Socialism will mean Peace, Prosperity and Plenty

SOCIALISM MEANS common ownership by all the people of the factories, mills, mines, railroads, land and all the other instruments of wealth-production. Socialism means production of things to satisfy human needs, and not, as under capitalism, for sale and profit. Socialism means free access to and democratic management of the industries by the workers. 

FOR YOU, as an individual, socialism means a full, happy and useful life. It means the opportunity to develop all your faculties and latent talents. It means that, instead of being a mere wage-slave bought and sold in the labour market, an appendage to a machine, an automaton, a producer of wealth for the ruling class, you will take your place as a human being in a free society of human beings. As a wage worker, under capitalism your price is determined by what your labour power, as a commodity, will bring in the market. By and large, taking into account the ebb and flow of the labour market, you receive a living wage -- the minimum amount necessary to feed, clothe and house you and your family. What you produce over and above your wages is appropriated by your employer who divides it with the banker, landlord, politician and sundry capitalist hangers-on.

YOUR JOB under socialism will not be dependent on the caprices either of a private employer or the capitalist market. When things are produced to satisfy human needs, instead of primarily for sale and profit, involuntary idleness will be an impossibility. The "demand," instead of being limited to what people can buy, will be limited only to what people can use. Nor will technological unemployment be possible under socialism. Improved technology, especially automation, has greatly increased the productivity of workers. And while, under capitalism, the workers are denied the fruits of technology, under socialism it will insure material well-being for all beyond the dreams of avarice. Taking all the factors into consideration, the elimination of waste, of capitalist parasitism, and the removal of all restrictions to improved techniques, it is safe to say that, under socialism.

YOUR HOURS of work under socialism will be the minimum necessary to fulfil society's needs. Work is not the end and aim of man's existence; it is the means to an end. We do not live to work; we work to live. Socialism will, therefore, strive in every way to lighten the labour of man and give him the leisure to develop his faculties and live a happy, healthful, useful life. It is estimated that, with the facilities we now have, by the elimination of capitalist waste and duplication, and by opening jobs at useful work to all who are now deprived of them, we could produce an abundance for all by working four hours a day, four days a week, and forty weeks a year. These are a few of the direct and elementary benefits that you will derive from Socialism. To them may be added a multitude of benefits. Patchwork palliative measures generally are schemes to keep you mentally imprisoned in the vicious circle of capitalist thought. Break this thralldom of the mind! Instead of illusory "welfare and social security" under capitalism, proclaim as your goal the goal of the working class: Socialism

YOU ARE NEEDED to help bring to fulfilment the promise of abundance and human happiness that this age offers. You are needed to help avert capitalist tragedy -- of mass wars and an even more catastrophic climate change.

The Socialist Party Plan

Many of us realise that capitalism has outlived its usefulness, and that it is time for humanity to move on to the next logical stage. We want to create a sane and productive world. But how can we do so? We need a road map. 

The Socialist Party's plan is based on workers acting with workers for workers. No condescending saviours, no philanthropic Santa Clauses is going to come along and set things right. It is useless for us to wait for deliverance from the pains caused by capitalism. We will have to deliver ourselves. Our is based on control by the entire working class instead of by an elite vanguard of political leaders (a dictatorship by any name.) Only if the people as a whole take control of the economy can they maintain that control and use the forces of production to fill their needs. The answer is that workers must form a political party of their own that specifically organises workers as a class. If working people stopped cooperating with the political parties of capitalism and actively took part in controlling our world through our own political and industrial organisations, capitalism would soon wither and die. We would then be able to both construct and maintain a system that is directly based on our own input. We cannot turn our backs on politics and passively wait for a better day that will never come. We don't have to go in search of direction-signs. A plan already exists that is simple, flexible and designed to meet the needs and desires of workers. It is peaceful, workable and within the grasp of working people. We don't have to suffer in isolation. We can join together and we can change our world. 

Years ago, the Socialist Party tried to warn the working class that unless they organised themselves into a political party to express their own interests they would soon be faced with a situation in which their ability to make a living and support themselves would be destroyed. Workers had better wake up to the implications of automation -- computerised robotic work-places -- and wake up soon, or they will find themselves ousted permanently from their jobs, and reduced to beggars living on handouts of the state. This is no exaggeration. It is a cold-sober appraisal of the prospects confronting our fellow-workers under capitalist society as a result of the technological Artificial Intelligence revolution. Virtually every sector of the economy is in the grip of commercial rivalries around the world. The result is a huge wave of downsizings outsourcing, off-shoring and unremitting job insecurity with a growing gig economy with more and more uber workers creating what some describe as a precariat.

Common sense should tell workers that the cause of declining wages, spreading economic insecurity and unemployment has nothing to do with who lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue or in 10 Downing St. Common sense should tell workers that politicians don't decide when factories will close down or how many workers to lay off. Common sense should tell workers that in a capitalist economy those decisions are made by those who own the factories, and sit in the board-rooms or invest on the stock-exchange. Common sense should tell workers that capitalists make those decisions in their own interests, not in the interests of the working class.

The Socialist Party recognises that the increased productivity, declining wages, massive elimination of jobs, spreading economic insecurity and the concentration of wealth proves that the capitalist system of private ownership and profit production is based on the exploitation of the working class. As long as this foundation of society remains this trend will continue regardless of the claims and promises of politicians. That the only solution to such fundamental problems stemming from the very nature of the system under which we live must also be a fundamental one. As long as the working class of the country tolerates the private ownership and control of the economy, workers will be used and disposed of to suit the profit whims of the tiny capitalist class.

How bad must conditions become before workers take action? Capitalism long ago developed the material conditions prerequisite for socialism. It has created production on a scale sufficient to banish forever want and the fear of want. Moreover, necessary production is carried out by socialised labour - by a working class organised at the point of production by the very nature of capitalist production itself. 

At the same time, capitalism no longer works. It is no longer a progressive social system. Instead, it stands in the way of further progress. Yet there has been no revolution. Rather the passive working class, while discontent, has been mired by confusion, uncertainty and despair. Socialism is no predestined inevitable development. A socialist revolution depends, not upon material conditions alone; it depends on clarity of vision to assist the social evolutionary process. Because socialism is not an automatic affair, workers as a class must play an active role in the socialist revolution. Capitalism will not disappear by itself. It will remain until it is overthrown. And capitalism can be overthrown only as the result of conscious mass action.

 Promoting class consciousness, however, is no easy task. Workers are indoctrinated daily by the capitalist media. Politicians and economists obscure the capitalist roots of the many crises and always falsely predict a better future after a painful period of sacrifice. Even worse, many so-called socialists confuse workers by talking about myths such as reforms, by raising false hopes that workers can force the State to solve the problems of unemployment and poverty. Such notions can only help convince workers that they have a future under capitalism and that capitalism is, at this late date, somehow capable of being reformed. In truth, ending the effects of capitalism requires ending their cause -- the capitalist system. It is important that workers come to recognise that there is an alternative to capitalism. For the sooner the working class realises that the misery imposed by capitalism need not be endured, the sooner will workers turn to socialism.

Organisation is required. Workers already hold in their collective hands the potential power capable of restructuring society. As capitalism is weakened by the maturing of its own contradictions, workers need to transform that potential power into a revolutionary organisation that is needed to establish socialism.

On the political field, workers need to form a mass revolutionary socialist party to challenge and defeat the political state for the purpose of dismantling it. That will clear the way for the ousting of the capitalist class from the seat of its economic power and by taking, holding and operating the economy in workers' interests. It is up to us, the working class. Capitalism won't vanish. It must be overthrown. 

"Their airses are oot the windae"

We are not a part of the "Left". We are opposed to measures which tinker with and attempt to reform capitalism. The "Left" on the other hand have kept their agenda well hidden, if it has a discernable revolutionary current, it isn't obvious, indeed, even their active supporters appear afraid to engage with any discussion about what socialism is.

However, it has been a "Left" tactic in the past where they are hypocritically asking workers to vote for a parliamentary party to get reforms which you know you can't get, on a road which they dont support, to socialism, which is not defined except, that it is recognisable as another state capitalism. The Socialist Party is opposed to such trickery of workers. This left-wingers call socialism. Such cynicism and hypocrisy allied to political opportunism is breathtaking. It started quite early this, Tommy Sheridan, at a radical book fair held in Edinburgh outlined his view of socialism which was nationalisation - with the maximum and minimum permitted wages of worker being in the ratio of 4-5:1, he added, that this lessening disparity of income was realistic as a society where equality of income existed wasn't realistic. Besides making him a “socialist” who doesn't believe in socialism, the society he mentions retains every feature of capitalism and therefore could only ever be a bastardised capitalist society.

Simply, the "Left" are not socialists. Lesson number one for would-be Leftists.

Even limited equality can not be achieved, while retaining the profit motive - It is economically impossible .

We on the other hand are quite explicit that socialism is, the common ownership and democratic control of all the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and on behalf of the whole population. In other word a free access society. We stand for the original idea of socialism.

Untrammelled by statist failures, indeed we predicted all of these failures. The "Left" appear to want to administer capitalism with minimum levels of wage slavery permitted in this.
Far from splitting the "Left", we, in the Socialist Party despise the "Left" for its political cowardice (being unable or unwilling to describe socialism to workers and nail their true colours to the socialist mast), of opportunism (interference in workers struggles and grass roots movements to subvert them to their cause), and for its pretensions (of presuming to know what socialism is, and presenting itself as the leadership to-wards it).
As the only Socialist Party we urge workers to "Abolish the wages system." We insist that socialism is an immediate and practical possibility, requiring only a majority of workers who know what it is, who desire it and are willing to organise as equals, without a vanguard of political leaders forming an elite and a cadre of misinformed workers, as their expendable cannon fodder and irrelevant pawns. Unlike the Leninist-Trotskyite, and former CP-er Stalinist Left, we dont, as Lenin said, regard workers, "left to their own devices as being only capable of achieving trade union consciousness"
What exactly is the purpose of the Socialist Party standing in elections? To put the case for socialism, as no others do this, made by workers seizing control of their own destiny and working for socialism , without the leadership of vanguardist organisations or any other leadership. The Socialist Party does not look for support or supporters, rather we insist, on the contrary, that workers learn what socialism is, and join us as equals to bring it about. We dont wish to lead them. They will not need leadership if they make themselves socialists. Far from having no link to working class people, we are the working class who are organised for socialism, admittedly pitifully small, though we are, but we dont lie to workers by pretending that by voting for reforms, or any other measure, they are supporting socialism. We do not intervene in workers struggles, except as workers in struggle.

Isn't standing against the Left is simply splitting the Left and helping the forces of capitalism? We are standing against all the capitalist parties, this inevitably includes the "Left" as they support a reformed capitalism with them as the new bosses, retaining wage labour capital, government control, and their platform reflects this. The "Leftists" ARE the forces of capitalism. 

Simply put, we are the only revolutionary alternative to capitalism. It is by insisting that left-wing style reforms can ameliorate the conditions of workers, and that this equates to a "socialist" response, the "Left" and any and all others who so mistrust the workers, that they can't describe the socialist alternative to them, are the reactionary element, leaving workers confusedly equating socialism with these tired and out-moded tried and failed remedies of the last century (the Labour Party, the Communist Party, social democrat parties of all stripes.)

The Socialist Party has an honourable record since 1904 of never selling socialism short and insisting it is an immediate and practical goal, requiring no other minimum demand, now that the vote has been won, that it can only be brought into existence by the workers themselves, comprising a majority, who know and understand what socialism is, a free access global society, without nation states. We don't pander to nationalist sentiments, following slavishly Lenin's silly "Imperialism as the highest form of capitalism" dogma.

Our demand is the world for the workers and not for some new state-capitalist entity, or a permissible level of wage slavery. In fact, the "Left's" platform is even less radical than the Old Labour one, where mistakenly, they thought they were ushering in a new era, and piously mouthed phrases such as "we are the masters now" and "socialism will come like a thief in the night " .

Matt Culbert

(slightly adapted)

Socialism for planetary salvation

Many lies are circulated about socialism, but space does not permit us to explore them here.

YOU'VE READ THE LIE that socialism would result in the loss of individual liberty; that all power would be surrendered to the state or the government, and a harsh bureaucracy would regulate our lives and enforce blind obedience.

THE FACT IS that socialism rejects the state! Socialists hold with Karl Marx that "The existence of the state is inseparable from the existence of slavery." How then, in the name of common sense, could socialists wish to glorify the state and surrender to it? Socialism rejects nationalisation or government ownership of industry!

On the contrary - where there is socialism, there can be no State, and where there is a State, there can be no socialism!

Socialist management will rest on social democracy. All power will reside in the hands of the people. Their delegates elected democratically will have the privilege of serving, but not the power of ruling over, their constituents.

YOU'VE READ THE LIE that socialism means nationalisation, or government ownership and control of industry.

THE FACT IS that socialism rejects nationalisation or government ownership of industry!

Government ownership, government control, are long-standing feature of capitalism - viz., post offices, sanitation, transportation systems, etc. Government ownership is bureaucratic management of industries that have outgrown management by individual capitalists or combinations of capitalists.

For the workers, government ownership is merely a change of masters - it brings no solution to their problems. Socialism is not a mere change of masters. Socialism means complete control of their tools and products by the workers. It guarantees this by placing the factories, the mines, the railroads, the land - all social wealth - under social ownership and control. Not a state, not the capitalists, not a bureaucracy, but the people collectively own, control, and democratically manage the means to produce and distribute all social wealth under socialism.

Socialism has never been established in any country on Earth. Socialism would broaden and stimulate incentive, offer an equality of opportunity with abundance for all, and work with less friction than any social system ever conceived by man. Socialism would offer incentive to all. Instead of fearing the loss of their jobs as a result of improved methods of production, workers would know that every such improvement would mean more leisure and more of the good things of life. Thus, socialism would give an unprecedented impetus to incentive on the part of all the members of a free society. Socialism would offer an equality of opportunity under which each worker would become the architect of his own future. Socialism would function smoothly because socialist production would be carried on for use, and not for sale and private profit. 

Capitalism keeps the workers on the ragged edge of pauperdom, by forcing them to keep their noses to the grindstone in order to eke out a bare existence. Capitalism functions so badly that increased production spells war or depression. When capitalists cannot profitably dispose of the wealth of which they despoil the workers, factories close and unemployment mounts. In order to avoid such depressions at home, capitalists seek foreign markets. The competition for such markets leads inevitably to war. The anarchy of capitalist production would be replaced by socialist cooperation, based on the principle that each worker should receive the equivalent of the full social value of his product. 

Who invents and circulates these lies? The answer is: the capitalist class, its spokesmen and representatives. They have a stake, a vested interest, in the capitalist system. They could not, if they would, give a disinterested appraisal of socialism, or tell the truth about it. To learn the facts about relativity one goes to an Einstein, not to a crystal-gazer. Socialists alone are competent to give the facts and the truth about socialism.

The Socialist Party, organised in 1904, is now, and has been since its inception, the only genuine socialist organisation in the United Kingdom. Whether ones agrees or not that socialism offers the only workable solution to the grave social problems of our age, one must acknowledge that the only way to find out what socialism really is is to consult authorities on the subject, not quacks or hostile elements.

Are you one of the millions who entertain false and distorted concepts about socialism? If you are, then surely, if only in fairness to yourself, not to mention the momentous issues at stake, you will want to get the facts straight. Do this by studying the literature and program of the Socialist Party. Contact us for full information, and learn what socialism really means. 

WHAT IS SOCIALISM? THE SOCIALIST GOAL

Socialism was born in response to the grave social problems generated by capitalism's uses of technology. Socialism grew out of the profound disruption of society capitalism caused. It was the pitiless and inhumane uses to which capitalism put the technology at its disposal to exploit human labour that made the socialist movement necessary. Socialism is not an idea that fell from the skies, but a natural response to the material conditions and social relations that took shape as the capitalist system of production developed. 

At the same time, however, the socialist movement has always recognised the tremendous material possibilities technological advances offer for eliminating the poverty, misery and suffering it has engendered -- not of its own accord, but as a direct result of the capitalist system of private ownership of the productive forces created by human labour and ingenuity. The whole purpose of the socialist movement, therefore, is to solve the grave social problems resulting from the march of technology monopolised by a numerically insignificant capitalist class so that the magnificent possibilities modern advances in technology hold out may benefit all of humanity. Accordingly, the socialist movement also sees in so-called post-industrial technology the productive instrument for the attainment of its goal. 

Whatever good there is in modern methods of production, whatever their potential for making the world a better place, for eliminating arduous toil, hunger and poverty, that potential is wiped out by a single, dominating fact. The one fact that overwhelms and nullifies the promise of all progress is private ownership of the means of production and distribution. Socialists don't deny that the world is changing. They were the first to point out that capitalism 'cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society.' But the nature, pace and purpose of such changes are not determined by society: they are governed by the whims and needs of that tiny minority that owns and controls the means of producing and distributing wealth. That is one of the two constants in capitalist society, no matter how many changes come along. The other is that the majority -- the working class -- has no say in the process. Capitalists hire and fire to suit their needs. As long as that division exists class divisions will continue. As long as class divisions continue the class struggle will exist.

The working class is the only progressive force in modern society, if by progressive force we mean a force capable of transforming society into one in which economic freedom and material security will be the birthright of every human being. And by the working class we understand all those who must sell their abilities to perform useful mental or physical labour to live. We also mean all those who, because the capitalist owners of the economy have no further use for them, have been forcibly removed from the economy and have become dependent on welfare and other stingy crumbs doled out by the capitalist class and its political state. Unless the working class becomes conscious of what a capitalist future holds the time may well come when it will be reduced to the beggar state of the proletariat of ancient Rome. The labour of the Roman proletariat was rendered useless by captive slaves; that of today's proletariat is being displaced by automated technology. A capitalist future of profound social dislocation and human misery is an absolute certainty because of the economic laws on which capitalism is based -- laws which compel every capitalist concern to strive for the greatest possible profit at the lowest possible cost. That can only mean one thing. It can only mean that permanent joblessness is the only future that millions -- perhaps the majority -- of workers can look forward to as long as capitalism survives. 

Socialism is the common ownership by all the people of the factories, communications, mines, transport, land and all other instruments of production. Socialism means production to satisfy human needs, not, as under capitalism, for sale and profit. Socialism means direct control and management of the industries and social services by the workers through democratic worldwide organisation. Such a system would make possible the fullest democracy and freedom. It would be a society based on the most primary freedom, economic freedom.

For individuals, socialism means an end to economic insecurity and exploitation. It means workers cease to be commodities bought and sold on the labour market and forced to work as appendages to tools owned by someone else. It means a chance to develop all individual capacities and potentials within a free community of free individuals.

Socialism does not mean government or state ownership. It does not mean a state bureaucracy as in the former Soviet Union or China, with the working class oppressed by a new bureaucratic class. It does not mean a closed party-run system without democratic rights. It does not mean nationalisation, or labour-management boards, or state capitalism of any kind. It means a complete end to all capitalist social relations.

The goal of the Socialist Party is to replace capitalism with the economic and social democracy of socialism.To win the struggle for socialist freedom requires enormous efforts of organisational and educational work. It requires building a political party of socialism to contest the power of the capitalist class on the political field and to educate the majority of workers about the need for socialism. Indeed, it is the only means of achieving the socialist goal because it is the only way that will enable the working class to organise the latent power of its vast numbers along the political and economic lines that are needed to accomplish a socialist reconstruction of society. You are needed for a better world. Find out more about the principles and work of the Socialist Party and join us to help make the promise of socialism a reality.

NO POWER IN THE WORLD CAN STOP US!

The Socialist Party has long contended that only socialism can solve the major social and economic problems plaguing our society today. But many people have been taught all their lives that "socialism" means the state-controlled system that existed in the former Soviet Union and its satellite states, exists today in China or Cuba. the Bolshevik and Chinese revolutions weren't socialist in character. They occurred in pre-industrial societies. Without a majority working class and the ability to eliminate scarcity of needed goods and services, creation of a classless society was impossible. Material conditions there bred conflict and made the continuation of the class struggle inevitable in such countries. Socialism can only be built in a developed, industrialised society with a working-class majority. In the Bolshevik and Chinese revolutions, an elite "vanguard" party seized control of the state and used the state to control the means of production. Instead of establishing a classless society, the party-state bureaucracy became a new ruling class. 

The socialism upheld by the Socialist Party, however, is completely different from any existing system. It has nothing to do with nationalisation, a welfare state or any kind of state ownership or control of industry whatsoever. On the contrary, it would give power not to the state, but to the people themselves, allowing collective control of their own economic future. A socialist political party is needed to educate the working class and to recruit workers to the socialist cause. Socialism would bring social democracy -- the rule of the people -- to the most vital part of our lives, the economy. 

Socialism means a class-free society. Unlike under capitalism, where a tiny minority owns the vast majority of wealth and the means of producing it, everyone would share equally in the ownership of all the means of production, and everyone able to do so would work. There wouldn't be separate classes of owners and workers. The economy would be administered by the workers themselves through democratic "associations of free and equal producers," as Marx described it. The workers collectively would decide what they want produced and how they want it produced. They would control their own workplaces and make the decisions governing their particular industry. Engels once described socialism as a system in "which every member of society will be enabled to participate not only in the production but also in the distribution of social wealth." Far from being a state-controlled society, socialism would be a society WITHOUT A STATE. Marx said that "the existence of the state is inseparable from the existence of slavery. The people themselves, through the democratic associations of workers, would administer the various levels of society.

Socialism will allow for us to carry on production for use in the most modern production conditions we can possibly create, utilising the safest and most manufacturing methods. The more we collectively produce, the more we shall collectively enjoy. All of us will be useful producers, working but a fraction of the time we are forced to work today. But we shall not only be useful producers, we shall all share equitably in the wealth we produce, and our compensation will literally dwarf anything we can imagine today. 

In socialist society there will be neither involuntary unemployment nor poverty. The young will be educated not only to prepare them to participate in social production but also to enable them to expand their interests and develop their individual interests and talents. 

The aged will be cared for, and not by any such demeaning methods as are used today. We shall provide all their material needs and create a social atmosphere in which they can live lives that are culturally and intellectually satisfying. It will not be charity, but their rightful share as former contributors to production.

Under capitalism, improved methods and machinery of production kick workers out of jobs. With socialism, such improvements will be blessings for the simple reason that they will increase the amount of wealth producible and make possible ever higher standards of living, while providing us with greater and greater leisure in which to enjoy them.

Inside socialism, we shall produce everything we need and want in abundance under conditions best suited to our welfare, aiming for the highest quality. We shall constantly strive to improve our methods and equipment in order to reduce the hours of work. We shall provide ourselves with the best of everything: the finest educational facilities, the most modern and scientific health facilities and adequate and varied recreational facilities. We shall constantly seek to improve our socialist society. Purposeful research, expansion of the arts and culture, preservation and replacement of our natural resources, all will receive the most serious attention. It will be a society in which everyone will have the fullest opportunity to develop his or her individuality without sacrificing the blessings of cooperation.

Freed from the compulsions of competition and the profit motive that presently hurl capitalist nations into war, socialism will also be a society of peace.

In short, socialist society will be a society of secure human beings, living in peace, in harmony and human brotherhood.

This all may sound too good to be true. Yet the world has the productive capacity to provide a high standard of living for all, to provide security and comfort for all, to create safe workplaces and clean industries, and to help other nations reach these same goals. The only thing keeping us from reaching these goals is that the workers don't own and control that productive capacity; it is owned and controlled by a few who use it solely to profit themselves.

Organising to bring the industries under the ownership of all the people, to build a socialist society of peace, plenty and freedom, is the only real alternative workers have. For, as William Morris once wrote, "While theologians are disputing the existence of a hell elsewhere, we are on the way to realising it here: and if capitalism is to endure, whatever may become of men when they die, they will come into hell when they are born." 

Revolutionary Times

There are times when social and economic problems become so 

bad that people are forced to choose between the social system that makes their lives difficult and a new one that will make their lives better. Times like that are called revolutionary times. They don’t come often, but when they do the question of HOW to make the change that’s needed becomes as important as WHAT that change should be. We face that kind of choice today. Capitalism—the social system we live under—no longer serves the interests of the people. It creates countless problems that it cannot solve. It uses technology to throw people out of work and to make those who keep their jobs work harder. It creates hardship and poverty for millions, while the few who own and control the economy grow rich off the labour of those allowed to keep their jobs. It destroys the cities that we built up. It is destroying the natural environment that is the source of the food we eat and the air we breathe. Every attempt made to prevent these problems, or to keep them from growing even worse, has failed. 

The reason is that society is controlled by a small capitalist class that owns the industries and services that everyone depends on. The workers built and they operate all of those essential industries and services. However, they do not own and control them. They are the majority, but they have no voice in deciding what to produce or how much to produce. Their needs and desires count for nothing when those decisions are made. When a small group owns and controls what everyone needs to feed, house and clothe themselves and their families, when that small group makes every important decision that affects the lives of the vast majority, it is called a dictatorship. Capitalism is economic despotism and it spoils and corrupts everything that is good and decent. Technology that could and should be used to lessen the need for arduous toil and to enhance our lives is used instead to eliminate jobs and increase exploitation. Poverty is as widespread as it has ever been. Joblessness, homelessness, helplessness and hopelessness are spreading. Economic insecurity places an unbearable strain on our families, our children and ourselves.

The Socialist Party seeks to build a serious socialist movement that will be bound together enough to act as a united body. Socialism is not a “dogma”. Historical materialism teaches us that nothing is static. 

The Socialist Party's goal is a class-free society based on common ownership and control of the industries and social services, these to be administered in the interests of all society by society. 

The Socialist Party is the political party of the working class. This is so because it is the sole protagonist of the policies and principles that the working class must adopt if it is ever to achieve its complete emancipation from wage slavery and, at the same time, save society from catastrophe. 

The Socialist Party is the only organisation demanding the abolition of capitalism and advocating the socialist reconstruction of society. It has been doing so for well over 100 years. It is the political party through which the workers can establish their majority right to reorganise society. To establish socialism, political unity under the banner of a mass political party of labour is needed.The role of the party is to educate workers to the need to abolish capitalism, to agitate and to express the revolutionary mandate of the working class at the ballot box. 

The Socialist Party aims to capture and dismantle the political state and pave the way for a new form of administration, a participatory democracy. To establish socialism,workers must unite as a class, based on the principle that the working class is involved in a class struggle with the employing, capitalist class, a struggle that cannot be ended under the capitalist system and until capitalist ownership of the industries and services is replaced with social ownership and democratic community control. After the revolution, the administration of all production and distribution will be the function of the various democratically elected or delegated bodies and organs at all levels and where easily and immediately exercisable power to recall exists to remove any administrator who, in their judgement, fails to serve their interests in office. Thus production will at long last be for use and the benefit of all.

Should we keep a social system that is destroying the lives? Or shall we do the common sense thing by making the means of production our collective property, abolishing exploitation of the many by the few, and create security and abundance for all? The workers can expect no help from the beneficiaries of capitalism. The capitalists, just like the slave-owning and feudal classes before them, will try to keep their strife-ridden and poverty-breeding system. The workers can only rely on themselves to build a better world and free themselves through their own class-conscious efforts. By workers we mean the working class. We mean all whose intellectual and physical labour contributes to the development, manufacture and distribution of the goods, services and information that our complex society needs. We mean all those who must sell their physical and mental talents and skills on the job market, and who depend on the wages and salaries they receive in exchange. We mean white-collar and blue-collar, production and office workers, those who research and develop as well as those who build, distribute and serve. We mean the whole working class, including the unemployed and those forced to settle for part-time or temporary work. The working class makes everything and it makes everything work. Collectively, it has tremendous potential power. The working class runs the industries from top to bottom. The potential economic power that rests in its hands is enormous.

The Socialist Ideas of the Socialist Party

What socialists do under capitalism is spread the case for socialism. Our main aim is to propagate socialist ideas in place of existing authoritarian and irrational ideas that help maintain capitalism. This involves us combating those ideas such as racism, nationalism, the idea that we need leaders, must have armies, need money, and also religion. Socialism doesn’t require people to behave all that differently from how most of us do most of the time at the moment, essentially only the accentuation of some of the behaviours we exhibit today (friendliness, helpfulness, cooperation) at the expense of others which capitalism encourages. The Socialist Party is not trying to lead anyone anywhere but are merely pioneers pointing the way.

The Socialist Party reasserts that the working and ruling classes of the world have nothing in common, and that every attempt to prevent the working classes of the world from uniting in their own interests requires the unqualified condemnation of all those who profess to speak in the interests of labour, regardless of their assertions and pretences to the contrary. The Socialist Party is in sympathy with the principle of unrestricted emigration of workers from one country to another and that attempts to limit, control or manipulate the working classes of the world is meant to serve the interests of the ruling classes of the world and also requires the unqualified condemnation of all those who profess to speak in the interests of labour. We oppose scapegoating migrants as the source of stagnant or falling wages, declining living standards and unemployment, and are hostile to any call for punitive measures against them. Unemployment, and whatever pressure immigrants place on wages, is a direct result of the competitive capitalist system itself. It is a by-product of the system of wage labour, which forces workers to compete for their livelihoods on the basis of the conditions laid down by the capitalist system. Accordingly, efforts to scapegoat migrants only serve to divide workers against one another, place greater hardships on migrants and their families, and draw attention away from the capitalist source of these problems.

The Socialist Party recognises that millions of workers who have migrated to in hopes of improving their lives have been bitterly disappointed and subjected to the most ruthless exploitation. It is clear that capitalism with its private ownership of the economy and exploitation of wage labour is responsible for economic hardship and insecurity for all workers; that it compels workers for economic reasons to leave their home countries and seek employment elsewhere; that immigration laws, whether promoted by so-called liberals or conservatives, only serve to benefit the capitalist class. Accordingly, the critical issue facing workers today is the abolition of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. Therefore, be it. The Socialist Party extends a fraternal hand of welcome to all immigrant workers and invites them to join in our efforts to abolish capitalism and establish the free and democratic Socialist Cooperative Commonwealth throughout the world.
The working class to organise a socialist party of its own to express its will to abolish capitalism, and to organise itself in the workplaces of the country to enforce that decision by taking, holding and operating the economy in the name of society. Only then can the working-class majority take control of its own destiny to ensure permanent prosperity, to uproot the cause of international conflicts, and to lay the foundation for worldwide cooperation and a lasting peace. 

Who Are We? What Do We want?

Hunger, misery, disease, and death is the daily lot of too many of our brothers and sisters around the world. Too many men and women are subjected to horror and tyranny. Capitalism is a social system which breeds conflicts. It is a seething jungle of struggles wherein individuals, classes, nations, and empires fight against each other. Individual wage-earners vie with each other for jobs; capitalists outbid one another for markets; classes struggle against each other in the economic and political arenas; and nations are prepared to wipe each other off the map for the sake of imperial conquest. But the struggle, international in its extent, which looms larger than all others, is the conflict between capital and labour. In this struggle the former fights with ability and consciousness of aim, while the latter fights with great confusion and without a knowledge of its own strength.

From the Socialist Party goes the message of unity and international class solidarity. We are socialists because we believe that socialism will solve the miseries of the world. We hold that socialism is practical. Capitalism has only known how to cause humanity unhappiness; socialism will establish peace and happiness. Working people of Britain must be shown what binds them with to the working men and women of all the world. This situation, so unbearable for the exploited classes, can only be altered by the destruction of the capitalist system and the establishment of a socialist system of production and distribution. Reformist tactics have proven to be wholly illusory. To pursue them further will cause ever more misery.

The Socialist Party is a political organisation. Politics is our means. It is our justification for existence. We are not a party of property rights. We have the ideal of abundance and security and peace and democracy for all. Our greatest of hopes is an age of brotherhood of all men and women without hunger, without ignorance, without war.

Every day the capitalists try to discredit socialism and tell the workers that it is not a worthy goal to fight for. The propertied interests seek to mould the ideas of the workers in such a way that their intellectual, industrial, and political activities may not be directed against Capitalism. Capital reinforces its economic power through its control of the political machine, so, on the other hand, it wields political power due in great measure to its control of the press—the greatest weapon it has, educationally, for moulding the ideas and therefore the political activity of the workers. Capitalism, let us reiterate, uses its various avenues of activity in such a way that they support each other, and all of them combined reinforce the wages system. Thus the media, in the hands of capital, attacks labour in the field of education, industry, and politics. 

The capitalist class understands the need of political action. It intends to be prepared in order to crush the attempts of awakening labour seeking to organise its forces. The workers will be confronted by the whole economic force of capital in alliance with its political force—the State. Can the Socialist Party, therefore, neglect the political field, which is at present one of capital’s strongest buttresses? The Socialist Party says no. We dare not leave the enemy entrenched in any position from which it can threaten the working class. We hold the political weapon as the instrument by means of which the workers can capture the State in order to uproot it. The Socialist Party advocates political action because it is the destructive arm of labour which will overthrow capitalism. Many are opposed to political action for no other reason than that they have not realised all that it means. Because the political weapon is used by the capitalist class against Labour, and because the political State is a machine to maintain class rule, there are many workers who contend that working class political action is futile, if not dangerous. Our political declaration is to aim at the capture of the political machine in order to tear the State, with its armed force, out of the hands of the capitalist class, thus removing the murderous power which Capitalism looks to in its final conflict with Labour. In a word, the revolutionary value of political action lies in its being the instrument specially fashioned to destroy Capitalism. Just as industrial unionism is necessary to construct Socialism.

We are convinced that socialism is the only hope of the workers. Neither reforms nor palliatives can in any way remove the great economic contradictions inherent in capitalism. Socialism contends that the only solution for the social problem is to be found in the reorganisation of society upon the basis of the social ownership of the means of wealth production. This plan is neither based upon emotion nor sentiment. It is based upon economic necessity. Since wealth is socially created it must be socially owned and controlled. Until that is done capitalism will stagger from one contradiction to another; from one crisis to a worse one; from one conflict to an ever fiercer one. Labour as the creator of all economic wealth demands the control of its product. To facilitate this end, the Socialist Party has outlined the ways and means whereby the world cooperative commonwealth may be inaugurated.