In seeking to avoid money economy, the Narodniks also sought to avoid the development of commodity production and exchange, which is the fundamental basis of money economy. But, without the development of commodity production and exchange, i.e. of the market, there is no development of competition, and so, no development of the productive forces, no accumulation of capital, and so no basis for Socialism.
“It is easy to see that the main features of this programme are saliently stressed in the Sketch : 1) condemnation of money economy and sympathy for natural economy and primitive artisan production; 2) various measures for the encouragement of small peasant production, such as credits, technical developments, etc.; 3) the spreading of associations and societies of all kinds among the masters, big and small—raw material, warehousing, loan-and-savings, credit, consumers’ and producers’ societies; 4) “organisation of labour”—a current phrase in all and sundry Narodnik good intentions.” (p 446)
But, none of this offered some new alternative path of development. It only offered a development of capitalism, constrained within dwarfish limits. And, the reality was that, despite the rose-tinted images portrayed by the Narodniks, history had already moved on.
“To take first the condemnation of money economy: as far as industry is concerned, it is already of a purely Platonic character. Even in Perm Gubernia, artisan production has already been forced far into the background by commodity production, and is in such a pitiful state that we find the Sketch itself talking about the desirability of “emancipating the handicraftsman from dependence,” in other words, of abolishing the artisan’s dependence on the private customer “by seeking means of extending the marketing area beyond the local consumption demand” (p. 33). In other words, condemnation of money economy in theory and a desire to convert artisan production into commodity production in practice! And this contradiction is by no means peculiar to the Sketch, it is characteristic of all Narodnik projects:” (p 446-7)
Even to the extent that the Narodnik proposals on credit and so on, for small producers, could have any effect, that effect was merely to encourage the development of additional petty-bourgeois producers, and the logic of the market, of competition, as described by Marx above, did the rest of turning a minority of these petty-bourgeois into bourgeois, of bringing about the accumulation, concentration and centralisation of these small capitals into a small number of very large capitals! The same is true of the same proposals today, for example, for a Universal Basic Income.
The Marxists, of course, unlike the Narodniks, saw the development of capitalism as progressive, as a necessary basis of developing the productive forces, as well as creating the working-class required for the construction of Socialism, but for that very reason they were not interested in limiting that development to the dwarfish scale implied by the Narodniks vision. So, Lenin says,
“But, it may be objected, if that is so, if the Narodniks in the practical measures they suggest, unconsciously and involuntarily serve to develop the petty bourgeoisie, and, hence, capitalism in general, why should their programme be attacked by people who on principle regard the development of capitalism as a progressive process?” (p 448)
The various reforms proposed by the Narodniks for credits, technical education and so on, could clearly be argued as advantageous to the development of the petty-bourgeoisie. The same applies to the reforms proposed by liberals, and conservative social democrats (neo-liberals), today. But, the point is not that socialists necessarily oppose any such measures, in so far as they facilitate the development of capital, but that we see them as wholly inadequate, and, in today's global economy, generally reactionary, because they seek to promote small capital at the expense of existing large-scale capital.
“We shall not dwell here on the point that even if such objections were justified, they do not in the least refute the fact that the dressing-up of petty-bourgeois projects as the most exalted social panaceas is in itself a cause of grave social harm. We intend to put the question on the practical footing of the vital and immediate needs of the times, and to judge the Narodnik programme from this deliberately narrowed viewpoint.” (p 448)
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