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

THE DEVELOPMENT OF CAPITALISM IN RUSSIA
557
muzhik’s ruin a source of business is becoming increasingly
profitable.
But let us return to our immediate theme. As we see, the
data indicate an enormous growth of commodity circulation
and capital accumulation. How the field for the employment
of capital in all branches of the national economy was
created and how merchant’s capital was transformed into
industrial capital, i.e., was directed into production and
created capitalist relationships between those taking
part in production, has been shown above.
II. THE GROWTH OF THE COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL
POPULATION
We have stated above that the growth of the industrial
population at the expense of the agricultural is a
requisite phenomenon of every capitalist society. In what
way the separation of industry from agriculture steadily
takes place has also been examined, and now all that
remains is to sum up on this question.
1) T h e G r o w t h o f t h e T o w n s
The most striking expression of the process under examination
is the growth of the towns. Here are data on this
growth in European Russia (50 gubernias) in the post-
Reform period*:
* For 1863 the figures are from the Statistical Chronicle (I, 1866)
and the Military Statistical Abstract. The figures of the urban population
of the Orenburg and Ufa gubernias have been corrected according
to the tables of towns. That is why our figure for the total urban
population is 6,105,100 and not 6,087,100 as given in the Military
Statistical Abstract.—For 1885 the data are from Returns
for Russia for 1884-85.—For 1897 the figures are those of the returns
of the census of January 28, 1897. (First General Census of the Population
of the Russian Empire, 1897, Central Statistical Committee,
St. Petersburg, 1897 and 1898, Pts. 1 and 2.) The permanent urban
population, according to the 1897 census, was 11,830,500, i.e., 12.55%.
We have taken the existing population of the towns.—Let us observe
that we cannot vouch for the figures for 1863, 1885 and 1897 being
absolutely uniform and comparable. For that reason we limit our
comparison to the most general proportions and give the data for the
big towns separately.