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Justus Möser and the Conservative Critique of Early Modern Capitalism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2008

Jerry Z. Muller
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Extract

As Albert Hirschman has recently observed, critics and advocates of a capitalist, market economy are forever reinventing the wheel, repeating arguments made by their forebears decades and sometimes centuries ago. Take the following observations of a social critic—let his name, for the moment, remain a mystery—as he casts his gaze upon the cultural influence of the market. New forms of capitalist economic organization, he observes, have led to the disappearance of the link between ownership of property and civic responsibility. Men are so involved in acquisition, he laments, that they no longer have time for political concerns and public life. He sees an eclipse of civic virtue, a diminishing willingness to sacrifice private concerns for the public good. Changes in social structure brought about by capitalist development are no less worrisome. The process of the market is leading to the replacement of once-independent producers by men who are mere specialized cogs in a productive machine. The cultural consequences of capitalism are cause for despair. The ever-shifting, international fashions on which the market thrives are destroying authentic, indigenous culture. New forms of capitalist merchandising prosper by arousing novel desires, creating tastes for consumer goods which people do not really need, and leading to excessive expenditure which is bankrupting the economy. Most pernicious are unprecedented marketing techniques which undermine the steadying influence of the family by invading the household itself.

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Articles
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Central European History , Volume 23 , Issue 2-3 , June 1990 , pp. 153 - 178
Copyright
Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 1990

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References

1. Hirschman, Albert O., “Rival Views of Market Society,” in his Rival Views of Market Society and Other Recent Essays (New York, 1986), 105–41Google Scholar. The author wishes to thank Mack Walker and James Van Horn Melton for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.

2. All references to Möser's work are cited from the standard modern edition, Justus Mösers Sämtliche Werke: Historisch-kritische Ausgabe in 14 Bänden (Oldenburg and Berlin, 1943), hereafter cited as SW.Google Scholar

An important source on Möser's economic environment is Runge, Joachim, Justus Mösers Gewerbetheorie und Gewerbepolitik im Fürstbistum OSnabrück in der zweiten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1966).Google Scholar On those aspects of Möser's thought relating to guilds see Walker, Mack, German Home Towns: Community, State, and General Estate, 1648–1871 (Ithaca, 1971)Google Scholar, a book of great value for its conceptualization of the town and its dissolution under the pressures of the state and the capitalist economy.

Among the most uesful discussions of Möser's life and thought are those of Epstein, Klaus, Mannheim, Karl, and Knudsen, Jonathan. Perhaps the best portrait of his thought is in Klaus Epstein, The Genesis of German Conservatism (Princeton, 1966), chap. 6;Google Scholar though like Mannheim, Karl before him, in Conservatism: A Contribution to the Sociology of Knowledge, ed. Kettler, David, Meja, Volker and Stehr, Nico (London, 1987)Google Scholar, Epstein tends to underrate Möser's dissatisfaction with the status quo in Osnabrück. Mannheim's essay offers a penetrating phenomonologocal description of some facets of Möser's thought, and makes important distinctions between Möser's brand of conservatism on the one hand, and the later Romantic conservatism of Adam Müller and the völkisch conservatism of Savigny and the historical school of law on the other (161–62). Mannheim's characterization of Möser suffers, however, from a tendency to reduce (or “impute”) mentalities to classes, so that Möser's thought, since it is not representative of the purported “calculating, meticulous book-keeping mentality” of the bourgeoisie, is linked by Mannheim to the “sober” rationality of the peasant (130). Knudsen, Jonathan, Justus Möser and the German Enlightenment (Cambridge, 1986)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, is an up–to–date and invaluable source on Möser's social, economic, and polotical environment, as well as on his thought. Knudsen provides divergent overall characterizations of Möser, however, which appear to be incompatible. At one point he writes that “Möser was significant to the public debate because he recaste estatist or corporatist presuppostitions in the language of the Enlightenment and thus served as a link to traditionalist critics” (147). Here Knudsen shares the view of Epstein and others, including this author. His more frequent characterization of Möser as part of what he terms the “corporatist Enlightenment” (while an important corrective to earlier portraits which ignored the reformist side of Möser's activity) seems at odds with this evaluation, and indeed with the thrust of Möser's thought. Knudsen's general claims regarding Möser's attachment to Enlightenment values are undercut by his own evidence and analysis, which shows, for example, that Möser was antipathetic to universal social theory, which he contrasted unfavorably with the developmental logic of historical institutions (154). Knudsen briefly acknowledges Möser's many criticisms of novel social and economic trends before the French Revolution (158), but tends to downplay their significance by noting that they did not cohere into a full social theory.

3. Justi, Johann Gottlob, Die Grundfeste zu der Macht und Glückseligkeit der Staaten (Königsberg, 1760), I: 555–558, 636Google Scholar; quoted in Walker, German Home Towns, 169.

4. On the rise of this conception of governmental activity, see Raeff, Marc, The Well-Ordered Police State: Social and Institutional Change through Law in the Germanies and Russia, 1600–1800 (New Haven, 1983), chap. I, esp. 39–42.Google Scholar

5. Möser, Justus, “Der jetzige Hang zu allgemeinen Gesetzen und Verordnungen ist der gemeinen Freiheit gefährlich” (1772) in SW, 5: 22–27, 23–24.Google Scholar

6. SW, 5: 22.

7. Möser, , “Die Vortelie einer allgemeinen Landesuniforme, deklamiert von einem Bürger,” SW, 5: 58–66, at 64Google Scholar, and “Über die zu nsern Zeiten verminderte Schande der Huren und Hurkinder,” SW, 5: 142–45, 142Google Scholar. For an English translation of the latter essay, see Muller, Jerry Z., “A Conservative Critique of Enlightened Absolutist Social Policy: A Document with Commentary,” History of European Ideas 10, no. 1 (1989): 89–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8. Möser, “Es bleibt beim Alten”, SW, 4: 183–85.Google Scholar

9. In Möser's day, the terms “patriotism” was often used in this sense, to denote a commitment to the common weal, defined in local terms. See Vierhaus, Rudolf, “‘Patriotismus’—Begriff und Realität einer moralisch-politischen Haltung,” in his Deutschland im 18. Jahrhundert: Politische Verfassung, soziales Gefüge, geistige Bewegungen (Göttingen, 1987), 96–109, esp. 97, 100.Google Scholar

10. See Braudel, Fernand, The Wheels of Commerce (New York, 1982), 81–93.Google Scholar

11. Walker, Mack, “Rights and Funcations: The Social Categories of Eighteenth–Century German Jurists and Cameralists,” Journal of Modern History 50 (06, 1978): 234–51, at 243CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also the sketch of Justi's thought in Walker, German Home Towns, 161ff.

12. The following description of Osnabrück in Möser's day is drawn largely from Knudsen, Justus Möser, chaps. 2–5.

13. Runge, Justus Mösers Gewerbetheorie, 23.

14. For illuminating general descriptions of dispersed manufacture see Weber, Max, General Economic Hisory (New Brunswick, N. J., 1981), 158–61;Google ScholarLandes, David S., The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Development in Weatern Europe from 1750 to the Present (London, 1969), 44–45Google Scholar; Braudel, Wheels, 287ff. Cf. n. 54, below.

15. Runge, Justus Mösers Gewerbetheorie, 45.

16. For an excellent analysis of this distinction see Berger, Peter, Berger, Brigitte, Kellner, Hansfried, The Homeless Mind: Modernization and Consciousness (New York, 1973), 83–96.Google Scholar On the concept of honor see also Zunkel, Friedrich, “Ehre,” in Brunner, Otto and Conze, Werner, eds., Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, 2 (Stuttgart, 1975): 1–63;Google Scholar and Reiner, Hans, Die Ehre: Sichtung einer abendländischen Lebens- und Sittlichkeitsform (Darmstadt, 1956).Google Scholar

17. A translation of the text of the document forms the appendix of Walker, German Home Towns, here 440.

18. Walker, German Home Towns, 91.

19. Möser, , “Haben die Verfasser des Reichsabschiedes von 1731 wohl getan, dass sie viele Leute ehrlich gemacht haben, die es nicht waren?” SW, 4: 240–44Google Scholar; Möser, “Über die zu unsern Zeiten verminderte Schande”.

20. See for example the distinction by Adam Müller between theories based upon natural law versus the lessons of experience, discussed in Berdahl, Robert, The Politics of the Prussian Nobility: The Development of a Conservative Ideology, 1770–1848 (Princeton, 1988), 170.Google Scholar

21. On this theme see Brunner, Otto, Land und Herrschaft, 5th ed. (Vienna, 1965), 111–20Google Scholar. For a description of the control exercised by the Prussian noble over those under him see Berdahl, Politics, chaps. 2–3.

22. Walker, German Home Towns, 94ff. For a similar argument by Möser in regard to rural ranks, see “Gedanken über den westfälischen Leibeigentum”, SW, 6: 224–38; 234.Google Scholar

23. Möser, “Gedanken”, esp. 227.

24. Möser, , “Was ist bei Verwandelung der bisherigen Erbesbesetzung mit Leibeignen in eine freie Erbpacht zu beachten?” SW, 7: 263–73.Google Scholar

25. For similar contemporary sentiments by the Aufklärer Christian Garve see Van Horn Melton, James, Absolutism and the Eighteenth-Century Origins of Compulsory Schooling in Prussia and Austria (Cambridge, 1988), 148.Google Scholar

26. See, for example, “Nichts ist schädlicher als die überhandnehmende Ausheurung der Bauerhöfe,” SW, 6: 238–55Google Scholar, and Knudsen, Justus Möser, 136–37.

27. Knudsen, Justus Möser, 117; Möser, , “Vorschlag zu einer Zettelbank,” SW, 5: 278–81.Google Scholar

28. Knudsen, Justus Möser, 50–51.

29. On the centrality of this question in eighteenth-century economic policy see Kaplan, Steven L., Bread, Politics, and Political Economy in the Reign of Louis XV, 2 vols. (The Hague, 1976).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

30. Möser, , “Vorschlag, wie die Teurung des Korns am besten auszuweichen,” SW, 5: 27–35; in a similar vein,Google Scholar see “Den Verkauf der Frucht auf dem Halme ist eher zu begünstigen als einzuschränken,” SW, 5: 103–6.Google Scholar

31. Möser's proto-romanticism is emphasized by Meinecke, Friedrich, Historism: The Rise of a New Historical Outlook (New York, 1972), 276ff.Google Scholar

32. While, as we have seen, Möser defended the institution of Leibeigentum, his characteristic emphasis on the independent peasant and the urban artisan distinguished him from the ideologists of the Prussian nobility examined by Robert Berdahl, with focus on the necessity of personal Herrschaft in rural social relations.

33. Möser, , “Gedanken über den Verfall der Handlung in den Landstädten”, SW, 4: 15–28,Google Scholar and “Von dem Verfall des Handwerks in Kleinen Städten”, SW, 4: 155–77.Google Scholar

34. Braudel, Wheels, 297–349.

35. See for example Möser, , “Ein sichers Mittel, das gar zu häufige Koffeetrinken abzuschaffen,” SW, 6: 146–47.Google Scholar

36. On the mercantilist fight against the consumption of coffee and tea, see Brunschwig, Henri, Enlightenment and Romanticism in Eighteenth-Century Prussia (Chicago, 1974), 75–77.Google Scholar

37. Möser, , “Der notwendige Unterscheid zwischen dem Kaufmann und Krämer,” SW, 5: 150–54.Google Scholar

38. Möser, , “Die Vorteile einer allgemeinen Landesuniforme, deklamiert von einem Bürger,” SW, 5: 58–66, here 61.Google Scholar

39. For an exploration of this theme see Hischman, Albert O., Shifting Involvements: Private Interest and Public Action (Princeton, 1982), 46–62.Google Scholar

40. Möser, , “Klage wider die Packenträger,” SW, 4: 185–88, here 187.Google Scholar

41. On peddlers, see Braudel, Wheels, 75ff.

42. Möser, , “Klage”, SW, 4: 188.Google Scholar

43. Möser, , “Noch etwas gegen die Packen–oder Bundträger,” SW, 8: 113–19, here 117.Google Scholar

44. Möser, “Noch etwas,” 117.

45. Möser, “Klage,” 188.

46. Möser, , “Das Pro und Contra der Wochenmärkte,” SW, 5: 218–21.Google Scholar

47. Möser, , “Urteil über die Packenträger,” SW, 4: 194–97.Google Scholar

48. This was a central theme of Möser's multivolume Osnabrückische Geschichte, his Germanic version of “the Ancient Constitution” explored in its French and British versions in Pocock, J. G. A., The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law (Cambridge, 1957, 1987), chaps. 1 and 2.Google Scholar

49. Möser, , “Der Bauerhof als eine Aktie betrachtet,” SW, 6: 255–70.Google Scholar

50. Möser, , “Von dem Einfluss der Bevölkerung durch Nebenwohner auf die Gesetzgebung,” SW, 5: 11–22.Google Scholar

51. On the creation of a mass population outside of the traditional social political structure see generally Kriedte, Peter, Peasants, Landlords, and Merchant Capital: Europe and the World Economy, 1500–1800 (Leamington Spa, 1983), 148ff.Google Scholar; on the alarm it created among policy makers in central Europe see Melton, Absolutism, chaps. 5–6, esp. 119, 123ff.

52. On these demographic patterns see Melton, Absolutism, 125.

53. Möser, , “Die Frage: Ist es gut, dass die Untertanen jährlich nach Holland gehen? wird bejahet,” SW, 4: 84–97.Google Scholar

54. Möser, “Ist es gut”; see also Knudsen, Justus Möser, chap. 5. Whatever the general validity of the correlation between rural manufacture and population growth, Möser's claims regarding a causal link between the two corresponds closely to the model posited by Medick, Hans in Kriedte, Peter, Medick, Hans, and Schlumbohm, Jürgen, Industrialization before Industrialization: Rural Industry in the Genesis of Capitalism (Cambridge, 1981), 54ffGoogle Scholar. The generalizability and empirical validity of the processes described by Medick have been called into question by Linde, Hans, “Proto–Industrialisierung: Zur Justierung eines neuen Leitbegriffs der sozialgeschichtlichen Forschung,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft 6 (1980): 103–24, and byGoogle ScholarSchremmer, Eckart, “Indus–trialisierung vor der Industrialisierung: Anmerkungen zu einem Konzept der Proto-Industrial-isierung,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft 6 (1980): 420–48Google Scholar. The pattern which Möser describes appears to have been widespread in northwestern Europe, and does account for the increase in population in some areas, though some areas without cottage industry also grew in population, indicating that the spread of rural industry canot be used as a general explanation of the eighteenth-century population rise. For a sceptical overview of the literature on Proto-industrialization see the informative review article by Houston, Rab and Snell, K. D. M., “Proto-industrialization? Cottage Industry, Social Change, and Industrial Revolution”, Historical Journal 27, no. 2 (1984): 473–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

55. Möser, “Ist es gut,” 94.

56. Möser, , “Vorschlag, wie die gar zu starke Bevölkerung im Stifte einzuschränken,” SW, 8: 299–300.Google Scholar

57. Möser, “Von dem Einflusse”, 20–21.

58. Möser, , “Etwas zur Verbesserung der Armenanstalten,” SW, 4: 68–73.Google Scholar

59. Möser, “Vorschlag,” 299–300.

60. “Die moralischen Vorteile der Landplagen,” SW, 5: 37–40.

61. On this aspect of Möser's thought, see Greiffenhagen, Martin, Das Dilemma des Konservatismus in Deutschland, 2d ed. (Munich, 1977), 51–61.Google Scholar

62. Möser, “Die Vorteile einer allgemeinen Landesuniforme, deklamiert von einem Bürger,” 58–66.

63. On the history and development of the civic virtue critique of liberalism and capitalism see Weintraub, Jeff A., “Virtue, Community and the Sociology of Liberty: The Notion of Republican Virtue and Its Impact on Modern Western Social Thought” (Ph. D. diss., Berkeley, Calif., 1979);Google Scholar and the works of Pocock, J. G. A., especially The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princeton, 1975),Google Scholar and “Between Gog and Magog: Republicanism and the Ideologia Americana,” Journal of the History of Ideas (1987), 325–46.

64. Möser, “Vorteile,” 59.

65. Möser, , “Von dem Verfall Handwerks in Kleinen Städten,” SW, 4: 155–77; 168–69.Google Scholar

66. Möser, “Vorteilr,” 65–66. Möser's scheme for uniforms as emblems of social honor superficially resembles the contemporaneous suggestions of the bourgeois Frenchman whose conception of Montpellier is explored in Darnton, Robert, The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History (New York, 1984), 134–45.Google Scholar Both eighteenth–century observers were troubled by the decline of clear conceptions of social hierarchy. But while the status-minded observer of Montpellier sought badges and uniforms as an antidote to the blurring of boundaries between existing orders, Möser sought to butterss the status of precommercial strata and create new honorific distinctions to revive civic virtue, which he perceived as decayed by the values of the market.

67. On both of these differences, see the discussion in Mannheim, Conservatism, 161–62.

68. For examples from one of the most articulate radical conservatives in the Weimar Republic, see Muller, Jerry Z., The Other God that Failed: Hans Freyer and the Deradicalization of German Conservatism (Princeton, 1987), passim and esp. chap. 3.Google Scholar