Lothian Socialist Discussion

Wednesday, 22 November
 7:30pm - 9:00pm

The Autonomous Centre of Edinburgh,
17 West Montgomery Place, 
Edinburgh EH7 5HA

The Socialist Party welcomes any upsurge in the militancy and resistance and organisation of our class. But we also know, from bitter experience, that work of an altogether quieter, patient, more political kind is also needed. The skirmishes in the class war must be fought if we are not to be reduced to beasts of burden. But as human animals capable of rational thought and long-term planning, we must also seek to stop the skirmishes by winning the class war and thereby ending it. This is only possible if the capitalist class is dispossessed of its wealth and power. That means that the working class as a whole must understand the issues, and organise and fight for these ends themselves by organising a political party for the conquest of state power. 

The Socialist Party does not minimise the necessity and importance of the worker keeping up the struggle over wages or to resisting cuts. There are some signs that union membership and general combativity are rising. And this is vital if our class is to develop some of the solidarity and self-confidence essential for the final abolition of wage slavery. We recognise the necessity of workers' solidarity in the class struggle against the capitalist class and rejoice in every victory for the workers to assert their economic power. But to struggle for higher wages and better conditions is not revolutionary in any true sense of the word; the essential weapons in this struggle are not inherently revolutionary either. It demands the revolutionising of the workers themselves. If there were more revolutionary workers in the unions—and in society generally—then the unions and the host of other community organisations would have a more revolutionary outlook.

We state to achieve socialism requires a clear understanding of socialist principles with a determined desire to put them into practice. For socialism to be established the mass of the people must understand the nature and purpose of the new society. Our theory of socialist revolution is grounded in Marx's - the position of the working class within capitalist society forces it to struggle against capitalist conditions of existence and as the workers gained more experience of the class struggle and the workings of capitalism, the labour movement would become more consciously socialist and democratically organised by the workers themselves and would require no intervention by people outside the working class to bring it.

 Socialist propaganda and agitation will indeed be necessary but will be carried out by workers themselves whose socialist ideas would have been derived from an interpretation of their class experience of capitalism. The end result is an independent movement of the socialist-minded and democratically organised working class aimed at winning control of political power in order to abolish capitalism.  The responsibility of the Socialist Party is to challenge capitalist apologists and pseudo-socialists in the battle of ideas and that requires talking to, leafleting and debating and engaging with our fellow workers.

Socialist ideas arise when workers begin to reflect on the general position of the working class within capitalist society. They do then have to be communicated to other workers, but NOT from outside the working class as a whole. They have to be communicated by OTHER workers who, from their own experience and/or from absorbing the past experience of the working class, have come to a socialist understanding. It's not a question of enlightened outsiders bringing socialist ideas to the 'ignorant' workers but of socialist-minded workers spreading socialist ideas amongst their fellow workers. We see socialist consciousness as emerging from a combination of two things - people's experience of capitalism and the problems it inevitably creates but also the activity of socialists in making hearing the case for socialism a part of that experience.  We are not against reform campaigns, co-ops, the trade unions, or any other way in which workers struggle. What we do say, is that these are not means towards socialism, and we advocate socialism as the better and lasting answer.

We insist on the necessity of majority understanding behind socialist delegates with a mandate for socialism, merely using the state and parliament for one revolutionary act, after which the state and the Socialist Party has no further existence. We can be proud of our long history in exposing the oxymoron of the "workers state" and attacking the concepts of Leninism (and its offspring, Stalinism and Trotskyism).

Free Access

'One Card' aims to encourage greater access to libraries by removing barriers between services and gives access to more than 120 libraries and 1.6 million books.

Pamela Tulloch, chief executive of Scottish Library and Information Council, said: "One of the fundamental defining characteristics of public libraries is that they are open to everyone. No-one is turned away from a library, there is no joining fee, and anyone can use a library and its services, regardless of age and background.

Culture Secretary Fiona Hyslop explained "As well as traditional services like book lending, libraries are also places where people can access free wi-fi, use a computer and socialise. Libraries can empower communities, helping tackle inequality, reduce isolation and boost the local economy."

The principle of free access is practiced today. We, in the Socialist Party, believe that the idea should be extended to all aspects of life, food, clothing, shelter, and services.

Sunday Sermon - "One World, One People"

Pope Francis declared 19 November 2017 as the First World Day of the Poor. It took the church long enough, didn't it?

Papa Frankie explains, "We know how hard it is for our contemporary world to see poverty clearly for what it is.  Yet in myriad ways poverty challenges us daily, in faces marked by suffering, marginalization, oppression, violence, torture and imprisonment, war, deprivation of freedom and dignity, ignorance and illiteracy, medical emergencies and shortage of work, trafficking and slavery, exile, extreme poverty and forced migration.  Poverty has the face of women, men and children exploited by base interests, crushed by the machinations of power and money.  What a bitter and endless list we would have to compile were we to add the poverty born of social injustice, moral degeneration, the greed of a chosen few, and generalized indifference! Tragically, in our own time, even as ostentatious wealth accumulates in the hands of the privileged few, often in connection with illegal activities and the appalling exploitation of human dignity, there is a scandalous growth of poverty in broad sectors of society throughout our world.  Faced with this scenario, we cannot remain passive, much less resigned...To all these forms of poverty we must respond with a new vision of life and society."

Indeed, there is a need for a vision for the future. The World Socialist Movement has one that it has been trying to convince well-meaning individuals for over a hundred years to accept and work towards. If we are one people we should be concerned about climate change, world poverty, and the global plight of refugees fleeing war-torn countries. If we are one people, from across the world we will come and take care of the elderly, the young and the frail and sick.

The most remarkable feature in modern life is the lack of interest displayed by working people in their economic condition. They seem to accept their status of beasts of burden as a matter of course, a state of affairs to be put up with without complaint or protest. A job of work seems to be the highest aspiration they have. Around that revolve their hopes and fears. A job of work brings them all the joy of life they ever know—food, clothing, shelter, some much-required leisure, and entertainment. For these things they start like horses on Monday morning, and finish like cows, complacently chewing the cud of future milking, by Friday. Fellow-workers appear to suffer from a poverty of spirit - fighting spirit. Docility seems to be the hall-mark of the “respectable” working men and women who have “something to be thankful for,” i.e., a job.  Workers live to work. They are instruments for the production of profit. The bread they eat, the clothes they wear, the houses they live in, are not so much necessaries of life as necessaries for the production of that labour-power, that energy, which is to be expended in the creation of profit. And, the saddest thought of all, those who live only to labour and to exude profit, are so used to this aspect of life that they have become dead to the real meaning of the word socialism. Never has there been an epoch that has succeeded so completely in robbing vast populations of their lives, as under the wages system. 

Fellow-workers, can you not see that you are being robbed of life. 

The Left

We are asking the working class to learn the lesson of history and reject the advice of “intellectuals” and act on the principle, “The emancipation of the working class must be the work of the working class itself.” The last thing these “saviours” suggest is that the workers should reject all leaders—including them. Our advice to the working class is clear. It cannot hope for an end to its misery under capitalism. It must abolish capitalism and establish socialism; it must become the owner of all the means of work—land, raw material, machinery, etc.—and, thereby, owner of the whole of the produce of its own labour. To do this, the workers must organise politically, because “a struggle between two great classes of society necessarily becomes a political struggle," and they must win political power.

The revolution is always round the corner. They believe that one day a “ revolutionary situation ” will arise in which they will seize power and lead the masses to victory. This wearisome nonsense abounds in the columns Trotskyist literature. The “revolution” would have taken place but for the fact that the workers were betrayed by their leaders, is a typical Trotskyist interpretation of workers history. According to Trotskyists, every political upheaval, every wave of strikes, would have resulted in the “revolution” but for the fact that workers lacked “real revolutionary leadership.” On almost every page of their journals, the idea is promoted “The leaders must show the way.”

 It is precisely because the workers lack socialist knowledge that leaders rise to power. If the workers’ leaders do not represent the interests of workers, they do certainly reflect the outlook of the workers. When workers do acquire socialist understanding, they will not require leaders. An organisation which claims to be revolutionary must be badly led indeed when its revolutionary object—the only excuse it can advance for its nominal separation from the Labour Party—becomes secondary or ultimate and has to wait while something else is done first.

Our task is to make socialism clear to the workers, and we shall persevere with that task until the game of the leaders is played out—until there is no one to lead, because the rank and file are ready to go forward of themselves, leaving the vanguard in the rear to follow on.

Socialism is the complete dispossession of the entire capitalist class and the reorganisation of society on the basis of production solely for use. We hold that when a majority understand the nature of capitalism, understand the futility of electing leaders to reform it and that a complete change of the basis of society is both necessary and possible. The candidates of other political parties pander to a variety of tastes and requirements and play off one group of people against another. “Something for everybody” is their motto.

You will find no “Great Men” in the S.P.G.B. The parts that its members play are varied, but no attempt is made to measure one against the other—the keynote is co-operative effort, as it will be in socialist society. One of our objections to the existence of “Very Important Persons” is that it presupposes that some persons are accounted of little importance. We are a band of ordinary folk, but each is as unimportant (and therefore each is as important) as the other, whether chosen for speaker, secretary, organiser or by-election candidate.

Capitalism casts aside hundreds of millions of workers classified as “redundant” or “surplus” to requirements. It disempowers the underpaid and the unprotected toiling in global sweatshops, keeping them cowed, anxious and compliant. It financialises the economy, creating predatory global institutions that extract money from consumers, institutions, and states through punishing forms of debt peonage. The 400 richest individuals in the United States have more wealth than the bottom 64 percent of the population, and the three richest Americans have more wealth than the bottom 50 percent of the U.S. population. It shuts down genuine debate in regard to vast income disparities and social inequality.

Attack the symptoms and the state will be passive. Attack the disease and the state will be ruthless. Time is no longer on our side. If we can build socialism we have a chance.  We cannot be distracted by the symptoms and apply palliatives. We must cure the disease.

Smacking and corporal punishment

Scotland joined the list of countries to ban smacking children altogether. 53 nations currently have a total ban on smacking children.

According to a new study US researchers found that the practice makes youngsters "more aggressive". Dr Elizabeth Gershoff of the University of Texas at Austin, who led the study, has conducted extensive research into the use of smacking on children and has concluded that it is “making them more aggressive and more antisocial”.

Past studies have also linked corporal punishment in children to the onset of depression, anxiety and drugs and alcohol abuse.

In the latest study, published in Psychological Science, Dr Gershoff and her collaborators recorded the behaviour of children whose parents did not smack them and those that did, as reported by their teachers.

Their findings showed a clear distinction between the groups, with an increase in behavioural problems from the age of five to eight.

“It affected how often they argue with other children, fight, act impulsively and disturb activities in the classroom,” said Dr Gershoff. Dr Gershoff says one of the main links between smacking and bad behaviour is that children don’t have to learn self-control. “What smacking teaches them is that when the parent is around, they should behave, otherwise they will be hit,” she said. “The child does not learn how to manage themselves when the parent is not around.”

Conducting a controlled experiment to find the effects of smacking on children is unethical, as it would involve telling parents to smack their children. However, by dividing the 12,112 participating children into smacked and non-smacked groups, and then pairing them according to various characteristics, the researchers were able to approximate an experimental setup.

Dr Gershoff said that a key message of her work is that corporal punishment simply “doesn’t work”.

“All of us get frustrated when things don’t go our way. Our job as parents is to teach children how to handle that,” said Dr Gershoff. “Smacking isn’t teaching those things.”

The State and political action

The Socialist Party view is based on a study of history and in particular of the role of the State. We see it as the seat of political power and the centre of social control. It is our view that it is possible for the working class to use the institutions to settle their class struggle with the owning class. The vote is thus a potential class weapon. But the vote, like other weapons, can be used properly or improperly. Because at present the workers use it to elect demagogues and careerists of one kind or another is no argument against its potentialities. As far as the Socialist Party is concerned, what is important is not so much the vote as the understanding behind it. Thus, when we contest elections we do all we can to make sure that only convinced socialists vote for us.  A vote won on other grounds is worse than useless as the history of the social democracy has shown. The vote is just a possible means to political power—the goal of a class-conscious working class. Our conception of political action differs from that of other parties and the reformists in particular. They engage in all kinds of demagogy in order to get elected. Without a Socialist working class behind them, what can they do? Nothing save maintain the status quo. Hence the phenomena of "sell-out” and “betrayal.” It is completely irrelevant to judge the usefulness of political action on how the reformists have used it, not least because they operate on a different assumption, namely, that you can substantially improve the lot of the working class without socialist understanding.

Economic systems are controlled politically. Marx showed that material conditions give rise to political institutions by means of which ruling classes dominate the economic world. The materialist view of history shows that the material conditions of production, etc., make necessary political machinery to govern or control the economic life of society. Every class struggling for control of the economic basis of society has to become politically supreme in order to maintain or obtain economic possession.

 Our case has always been that the establishment of socialism can be achieved only by parliamentary means: once the working class understands and wants socialism it will send its elected representatives to take control of the governmental machinery by which capitalism is maintained. The class struggle arises on the economic field, but that the workers can only be victorious in that struggle by becoming conscious of their class interests and controlling political power.  When Socialist Party delegates are sent to the centre of political power they will be the delegates of the working class because the Socialist Party will be the working class organised consciously and politically. The point is that we are not a political party in the conventional sense of the term, we are not a group of politicians trying to get elected to do something for the working class, to legislate the new society into being. Far from it, in our view, a socialist party should not be a vanguard but an instrument. We conceive ourselves as an instrument which the working class can use to achieve political power, a necessary prerequisite for the establishment of socialism. The struggle to change society from capitalism to socialism has nothing to do with fighting in the streets or organising strikes. It has to be a political one. The powers of government include and in the last analysis rest on armed force to maintain capitalism in each country. The only logical strategy to abolish capitalism is, therefore, for the working class — not leaders or an élite, but the socialist working class itself through its mandated delegates — to take control of those powers; so that the protection of capitalism has gone, and no-one can prevent the introduction of socialism.

In almost every way you examine it, capitalism has been an abysmal failure. The Socialist Party take the same position on not advocating reforms and on trade unionism now as in 1904 not because we are committed to any dogma but from that conclusion. Socialists are not concerned with reforms, but we are very much concerned with the conditions they attempt to remedy or palliate. Throughout this century, working men and women have been deluded that a change at an election — another party and another policy — will solve the problems for them. The truth is that these problems arise from the capitalist system we live under. People need housing, schooling for their children and “welfare” because they are wage-workers, producing wealth but denied access to it. While the unending awfulness of the housing problem is discussed, there is a surplus of housing. It is not a housing problem at all; it is an aspect of the working-class situation. Indeed a practical programme is needed. Clearly, it must be quite different from the chronically unsuccessful policies of the Labour and Conservative parties. The Socialist Party has a policy which will end forever the state of affairs these parties cannot overcome. It is a simple cause-and-effect proposition: if, as we have shown, again and again, capitalism itself produces the problems, the only solution is to abolish capitalism and put socialism in its place.

The Socialist Party candidates are not saying “Elect us, trust us, that is what we will try to do”. Far from it: our case is that Socialism cannot be presented to or imposed on people by leaders, even well-meaning ones. The condition for it is the working class understanding and wanting it, and giving the mandate to Socialist candidates to take possession of the powers of government and establish it. Those are the only kind of votes we want. One of the reasons for standing in elections is to show our position in contrast with the sham appeals of the pro-capitalist parties. Every vote now cast consciously for socialism is a step towards political control and a fresh notification that the future is ours. And if you have begun to understand what capitalism is and does, you have no alternative — the days of voting for the continuation of capitalism are over, and only socialism will do.

Re-filling the empty land

Work is ongoing to repopulate some of the country’s most remote territories and reverse years of decline set by the Highland Clearances and mass migration.

Peter Peacock, policy director of Community Land Scotland, said: “Vast areas of the Highlands that were cleared are still empty. There is a very strong cultural sense of ‘why should they be empty, why can’t they go back?’

Around 500,000 acres of Scotland - home to some 25,000 people- are managed by community landowners who have successfully taken land out of private hands. Despite the sizeable hurdles, more than 300 new homes have been built by just 12 community land organisations with new enterprises in sectors such as tourism, renewables, retail and forestry supporting livelihoods. On Eigg, which was bought by the community from its landlord 20 years ago, the population has grown by 60 percent. 
Knoydart was home to around 65 people in 1999 when the community bought the estate from the Bank of Scotland after its owner went into receivership. Now 115 people live there with a range of community businesses helping to employ local people, from a home maintenance firm to a venison butchery and forestry.

With Scotland’s population to rise by 350,000 by 2039, some believe Scotland’s rural areas offer a potential alternative to the country’s creaking urban centres. People numbers are due to rise by 21 per cent in Edinburgh and 17 per cent in Aberdeen over the next 22 years. Meanwhile in Highland, despite significant recent growth, the figure falls away to 3.5 per cent.

Despite the population rise, some communities remain incredibly fragile. In the Western Isles, population is due to fall by 13.5 per cent due to “negative natural change” - or when the death rate outstrips the numbers born. Women are less likely to move to the islands and more likely to leave.

Around one-fifth of Scotland has now been designated “wild land.” However, some believe the wild land designations don’t recognise man’s place in the environment over centuries. Mr Peacock added: “Some of our members look out on wild land and they don’t see wild land. They see forlorn land, land that is empty and that was once full of people, of children.” “In some of the land that is now designated wild land, people were living there until 80 years ago.” Mr Peacock added,“Of course we want people to still enjoy the mountains, the views, the landscapes. But it’s quite nice to see a few natives in the foreground.”

The John Muir Trust said the wild land areas were designed to protect against such industrial development - and not to impede community developments. Chief executive Andrew Bachell said: “The purpose of the map, as we see it, is not to block housing, hydro schemes or any other community-scale projects, but to provide a degree of regulation and protection of important landscapes from outside commercial interests.”

Trust and ye shall be betrayed.

Let the working class give up its sheep-like acceptance of leaders and themselves set about solving the social problem. The problem and the solution are comparatively simple, but they cannot be wafted away by phrases or slogans. The budding leader can always be recognised by his predilection for such things. Phrases and slogans have always been the stock-in-trade of the men who have striven to rise on the crest of waves of popularity to positions either of economic security or positions that flatter the vanity of the lover of power for its own sake. The society we aim at building in the future is one wherein all will have a free and equal hand in the ordering of affairs. How can such a society be built on foundations such as the blind worship of the leaders? We often hear said that “Some are born to lead, others are born to be led”. Socialists have contempt for such ideas. We are told by the defenders of capitalism that the ordinary person is not be intelligent enough to take over the running of society from top to bottom. In fact, it is the workers who run society now — from managers to doctors to dockers — but far from using their abilities for their own benefit, they use them for the benefit of the privileged few.  When it is said there have always been leaders, it must be realised that their existence has been and is bound up with the institution of private property.

The Socialist Party keeps on repeating, monotonously, that no leader, no matter how honest, clever or well-intentioned he may be can lead the workers out of slavery. No man or group of men, however intellectual, can create a new society which depends for its success upon the knowledge and understanding of the bulk of the population. Socialism will be a society of voluntary co-operation. This means that in order to run socialism, the workers have to be aware of what is necessary to make the new society function. And it follows from this, that it will not be possible to establish a voluntary society unless those seeking to do so are in fact the majority of people in society, and those people know what is involved and can work conscientiously for socialism. Socialism can only be attained by working men and women who know what socialism means and how it is to be obtained. Therefore, it is necessary for working men and women to do the comparatively small amount of thinking that is necessary to understand socialism. When they have done so they will know the steps to be taken, and will no longer need to rely on leaders. In that day the orator of cheap, hackneyed false phrases will find his eloquence wasted and depart.

Leaders spend a lot of time, money and effort, trying to persuade us that someone, someone at least, is in control and that we have some real control in our own lives, through, of course, them. The truth is that no elected politician can control the market—which operates for the private gain of a tiny number of owners. As long as the market exists we cannot have control of our own lives, run things in our own, and our own communities' interests, because that would threaten the profits of the tiny few. Leaders can't change that. Only we can, by acting together, without leaders, to end the whole profit-driven, market system. Capitalism cannot exist without its inevitable problems; it traps its leaders just as surely as it does those who are led. Even if a leader may wish to be different, to stand out for some apparently novel policy, they are similarly ensnared and quickly exposed for their inability also to climb out of the trap.

The working class must recognise that they have the knowledge and the ability to administer and operate a modern society — its machinery of production, distribution, communication. They will then realise that in fact, they do all of this already, but in the interests of a minority ruling class when they could do it in their own interests, to the benefit of the majority. From this basic knowledge, it is but a short step for the working class to see that they must act for themselves in the overthrow of capitalist society and its replacement with socialism. For this, because it will be the act of a conscious majority, no leaders are necessary — indeed, socialism cannot be imposed on the majority of society by a minority of allegedly better-equipped leaders.

Workers who despair of the apparently endless procession of cynical, futile leaders and candidates for leadership should consider the proposition that the alternative is not to switch their support from one leader to another but to join the Socialist Party which is the only political party in this country which insists that its membership understands and supports the principles of socialism. The Socialist Party is without leaders; it is a democratic party whose members cooperate and participate in the work of socialist propaganda in equal standing. It is not new leaders that are needed, but a new system. Socialism will not be brought about by workers following some self-appointed vanguard on a mystery tour. The choice is yours: leaders or socialism — choose wisely, for your life depends on it.

The road to socialism

The Socialist Party policy is one of spreading revolutionary ideas amongst the workers, organised and unorganised, in order that capitalism shall be abolished and socialism established. That is the work of a mass movement. Leader-hunting is an old pastime. Over the years, we have grown familiar with the dreary process of some politician starting his or her career as a left-wing firebrand.  What the militants want is the leaders’ jobs. What the workers want is knowledge, not leaders. What makes a working class party is socialist principles, not political expediency. Why do so many leaders seem to betray the trust in them? Because they can only administer a policy which, whatever niggling reforms it may contain, leaves the capitalist social system intact. Capitalism has its inevitable problems. The betrayals are in the fact that the leaders promise that, with them in control, we can have one without the other. That is why men who climbed to power through the trade unions have sat in a government which has broken strikes. Leaders exist by virtue of the ignorance of their followers. With political understanding, they are unnecessary. Knowledge, then, is the key.  The working-class movement should concern itself with the spread of socialist knowledge and with principles, not personalities. If the workers continue to put their trust in leaders and cherish the ever-renewed hope that at last, they have found the inspired political Moses, who will lead them out of the wilderness, they do so at their peril. We are makers of history, not spectators. When the change from capitalist insanity to production for need comes about we will not be watching it on the box. We will not be following leaders or be waiting for the revolution to be announced from a podium. The socialist revolution will be the activation of human consciousness, transforming us from viewers of the spectacle to makers of the future. When will socialism rule? When the majority decides that they will no longer be ruled by others.

The parties that claim the loyalty of the working-class to-day are saturated with the worship of the “great men”, self-appointed guardians of the interests of the working class,  preaching empty platitudes and futile reforms, all alike in deserving the uncompromising hostility of the workers. The Socialist Party propagates great principles and not “great men”.  The Socialist Party rejects all attempts at taking out of the hands of the working-class the control of its destiny, taking as its watchwords, "The emancipation of the working-class must be the work of the working-class itself.” The ruling class does not rely on one demagogue to “lead a nation,” there are many volunteers and much competition, with almost as many policies and palliatives—most of them quite shallow and easily exposed. It is the workers themselves, by their adulation, that create personalities; that makes a man great in the modern sense. When the "Hero” has gone the way of all flesh, the false and unscientific ideas that he foisted on an over-credulous working class are examined by those who come after with coolness and deliberation, and their verdict must necessarily be that those associated with it were either knaves or dupes. There is only one way for the worker to escape this verdict: to study socialism. The Socialist Party claims that dependence on leadership is a menace to the working-clam movement and that not emotionalism and leader-worship but knowledge, understanding, and self-reliance are the workers' road to emancipation.   Workers must understand the cause of capitalism's problems and realise that they will be solved only by the establishment of socialism. Without that, we face the chaos and brutality of capitalism. With it, a happy, free and plentiful world is ours for the taking. A movement of workers brought up to be spell-bound worshippers of oratory and personality are going to acquire the knowledge and self-reliance necessary. 

The workers have still a fair road to travel before they will get rid of the superstition of "Leadership" or the dope of "good" and "bad" leaders.

We don’t object to leadership because we want to be awkward, but because we see it as one of the biggest obstacles to the spread of socialist ideas. Capitalism has developed to the point where workers run society from top to bottom. Owners of capital need not play the smallest part in the undertaking which produces their rent, interest or profit; they can even have their wealth added to while in a lunatic asylum. Yet still, most workers haven't seen the possibility of a world without masters, a world which would be run in the interests of all mankind instead of those of a capitalist or “leading” class. There are no leaders in the socialist movement because there will be no leaders inside socialism—there can be none in a society based on equality of status and the willing co-operation of all in production solely for use.

Leadership only makes sense when there is a ruling class and a ruled class, and it implies that most people are incapable of organising affairs in their own interest and so must accept the dictates of a few. Ours differs from all previous revolutionary movements in that it doesn’t aim to replace one ruling class by another but to abolish classes altogether. All leaders are placed in a privileged position by their followers, who either agree with the policies laid down or think they can do nothing about them. By contrast, socialism means that nobody will be placed in a position of governing others.

One of the main reasons for people acquiescing in the continuation of capitalism is that they are led to believe it is the only possible system. It is just because they are so used to being told what is good for them that they are often puzzled when we say “We can’t lead you to socialism—you must understand and build it yourselves.” The blunt truth is that if people want leaders they want class society, and if they want class society they cannot want socialism. But more and more of them will become interested in socialism because they are faced with the same problems as we are, and failure to solve them within capitalism will eventually lead them to see the necessity of abolishing it. We do our best to point out the road to socialism and to encourage others along with it, but there can be no substitute for their knowledge of what is needed to achieve the goal.

We are always eager to help people to understand our case and to discuss with them the difficulties and objections they have concerning it. From our understanding of the past and the needs of the present, we try to show what the future class-free society will look like. But what you propose is that we should work out all the details in advance, and present them to the as yet non-socialist majority as a sort of pill to be taken for their sufferings under capitalism. If we did that, however, we should be acting no differently from the reformers who offer to lead the working class to better conditions and consistently fail to do so. The lesson is that no matter how well-meaning you may be, once you are given political power you must follow where events lead and, without a majority of socialists, that cannot be to socialism.

You have only to look at the Labour Party to see why in its early days quite a few of its leaders were no doubt sincerely in favour of abolishing capitalism and they thought that the working class would have to be led to it, and the means they adopted were those of getting into Parliament on the votes of reformists in order to advocate socialism. So they stood for Parliament, but when they were elected the means (political power) became the end in itself. Thus we see that as such leaders push themselves forward their “socialism” recedes farther into the future and is eventually lost altogether. You must not confuse such leaders of the working class with the delegates the socialist movement chooses to carry out its will. The former has no mandate to abolish capitalism even if they wished to do so—the latter are the instruments the majority in society will use to institute Socialism. To think in terms of political power without political knowledge on the part of those who make up that power is to oppose all that socialism means.

Edinburgh and rents

Private rents now account for about a third of all households in Edinburgh - roughly 140,000 city residents - as numbers soared in the years following the financial crash. There has been a rise of 33.7% in rent costs between 2010 and 2017 in Edinburgh and the Lothians, the Scottish Government figures show, while rising 6.9% between 2016 and 2017. 

Glasgow has also seen a 32.1% since the start of the decade and 7% over the year. All other areas of Scotland are below the national average of 19.9% and 4.4% respectively.

The average rental cost of a two-bedroom flat now stands at almost £900. The same type of property costs about £550 across the rest of Scotland.

 For a one-bedroom flat, it now costs more than £700 (£704) to rent a one-bedroom flat in the capital on average - up from £520 at the start of the year.

Adam Lang of Shelter Scotland, said: “Rent increases of these amounts will hurt those who are already living on a knife-edge. “We already know that a great many families are struggling day-to-day to keep a roof over their heads. Affordability was the single biggest reason people came to Shelter Scotland with last year and private renters are the biggest group who contact Shelter Scotland for help."

Fight the Disease, Not the Symptoms

The Socialist Party would agree with the proposition that labour and management have nothing in common. Fundamentally, the interests of management must be to operate profitably. They are not in business for the benefit of the employees (albeit some employers may be benevolent because it means harmonious industrial relations and therefore good business-sense). Labour, on the other hand, is primarily concerned with wages, hours, and working conditions. Without their unions, labour would be in a sorry plight, for capital is in the stronger position, economically. Unions are the only weapons workers have. There exist ample experience and plenty of evidence to realise where labour would be if they had not resisted and fought.

It is mistaken to believe that anyone can serve both the bosses and the workers. There is a basic conflict of economic interests. Employers are concerned with lowering labour costs; employees are concerned with a living wage to support their families. Without resistance by workers in their unions, the tendency of capital is to reduce labour costs to the very bone in the interests of their profits. Invariably, capital will always cry “poverty,” despite what the real facts might be. There is a conflict of interests between capital and labour because, in the final analysis, a reduction in wages results in an increase in profits. Conversely, an increase in wages results in a decrease in profits. Inexorably, wages are determined by the cost of existence of the workers. It is the rise in living costs that compels the fight for higher wages. The superstition that a rise in wages causes a rise in prices is nothing but brainwashing propaganda on the part of capital. It is as simple as that.

This fact of life is what gave birth to trade unions in the first place. The labour movement was not created by philanthropists. It arose because of the solidarity of unionists in their common interests. This very solidarity gave rise to its democratic procedures. Within trade unionism, no action should be taken without the approval of the membership. The members must be watchdogs, constantly on the alert for abuses of sound unionism. The union is controlled by its members and not by any officialdom. The Socialist Party advocates trade unionism — the economic manifestation of the class struggle, but we certainly do not support all aspects of trade union activity such as its growing bureaucracy and endorsement of capitalist political parties. Workers are divorced from the means of production. Unions function to offer workers some protection within the limits of this estrangement. Therefore unions do not and cannot give workers an opportunity to have a real say in the vital processes of our society; unions, like the workers who compose them, are cut off from the roots of social processes.

 Nothing has taken place in recent developments that have even remotely repudiated the wage-labor and capital basis of present-day capitalism. This also applies to the following: the prime object of production is the production of commodities to be sold on the market with a view to profit; that the accumulation of capital is accompanied by and concomitant with the production of surplus values; that there does take place a class struggle both economically and politically; that the transformation of ownership from entrepreneurs to gigantic combines and state ownership still finds a class whose members are the “eaters of surplus value,” even though they may be government bond-holders, a state bureaucracy or the One-Party.  The general analyses of Marxian economics have not been found invalid despite the best efforts of capitalist academics who claim that we socialists " Were correct yesterday but wrong today." But capitalism remains capitalism.

It suffices to say that the workers do not have “economic power” as long as they are wage slaves. Economic power has no meaning when it is confined to just withholding your labour power from production, which still leaves economic power in the hands of the masters. Economic power flows from having political control of the state machinery. Remember: in spite of all their growing economic influence, prestige, and advantages, the rising bourgeoisie was choked by the control of the state by the feudal aristocracy. The success of the bourgeois revolution (capture of the state) transferred economic power into the hands of the new rising bourgeois class. The class struggle is one of scientific socialism’s three great contributions to knowledge. Unions deal with the economic phase of the class struggle, not its political phase. The realisation of the class struggle leads to the understanding that the politically awakened working class will vote for socialism.

There are those in other organisations who are very close to the views of the Socialist Party on most matters, except on the use of the ballot. These anti-parliamentarian views arose from the concepts of syndicalism, industrial unionism and workers councils. To them, the road to socialism was via the path of economic organisation of the workers. They stressed that the State was an organ of the ruling class and electoral activity was a deception, merely a democratic form and not democratic essence. However, it is not the economic phase that is the highest expression of the class struggle, but the political phase. In the factories, co-ops, unions, we are fragmented, sectionalised and tied to our interests, but on the political field, we can make our numbers tell in a way in which they cannot use the state to strangle. The economic phase by its very nature is limited to working within the framework of capitalism. It is the fact that State power is in the hands of the ruling class that stymies workers from revolutionary changes. Titles and deeds, the military forces, etc., are in the hands of the ruling class through its control of the State. The essence of Marx’s writing (from the Communist Manifesto on) was consistent in stressing the need for political action, and this view has stood the acid test of unfolding events. Because the state is the central organ of power, it requires the political action of a resolute, determined class-conscious majority to accomplish the transfer of the means of living from the hands of the parasites to the possession of society, as a whole. That is revolutionary socialist political action. 

The class struggle is one of socialism’s great contributions to knowledge. Unions deal with the economic phase of the class struggle, not its political phase.

A number of writers are fond of describing socialism as a society in which the worker gets the “full product of his or her toil.” This is a misleading concept. There is no class of workers in a socialist society. There are only citizens, members of society, who receive according to their need. If everyone got the full product what would be left for the common administration of the affairs of the whole community?

We Want Freedom for All

The Socialist Party is made up of workers who share agreement on some simple generalisations. Our bond of comradeship is rooted in the acceptance of the barest minimum of socialist principles which are

1. Socialism is a product of social evolution;
2. The socialist revolution is inherently democratic because of its nature of being conscious, majority, and political;
3. Socialism is based on the social relations of a community of interests between all the members of society and society as a whole.
4. A socialist is one who recognises and realises that capitalism can no longer be reformed or administered in the interest of society or of the working class;
5. Capitalism is incapable of eliminating poverty, war, crises, etc.;

The times call for arousing the majority to become socialists to construct socialism, which is now possible and necessary.

To establish socialism, the workers must first gain control of the powers of government through their political organisation. The state is the central organ of power in the hands of the capitalist class. The state has through the ecades demonstrated its function as the executive committee of the capitalist class.  By gaining control of the powers of the state, the socialist majority are in a position to transfer the means of living from the parasites, who own them, to society, where they belong. This is the only function or need the working class has of the state/government. As soon as the revolution has accomplished this task, the state is replaced by the socialist administration of affairs. There is no government in a socialist society. We emphasise that the ballot is the lever of emancipation.  We urge the socialist majority to vote for socialism, and socialism alone. If the workers ever rely or depend on the Socialist Party, then the Party may well indeed sell them down the river but nothing could be more repugnant to a member of the Socialist Party than the idea of voting for it so that they might do something for the workers. We are uncompromisingly opposed to any leadership policy or principle!  We are organised for action to change the world from capitalism to socialism. We are not concerned with the problems of administering capitalism. Capitalism cannot be administered in the interests of the working class or of society as a whole. 

 The Socialist Party is always prepared express solidarity in the economic struggles between the wage slaves and their parasitic masters over the division of the wealth produced by the workers. We also always support the fight for civil and human liberties. Workers who are satisfied with the status quo, are contented slaves and poor prospects for socialist revolution. Civil liberties are powerful tools for socialist victory. What stands in the way of socialism, today? It is not the limitations of technology, nor of the material conditions of existence. It is not the lack of literacy, scientific information or democratic forms. The only material condition lacking is a majority of class-conscious revolutionary socialists determined to inaugurate the new social system. Building that majority is the task of the socialist movement. Our great ally is the workings of capitalism and the lessons of experience. That is the latent strength of socialism. Once the workers wake up and the ideas of socialism spread like wildfire, they have the tools ready to hand — the vote. All that the capitalist class can do is to submit to the inevitable.

The Socialist Party does not advocate reforms nor fight for reforms, that does not mean that it refuses to accept reforms. However, reforms and reformism are just because their objectives are palliative in nature and are fought for in order to make the system function more smoothly. Historically, reformism has dissipated the earnest energies of so-called socialists from doing any socialist work. Once achieved the need to protect the gains of the reforms is an all-time job. Reforms are efforts to introduce measures into the legal machinery of the State for making the operation of capitalism more efficient. The difficulties that arise from the irreconcilable contradictions of the system require “remedial” measures. Thus the advocacy and fight for reforms, such as nationalisation, social welfare, tax relief, and the host of proposals as can be found in the programmes of all the parties that are geared to the amelioration of the conditions of life with a view to a better administration of capitalism.

But we have to distinguish activities that some like to equate with reformism but we consider not to be..

1. Workers going out on strike over wages, hours, work-shop conditions, have as their objective resistance to increased exploitation. The economic phase of the class struggle, trade unionism, is sometimes mistakenly referred to as a reform. It is undeniable that many unions do engage in reform activities. Workers are compelled to organise into unions by the very conditions of capitalism, i.e., the division of the new value produced by the workers into its two component parts: variable capital (the workers’ share) and surplus value (the capitalists’ share). Through the mechanism of unionism, the workers, over the long run, sell their commodity, labour power, at its value. 
2. Socialists fighting for civil liberties, the right to free speech, to publish and distribute literature, removing restrictions from the franchise and similar activities strengthen the workers' movement to get rid of capitalism — and have nothing to do with reforming the system. The strength of the socialist movement is that it is the task of the vast majority. Democratic procedures are the essential conditions for the social change we are working for; they themselves are the special products of the material conditions of the 20th century. Civil liberties are revolutionary weapons in the hands of socialists and the socialist majority. This is not a reform activity.

The fight by workers for their economic interests within the framework of capitalism is the economic phase of the class struggle. The fight for civil liberties within the framework of capitalism is a manifestation of the highest expression of the class struggle, its political phase.

Glasgow branch meeting

Wednesday, 15 November 
 7:00pm - 9:00pm

Maryhill Community Central Halls,
 304 Maryhill Road, 
Glasgow G20 7YE

The Socialist Party policy is not to advocate any reform, but to advocate only socialism. However, the Socialist Party is not the socialist "party" that Marx (or even our Declaration of Principles) envisages, ie the working class as a whole organised politically for socialism. That will come later. At the moment, the Socialist Party can be described as only a socialist propaganda or socialist education organisation and can't be anything else (and nor would it try to be, at the moment ). Possibly, we might be the embryo of the future mass "socialist party" but there's no guarantee that we will be ( more likely just a contributing element). But who cares? As long as such a party does eventually emerges. At some stage, for whatever reason, socialist consciousness will reach a "critical mass" , at which point it will just snowball and carry people along with it. It may even come about without people actually giving it the label of socialism.

In 1904 we raised the banner for such a single, mass socialist party and proclaimed itself as the basis of such a party. Not only did the working class in general not "muster under its banner" but neither did all socialists. So although with a long history as a political party based on agreed goals, methods and organisational principles we were left as a small propagandist group, but still committed to the tenets set out in our Declaration of Principles. But we have never been so arrogant as to claim that we're the only socialists and that anybody not in the Socialist Party is not a socialist. There are socialists outside our party, and some of them are organised in different groups. That doesn't mean that we are not opposed to the organisations they have formed, but we are not opposed to them because we think they represent some section of the capitalist class. We are opposed to them because we disagree with what they are proposing the working class should do to get socialism -- and of course, the opposite is the case too: they're opposed to what we propose. Nearly all the others who stand for a class-free, state-free, money-free, wage-free society are anti-parliamentary (the old Socialist Labour Party being an exception). For ourselves, using the existing historically-evolved mechanism of political democracy (the ballot box and parliament) is the best and safest way for a socialist-minded working class majority to get to socialism. For them, it's anathema. For the Socialist Party, some of the alternatives they suggest (armed insurrection or a general strike) are anathema. We all present our respective proposals for working-class action to get socialism and, while criticising each other's proposals, not challenging each other's socialist credentials.

In the meantime, the best thing we  can do is to carry on campaigning for a world community based on the common ownership and democratic control of the Earth's natural and industrial resources in the interests of all humanity.  We will continue to propose that this is established by democratic, majority political action. Other groups will no doubt continue to propose your own way to get there. And, in the end, we'll see which proposal the majority working class takes up. When the socialist idea catches on we'll then have our united movement.