This is socialism. This is a socialist party

We are socialists because we recognise in it the only principle by which the working-class men and women can emerge as free people and not as mere profit-making machines for the service of others. The future advocated by the Socialist Party is the socialist commonwealth. Our objective is aimed at the right of the community to control for the good of all, the production of its social wealth. The Socialist Party’s goal is a class-free society based on the common ownership and control of the industries and social services to be administered in the interests of all society. Socialism means production to satisfy human needs, not as under capitalism, for sale and profit. Such a system would make possible the fullest democracy and freedom. It would be a society based on the most primary freedom—economic freedom. For individuals, socialism means an end to economic insecurity and exploitation. It means workers cease to be commodities bought and sold on the labour market, and forced to work as appendages to tools owned by someone else. It means a chance to develop all individual capacities and potentials within a free community of free individuals. It means a classless society that guarantees full democratic rights for all workers. Socialism is that social system under which the necessaries of production are owned, controlled and administered by the people, for the people where political and economic despotism has been abolished and class rule is at an end. That is socialism.

If it does not fit this description, it is not socialism—no matter who says different. We must not be swept off our feet by revolutionary phrases and radical slogans. Those who claim that socialism existed and failed in places like Russia and China simply do not know the facts. Socialism does not mean a government command economy or state ownership. It does not mean a one-party system run without democratic rights. Those things are the very opposite of socialism. Socialism has so far never existed anywhere. It did not exist in the old U.S.S.R., and it does not exist in China. When the working class takes control of state power it controls all that is necessary to run production on socialised lines. A dictatorship of the proletariat is unnecessary, the workers being in a majority. There will not even be a rule of the proletariat because the act of socialising the industries automatically abolishes all classes and therefore the proletariat as a class ceases to be.

The Left wants a dictatorship over the proletariat. It argues that the large mass of workers will never become Socialist and will have to be led by an intelligent minority. So, it is willing to unite with any movement of workers, no matter how wrong this may be, in order that they will have some masses to lead. The Socialist Party knows that no leaders are going to pull the workers into Socialism. As Marx stated, “The emancipation of the working class must be the class-conscious act of the working class itself.” An ignorant muddleheaded working class will never be able to act correctly or move in the proper direction no matter how clever the leaders may be. “The day is past,” says Engels, “for revolutions carried through by small minorities at the head of unconscious masses.” In order to gain a following the left-wingers caters to the ignorance of the masses and so we find its platforms filled with all kinds of petty reforms. The Socialist Party holds that the political party must be a party of no compromise. Its mission is to point the way to the goal and it refuses to leave the main road to follow the small bypaths that lead into the swamp of reformism. The crimson banner of socialism is held high by ourselves and not dragged down into the quagmire of reform. Capitalism cannot be reformed. It must be overthrown.

The Socialist Party is opposed to violence or the advocacy of violence in the labour movement because it knows that such tactics are playing right into the hands of the capitalist class. It is not cowardice that dictates our position but common sense. In many countries, workers have the right to openly and agitate for the overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. If we did not have this opportunity then no alternative would be open for us but to advocate the forceful overthrow of capitalism. The capitalists can steal elections, miscount votes, and resort to a thousand and one political tricks, but it is merely tampering with a thermometer — it cannot change the temperature. And the temperature is the organised power of the working class. Let a revolutionary moment arise and unless the workers are organised, all the armed insurrection and physical force will bring us nowhere unless the working class are politically and industrially organised so an invulnerable unity be offered to the master class. Advocacy of violence brings naught to the workers but imprisonment and executions.

 Socialism will be a society in which the things we need to live, work and control our own lives—the industries, services and natural resources—are collectively owned by all the people, and in which the democratic organisation of the people within the industries and services is the government. Socialism means that government of the people, for the people and by the people will become a reality for the first time.

You need to be in the Socialist Party fighting for a better world—to end poverty, racism, sexism, war and to avert the threat of imminent environment catastrophe. The Socialist Party calls upon all who understand the critical nature of our times, and who are aware that a basic change in our society is needed, to join us to put an end to class conflict and all its poisonous results. By placing the land and the instruments of social production in the hands of the people as a collective body in a cooperative socialist society we seek to build a world in which everyone will be free.

The Socialist Party alone of all the organisations on the political field has a concrete, clear, concise, principled vision, the only one possible of inaugurating. The time is ripe for action. It is the responsibility of every class-conscious worker to line up on the side of that organisation that has the conviction, the principles and the tactics necessary to the emancipation of the working class. Right now, the Socialist Party alone points the way to freedom. The only argument ever made against the Socialist Party is that we are small. When the time is ripe for the social revolution, it will be the organisation, no matter what its size, that has the correct principles and tactics that will be the rallying point of the working class.

The Socialist Party never compromises truth to make a friend, never withholds criticism of mistakes lest it make an enemy. It pursues its course unswayed by a desire for temporary advantage. Its integrity of purpose by which it is inspired will, in the long run, win the respect and confidence of our fellow workers.