Change is Taking Place Whether We Like It Or Not

FREE ACCESS AND COMMON OWNERSHIP

It’s the system. A world of afflicted human beings, nearly half of whom struggle to survive on less than $2 a day. Capitalism is designed to profit a privileged few, not to nourish a humane and sane society. Unbearable conditions are causing upheavals globally, and rulers are desperate to suppress them. Capitalist barbarities are global and workers organising across borders vital. It’s going to take a revolution to abolish this system. The owners of capital have zero interest in such a radical change of ownership. It doesn’t take a genius to see that we live in a deeply destructive world.

The word “socialism” is so loaded with negative connotations, being linked to totalitarian regimes and brutal repression of freedom and rights from Stalin to Pol Pot where everyone suffers under the oppressive the heel of relentless state control. Socialism, then, is vilified as a fundamental danger to human freedom. Socialism that envisions a significant reorganization of society is seen as merely an anachronism. It is time that those of us shake off our fear of being branded as wild-eyed radicals who espouse long-discarded Marxist pipe-dreams of sharing the planet’s resources and proposing a society controlled by membership in that society, not by accumulated wealth whether individuals or corporate. If socialism were as anachronistic and as irrelevant as those who oppose it say it is, then why such a reaction to it? There are those who see change as absolutely necessary for survival and they are doing all they can to bring it about, no matter how the ruling minority’s media and political servants act to the contrary or some Left critics insist it’s ineffective or even hopeless for capitalism’s apologists are paradoxically joined by many of its critics in seeming unity of belief that there is no chance or need for change. This is understandable as we experience an almost endless loop of bad news about everything, along with a political system that offers a choice between cholera or plague every election day with no seeming hope for ending the disease. Nevertheless, while the danger to humanity is greater than ever, so are the possibilities for success. The rise of resistance to dictatorships, corporate rule, military occupation and corrupt politics brings new hope for humanity.

The current ecological and economic problems facing the world have happened precisely because we live in a political and economic system that puts profits ahead of people and the planet—capitalism. To save ourselves and our planet we need a sharp change of direction towards a new people-centred form of social organisation—socialism. Imagine a society where each individual has the means to live a life of dignity and fulfilment, without exception; where discrimination and prejudice are wiped out; where all members of society are guaranteed a decent life, the means to contribute to society; and where the environment is protected and rehabilitated. This is socialism—a truly humane, a truly ecological society.

The goal of the big corporations is to secure the greatest possible profits for their share-holders —regardless of the consequences to the planet and its people. More and more people are realising that society needs to be liberated from the rule of capital. Under capitalism, a tiny handful of people—the capitalist class, “the 1%”—control the means of production, distribution and exchange. They own the corporations that own the mines, factories, banks, transport networks, supermarket chains, media empires, and so on. The economy is a social enterprise. We all depend on it and the labour of working people keeps the wheels turning. But because the capitalists control it they get the profits and workers’ wages never reflect the full value of what they produce. The fight for a decent wage is a constant struggle against entrenched corporate power, backed by the state. The market-based system is represented in the media as all-powerful and constant. Any possible alternative is excluded. But our economic and social relationships are a human creation, and as such, they can be changed. Our economy must be socially owned and controlled. We need a radically different political system: a system of grassroots, participatory democracy that empowers the big majority of people who are currently excluded from genuine decision making power. This would be based on organisations of popular democracy in localities and workplaces which could directly make decisions affecting their respective communities. Any administrators or officials elected by these bodies would be subject to recall through a simple process if their electors are dissatisfied. Centralised decision making bodies need to be accountable to their local counterparts. Real democracy is impossible if one part of society (the capitalist class) owns the main levers of the economy and can run them autocratically in their own private interest and at the expense of the workers who are compelled to work for them. By contrast, social ownership makes possible democratic decisions about the main goals and targets of economic activity including environmental, labour and human rights standards. These goals and targets should be popularly decided. Workers should be able to elect their own administrators and collectively direct their workplaces.

We need revolutionary change. Revolution doesn’t mean a violent coup by a minority: a revolution can only come about when the majority of people see the need for radical change, and are actively involved in bringing it about. A revolution is a mass struggle to create new and far more democratic forms of political power and a new social system. While this seems a long way off at present, deepening economic, environmental and political crises can create a situation where people are looking for solutions and are open to revolutionary ideas. An important step in the struggle for such change is winning political power and capturing the machinery of the State within the current parliamentary system. History also shows that we will have to mobilise in the workplaces and neighbourhoods to defend any the political majority. If we can overcome capitalism—if the economy is socially owned and controlled and we have a system of popular power—then we have a framework for dealing with the ecological and social problems that we face. The guiding principle of a post-capitalist society would be placing the welfare of all people and ecological sustainability first. No one would be abandoned to their fate, as is the case under capitalism.

Ten Years After

Ten years ago, the G8 summit was held at the heavily fortified Gleneagles Hotel and  Make Poverty History movement came to Edinburgh with churches and the charities at the forefront with over a quarter of a million marching in the streets, Bob Geldof was hosting a rock concert at Murrayfield for LiveAid and the anarchist Black Bloc was futilely endeavouring to make their presence felt. What did it all accomplish? Not a lot.

What the Socialist Party said at the time in our effort to bring home some unwelcomed truths and spoil the self-congratulating media personalities presentation:

“What is now clear is that the anti-globalisation/pro-development movement, however well-meaning, does not seek to replace capitalism with any real alternative social system. At best it attracts a myriad of groups, all pursuing their own reformist agenda. Some call for greater corporate responsibility. Some demand the restructuring of international institutions like the IMF, World Bank and the WTO. Others call for the expansion of democracy and fairer trading conditions, debt cancellation and more aid. All, however, fail to address the root cause of the problems of capitalism and promote the damnable system they are critical of by applauding any meagre reform.

One thing is certain: no amount of high table reform is going to legislate poverty out of existence as the MHP coalition believes. Capitalism cannot be reformed in the interests of the world’s suffering billions, because reform does not address the basic contradiction between profit and need. Moreover, reform can be so packaged and camouflaged as to be acceptable to protestors whilst leaving their real grievances unaddressed. The world’s leaders simply cannot be depended upon to implement real change because they can only ever act as the executive of corporate capitalism.

The protesters at the G8 might think they are united in common cause, but in truth they are only united in supporting capitalism and in their mistaken belief that poverty can be legislated out of existence, They have no blueprint for change other than the three demands put forward by the Make Poverty History campaign – Fair trade, more aid and debt cancellation. – and this is about as radical as it gets. In mirroring in their objectives the overseas goals of Blair and Brown they are anything but the modern day revolutionaries they claim to be.”

There can be little doubt that the world can still be described as one motivated by greed through the ruthless exploitation of natural and human resources. The main players are still governments, multinational corporations and corrupt local politicians running gangster regimes. The G8 made gestures such as the partial cancellation of Third World debt but the write-off of these dollars will only be a means of continuing their grip on African countries whilst dressing their actions with the phoney rhetoric of care and concern. There was no outcome that solved the problems of the desperately poor of Africa, and no matter how well-meaning were their slogans, campaigners in the developed countries still became involved in the machinations of interest groups whose basic concern is profit and the economic strategies of ruling elites. The G8 protests demonstrated a great strength of feeling but it also demonstrates a great weakness; the lack of control of those who take part and their dependence over the decisions and actions of present power structures. The Make Poverty History marcher were victims of a seductive but deadly process. The capitalist system constantly throws up issues that demand action amongst those who are concerned and by many people who think of themselves as ‘socialists’. As a result, protest tends to become a demand for an “improved” kind of capitalism which leaves the long-term reasons for protest intact.

Given the number of people currently still suffering and dying from the effects of world poverty it should be obvious that we must go far beyond mere reform campaigns and instead organise to abolish the profit system and replace it with a world of common ownership, democratic control and production solely for needs. Such a socialist world would be able to stop people dying from hunger immediately and rapidly increase world food production to reach a point where every person on the planet would have free access to sufficient good quality food to maintain good health. The shortest distance between capitalism and an alternative society is a straight line.  Let’s campaign for the abolition of capitalism and not misdirect our energies in trying to humanise capitalism, which can only – as many now recognise – put profit before people.

This blogger recalls that it was only the Socialist Party that was conveying this message when volunteers from our various branches also gathered in Edinburgh and Gleneagles to distribute leaflets and literature. 

The revolution is socialist or it is nothing

The Socialist Party is not a Leninist organisation, nor Stalinist or Trotskyist. It is not anarchist. It is not Left nor Right. It is just socialist. Plain and simple. The Left consists of those parties or organisations, usually describing themselves "socialist" or "communist", which claim to represent the interests of the working class, but are in fact simply the left wing of capitalism. How does the Left support capitalism? The Left's objective function for capitalism is as a kind of safety net to catch those of us who have seen through the usual bourgeois con tricks, and thus lead us into supporting capitalism in a more radical form when we think we are supporting our own class interest. The Left, from the Labour Party (including all its Old Labour factions) or the "Communist" Party to the SWP, SPEW etc ad nauseam, whether Stalinist, Maoist or Trotskyist, is totally counter-productive and counter-revolutionary and is the enemy of the working class. To all militants who honestly wish to fight for proletarian class interests, but who have illusions in Leftism, we say: Abandon these ideas. Socialism a society without classes, in which we all collectively control our own existence, in which we run the world for our own needs and desires, in which humanity can fulfil itself as the conscious agent of its own history, and no longer be an enslaved mass toiling for the benefit of a parasitic ruling class. The Left is a barrier in the way of the acceptance of a revolutionary view of society, and a revolutionary struggle leading to the establishment of socialism. The sins of omission and commission of those who call themselves progressive has for so many years helped to frustrate every attempt to build up an authentic genuine world socialism movement. What can we do in the meantime?

1) Keep our principles intact. There's no point in diluting the proposals of revolutionary socialists in order to artificially inflate our numbers;

2) Continue to point out and explain in our literature and other campaigns the underlying cause of social problems;

3) Describe how a socialist society could be organised to solve these problems; and

4) Avoid any actions or words that suggest that our class can improve its condition in a meaningful way without abolishing the capitalist system.

We need to form a more clear and definitive anti-capitalist movement which unequivocally has as its aim to abolish capitalism and the political state and which seeks to replace it with a classless, moneyless, democratically worker-run society of free access. As a socialist party we do not mean one which is reformist, nor one which seeks state power in order to maintain state power as in Leninism. Both are inimical to the socialist vision of a stateless, moneyless, society of free access. The Socialist Party is leaderless without a hierarchy, totally democratically structured, one which has as its sole objective to gain a majoritarian vote at the polls so that once elected it may set about the immediate dismantling of the state and the capitalist system. Working in conjunction with revolutionary socialists on other battlefields, it may then help to usher in a production-for-human-use society. No-one can predict which revolutionary method will work the surest, but even if the electoral method does not turn out to be the unequivocal deciding factor in dealing with state power, it will work well in combination with other initiatives. By no means though should party organising be seen as a passive substitute for other forms of organising outside the electoral process. In order to build a majoritarian movement, it will be necessary to get our ideas more effectively transmitted into the mainstream consciousness of people. Having competent socialists publically debate with capitalist apologists, putting forth the socialist position will work well towards this end. In fact, working in concert with other initiatives it will help to build the revolutionary momentum that makes socialism truly an idea whose time has come.

The system has no answers to its current crises – there is no light at the end of the tunnel of capitalism. Capitalism, as an economic system, and its chief weapon, the state, are dedicated to one thing - maintaining the ascendancy of a minority over the majority. The ever recurring problems of the system are driving a new generation into struggle against it. These changes provide a real opportunity to raise the challenge of the overthrow of globalised capitalism, which is hated by the vast majority of humanity. Socialism has its roots in the inability of capitalism to solve humanity's problems. Working people gravitate toward a radical critique of society out of necessity, out of a sense that the existing arrangements of society fail to fulfill their material and psychological needs. Real ownership and control of social property, through a democratic and participatory society are the foundational aspects of socialism. But frustratingly the problem is that people don't see any alternatives, or dismiss those they are presented with as utopian and unreachable. But this does not mean that people's minds are totally closed to radical ideas. Capitalism sows the seeds of its own destruction. It brings workers together into workplaces, forcing them to organise collectively, and the relentless drive for profit constantly reminds workers that they have collective interests, diametrically opposed to those of the ruling class. This means that, even when the confidence of the class as a whole is at its lowest, there will still be areas where people are fighting back. There exists a recognition that there are problems in the way society is run, though it may be focused on one issue initially. People get involved because they know that things have to change. This can lead people to realise that tinkering with the system isn't enough, real improvement requires real change - revolutionary change. Struggle is inevitable, revolution is not.

No revolution can ever succeed as a factor of liberation unless the means used to further it be identical in spirit and tendency with the purposes to be achieved. Marx and Engels’ vision of the future society began not from a moral conception of a “good society” juxtaposed to the present “bad society” but rather from a study of the present and what potential it offers us for making change.  Under capitalism, virtually all poverty is artificial.  Poverty and hunger in previous societies was typically the resulted from natural disasters like a flood or a drought.  But today, these things are the result of a society that is organized strictly for the purposes of enriching the few at the expense of the many. Alongside unspeakable poverty, unimaginable wealth enough is produced to feed, house, educate, clothe, and care for everyone in human society. We can take advantage of technology and productivity and these resources and use them to meet everyone’s needs, but doing that requires overthrowing the power of the ruling 1% and taking control of the tools of production to meet our own needs.  That is what socialism is. This movement has to be by the working class, not only because we’re the largest class in society but also because we have a material interest in taking the fight all the way. The capitalists sow the seeds of their own overthrow.  Since they rely on the exploitation and oppression of the working-class and oppressed people they create conditions for ongoing resistance and struggle.  While there are periods of relative social stability, as long as the capitalists continue to exploit and oppress, people will want to organize to fight back—trade unions, community organizations, and other formations. Through these struggles—no matter if they’re for better wages, against police brutality, or to stop sexual assault—people can start to sort through the various contradictory ideas and develop a revolutionary worldview.

If our aim was just a political reform then we would like many others attempt to channel discontent into support for a platform of palliatives but for us, we seek a social revolution. Self-confidence and self-activity is the key to socialism, to do what needs to be done without looking for leaders to step in and take over. For this reason our role is to work with people and not for people. Our aim is educate, agitate and organize - to inspire. The revolutionary party does not exist as “the embryo” of the future society or future state, but rather, it exists as a tool. Only the working class can win a socialist society.  Nobody can do it for them.  As the American revolutionary socialist Eugene Debs said: “I would not lead the workers out of bondage if I could; for if you could be led out, you could be led back again.”  Therefore, a premium has to be put on those things that actually unite the working class, raise the people’s political consciousness, their self-confidence and their participation in struggle. Socialists need to be vigilant in arguing against racism, nationalism, sexism or any other bigotry. Socialists need to argue against undemocratic practices in movements since these harm people’s ability to control the struggle themselves, debate their strategies and tactics, and learn lessons from their own struggle and therefore grow politically. Socialists in general, should oppose violence as a strategy since it’s needlessly provokes state repression and therefore deter people’s political radicalization. The means we use in struggle are selected on the concrete conditions of the struggle we face here-and-now. We organize ourselves based around how the world is rather than around how the world is ought to be.

We revolutionaries must come together to tear away the curtains of capitalism’s camouflage that hide the absurdity and truly horrendous perspective of continued capitalist rule, and to hold a mirror to fellow workers: see clearly, see the danger, see yourself, see your power. Recognise the necessity and the possibility. They're here. Now.

OUR DAY WILL COME!!!

We are The Socialist Party

The Socialist Party purpose is straightforward, and we do not hide it. We want to re-establish the genuine meaning of socialism. The socialist movement is a project for revolutionary change. Socialists want to overthrow today’s society based on exploitation, and build a new world where ordinary people have control over their lives and communities. The agent for this change is the working people themselves. Socialists seek to empower working people to change the world while trade unions are organisations for working people to defend their interests. An overlap of purpose is obvious. Capitalism is a system that serves to exploit. This exploitation changes and develops over time. To challenge capitalist exploitation, it is important for trade unions to be in all sectors of the economy. When workers are organised they can exercise their collective power by going on strike or refusing to over-time or working-to-rule to combat low pay, long hours, or bad working conditions. Socialists support trade unions as organisation for workers to fight for their interests. Therefore, socialists do not support practices that undermine unions. However, socialists have a vision that looks much further than limiting the forms of exploitation that working people submit to and socialists strive for the overthrow of capitalism and building a new world based on co-operation and social ownership. Socialists support unions because we believe in the power of ordinary people. The role of a socialist in a union can be varied. Socialists will always try to be good unionists at their work, but this can take different paths, depending on a range of factors. Being a union radical can mean assisting with initiatives in the union and building organisation for the next fight with the boss. It could mean opposing a corrupt leadership and building rank and file networks to challenge an entrenched union bureaucracy. Sometimes socialists may work for unions to contribute to building the organisation as an official. But always, socialists union activists seek to build the capacity for the working class to fight against their oppression.

The “disappearing working class” thesis in unsupportable. It was fashionable in the past to say it had been “bought off”, become “middle class” etc. etc. but hasn’t this recession exposed that myth. What is disappearing is the false idea that those in the middle class are not actually members of the working class.  It's true that waged industrial manual workers has shrunk in size and significance but you don't cease to be working class because you're serving burgers in a McDonalds rather than a factory worker. “Working class” denotes a position within the social relations of production. Socialists see the working class as the agents of revolutionary change not because it suffers a lot (sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't), but because it's so placed within the capitalist system as to be feasibly capable of taking over. Who else but the men and women who create the system, whose livelihood depends on it, who are capable of running it justly and collectively, and who would most benefit from such a change, should take it over?

The central place of wage workers in the productive process gives them the social power to overthrow capitalism. No other social class or group has the power to achieve this. Because the system of private property is the source of its oppression, the working class can liberate itself only by abolishing this system and replacing it with a system based on social ownership of the means of production. The working class re simultaneously at the root and source of the capitalist system and incapable of being wholly included within it. Only another of the contradictions of capitalism.

The point Marx made over and over again is that the working class is revolutionary or it is nothing. Worldwide the labour and socialist movements appear to have been in retreat for several decades. Yet it is a mistake to see the workers movement as merely that section of the working class organised within the trade unions or worse still the union leadership. The predominance of racist and sexist ideas, the whole-scale belief in religion, and other socially conservative ideas that seem to belie any possible revolutionary role for the working class. Despite the rout of the traditional working class organisations, the class struggle continues unabated.

If our vision of socialism is simply a slightly modified version of what exists, don't expect it to embraced. The market cannot coexist with socialism because socialism means that society owns and controls both the means of production and the goods which result from productive activity. For the market to exist, some sectional interest (an individual,  a joint-stock company, a nationalised concern, a workers' cooperative and so on) has to be in control of part of the social product, which it then disposes of by entering into exchange relations with others. Exchange cannot take place when society, and none other, controls the means of production and the social product. Far from socialism being compatible with exchange and the market, the generalised production of goods for exchange on the market is the hallmark of an entirely different type of society - capitalism. We are not saying that absence of the market is the sole defining feature of socialism. On the contrary, socialism is not merely a market-less society; it is also a stateless society, a classless society, a moneyless society, a wage-less society. The fact that social democrats, Leninists, Trotskyists and other supposed “socialists” or “communists” accept a role for the market, tells us that they represent forces for maintaining capitalism, not for achieving socialism. Haven't they all had their share of power, and haven't they all proved totally ineffective in ridding the world of the problems which capitalism continually recreates? Other contenders for the privileges which accompany the administration of capitalism such as the 'Greens' are waiting in the wings, and are having some success in turning themselves into mass movements because of the illusory attractiveness of their promises to reform the market system. Like previous attempts at reform, these latest efforts directed towards making the capitalist system function in a manner which gives priority to human interests are bound to fail. As long as the world market remains, human beings will be forced to dance to its tune. Market forces cannot be tamed; only eliminated. The very existence of humankind is now threatened by the rivalry and the fixation on profit which are inherent in the market system.

In the society envisaged by non-market socialists, the people of the world would own the global means of production in common and would operate them communally for the benefit of humankind as a whole. Socialism in one country, or even one part of the world, is impossible. Since capitalism today is a global society which encompasses all parts of the world, the socialist alternative to capitalism must be equally global in its scope. Socialism is as relevant to the plight of those who are starving in Africa and other parts of the world as it is to the inhabitants of London or Paris. It is true that non-market socialists have generally seen the wage workers of those advanced, industrialised areas of the world which act as the power-houses of international capitalism (Europe, North America and Japan) as the force which is likely to initiate the revolutionary change from world capitalism to world socialism. Yet the establishment of non-market socialism could not be accomplished without the active cooperation of the majority of the population in those parts of the world which capitalism has consigned to underdevelopment. In contrast to the hopelessness and destitution which afflict the majority of the people in backward countries under world capitalism, the prospect of dignity and sufficiency which world socialism would open up for them would be overwhelmingly attractive. It is also worth mentioning that several of the non-market socialist principles closely resemble the principles of social cooperation found among hunter-gatherers and other supposedly 'backward' people. People in their social position would take much less convincing of the desirability of non-market socialism than would many of those in 'advanced' countries who are currently steeped in the values and assumptions which capitalism encourages. Socialism would be a global solution to the global problems which have accompanied the rise of world capitalism.

If Socialism is worth struggling for, it is precisely because it will be based on the principle of "from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs". And capitalism, with its reliance on exchange, utterly fails to satisfy the real needs of the vast majority of the humanity.  

Change your minds - Change your world

The Socialist Party stands for the transformation of human society, from its current basis of exploitation and oppression to a commonwealth, a classless society based upon a worldwide system of democratically planned production to meet human need and social ownership in harmony with our planet’s ecosystems. The working class is the only social class that has the potential to replace capitalism with socialism, not only because its organisation and centrality to production under capitalism give it the ability to do so, but because it is the human embodiment of socially cooperative labour.  Capitalism has “united” the world, but to maintain its exploitation of the working people, the capitalist class creates numerous inequalities that work to prevent the exploited uniting — racism, sexism, discrimination based on national or ethnic or religious origin, persecution on the basis of sexual orientation. Exploitation and oppression cannot be finally overcome while capitalism continues to exist. But partial victories against them can be won, and can contribute to the weakening and eventual overthrow of capitalism.

Revolution is seen as being impossible. People are told we are too apathetic or ignorant—we’ll never fight back. They tell us the working class has been bought off, so forget change and instead, relax and enjoy life the best you can hope for. Workers are brought up to believe that capitalism is normal. Society tells us that anyone who believes the status quo can be changed is simply extremist, utopian or unrealistic. This leads people to believe that capitalism cannot be brought down by the mass of working class people, and that we have to rely on parliament for reform. Nevertheless, over and over again, people unexpectedly, out of nowhere erupt and engage in radical struggles. Then we are told such momentous events cannot happen here. But they do. The working-class struggle for socialism is prepared by and grows out of the contradictions of the capitalist social order.

Large numbers of people want change - radical, revolutionary, real socialist change. They don’t just want to elect a different government but to do away with rulers and ruled, to do away with rich and poor, to entirely do away with bankers and bosses. They want to run their own lives, in what is called participatory democracy, the idea that we should have the right to make the most important decisions that affect our lives, and that we should determine the conditions under which we live. As people begin to see that there could be change, new movements that had not previously existed arise. We expect that the future will bring many new experiences, which we must think about, learn from, and incorporate into our theory and practice. The Socialist Party want people power and an end to our exploitation and oppression. All of us are called upon to make a decision. There’s nobody who can liberate you but yourself. The first thing you have to do is liberate yourself; liberate your mind. Decide that you will not put up with injustice, oppression, exploitation and war that you’re not going to go quietly being processed to put up with all they want you to accept. You have to know who you are, and which side are you on. You have to know is that you cannot liberate yourself by yourself; you can only do it with other people. There’s no way to end your own oppression and exploitation without collective action, collective struggle, joining with other people to change this world. And so all of you have to start thinking through what that means; how you’re going to educate yourself, to raise your own and other peoples’ consciousness, to create the sort of effective organization that can lead to a successful liberation. The historian Howard Zinn said it is who’s “sitting in the streets, occupying, protesting and demonstrating” who are more important that who is sitting in the White House. No socialist president alone can change the system. That is a job for the people themselves. We need to build a mass movement for revolutionary change. Socialists aim to change the world and have always sought to organise themselves as effectively as possible in order to achieve this goal. The lessons are that we should be preparing now for the future explosion by building revolutionary working-class politics and organisation. More important than what we have done in the past, is what we will do together in the future to build a society that makes possible the full development of all human beings: the socialist society.

Humanity stands at a crossroad. The knowledge and productive capacity that already exist could, if used rationally, enable all people not only to be supplied with the material means for a full and ample life but also provide for a vast advance in humanity’s social and cultural development. The alternative is also already visible around us. It is the further intensification of human misery and environmental destruction. The threat of extinction of the species homo-sapiens from the increasing pollution of the planet’s air, water and land looms over the whole of humanity. Socialism must give priority to sustainability, not growth without limits, not growth that degrades the natural conditions that make the production and reproduction of life and human society in its infinite variety of forms possible. Humankind now faces changes in our planet's climate that could not only make socialism a mere dream, but make the Earth itself uninhabitable. We are approaching tipping points which if reached will give global warming a momentum that human actions will have little or no control over. These dangers must be confronted now. Only a determined socialist movement stands a chance of defeating an entrenched and powerful economic and political bloc and, in doing so, taking a first and absolutely necessary step to protect and sustain Earth and life on it - and the possibility of a socialist future. The problem is not that there are “too many people” or that our living standards are “too high”; the problem is the completely irrational nature of capitalism, arising from its basis in private ownership and production for profit. There is no reason why we couldn’t massively raise the standards of living for the whole population, whilst at the same time greatly reduce society’s impact on the environment. The productive forces have reached the point where life without starvation and homelessness is within reach, for all. The technologies exist to do so; what is needed is a rational and democratic plan of production to integrate and implement these technologies. Only the rule of one class over the rest prevents it. Clearly the world faces a choice between socialism and an increasingly apparent barbarism. There is no room left for any alternative but revolution. Yet the bulk of the world’s leftists remains dedicated to “realism”, ‘pragmatism”and populist “nationalism”.  In short, what is really needed is the revolutionary socialist transformation of society. The task facing the Socialist Party is to explain the common cause of capitalism behind the various problems facing both people and the planet; to link these struggles together by fighting for a revolutionary socialist change in society.

Only through a revolutionary change in the system of ownership and management of society’s productive wealth can working people guarantee themselves — and humanity as a whole — a future. Ownership and control of society’s productive resources must be taken out of the hands of the capitalist minority and transferred to society as a whole, and subordinated to democratic planning in order to meet humanity’s rational needs. Such a change is not only possible; it is long overdue. It will bring about the next great step forward in the evolution of humanity — the creation, through the transfer of political and economic power to the working class, of the classless socialist society. If our vision of socialism is simply a slightly modified version of what exists, don't expect it to embraced. Only a vision that is modern and forward looking will capture the imagination of the people. It is evident that people are gravitating toward a radical critique of society. Economic crisis alone, however, is not the sole cause of revolutionary change. The ground is prepared via the cumulative impact of many different issues- economic, political, social, and moral - taking place over time, during which people's understanding gains in sophistication going beyond "them and us" and "the system sucks". The “revolution" is a more protracted and complicated political/historical process. Socialism, it is correctly said, must be the product of an engaged, united, and politically sophisticated majority. But it doesn't follow that such a majority will simply emerge out of everyday struggles. It is also mistaken thinking that socialism will be the product of a radical minority. The struggle for democracy (economic and social as well as political) is at the core of the struggle for socialism. It's not a diversion or a second-order task. The point of political engagement isn't to feel righteous or conjure up "get socialism quick schemes." It is to change the world.

The spectre of communism does not haunt the world today and elementary socialist principles have been abandoned. Across our planet, in recent decades the working class has risen up time and again against the murderous and exploitative rule of capitalism. But its struggles have not resulted in socialism. The working class does not need “condescending saviors” in the words of The International. Leaders have been a big part of the problem and not the solution. The working class is capable of achieving socialist consciousness through the lessons it learns in the course of struggle. Under the banner of authentic socialism, in open and defiant hatred of the ruling class, The Socialist Party is dedicated to the struggle to overthrow the employs. In the spirit of the Communist Manifesto, we disdain to hide our political identity. We means what we say. Trickery and opportunism will not advance the cause of revolution – working class consciousness and therefore the truth about what must be done, will. The working class alone has been created by capitalism itself to be its gravedigger and the independence of the working class is a prime necessity for class consciousness. Only the proletariat can make the socialist revolution. In our efforts, the Socialist Party is devoted to exposing, not hiding, the vacillations, capitulations and betrayals of the reformists who have stood as a major prop for the preservation of capitalism. Whichever road reformists choose, they promote class collaborationist populism.

The full development of the forces of production, the achievement of abundance for all and the flowering of humanity and human culture, require the establishment of socialism, a classless society. The Socialist Party proudly tell the truth as we see it to our fellow workers. Capitalism destroys human beings and nature and that we desperately need a vision of the socialist alternative. Our party is committed to destroy the cancerous capitalist system by revolution, nothing less than the complete dismantling of the system. Socialism will foster a society where humanity will organise their economy in accordance with peoples’ needs and environmental demands. 

PEOPLE POWER

Monbiot's one step beyond

‘Tartan Stalinists”, the “Highland Stasi”, “Scottish Nazi party”. The mild proposals in the Scottish government’s land reform bill, published last week, provoke much fulminations among the proprietorial class. David Cameron’s stepfather-in-law, Lord Astor described Scotland’s proposals as “a Mugabe-style landgrab”. He owns, among the other properties he was enterprising enough to inherit, the deer-ravaged Tarbert estate on the isle of Jura, run by a trust patriotically registered in the Bahamas.

Much of this fury is caused by the plan to cancel the business rate exemption (granted to the aristocracy by John Major’s government in 1994) for deer-stalking estates, grouse moors and salmon fishing. Talk about a culture of entitlement.

As a result of the Highland clearances, which dragged much of the population off the land destroying their houses and replacing them with sheep ranches or deer and grouse estates, Scotland vies with Brazil for the world’s highest concentration of ownership. (It’s hard to tell which comes first as the ownership of many estates has been kept secret.) One estimate suggests that 432 people own half the country’s private rural land. No other rich nation has so excluded its citizens from their common heritage.

Given these circumstances the bill is, if anything, too timid. It gives local people consultation rights over how land is used, strengthens the ability of communities to buy land, improves the position of tenant farmers, removes the business rate exemption, tries to discover who the owners are, seeks to reduce the ridiculous densities at which deer are maintained for stalking, and creates a land commission to keep the issue alive. That’s all.

It seems that two things are missing from the bill. While there are new opportunities for families and communities, there is no designation of land for the nation as a whole. There is also little that will alter the ownership pattern where it is most extreme: in the rocky Highland cores, which are likely to be unsuitable for community buyouts. As the Scottish minister Aileen McLeod concedes, “community ownership may not be appropriate for all land: it’s not a panacea”. 

But perhaps there’s a way in which both issues could be addressed.

 With the possible exception of the western side of the Cairngorms, there are no nature parks in Britain that meet the international definition: places protected mainly for their wildlife and habitats. When the International Union for Conservation of Nature sought to classify Britain’s national parks, of which there are 15, it had to invent a new category. Ours are not set aside for nature. They are, strictly speaking not parks. There are good reasons for this and bad ones. When the parks were designated, many people were living within their boundaries. It’s essential that they can make a living and keep their communities alive. (Unfortunately the industries covering most of the land offer neither possibility: though lavishly subsidised, they still bleed jobs and money.) But on the rare occasions when the private owners are not wrecking the land with sheep, overstocked deer and scorched-earth grouse shoots, the park authorities step in to finish the job.

With a few exceptions the ecological management of our existing national parks is irrational, anally retentive and scientifically illiterate. They remain subject to a 19th-century worldview in which the natural world is seen as a garden to be pruned and trimmed rather than as a thriving, living system in which we could escape from the management and control that surrounds us everywhere else.

Scotland, thanks in part to its dismal feudal legacy, has only two national parks, and less land designated than in the other parts of Britain – 7%, while England has 9% and Wales 20%. Is it not time to augment those with new parks, with a different philosophy. Where Scotland’s deer stalking and grouse shooting provide possibly the lowest level of employment per square mile to be found in any temperate region in Europe, national parks could generate new jobs within an economy built on wildlife and tourism. They would restore both human populations and the other species that were wiped out by the clearances. They would bring life of all kinds to barren lands. Long live the Highland spring.

Adapted from George Monbiot in the Guardian

Socialism is the Future of Humanity – Start Building Now

Anger at capitalism is growing daily. Human beings are losers. We have lost families, friends and our communities. Have we also now lost our will to fight back? Capitalism’s days are numbered. Across the world, millions of people have taken to the streets against austerity, injustice and endless war. Capitalism has far outlived any usefulness. Under capitalism, people have no future beyond wage slavery and poverty. Socialism as a possibility will exist so long as capitalism persists as a reality. To build unity and solidarity, we need a vision for the future. One vision of socialism is the expansion of democratic decision-making into the economy, the common ownership of resources and free access to goods and services based on need. In other words, making the worker and community control over production a reality. It is clear that the world as a whole is becoming one community, or at least needs to be seen and treated as one. The human species needs socialism not only to realise all its potentials but to survive.

Marx used 'socialism' and 'communism' as synonymous terms, both referring to the same kind of society, that is, a 'cooperative society' or 'association' based on 'free associated labour'.  Marx nowhere speaks of 'socialism' as a distinct stage or social formation or of 'transition between socialism and communism'.  For Marx, as the new society emerges from the capitalist society itself, the former is obviously an integral part of the same new society, being its 'first phase' only chronologically, with the specific kind of developments corresponding to it. For him between capitalism and communism lies no stage or stages, only a transition, more or less prolonged according to circumstances.  That there is no fore-ordained model or blueprint of socialism or socialist transition, certainly none suitable for all countries and all times, does not mean absence of general principles. Marx was no determinist. For Marx socialism is nothing inevitable, it is something to be struggled for. Thus there are no guarantees of victory; only alternatives, one being the mutual ruination of the contending classes, the total destruction of humanity summed up by Rosa Luxemburg as 'socialism or barbarism'. Optimistically, Marx gave capitalism a short lease of life, looking forward to an early revolution in Europe and, therefore, Marx never explored the possibility of this imminent threat hanging over the future of humankind. This makes the struggle for socialism all the more imperative and urgent today.

However, capitalism continues to survive, but this, by itself, cannot be seen as an argument for the desirability, or a sign of the progressiveness of the capitalist order. Capitalism is a system that is chronically diseased by pathological inflictions which manifest themselves variously in different places as racism, sexism, anti-semitism, xenophobia, ethnic or national hatreds, fundamentalism and intolerance, even as plain cruelty and criminal aggression.  Poverty, unemployment and insecurity-related crimes and associated phenomena – ill-health and suicides, alcoholism and drug addiction, violence against women and child abuse, etc. -- are on the rise everywhere. The introduction of new technology and communication have become the means of debasing people's understanding and preventing them from looking beyond the capitalist horizon of a consumerist paradise of instant gratification. Gone is the aspiration for a life which would fulfil basic human needs -- decent livelihood, knowledge, solidarity, cooperation with fellow human beings, job satisfaction at work and freedom from unnecessary drudgery and toil. Today’s society is sick and who can deny that diagnosis but it lingers on in its putrefying decay. Socialism will always remain on the agenda wherever capitalism exists, be it 'developed', 'under-developed', 'developing' or any other part of the world. Socialists say surely it is people and not 'economic growth' and GDP that must come first in society.  Socialism is a humane society that fosters cooperation, solidarity and respect and makes for a non-alienated, 'truly rich human life' that Marx spoke of.  Of course, such a world cannot be achieved without basic material conditions being met but to believe that you can assure satisfy the majority of people through greed, private acquisition, competition and rivalry-- the values of capitalism -- and yet still hope for a humane society of cooperation and solidarity is utopianism of the worst kind. As human beings, people simply don't fit into the capitalist market exchange economy. Capitalism has to go. No matter how slowly or haltingly we must strive and struggle for our emancipatory vision of socialism. Just as there is no single model of socialism, one that is suitable for all climes and all times, there is none of socialist politics either.  The specific conditions or demands and the forms of struggle they generate will vary from country to country.  Which, however, also again, does not mean the absence of general principles to guide it. The application of these principles is in fact a must for any successful pursuit of socialist politics today. Socialism is the only just, rational and sustainable future for the people of the world and that this future has to be struggled for here and now.

Socialism is a difficult word to define, especially given the various countries that have called themselves "socialist" at one point or another in time. Many people believe socialism only means government nationalization of the means of production, which is a definition we in the World Socialist Movement distance ourselves from. Socialism isn't something that can be summed up in one sentence. Socialism is about radical democracy. It would give people democratic control over political as well as economic matters, rather than the system we have now that concentrates the control of these areas into the hands of a small group of people at the top of the socio-economic ladder. It means giving you control over your workplace rather than in the hands of some board of trustees, the stock holders, or the bureaucrat official in a government ministry who are only interested in profit and not your livelihood. Within socialism people have the right to a job , decent housing, health care, education, etc.  Socialism means common ownership, and democratic control by the people, of the factories, farms, mines, offices and all other industries and services, a moneyless wageless stateless commonwealth. But if you need just one sentence, there is the old adage: "From each according to ability, to each according to needs." Or in two words – People Power. The workers must prepare themselves for their emancipation by class-conscious organisation on both the political and the economic fields for the establishment of socialism. The Socialist Party never asserted that socialist society would result from the actions of parliamentary delegates alone.

The most common argument against a moneyless society is that money seems to be the only effective regulating force which can prevent wastage. This may be the case in a money-driven society, where everything is evaluated by its price-tag, and the manner in which we deal with things is determined to a big extent by the monetary value. The higher the price, the bigger the value, the more one takes care of it; the lower the price, the lower the value, resulting in indifference and carelessness; this is the mechanism of a money-based society. But in a moneyless society the rules of a money-driven society do not apply anymore. You cannot predict behaviour patterns in a moneyless society by the rules of a money-driven society. In the usual money-based society the individual has the right to do whatever he wants with his financial resources. He sees everything through the perspective of its price. And if he has enough money, why not afford something which makes life more convenient or nice? And if something is cheap or free of charge, why bother about it? In this attitude the typical individual is fully justified in a money-based state of life.

But if we try to install a moneyless society around the world, then this attitude of course has to change, and will change. Once it is clear that electricity, water or food is a common commodity, which is free for all, but which has a cost for the community, then the justification for a non-caring attitude is gone. Today the fact that somebody pays for his electricity gives him the right to use it as he wants. Nobody can say anything, and he may feel himself fully justified in using it carelessly, or with care. This attitude of a money-based approach is of course stillexists within today’s society, since we still have a money-based society. But once we no longer have it, this attitude will change. Even the richest of the rich then won’t be able to treat the common commodities carelessly anymore, because they will no longer be “his electricity”, “his water”, “his food”, etc, that he is using. He will use a collective value and be forced to cherish it. There may be people who won’t like it that their electricity or water or food comes free, because it takes away their justification to use it as they like. Responsibility for the collective is inevitable in a collective based economy.

We therefore do not think that individuals will start wasting common commodities with indifference once he or she no longer feels any personal financial disadvantage in doing so. Some people may claim that a person will leave their light on when they leave the house, their windows open with air conditioners running, etc, once electricity is free. Such a claim can only be based on the assumption that the average-person is a careless, unconscious person who is not interested in anything but their own personal advantage. We do not think that this is true.

.Attempts to install a money-less approach within a money-driven society cannot work. As long as the basic thought and behaviour pattern is still money-based, you cannot expect a consciousness to come up. The basic idea of a money-less economy is that the motivation to work, to care, to make an effort, does not originate from a desire for money. If we want to install a money-less economy on a money-based consciousness we will fail.

Profit From Others Misery

That abomination known as incarceration, otherwise known as unnecessary torture, is still rising in the US. There, 2.2 million are in jails, greater even than in that 'communist' country, China, that has 1.6 million incarcerated. State spending on jails has soared from $16.9 billion in 1990 to $51.9 billion in 2013. 40,900 were jailed for drug crimes in 1980, by 2013 the number was 489,000. The black population in the country is thirteen per cent but they make up 38% of the prisoners. Obviously there is a plan to incarcerate as many as possible and someone is making a lot of money out of it. Profit from the misery of others!. John Ayers.

The Rich Do Better.

 "It should shock no one that in the matter of access to health care, even to the organs in other people's bodies, the wealthy and well-connected...are different from the rest of us.' The rich do better', Dr, Arthur Caplan, head of bioethics at New York University Medical Centre, told the Star (May 23). 'I don't know that that's a headline, but it's nonetheless true. Right down to the homeless, health care is a tiered system. John Ayers.

Action Man (video)

No More Empty Promises

“Accumulate, accumulate! That is Moses and the prophets!” - Marx

Capitalism has now become a threat to life on Earth. The system’s need for infinite growth and the finite resources of Earth stand in contradiction to each other. Successful capitalism means growth which means that on the one hand nature is treated as a resource to be exploited ruthlessly, and on the other, toxic waste is dumped. The capitalist class appoint economists, rather than environmental scientists to advise them on the ecological crisis. What these economists do not appear to realise is that, while starting from the assumption that the ecological crisis can be solved within the capitalist system, their calculations, which show the required costs would be unsustainable, prove the opposite, namely that this environmental  crisis cannot be solved within capitalist relations of production. It is clear that the demands of the capitalist system, namely profits via cheap energy are being followed in preference to any strategy which could ensure the long term survival of life on the planet, the exact opposite of what rationality should dictate. The capitalist system requires continuous accumulation of capital. If capitals do not accumulate they will collapse, and there is therefore a general struggle for accumulation of capital, which means growth and expansion of markets, throughout the entire system. This drive for accumulation is derived from the internal functioning of the system and cannot be avoided. Capitalism has to “expand or die”, which is why all countries measure their success in terms of economic growth. The forces propelling this drive come from the workings of the capitalist system itself, not from the immorality of the capitalist class. Consequently the attempts of environmentalists to persuade the capitalist class to “wake up” and to adopt a zero growth economy, reflect a failure to understand capitalism, and are therefore futile.

Capitalism is a productive system which produces for profit not for human needs. Only when the ecological problems start to affect profits will capitalists start to treat them seriously. This will occur when the ecological reserves have been used up and by then it will be too late to do anything about it. Regarding climate change, the problem isn’t “industrial civilization” as such. It is its particular form known as capitalism, which stands in an inherently incompatable to livable ecology. The capitalist system at its root is all about the growth, accumulation and is exploitation-addicted world system, with its anarchic and atomized decision-making, incapable of democratically planning for the common good. Capitalism is inseparable from the compulsion to indiscriminate growth that drives consumerism which is inimical to collective values and insensitive to the environment. As a social system based on private ownership of production it can’t support the kind of planning that could avert environmental catastrophe. The owners of capital are fragmented and compelled by competition to look after their own interests first, and any serious planning would have to override property rights — an action that would be opposed by vested interests.

Ecological harmony and a sustainable environment are essential to the continued existence of humanity. Humanity is the only species that has developed the ability to alter its environment. Under capitalism, these alterations have been at once beneficial and harmful. While human beings marvel at the latest technological innovations and feats of engineering, we also lay waste to whole sections of the earth. In the name of capitalism and the drive for the highest possible profits, we have threatened the very ecological balance that created us. The Socialist Party believes in using all the technology and knowledge available to us to undo as much of the damage humanity has done to the planet we all share, in addition to improving on and creating new ways to rebuild our natural world. Once we can eliminate the profit motive, the door is open to rational use of natural resources for the first time in human history. How we make use of such resources will naturally be informed by our understanding that reason governs the outcome and not quarterly earnings returns to the boards of corporations. Naomi Klein is correct when she writes “We are stuck because the actions that would give us the best chance of averting catastrophe – and would benefit the vast majority – are extremely threatening to an elite minority that has a stranglehold over economy, our political process, and most of our major media outlets”

The really “inconvenient truth” (as one of the Socialist Party’s pamphlets on the environment is titled) is that the problem is capitalism, itself.  It is not merely the Friedman free-market vulture capitalism but also the he Keynsian “regulated” and “welfare state” capitalism. Any form of capitalism is the recipe for disaster and catastrophe, for the profit system lays at the base of all the “Doomsday” scenarios. Understanding and going beyond capitalism is essential for averting the ecological apocalypse that we are heading towards. The disharmony with nature and all the other social evils and ills of so-called modern-day society are intimately interwoven and interrelated with the capitalist economic system. All our struggles for justice around the world—for equality, the right to food, economic fairness, human rights, decent work, environmental protection and more – are interconnected and all are tied up. The real problem we face are not the important but nevertheless innumerable superficial matters but the vital radical reconstruction of society itself. We need to replace capitalism and repair the world with socialism. Nothing less than the transformation of our society, our economy, and our world will suffice to solve the climate crisis. All around the world we are seeing the effects of the climate crisis. But all around the world we are seeing an unprecedented movement of people calling for urgent and concrete action to protect people and our planet. It's good to see the environmental movement catching up with the idea that truly addressing climate change will real attention to the root causes of the crisis - capitalism. We must send a clear message that our demand is for people power. We have to be much more real, much bolder, and much more determined to make it happen. It is all about people, and our capacity as humanity to secure safe and dignified lives for all with solutions based in a vision of the world that recognizes the need to live in harmony with nature, and to guarantee the fulfillment of all human needs. The balance of power is changing across the world, because people across the world are prepared to fight to protect their homes, their right to food, and their right to a decent job.

The World Socialist Movement acts as a catalyst for those who possess this shared vision for a better future. We need a broad deep movement of solidarity and action, with electoral commitment but also a focus on the effective exercise of popular power in other ways. Electoral efforts will emerge from wider forms of popular organizing as the outgrowth of people power.

Capitalism Lampooned

With all the gloom and doom around, it's nice to report some good news – the meteoric rise of comedienne Amy Schumer, who, in a word, can be described as refreshing. Though no subject is too sacred for the adventurous satirist, the area she specialises in is gender politics. Her recent lampooning of rape culture was both hilarious and to the point. As one scribe said, "Her comments are funny and horrific at the same time, mostly because they have a ring of truth." Though we know nothing of her political views, it's good to see the effects of capitalism lampooned in such a devastating way. John Ayers.

Money Counts People Don't

On May 1, Canada and the US announced a ten year plan to phase out trains like the one used in the Lac- Megantic disaster in Quebec. It set a series of deadlines by which different models need to be retro-fitted. By 2020 all types of cars carrying crude oil will have to have new shells, head shields and thermal protection. To quote the Transport Minister, I know the safety measures we have outlined today will not be easy and, quite frankly, they will not be cheap, but the financial losses and the costs of cleaning up after such events as Lac-Megantic will in the long run be more burdensome." In other words, it costs less to improve safety features than have a derailment. The minister said nothing about the loss of people who died in that and other disasters. Money counts, people do not. John Ayers.

Class Contrasts

The New York Times reported that the sale of a Picasso painting for $179 million is a reflection on inequality. The soaring price for art over the last generation shows the growing number of people with vast amounts of money for such things is producing a competitive market that drives prices ever upward. It begs the question, where is all the money coming from. While billions struggle with poverty and deprivation of vital needs the world over, including in the 'rich world', they are eclipsed by the incomes of the top 0.1 per cent, and, as the article says, "And the kind of people who can comfortably afford to pay a nine-figure sum for a Picasso, the top 0.001 per cent, say, are doing still better than that." What a crazy system where children die of malnutrition and the rich can fork out millions for a painting! John Ayers.

Freeing Ourselve

“enough for everyone and time for what we will.”

Slavery existed long before capitalism. Today the vast majority of people are employees, "wage earners," at least the vast majority of those who can find a job at all. Wage slavery is the predominate form of oppression today. Workers are forced to sell themselves (actually, their labour power) in order to survive. Rather than being owned, and provided for in some fashion. A typical wage slave’s day is eight hours of wage slavery, eight hours of free time to eat, relax and watch TV, and eight hours for sleep, in order to regenerate for the next day of wage slavery. Everything we need to live our daily lives has to be paid for. Water, gas, electricity, housing, transport, food and clothing – the principle is the same: if you can’t pay, you can’t have. No one likes being in a condition of slavery. It’s understandable that slaves either identify with their master or deny that they are slaves. Slavery has never lacked for defenders, and wage slavery is no exception. One after another they appear, selling their services to the plutocracy, presenting arguments in defence of capitalism, or in attempted refutation of Socialism. They have been hailed as new prophets, as the saviors of the capitalist slave system.  The ineffectiveness of their defence of wage slavery, has changed little since Marx's time.

Marx should be acknowledged as the most dominant thinker affecting the way political economists think about world poverty and mass powerlessness over the last two centuries. Marx cannot be faulted in his analysis of why a market economy in the modern world contains the seeds of its own destruction, assuming that the ownership of the means of production remained concentrated in too few hands and workers had only their labour to sell in direct competition with labour-displacing technology or with workers willing to work for lower wages. Whether the bosses are state-officials or CEOs, the paid hirelings of a small ownership elite, the worker ends up being a wage-slave. Even unions, if they confine themselves to obtaining higher wages do nothing to empower the worker or gain real liberty and justice. The worker may be well paid, but in the end he is still simply a wage-slave who gets more than the other wage-slaves. Instead of fighting for an end to the system of wage slavery, reformists prop it up by sowing illusions in the advantages that come from a higher wage. Rather than fight to free workers from exploitation by the ruling classes and oppression by their state, the reformist “socialists” seek to transform the capitalists’ state into an institution that “works for the people.” They may litter their speeches with appeals for “socialism,” and “revolution but the radical rhetoric and wishful thinking cannot measure up against what these phony socialists” end up doing in the real world. It would be both dishonest and unprincipled to portray reformism as something “revolutionary.” Wage slavery and exploitation have not ceased to be at the heart and root of capitalism. Today there seems to be no challenge to this system.

In Wages, Price and Profit, Marx talks about ‘that false and superficial radicalism that accepts premises and tries to evade conclusions’. He goes on: ‘To clamour for equal or even equitable retribution on the basis of the wages system is the same as to clamour for freedom on the basis of the slavery system. What you think just or equitable is out of the question. The question is: What is necessary and unavoidable with a given system of production?’ Later on he says: ‘Instead of the conservative motto, “A fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work!” [or any other dream of a cooperative and crisis free capitalism] workers ought to inscribe on their banner the revolutionary watchword, “Abolition of the wages system!” Marx’s point is completely valid. How can there be justice when the system is built on and exists on the injustice of exploitation?

In the Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels explained:

“The modern labourer… instead of rising with the progress of industry, sinks deeper and deeper below the conditions of existence of his own class. He becomes a pauper (i.e. beggar), and pauperism develops more rapidly than population and wealth…. (The bourgeoisie) is unfit to rule because it is incompetent to assure an existence to its slave within his slavery (as a slave to his/her job – a wage slave), because it cannot help letting him sink into such a state, that it has to feed him, instead of being fed by him. Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie; in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society.”

What could be more true today?

The apologists for capitalism portray it as the “natural” state of affairs arguing “it’s always been like this, and it always will be”. But they’re wrong. Early human societies were communal: they weren’t divided into rich and poor and they shared property instead of having to buy and sell the things they needed. After this, human history has been a succession of different class societies: different systems of the rich exploiting the poor. We get the slavery of Ancient Greece and Rome, then the feudal system of barons and serfs, and then we get capitalism. Under capitalism the vast majority of the world’s population is systematically deprived of any way of supporting itself other than working for an employer. An economic system that cannot hush the wails of hungry children isn't worth a damn. Wage slavery is more about living an inhuman life an exploitative system to survive. We don't have freedom to choose our values. We must choose those values that help us to make money. We can’t ensure a safe environment for our loved ones. We can't protect them from exploitation or pollution,

Where do profits come from? It is argued that it comes from buying cheap and selling dear - “marking up” the price. But if all capitalists systematically charged too much for the things they sell there would be spiraling inflation and the system would collapse. No, the real source of profit is the labour of all the people who work for a living. The harder the workers work, and the lower the wages they get paid, the bigger the share dividend. Would you help to abolish crime, disease and despair from the world? Then abolish poverty which is the cause. Would you abolish poverty? Then assist us in abolishing the wages system, the cause of poverty. So long as society maintains the present system of wage slavery, there can be no relief except through the united effort of the whole working class in ending it. Socialists recognise the system for what it is – vicious, brutal, built on the exploitation of workers and interested in only one thing – profit, profit and more profit.

Class-struggle must not limit itself to narrow “bread-and-butter” economic demands. We only have one life and people should rather spend it enjoying themselves instead of being wage slaves. It’s as simple as that. Socialism would end wage slavery and give the means of production back to people for use and not for profit. Socialism is what people truly need and deserve. We can build a sharing economy and give each other the means to make our own way in this world with dignity. We can do it together. We can balance the needs of the planet and human needs. Our fight is to organise as a clear conscious force, a class for itself, to break capitalist state power, abolish wage slavery and establish a comprehensive, democratic self-rule throughout society. Capitalism holds no future for the human race other than the destruction of the environment, mass poverty and unemployment, disease and war. Capitalism’s not natural, it’s not fair and it’s not permanent. It will produce either socialism or barbarism. Which will it be? The answer is in a co-operative commonwealth. Cooperative labour and association shall take the place of the wage system with its class rule.  The instruments of production must cease to be the monopoly of a class -- they must be the common property of all. There shall be no more exploiter or exploited. Production and distribution of the produce must be administered in the interest of the whole. Our end is a society of associative labour. The welfare of all is for us the one end of society. We seek justice and fight injustice. We seek free labour and attack wage slavery. We seek the prosperity of all and struggle against misery. A Utopia? No. It’s a necessity.

The Socialist Party is united upon one issue: No More Wage Slavery! 

A SOCIAList PARTY

"Glasgow branch held another big meeting at the Central Halls, Glasgow, on Sunday evening, March 8th. Com. Higgins was the speaker, and reports indicate that the Branch's efforts to ensure a good attendance, literature sales, etc., were rewarded with success. 

Perhaps the high-light of Glasgow branch's activity during March was their annual dance, which took place at the New Astoria Ballroom, Sauchiehall Street, on March 12th. Over 750 friends and sympathisers enjoyed themselves at the dance."

From the April 1942 issue of the Socialist Standard

Free Access For All

On May 1, Social Services Minister, Helena Jaczek, apologized and admitted that case workers had not been properly trained in how to use the province's new problem-ridden welfare caseload software. This meant that many case workers have been unable to do their jobs. A new retraining program has been suggested. We would suggest scrapping the welfare system in favour of free access for all, John Ayers.

Indentured Servitude

Many young people from Spain, Greece, and Italy went to Germany to seek work after the financial crisis of 2008. They received lower pay than their German counterparts and worked longer hours, even though they were better qualified in some cases. Some tried to quit but were locked into contracts that demanded they pay off language lessons and accommodation provided by the employer. (a tactic as old as the hills in capitalism). There are cases where up to US$12,000 was demanded after employees left their jobs early. It's a modern version of indentured servitude, better known as slavery. Taken with the above point re nail workers, it is easy to see that we are losing many gains won in the past century. Another reason why we want revolution, not reform. John Ayers.

The Price Of Nails

 In "The Hidden Price of Nails" (New York Times, May 17) we are told that in the 17,000 nail salons in the US, exploitation of workers, mostly young Asian and Hispanic women, is rampant. Picked up in battered Ford Econoline vans they are ferried to the salons for ten to twelve-hour shifts. For this they carry their own tools and pay $100 to the salon owner for the privilege of having a job. Interviewing one hundred and fifty nail salon workers, the NYT learned that most are paid below minimum wage, routinely lose their tips for minor infractions, and are often subjected to physical abuse, to say nothing of the cancer risk and serious health problems due to the toxic nature of the products they use. Third world conditions are alive and well in North America and will become more and more common as capital puts the squeeze on workers to increase its returns. John Ayers.

The Changing War Story

Is there any wonder why there is perpetual war in the world? The New York Times (April 26) that "US arms sales fuel the wars of the Arab states'. Saudi Arabia is using Boeing's F-15 fighter jets to bomb Yemen, United Emirates' fighter pilots are flying Lockheed Martin' F-16s to bomb Yemen and Syria and want to use Predator drones for spying missions. Middle Eastern countries that have stockpiled American military hardware are now using it and wanting more. The result is a boom for American defence contractors And the fuelling of a new arms race in the region. The long time ban on selling certain types of weapons that could be sold to the Arab nations to ensure that Israel maintains its military advantage, is being lifted, at least partially, as those Arab nations fighting ISIS are now seen as allies. Alliances may change, countries can be redrawn but the profit motive carries on unabated. John Ayers.