CAPITALISM – THE ENEMY OF HUMANITY

 

The highest aspiration of the Socialist Party is for the triumph of its cause. Our members' hopes are bright with the possibilities of the future commonwealth. Their ambitions are no longer individual, nor are their joys and sorrows. They are glad and downcast with the flow and ebb of the movement. We view events in their relation to the revolution; we ask of institutions whether they can assist or only obstruct it. The revolution is no one’s business but the workers'.

 In the perennial class struggle around conditions of livelihood, workers suffer defeat on defeat; worse, we combat one another. We allow ourselves to be divided on all manner of pretexts. We have not learned to unite even in defence of the meagre things we have. As to completely re-organising social life, we should end our masters' packing to produce and distribute by democratic arrangement—but it is never done. Claim and receive what we need from the common store lies outside our fellow-workers imagination. Such is the present state of mind of the working class whose mission it is to overthrow capitalism.

The Socialist Party may do one of two things: lead the workers or teach them. 

A political party by zeal and devotion may aim at acquiring a strong influence over the working class, so that when decisions are to be taken their advice will be asked and followed, relying for support on people who better understand socialism. In other words, activists may either act for their fellow-workers, making all efforts meanwhile to bring them into the party line. This method of leadership recommends itself to some because it appears at first sight to be the quicker.

On the other hand, the socialists may devote all their energies to education, assisting no reformist activity, but rather making clear the worthlessness of such endeavours, and the true remedy for the distress which gave rise to them. In this case, the minimum prerequisite for a seizure of political power would be a majority of socialists. That is not to say that the majority need be profound Marxian scholars, but they must:

(1) understand well the basic principles of capitalist and socialist society respectively;

(2) have freely decided to destroy the one and set up the other, and consequently be able

(3) intelligently to exercise the right of recall, if any of those whom they depute to give effect to their will shall seek to play them false; or

(4) to appoint suitable successors if chance should remove some of their delegates so that the direction of the revolution is in no wise accidental.

(5) Socialists concentrate on making working people capable of acting for themselves.

To count on the support of people who do not understand your purpose is to build on foundations of sand. At most,  they may desert you. If they can be influenced by you, they can also be swayed by your enemies too; and, become in the hardships and uncertainties of the transition period, the seeds of counter-revolution? Moreover, if accustomed to leaders, how shall they show the qualities necessary for democratic control—independence, and the responsibility to run a socialist society? Not understanding how the system should develop, where is the safeguard against their wrecking it by unsound decisions? And to prevent that you must govern over your fellow-workers after all.  Not a co-operative commonwealth, but a bureaucratic state —a sorry achievement of leadership, which leaves the task of education still before you.

No genuine and enduring transformation of society is possible until the majority of the workers have embraced socialist principles, the Socialist Party directs all its actions towards organising an ever-growing body of socialist conviction. It takes no part in reformist agitation but calls on the workers to come together for the one action that can help them. We avoid confusing our message by advocating socialist principles with our slogans and supporting reformist programmes through our actions. We seek to ensure that new comrades join us with their eyes wide open— knowing the road without the need for a leader. Say in a time of revolution a leader is entrusted with a great task. He or she fails or dies; it is but to supply a replacement with another. The revolution will not fail or die with one person. All are not equally gifted, but the field of selection is as wide as the party, not limited to a small elite vanguard. Leaders, regardless of how strong and courageous, cannot guarantee victory, and a defeated insurrection would sow despair and defer what it sought to hasten. But a resolute majority, equipped with knowledge, is invincible.

“Intelligence enough to conceive, courage enough to will, power enough to compel. If our ideas of a new society are anything more than a dream, these three qualities must animate the due effective majority of the working people: and then I say the thing will be done.” William Morris

There Is No Lesser Evil

 In the world today, the Socialist Party hold no control over events. The fact has to be faced that events might produce setbacks, real or apparent, despite the will or desire of socialists. While the workers are in the main not ready for socialism this is unavoidable.  The time has not yet come when the Socialist Party can consciously plan to overcome events. In the meantime, however, we reject any evils which the world offers as choice. The Socialist Party does not have to choose which is the lesser of the evils. In a world where the majority are dispossessed of the means of living and where the minority who own quarrel between themselves over possessions which should belong to society, working-class independence should remain among the first and fundamental of socialist principles. Socialists want a world based upon voluntary co-operation, in order that the products of working people’s efforts can be of free access—a world where money will not be necessary. We want people to break out of this vicious circle that perpetuates the ideas of property society. We want their thinking to be socialist thinking.

While some reforms might be able to alleviate, at least temporarily, problems facing some workers, they will never be able to solve any of the multifarious problems from which workers suffer under capitalism. This is because reforms are aimed only at treating effects while leaving the cause (capitalism) unchanged, and as long as capitalism continues it will create problems for those who depend for a living on working for an employer for a wage. More accommodation might indeed be provided for some of the homeless but the housing crisis would remain. The only lasting solution lies in the establishment of socialism, the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production with production for use not profit and free access to consumer goods and services according to self-determined needs.  The kind of socialist society we advocate is money-free wage-free market-free  based on  social cooperation.

The “lesser evil” argument is invalid because it assumes that what a government does depends on the good or bad intentions act, and their priorities, is the workings of the capitalist system. Capitalism is based on the concentration of wealth in the hands of a privileged few. Under it production is carried on for profit. The world is divided into a number of capitalist states all of which are competing against each other to sell their goods on the world market at a profit. International capital will drag governments around by their ears. How successful a state is in this is what of the leaders of the party in power. In fact what determines how governments limits its government’s actions. This is why it does not matter which party forms the government; in the end all governments are forced by economic circumstances to pursue basically similar policies. Capitalism is a class system that can only work for those who live off profits, and never for those who work for wages.

Socialism is the solution to the workers’ problems and until they establish socialism they will have to put up with capitalism and all its attendant evils. The great need is to convince the workers of the necessity for socialism and that will not be done by telling them to support a capitalist party because it is considered to be a “ lesser evil ” than some other party. By that means they will be giving support to the capitalist class to prolong this system and delay the establishment of socialism. By supporting the capitalist parties the workers are forming the tail-end of capitalist politics. Those who urge them to do that and betraying working class interests. The workers must be urged to break completely with the political parties of capitalism. They must be brought to realise that they must join a political party, separate from and opposed to the capitalist parties. Socialism is an immediate necessity. As long as capitalism lasts there will be wars, poverty, insecurity and all the rest of the evils that flow from this system. There is no “lesser evil ” to be found by supporting any one of the capitalist parties in preference to another.

If a person is robbed by two thieves, it is in his or her interest to regain his property, not to take sides with one thief or the other in their differences about the share-out of their loot, even if one of them has got a kind-looking face. When one tries to get one’s stolen property back he or she will soon find that the two robbers will sink their differences and gang up to prevent the recovering of the  goods. They will both be vicious and must be opposed.

 The SocialistParty has been accused of refusing to opt for the least, or the lesser, of many evils. This argument was based on the assumption that there was something in common between the Socialist Party and the capitalist parties. Socialism is an idea which implies certain political principles and one of these is an unshakeable refusal to compromise with the enemies of the working class—with any political party, whatever it calls itself, which stands for capitalism. 

Looking Forward

 What sort of world awaits the working class in the future? Will it be a brand new world free from class privilege and wage-slavery; a world of social equality, security and happiness? Our message is the only message of hope in a world that appears to be on the verge of catastrophe.

The World Socialist Movement exists to achieve a society of communal ownership. The workers are a global class. At one level they may be in conflict — when they compete as individuals for scarce jobs, for example — but at the collective level of their class, their interests are in unity. Above nationalism, above any prejudice of race or sex, working people throughout the world must assert their essential unity in the work to overthrow capitalism and establish socialism in its place.  It will be a significant step on the way, when they cease to think in terms of national or regional solutions to world problems and begin to think globally. Does capitalism deserve to continue any longer? It brings toil, misery and desolation, in peace and in war, to the mass of the people. It is time those who bear the sufferings took time to think about how those sufferings could be abolished. The only way to do so is to destroy the source from which they flow—the private ownership of the means of production. Instead, we can co-operate to provide a good life for all while avoiding damage to the environment.

 People in socialism will enjoy freedoms of decision-making and action that are denied to us under the capitalist system. With all people in harmony with their shared interests, the division of the world into rival capitalist states will be replaced by a democratic administration organised on a world, regional and local levels. 

in the socialist world, there will be no boundaries to countries. The world will become a single unit. It will not be necessary for people to fight for food or a “standard of living,” or any of the thousand and one reasons given from time to time to various nations in order to gain the support of the people in a war. In the socialist world, the people will produce food and build houses for all. The natural wealth of the world is more than enough to amply satisfy the needs of all humans, be they Asian, African, American or European. There need be no shortages. The root cause of world poverty is to make sure that the “real world” continues to be one in which human beings needlessly die and the Earth is systematically ravaged in the name of profit.

We, socialists, stand for a society based on mutual aid and solidarity, the cooperation of all people worldwide on the basis of free decision-making and participatory democracy. We believe that others share our concern for the well-being of people in our society, and for the well-being of the planet itself. We are part of a long-established independent democratic movement which seeks by persuasion and worldwide peaceful political organisation to transform our present society into one fit for humankind.

The problems of our world cannot be solved within the existing structures of production and government. Our world is divided into national areas dominated by class minorities in each country. The ruling class and their political representatives, by reason of a combination of historical circumstances, governmental, military and ideological control or influence, are able to keep the majority of the world's population in subjection and subjugation. Socialism is a new world society where the means of production are commonly owned and where governments and systems of exchange, whether barter or money, have been replaced by democratic administration at local, regional and world levels: a society where there could be decentralized co-ordination of production with free access according to to need.  We want people not to be thinking in national terms but to consider the socialist proposition of a world community without frontiers.

Socialism cannot be established in one country. Even under capitalism, the Nation-State has become too small a framework for capital’s expansion. The World Socialist Movement does not defend national sovereignty or promote separatism. Our criticisms of capitalism are precisely that it has divided the world into competing nation-states whose conflicts mean trade wars and armed conflicts. Nationalism in one country begets its echo in others. What we want is not national independence but world socialism without frontiers.

War is completely unnecessary. We are living in a world that has enough resources to provide plenty for all, to eliminate world poverty, ignorance and disease, and to provide an adequate and comfortable life for everyone on the planet. Yet under capitalism resources are squandered on armaments, of individual as well as of mass destruction, and, as now, in actual war. Even in times of peace – as the armed truce between wars is called – capitalism's pursuit of profit pollutes and plunders the planet and upsets the balance of nature with potentially devastating consequences. The economic law “no profit, no production” applies implacably, resulting in millions dying of hunger and related diseases every year simply because it is not profitable to produce the food to feed them and, in fact, often while the food that could feed them is destroyed so as to maintain prices and profits.

The World Socialist Movement opposes war and capitalism which breeds it: 

 · We place on record our horror that capitalism has once again provoked the orgy of death and destruction known as war.

· We extend the hand of friendship to our fellow workers who our political masters have designated as targets for destruction.

· We pledge to do all within our means to bring the slaughter to an immediate end.

· We pledge ourselves to continue to work for the establishment of a world socialist society of peace and cooperation.

· We call upon fellow workers everywhere to join in the struggle for World Socialism.

One World, One People, For World Socialism!

Capitalist Wage Slavery V Socialist Freedom

 “All I want is freedom for my country, happiness, peace and prosperity."

A refrain, with variations, that we have heard unceasingly over the centuries. The Socialist Party has not been duped by such sentiments of national independence 

Freedom: In capitalist society means the right of the vast majority to be propertyless wage workers producing wealth to be sold on a market with a view to profit.

My country: The countries of the world are owned by a privileged minority. The working class has problems and interests that are produced by capitalism and not by the existence of national barriers. 

Prosperity: All workers are poor, and some are destitute. A prosperous working class is a contradiction in terms. Capitalism is as incapable of producing a working class that is prosperous as it is of producing a government that is popular.

Peace: Even if the shooting stopped the class war would remain, that is the struggle which goes on all the time over the ownership of the wealth of society, whether it be in a so-called “United" Ireland, the “United" States, the “United" Kingdom, the “United” Arab Republic. Russia, Africa, in fact wherever capitalism is the predominating form of society.

 To appeal to any national group of capitalists for disarmament, to give up their only defence against their like-minded predatory neighbours and against the workers from whose robbery the privileged position of the capitalist class arises, is to ask them to commit suicide, and will naturally be given the amount of consideration such a proposal would deserve. Is it to be expected that our capitalist rulers, armed to the teeth to defend their private property, will scrap their armaments and voluntarily sacrifice their hold on the world's wealth merely in response to muddle-headed reformers?

Only when all the resources of the earth, natural and man-made, are owned in common by all the people of the world can they be used in a rational way – to provide an abundance of goods and services which people can take and use freely as and when they need to.

The Socialist Party has always contended that capitalism should be abolished because it mismanaged the means of production so that a very few – those who own the means of production – reaped great profits while the masses of the people were deprived of a secure standard of living. Also, we would often prove this assertion by demonstrating the tremendous capacities which modern technology has; how it could satisfy the needs of everyone if it were run for that purpose; and how capitalism, instead, ran the industrial machine for profits. 

Look, the Socialist Party would say, if only the people could run these industries themselves, they could produce enough to satisfy everyone’s needs.  It remains the great and tragic paradox of our age – poverty in the midst of plenty.  The primary interest of the capitalist, we have said, is profit. Capitalism is a wasteful and inefficient system. Socialism could plan better, and provide the people with all necessities. Socialism could take the vast resources which are available and use them for constructive purposes. In place of capitalism could arise a new society of peace and plenty. That is why socialism is the burning need of the hour. Capitalists are interested in production for profit, and socialists in production for use. Capitalism is based upon a constantly increasing exploitation of labour, in order to maintain its profit; workers constantly resist this exploitation. There is and can be no such thing as a “fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work,” inasmuch as wages are the payment for only one part of the day’s work, the other part of which the worker is compelled to contribute to the employer in the form of surplus-value, or profit. Capital always seeks to increase its profits, which can be done only by exploiting labour; labour always seeks to resist exploitation, which can be done only at the expense of profits. These are fundamental economic facts. Under capitalism, nothing that all the capitalists or the whole government will ever do can succeed in wiping out these facts.

The Socialist Catalyst

 We know that socialism is necessary to the emancipation of working people. Capitalism has reduced the workers to a condition of wage slavery. The capitalists get the profit, grow rich, live in mansions and penthouses, own yachts and private planes, choose judges, buy up the media and bribe polititians. To speak of democracy is a mockery. In every land capitalism rules. Freedom in socialism is the only thing worth striving for. To work for wages, no matter how high, or how short the work-day, is to acknowledge a master. Without socialist freedom civilisation will crumble and die. Socialists will work together to build a new world out of the rubble of the old. Poverty is civilisation’s greatest crime. And this crime cannot be atoned for by charity or philanthopy. It is not “charity” we want. It is justice

The capitalists claim to riches is fraud, hypocrisy, and false pretenses.  The capitalist’s income is simply pure robbery. Not a penny of it does he produce. It is all taken from those in whose sweat and suffer in the fields and factories. There is a cause for poverty, and that cause can be removed. As long as the few own the sources of wealth, the many will be condemned to work for them and the the few will accumulate up millions and billions more. Capitalism dooms the world to more inequality.  Religion and race, national independence and patriotism, are now, from the worker’s point of view, just so many ruling-class devices useful for the purpose, among others, of stirring up hatred when and where they may want it.   Socialism alone is worth struggling for. That is the message of the Socialist to all the working-class dupes of the closely-allied superstitions of religious, racial and patriotic rivalries.

Socialist ideas are developing and in due time the cooperative commonwealth will arise. Working people are mustering their mighty forces for political and economic change. Liberation from the chains of wage slavery is our aim. Organisation is the demand of the day. Working men and women, this is the day for you to realize that your interests are the same, that divided you are helpless.

United political action will place the working class in control of the State, and the abolition of capitalism will inevitably follow. In the socialist future workers will be their own masters and enjoy all the fruit of their toil. Resolve this day to  abolish the wage system. The Socialist Party is the party of the working class, the party that stands for economic equality and industrial freedom, the party of progress and civiliSation. This is the day to hold aloft its banner and proclaim its principles. The future is for socialism and humanity. when the exploitation of man by man ceases and society is organized upon enlightened mutual interests of all, democracy will dawn, war will cease, poverty will be in the past, and the dawn of a new civilisation will light the world.

Work is necessary, but it need not be a burden on our backs. We can organise it so that it it transformed into free cooperation. Automation can reshape workplaces and play a key role in ending the degradation of wage slavery and returning the dignity of work. Robots can replace drudgery. Technology can usher in a post-scarcity age of abundance.

We point out first that the working class are poor and a subject class because the capitalist class have political power and own and control the machinery of production and distribution. The cause of working class poverty is not the existence of certain defects in the political machinery by which capitalism is administered. Therefore, no political reform (proportional representation, for example),no social reform, and no accumulation of such reforms will remedy the problem. If the whole of the reforms advocated by all the reform parties, from Conservative to Communist, were put on the statute book, the working class would still be a subject class and still poor. Therefore, the Socialist Party advocates socialism, and seeks to organise the working class on a socialist basis.

We point out that the only method of achieving socialism is for a socialist working class to gain political control. Anyone who urges the working class to put political power into the hands of persons and parties seeking election on a non-socialist programme, and therefore unable, even if willing, to use their power for any other purpose than the administration of capitalism, is acting directly contrary to the interests of the working class. All the reform parties have in this way acted contrary to working class interests.

The development of capitalist industry constantly produces new social problems for the workers and aggravates old ones, and in the interests of the capitalists themselves these evils, which are merely the effects of capitalism, have to be palliated by various reform measures. The capitalists have to pass these reforms for two main reasons: loss of efficiency and loss of political support. If allowed to work unchecked, capitalism would produce such worsening in the conditions of the workers that they would, on the one hand, lose efficiency as profit-producers, and would perhaps, so the capitalist thinks, on the other hand, show their discontent with intolerable conditions by interesting themselves in socialism or by riot and revolt which, though suicidal for the workers, would be troublesome and costly for the employing class. Incidentally, common sense suggests that the development of a strong socialist movement would cause the capitalist to fall over each other in their anxiety to make concessions in order to persuade the workers that socialism is unnecessary and capitalism not so bad after all.

In short, the Socialist Party opposes the parties which preach reform because there is no way of achieving socialism except through the making of socialists and their organisation into a political party which will gain political power for the purpose ot introducing socialism.

Trade unions are chiefly concerned with the defence of the workers in their direct relations with the employers. They can, when market conditions are favourable, bring a certain organised pressure to bear on the employers to resist a decrease or secure an increase in wages. This is a definite, if limited, gain to the workers concerned.

Therefore, we support workers in their efforts in this direction, at the same time drawing their attention to the limits which capitalism imposes on all such activities.

 

 We point out in particular that every increase in wages or reduction in hours or curtailment of output gives the employers an added inducement to introduce more labour-saving machinery, thus in creasing the number of unemployed and the consequent competition for jobs.

We point out also that the workers should always keep the control of policy in their own hands and not give power to their leaders to negotiate in secret and settle on their own terms. But emphasising once more that no action of this kind, however well organised, can solve the real working class problem of abolishing capitalism, and, further, that the employing class always have it in their power to starve striking or locked-out workers into submission if they deem it worth while to do so..