Socialism Is the Goal We Must Strive For

“An injury to one is an injury to all”

In a climate of intense insecurity, cultivated by both the hostile corporate setting workers hesitate to speak out against their employers for fear of losing their jobs. The capitalist class has shown itself unfit to rule because it cannot even feed its wage slaves. But one thing is certain: the material conditions of life for the ordinary worker is drastically changing, and with them are changing the views and ideas of working men and women. A new and heartening sign of the fraternal mood that has been growing in the radical movement. The socialist alternative is beginning to appear realistic to many more working people. Such a perspective ought to appeal to the imagination of every genuine socialist.  

Vote for Corbyn (or Sanders) as many times as you like, and celebrate your supposed “victories,” but then when the next choice between Tweedledee and Tweedledum” comes up, you are right back where you were. You have not advanced an inch, you are still at the mercy of the choice between the lesser and greater evil. BUT – take your own fate in your hands, break away from all capitalist exploiters, begin the union of the workers, on the political field, and THERE YOU HAVE THE REAL FRUIT OF THE BATTLE. “Every class struggle is a political struggle.”

Regardless of their claims to the contrary, the ruling class of the capitalist state and their apologists are the inveterate enemies of democracy. It must be recognised that the capitalists run the machinery of state and control its repressive agencies. They will honour the rights of the individual citizen and the people only so long as these do not cut deeply into their vital interests. None of the agents of the plutocracy can be relied upon to adhere even to their own legality. Our case for socialism is based on the unconquerable ideas of Marx and Engels, and you can never kill those ideas. We shall not retreat an inch. We shall recant nothing. We shall fight to the last ditch and with all our strength.

To establish democracy, not the fake limited we have today but real political and economic democracy that is the aim of socialism. Democracy is not merely a pathway to the socialist goal. It is an integral part of that goal. True democracy is possible only in a socialist society and that what we have now as democracy is an illusion. Not only is socialism impossible without democracy but that there is no other way to socialism except through democracy. Democracy is indissolubly bound up with socialism both as a means to an end and as an integral part of the final goal. The ruling classes know very well what democracy means to the wage-earning workers. Where its establishment has been compelled they readily avail themselves of every opportunity to limit it.

We of the Socialist Party have nothing to do with opportunism and class collaboration. We are orthodox Marxists because we know that Marxism is the only revolutionary socialism of the working class, and that is the only genuine socialism. History has demonstrated the spuriousness of every other brand. Marxism teaches that socialism will not fall from the skies. Neither will it be gained by any appeals to the good-will and compassion of the capitalist exploiters as some people still seem to think. Marxism is a theory of social evolution which affirms that capitalism is obsolete and bankrupt. Socialism can be realised only as the outcome of the class struggle of the workers. The class struggle is the motive force of history. Politics has no serious meaning except as the expression of conflicting class interests. There is an irreconcilable conflict of class interests between the workers and their capitalist exploiters. The political principles of a socialist party must be determined accordingly. All the political actions and judgments of a socialist party must always be directed against the capitalist class, and never be taken in collaboration with them. The class struggle is the central and governing principle of socialist politics. It is by carrying the class struggle to its necessary conclusion — that is, to the victory of the working class and the abolition of capitalism — that the socialist society will be realised. This is the teaching of Marxism. There is no other way. And every attempt to find another way, by supporting the capitalists, by conciliating them, by collaborating with them has led not toward the socialist goal but to defeat and disaster for the workers.

There can be no greater crime than to mis-inform or deceive fellow-workers upon which so much depends for the salvation of mankind. It is a crime to offer them a platform of reformism under the label of “socialism”.