The Origin of The Family, Private
Property, and the State
A Summary
The origin, written by Friedrich Engels, is
significantly based on Karl Marx’s notes from the book Ancient Society: Researches in the Lines of
Human Progress from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization by Lewis
Henry Morgan, an American anthropologist.
After his death, Marx’s notes were picked up by Engels who
transformed them into The Origin. It is important to remember that The Origin is composed of the thoughts
of many people as Engels was influenced by many. Engels was influenced by Marx and Morgan as
mentioned before, but he’s also influenced by Bachofen, who wrote Mother Right and believed in the
historical change of the sexes to monogamy.
Engels was also influenced by J.F. McLennan who was regarded as the
pioneer of developing a history of the family.
Engels’
Origin of the Family, like Morgan’s Ancient Society, subdivides human history
into three stages: savagery, barbarism, and civilization. These stages are divided according to the
progress made in food production: namely hunter gatherer societies under
savagery, horticultural societies under barbarism, and commodity production
under civilization. The progress made in
food production led to changes in the social organization of society; this is a
materialistic explanation of society where society’s production (the production
of the means of existence: food, shelter, tools) & society’s reproduction
(the propagation of the species) determines society’s social organization. Increases in food production over the three
stages of human history led to changes in the social organization of kinship
arrangements which are built upon differing arrangements of marriage. Increases in food production over the stages
also led to different social organizations of the division of labor, the rise
of surplus production, and the gentile constitution giving way to the
state. Another important aspect of these
stages are the gens, which was a kinship organization based on blood relation
with descent recognized from the female line.
The gens was also bound together through religious and social
institutions between whom marriage was prohibited. The gens is based on matrilineal descent due
to the fact that women are more easily identified as the biological mother as
they literally carry the next generation.
The
economic base of society (production) determines the superstructure of society
(the family); this is a materialistic explanation of society. As the economic base of society increased in
wealth due to the increase of production, the family is transformed into the
monogamous family. In other words the
amassing of property or surplus (the mode of production or the economic base of
society) broke up the gens, replacing it with the modern single monogamous
family (the superstructure of society) dominated by private property, social
classes, and the state.
The
three stages of human history begins with Savagery. Savagery, or what modern anthropology refers
to as hunter gatherer society, was dominated by group marriage, the gens with
matrilineal kinship, and equality between women and men where the sexes had a
‘natural’ division of labor. According
to Engels, this ‘natural’ division of labor is a sexual division of labor which
proclaims that women naturally own the household, having real supremacy over
her own labor within the household. Men,
on the other hand, naturally own the instruments of productive labor which are
responsible for the ‘productive work’ of obtaining and producing food. The stage of savagery experienced two types
of group marriage: the consanguine family and the punaluan family. Both the consanguine family and punaluan
family had prearranged marriages decided before birth where whole groups of men
and women mutually possess one another in marriage. The first stage of the family is the
consanguine family, which excludes marriage between parents and children (i.e.
exclusion of marriage between generations) but not among brothers, sisters and
cousins who are all held together in group marriage. The consanguine family gives way to the
punaluan family, which is the second stage of the family and prevents brothers,
sisters, and cousins from marrying. Due
to this exclusion of marriage among sisters, brothers, and cousins within the
punaluan family, the gens develops where descent is recognized through the
mother. The gens separates brothers and
sisters into different families.
The
second stage of human history is Barbarism, which is comparable to
horticultural or pastoral societies. The
third stage of the family, the pairing family, comes to fruition under
Barbarism where marriage is decided by the parents and prohibits marriage among
all relatives, ending group marriage for good.
The pairing marriage is between one unrelated woman with one unrelated
man, giving men a better warrant of paternity but still not passing down
inheritance to the man’s children. While
group marriage comes to a close under Barbarism and ends group marriage as the
pairing marriage rises, the gens with matrilineal descent still lives on
becoming common to all, leaves men with better paternity, and is characterized
by the supremacy of women since women were all from the same gens under one
family while men were separated into the different families of the women.
Barbarism
is also the beginning of animal domestication and the origin of agriculture,
which coincides with the transition from the pairing family to the monogamous
family as they are connected through a materialist explanation where increases
in production lead to changes in the superstructure, the family. In the eastern hemisphere of the world animal
domestication becomes prominent, while the western hemisphere is dominated by
agriculture. This is where the two
hemispheres of the world split from each other into different stages of human
history. The eastern hemisphere marched
on through Barbarism and on into Civilization, while the western hemisphere
becomes inert, remaining in Barbarism until the eastern hemisphere conquered
the west. This stagnation of the west is
due to the lack of animals capable of being domesticated. In the east, however, animal domestication
flourished, increasing production as domesticated herds aided in the process of
crop production. This increase in
production included all branches, i.e. cattle raising, agriculture, domestic
handicrafts. This increase in production
lead to a crop surplus and created a regular exchange system. This crop surplus of the east resulted in the
first great social division of labor where pastoral societies separated from
the rest of the barbarians or from the Barbarism Stage and transitioned into
Civilization. As an increase in production
due to the labor of domesticated animals lead to an increase in surplus, new
labor forces were needed to maintain this growth in production. Slavery became the answer to maintaining
growth in production and became functional within society unlike never
before. Before, slavery was worthless as
human labor power couldn’t before produce a surplus. As slavery became functional within society,
it produced the first great cleavage of society into classes where there were
masters and there were slaves; one group was composed of exploiters while the
other was exploited for their surplus producing labor. Also, for the first time, wars were waged as
a regular industry for the sole purpose of plunder to gain their property for
wealth. Domesticated animals were passed
out of the common ownership of the gens and into the ownership of individual
heads of families as a cleavage of society into classes can’t maintain a
harmonized or coherent society like the gens.
Barbarism
began with the pairing family where men and women were still relatively equal,
but, with a surplus in production, a transition to monogamy ensued. Therefore, this is a materialistic
explanation where a change in the production with the beginning of a surplus
(the material basis for the change) affected the superstructure of society: the
family. The family began the transition
to monogamy due to the economic changes in production. This revolution of the family to monogamy
only occurred in the east, not the west until eastern intervention. This revolution of the family is constructed
from the first ‘natural’ division of labor between the sexes. In other words, the already-in-place
‘natural’ division of labor guided how the family was constructed. Men have always acquired the necessities of
life owning and producing the means of production, while women utilize the
products produced by men in order to run the household which they own. The ‘natural’ division of labor doesn’t cause
the transition to monogamy (a surplus owned by the men does) but it sets the
stage for an altered form of the family.
As men have always owned the means of production, they inherited the
domesticated animals and slaves as they are both tool of production. Women don’t own the domesticated animals and
slaves; their realm of ownership is within the household, which was at first
considered as equally important as owning the means of production. As stated before, domesticated animals and
slaves produced a surplus, which became the property of men, not women. Women still enjoyed the surplus created from
animal production by men, but they didn’t own it. In other words, the ‘natural’ division of
labor between men and women stayed the same, but it structured the division of
property between women and men as men solely owned the new property of the
cattle and slaves which produced a surplus.
Therefore, men alone owned the surplus, giving men an advantage over
women as they had more wealth which created unequal power between men and
women. With this advantage, men
overthrew the matriarchal gens and replaced it with the single monogamous
family based on male inheritance as we now know today. This was done by men in order to put in place
a system of male lineage where their male children inherited the surplus and the
surplus producing property of domesticated animals and slaves. The transition to monogamy and the abolition
of the gens was a step taken by men due to their exploitive position. The surplus they gained through slaves and
domesticated animals increased their wealth and amplified their position over
women within the family. With this
leverage over women, men overthrew the gens in order to secure inheritance
rights for their children, passing inheritance on through the male line instead
of the female line. Ever since the
overthrow of the gens, women have been degraded to the servitude of men,
becoming instruments of reproduction to ensure the paternity and inheritance
rights of his children.
During
the ending of Barbarism the second social division of labor occurs where
handicraft production is separated from agricultural production. This leads to commodity production where
production is no longer for use by producers but is directly exchanged for
money or cattle which acts in the place of money. In other words, production becomes no longer
used by the producer, but is now exchanged for cattle and later money. Slavery now becomes essential to society
where freemen and slaves become the new cleavage of class society. Since there are inequalities in property
ownership among the men in individual heads of families, it breaks up
communities, leading to the erosion of kinship and the movement of people no
longer bound to their territory. The
transition to private property due to a surplus in production (the economic
base) leads to changes to the single monogamous family (the superstructure).
This
now brings us to the stage of civilization: the current stage of human
history. Civilization is characterized
by the monogamous single family, commodity production with exchange between
individuals, and the state which overthrew the gentile constitution of previous
times. Civilization only developed in
the eastern hemisphere, until it was brought into the west during colonization. Civilization is dominated by the monogamous
family, the fourth stage of the family.
Under the monogamous family, marriage is decided by economics as the
single family is the economic unit in society.
The monogamous family is based on male supremacy as monogamy is used to
subjugate women who are used to produce children with undisputable paternity in
order to pass down the property of domesticated animals and slaves through the
male line. Before both women and men’s
tasks were social and public (women upheld the communistic household while men
produced food communistically), but, under the monogamous family, the household
lost its public character, moving into the private sector where women were
excluded from public production. While
the term monogamy implies sex with only one other person, the ‘monogamous’
family is actually supplemented by adultery and prostitution. This is because marriage is predominately
decided by economics, which makes it a matter of convenience and not a matter
of love. The monogamous family didn’t
develop due to matters of sex love but due to economic reasons where men could
pass down private property through the male line.
Civilization
also leads to the third great social division of labor where the merchants were
born. The merchants became the mediators
between the producers, creating a division between those who direct production
(the merchants) and those who execute production (the producers). The merchants’ primary concern is with exchanging
products for profit, not with production.
This third social division of labor led to periodical trade crises;
metallic money as an instrument of domination of the non-producer over the
producer; loans leading to interest; wealth in commodities, increases in
slaves, money, and land; the concentration and centralization of wealth
increasing mass impoverishment; and the breaking up of the settled conditions
of life from the repeated shifting and changing of residence due to the
pressure of trade, alteration of occupation, and changes in ownership of land.
As
stated previously, the state comes to dominate society with the birth of
civilization replacing the old gentile constitution of previous stages of human
history. The gentile constitution was a
social institution that divided society based on the gens and was for the will
of the people requiring members to be settled in the same territory. Division of labor under the gentile
constitution is based on the ‘natural’ division of labor where only the sexes
are divided, each the master in their own sphere and owning the instruments of
their labor. Under this system, there
are no poor or slaves, no ruler reigning over the people, and no complicated
administrative apparatus. All are equal
and free with no difference between rights and duties among people. As the state took over society due to the
sale and purchase of land and the progressive division of labor, the gentile
constitution sank to the level of private associations and religious
bodies. The state came from the material
need to support and maintain the new system of the monogamous family where men
owned private property (i.e. the surplus producing slaves and domesticated
animals, the money, etc.).
The
state is a machine for the plundering, oppression, and domination of others in
order to protect the possessing class against the non-possessing class to
secure riches and sanctify the private property of men, classes, and male
privilege. The state requires many
features in order to function. First, it
requires people be grouped on the basis of territory where traditional kinship
is eroded in order to break people apart into classes. Territory becomes heterogeneous where slaves,
citizens, and foreigners all coincide in the same territory. The state also requires an armed public force
consisting of an army, prisons, a police force, and other coercive
institutions. This armed public force is
separated from the masses of the people, serving state authorities not the
people as it’s impossible to have a people’s army because of the cleavage of
society into classes. Third, the state
needs class opposition and division where the privileged have the rights and
the unprivileged have the duties of society, setting people against each other
in classes. Fourth, the state
necessitates an alienating power standing above the warring classes of society
in order to suppress open conflict and keep it within the bounds of ‘order’
letting the classes fight it out on an economic level. Fifth, the state needs taxes to maintain the
armed public force, which inevitably leads to state debt as it’s never enough.
Engels
proposes society is moving towards a fifth stage of the family which I’ve
termed the egalitarian family where marriage is decided by ‘sex love.’ Previously, marriage was decided before birth
under group marriages, by parents under the pairing family, and by economics
under the monogamous family of civilization.
The monogamous family still holds true even today as marriage is still
linked with material economic wellbeing (i.e. women still marry men as a
security measure where our culture is pervaded by the idea that women need men
in order to survive economically).
Engels argues that society’s production, the economic base of society,
will eventually lead to the development of social property instead of private
property. Private property with its
ownership over land, animals, slaves, and money is the economic foundations of
the monogamous family and the material conditions for the existence of
patriarchy. Engels argues that with a
social revolution of society’s production into social property, monogamy will
be truly realized. This social
revolution will transform the means of production into social property where
women can prosper economically without the security of men. The labor of women will leave the private
sector of society and will no longer be excluded from social production; this
will lead to the destruction of the monogamous family where patriarchy rules
under private property.
