is often worth while,
because it tends to weaken unionism; but it cannot be regarded as a
cure for industrial ills, because it is a remedy of uncertain value,
and at best is not based on the principle of industrial democracy.

205. =Principles for the Solution of the Industrial Problem.=--Three
principles contend for supremacy in all discussions and efforts to
solve the industrial problem. The first is the doctrine of _employer's
control_. This is the old principle that governed industrial relations
until governmental legislation and trade-union activity compelled a
recognition of the worker's rights. By that principle the capitalist
and the laborer are free to work together or to fight each other, to
make what arrangements they can about wages, hours, and health
conditions, to share in profits if the employer is kindly disposed,
but always with labor in a position of subordination and without
recognized rights, as in the old political despotisms, which were
sometimes benevolent but more often ruthless. Only the selfish,
stubborn capitalist expects to see such a system permanently restored.

The second principle is the doctrine of _collective control_. This
theory is a natural reaction from the other, but goes to an opposite
extreme. It is the theory of the syndicalist, who prefers to smash
machinery before he takes control, and of the socialist, who contents
himself with declaring the right of the worker to all productive
property, and agitates peacefully for the abolition of the wage system
in favor of a working man's commonwealth. The socialist blames the
wage system for all the evils of the present industrial order, regards
the trade-unions as useful industrial agencies of reform, but urges a
resort to the ballot as a necessary means of getting control of
industry. There would come first the socialization of natural
resources and transportation systems, then of public utilities and
large industries, and by degrees the socialization of all industry
would become complete. Then on a democratic basis the workers would
choose their industrial officers, arrange their hours, wages, and
conditions of labor, and provide for the needs of every individual
without exploitation, overexertion, or lack of opportunity to work.
Serious objections are made to this programme for productive
enterprise on the ground of the difficulty of effecting the transfer
of the means of production and exchange, and of executive management
withou