No Return to Normal

 

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and our climate emergency has shown us something, which many of us have known for a long time, that there is something very wrong with our system. It has led many people to foresee a future of apocalyptic catastrophes. Socialists, however, hold hope that global warming and plague might lead to a better world. Both crises has made clear the oneness of the peoples of the world. What we share is much more powerful than what keeps us apart. All people are inescapably interconnected, and the more we can come together to solve our problems, the better off we will all be.

The Socialist Party is a component of the greatest social movement in human history. It is a world movement, a movement of movements. It is rooted in the blood, sweat and tears of millions who have spent their lives throughout history clamouring for social justice, working for peace, striving for a society that works for everyone. This movement does not appear by magic and we need to consciously commit ourselves to the systemic transformation needed. Humanity can work together to prevail over problems and learn the folly of battling each other. The climate rises and the pandemic demonstrate the mutual dependencies of the world’s peoples and the requirement that the planet’s resources be redirected for the service of health and peaceful life. The overriding goal must be human security, providing food, water, a clean environment and caring for people. Socialists recognise the value of collective social relationships. We’re brothers and sisters who must think and act cooperatively like one family. 

Socialists see the potential for transformations that would lead to greater equality and better well-being for all. It is our opportunity to do things differently. Social change is possible. A different world, a different economy can be the future. We must become one world. Through genuine cooperation and solidarity among all the people of the world, socialists urge we collaborate to protect humanity. We need a mighty movement to transform the political institutions and economic structure. The same dedication and determination which mankind has conducted war through the ages must now be applied to building a peaceful and prosperous planet.

 Human beings can only take so much. The living world can only take so much. Eventually, things need to change. The peoples of the planet are ripe for radical political change, but that change doesn’t necessarily have to be progressive in nature. It could also be reactionary and fuelled by religious extremism, xenophobia, racism, and tribalism. That’s up to us socialists to present a positive vision of a possible future. Even to-day we can see mutual aid networks flourishing all over the world.

While our attention is presently distracted by the pandemic, the planet continues to warm – polar ice-caps melts, glaciers disappear, forest fires and droughts appear, seas rise, plants and animals disappear and people continue to be displaced. Time is running out. Now is the time for alternatives. The stakes couldn’t be higher. Society must redirect the resources it’s currently spending on weapons and on the waste of consumerism, and instead provide what people really need - for free.

To survive and prosper, to fulfil our potential, socialists say we must reject divisions and that it is possible to build a new society of social justice. Out of chaos of the old we can create a future civilisation in which humanity can live in harmony. In times of crises, people are expressing solidarity with one another. It demonstrates humanity is social. We cannot have a return to normal, because normal was the problem. This as an opportunity to restart society for a better future. We can rebuild our society in an egalitarian way, in an environmental friendly way. We can banish the politics of hate. There are endless possibilities that a future can offer us to change our world. Our present capitalist system is unsustainable, and it works for the interests of a few very rich people. We must build a sustainable, steady-state, zero-growth economic system, an social system which ends inequality and injustice.

The Socialist Party is in favour of the common ownership of all the means of production and distribution: namely, the land, mines, mills, factories, and productive machinery, for the purpose of operating industry in the interest of the whole people. The Socialist Party proposes to establish economic democracy, namely, the ending of the profit system. Working people have been fed the arguments that human nature, over-population, shortage of resources, the need for leaders requires a process of gradual reforms to bring about a socialist society and a world of abundance.

We have had enough of waiting.