¹ This is probably more necessary today than during previous historical periods when growth was more sporadic, more limited, and due less to technologi cal innovations than to market speculation, monopoly gains in trade, and similar factors.

² The reader may feel that by starting with the familistic economy, a somewhat over-simplified view is proposed. For certainly, the sudden rise of the western European economies from the latter part of the 18th well into the 19th century began from a social base quite different from the one alluded to here. This is true. But it may be argued in partial refutation that the rapid tempo of European development during this period was made possible by the fact that a large measure of social, political, and economic integration already existed, particularly, of course, in England, so that economic growth could be attributed to a significant extent to innovations and the propensities for saving and organization management. Neither Italy nor Germany could make much progress until they had achieved a certain degree of internal unification, and their subsequent growth served to stimulate further this cohesion. But all three of these countries, particularly England and Germany, enjoyed rather comfortable levels of living prior to the industrial revolution which indicates the considerable growth (and integration) that must have taken place during earlier periods. On the other hand, a majority of today's so-called under-developed countries is far more primitive than England, Holland, Germany, or France were at the time of their own more recent economic push, and are thus starting with a severe handicap, i.e., with an almost total lack of social and economic integration.

³ The same reasoning applies to a society which is divided into a subsistence and a money economy. The former must be absorbed into the latter if a single economic space is to be formed.

⁴ It is, of course, also conceivable that the creation of an economic space precedes political and social integration, though such procedure would be tempo rary only, the tendency being for economic unities to require political and social unities as well.

⁵ Perhaps the most far-reaching of socialist institutions to obtain maximum economies of scale (as well as to reach other important social and political objectives) is the People's Commune recently introduced by Communist China as the basic social unit for "industrial and agricultural production, exchange, and cultural, educational, and political affairs." One of the principal provisions for their establishment is that the property of members, either privately or coopera tively owned, is to be turned over to the Communes for its more efficient management under a system of "centralized leadership and decentralized control." The modern, rationalist character of the Commune, as contrasted to the tra ditional forms of management common particularly in the rural areas of China, becomes readily apparent from the following requirements (quoted in part):

⁶ For an elaboration of this concept of "maturity," see the author's, "Lo cational Aspects of Economic Development," Land Economics, August 1956, pp. 213-27.