Monday, October 05, 2020

The happiness of humanity is not in the past, but in the future


The Socialist Party desires to base practice upon sound theory. Are we not seeking to establish a class-free society so our organisational structure must reflect our goal. Capitalism promises the people of our planet not prosperity nor amelioration of conditions but austerity, oppression, and possible environmental destruction of humanity. Only through an irreconcilable struggle against capitalism, towards its elimination and the establishment of socialism, will working people of the world find the full freedom, equality and democracy for which they aspire. Only when the working people in the world have the power in their own hands can we realise the cherished cooperative commonwealth. Technological progress is now reaping vast profits for the industrial and financial oligarchy and condemning millions to misery.

The Socialist Party opens up tremendous possibilities for our fellow-workers. But to realise the possibilities it must present itself as a real alternative to the capitalist parties. It must be rooted in the working class—in the social movements of the working class. The interests of big business and workers are fundamentally irreconcilable. Every penny of capitalist profit is robbed from the workers’ pockets. Only uncompromising struggle against the capitalists and their parties can advance the position of working people. Workers can have no truck or trade with the capitalist parties. No worker should vote for the capitalist parties at the ballot box. Power resides in the ownership of capital. The capitalists control the mass media, the educational system, all the means of indoctrination in capitalist ideology. This ruling class exercises power through the state machinery which they control — the army, the police, the courts, the upper echelons of the civil service, all tied to the corporate bosses by a thousand strings. The state is administered by the cabinet, hand-picked from the most reliable politicians capitalist politics has to offer. Parliament does not rule. It provides rulers with the facade of sharing their power with working people. It is only through independent labour political action that workers can win real power. The cause of the labour movement cannot be forwarded by crossing class lines. The party of the working people must speak and act like one. In this lies its future. The profit system cannot make use of new technology, artificial intelligence and automation for the benefit of society; socialism will! The future society that will be constructed under socialism will reduce work to a insignificant part of daily life and offer the individual the fullest possibilities to pursue his own abilities and interests.

We live in a society racked with crises. This society can neither guarantee them a secure future nor even promise there will be a future. The threat of the climate emergency casts a shadow over the lives of all of us. The vast majority of our people work out their lives for the enrichment of the small minority of profiteers who own the  wealth and control the entire society - all these are hallmarks of the "system" we live under. The system is capitalism. it’s their system, not ours! Under it a small minority rule in fact if not in name, and profit is the be-all and end-all of economic life; human needs come second—if at all.

The class struggle as it is reflected by the Socialist Party means opposing the reformist mis-leaders of the working class. It means striving to generalize and transform every impulse in the class struggle of the workers to go beyond reformism toward revolutionary action.

The next revolution will not only break down the state and substitute free federation. Working people will trust the free organisation of food supply and production to free groups of workers which will federate with like groups in other cities and villages to accomplish their aim. The workers will do the planning; they will organise production; they will manage production. Socialism will see that each person make a full contribution to the common thought and engage in the running of everyday life. We believe that men and women can and must participate actively in change to ensure that they bring fulfilment of their aspirations.

Reformists put off the cooperative commonwealth and prolong the suffering of the world’s disinherited. The Socialist Party points out the economic basis upon which democracy must stand in order to achieve liberty. It proclaims all liberty to rest back upon economic liberty, and all individuality to be rooted in economic unity. It affirms that there can be no liberty save through association; no true commonwealth save a cooperative commonwealth. It makes clear that democracy in the state is but a fiction, unless it be realised through economic democracy in production and distribution. 

The polarisation of wealth, the result of the accumulation of capital is the cause of the intensification of the class struggle. Socialism is the sole solution to the major problems which dominate over all others, meaning the question of poverty, the question of exploited labour. The Socialist Party hold that the exploitation of labour, with all of its consequences will not disappear until the day the means of production –– land, machinery, and in general all that serves production –– will be transformed from private property into common property. The socialist movement is as wide as the world, and its mission is to win the world — the whole world — for humanity. Then the world — the world the socialist movement shall win from capitalism — will be filled with wealth for all to have and to enjoy in its abundance. The world is one vast store of raw materials. In every passing breeze, in every wave, in gurgling stream, all the rays of the Sun, energy transforms natural resources into wealth, and provides fabulous abundance to banish for all time spectre of want, and make the world fit for human habitation. The worst in socialism will be better than the best in capitalism.

The Socialist Party supports economic and political solidarity. When enough have become socialists a new power will be in control! The People! For the first time in history the working people will be free and no class will be in subjection. Even the descendants of the present capitalists will thank the socialists of today for the freedom and harmonious civilisation they enjoy. The Socialist Party proclaims its mission to win the world from capitalist barbarians and dedicate it to the human family. No greater mistake was ever made than to suppose that socialism is a dream and that “human nature” excludes it from being realised. Socialism is neither a dream nor a scheme, but a theory of society based upon the principles of social evolution, Industrial democracy will wrest the earth from its exploiters and its vast and inexhaustible storehouse will yield abundance for all. The growth of socialism is the promise of freedom and fraternity — the heralding of a new dawn. Workers at last are waking.

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