Year 12 IB Extended Essays 2017

Marx & Proudhon in the Digital Age

gjy680

labour and surrounding societal structures, as “the way in which equality of condition and

intelligence is realised”. Furthermore, that “through diversity of function, it gives rise to proportionality of products and equilibrium in exchange.” 6 This framework allows Proudhon to

characterise the division of labour as “the first phase of economic evolution”, and the cause of

early societal structures. Proudhon further reinforces the role of an organisational coherence

in the division of labour with the claim that labour will fail to properly contribute to society when

allowed to develop “according to the law peculiar to it”, and not in the way which serves society

best. According to Proudhon, the fundamental role of any government in any society, which relies

upon the division of labour, is to maximise production. Government must be primarily concerned

with ensuring the proper division of labour, and the need of each class is properly met.

Proudhon’s primary criticism of labour’s division and specialisation is the decay of a craftsmen,

who originally possessed a multitude of skills. Proudhon decries the collapse of the craft of metal

working into separate ‘machinists’, who are “simply a man who knows how to handle a file or a plane” 7 and not wholly educated craftsmen. Proudhon also decries the death of the ‘man of

letters’, and the collapse of the educated individuals into single narrow specialisations. Proudhon

expresses the concern that this division of intellectual labour resulted in being ‘well-read’ as

assumed element of a profession, and not an independent and equally valid pursuit in its own

right.

According to Proudhon, the implication is that machinery serves as the second economic evolution ,

and, as such, radically changes the way in which society needs to be structured in order to

6 Ibid ., 1. Antagonistic effects of the principle of division 7 Ibid., Chapter 3 ‘Economic Evolutions First Period. The Division of labour. 1. Antagonistic effects of the principle of division.’

7