Ours is an unequal world

That the joyless nature of existence which the working class are forced to lead under capitalism should make them so regardless of murdering one another in capitalist wars, is also to be regretted. Such conduct, however, is explained by the conditions of capitalist society, with its permanent unemployment, its poverty, its monotonous drudgery and insecurity of life. To many workers, war appeared almost as a relief. It could not, they thought, be much worse than the ills they knew.

The part which the capitalist media plays in times of war is too well known. For them no act is too low in vile cunning; no scheme too diabolical and murderous to secure the approval of those whose business it is to line up heroes for their death. We in the Socialist Party do not support mad, murderous slaughter. We do not ask that the world should be made a graveyard to satisfy the money lusts of the owning class that the media champions. Instead, we appeal to you to catch the inspiration of our message. At present men and women are hardened and embittered by the needless competition for employment which is an essential feature of capitalism. They are, moreover, when capitalist interests demand it, perfect in the arts of mass murder. In contrast with the preaching of the media consistent only in the respect that it always serves capitalism, we offer the message that you should organise with us for socialism, a system of society in which production would be carried on co-operatively in the interests of the whole of society, not for the profit of a few, as it is today.

International, national or local politics, of which these three fronts should the revolutionary party of the workers concentrate their efforts? This question is a common one at Socialist Party meetings.

Our reply is, that conditions must always determine policy. The Socialist Party can go no faster than the desires and understanding of the workers. Our mission is to extend that understanding along all three fronts. But which should be given preference? comes the follow-up question. The answer is that our activities will be guided by the resources at our disposal. At present these resources are small. There are hardly any places, for example, where the Socialist Party is in sufficient numbers to make possible at present the election of socialists at local council elections.

Certainly, if it were now the case that any district or locality displayed a sufficient desire for socialism and candidates were elected, our propaganda would be broadcasted from a louder sounding-board.

This in itself is of considerable value in making more widely known the general principles of socialism. It is to propaganda on a wide and scattered front—here and abroad, wherever our word penetrates, that our energies are devoted.

Unlike the left-wing we do not think that the workers will rally to our side merely because we call upon them to do so. If in the future history of socialist politics one geographical area becomes stronger than another in its desire for socialism, Socialist policy would depend upon the forces of the Socialist Party in other countries.

The revolutionary workers’ party will not try to go faster than its abilities to travel —those abilities are dependent on an understanding of our class and their organisation.

Our policy will be, as in the past, to continue to proclaim the principles of socialism. Our ability to do this is determined by the support we receive from those who want socialism.

Should these lines meet the eye of any of those many friends that we are continually meeting, who tell us, “I have been a socialist for — years,” whilst still remaining outside the ranks of the Socialist Party—may we once again ask them to consider the desirability of enjoying the unique pleasure—in these days when docile placidity appears to reign supreme—of exercising the courage of their convictions. Activity in a socialist organisation gives such an opportunity. What resources does a person need to be well? It is the question that any society should be asking itself.

Pirates and Emperors (video)

 

The Trouble with Capitalism.

 

Capitalism is a social system that produces all sorts of contradictions. Tremendous technical advances should mean a better society but inside capitalism, it leads to better ways to maim, kill and destroy. Improvements in the production of food should lead to a happier world but it produces exactly the opposite. 

“According to Marx, capitalism is a system of accumulation. Profits are made but can’t all be consumed by owners. Extra profits need to be recycled through the market. ‘The only way you can successfully recycle them is to either expand your existing business or diversify into another business,’ says Shutt. ‘It all depends on the ultimate consumer, consuming more and more. It has to grow, growth is built in.’ The problem is that as profits are invested into the market, generating more profits that in turn have to be reinvested, production expands until it reaches a level that can no longer be absorbed by consumers. The market is glutted, and recession results. But the destruction of capital and jobs creates pent-up demand for the whole process to begin again in time. That, in brief, is the business cycle.” (www.redpepper.org.uk/Prophet-of-doom)

Banking, hedge funds and the myriad financial off-shoots that make up Wall St and the City of London are central to the running of modern capitalism. They produce nothing of course but then neither does the industrial capitalist class. It is probably a bit unfair to say they produce nothing. They certainly produce nothing useful, but it certainly produces hypocrisy in large doses.  Speed the day when banks and other financial institutes are part of the unlamented history of capitalism along with all its apologists, both religious and secular.

The Party’s pamphlet Socialism as a Practical Alternative predicts millions of socialists preparing “programmes of action for immediate implementation once the movement has gained control of the powers and machinery of governments.”

When today we join the Socialist Party we join the world socialist movement; we withdraw support for capitalism even though we have to live in it for the time being; we take the first few faltering steps towards building the socialist future. A few hundred of us make no impression on the dominance of capitalism; a few thousand of us will begin to make an impression. As our numbers grow we will infiltrate and revolutionise the media, the educational bodies, the workplaces, the arts, cultural, scientific, leisure and other worlds.

The hard part is to get from here to the beginning of there…

  The main thing is that as more of us give up supporting capitalism and start building a socialist world we shall put some flesh on the bones of common ownership, democratic control, production for use and free access.

 

Capitalism’s continued existence does not require a conspiracy or a conspiracy theory. All it requires is the support, or more likely acquiescence, of the overwhelming majority in their own exploitation.

The conflicting interests of sections of the capitalist class do not affect the workers’ interests. They are robbed by the whole capitalist class and the way in which the capitalists divide the spoils between themselves makes no difference whatever to the workers.

The working-class forms the great bulk of society. They produce all wealth. Instead of owning the wealth themselves, they allow the capitalist class to own and market it. Born and educated in a capitalist world, it is hard for them to conceive of any method of distributing wealth other than by exchange.

The capitalist method is ownership of the means of wealth production by the capitalist class; enslavement of the working-class by compelling them to sell their energy for wages, and setting them to the production of commodities to be sold on the world’s markets. It is this method, this system, that causes unemployment and poverty, not the high cost of production and Trade Union restrictions, and the only cure is the removal of the cause; the abolition of capitalism.

All workers organised in the mad competitive struggle for markets, as well as the millions of unemployed should learn the truth about capitalism. They should organise with the Socialist Party for its overthrow, and for the establishment of a system where production and distribution will be carried on for the people by the people themselves.

Class ownership of the means of life is the cause of working-class misery. Substitute ownership by the people, production and distribution by the people—leaving out the cash basis—and unemployment will no longer be the name with which we shall designate the long periods when our labour is not required. Modern methods of production can satisfy all our needs and leave us with ample leisure for enjoyment.

Union Maid (music)

 

The Socialist Catalyst

 We know that socialism is necessary to the emancipation of working people. Capitalism has reduced the workers to a condition of wage slavery. The capitalists get the profit, grow rich, live in mansions and penthouses, own yachts and private planes, choose judges, buy up the media and bribe polititians. To speak of democracy is a mockery. In every land capitalism rules. Freedom in socialism is the only thing worth striving for. To work for wages, no matter how high, or how short the work-day, is to acknowledge a master. Without socialist freedom civilisation will crumble and die. Socialists will work together to build a new world out of the rubble of the old. Poverty is civilisation’s greatest crime. And this crime cannot be atoned for by charity or philanthopy. It is not “charity” we want. It is justice

The capitalists claim to riches is fraud, hypocrisy, and false pretenses.  The capitalist’s income is simply pure robbery. Not a penny of it does he produce. It is all taken from those in whose sweat and suffer in the fields and factories. There is a cause for poverty, and that cause can be removed. As long as the few own the sources of wealth, the many will be condemned to work for them and the the few will accumulate up millions and billions more. Capitalism dooms the world to more inequality.  Religion and race, national independence and patriotism, are now, from the worker’s point of view, just so many ruling-class devices useful for the purpose, among others, of stirring up hatred when and where they may want it.   Socialism alone is worth struggling for. That is the message of the Socialist to all the working-class dupes of the closely-allied superstitions of religious, racial and patriotic rivalries.

Socialist ideas are developing and in due time the cooperative commonwealth will arise. Working people are mustering their mighty forces for political and economic change. Liberation from the chains of wage slavery is our aim. Organisation is the demand of the day. Working men and women, this is the day for you to realize that your interests are the same, that divided you are helpless.

United political action will place the working class in control of the State, and the abolition of capitalism will inevitably follow. In the socialist future workers will be their own masters and enjoy all the fruit of their toil. Resolve this day to  abolish the wage system. The Socialist Party is the party of the working class, the party that stands for economic equality and industrial freedom, the party of progress and civiliSation. This is the day to hold aloft its banner and proclaim its principles. The future is for socialism and humanity. when the exploitation of man by man ceases and society is organized upon enlightened mutual interests of all, democracy will dawn, war will cease, poverty will be in the past, and the dawn of a new civilisation will light the world.

Work is necessary, but it need not be a burden on our backs. We can organise it so that it it transformed into free cooperation. Automation can reshape workplaces and play a key role in ending the degradation of wage slavery and returning the dignity of work. Robots can replace drudgery. Technology can usher in a post-scarcity age of abundance.

We point out first that the working class are poor and a subject class because the capitalist class have political power and own and control the machinery of production and distribution. The cause of working class poverty is not the existence of certain defects in the political machinery by which capitalism is administered. Therefore, no political reform (proportional representation, for example),no social reform, and no accumulation of such reforms will remedy the problem. If the whole of the reforms advocated by all the reform parties, from Conservative to Communist, were put on the statute book, the working class would still be a subject class and still poor. Therefore, the Socialist Party advocates socialism, and seeks to organise the working class on a socialist basis.

We point out that the only method of achieving socialism is for a socialist working class to gain political control. Anyone who urges the working class to put political power into the hands of persons and parties seeking election on a non-socialist programme, and therefore unable, even if willing, to use their power for any other purpose than the administration of capitalism, is acting directly contrary to the interests of the working class. All the reform parties have in this way acted contrary to working class interests.

The development of capitalist industry constantly produces new social problems for the workers and aggravates old ones, and in the interests of the capitalists themselves these evils, which are merely the effects of capitalism, have to be palliated by various reform measures. The capitalists have to pass these reforms for two main reasons: loss of efficiency and loss of political support. If allowed to work unchecked, capitalism would produce such worsening in the conditions of the workers that they would, on the one hand, lose efficiency as profit-producers, and would perhaps, so the capitalist thinks, on the other hand, show their discontent with intolerable conditions by interesting themselves in socialism or by riot and revolt which, though suicidal for the workers, would be troublesome and costly for the employing class. Incidentally, common sense suggests that the development of a strong socialist movement would cause the capitalist to fall over each other in their anxiety to make concessions in order to persuade the workers that socialism is unnecessary and capitalism not so bad after all.

In short, the Socialist Party opposes the parties which preach reform because there is no way of achieving socialism except through the making of socialists and their organisation into a political party which will gain political power for the purpose ot introducing socialism.

Trade unions are chiefly concerned with the defence of the workers in their direct relations with the employers. They can, when market conditions are favourable, bring a certain organised pressure to bear on the employers to resist a decrease or secure an increase in wages. This is a definite, if limited, gain to the workers concerned.

Therefore, we support workers in their efforts in this direction, at the same time drawing their attention to the limits which capitalism imposes on all such activities.

 

 We point out in particular that every increase in wages or reduction in hours or curtailment of output gives the employers an added inducement to introduce more labour-saving machinery, thus in creasing the number of unemployed and the consequent competition for jobs.

We point out also that the workers should always keep the control of policy in their own hands and not give power to their leaders to negotiate in secret and settle on their own terms. But emphasising once more that no action of this kind, however well organised, can solve the real working class problem of abolishing capitalism, and, further, that the employing class always have it in their power to starve striking or locked-out workers into submission if they deem it worth while to do so..

The Rebel Girl (music)

 

Class war will only end with socialism

The many problems of capitalism can only be solved by a universal remedy. The workers who produce all wealth are poor in the midst of plenty. We say that the only remedy suggested, so far, that has stood every sort of criticism, is socialism.

All our means of livelihood are privately owned, and all of us workers are liable to be sent packing whenever our hirers can find a cheaper substitute. How long are we going to stand it? Why should we not own our own means of livelihood? Why should a relatively small and parasite class dictate to the vast mass of people when they shall work and when not? Let us take possession of the things that are vital to our very existence. We make them, we operate them, we repair them and renew them. We do everything but own them. Without us the whole of the machinery in the world, beautiful as it is, clever as it is, ingenious as it undoubtedly is, is so much junk. Let us make the land, the factories, the machines and the tools of production, common property, and then perhaps, instead of new technology making men and women into paupers, we shall welcome every machine that lightens labour, for it will bring us ewer working hours and increased leisure. The system where the means on how all live are commonly owned and administered, is called socialism. That is what we are aiming at, and we want fellow workers workers to say definitely they want it, and are prepared to help get it. Will you be one?

Capitalism, administered by workers, differs in little from capitalism administered by capitalists. Fellow workers must learn that it is not the individuals, it is the system that is at fault. They must grasp this fact and hold on to it, that changing the name and not the thing achieves nothing.

In nature parasitism on the part of certain organisms is known to possess what is termed “survival value,” that is, this feature plays a successful part in the struggle for existence. Not so in human society. Parasitism in human society owes its success to the fact that those who practise it control the means of enslaving their victims while at the same time permitting them sufficient to keep them from dying and so ensure an abundance of material to serve their needs. Though there are two classes in society—a slave class and a parasitic class—and though one class occupies what is termed a higher social rank, it is not because of its biological fitness to survive, measured by nature’s laws, but merely because in the course of the development of society certain individuals have seen their opportunity to relieve themselves from the necessity of providing a living by their own efforts, and in the course of time to improve the opportunity by introducing the necessary legal sanction in accordance with the degree of development.

Mankind’s conquest of its environment has made possible a remarkable increase in the productivity of every kind of material wealth. But hand in hand with this development has gone an appalling increase in the differences of prosperity and well-being. This concentration of wealth into the hands of a relatively small section of the human race has meant the demoralisation and degradation of literally millions. It is quite true, as history will testify, that the emphasis upon luxury, idleness and extravagance has been just as demoralising to those who hold the wealth, but such an outcome is only in keeping with a system where slavery is practised. Degeneration is the natural corollary of a parasitic mode of life.

 

The Socialist Party has consistently maintained that the Russia Revolution accomplished the overthrow of the absolute monarchy, and was a revolution only in the sense that the power of the landowners was shattered, and the obstacles to development along capitalist lines were swept away. In the early days of the Bolshevik regime, the “Communist” Parties in this and other countries claimed that Russia was the first country to achieve socialism. Whilst due credit should be given the Bolsheviks for their intentions and some of their actual achievements, we explained this mistaken assertion —even at the risk of antagonising would-be supporters who failed to grasp the real significance of Russian events.

Our standpoint has been amply justified by the evidence  and the “Communist” Parties do not as often make this untenable assertion, realising, perhaps, that conditions in Russia could not be cited as an advertisement for socialism. There is, however, one erroneous and harmful assertion that is still being spread about, namely, that in Russia the working class was supreme, or, in their own vague phraseology, that there was a “Dictatorship of the Proletariat.”

SPGB on GB News

Wolves in Workers' Clothing

 

While the Socialist Party support sound trade union action they have to point out, too, that trade unions, though necessary and useful organs of working-class resistance, cannot emancipate the working class from capitalism—that can be done only by a socialist working class politically organised to take control democratically of the machinery of government, for the purpose of abolishing capitalism and introducing socialism. Equipped with sound socialist knowledge, and the will to unite for victory, the working class will achieve its emancipation, in spite of the confusion and disillusion spread by office-seeking political opportunists.

The occasional reference to socialism from the so-called revolutionary left-wing betrays the historical irony that those who now adopt the terminology of socialist revolution are deeply committed to the maxim of the German reformist, Bernstein, that “the goal is nothing, the movement everything”. For them the goal is everything, the movement is never more than a means to it. They care more for movement than for direction; more for growth than for principle; and more for the tactics of a struggle than for the nature of victory. 

The Socialist Party refuses to sacrifice our socialist goal for reformist demands and as a result, it is labelled utopian. This universal slur from the left is reserved for those clear-sighted workers who enter the historic battle of the classes because they look forward to the fruits of victory and not the ‘reality’ of repeated defeats.

The Socialist Party aims to establish a system of society based upon common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and in the interests of the whole community. Those who reject that aim are the idealists, stumbling among the chaos of capitalism, searching for new brick walls to bang their heads against.

It would be extreme arrogance for socialists to devise detailed plans for the lives of emancipated humanity after they have carried out the political act to establish socialism. Like Marx, we are not the designers of a Utopia, but we do not fear prediction and speculation regarding life in a socialist society.

In socialism, a baby will not be destined to accept the label of class. Male or female, black or white, mentally and physically normal or abnormal, it can expect the freedom to develop as a social individual in a world based upon the practice of co-operative equality.

The capitalist-style family will not exist if indeed the family is retained in any form. Certainly, there will no longer be imposed sex roles, indoctrination in the name of education, and repression in the name of discipline. Now, a child must learn to become a wage slave — or, if lucky, a supposedly cultured parasite. In socialism, children will learn from experience over which they will have control.

No society can operate without work, and neither will socialism. Not employment, which is simply the capitalist word for slavery, but useful, self-imposed, creative work. Production in a socialist society will be for use, not profit; with each member of society giving according to his or her ability and taking according to self-determined needs. There will be no wages as a price for a worker’s labour power, nor money as a barrier to the world’s wealth. Free access will be the basis of wealth distribution.

Without the compulsion of wage labour, men and women, if they are able to, will contribute to the tasks of production and distribution. Work will be transformed by socialism; no more dull conditions, no more master-slave relationships, no more shoddy production of cheap commodities, no more need to do one job for life. The aim of work will be the production of the best and the satisfaction of the producer. The latter is an important qualification. There will not be a producer-consumer division in socialism, but satisfactory lifestyles both inside and outside the production process.

A Socialist society will be a political and economic democracy. Everyone will own everything' since private property will not exist. Does that mean we shall have the right to take each other’s coats? No: it means that men and women will use what they need, sometimes permanently as in the case of a coat, sometimes temporarily as in the case of a library book. There will be no rights of property. If someone takes another’s coat — either by accident or because they are acting irrationally — then there will be free access to as many new coats as are needed. Economic democracy will mean that decisions about production and distribution will be made socially, either by the whole of society — which would be no problem even today, with current methods of world communication — or by those involved in the processes, if society is prepared to leave the decision to them. We do not aim to replace the present capitalist elite with a new bureaucratic elite. The socialist revolution will be a permanent revolution in the sense that once enacted, people would have to participate in running society.

Free mobility will be available for everyone in a socialist society. Today, workers are born and they die in one country, usually without travelling far out of its borders. No boundaries, nations or provinces will divide socialist society. The world will be one. That is not to say that we aim to create a monolith, devoid of cultural, language and other variations.

Social organisation in socialism will not depend upon governments, leaders or parties. These only exist in a class society, where laws are the expression of the ruling class's interest. When the socialist working class take power, they will use the law to dismantle capitalism and build socialism. Once that has been done, there will be no laws created by one section of society in order to control another.

Just as there will be no secular laws, so there will be no laws of the phoney creation of primitive man - god. Socialist society will have no need for religions and utopias beyond the grave. What if a minority within socialism want to continue their religious lifestyle? Then they shall be free to do so, and those who want to walk across the Red Sea or jump from a high building without a parachute may do so too.

The morals of socialism will be fashioned by common ownership and free access, and by the sovereignty of democratic decisions. Taboos about sex will be as laughable as taboos about witchcraft are today. To those conditioned by the popular prejudices of capitalism, socialism seems amoral. In truth, it will be a society which will reflect human urges — the imagination and the self-interest of humanity.

Hanging on the wire (music)