PREFACE
This book, although it stands by itself, is designed to be the first of a series forming together a general history of Socialist thought. It covers, roughly, the years from
1789 to the middle of the nineteenth century; but even within the limits of space which I have set myself, it obviously leaves out some things which belong to that period.
The biggest of these omissions is that of Russian Socialism — from Pestel’s projects of land nationalisation in the 1820s to Belinsky, Herzen, and Bakunin, who were all active well before 1850.
This omission is deliberate, and will be made good in the second volume. I found it more convenient to postpone discussion of Herzen and Bakunin in order to be able to link
them directly with later developments — Herzen with Chernishevsky and the Narodniks, and Bakunin with the struggles which split the First International and with the development of Anarchism.
As against these omissions, I have carried the story of a number of thinkers with whom I have dealt in the present volume a long way beyond 1850. Blanqui and Proudhon
are outstanding instances. In the case of Marx and Engels, on the other hand, I have tried to deal only with the earlier phases, leaving the later development of their thought to be
discussed in connection with the movements which they created or influenced in the second half of the century.
Thus, no full exposition of Marxism is attempted in this volume, which stops short, not quite at the Communist Manifesto , but at the dissolution of the Communist League after the eclipse of the European revolutionary movement at the beginning of the 1850s.
I wish to make it clear that this book is not meant to be a history of Socialism, but only of Socialist thought, with such references to actual movements as are necessary to explain the thought. Indeed, the writing of a comprehensive history of Socialism would be an impossible task for any single author, and would have to be on a much bigger scale than anything I have in mind to write — or should have, even if I possessed the requisite knowledge. Even within the more modest limits of what I am attempting I am very conscious of my shortcomings. I have no Russian, almost no Spanish, very little
Italian, and not much German; and I hate reading German, and avoid it whenever I can. I tend therefore to use English or French translations of works in these languages where they exist, and to refer to German originals of translated works only when I want to be sure a passage has not been wrongly rendered. I also tend to take my German material much more at second hand, where translations do not exist, than either English or French writings; and I expect my more expert readers will easily discover this for themselves, though I hope I have not allowed myself to be led badly astray.
The second volume of this work is already half in draft. Besides picking up the omitted Russian pioneers, it deals mainly with the later phases of Marxism up to the rise of the
various Social Democratic Parties in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, with the First International, the Paris Commune, and the split between Marxists, Anarchists, and
those, such as the British Fabians and Independent Labourites, who were neither, and also with the continental developments of Christian Social doctrine after 1850 and with the peculiarly German movement often called ‘Academic Socialism’, or ‘Socialism of the Chair’. I mention these facts because they help to explain the omission from the present volume of a number of non-Russian Socialists who had begun to be active well before 1850 — for example, Rodbertus, Lassalle, and von Ketteler in Germany, Colins, Kats, and de Kayser in Belgium, and some of the Italian and Spanish pioneers.
In connection with the present volume, I have a number of obligations to acknowledge. The greatest of all is to my colleague, Isaiah Berlin, who has read the whole book in
proof and has helped me to improve it greatly in accordance with his admirably sagacious criticisms. I also owe valuable suggestions to my colleagues, Dr. H. G. Schenk and John
Plamenatz, who read a number of chapters and put me right in not a few places where I had gone wrong. I am also most grateful to my brother-in-law, Raymond Postgate, and to
my friend, H. L. Beales, for the loan of books which I should have not found it easy to obtain elsewhere ; and, as always, I owe a great deal to the untiring help of my secretary, Rosamund Broadley, who, by a miracle, can read my writing and forgive
me for it.
My wife I am in debt to so often that I usually end by not thanking her at all.
G. D. H. Cole
All Souls College, Oxford
July 1952
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