the cause of every evil in the
fact that its opponent, instead of itself, is at the helm of the
State. Even the radical and revolutionary politicians seek the cause
of the evil not in the essence of the State, but in a specific form of
the State, which they aim at replacing by another State form.

From the political standpoint, the State and the institution of
society are not two separate things. The State is the institution of
society. So far as the State recognizes social evils, it attributes
them either to natural laws, which are amenable to no human power, or
to the defects of private life, which is independent of the State, or
in the futility of the administration which is dependent on it. Thus
England finds poverty to be grounded in the natural law according to
which the population is always bound to overstep the means of
subsistence. According to another side, it explains pauperism from the
wicked dispositions of the poor, just as the King of Prussia explained
it from the unchristian sentiment of the rich, and just as the
Convention explained it from the counter-revolutionary and suspicious
dispositions of the property owners. England therefore punishes the
poor, the King of Prussia exhorts the rich, and the Convention
decapitates the property owners.

Finally, all States seek the cause of social evil in accidental or
deliberate defects of administration, and therefore look to
administrative measures for the remedy. Why? Just because the
administration is the organized activity of the State.

The State cannot abolish the contradiction between the intentions and
the good will of the administration, on the one hand, and its
expedients and its resources, on the other hand, without abolishing
itself, for it is based upon this contradiction. It is based upon the
contradiction between public and private life, upon the contradiction
between the general interest and individual interests. The
administration is therefore obliged to confine itself to a formal and
negative activity, for its power ceases where middle-class life and
its work begin. Yes, as against the consequences which spring from the
unsocial nature of this middle-class life, this private property, this
trade, this industry, this mutual plundering of various middle-class
circles, as against these consequences impotence is the natural law of
the administration.

For this dismemberment, this slavery of middle-class society, is the
natural foundation upon