The Poverty of Capitalism

It remains the great and tragic paradox of our age – poverty in the midst of plenty.

One class—the capitalist class—owns and controls the economic resources of the world. That class, for its own protection and perpetuation in power, subjects all institutions to its own interests. In its advent to power and supremacy the present economic master class succeeded another that had decayed in the process of evolution. The feudal lords had to surrender to the ascending capitalist class. We socialists have always contended that capitalism should be abolished because it mismanaged the means of production so that a very few – those who own the means of production – reaped great profits while the masses of the people were deprived of a secure standard of living. We would often prove this assertion by demonstrating the tremendous capacities which the modern industrial machine has; how it could satisfy the needs of everyone if it were run for that purpose; and how capitalism, instead, ran the industrial machine for profits. When the capitalists could not sell their products at a profit,  industrial capacity would lie idle because the capitalists despite the need for these products. We socialists would say, if only the people could run these industries themselves, they could produce enough to satisfy everyone’s needs.

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 capitalist class. Workers possess only their own labour-power which they must sell in order to live. The system of capitalist relations of production leads to ever-more acute economic crises, bringing the miseries of unemployment and falling real wages on the working class. The class interest of the workers is to eliminate capitalism entirely and to build a socialist society, the classless society free from exploitation and from racial, sexual and all other forms of inequality.

The aim of the socialist movement is to replace world capitalist economy by a world system of socialism/communism. Socialist society is mankind’s only way out, for it alone can abolish the problems of the capitalist system which threaten to degrade and destroy the human race. Socialism will abolish the class division of society and simultaneously with the abolition of anarchy in production, it will abolish all forms of exploitation and oppression of man by man. Society will no longer consist of antagonistic classes in conflict with each other, but will present a united commonwealth of labour. At the same time, the organs of class domination, and the State in the first place, will disappear also. The State, being the embodiment of class domination, will die out in so far as classes die out, and with it all measures of coercion will expire. For the first time in its history mankind will take its fate into its own hands. Instead of destroying innumerable human lives and incalculable wealth in struggles between classes and nations, mankind will devote all its energy to the development and strengthening of its own collective might.

After abolishing private and state ownership of the means of production and converting these means into social property, the world socialism will replace the elemental forces of the world market, competitive and blind processes of social production, by consciously organised and planned production for the purpose of satisfying rapidly growing social needs. With the abolition of competition and anarchy in production, devastating crises and still more devastating wars will disappear. Instead of colossal waste of productive forces and spasmodic development of society-there will be a planned utilisation of all material resources and a painless economic development on the basis of unrestricted, smooth and rapid development of productive forces. Work will cease to be toiling for the benefit of a class enemy: instead of being merely a means of livelihood it will become a necessity of life: want and economic inequality, the misery of enslaved classes, and a wretched standard of life generally will disappear; the hierarchy created in the division of labour system will be abolished together with the antagonism between mental and manual labour; and the last vestige of the social inequality of the sexes will be removed.

With the disappearance of classes culture will become the acquirement of all and the class ideologies of the past will give place to scientific materialist philosophy. Hence, it will bury forever all mysticism, religion, prejudice and superstition and will give a powerful impetus to the development of all-conquering, scientific knowledge. Under such circumstances, the domination of man over man, in any form, becomes impossible, and a great field will be opened for the social selection and the harmonious development of all the talents inherent in humanity. Socialism will make it possible to raise the well-being of the whole of humanity and to reduce to a minimum the time devoted to material production and, consequently, will enable culture to flourish as never before in history.

 In socialism no social restrictions will be imposed upon the growth of the forces of production. Private ownership in the means of production, the selfish lust for profits, the artificial retention of the masses in a state of ignorance, poverty-which retards technical progress in capitalist society. The most expedient utilisation of the forces of nature and of the natural conditions of production in the various parts of the world, the removal of the antagonism between town and country, that under capitalism results from the low technical level of agriculture and its systematic lagging behind industry; the closest possible co-operation between science and technique, the utmost encouragement of research work and the practical application of its results on the widest possible social scale; planned organisation of scientific work; the application of the most perfect methods of statistical accounting and, planned regulation of economy; the rapid growth of social needs, which-is the most powerful internal driving force of the whole system-all these will secure the maximum productivity of social labour, which in turn will release human energy for the powerful development of science and art.

Capitalism is a wasteful and inefficient system. It cannot plan on either locally or a worldwide scale. It deprives the mass of the people of products. Socialism could plan better, provide the people with all necessities. In socialism there would be no shortages or unemployment created by the greed of a few owners of the means of production, because the people would collectively own the means of production. Socialism could take the vast resources devoted to war  and use them for constructive purposes. These are the real class interests of the working class. That is why socialism is the burning need of the hour. The capitalist class continuously tries to make the working class carry the burden of their economic crises.  The introduction  of more repressive legislation facilitates this, together with the attacks on the peoples’ living standards.

In opposition to all other parties—ConDem Coalition,  Labour or nationalist—the Socialist Party affirm that so long as one section of the community own and control the means of production, and the rest of the community are compelled to work for that section in order to obtain the means of life, there can be no peace between them.