536 THE CLASS STRUGGLE BRIDGING THE GAP 537 Germany may be cited as the highest development of State Control with, of course, reservations, the nearest approach to State Socialism, including many of the evils that would go with an efficiently organized society of that form.
There is in Germany the rigid, iron grip of the ruling class nn the educational institutions, which tend to miseducate, and with much success, the mass of the people against their class interests.
There is the constantly expanding state control of all industrial activities (even when state ownership is absent or only nominal. And there is the benevolent paternalism of the State, which through widely advertised social legislation (the modern counterpart and natural evolution of private charity in laisser faire society) throws a few crumbs to the masses and grants them some protective measures, principally to better prepare them to fill their role as cogs in the industrial and military machine. It makes them better and more contented working animals.
This benevolent paternalism has, in some respects, just as vicious an effect as the mind warping educational system. At least, it is more pitiable in that it fills the deluded worker with an overpowering gratitude for what the government is doing for him.
As a result, he is the more willing to obediently (even gladly)
submit to the will of his masters at all times, with only some minor grumbling, and he will ofttimes willingly fight to the death for the perpetuation of his own servile condition, and of the state which has enchained him.
While we appreciate the danger that lies in this paternalism, bestowed on the workers by a ruling class, we recognize the fact that socialist representatives in capitalist parliamentary bodies must continue to fight for social measures and labor protection, This is not a contradiction, as in the latter case it is an intelligent demand by the workers for an ever increasing share of the comforts of life until they finally obtain the full social value of their labor. It is not a self satisfied end in itself. The workers who make these demands through their political party are not, and do not intend to be, satisfied when they obtain the advantages, if any.
They do not ask them as a God or man given privilege to be thankful for, but as only part of their inherent rights. And they intend to increase and continue their demands, which is part of their elaborate program of emancipation, until they eventually achieve the full measure of justice that they are fighting for.
The chief distinction between the German state organization and a system of State Socialism as we may preconceive it, is that the former, instead of being fundamentally a capitalist government, for the benefit of the capitalist class as such, is a very highly developed feudalistic bureaucracy Junkertum in its literal sense. The main beneficiaries are not the industrial and financial capitalists, but the hereditary ruling caste which, backed by a tremendous military machine, dominates even at the expense of the real capitalist class. In the orthodox capitalist nations, on the other hand, the government is subordinated absolutely to the interests of the capitalist class. State Socialism, or any other future form of collectivity that bars the ultimate essential of democratic control, can only be a highly concentrated form of state capitalism with its heartlessness partly shielded by the cloak of paternalism.
The war has pushed the belligerent governments, and many of the neutrals headlong into state control of industrial and agricultural production. This has been necessary because of the unparalleled demands of the gigantic modern military machines.
They consume and destroy to an extent that hopelessly outdistances the facilities of private production, and that makes tlie competitive system an anachronism.
The countries that are in the midst of the war had to take over the essential industries, means of transportation, etc. almosi immediately, in order to preserve the integrity of the state that is, the political state, which functions for the interests which dominate it.
Millions of men, women and children in Europe are now working for the state, who had previously worked for private employers. They are producing on a scale that reduces to a fraction their former output. All the innovations of scientific management and super Taylorized efficiency have been called into prac