Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 16 - From Marx to Mao

428V. I. LENINlarge-scale production. Recently, in an article entitled “Tendenciesin Agrarian Evolution in Germany” published inEkonomist Rossii 148 No. 36 of September 11, 1910, ProfessorVobly, on the basis of the data of the 1907 census,tried to refute the applicability to agriculture of “the schemeelaborated by Marx in relation to the development of industry”149 and to prove that “small enterprises not only do notperish in the struggle against large ones in the sphere of agriculture;on the contrary, each new census registers theirsuccess”.We think, therefore, it would be opportune to analysein detail the data of the 1907 census. True, the publicationof the materials of this census is not yet complete; threevolumes containing all the data of the census* have appeared,but a fourth volume devoted to an “exposition ofthe results of the census as a whole” has not yet appearedand it is not known whether it will appear soon. But thereare no grounds for postponing a study of the results of thecensus until this concluding volume has appeared, for allthe material is already available, as well as the summaryof it, and it is being widely used in the press.We shall merely note that to put the question in the formin which it is usually put, confining oneself almost exclusivelyto a comparison of the number of farms of varioussizes (in area) and the amount of land they possessed in variousyears, is an absolutely incorrect approach to the subject.The real differences between the Marxists and the opponentsof Marxism on the agrarian question are muchmore deeply rooted. If the aim is to give a complete explanationof the sources of the differences, then attention must bedevoted primarily and most of all to the question of the basicfeatures of the capitalist system of modern agriculture. Itis just on this question that the data of the German censusof June 12, 1907, are particularly valuable. This census* Statistik des Deutschen Reichs, Band 212, Teil 1 a, 1 b and 2 a.Berufs- und Betriebszählung vom 12. Juni 1907. LandwirtschaftlicheBetriebsstatistik, Berlin 1909 und 1910. (Statistics of the GermanState, Vol. 212, Part 1 a, 1 b and 2 a. Census of occupations and enterprisesof June 12, 1907. Statistics of agricultural production, Berlin,1909 and 1910.—Ed.)