A Critical Review of Marxist Ideologists' Comparison between Industrial Workers and the Livelihood of Slaves - Essay Example

1840 ECONOMIC HARDSHIP AMONGST COMMONERS: A CRITICAL REVIEW OF MARXIST IDEOLOGISTS’ COMPARISON BETWEEN INDUSTRIAL WORKERS AND THE LIVELIHOOD OF SLAVES Introduction Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels are known to be left-wing theorists and commentators who demanded change in the distribution of wealth and questioned the entire foundations of mainstream Capitalist nations. In their critique of the status quo, Marx and Engels went great lengths to condemn many elements that were a direct result of the Capitalist governance structures of modern nations. One of these criticisms asserted that the living condition of industrial workers in the 18th and early 19th Century was worse than the conditions of slaves in the same period. This paper analyses the statement of Marx and Engels and examine whether the conditions of industrial workers was worse than the conditions of slaves in the early years of the Industrial Revolution or not. Similarities between the Slave Trade and Industrial Work Industrial work in the 1700s and 1800s were very negative and harsh. In the Communist manifesto, Marx and Engels set ball rolling by presenting the view that everyone must be treated equally and fairly by the law (Marx & Engels, 1948, p14). This clearly shows that there was a class system that existed in Europe of the 1800s in which the law and ruling system had caused people to be classified as slaves and hence, such persons were expected to live a low life. This form of slavery and the degradation of certain classes of people in Europe was somewhat similar to the position taken in the Americas where persons of African origins were all classified as slaves and treated in a manner similar to what existed amongst the lower classes of people in Europe. It is no coincidence that most of the people who belong to the servant class in Europe and had been serfs for hundreds of years were drafted into the lower classes of the organizational structures around Europe. This is because these serfs and servant-caste members in Europe became the source of cheap labor to feed the Industrial Revolution. And the laws remained in the hands of the nobility who treated the working class as slaves through various legal systems and processes. On this basis, Marx and Engels argued that “modern industry has converted the little workshop of the patriarchal master into a great factory of Industrial Capitalism” (Marx & Engels, 1948, p18). This caused them to become slaves that were used daily to produce wealth for the bourgeoisie class and the bourgeoisie state who enjoyed from the labor and sweat of the working class. This was on the same level as the Black slaves of the Americas who were made to toil from the early hours of the day to the late night for nothing more than food that kept them alive to work the next day. Marx and Engels also asserted that the rulers kept a de facto system that kept slavery going and this is fundamentally because a small network of people worked together to keep the Capitalist system going (p21). This was the same as the White-dominated system of nations in the Americas that kept a small group of White people in privileged positions and the vast majority of Blacks as slaves. Extracts from various reports and different investigations commissioned by the British parliament indicated that the conditions of work in the 1800s during the Industrial Revolution were terrible (Stanley, 1998, p34). Extracts from the Sadler Committee Report released in 1831 indicated that children less than 9 years of age were working in industries and workers worked without rest. This was the same as the Black African slaves in plantations in the New World who worked for their masters every day from dawn to dusk without breaks. Also, the Black slaves in the New World had children who became the property of their owners and these children were working on their owners’ plantations before reaching the age 9. The working conditions were hazardous and the water and other products they had were contaminated and the working class of the Industrial Revolution were to live with them (Stanley, 1998, p35). This was exactly like the conditions the African slaves endured in plantations in the Americas. This is because most slave owners wanted to cut down costs and they did this by cutting down on the cost of maintaining their plantations and this was done by neglecting the needs of their Black slaves. Therefore, in effect, it can be argued that in the late 1800s when slavery was banned in the United States of America and other nations in the Americas, slavery continued in the form of industrial work that was carried out in poor working conditions. Whereas slaves had no right to fix the working hours in a day and the working days in a week, industrial workers also presented themselves to their employers almost every day because they were earning very little and were at the mercies of their employers. The employers in the Industrial Revolution days kept their employees working for long hours all weeklong. This shows that the idea of Capitalism which fueled the desire to import slaves into the Americas existed in Europe as well during the Industrial Revolution. Thus, there are no significant differences between slaves and workers of the 1840s. Thus, the assertion by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were true to a large extent. Differences between Industrial Workers and Slaves A critical view of slavery reveals some shocking elements that show a sharp difference between the slave trade and the plight of workers in the 1840s. In the Communist manifesto, Marx and Engels stated clearly in no uncertain terms that there is a difference between slavery and the proletarian. “The slave is sold once and for all, the proletarian has to sell himself by the day and by the hour. The slave is the property of one master…” (Marx and Engels, 1948, p38). This shows that the slave has one master and under international law, he is to be seen as the property of his master. However, in the parlance of the worker in the 1840s, workers had some degree of rights. And this included the right to freedom of movement to a large extent. For instance, a person from a slave caste in Britain working under harsh conditions in a factory could just get onto a ship and sail to America or Australia. A slave who did that was supposed to be arrested by the ship and sent back to his master. And in most cases, the master had the right to flog or punish such a runaway slave. The views of the European slave traders had the perception that Africans were low-thinking persons who were better off in American plantations as slaves. This is because they believed there were wars all over the African continent and many Africans on the continent were living in conditions that they considered to be inferior. So in their views, the slaves were not human and they were to be sent to the Americas as slaves. In the New World, they were all treated as property and chattels for White plantation owners (James, 1963, p7). The system of presenting the slaves to their European slave owners was also devastating and challenging. Never at any point did European industrial workers get chained and sent from one part of the world to another part of the world. Many slaves died in the trans-Atlantic trip in which they were allowed to live under harsh conditions (James, 1963, p8). Slaves were property and they could be transferred from one owner to another (Esguerra, 2013 p13). Workers in the 1840s had the right to choose whatever they wanted. Their employers did not own them an they were also free to pursue business ends that could make them business owners. Although this was technically, it was not the same as the case of the Black slave in the New World who could not own businesses and were destined to live and die as slaves. The only realistic way slaves could gain the freedom from slavery was to indulge in a slave revolt to eliminate the White plantation owners and establish a Black-controlled territory (DuBois and Garrigus, 2003 p102). There were many slave revolts that were quelled by the White governments because the Whites in the Americas were the only ones who controlled sophisticated weapons. The only successful revolution happened in Haiti (Clavin, 2010 p14). Due to the fact that slaves were subjected to the position of an inferior caste, they lived on the excesses of their owners, hence they got just enough that could cause them to survive (Esguerra, 2013 p2). Also, since the slaves were suppressed by harsh laws, they could not do anything about their conditions but to accept them. Thus, on these grounds, slavery is somewhat different from the conditions of workers in the 1840s. Conclusion From the essay, it is apparent that although there were so many similarities between slavery and the conditions of the European low-level worker of the Industrial Revolution, there is strong evidence that shows that the conditions of slaves were worse. This is because slaves were forced into the plight of being slaves and the law classified these persons and their children as slaves for ever. Industrial Revolution workers could change their plights and they could make choices. Although this was difficult, it was not as harsh as the condition of slaves. Therefore, the argument of Marx and Engels that the conditions of the industrial worker is the same as that of slaves is over-exaggerated and hence, invalid. Bibliography Clavin, Matthew J. Toussaint Louverture and the American Civil War: The promise and peril of a second Haitian revolution. Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010. DuBois, L. & Garrigus, J. D. Slave Revolution in the Caribbean 1789-1804 London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. Esguerra, Jorge. The Black Urban Atlantic in the Age of the Slave Trade. 1. ed. Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 2013. James, C. L. R. The Black Jacobins; Toussaint LOuverture and the San Domingo Revolution. 2d ed. New York: Vintage Books, 1963. Marx, Karl, and Friedrich Engels. Manifesto of the Communist party, New York: International Publishers, 1948. Stanley, Amy Dru. From bondage to contract: Wage labor, marriage, and the market in the age of slave emancipation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Read More