TRANSITIONS OF FORMS OF RENTS.
Transition from Métayer Rents.
I will resume what has just been said.The Doctrine of Rent as delivered by modern economists, has been considered as themost remarkable example of reasoning on such subjects.But this doctrine applies only to Farmers' Rents; now Farmers'
Rents are the sums paid for the use of the Land by capitalist, farming for Profit: it being implied that profits are determinedby competition; and that if the farmers do not make such an amount of profit they will remove their capital to some otheremployment.But these conditions are not generally verified in countries as they exist actually.The cultivator is not acapitalist, and the stock employed upon the land is not moveable.Taking the surface of the earth at large, the conditions onwhich the cultivator holds it are different in different countries; but Farmers' Rents exist nowhere except in England and afew regions elsewhere.Taking the actual conditions of culture, it appears that tenants may be divided, as I said before, intofour classes; Métayers, Serfs, Ryots, and Cottiers, in addition to Farmers.
It may be observed that we have, in.this new view of the subject, an example of the inductive method applied to PoliticalEconomy, in distinction from the deductive method, which is that of Ricardo and his school.Their method consists in takingdefinitions, and reasoning downwards from them, as is done in geometry; and thus, as Mill says, we come to propositionswhich, like those of geometry, require an aptitude for such reasoning in the student.We take the definition of Rent, that it iswhat is paid by a capitalist for the use of the land, and we come to the proposition that Rent is the excess of good soilsabove the worst.In the other method we begin not from definitions, but from facts.We take the facts as we find them in thevarious countries of the globe: we classify these facts; and having so classified them, we see what propositions can be trulyasserted concerning each class.And this method is the more useful, because the truths to which we are thus led are thosewhich are characteristic of the social and political condition of each people; of the relations of ranks; and of the means andchances of change and progress.I will mention a few such propositions mainly as examples.The work of Mr Jones on Rentto which I have already referred, is occupied almost entirely with the consideration of such subjects.
Next to Farmers' Rents, which occupy the soil of England, we may consider Métayer Rents, which occupy a large part of thesoil of France and Italy.The usual form of such rents is, as the name implies, that the proprietor and the cultivator divide theproduce equally.A French gentleman who came from a Métayer part of France gave me a very definite image of this equaldivision.He said that the produce was every year garnered by the cultivator into two barns, locked up there with two keys,and then the proprietor took which key he chose, the cultivator taking the other, each being thus put in possession of his halfof the harvest.
Countries in a state of Métayerage are commonly far less rich and populous than countries where Farmers' rents prevail: butthe difference is not a difference which can be remedied by any alteration in the system.The system itself depends upon thegeneral state of wealth and population in the country.M.de Lavergne has pointed out with great precision the difference ofFrance and England in this respect: and has made a remark which appears to be of the highest importance, following ArthurYoung: namely: that the progress of agriculture from the system of métayerage to the system of farmers depends on theexistence of a Market ( débouchés ) for agricultural produce.He says (p.166):
"Beginning with the reign of Queen Anne, England visibly gets the start of France in industry and commerce; that is to say,in everything, for progress in these respects includes all other progress.After the American war, when the nation, afflicted atthe loss of its principal colony, threw itself back upon itself to find compensation in its own resources, the vigour of itsadvance was quite without parallel.Then appears Adam Smith, who in an important work, examines the cause of the wealthand greatness of nations.Then appeared great inventors, as Arkwright and Watt, who are as it were the instruments ofAdam Smith, to realize his theories in the practice of industry.Then appears William Pitt, who carries the same spirit intothe administration of public affairs.Finally there appear Arthur Young and Bakewell, who apply the new ideas toagriculture.
"The system of Arthur Young is very simple.It is comprized in a single word, of which Adam Smith had recently fixed themeaning--a market.Till that time the English cultivators, like those of the continent, had worked but little with a view to amarket.The greater part of agricultural produce had been consumed upon the spot by the producers themselves: and thoughmore was sold in England than elsewhere, the idea of the market was not that which governed the process of production.
Arthur Young is the first who made the English agriculturists understand the growing importance of a market, that is, of thesale of agricultural produce to a non-agricultural population.This non-agricultural population, till that time small, began togrow into importance; and since then, thanks to the expansion of industry and commerce, the multiplication of theirpopulation is become immense.
