We Are The Future

 

The Socialist Party's goal is a class-free society based on common ownership and collective control of the industries and social services, these to be administered in the interests of all society. Its primary role is to challenge the political apparatus of the capitalist class and promoting worker class consciousness. Socialism means production to satisfy human needs, not as under capitalism, for sale and profit. Socialism does not mean government or state ownership. It does not mean a closed party-run system without democratic rights. Those things are the very opposite of socialism. Socialism is a social system under which the necessaries of production are owned, controlled and administered by the people, for the people. The cause of political and economic despotism is abolished and class rule is at an end. 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 owned by all the people, and in which the democratic administration of the people within the industries and services is the “government”.

Socialism means that rule of the people, for the people and by the people will become a reality for the first time. That is socialism, nothing short of that. If it does not fit this description, it is not socialism—no matter who says different. Those who claim that socialism existed and failed in places like the former Soviet Union or in Cuba or China simply do not know the facts. Socialism has never existed. It did not exist in the old U.S.S.R., and it does not exist presently anywhere. 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 owned in common by all the people.

The Socialist Party is the political party of the working class. This is so because the Socialist Party is the sole advocate of the principles that the working class must adopt if it is ever to achieve its complete emancipation from wage slavery and, at the same time, save society from catastrophe. The Socialist Party is the only political organisation demanding the abolition of capitalism and advocating the socialist reconstruction of society. It has been doing so for well over 100 years. It is, in short, the organisation through which the workers can establish their majority right to reorganise society through its agitational and educational activities.

Capitalism no longer serves the interests of the people. It creates countless problems that it cannot solve. It uses new technology to throw people out of work and to make those who still hold their jobs work harder. It creates hardship and poverty for millions, while the few who own and control the economy grow rich off the sweat and toil of others. It destroys the cities that we built up. It is destroying the natural environment that is the source of the food we eat and the air we breathe.

Every effort made to prevent these problems, or to keep them from growing even worse, has failed. The reason is that the country is controlled by a small capitalist class that owns the industries and services that everyone depends on. The workers built and operate all of those essential industries and services. However, they do not own and control them. They are the majority, but they have no voice in deciding what to produce or how much to produce. Their needs and desires count for nothing when those decisions are made.

When a small group owns and controls what everyone needs to feed, house and clothe themselves and their families, when that small group makes every important decision that affects the lives of the vast majority, it is called despotism. 

Capitalism is an economic despotism, and like any other form of despotism, it corrupts everything that is good and decent.

Generations of workers built the industries that can produce more than enough to wipe out poverty and guarantee the economic security of every man, woman and child.

Capitalism has twisted this great achievement of humanity’s collective genius by causing wealth and power to stay in the hands of a few. Technology such as robotics and AI and IT that could and should be used to lessen the need for arduous toil and to enhance our lives is used instead to eliminate jobs and increase exploitation. Poverty is as widespread as it has ever been. Wages remain stagnant even as productivity rises. Joblessness, homelessness and helplessness are spreading. Economic insecurity and social breakdown place an unbearable strain on our families, our children and ourselves. Emotional stress, crime, prostitution, alcoholism, drug abuse, suicide, and many more signs of unhappiness and hopelessness, are on the rise.

Is this what we want? Is this what we have worked so hard to build? Should we keep a social system that is destroying the lives, the liberties and the chance for happiness that our work and productivity make possible? Is it really worth the price to keep a small and despotic class of capitalists living in obscene wealth?

Or shall we do the common sense thing by making the means of production our collective property, abolishing exploitation of the many by the few, and using our productive genius to create security and abundance for all?

Working people can expect no help from the beneficiaries of capitalism. Philanthropic capitalists may see the handwriting on the wall and support progressive policies. As a class, however, they, just like the slave-owning and feudal classes before them, will try to keep their strife-ridden and poverty-breeding system. The workers can only rely on themselves to build a better world and free themselves through their own class conscious efforts.

Workers make up the vast majority of the population. By workers, we mean the working class. We mean all whose intellectual and physical labour contributes to the development, manufacture and distribution of the goods, services and information that our complex society needs. We mean all those who must sell their physical and mental talents and skills on the labour market, and who depend on the wages and salaries they receive in exchange. We mean white-collar and blue-collar, production and office workers, those who research and develop as well as those who build, distribute and serve. We mean the whole working class, including the unemployed and those forced to settle for part-time or temporary work.

The working class makes everything and it makes everything work.