Socialism: Utopianism And Marxism

Socialism

Pamela AuCoin

Professor James Lewis

7/23/07

Auguste Blanqui and John Stuart Mill had devised very different paths to to socialism. Auguste Blanqui was an incendiary figure. The same cannot be said for John Stuart Mill, who advocated a gradual transition from a market economy to a socialist one. Blanqui demanded immediate action, and Mill advised the people to wait. Each strategy could be called a litmus test for the kind of socialist you are – one demanding revolution now, or one who believes that socialism can only evolve over time. Blanqui writes of his strategy: “This program is purely military and leaves entirely to the side the political and social question, for which here is not the place: Besides, it goes without saying, that the revolution must effectively work against the tyranny of the capital, and reconstitute society on the basis of justice.” (Auguste Blanqui, “Manual for an Armed Insurrection.”) Blanqui found no time for pontification. The masses must mobilize and militarize now, and worry about how society and government will be restructured after the revolution. He was especially concerned, since the revolutionaries were completely unprepared to fight against the military. The commoners did not lack passion. What they needed were sufficient weaponry, trained soldiers, and an organized militia that would rival the official one. How could the radicalized proletariat waste time on intellectual theorizing? The

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time to destroy the oppressive regime was now. Later, they can figure out the rest. Predictably, Blanqui despised socialist intellectuals as ineffective and bourgeois. He writes, “These heroes of the inkstand profess the same scorn for the sword as the nobility for their slices of bread. They do not seem to suspect that force is the only guarantee of freedom, that people are slaves wherever the citizens are ignorant of the art of soldiery and give up the privilege to a military caste or a professional army.” (Blanqui, Ibid). John Stuart Mill was one of Blanqui’s “hero(es) of the inkstand.” Predictably, Mill discredited many revolutionaries as rash and unreasonable. He distrusted figures such as Robbespierre who, “must have a serene confidence in their own wisdom on the one hand and a recklessness of other people’s sufferings on the other.” (John Stuart Mill, “Chapters on Socialism.”) Mill understood the popularity of the revolutionaries: it appeals to their emotions and anger, and promises quick solutions. Mill might argue that there was something childish about their inability to effectively prepare for such radical changes. Furthermore, why should the public suffer for their rage, and radicalism? Mill advocated gradual change, which was the only kind that would, he wrote, in the long run, be effective. If socialism was to be successful, there must be a period of reeducation, during which the population learns how to share wealth and think in terms of the collective. Mill writes, “We must therefore expect, unless we are operating upon a select portion of the population, that personal interest will for a long

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time be a more effective stimulus to the most vigorous and careful conduct of the industrial business of society than motives of a higher character.” (Mill, Ibid). In other words, revolutions are doomed to fail, since the populace must adapt to Socialism, which is a radical departure from the individualism to which they are most accustomed. Mill did not expect all classes, even the poorer ones, to gladly surrender whatever it was that they owned. Unlike Blanqui, Mill did not predict the transformation from capitalism to egalitarianism would actually occur post-revolution. Blanqui did not see beyond the revolution. He believed that the war would be the hard part, since it involved building a well-trained, well-armed army of the proletariat. For Mill, army-building was not the issue; he certainly would have found Blanqui dangerously naïve. Blanqui wrote that after they won the war, “(society would be reconstituted) on the basis of justice.” (Blanqui, Ibid). According to Mill, this vagueness could have disastrous consequences. What does justice mean? Who determines what this would be? Who will organize the post-revolutionary world? These details are left out. Mill saw beyond that initial stage, and did not trust the aftermath would go so smoothly.

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