The dead hand of the past

 

Socialism is a social system, not a political regime, or a phase of some other system. It requires a revolutionary change for its establishment and the cooperative effort of the whole community for its successful functioning. It necessitates fundamental changes in the relationships of the members of the community, the casting aside of long-cherished and deep-rooted ideas and customs. This change cannot be brought about except by the conscious effort of at least the majority of those concerned. No dictatorship, no matter how determined, how well-intentioned, how efficient, how “human,” could ever impose such fundamental changes on society. Dictatorships have crashed for attempting less. If the establishment of socialism requires a majority effort then majority decisions “in meeting each and every situation” are necessary for the struggle for its achievement. This is not a “dogmatic assertion.” We are not concerned about whether “democratic methods are always good and dictatorial methods are always wrong.” We are concerned only with effective means of achieving socialism.

Those who seek to explain by reference to “ideologies” the swift movement of events in the world, the sudden collapse of impregnable positions, the seemingly inexplicable changes which show the grand old men of yesterday to be the dodderers of to-day, must be bewildered and confused by what is going on before their eyes.

The idealist who tries to discern the pattern in history, past and present, is prevented from doing so because he believes that ideas and beliefs have an independent origin and that one set of ideas will triumph over another if only the men who hold them have leaders of goodwill and integrity. The socialist who looks to social relations and economic forces is better placed. Not, of course, that the socialist can predict with certainty just how and when a conflict of forces will work out in the future, but at least he or she knows what is the nature of the forces on which the issue depends. Knowing, as Marx puts it, that “it is not men’s consciousness which determines their life,” but “their social life which determines their consciousness,” we also allow for the fact that at any given period of history the vital forces at work have to struggle with ideas which resulted from past conditions—”the tradition of all past generations weighs like an alp upon the brain of the living.”

The safeguarding of property interests is the dead hand of the past, but what of the more active forces pushing towards change and reorganisation in Europe? Can the men who appear as leaders hold developments in check, or failing that can they guide them into the channels they desire? Are they the creatures or the masters of the forces behind and below them?