Quiz: On Authority

All 13 questions. A perfect score earns the gold medal; 80% earns silver.

1. 1. What does Engels propose writing over the factory gates?

   “Labour is the source of all wealth and culture” “Abandon all autonomy, ye who enter here!” “Liberty, equality, fraternity, or death” “From each according to his ability”
2. 2. How does Engels define authority at the start of the article?

   The imposition of another’s will upon ours Respect freely given to expert knowledge and experience The rule of capital over labour in the workshop The legal power of the state over its subjects
3. 3. How does Engels characterise a revolution?

   As the abolition of all authority whatsoever As a peaceful change in the opinion of the majority As a purely economic event As the most authoritarian thing there is
4. 4. Where does Engels say the need for imperious authority is most evident?

   In a parliament In a cotton mill In a village commune at harvest time On a ship on the high seas
5. 5. What is Engels’s general conclusion about authority and autonomy?

   Authority is absolutely good They are relative, and their spheres vary with the phase of social development Authority is absolutely bad and autonomy absolutely good, in every phase of society Autonomy is an illusion in every society
6. 6. According to Engels, what remains true even if questions in the mill are settled by majority vote?

   The capitalist regains control Authority disappears entirely Someone’s will must still be subordinated The mill must stop until all the workers agree
7. 7. What do all socialists agree will happen to public functions after the social revolution?

   They will lose their political character and become administrative They will pass to the church They will be abolished at a stroke, together with the state They will become hereditary
8. 8. What trend in modern production does Engels start from?

   The spread of self-employment The decline of agriculture Combined action replacing the isolated action of individuals The return of small independent workshops and of domestic home industry
9. 9. What does Engels assume for the sake of argument, from the anti-authoritarians’ point of view?

   That every worker owns a separate workshop That the capitalists remain owners of the factories but share their profits with the workers That the state owns all industry That land and the instruments of labour belong collectively to those who use them
10. 10. How does Engels answer the anarchists who say delegates hold not authority but a “commission”?

    He says delegates should be appointed for life He says commissions are worse than authority He accepts the distinction They have changed the name, not the thing
11. 11. What reproach does Engels make against the Paris Commune?

    It did not use the authority of the armed people freely enough It abolished all authority at a single stroke It seized the Bank of France and so alarmed the provinces It used terror too freely against its enemies within Paris
12. 12. To abolish authority in large-scale industry would, Engels says, amount to what?

    Establishing workers’ control Abolishing industry itself and returning to the distaff Increasing productivity Ending the division of labour at a single stroke
13. 13. In the cotton mill, what fixes the hours at which everyone begins and ends work?

    The owner’s personal whim The factory inspectors Each worker’s own choice The authority of steam