Page:Karl Kautsky - The Class Struggle (Erfurt Program) - tr. William Edward Bohn (1910).djvu/207

 every set-back, every new form of oppression.

This moral elevation of the proletariat is identical with the increasing demands which it makes on society. Moreover it advances more rapidly than the conditions of labor which necessarily prevail under the present system of exploitation. The result of the class-struggle can, therefore, be nothing else than increasing discontent among the proletarians. And therefore the class-struggle appears purposeless so long as it does not look beyond the present system of production.

Only socialist production can put an end to the disparity between the demands of the workers and the means of satisfying them. By doing away with exploitation it would render impossible the luxuries of the exploiters and the natural discontent of the exploited. With the removal of the standard set by the rich the demands of the workers would, of course, be measured by the means at hand to satisfy them. We have already seen how much the socialist method of production would increase these means.

Perpetual discontent is unknown in communistic societies. In our capitalistic world it results naturally from the distinction of classes wherever the exploited feel themselves to be the equals of the exploiters.

So long, therefore, as the class-struggle of the proletariat was opposed to socialism, so long as it did nothing beyond attempting to improve the position of the proletariat within the framework of existing society, it could not reach its goal. But a great change came with the amalgamation