Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 3 - From Marx to Mao

THE DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM IN RUSSIA
249
We assert, the Narodnik theory notwithstanding, that
the “peregrination” of the workers not only yields “purely
economic” advantages to the workers themselves, but in
general should be regarded as progressive; that public
attention should not be directed towards replacing outside
employments by local “occupations close at hand,” but, on
the contrary, towards removing all the obstacles in the way
of migration, towards facilitating it in every way, towards
improving and reducing the costs of all conditions of the
workers’ travel, etc. The grounds for our assertion are as
follows:
1) “Purely economic” advantage accrues to the workers
from “peregrination” in that they go to places where wages
are higher, where their position as seekers of employment is
a more advantageous one. Simple as this argument is, it is too
often forgotten by those who love to rise to a higher, allegedly
“national-economic” point of view.
2) “Peregrination” destroys bonded forms of hire and
labour-service.
Let us recall, for example, that formerly, when migration
was little developed, the southern landowners (and other
employers) readily resorted to the following system of
hiring labourers: they sent their agents to the northern
gubernias and (through the medium of rural officials) hired
tax-defaulters on terms extremely disadvantageous to the
latter.* Those offering employment consequently enjoyed the
advantage of free competition, but those seeking it did not.
We have quoted instances of the peasant’s readiness to
flee from labour-service and bondage even to the mines.
It is not surprising, therefore, that on the question of
“peregrination” our agrarians go hand in hand with the
Narodniks. Take Mr. S. Korolenko, for example. In his book
he quotes numerous opinions of landlords in opposition to
the “migration” of workers, and adduces a host of “arguments”
against “outside employments”: “dissipation,”
* Shakhovskoi, loc. cit., 98 and foll. The author cites even the
list of “fees” paid to clerks and village elders for the hire of peasants
on advantageous terms.—Tezyakov: loc. cit., 65.—Trirogov The
Village Community and the Poll Tax; article entitled “Bondage in the
National Economy.”