Free Development of Man

The self-conscious, voluntary, and free development of human as a subject is the development of human as an end in itself and at its own disposal. Marx and Engels clearly put forth the viewpoint of human’s free development in The Communist Manifesto: “When, in the course of development, class distinctions have disappeared, and all production has been concentrated in the hands of a vast association of the whole nation, the public power will lose its political character.” Political rule, in its original sense is the organized violence used by one class to oppress another. “In place of the old bourgeois society, with its classes and class antagonism, we shall have an association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all”. This offers a brilliant description of the coincidence of social development and individual development, collective freedom and individual freedom in the future communist society, in which social freedom cannot be used to suppress individual freedom, nor can individual freedom be emphasized one-sidedly to the extent of hindering or undermining social freedom, and takes this as one of the fundamental differences between the new social union and the old society, which developed in class antagonism in the past; and also transcends the opposition between socialism and individualism in terms of value orientation, and distinguishes scientific socialism from anarchism, which absolutizes individual freedom, and focuses on measuring the level of development of the human subject as a whole from the degree of free development of individual subjects, holding that the free development of each individual precisely indicates that external forces have been harnessed by the autonomous activities of man, and that individuals as well as mankind as a whole have truly become masters of their own relations.

Marx and Engels pointed out in The German Ideology that the free development of the individual cannot be separated from the definite social and historical conditions, the individual can develop himself only to the extent permitted by the definite particular socio-historical conditions in which he lives, so as to realize the freedom that his time may achieve. These conditions of existence are, of course, only the productive forces and forms of intercourse at any particular time.

The realization of free development of man depends on material and cultural conditions, as well as on social relations determined by economic relations. The extent to which people can freely satisfy their material needs depends fundamentally on the abundance of material means of life provided by material production. At the same time, the development of people's abilities is determined only by man’s material existence, and the development level of material production directly restricts the development of people’s abilities. The nature and condition of the social relations in which people live are different, so the restrictions and influences on the development of man, and ultimately men’s actual possibilities for realizing the free development are different. The free development of human is a dialectical process full of contradictions, and its realization is a gradual process. The free development of man is not and abstract or remote process; it is not only a future social ideal; it is also progressing gradually in reality; it is both inevitable and necessary, a real and gradual process.

Marx vividly described the scene of “full and free development of man” in the communist society in a vivid language: “In communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, herdsman or critic.” Abolishing private property, developing productive forces and eliminating the forced and fixed old division of labor are the only way to overcome estrangement and make everyone have enough free time to spend, which is the only way to “free development of every individual”.