The catastrophic situation where the powerlessness of politicians and the indifference of the privileged class have placed the world at the edge of an abyss. If the people, organised in a revolutionary way, don’t act, their future is lost, all is lost. The political unity we seek is the voluntary association of all local initiatives, the spontaneous and free coming together of all individual energies in view of a common goal: the well-being, the freedom and the security of all. The class war between capitalists and workers is one of those that cannot be ended through illusory compromises. One class today has taken all, stealing from the other class the bread not only of its body but also of its soul and spirit. It is our obligation to fight and to win. Socialists urge men and women to think, to investigate, to analyse every proposition. We are not “believers”; we don’t bow before Marx and Engels. We debate their ideas, we accept them when they are in accord with our own conclusions, but we reject them when they don’t strike a chord within us. We are far from possessing the blind faith in something because Marx once said it.
When speaking of socialism, most people think of the more or less authoritarian State-Capitalism advocated last century and practiced in certain countries. Socialism is not only on the side of freedom but it is equivalent to freedom. We affirm and recognise only free socialism. The following three essential points were learned:
[1] The abolition of the wage system, the modern form of ancient slavery,
[2] The abolition of private ownership in the means of production, and
[3] The emancipation of the individual and of society from the political machinery, the State, which helps to maintain economic slavery.
Socialism guarantees economic freedom because it can guarantee well-being, even luxury, in return for a few hours of work. This means emancipation from one of the heaviest burdens of slavery on man. It is an increase of liberty, where men and women have their means of existence guaranteed and is not forced to sell their brawn and brain to those who condescend to exploit them. Socialism is a free, non-governed society, which offers freedom, equality and solidarity for its members. Its foundations are to be found in mankind's sense of mutual responsibility.
Socialism cannot be made by force and is only possible when it is understood and wanted by the majority of people who embrace all the elements necessary to creating a society superior to the present one. The revolution will not be socialist if the masses are not socialist. We must organise and act like socialists before, during and after the revolution. Organisation which is, after all, only the practice of cooperation and solidarity, is a natural and necessary condition of social life. The age-long oppression of the masses by a small privileged group has always been the result of the inability of the oppressed to agree among themselves to organise with others for production and for enjoyment. Socialism exists to remedy this state of affairs.
Many would not dispute the fact that the current social system is evil, and the proof that it is, is that everyone suffers from it. From the poor, with neither bread nor roof, who knows constant hunger, to the millionaire, who lives in fear of a revolt of the poor. All of Humanity lives in a state of anxiety and it is easy to prove that all the ills we suffer from flow from the existence of the private property. Poverty, crime, war, and authoritarianism are all nothing but the results of capitalism. We socialists want to replace private property with communism, and oppression with freedom.
We don’t claim that all men and women will have the same intelligence, the same physique: we know that there will always be the greatest diversity in intellectual and physical aptitudes. But one will not be considered superior to the other. In a century that we call one of progress and of science, is it not painful to think of the millions hungry for knowledge and that cannot flourish? How many children who could have become men and women of great value, useful to humanity, will never go further than a rudimentary education.
Will everyone want to work? What about the lazy? We answer yes, everyone will want to work. Here is why. Many workers are engaged in work that is absolutely useless to society, for instance, on armaments. Many are also unemployed. Add to this a considerable number of able-bodied men who produce nothing: civil servants, financial sector employees, shop workers. We can thus say, without exaggeration and with a conservative estimate, that of a hundred capable of producing some kind of labour, only fifty furnish an effort truly useful to society. It is these fifty who produce all of our society’s riches. From this flows the deduction that if everyone worked, instead of eight hours the workday could decrease to only four. Beyond this, we should also consider that in the current state of things the total of manufactured and agricultural products are many times the amount required to meet humanity’s needs; which is to say that if the population was in even higher numbers three times we could still clothe, house, heat, and feed all; in a word, would have all of its needs satisfied if waste and other causes didn’t destroy that over-production. A society where all would work together, and which would be satisfied with productivity not far beyond its consumer needs (the excess of the first over the second would constitute a small reserve) would have to ask of each of its able-bodied members an effort of only two or three hours, perhaps less. So in reply to the original question, who would then refuse to give such a small quantity of work? Who would want to live with the shame of being held in contempt by all and being considered a parasite? Work being a natural need will all accept that no one would flee from the demand for such minimal effort. There would be no reason to have recourse to coercion to avoid the problem of idlers. But if in some extraordinary case someone wanted to refuse to contribute to his brothers and sisters, it would still be less costly to feed this unfortunate, who can only be described as sick, than to maintain magistrates, police and prison wardens to break him down. If there is no more authority, if there is no fear of the existence of the police to stop the criminal, don’t we risk seeing crimes multiply at a frightening rate? The answer is easy: We can categorise the crimes committed today in two principal categories; crimes of gain and crimes of passion. The first group will disappear on its own since there can be no attacks on property in a society which has done away with property. As for the second group, no law can stop them. But with socialism there will be no more making man the property of woman and woman the property of man; no more demanding of two beings who loved each other but a moment that they remain attached to the end of their days. Consequently crimes, in a future society, will become increasingly rare until they disappear completely.
Capitalism. That is the enemy of human happiness, for it alone creates inequality, and in its trail competition and division. With socialism and the end of nationalism, there will not be any more countries to incite hatred between fellow-workers, pitting one against the other, men and women who have never set eyes on each other. There will be the replacement of the narrow and petty attachment of the chauvinist for his country by the large and fruitful love of all of Humanity, without distinction of race or color. Religions will disappear giving people the hope of a better life and to enjoy life in the here and now, not in the after-life. No more hindrances to the free development of human nature. Each person working and consuming according to his or her needs, which is to say, as they wish.
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