The EU Elections

SPOIL YOUR BALLOT

The circus is on again and the political acrobats are back on the streets asking for our votes in the elections for the European Parliament, with their worn out political promises. At the end, none of it will make any real difference to working people. The capitalist band-wagon will keep on going, perhaps with a different driver and perhaps with one or two new parts. Between them they are covering up the fact that it is the capitalist system which is the real enemy of the people. All the parties in their own way work to protect the system and the interests of the ruling class.

The EU is essentially a business arrangement, an agreement between different capitalist ruling classes, relating to the way in which they organise their markets. Europe’s capitalists find themselves driven by the scale of business operations to try and integrate their efforts. Only in this way could they develop the resources to enable them to compete with other giants of the modern world economy.  The EU wants a ‘europeanisation’ of capital – but this continually clashes against national state boundaries. The only way out would seem to be to somehow reduce the dependence of firms on the national state by developing some sort of European state.

Modern capitalism is a highly integrated international system. Production is organised across national boundaries, trade and finance operate on a world scale. No single unit of capitalist society can jump outside of this system. Contrary to the UKIP’s dreams, there is no way that Britain can simply put up the shutters and pursue its own economic destiny within its own frontiers. The capitalist ruling class are compelled to think in terms of international cooperation and planning, hence the various economic summits and similar. Indeed, many national states are now too small to function adequately in terms of the needs and pressures of modern capitalism. The EU could be simply summed up as an alliance of ruling classes.

The national state is not our state. It functions to defend the ruling class, and cannot operate in any other way. The harping of the Left such as NO2EU about ‘national sovereignty’ only serves to sustain the illusion that somehow we have an interest in common with those who run the state at present. It intensifies the differences between workers in different countries. And it does so at a time when the growth of globalisation emphasises the need for united international working class action. The arguments of the anti-EU in the labour movement have had no more substance than those of the pro-EU. They have adopted a narrow nationalistic outlook, appealing against the loss of British “sovereignty”.

The advent of the EU in no way meant that nationalism and xenophobia ceased to be an weapon in the hands of the ruling class. The very way in which decisions are arrived at – by continual, and often very bitter haggling between different governments – creates an environment in which nationalistic talk can flourish. National governments can blame unpopular moves on the pressure of the other member states and demand national ‘sacrifices’ in order to resist them. They can claim that they, are being forced by the EU to carry through unpopular measures – even when, in reality they could claim exemptions to the rulings. They can simultaneously blame the Commission or European Parliament for unpopular policies, and divert protest into a nationalistic blind alley. Both Tory and Labour know that the process of integration has already gone too far to be unraveled.

Where more profits can be gained by property swindlers out of speculation, or currency speculation, or investment abroad rather than investment in home industry, naturally the capitalists will always opt for the latter. Even if for the benefit of their individual interests or company they undermine the collective or ‘national’ interests of the capitalist class as a whole. Who is “industry?” Why not say bluntly in class terms that with the capitalists as individuals, and with capitalists controlled nations, they invest where they can get the biggest profits. They are too short sighted to see the results for tomorrow. It is each man, company or country for itself.

 Neither the narrow British nationalism of UKIP nor pseudo-Europeanism of sections of the LibDems is a solution in the interests of the working class. Inside or outside the EU there is no cure. Neither the Eurosceptics nor the Euroenthusiasts offer a way forward but simply highlight the bitter divisions within the ruling class. In or out, the problems facing the worker are very much the same. The remedy to the problem lies in the unity of the workers of the world against the capitalists of the world. The battles the labour movement will have to fight cannot be won within the confines of one country. Never were the perspectives of real internationalism more relevant and more practicable. Side by side we must join battle with our common enemy.  The workers’ movement should not be wasting valuable time now fighting irrelevant  battles on the questions of national sovereignty or  ‘our British way of life’ but should be gathering and coordinating its international forces for the battle for socialism. The struggles of the world’s labour movement demand the maximum cooperation between the different national sections. The workers of Britain have interests in common with the workers in Europe and of all countries. Their interests are opposed to the capitalist class of all countries including Britain.

1. What is the Socialist Party’s stance on Britain’s future in the EU?

Whether Britain should stay in or get out of the EU is irrelevant as, in or out, capitalism will continue and so the problems it causes as a system in which profits have to come before people. The answer is not to retreat into an impossible “independent Britain” but to go forward to world society. It is only on a global scale that problems such as climate change, world hunger and war can be tackled.

2. What would be the Socialist Party’s main aims if elected to the European Parliament?

Use it as a platform from which to denounce the way the profit system works against the interest of the vast majority by imposing its logic of “no profit, no production” and “can’t pay, can’t have”. To argue instead for a world community without frontiers based on the planet’s resources being the common heritage of all humanity under democratic control and where the principle “from each according to their ability to each according to their needs” would apply.

3. How can having a Socialist Party/World Socialist Movement MEP benefit people?

They would have a voice expressing their interest in getting rid of the profit system, even though having a genuinely socialist MEP wouldn’t, and, because of the nature of the system, couldn’t, mean much in practical terms.

The “choice” between Labour and Tory is not a choice between socialism and capitalism, both are pro-capitalist. Both are parties indispensible to capitalism. It is not easy for workers to decide not to vote. It is after all a right we fought hard for. But our call is to go to the voting booth and spoil your ballot paper by writing “world socialism" is taking a political stand, a principled stand against the capitalist parties. In Scotland there is no party of the working class standing in these elections so show your political independence and vote for no-one.