Socialism is the Future of Humanity – Start Building Now

Anger at capitalism is growing daily. Human beings are losers. We have lost families, friends and our communities. Have we also now lost our will to fight back? Capitalism’s days are numbered. Across the world, millions of people have taken to the streets against austerity, injustice and endless war. Capitalism has far outlived any usefulness. Under capitalism, people have no future beyond wage slavery and poverty. Socialism as a possibility will exist so long as capitalism persists as a reality. To build unity and solidarity, we need a vision for the future. One vision of socialism is the expansion of democratic decision-making into the economy, the common ownership of resources and free access to goods and services based on need. In other words, making the worker and community control over production a reality. It is clear that the world as a whole is becoming one community, or at least needs to be seen and treated as one. The human species needs socialism not only to realise all its potentials but to survive.

Marx used 'socialism' and 'communism' as synonymous terms, both referring to the same kind of society, that is, a 'cooperative society' or 'association' based on 'free associated labour'.  Marx nowhere speaks of 'socialism' as a distinct stage or social formation or of 'transition between socialism and communism'.  For Marx, as the new society emerges from the capitalist society itself, the former is obviously an integral part of the same new society, being its 'first phase' only chronologically, with the specific kind of developments corresponding to it. For him between capitalism and communism lies no stage or stages, only a transition, more or less prolonged according to circumstances.  That there is no fore-ordained model or blueprint of socialism or socialist transition, certainly none suitable for all countries and all times, does not mean absence of general principles. Marx was no determinist. For Marx socialism is nothing inevitable, it is something to be struggled for. Thus there are no guarantees of victory; only alternatives, one being the mutual ruination of the contending classes, the total destruction of humanity summed up by Rosa Luxemburg as 'socialism or barbarism'. Optimistically, Marx gave capitalism a short lease of life, looking forward to an early revolution in Europe and, therefore, Marx never explored the possibility of this imminent threat hanging over the future of humankind. This makes the struggle for socialism all the more imperative and urgent today.

However, capitalism continues to survive, but this, by itself, cannot be seen as an argument for the desirability, or a sign of the progressiveness of the capitalist order. Capitalism is a system that is chronically diseased by pathological inflictions which manifest themselves variously in different places as racism, sexism, anti-semitism, xenophobia, ethnic or national hatreds, fundamentalism and intolerance, even as plain cruelty and criminal aggression.  Poverty, unemployment and insecurity-related crimes and associated phenomena – ill-health and suicides, alcoholism and drug addiction, violence against women and child abuse, etc. -- are on the rise everywhere. The introduction of new technology and communication have become the means of debasing people's understanding and preventing them from looking beyond the capitalist horizon of a consumerist paradise of instant gratification. Gone is the aspiration for a life which would fulfil basic human needs -- decent livelihood, knowledge, solidarity, cooperation with fellow human beings, job satisfaction at work and freedom from unnecessary drudgery and toil. Today’s society is sick and who can deny that diagnosis but it lingers on in its putrefying decay. Socialism will always remain on the agenda wherever capitalism exists, be it 'developed', 'under-developed', 'developing' or any other part of the world. Socialists say surely it is people and not 'economic growth' and GDP that must come first in society.  Socialism is a humane society that fosters cooperation, solidarity and respect and makes for a non-alienated, 'truly rich human life' that Marx spoke of.  Of course, such a world cannot be achieved without basic material conditions being met but to believe that you can assure satisfy the majority of people through greed, private acquisition, competition and rivalry-- the values of capitalism -- and yet still hope for a humane society of cooperation and solidarity is utopianism of the worst kind. As human beings, people simply don't fit into the capitalist market exchange economy. Capitalism has to go. No matter how slowly or haltingly we must strive and struggle for our emancipatory vision of socialism. Just as there is no single model of socialism, one that is suitable for all climes and all times, there is none of socialist politics either.  The specific conditions or demands and the forms of struggle they generate will vary from country to country.  Which, however, also again, does not mean the absence of general principles to guide it. The application of these principles is in fact a must for any successful pursuit of socialist politics today. Socialism is the only just, rational and sustainable future for the people of the world and that this future has to be struggled for here and now.

Socialism is a difficult word to define, especially given the various countries that have called themselves "socialist" at one point or another in time. Many people believe socialism only means government nationalization of the means of production, which is a definition we in the World Socialist Movement distance ourselves from. Socialism isn't something that can be summed up in one sentence. Socialism is about radical democracy. It would give people democratic control over political as well as economic matters, rather than the system we have now that concentrates the control of these areas into the hands of a small group of people at the top of the socio-economic ladder. It means giving you control over your workplace rather than in the hands of some board of trustees, the stock holders, or the bureaucrat official in a government ministry who are only interested in profit and not your livelihood. Within socialism people have the right to a job , decent housing, health care, education, etc.  Socialism means common ownership, and democratic control by the people, of the factories, farms, mines, offices and all other industries and services, a moneyless wageless stateless commonwealth. But if you need just one sentence, there is the old adage: "From each according to ability, to each according to needs." Or in two words – People Power. The workers must prepare themselves for their emancipation by class-conscious organisation on both the political and the economic fields for the establishment of socialism. The Socialist Party never asserted that socialist society would result from the actions of parliamentary delegates alone.

The most common argument against a moneyless society is that money seems to be the only effective regulating force which can prevent wastage. This may be the case in a money-driven society, where everything is evaluated by its price-tag, and the manner in which we deal with things is determined to a big extent by the monetary value. The higher the price, the bigger the value, the more one takes care of it; the lower the price, the lower the value, resulting in indifference and carelessness; this is the mechanism of a money-based society. But in a moneyless society the rules of a money-driven society do not apply anymore. You cannot predict behaviour patterns in a moneyless society by the rules of a money-driven society. In the usual money-based society the individual has the right to do whatever he wants with his financial resources. He sees everything through the perspective of its price. And if he has enough money, why not afford something which makes life more convenient or nice? And if something is cheap or free of charge, why bother about it? In this attitude the typical individual is fully justified in a money-based state of life.

But if we try to install a moneyless society around the world, then this attitude of course has to change, and will change. Once it is clear that electricity, water or food is a common commodity, which is free for all, but which has a cost for the community, then the justification for a non-caring attitude is gone. Today the fact that somebody pays for his electricity gives him the right to use it as he wants. Nobody can say anything, and he may feel himself fully justified in using it carelessly, or with care. This attitude of a money-based approach is of course stillexists within today’s society, since we still have a money-based society. But once we no longer have it, this attitude will change. Even the richest of the rich then won’t be able to treat the common commodities carelessly anymore, because they will no longer be “his electricity”, “his water”, “his food”, etc, that he is using. He will use a collective value and be forced to cherish it. There may be people who won’t like it that their electricity or water or food comes free, because it takes away their justification to use it as they like. Responsibility for the collective is inevitable in a collective based economy.

We therefore do not think that individuals will start wasting common commodities with indifference once he or she no longer feels any personal financial disadvantage in doing so. Some people may claim that a person will leave their light on when they leave the house, their windows open with air conditioners running, etc, once electricity is free. Such a claim can only be based on the assumption that the average-person is a careless, unconscious person who is not interested in anything but their own personal advantage. We do not think that this is true.

.Attempts to install a money-less approach within a money-driven society cannot work. As long as the basic thought and behaviour pattern is still money-based, you cannot expect a consciousness to come up. The basic idea of a money-less economy is that the motivation to work, to care, to make an effort, does not originate from a desire for money. If we want to install a money-less economy on a money-based consciousness we will fail.