Things are changing

 “We want no condescending saviours to rule us from a judgment hall.

The Socialist Party is a Marxian party. That is to say, we base our outlook on history and economics on the theoretical researches of Karl Marx. On the basis of Marxian economics, we have pointed out that there is no solution for booms and slumps as long as capitalism lasts. That booms and slumps are inevitable products of capitalism and will always be a part of it. We accept the fact that there is a class struggle in society—but that its solution lies in the hands of the workers to take political action for the establishment of socialism when they understood and want it. Consequently, we have put forward candidates in the parliamentary and local elections for the purpose of taking control out of the hands of our capitalist rulers in order to clear the way for the establishment of socialism. We hold that all people in the world, regardless of colour or nationality, are capable of understanding socialism and its implications. There is no fundamental difference in mental capacity of different groups of mankind, only differences in their stages of social development which has nothing to do with a difference in mental capacity. We have always insisted upon the capture of political power before any fundamental change in the social system can be achieved. Political power is the centre of the capitalist citadel, though the workers place this power in the capitalists’ hands at election times. But no fundamental change is possible until the majority understand and want it. We have also been opposed to reform policies and have kept unswervingly to the pursuit of socialism as our sole objective.

Just as capitalism has spread all over the world, bringing similar conditions of frustration, poverty, and insecurity to all peoples, so also the seeds of discontent and the yearning for something better has become a part of life everywhere. Unfortunately, this discontent takes wrong turnings and has led to riots and nationalist uprisings that, in the long run, have helped nobody but the ruling class of capitalists or budding capitalists. The solution is the same everywhere, for socialism is an international movement involving the workers of the world, whatever their colour. It is not possible to establish socialism in one country alone, in the midst of a wilderness of capitalism. Just as capitalism has spread, so have socialist ideas.  We, therefore, urge the workers of the world to unite in the world-wide socialist movement which has already begun, because socialism is the only solution to the social ills of mankind. Socialism is a system in which there will be no privileged class, as everything that is in and on the earth will be the common and equal possession of all mankind. Capitalism is not going to disappear of its own volition. Ours is the choice of being shaken by its shivers of fever for the whole of our lives or of using our brains and using successfully the only antidote, fraternal co-operation. Socialism!

Only then will mankind be able to live truly. Only then will it be no longer necessary for workers to have to beg for an opportunity to work and for men and women to be forced, after a life of labour and want, to have to drag themselves along to protest meetings in order to be able to keep some part of their standard of living. Peace and prosperity will then be truly secured as a matter of course. Man will step from the darkness of the jungle into the bright light of the landscape of culture.

On the contrary, we affirm that no political party, irrespective of its title or aspirations, can run a system BASED ON THE EXPLOITATION OF THE WORKING CLASS THROUGH THE WAGES-MONEY SYSTEM IN THE INTERESTS OF ALL. They have all put forward the ignorant assumption that they possess the policies and personnel to make a buying-and-selling system, a capitalist system, operate in the interests of ‘the people’.

The fact that it has not worked in the interest of the working class ANYWHERE, under ANY government or ANY political party, whether in the guise of ‘western democracy’ or ‘peoples' democracy’, bears eloquent testimony to their ignorance of the nature of capitalism.

Our role in the cocktail of politics is the political education of our fellow members of the working class to the end of achieving a mass understanding of why capitalism must always operate against us and why we must choose the Socialist alternative—a wage-free class-free society of production for use. With such understanding achieved, our purpose will not be to ‘take over the government’ but, rather, to gain, democratically, the use of its executive authority and, in concert with our fellow workers throughout the world, to banish such government—along with the system of class privilege that gave rise to it. Unlike our opponents we in the Socialist Party have no plans for running—or being run by— capitalism, separated, united, inside or outside the EU We have no urge for taking over the role of government, nor can we claim that, given the opportunity of ‘taking over the government’ we could administer capitalism fairly and in the interests of all. As socialists, knowing full well the nature of capitalism, knowing that that system cannot operate IN ANY CIRCUMSTANCES in the interests of the working class, we feel safe in prophesying that our problems, the problems of the working class, will remain with us whatever the demarcations of capitalism’s market.