We are socialists

WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE

Vast changes are taking place in the world, sweeping away old political labels. There seems to be many ideas how not to do things. There seems to be a feeling that we can make ourselves more respectable by changing our name, to get away from that dreadful word socialism; that if we masqueraded the political expression of the class war under some other name, large numbers of the working class will be swayed and the all the factional differences in the labour movement ended. The Socialist Party of Great Britain, however, still declares it stands for socialism, a classless society, free from exploitation. The creators of all wealth, workers; obtain in wages only the minimum necessary to live and raise children so that capitalism has a steady supply of labour-power. All means of production, whether factories, machines or mines, are owned by the monopoly capitalist class. Workers possess only their own labour-power which they must sell in order to live. The class interest of the working class is to eliminate capitalism entirely and to build a socialist society. To overthrow capitalism and establish socialism the working class must have a revolution.  It must replace the dictatorship of the exploiters with the the rule of the majority. These are the real class interests of the working class.

Are the socialist principles fundamentally unsound? If so, we have been on the wrong track all the time. Any movement worthwhile, no matter what name it is given, will have to be founded on the cardinal principles of the socialist philosophy, viz, that society is divided into classes with conflicting economic interest; that economic materialism is the mainspring of human action; that surplus values are wrested from the working class through the private ownership and monopoly of the jobs If the basic ideas of socialism are sound, then why try to build another movement on a false foundation? Shall we abandon all for the sake of vague promises of some election gains?

Various political parties and trends claim to represent workers and working class interests and they attempt to win support among workers but their political ideas and aims are reformist. It is objectively their role to accommodate the capitalist system, not to defeat it. The Labour Party is committed to an all-out effort to make capitalism work indefinitely. As a result all those on the Left who seek their objective through a relationship with the Labour Party drift into tacit acceptance of capitalism.  They do not want power to pass from the existing state to the workers to dispossess the capitalist class and create a classless society.  There have been many splits, re-splits, counter-splits, duplicate splits, and all sorts of splits in the Left-wing. Calls for unity of the Left which ignore the fundamental conflict between Leftist liberal democracy and Marxism obscure the difference between reformist politics and class struggle. Unity against capitalism must be accompanied by the struggle against capitalist ideas which weaken the fight and limit its effectiveness. Without such struggle unity becomes a path to capitulation. In fighting increasingly against ideas which gloss over the class struggle the workers increase their own understanding and become conscious that their class has the power to carry through the necessary revolutionary transformation of society.

The capitalist class continuously tries to make the working class carry the burden of this crisis. The necessity of more repressive legislation to facilities this, together with the increasing spontaneous struggle of the workers against the attacks on their living standards, make it harder for the capitalists to rule in the old ’democratic’ way. Nationalism and racism must be continually and consciously struggled against. While there are differences among the British capitalists on the tactics to be employed, they are united in their central aim of maintaining their domination by divide and rule.

Our society can no longer afford to address all the pressing social problems that we face as separate and individual issues. Piecemeal solutions have been tried and they have failed. We can no longer rely on the empty promises of politicians and philanthropists to solve these problems through reforms. They have failed because all these problems are products of our social and economic system - capitalism. They cannot be solved by any means short of the abolition of that system. The capitalist system cannot be made to work in the interests of the majority. The only way that workers can win the struggle to make for themselves a safe, secure and better life is to organise and overthrow the capitalist status quo. But the workers have only won a few battles, achieved only limited and temporary advances in the class war. The Socialist Party while recognising the working class must fight its day-to-day battles, it emphasises the urgent need  for workers to organise for the revolutionary change to the present society. While engaged in its day-to day struggles workers should never lose sight of the final socialist goal. The Socialist Party is necessary to persuade of the viable possibility and desirability of socialism. For only a working class that is class conscious and understands its common class interests can act to take control of the economy and build a socialist society.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain  assists in the transformation to socialism by seeking control of the existing political state, capturing the state it for the express purpose of dismantling it. The potential of creating a world without money, without frontiers and without leaders is within our grasp but can only be realised  if workers themselves take control of their own lives by organising politically and industrially for socialism.