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

THE DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM IN RUSSIA
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Gubernia). A comparison of the different uyezds shows the
most highly industrialised ones to be marked by the lowest
percentage of locally-born workers. For example, in the
poorly industrialised Mozhaisk and Volokolamsk uyezds
from 92 to 93% of the factory workers are natives of the uyezd
where they work. In the very highly industrialised Moscow,
Kolomna and Bogorodsk uyezds the percentage of locallyborn
workers drops to 24%, 40% and 50%. From this the
investigators draw the conclusion that “the considerable
development of factory production in an uyezd encourages
the influx of outside elements.”* These facts show also (let
us add) that the movement of industrial workers bears the
same features that we observed in the movement of agricultural
workers. That is to say, industrial workers, too, migrate
not only from localities where there is a surplus of labour,
but also from those where there is a shortage. For example,
the Bronnitsi Uyezd attracts 1,125 workers from other uyezds
of Moscow Gubernia and from other gubernias, while at the
same time providing 1,246 workers for the more highly
industrialised Moscow and Bogorodsk uyezds. Hence, workers
leave not only because they do not find “local occupations
at hand,” but also because they make for the places where
conditions are better. Elementary as this fact is, it is worth
while giving the Narodnik economists a further reminder of
it, for they idealise local occupations and condemn
migration to industrial districts, ignoring the progressive
significance of the mobility of the population created by
capitalism.
The above-described characteristic features which distinguish
large-scale machine industry from the preceding
forms of industry may be summed up in the words—socialisation
of labour. Indeed, production for an enormous
national and international market, development of close
commercial ties with various parts of the country and with
different countries for the purchase of raw and auxiliary
materials, enormous technical progress, concentration of
production and of the population in colossal enterprises,
demolition of the worn-out traditions of patriarchal life,
* Statistical Returns for Moscow Gubernia, Sanitary Statistical
Section, Vol. IV, Sec. I (Moscow, 1890), p. 240.