Quiz: The Conquest of Bread

12 questions drawn at random. Score 80% for a silver medal.

1. What did Tsar Nicholas I reportedly do when shown drafts for the Moscow–Petersburg railway? Handed the project to a private company Drew a straight line between the two cities with a ruler Refused to allow any railway at all Ordered it to pass through every provincial capital
2. After the work needed for necessaries, how does Kropotkin propose people would obtain luxuries such as a piano or a telescope? By buying them with labour-notes earned by overtime By joining voluntary associations and giving part of their leisure to the work By inheriting them from the expropriated bourgeoisie By applying to the commune’s central luxury department, which allots them in turn to each household
3. What historical parallel does Kropotkin draw against the claim that people will not work without compulsion? The Paris Commune proved that workers would not work at all without wages or overseers Medieval guilds abolished wages without loss The same was said before the abolition of slavery and serfdom, and proved false The same was said before the invention of machinery
4. Whose Paris market garden does Kropotkin analyse to show the yields of intensive culture? M. Barral M. Ponce M. Toubeau Mr Hallett
5. Which two countries does Kropotkin say introduced the zone system on their railways? Belgium and Italy Germany and Switzerland Britain and France Hungary and Russia
6. What working commitment does Kropotkin calculate would guarantee well-being to all members of a society like Paris and Seine-et-Oise? Three days a week, from about twenty-five until the age of sixty or sixty-five Ten hours a day, but only during the harvest and the vintage Eight hours a day, from about sixteen to sixty-five, for all Five hours a day, from about twenty or twenty-two to forty-five or fifty
7. What does Kropotkin say would happen to the descendants of the inventor of the first lace-making machine if they claimed it today? They would receive a share of the factory’s profits as the inventor’s heirs They would be told “Hands off!” and shot down if they tried to take it They would be honoured with a public pension They would be given jobs as foremen
8. What example does Kropotkin use to show that individual contributions cannot be measured? The crew of a lifeboat, from the coxswain to the bow oarsman The compositors of a newspaper, from the typesetter to the editor The workers of a coal-mine, from cage-boy to engineer The volunteers of the Red Cross, from the nurse to the stretcher-bearer
9. What does Kropotkin say gave “the most striking proof” against national specialisation? India’s growth of cotton and jute mills Germany’s chemical industry Brazil’s coffee plantations The silk factories of Lyons and of northern Italy
10. Why, according to Kropotkin, is a house in parts of Paris worth many thousands of pounds? Because of the taxes levied on it Because its owner has improved it at great expense over many years Because it is in Paris, a city built by generations of work Because of the quality of its materials
11. What happened when workers claimed the “right to work” in 1848, according to chapter 2? National workshops paid 1s. 8d. a day; later the workers were told to colonise Africa or be shot Workers were granted land in the provinces free of rent The government nationalised all the factories of Paris and placed them under elected workers’ councils An eight-hour day was legislated for all trades
12. Why does Kropotkin say an anarchist society need not fear a Rothschild settling in its midst? No one with secure well-being would sell his strength for a starvation wage The commune would confiscate his gold at the frontier and melt it down for public use Gold would be declared illegal He would be required to work five hours a day

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