Change the world before it changes you

“Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” can be achieved in today’s world only by a socialist revolution. The Socialist Party is a Marxist party in that we understand that the interests of the capitalist class and the working class are opposed and cannot be reconciled; that capitalism can and must be ended and replaced; that the working people must capture the State then build a socialist society. Reformism - the acceptance of the framework of the capitalist economy and state - and seeking to "manage" capitalism has always ended by leading the attacks on the working class. The attempt to travel the road to socialism in small steps, to start it off through changes or reforms which are possible under capitalism, leads inevitably to forgetting the final aim and making the means an end in themselves. Reformist tactics have up to now led to the the carrying out of reforms being by the leadership of working class organisations, the politicians of the parliamentary parties thus every successful reform strengthens the faith of the workers in ‘those in power’, who can ‘get it done’, and to weaken the independence and consciousness of the working class. Socialists call upon the consciousness, self-activity and self-reliance of the workers and thus strengthening them in the class struggle.

Socialism will not be won by moving speeches and convincing writings, nor will it come if we were to elevate the day-to-day struggles to the exclusion of the fight to win the minds of the working class. We do suggest that the outlook which sees these struggles as ends in themselves, will also prove lacking. Our approach must be a synthesis of ideas and action. A socialist party is needed to give the working people an understanding of the nature of the capitalist system in which they live. Socialist understanding does not arise by itself from the immediate struggles, however hard or successful they may be. The working class does not develop a political, socialist consciousness spontaneously, out of separate or even out of a series of struggles or campaigns. The impact of a recession upon workers does not immediately and automatically turn into class-consciousness, but only through long drawn out theoretical education, propaganda and agitation. Without these, sections of the working class can very easily develop a fascist consciousness instead of a socialist one in a crisis. Everyone who has participated in a strike knows that the strikers, however militant, do not automatically become socialists as a result of their struggles. Socialist theory enables the Socialist Party to present the interests of the whole of the working class and not of any one section of it at the expense of others. This means that the Socialist Party helps the working class to fight against narrow sectional advantage and to fight for the unity of the working class.  We have no ready-made solutions to this problem which events have forced upon us. We claim only that the problem must be faced: and there must be discussion. The result of this discussion, we hope, will be to liberate great political energies based on socialist principles. As in the case of the New Model Army during the English Civil War against the monarchists, those soldiers, “know what they fight for, and love what they know.”

The State is an instrument of power in the hands of the big industrialists, bankers and landlords, who by this token are the ruling class. The State is there to effect the exploitation and oppression of the workers. There is war. It is class war. It is waged by the representatives of one class, the oppressors, against the mass of another class, the oppressed. In this war, the State is always and invariably on the side of the oppressors. Some of its representatives may try to achieve the ends of capital by cajoling and wheedling. But they always keep the big stick ready. The State — that is the big stick of the owners of wealth, the big stick of the big corporations. This is the only realistic view of the State. Everyone who tries to persuade you that the State is your friend, your defender, that the State is impartial and only “regulatory,” is misleading.

The winning of a majority in Parliament, supreme organ of state power, is one of the essential steps. A primary task of the socialist government would be to deprive capitalists of economic and political power. When a socialist majority in Parliament is won it will need the support of the mass movement outside Parliament to uphold the decisions. The working class and popular movement will need to be ready to use its organised strength to prevent or defeat attempts at violence against it.

Suppose you reject the case for socialism and decline to organise for its establishment. Will the world stay just the same, will it move forward, or will it go backwards? It is most important to understand what will happen to capitalist society if it is not replaced by socialism.  In every country, the crises of capitalism makes life harder for people to endure. Silent obedience is made a “patriotic” duty. Today under the austerity policies being imposed, the unemployed, “maintained” by the government and are at the government’s mercy. They are ordered to take any job, regardless of wages of working conditions, which it instructs them to take. Although this may make the chains of wage-slavery heavier and harder to bear, it does not lead to our extinction as a species. Capitalism’s effects on the environment, however, does that very thing. Socialism will also conserve the natural resources of the country which are now being ruthlessly wasted in the mad capitalist race for profits.

We live in a world of enormous economic and social contrasts. Although the potential exists to create wealth unimagined by previous generations and distribute them around the world billions in the developing countries have no safe water supply, lack sanitation and millions suffer from chronic malnutrition. Capitalism is unable to tackle the problems of the world because it is a system based on private ownership and individual greed. Socialism remains the only alternative and this conclusion is not a case of wishful thinking.

The capitalist class own most of industry, land, commerce, the banks and the mass media. The overwhelming majority of people can live only by selling their labour power to a capitalist employer, or to the state. Under capitalism, the price of commodities that workers produce reflects the average labour time taken to produce them, including their inputs (raw materials, power, wear and tear of machinery etc.) But the revenue that capitalists receive from the sale of those commodities is more than enough to pay the wages bill, other production costs, taxes and renewed investment. The balance—capitalist profit—goes mostly in dividends to shareholder capitalists, in rent to landowning capitalists and in interest payments to money-lending capitalists. Where does this capitalist profit come from? It is the value created by the company workforce, over and above the value of their wages. Workers, for example, create almost twice the value of their wages. The portion they do not receive back in wages or social benefits is the ‘surplus value’ kept by their employers. Here is the source of capitalist profit, and in this way workers are exploited under capitalism.

As employers seek to minimise costs and to squeeze more surplus value out of their workforce, they will try to hold down wages while also investing in machinery and equipment that saves labour costs and enables them to produce commodities more cheaply than their competitors. As the price of a commodity is determined largely by the average labour time taken to produce it, companies producing it at below average cost and value will make extra profits at the expense of the high-cost ones. In the state sector, workers in local government and the civil and public services are also engaged in a struggle with employers. Lower costs and higher productivity of labour will keep public expenditure down—which means lower taxes, less pressure to increase wages and therefore bigger net profits in the private sector. Whether in the private or public sector, it is in the interests of the capitalist class to reduce labour costs by employing workers who can be discriminated against on the basis of their race, gender, or age. Divisions within the working class on these and other grounds assist the capitalists to force down the general level of wages and other labour-related costs. That is why it is in the interests of all workers to unite against discrimination and inequality.

In a world-wide rush for profit capitalism has ravaged the resources and environment of the earth for more than a century. Widespread pollution of the air, soil, rivers, lakes and seas is but one of the consequences. Global warming and its ‘greenhouse effect’ threaten a greater incidence of climatic instability, crop failure and flooding. Destruction of the rain-forests is driving plant and animal species to extinction. We must move towards an overall system of production in which waste is either eliminated or reduced to an absolute minimum. The atmosphere, the oceans and the land can no longer be treated as a dustbin. Waste must either be recycled or used as a starting point for other processes. Where this is not possible in a particular process of production, that process may have to be abandoned or replaced by an alternative one. At all times, the effects of human activity on the environment will have to be carefully monitored, and research carried out to deal with problems as they arise. This applies to agriculture as much as to industry. The change to a closed system of waste-free production is incompatible with the existence of an unplanned capitalist economy dominated by the monopolies. Their drive for maximum and short-term profit takes precedence over the long-term consequences for the environment. The drive for private capitalist profit is an in-built obstacle to greater environmental protection. It regards ‘green’ policies as a drain on potential profits and dividends. It leads to the wasteful levels of consumption of raw materials seen today in the highly industrialised world.