THE
POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.
NOVEMBER, 1881.
| THE INDUSTRIAL TYPE OF SOCIETY.[1] |
By HERBERT SPENCER.
HAVING nearly always to defend themselves against external enemies, while they have to carry on internally the processes of sustentation, societies, as remarked in the last chapter, habitually present us with mixtures of the structures adapted to these diverse ends. Disentanglement is not easy. According as either structure predominates, it ramifies through the other: instance the fact that, where the militant type is much developed, the worker, ordinarily a slave, is no more a free agent than the soldier; while, where the industrial type is much developed, the soldier, volunteering on specified terms, acquires, in so far, the position of a free worker. In the one case the system of status, proper to the fighting part, pervades the working part; while, in the other, the system of contract, proper to the working part, affects the fighting part. Especially does the organization adapted to war obscure that adapted to industry. While, as we have seen, the militant type, as theoretically constructed, is so far displayed in many societies as to leave no doubt about its essential nature, the industrial type has its traits so hidden by those of the still dominant militant type that its ideal form is nowhere more than very partially exemplified. Saying thus much to exclude expectations which can not be fulfilled, it will be well, before proceeding, also to exclude probable misconceptions.
In the first place, industrialism must not be confounded with industriousness. Though the members of an industrially-organized society are habitually industrious, and are, indeed, when the society is a developed one, obliged to be so, yet it must not be assumed that the industrially-organized society is one in which, of necessity, much work
- ↑ Part XI of the series on "The Development of Political Institutions."
