No Shortcuts

Society is divided into two classes: the working class, doing all the labour; and the idle class, living on the fruits of labour. Workers resistance to capitalist exploitation is as old as the working class itself. The first unions were formed with the greatest sacrifice on the part of workers. Their immediate goal was to unite workers and to organise their collective fight for better wages and working conditions. They marked a great step forward for the working class: its passage from a scattered and weak state to the first attempts at class organisation.  The unions are the broadest and most important mass organisations of the working class. They are an indispensable weapon in the workers’ struggle against capitalist exploitation. But as the class struggle developed, the limits of the unions became clearer. Left to themselves the unions tended to withdraw into the fight for reforms alone, and to remain outside the revolutionary political struggle.

Karl Marx said: “Trade Unions work well as centers of resistance against the encroachments of capital. They fail partially from an injudicious use of their power. They fail generally from limiting themselves to a guerrilla warfare against the effects of the existing system, instead of simultaneously trying to change it, instead of using their organized forces as a lever for the final emancipation of the working class, that is to say, the ultimate abolition of the wages system.”

Marx correctly pin-pointed the weakness of all trade unionism. What every worker must realise is that the  trade union struggle is not fighting causes  but only symptoms. We are fighting against the effects of the system as Marx points out, and not against the system itself.  Not merely that, but they also envisage the continuation of the capitalist system. What trade union struggles really do is to fight to improve the conditions of the working class within the framework of the capitalist system. They do not challenge capitalism itself. Every wage increase that is won by the workers is eventually offset by the employers by more intensive work, by stricter supervision etc. and by a general price increase. So that, usually the worker is back to from where he started. What all workers must understand is that their misery is due to exploitation carried on by the capitalist class. Trade unionism merely restricts their struggle to attempts at lessening this exploitation. It does not fight to end exploitation i.e. to end the capitalist system and replace it by socialism. This is the fatal limitation of trade union struggles.

Regardless of their flaws, economic organisations of workers are a necessity and we do not, of course, oppose trade union struggles or refuse to participate in them. The unions are a powerful weapon in the workers’ hands to defend their immediate interests.  But it became necessary for the working class to create a higher form of organisation in the struggle to do away with capitalism. It is only when socialist ideas began to take hold in the working class that the awareness also of the need to overthrow capitalism by means of revolutionary political struggle begn to grow and the ensuing creation of a socialist party.

 There are no shortcuts to the socialist revolution. The social revolution is an immense task and should not be dreamt of if  workers cannot have their own organisations. The unions’ role is to defend the workers’ interests and to act as schools of class struggle while the Socialist Party strives for strong unions defending the workers against capitalist exploitation so as to develop, strengthen and unite a current of class consciousness through agitation and propaganda with the purpose of turning trade unions away from sectional interests and into class organisations,  and to build unity in action and solidarity among workers and unions, and educate their members in the spirit of class struggle.

Names and terms have frequently given rise to bitter disputes  so let us be clear in our understanding.  A Socialist means a man or a woman who recognises the class war between the worker and the possessing class as the historic outcome of the capitalist system and its economic and social antagonisms which it engenders and fosters. .

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. Capitalist ownership of industries had its origin in the unfolding of conditions which hastened the downfall of the feudal system, and the advent of the capitalist class to power. The feudal lords had to surrender their scepter to the ascending capitalist class. Capitalism has now  fulfilled its historical mission and socialised all aspects of labour,  and has grown to  become an obstacle for the progress of society. It thus compels the working-class to take power into its own hands and, in the interests of the whole of society, to abolish the form of appropriation of wealth which prevails in capitalism.

The working class alone is interested in the removal of inequality, and that can only be accomplished by a revolution. The workers, in their collectivity, must take over and operate all the essential industrial institutions, the means of production and distribution, for the well-being of all. This can only be by the complete control by the whole people, thus abolishing the class State and the wages system, and constituting a co-operative commonwealth. Private property in social necessities must be abolished root and branch. It is not enough to seize the means of production and abolish private property. It is necessary to abolish the basic condition of modern exploitation, wage slavery, and that act brings forth the succeeding measures of reorganisation that would never be invoked without the first step.

The trade unions are more than merely a means to win a few cents an hour more in wages or a few minutes a day less of work; they are an army of emancipation in the making. At heart and in their daily action the trade unions’ unchangeable policy is to withhold from the exploiters all they have the power to. The day will come when they will pit their strength  against the parasitic employing class to end the wages system forever and set up the long-hoped-for era of social justice. That is the true meaning of the trade union movement. The unity of the workers is the merger of political parties or trade unions because  of the need for mass action.

Who are our enemies? Who are our friends? This is a question of the first importance for the revolution.The government is an executive committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.  Our enemies are the monopoly capitalist class and all those in league with them. The Labour Party is not “the lesser evil”. The Labour Party is the greater danger!