A Liberal Professor on Equality - Lenin
Lenin, Collected Works, 4th English Edition, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1964 Vol. 20, pp. 144-47
Liberal Professor Mr. Tugan-Baranovsky is on the path of war against socialism. This time he has approached the question, not from the political and economic angle, but from that of an abstract discussion on equality (perhaps the professor thought such an abstract discussion more suitable for the religious and philosophical gatherings which he has addressed?).
"If we take socialism, not as an economic theory, but as a living ideal," Mr. Tugan declared, "then, undoubtedly, it is associated with the ideal of equality, but equality is a concept . . . that cannot be deduced from experience and reason."
Here is the reasoning of a liberal scholar who repeats the incredibly trite and threadbare argument; they say that experience, and reason clearly prove that men are not equal, yet socialism bases its ideal on equality. Hence, socialism, if you please, is an absurdity which is contrary to experience and reason, and so on so forth!
Mr. Tugan repeats the old trick of the reactionaries; first to misinterpret socialism by making it out to be an absurdity, and then to triumphantly refute the absurdity! When they say that experience and reason prove that men are not equal, they mean by equality, equality in abilities or similarity in physical strength and mental ability.
It goes without saying that in this respect men are not equal. No sensible person and no socialist forget this. But this kind of equality has nothing whatever to do with socialism. If Mr. Tugan does not know how to think at all, then in any case he knows how to read; and taking the well-known work of one of the founders of scientific socialism, Frederick Engels, directed against Dühring, Tugan could read there a special section explaining that by equality in the economic sphere it is foolish to understand anything other than the abolition of classes. But when gentleman professors undertake to refute socialism, one never knows what to be more surprised at; their stupidity, or their ignorance, or their unscrupulousness.
You will have to start from the basics, since you are dealing with Mr. Tugan.
By equality Social-Democrats in political sphere mean equal rights, and in economic sphere as we have already said, mean the abolition of classes. As for establishing human equality in the sense of equality of strength and abilities (physical and mental), socialists do not even think of such things.
Political equality is a demand for equal political rights for all citizens of a country who have reached a certain age and who do not suffer from either ordinary or liberal-professorial dementia. This demand was first put forward, not by the socialists, not by the proletariat, but by the bourgeoisie. The well-known historical experience of all countries of the world testifies to this, and Mr. Tugan could easily have discovered this had he not called "experience" to witness solely for the purpose of duping students and workers, and please those in power by "destroying" socialism.
The bourgeoisie put forward the demand for equal rights for all citizens in the struggle against medieval, feudal, serf-owner and caste privileges. In Russia, for example, unlike America, Switzerland and other countries, the privileges of the nobility are preserved to this day in all spheres of political life, in elections to the Council of State, in elections to the Duma, in municipal administration, in taxation, and many other things.
Even the most slow-witted and ignorant person can grasp the fact that individual members of the nobility are not equal in physical and mental abilities any more than are people belonging to the "tax-paying", "base", "low-born" or "non-privileged" peasant class. But in terms of their rights, all nobles are equal, just as all the peasants are equal in their lack of rights.
Does our learned liberal Professor Tugan now understand the difference between equality in the sense of equality of rights, and equality in the sense of equality of strength and abilities?
Let us now turn to equality in the economic sense. In the United States of America, as in other advanced countries, there are no medieval privileges. All citizens are equal in political rights. But are they equal in terms of their position in social production?
No, Mr. Tugan, they are not equal. Some own land, factories and capital and live on the unpaid labor of the workers; such an insignificant minority. Others, namely, the vast mass of the population, own no means of production and live only by selling their labor-power; they are proletarians.
In the United States of America there are no nobles, and the bourgeoisie and the proletariat enjoy equal political rights. But they are not equal in class status: one class, the capitalists, own the means of production and live on the unpaid labor of the workers. The other class, the wage workers, the proletariat, own no means of production and live by selling their labor-power in the market.
The abolition of classes means placing all citizens on an equal footing with regard to the means of production belonging to society as a whole. It means giving all citizens equal opportunities to work on the publicly owned means of production, on publicly owned land, at the publicly owned factories, and so forth.
This explanation of socialism has been necessary to enlighten our learned liberal professor, Mr. Tugan, who perhaps, with some effort, will now grasp the fact that it is absurd to expect equality of strength and abilities in a socialist society.
To put it briefly: when socialists speak of equality, they always mean social equality, equality of social status, and not by any means the physical and mental equality of individuals.
The reader will probably ask in bewilderment: how could it be that a learned liberal professor have forgotten these elementary truths known to anybody who was exposed to the views of socialism? The answer is simple: the personal characteristics of present-day professors are such that we may find among them even exceptionally stupid people like Tugan. But the social status of professors in bourgeois society is such that only those who sell science to the service of the interests of capital are admitted to this position, only those who agree to speak the most fatuous nonsense, the most shameless absurdities and nonsense against the socialists. The bourgeoisie will forgive the professors for all this as they are engaged in the "destruction" of socialism.
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