We need a rational world, Not a rationed world

The Socialist Party advocates the principle of common ownership. There was a time when it seemed to many that it was possible to tame the State and create a “welfare state” for the benefit of all. Yet it has only offered us crumbs. The apathy and despair endemic to our culture are symptoms of the powerlessness people experience over their lives. The State cannot build a socialist world for us, that must be built by ourselves. We seek to abolish capitalist commodity production and wage labour and replace these with a system where the wealth of society is owned in common, managed by the people themselves, and used to produce and allocate goods and services to each equitably and according to their needs. This socialist revolution will liberate us from both the need and the drive to create wealth for the rich, making possible a socialist mode of production that seeks to benefit all of humanity. Mutual aid is essential and promotes the positive flourishing of our collective humanity.

The Socialist Party’s object is the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by, and in the interests of, the whole people. What do we mean by common ownership? Do we propose taking over all the means of production, etc., and then divide them up amongst the whole people? Of course not. Industry and transport are all too large and too complicated to parcel out piecemeal division. In fact, one of the benefits capitalist production has conferred upon society is just this: that it has organised production on a social scale, though the process has brought misery to millions of workers and small proprietors. If we were to attempt to “divide up” existing wealth, therefore, we would have to take a step backward in development and revert to the primitive productive methods of our forefathers. And even if it were possible to take such a step backward, we would then be faced with two hopeless tasks: (1) To produce enough to satisfy the needs of the present huge population, without the productive, transport and other facilities that exist to-day; and (2) with private property of a primitive kind in existence to prevent the regrowth of huge amalgamations, such as exist to-day. We do not propose a “divvying up” society’s wealth.

What we do intend is that all the means of producing and distributing the things we need shall be taken over and administered as the common possession of one huge family—the human family. In other words, that each will be free to eat, drink and clothe himself according to his needs, and that in return each will contribute his services to production according to his capacities and the requirements of the times. This will involve the organisation of production according to plan. That is, it will be necessary to determine roughly: (1) The production required; (2) the raw material and machinery, etc., required; (3) the amount of work required to ensure the necessary production; (4) the allocation of the population to the work required.

Socialists are not hero worshippers because the emancipation of the working class can only be the job of the working class itself. That as long as it sits back trusting passively in some leader or savior or even party to “do good” for the people, it will never get an inch nearer to the great goal of freedom. The Socialist Party does not seek to “bring” socialism to the people; we seek to bring about  the conditions where the people win socialism for themselves.

When the new society has settled down to production on the new plan of organisation there will be ample leisure for each individual to employ himself in ways productive of pleasure. To some leisure time devoted to invention; to others the devotion to the different arts will be the outlet for their superfluous energies. Others again will like to spend some time in travel and it is just here that the new arrangement promises most. Modern technology has so simplified production that it has reduced the part of each to a comparatively simple one, and the tendency in this direction is still rapidly proceeding.

Working people live their whole life on the poverty line, some of them a little below it and some of them a little above it, but most of them precariously poised on it. Recession or war, unemployment or over-wok, hunger or obesity, collapse of economy or collapse of the environment – these are the alternatives presented by capitalism. It’s not difficult to prove that this is an insane world. Every issue of the Socialist Standard offers proof of the absurdity of the capitalist system. Even the capitalist media finds itself admitting the irrational character of this social system. Suffering and sorrow are the fate of individuals bent on self-destruction. Poverty and financial crises drive many into depression and to suicide. If one did not foresee a socialist solution to all of these problems, it would be easy to lose one’s mental balance. Our critics like to make fun of us and call us “crazy dreamers” But they are the ones who are supporting  this lunatic asylum called capitalism.

 You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one