Socialism is our Goal

 

Socialism will not fall from the skies. Neither will it be gained by any appeals to the goodwill and compassion of the capitalist exploiters. Socialism can be achieved only as the outcome of the class struggle of working people. The class struggle is the engine of history. Politics has no serious meaning except as the expression of conflicting class interests.  There is an irreconcilable conflict of class interests between the workers and their capitalist exploiters. The principles of a socialist party must be determined accordingly. All the political actions and judgments of a workers' party must always be directed against the capitalist class, and never be taken in collaboration with them. Only with the victory of the working class and the abolition of capitalism can the socialist society be accomplished. There is no other way. Every other attempt to find another way, by supporting the capitalists, by conciliation and compromise with them, by collaborating with them has led not toward the socialist goal but to defeat and disaster for the workers. The Socialist Party offers no support whatever to the government of the capitalists in war or in peace.

The capitalist mode of production shall be replaced by the socialist mode. In socialism, the means of production, land, mines, raw materials, tools, machines, and transport, will be transferred to the common ownership of society. They shall no longer serve individuals as a means of living off the labour of others, and no longer be the means of the economic enslavement of the propertyless. Thus the commodity production of independent private producers is changed into a planned social production by the people and for the people. And through it will be engendered the greatest possible wealth for the enjoyment of life and the cultural development of all members of society. Socialism is the description of a social order which is founded upon the common ownership of the means of production.

The rich exploiters fight bitterly to discredit socialism. They say that socialism may be a nice idea but that it can't work. They preach that the division of society between rich and poor, exploiters and exploited has been determined by human nature. In a capitalist society, despite all the changes which may have occurred, the state remains the centre of decisions serving the capitalists. The savage rule of a handful of billionaires lies in their great wealth and their subsequent power and control over the state apparatus of armies, police, prisons, courts and the enormous bureaucracy. The capitalist state means democracy only for the rich ruling class, while it is a means of violence for the brutal suppression of the working class and oppressed masses.

Do you really believe that war is in the interests of the working class? What have you got to defend? The capitalists may wish to grab mines and ore deposits but for you, there is nothing to be gained. Money-men may hope to make millions in armaments speculation but you receive nought. So don't let yourselves be caught. Yet there is still one war which you should fight. That is a battlefield in which you should join. And that war is not against a foreign enemy. It is against the enemy of the people's happiness, progress and human civilisation and that is capitalism, private ownership of all means of production, factories and machines, mines and land. Do away with capitalism in the final war.

Throughout the world, the yoke of capitalist exploitation and oppression is becoming an ever more unbearable burden on the shoulders of the working people. The capitalists are doing everything they can to disorient and weaken the mounting opposition of the working people. They want to keep the workers' struggle within the narrow perspective of reformism. In particular, the capitalists are striving to reduce the movement to an impotent pressure group.

There is a way out of this capitalist hell of perpetual crisis, unemployment, poverty, police-state despotism, racism,  war, environmental devastation, and all the other scourges of the capitalist system. The working class can act as the standard-bearer of the social revolution to overthrow capitalism, put an end to exploitation and oppression, and build a new socialist society.