FOURIER, CHARLES (1772–1837)

FOURIER, CHARLES (1772–1837)

Charles Fourier was the first of the French early or ‘utopian’ socialists (see EARLY SOCIALISM). The outlines of his ‘scientific’ conception of society were first published in book form in 1808, entitled The Theory of the Four Movements. The book itself was an oddity with his theory hidden amongst complex and bizarre dialogue. The reader was presented with details of his discovery alongside a critique of ‘civilization’, fantastic pronouncements about copulation between planets, promises about a new religion and an outline of amorous and gastronomic delights to come. Yet despite the obscurity of its presentation the book told of the most fantastic utopia of the nineteenth century. In addition it was the first work to define and discuss the ‘the social problem’ which later occupied socialists. Since it was the reader’s task to extract ‘the pearl in the mud’ (Fourier’s metaphor for his great scientific discovery), many simply ignored the work, and the little attention it did receive was ridicule. Fourier remained neglected until the 1830s when socialists seeking a solution to the social question ‘resurrected’ his works. A small and dedicated band of followers, led by VICTOR CONSIDÉRANT, presented a bowdlerised and simplified version of Fourierism, which omitted his more radical ideas. Additionally Victor Considérant’s wife held back the cahiers announcing a new amorous world and these were not published until the 1960s. Such was the appeal of Fourierism

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that an impressive number of simplified versions of Fourier’s theory appeared in the 1830s and 1840s. One such example is The Phalanstery or Attractive Industry and Moral Harmony written by Zo Gatti de Gamond. Fourier’s call for women’s liberation attracted the respect and support of a number of leading feminists following their disenchantment with Saint-Simonianism (see SAINT-SIMON, HENRI DE). Indeed Pamela Pilbeam has shown that the high level of mostly middle-class female assistance was crucial to the financing and development of his theories, making Fourierism a significant socialist movement during the years 1820–48.

Like the Fourierists, later socialists, such as Marx and Engels, found it problematical presenting Fourier as both the founding father of a socialist tradition and the creator of a fantastic theory. So over the years various attempts have been made to acknowledge Fourier’s socialist and critical foresight whilst also explaining why his theories were enmeshed in a bizarre dialogue. Consequently he has been portrayed as a solemn humanitarian, a social reformer, a satirist and even a precursor of surrealism. However, the translation of The Theory of the Four Movements by Gareth Stedman Jones and lan Patterson allows individual assessments to be made regarding just how serious Fourier was about his theory.

From the outset of The Theory of the Four Movements Fourier was keen to tell the reader that this first work would only give us a glimpse of his theory, a taster of things to come. He claimed that should he unveil all the good things to come it would be more that civilization could bear in its unhappy state. However, Fourier warned that not everyone was capable or serious-minded enough to appreciate the finer details of the theory. Further-more, patience was needed and the five preliminary chapters of the ‘General Destines’ must be read at least twice, or preferably three times to fully understand the concept. Aware that many people would simply not understand his complex theory Fourier lowered his expectations to raising an awareness of the ‘absurdities of civilised politics’ and the existence an exact science. Fourier argued that God gave every globe the problem of solving the puzzle of the General System of Nature. And only by solving this puzzle could humanity be happy. Philosophers and governments had failed to find the key to happiness because they had not been studying an exact science. Prejudice, closed minds and self-interest had served to blind them of the real solution to society’s ills. The constraints of space limit a full discussion of the more magical aspects of Fourier’s theory: copulating planets, anti-lions, restoration of the earth’s Northern Crown, pink lemonade seas, humans growing tails, and an identical climate throughout the globe. Thus only the bare mechanics of the scientific aspects of his theory will be discussed here.

Fourier acknowledged that Newton and Leibniz were on the right track but had only partially uncovered the discovery. Fourier furthered their idea that there were laws governing the physical world by suggesting that there were parallel laws governing social relationships. Thus he theorized ‘there is a unified system of movement for the spiritual and material world’, therefore ‘the analogy of the four movements, material, organic, animal and social’. Fourier claimed that he alone had solved the problem of the General System of Nature by discovering an absolute divine order through the study of Agricultural Association, the Theory of Passionate Attraction, and the Analogy of the Four Movements. According to Fourier there were several phases and periods in the progress of social movement. The society he lived in had become stuck in the fifth stage

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‘civilization’ simply because it had not followed the God-given theory. In order to effect the leap from ‘Chaos’ to ‘Harmony’, from present society to a utopia, society needed to organize themselves into autonomous associative communes, or phalanxs. Fourier asserted that ‘man was composed of twelve passions’, the liberation of which would lead to happiness and order. So essential to the success of the commune was the correct combination of passional types. Fourier’s ideal phalanx would be a group of 1,620; a figure chosen because it represented the double number of ‘passional’ types he identified in human society. Once correctly organized, man’s natural instincts would be released, and a return to a state of nature would bring instant perfection and universal love.

Associated Households and Attractive Industry equalled continually increasing wealth. Although claiming that the phalanx was based on the passions Fourier constantly stressed the viability of his system. Since everything in the phalanx would be made and sold communally Fourier expected profits to be four times bigger than those in existing enterprises in ‘civilization’. Additionally communal living made economies of scale possible and waste would be stamped out. The commune would be democratic, with a community committed to social improvement and the displacement of capitalism. But whilst the commune would eradicate capitalism it would not be communist and consequently land and property would still belong to individuals. Children from the age of 3, men and women would be shareholders; no one would be a wage earner. The annual profit would be divided amongst the group in twelfths. So five-twelfths would be dispensed for labour performed, four-twelfths to capital invested and three-twelfths according to talent displayed. Class would not disappear but would be made less noticeable as everyone in harmony would be satisfied.

Since the commune’s driving force would be love not discipline Fourier envisaged that such a peaceful state would not require laws or moral codes. So whilst Fourier accepted a God, his was all-knowing but not all-powerful. For him God was the source of knowledge and understanding of the pre-ordained social order, the one who held the key to a divinely ordained destiny. However, once God had revealed to Fourier how society should be organized his work was at an end. Therefore there would be no need for a judicial structure or the need for a God to uphold moral principles, especially a God who was bound by the rules of universal order and had no power to bend or remake them. Thus Fourier’s deity was an impersonal concept, which explains why there was no provision in the phalanxs for a church.

Central to Fourier’s doctrine was the freeing of the passions and the liberation of women, including their sexual liberation. Fourier argued that until women were liberated social progress was impossible and he ensured that life in the phalanx offered a practical solution to their subordination. This resulted in women being assured the right to an education, the right to work and the right to choose sexual partners. Since marriage and the family were central to women’s subjection in civilization there would be no place for either in Harmony. He railed that following the French Revolution the Convention had not gone far enough in ‘trampling down all prejudices’ because it had not destroyed marriage. Marriage stifled the passions that needed to be expressed collectively ensuring unhappiness for both parties. He asserted that men entered marriage under duress only to

be rewarded with at least eight universal sources of annoyance, including monotony, random happiness, expense and cuckoldom. But however wretched marriage was for men it was nothing compared to the slavery endured by women. Moreover in the absence of

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any productive employment marriage remained the only option for women, which was effectively prostitution by another name. Fourier observed that once married the rules were clear, a lifetime of bondage and obedience to a husband, and moral servitude to the family. Moreover the ever-present knowledge that she would have to attract a buyer- sponsor in the form of a husband had a damaging effect on the personality of a growing girl and caused most women to develop vice-ridden characters, marked by ‘servility and deviousness’.

Fourier’s invective on the subject of marriage was matched by his feelings regarding the family. He described family feelings as the Judas among the twelve passions. Fourier continued, arguing that after much observation he had not found a single joyful family. There was no gaiety and no happy moments to be found in family life, which resulted in family members seeking escape at the first opportunity.

In short, the family in civilization represented an unnatural arrangement and it was this division into families that had caused fragmentation of the modern social order, or ‘chaos’. Consequently the commune not the family was the basic social unit in Fourier’s Harmony. Later in life Fourier does modify his hostility to marriage, accepting that it could be possible if developed by degrees becoming permanent only after the birth of children, as love and paternity were the last of the passions to be brought to the phalanx.

Fourier unlike his contemporaries believed that both men and women possessed sexually passionate natures. Therefore in the phalanx men and women of all classes would be free to choose and change sexual partners as their desires dictated. Sex was integral to life in Harmony and as necessary as food. A system of ‘amorous guarantees’, or the ‘amorous corporation’, would ensure that every member had access to a sexual minimum of fulfilling sex. A complex incentive system would allow even the old and ugly to participate in an amorous life. Jealousy and other ‘illegal voluptuousness’ would disappear because everyone would have a fully satisfying love life. The elderly were not forgotten and their assistance was required in giving advice on sexual matters.

In Fourier’s teaching there were three sexes, male, female and the neuter sex. Children would be the immature or neuter sex and it was Fourier’s wish to prolong this ‘neutrality’ or their chastity for as long as possible. To this end he did not want them to study material that might give them pre-mature sexual information; this even included observing intercourse among animals. As from the age of 16 all young people would start in the group of vestals, virgins as the name implies. Half of the group would then progress to form the parallel group of damsels. Vestals would be composed of two-thirds young women and one-thirds young men, while the reverse would be true of damsels. Fourier envisaged that the specific contribution of the vestals would be to attract men into the industrial armies. Industrial soldiers would compete for the loveliest vestals and as an added attraction there would be nightly amorous festivals.

Perhaps as a result from pressure from his followers, Fourier wrote less about love in his later works. To the extent that he even acknowledged that initially the phalanx would have to be established without the proper organization of love, since this would be more acceptable to man and woman brought up in civilization. This contradiction of on the one hand criticizing ‘civilization’ for its sexual abuses of women whilst presenting the idea that women would act as tactile bait to men in Harmony has raised doubts as to the nature of women’s liberation. It is this element of Fourier’s vision that caused Marx to complain

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that Fourier’s suggestions result in making women a piece of communal property, thus moving from private marriage to general prostitution.

Fourier was the first to claim that access to an education and work was a natural right. No one in the commune would be disbarred from either due to gender or class. Everyone was given a chance in spite of capability and inclination; indeed Fourier envisaged that the phalanx would form one vast school of mutual instruction.

It was Fourier’s design that work in harmony should be a constant delight. He argued that it was God’s intention that work should not be a trial and due to the law of passionate attraction people need only to participate in work they were drawn to. Thus work would no longer be forced or distasteful. Such was the organization of work that people need only work at one task for as long as their concentration lasts, which is usually an hour, thus workers were fresh and motivated throughout their working day. Since the organization of work and the organization of pleasure were inextricably linked Fourier devised a system of gastronomic and sexual rewards to act as incentives. Presumably this came in useful when really horrible jobs needed doing.

Aware that both education and work were fundamental to women’s independence Fourier ensured that his system offered a practical solution to their subordination. Moreover he argued that the existing enslavement of women was uneconomic because it prevented them from making their rightful contribution to society. Accordingly in Harmony women would be freed from the responsibilities of childcare and household duties leaving them able to pursue an education and a career. Children, although belonging to the mother by right, are the ultimate responsibility of the community. Infants and babies were to be looked after in communal nurseries by women passionately drawn to such work. No woman should be excluded from any work for which talent and strength qualified her. Accordingly half the jobs were to be reserved for women and all attempts must be made not to relegate them to the thankless and servile roles they had become accustomed to. Whilst expecting that some women would be drawn to ‘traditional’ work, such as looking after children and household cares, he also believed that women’s talents did not end there. Acknowledging that women had talents for the arts, the sciences and industrial works, Fourier anticipated that women would make up two-sixths of the industrial armies. These women would travel the world undertaking Herculean tasks such as reclaiming the Sahara Desert, living an itinerant lifestyle and enjoying the great festivities. Thus in Harmony no longer would prejudice pressure women out of every gainful employment except prostitution or marital subjugation.

Fourier died in 1837 just as his ideas were becoming known more widely. The wealthy benefactor needed to fund a full-scale phalanx never appeared, but Fourier did become involved in an experimental commune at Condé-sur-Vesgre (Rambouillet). The venture failed, as did the attempt at Citeaux in which Gatti de Gamond was actively involved. Despite these failures Fourierism grew with groups founded across Europe and North America. The significance of Fourier’s work is that he was the first raise issues such as the liberation of women, the right to work and the evils of capitalism, issues which were later and indeed still today occupy socialists and feminists alike.

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