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- Herausgeber: DigiCat
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
In "Woman and Socialism," August Bebel articulates a pioneering discourse on the intersection of gender and socialism, challenging the patriarchal structures of 19th-century society. Through a meticulously researched exposition, Bebel combines historical analysis with socialist theory, exploring the position of women in both the domestic sphere and the workforce. His literary style is marked by clarity and vigor, making complex ideas accessible to a broader audience. The work stands as a fundamental text in feminist theory and social criticism, contextualized within the broader framework of the socialist movement during a time of significant socio-political upheaval in Europe. August Bebel, a German socialist and a founding member of the Social Democratic Party, was profoundly influenced by the socio-economic conditions of his time. His experiences in the labor movement, combined with his deep commitment to social justice, propelled him to advocate for women's rights, recognizing that true socialism cannot be achieved without gender equality. Bebel's own life was marked by advocacy and activism, which greatly informed his perspectives on societal reform. "Woman and Socialism" is essential reading for those interested in the historical roots of feminist thought, socialism, and social reform. Bebel's arguments remain relevant, encouraging readers to reflect on contemporary issues surrounding gender equity and class struggle. This book not only illuminates the past but also inspires present and future movements aimed at achieving social justice. In this enriched edition, we have carefully created added value for your reading experience: - A succinct Introduction situates the work's timeless appeal and themes. - The Synopsis outlines the central plot, highlighting key developments without spoiling critical twists. - A detailed Historical Context immerses you in the era's events and influences that shaped the writing. - A thorough Analysis dissects symbols, motifs, and character arcs to unearth underlying meanings. - Reflection questions prompt you to engage personally with the work's messages, connecting them to modern life. - Hand‐picked Memorable Quotes shine a spotlight on moments of literary brilliance. - Interactive footnotes clarify unusual references, historical allusions, and archaic phrases for an effortless, more informed read.
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022
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Woman and Socialism
Table of Contents
Introduction
At the heart of Woman and Socialism lies the unresolved contradiction of a modern society that celebrates liberty and progress while structuring economic life, domestic relations, and public power in ways that render women dependent, invisible, or expendable, a contradiction that August Bebel dissects to show how the emancipation of half the population is inseparable from the emancipation of all, how intimate life is shaped by political economy, and how freedom demands the remaking of institutions that determine who works, who cares, who decides, and who benefits from the wealth and possibilities generated by industrial modernity, and how social arrangements deemed natural are historically produced and open to deliberate change.
Written in the late nineteenth century amid rapid industrialization and the rise of organized socialism in Germany, Woman and Socialism is a work of political theory and social critique that situates questions of gender within the broader analysis of class, labor, and property. August Bebel, a prominent socialist parliamentarian and party leader, composes a wide-ranging treatise rather than a memoir or novel, speaking from the vantage of a movement confronting the upheavals of factory work, urbanization, and new forms of poverty. Its pages engage the social conditions of the time while advancing a programmatic vision aimed at readers across the emerging workers’ movement.
Readers encounter a synthesis that moves from broad historical sketches to concrete observations about contemporary workplaces and households, written in an urgent, polemical voice that remains accessible and systematic. Bebel threads economic reasoning with moral argument, drawing on historical narratives and social observation to illuminate how family forms and labor markets interact. The style is declamatory yet organized, alternating exposition with critique, so the experience is less a detached academic treatise than an engaged public argument. Without relying on private anecdotes, the book builds a cumulative case, inviting readers to connect structural analysis with everyday realities without dictating a single emotional register.
Central to the book is the claim that women’s subordination cannot be explained by nature or custom alone, but by economic structures that allocate work and resources through property relations. Bebel examines how marriage and family life reflect material arrangements, how access to education and employment conditions autonomy, and how unpaid domestic labor supports profit and public life while remaining undervalued. He analyzes the ways legal systems codify these inequalities and how cultural norms reinforce them, yet he insists that the same forces that concentrate power can also be reorganized. The argument steadily reorients readers from individual shortcomings to systemic constraints and possibilities.
The constructive horizon of Woman and Socialism is an egalitarian social order in which economic independence, political participation, and shared responsibility for care become practical guarantees rather than private struggles. Equality is not framed as a mere extension of existing privileges, but as a reconfiguration of work, time, and resources through collective solutions that expand freedom for everyone. Bebel therefore links women’s emancipation to broader transformations in production and governance, arguing that stable rights require material supports. The reform of laws matters, yet durable change, he contends, depends on reimagining how society organizes sustenance, education, and the daily labor that maintains life.
Contemporary readers will find in Bebel’s analysis a vocabulary for ongoing debates about pay equity, care infrastructures, workplace discrimination, and the distribution of time and risk in a globalized economy. The book’s insistence that household labor and wage labor are interdependent illuminates discussions of parental leave, childcare access, and the pressures of precarious work. Its focus on structural arrangements complements current conversations about representation, safety, and bodily autonomy by asking what economic conditions make rights real. Even where historical details reflect the period, the core questions—who bears the costs of social reproduction, and who controls the surplus it enables—remain urgent.
Approached today, Woman and Socialism reads as a foundational statement of socialist feminism as well as a snapshot of movement thinking in its formative decades, a text whose persuasive force lies in connecting personal conditions to public arrangements. Some formulations bear the marks of their era, yet the book’s central insight—that emancipation is collective, institutional, and materially grounded—continues to challenge readers to think beyond individual remedies. As an introduction to the debates it helped shape, it prepares one to engage more deeply with histories of labor and gender while offering a principled framework for imagining a more capacious and practical freedom.
Synopsis
August Bebel’s Woman and Socialism, first published in 1879 and expanded in later editions, investigates the social condition of women through a socialist lens and argues that their full emancipation is inseparable from the broader liberation of the working class. Written by a prominent figure of the German labor movement, the book combines historical survey, social analysis, and programmatic proposals. Bebel situates women’s subordination within the development of property relations and class society, seeking to show that prevailing gender arrangements arise from material conditions rather than immutable nature. The argument moves from history to contemporary critique and toward a transformative social alternative.
Beginning with pre-class communities and moving through antiquity and feudalism, Bebel sketches how changing modes of production altered family forms and women’s status. As private property intensified, he argues, paternal authority and inheritance rules consolidated male dominance, while religious doctrine and civil law reinforced it. In this account, domestic labor is rendered invisible, and women’s legal personhood is curtailed in matters of marriage, guardianship, and property. The aim is not antiquarian detail but a pattern: social structures shape gender relations, and when economies shift, familial norms follow. This framework underpins the book’s subsequent examination of modern bourgeois society and its contradictions.
In his critique of contemporary life, Bebel analyzes the middle-class family as both an affective unit and an economic arrangement, contending that dependence within marriage reproduces hierarchy. Legal inequities, restricted education, and barriers to professions are presented as systemic, not accidental. He explores the double standard that condemns women while tolerating male sexual freedom, and he treats prostitution as a market outcome linked to poverty and unequal opportunities rather than personal failing. These observations culminate in a diagnosis: the private household and the wage system interact to confine women to unpaid or underpaid labor, sustaining social dependence behind a rhetoric of domestic virtue.
Industrialization, for Bebel, complicates this picture by pulling women into factories and workshops, where they encounter long hours, low wages, and precarious employment. He observes how economic necessity redraws family roles, strains motherhood, and exposes children to exploitative labor markets. Yet he also treats women’s wage labor as historically significant, because participation in production undermines the premise of natural domestic confinement. The analysis supports demands for equal pay, access to skilled trades, and measures safeguarding health and maternity. At the same time, Bebel contends that piecemeal reforms cannot overcome the structural dynamics that commodify both labor and intimate life.
The book’s constructive core outlines a socialist reorganization of society intended to remove the economic basis of gender inequality. Collective ownership and coordinated production, Bebel argues, would enable broad public services—such as communal kitchens, laundries, and childcare—thereby socializing housework and freeing women and men for education, creativity, and civic participation. He advocates coeducation, universal access to learning, and full civil and political equality. In such conditions, personal relationships would be grounded in mutual inclination and responsibility rather than material compulsion, and parenting would be supported as a social concern, not privatized as an unequal domestic burden.
Strategically, Bebel links women’s emancipation to the organized struggle of the working class while distinguishing his position from currents he deems narrowly liberal. He acknowledges the importance of legal reforms but argues that a feminism aligned solely with property-owning interests cannot address labor exploitation or the unpaid work that sustains households. Education, unionization, and political participation are presented as immediate tasks, coupled with a demand for equal suffrage and legal equality. Throughout, Bebel adopts a rationalist stance toward moral controversies, urging that questions of sexuality, family life, and social policy be considered in light of health, autonomy, and collective welfare.
Without relying on idealized portraits or mere denunciation, Woman and Socialism articulates a comprehensive case that gender justice is inseparable from a reordering of economic life. Its synthesis of history, social criticism, and practical proposals made it a foundational text for socialist and labor movements and a touchstone for later debates on care work, reproductive autonomy, and equality at work. Though written in a specific nineteenth-century context, the book’s central question—how material structures mold intimate relations—retains relevance. Its enduring resonance lies in challenging readers to connect reforms in law and culture with the deeper organization of production and everyday life.
Historical Context
August Bebel’s Woman and Socialism emerged in the newly unified German Empire, founded in 1871 under Prussian leadership and chancellor Otto von Bismarck. Industrialization was transforming cities, labor, and family life, while the Reichstag provided limited parliamentary representation in an authoritarian constitutional monarchy. Bebel, a turner by trade and a cofounder of the German Social Democratic movement, wrote amid escalating repression: the Anti-Socialist Laws of 1878 banned socialist organizations, meetings, and press. First published in 1879 and revised repeatedly, his book addressed the political economy and social institutions of his time, intervening in debates on labor, citizenship, and the family.
German socialism had consolidated through the merger of two currents: Ferdinand Lassalle’s ADAV (1863) and the Eisenach tendency of Wilhelm Liebknecht and Bebel, which formed the SDAP (1869). They united at Gotha in 1875, adopting a program that Karl Marx famously criticized for its compromises. Bebel and Liebknecht had already gained notoriety for opposing the Franco-Prussian War, leading to their 1872 imprisonment for high treason. After 1878, socialists were forced to organize clandestinely while still contesting Reichstag elections. This experience of persecution, parliamentary practice, and programmatic debates shaped Bebel’s insistence that women’s emancipation was inseparable from the broader socialist struggle.
In late nineteenth-century Germany, women faced entrenched legal and civic inequalities. They lacked voting rights at municipal and national levels and, until a 1908 reform of association law, were barred from membership in political parties. Access to higher education and many professions was severely restricted; substantial openings came only around 1900, and many aspiring students sought admission abroad, especially at the University of Zurich. The German Civil Code (Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch) of 1900 codified the husband’s authority in marriage, including decision-making within the household and limits on a married woman’s economic autonomy. These institutions formed the backdrop for Bebel’s critique.
The German women’s movement had organized since the 1860s through associations such as the Allgemeiner Deutscher Frauenverein (1865), led by figures including Louise Otto-Peters and Auguste Schmidt. Often middle-class and reformist, these groups prioritized education, employment access, and legal reforms but were cautious about class conflict. Social Democrats, by contrast, linked women’s rights to a critique of capitalism and universal suffrage. Under restrictive laws, SPD activists built separate networks and publications, later exemplified by Clara Zetkin’s leadership and the journal Die Gleichheit from the 1890s. This landscape of bourgeois and socialist feminism informed the reception and uses of Bebel’s arguments.
Public debates on sexuality and social hygiene intensified as cities expanded. Across many German municipalities, prostitution was regulated by police and medical authorities through registration and compulsory health examinations, a system that critics condemned as discriminatory. Transnational abolitionist campaigns, associated with activists like Josephine Butler, challenged regulationist regimes and double standards in sexual morality. Bebel’s work intervened in these controversies by analyzing how economic dependence, poverty wages, and legal inequalities exposed women to exploitation. He situated questions of marriage, reproduction, and morality within broader structures of labor and power, arguing that social arrangements—not individual failings—underpinned contemporary gender relations.
Rapid industrialization drew large numbers of women into wage labor, particularly in textiles, domestic service, and factory piecework, typically at lower pay than men. Workdays were long, and the health consequences of industrial employment spurred protective legislation. A major revision of the Imperial Industrial Code in 1891 introduced restrictions on night work for women and young workers and strengthened Sunday rest provisions. Bismarck’s pioneering social insurance laws—health (1883), accident (1884), and old-age and disability (1889)—addressed the “social question” while seeking to curb socialist influence. These reforms framed the terrain on which Bebel connected economic structures, class organization, and women’s independence.
Bebel wrote in dialogue with socialist political economy and emerging social science. He shared analytical ground with Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and later stood alongside Engels’s The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884), which drew on Lewis H. Morgan’s anthropology to relate kinship forms to property relations. Socialist circles circulated ethnographic and historical studies to argue that gender hierarchies were historically contingent. Bebel assembled contemporary statistics, legal comparisons, and international examples to contest claims about “natural” female dependency. His synthesis reflected a broader nineteenth-century effort to anchor social critique in empirical research and historical development.
After the repeal of the Anti-Socialist Laws in 1890, the SPD adopted the Erfurt Program (1891), explicitly demanding equal rights and universal suffrage, and grew into Europe’s largest socialist party, becoming the strongest Reichstag faction by 1912. Woman and Socialism went through many editions, was translated widely, and became a touchstone for socialist militants and readers of diverse backgrounds. It crystallized the era’s conflicts over labor, citizenship, and the family while indicting legal and economic institutions that sustained women’s subordination. By linking emancipation to collective social transformation, Bebel’s book offered a systematic critique of his age and a programmatic vision for change.
Woman and Socialism
Introduction.
WE are living in an age of great social transformations that are steadily progressing. In all strata of society we perceive an unsettled state of mind and an increasing restlessness, denoting a marked tendency toward profound and radical changes. Many questions have arisen and are being discussed with growing interest in ever widening circles. One of the most important of these questions and one that is constantly coming into greater prominence, is the woman question[1].
The woman question deals with the position that woman should hold in our social organism, and seeks to determine how she can best develop her powers and her abilities, in order to become a useful member of human society, endowed with equal rights and serving society according to her best capacity. From our point of view this question coincides with that other question: In what manner should society be organized to abolish oppression, exploitation, misery and need, and to bring about the physical and mental welfare of individuals and of society as a whole? To us then, the woman question is only one phase of the general social question that at present occupies all intelligent minds; its final solution can only be attained by removing social extremes and the evils which are a result of such extremes.
Nevertheless, the woman question demands our special consideration. What the position of woman has been in ancient society, what her position is to-day and what it will be in the coming social order, are questions that deeply concern at least one half of humanity. Indeed, in Europe they concern a majority of organized society, because women constitute a majority of the population. Moreover, the prevailing conceptions concerning the development of woman’s social position during successive stages of history are so faulty, that enlightenment on this subject has become a necessity. Ignorance concerning the position of woman, chiefly accounts for the prejudice that the woman’s movement has to contend with among all classes of people, by no means least among the women themselves. Many even venture to assert that there is no woman question at all, since woman’s position has always been the same and will remain the same in the future, because nature has destined her to be a wife and a mother and to confine her activities to the home. Everything that is beyond the four narrow walls of her home and is not closely connected with her domestic duties, is not supposed to concern her.
In the woman question then we find two contending parties, just as in the labor question, which relates to the position of the workingman in human society. Those who wish to maintain everything as it is, are quick to relegate woman to her so-called “natural profession,” believing that they have thereby settled the whole matter. They do not recognize that millions of women are not placed in a position enabling them to fulfill their natural function of wifehood and motherhood, owing to reasons that we shall discuss at length later on. They furthermore do not recognize that to millions of other women their “natural profession” is a failure, because to them marriage has become a yoke and a condition of slavery, and they are obliged to drag on their lives in misery and despair. But these wiseacres are no more concerned by these facts than by the fact that in various trades and professions millions of women are exploited far beyond their strength, and must slave away their lives for a meagre subsistence. They remain deaf and blind to these disagreeable truths, as they remain deaf and blind to the misery of the proletariat, consoling themselves and others by the false assertion that it has always been thus and will always continue to be so. That woman is entitled, as well as man, to enjoy all the achievements of civilization, to lighten her burdens, to improve her condition, and to develop all her physical and mental qualities, they refuse to admit. When, furthermore, told that woman—to enjoy full physical and mental freedom—should also be economically independent, should no longer depend for subsistence upon the good will and favor of the other sex, the limit of their patience will be reached. Indignantly they will pour forth a bitter endictment of the “madness of the age” and its “crazy attempts at emancipation.” These are the old ladies of both sexes who cannot overcome the narrow circle of their prejudices. They are the human owls that dwell wherever darkness prevails, and cry out in terror whenever a ray of light is cast into their agreeable gloom.
Others do not remain quite as blind to the eloquent facts. They confess that at no time woman’s position has been so unsatisfactory in comparison to general social progress, as it is at present. They recognize that it is necessary to investigate how the condition of the self-supporting woman can be improved; but in the case of married women they believe the social problem to be solved. They favor the admission of unmarried women only into a limited number of trades and professions. Others again are more advanced and insist that competition between the sexes should not be limited to the inferior trades and professions, but should be extended to all higher branches of learning and the arts and sciences as well. They demand equal educational opportunities and that women should be admitted to all institutions of learning, including the universities. They also favor the appointment of women to government positions, pointing out the results already achieved by women in such positions, especially in the United States. A few are even coming forward to demand equal political rights for women. Woman, they argue, is a human being and a member of organized society as well as man, and the very fact that men have until now framed and administered the laws to suit their own purposes and to hold woman in subjugation, proves the necessity of woman’s participation in public affairs.
It is noteworthy that all these various endeavors do not go beyond the scope of the present social order. The question is not propounded whether any of these proposed reforms will accomplish a decisive and essential improvement in the condition of women. According to the conceptions of bourgeois, or capitalistic society, the civic equality of men and women is deemed an ultimate solution of the woman question. People are either unconscious of the fact, or deceive themselves in regard to it, that the admission of women to trades and industries is already practically accomplished and is being strongly favored by the ruling classes in their own interest. But under prevailing conditions woman’s invasion of industry has the detrimental effect of increasing competition on the labor market, and the result is a reduction in wages for both male and female workers. It is clear then, that this cannot be a satisfactory solution.
Men who favor these endeavors of women within the scope of present society, as well as the bourgeois women who are active in the movement, consider complete civic equality of women the ultimate goal. These men and women then differ radically from those who, in their narrow-mindedness, oppose the movement. They differ radically from those men who are actuated by petty motives of selfishness and fear of competition, and therefore try to prevent women from obtaining higher education and from gaining admission to the better paid professions. But there is no difference of class between them, such as exists between the worker and the capitalist.
If the bourgeois suffragists would achieve their aim and would bring about equal rights for men and women, they would still fail to abolish that sex slavery which marriage, in its present form, is to countless numbers of women; they would fail to abolish prostitution; they would fail to abolish the economic dependence of wives. To the great majority of women it also remains a matter of indifference whether a few thousand members of their sex, belonging to the more favored classes of society, obtain higher learning and enter some learned profession, or hold a public office. The general condition of the sex as a whole is not altered thereby.
The female sex as such has a double yoke to bear. Firstly, women suffer as a result of their social dependence upon men, and the inferior position alloted to them in society; formal equality before the law alleviates this condition, but does not remedy it. Secondly, women suffer as a result of their economic dependence, which is the lot of women in general, and especially of the proletarian women, as it is of the proletarian men.
We see, then, that all women, regardless of their social position, represent that sex which during the evolution of society has been oppressed and wronged by the other sex, and therefore it is to the common interest of all women to remove their disabilities by changing the laws and institutions of the present state and social order. But a great majority of women is furthermore deeply and personally concerned in a complete reorganization of the present state and social order which has for its purpose the abolition of wage-slavery, which at present weighs most heavily upon the women of the proletariat, as also the abolition of sex-slavery, which is closely connected with our industrial conditions and our system of private ownership.
The women who are active in the bourgeois suffrage movement, do not recognize the necessity of so complete a transformation. Influenced by their privileged social position, they consider the more radical aims of the proletarian woman’s movement dangerous doctrines that must be opposed. The class antagonism that exists between the capitalist and working class and that is increasing with the growth of industrial problems, also clearly manifests itself then within the woman’s movement. Still these sister-women, though antagonistic to each other on class lines, have a great many more points in common than the men engaged in the class struggle, and though they march in separate armies they may strike a united blow. This is true in regard to all endeavors pertaining to equal rights of woman under the present social order; that is, her right to enter any trade or profession adapted to her strength and ability, and her right to civic and political equality. These are, as we shall see, very important and very far-reaching aims. Besides striving for these aims, it is in the particular interest of proletarian women to work hand in hand with proletarian men for such measures and institutions that tend to protect the working woman from physical and mental degeneration, and to preserve her health and strength for a normal fulfillment of her maternal functions. Furthermore, it is the duty of the proletarian woman to join the men of her class in the struggle for a thorough-going transformation of society, to bring about an order that by its social institutions will enable both sexes to enjoy complete economic and intellectual independence.
Our goal then is, not only to achieve equality of men and women under the present social order, which constitutes the sole aim of the bourgeois woman’s movement, but to go far beyond this, and to remove all barriers that make one human being dependent upon another, which includes the dependence of one sex upon the other. This solution of the woman question is identical with the solution of the social question. They who seek a complete solution of the woman question must, therefore, join hands with those who have inscribed upon their banner the solution of the social question in the interest of all mankind—the Socialists.
The Socialist Party is the only one that has made the full equality of women, their liberation from every form of dependence and oppression, an integral part of its program; not for reasons of propaganda, but from necessity. For there can be no liberation of mankind without social independence and equality of the sexes.
All Socialists will probably agree with the fundamental principles herein expressed. But the same cannot be said in regard to the manner in which we picture the realization of our ultimate aims, that is, in regard to the particular form that institutions should take to bring about that desired independence and equality for all. As soon as we forsake the firm foundation of reality, and begin to depict the future, there is a wide field for speculation. A difference of opinion immediately arises as to what is probable or improbable. Whatever, therefore, is stated in this book concerning future probabilities, must be regarded as the personal opinion of the author, and eventual attacks must be directed against his person, because he assumes full responsibility for his statements. Attacks, that are honestly meant and are objective in character, will be welcome; those that distort the contents of this book or are founded upon an untruthful interpretation of their meaning, will be ignored. It remains to be said, that in the following chapters all conclusions should be drawn which become necessary for us to draw, as a result of our investigation of facts. To be unprejudiced is the first requirement for a recognition of the truth, and only by expressing without reserve that which is and that which is to be, can we attain our ends.
Woman in the Past.
CHAPTER I.The Position of Woman in Primeval Society.
1.—Chief Epochs of Primeval History.
IT is the common lot of woman and worker to be oppressed. The forms of oppression have differed in successive ages and in various countries, but the oppression itself remained. During the course of historic development the oppressed ones have frequently recognized their oppression, and this recognition has led to an amelioration of their condition; but it remained for our day to recognize the fundamental causes of this oppression, both in regard to the woman and in regard to the worker. It was necessary to understand the true nature of society and the laws governing social evolution, before an effective movement could develop for the purpose of abolishing conditions that had come to be regarded as unjust. But the extent and profoundness of such a movement depend upon the amount of insight prevailing among those strata of society affected by the unjust conditions, as also upon the freedom of action possessed by them. In both respects woman, owing to custom, education and lack of freedom, is less advanced than the worker. Moreover, conditions that have prevailed for generations finally become a habit, and heredity as well as education make them appear “natural” to both parties concerned. That explains why women accept their inferior position as a matter of course, and do not recognize that it is an unworthy one, and that they should strive to obtain equal rights with men, and to become equally qualified members of society.
But whatever similarities exist between the position of woman and that of the workingman, woman has one precedence over the workingman. She is the first human being which came into servitude. Women were slaves before men.
All social dependence and oppression is rooted in the economic dependence of the oppressed upon the oppressor. Woman—so we are taught by the history of human development—has been in this position since an early stage.
Our understanding of this development is comparatively recent. Just as the myth of the creation of the world, as taught by the Bible, could not be maintained in face of innumerable and indisputable facts founded upon modern, scientific investigation, it also became impossible to maintain the myth of the creation and development of man. Not all phases of the history of evolution have as yet been elucidated. Difference of opinion still exists among scientists in regard to one or another of the natural phenomena and their relation to each other; but, on the whole, clearness and a general consension of opinion prevails. It is certain that man has not made his appearance upon the earth as a civilized being—as the Bible asserts of the first human pair—but that in the long course of ages he gradually evolved from a mere animal condition, and that he passed through various stages during which his social relations as well as the relations between man and woman experienced many transformations.
The convenient assertion that is resorted to daily by ignorant or dishonest people, both in regard to the relation between man and woman as also in regard to the relation between the rich and the poor—the assertion that it has always been thus and will always continue to be so—is utterly false, superficial and contrary to the truth in every respect.
A cursory description of the relations of the sexes since primeval days is of special importance for the purpose of this book. For it seeks to prove that, if in the past progress of human development, these relations have been transformed as a result of the changing methods of production and distribution, it is obvious that a further change in the methods of production and distribution must again lead to a new transformation in the relation of the sexes. Nothing is eternal, either in nature or in human life; change is the only eternal factor.
As far as we can look backward along the line of human evolution, we see the horde[1] representing the first human community. Only when the horde increased in numbers to such an extent that it became difficult to obtain the necessary means of subsistence, which originally consisted of roots, seeds and fruit, a disbanding of the members resulted, and new dwelling places were sought for.
We have no written records of this almost animal-like stage, but studies of the various stages of civilization among extinct and living savages prove that such a stage has at one time existed. Man has not stepped into life as a highly civilized being, upon a command from the Creator, but has passed through a long, infinitely slow process of evolution, and in the ups and downs of wavering periods of development, and in a constant process of differentiation, in all climes and in all quarters of the globe, has passed through many stages until finally climbing the height of his present civilization.
And while in some parts of the globe great nations represent the most advanced stage of civilization, we find other peoples in various places representing varied stages of development. These present to us a vivid picture of our own past, and point out to us along which roads humanity has traveled in its long course of evolution. If we shall at some time succeed in establishing general and definite aspects according to which sociological investigations shall be conducted, an abundance of facts will result, destined to cast a new light upon the relations of men in the past and the present. Events will then seem comprehensible and natural, that at present are quite beyond our comprehension, and that superficial critics frequently condemn as irrational, sometimes even as immoral. Scientific researches, commenced by Backofen[2], and since continued by a considerable number of learned men as Taylor, MacLennon, Lubbock and others, have gradually lifted the veil from the earliest history of our race. These investigations were elaborated by Morgan’s able book, and to this again Frederick Engels has added a number of historic facts, economic and political in character. Recently these researches have been partly confirmed and partly corrected by Cunow.[2]
The clear and vivid descriptions given by Frederick Engels in his splendid work, that is founded upon Morgan’s investigations, have cast a flood of light upon many factors in the histories of peoples representing various stages of development; factors that until that time had seemed irrational and incomprehensible. They have enabled us to obtain an insight into the gradual upbuilding of the social structure. As a result of such insight we perceive that our former conceptions in regard to marriage, family and state, have been founded upon utterly false premises. But whatever has been proven concerning marriage, family and state, is equally true in regard to the position of woman, which, in the various stages of social development, has differed radically from what is supposed to be woman’s “eternal” position.
Morgan divides the history of mankind—and this division is also adopted by Engels—into three chief epochs: savagery, barbarism and civilization. Each of the two earlier periods he subdivides into a lower, a medium and a higher stage, because these stages differ in regard to fundamental improvements in the method of obtaining the means of subsistence. Those changes which occur from time to time in the social systems of nations as a result of improved methods of production, Morgan considers one of the chief characteristics in the progress of civilization, which is quite in keeping with the materialistic conception of history as laid down by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. Thus the lowest stage in the period of savagery represents the childhood of mankind. During this stage men still were tree-dwellers, and fruit and roots constituted their chief nourishment; but even then articulated language began to take form. The medium stage of savagery begins with the consumption of small animals such as fish, crabs, etc., for food, and with the discovery of fire. Men begin to manufacture weapons, clubs and spears made of wood and stone, and this means the inception of the hunt and probably also of war among neighboring hordes, who contended with one another for the sources of nourishment and the most desirable dwelling places and hunting grounds. At this stage also cannibalism appears, which is still met with among some tribes in Africa, Australia and Polynesia. The higher stage of savagery is characterized by the invention of the bow and arrow; the invention of the art of weaving; the making of mats and baskets from bast and reeds, and the manufacture of stone implements.
As the beginning of the lowest stage of barbarism, Morgan denotes the invention of pottery. Man learns the domestication of wild animals with the resultant production of meat and milk, and thereby obtains the use of hides, horns and furs for the most varied purposes. Hand in hand with the domestication of animals, agriculture begins to develop. In the western part of the world corn is cultivated; in the eastern part, almost all kinds of grain, with the exception of corn, is grown. During the medium stage of barbarism we find an increasing domestication of useful animals in the East, and in the West we find an improved cultivation of nourishing plants with the aid of artificial irrigation. The use of stones and sun-dried bricks for building purposes is also originated at this time. Domestication and breeding favor the formation of herds and flocks and lead to a pastoral life, and the necessity of producing larger quantities of nourishment for both men and animals leads to increased agriculture. The result is a more sedentary mode of life with an accompanying increase in provisions and greater diversity of same, and gradually cannibalism disappears.
The higher stage of barbarism has been reached with the smelting of iron ore and the invention of alphabetical writing. The invention of the iron plough gives a new impetus to agriculture; the iron axe and spade and hoe make it easier to clear the forest and to cultivate the soil. With the forging of iron a number of new activities set in, giving life a different shape. Iron tools simplify the building of houses, ships and wagons. The malleation of metals furthermore leads to mechanical art, to an improvement in the manufacture of arms, and to the building of walled cities. Architecture is developed, and mythology, poetry and history are conserved and disseminated by means of alphabetical writing.
The Oriental countries and those situated about the Mediterranean Sea—Egypt, Greece and Italy—are the ones in which this mode of life was especially developed, and here the foundation was laid to later social transformations that have had a decisive influence upon the development of civilization in Europe and, in fact, in all the countries of the globe.
[1] “The theory of natural rights and the doctrine of the social contract, which places an isolated human being at the beginnings of human development, is an invention utterly foreign to reality, and is therefore worthless for the theoretical analysis of human institutions as it is for a knowledge of history. Man should, on the contrary, be classed with gregarious animals; that is, with those species whose individuals are combined into permanent groups.”—(Edw.Meyer: “The Origin of the State, in Its Relation to Tribal and National Association.” 1907.)
[2] Backofen’s book was published in 1861. It was entitled, “The Matriarchate; Studies of the Gynocratic Customs of the Old World in Their Religious and Legal Aspects.” Publishers, Krais & Hoffmann, Stuttgart. Morgan’s fundamental work, “Ancient Society, or Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery Through Barbarism to Civilization,” was published in 1877 by Henry Holt & Co. “The Origin of the Family,” by Frederick Engels, founded upon Morgan’s investigations, was published by J.H.W. Dietz, Stuttgart, as was also “Relationship Organizations of the Australian Negro; a Contribution to the History of the Family,” by Henry Cunow, which appeared in 1894.
2.—Family Forms.
The periods of savagery and barbarism were characterized by singular social and sex relations, that differ considerably from those of later times.
Backofen and Morgan have thoroughly investigated these relations. Backofen carried on his investigations by a profound study of ancient writings, with the purpose of gaining an understanding of various phenomena presented in mythology and ancient history, that impress us strangely and yet show similarity with facts and occurrences of later days, even down to the present time. Morgan carried on his investigations by spending decades of his life among the Iroquois Indians in the State of New York, whereby he made new and unexpected observations of the modes of family life and system of relationship prevailing among them, and these observations served as a basis to place similar observations, made elsewhere, in the proper light.
Backofen and Morgan discovered, independently from one another, that in primeval society the relations of the sexes differed vastly from those prevalent during historic times and among modern, civilized nations. Morgan discovered, furthermore, as a result of his long sojourn among the Iroquois of North America, and his comparative studies to which these observations led him, that all existing primitive peoples have family relations and systems of relationship that differ markedly from our own, but which must have prevailed generally among all peoples at a remote period of civilization.
At the time when Morgan lived among the Iroquois, he found that among them existed a monogamous marriage, easily dissolved by either side, termed by him the “pairing family.” But he also found that the terms of relationship as father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, although there could be no doubt in our minds as to whom such terms should apply, were not used in their ordinary sense. The Iroquois addresses as sons and daughters not only his own children, but also those of all his brothers, and these—his brothers’ children—call him father. On the other hand, the Iroquois woman does not only call her own children sons and daughters, but also those of all her sisters, and again all her sisters’ children call her mother. But the children of her brothers she calls nephews and nieces, and these call her aunt. Children of brothers call one another brothers and sisters, and so do children of sisters. But the children of a woman and her brother call each other cousins. The curious fact then presents itself that the terms of relationship are not determined by the actual degrees of relationship, but the sex of the relative.
This system of kinship is not only fully accepted by all American Indians as well as by the aborigines of India, the Dravidian tribes of Deckan and the Gaura tribes of Hindostan, but similar systems must have existed everywhere primarily, as has been proven by investigations that were undertaken since those of Backofen. When these established facts shall be taken as a basis for further investigations among living savage or barbaric tribes, similar to the investigations made by Backofen among various peoples of the ancient world, by Morgan among the Iroquois and by Cunow among the Australian Negroes, it will be shown that social and sex relations constituted the foundation for the development of all nations of the world.
Morgan’s investigations have revealed still other interesting facts. While the “pairing family” of the Iroquois is in contradiction to the terms of relationship employed by them, it was shown that in the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii) there existed up to the first half of the nineteenth century a family form which actually corresponded to that system of kinship that among the Iroquois existed only in name. But the Hawaiian system of kinship again did not agree with the family form prevailing there at the time, but pointed to another form of the family, still more remote, and no longer in existence. There all the children of brothers and sisters, without exception, were regarded as brothers and sisters, and were considered the common children, not only of their mother’s and her sisters’ or their father’s and his brothers’, but of all the brothers and sisters of both their parents.
The Hawaiian system of kinship then corresponded to a degree of development that was still lower than the prevailing family form. We are thus confronted by the peculiar fact, that in Hawaii as among the North American Indians, two different systems of kinship were employed that no longer corresponded to existing conditions, but had been superseded by a higher form. Morgan expresses himself on this phenomenon in the following manner: “The family is the active element; it is never stationary, but progresses from a lower to a higher form in the same measure in which society develops from a lower to a higher stage. But the systems of kinship are passive. Only in long intervals they register the progress made by the family in course of time, and only then are they radically changed when the family has done so.”
The prevalent conception that the present family form has existed since times immemorial and must continue to exist lest our entire civilization be endangered—a conception that is vehemently defended by the upholders of things as they are—has been proven faulty and untenable by the researches of these scientists. The study of primeval history leaves no doubt as to the entirely different relation of the sexes at an early period of human development from their present relation, and when viewed in the light of our present-day conceptions, they seem a monstrosity, a mire of immorality. But as each stage in social development has its own methods of production, thus each stage also has its own code of morals, which is only a reflection of its social conditions. Morals are determined by custom, and customs correspond to the innermost nature, that is, to the social necessities of any given period.
Morgan arrives at the conclusion that in the lowest stage of savagery unrestricted sexual intercourse existed within the tribe, so that all the women belonged to all the men and all the men belonged to all the women; that is, a condition of promiscuity. All men practice polygamy, and all women practice polyandry; there is a common ownership of wives and husbands as also a common ownership of the children. Strabo relates (66B.C.) that among the Arabs brothers have sexual intercourse with their sisters and sons with their mothers. Incest was originally a requirement to make it possible for human beings to multiply. This explanation must especially be resorted to if we accept the biblical story of the origin of man. The Bible contains a contradiction in regard to this delicate subject. It relates that Cain, having killed his brother Abel, fled from the presence of the Lord and lived in the land of Nod. There Cain knew his wife and she conceived and bore a son unto him.
But whence came his wife? Cain’s parents were the first man and woman. According to the Hebrew tradition, two sisters were born to Cain and Abel, with whom they begot children. The Christian translators of the Bible appear to have suppressed this unpleasant fact. That promiscuity prevailed in a prehistoric stage, that the primeval horde was characterized by unrestricted sexual intercourse, is also shown in the Indian myth that Brama wedded his own daughter Saravasti. The same myth is met with among the Egyptians and in the Norse “Edda.” The Egyptian god Ammon was the husband of his mother and boasted of the fact, and Odin, according to the “Edda” was the husband of his own daughter Frigga.[3]Dr.Adolf Bastian relates: “In Swaganwara the daughters of the Rajah enjoyed the privilege of freely choosing their husbands. Four brothers who settled in Kapilapur made Priya, the eldest of their five sisters, queen mother and married the others.”[4]
Morgan assumes that from the state of general promiscuity, a higher form of sexual relation gradually developed, the consanguine family[3]. Here the marriage groups are arranged by generations; all the grandfathers and grandmothers within a certain family are mutually husbands and wives; their children constitute another cycle of husbands and wives, and again the children of these when they have attained the proper age. In differentiation then from the promiscuity prevailing at the lowest stage, we here find one generation excluded from sexual intercourse with another generation. But brothers and sisters and cousins of the first, second and more remote grades are all brothers and sisters and also husbands and wives. This family form corresponds to the system of kinship that during the first half of the last century still existed in Hawaii in name but no longer in fact. According to the American and Indian system of kinship, brother and sister can never be father and mother to the same child, but according to the Hawaiian system they may. The consanguine family also prevailed at the time of Herodotus among the Massagetes. Of these he wrote: “Every man marries a woman but all are permitted to have intercourse with her.”[5] Similar conditions Backofen proves to have existed among the Lycians, Etruscans, Cretans, Athenians, Lesbians and Egyptians.
According to Morgan, the consanguine family is succeeded by a third, higher form of family relations, which he calls the “Punaluan family”—“punaluan” meaning “dear companion.”
Morgan’s conception that the consanguine family, founded upon the formation of marriage classes according to generations, which preceded the Punaluan family, was the original form of family life, is opposed by Cunow in his book referred to above. Cunow does not consider the consanguine family the most primitive form of sexual intercourse discovered, but deems it an intermediary stage leading to the true gentile organization, in which stage the generic classification in strata of different ages belonging to the so-called consanguine family, runs parallel for a while with the gentile order.[6] Cunow says, furthermore: The class division—every man and every woman bearing the name of their class and their totem—does not prevent sexual intercourse among relations on collateral lines, but it does prevent it among relations of preceding and succeeding lines, parents and children, aunts and nephews, uncles and nieces. Terms as uncle, aunt, etc., denote entire groups.
Cunow furnishes proof in regard to the points in which he differs from Morgan. But though he differs from Morgan in many respects, he clearly defends him against the attacks of Westermarck and others. He says: “Although some of Morgan’s theories may be proven to be incorrect, and others partly so, to him still is due the credit of having been the first to discover the identity existing between the totem-groups of the North American Indians and the gentile organizations of the Romans. He, furthermore, was the first to show that our present family form and system of relationship is the outcome of a lengthy process of evolution. We, therefore, are indebted to him for having made further research possible, for having laid the foundation upon which we may continue to build.” In the introduction to his book he also states explicitly that his work is partly a supplement to Morgan’s book on ancient society.
Westermarck and Starcke, to whom Dr.Ziegler especially refers, will have to accept the fact that the origin and evolution of the family are not in keeping with their bourgeois prejudices. Cunow’s refutations should enlighten the most fanatical opponents of Morgan as to the value of their opposition.
[3]Dr. Ziegler, professor of zoology at the university of Freiburg, ridicules the idea of attaching any historical importance to myths. This conception only proves the biased judgment of the scientist. The myths contain a profound meaning, for they have sprung from the soul of the people and are founded upon ancient customs and traditions that have gradually disappeared but continue to survive in the myths glorified by the halo of religion. If facts are met with that explain the myth, there is good ground for attaching historical importance to the same.
[4]Dr. Adolf Bastian, “Travels in Singapore, Batavia, Manila and Japan.”
[5] Backofen: “The Matriarchate.”
[6] In the gentile order each gens has its totem, as lizard, opossum, emu, wolf, bear, etc., from which the gens derives its name. The totem animal is held sacred, and members of the gens may not kill it or eat its flesh. The significance of the totem was similar to that of the patron saint among the medieval guilds.
3.—The Matriarchate.
According to Morgan, the Punaluan family[4] begins with the exclusion of brothers and sisters on the mother’s side. Wherever a woman has several husbands, it becomes impossible to determine paternity. Paternity becomes a mere fiction. Even at present, with the institution of monogamous marriage, paternity—as Goethe said in his “Apprenticeship,” “depends upon good faith.” But if paternity is dubious in monogamous marriage even, it is surely beyond the possibility of determination where polyandry prevails. Only descent from the mother can be shown clearly and undeniably; therefore, children, during the term of the matriarchate, were termed “spurii,” seed. As all social transformations are consummated infinitely slow upon a low stage of development, thus also the transition from the consanguine family to the Punaluan family must have extended through a great length of time, and many retrogressions must undoubtedly have occurred that could still be perceived in later days. The immediate, external cause for the development of the Punaluan family may have the necessity of dividing the greatly increased group for the purpose of finding new soil for agricultural purposes and for the grazing of herds. But it is also probable that with increasing development, people gradually came to understand the harmfulness and the impropriety of sexual intercourse between brother and sister and close relatives, and that this recognition led to a different arrangement of marriage relations. That this was the case is shown by a pretty legend that, as Cunow tells us, was related to Gason among the Dieyeris, a tribe of Southern Australia. This legend describes the origin of the “Murdu,” the gentile organization, in the following manner:
“After the creation fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters and other closely related persons married indiscriminately among themselves, until the evil consequences of such marriages were clearly seen. Thereupon the leaders held a council to consider what could be done, and finally they begged Muramura, the great spirit, to bid them what to do. Muramura bade them divide the tribe into many branches and to name these after animals and inanimate objects to distinguish them from one another; for instance, Mouse, Emu, Lizzard, Rain, etc. The members of each group should not be permitted to marry among themselves, but should choose their mates from another group. Thus the son of an Emu should not marry the daughter of an Emu, but he might marry the daughter of a Mouse, a Lizard, a Rain, or any other family.” This tradition is more plausible than the biblical one, and shows the origin of gentile organization in the simplest manner.
Paul Lafargue showed in an article published in the German periodical, “Neue Zeit,” that names like Adam and Eva did not originally denote individual persons, but were the names of gentes in which the Jews were constituted in prehistoric days. By his argumentation Lafargue elucidates a number of otherwise obscure and contradictory points in the first book of Moses. In the same periodical M.Beer calls attention to the fact that among the Jews a superstition still prevails according to which a man’s mother and his fiancee must not have the same name, lest misfortune, disease and death be brought upon the family. This is a further proof of the correctness of Lafargue’s conception. Gentile organization prohibited marriage between persons belonging to the same gens. According to the gentile conception, then, the fact that a man’s mother and his fiancee had the same name, proved their belonging to the same gens. Of course, present-day Jews are ignorant of the connection existing between their superstition and the ancient gentile organization which prohibited such marriages. These prohibitory laws had the purpose of avoiding the evils resulting from close intermarriage, and though gentile organization among the Jews has gone out of existence thousands of years ago, we still see traces of the ancient tradition preserved. Early experiences in the breeding of animals may have led to a recognition of the dangers of inbreeding.
How far such experiences had been developed may be seen from the first book of Moses, chapter30, 32stanza, where it is told how Jacob cheated his father-in-law Laban by providing for the birth of spotted lambs and goats that were to be his, according to Laban’s promise. Thus ancient Israelites were applying Darwin’s theories in practice long before Darwin’s time.
Since we are discussing conditions that existed among the ancient Jews, it will be well to quote a few further facts which prove that in antiquity maternal law actually prevailed among them. Although in the first book of Moses,3, 16, is written in regard to woman: “And thy desire shall be to thy husband and he shall rule over thee,” in the first book of Moses,2, 24, we find the lines: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife and they shall be one flesh.” The same wording is repeated in Matthew,19, 5; Mark,10, 7, and in the epistle to the Ephesians,5, 31. This command then is rooted in maternal law, for which interpreters of the Bible had no explanation and, therefore, presented it incorrectly.
Maternal law is likewise shown to have existed in the fourth book of Moses,32, 41. There it is said that Jair had a father of the tribe of Juda, but his mother came from the tribe of Manasseh, and Jair is explicitly called the son of Manasseh and became heir to that tribe. In Nehemiah,7, 63, we find still another example of maternal law among the ancient Jews. There the children of a priest who married one of the daughters of Barzillai, a Jewish clan, are called the children of Barzillai. They are, accordingly, not called by their father’s but by their mother’s name.
In the Punaluan family, according to Morgan, one or more series of sisters of one family group married one or more series of brothers of another family group. A number of sisters or cousins of the first, second and more remote degrees were the common wives of their common husbands, who were not permitted to be their brothers. A number of brothers or cousins of various degrees were the common husbands of their common wives, who were not permitted to be their sisters. As inbreeding was thereby prohibited, this new form of marriage was favorable to higher and more rapid development, and gave those tribes that had adopted this family form an advantage over those who maintained the old form of sex relations.
The following system of kinship resulted from the Punaluan family: The children of my mother’s sisters are her children, and the children of my father’s brothers are his children, and all are my brothers and sisters. But the children of my mother’s brothers are her nephews and nieces and the children of my father’s sisters are his nephews and nieces, and all are my cousins. The husbands of my mother’s sisters are still her husbands and the wives of my father’s brothers are still his wives, but the sisters of my father and the brothers of my mother are excluded from the family group, and their children are my cousins.[7]
