The transition from Feudalism to capitalism stands as one of the most pivotal and extensively debated periods in human history. It represents a fundamental shift in economic organization, social relations, and political structures, moving from a system dominated by landed elites extracting surplus through extra-economic coercion to one characterized by commodity production, wage labor, and market exchange. This complex historical process, spanning several centuries, has attracted intense scrutiny from various schools of thought, but none more rigorously than Marxist historiography, which views it through the lens of changing modes of production and class struggle.

Within this broader Marxist tradition, the “Transition Debate” of the mid-20th century became a seminal intellectual arena, pitting different interpretations of historical materialism against each other. Initiated by the economic historian Maurice Dobb and economist Paul Sweezy, the debate explored whether the internal contradictions of feudalism or external forces like trade and market expansion were primarily responsible for its decline. Rodney Hilton, a distinguished medieval historian and a prominent figure in the British Marxist Historians’ Group, emerged as a crucial contributor to this discourse. His profound understanding of medieval society, particularly the lives and struggles of the peasantry, allowed him to inject a vital dimension into the debate, shifting the emphasis firmly towards the agency of the working population and the centrality of class struggle in shaping historical outcomes.

Rodney Hilton’s Perspective on the Transition

Rodney Hilton’s contribution to the debate on the transition from feudalism to capitalism is characterized by his unwavering focus on the internal dynamics of feudal society, the inherent contradictions within its mode of production, and, most significantly, the persistent and often violent class struggle between lords and peasants. Unlike some of his contemporaries who might have emphasized demographic shifts or the growth of trade as primary catalysts, Hilton rooted the process of transition in the specific social relations of production defining feudalism and the constant tension arising from surplus extraction.

The Primacy of Class Struggle

At the heart of Hilton’s argument lies the concept of class struggle as the main motor of historical change. For Hilton, feudalism was not a static system but a dynamic one, constantly shaped by the antagonistic relationship between the feudal lords, who owned the land and held political power, and the peasant producers, who cultivated the land and directly produced the surplus. The lords’ primary objective was to maximize the extraction of surplus (in the form of labor services, produce rents, or money rents) from the peasantry, often through extra-economic coercion. The peasants, in turn, sought to resist this exploitation, retain more of their produce, and secure greater autonomy.

This struggle manifested in various forms, from overt rebellions like the English Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 and the French Jacquerie of 1358, to more subtle, everyday acts of resistance such as foot-dragging, feigned illness, pilfering, or fleeing to urban centers. Hilton meticulously documented how these myriad forms of resistance, even if individually minor, cumulatively exerted immense pressure on the feudal system. They limited the lords’ ability to increase exploitation indefinitely, forced concessions, and eventually undermined the very foundations of serfdom and unfree labor. It was this continuous, often unheroic, but persistent struggle from below that Hilton saw as fundamental to the dissolution of feudal bonds and the creation of conditions conducive to new economic relations.

The Peasant Economy and its Resilience

Hilton possessed an unparalleled grasp of the medieval peasant economy. He understood that while peasants were exploited, they also possessed a degree of self-sufficiency. The peasant household, based on family labor, produced not only for subsistence but also for rent, tithes, and taxes. This direct connection to the means of production (land and tools) gave peasants a powerful material basis for resistance. Unlike slaves, peasants held customary rights to their land and could not be simply bought and sold. This allowed them to reproduce their existence and, crucially, to organize and resist collective demands.

Hilton argued that the very resilience of the peasant economy, even under duress, placed limits on the lords’ ability to extract surplus. When lords tried to intensify exploitation, they often met fierce resistance, leading to diminishing returns or outright revolts. The struggle over the control of the land and the terms of its cultivation was central. The peasants’ fight for secure tenures, fixed rents, and the commutation of labor services into money payments gradually eroded the manorial system’s coercive power. This process, driven by peasant agency, was critical in creating a more mobile labor force and a nascent land market, both prerequisites for capitalist development.

Internal Contradictions of Feudalism

Beyond class struggle, Hilton also highlighted the inherent internal contradictions within the feudal mode of production itself. Feudalism, by its nature, was geared towards direct consumption by the ruling class rather than reinvestment in productive forces or accumulation of capital for expanded reproduction. The surplus extracted was primarily used for conspicuous consumption, warfare, and maintaining the apparatus of power, not for improving agricultural productivity or technological innovation.

The reliance on extra-economic coercion meant that there was little incentive for technological improvement or efficiency on the part of the lords or the direct producers. Lords had no motivation to invest in their tenants’ holdings, and peasants, knowing any increased output would be seized, had little incentive to produce beyond what was necessary for their survival and rent. This created a structural barrier to productivity growth. Furthermore, the fragmented political power inherent in feudalism, with localized lordships and constant warfare, hindered the development of broader markets and unified economic regions necessary for capitalist growth. These systemic inefficiencies, exacerbated by the recurring crises (famine, plague, warfare) of the late medieval period, exposed the fragility of the feudal system.

The Role of Towns and Markets: A Nuanced Perspective

Hilton offered a more nuanced view on the role of towns and markets than some of his contemporaries, notably Sweezy. While Sweezy emphasized external trade and the “dissolving” effect of a money economy on feudal relations, Hilton argued that towns were not external enclaves but rather integral parts of the feudal social formation. Their growth was often stimulated by the surplus extracted from the countryside (feeding urban populations, providing goods for the wealthy) and by the needs of the feudal aristocracy themselves.

However, Hilton recognized that towns did provide alternative opportunities and refuges for peasants fleeing manorial exploitation, thus weakening the lords’ control over labor. They also fostered new forms of social organization and economic activity, including artisan production, merchant capital, and eventually, some forms of wage labor. Yet, he was cautious about attributing a revolutionary role to urban burgesses early on. He pointed out that urban elites often collaborated with feudal lords, and urban economies were themselves often structured by guild regulations and monopolies that limited purely capitalist development. The key was not simply the existence of markets, but how the social relations of production within both rural and urban areas were transformed, largely through the pressures of class struggle emanating from the countryside. Markets, in Hilton’s view, acted more as arenas where the existing social contradictions played out and were reshaped, rather than as an independent force destroying feudalism from without.

Differentiation within the Peasantry and the Genesis of Agrarian Capitalism

A critical aspect of Hilton’s analysis was his recognition of increasing differentiation within the peasantry itself, particularly from the 14th century onwards. As feudal relations weakened and money rents became more prevalent, some peasants were able to accumulate land, livestock, and capital. These “kulaks” or “yeomen,” as they were sometimes called in England, became a more substantial, commercially oriented group. They might lease additional land, employ wage labor, and engage more actively in market production.

This internal stratification of the peasantry was crucial for the transition to capitalism. While the broad mass of peasantry engaged in resistance against the lords, the emergence of a prosperous, commercially-minded stratum within the peasantry provided the social base for agrarian capitalism. This group, freed from onerous feudal obligations, could invest, innovate, and gradually transform agricultural production from subsistence farming to commodity production. Concurrently, the poorer peasants, often dispossessed or unable to compete, became a potential source of wage labor, thereby contributing to the formation of a proletariat.

The Specificity of the English Case

Hilton often used the English experience as a primary example to illustrate his arguments. He noted that in England, particularly after the Black Death and the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, peasant resistance was relatively more successful than in many parts of continental Europe, especially Eastern Europe. The decline of serfdom, the widespread commutation of labor services to money rents, and the fragmentation of demesne lands into leaseholds were more pronounced in England.

This success of the English peasantry, according to Hilton, led to a more rapid development of a land market and the consolidation of landholdings in the hands of enterprising gentry and yeoman farmers, who then employed an increasingly landless rural proletariat. This distinct trajectory, driven by the intensity and outcome of class struggle, paved the way for England’s unique path to agrarian capitalism, which arguably laid the groundwork for its later industrial revolution. In contrast, in Eastern Europe, where peasant resistance was weaker, a “second serfdom” emerged, reinforcing feudal relations and delaying capitalist development.

Hilton’s Synthesis and Influence

Hilton’s work, particularly his influential essay “Capitalism – What’s in a Name?” and his editorship of “The Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism” (a collection of essays from the debate), served to synthesize and solidify the Marxist position emphasizing internal dynamics and class struggle. He critiqued purely demographic or commercial explanations, arguing that while these factors were important, their impact was always mediated by the existing social relations of production and the ongoing class struggle. For Hilton, the decline of feudalism was not merely a crisis but a process of transformation driven by the active resistance of the exploited.

His scholarship resonated deeply with the “history from below” movement, championing the historical agency of common people. By meticulously detailing the lived experiences and organized resistance of medieval peasants, Hilton brought their struggles to the forefront of historical analysis, demonstrating their pivotal role in shaping the grand narrative of historical change. His work underscored that economic systems do not simply evolve passively but are actively contested and reshaped by the social forces operating within them.

Rodney Hilton’s incisive analysis irrevocably shaped the understanding of the transition from feudalism to capitalism. He argued that the decline of feudalism was not an inevitable evolutionary process or simply the result of external economic forces. Instead, it was fundamentally a consequence of the internal contradictions of the feudal mode of production, critically exacerbated and ultimately undermined by the relentless and multifaceted class struggle waged by the exploited peasantry against their feudal overlords.

For Hilton, the active agency of the peasantry, through both overt rebellion and everyday forms of resistance, played a decisive role in loosening the bonds of serfdom, forcing the commutation of labor services to money rents, and eventually creating conditions for the emergence of a land market and a more mobile labor force. These changes, driven from below, broke down the traditional manorial system and paved the way for new agrarian relations that were capitalist in nature, characterized by commodity production, wage labor, and the pursuit of profit.

Ultimately, Hilton’s enduring legacy lies in his profound re-centering of the historical narrative around the pivotal role of class struggle, not as a peripheral factor but as the primary engine of socio-economic transformation. His rigorous empirical research into medieval peasant life and his theoretical clarity provided a powerful and sophisticated Marxist framework for understanding how an old social order can disintegrate under the weight of its own internal tensions and the active resistance of those it exploits, leading to the complex and often violent birth of a new economic system.