Guilds were urban economic institutions that existed during the end of feudalism and beginning of capitalism. They restricted and monopolized industrial production.[1] Following the bourgeois revolutions, large-scale industry replaced them and replaced their restrictions on production with competition. Some reactionary anti-capitalists seek to reverse history and restore the guild system.[2]
History
After serfs escaped from their lords and moved to towns, craftsmen united into guilds to stop outside competition. Guilds first emerged in China and the Arab caliphates before spreading into Byzantium and Italy in the ninth and tenth centuries. They later spread to the rest of Europe, including Russia.[3]
Structure
Guilds strictly regulated crafts and limited improvements in technique. By the late feudal period, they began slowing down the growth of productive forces. It became almost impossible for apprentices and journeymen to become masters, and they became wage workers. The masters exploited them and made them work 14 to 16 hours a day.[3]
Merchant guilds
Merchant guilds began in Asia in the ninth century and spread to Western Europe by the tenth century and Russia by the 12th century. They defended merchants from feudal lords, regulated weights and measures, and prevented competition from outside merchants.[3]
References
- ↑ Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels (1848). Communist Manifesto: 'Bourgeois and Proletarians'. [MIA]
- ↑ Friedrich Engels (1847). The Principles of Communism. [MIA]
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Economics Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R (1954). Political Economy: 'The Feudal Mode of Production; The Medieval Town. Craft Guilds. Merchant Guilds'. [PDF] London: Lawrence & Wishart. [MIA]