We’re going after the system!

The world and humanity are heading for unprecedented dangers and conflicts, up to and including the end of a habitable planet, if we are to trust some climate change experts.  They say this is the apocalyptic reality facing future generation. Current policies may well make our earth unliveable. Why do we not respond to the crisis? Only immediate action can save the future. If the future is to be saved the world requires a different economic system. Capitalism uses every trick, fair or unfair, to turn natural resources into money. By law, the directors of corporations are obliged to put the profits of stockholders above every other consideration. No room whatever is left for an ecological or social conscience. They act in such a way as to make themselves richer, and to increase their control of the political system to ensure they can accomplish this.

The media is dominated by trivia, entertainment, sports, the weather, celebrity gossip and so on. Worries about the future, the danger of new wars resulting from uncontrollable climate change, of widespread famine arising from global warming, of the possible mass migrations of peoples because of environmental destruction seldom appears in the news or in daily conversations of the public. Serious discussions of the crises which civilisation now faces are almost entirely absent. The media gives no hint at all of the true state of the world or of the dangers which we will face in the future. The lack of urgency demonstrated by the media and politicians gives the false impression that all is well with the world. But in fact, all is not well. We have to act immediately and adequately to save the future. 

Trump’s victory was achieved because he was able to convince a large majority of working-class whites that he represented a better hope for a healthy economy and world peace. Interlaced with his appeal was a deep undercurrent of national chauvinism. Trump shamelessly presented a program of thinly veiled racism, painting those who do not become rich or successful in a capitalist society as inferior, lazy and leeching off hard-working taxpayers. Trump is a throw-back to the bygone days of unchallenged U.S. supremacy in the world. His nationalism calls for a return to aggressive U.S. unilateralism.

We live today in an era of populism. We don’t know how coming events will pan out. But what is certain is that the economic and political crises are going to get worse, that the ruling classes have no alternatives to these crises, do not offer any future.

Across the world we see a wholesale embrace of the anti-working-class reformist ideology, along with attempts to create whole new reformist institutions to replace the openly discredited ones. In some cases, leftists are already taking the logic of their shift further: attempting to build or support openly class collaborationist populist parties and popular fronts. The gap between the capitalists and the increasingly impoverished working class is widening. Reformism is a proven failure: that is why the progressives and liberals are moving rightward. The far left’s rehashed reformism has even less viability. Its programme is worse than illusory: it is dangerously misleading. he liberation of the proletariat is the task of the proletariat itself; it is a task it must carry out in opposition to “condescending saviors.” Reformism is not a moderate or too slow form of socialism, but its enemy. We want the working class to become conscious of itself and its power in society. Success in the class struggle demands working-class independence from all capitalist parties. If more workers are to be won to the cause of socialism it is clear that we must greatly advance in our ability to explain the advantages of a socialist society and how we can achieve it. Working people remain open to socialism and are looking for change. But they remain to be convinced that socialism can provide them with a better life – greater democracy and improved material well-being. It is clear we must improve our explanation of our fundamental socialist option. We must combat the distortions of what socialism is. First of all, the word “socialism” is in the popular consciousness closely associated with the former USSR and Warsaw Pact countries. While these regimes were never socialist we never stop hearing that these countries typify socialism. Not only do the former Soviet Union and its satellites repeat this endlessly to cover up the fierce exploitation of workers in their societies, but the media and academia also take up the same refrain. They like nothing better than to point their finger at the ex-USSR and say, “Look, that is socialism,” knowing full well that the police state structure and the command economies of the East bloc countries are unlikely to attract workers.

Sooner or later, we should prepare for the time to re-structure the world’s economy to achieve planetary sustainability and steady-state economics. We must achieve a new kind of economy – socialism. What is needed more than hope is political action. We must end capitalism. We must create industrial democracy. We must replace nationalism with a movement for a world commonwealth. Fight for a future.