We are a Marxist Party

Socialism has been defined and interpreted in lots of different ways, most of them bogus. We are one of the few political organisations who emphatically maintain that socialism should be identified with abolition of wage-labour and creation of economic equality between people. This clearly distinguishes us from all those currents who identify socialism with state-ownership or with redistribution of wealth. We maintain that socialism requires the abolition of wage-labour, and the transformation of the means of labour, means of production, into the common property of society. Social welfare and economic security of people can only be the result of such a revolution in the economic foundations of society. Marxism is not a scholastic criticism of capitalism. It is the worker’s criticism as a definite class and a living fighter in capitalist society.

There are a many sincere people these days on the Left who seek modify or revise Marxism. Such as trying to add the "market" to the concept of socialism. As far as we are concerned, it is absurd to abandon Marxism to people who accept it, not as a critique of capitalism, but as a fashionable school of thought that they can pick and choose whatever suits their thesis. A great many of them are people who had been using Marxist terminology as a wrapping for views and social aspirations alien to Marxism. As a Marxist political party we challenge the non-Marxists in the general labour movement. We criticise, from a Marxist standpoint, the way they explain the condition of the working class, the society, the economy, the state, religion, the political regime, etc. This is a fundamental objective of our party. Our account of the history of the social struggle of the working class, and of the causes of socialism's failure so far, is itself a characteristic and distinctive feature of our tradition. On why we have not yet achieved socialism, some have already come up with what they regard as answer. The tell us: "Marxian theory was wrong" and "socialism, in general, has always been a Utopia; it's not practicable". In response to such explanations we put forward a totally different argument.

In response, we are able to explain other reasons for the failure. We are able to show capitalist movements borrowed the slogans and the language of our movement. We can explain our movement was defeated by nationalism and the experiences of the false socialism in the Soviet Union. We can point to the reformists who said their way was the most efficious way towards socialism as it led workers and their organisations up the garden path to dead-ends. The victory of socialism was never inevitable and a pre-determined outcome of history. A modern slavery for several generations could just as well be the destiny of the world.  The resistance and protests of workers against capitalism is, of course, inevitable. But no one can claim that this protest will inevitably occur under the banner of the real socialists. Our future depends entirely on the actual practice of our movement and its activists; on what they do, and what visions they have and hold out to the workers' movement. If we do it right, it will work out; if we don't, it won't. There is no historical inevitability here.

Our socialist case , however, begins within our own class, as a current critical of the non-socialists, as the political party that pursues a more fundamental cause and a more radical change, as a Marxist party that propagates a particular view within our class. Supporting trade unions and strengthening the labour movement as a whole against the bosses, is an important task. But, we must examine the visions, the policies, and the views of working-class organisations and their leaders. To democratise the debate we have to ask vital questions: What do you think of socialism and Marxism? What alternative do you have for the reorganization of society? How, in your mind, can workers' total liberation be finally brought about? Workers should be confronted with the question as to why they are not socialists; why they have nothing to say and nothing to do concerning the economic foundations of the present system, the state, religion, the educational system, the permanent war drive, and so on, and so forth. We do not bow to the attitudes of the reformist workers' movements. We are duty-bound to intervene in economic, political, cultural and intellectual life of society. We want the worker to emerge as the force that presents the whole human society with a real alternative. We regard socialist vision, the Marxist critique and social revolution as crucial; just as we regard the fight for a wage rise, or to defend unemployment benefits, the right to strike, and organising to bring about improvements in the economic and political condition of the working classes as vital. Each one of these aspects expresses a different moment in the life, the struggle, the self- assertion, of the working class; aspects that we regard as indivisible and indispensable. We must criticise all social tendencies, working-class or otherwise, which break apart this whole and keep workers away from the social revolution and the social revolution away from the workers. We are fighting for the establishment of the worker’s social and economic alternative as a class. The worker’s position in production does not change. The economic foundation of society does not change. This class’s alternative for the organization of human society does not change. The worker still has to sell his or her labour power daily in order to live, and thus views the world from the same standpoint and offers the same solution to it.

The Socialist Party arose from a certain tradition of struggle within the class itself. Its relation with the working class is thus based on the relation of that tendency within the class with the working class as a whole. This means that it is not a party formed by a number of social reformers for the salvation of the working class. It is not the party of "all workers" irrespective of their outlook and their social and political aims. This is the party of the socialist workers who put forward a fundamental and comprehensive critique of the present system. We consider ourselves not a political party outside the class, but a critical party, with a definite socialist outlook, within the class itself. It is therefore for us to confront others within our class theoretically, politically, and ideologically. Socialism is the cause of workers to destroy capitalism, abolish wage-labour and do away with exploitation and classes. It may seem that socialism has turned into the password of reformist parties who to realise their palliative programme have needed workers’ power. But the workers remains where they are, with their objective situation, with their protest against the effects of the wages system and private property, with their real solution for mankind, and cannot protest against the present system except by socialism. We as activists in this socialist movement movement declare this movement, and this movement alone, is the only the present situation. The working class will triumph by virtue of being the backbone of production in the existing society and the social class having a real solution to human suffering as a whole. The power of the working class lies in its size, we have the numbers, but also rests on this class’s position in capitalist production. The era of workers’ show of strength on the political stage is once again arriving, and this time, particularly, in the cradle of capitalism its heartlands where allegedly workers’ weight has declined.

Edinburgh's Luxury Houses

Chinese investors are snapping up multi-million pound Scots homes – because they are “inexpensive”. House prices in Scotland remain modest compared to those in London, China’s big cities and Hong Kong. Wealthy Chinese families have been showing growing interest in Scotland’s “affordable” high end property market. Interested buyers have even flown halfway across the world to view extravagant mansions that most would only be able to dream of acquiring.

Estate agents across the country have revealed that as a result, there has been a surge in the sales of properties over £750,000 in recent months. A private island off Scotland’s west coast is currently up for sale for just £550,000 – the same price as a one-bedroomed flat in certain parts of London.

Savills, CKD Galbraith, Rettie and Strutt and Parker say they have all had recent interest from Chinese investors, particularly in Edinburgh properties. They say that education plays a key role in the city’s appeal, with several sought-after private schools located in the centre. Blair Stewart, a partner at Strutt & Parker, said: “Two or three high net worth Chinese buyers who have children going into St George’s and Fettes have come over recently. They want houses nearby in the Inverleith area. “Last week we had a Chinese buyer fly over to look at Windmill House, a £2.8 million property in Edinburgh. The buyer’s daughter is going to St George’s School, right next to the house, and he was over from Beijing and thought that the Edinburgh property market was very inexpensive.”

Windmill House, located in secluded grounds in the heart of Murrayfield, boasts ten bedrooms, eight bathrooms and an impressive south-facing terrace. It is described as being in “one of the most desirable residential areas in the city” with private riverside access to the Water of Leith.

Max Mills, at Rettie, said: “High-end contemporary flats appeal to Chinese buyers. One example is Quartermile, because it’s a new development. It was designed by an award-winning architect, and it comprises shiny new properties with lots of glass and stainless steel, which reminds them of upmarket flats in the Far East.

Peter Lyell, of Savills Edinburgh Residential, said: “We have had three sales at Quartermile alone to buyers from China, Hong Kong and Singapore already this year. There are more being sold as new-build investment properties in the same development.”

Oceans Of Plastic?

As many as nine out of ten of the world's sea birds probably have pieces of plastic in their guts, a new study estimates. The birds mistake plastic for fish eggs so they think they are getting a meal. One researcher said, "I've seen birds eat everything from cigarette lighters to bottle caps, to model cars, even toys." It's obvious it's time to clean up the oceans, but can it be done in our present system? And, The New York Times reported recently that researchers have found a' stunning' amount of plastic in the world's greatest fresh water system, The Great Lakes. Studies show that there are about 7,000 plastic particles per square kilometre in Lakes Superior and Huron, 17,000 in Lake Michigan, 46,000 in Lake Erie and a whopping 248,000 in Lake Ontario. Another report published in "Global Change Biology" states that fifty-two per cent of turtles worldwide have eaten plastic debris. Not too surprising as, in this throw-away society, developed to increase profit, about thirteen million tons of plastic is dumped into the oceans each year John Ayers.

Hoarding Money

Thomas Walkom of the Toronto Star, discussing politics and the election, wrote, "Corporations still make profits (in spite of the recession). But because demand for goods and services they produce is so weak, many don't reinvest. Canadian companies are sitting on billions of dollars worth of what former Bank of Canada governor, Mark Carney, called dead money." Bingo! He got it right. All socialists know that when something is not profitable, money gets hoarded, production slows, and unemployment results. Nice to see it written in the press, though. John Ayers.

Fracking and farming

Scotland has announced a moratorium on underground coal gasification and has also widened a review on the effects of fracking, moves that have delighted environmentalists. Scotland was taking a “precautionary, robust and evidence-based approach” to unconventional gas” explained Fergus Ewing, the SNP energy minister.

Campaign group Friends of the Earth Scotland praised the new moratorium, saying underground gasification was a “risky and experimental technique, with a very chequered history around the world”.

Fracking for shale gas under Scottish farmland could have a "profound effect" upon the food chain for current and future generations, Professor Robert Jackson, a pollution expert has warned in a recent issue of Scottish Farmer.

 Described by Scottish Water as one of country's leading independent experts in waste water management, he has cast doubt on the gas extraction industry's safety claims, citing years of evidence from the US that many hydrocarbon wells, sooner or later, will threaten groundwater with noxious leaks.

Incredibily Stupid

Although, as reported last month, the Pope has supposedly lost support for his stance on climate change, he is currently appearing to large cheering crowds in the US. Not all are happy, however. A University of Iowa professor, who should know better, criticised him by saying, "The church should be about making people holy, not about making the environment clean." Incredibly stupid. John Ayers.

U. N. Failing Goals

Talking of the UN, it appears to be failing in reaching many of its stated goals such as ending poverty – the Democratic Republic of Congo has GDP per capita of US$394 per year; End hunger – six million Syrian refugees are totally dependent on food aid; ensure healthy lives – the world's highest infant mortality rate is in Afghanistan with 117 deaths per 1,000 live births; full and decent employment for all – Bosnia and Herzegovina's youth employment rate is a staggering 62.8 per cent, the highest of any country at peace. The list goes on and on showing the incredible failure of the capitalist mode of production. John Ayers.

This is what socialism is

The Socialist Party struggles for the complete victory of the social revolution of the working class. The advances of human society in economy, science, technology and standards of civic life have already created the material conditions necessary to set up a free society without classes, exploitation and oppression, i.e. a world socialist community. Marxism is a very coherent explanation of capitalist society. It is the indictment of a particular section of society – the wage-workers– against the existing relations. It is an analysis which contends to be the true explanation of society and there is no reason to reject it, and the recent world developments only more emphatically prove its legitimacy. Marxism proposes that economic relations determine society’s political and cultural life. Everyone knows that it all comes down to profits and labour productivity. At the back of their mind, everybody knows what the state is good for, what the police and the army have been built for. All know that there is an incessant conflict going on within society between the employer and the employee; that any trace of freedom and humanity has come from the power of worker and working-class organisations to prise gains from business and their state. People naturally expect unions to be against exploitation and discrimination, to stand for social welfare, and so on. Intellectuals considers the Marxist label as boost to their credentials (deservedly or not) and dress themselves up in the Marxist garb. Nationalists, and reformists and a whole host of other tendencies had turned to Marxism. We need not a revision of Marxism but the application of it to the contemporary world.

To this day, socialism, in the sense meant by Marxists, has not been set up anywhere. Marx was the most important and profound critic of the dehumanisation of humanity under capitalism. In capitalist society the human being is slave to blind economic laws which determine his/her economic fate, independently of his/her thinking, reasoning and judgement. Socialism aims to return this identity to human beings. The slogan `from each according to ability, to each according to need’ is entirely based on the recognition and guaranteeing of the right of every person himself/herself to determine his/her position in society.  Socialism is a society in which human beings gain control over their economic lives, are freed from the chains of blind economic laws and themselves consciously define their economic activity. The decision is with the person not with the market, or accumulation or surplus value. This liberation of entire society from the blind economic laws is the condition of emancipation of the individual and the restoration of humanity and human specificity of every individual. The basis of socialism is the human being – both collectively and as an individually. Socialism is the movement to restore man’s conscious will, a movement for freeing human beings from economic necessity and enslavement in pre-determined moulds. It is a movement for abolishing classes and people’s classification. This is the essential condition for the growth of the individual.

Technical innovation and improvement in product quality is not an invention of capitalism. Human beings are always eager for knowledge and improvement in production techniques and in the quality of their lives. In capitalism it is the market that defines the needs and the level of demand for the commodities which satisfy them. Capitals which produce these commodities make profit. It is through these capitalist equations that scientists and experts find and take up their researches and projects. It is here that the proportion of society’s resources which should be set aside for scientific research, the direction science and its practical application should take, the areas which have priority are decided. In socialism, on the other hand, there is no market, no competition and no individual interest. But people and their scientific curiosity and drive for innovation and to improvement of the quality of life are there. A socialist society is an open and informed society. In socialism it will be a routine procedure to constantly inform people about the needs and problems in the various areas of human life worldwide. Under capitalism it is the market that informs capitals about the existence of demand and the opportunity of making profit in the production of certain commodities. In the socialist system it is the citizens and their institutions that constantly inform each other of the economic, social and human needs, as well as of the scientific and technical advances of the different sectors. Given the present technology, the organization of such information interchange and of everyone’s constant access to it is feasible even right now. A socialist society will be a society in which people enjoy a much higher level of scientific education than today. Access to learning and participation in scientific activity is not a privilege of a particular social group; it is everyone’s elementary right. Just as once literacy was the privilege of a few but today is regarded as a basic right. We see even today how, for instance, using computers and even their relatively complex and specialized application, at least in the more advanced countries, has become so generalized – though still a far cry from socialism’s capability in promoting general scientific capacities and making the means for scientific work accessible to all.

Capitalism has itself brought about striking technical changes but in this society technology develops where it is profitable for capital. Alongside the enormous progress in the development of armament technology we see the advances in medicine and health care, education, housing, agriculture thwarted by lack of investment. And the majority of the people of the world is deprived of the results of this technological progress. Socialism will certainly be different from capitalism, since the technical priorities of a society based on improving people’s lives will be totally different from a society driven by the profit motive.

Capitalism’s stereotyped picture of the human being and human motivation cannot be a starting point for the organisation of socialism. Capitalism builds on individual self- interest and competition. To make the economy work, it bolsters these qualities in people and trains them in this spirit. The basis of socialism, however, is man’s humanism and his social nature. Scientific effort and the socialist ideal cannot be realised without getting rid of the intellectual prejudices fostered by capitalism. Like any other social system, socialism will reproduce the appropriate human being and it is not difficult to imagine a society in which people’s motivation in their economic and scientific activity is to contribute to the well-being of all, to participate in a common effort to improve the lives of all.

The realisation of socialism is the result of class struggle, and this struggle is capable of defeat so capitalist barbarism, on a scale perhaps not yet experienced by our generation, can be the outcome. There is now a need to express the socialist vision in more concrete terms and offer more practical models of economic organisation in socialist society and elaborate further. If you’d put this question to a Marxist at the beginning of the century he or she would reply that it is not for us to devise blueprints and utopias, that our task is to organise a revolution against the existing system, that our goals are clear and the process of workers’ revolution itself will provide the practical forms of their realisation. The rise of capitalism itself was not on the basis of a clear positive model of the system. But what has to be done is, firstly, to clarify the precise meaning of socialist aims, and, secondly, to show the feasibility of their realisation. It must demonstrate, for instance, that the abolition of capitalist ownership does not mean introduction of state ownership, and explain how the organisation of people’s collective control over means of production is practical. It must be emphasizes that socialism is an economic system without money and wage labour, and then shown how organizing production without labour power as a commodity is feasible. What cannot be done is to prepare a detailed blueprint of production and administration in a socialist society. The specific form of economy, production and system of administration in a socialist society should be worked out in the context of the historical process. Our job to show in what ways socialist society differs from the existing one. For example, we show the process of the withering away of the state following a workers’ revolution by explaining the material basis of the state in class society and its superfluous requirement as a political institution in a classless society, and not by issuing a step-by-step pamphlet dismantling of state institutions and departments.

We can always find people who shrug their shoulders at socialism, at socialist organization and even at having lofty ideals. Deriding socialism and workers has always been rewarded by the elite. Perhaps more intellectuals and academics than ever before, in the media, universities and the various think-tank institutions have turned it into ‘honourable’ profession. This is not our concern. More important today is implanting Marxist ideas and actual involvement in working-class mass movements. We emphasise the terms Marxist because for many on the left protest simply means anti-capitalism and not proposing socialism. Many times what is meant left activism is participation in reform movements or democratization of this or that political regime, and so on. The world is full of campaigns and protesters who carry out ‘alternative’ activity only later to find it incorporated into the established tradition. The ruling class are putting up its own economic, political and cultural ‘alternatives’ – from nationalism to religion, neo-fascism and racism. The period we are entering will not be lacking in working class protest movements and actions. But the outcome of these struggles and specifically their impact on the general conditions of workers in society, their power and dignity, is another question. It requires an active socialist movement in society and a revolutionary presence within the workers’ movement.

Money free, wage free, market free

It is at the point of production exploitation takes place. Robert Tressell's ‘Ragged Trousered Philanthropists’ piece on waged slavery is still applicable today.

Poverty is both actual and relative.

Capitalism is global and will continue to exploit locally and globally to extract surplus value from the workers it employs on a waged rationed access basis. It must 'exploit or die' its watchword, Accumulate! Accumulate!

"…capital comes dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt". (Marx)

We need to have a dialogue with fellow workers worldwide, and make our common cause about abolishing waged slavery and establishing a post-capitalist commonly owned world of free access for all, in re callable delegated democratic conditions of social equality.

Capitalism cannot be reformed and must be replaced, by a post-capitalist society, a commonly-owned, production-for-use, not a for-sale society.

Which has free access to the common produce.

Which is a money free, wage free, market free society.

Which has delegated democracy over the control of resources. Not representative democracy over people.

"The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves. We cannot, therefore, co-operate with people who openly state that the workers are too uneducated to emancipate themselves and must be freed from above by philanthropic big bourgeois and petty bourgeois.’ (1879 Marx and Engels)

The Socialist Party of Great Britain speakers, who had a platform in Royal Exchange Square in Glasgow on most Saturday afternoons espoused the unequivocal case for socialism. They were and still are, the only political party who don't want to be leaders or 'guvnors', insisting, 'don't vote for us if you don't understand', that the task of bringing in socialism is the task of the working class themselves and pointed to self-education allied with political action as the means of self-liberation.

Wee Matt

Edinburgh Branch

Job Worries

Almost 70 per cent of workers say the quality of their job is getting worse, according to a Scottish Parliament survey. Most had been in their job for more than five years and 68 per cent of this group said work was getting worse. Key factors include low pay, poor management and insecure employment.

More than 60 per cent said their mental or physical health had been impacted by their job, with almost 90 per cent of that group mentioning stress, anxiety or depression.

Dumfries and Galloway Council said: “On the whole jobs have become worse since 2008.

“Though there is an ever-increasing awareness of what a good job involves and requires (the importance of aspects such as fairness, equality and work life balance are greater understood and emphasised), there are fewer full-time jobs, there are fewer well-paid jobs and there is less job security.”

NHS Health Scotland said risks to workers’ health was the highest in elementary jobs, sales and customer service, process, plant and machine operative and caring and leisure positions. According to the most recent Annual Population Survey, these occupations account for around one third of the labour force.

The Unite union said tensions in the labour market had created a problem with “presenteeism”, where staff ignore health troubles and continue working for fear that taking sick leave could cost them their livelihood. The union said: “Around one third of sick people are going in to work with stress due to workload and a further 13 per cent with fear of being made redundant. When they do attend work they are unfortunately subjected to extreme stress levels leading some workers to suffer bouts of mental ill health.

Citizens Advice Scotland told the enquiry the number of work-related cases it was handling had gone up 12 per cent from around 45,100 in 2011-12 to more than 50,600 in 2014-15. During that time, it experienced “particularly sharp increases” in matters of pay and entitlements, dispute resolution and self-employment.

The Scottish Trades Union Congress said: “Feedback from trade union workplace representatives across the economy strongly suggests that the quality and security of employment has deteriorated since the recession started in early 2008.

“Adverse trends which were apparent prior to 2008 – eg underemployment, zero hours contracts – have become more deeply embedded over the past seven years with the rising prevalence of insecure work a particular concern. Although concerns around insecurity tend to focus on zero hours contracts, it is important to note other insecure forms of work are also increasingly common.”

A Disgrace To Mankind

As we watch the refugee crisis in Europe unfold, we tend to forget the plight of others around the world. The Toronto Star, September 19 reminds us that Dadaab in Northern Kenya near Somalia's border, is the world's oldest and largest refugee camp, "More city than camp, more prison then city." The UN says there are 350,000 people living there but the count is likely closer to 500,000. The camp started twenty-four years ago as a temporary shelter and there are over 6,000 grandchildren of the original inhabitants. That such a place can exist in the twenty-first century is a disgrace to mankind. Time to stand up and be counted! John Ayers.

Tawdry Values

A recent TV program on the American Civil War mentioned the fact that two days after the Confederate victory at Bull Run, a bunch of real estate sharks bought the land and turned it into a museum of the battle to, obviously, cash in on the public interest. So much for capitalism's tawdry set of values. John Ayers.

This topsy-turvy world

The capitalist world is a world that is upside down. The motivating aim of economic activity is not satisfaction of people's needs, but profitability of capital. Scientific and technological progress, which are the key to human welfare and well-being, translate in this system into even more unemployment and impoverishment for hundreds of millions of workers. In a world that has been built through cooperation and collective action, it is competition that reigns. To put the world right side up is the aim of the Socialist Party.

The socialist revolution is the abolition of private ownership of the means of production and their conversion into common ownership of the whole society. Communist revolution puts an end to the class division of society and abolishes the wage-labour system. Thus, the market, exchange of commodities, and money disappear. Production for profit is replaced by production to meet people's needs and to bring about greater prosperity for all. Work, which in capitalist society for the overwhelming majority is an involuntary, mechanical and strenuous activity to earn a living, gives way to voluntary, creative and conscious activity to enrich human life. Everyone, by virtue of being a human being and being born into human society will be equally entitled to all of life's resources and the products of collective effort. From everyone according to their ability, to everyone according to their need — this is a basic principle of socialism.

Not only class divisions but also the division of people according to occupation will disappear. All fields of creative activity will be opened up to all. The development of each person will be the condition of development of the society. The socialist society is a global society. National boundaries and divisions will disappear and give way to a universal human identity. Socialist society is a society free of religion, superstitious beliefs, ideology and archaic traditions and moralities that strangle free thought. The disappearance of classes and class antagonisms makes the state superfluous. In socialism the state withers away. The socialist system is a society without a state. The administrative affairs of the society will be managed by the cooperation, consensus and collective decision-making of all of its members. Thus it is in a socialist society that the ideals of human freedom and equality are truly realised for the first time. Freedom not only from political oppression but from economic compulsion and subjugation and intellectual enslavement. Freedom to enjoy and experience life in its diverse dimensions. Equality not only before the law but in the enjoyment of society's material and intellectual wealth. Equality in worth and dignity for everyone in society.

Socialism is not a dream. All the conditions for the formation of such a society have already created within the capitalist world itself. The scientific, technological and productive powers of humanity have already grown so enormously that founding a society committed to the well-being of all is perfectly feasible. The spectacular advances in communication and information technology during the last few decades have meant that the organisation of a world community with collective participation in the design, planning and execution of society's diverse functions is possible more than ever before. A large part of these resources is now either wasted in different ways or is even deliberately used to hinder efforts to improve society and satisfy human needs. But for all the immensity of society's material resources, the backbone of communist society is the creative and living power of billions of men and women beings freed from class bondage, wage-slavery, intellectual slavery, alienation and degradation. The free human being is the guarantee for the realisation of communist society.

Socialism is not a utopia. It is the goal and result of the struggle of an immense social class against capitalism; a living, real and ongoing struggle that is as old as bourgeois society itself. Capitalism itself has created the great social force that can materialise this liberating prospect. The staggering power of capital on a global scale is a reflection of the power of a world working class. Unlike other oppressed classes in the history of human society, the working class cannot set itself free without freeing the whole of humanity. A socialist society is the product of workers' revolution to put an end to the system of wage-slavery; a social revolution which inevitably transforms the entire foundation of the production relations.

The wage-labour system, that is the daily compulsion of the great majority of people to sell their physical and intellectual abilities to others in order to make a living, is the source and essence of the violence which is inherent of this system. This naked violence has many direct victims: Women, workers, children, the aged, people of the poorer regions of the world, anyone who asks for their rights and stands up to any oppression, and anyone who has been branded as belonging to this or that 'minority'. In this system, thanks essentially to the rivalry of capitals and economic blocs, war and genocide have assumed staggering proportions. The technology of war and mass destruction is far more advanced than the technology used in production of goods. The global arsenal can annihilate the world several times over. This is the system that has actually used horrendous nuclear and chemical weapons against people. Capitalist society can also take pride in its remarkable advances in turning crime, murder, abuse and rape into a routine fact of life in this system.

Capitalism is a world system, the working class is a world class, workers' conflict with the employers is a daily struggle on a global scale, and socialism is an alternative that the working class presents to the whole of humanity. The socialist movement must also be organised on a global scale. The aim of the World Socialist Movement is to organise the social revolution of the working class. A revolution that overthrows the entire exploitative capitalist relations and puts an end to all exploitations and hardships. Our immediate programme is for establishment of a socialist society; a society without classes, without private ownership of the means of production, without wage labour and without a state; a free human society in which all share in the social wealth and collectively decide the society's direction and future. Socialism is possible this very day. The socialist revolution that must bring about this free society does not happen just upon the will of a political party. This is a vast social and class movement that has to be organised in different aspects and forms. All kinds of barriers must be swept out of its way.

The socialist revolution is not a revolution out of desperation or poverty. It is a revolution relying on the political consciousness readiness of the working class. The wider the extent of political freedoms, economic security and social dignity of the working class and people in general and the more progressive the political, welfare and civil standards, the more prepared will be the conditions for workers' revolution, and the more decisive and sweeping the victory of this revolution. The revolutionary struggle to build a new world is inseparable from the daily effort to improve the living conditions of the working humanity in this same world. But the Socialist Party stress the fact that complete freedom and equality cannot be achieved through reforms. Even the most profound economic and political reforms, by definition, leave the foundations of the existing system, namely private property, class divisions and the wage-labour system, untouched. Besides, as the whole history of capitalism and actual show reforms which are won are always temporary, vulnerable and capable of being rolled back. The Socialist Party insists on the necessity of social revolution as the only really viable and liberating working-class alternative.

Scotland's Wealthiest Families

Report from Oxfam Scotland finds wealth off the top four dwarfs the poorest one million people in the country. The four richest families in Scotland are worth £1 billion more than the poorest 20 per cent of the country’s population, according to new research. 

The combined wealth of the Grant-Gordon whisky family, Highland Spring water owner Mahdi al-Tajir, oil tycoon Sir Ian Wood and former Harrods owner Mohammed Fayed dwarfs that of the one million people who make up Scotland’s poorest 20 per cent, according to Oxfam Scotland.

The four families – all of whom are either based in Scotland or have substantial business interests there – are worth an estimated £6.1bn, according to the most recent Sunday Times Rich List. Scottish Government figures show the combined wealth of the poorest 20 per cent of Scots stands at around £5.1bn. Researchers at the charity also calculated that Scotland’s 14 wealthiest families are better off than the most deprived 30 per cent of the population.

You Can Get Rid Of Poverty

Statistics recently released by the Associated press inform us that on any given night, 153,000 homeless people are on the streets in the US. There are 120 homeless people per 10,000 residents in the District of Columbia that includes the nation's capital. Thirty-four per cent of cities ban camping in public. According to The National Law Centre on homeless and poverty, fifty-three per cent of cities ban sitting or lying down in certain public places. To think, all this is in the world's number 1 industrial power. You cannot get rid of poverty by sweeping it under the carpet but you can with a change from capitalism to socialism. John Ayers.

A Socialist Tenet

On a recent TV Ontario program about the spice trade, mention was made of the suicide of 200 pepper farmers in India. A disease that destroyed the pepper trees gave them the choice – starvation or suicide. Free access to all, a socialist tenet, would solve any such problem. John Ayers.

Capital Disgrace

Children living in poverty in Edinburgh are marked out for stigma even before they get to school, and may never lose that scar, accordingto a report to the city’s education, children and families committee yesterday.

15,000 children in the capital are officially designated as living in poverty, with every ward affected. The number is expected to rise to 19,000 within the next five years, while “in work” poverty – in which one person in a household is working but their income is below poverty level – was also expected to grow significantly.

John Heywood, the council’s lead officer on tackling child poverty, said: “The gap with more affluent peers is pronounced well before children in poverty start school and continues to widen as they move up through the school system. There is a hardening of attitudes towards people living in poverty, and that includes children, and people are increasingly willing to blame some sort of individual failing rather than structural issues. There is therefore a strong stigma associated with poverty.”

Socialism V Capitalism

The Socialist Party is pledged to abolish the capitalist system, class-rule and wage-slavery—a party which does not compromise. A socialist economy must be an economy without wages. It is simply a question of capitalism or socialism, of despotism or democracy, and they who are not wholly with us are wholly against us. No sane person can be satisfied with the present system. When you are born you have a right to live like everybody else and socialism assumes that you have the common sense to get up and contribute something to society according to your creative ability. To change the world and to create a better one has always been the aspiration of people throughout human history. It is true that some portray the present plight of humanity as somehow given and inevitable. Nevertheless the actual lives and actions of people themselves reveal a deep-seated belief in the possibility and even the certainty of a better future. The hope that tomorrow's world can be free of today's inequalities, hardships and deprivations, the belief that people can, individually and collectively, influence the shape of the world to come, is a deep-rooted and powerful outlook in society that guides the lives and actions of vast masses of people. The Socialist Party shares this belief of countless people and successive generations that building a better world and a better future by their own hands is both necessary and possible.

The capitalist system is behind all the ills that burden humanity today. Poverty, deprivation, discrimination, inequality, political repression, ignorance, bigotry, cultural backwardness, unemployment, homelessness, economic and political insecurity, corruption and crime are all inevitable products of this system. No doubt bourgeois apologists would rush to tell us that these have not been invented by capitalism, but have all existed before capitalism, that exploitation, repression, discrimination, women's oppression, ignorance and prejudice, religion and prostitution are more or less as old as human society itself. We answer:

Firstly, all these problems have found a new meaning in this society, corresponding to the needs of capitalism. These are being constantly reproduced as integral parts of the modern capitalist system. The source of poverty, starvation, unemployment, homelessness and economic insecurity at the end of the 20th century is the economic system in place at the end of the 20th century. The brutal dictatorships, wars, genocides and repressions that define the life of hundreds of millions of people today draw their rationale from the needs of the system that rules the world today and serve specific interests in this world.

Secondly, it is the capitalist system itself that continually and relentlessly resists people's effort to eradicate and overcome these ills. The obstacle to workers' struggle to improve living conditions and civil rights is none other than the bourgeoisie and its governments, parties and apologists. Wherever people rise in the poorer regions to take charge of their lives, the first barrier they face is the armed force of the local ruler. It is the capitalist's state, its enormous media and propaganda machinery, institution of religion, traditions, moralities and educational system which shape the backward and prejudiced mentalities among successive generations. There is no doubt that it is capitalism who stand in the way of the attempt by millions of people to change the system. The capitalist system and the primacy of profit have exposed the environment to serious dangers and irreparable damages. This is the reality of capitalism today, boding a horrifying future for the entire people of the world. For sure, present society is no doubt complex and sophisticated. Billions of people are in continuous interaction in elaborate arrays of economic, social and political relations. Technology and production have acquired gigantic dimensions. Humanity's intellectual and cultural life, just as its problems and difficulties, are broad and diverse. But these complexities only keep out of sight simple and comprehendible realities that make up the economic and social fabric of the capitalist world.

Like any other class system, capitalism is based on the exploitation of producers — the appropriation of a part of the product of their labour by the ruling classes. Under slavery not only the slave's product but he himself belonged to the slave- owner. He worked for the slave-owner, and in return was kept alive by him. In the feudal system the peasants either handed over part of their produce to the feudal lord, or performed certain hours of forced and unpaid labour. Under capitalism, however, exploitation has quite different bases. Here the main producers, i.e. the workers, are free; they don't belong to anyone, are not appendages of any estate, they are in bondage of any lord. They own and control their own body and labour power. But workers are also 'free' in yet another sense: they are `free` from the ownership of means of production, and so in order to live, they have to sell their labour power for a certain length of time, in exchange for wages, to the capitalist class — i.e. a small minority that own and monopolise the means of production. The workers have to then buy their means of subsistence — the goods they themselves have produced — in the market from the capitalists. The essence of capitalism and the basis of exploitation in this system is the fact that, on the one hand labour power is a commodity, and, on the other hand the means of production are the private property of the capitalist class.

Under capitalism labour power and means of production are shut off from each other by the wall of private property; they are commodities and their owners must meet in a market. On the face of it, the owners of these commodities enter into a free and equal transaction: the worker sells his/her labour power for certain periods, in exchange for wages, to the capitalist, i.e. the owner of the means of production; the capitalist employs this labour power, uses it up and makes new products. These commodities are then sold in the market and the revenue begins the production cycle anew, as capital. However, behind the apparently equal exchange between labour and capital lies a fundamental inequality; an inequality which defines the lot of humanity today and without whose elimination society will never be free. With wages, workers only get back what they have sold, i.e. the ability to work and to show up in the market once again. By its daily work the working class only ensures its continued existence as worker, its survival as the daily seller of labour power. But capital in this process grows and accumulates. Labour power is a creative power; it generates new values for its buyer. The value of the commodities and services produced by the worker at any cycle of the production process is greater than the worker's total share and that portion of the products which goes into restoring the used up materials and wear and tear. This surplus value, taking the form of an immense stock of commodities, belongs automatically to the capitalist class, and increases the mass of its capital, by virtue of the capitalist class's ownership of the means of production. Labour power in its exchange with capital only reproduces itself, while capital in its exchange with labour power grows. The creative capacity of labour power and the working class's productive activity reflects itself as the birth of new capital for the capitalist class. The more and the better the working class works, the more power capital acquires. The gigantic power of capital in the world today and its ever-expanding domination of the economic, political and intellectual life of the billions of inhabitants of the earth is nothing but the inverted image of the creative power of work and of working humanity.

Thus, exploitation in capitalist society takes place without yokes and shackles on the shoulders and feet of the producers - through the medium of the market and free and equal exchange of commodities. This is the fundamental feature of capitalism which distinguishes it in essence from all earlier systems. The surplus value obtained from the exploitation of the working class is divided out among the various sections of the capitalist class essentially through the market mechanism and also through state fiscal and monetary policies. Profit, interest and rent are the major forms in which the different capitals share in the fruits of this class exploitation. The competition of capitals in the market determines the share of each capitalist branch, unit and enterprise. But this is not all. This surplus pays whole cost of the bourgeoisie's state machinery, army and administration, of its ideological and cultural institutions, and the upkeep of all those who, through these institutions, uphold the power of the bourgeoisie. By its work, the working class pays the cost of the ruling class, the ever-increasing accumulation of capital and the bourgeoisie's political, cultural and intellectual domination over the working class and the entire society.

Technological progress and rise in labour productivity mean that living human labour power is increasingly replaced by machines and automatic systems. In a free and human society this should mean more free time and leisure for all. But in capitalist society, where labour power and means of production are merely so many commodities which capital employs to make profits, the substitution of humans by machines manifests itself as a permanent unemployment of a section of the working class which is now denied the possibility of making a living. The appearance of a reserve army of workers who do not even have the possibility of selling their labour power is an inevitable result of the process of accumulation of capital, and at the same time a condition of capitalist production. The existence of this reserve army of unemployed, supported essentially by the employed section of the working class itself, heightens the competition in the ranks of the working class and keeps wages at their lowest socially possible level. This reserve army also allows capital to more easily modify the size of its employed work force in proportion to the needs of the market. Massive unemployment is not a side-effect of the market, or a result of the bad policies of some government. It is an inherent part of the workings of capitalism and the process of accumulation of capital.

Muzzling Scientists!

An Environment Canada scientist has been placed on leave because his election contribution was to compose a song and sing it on You-Tube re the Prime Minister. Among other things, the lyrics of the song accuse the PM of muzzling scientists. He has been placed on suspension with pay. Having an opinion that differs with the establishment appears to be a dangerous thing. Exactly what would be his chances for promotion or even holding on to his job in the next round of scientific cuts? John Ayers.

The Socialislt Solution.

The refugee crisis continues unabated. The Toronto Star reported, August 29, that 71 people died cooped up in the back of a truck while 200 people were feared drowned in the Mediterranean off Lybia. This brings the death toll to 2, 636 for this year to date. Hasten the socialist society of open borders and healthy and secure places the world over from which no one has to flee! John Ayers.

A world family of humanity

The Socialist Party declares that life, liberty, and happiness depend upon equal political and economic rights. Capitalism, the private ownership of the means of production, is responsible for the insecurity of subsistence, the poverty, misery, and degradation of the ever-growing majority of the people. The present system of social production and private ownership created a society of two antagonistic classes — i.e., the capitalist class and the propertyless class. The Socialist Party declares its object to be the abolition of wage slavery by the establishment of a system of cooperative industry, based upon the social or common ownership of the means of production and distribution, to be administered by society in the common interest of all its members, and the complete emancipation of the socially useful classes from the domination of capitalism. The capture of political power by the Socialist Party will be tantamount to the abolition of all class rule. The solidarity of labour connecting the millions of class conscious fellow-workers throughout the civilized world will lead to world socialism.

Private ownership of the means of production and distribution is responsible for the ever-increasing uncertainty of livelihood and the poverty and misery of the workers. The possession of the means of livelihood givers to the capitalists the control of government, the media, and the educational system, and enables them to reduce the working men and women to a state of intellectual, physical, and social inferiority, political subservience, and virtual slavery. The economic interests of the capitalist class dominate our entire social system; the lives of the working class are recklessly sacrificed for profit, wars are fomented between nations, indiscriminate slaughter is encouraged, and the destruction of whole peoples is sanctioned in order that the capitalist corporations may extend their commercial dominion abroad and enhance their supremacy at home. Socialism, which will abolish both the capitalist class and the class of wage workers. And the active force in bringing about this new and higher order of society is the working class. The workers can most effectively act as a class in their struggle against the collective powers of capitalism by constituting themselves into a political party, distinct from and opposed to all parties formed of the propertied classes and their proxies.

The socialist movement is as wide as the world and its mission is to win the world. The world the socialist movement is to win from capitalism — will be filled with wealth for all to have and to enjoy in its abundance.

And why not?

Nothing is so easily produced as wealth. The earth is one vast mass of raw materials. Hidden in every passing breeze, in every wave, in the rays of sun are the natural forces to provide energy to produce the myriad forms of wealth, and in such fabulous abundance as to banish for all time the gaunt and hideous specter of want, and make the world fit for human habitation. An era of invention and new technology has brought us to this stage of human development. There are those of us who proclaim the machine has come to free, and not to enslave; to create and not to destroy. It can equalise burden of drudgery, bring joy and leisure for all, and, emancipated from toil, to rise mankind can reach heights of intellectual exaltation. To realize this great social ideal is a work of education and organisation. The working class must be aroused from its apathy. The means of production must belong to those who made use of it — whose freedom and very lives depend upon it. The worst in socialism will be better than the best in capitalism. With socialism a new power will be in control! The people! For the first time in history the working class will be free and no class will be in subjection.

 The trade union movement is the natural result of capitalist production and represents the economic side of the working class movement. We consider it the duty of socialists to join the unions of their respective trades and assist in building up and unifying the trade and labour organisations. We recognise that trade unions are by necessity should be organised on neutral grounds, as far as political affiliation is concerned. We call the attention of the trade unionists to the fact that the class struggle so nobly waged by the trade union forces today, while it may result in lessening the exploitation of labour, can never abolish that exploitation. The exploitation of labour will only come to an end when society takes possession of all the means of production for the benefit of all the people. It is the duty of every trade unionist to realise the necessity of independent political action on socialist lines, to join the Socialist Party and assist in building a strong political movement of the working class, whose aim must be the abolition of wage slavery and the establishment of a cooperative society, based on the common ownership of all the means of production and distribution. The World Socialist Movement proclaims its mission to win the world from capitalist barbarism and help to turn it into a genuine common family of humanity.

Saving Civilisation

The owning class is necessarily the ruling class. Corporations are organised purely for private profit; the rights of the corporations to exploit the working class and exact tribute from the people are to be respected, according to the capitalists. The employing and owning class dictates legislation and has it constructed for its own interest. Capitalism is based on the class of those to whom belong the means of production of the whole world. These are linked together by connections of business and interest and by a political alliance. Parties, like individuals, act from motives of self-interest. The platform of a party is simply the political expression of the economic interests of the class it represents. The Labour Party differs from the Tory Party as the manufacturing capitalist differs from the financial capitalist. The Socialist Party differs from them both as the exploited wage worker differs from his exploiter; the difference here is not in business field but in kind.

Socialism has its social base in the working masses of the whole world. They are the real living force of the new society which must replace capitalism, but they continue to be tricked by their ignorant or treacherous leaders who do not give them a political line of their own and who have lined them up behind the plutocrats.  The prevailing economic system can only be abolished in two ways; namely, by securing control of government or by violent insurrection. No sane person prefers violence to peaceful measures, and hence socialists rely upon the efficacy of a united class-conscious ballot to accomplish our end.

 The Socialist Party is necessarily a revolutionary party in the sense its basic demand is the common ownership of the means of production and distribution and the operation of all industry in the interest of all the people. Economic freedom can result only from collective ownership, and upon this vital principle the Socialist Party differs diametrically from every other party. Between private ownership and collective ownership there can be no compromise.  One produces for profit, the other for use. One produces millionaire elites and the other economic equals. The Socialist Party seeks to abolish class rule, wipe out class distinction, secure the peace of society, and make of this world a fit and habitable place. Sadly the workers sing the “Internationale” but do not presently apply it in practice. The workers must struggle against capitalists and must extricate themselves from their grasp. Capitalism inevitably produces exploitation and poverty, war, nationalism, racism and sexism, a poisoned environment and the waste of human and natural resources, none of which can be consistently eliminated without the socialist transformation of society.

Capitalism does not dare use to their fullest extent the productive forces of our present age. Its very existence depends upon limiting these forces. There are a number of ways in which this limiting of production takes place, but all involve fundamental principles of the profit system. Under capitalism the production of wealth is carried on for profit. The desire for profits is the motive force which drives the capitalist class to use its capital in the production of wealth. In order to secure profits the workers must be exploited. Part of the product of their labour must be turned over to the capitalist class in the shape of interest and dividends. Only through common ownership can society secure for all its members the benefit of an improved method of organisation. Once we establish common ownership of our industries we will throw off the checks of our productive powers and will be able to produce more than enough not only to supply every human being food, clothing, and homes to live in, but the opportunity for education and culture which can make life worth living

The Socialist Party is an integral part of the World Socialist Movement and declares itself to be the political organisation and political expression of the working class. The Socialist Party, (in common with all political parties) is a class party. It frankly admits that a political organisation is but an expression of class interest. The party therefore exists for the sole purpose of representing the producers, that is to say, the working class. Representing, as it does, the working and dispossessed class of the state, and having for its platform the abolition of the exploitation of the workers through rent, interest, and profit, there can be no compromise between the Socialist Party and the political expression of the owning class.  The Social Party to clearly state the principles which guide its attitude believe that poverty is necessitated by an industrial system based upon individual ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, utilised for private profit. They fully understand that low wages, long hours, and scarcity of employment — that is, poverty — can only disappear with the disappearance of the capitalist system of which these things are the inevitable outcome. We have no hostility or jealous feeling with regard to the workers of any other country, and disavow any intention of gaining advantage at their expense.

Some say we in the Socialist Party are “idealists.” They say on the whole we are a fine bunch of chaps but utterly impractical. Now, what is this socialism we are accused of promoting. Socialism is defined as the common ownership of the social means of production and distribution. It is the name given to the next stage of civilisation, if civilisation is to survive.  The machinery and progress in the technology of production today we do not want to use to destroy, if we are to have civilisation. Modern humanity does not intend to go back to the barbarism of the Dark Ages. But as long as the instruments of production — land, machinery, raw materials, etc. — remain private property, only comparatively few can be sole owners and masters thereof. And so long as such is the case, they will naturally use this private ownership for their private advantage. If we are to remain a politically free people, the inevitable outcome will be that the people must take possession collectively of the social means of production and distribution. And this is called socialism. If civilisation is to survive, we must act that civilisation does survive and that can only be accomplished by establishing a socialist society. 

Teaching Socialism

(with thanks to http://skewednews.net/ for the image)

To-day there is inequality and misery in the world and this is the outcome of our social conditions where the mass of the people, the working class, produce and distribute all commodities, yet a minority of the people control and possess these commodities. This tyranny of the possessing class over the producing class is based on the present wage-system and it maintains all other forms of oppression, and this tyranny of the few over the many is only possible because the few have obtained possession of the land, the raw materials, the machinery, the banks, the railways, in a word, of all the means of production and distribution of commodities, and have, as a class, obtained possession of these by no superior virtue, effort or self-denial, but by either force or fraud. The possessor can and does dictate terms to the man or woman of that non-possessing class. “You shall sell your labour to me. I will pay you only a fraction of its value in wage. The difference between that value and what I pay for your labour I pocket, as a member of the possessing class, and I am richer than before, not by labour of my own, but by your unpaid labour.” This is the teaching of socialism

To-day production is conducted by individual capitalists independently of all others. What and where commodities are to be produced, where, when and how the finished product is to be sold, is decided by the individual capitalist owner or corporation. Nowhere does the community or the worker have the slightest influence upon these questions. In a socialist society all this will change. Private ownership of the means of production and subsistence must disappear. Production will be carried on not for the enrichment of the shareholders but solely to supply the wants and needs of the people. To this end all the wealth and resources must be taken from their exploiting owners to become the common property of the entire people, placing them under social control. The time has come when big changes are necessary. In the words of Shelley “the system of human society as it exists at present must be overthrown from the foundations.”  The two classes at present existing will be replaced be a single people possessing all the means of production and distribution in common, and working in common for the production and distribution of commodities.

Wars, poverty, malnutrition, recessions and unemployment have been our lot the billionaires, the big industrialists and the great financiers have made their fortunes out of the people’s labour. The profits of the corporations are higher than they have ever been. The capitalists have done exceptionally well; indeed, they have never been better off. The Labour Party does not want to abolish capitalism. They defend the system of capitalist profit and exploitation, defend the position of the capitalists and seek to prop up the bankrupt capitalist social structure of riches for the few, poverty for the many, and ever-recurring threat of recession and of war. The Labour Party act as the main supporters of capitalism, and are doing their best to safeguard the privileges and profits of the investors and shareholders, providing them with opportunities to continue their exploitation of the rest of us. The Labour Party disrupts and demoralises the wider labour movement by its poisonous propaganda of collaboration with and capitulation to capitalism, and its betrayal of every principle on which the union and labour movement was formed.

Only by the establishment of socialism can the World’s problems be finally solved and its people guaranteed a good life, decent living standards and lasting peace. Socialism means an end to slumps, unemployment and poverty because it abolishes the capitalist profit system.  Socialism means an end to capitalist profit and exploitation, for it will deprive the capitalists of their ownership and control of the land and factories offices, mills and mines and transport, to ensure that production is organised for the use of the people and not for the profit of the tiny minority of capitalists. Socialism ends the gulf between poverty and plenty, and frees the creative energies of the people and the productive resources for gigantic economic, social and cultural advances on the basis of a planned socialist economy. Socialism means peace and an end to the danger of wars, because with socialism there are no longer capitalists who want to conquer new markets, and to exploit dependent peoples and cheap labour. The power of the working people, united in recognition for the need for social change and participating to carry it through, as expressed and laid down through Parliament, is capable of securing the establishment of socialism and transforming  the system of capitalist private ownership into socialised - people’s - ownership.

Inside a socialist society there are no markets, commodities, values, prices or wages. With socialism goods are no longer sold for a market, but are produced for use. The workers, through their delegates, guide their own destinies and organise themselves so that production may be purposefully controlled and managed. The allocation of material and workers to a particular industry is made, not according to the fluctuations of the market but by analysis of the needs of the community, of the productivity of the workers, and of how much resources is needed to fulfill these needs. There being no class struggles, there is now no need for a State, and the State withers away. The armed forces are not necessary. Police disappear, too because the basis for crime is gone, since all the wants of life easily can be obtained. The occasional criminal is treated as a maladjusted sick person and is given therapy until he or she is rehabilitated. The tremendously increased productivity of mankind will have reduced to a bare minimum the amount of time necessary for each to produce the wants of life. Elimination of all toil in work will enable the worker to become an artist, to find the greatest pleasure in the objective result of his labors, to fuse into one work and recreation, and to combine his constructive relations with nature with the construction and reconstruction of himself. If work becomes a pleasure, pleasure itself is work.

Time For Socialism

If socialism is nothing but an empty dream, then there is little to look forward to at all on this Earth. It means simply for each one of us to stave off pain of daily life and grasp at whatever passing pleasures come our way without regard to others. There are people who think that that is all we can do: and others who think that all our personal endeavours must be to secure a good career and some prestige. But those in the Socialist Party say that unless socialism is altogether a mirage, it will rise again. Socialists seek to give to existing society a new purpose.

By socialism we understand the system of society the material basis of which is social production for social use; that is, the production of all the means of social existence — including all the necessaries and comforts of life — carried on by the organised community for its own use collectively and individually. It is not the way society at the present time is organised. Production is carried on to-day purely in the interest and for the profit of the class which owns the instruments of production — by which we mean the land, the factories, the machinery, the mines and mills, in short, everything for human use. Socialism would substitute social ownership of these things for class ownership, and this would also involve the abolition of classes altogether. Socialism does not mean government ownership or management. The State of to-day, nationally or locally, is only the agent of the possessing class. State-owned businesses are run for profit just as outer businesses are; and the government, as the “executive committee”of the possessing class, has, in the interests of its employers, to treat the employees just as other employees are treated. The organised democratic society contemplated by socialists is a very different thing from the class state of to-day. When society is organised for the control of its own affairs, and has acquired the possession of its own means of production, its delegates will not be the agents of a class, and production will be carried on for the use of all and not for the profit of a few. In socialist society the means of production have ceased to be capital, that is, to be a means of exploitation. In socialist society there are no longer classes with a monopoly of property in the means of production arid classes deprived of property in the means of production. In the conditions of socialism the means of production are social property.

The establishment of socialism means a complete change in society in all its aspects. Social property is the foundation of the socialist system. Far from abolishing personal ownership of objects of consumption, socialism provides the only real safeguard for the ever fuller satisfaction of the personal needs of all members of society. Social ownership means an end to the chaos and wasteful competition of production for profit and the development of new productive resources to provide what people really want. Socialism does not mean the levelling down of living standards. Nor does it bring bureaucracy and tyranny. On the contrary, socialism draws more and more people into planning and making their own future, and frees their creative energies for great economic, social and cultural advances. A socialist society means a better future for all where there are neither masters nor servants, but only people working together for a happy, prosperous life. In order to build socialism political power must be taken from the hands of the capitalist minority and firmly grasped by the majority of the people. Working class power means an end to this privileged position of the rich, which they use to protect and increase their profits and to maintain their power over the people. Socialist political power is only a means to an end. It is the instrument with which labour will achieve the complete, fundamental reconstruction of our entire capitalist system. The essence of socialist democracy is to replace the control of the rich by participation of the people in running the administrative affairs of community and industry, transforming existing organisations and changing them into instruments through which this principle can be applied. Ownership and control by the people of the productive resources provides the means for extending and improving the social services in a new spirit with a positive aim.

The socialist is one of hope and confidence. Working people, acting together, can take political power into their own hands, end the exploitation of man by man, and use resources to meet the needs of the people, a society organised on the principle that “the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all”.

The Price of Education

Children from low-income families can be held back at school by the costs associated with meals, trips and every-day equipment, suggests a year-long study by the Child Poverty Action Group involved 340 pupils and 120 staff at eight primary and secondary schools across Glasgow.

It identified basic cost barriers to some pupils reaching their potential. These were identified as uniform, travel, learning, meals, trips, clubs, fun events and attitudes to poverty.

 Stephen Curran, the council's executive member for education and young people, said: "It is estimated in Glasgow that one in three children are in poverty - affecting almost 36,000 of our children. This can result in them feeling excluded from school activities, trips, meals or simply finding it difficult to take part in routine school tasks like submitting homework which requires online access.”

John Dickie, director of the Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland, added: "No child should ever miss out or be made to feel awkward at school just because their families are struggling on a low income but our work tells that all too often they do.”

The Party of dispossessed and exploited

No blueprint of socialism can be given. Many accuse the Socialist Party of not providing a prescriptive path forward or setting out how socialism should be run. We can only generalise on what kind of society will replace the irrational one we live in. The Socialist Party does possess a vision of a better society and holds a general agreement on how to achieve it. What is needed for peace and prosperity is not another wish-list of UN promises from the same old bandits – but a worldwide union of workers. What is needed is the death of capitalism and the birth of socialism. Power and profit – the motive force of capitalism – must perish. The peoples of the world will be able to exchange their goods and their resources according to their human needs. 

Most people in the world still struggle daily for food, clothing, and shelter. While a relative handful of people grow ever richer, the vast majority of people face a rapidly declining standard of living. Homelessness, unemployment, crime, inadequate education and health care, and mass alienation have become facts of life. For the first time in US history, present and future generations are confronted with the reality that they will be worse off than their parents. Millions of children are living in poverty, millions are homeless and millions of Americans have no health coverage. College education is now beyond the reach of many Americans. Impoverishment does not begin below the subsistence line of mere physical existence as defined by some authority. It can begin anywhere. A worker deprived of his or her car by unemployment or a falling real wage is just as much impoverished. And where his forefathers fought for bread he or she fights to meet the payments on the home or the central heating. Increasingly, people are looking for alternatives to the way of life currently available to them. We believe that society must be organised to put human needs not for profit. We believe future history will be made by people struggling to put society’s resources at the disposal of the majority of the people.

We reject Lenin’s view of the vanguard party. We do not believe that a single party can or should determine the direction, strategy and tactics of the struggle for fundamental change. We reject the idea that fundamental change can or should come about through a seizure of power by a vanguard party claiming to act in the interests of the working class and the majority of society. We reject the goal of the “dictatorship of the proletariat” as it is currently understood. We reject the view that a single party can use its claim to represent the working class as a substitute for multi-party democracy and free elections. We are opposed to dictatorship in any and all forms, and we recognise that the application of this principle has in every case meant that a minority acts for and defines the interests of the majority of society. Such a view is antithetical to genuine democracy, and we believe that the socialist movement must practice and embody the values and principles that they strive to achieve in society.

Today workers live and work in a world dominated by far-flung corporate empires, of a scope and size unimaginable to previous generations, which treat the entire planet as their domain. They are a law unto themselves, free to roam the globe in search of cheaper labour, more exploitable resources, more pliant governments and greater profits. They now hold the power of life and death over every region and industry on our planet. By their dictates, our resources have been plundered. Workers are their pawns in a global game of mergers, shutdowns, and relocations. These multinational conglomerates have robbed us of our wealth and of the very power to determine our own future. The legacy of these profiteering monopolies is that they are incapable of turning their technology and organisation to the needs of people and have distorted the economic development of the world so fundamentally that the resources they waste on war production, for instance, could eliminate hunger in the world.

The new technology information revolution will only intensify massive permanent unemployment with further automation and robotics, leaving tedious and stressful jobs for the remaining workers, and terrifying concentrations of knowledge and control in the hands of private corporations. The central question posed by technology is political. What kind of society do we want to create with the most powerful extensions of human labour and intelligence since the industrial revolution? If harnessed to popular administration and planning, new technological innovation could help us achieve an era of abundance for all, release us from monotonous toil and enrich our store of accessible information. The socialist option is the only alternative. The needs of people, not profit, are the driving force of a socialist society. It will be accomplished by democratizing all levels of society, and by making workers’ participation the centre of industrial organisation. Under capitalism, labour is a commodity. Workers are used as replaceable parts, extensions of machines—as long as they provide dividends. Employers use their power of ownership to devastate the lives of workers through layoffs, shutdowns and neglect of health and safety. Unions, despite their courageous efforts, have encountered difficulties eliminating even the worst abuses of management power. Socialism will dissolve the economic foundation of one-sided management privilege by relying on the needs and creativity of people, enhancing the power that people can exercise over their own lives.

The Socialist Party is the party of the dispossessed and exploited struggling to build a new world. As socialists we support all struggles against the injustices of capitalism. The Socialist Party does not offer just a blueprint to a better future. We offer an invitation to all fellow workers to join us in our common efforts to eradicate a social system based on exploitation, discrimination, poverty and war. The capitalist system must be replaced by socialist democracy. That is the burning issue of our era, the only hope of humanity. 

Stealing to eat

Police in the Highlands and Islands have detected a rise in thefts of foodstuffs by shoplifters. Chief Supt. Julian Innes said it was believed that people were stealing to feed themselves.

The Highlands and Islands area commander added that this type of shoplifting had not been seen before in the region. He explained: 

"Shoplifting has seen a spike this year. We've seen more shoplifters than ever in the Highlands and our view is that people are stealing to feed themselves. The evidence that makes us believe that is what things people are stealing. People have always stolen from shops but we have been seeing an increase in people stealing foodstuffs."