“The basic law of capitalism is you or I, not you and I.” - Karl Liebknecht
If the working men and women took half as much interest in
politics as they do in football and tennis or other pastimes we would have a
different kind of world. Many people don’t understand the problem of
concentration of income and wealth because they don’t see it. People just don't
understand how much wealth there is at the top. The wealth at the top is so
extreme that it is beyond most people’s ability to comprehend. Most people have
not investigated socialism for themselves and accept whatever is said about it,
usually by those who oppose it or wish it to be something different from what
it is.
Socialists believe
that socialism, by abolishing the profit making system in business, and by
establishing the co-operative commonwealth, will remove, more than anything
else proposed, the causes of economic wrongs, without destroying individual
liberty or the incentive to worthy effort. The means of production and distribution
of wealth that are social and public in their nature shall be owned
collectively and each person may possess individually as much non-productive
property as she or he can earn by an honest labour of hand or brain. This would
include your home, automobile and all other private personal effects not used
for exploiting purposes.
Socialism requires
that the process of production and distribution shall be regulated, not by
competition with self-interest for its moving principle, but by society as a whole,
for the good of society. Socialism will abolish wage slavery and its
oppression. It will cause the labour-saving automation and technology to
fulfill its greatest possible good. It will give employment to all workers
during their productive years. It will remove the fear of want and poverty. The
production of an overabundance of commodities for life and comfort will not,
inside socialism, cause distress and need as now, by closing down mills,
workshops and other industries. The more wealth you produce the more you will
have available for your use, instead of adding to it, as now, to the capital
and exploiting power of a master class. Socialism will end strikes, lockouts,
lost jobs, and the ever constant war that is waged between capital and labour.
It will end the deceptions of a hundred kinds that are practiced for
profit-making. It will eliminate disease to a large degrees by bringing within
each reach of all those chief conditions upon which health depends––plenty of
pure air and sunlight; enough good food and healthful drinks; cleanliness,
proper clothing and shelter; regular periods for sufficient rest, sleep and
exercise. Socialism will start the human race on the way to the attainment of
physically, mentally and morally well-being. Socialism stands for co-operation
and the benefit of all.
The idea that capitalism can be reformed to become
charitable is not at all a realistic prospect. Capitalism needs to constantly
accumulate and operates on the basis of constantly expanding production. The present
world order is driven by the striving for profit. The entire system of
production based on wage labour and capital needs to be replaced with a system
which produces for human needs. All the half measures of converting aspects of
capitalism to socialism, while the fundamentals of capitalism remain in place,
are just wishful thinking; and to pretend they could solve our problems is pure
deception. The means of production need to be converted from capitalist class
property to social property. Instead of the present system in which workers are
alienated from the means of production and from the products of their labour, a
free association of producers producing for the needs of humanity, is required.
We call this type society of property owned in common by freely associated
producers, producing for human needs, “socialism” or “communism”. It will be a
world in people will give of themselves according to their ability, and take
according to their needs. A world where the free development of each will be the
condition for the free development of all. Such a society will differentiate
itself from capitalist in a myriad of ways, but the principal differences will
be that it is a society without state, without money, where the mass of
humanity participate in the planning and running of society. It will be a
society without wage slavery and commodity production and without classes. It
will be possible to democratically and collectively plan the future of the
human species. Humanity will have a common interest and will be able to work
towards achieving it. Working time will be reduced and the mass of the
population will be drawn into the running of that new society. All will have a
common interest in solving the ecological problems inherited from capitalism.
With the abolition of capitalist society, all its waste, its cruelty, its wars,
and all the misery it inflicts on the working people, will be ended. Socialism will
draw on the abilities of all and produce for the needs of all. It will be able
to balance these needs with sustainability. It will then be possible to roll
back and repair the dreadful damage capitalism has inflicted on the planet in
the few centuries during which it has been the dominant system of production.
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If we are to survive as a species we must take a radical
step, we must break once and for all with capitalism. Capital can never stand
still. It exists in order to expand, through accumulation, and as it expands it
extends itself across the entire globe and into every sphere of life. If there
is any hope for humanity it must come through the realization of socialism. It
is essential that the perspective of a total rejection of capitalism emerges
and is adopted as the only solution. Humanity faces a crossroads. The turning
we take and the direction we travel depends on each one of us. Do we continue
down the road of destruction towards possible extinction or organise for our
survival as a species with a new society?
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