Socialism, Utopian and Scientific

Socialism, Utopian and Scientific is by Friedrich Engels, translated by Edward Aveling. A prefatory note says the book ranks with the Communist Manifesto as one of the indispensable books for anyone desiring to understand the modern socialist movement. The text divides the history of industrial production since the Middle Ages into three periods, among them handicraft with small master craftsmen and modern industry, where the product is produced by machinery driven by power.

The author says he is perfectly aware that the contents of this work will meet with objection from a considerable portion of the British public. A quoted passage says that the working part of a population of 2,500 persons was daily producing as much real wealth for society as, less than half a century before, it would have required the working part of a population of 600,000 to create. The text states that the possibility of securing for every member of society, by means of socialized production, an existence guaranteeing to all the free development and exercise of their physical and mental faculties is now for the first time here.