Socialise Our Democracy

What is socialism? If we are socialists, what are we actually fighting for? The aim of socialism is to take the means of production and distribution out of the hands of the capitalist class and place them into the hands of the people. This aim is sometimes spoken of as common ownership. This should be distinguished from ‘public ownership’ or nationalisation or municipalisation which is the ownership, i.e. the right of disposal, by a public body representing ‘society’, by government, state power or local authority or some other political body. The persons forming this body, the ministers, civil service department heads, appointed managers, are the direct masters of the production apparatus; they direct and regulate the process of production; they command the workers. Common ownership is the right of disposal by the workers themselves; the working class itself — taken in the widest sense of all that partake in really productive work, including employees, farmers, scientists — is direct master of the production apparatus, managing, directing, and regulating the process of production which is, indeed, their common work. Under ‘public ownership’ or ‘state ownership’ the workers are not masters of their work; they may be better treated and their wages may be higher than under private ownership; but they are still exploited. Exploitation does not mean simply that the workers do not receive the full produce of their labor; a considerable part must always be spent on the production apparatus and for unproductive though necessary departments of society. Exploitation consists in that others, forming another class, dispose of the produce and its distribution; that they decide what part shall be assigned to the workers as wages, what part they retain for themselves and for other purposes. Under public ownership this belongs to the regulation of the process of production, which is the function of the bureaucracy. This was the case in the old Soviet Union where bureaucracy was the ruling class, the masters of production. Those who work the most and hardest are still deprived of all say in the organisation of their industry, just the same as in all private enterprises. Working people, which means the vast majority of people, should rule society in their own interests. Socialism unleashes the creativity of working people, who are capable of tremendous advances when not toiling under a system of exploitation.

One of the most significant signs of our times is the readiness with which the capitalist class turns to schemes of State ownership and control, for relief from the economic pressure under which it is struggling. We had Northern Rock and Royal Bank of Scotland being taken over by the government but there has been many more examples before them. Therefore, to repeat, state ownership and control is not socialism. What we merely have a trend towards state capitalism, a despotism that might be worse for the workers than the status quo. State capitalism’s control of the industry will not make it any less ugly than it is under ‘free enterprise’capitalism. Indeed, the direct intervention of the government in its affairs will increase workers’ difficulties. Reforms galore are, of course, promised by the left-wing and right-wings of capitaism, but when it comes to carrying them out, that will be a different question. Reforms that are out-with the framework of capitalism, under the pressures of big business and capitalist reality, are dropped and reversed. Socialists are alert, however, in pointing out the great distinction between "government" or "public" ownership and “common” ownership or “collective” ownership in reiterating the socialist demand for the complete social ownership of all the means of production and distribution as the only cure for the evils of the competitive system. Another way of expressing the socialist aim is to call for a cooperative commonwealth by democratic means of a cooperative commonwealth in which the supplying of human needs and enrichment of human life shall be the primary purpose of our society. Such an economy will yield the maximum of goods and services for the satisfaction of human needs.  

The Socialist Party aims to replace the present capitalist system, with its inherent injustice and inhumanity, by a social system from which the domination and exploitation of one class by another will be eliminated, in which economic planning will supersede unregulated private enterprise and competition, and in which genuine democratic self-government, based upon economic equality will be possible. The present order is marked by glaring inequalities of wealth and opportunity, by chaotic waste and instability; and in an age of plenty it condemns the great mass of the people to poverty and insecurity. Power has become more and more concentrated into the hands of a small irresponsible minority of financiers and industrialists and to their predatory interests the majority are habitually sacrificed. When private profit is the main stimulus to economic effort, our society oscillates between periods of feverish prosperity in which the main benefits go to speculators and profiteers, and of catastrophic depression, in which the common man's normal state of insecurity and hardship is accentuated. We believe that these evils can be removed only in a planned and socialised economy in which our natural resources and means of production and distribution are owned, controlled and operated by the people.

The Socialist Party will not rest content until every person in all other lands is able to enjoy equality and freedom, a sense of human dignity, and an opportunity to live a rich and meaningful life as a citizen of a free and peaceful world. This social and economic transformation can be brought about by political action. We consider that the other political parties are the instruments of capitalist interests and cannot serve as agents of social reconstruction, and that whatever the superficial differences between them, they are bound to carry on government in accordance with the dictates of the big business interests who finance them. The Socialist Party aims at political power in order to put an end to this capitalist domination of our political life. It appeals for support to all who believe that the time has come for a far-reaching reconstruction of our economic and political institutions and who are willing to work together to end capitalism.