Page:Eleven Blind Leaders (1910?).pdf/15

 weak syndical or union movement, and we find that conditions for the workers in that country are essentially the same as in other capitalist countries. Furthermore, the "co-operatives" retain all typical features of like capitalist institutions of exploitation. "Profits" on one side implies "wages" on the other. That foreshadows trouble between worker and employer: As was pointed out by one of the critics of Professor Kennedy—a Belgian recently from that country—it is a frequent occurrence for workers employed in the Belgian co-operatives to go on strike for better conditions.

Just how far these institutions will be able to proceed in the competitive struggle with the capitalist class dominant in the field of "business," is a matter for the future to determine. But we may safely predict that their continued survival for any length of time will depend upon their comparative insignificance together with the necessarily restricted development of Belgian industry.

The main point urged in their favor is that "co-operatives" are training the workers for collective operation of industries in the Co-operative Commonwealth. As a matter of fact, the evidence shows that they are only training functionaries, with middle class instincts, in the arts of "profit making" and exploitation. Critics of the "co-operative" idea have frequently pointed out that this system has emasculated the revolutionary socialist movement of Belgium and made that country the classic land of "political opportunism." That contention is emphasized by the fact that unionism plays a subordinate role in the socialist movement in Belgium. Out of 145,781 affiliated members of the socialist party at the close of 1906, only 35,624 were members of unions which form practically all the syndicalists of that country. Further facts, tending to show the emasculation of the Belgian socialist movement will appear later when I deal with the question of labor legislation.

Outside of Belgium, in the larger European countries, "co-operatives" play a very insignificant role as an