Socialism, One World-One People.

The Scottish nationalists are once again marching through the streets, this time it is in Aberdeen. And once again the Socialist Party is obliged to make our views on the independence campaign very clear.

You say what you are going to say, say it, and then end by saying what you have just said. Repetition, repetition, repetition.

“One World. One People” is the slogan of the Socialist Party. It is meant to convey that we stand for a world solution and that we rejected nationalism and racism.

Workers have no country.

Nationalism has always been one of the biggest poisons for the working class. It has served to divide workers into different nation states not only literally but ideologically. Today it is probably fair to say that a majority of workers—to one extent or another—align themselves with their domestic ruling class. After all, the ideology of nationalism ultimately means that workers and capitalists living in a particular geographical area must have a common interest. As with most myths there is an element of truth in this. 

Normally, a common language is shared and on a superficial level at least, a common "culture" can be defined, e.g. "the British way of life". However, if one probes slightly deeper such an analysis fails to stand up. Socialists argue that world society can be broken into two great classes of capitalists and workers. Despite many workers finding it difficult to communicate with and understand each other because of language or cultural barriers this does not alter the fact that they are all part of one globalised exploited mass with more in common with each other than with their indigenous bosses. The interests of the working class are diametrically opposed to the interests of all sections of the capitalist class including capitalists seeking their own nation states and independence. Workers have no country to fight for, we have a common interest in ending national boundaries and establishing world socialism. 

We argue against nationalists who co-opt the term ‘self-determination’ because it can only mean working people democratic controlling society and production. Self-determination concerns participatory democratic decision-making. 

The Socialist Party strives for a world without borders and without capital – a vision of a worldwide federation of free associations of peoples, class-free and state-free, of communities where production is based on need and more conducive to our environments.

The Socialist Party's case is not just against capitalism, but goes beyond capitalism to a post-capitalist society. It is not about another world that are possible, but is necessary. 

The Socialist Party argues that it would be pointless dismantling the British state only to replicate it as a sovereign Scottish state. An independent Scotland would not bring any fundamental change to the lives of most Scots, who would still be powerless, both economically and socially. Capitalism isn’t being threatened by the left-nationalists, rather they hope for greater state intervention, a larger welfare state, aspiring to the Scandinavian-type model and they present an image of a booming ‘Celtic Tiger’ economy to attract global corporate investment. Big Business will continue to rule Scotland.

Pride "Commercialised"

ONE PEOPLE ONE FAMILY

Unite trade union will not be taking part in Saturday's event after its Scottish LGBT+ committee said it did not agree with imposing charges on organisations to join in the demonstration. It also criticised companies using Pride to "enhance customer reach".

The parade will travel through the city centre to the Broomielaw from 11:30.

Tickets to enter the charity's march this year cost LGBT+ groups £120 for a walking group or £420 for commercial organisations, while it costs £600 to have a float at the event.

Describing Pride as a protest, Unite Scotland's LGBT+ committee wrote: "The Pride movement started as a riot 50 years ago this year at Stonewall Inn and as we remember this, we remember those we have lost and also celebrate the gains we have made.

"Yet, for some large commercial organisations, support for LGBT equality merely extends to paying a fee for a Pride March or temporary rainbow branding to enhance their customer reach. Once Pride season is over, there is no wider benefit to the LGBT community."

They added: "We hear nothing about what is happening in our communities, about rising intolerance and hate crime, and the violence being perpetrated against LGBT+ citizens of our country. When people are abused and beaten for being themselves, the response from Pride is deafening in its silence. The politics has been driven from Pride by over-commercialisation and greed of those involved in making it ever-more commercial for financial gain."

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-49372559

Protect Glasgow's Asylum Seekers

Some 300 failed asylum seekers who live in flats - often several people to a room - in some of the most deprived areas of Glasgow are living under the threat of eviction, having been told by the Home Office that they cannot stay in the United Kingdom. In July last year, when Serco first announced its eviction policy

Serco, a private company contracted by the British government to provide social housing in Scotland, are changing the locks on the doors and have tried evicting residents. 50 Serco evictions were temporarily suspended by the Glasgow Sheriff Court.  On August 28, the Scottish Human Rights Commission (SHRC) will be granted the right to intervene in a legal appeal against the evictions, citing "serious human rights implications".

"These are people from Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Afghanistan and Iraq," said Mohammad Asif, a member of the Scottish Afghan community, who settled in Glasgow after fleeing the Taliban in 2000. "They are living in limbo and are not allowed to work or do anything and have to rely on charity and handouts."https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/hundreds-refugees-live-threat-eviction-glasgow-190815074300235.html

Capitalist Ruination or Workers’ Revolution

Our goal is one of a world free from exploitation and poverty. The Socialist Party reaches out to our fellow-workers wherever they may be to engage in debate and discussion. We invite all who see that there is a problem and are ready to do something about it to join with us. The future is in our hands. We shall overthrow capitalism. We use the term socialism as though it were identical with the teachings of Marx and Engels.

If humanity is to be reborn we need to build a peaceful, prosperity world. Our fight is to reorganise society. Our vision is of a new, co operative society. The revolution we need is possible. A great optimism is beginning to sweep over the oppressed. We must guarantee the revolution achieves the common good through common ownership. If there is going to be production without wages, then there must be distribution without money. Political education is the cornerstone of the Socialist Party. Only by engaging in the most sustained and unflinching struggle for the hearts and minds of the people can we win this social revolution. We seek to challenge people to begin the process of transformation into conscious thinkers who, through the science of society, become aware of themselves as indispensable contributors to the liberation of humanity. No policy of patching up capitalism can avail. Capitalism maintains its profits solely on the basis of lowering and worsening the standards of the workers. 

Socialist society is the first society which no longer proceeds in chaos, but according to the fulfillment of genuine human needs. The system of wage labour will be abolished and the guiding principle of labour will be “from each according to ability, to each according to need.” The means of production will be held communally and private property will be eliminated.

With the abolition of classes and class distinctions, all social and political inequality arising from them will disappear. The conflicts of interest between workers and farmers, town and country, manual and intellectual labour will disappear. As classes will not exist, the state will not be necessary as an instrument of class rule and will gradually have withered away.

Piecemeal social reform is useless against a structure sustained by competitive inequality. Ending poverty does not mean a redistribution of income through higher wages, nor a progressive tax regime or any other government welfare policy. As long as business is allowed to profit by there can be no sharing in the benefits to improve living standards. The poor will not always with us – provided we end capitalism. Workers have a common interest in fighting exploitation and breaking the system as a whole. Stupefied by brutal poverty, workers demand that they shall have some of the beauty, some of the comforts, some of the luxuries which they have produced. Slowly the people — the great "common herd" —are waking up to what is wrong with the social, political and economical structure of the system of which they are a part.

Things are as they are because the foundation of society is laid upon a basis exploitation for a small minority, with total disregard to the well-being of all the rest. Society built upon mercenary principles is bound to thwart the development of all men and women, even the most successful because it tends to divert energies into useless channels produce a depraved and degraded standard of values. Greed and self-interest are held to be the main objects of pursuit and conquest, the lowest instincts in human nature — love of gain, cunning and selfishness — are fostered.

The climate crisis is proof positive that capitalism has once more failed us all. However this system will not fall on its own accord. It requires to be tumbled and only the working class can give it its necessary push for only working people understand that our class interests are not merely the economic needs of working people but the universal interests of a healthy planet for all the people.

If the working class continue to accept capitalism as the as normal, then there is indeed no alternative but to campaign for improved management and better technical fixes to cope with capitalism's endless growth. Capitalism is a “grow or die” economy, it cannot consider place limits on its search for profits and capital accumulation even if it is contrary to our best science. Businessmen cannot stop themselves from investing for short-term advantage nor can they avoid the commercial quest for limitless profits and limitless growth. No capitalist enterprise can opt out of the system for long and survive. Capitalism's goals are power and profit. The oligarchs and plutocrats are organised class-consciousness, thinking globally and acting globally. They use all the means at their disposal.

How about us? We should be building a socialist opposition – the movement of movements. We have the vision of a new way of living but cannot continue to act in the old way and let the elite to rule us as they have. In the end, organising is about political action, all about “power to the people”. When millions of us begin to move, we will find the way forward together.

While we aspire to be “a class for itself”, we can also simultaneously become a class for all humanity and the whole planet. We can inherit the earth as our shared heritage without owning it. We can receive its bounty without wasting or destroying it. This way we can win. Let us all begin to act now.

“There has never been anything like this revolution in the history of the world. There is nothing analogous between it and the American Revolution or the French Revolution. It is unique, colossal. Other revolutions compare with it as asteroids compare with the sun. It is alone of its kind, the first world- revolution in a world whose history is replete with revolutions. And not only this, for it is the first organized movement of men to become a world movement, limited only by the limits of the planet.” — Jack London

The rich live longer and healthier

A boy born in 2018 in one of the 10% most deprived areas of Scotland will live for 13 years less than a boy from the most affluent areas. Girls born between 2015 and 2017 in the 10% most deprived areas in Scotland can expect to live 9.6 years less than those who live in the 10% least deprived areas.

Women living in the 10% least deprived areas can expect to spend 23 more years in good health than those in the 10% most deprived areas. For men, the difference in healthy life expectancy is 22.5 years.

The figures are a stark reminder that deprivation has a significant effect on life expectancy, and an even greater one on healthy life expectancy

While Scotland continues to have the lowest life expectancy in the UK – as it has done since the early 1980s – the figures published on Wednesday suggest that recent improvements have stalled with soaring drug deaths and heart disease to blame.

The head of public health at NHS Scotland, Gerry McCartney, said, “The circumstances in which we live should not impact on health so much that the right to live a long and healthy life is compromised by how much money we have.

Registrar General for Scotland, Paul Lowe, said, “Life expectancy in Scotland has been increasing over the long term, but recent estimates indicate that it has stopped improving..."

While the mid-2018 population of Scotland had reached a new high – for the ninth consecutive year – of an estimated 5,438,100, the country’s birth rate is now the lowest of all UK countries and falling at the fastest rate.  Migration continues to be the main driver of Scotland’s population growth, although net migration has decreased over the past two years.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/aug/14/scotland-boys-in-deprived-areas-face-13-year-life-expectancy-gap

Imagine a better future

There is great confusion in the world today over the question of what is socialism. When we read the books of the professors on the subject of socialism we are astonished to find how little the so-called experts understand. Our aim is to try to clear some of this up.

A planned socialist economy on a worldwide scale will put an end to environmental destruction and waste of productive resources. Socialism will also remove the enormous duplication of effort - the manufacture of numerous but essentially alike products on the supermarket shelves and in the showrooms. It will put an end to the massive advertising and production of superfluous luxuries for the rich and shoddy goods for the poor. The quality and productivity of labour will greatly increase because the producers will – for the first time – have a direct vested interest in production and be healthier and vastly better educated. socialism will bring about a phenomenal development of the productive forces which will rapidly eclipse all that has been achieved in this sphere in the whole of past history. It is this economic advance which will lay the material basis for a completely class-free society of abundance. Socialism will make it possible to provide sufficient food, decent shelter adequate education and efficient healthcare– the necessities of life – for everyone on the face of the planet. Never again will any person die of malnutrition or of easily preventable disease. This alone would be more than enough to justify socialism. Socialism will offer free distribution according to need and plenty for all. Socialism will unleash the productive forces hitherto constrained and confined by capitalism. Money can be dispensed with altogether. There is nothing unrealistic about it.

We are living in rapidly changing, dangerous times. From the right and from the left, the people are becoming more disgusted with and distrustful of the government. All the elements of a social upheaval are in place. The people are responding to, but do not yet understand the root of the problems they engulfs them. No reform is possible. There is no “golden age” to go back to. Every step the ruling class takes only makes the situation worse. The ruler’s aim is to guarantee that our class does not unite. They use every divisive ideology history has handed them. At the same time, the breadth of inequality and poverty is creating the basis for real class unity. Experiencing increasing misery and mounting despair and the refusal of the politicians to redress their grievances, workers are losing their faith in the government and beginning to distance themselves from the political process. Simply fighting back is no longer enough, and the workers are beginning to advocate policies in their interests. Race is a political not a scientific concept. Identity politics is being used in a manner that suits the political needs of the ruling class.

Working people cannot give up resistance and stay at home. They need jobs, housing, food, healthcare and many other basic necessities of life. Socialism is the people's movement to transfer capitalist property to themselves in order to feed, clothe, house and care for themselves. Fighting back means putting forward a vision of what is possible today. The Socialist Party fights for a cooperative commonwealth that is possible. We attack the system of private property. We point out the necessity of overthrowing private property and transferring these gigantic means of production into common property. The attack against private property cannot succeed without vision. The goal of all of our work today is to give people a vision of what is possible. It is a vision of a world where no one has to compete with another for the daily bread of existence. It is a vision where cooperation and fulfilling the needs of humanity are the guiding principles. It is a vision that satisfies the deepest yearnings of the people for peace and prosperity. The first step is that the American people have to be won over to the reality that private property can be brought to an end.

The workers do not understand they are slaves. The first thing in liberating the slaves is to make them understand wage-slavery. Proposing socialism is the practical solution to the problems the workers face. Socialism is the common ownership of the socially necessary means of production and the distribution of the social product according to need. It an expression of the deepest strivings of the people: independence from the chains of exploitation, the guaranteed ability of every person to contribute to society, freedom from want and an expectation of a better life. Workers have fought for this vision, but have not achieved. Conditions have changed and workers are coming more and more to understand they have to end slavery. It is only through widespread education and persuasion that we can get this vision over. We must bring the message that capitalism can be brought to an end. We must show a cooperative commonwealth is not only possible, but is the only rational solution to the problems they face. What we do today is the basis for what happens tomorrow.

“I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves.” - abolitionist Harriet Tubman

cancer and the poor

People living in Scotland’s most deprived communities are significantly less likely to have cancer detected early than their richer peers.

Only 22 per cent of breast, bowel and lung cancers among people living in the poorest parts of the country were diagnosed at the earliest point, known as stage one, the NHS figures show. By contrast, patients living in the richest areas were more likely to have the disease detected early on, with 29 per cent being diagnosed at stage one.

Cancer Research UK described the difference in detection rates between rich and poor areas as “unacceptable”

FORWARD TO SOCIALISM!

Under capitalism, the capitalists own the means of production. Workers are forced to sell their labor power and the capitalist exploits and oppresses them. In socialism, the main means of production are owned in common by the whole of society.

According to the Marxian theory of the law of value, the value of every commodity is determined by the amount of socially necessary labour required for its production (or reproduction). In the highest stage of commodity production, the one in which it becomes predominant, namely, capitalism, labor power itself becomes almost universally a commodity, a peculiar commodity, it is true, but one whose value is nevertheless determined like that of any other commodity. The worker sells his commodity, as he must, to the capitalist. But, exploiter though he is, the capitalist pays the worker the full value (more or less) of his labor power. He pays him in the form of another peculiar commodity, money, which is a universal equivalent and with which the worker in turn acquires those commodities he needs to live on (that is, to reproduce his labor power). He in turn pays the full value (more or less) for these commodities. For the value of his labour power, the worker receives an equivalent value in other commodities. The bourgeois principle of equality is perfectly maintained. Equal values have been exchanged. There has been no cheating, no stealing. Commodity exchange can operate on no other principle, above all under the conditions of capitalism, than that of the exchange of equivalents.

Yet the capitalist exploits the worker. In paying for labour power at its value, the capitalist has the use of labour power, namely, labour itself, for a longer time than is needed to reproduce the value of the labour power he has bought. That is, he disposes of its use during the time when it is necessary labour, and during the time when it is surplus labour, that is, while it produces a value above that of the labour power purchased. The secret of surplus value is laid bare. No cheating, equal values fairly exchanged – and that is exactly how the worker is exploited and surplus value appropriated by the capitalist. 

Thus, the Marxian theory of value is nothing but the theory of surplus value. How can this profit be made by the capitalist? Only in one way. Only by compelling the worker to produce, in the course of the production process, more values than those he receives in the form of wages. The worker is compelled to produce surplus value for the capitalist; which is only another way of saying that he is compelled to do a certain proportion of unpaid labor for the capitalist. The capitalist relation is thus an exploitative relation. Which is why we had repeatedly to point out that if you preserve private profits, you are bound to preserve exploitation. The only way to abolish capitalist exploitation is to abolish capitalist private property. Capitalist private property is but the capitalist means to private profit. No profits; no production: that is the capitalist law. For, the whole purpose of the capitalist production process is – private profit, which is but another name for the self-expansion of capital. The capitalist throws into the productive process a certain quantity of capital as a means to expanding it. That is the whole point in the process – for the capitalist. If at the end of the process the capital thus thrown in has not expanded, i.e. increased in quantity, the whole process is, from his point of view, useless. Which is why we say that capitalist production is but a means to capitalist profit. Production, which is essential to society, is only incidental to the process; profit is its motive, and profit its purpose.

That is the sum and substance of Das Kapital. 

Property will no longer belong to a small number of capitalists nor the state, which is the instrument of a class, but to the community. Socialism is a self-acting society of associated producers will also be class-free inasmuch as its members will have no differential relation to the means of production and distribution. That is the socialist society.. Nationalisation is the act of vesting in the state; socialization is the process of vesting in the community. You cannot vest in the community if classes exist; for, in that case, whatever you may term it in form, it will in fact be a vesting in the dominant class. You vest in the state precisely because classes exist; and statification is the method by which the working class takes into its hands the property of which it has expropriated the capitalists. This does not to bring in the class-free society. Without the abolition of private property, you cannot free the productive forces of society from the fetters of private profit which obstructs that further development of them which is essential to the building of socialism. 

The Socialist Party holds that socialism is the only alternative to capitalism. When Marxists declare that socialism is the only alternative to capitalism, they thereby mean, firstly, that socialism is the next higher stage in society’s evolution; and, secondly, that it provides the only progressive solution of capitalism’s contradictions. Capitalism is not an eternal system which has existed from the beginning and will prevail to the end. On the contrary, it is only one system in an historical series (primitive communism – slave owning society – feudalism – capitalism.) Like all preceding social systems, however, capitalism too must die. It is dying because it is being choked by the working out of its inherent contradictions, the basic one of which is the contradiction between the associated labor process and the individual appropriation of the product. Socialism is thus the road forward from capitalism, the next higher stage of progressive social evolution. The world was ripening under capitalism itself for socialism.

Marx did not say or imply that if you somehow destroy capitalism socialism must dawn. That is a fatalist and mechanistic conception with which Marxism has nothing in common. What Marx did teach and demonstrate was that if you destroy capitalism in a certain way, that is, by a certain form of social action, the road to socialism would be opened. In what way? In the revolutionary way. If socialism is to be the outcome of capitalism’s downfall, it is necessary that mankind take conscious action in that direction. Marx showed that the successful carrying forward of the struggle of the working class to free itself from capitalist exploitation would open the road to socialism by demonstrating that the working class could not emancipate itself without also emancipating all society. In order to emancipate itself, the working class would have to expropriate the capitalists and socialize their property. the carrying forward of the class struggle to success connotes the overthrow of the capitalist state power and the expropriation of the capitalist class. You cannot keep the capitalist state power and expropriate the capitalist class. It cannot be used for the opposite purpose. It must be replaced.

Socialism is the only progressive alternative to capitalism and that the bringing of the socialist society into being demands the carrying forward of the revolutionary class struggle to its logical conclusion, i.e. the overthrow of the capitalist class and its state. Abandon the end, and you abandon the means.

Moving Forward

IWW soap-box speakers would attract an audience by yelling “Stop thief!” and once a crowd had been drawn, would then deliver the punchline: “We’ve all been robbed. We've had our wealth stolen by the capitalists.” 

And it all began with the Enclosures and the rise of capitalism, when the countryside and its commons were privatised by some local squire and the peasant displaced and turned into slum-dwelling proletarians

The Socialist Party contends that there is no solution for the workers’ problems except socialism. It is not possible for the Labour Party or any other party to administer capitalism in such a way that the workers’ problems can be solved within the framework of the existing system. The failure of past Labour government is not an accident. It is not due to mistakes in tactics, or to the failure of the personal qualities of its leaders.

Before the productive power of modern technology can become a beneficial advantage to the whole of society the instruments of production must become common property. They are socially operated; they have yet to become socially owned and controlled. This of course involves the abolition, through political action, of the “rights” of the capitalists to own and control the land, factories, transport, etc. It implies the conscious assumption by the working-class, organised for the purpose, of complete control of the machinery of government so that they may obtain control of the entire industrial resources of society. This abolition of classes is the equality at which socialists aim (not a mathematical equality of income which is fantastic and unwanted); but an equality of access to the means of living and of obligation to contribute to their production. Such an equality would render the term “wages” a meaningless one, for no one would be in a position to buy the services of others in order to make a profit, just as no one would be in the position of having to sell their energies in order to obtain a bare subsistence. Our object is to get socialism.

Under such a system it would be to the interests of all to expand the material resources of society as rapidly as possible in order to increase the common stock of necessities and amenities. For so long as these resources are fettered by capitalist ownership, whether in the form of private capitalism or nationalisation, the workers will be restricted to the consumption of such a quantity of goods as is sufficient to enable them to go on producing a profit. Hence we find everywhere that the capitalists, faced with a quantity of goods which cannot be sold, are compelled to take steps to restrict production. Socialism will abolish the need for such restriction and while, even with the present resources of production, it would immediately increase the wealth available for the workers' enjoyment, it would also render possible a considerable expansion of those resources in order that the free development of every individual should be translated from a dream into a reality.

Wages are paid only in order that employing concerns may squeeze out of the workers that profit which it is the object of their existence to obtain. The enthusiasm of even the staunchest Labour voters has been undermined by instance after instance of successful attacks on their wages and working conditions. Knowing that socialism is the only solution and that it can be brought about only when the electors become socialists, we have consistently opposed the Labour Party and its left-wing hangers-on. We urge our fellow-workers to abandon their illusions and oppose capitalism, including its Labour Party supporters. 

The Socialist Party is the only party in this country that has never betrayed the workers’ interests by supporting reform programmes or capitalist parties. We are at present necessarily a propaganda organisation, working to make Socialist principles better known. Political leaders thrive not on the knowledge of the workers but on their ignorance. Whether they are honest or dishonest these leaders cannot bring about socialism for the working-class—that the workers have to do for themselves. Which means that they, and not merely their leaders, have to acquire knowledge. It is the purpose of working-class education to give the workers the knowledge. Until the workers rid themselves of their trust in leaders they will continue to be misled, defeated, and betrayed, whenever suitable occasion offers. 

The assumption that the Socialist Party attaches no importance to action is grotesque. What we want is sound action, the action of socialists who want socialism. Of course we reject the unsound action of the “something now” parties. Would our critics have us participate in their actions, such as protecting the capitalist system, and—most important of all—preaching the false doctrine that the workers’ problems can be solved by the “something now” policy of reforming capitalism? Our slow progress is merely a reflection of the success of the propaganda efforts of the capitalist parties, including the parties of capitalist reform. But not even their most skilful propaganda will serve permanently to cover up the woefully inadequate results of their “something now” actions. 

No member of the Socialist Party, proposes to give up our action directed towards the attainment of socialism, in order to perpetuate the endless, useless and dangerous mistakes of the ‘‘something now” parties. In due course the workers, disappointed with that policy, will join us and make socialism a reality. We are optimistic enough to believe that. The evidence of capitalism's decay, its redundancy, is persistent and overwhelming. The working class, who now run capitalism in every way, need only to see this evidence for what it is and then to opt for the social system which they can run in the interests of the entire human race.