Socialism And The Social Movement In The Nineteenth Century (e-book) (used book) | bookbook.eu

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Excerpt from Socialism and the Social Movement

Socialism, in the meaning of the word here adopted, is the intellectual embodiment of the modern Social Move ment. That, in its turn, is the conception of all the attempts at emancipation on the part of the proletariat one of the social classes of our time. In order fully to understand the subject under discussion it will be meces sary to form a true notion of what is meant by a social class in general, and in particular Of the social class which is of special interest to us here.

By the term social class, then, I understand a social group, the individuals of which are the representatives of some economic system. In using the words economic system I mean a given economic order, or an economic condition of things, which is characterized by one or more prominent economic principles. Any economic order is, in my view, the sum-total of all legal and moral ideas which regulate production and distribution for the time being; and economic principles is the name I give to that chain of motives which influences the economic activities of individuals. This will become clearer when we apply these abstract ideas to concrete conditions of the present day.