Which Future?

 

Let us frankly admit we are living in the aftermath of great defeats suffered by the labour and socialist movements internationally. The working class requires revitalisation.  We believe that humanity can develop a healthy society of prosperity and peace. Capitalism is at a loss to reconstruct such a world. Hunger and poverty in the midst of plenty; war and climate change uprooting of millions of people; renewed totalitarianism; diplomatic duplicity – this catalogue of the aspects of capitalist society can be continued indefinitely. Capitalism is beyond redemption, beyond reform. It is sick, moribund and overripe for change. No realistic desirable alternative exists other than a thorough socialist reconstruction if It is not to sink completely into a new era of barbarism.

Class war is the inevitable result of an economic system in which 'anything goes if you're rich enough and winners take most'. The modern class war has been waged between wage-earners (who sell their labour) and their employers (owners of capital and the means of production). These classes have been assigned various names (proletariat, bourgeoisie, capitalists, etc.)

We need a vision of hope, not one of a dystopian future. We need to get beyond "wake-up call". We need to galvanize people to act with the urgency required to pull us back from the brink of oblivion. This process is not about terrifying people with apocalyptic images but explaining the choices before them. Far from gloom and doom, a powerful sense of resistance and a determination for change is what the Socialist Party advocates.  Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness—that is what is at the heart of understanding how we can survive. We provide a plan for a regenerative sustainable socialism. We want a society not for profit but one of common good.

Capitalism, as we have pointed out on numerous occasions, has been unable to solve any of the contradictions which are tearing apart mankind. It has channelled revolutionary struggles of the masses into the blind alley of nationalism and class collaboration. World capitalism is ripe for socialist transformation.  Capitalism cannot be reformed; it must be abolished and replaced. Do you want a society of abundance, production for use? Then you must fight for socialism. Do you want a future without wars, without terrorist bombing? Then you must fight for socialism. Either chaos and destruction – or socialist reconstruction.  The socialist perspective is more valid, more essential than ever because it alone meets the problems of our times. We unfurl the red banner of socialist revolution; we stand with our comrades throughout the world; we march towards the future.

The Socialist Party is the only international political party in the world. The fundamental principles of modern socialism are essentially the same in all lands. The Socialist Party recognises no national boundary lines. A socialist is a socialist irrespective of nationality, colour, creed, or sex in working-class solidarity for economic freedom. Every worker everywhere is a brother or a sister. Across the borders of all lands socialists clasp hands as comrades. As a socialist party, we pledge our fidelity to the principles of international socialism as embodied in the united thought and action of the socialists of all nations. The socialist movement, therefore, is a world movement. It knows of no conflicts of interests between the workers of one nation and the workers of another. It stands for the freedom of the workers of all nations; and, in so standing, it makes for the full freedom of all humanity

The Socialist Party is the only party that honestly stands for economic justice, which is impossible in a system based upon exploitation. Socialism is the next phase in the social evolution of civilisation. Socialism means that all those things upon which the people in common depend shall by the people in common be owned and administered; that the tools of employment shall belong to their creators and users; that all production shall be for the direct use of the producers; that the making of goods for profit shall come to an end; that we shall all be workers together; and that all opportunities shall be open and equal to all men and women. 

The campaign of the Socialist Party is and will be wholly educational. To arouse the consciousness of the workers to their economic interests as a class, to develop their capacity for clear thinking, to achieve their solidarity industrially and politically is to invest the working class with the inherent power it possesses to abolish the wage system and free itself from every form of servitude, and this is the mighty mission of the world socialist movement. The people, like helpless children, are forever looking for some “great man” and “enlightened leader” to watch over and protect them. Socialists are not looking for some mythical Moses to lead them into a fabled promised land. They have made up their minds to be their own leaders and to save themselves. They know that persons have deceived them and will again, so they put their trust in principles, knowing that these will not betray them.

The Socialist Party is the only party that does not want a vote that is not intelligently cast. The popularity of a candidate is against him rather than for him in the Socialist Party. No vote is wanted on account of the personality of a candidate.  Better united on the solid basis of principle, than ten times that number thrown together on the shifting sands of personality. It is the value of the socialist principle that is taught and emphasised, and if this is not understood and approved the vote is not wanted. In the socialist movement principles are paramount; the candidates are the last and least consideration. The supreme question is, “What are the principles?” Mere disgust with other parties is not accepted by socialists as sufficient reason to encourage the voting of the Socialist ticket. Such votes are unreliable, deceptive and misleading. The men who cast them are apt to desert at the very time they are most needed Any vote that is subject to the influence of personal considerations is so vacillating that it is of no use in the constructive work of a revolutionary political movement.

The Socialist Party addresses itself to the working class and it appeals to the ballot for the realisation of its cooperative commonwealth. One class now owns the machinery while another class uses them. One class is small and rich and the other large and poor. One wants more profit and the other more wages. One consists of capitalists and the other of workers. These two classes are at war. Every day of truce is at the expense of labour. There can be no peace and good will between these two essentially antagonistic economic classes. This class conflict be covered up or smoothed over.

The workers are not all blind to the causes underlying this great struggle. They are beginning to see and to think, and many of them will begin to act. Why should our fellow-workers support the Socialist Party? Because it is the only party that is unequivocally committed to their economic interests, to the abolition of the wage-system and the freedom of the worker from exploitation and every other species of servitude. The Socialist Party does not expect the support of the capitalist class, for it is opposed to their economic interests, and it would be foolish to expect them to abolish themselves. The Socialist Party is the party of the workers, who are on the right side of this worldwide struggle, and, although a minority today, it contains all the elements of self-development and will expand to majority proportions to inaugurate the impending change as certain as the forces of industrial evolution are undermining the present system and making that change inevitable.

The Socialist Party is the party of the present and of the immediate future. It believes that the competitive system has outlived its usefulness, that it has become an obstruction in the path of progress, that, like feudalism, from which it sprang, it must pass away. The Socialist Party stands for the abolition of the wage system, for the economic freedom as well as the political equality of the working class, knowing that without the former the latter is impossible. The Socialist Party stands for the common ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution and the operation of industry in the interest of all. The Socialist Party stands for wealth may be produced for the use of all instead of for the profit of a few , in which every citizen shall have the inalienable right to enjoy all the fruits of society’s collective labour.