> There was a division of labor in hunting and gathering society. I'm
> not
> universalizing. I'm pointing the historic _fact_ that there is
> always a
> division of labor in human society. Division of labor is one of the
> defining characteristics of the human species.
If you mean by "division of labour" the specialization of individuals to particular kinds of work, this is inconsistent with Marx's idea of the "universality" that would characterize the universally developed individual. He associates "specialized functions, specialists" with "craft-idiocy."
"What characterizes the division of labor inside modern society is that it engenders specialized functions, specialists, and with them craft-idiocy.
'We are struck with admiration,' says Lemontey, 'when we see among the Ancients the same person distinguishing himself to a high degree as philosopher, poet, orator, historian, priest, administrator, general of an army. Our souls are appalled at the sight of so vast a domain. Each one of us plants his hedge and shuts himself up in his enclosure. I do not know whether by this parcellation the field is enlarged, but I do know that man is belittled.'
"What characterizes the division of labor in the automatic workshop is that labor has there completely lost its specialized character. But the moment every special development stops, the need for universality, the tendency towards an integral development of the individual begins to be felt. The automatic workshop wipes out specialists and craft- idiocy." <http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/poverty-philosophy/ch02b.htm
>
In Capital (which also points to the inconsistency of the "division of labour" with Hegel's idea of "educated men"), Marx describes the "fully developed individual" as the individual "fit for a variety of labours, ready to face any change of production, and to whom the different social functions he performs, are but so many modes of giving free scope to his own natural and acquired powers."
"Modern Industry, on the other hand, through its catastrophes imposes the necessity of recognising, as a fundamental law of production, variation of work, consequently fitness of the labourer for varied work, consequently the greatest possible development of his varied aptitudes. It becomes a question of life and death for society to adapt the mode of production to the normal functioning of this law. Modern Industry, indeed, compels society, under penalty of death, to replace the detail-worker of to-day, grappled by life-long repetition of one and the same trivial operation, and thus reduced to the mere fragment of a man, by the fully developed individual, fit for a variety of labours, ready to face any change of production, and to whom the different social functions he performs, are but so many modes of giving free scope to his own natural and acquired powers.” <http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch15.htm>
A footnote quotes a French worker discovering through his American work experience that he was “fit to any sort of work” and, in consequence, feeling “less of a mollusk and more of a man.”
“A French workman, on his return from San-Francisco, writes as follows: “I never could have believed, that I was capable of working at the various occupations I was employed on in California. I was firmly convinced that I was fit for nothing but letter-press printing.... Once in the midst of this world of adventurers, who change their occupation as often as they do their shirt, egad, I did as the others. As mining did not turn out remunerative enough, I left it for the town, where in succession I became typographer, slater, plumber, &c. In consequence of thus finding out that I am fit to any sort of work, I feel less of a mollusk and more of a man.” (A. Corbon, “De l’enseignement professionnel,” 2ème ed., p. 50.)" <http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/ch15.htm#n227>
Ted