RUSSIAN TRADE GUILDS

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1683, 1 June 1904, Page 2

RUSSIAN TRADE GUILDS

Strange-though it seem in a country where the mosWabsolute individualism apparently prevails, it is certain that the , typical Russian has a genius for combination and socialised labour. At heart Russia is the most communistic country in Europe. For this very reason, it is so honey-combed with secret societies. The town'labourer, the artisan, the peasant, all believe intuitively in the value of co-operation, and for many years this belief was exploited by foreigners, largely Germans. But there are now plenty of Russians who themselves have the necessary skill, the requisite experience to supplant the German labour master.

In most villages there is at least one

“artel,” or kind of trade guild, formed by the villagers. Thousands of peasants belong to co-operative societies for carriage building and the making* of sledges, their products being highly esteemed. Many thousands are concerned in the making of clothes, and an immense number make toys to be exported for the delight of children in the Far East. The exact demand of each foreign market is carefully considered. For instance, in certain countries of the East particular colours must be avoided, these colours being deemed unlucky. Certain designs also have to be avoided, since the tastes of semi-barbarous nations are most easily offended in this matter. Millions of wooden, spoons are annually exported to China and Bokhara. For home purchase, and for the countries where Greek Orthodoxy prevails, millions of “ ikons ” or sacred pictures are prepared—the very poorest peasant demanding an “ ikon ” for liis hut.-’ In preparing these pictures much labour might, of course, be saved bj 7 macinnery, hut the peasant prefers to do all the labour by hand; to> do otherwise would seem a profanity. By this mode of association the poorest peasant can often gain a livelihood, where, on his own individual labour, -he would be compelled to starve. There is another department in which the same manner of combination is resorted tc. A large number of peasants eim find plenty of agricultural labour during the summer, but migrate to the towns in winter. They organise themselves into artels, with an elected manager or “ starosta,” who has-to fmd a factory that is willing to employ them and arrange the terms of wage—for which services he receives a small percentage. The housing and board of these parties is all conducted on tho same system of co-operation, and if the individual worker is abstemious he may take back £4 or £5 to his village when .ho returns for the summer.