Petty Production in Agriculture

This is Lenin’s article on the peasant question. It was written on June 7, 1913 and published in Workers’ Pravda issue No.5 on July 18, 1913. The Chinese translation is included in Vol. 23 of the second revised edition of Complete Works of Lenin.

Firstly, Lenin pointed out the importance of clarifying the peasant issue. The peasant issue in modern capitalist countries has become a central focus. This issue was also the most-frequently doubted issue by Marxists and would most easily bring attacks from bourgeois political economics to Marxism.

Secondly, Lenin pointed out that there were two different views on small-scale production and on peasants in modern capitalist countries. Lenin argued that under the capitalist system, it was inevitable that small-scale agricultural production would perish. In order to make a living, peasants would inevitably become hired workers. However, Narodniks and opportunists argued that under the capitalist system, small-scale agricultural production was viable and more profitable than large-scale production.

Thirdly, Lenin proved Marxist views are correct and revealed the erroneous views of the bourgeois political economists. He used materials about women workers in agriculture in Austria and Germany to analyze, compare and explain the defects of small-scale production, showing that the composition of labor force in small-scale production is much worse than that in capitalist large-scale production. He thus revealed the fact that small-scale agricultural production cannot compete with capitalist and socialized large-scale production.