Sunday, March 29, 2020

Wage-slavery is the fact.


Who controls my bread controls my head

 The social revolution is the hope of the oppressed people. The Socialist Party holds that political understanding alone can help the people to crystallise their discontent into an intelligent, ordered. Never before has technology provided such favourable conditions for the spread of education and agitation. Many who have never taken the trouble to get even an elementary knowledge of the fundamentals of socialism, have convinced themselves that “socialism will not work” and, in fact, that “socialism is dead.” On the contrary, socialism still lives. If our fellow-workers want socialism, they must join the Socialist Party, and agitate, educate, and organise for socialism. Capitalism today can no longer satisfy their demands. Our goal is to win the greatest mass of workers to socialism. Political agitation is the struggle to raise class consciousness.

Capitalism is founded upon production for profit. Socialism is all about production for use. The Socialist Party does not confuse revolution and violence with one another. Violence and bloodshed do not make any movement revolutionary, and essentially they have nothing in common. Being a party which stands for the brotherhood of humanity, and directing its activities toward the attainment of general happiness and well being, the Socialist Party hopes that it will be accomplished by peace. Our party, the Socialist Party, is also aware of the fact that the success of the social revolution is guaranteed only when the minds of the people have matured for it. Therefore, our greatest duty is to educate and organize the working class so that it will become capable of carrying out this historic duty. But just as we cannot define the form of the revolution, neither can we determine the moment or its course. The Socialist Party works for the revolution when its struggles for the well-being, for the self-respect, and for the self-consciousness of working people.

The economic basis of present day society is the private ownership and control of socially necessary means of production, and the exploitation of the workers, who operate these means of production for the profit of those who own them. The interests of these two classes are diametrically opposed. It is the interest of the capitalist class to maintain the present system and to obtain for themselves the largest possible share of the product of labour. It is the interest of the working class to improve their conditions of life and get the largest possible share of their own product so long as the present system prevails, and to end this system as quickly as they can. In so far as the members of the opposing classes become conscious of these facts, each strives to advance its own interests as against the other. It is this active conflict of interest which we describe as the class struggle.

The Socialist Party seeks to organise the working class for independent action on the political field, not for the betterment of their conditions, but above all with the revolutionary aim of putting an end to exploitation and class rule. Such political action is absolutely necessary to the emancipation of the working class, and the establishment of genuine liberty for all. To accomplish this aim of the Socialist Party is to bring about the common ownership and democratic control of all the necessary means of production — to eliminate profit, rent, and interest, and to change our class society into a society of equals, in which the interest of one will be the interest of all. The political parties are as rotten and bankrupt as the system they uphold. They can maintain themselves and that. system today only by piling additional burdens upon the people. For the future they offer only more poverty and continual war. The evils of capitalism will disappear only with the destruction of capitalism and the building of socialism.

The socialist society will do away with the anarchy of capitalism. Democratically-elected neighbourhood assemblies and workers’ councils in every industry and district will manage public services and production. The vast technological and natural resources will help us with the re-construction of society. The only path forward is the socialist road. Today it is the ballot that we use against capitalism. Vote, then, for socialism.” Vote for the Socialist Party, the only party that keeps the revolutionary red banner unfurled. The prevailing economic system can only be abolished in two ways; namely, by securing control of the state machine or by violent insurrection. No sane person prefers violence to peace, and hence socialists rely upon the efficacy of a united class-conscious ballot to accomplish their end.

The Socialist Party is necessarily a revolutionary party in the sense above indicated, and its basic demand is the common ownership of the means of production and distribution and the operation of all industry in the interest of all the people. This will mean an economic democracy. Economic freedom can result only from common ownership, and upon this vital principle the Socialist Party differs from every other party. Between private ownership and common ownership there can be no middle way. One produces for profit, the other for use.

No comments: