What is the future of mankind?

 

In this time of pandemic, climate emergency and nuclear weapon arsenals do we stand upon the threshold of death and destruction for the whole of mankind? Or do we stand upon the threshold of a new age of unparalleled peace and plenty, a harmony of humanity?

The association of socialism with austerity is a misleading one.  All around us are the signs that we can produce more than enough for everyone. The Socialist Party says that the age of plenty for all is already possible on the basis of productive powers we have achieved over last several decades. Today it is no longer a matter of it being possible but being postponed. Everybody knows it is an example of something crazy about this capitalist system we live under. So many intellectuals endeavour to deny such a realist and declare that scarcity of resources is the situation we all face. Yet there is TOO MUCH of everything, and people suffer hunger.

We have the factories and the resources that can produce a world of plenty. We have the willing brawn and brains to do the requisite tasks. All we have to do is let the one work on the other, and distribute what is produced. But society as a whole doesn’t own the factories and technology. It has nothing to say about whether they’ll be used and for what because all these are owned by a small handful of capitalists who won’t let a machine run unless they can make a profit.

In a socialist world of plenty, people are at long last freed of the dominance of economics, the tyranny of economics. We will for the first time be free to develop the full potentialities and capacities of the human individual, and see the full flowering of humanity’s spirit. This is the goal worth fighting for today. It is the real freedom.

The Socialist Party teaches that the workers of all lands must regard each other as brothers and sisters who stand together in solidarity on behalf of the interests of working people. These interests demand that in order to gain a world of plenty for all, freedom, and a permanent peace, the capitalist system must be abolished and replaced with a cooperative commonwealth of planned production for use.

Contrary to those over-population catastrophists output of food, raw materials and manufactures had risen steeply, far outstripping the growth of population. There was enough and to spare to feed, clothe and house the working billions of the world. The environmentalist Cassandras’ evaluations are both pessimistic and myopic.

The coming social revolution must place the new technology in the hands of the people. Robotics and other forms of automation will be the foundation for a whole new world. Abundance, created by Artificial Intelligence and people working for the common good rather than the profit of the few, will forever end poverty, exploitation, oppression and war. Our organisation is increasingly structured around this vision, the creation of a cooperative, communal society based on the application of computerised, labour-saving production. Ours is a revolution for a better world, a vision of a world of abundance. Society now has the capacity to satisfy the needs of all.

 If production is planned and its products shared fairly, there is no reason why anyone should be short of anything – nor why the environment should be degraded in the process. Our aim is to end as much as feasible the dirty, dangerous, demeaning work and its drudgery, and instead direct people’s lives towards education, recreation and leisure. A socialist planned economy will be production for need, not for exchange, not one of commerce. Poverty is not inevitable; that is true. But it is inevitable so long as capitalism exists, so long as the profit-economy reigns. An improvement in the global standard of living is possible, but not on the basis of capitalism. Freedom is possible and necessary, but it cannot be achieved under the system of capitalism, not in a class society where the reality of the social order increases national and racial antagonism as the means of keeping the ruling class in power. Genuine freedom and real democracy are possible, but only in a free economic society.

Capitalist economics is the the economics of enforced scarcity in a world of plenty. The struggle for socialism has become the fight for the very survival of civilisation and instead to strive towards a world of plenty. Abolish the capitalist profit-suckers. Take over our economic world, organise it democratically. Common ownership – that’s socialism.

 

What our Goal is

 No single individual really rules. A CLASS rules. The capitalist class. Like all previous class rule, capitalist rule is the rule of a tiny minority, based on the foundations of scarcity economy. The only way a minority has or can or ever did rule over the majority is either by brute force or the use of deception and lies. When we take over the economy we’ll have real democracy, social democracy. Working people will be running things in our own interests. There will be no prime ministers or presidents. Organise with us to overthrow the whole rotten system. Get people to together to fight for socialism.

 

 Capitalists own all the factories, the mines, the transport and everything we work at. We just own our debts, empty bellies and our muscles. We have to give the capitalists our muscles so we can pay our debts and fill our stomachs. But we also have the possibility of running the world to benefit the majority.

 

For socialists if human rights are to mean anything each one of us has the right to share in the social heritage of human beings by an equal right to the use and benefits of the products of the social brain and the social hand by in order to be able to develop his or her own potential, that everyone has the right to be able to develop their full potential and capacities through democracy and participation in our workplace and community, and that we all possess the right to live in a society in which human beings and nature can be nurtured by a society in which we can develop our full potential in communities based upon cooperation and solidarity. The association of producers becomes an opportunity to meet our needs by meeting each other’s needs.

 

From their stocks and shares capitalists can enjoy a windfall of rewards without lifting a finger.  Meanwhile, the people who work the hardest, the unskilled workers, domestic servants, etc., make the least amount of money. Workers must constantly struggle against unrelenting downward pressure on their standard of living. Socialism is more than being well paid for the work one does. It truly revolutionises how society operates. The capitalist system, in which a small number of capitalists are allowed to subordinate everyone else’s interests to their own pleasures, is replaced with a democratic structure in which the working class itself collectively directs the economy according to a conscious plan that was chosen after a full debate with all the relevant information and a democratic vote. In other words, a whole new culture will be created in which all of the members of society will become informed and encouraged to participate in determining the fundamental policies that will guide the direction of society. Such a transformation will allow us a qualitatively better life. It will enable us to end the anarchy of capitalism, where every individual capitalist enterprise pursues its own self-interest, with an economy that is planned to efficiently satisfy the vast majority of the population’s needs in the most sustainable manner to identify and maximise everyone’s well-being while eliminating whatever undermines this goal. A better world is indeed possible. 

 

Humankind can produce such abundance that society can be free from hunger, homelessness and backbreaking labour. The only thing standing in the way is this system of exploitation and injustice.  We invite all who see that there’s a problem and are ready to do something about it to join with us. With our organised strength, we will liberate the thinking of working people and unleash their potential energy. We can inspire fellow-workers with a vision of a world of plenty. New technology provides better and more products with less and less labour. Society now has the capacity to satisfy the needs of all.

 Radical changes in the way a society produces its wealth call for radical changes in how that society is organised. The capitalist class cannot convince the people to believe in their system while destroying their hopes and dreams. We can arouse working people with a society organised for the benefit of all. A society built on cooperation that puts the well-being of its people above the profits and property of a handful of billionaires. When the class which has no place in the capitalist system seizes control of all productive property and transforms it into the common property of all, it can reorganize society so that the abundance is distributed according to need.

 

Capitalism is our Enemy

Capitalism, the private ownership of the means of production, is responsible for the insecurity of subsistence, the poverty, misery, and degradation of the majority of working-people. The present system of social production and private ownership is rapidly converting society into two antagonistic classes — i.e., the capitalist class and the propertyless class. Independent political action and the trade union movement are the chief emancipating factors of the working class, the one representing its political, the other its economic wing, and both must cooperate to abolish the capitalist system. Therefore the Socialist Party declares its object to be:

 First — The organisation of the working class into a political party to conquer the public powers now controlled by capitalists.

Second — The abolition of wage slavery by the establishment of a system of cooperative industry, based upon the common ownership of the means of production and distribution, to be administered by society in the interest of all its members, and the complete emancipation of the wage-slaves. 

Socialism shall satisfy all the material needs without stint or measure from the common storehouse, according to their desires. The abundant production now possible, and which invention will constantly facilitate, will remove any need for rationing or limiting of consumption. Every individual, relying on the great common production, will be secure from material want and anxiety. There will be no class distinctions. There will be neither rich nor poor. There will be neither masters nor servants, all being in a position of economic equality — no individual will be able to become the employer of another. When wages have disappeared, when all are upon a basis of economic equality, when the position of manager, director, organiser, etc., brings no material advantage, the desire for it will be less widespread and less keen, and the danger of oppressive action by the management will be largely nullified. Nevertheless, management imposed on unwilling subordinates will not be tolerated; where the organiser has chosen the assistants, the assistants will be free to leave, or change him; where the assistants choose the organiser, they will be free to change him. Co-operation for the common good is necessary, but freedom, not domination, is the goal.

Money will no longer exist, and none will desire to hoard commodities not in use, since a fresh supply may be obtained at will. There will be no selling, because there will be no buyers, since everyone will be able to obtain everything at will, without payment. The possession of private property, beyond that which is in actual personal use, will disappear. Since co-operative work and mutual reliance on mutual aid renders some kind of organisation necessary, the best possible form of organisation must be chosen: the test of its worth is its efficiency and the scope for freedom and initiative it allows to each of its units.

The land, factories, mines, transport, all the means of producing are owned by the capitalist class. The majority of the people own nothing except their muscles and brains, that is, their power to work. The capitalist will only buy labour if he can make profit out of it. The capitalist will compel the worker to work as hard and as long as he can, for as little money as possible. The worker has nothing to sell but his or her labour power. Working-people sells their labour power to an employer for so many hours a day for a certain price, that is, wages. Since one cannot separate labour power from one’s body it comes to this, that a worker actually sells oneself like a slave. Wages are determined by what it costs to keep a worker and  family. What does capitalism offer workers? A life of toil, a bare subsistence. Always the dread fear of unemployment. The whole world must become a huge cooperative society, and working people, instead of slaving to enrich the idle capitalist, creates wealth for the whole community. The workers will enjoy the results of their labour, without having to pay tribute to stock exchange speculators and industrial profiteers. They are no longer slaves of a master but a member of a great global community. Together we shall build a worldwide Co-operative Commonwealth.

The words socialism and communism have the same meaning. They indicate a condition of society in which the wealth of the community: the land and the means of production, distribution and transport are held in common, production being for use and not for profit. We must fight, struggle, be ready for defeats and disappointments, but once we have consciously set our feet on the right road, with a clear vision of the task ahead, nothing can daunt us and all causes for pessimism disappear.

Socialism - A Solidarity Society

 

The Socialist Party conceives of a society without exploitation, organised democratically for the common good. There may be still room for improving the present social system, but it is of minor consequence compared to the world’s crying need for industrial and social reorganisation. The next great change in the evolution of society must be the socialisation of the means of our common life. Privately owned production for individual profit are no longer compatible with social progress and have ceased to work out to humane ends. With all its marvellous progress in technology and invention, the monumental achievements of science, this world of ours has not yet learned how to feed itself. There is no longer the least excuse for a hungry person. All the materials and resources are at hand and easily available for the production of all things needed to provide nourishing food, good health and decent homes for every man, woman and child, thus putting an end to the poverty and misery. But these tools and materials and forces must be released from private ownership and control, socialised, democratised, and set in operation for the common good of all instead of the private profit of the few. A privately owned world can never be a free world and a society based upon warring classes cannot stand. Such a world is a world of strife and hate and such a society can exist only by means of coercion and force. The education of the people is the task of the people to be performed only by themselves. All history attests the fact that all the few have ever done for the many is to keep them in ignorance and servitude.

The Socialist Party visualises socialism as a higher stage of human society, economically, socially and intellectually, where all science and the arts is to be utilised, not for the few, but for the benefit of mankind as a whole. Based on the common ownership of the means of production and distribution, a new and better economic system is to be built, ending all social oppression creating a community of free and equal producers striving not for sectional interests, but for the common welfare. This socialist commonwealth, liberates the individual from all economic, political and social oppression, would provide the basis, for real liberty and for the full and harmonious development of the person, giving full scope for the growth of the creative personality.

If mankind equally possessed and enjoyed in common...the goods, wealth, and conveniences of life and if they wisely managed the goods of the land and the fruits of their labour and industry, they would all have sufficient place to live happy and content, for the earth almost always produces sufficient and even abundantly enough to nourish them and sustain them, if they would always make good use of these goods, and it’s quite rare that the earth fails to produce the necessities of life; and thus all would have enough to live peacefully. No one would lack what is necessary, no one would suffer in order to have what they need to feed or house themselves; for all would find all of this surely, abundantly, easily and comfortably in a well-run community; and thus no one would have any interest in resorting to fraud or falsehood.

No one would have any interest in envying neighbours, nor to be envious of each other, because all will be more or less in a state of equality. No one would have any interest in stealing what others might have, no one would have any interest in killing anyone in order to acquire their possessions, for this would be of no good. No one would have any interest in working themselves to death with fatigue, as is now done by countless numbers of poor people, who barely have what they need to live as well as to meet the expenses that are rigorously demanded of them because each would assist the other in sharing the sweat and toil of labour, and no one would remain uselessly idle while others occupy themselves usefully at labour. The rich steal the better part of the fruits of your hard labours, and leave them nothing but the dregs, fearing penury or poverty. There is no happiness anywhere. Surely we ought to make a stand. What is your life or my life worth, unless it has been exercised in doing something to add to the sum of happiness of the human family? 

Co-operation instead of competition is one of the aim of the Socialist Party. It is nonsense to say that if you remove competition individuals will not excel. How many geniuses who have given us great things thought of profit when they were inventing them? Was it not the thought of the having accomplished something so wondrous for many of them? They did not think of themselves, nor of profit.

Our present system has been a pronounced failure. Political parties have failed. There must be unity and co-operation if we are to rise and take upon ourselves the responsibility of proving that we can under the favorable conditions we have around us find the solution to capitalism’s problem. We can do it. We can if we set our minds upon it.