank: the University College, Univer- sity of New South for a Special Research Grant which enabled part of the research for this article to be undertaken in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; and Professor William Doyle of the University of Bristol for his encouragement. 1 See A. Gray, The Socialist tradition-. Moses to Lenin (New York, 1968). By contrast, G. Lichthelm, The origins of socialism (1969), pp. 17-98, saw French Socialists as 'heirs of the '. For an affirmation of Lichtheim's view, see also L. Kolakowski, Main currents of . I. The founders, trans. P. S. Falla (Oxford, 1981), pp. 182-233. 1 Hedva Ben-Israel, for example, argues that 'English socialism was not connected with the French movement nor did it grow from the tradition of the French Revolution': English on the French Revolution (Cambridge, 1968), p. 159. 1 Francois Furet embraces both: 'En effet I'idee socialiste, ou communiste ... a recu de la Revolution francaise, avec Babeuf, une sorte de confirmation de I'histoire. II n'est que d'eten- dre I'idee d'egalite au domaine economique et social, en repassant du citoyen a l'homme, pour tomber sur la critique de la propriete privee': 'Revolution francaise et tradition jacobine', The French Revolution and the creation of modern political , ii, ed. C. R. Lucas (Oxford, 1988), 329-39 at p. 336.

© 1992 French , Vol. 6No. 2, pp. 185-205 186 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM of the Enrages4 and especially the hostility to private proper- ty of the Babouvists - transmitted by way of Buonarroti's 1828 publication of the La conspiration pour I'egalite, dite de Babeuf- inspired the early Socialists.5 Secondly, the Revolution is said to have contributed indirectly by beginning a relentless of demands for equality and (which actuated the aforementioned plots). Within the 'bourgeois' political and economic framework it created or ratified, those demands were insatiable. Jean Jaures became a Socialist on the strength of this logic. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 'Le socialisme', he declared, 'est l'accomplissement de la Republique eten- due de la cite a 1'atelier ... la realisation totale de la democratic dans la vie economique comme dans la vie politique.'6 Whatever their purchase on later Socialism, such explanations are not adequate to account for its earliest manifestation, from around 1830 until 1848, in France. As to their specifics, it is perhaps enough to mention that the early Socialists abhorred and feared revolutionary ; the aboli- tion of was generally not among their aims; and their watchword was organization rather than democracy. And despite Jaures's understan- dably French stress on continuity, both types of explanation tend to stress the distance between Socialism and the French Revolution. Both express in different ways Sylvain Marechal's conviction that the Revolution was only the forerunner of a final, and far more profound revolution.7 The prevail- ing Socialist view on which they draw sees the Revolution as, broadly speaking, a struggle of class against class, which led to the ascendancy of the and the defeat of and its aristocratic stretcher- bearers. The Revolution heralds capitalist ; Socialism requires a more thoroughgoing revolution, a new break. Yet it be argued here that most of the early French Socialists saw the revolutionary work as (thankfully) behind them; that theirs was not a doctrine which sought to heighten (the workers' awareness of) class antagonism; and that they saw themselves as fulfilling the Revolution, not attempting to transcend it. In this essay, the transmission of the Revolutionary heritage to early French Socialism will be sketched by way of the writings of Saint-Simon and , and with reference to the peculiar role and nature of the 1830 Revolution. The Socialist implications of this heritage are brought into sharp relief by contrasting the early French Socialists with their Com- munist contemporaries. Three major issues - the suitability of violence as a

' The claim that the Enrages were themselves Socialists is rejected in R. B. , The Enragis: Socialists of the French Revolution? (Sydney, 1965). ' Marx and Engels wrote: 'The which began in 1789 in the Cercle social, which in the middle of its course had as its chief representatives Leclerc and Roux, and which finally with Babeuf s conspiracy was temporarily defeated, gave to the communist idea which Babeuf's friend Buonarroti re-introduced in France after the Revolution of 1830': K. Marx and F. Engels, , in Collected works, iv (1975), 119. ' Jean Jaures, 23 Oct. 1902, cited in Jean Jaures, ed. V. Auriol (1962), p. 105. ' See S. Marechal, 'Manifesto of the Equals', in P. Buonarroti, Babeuf s conspiracy for equality (1836), trans. B. O'Brien (New York, 1965), p. 315. DAVID W. LOVELL 187 method of social and political change; the future of ; and the meaning of 'equality' - will serve here to encapsulate their differences. This article will conclude by reflecting on the complexity of Socialism which is presented by such a study of origins and influences. First, however, the notion of Revolutionary heritage as it relates to early Socialism must be clarified. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021

The Revolution was both large and intricate, as a cursory glance at its history suggests and specialist studies continue to reveal. To regard it as univocal is an illusion created by distance and fostered by one slogan in particular - ', Equality, Fraternity' - even though themselves differed over the meanings of its constituents, disagreed about the relative emphasis which should be placed on each, and all the while ex- ploited their malleability. The Revolution had many legatees: its slogans and symbols were appropriated by various causes. It is thus no surprise that the writing of its history was, until fairly recently by some estimates, also an exercise in politics; in the nineteenth century, it was intensely so.8 William Doyle explained the breadth and diversity of the Revolution's ap- peal by arguing that despite its proclamations of principle, 'the Revolution appears to have stood for nothing constant at all';9 it did not stand, it was made to stand. For early French Socialism, as for many other political cur- rents of the time, 'the Revolution' was a touchstone. Given the foregoing considerations, we are entitled to ask: 'Which Revolution?' The Revolution with which the early FrencrTSocialists sought resonance was not the Revolution of 1789, or of 1793,10 though some made that distinction and were enthusiasts for Robespierre (but not for the Terror). It was certainly not the Revolution of Babeuf and the lesser-known ''. Rather, it was the Revolution of just recognition and reward for contribu- tion to the or society; the Revolution of the of Man, which also recognized that resources might have to be provided to allow all men the ability to exercise their rights; the Revolution which largely accepted private property and earned , and which yielded only reluctantly to the threatening crowd on this and other issues; the anticlerical, but not anti-Christian Revolution, despite dechristianization; the Revolution which conflated French and international ; the self-critical Revolu-

1 This point is made in various places; sec, for example, N. Hampson, 'The French Revolu- tion and its historians', The permanent revolution: the French Revolution and its legacy, 1789-1989, ed. G. Best (, 1989), pp. 211-34. ' W. Doyle, 'The principles of the French Revolution', The impact of the French Revolu- tion on European consciousness, ed. H. T. Mason and W. Doyle (Gloucester, 1989), pp. 1-10 at p. 8. 10 Jessica Peixotto argued, by contrast, that on many crucial issues 'the French Revolu- tionists of '93 and the French Socialists of 1900 are scarcely separated in opinion': The French Revolution and modern French Socialism (New York, 1901), p. vii. 188 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM tion which sometimes glimpsed its failures and unintended consequences, and sometimes attributed them to social forces; the Revolution of meritocratic equality and social . This 'Revolution' was not embodied in any one person, club or event, though it has some affinity with the Girondins." Nor was it the only 'Revolution'; indeed, the early French Socialists were antipathetic chiefly towards the and laissez-faire which were indisputably elements of the historical Revolution. Yet theirs was a composite, sym- Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 bolized by the universalist triad of values only because that committed them to so little. And if it is described here as '' this is not to deny the other conventional elements of the Revolutionary heritage which they rejected, but to emphasize just how conventional the early Socialists were. 'Mainstream' also serves to provide a marked contrast to the ultra- revolutionary, 'oppositional' tradition of conspiracy allied with appeals to the menu peuple, of radical egalitarianism, of irreligion and of hostility to private property with which Socialism is often uniformly associated. Fur- thermore, it is an image for which 'Jacobinism' is an inappropriate designa- tion: not just because of the 'semantic elasticity' of the term,12 but because the early French Socialists tended to dismiss the reliance on political which was central to Jacobinism. The early French Socialists themselves were alive to the question of origins. Many of them scoured the writings of the ancient Greeks, the early Christians, and Utopians throughout the ages for evidence of (distinguish- ed) precursors. As the Fourierists declared in 1844:'3 il n'est pas permis d'ignorer que la conception d'une societe ideale a toujours preoccupe les , et que cette aspira- tion vers un monde meilleur a, dans tous les temps, trouve pour interprete un homme de genie qui s'est appele Pythagore, Platon, Thomas Morus, Campanella, Morelly, veritables ancetres des socialistes modernes. Their aim was not just to situate Socialism in a tradition of social, political and moral theorizing (as distinct from the history of social !), but - perhaps like most family genealogists - to provide it with a 'pedigree' in the elevated sense. Some demurred. , for example, in- sisted that 'les principes du socialisme ne sont pas des vieilleries renouvelees de l'antiquite'.14 The Revolution's influence presented fewer genealogical conundrums, though less elevation. It, too, produced its share of anachronisms. Etienne Cabet argued that Christ showed the world 'un

" I am indebted to William Doyle for this observation. 12 Francois Furet, 'Jacobinism', A critical dictionary of the French Revolution, ed. F. Furet and M. Ozouf, trans. A. Goldhammer (Cambridge, Mass., 1989), pp. 704-15 at p. 710. 11 Dimocratie Pacifique, 22 Apr. 1844, p. 3. 14 C. Pecqueur, Tbeorienouvelled'economiesocialeetpolitique, ouetudessurl'organisa- tion des societes (1842), pp. 476-7. DAVID W. LOVELL 189 drapeau sur lequel etaient ecrits ces mots: Fraternite, Egalite, Liberte, Unite' (in French, one imagines).13 And 'Fraternite fut le symbole le plus moral, le plus pur, le plus eleve, le plus humanitaire de la Revolution francaise.'" Though early Socialism drew upon enduring themes, it grew out of theoretical systems expounded by Saint-Simon and Charles Fourier under the direct impact of the Revolution." It emerged fully after the 1830 echo of the Revolution, and it produced its own historians of the Revolu- tion: among them, Philippe-Jospeh Buchez, Cabet and ." Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 The Trois Glorieuses of 1830 seemed to present an opportunity to com- plete the Revolution, hitherto frustrated by war, Directory, and . Yet the installation of King Louis-Philippe served only to con- centrate the minds of many thinkers on the 'problem of the Revolution': its inability to fulfil its promises. Alphonse Lamartine wrote in 1831 that 'les grands principes de la Revolution de 89 sont vrais, beaux et bons; l'execu- tion seule a ete atroce'." Socialism was one response to this problem. The journal La Reforme, for example, declared that it was published to fulfil the aims of 1789 and 1830.20 Louis Blanc claimed that the formula which expressed and summed up Socialism was 'Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite'.2' From Blanc to Cabet, from Prosper Enfantin to Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, the legacies of the French Revolution were analysed and absorbed. Along with a host of lesser-known publicists, pamphleteers and organizers such as Victor Considerant, Jules Lechevalier, , Pecqueur and ," they down a broad framework within which early Socialism would develop. In particular, they began to focus upon the nature of society to account for the Revolution's disappointments, explain- ing that 'class' had also become a malignant factor in social relationships."

" Le Populaire, 5 June 1842, p. 1. 16 Le Populaire, Jan.-Feb. 1845, p. 1. " C. H. de Rouvroy, Comte de Saint-Simon, 1760-.1825; Francois Marie Charles Fourier, 1772-1837. Saint-Simon's Lettres d'un habitant de Geneve a ses contemporains was first published in 1803; Fourier's Thiorie des quatre mouvements et des destinies generates, in 1808. " Buchez collaborated with Prosper-Charles Roux to produce the Histoire parlementaire de la Revolution francaise in 40 volumes between 1834 and 1838; Cabet published the Histoire populaire de la Revolution francaise in 1839; Blanc published his Histoire de la Revolution franfaise in 12 volumes between 1847 and 1862. " Lamartine to Virieu, 25 Dec. 1831, cited in M. Leroy, Histoire des idees sociales en France, de Babeufa Tocquevtlle, 5th edn (1950), p. 35. " La Reforme, July 1843. 21 L. Blanc, Catechisme des socialistes (1849), p. 3. " Their dates are as follows: Louis Blanc, 1811-82; Etienne Cabet, 1788-1856; Prosper En- fantin, 1796-1864; Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, 1809-65; Victor Considerant, 1808-93; Jules Lechevalier, c. 1800-?; Pierre Leroux, 1797-1871; Flora Tristan, 1803-44; Constantin Pec- queur, 1801-87. A good selection of the writings of many of them can be found in Before Marx: Socialism and in France, 1830-48, ed. P. E. Corcoran (1983). Corcoran elsewhere has argued that the works of Cabet and Fourier 'are representative of early French socialism': P. E. Corcoran, 'Early French Socialism reconsidered - I. The propaganda of Fourier and Cabet', Hist Eur Id, 7 (1986), 469-88 at p. 470. !) See, for example, DGmocratie Pacifique, 8 Jan. 1844. 190 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM In the , Marx complained that 'The French have social theories, but not a social theory.'24 Whether complaint or observation, this alerts us to the fact that just as the Revolution was diverse, so too was early French Socialism. Yet in neither case does this seem an adequate ground for deny- ing that the shorthand expression conveys meaning. Indeed, here and elsewhere, Marx himself provides some unifying strategies: the early French Socialists shared the common ground of 'the social'; and their distinguishing feature was 'utopianism', a pejorative they helped to coin, Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 but for the investment and circulation of which Marx is chiefly respon- sible. For Marx, Kamenka has explained, the Utopians had three major weaknesses: they 'believed in power of moral example and treated education as though it were socially unconditioned . . . [they] had no true conception of a class struggle . . . [and they] rejected all political and especially revolutionary action; they wanted to gain their ends by peaceful means.'25 Roger Soltau likewise saw early French Socialism as a distinctive current of thought whose abstinence from 'ap- peals to baser materialistic instincts' and whose religiosity ruled out 'any conception of a permanent hostility between capital and labour'.26 While the core of the 'utopian' critique mounted by Marx was a concep- tion of social classes as irreconcilable, Socialist 'utopianism' grew from a particular perspective on the Revolution. The early French Socialists stressed the epoch-separating character of the Revolution.27 Considerant concluded, as did many others, that i'oeuvre revolutionnaire est ac- complie, I'oeuvre democratique est a peine entamtje'.28 It was not a ques- tion of a new revolution, but of finishing the work of the old. Even the language of the early Socialists was influenced by 1789: what they oppos- ed, they often depicted as a new type of feudalism. Considerant warned against the development of la Feodalite industrielle etfinanciere'." Cabet espied 'une Aristocratie d'argent'.30 They amplified Marat's question in 1790: 'Qu'aurons-nous gagne a detruire 1'aristocratie des nobles, si elle est

14 Marx and Engels, The holy family, p. 152. Early French Socialism is often seen as the im- mature version of a Socialism which reached its majority with Marx's contributions. Despite its title, Jacqueline Russ, La pensee des precurseurs de Marx (1973) stresses the value of the 'pre-Marxists'. Paul Corcoran also values the works of the early French socialists in- dependently of their contributions to Marx's theory: see Before Marx, ed. Corcoran, pp. ix-xi. 1! E. Kamenka, 'Socialism and Utopia', Utopias, ed. E. Kamenka (Melbourne, 1987), pp. 77-8. :s R. H. Soltau, French political thought in the nineteenth century (New York, n.d. [pro- bably 1931]), pp. 132-3. " V. Considerant, Principes du socialisme. Manifeste de la democratie au xix* siecle, suivi du prods de la Democratie Pacifique (1847), p. 2. See also C. Pecqueur, Des ameliorations materielles dans leur rapports avec la liberte. Introduction a Vetude de I'economie sociale etpolitique (1840), p. xxii. !1 Considerant, Principes du socialisme, p. 4. " Ibid. p. 6. 10 E. Cabet, Douze lettres d'un communiste a un reformiste sur la communaute (1841), p. 26. DAVID W. LOVELL 191 remplacee par l'aristocratie des riches?'31 The early Socialists took up the same cry as some of the revolutionaries: that the shortcomings of 1789 could be overcome in part if all citizens had 'les droits avec la facilite pour les exercer'." Ability, they believed, was related chiefly to the possession of ," but there was no accompanying threat of ex- propriation. In this respect, early Socialists were ambivalent towards the liberals who had championed the Revolution, but had stopped short of ex- tending their reforms to all the population. A Saint-Simonian expressed Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 this by arguing that 'En POLITIQUE la bourgeoisie, apres avoir marche long temps a la tete du mouvement liberal, apres avoir proclame avec ferveur l'egalite sociale aussi long-temps qu'elle a vu quelque inegalite audessus d'elle; la bourgeoisie se sent avec terreur pressee par les conse- quences des principes qu'elle a poses.'34 The liberals may have had a mandate to abolish an intolerable situation, blameworthy social relations and a brutal , but now social bonds themselves threatened to break down.35 The danger of 'la gangrene de l'egoisme' was .36 Despite its divisions, early French Socialism can be treated as a unit. It was motivated by the same sorts of questions as Sieyes asked: who con- tributes to society, and what is their reward? The 'Third Estate' gave way to 'the productive'. 'The productive' were the backbone of the new socie- ty, but the idle benefited. Yet 'the productive' joined together what later Socialists have been keen to separate: capitalists and workers. Early French Socialism was characterized by its appeal to without distinction of class. It preferred reward according to merit to radical egalitarianism. It largely accepted private property as a legitimate reward, believing that it need not be a social solvent. The early French Socialists saw harmony bet- ween productive classes as their ultimate aim, and were reluctant to incite the working classes to change unilaterally the present system under which they suffered. They believed that the two principal contemporary pro- blems were the atomization of society, and the unjust of socie- ty's rewards and benefits. Their solutions were various and hotly disputed: some seeing a role for the , for example, others not. But there were

11 Marat in Ami du peuple, 1790, cited in S. M. Gruner, 'Le concept de classe dans la revolution francaise: une mise a jour', Hist Soc, 9 (1976), 406-23 at p. 413. 11 La Reformateur, 56, 3 Dec. 1834, p. 1. " In June 1793 the sans-culotte leader, Jacques Roux, declared: 'Liberty is a hollow sham if one class can deprive another of food with impunity. Liberty is meaningless where the rich may exercise the power of life and death over their fellows with impunity'; cited in G. F. E. Rude, 'The French Revolution and "participation"', A world in revolution.', ed. E. Kamenka (Canberra, 1970), p. 20. " A. Transon, Le Globe, 2 Jan. 1832, p. 1. 15 The Saint-Simonians complained to the liberals: 'vous n'aviez pouvoir que pour la destruction pure et simple de ces liens sociaux, de ces inegalites, de cette bierarcbie, et e'est pour cela qu'aujourd'hui il n'est plus de liens entre les hommes; e'est pour cela que les peuples croient maintenant i une egalite absolue, quoiqu'il n'y ait pas deux hommes egaux sur la terre en force, en intelligence, en volonte; e'est pour cela que parmi vous regne Yanar- cbie la plus complete.' Le Globe, 20 Feb. 1831, p. 1. " L Echo de I Industrie, 15 Oct. 1845 (no. 1). 192 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM certain common expectations. A new social organization - without the in- , , competitiveness and disorganization introduced by the - had-to be constructed by first erecting a framework of , of remuneration or of architecture37 which would reconcile to each other, to their plentiful but differential rewards, and to their place in the community.38 As Gaston Isambert insisted, early French Socialism was a humanitarian project reliant upon the of the diverse classes of society.39 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021

II It is to Saint-Simon and Fourier, not to Babeuf, that we should look for the transmission of Revolutionary ideas to the early French Socialists. Saint- Simon did not live to see 1830; Fourier died in 1837, after creating a Socialist movement almost despite himself. Their names (along with 's) were often linked, Paget describing them in 1838 as 'ces trois genies reformateurs'.40 If they are not considered Socialists, they are at least the 'fathers' of Socialism. They formulated their most significant ideas within two decades of the beginning of the nineteenth century. The French Revolution was arguably the most important formative influence in their lives. Yet their systems were heralded by no fundamental theoretical breakthroughs, nor did they set out to challenge 'bourgeois society'. 'Bourgeois society' did not exist for them. What their Socialist successors saw as class society, they - whatever their term for it, and along with others of all political hues - saw as rampant individualism. Their theories were attempts at community-making in its broadest sense. They worked within the framework of what Patrice Higonnet has called 'bourgeois universalism', the view attributed by him to the Revolutionary French bourgeoisie that individualism and community were complemen- tary values.41 In his New , published just before his death, Saint-Simon argued that 'un tres-grand mal est resulte pour la societe de l'etat d'aban-

17 Architecture was at the time a popular response to social problems: consider Jeremy Ben- tham and Claude-Nicolas Ledoux. See, for example, A. Vidler, Claude-Nicolas Ledoux: ar- chitecture and social reform at the end of the ancien regime (Cambridge, Mass., 1991). " F. Hayek has argued that the influence of Saint-Simon was paramount: 'by about 1840 Saint-Simonian ideas had . . . come to form the basis of all the socialist movements. And the socialism of 1848 . . . was in doctrine and personnel still largely Saint-Simonian'; see F. A. Hayek, The counter-revolution of science: studies on the abuse of reason, 2nd edn (In- dianapolis, 1979), p. 311. " G. Isambert, Les idees socialistes en France de 1815 a 1848: le socialisme fondS sur la fraternite et I'union des classes (1905), p. 4. 40 A. Paget, Introduction a I'Etudede la science sociale, contenantun abregede la thiorie socie'taire, precede d 'un coup d'oeil general sur I 'itat de la science sociale, et sur les systemes de Fourier, d'Owen et de I'ecole Saint-Simonienne (1838), p. xviii. 41 P. Higonnet, Class, , and the rights of nobles during the French Revolution (Ox- ford, 1981), p. 5. DAVID W. LOVELL 193 don dans lequel on a laisse, depuis le quinzieme siecle, les travaux relatifs a 1'etude des faits generaux, des principes generaux et des interets generaux'.42 The egoism to which this neglect had given rise was a product of the lack of attention to general ideas, of a moral emptiness or neglect; a rehabilitation of Christian values would stimulate the growth of communi- ty. Fourier described the manifestation of egoism as 'Civilization'. The isolation of men, and the hostility between them was the product, he argued, of an imbalance among the passions, not simply of differences in Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 wealth or property. These 'founding fathers' appealed to men in general - in effect, to reason - to implement their projects. Because their appeal was to reason, they looked for support among the enlightened who were, almost by definition at that time, the wealthy and propertied. The coincidence had been noted before. In 1795, Boissy d'Anglas explained that:43 Civil equality, in fact, is all that a reasonable man can claim. Ab- solute equality is a chimera . . . We must be governed by the best; the best are those who are best educated and most in- terested in the maintenance of the : now . . . you find such men only among those who, owning a piece of property, are devoted to the country that contains it ... Fourier encouraged and expected financial support for his phalansteres from the wealthy, an expectation around which he fashioned his daily life.44 Saint-Simon was not particularly discriminating about those to whom he offered his system: he appealed to the Congress of and to Charles X. He wrote to Louis XVIII in 1821, inviting him to found and lead the new industrial and scientific system.45 Similarly in 1834, the Fourierist Considerant dedicated his Destinee Sociale to the king: 'Du Roi, Comme etant, a titre de chef du gouvernement et de premier proprietaire de France, le plus interesse a l'ordre, a la prosperite publique et particuliere, au bonheur des individus et des nations.'46 Although there was a certain indifference to political forms and acceptance of the among many of the early Socialists, we should not forget that the revolutionaries had been reluctant republicans. These appeals went hand in hand with a keen in the well- of the poor and the victims of the emerging industrialization. But Saint-

41 Saint-Simon, Nouveau christianisme: dialogues entre un conservateur et un novateur, in Oeuvres de Saint-Simon et d'Enfantin, 23 vols. (1865-78; rcpr. Aalen, 1964), p. 184. " Cited in W. Doyle, The Oxford history of the French Revolution (Oxford, 1989), p. 318. " Fourier's daily routine is discussed by F. E. Manuel and F. P. Manuel, Utopian thought in the (Oxford, 1979), p. 645. " See The political thought ofSaint-Simon, ed. G. Ionescu(1976), pp. 180-1. Fourier, too, appealed to the French King - and the Russian tsar, and the Rothschilds, and the American consul in Paris. See Manuel and Manuel, Utopian thought, pp. 645-6, and N. V. Riasanovsky, The teaching of Charles Fourier (Berkeley, Calif., 1969), pp. 117-31. 46 Considerant, Destinee Sociale, 1 (1834). 194 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM Simon feared insurrection and revolt, as did Fourier.47 He wrote in his New Christianity'* mon premier soin a ete . . . de prendre toutes les precautions necessaires pour que remission de la nouvelle doctrine ne portat point la classe pauvre a des actes de violence contre les riches et contre les gouvernements. J'ai du m'addresser d'abord

aux riches et aux puissants pour les disposer favorablement a Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 l'egard de la nouvelle doctrine, en leur faisant sentir qu'elle n'etait point contraire a leurs interets . . . The 'founding fathers' had little success in convincing the rich. Fourier was isolated by his libertine views on sex, and his other notions.4' Saint- Simon was tried for treason, but only after publishing in 1819 the so-called 'parable of Saint-Simon',50 interpreted (wrongly) by political leaders as ad- vocating their overthrow. But the attack on egoism was not peculiarly Socialist, nor was it instantly equated with attacks on property, or with in- citing the propertyless. Furthermore, the 'founding fathers' saw a place for continued social differentiation. Fourier's phalanstere proposal countenanced large differences in the personal wealth of its members. Not only did Fourier describe three distinct classes in his proposal, with atten- dant differences in daily activities, rewards and food, but the various con- tributions to would be differently rewarded." The result, he hoped, was that the classes of Harmony would unite, not try to tear apart as in Civilization. Antagonisms would centre not on people, but on roles: rivals in one occupation would be partners in another.32

Ill It took the Trois Glorieuses to crystallize such abstraction into a relatively coherent Socialist response to modern society, chiefly because of their im-

" On Fourier's to revolutionary violence, and his hostility to the French Revolution of 1789 in general, see R. C. Bowles, 'The reaction of Charles Fourier to the French Revolution', Fr Hist Stu, 1 (I960), 348-56. " Saint-Simon, Nouveau christianisme, p. 179. " Yet his principal work on this subject was not published until 1967, and his followers kept largely silent about such ideas. For a brief account of Fourier's sexual theories, and ah in- terpretation of them as a parody of Catholic religious practice: J. Beecher, 'Parody and libera- tion in The new amorous world of Charles Fourier',/ftsf Worksb, 20(1985), 125-33. Roland Barthes argued that the 'motive behind all Fourierist construction (all combination) is not , equality, liberty, etc., it is pleasure', especially sensual pleasure: Barthes, Sade, Fourier, Loyola, trans. R. Miller (1977), p. 80. !0 For the text of the 'parable', see The political thought of Saint-Simon, ed. Ionescu, pp. 138-41. On this episode see F. E. Manuel, The new world of Henri Saint-Simon (Cambridge, Mass., 1956), pp. 210-14. " Riasanovsky, The teaching of Charles Fourier is the best discussion of Fourier's system in English. The right principle of remuneration - which Fourier considered his great discovery - is discussed on p. 61. The gain of the community was to be divided so that five-twelfths went to labour, four-twelfths to capital and three-twelfths to talent. " See Riasanovsky, The teaching of Charles Fourier, pp. 49-50 and 60-3. DAVID W. LOVELL 195 pact on social analysis. They seemed to have simplified the texture of French society.53 Though the revolutionary role of the workers and the 'lit- tle people' of Paris was widely acknowledged and applauded,54 they became quickly disillusioned. Workers wondered whether their message was being heard, or was misunderstood: they began to establish journals to put their own case.55 As Adolphe Boyer explained, ies proletaries pensent que 1830 est une ere nouvelle d'intelligence et d'harmonie', in which they could not be refused an honourable place.56 Socialists, too, took up their Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 cause. Five years later, Le Reformateur reflected: 'Tout a ete deplace dans cette belle revolution, excepte le peuple qui est reste a sa place de pro- letaire, de combattant pour le compte des autres, de matiere exploitable et corveable a volonte.'57 Those who had made the Revolution, many con- cluded, had not benefited from it: this view was a major impetus to class analysis. After 1830, social, rather than political, diagnoses came to the fore, much to the alarm of conservatives.58 In September 1830, Le Globe declared that 'La question n'est plus une question politique, mais une ques- tion sociale; on n'en est plus a la liberte, mais a la propriete.'59 The July Monarchy, for example, was widely described as a bourgeois monarchy.60 Social analysis was certainly not unknown to the French revolutionaries,

" The journal L'Avenir declared in October that 'La hierarchie sociale s'est singulierement simplifiee depuis trois mois, car le derniere victoire, remportee sur la feodalite ne laisse plus en presence que la bourgeoisie et le peuple, la classe qui achete le travail et la classe qui le vend': L'Avenir, 19 Oct. 1830. " See, for example, La Revolution, n.d., but probably late July or early August 1830, p. I: 'le peuple, le peuple seul, a tout fait'; as well as Adolphe Thiers, in Le National, 30 July 1830, cited in E. Cabet, L'ouvrier; ses misires actuelles, leur cause et leur remede; son futur bonheur dans la communauti; Moyens de I'etablir (1844), p. 25. " One of these journals, L 'Artisan, asked: 'Without a tribune where they can expose their grievances and their complaints, how can workers make themselves understood by the ?', cited in W. H. Sewell, Jr, Work and revolution in France: the language of labor from the Old Regime to 1848 (Cambridge, 1980), p. 197. On the role of this press, see also E. Coornaert, 'La pensee ouvriere et la de classe en France de 1830 a 1848', Studi in onore di Gino Luzzato, Milan, 3 (1949-50), especially p. 28. " A. Boyer, De I'Etat des ouvriers et de son amelioration par Vorganisation du travail (1841), p. 14. " Le Reformateur, 26 July 1835, 'Anniversaire des Trois Jours!!!' " See, for example, F. Guizot in the Moniteur Universel, 22 Dec. 1831: '[T]oday we have the difficulty of constructing a government and defending a society'. Cited by R.J. Bezucha in The Lyon uprising of 1834: social and political conflict in the early July Monarchy (Cam- bridge, Mass., 1974), p. 66. " Le Globe, 15 Sept. 1830. 60 Not just by Marx (see The class struggles in France, 1848 to 1850, K. Marx and F. Engels, Collected works, x, Moscow, 1978, 48-51, especially p. 50: 'The July monarchy was nothing but a joint-stock company for the exploitation of France's national wealth'; and Marx and Engels, The holy family, p. 124), but by many others. See, for example, L. Blanc, The history of ten years, 1830-1840, i (1844), 266: 'The bourgeoisie was triumphant [in 1830). It had placed a prince on the throne, who owed his authority to its gift alone.' See also Considerant, Le socialisme devant le vieux monde, ou le vivant devant Ies morts (1848), p. 15, and F. Tristan, Union ouvri&re (1843), p. 27, both of whom argue that 1830 represented the definitive victory of the bourgeoisie. 196 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM but their categories were moral and political, rather than grounded in pro- duction. R. B. Rose stresses that throughout the Revolution, and not simp- ly in its ultra-radical phases, the critique of the rich and proposals for confiscation of their property were 'not directed against the rich en bloc but only against the corrupt rich'." The distinction between legitimate com- merce and criminal speculation, proposed by Jacques Roux among others, was ultimately a political (and arbitrary) one. The early French Socialists, by contrast, developed the now more familiar class categories based on Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 ownership of labour or the instruments of production." But while class analysis was central to their understanding of modern society, and played a role in their solutions to its problems, they were impelled by the spectre of society disintegrating into its atoms. The organization of production and proper recompense for the pro- ducers would increase social wealth, abolish social tensions and overcome the individualism which marred post-Revolutionary society. For the chief early Socialist complaint against 'society' was that it scarcely merited the name. One of the most odious words in their vocabulary was 'in- dividualism'. Buchez criticized 'le dogme de la liberte' for isolating in- dividuals.63 Man is a social animal, 'Or, il n'y a societe que la ou il existe un but commun d'activite, qui rallie tous les hommes dans un meme desir, un meme systeme, et un meme acte. Cette unite d'interets et de mouvements est la condition absolue, non-seulement d', mais encore de conservation de toute association quelle qu'elle soit.'64 The Saint-Simonians declared: 'qu'elles ne sont plus des associations d'hommes animes des memes sentiments, imbus des memes pensees, combinant et unissant leurs efforts'." The current trend of individualism, they believed, violated basic human drives towards sociability and association. To individualism, the early Socialists counterposed fraternity. For many, it was their primary value; all else was subordinate. As Pecqueur explained, 'La fraternite seule est le principe social generateur par excellence. L'egalite et la liberte delimitent et precisent la fraternite.'66 Fraternity is a complex notion, and it found among these Socialists a variety of expres- sions, yet each of them wanted, in his own way, to create a community out of what he saw as an individualistic, egoistic and chaotic contemporary society. Fraternity does not necessarily encompass radical equality.

" Rose, The Enrages, p. 86. S. M. Gruner, 'Le concept de classe dans la revolution franchise', outlines the development of 'class' during the Revolution, and points to the confu- sion of class terminology and (relatedly) its use in political struggles. 62 See D. W. Lovell, 'Early French Socialism and class struggle', Hist Pol Th, 9 (1988), 327-48. " P. J. Buchez, Introduction a la science de I'histoire ou science du developpement de Vbumanite (1833), p. 40. 64 Ibid. p. 45. " Le Globe, 25 Jan. 1831, p. 1. Examples could be multiplied endlessly, but see: La Refor- mateur, 10 Oct. 1834, p. 1 (no. 2); Le Travail, 1841, p. 17 (no. 3); and Paget, Introduction a VEtude de la science sociale, p. xii. " Pecqueur, Theorie nouvelle, p. 3. DAVID W. LOVELL 197 Rather, most Socialists saw at its base allegiance to one or another fun- damental set of ideas, whether it be religious or secular. Le Travail, for ex- ample, argued: 'Considerons-nous tous comme les membres d'une seule et immense famille.'67 The community was a means of realizing liberty, equality and fraternity. This fraternal message was reinforced at a banquet in Limoges late in the 1840s. A toast was given by a M. Yvernaud: 'A la solution pacifique du probleme du !'68 He added: 'Commenc.ons par nous aimer les uns et les autres sans distinction de classe . . . et nous Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 aurons fait le premier pas et le plus grand dans la solution du probleme du proletariat.'69 Individualism, , social disorder and were regarded by the early Socialists as the chief, interrelated problems of modern society. While many proclaimed the scientific credentials of their theories, schemes or cosmologies, and sometimes formed themselves into 'schools', they looked above all to political to solve the task of economic organization from which social harmony would flow. In general, they considered it ironical and perhaps even sinister that a study aimed at describing the conditions for creating wealth had so far helped only to make some people vastly wealthy and most others rather worse off than before.70 Pierre Leroux declared: 'nous regardons comme un fleau . . . l'individualisme actuel, l'individualisme de l'economie politique anglaise, qui, au nom de la liberte, fait des hommes entre eux des loups rapaces, et reduit la societe en atomes . . .'" Nevertheless, they believed that was the key to finding the economic organization which would solve the social problem. As the Fourierists explained: 'Organiser le travail d'une maniere heureuse pour tous, mettre en harmonie les interets de toutes les classes, de tous les individus, tel est le grand probleme qui preoc- cupe aujourd'hui tous les coeurs genereux.'72 In this belief they were sus- tained by sympathetic non-Socialist economists such as Simonde de Sismondi and Adolphe Blanqui, the more conventional brother of the in- veterate conspirator, Louis-Auguste.73 The labour theory of value - 'Au fond, toutes les richesses . . . ne sont que du travail humain, de la sueur hu- maine plus ou moins condensee'74 - suited the view that only the pro- ducers made a valuable contribution to society. Usually excluded from 'the

" Le travail, ?June 1841, p. 3. " P. Leroux, Compte-rendu du banquet de Limoges, 2 Janvier 1848 (1848), p. 4. " Ibid. p. 5. 70 Piere Leroux declared that 'Les economistes, qui appellent leur science la science de la richesse, ignorent veritablement ce que c'est que la richesse. La richesse veritable, c'est I'horame, c'est la vie humaine. La richesse est faite pour les hommes, et la richesse qui tue l'espece humaine n'est pas la richesse': Revue Sociale, March 1846, p. 89. " Leroux, Revue Sociale, p. 20. " 'Du socialisme', Democratie Pacifique, 18 Feb. 1844. " L-A. Blanqui, De la concurrence et du principe d'association (1846), p. 9. " Revue Sociale, January 1846, p. 55- Constantin Pecqueur, however, argued that work differs in its nature, and that there is no standard measure - certainly not the duration of work: see Theorie nouvelle, p. 609. 198 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM producers', however, were merchants: they were attacked as contributing nothing to wealth and making a by deception." For most of the early Socialists it was axiomatic that organization was conducive to the produc- tion of wealth. They saw the market as chaotic, neglecting the informa- tion transaction which helps determine production-, who wants what, where and for how much. To their proposals for organization, the Socialists added a quantity of familiar social cement: . Machiavelli had referred to religion 'as the Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 most necessary and assured support of any ';76 had also recognized its social effects; and Robespierre had encouraged the cult of the Supreme Being. In his aptly titled Catechisme des socialistes, Louis Blanc responded to the question what is Socialism: 'R. - C'est l'Evangile en action."7 The French Socialists were almost all Christians, as Engels noted with concern.78 The Fourierists stressed their connection with the fulfil- ment of Christ's teachings.7' One argued that 'ce serait accuser Dieu d'in- eptie' to say that he had omitted to furnish the means for harmonizing society.80 Cabet declared that (his, true) 'Communisme, c'est le Chris- tianisme',81 but 'c'est le Christianisme dans sa purete, avant qu'il ait ete denature par le Catholicisme'.82 The Saint-Simonians argued that Catholic dogma was no longer in harmony with the moral, intellectual and material needs of modern society,83 and founded their own church. The early Socialists felt the need for general systems which could inspire common beliefs and hence, it was thought, be useful for social integration. Cabet declared that his journal would offer 'a la nombreuse classe de travailleurs le tribut d'une longue etude . . . [L]e but est de donner a la masse une opinion , une espece de religion sociale et politique qui reunisse les individus dans le meme sentiment comme dans la meme pensee'.84 Inequality, based on proper and just principles, such as Fourier's 'right principle of remuneration', would be accepted by all, and not be a source of envy and covetousness, and thus of division. The problem, as many Socialists saw it, was that in the current society vast differences in wealth did not properly correspond to perceptible differences in talent,

" See G. de Gamond, Fourier et son systeme, 2nd edn (1839), p. 61; P-J. Proudhon, What is property? An inquiry into the principle of right and of government, trans. B. R. Tucker (New York, 1970), p. 267; and even F. Engels, 'Outlines of a critique of political economy', K. Marx and F. Engels, Collected works, Hi (1975), 418. " N. Machiavelli, Discourses on the first ten books of Titus Livius, ch. xi, in Machiavelli, The Prince and The Discourses (New York, 1950), p. 146. Blanc, Catechisme des socialistes, p. 3. Engels, ' of social reform on the continent', November 1843, K. Marx and F. Engels, Collected works, iii, 399. Democratic Pacifique, 1 Aug. 1843. A. Maurize, cited in Paget, Introduction a I'Etude de la science sociale, p. 36. Le Populaire, 26 July 1846, p. 1. Cabet, L'ouvrier, p. 44. Le Globe, 1 Jan. 1831, p. 1. Le Populaire, 14 Mar. 1841, p. 5. See the discussion of D. G. Charlton, Secular in France, 1815-1870 (1963), p. 65. DAVID W. LOVELL 199 ability or . The problem with current inequality was that its foundations were arbitrary and unjust.

IV What to do about the problems of disorganization besetting modern socie- ty was approached in different ways by the early Socialists, with some recommending the organization of labour, others a people's bank with free credit, others the creation of model communities. Some wanted the state Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 to organize production; others did not. Some looked to particular forms of government under which the social problem could be solved; for many, perhaps most, the 'political question' narrowly conceived was not a con- cern. But there was nevertheless a commonality among them which distinguished them from the Communists, whom they saw as both their competitors, and as dangerous. Though Socialism and Communism are often seen as points on a continuum of social and political methods con- nected with, respectively, democracy and revolution,85 or depicted as suc- ceeding historical stages, they began as distinct projects. Communism, for example, stressed egalitarianism and the abolition of property and appeal- ed to workers, while early French Socialism emphasized social and in- dustrial organization, and an abundance of wealth rather than egalitarian distribution. They differed also in their view of the and its role. Lichtheim declared that 'What distinguished "communism" from "socialism" at this stage was its proletarian character and its radical egalitarianism.'" These differences may be reduced to three central areas: the future existence of property;, the role of violence in solving the social question; and the meaning of equality in a society in which the social ques- tion had been solved. The source of these differences lies less in the alleged class character of early Socialism, described variously as 'bourgeois' and 'petty bourgeois'," than in the conflicting heritages of the French Revolu- tion. The Communists took their cue from Babeuf and the ultra- revolutionaries."

11 Mill, for example, argued that Communism was the 'extreme limit of socialism', chiefly on account of its egalitarianism: J. S. Mill, Principles ofpolitical economy, p. 210. In similar terms, W. B. Guthrie argued that Communism was 'an extreme type of socialism', since it wants to abolish private property: Guthrie, Socialism before the French Revolution: a history (New York, 1907), p. 11. " G. Lichtheim, A short (1975), p. 37; see also p. 51, where Lichtheim adds to this that Communists, unlike Socialists, 'thought in terms of conspiracy and armed in- surrection'. " Engels claimed in 1890 that Socialism in 1847 was 'a bourgeois movement' and that Communism was 'a working-class movement': F. Engels, '1890 Preface' to K. Marx and F. Engels, Manifesto of the , in K. Marx and F. Engels, Selected works, i (Moscow, 1976), 103. Pierre Angrand argues that Socialism 'n 'etait que 1 'expression asse2 pale et incertaine des inquietudes de la devant les progres devorants de la grande entreprise capitaliste': 'Notes critiques sur la formation des idees communistes en France', La Pensie, 19 (1948), 38-46 at p. 41. " I designate as 'Communists' individuals such as Louis-Auguste Blanqui (1805-81), Theodore Dezamy (1805-50), Richard Lahautiere (1813-82) and Jean-Jacques Pillot 200 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM The early Socialists abhorred violence," unlike the smaller band of Com- munists. Pecqueur explained that 'la violence nous paraitrait la plus grande des calamites'.90 Socialists stressed the destructive and counter-productive aspects of revolution. Considerant even based his distinction between Communists and Socialists on their attitude towards violent . The Fourierists promised that if they were successful, they would let the Communists attempt to set up their communities of goods, even while

believing that they would eventually be drawn to the system of the Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 phalanstere. But the Communists must agree not to impose their prin- ciples." In 1848, Blanc declared: 'Oui, mes amis, soyons calmes, soyons patients et moderes. Laissons les vulgaires ressources de la violence a nos adversaires. Nous avons de notre cote la justice et la raison.'92 Ironically, the largest Socialist group at this time, the Icariens, described itself as 'Communist', though 'communitarian' might have been a more ap- propriate title. Cabet, their leader, declared: 'il y a . . . Communistes et Communistes'.93 He rejected the use of violence. The social transformation 'etait possible sans bouleversement, sans depouiller les riches'.94 Cabet's aversion to violence was overriding: the Community could only be established by the power of public opinion, and conviction.95 He added: 'je suis Reformiste plus que revolutionnaire . . . Mais je ne suis ni Hebertiste ni Babouviste.'96 Pacifically disposed, the Socialists refrained from appealing to the workers because of the danger of revolutionary explosion. The laid the basis for the modern working class, though Socialism at first had a rather cerebral and distant regard for it as the subject of suffer- ing, exploitation, injustice and competition.97 But their sympathy for the working classes, shared with many others,98 did not translate into revolu-

(1808-77); groups such as the Societe des Saisons; and journals such as La Tribune du Peuple, L'Egalitaire and LIntelligence. " Gaston Isambert also argued that insurrections and conspiracies were not characteristic of the Socialist movement of 1815-48: see Isambert, Les idees socialistes, p. 372. 90 Pecqueur, TbSorie nouvelle, p. vii. " V. Considerant, les deux communismes, in Appel au ralliement des socialistes (1847), pp. 19-20. " L. Blanc, Commission de Gouvernementpour les travailleurs, seance du 3 avril 1848, p. 6 " Cabet, Comment je suis communiste (1840), p. 3- " Ibid. p. 7. " Ibid. p. 12. " Ibid. p. 14. " It is only partly true to say, as does Norman MacKenzie, that Socialism 'began, early in the industrial age, as a protest against the misery of the factory system': N. Mackenzie, Socialism: a short history, 2nd edn (1966), p. 19. France was predominantly a country of peasants, and Paris was predominantly a city of luxury trades. " There were a number of important social enquiries around this time which highlighted the problems of the working class, including: baron de Morogues, De la misere des ouvriers (1833); le vicomte Alban de Villeneuve-Bargemont, Recherche sur la nature et les causes du pauperisme (1834-5); Eugen Buret, De la misere des classes laborieuses (1840); Dr Louis- Rene Villerme, Tableau de I'etat physique et moral des ouvriers (1840). DAVID W. LOVELL 201 tionary appeals. As Considerant explained: 'La conversion de la Bourgeoisie dirigeante au Socialisme, telle est done la chose desirable et urgente.'" One Fourierist dissenter criticized his colleagues for addressing their works 'aux philosophes, aux riches et aux rois de la terre',100 rather than to the workers. It is not true to say, however, that these Socialists the working class to its fate. Indeed, in a number of places, they advocated the organization of workers to protect and advance their interests. In 1842, J-J. Navel, for example, made an 'Appel aux Travailleurs': 'Comme a Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 toutes les autres classes de la societe, une part d'aisance et de bien-etre vous est due: il depend de vous de l'avoir.'10' 'Ouvriers, ce n'est point un appel aux armes que nous venons vous faire. Nous ne vous engagerons pas davantage a faire des emeutes, a conspirer, fabriquer des munitions.'102 Flora Tristan, too, made the organization of the workers for their self-help a basis of her 'Union Ouvriere' proposals. Revolutions were equated with violence, and revolutions had nowhere been successful, except in replac- ing one form of privilege by another. Shortly after the 1830 Revolution, the journal La Revolution, Journal des interetspopulaires declared:103 toutes ces revolutions dont nous avons ete les temoins, se sont faites au profit d'une seule classe, d'une classe privilegiee, constituant une nouvelle aristocratie, qui repousse incessamment et de tout son pouvoir les autres classes . . . [L]a bourgeoisie privilegiee qui, dans ce moment, ramasse le sceptre que le peuple a brise, ne voit pas qu'elle remplace cette noblesse hautaine contre laquelle fut principalement dirigee notre premiere revolution. Socialism was not just a movement for social and . It was bound up with a particular view of history, history as the record of social progress in which the Revolution represented a new departure. The early French Socialists all gave accounts based on the progress of 'civiliza- tion' - especially of ideas and moralities.104 Considerant stressed the cen- trality of the Revolution:105 L'Epoque de 89 a done marque dans l'histoire de l'humanite la grande separation entre l'Ordre ancien et l'Ordre nouveau; entre le droit de la force et le droit du travail, entre le droit

" Considerant, Le socialisme devant le vieux monde, p. 157. ">0 J. Czynski, Avenir des ouvriers (1839), p. 7. 101 Almanach, ed. Dezamy, p. 13. '" Ibid. p. 14. 101 La Revolution, 11 Aug. 1830. 104 See P. Corcoran, 'Early French Socialism reconsidered - II. , rhetoric and historical progress', Hist Eur Id, 7 (1986), 651-60 at p. 656. Corcoran's thesis is that because the early French Socialists saw the major obstacle to realizing their schemes as a moral one, the logical, practical firstste p was to appeal to reason and hence to proclaim their systems by publishing them. "' Considerant, Princtpes du socialisme, p. 2. 202 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM aristocratique, le droit de la conquete perpetue par la naissance, et le droit commun, le droit de Tous a Tout, LE DROIT DEMOCRATIQUE. There was nothing mechanical or inevitable in the early Socialist view of the development of history, and it placed upon them an awesome respon- sibility in what was seen as a critical historical juncture. In 1845, Pierre

Leroux declared that they were 'entre deux mondes', the world of ine- Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 quality and , which had ended, and a world of equality which was about to begin.106 They believed that they had a role to play in bringing that new world into being, but they were acutely aware of the limits of what a could do. The Fourierists, for example, declared that107 la Transformation de YOrdre social ancien en YOrdre actuel n'a point ete l'oeuvre de la Revolution [1789]; elle a ete l'oeuvre du developpement des sciences, des arts, de l'industrie, l'oeuvre des richesses creees, enfin des conquetes pacifiques operees par le travail du peuple et de la bourgeoisie. La transformation a ete consacree par l'oeuvre de l'Assemblee Constituante; elle etait terminee par elle et les faits revolutionnaires qui ont succede n'ont ete qu'un accident, que de malheureuses necessites de guerre et de defense. They saw revolutions as 'accidents deplorables': Le MOYEN du PROGRES SOCIAL et de l'EMANCIPATION des Peuples a ete le TRAVAIL."08 Communists and Socialists also responded to the question of property in quite different ways. For Considerant, 'II ne s'agit pas de detruire la Pro- priete, dont le developpement est lie au developpement intime de l'Humanite."0' He counterposed the 'association hierarchique' to the 'communaute egalitaire' (confused and barbarous)."0 At a banquet to celebrate the birth of Fourier, property was toasted: 'La propriete a stimule les hommes au travail productif . . . Par l'association, elle devient collec- tive sans cesser d'etre individuelle. Ainsi transformed, elle distribue a tous les bienfaits de la richesse et de l'independance.'1" The Fourierists were particularly keen to distinguish themselves from Communism or 'subver- sive Socialism', advocated by those who found the source of 'non dans l'organisation vicieuse, mais dans l'existence meme de la propriete'."2 Abel Transon argued in 1833 that 'Tout ouvrier doit avoir une part a la pro- priete.'"3 Property had its place in a well-organized society, but it had to

Revue Sociale, October 1845, p. 2. La Phalange, 24 Mar. 1839, p. 510. Ibid. p. 514. Considerant, Principes du socialisme, p. 45. Ibid. Cited in Democratic Pacifique, 8 Apr. 1847. Dimocratie Pacifique, 20 June 1847. A. Transon, 'Maitre et ouvrier', Le Pbalanstere, 2 (1833), 290. DAVID W. LOVELL 203 be prevented from developing 'egoistement et exclusivement'."4 The un- equal distribution of property was agreed to be a source of much social evil. Socialists, however, proposed the universalization of property, not its abolition."5 Blanc protested that Socialists did not want to destroy proper- ty but make it 'accessible a tous'."6 Proudhon's well-known Qu'est-ce que lapropriete?', which condemns property as theft, meant only to condemn the excessive taking of profits, not to advocate the destruction of private property itself. If most of the early Socialists did not want the right to pro- Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 perty destroyed, however, they wanted it supplemented by the right to work."7 The question of property was linked to that of equality. Kropotkin seems correctly to have pointed to the question of distribution, rather than the organization of production, as the core of Communism. This means that Socialism is much more historically specific than Communism, whose sentiment arises wherever there is inequality. Kropotkin declared that what made the 'communism of the Great Revolution superior to the socialism of 1848 and its later forms' was that it 'went straight to the root in attacking the distribution of produce'.'" Unlike most of the early French Socialists, Cabet was a convinced egalitarian. He argued that inequality was the fundamental cause of all evil, by producing 'd'un cote I'extreme misere et Yoppression du plus grand nombre, de l'autre cote Yexcessive opulence et la domination de la minorite'."' He believed that fraternity could not be achieved without equality, and criticized other Socialists for countenancing inequality.120 Yet Cabet may be considered a Socialist because he agreed to a lengthy transition period between inegalitarian and egalitarian society, which did not insist on the forcible abolition of property but on persuasion. 'La seule chose possible', he claimed, 'c'est d'adopter le Principe de la Communaute et un Regime transitoire et preparatoire, pendant lequel on travaillera sans relache a son etablissement, progressif, partiel et definitif.'121 The others, however, expressly rejected this emphasis on the ultimate objec- tive of equality, no matter how distant. They did not object to legal equali- ty, or to the idea of trying to make it more genuine,122 but they also held that men were fundamentally unequal and that recognition of this was no barrier to harmony. The Fourierists contrasted Community to their own

Democratic Pacifique, 31 Jan. 1847. Pecqueur, Theorie nouvelle, p. vii. Blanc, Catechisme des socialistes, p. 14. Gamond, Fourier et son systeme, p. 40. P. A. Kropotkin, The great French Revolution: 1789-1793 (1909), p. 488. Le Populaire (supplement), 14 Mar. 1841, no. 1, p. 5. Le Populaire, 11 Dec. 1842, p. 3. Any attempt at absolute equality, which he labelled as the 'agrarian ', only led to TEgalite de misere': Cabet, Douze lettres, p. 23. Cabet, Comment je suis communiste, p. 13. 122 Cabet, too, argued that there was a need to establish TEgalite en fait comme en droit': Douze lettres, p. 22. 204 THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND ORIGINS OF SOCIALISM idea of Association. For them, the essence of Community was equality, a 'monstrous and odious' principle.123 Association, by contrast, respected in- dividuality, and gave to each, proportionally, its advantages. Overstating their case somewhat, the Fourierists declared that 'Rien au monde n'est done moins egalitaire que la doctrine de Fourier.'124 Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 Disputes over interpretation seem to be the mainstay of Revolutionary . They are neither recent nor 'academic'; nor are they likely to be resolved. They point to the complexity of the Revolutionary process and ideals, and serve to highlight the latter's centrality to modern political thought of all complexions. While Socialists have a particular image of their relation to the Revolution, it has been suggested here that there is more than one Socialist view of the Revolution, and that the origins of Socialism are to be found in a 'mainstream' of Revolutionary ideology which is more conventional than has generally been accepted. The Revolu- tion did not directly produce Socialists or Socialist ideas.125 Despite intermittent demands for an 'agrarian law' and other measures of radical equality, despite popular disaffection with market pricing and resentment at the wealthy, none of these singly or together constituted a Socialist current. Though these themes found some resonance in Socialism, they were neither its inspiration nor, in its early period, its heart. Radical oppositional currents and the dynamic of demands for egalitarianism were unquestionably legacies of the Revolution, with com- plex repercussions. But the character of early French Socialism, deriving from a Revolutionary heritage as much as from its distinctive class analysis of why the Revolution's demands had not yet been met, required no fun- damental break with the Revolution - though it deepened Revolutionary misgivings about individualism. These links with the Revolution render early French Socialism distinct from later Socialist currents; they also pro- vide a more plausible explanation for the emergence of Socialism itself than the 'working-class ideology' thesis. Socialism did not originate within, or for, the working class. Its aims were supplied by the universalist slogans of the French Revolution; its particular approach to the social dimensions and obstacles to those aims gave rise to sympathy for the work- ing class, not revolutionary appeals to it. More important in the develop- ment of early Socialism than egalitarian themes was the horror of individualism and competition. And on issues such as the social importance of religion, reason as the test for all social arrangements, social advance-

'" La Phalange, September 1837, p. 1009. '" La Phalange, 15 July 1840, p. 262. 125 For the contrary viewpoint, see W. B. Guthrie, Socialism before the French Revolution: a history (New York, 1907), and A. Lichtenberger, Le socialisme et la Revolution francaise: etude sur les idees socialistes en France de 1789 a 1796 (1899; repr. , 1970). DAVID W. LOVELL 205 ment according to merit, mistrust of the lower classes, respect for private property and an intrinsically historical view, the early Socialists were Revolutionary, without being revolutionary. This is not to say that early French Socialism was nothing more than an imitation or extension of moderate Jacobinism. It was a critique of the Revolution which employed and developed a number of important features of the Revolutionary tradi- tion itself, but which stressed the social - often at the expense of the political - dimension of the problem and its solution. Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/fh/article/6/2/185/630352 by guest on 29 September 2021 This account of the origins of Socialism suggests that our picture of Socialism is, chiefly by of the influence of Marxism, incomplete. The early French Socialists constructed a doctrine which is in many respects different from the popular image, differences which may be traced to its relation to the Revolution. Perhaps the chief popular assumption about Socialism is that its central value is equality, and its preferred organization the public ownership of the .126 Yet most of the early French Socialists were not egalitarians;127 their central concern was for community (differences, they recognized, do not necessarily lead to divi- sion). And while organization was a Socialist preoccupation, few Socialists were convinced that the state should be the central organizer, or that cen- tral organization was required. Though Considerant declared that Notre regime industriel, fonde sur la concurrence sans garanties et sans organisa- tion, n'est done qu'un Enfer social',12S Socialists looked to prompt remedies to avoid another tempestuous revolution. The critique was powerful, the proposed solutions were less cogent. The Revolution of 1848 ended the early French current of Socialism, even though a number of its distinctively ethical and pacific elements recur in the Socialist tradition. 1848, however, signified an exacerbation of social conflicts which seemed to fit the class struggle model of Socialism then striving for supremacy; it raised political opportunities that the early Socialists were not equipped to capitalize upon; and in the battle of the Revolutionary interpretations, which was part of its subtext, the mantle of the 'mainstream' was appropriated by non-Socialists who blurred the distinctions between Socialist and Communist by the label '. Such developments were not unwelcome to the Marxian synthesis which, in defining itself in contrast to the 'bourgeois' Revolution, was decidedly revolutionary. If we have become accustomed, when reading of the French Revolution, to asking 'Which Revolution?', perhaps we ought also to ask when considering the history of Socialism: 'Which Socialism?'

'" See S. Lukes, 'Socialism and equality', The Socialist idea: a reappraisal, ed. L. Ko/akowski and S. Hampshire (1977), p. 74; J. D. Forman, Socialism: its theoretical roots and present-day development (New York, 1972), p. 3. E. B. Ader declared that 'socialism is primarily an economic doctrine'; Ader, Socialism (New York, 1966), p. 8. 127 A. Wright, in his Socialisms: theories and practices (Oxford, 1986), pp. 33-4, talks of the difficulties involved if one attempts to elevate equality as socialism's primary value. l!1 Considerant, Principes du socialisme, p. 16.