Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 9.djvu/530

 5 1 2 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

of exposing the errors of the opponent in the most unpitying fashion, every conclusion of peace previous to decisive victory, would be treason against that reality for the sake of which the personal element is excluded from the conflict.

With endless varieties otherwise, the social struggles since Marx have developed themselves in the above form. Since it is recognized that the situation of laborers is determined by the objective organization and formulas of the productive system, independent of the will and power of individual persons, the personal embitterment incident to the struggle in general, and to local conflicts exemplifying the general conflict, necessarily diminishes. The entrepreneur is no longer, as such, a blood- sucker and damnable egotist; the laborer is no longer uni- versally assumed to act from sinful greed ; both parties begin, at least, to abandon the program of charging the other with demands and tactics inspired by personal malevolence. This lit- eralizing of the conflict has come about in Germany rather along the lines of theory ; in England, through the operation of the trade unions, in the course of which the individually personal ele- ment of the antagonism has been overcome. In Germany this was effected largely through the more abstract generalization of the historical and class movement. In England it came about through the severe superindividual unity in the actions of the unions and of the combinations of employers. The intensity of the struggle, however, has not on that account diminished. On the contrary, it has become much more conscious of its pur- pose, more concentrated, and at the same time more aggressive, through the consciousness of the individual that he is struggling, not merely, and often not at all, for himself, but rather for a vast superpersonal end.

A most interesting symptom of this correlation was presented by the boycotting of the Berlin breweries by the labor body in the year 1894. This was one of the most intense local struggles of the last decade. It was carried on by both sides with extra- ordinary energy, yet without any personal offensiveness on either side toward the other, although the stimulus was close at hand. Indeed, two of the party leaders, in the midst of the struggle,