Understanding socialism

Socialists visualise machinery and technology, created by the genius of humanity, being used, not for the few, but for the benefit of mankind as a whole. Based on the common ownership of the means of production and distribution, a new system is to be built, raising production and ending all social division by dissolving the hostile classes into a community of free and equal producers striving not for sectional interests, but for the common good. This socialist commonwealth, liberating the individual from all economic, political and social oppression, would provide the basis, for real liberty and for the full and harmonious development of the personality, giving full scope for the growth of the creative faculties of the mind.

 These days there is a tendency to reduce the meaning of socialism to the introduction of planned economy on the basis of a state-controlled life. The idea of socialism has been divorced from the idea of liberty. State capitalism has been regarded as a stage on the way to socialism and at present there prevails a great confusion of thought where various forms of state capitalism are referred to as socialism. The experiences of the Russian Revolution have revealed the grave innate dangers of state capitalism. State capitalism concentrates an overwhelming power in the hands of the State, and places the citizen completely at the mercy of the State. This State is not run by the working-class and its ruling class use their tremendous power to subjugate the people. Under State capitalism the government derives its income automatically from the economic enterprises of the State. The State becomes the universal employer, the universal landlord. It controls everything on which the fate and happiness of the individual citizen depend. The citizen is dependent on the State as regards employment, housing, supplies, amusement, educational and transport facilities. This enormous power of the State over the individual citizen must needs call forth or strengthen tendencies towards a dictatorship. Therein lies the chief danger of State capitalism. State capitalism does not yet solve any of the outstanding problems. It does not abolish crises, classes, the wage-system. Under State capitalism there is production of commodities for sale, not production for use. Between production and consumption there still remains the partition wall of prices.

 The scramble for profit has wasted and despoiled our world’s rich resources of soil, water, forest and minerals. A lack of social planning results in a waste of our human as well as our natural resources. Socialism offers the maximum opportunities for individual development and the satisfaction of human needs. Many call to “smash” the corporations, we socialists point it is not the  multinational monopolies but the capitalist system which is at fault.  The question for the workers is how to combine industrially and politically to got hold of these industrial giants and distribute their products throughout the whole community, according to the needs of those who have worked to produce.

What are we organised for? What is our chief bond of unity? What is our avowed object? The welfare of the working class and the abolition of capitalism.  We aim at a new society – the socialist commonwealth. Our aim is the commonwealth without State, without government, without classes, in which the workers shall administer the means of production and distribution for the common benefit of all. Industrial slavery is as old as capitalism itself, and before that there were other forms of slavery for the workers. So long as the capitalist system exists, some men will be mking money out of the labour of others. All reforms of the present system of society simply fool the worker into believing that he isn’t being robbed as much as he was before. Class-conscious workers of the world must attack and destroy capitalism and root it out of the world. The State is used to defend and strengthen the power of the capitalists and to oppress the workers. In order to destroy capitalism the workers must first wrest the State power out of the hands of the capitalist class. They must not only seize this power, but abolish the state apparatus entirely. The capitalist State is built to serve capitalism, and that is all it can do, no matter who is running it. propose to overthrow the capitalist State and to establish in its place immediately the industrial commonwealth. Socialists are also opposed to the State and wish to abolish it – to substitute for the government of men the administration of things. The State can only exist as long as there is class struggle. The private property of the capitalist class, in order to become the social property of the workers, cannot be turned over to individuals or groups of individuals, not to sectional owners such as syndicalist unions or cooperatives. It must become the property of all in common. Industries, too, which supply the needs of all the people, are not the concern only of the work-fore, in each industry, but of all in common, and must be administered for the benefit of all.

Much has been said and written about the new radicalisation yet for all the optimism it has not yet transmitted to a broader spectrum of the working class. What we are witnessing is indeed changing of attitudes, a shifting of beliefs, rejecting previously accepted ideas nd values. It is the response to the economic and social crises we re facing. This radicalisation is measured by the the search for new methods and new standards of social behavior, the desire for a complete change to something better. Who needs the “new” left today when it means trying to emulate the “old” left? What good is “participatory democracy” if it is only to lobby capitalist politicians?

Social forces do not arrive and marshal themselves in movements without some common factors being at work. There is no need to repeat the numerous issues and campaigns that have been conducted in current politics. People are seeing the  callousness of governments in subordinating the alleviation of poverty to the needs of capital accumulation. We have witnessed massive attacks on the working and the poor. People are angry at the attacks on their basic living conditions. A mass movement has never been more necessary but the left has not, except in isolated incidents, been able to rally masses of people. Protest groups in general have not been able to capitalise on the situation. The Left has failed to develop a significant political movement at a time when the need for such a movement is great. What has been the problem? Why has the Left failed?

When the crisis hit, the trade union movement responded in the same manner as it always had. That is, each union fought the cutbacks and layoffs on economic lines as any union would with its employer. This basic response is one of trying to win concessions and compromises. There is but one power which can bring freedom, happiness and peace to humanity. That power is the working class if well organised and determined to fight all who would oppose and prevent its complete emancipation. Socialism seeks to solve the  problem of human misery by revolution. We must always keep in mind that our goal is socialist revolution. Our agitation and propaganda is to help raise the level of class consciousness and understanding of what socialist revolution means. We must be above board and honest rather than manipulative.