Socialism is the ONLY answer

There is not a single country in the world where capitalism is not trampling upon the most elementary demands of the working class underfoot with its iron heel. The Socialist Party seeks to replace the rule of a handful of exploiters, the capitalists, with the democracy of the working class, the producers of the wealth of society. We seek to replace the anarchy of capitalist production, with its recessions and precarious employment, with a planned economy, based on the needs of working people. We want full equality for all will as a reality and not as a slogan. We stand for the fullest democracy for the working people. We believe on every issue, every question, and in every struggle the working class has a special stake. It has interests different from and antagonistic to the capitalists. The problems of poverty, war, hunger and the exploitation of working people are all products of the capitalist system. 

 

The Socialist Party holds that capitalism can not be reformed into a humane social system that will serve the people. It has to be overthrown through a socialist revolution that will then reconstruct society along genuinely democratic lines. We wish for a social order in which there is no capitalist class, no private property, no profit, no production of commodities for the market, no working class selling its labour power on the labour market. 

 

Rather than being basically dependent upon supply and demand, prices in the marketplace actually fluctuate around the real value inherent in a commodity. The value of a commodity comes from the labour invested in it, including the labour that manufactured the machinery and extracted the raw materials used to create the item. And the boss' profits do not come from his skills or his capital investment or his mark-up, but from the value created by labour - specifically, surplus-value.

Surplus value derives from unpaid wages. The worker is never paid for the value of the product, only for the value of her or his labour time, which is considerably less, and which meanders widely depending upon the historical, cultural and social conditions of a country. Workers produce a commodity which has more value than what they get in wages to keep them functioning. This differential is surplus value, which is the source of capital. Under capitalism or the profit system, it is necessary to maintain and, if possible, increase the gap between wages (or what it costs in labour power to produce goods) and price (or the exchange-value which those goods have on the market). This gap exists because the worker only receives the price of labour power and no share in the values created. With socialism, there will be no wages at all. There will be no prices or market values in the sense of goods obtainable only on the basis of paying for them.  With socialism, all this is changed. Goods are produced for the use of men and NOT for the profits which they bring in to bosses. Labour power is no longer regarded as a commodity to be bought and sold. It is not purchased at all, let alone purchased at the lowest possible price to keep it alive and able to produce more value. Men and women, inside socialism, will work and produce useful goods. But they will produce these for their mutual needs and for their mutual development. The sufficiency of goods which mankind and machines can create will be given to everyone to develop their bodies so that their minds can grow rich in the wealth of human knowledge and culture. Mankind no longer fettered by the necessity of working not only for their own material maintenance, but for the bosses’ even more material profits, will be freed to live more fully. The time that each person must work will be small, yet the goods produced for all to enjoy will be plentiful.

What the Socialist Party wants is to achieve plenty for all, peace, solidarity, and freedom. The Socialist Party calls upon all workers to work with it toward this end. The working class must make its stand against its own capitalist system – whose lust for profits and interest, for investments, markets and expanded capital, for raw materials and cheap exploitable labour, can mean only exploitation and abject slavery. Socialists will produce for use according to a reasonable plan and without a thought for the odious notion of profit. And with no insatiable parasitic class to maintain, socialist society will produce abundance for all. That's a fact. 

Socialism and no compromise is our class war-cry

 

Working-people have no control over industry or of the state. Arbitrariness and bureaucracy still continue to dominate society. There is still want and misery. The people are aware of the privilege, luxury and swindling of those at the top. So voracious and insatiable, so intoxicated with privilege and power are the plunderers and pillagers of Wall Street. Giant corporations, are conspiring to undermine and, if possible, destroy the unions and drive down living standards. They are determined to maintain the unprecedented profits they are wringing from the workers, the real producers. They are scheming, with the aid of the compliant government, to rob the workers of any gains. It is only through socialism that the resistance of the rich can be swept aside and the real problems of the people be really tackled. Working people have always resisted grinding exploitation and brutal oppression. 

Today the rich and powerful, the tiny handful who are perched at the tip of class pyramid try to claim the banner of freedom for themselves. For them, the rulers, freedom means the freedom to structure everything in society to serve their own interests.

Meanwhile, for the great working class majority, the freedom preached by the rich means only the freedom to choose between a rock and a hard place, between selling our labour-power to them to enrich them further and suffering hardships. The great majority of women and men want freedom from misery, from exploitation, from the jackboots of the state, from living our whole lives in precarious insecurity. We want freedom to become fully human, to develop all our gifts and abilities. And we understand this cannot be done by each of us as individuals, but only by the pooling of our collective strength and sharing our wisdom. 

There is absolutely no reason for anyone on this planet as rich as this going hungry, without health-care, or being homeless. Mankind has at its disposal the technology that makes it unnecessary for it to struggle for mere survival and the a bare necessities for subsistence. We could be freed from the rigours of drudgery and toil. It is time to break the chains of wage-slavery. The tortured and deceived peoples are no longer prepared to leave their fate in the hands of the capitalists, but are beginning an active and independent intervention in their own lives, with aims and purposes of their own. Our fellow-workers will no longer permit themselves to be killed and maimed for the greater profit of their exploiters and oppressors. 

The Socialist Party must convince working people that the only road to peace and security is the road to socialism. They must convince them that so long as capitalism with its greedy rivalries remains, war with all its horrors, distress and privation will go on and new wars will be inevitable. They must convince the workers that only they, by their united action, can sweep the putrid capitalist system away and build a new world of peace and plenty. 

The Socialist Party does not oppose campaigns for reforms nor is it against the concept of workers’ councils if the workers themselves or their organisations demand them. But we insist that a socialist party's activity must be based on the struggle for the conquest of political power. It can only be a class party that has managed to overcome narrow sectional interests. So long as political power remains in the hands of the capitalist class, the general interests of the proletariat can only be found in the political arena. Our class emancipation needs no condescending saviours, whether they be moral preachers or new technocrats with artificial intelligence miracles.

Freedom is not a thing that can be won for a few. If any are in chains, no one is truly free. Nor can freedom be given as a gift. It must be taken by the many because only in doing so can we learn to use and expand it. The rich hate the thought of socialism so much that they call socialist any reform in the system that cuts into their wealth in the slightest—from public education, to environmental regulations and a national health care system. Such reforms are not socialism. Real freedom will require the revolution of the whole current social order which is based on the rights of the wealthy to keep everything they have and constantly grab for more. 

Socialism will mean organising society and the economy on a totally different basis, where the wealth created by the labour of the many goes to serve the people and not to enrich a tiny handful of parasites. The wealth of society, produced by the toil of millions, will go to benefit the many, not to fatten the bellies and bank balances of the few. In place of this dog-eat-dog madness, we need cooperation, mutual aid and solidarity. We, the working people, make all of society run, each and every day. Why shouldn’t we plan and administer all of society?

Understanding who we are

 

The Socialist Party proposes that all resources, all land and buildings, all manufacturing work-places, mines, the means of transportation and communication, should be, not private property, but the common property of all. We propose that production be made to serve the needs of society, rather than to serve the needs of a few parasites. It is a planned economy on the basis of common ownership without any class division. Experience has proved that rational planning under capitalism is impossible. When we speak of a society organised on the basis of planned production and distribution what we have in mind is very simple. It is clear-cut. Do away with production for profit. Distribute the fruits of social production among all the members of society. Improve their well being. Increase production still more by further improved technology. Distribute the benefits of this increased production again among the people without exception to enrich the economic and cultural life of all the members of society and to ease their labour. Continue this process. When you do so there will be no crises, no unemployment, no exploitation, no wars, no fear of the future. Scientific advance on a colossal scale reduces human labour to the easy task of supervising machinery a few hours a day. It leaves mankind free to engage in other pursuits. It makes everybody responsible for the welfare of all. There is no exploitation, no oppression, no insecurity, no poverty. Life is made humane. 

The purpose of the Socialist Party is to help educate our fellow-workers of the necessity of united political action against the encroachments of the corporations and at the same time teach the need to abolish capitalism and make the workers, instead of the parasites, the masters of the world. We live in the capitalist system, so-called because it is dominated by the capitalist class. In this system the capitalists are the rulers and the workers the subjects. The capitalists are in a decided minority and yet they rule because of the ignorance of the working class. So long as the workers are divided they will remain in subjugation, exploited of what they produce, and treated with contempt by the parasites who live out of their labour. So long as the workers are content with conditions as they are, so long as the workers are meek and submissive followers, mere sheep, they will be fleeced.

The Socialist Party is the party of the workers, organised to express in political terms their determination to break their chains and rise to the dignity of free men and women. Socialism means throwing the parasites off the workers’ back. And socialism means workers’ control of industry. Nationalisation will bring the working people little good as the same exploiting gang is left to control and manage the nationalised industries to yield happy returns. Society is clearly treading the road to the abyss. We believe in the emancipation of humanity from the age-long enslavement by the class state and class rule. The abolition of the capitalist system and the wage slavery upon which it is based will put an end to the misery of the millions and nothing else can do it. The millions of workers — wage-slaves, male and female, must be aroused to consciousness of their class interests and their class power. Great as the task is, it must be accomplished by the working class itself. The wage workers of the world today are poor as a rule and ignorant as a class, but the constitute the overwhelming majority. In other words, they have the power but are not conscious of it. The working class alone does the world’s work, creates its capital, digs its wealth from out of the ground, builds its factories, its mills, its transport, conquers the rivers and the mountains, manufactures the things that support the people, feeds and clothes the multitude. Organisation means getting together with a common understanding and a common end in view, and working systematically for the attainment of that end. The rich did not gain their wealth by honesty, industry, self-denial and close attention to business and they preach that poverty is a blessing and wage-slavery a privilege. Labour is exploited, profits are robbery, the rich are parasites. The workers have the ballot and can use it for their own emancipation. All wealth is produced by labour, but it is taken by the capitalists. The capitalists own the natural resources and machinery of production and the capitalists live in luxury and extravagance never before heard of in the history of the world. They control government and all institutions of society by means of their wealth; they get their wealth by means of controlling the job, the source of all wealth. As long as the capitalists remain in control governments bow to them, courts do their bidding, politicians grovel at their feet, the media colour the news and distort facts in their interest and intellectuals fawn over them. They control all these elements of society by means of their wealth, and they get their wealth by virtue of their control of industry. The only way to abolish capitalism is to strike at the root. While the capitalists revel in luxury in extravagance, the workers are condemned to lives of poverty, ignorance, toil and privation. They lack economic security. 

Poverty and the fear of poverty render their lives miserable. The average worker is not more than a few weeks away from a state of destitution. If we should become sick or injured, we quickly become a burden to friends or relatives or beg for charity. 

Thousands are killed annually in the industrial accidents. Hundreds of thousands die from occupational diseases. Millions of children are deprived of education, many are stunted and dwarfed physically and mentally, millions go hungry to school. Having no standing before the law, workers are hounded by the police, victimized by the courts and subjected to all kinds of abuse, injustice and tyranny. Lacking wealth, workers lack power. Workers run industry and carry on production. They can do this without capitalists, while without workers, capitalists are helpless. Social control means possession of the source of all wealth and social power. When the workers control industry, they will own the earth. When a worker knows these facts, he has a correct understanding of conditions.

The Socialist Party - No Change

 

A new poll from Ipsos MORI for STV has suggested that 58% now say that they would vote Yes in another independence referendum. Just 42% state that they would vote No.  

It is the ninth poll in a row since June to put Yes ahead. On average, these polls have put Yes on 54%, No on 46%. A poll from Savanta ComRes put support for independence at 53%.

So it appears that a substantial number of Scots have changed their mind on a separate sovereign Scotland.

The Socialist Party has not. 

Socialists in Scotland, like socialists the world over, are confident of the working class ultimately accepting the view that the world and all that is in or on it, should belong to all. Socialists echo the poet’s desire for the day "That man to man the world o’er shall brothers be for a' that”. This will be a fact when the world's wealth, owned in common, can be used for the satisfaction of all mankind.

Capitalism's problems are the result of non-social ownership of the means of life in the field of social production. National identity or location of the legislature have very little effect on our standard of living. It is time to reject the notion that there are Scottish problems which apply exclusively to Scottish workers and which can be solved by a Parliament of their own.

The working class of the world, in fact, own no country, no city, no land—most of them do not even own the place where they dwell.

Save the planet from capitalism

 

The Apocalyptic four horsemen, hunger disease, war and death are riding across the globe, plunging our planet into catastrophe and chaos. Capitalism is destroying humanity and the planet. What we are living through is a global economic crisis of a systemic and structural character and not just one more cyclical crisis. Those who think that this crisis will be resolved through a Green New Deal, with an injection of government spending and with some regulatory measures are very mistaken. Capitalism has instigated an ecological crisis by subordinating the necessary conditions for life on this planet to the domination of the market and profit. Capitalism that threatens to put an end to the existence of life and the planet. The changes needed by the people of this world are directly contrary to the needs of capital. The profit system has only one imperative: it has to grow. Capital accumulation and market expansion are the defining features of capitalism. Without them, the system would rapidly collapse. All that contributes to profits, and to the growth of capital – that’s what counts. Environmental damage is not an accidental aberration, a “market failure.” It is the way the system operates. Competition and the thirst for profit without limits of the capitalist system are destroying the planet. Under Capitalism we are not human beings but customers. Under capitalism everything becomes a commodity: the water, the soil, the human beings and life itself. The climate crisis has humankind a  choice: to continue in the ways of capitalism and destruction, or to re-start civilisation in harmony with nature. The only choice, the only way forward, is socialism. 

 

It is necessary to develop an alternative model to that of the capitalist system. A system based on:

 

Solidarity and cooperation and not competition;

A sustainable system in harmony with our planet’s ecology rather than the looting of our natural resources; ·

A system based on cultural diversity, based on social justice and a system that restores the human condition of our societies and peoples rather than reducing them to simple consumers or commodities.

 

A question we should be asking is why, when so much food is available, are over 800 million people hungry and malnourished? Why do thousands of  children die of hunger every day? Why can’t the global food industry feed the hungry? The answer is that he global food industry is not organised to feed the hungry; it is organised to generate profits for corporations and their investors. Karl Marx wrote that, “the capitalist system works against a rational agriculture … a rational agriculture is incompatible with the capitalist system.”

 

The capitalist system puts profit ahead of human needs and has driven millions of producers off the land, undermined the earth’s productivity by  poisoning its soil, its water and the air, and condemning nearly a billion people to chronic hunger and malnutrition. The food crisis and the farm crisis are rooted in an irrational system. To feed the world, working people must sweep that system away. We are fighting for a world where all peoples are able to determine their own food producing systems and policies that provide every one of us with good quality, adequate, affordable, healthy food while able to live with dignity in a culture of their own choosing.

 

Capitalism has simply proven incapable of stopping the destruction of our planet and its peoples. Capitalism is driven by ‘short termism’ in its hunger for profits. Investment decisions are made on the basis on what will make a return in the quickest time. Such a system cannot deal with the scale of the climate crisis or make rational planned decisions about what to produce that is separate from the bottom line of profits. Socialists are well aware of the system’s rapacious nature. Faced with the argument from socialists that capitalism is the cause of climate change and socialism i.e. common ownership and democratic planning of production is the answer, many climate activists object and believe that campaigning governments to act and produce legislation to to regulate businesses is more effective than to overthrow capitalism. We reply ‘There is no time to wait for the capitalists and their governments to listen to reason’. Whether capitalism could solve the problem of climate change is an abstract question; it is clearly not doing so and there is no reason to give it the benefit of the doubt. Capitalism has simply proven incapable of stopping or limiting global warming. Socialists can expose this contradiction and win a generation of activists to the struggle for revolutionary change to ensure the survival of humanity in the face of what may be greatest threat it has ever faced.

 

The problem with capitalism is that it is built on the need for private enterprises to make money, no matter what. The need for profit clashes with the needs of the general public. In a capitalist world, each economic enterprise must act to protect what it deems its own interests. Each of the capitalist nations is loathe to weaken its economic position vis à vis the other capitalist countries. If necessary companies that do not like potential government regulations will close up shop and move their businesses elsewhere in what is known as “capital flight” or as more people know it “out-sourcing” and “off-shoring”. Thus businesses coerce governments into allowing them to harm the planet

Working for a Society Where Unions Wouldn't Be Needed

On Sept. 23 workers at Indigo books in Mississauga, Ontario voted in favour of unionization. They got a majority vote online according to the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada, Local 1006A, one of Ontario's largest private sector unions. Indigo did not respond with a comment, but the union said it can now start to negotiate a contract with the Toronto based retailer.

 It hopes the contract will address the concerns of Indigo workers for higher wages, job security and sick leave. 

This is all very upbeat because it shows not all workers have become demoralized by the capitalist’s efforts to break the power of unions and abolish workers rights in general, which we have seen in the last 30 years. 

It would be more upbeat if these same workers put the same effort in working for a society where unions wouldn't be needed.

S.P.C. Members.

Worthy Candidates For The Museum of Broken Dreams.

 

On Sept.16 the Mountain Equipment Co-operative announced that it had entered into an agreement to sell its assets to an American company, Kingswood Capital Management. 

If the deal goes through, Kingswood will operate the former member owned co-op as a private, hence for profit, company. MEC's board of directors made this decision without consulting their members, which did not please them. MEC was founded in Vancouver in 1971 and expanded across Canada to operate stores in 20 cities. It was formed to sell outdoor recreation gear and clothing to members who held a lifetime membership, which is technically a share. 

At its peak it had 5.4 million members.

 Some may consider Co-op's to be a form of Socialism, but nevertheless since they exist within capitalism they have to conform to the iron clad laws of capitalist economics. As such they had to compete with companies like Nike who were underselling them. 

To stay in business, in 2019 MEC laid of 38 per cent of their workers, (1,500 people), and cut deliveries to once a week. A Co-op director once said to me, ''We don't make a profit, we make a surplus,'' like there's a difference.

 Co-operatives are like reforms and nationalism and all other schemes to make life better within capitalism - worthy candidates for the Museum of Broken Dreams.

S.P.C.Members.