RUSSIAN LABOUR
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Professor Wilden-Hart, in his letter in your issue of March 7th, states that, " The success of the Five Year Plan means, in short, the enslavement of the whole population of Russia and the flooding of the world with slave-made goods." I would be grateful to read Professor Wilden-Hart's definition of slavery. The Oxford Dictionary defines a slave as a " person who is the legal property of another or others and is bound to absolute obedience." Now, whatever is happening in Russia, and however true it is that the present industrial development will increase Russian competition in the world markets, it is surely the last country in the world at the present time in which it can be said that one person is the property of another or of others 1 Nothing, it seems, could be more remote from slavery than a situation in which all property is owned by the workers, and these are self-governing, fixing their rates of wages, hours of labour, and electing the officials who market the products of their labour.—I ams
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