Property; a free working class; and Competition. Private property in the means of production is, of course, at the foundation of the capitalist system as it is of all societies divided into classes. In this it does not differ from other class-societies which preceded it. Not so with the other two elements. They were almost unknown to the social systems which preceded it, but are absolutely essential to capitalism. We have already seen how important a role competition plays in the realization and distribution of the surplus-value among the members of the capitalist class. It also plays an important part in determining the relative amount of the surplus in all the values that are produced, as we shall have occasion to see later.
This however, depends on the third element, the free working-class. The working-class in order to serve as an efficient instrument of capitalist production must be absolutely free. "Free," as Marx says, both from personal bondage and from the ties of property. Were the workingmen to be burdened with property the whole edifice of capitalism would be impossible, for the commodity labor-power would then be absent from the market and the possession of the necessary and surplus-value would then be united in the same person, which would extinguish all difference between them. Production of commodities would also be next to impossible were the workingmen not free personally so as to be able to sell their labor-power to the highest bidder. Competition among the producers would then be impossible. For competition implies equality of opportunity, whereas under such conditions the opportunity of production would depend on the possession of workingmen. Besides, production or abstention from production would then depend not on the choice of the capitalist but on the number of workingmen he possessed. He could not produce if he possessed none, and would be compelled to produce if he possessed them. For it is of the essence of a slave that he must be fed, and consequently worked. The presence of these three elements together turns the
