Socialism – The Solidarity Economy

Long before the coming of the World Socialist Movement, it was understood by the economists that all wealth is produced by labour. How then, it was questioned, can profits be accounted for? If labour produces all wealth why do not the labourers receive their full product? The answer to this question was not known until it came from Karl Marx. Wages, said Marx, are not the full product of labour. Nor are wages any,definite part of the product. Wages are simply the selling price of the worker in the market. This selling price, on the average, is just enough to keep the worker in good condition to do work and reproduce someone to take his or her place. For instance, if the worker toils ten hours and produces $10.00 worth of wealth, he does not receive $10.00, nor $5.00. If $2.00 will support him he receives $2.00, and no more. These $2.00 are his wages and the remaining $8.00 are the profits of the capitalist. If the hours of the worker be increased, and better machines introduced, the workers' product is increased, let us say, to $15.00. Do the workers' wages go up? No. Instead of rising they fall. They are now but $1.50.

The theory of surplus value is the beginning of all socialist knowledge. It shows the capitalist in his true light, that of an idler and parasite. It proves to the workers that capitalists should no longer be permitted to take any of their product. Without this knowledge, the worker will never fight along correct lines. With this knowledge, he will never stop fighting until Socialism, which will give to the working class the whole of its product, shall be fully realised.

An understanding of the class struggle, which we have repeatedly discussed before, comes only from a knowledge of the economic interpretation of history. If the conditions of a people are determined by the nature of the tools they use, of the work they do, and by their relation to these tools (that is, whether they own them or not), then we may easily obtain an insight into the working class struggle. All the great revolutions of history, said Marx, have been class struggles. So, too, must be the movement of the workers. No class has been really free until it has ruled society. Therefore the working class, to be free, must rule society. But the workers, when they free themselves, will make slaves of no one. Machines will be so developed that everyone can labor and live in freedom. Long ago slavery was necessary to the end that the master might develop civilization. In socialism a higher and better civilisation will be open to all.

Until Marx, it was generally thought that history was made by great men. Great men won battles, made treaties of peace, created constitutions and laws, ruled nations, and saved humanity from destruction. Marx and Engels showed, through their study of history, that this was a childish view of life and of government. The great facts of history-its wars, its governments, its art, science, and literature-these were created by a deeper social force. This force, said Marx, was the economic or material force. People lived as they did and acted as they did because they made their living in a certain way. If they used small, crude tools, and the soil they worked. was poor, their ideas would be much different from what they would be if they used larger and more productive tools upon richer soil. The nature of man's social life depends chiefly upon the physical conditions under which he is living. This same principle is true in matters of morality. An individual, or nation, or a class, will finally come to think that right which is to his material advantage. Nations make war in order to add to their possessions. Individuals engage in such work or business as will yield them the largest pay or profits. A class will fight to the death with another class over profits or wages.

In war, killing people and burning cities is thought to be a patriotic work. If successful it is considered to be right and fine. In industry, the capitalists will enslave small children, and the profits wrung from their pitiful toil goes to build churches and universities and support Christian missions. The murderous capitalist who robs cradles to get his gold comes to be praised as most "benevolent," "virtuous," "religious," etc.

When the worker, either through experience or a study of Socialism, come to know this truth, he acts accordingly. He retains absolutely no respect for the property "rights" of the profit-takers. He will use any weapon which will win his fight. He knows that the present laws of property are made by and for the capitalists. Therefore he does not hesitate to break them. He knows that whatever action advances the interests of the working class is right because it will save the workers from destruction and death. A knowledge of economic determinism places the worker squarely oil his intellectual feet and makes him bold and independent of mind.

The necessity and value of a knowledge of socialism to the working class need not be emphasized. Into every country has gone the Socialist Party with its message of enlightenment and hope. This part of its work has just begun. During our political campaigns, the educational work of the Party is especially effective. It can then get the ear of the working class and emphasise the great truths it bears, drawing the attention of the working class to socialism and spreading a desire to understand it. The mission of the Socialist Party is therefore twofold:

First, it must lay bold of all the powers of political government and prevent them from being used against the industrial organization of the workers.

Second, it must be the bearer of sound knowledge, using its great and growing organisation to teach socialism.

The Socialist Party through its knowledge of the law governing social progress gains an insight into the future which is impossible to those ignorant of social evolution.  Through the study of history, we come to understand the part played by revolutions. Whenever a social class has become powerful enough to rule society it has seized the reins of government. When the working class is strong enough at the ballot box, it will make an end to capitalism. That period in which it will be engaged in the work of seizing all the powers of industrial and political government will be the period of the social revolution. Of course, we cannot tell when this will come. Neither can we tell whether the period of revolution will be long or short? Both will depend upon several facts. The most important question is, how long will take for the working class to educate and organize itself. This will depend much on what the capitalists will do. The revolution might be hastened by a recession. It might be retarded by reforms or a war. But it is bound to come. That the Socialist Party can clearly see. For the revolution to be successful, it will have to result in the common ownership and democratic control of the fields, the factories, the mines and communications by the workers.  When a worker understands socialism, he or she does not ask who will do the hard work, will socialism divvy up the fruits of labour, will socialism destroy incentive and similar questions. The questions which come into our minds about socialism are few and simple.  "The less work the better," is the motto which the workers must set themselves. Let all the wealth now wasted in wars, in the commerce of the market - let all this waste stop. Let the immense profits which now go to the capitalists be taken by the workers. Let the workers be liberated for the many inventions and the development of better processes, which would rapidly follow inside Socialism. If all this were to be done, it is readily seen that a small portion of the day, or a few days per month, or a few months steady work per year, will yield wealth in abundance. It would be foolish for us to say how much a worker should work because we do not know how much wealth lie will desire for himself and his family. It is not for us to determine that. But it is most reasonable to suppose that with socialism an individual working eight hours a day for four months in the year will produce food, clothing, and shelter in abundance for a family. Those who will not work will probably not be permitted to starve. They will undoubtedly be tenderly cared for in insane hospitals and nursed back to health. At present, even, all healthful people wish to work, yet none desire life-long slavery to the profit of others.

 The working class, through securing freedom for itself, will liberate humanity itself. Socialism will free not only the slave but the slave-driver and the slave-owner. Socialism today makes war upon the enemies of the working class. When it is victorious, the enemies of the working class will embrace it. Peace and brotherhood will come with freedom.

 

Suicidal Scotland

Scotland still has the worst suicide rate in Britain – despite long-term improvements from a record high. Official figures yesterday revealed 13.9 deaths for every 100,000 people in Scotland last year, compared with 9.2 in England.

The Samaritans charity warned in May that the Scottish Government had not treated suicide as top priority.

We Have the Power

The unity of labour upon the basis of the class struggle. is at this time the supreme need of the working class. We are engaged today in a class war for the simple reason that in the capitalist system in which we live, society has been divided into two economic classes – a small class of capitalists who own the tools with which work is done and wealth is produced. and a great mass of workers who are compelled to sell themselves on the labour market as they are property-less. Between these two classes there is an irreconcilable economic conflict. No master ever had any respect for his slave, and no slave ever had any love for the master. The capitalist who never works comes to despise work and the workers. The worker naturally hates the capitalist who is taking such huge profits and paying such low wages. But at first, the worker's opinions are not clear in his own mind. In fact, few workers even now understand the real problem which confronts them. Capitalists cannot live without wage-workers. Where one class exists there the other will be found. Furthermore, there is sure to be trouble between the two. The master is always scheming to get more profits out of the worker. The worker fights for more wages from his boss. The less one gets the more there is for the other. Hence we have, between the capitalist and his worker, what is known as the class struggle. Unfortunately the workers do not yet understand the nature of this struggle, and for this reason, has hitherto failed to accomplish any effective unity of their class.

Socialism is the future system of modern society. Under capitalism, today machinery and other means of wealth production are privately owned. Under Socialism tomorrow they will be owned in common. Under capitalism constitutional government's main purpose is the protection of private property, Industry is at present governed by a few tyrants. Its purpose is to take from the workers as much wealth as possible. With socialism will be fully democratic, an industrial democracy. Its purpose will be to manage production and to establish and conduct the great social institutions required by humanity. Political government will then, of course, have ceased to exist. Socialism will save the working class, or rather, show the working class how to save itself. The world does not need to be cursed by long hours, by low wages, by starvation, by worry, and by disease.  When enough of the workers understand Socialism, believe in it, and are firmly resolved to have it, the time will be ripe for the change. That change is coming. It is coming soon. The working class is today enslaved chiefly because it does not understand the conditions of its life. A few rich people own the land and machines. The many who toil have nothing. This every worker knows.  

Only when they fully understand will the first great step toward a better condition have been taken. New technology and robotics have come to free the working class. Until the invention of machines people were enslaved by small tools to the soil. For them, it was work or starve. Work or starve it is still, not because nature forces us to do so, but because we have not yet seen our way out of it. We are enslaved not to the soil but to the people who own the factories. The world socialist movement has come to place technology, the shops, the transport networks, the land and the mines in the possession of the workers. That will mean freedom, security, and opportunity for all who live. The worker cannot rise as a worker without joining in unity with other workers and helping all. This mutual dependence of worker upon worker taught them by their everyday experiences in the shop, is the best and finest thing in modern life. It leads to brotherhood. It develops the mind of the worker. It raises us out of a state of individual selfishness and points to the goal of cooperation - Socialism.

When the World Socialist Movement was first started, socialists aimed to do two things. First, they wished to abolish competition and establish cooperation. Second, they wished to have the working class so organised that they could control the machinery of production and share in the whole product. Competition was known to be a very great evil. It immensely increased the whole amount of work to be done. For instance, instead of having one fine large department store in a city of 25,000 people, the socialists saw a hundred small stores. The socialists saw the competing businessmen cheat one another and the consumers. They saw ten doing work which one could do. Surely this, said the socialists, is a most foolish and wasteful way of doing business. Socialism would make an end of it. Socialism would bring about co-operation instead of competition. It would end competition not only in the store, but also in the work-shop.

The capitalists rule the world today because they have control over the State. In their war upon the working class, one of the most effective weapons of the capitalists has been the physical force wielded by their political government. Everywhere the workers have been fooled into supporting this government.  The Republican and Democratic parties, the Tories or the Labour Party and all the other various reform parties are maintained to keep the workers divided. Whichever of these capitalist parties is victorious, the workers are always defeated. Pro-capitalist politicians alike use the powers of government in the interests of the master class. Fortunately, workers have the vote. At first they foolishly try to defend themselves by defeating this or that obnoxious politician of the old parties. They vote for such politicians as call themselves "the friends of labour." But they soon find out again that "the friends of labour" out of office, become the enemies of labour when in office. So finally, in every country under the sun, the workers are obliged to organise a party of their own - a socialist party. 

The Socialist Party stands for the POLITICAL supremacy of labour. Its purpose is not to secure old age pensions and free meals for school children. Its mission is to help overthrow capitalism and establish socialism. The object of the Socialist Party is to capture the powers of the State and thus prevent them from being used by the capitalists against the workers. The Socialist Party is not a political party in the same sense as other parties. The success of socialism would abolish practically every office existing under the present form of government. 

Number Two Party

Alex Salmond's resignation may have reduced the SNP numbers by one but its membership has overtaken the Conservatives.  

The SNP has just under 125,500 registered members, compared to 124,000 for the Tories. Labour had the highest with 540,000 members.

The future belongs to labour

When the producers, who work for wages, organize politically and economically, they will have taken a long step in the direction of industrial freedom. The Socialist Party Declarations of Principles is not intended to apply to only one country but is intended to cover wage-worker in all countries.  Fundamentally, there is no difference between those workers who move about from job to job and from one industry to another in one city or neighborhood, and those who cross nations shifting from locality to locality, and following now one and again another industrial calling. The only thing that distinguishes or rather differentiates one from the other is the distance in which they move about. To change residence from one part of the city to another, is not different to changing from one city, or country or continent, to another. The necessity to move arises from a common cause. The problem of the one element is the problem of the other, and they must unite to solve it.

The migrant is an unemployed wage-worker in search of employment. He or she may find a job within reaching-distance of their residence or may have to travel thousands of miles to find one. But find a job they must, or suffer. To sell one's labour power is the sentence of capitalism upon the wage-worker. To try to sell it is his or her pressing business when unemployed. How far they must travel before they succeed in doing so depends on the circumstances and the person. Between the city's unemployed, who tramp the streets from factory to factory, and those who go from place to place, there is no difference substantially. The difference is only psychological, not material. The condition is identical, resulting from the same cause, springing from the same source, and demanding the same remedy. They must unite to solve that problem. Socialism offers the only means for doing so. The existing ownership and the class relationship growing out of it makes it imperative for the migratory workers to seek permanent access to the means of life—the earth's resources and the instruments of production. This element is where it must move for its own preservation, and the only objective toward which its condition and experiences are driving it entails a revolutionary change. It must have access to its means of livelihood. The present system of ownership stands between it and the social destination toward which it must travel—it must remove and replace that system of ownership before it attains security for itself.

Socialism is a message of hope

Humanity faces a multi-faceted crisis. Endless wars, economic inequality, racism, xenophobia, sexism and other forms of hate-filled discrimination and possible climate Armageddon. There is no “we”; there is only “us and them.” There are two opposing sides in this struggle. Pleading with those few with wealth and power to do the right thing is not a very effective strategy and it hasn’t gotten us very far up to now. A better strategy is to take the power and wealth into our own hands – into the hands of the majority – and use that political power to directly address the problems we face. We must adopt the democratic position of the majority giving the orders rather than continuing to accept the crumbs offered by the unelected minority that has been running the system for generations. We have to identify who’s on our side and whom we’re up against. Our allies are broadly speaking all working people, every person who lives from pay cheque to pay cheque.

Does capitalism deserve to be supported any longer? It brings hard toil, misery, and desolation, in peace and in war, to the mass of the people. It is time those who bear the sufferings took time to think how those sufferings could be abolished. The only way to do so is to destroy the source from which they flow—the private ownership of the means of production. It is high time that the workers realised that whoever rules over them will continue to serve the interests of only one section of society, the capitalist class. In socialism, there will be no ruling class and no working class, just free and equal human beings who will run society’s affairs communally and democratically. Socialist society will serve the interests of all.

One of the consequences of believing that big is bad is that certain key aspects of capitalism—such as markets, money, and buying and selling—can come to be seen as acceptable provided they only exist on a small-scale; then they become beautiful. 

Marxism is not a dogma, not a record of the sayings and doings of Karl Marx to be carefully preserved and uncritically applied whatever the circumstances. Marxism is a method of assessing what, at any particular time, is in the best interest of the working class and should be done to hasten the establishment of socialism.

Being Marxists, the Socialist Party broadly accepts the analyses of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels which indicted the capitalist mode of production as underpinning the state of class divide in contemporary society. They identified that the material abundance created by capitalism paradoxically involved the exploitation of the majority of people, and their deprivation from a share in the fruits of their own labour. Nevertheless, their subjugation could also provide an opportunity for the emergence of a class consciousness, an opportunity for a consciousness that could bring about a socialist revolution which would dispossess the capitalists of their ownership of the means of production. This would in effect dissolve the basis for class domination and in turn, allow for a different kind of economy built on efforts in common.

Mankind is facing frightful threats to its survival. Some already believe it is already too late and doomsday unavoidable. The Socialist Party believes that humankind is not doomed and it is not merely wishful thinking but we make no predictions about the future. Within a capitalist society, human beings are despised, alienated, exploited, oppressed or denied basic dignity.  There is no better way than to dedicate your life to the great cause of ending such a humiliating system.

The Price System Has Outlived Its Usefulness

The Socialist Party differs from every other political party and organisation in that it has set up the abolition of the wage system as its standard. The Socialist Party is working on changing the basic foundation of the current social system. Its enemies are the capitalist class, and capitalist lackeys of every kind and stripe The State is the servant of commerce. A mere change of personnel does not satisfy us. There have been changes of politicians in the State machinery but the wage system has stayed. The exploitation continues. And it will continue, until the workers take control of the fields, the factories and the means of production, and abolish the wage system. We are wage-workers, wage-slaves, and we bear the weight of this system upon our backs. The abolition of the wage system is our organisation’s expressed goal, to which we must cling with determined conviction. Solidarity of labour is a prospect of which the employing class stands in dread.

 Capitalism rules unmercifully. Its convulsive grip and its terrible use are expressed in profit, poverty, and want. While the other political parties are occupied with reforms, the Socialist Party is set upon the overthrow of the capitalist system. The new society, of which we speak of, cannot be realised without a class struggle. Our organization promises nothing, but if our fellow-workers become its members the reward will be a new, free, and happy world, where there are no more classes, no more wage-worker, and no more idle parasites. A social system, which will not be led by the privileged but carefully guarded by society’s useful producers. A world in which everyone will have to do their useful social work if they want to live.

Let us organise, read, and learn, because we have no time to lose. The future belongs to the workers.


That form of social organisation known as socialism should not be-in fact, is nota hazy or nebulous conception. The working class is essentially a democratic class and in its new society the ownership and control of the means of life, must necessarily be democratic for to give an opportunity for a monopoly to reappear is unthinkable. Freedom of access to the machines and enjoyment of the full product of one’s toil must be the base of life. Participation in production will make the worker a joint owner and administrator with his fellows, not only in the industry in which he or she works, but in all industries - in all the wealth producing activities of humanity. The evils in society that compel organisation into socialist parties by the wage-workers are inherent in the capitalist system. They are its logical fruit. The philosophy of the Socialist Party is not the philosophy of salvation through physical force, but the philosophy of freedom through organised political power. It does not teach the doctrine of blood-letting and wide-spread misery, but the doctrine of human dignity and the abolition of misery.


As a changing mode of production operates to change all the institutions depending upon it, it is as well to recognise that production is the substantial foundation upon which any society rests. So that in any society that element only is necessary whose functions are essential to the prevailing productive system. In present day society, this element is comprised of every population which labors for a wage. Without the wage labourers our system of production could not endure.

A little consideration will satisfy even the most prejudiced that if the wage workers did not make and operate the tools of production, this system of production would go to pieces and our present civilization disappear.

The clothes we wear, the food we eat, the houses that afford shelter, the means of transportation on land, sea and air would all be out of reach, were not the hands of the wage labouring class busy in productive social service. Society does not depend upon the capitalist or the politician. It depends upon the workers. From the most primitive forms up to the present, human society has always depended upon the working class element. The workers have always constituted the social guarantee, and their efforts as producers is the price that humankind has paid for its existence, from the time when man lived precariously until the present day, when the question of sufficient to enable the race to survive has been answered by superabundant production.

The productive facilities and capacity must exist before an organised society is possible, which is to say that production is prior to and more important than politics. Politics is the handmaiden of industry. As the system of production changes, so do we observe corresponding social and political changes.

But by whom is the mode of production changed? Obviously by those who alone are competent to change it—the human productive factors, at the present time, the wage workers. For if this contention did not hold true, our philosophy would be at fault. If it could be proven that the capitalists, as such, have contributed to the change in the productive system, then they would have justified their existence in a social sense. But they have not done so. Every change effected, which has won social advantage industrially, has been due, to those actively engaged in productive work. The capitalist, as such, seized and fattened upon every invention, mechanical and administrative improvement. He has never contributed anything to human advancement. He is a parasite, and like all other parasites, he has no independent existence, but lives upon the constructive wealth-producing organism which the enthralled labour of the ages has built up.


The power of the capitalist class is a delegated power, which labour ignorance has invested in it. It has no power in itself. Labour is power, and, when conscious of its own interest and its social responsibility, it is the only power. Therefore, the Socialist Party depends upon education, not upon terror. Facts are its weapons, not bombs. It is busy teaching instead of intimidating. Its arsenal is lined with bookshelves, and not with gun-racks. Truth is its artillery, and justice its objective. The Socialist Party brings hope to the dispossessed and downtrodden, and promises the planet and the fullness thereof to those who make use of the one to bring forth the other. One for all and all for one.

Understanding what is needed

To state it plainly capitalism is an economic system based upon exploitation. People's minds are indoctrinated with falsehoods about the virtues of the private-property profit system. Capitalism is a brutal system where the one who holds the wealth holds the power.  Duping people is admired and fakery is promoted and encouraged. That is how business is done in capitalism. Capitalism is a system based on gaining the advantage over someone and then exploiting that leverage.  Under capitalism working people build the buildings, grow the food, stock the shelves, and are then charged to use all the things they collectively produce and use while the bosses and investors take all the profits. Far from capitalism of having tamed the savage, It has made man into a “savage."

Socialism will be a society entirely geared to satisfying human needs. What human beings decide they want will be paramount; everything else will be subordinate to this aim. It is difficult for us living in a capitalist society where time-measured cost as reflected in accounting in monetary units is paramount, and where human energies are no more than a costed factor of production. to appreciate how enormous a change this will be. Today time is money and the economic pressure is to do everything as quickly as possible. In socialism not only will there be no money but time will no longer be so important. Men and women will be free to choose to take longer to produce something if, for instance, this slower production method gives the producers more pleasure, is less unpleasant or results in a product that is better for the health and the welfare of human beings.  Socialism is to satisfy human wants and needs. 

When we have cleared up the mess left by capitalism—which will involve an immense increase in production to eliminate material want and misery throughout the world—socialism can be expected to become a stable, slow-changing society, in terms both of population size and of the wants and consumption habits of its members. This will considerably simplify the task of balancing production and consumption. As the consumption habits would be stable or only slowly changing, so would the distribution circuits. Everything would be running more or less smoothly from year to year: adjustments would be relatively easy since it would only be a question of adding something here or subtracting something there in the context of an already functioning system. Production can be expected to platform off (and eventually may even fall since goods will be well-made and so will last longer than today, so needing to be replaced less often). Nevertheless, it is still useful to outline how such a system of ensuring the satisfaction of the material needs of humans might function.

The material needs of human beings boil down basically to food, clothing, and shelter. We will begin with food. Here, as with everything else in socialism, humans will have a free choice. Having made this proviso, however, it is hard to sec the people of socialist society being satisfied with the Instant this and Quick that that is the staple diet of most people today. In fact, most of the food available today in shops and supermarkets are likely to be rejected as substandard. If only for the sake of their health (quite apart from improved taste) people are going to demand more fresh fruit and vegetables and more free-range animal products.

If we imagine people living in much smaller urban communities than today we can also imagine this need being satisfied to the maximum extent possible locally, with each town/country area trying to be as self-sufficient in these products as it can. Some, of course, will be less successful in this than others, their excess needs having to be satisfied on an inter-regional basis in the same sort of way as we shall see could be applied for certain other consumer goods.

What we have described here is not something completely new thought up by socialists. It is something which already exists and which we are suggesting could be extended and adapted to serve human needs, instead of being prostituted in the service of profit and capital accumulation. After all, as we have always said, the material basis for socialism (of which the mechanism for adjusting supply to needs is one aspect) already exists, and has existed for some time; all that is lacking is the will to change society so as to be able to take full advantage of it.

Whether votes are a power or not depends upon the type of men who cast them. If the voters regard the capitalists as “ bread-givers," such workers will certainly not capture political power through the vote they cast. So far as they possess the vote at all, they will rather be inclined to sell the political power which it represents to the highest bidder. When the workers form a majority and are conscious of their importance to society, their voting for the Socialist Party signifies that they have recognised their strength and are determined to make use of it and it will be from our constant reiteration of the fact that the cause of the majority of the evils with which the working-class are to-day so miserably and persistently afflicted is to be found in the capitalist nature of modern society that fellow-workers will realise their wage-slave condition.

September 2018 Socialist Standard No.1369

Due to a security incident, the websites for the World Socialist Movement and the Socialist Party of Great Britain are currently down for extended maintenance. The Socialist Standard published without interruption since 1904, was therefore unable to publish the web version in the usual manner on their website. So this is for  the time being, an unusual version, using the Socialism or Your Money Back blog to deliver backup pages in real time.




  We will to be back on our own websites propagating socialism,very soon, we have never stopped, with important historical archival material dating from 1904 to the present day .

PDF Editorial: Capitalism doesn't care Pathfinders Anti-semitism: What it is and What it isn't. Cooking the Books 1: When did capitalism start? Wood for the Trees Material World: Ortega – The new Somoza? The Hard Left: A 21st Century Anachronism A Letter from Turkey: Hard Times in Asia Minor How to Destroy Capitalism: Blueprint for Revolution Capitalism and Food: Consuming Hunger Cooking the Books 2: Gizza’ job Franchise Centenary: A Very Limited Democracy Proper Gander: Revenue Streams Reviews :Books :Film  :Exhibition 50 Years Ago: What! No Money! Obituary: Dorothy Morriss Meetings Rear View Free Lunch

Humanity stands at a precipice

 The Socialist Party makes no apology for our preoccupation with Capitalism being alone responsible for the problems now confronting the working-class. It is clear that we must of necessity make frequent, and repeated references to that system and the effects to which it gives rise.  The capitalist system is a fact. It is not the creation of an abnormal socialist imagination, devoid of all basis in reality. It is not a bogey, raised by us to frighten normally contented workers into supporting us.

 Although we are the only party that, stands for the total abolition of Capitalism, we are not the only organisation that makes attacks upon it. All kinds of organisations and individuals are continually making efforts to reform and improve it. Even the capitalist class itself, through its apologists and its stooges takes great pains to convince the workers of its merits and the manifold benefits it confers upon them. True they refer more to “private or free enterprise system” than they do to capitalism.


Firstly. It is a class society. One class, the workers, possesses no property, and are consequently compelled to sell their abilities and energies to others in order to live. The other class, the Capitalist class, by virtue of their ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution, i.e., the. laud, the factories, the mines, the railways, etc., can buy the worker’s only commodity, his power to work, and exploit it for their own profit.


Secondly. Arising out of this relationship between the possessors and non-possessors of property, there results of necessity a conflict of interest between the two classes. The capitalist class, as a whole, do their utmost to maintain, and, if possible, increase their property, which they can only do at the expense of the working-class. They strive hard to keep the level of wages low and attempt, by all the means, possible to keep a plus sign in front of their annual profit figure. On the other hand, it is obviously in the worker’s interest to keep their wages high and their working hours low. Industrially, this struggle finds organisational expression in Trade Unions and Employer’s Federations; politically, in the attempts of the various parties to obtain Parliamentary power


Thirdly. Out of this class division in society arises also the wages system, whereby, for services rendered to his employer, the worker receives in return an amount of money, which he exchanges for the various commodities needed by him. The amount he receives in wages is seldom more than enough to maintain him in a state of reasonable working efficiency. It also enables him to raise a number of children to continue the good work of making profits for capitalists when he is reaping the reward of his lifetime of labour in the workhouse or on the parish


Fourthly. The goods produced by the workers take the form of commodities, i.e., they are goods produced for sale or exchange. They are not articles produced solely for use, but are made for the prime purpose of reaping a profit. When, as in times of “crisis" or “depression”, markets are restricted and there are few opportunities for profit-making, production is drastically curtailed and millions are thrown out of employment, even though large numbers of the earth's inhabitants are in dire need of food, clothing, and shelter.


These conditions will exist as long as capitalism exists. They will only be ended when the working-class, acting in unison and with understanding, take hold of political power, dispossess the capitalist class of its ownership of the means of life and make them the common property of the whole of society.

The task of the Socialist Party is to convince our fellow workers of this, their task.

There is no fair wage

We have to make sure labor is valued.” We hear statements like this from the leaders of the business unions all the time. For instance, “A fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work” has now been the motto of the mainstream labor movement since at least the beginning of the 20th century. On the face of it, this general demand for workers sounds like a good thing. We have to work for a living, and so long as that’s the case, we should be paid a fair wage for our efforts. We don’t want to be exploited. We want our fair share of the pie.

However, what is a fair day’s wages, and what is a fair day’s work? To answer this we have to think about the specifics of how our economy—a capitalist economy— operates. We can’t simply ask what feels morally fair or what the law says is fair, whether that be the federal minimum wage or the often discussed and calculated “living wage.” What is morally fair, and what is even fair by law, may be far from being socially fair. Social fairness or unfairness is determined by the material facts of production and exchange.

First, we can ask, from the perspective of a boss—a capitalist—what are a fair day’s wages? The answer from this perspective is pretty simple. The labor market defines the capitalist’s role as a buyer of workers’ ability to work, and the employee’s role as the seller. The employee sells her time to the employer who in turn pays the employee in wages. The capitalist pays his version of a “fair wage”—the amount required for a worker with average needs to survive and keep coming back to work each day. Some bosses might pay a little more, some a little less, but on average this is the base rate of “fair” pay.

From this same perspective of a capitalist, then, what is a fair day’s work? A fair day’s work to the boss is the maximum amount of work an average worker can do without exhausting herself so much that she can’t do that same amount of work the next day. You, the worker, gives as much, and the capitalist gives as little, as the nature of the bargain will allow. As is probably obvious, this is a very strange sort of “fairness,” and probably not how any rational person would define the word. Let’s look a little deeper into this issue.

People who praise the great “free market” would say that wages and working conditions are fixed by competition between the buyers, the capitalists. Supposedly, capitalists are all competing for workers, so that competition inevitably leads to fair wages and working conditions. After all, the seller—the worker—theoretically has several options of employers to choose from. If a buyer doesn’t offer a price that a worker thinks is fair for her labor, then she can look for another job that pays better. By agreeing to the prevailing wage, so goes this line of argument, workers have essentially made the statement: “We think this is fair.”

One problem with this “logic” is that workers and bosses do not start on equal terms when they are buying and selling. It’s not like you’re selling an iPod on Craigslist, in which you can wait until someone pays the price you want. For most of us, if we don’t have a job, we can’t pay our bills, feed ourselves and our families, or heat our homes. Having employment is a life or death issue. It may not be life or death in the short term, but eventually if you can’t find a job or someone with a job who will help you out financially, you will not be able to buy the things you need to live, let alone the things you need in order to be happy and fulfilled.

It’s a very different story for the owners of the companies we work for. They have money in the bank, and if they don’t get employees tomorrow or even this month, they might be severely inconvenienced. Although their companies might take a hit in profits, they won’t risk anything like the consequences workers do. Their worst case scenario is far better than ours, so the free market lover’s idea of an “even playing field” is, in reality, a sick joke.

This isn’t the worst part of it. Bosses lay off workers when they develop new technology to replace employees and they lay people off when their profits plunge, as is the case in the current recession. As a result, workers lose their jobs way faster than they can be absorbed into other jobs. Today, there is a massive pool of unemployed workers and the capitalists, as a class, use unemployed working-class people against the rest of the class. If business is bad and there are few jobs for those of us who find ourselves out of work, some of us can collect a meager amount of unemployment money, while some turn to stealing and some lose their homes and are forced to beg for money on the street. If business is good and jobs appear, then unemployed people are immediately ready to take those jobs. Until every single one of those unemployed workers has found a job, capitalists will use desperate job seekers to keep wages down. The mere existence of this pool of unemployed workers strengthens the power of the bosses in their struggle with workers. Anyone who has ever heard a boss say, “If you don’t like it here, there are 10 other people I could hire to do your job,” will know how this plays out in terms of respect on the job. In the foot race against the capitalist class, the working class has to drag an anvil chained to its ankle—but that is “fair” according to a free market economist.

Now let’s take a look at how bosses pay their workers. Where does a capitalist get the money to pay our very “fair” wages? He pays them from his capital, his stored up funds from all the business he’s done, from all the goods or services his company has sold. Where did those goods and services come from in the first place? They came from the workers. The employees are the ones who worked to create those products or services that were then sold to consumers. The boss doesn’t do any work—he might oversee some of the workings of the company, but for the most part, he sits on his ass watching as the work takes place. So we can say clearly the workers created the value that built the fund that they get paid from—a worker’s wage is paid from the product of her own work. Now, according to common fairness, you should get out what you put in, your wage should be equal to the value that you have created for the company through your work—but that would not be fair according to the values of a capitalist economy. On the contrary, the wealth you have created goes to the boss, and you get out of it no more than the bare necessities of life—a wage as low as the boss can get away with paying. So the end result of this supposedly “fair” race is that the product of the working class’s labor gets accumulated in the hands of those that do not work, and in their hands, it becomes the most powerful means to enslave the very people who produced it.

A fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work! There’s a lot to be said about the fair day’s work too, the fairness of which is about as fair as these “fair” wages. It is also worth examining the role that unions play in affecting the rate of wages, but rarely the fairness of the wage process. We’ll be talking about these issues in future articles. From what has been stated so far though, it’s pretty clear that the old slogan has outlived any usefulness, and no one should take it seriously. The “fairness” of the market is all on one side—the side of the capitalist class. So let‘s bury that old motto forever and replace it with a better one: “Abolish the wage system!”

Originally appeared in the June 2012 issue of the Industrial Worker via Libcom

We have a world to win.

Indeed the contradictions of capitalism are many. The contradiction of a system of society whose fundamental contradiction is the ownership, by a small section of the community, of the wealth produced by the co-operative and associated effort of the overwhelming majority in that community. This fundamental contradiction, source of many secondary ones, will be solved by socialism, which removes the fundamental contradiction by the revolutionary replacement of the present system of society by a new social order, wherein the wealth produced by the freely associated efforts of the whole community is owned by the producers and distributed according to needs of the individual members of the community. In short— Socialism. The popular belief in the necessity of a monetary system to secure distribution is unfounded.  We do claim that convinced socialists when socialism has been achieved will behave like responsible members of society. 

 The world is full of manifestoes proposing to bring prosperity to this or that nation. None of them is worth the paper it is written on, for there can be no solutions to social problems on a national basis. Trade is international, banking and the money market cross the world, war policies involve multi-national gangs of murderers, such as the Warsaw Pact and NATO, communication technology has turned the world into a global village, the entire process of wealth production and distribution depends upon a complicated, worldwide division of labour. Anyone who proposes to examine the problems of society by concentrating upon just one nation is like a Professor of Anatomy whose study of the human body does not extend beyond the little finger on the left hand. That is why all parties of the world are wasting time in the futile pursuit of policies for national solutions: only the World Socialist Movement has recognised that capitalism is a world system requiring a worldwide solution.

Socialism is not a policy for running a nation. There has never been, and nor could there ever be, socialism in one country. Socialism has yet to be established, and when workers do decide to bring it about we shall do so as a worldwide transformation of society. In short, the struggle for world socialism requires a movement with a worldwide perspective. Nothing less than common possession of the world and all that is in it is worthy of our political effort as a class. To that end, we urge you to take your place as class-conscious workers within the World Socialist Movement.

In a socialist society all the resources of the earth, including the factories, mines, offices, land and the means of communication and transportation, will belong to everyone, regardless of colour, sex, age, or where one happens to live. All people will have free access to the goods and services which the world is able to produce. A socialist world will be free from the fetters of production for profit, the sole basis of creating goods and services will be the satisfaction of human needs. Without several nations competing to make the same product, without rival research institutes in different nations each trying to make a discovery without others knowing what they know, the world will be able to unite its energies for the first time ever. The waste, duplication, and tension of a society cut up into nations will give way to one world, one people and one common aim of mutual survival and comfort.

The abolition of nations will not mean that cultural variety will be destroyed. Indeed, it is nationalism which all too often suppresses minority cultures. In a socialist society, the richness of cultural customs will make the world a better place.

All for All

Research from children's charity Plan International shows that 45 percent of girls in Scotland have had to use alternatives such as toilet paper, socks and newspaper during their periods because they could not afford to buy sanitary products. One survey from grassroots group Women for Independence found that one in five women in Scotland have experienced "period poverty" — a phenomenon in which people struggle to pay for basic sanitary products on a monthly basis, resulting in a negative impact on their hygiene, health, and well-being.

In order to address these issues and "banish the scourge of period poverty," the Scottish government approved a £5.2 million initiative that will make sanitary products free at all schools, colleges and universities — making Scotland the first country in the world to do so.

"In a country as rich as Scotland, it's unacceptable that anyone should struggle to buy basic sanitary products. I am proud that Scotland is taking this world-leading action to fight period poverty," said Communities Secretary Aileen Campbell.

Susannah Lane, Head of Public Affairs at Universities Scotland, agreed that this stigma causes undue emotional and economic burden on Scotland's students. "It is unacceptable that anyone should suffer the embarrassment and distress caused by period poverty so we welcome free sanitary provision being made available in universities across Scotland," she explained.

Socialist Courier fully understands the need for the necessities of life to be free. Our puzzlement is the question of why people do not seek to expand the idea of free tampons to all goods and services. In fact, that is our goal, "to each according to need."  The Socialist Party case for socialism shows convincingly and clearly why and how a world of free access is the only form of society which can permanently ensure a satisfying, fulfilling, secure and happy personal and social life for the whole population of the world. We say that the proposal is not a far-off dream, that everyone is capable of understanding and that 'human nature' is not a barrier. It is a simple, practical and undeniable case for a completely new form of worldwide society—in the interests of all people. But it can not be introduced by dribs and drabs such as free tampons for young women or free bus passes for the elderly.

There is only one way a world of free access can be established. That is the majority of people in each country of the world must come to recognise that advances in science, technology, and knowledge now make a world of free access an immediate, practical and realistic possibility, that the worldwide money, wages, buying and selling form of society, whether run on so-called 'capitalist', 'socialist', 'communist', 'state-capitalist', 'mixed' economy or any other basis, is the root cause of nearly all the problems, personal and social, we face today, and that it is effectively holding back human potential, security, happiness, and well-being, that continuing to engage in reforming or rearranging the money, wages, buying and selling form of society in any way only ever offers temporary and severely limited results and always leaves the cause of the problems—the money, wages, buying and selling society itself—intact. So long as people continue to put faith in reforming and rearranging the present society in various ways a world of free access will never be established. 

The Socialist Party Pledge

Most people have a feeling that the system isn’t working for them and a big part of that is at work because of the way that your employer is so incredibly advantaged over you. Workers arrive at their jobs with no power. The  Socialist Party insists that there is an alternative to capitalism and devotes its energy and efforts to building up an international socialist working class with the consciously-held aim of putting socialism in the place of capitalist wage-slavery.

The Socialist Party does not anticipate an overnight revolution because socialist consciousness, unlike reformist moralising, is not best developed in the dark. Socialism will be the result of social forces within capitalism driving workers to the conclusion that the present system does not operate in their interests and that only a society of common ownership of the means of production. democratically organised by themselves, can. 

The Socialist Party is one among many of these forces. We do not think that our efforts alone will bring socialism, but that the whole range of workers’ experiences (including contact with ourselves) will prepare them for it. If to some people this preparation seems a tedious process and our progress seems slow, we must say that we too would like to see the socialist idea spreading more quickly. However, important ideas in human history have always taken quite some time to become popular and have only seemed credible to the majority after once being accepted by a sizeable minority. Then they have spread very quickly. Historically speaking the socialist idea has only been around a brief moment. Capitalism has not been around long either. We hope it won’t be with us much longer, but we may have to live under it for some time yet. This we must be realistic about and accept. 

Socialist education is necessary, but we do not think that it is best to educate workers about the alternative to capitalism by feeding them with illusions about how it can be made safe and peaceful. We agree that the revolution in consciousness may take time, but we do not imagine that it will take any less time if workers who agree with us refuse to join with us because they think that the rest of the working class cannot understand our case. 

The Socialist Party has never urged workers to sit back and wait for socialism. Those who merely wait for socialism, and occupy themselves in the meantime with illusory and futile “short-term measures, are the ones who are perpetuating the cause of the many social problems we face today.

The English Migrants

In April it was revealed Scotland’s population was now at a record high of 5.4 million – the eighth year in a row it had risen, with migration cited as driving the increase.

Historian Tom Devine has hailed the “silent revolution” of English migrants who have sent Scotland’s population soaring to a record high.

The academic’s latest project shows how the number of first-generation English people living in Scotland has more than doubled in 60 years.

English-born “new Scots” now account for nearly 500,000 of all migrants – outnumbering all other first-generation migrants to Scotland put together.

Devine said the influx of English people has reversed a centuries-old tide of net-emigration from Scotland and transformed the economy, with nearly 90% of English people in work. The historian said any perception that English people have had a hard time living in Scotland has been largely at odds with the fact that increasing numbers want to settle here. Most English people didn’t see themselves as migrants and had integrated so well into Scottish society.

He said: “Really up and until about the 1990s net-emigration was the demographic experience of this small country, one of the reasons why it never achieved the population growth of its big neighbour to the south was because if many more people came to Scotland, many more people left...After so many centuries of loss, we now have a situation of net gain and the biggest net gain is not from the best known ones, not from Eastern Europe, but from our closest neighbours. It is good that our population size is growing." 

On anti-English sentiment, he explained: “The conclusion from a number of studies on this is at worst it is a feeling of resentment, it is rarely open abuse and it is even rarer – perhaps expect where drink has been taken – to be physical violence." The migrants “never threatened religious values or the wage levels of Scottish workers” helped the relatively seamless integration.

https://www.sundaypost.com/fp/silent-revolution-of-english-migrants-allowed-scotland-to-grow-says-top-historian-sir-tom-devine/