To whom does the future belong?

We are not prophets and we must restrict ourselves to tracing, in only the broadest brush-strokes, the picture of a future socialist society. The Socialist Party is committed to inspiring a vision of an alternative way of living where all the world's resources are owned in common and democratically controlled by communities on an ecologically sustainable and socially harmonious basis. We believe such a society will no longer require money, markets, or states, and can only be established democratically from the bottom up without the intervention of politicians or leaders. We are a principled movement for radical change seeking a society of cooperation and solidarity. The members of the Socialist Party share a vision of the future society as a worldwide, class-free, state-free and market-free cooperative commonwealth, based on the common ownership and democratic control of productive resources in the interests of the whole community, with production directly for use. The Socialist Party seeks to establish a free society, which will render impossible the growth of a privileged class and the exploitation of man by man. The SPGB therefore, advocates common ownership of the land, industry and all means of production and distribution on the basis of voluntary co-operation. In such a society, the wage system, finance, and money shall be abolished and goods produced and distributed not for profit, but according to human needs. The State in all its forms, embodying the ruling class, is the enemy of the workers and cannot exist in a free, classless society.

Socialism is the movement of the working class towards a new society. Society at the moment is run in the interests by a powerful elite that controls the means of producing and distributing wealth. That production has become an end in itself. Without constantly seeking to expand, capital faces ruin. To avoid that ruin, capital seeks to produce more commodities all the time. The influence of the commodity spreads into more and more areas of our lives. Every aspect of our life, every minute of our day and night is fair game to capital. Everything we do is becoming subject to the commodity. In our everyday life,we passively watch this domination.

Socialism means the end to buying and selling. It means and end to working for employers. It means and end to the nations, states, and corporations that perpetuate and protect commodity production. It means production for use and distribution according to need. It will be a society based on the free association of the people who live in it. It will bring the end of racism, sexism, homophobia, environmental destruction and greed.

Reforms of capitalism have been going on as long as the system has been in existence. Some of the most significant of these have been the extension of the voting franchise, the introduction of the so-called "welfare state", nationalisation, and de-nationalisation, increased regulation by the state and de-regulation. While the material living conditions at least, of the populations of developed countries, have improved since the 19th and early 20th centuries, inequality in the U.K., for example, is now greater than it was 50 years ago, according to a recent government survey. Stress in the workplace and in many other aspects of society has certainly not decreased, rather the reverse. Such trends can be observed on a global scale. Additionally, rampant poverty in underdeveloped countries is as widespread as it ever was. Wars and environmental degradation continue. All of this clearly confirms the correctness of the socialist assertion that the present system CANNOT be reformed in the interests of the majority of people and of the environment, in any significant way. What we need is a complete alternative. Genuine world socialism, with common ownership, its production for human need and real democratic control is very much that alternative. The most important of capitalism's reforms have usually NOT achieved what they are supposed to have achieved and even when some very limited success has been gained, these so-called "gains" have often been either very limited, temporary or partially reversed. The "Welfare State" is an obvious example of this.

Paul Lafargue in his 1883 critique of the capitalist work ethic - 'The Right to be Lazy' realised that an alternative to the drudgery and grind of wage slavery had become a real possibility. Under a system common ownership and democratic control, people would be free to choose how they worked and how they consumed; instead of toiling to enrich the wealth of a tiny minority. In 1998 Ken Knabb put it this way:

'If a household gets a washing machine, you never hear the family members who used to do the laundry by hand complain that this “puts them out of work.”

But strangely enough, if a similar development occurs on a broader social scale it is seen as a serious problem — “unemployment” — which can only be solved by inventing more jobs for people to do.

Proposals to spread the work around by implementing a slightly shorter workweek seem at first sight to address the matter more rationally. But the absurdity of 90% of existing jobs is never mentioned. In a sane society, the elimination of all these absurd jobs (not only those that produce or market ridiculous and unnecessary commodities, but the far larger number directly or indirectly involved in promoting and protecting the whole commodity system) would reduce necessary tasks to such a trivial level (probably less than 10 hours per week) that they could easily be taken care of voluntarily and cooperatively, eliminating the need for the whole apparatus of economic incentives and state enforcement.'

A socialist society is characterised by the formula:

 “To each according to needs, from each according to abilities.”