Towards A Socialist Cooperative Commonwealth

Crashes across the world’s financial markets with share prices in free-fall due to the COVID-19 pandemic have sent shock-waves through the media and the owning class. 


We are entitled to suspect the newly discovered sincerity of corporate CEOs and to view their motives with some cynicism. But as long as the employing class own the means of production and control political power the working class will always be on the receiving end of any economic crisis. This pandemic is one more piece of evidence that this supposedly great economic system has just a failed us once again. The gross inequalities and declining standards of life are magnified by the corona crisis, pushing already marginalized working people to the brink.


When will the people stop expecting the system to do the impossible? When will they cease to be surprised that the system works in the interests of a privileged minority? When will those who mistakenly believe capitalism is the most rational and efficient way of ordering human affairs accept that in reality it is an insane and chaotic society? Too many are as yet blind to the realities of the capitalist system. At the mercy of this pandemic and profiteers they frantically turn this way and that way to cope with the evils of capitalism. But the SYSTEM that produces their sufferings they do not dream of attacking. They see neither a definite goal, nor the way to it. Capitalism is a society which cannot hold any regard for human interests or values. We must resolve to abolish the system altogether.


Normalcy is nothing that we should return to. Instead we must forge a path for fundamental and transformative change with a new movement. There should be no turning back to the pre-COVID-19 days of accepting the austerity of capitalism which is dedicated to making life as miserable as possible for the masses of people and crushes any attempts made for even minimal reform. The moment is ripe for campaigning and demanding socialism as our political demand. This pandemic is an opportunity for new political activity.

Only with the end of capitalism itself, and the establishment of a worldwide socialist cooperative commonwealth can we escape the misery inflicted upon us.

The remedy is in your hands

THE SOCIALIST PARTY claim, and prove their claim, to be the only party in the UK whose principles will benefit the working class. We have no connection with the Labour Party, the Socialist Workers Party or other left wing group who are only interested in two things: firstly, grinding their own axes; secondly, trying to make the present rotten capitalist system bearable to you, thereby prolonging the life of that system which grinds YOU down so mercilessly.

We address ourselves to our fellow-workers: —The machines and tools with which you produce vast quantities of wealth—themselves the product of labour—are owned by the master class. You are compelled to sell the only commodity you possess — the power to labour—to the owners of those tools for a miserable pittance varying but little from the actual cost of subsistence, while they, the minority in society, take to themselves the fruits of your labour. YOU ARE EXPLOITED.  You lose one master, but are compelled to find another, and because of your non-ownership of the means of producing the necessaries of life you are enslaved to the possessing class —the capitalists. Constantly you are confronted with the fear of unemployment, and conditions do not improve—they are getting worse. Your interests are opposed to those of the exploiters, and you will be exploited and oppressed by them until you realise your true position, and organise as a class into a political party with the object of capturing political power and overthrowing the present system of contradictions of wealth and poverty, and the conversion of the means of wealth production from instruments of profit-grinding into common property to be administered for the well being of all.

We have all heard at some time or other that if we were careful, industrious, thrifty, god-fearing, and abstained from hedonism the ladder is clear and easy to climb for every one of us . We have all heard of so-and-so who started life in humble surroundings and, by leading a virtuous life, ultimately became wa successful "self made men." Even though most of us  realise that to be born in the poverty of the working class means being doomed to remain there until the end of their days. The road to affluence and power is not through self-sacrifice and the sweat of our toil. When will our fellow-workers learn and understand their position in society, then organise to overthrow the system that robs them of the fruit of their labours.

From the capitalist standpoint socialism is a "great evil.” They never examines the basis of capitalism because it is the best possible system..for them. It divides society into a privileged and a slave class, and their lot is cast among the privileged. Socialism is repugnant to the capitalists because it would abolish slavery and privilege and establish society on a basis where the means of wealth-production, instead of being owned by a small capitalist class, would be the common property of society, to be used for the needs of a community making arrangements for production and distribution according to a settled plan agreed upon by all, a system based upon common ownership and democratic control of all the means of life. 

The workers are poor because they are robbed of the greater portion of the wealth which they produce. The necessaries of life are produced by the social labour of the workers, but the means and instruments for producing these necessaries are owned and controlled by the capitalist class. It is because of this antagonism, this contradiction, in society, i.e., social production side by side with private ownership, that we have poverty-stricken workers and idlers rolling in wealth.

The solution to the "problem" rests with the working class, who must get to understand their class position in society and enrol themselves in a political party with the object of capturing the powers of government, in order to establish socialism. That political party already exists—it is the Socialist Party.

 
The Socialist Party pronounces the sentence of death upon capitalism to usher in the Socialist Commonwealth.

Another Future For Us All?

A lot needs changing to our world if we are all to enjoy decent secure lives. It was clear well before the COVID-19 pandemic that humanity required to learn to share, to cooperate and to create a world free from conflict, and we had to help the planet to heal from the harm done to it. Mankind is one family, although a species large and diverse, consisting of unique individuals with a variety of qualities, yet all sharing the same inherent nature, suffering from the same fears and having similar hopes and longings.

Capitalism has led to a ‘dog eat dog’ mentality, and the false belief that people innately selfish, greedy and driven by aggression. Capitalism has successfully polarised large sections of the world's population through sexism, racism and nationalism, and that is just a few of the ways. Generations have been conditioned into believing that this is the way to live, that we are separate and must compete with one another to survive and it is that what makes us human beings, and there is no alternative. Such ideas are fundamentally misguided.

Socialists have always called for a shift in this way of thinking and demanded a change in mode of production and style of living. The world socialist movement has urged collective action for tolerance and and cooperation. To survive and prosper, to fulfil our potential, socialists say we must reject divisions and that it is possible to build a new society of social justice. Out of chaos of the old we can create a future civilisation in which humanity can live in peace and compassion. As the humanitarian responses to this pandemic is showing, in times of crises , people are expressing solidarity with one another. It demonstrates one more that mankind is good and humanity is social. 

Socialism is the real alternative

The popular demand for social is a sham demand as it is unrealisable under capitalism. Instead the demand should be nothing less than abolition of classes, i.e., abolition of all exploitation. The Socialist Party demands, and fights for, mastery over the production apparatus, whereby under common ownership in a class-free society true equality will be established. You are yoked up as wage slaves. The socialist revolution will be a great step forward in the history of mankind. With socialism for the first time in history the individual will have the opportunity of real freedom, of real self-development. The Socialist Party places its hope in the ability of the people to reach high levels of political consciousness and to end the rule of the propertied dictatorial class. 

Socialism offers as its fundamental contribution to the cause of peace a society with constantly expanding perimeters of political and social democracy.We are socialists. We are opposed to capitalism. We are for socialism. We make no secret about that. It is capitalism and its built-in, all-consuming need for profit, regardless of the needs of people, that enslaves all workers—women and men alike, of all races, ethnic and religious backgrounds—and condemns them to struggle for their very existence. Capitalism’s overwhelming and compelling need to increase profits above, and at the expense of, all else  is the driving force behind all corporate executives, no matter of what race or gender they may be. There is no “trickle down” in money or justice under capitalism. Every bit a worker gets, or will ever get, must be fought for, tooth and nail.

World capitalism and its the frightful crises has plunged working people into unheard of misery which threatens to destroy the whole human culture. When, in the course of human development, existing institutions prove inadequate to the needs of man, when they serve merely to enslave, rob, and oppress mankind, the people have to overthrow, these institutions. Throughout the world the workers have to reach the determination to take control of their own lives.  In this country this can and must be achieved peacefully by the workers uniting at the ballot boxes. 

If socialism is to be relevant today it must present a policy for freedom. Vote for socialism and be free. We summon the workers of city and country, all nationalities,  all who are exploited and oppressed by capitalism. Only a socialist world can give us peace and plenty. Look how the capitalist world totters on the brink of destruction. The capitalist parties are as rotten and bankrupt as the system they uphold. They can maintain themselves and that. system today only by piling additional burdens upon the people. The evils of capitalism will disappear only with the destruction of capitalism and the building of socialism. Solidarity and unity are the very life of the Socialist Party, the source of its strength.

The Real Freedom Fighters

While Scottish “patriots” recall the 700th anniversary of the 1320 Arbroath Declaration, there will be far fewer remembering the bicentennial of the weavers uprising in April 1820.

The neglected Battle of Bonnymuir took place on the 5th of April, 1820, during the ‘Radical War’ . It wasn’t much more than a skirmish, an event that hardly constitutes a major rising. Sixteen Hussars and sixteen Yeomanry routed a band of twenty-five, poorly armed, striking weavers. The leaders were captured, tried and sentenced, with the outcome being a judicial execution of John Baird and Andrew Hardie, who came to be known as the ‘Radical Martyrs’. For some historians, the whole incident may appear minor and of little historical importance. The rising had been doomed from the outset. However, the rising must seen in the context of ordinary people from all over a growing industrial Scotland being inspired to rise up and overthrow the government in order to secure their rights and better working conditions. It should not be forgotten.

Glasgow was just a collection of small villages like Bridgeton, Calton and Anderston. In all of these communities the main occupation was weaving. The handloom weavers traditionally enjoyed skilled status, dictated by the nature of their work. They worked to commission. They could decide upon their own hours of work and could decide upon periods of leisure if they were willing to forego some proportion of their earnings in the short term. Given that these workers had opportunities for leisure a high proportion were able to read and wanted to debate about what they had read and would be discussing the American and French revolutions.

 A slump in the economy after the Napoleonic Wars  resulted in workers, particularly weavers in Scotland, seeking reforms from an uncaring government and from a gentry in fear of revolution. Their pay and conditions deteriorated drastically. Between 1800 and 1808, the earnings of weavers were halved and this trend continued up to 1820. In 1816, weavers in Kilsyth were working for just over £1 per week and, by 1820, their weekly income was down to between eleven and twelve shillings. This widespread discontent came to a head with a two-month long strike in 1812. 

The Weavers Uprising was a culmination of earlier protests where the government had persecuted Scottish reformers such as Thomas Muir in the 1790's with transportation to the colonies. An organisation called the United Scotsmen had been formed to campaign for universal male suffrage vote by secret ballot, payment of MPs and annual general elections. In 1816 some 40,000 people attended a meeting on Glasgow Green to demand more representative government and an end to the Corn laws which kept food prices high. The Peterloo massacre of August 1819 sparked protests across Britain including at various meetings across Scotland often in weaving communities. A rally in Paisley led to a week of rioting and cavalry were used to control around 5,000 demonstrators.

 A Committee of Organisation for Forming a Provisional Government put up placards around the Glasgow districts on Saturday 1 April, calling for an immediate national strike. Some believe that it was actually issued by the Government agent provocateurs as a means of bringing the radicals out into the open as the leaders of the Committee were already in custody.

The proclamation began:
 ’Friends and Countrymen! Rouse from that state in which we have sunk for so many years, we are at length compelled from the extremity of our sufferings, and the contempt heaped upon our petitions for redress, to assert our rights at the hazard of our lives.’ 

And, it called for a rising:
 ’To show the world that we are not that lawless, sanguinary rabble which our oppressors would persuade the higher circles we are, but a brave and generous people determined to be free.’

Most of central Scotland, especially in the weaving communities, came out in support the following week.

One group of strikers decided that attack was the best form of defence. With the purpose of increasing their puny arsenal of weapons, about twenty-five weavers led by Andrew Hardie and John Baird, marched on the Carron Iron Works near Falkirk to capture weapons which were manufatureed there. Tragically for that group due to underground societies like the United Scotsmen gave the government major concern, its spies were active which meant the march on Carron was already known about. Having received intelligence from their informers, the Army was given its own marching orders. The two forces met and the radicals began firing. After a few volleys on both sides, the cavalry flanked the rebels and the inevitable end was swift. And so ended the Battle of Bonnymuir. Later, the militia taking prisoners to Greenock jail was attacked by local people and the prisoners released. James Wilson of Strathaven was singled out as a leader and was later hung and decapitated.

 Nineteen of the weavers, including the leaders, were taken prisoner. Hardie and Baird were condemned, hung and beheaded, and twenty men, including a fifteen-year-old youth named Alexander Johnstone, were transported to the penal colonies in Australia.

 
On the day of his execution, Hardie spoke saying:
 ’Yes, my countrymen, in a few minutes our blood shall be shed on this scaffold…for no other sin but seeking the legitimate rights of our ill used and down trodden beloved countrymen.’

At that, an irate Sheriff ordered him to stop, ‘such violent and improper language’. 

Hardie retorted:
 ’What we said to our countrymen, we intended to say no matter whether you granted us liberty or not. So we are now both done.’ 

We can look at the 1820 Rising as an early emergence of the mass movements that would later gather under the Chartism.

The Salisbury Crags path at Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh is known as the Radical Road built by unemployed weavers, at the suggestion from Walter Scott in the aftermath of the abortive 1820 Rising. The Martyrs' Monument was erected in secrecy in 1847 at Sighthill Cemetery, Springburn as a reminder of the sacrifices made in the cause of democracy.