The Socialist Answer

The hope for a class-free society is a very old idea.  The stoics of the the 3rd century BC believed in a "world city" where all were brothers. They were the first to condemn all kinds of slavery and to talk about the oneness of the whole human community regardless of national and ethnic differences.

 Some say that early Christianity was originally ‘socialist’ where the expression “to each according to their need” should not be credited to Marx but to “Acts of the Apostles” in the Bible.

 In the 13^th Century the preacher, John Ball, was telling peasants:

 “ye good people, the matters goeth not well to pass in England, nor shall do till everything be common, and that there be no villains nor gentlemen, but that we are all united together, and that the lords be no greater masters than we. What have we deserved, or why should we be thus kept in servage? We be all come from one father and mother, Adam and Eve: whereby can they say or show that they be greater lords than we, saving by that they cause us to win and labour for that they dispend?”

By the 17^th Century, Gerard Winstanley was writing about  the abolition of money.

 “Every tradesman shall fetch materials… from the public store-houses to work upon without buying and selling; and when particular works are made… the tradesmen shall bring these particular works to particular shops, as it is now the practice, without buying and selling. And every family as they want such things as they cannot make, they shall go to these shops and fetch without money.”

We hear much about the“dignity of work” especially from those who do not toil.They instruct us to be content with our lot in life. To say that we should rise above meaningless drudgery and wage-slavery makes us socialists agitators and rabble-rousers.The term “labour or job market” expresses the fact that in capitalist society a worker is merchandise to be bought and sold for a price.It means little if the person is skilled or unskilled, works with ones hands or brain. It simply makes the price paid different.The mission of the Socialist Party is to abolish the wage system, in it entirety.Society needs to be reconstructed upon a new foundation, and the working class alone — the only class without which society would perish — can accomplish the task.The working class holds  the power at the ballot-box to end the tragedy of toil and modern technology  will become our servant, not our master.

Socialism is not an authoritarian creed. It is a society without a government. It is a free society; a society without rulers and ruled, nor leaders and led, without masters and slaves. Socialism is not only on the side of freedom but is equivalent to freedom, standing opposed to hierarchy, bureaucracy , regimentation, oppression, repression and submission. Any movement towards freedom is a movement towards socialism. The Socialist Party does not intend to lead the masses towards a free and classless society because we are a part of the masses themselves and adhere to the motto of the First International: “The emancipation of the workers is an act of the workers themselves”. If our fellow-workers wait for a “revolutionary vanguard party” to lead them to the free society, they will neither be free nor classless.

 No socialist can be a socialist in a non-socialist society. The socialist know it and, therefore, tries to bring about a socialist society. Our goal of socialism is a class-free society offering abundance for all.  The class character of society cannot be achieved by machinations and manipulations at the top. It can only be done by a revolution which is followed by a fundamental change in property relations. 

The Only Hope for Civilisation

The Socialist Party advances the theory of socialist revolution. It does not promote this goal as Utopian, a mere vision of what would make working people happy, but as a practical aim to be attained. Capitalism has nothing to offer but uncertainty for tomorrow, economic insecurity, environmental disasters, and wars. Society is more and more divided.

Global warming and the environmental crisis is one of the greatest challenges facing humanity. The relentless exploitation and unsustainable waste of resources by capitalism is the source of this disaster.  Short-term hunt for profit and the abuse of science under capitalism is destroying the world’s environment at an accelerating speed. Technology can be positive and beneficial to society, but private property and the priorities of the ruling class create these great problems. Our answer is that the working class must organise to overthrow those who threaten the survival of the people of the world. Only a planned socialist economy will remedy the current climate catastrophe. It is the task of the working class to put an end to capitalist exploitation and oppression. Capitalism knows no national boundaries. It encompasses all the world’s countries and peoples. The working class is also international, even if the working class of each country first must first do away with their own capitalists. 

Socialism is the power of the working class. This class sets out to reclaim the people’s property from the owning class. Socialism is the sensible use of the resources. Production will be planned on the basis of what serves society, not what yields the most profit. The producers themselves will decide what to produce and how – not “the market”.

 A class-free society is the goal of the Socialist Party. Only when classes and the state have ceased to exist, can people attain full and unlimited freedom. Only then the principle “From each according to ability, to each according to needs” can be fully realised.

The source of oppression lies in the private ownership of the means of production. The capitalist system is the enemy of men and women, and it is only through a socialist revolution and the abolition of the private ownership of the means of production that the oppression and exploitation can disappear. Socialist revolution creates the basis for the participation of working people at all levels of society. While there seems nothing wrong with giving support to political movements in favour of defending a particular sector of the oppressed, the Socialist Party has stubbornly clung to the basic concept of Marx, that only the working class, i.e. the mass of all those forced to sell their labour power in exchange of wages, unites the objective and subjective conditions for building a socialist, i.e. class-free society. We have defended that idea throughout our existence and when it was  less fashionable than it is today. Socialism, on Marx’s view, would be born out of capitalism. But it would be the society of true freedom. Socialists  believe that our fellow-workers, in their misery, yearn for freedom, that they reject servility as we ourselves have rejected them and won’t be bought off with ameliorated conditions, promises  of future rewards or greater opportunities for the worker to ‘better’ oneself. Reformism is a matter of negotiation and bargaining for improved conditions and more security within existing conditions. The reformists are bound to fail, since palliatives under capitalism cannot last, they are not permanent.

Liberty is not something that can be brought to the worker by leaders or saviours. The bringing of freedom to somebody is not a free but a despotic conception. The abolition of the State seems the necessary precondition for the emancipation of the proletariat. The free society will be a federation not of nations but of groups or communes where  production will be placed under the direction of a well-organised administration. To expect from the government of the propertied class that it will help by its mighty hand the strivings of the proletariat towards victory, means to expect the impossible from it. The power of the government reaches only so wide as the interests of the ruling class permit it. It can by a clever see-saw game between parts of the ruling class to obtain particular privileges and power. This rivalry for power however disintegrates the moment when it wants it faces its common enemy, the working class.

Political parties are the product of the class struggle. In a classless society which has rid itself of the remnants of class interests and ideology there will be no political parties. They will be unnecessary. But we have not reached the class-free society. We are in the midst of a society torn apart by class war, and the political parties of necessity express and reflect the interests of classes in this conflict. The more fierce the class struggle becomes, the more society is divided into two camps, when the class antagonisms take the form of the capitalist and landlord class versus the working class. It is this class is the custodian of socialism, of the evolution of mankind. The capitalist class is no longer a progressive class. It cannot lead mankind forward but only backwards. Based upon private property, it has long-since fulfilled whatever progressive role it had to play in the development of society. Capitalism now is a fetter upon the productive forces of society and will lead to desolation and catastrophe.  Unless the changes in society from one social system to another takes place, then mankind will still live in a primitive society.  We want a conscious organised working class which will dare to use its political strength to advance to socialism.

PEOPLE’S POWER

Capitalism is the enemy. Who supports capitalism is the enemy. Who supports the hirelings of capitalism is the enemy. By supporting capitalist candidates they support working-class enemies. Why cannot the worker learn this lesson? When the worker has learnt this lesson; when we know we must rely upon ourselves and upon our fellow-workers what are we to do ? How are we to apply our knowledge to matters of everyday importance to us? It is evidently futile for us to assert our independence of the other political factions if we are independently to strive for measures which those factions advocate. It is also useless for us to organise ourselves into a party which is unable to agree upon a working programme and a common line of action. 

The political party of the workers must be the reflex of the economic interests of the workers who are the propertyless class, in the same way as the other parties reflect the economic interests of the propertied class. We are then driven to the necessity of searching for the economic interest of the worker. And this we find in the principle that the working-class having created all the wealth of society are the rightful owners of that wealth. Every person should receive the product of their own labour, but as in modern society it is impossible to determine the portion which any individual adds to the value of the articles he helps to create, we must be content to let all those who labour remain joint owners of the aggregate product. This, however, is not what obtains in modern society where the reverse is the case. In modern society to-day the non-producers of wealth are the joint owners of the aggregate amount of wealth produced. In this fact we have surely the true differentiation of the party of the workers from the party of the property-owners. And the first object of the political party of the workers, therefore, should be the securing for workers as a class the fruits of their own labour.

 It is within the power of a socialist working class to register, through the vote, its disagreement with capitalism and the capitalist system of society: within its power to register its belief in the superiority of a socialist system, and through this means, of using social forces on behalf of the movement clearly indicated by the trend of economic development, and opposed only to the extent of the power of the ruling class. The power of the ruling class to day is in the main that lent it by the votes of the workers who, in their class unconsciousness, vote on one or other of the pretexts skilfully put before them by the politicians of the masters.

The political party standing for socialism and socialism alone is already in existence; the economic organisation is not yet born. It may be that the framework of existing organisations will be clothed anew with the spread of socialist ideas among their ranks; certain it is that the economic organisation, if separate, must work in complete unison with the political party, since their membership must necessarily consist, in the main, of the same individuals, and their objective be identical.  To be afraid of the corruption that has grown up with the political chicanery in the past, is to play into the hands of the masters. They would wish for nothing better than to be left in the quiet possession of the strings controlling society, while the workers run their heads against the bayonets they hold—or have held by others—to receive them.

That any essential improvement will accrue within the capitalist system it is impossible to imagine, but the way will be prepared for the final overthrow of capitalism and the inauguration of the Socialist Co-operative Commonwealth.

There Are Two Sides To Every Story.

The caption at the top of page of the Toronto Star’s business section of August 1, reads: ''Canadian economy starting to look up.'' Our old friend Stats-Canada waxed rhapsodic that the GDP expanded 4.5 per cent in May and that June was even stronger; over all the GDP increased about 10 per cent in the two months, after falling more than 18 per cent in March and April. 

To quote, ''The report confirms that Canada's economy has experienced a sharp recovery since emerging from nationwide lockdowns.'' But wait a minute folks, before you reach for the six-pack, the condoms or whatever else that helps you celebrate, that ain't all that was on page 3. There were articles on four Canadian companies - the captions read, ''Air Canada hits rough winds with $1.75B loss”; “Reitman's future thrown into doubt''; ''David’s Tea reports $45.8 million loss,'' and though it’s not a company another report states that in Toronto, ''Condo sales down but prices are up.'' 

Er...excuse me, I thought every thing was hunky-dorey.

S.P.C. Members.