CAPITALISM – THE ENEMY OF HUMANITY

 

The highest aspiration of the Socialist Party is for the triumph of its cause. Our members' hopes are bright with the possibilities of the future commonwealth. Their ambitions are no longer individual, nor are their joys and sorrows. They are glad and downcast with the flow and ebb of the movement. We view events in their relation to the revolution; we ask of institutions whether they can assist or only obstruct it. The revolution is no one’s business but the workers'.

 In the perennial class struggle around conditions of livelihood, workers suffer defeat on defeat; worse, we combat one another. We allow ourselves to be divided on all manner of pretexts. We have not learned to unite even in defence of the meagre things we have. As to completely re-organising social life, we should end our masters' packing to produce and distribute by democratic arrangement—but it is never done. Claim and receive what we need from the common store lies outside our fellow-workers imagination. Such is the present state of mind of the working class whose mission it is to overthrow capitalism.

The Socialist Party may do one of two things: lead the workers or teach them. 

A political party by zeal and devotion may aim at acquiring a strong influence over the working class, so that when decisions are to be taken their advice will be asked and followed, relying for support on people who better understand socialism. In other words, activists may either act for their fellow-workers, making all efforts meanwhile to bring them into the party line. This method of leadership recommends itself to some because it appears at first sight to be the quicker.

On the other hand, the socialists may devote all their energies to education, assisting no reformist activity, but rather making clear the worthlessness of such endeavours, and the true remedy for the distress which gave rise to them. In this case, the minimum prerequisite for a seizure of political power would be a majority of socialists. That is not to say that the majority need be profound Marxian scholars, but they must:

(1) understand well the basic principles of capitalist and socialist society respectively;

(2) have freely decided to destroy the one and set up the other, and consequently be able

(3) intelligently to exercise the right of recall, if any of those whom they depute to give effect to their will shall seek to play them false; or

(4) to appoint suitable successors if chance should remove some of their delegates so that the direction of the revolution is in no wise accidental.

(5) Socialists concentrate on making working people capable of acting for themselves.

To count on the support of people who do not understand your purpose is to build on foundations of sand. At most,  they may desert you. If they can be influenced by you, they can also be swayed by your enemies too; and, become in the hardships and uncertainties of the transition period, the seeds of counter-revolution? Moreover, if accustomed to leaders, how shall they show the qualities necessary for democratic control—independence, and the responsibility to run a socialist society? Not understanding how the system should develop, where is the safeguard against their wrecking it by unsound decisions? And to prevent that you must govern over your fellow-workers after all.  Not a co-operative commonwealth, but a bureaucratic state —a sorry achievement of leadership, which leaves the task of education still before you.

No genuine and enduring transformation of society is possible until the majority of the workers have embraced socialist principles, the Socialist Party directs all its actions towards organising an ever-growing body of socialist conviction. It takes no part in reformist agitation but calls on the workers to come together for the one action that can help them. We avoid confusing our message by advocating socialist principles with our slogans and supporting reformist programmes through our actions. We seek to ensure that new comrades join us with their eyes wide open— knowing the road without the need for a leader. Say in a time of revolution a leader is entrusted with a great task. He or she fails or dies; it is but to supply a replacement with another. The revolution will not fail or die with one person. All are not equally gifted, but the field of selection is as wide as the party, not limited to a small elite vanguard. Leaders, regardless of how strong and courageous, cannot guarantee victory, and a defeated insurrection would sow despair and defer what it sought to hasten. But a resolute majority, equipped with knowledge, is invincible.

“Intelligence enough to conceive, courage enough to will, power enough to compel. If our ideas of a new society are anything more than a dream, these three qualities must animate the due effective majority of the working people: and then I say the thing will be done.” William Morris

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Our Answer is Socialism

 

 If socialism is assumed to be no more than social reforms or government regulations shows that the worker is not yet ready for socialism.

Socialism is not around the corner. To pretend that it is or to ignore the immense tasks that yet lie before socialists and the working class would be a disservice to socialism,

We scorn the easy road that might lead to large support and popularity. We have been in the business of making socialists for no other reason than that a majority wanting socialism is the first condition for its establishment. 

Over years events have provided innumerable tests of the soundness of our Object and Declaration of Principles. Nothing has deflected us from our purpose and path or diverted us to the pursuit of any secondary purpose or of any other object than socialism.

 

We have tenaciously ploughed our way unshaken by revolutions, civil wars and world wars. More than ever to-day we take our stand on the position that the economic and social problems of the world can be solved only by socialism; that workers everywhere have a common interest with each other that overrides all other interests.

There can be but one answer to these problems for the workers. There is no solution to any of them separately. The solution to any one of them is the solution which will sweep all of them away together. That solution is the one we have proffered at all times throughout our history as the remedy for the social and economic problems which confront the workers. That solution is not a new discovery. At all moments throughout our history, it has been our answer. It still is and will continue to be: It is SOCIALISM NOW

The reality of capitalism is that such problems are endemic to the system. They flow directly from its basis and in one form or another, they will endure for as long as capitalism lasts. The reformist case is that capitalism need not be abolished (although some reformists profess this to be their eventual, distant, objective) just yet because it can be modified so as to be acceptable to people. All the evidence destroys this myth and points to the conclusion that socialism cannot be delayed. It points to the conclusion that reformism is not only futile but reactionary, since it aims to postpone socialism when this, in fact, means the abandonment of the aim of social revolution and therefore the continuation of capitalism with all the problems which so concern the reformists.

The Socialist Party will not barter its support for any promise of reform. For, no matter whether these promises are made sincerely or not, we know that the immediate need of our class is emancipation, which can only be achieved through the establishment of socialism. Our interests are opposed to the interests of all sections of the master-class without distinction; whether bankers or industrialists, landlords or commercial magnates, all participate in the fruits of our enslavement. All will unite, in the last resort, in defence of the system by which they live.

For the party of the working class, one course alone is open, and that involves unceasing hostility to all parties, no matter what their plea, who lend their aid to the administration of the existing social order and thus contribute, consciously or otherwise, to its maintenance. Our object is its overthrow, and to us, political power is useless for any other purpose. With these facts clearly in mind, and conscious that economic development is our unshakable and inseparable ally, we call upon the workers of this country to muster under our banner.

Our case has stood the test of time and has been kept clear and forceful for all these years. But we are aware that progress towards socialism is desperately needed; we are not satisfied that the workers remain so wedded to capitalism, so susceptible to the specious propaganda for the social system which exploits and degrades them. If we look back, then, it is only to draw the lessons of the past and to apply them in the future. The years since 1904 have taught us of the need to refuse compromise, to stand for socialism and for that alone and to insist that the revolution is an immediate possibility; the working class can and must understand socialism and opt for it. That is the continuing task of socialists everywhere.

When that happens, the role of the Socialist Party is at an end. A class-free, united society will have no need for any expression of class-divided society; there will be no privileges, no coercive machinery, no medium through which ownership on the one hand, and denial of access on the other, are expressed. Neither will there be political parties, which exist as proponents of class interests. The socialist parties alone represent the interests of the working class; when that class is abolished with the establishment of socialism the socialist parties, along with all others, will cease to exist.

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A Party of Principle

 The Socialist Party stands for the revolutionary transformation of society. Because history has proved that a party for revolution cannot be built up on reform programmes, the Socialist Part does not seek to win support by advocating reforms. We do not expect, therefore, to gain the support of people still unconvinced of the need for socialism—nor do we desire to be supported by non-socialists. Until the majority desire and are prepared to organise for the specific job of establishing socialism, the achievement of the new society is an impossibility. Our task now then is, to propagate socialist principles, to make socialists. Non-socialists, people interested in the reform of capitalism, would hamper us in that job.

 Once a revolutionary party begins to compromise with capitalism and is willing to help in its administration and reform, such a party is doomed as a weapon for socialism. It ceases to be revolutionary. Once a party adopts reform programmes, it appeals to many kinds of people who are anything but socialist. The result is that the socialists are swamped, and socialism is pushed further and further into the background on the party programme until socialism ceases to be the object of the party.

Workers should refuse to give their support to any party which, while claiming to be socialist, fights elections on a reformist programme. Such parties could not introduce socialism even if they won power. Their mandate would be for the reform of capitalism, not for socialism. Such parties which use plenty of revolutionary jargon but which have reform programmes cannot bring to an end the workers’ wage-slavery. Socialism alone will do that, and such parties are merely reformist. Let the workers, then, reject reformism, and embrace revolution. Let them cease to spend their forces on reformist futilities. 

A further objection is that no matter what reforms are introduced capitalism will still remain. It will frequently nullify the temporary improvement brought about by each reform and at the same time produce other evils which in their turn demand still more reforms. The only solution of the workers’ problem is the introduction of socialism, and this can be brought about only when a majority have been won over to an understanding of socialism and have organised to achieve it. All the time and effort spent on reforms is time and effort lost to the propagation of socialism.

Better far to have a party, no matter how small, with common principles and a common end, than a party, however large, which is bound by no tie save party interest. We, therefore, who differ from these other parties in essential principles—inasmuch as we accept the principle of the class struggle while they do not—cannot consent to unite our forces with theirs. It would weaken both parties—and the weakening would he more disastrous to the uncompromising section than to the revisionist. We are all for unity, but it is for a unity firmly established on a common aim, and a common method. Any other unity is but a delusion.

Let us restate a few basic essentials of the Socialist Party case.

Socialism involves the abolition of private and class ownership in the means and instruments of production, and the establishing of an order of things wherein they will be owned by society. For the first time in modern times, mankind will  have the possibility of organising production for society without an owning class. Things will be produced solely for use and because people need them. They will not be produced to sell and to provide profit for the owners of the means and instruments of production as they are under capitalism. There will be no profit. There will be no wages because men and women will not need to sell their energies in order to live. The function of money to circulate goods will disappear because it will not be needed. The function of wages to ensure that the worker receives only part of the wealth he or she produces will disappear because the worker in socialist society will enjoy the full fruits of his production, after meeting the necessary replacements and enlargements of the means of production and distribution. Wages are an indication of working-class poverty. The continuance of the wages system under any government or with whatever modifications is still capitalism.

The revolutionary change in the economic basis of society from private to common ownership will produce corresponding changes in the whole organisation of social life. Culture and leisure will be free to all instead of to a minority. Social, moral and family habits and customs which rest upon the private property basis of capitalism will adjust themselves to fit into the new order. Capitalist ideas will dissolve into history’s melting pot. Freed from the poverty and servitude of class-society men and women will face each and the other as free and equal social beings. All social values will undergo revolutionary changes. Reflection upon the potentialities of society organised on a socialist basis humbles the imagination. Anything short of this is not socialism: it is capitalism by whatever name it is called.

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The Revolutionary Demand

 

Change is needed. Most people agree with that. The question is what kind of a change is it to be? Is it to be envisaged only the reform of present-day society, the type of change the capitalist class and their supporters would wish? Or will the workers act in their own interest in the revolutionary act of abolishing capitalism and establishing socialism? The choice rests with working people. If they want mere modifications of capitalism which will still leave them fundamentally in the same position as they live under today, they can have them. On the other hand, should they decide to have done once and for all with capitalism, its private property, profits and privileges for the few and its wage-slavery and poverty for the vast majority, there is no-one who can prevent them. The working-class can decide the nature of society. The lesson is plain. The workers, the bulk of the population, can decide how society will change. Should the workers support plans for the reform of capitalism? Or should they take matters into their own hands, abolish the present system and build socialism?

The reformists assume that capitalism will remain forever. Any changes they advocate are to be brought about within the framework of capitalism. This is the essence of reformism. Capital and wage-labour, the two bases of capitalism, they leave fundamentally untouched. They do not seek to eradicate these roots of capitalism. They merely try to lessen the pains inflicted on society by the capitalist system.

 All reformist efforts to solve the fundamental problems of the workers are bound to fail.Capitalism cannot be so modified by reform measures that it becomes the best of possible worlds for the working-class. Capitalism, it must be understood, is a system of a society organised so as to provide profit to the owners of industry, the capitalist class. To do this, the wage-worker is set to work, and what he produces belongs to the employers, the capitalists. The wage-worker is given back, in the form of wages, only a portion of what he produces ; the rest, the surplus, the capitalist owner retains. Thus is the worker exploited and kept on the poverty line, for the portion he receives as wages is just about sufficient to keep him fit enough to perform his particular job and reproduce his kind—future wage-slaves for the service of the capitalist class. Hence the worker is born poor, he lives his life in poverty and dies still poor. The motive power of capitalism is the lust for profit, any wage increases won by the workers are, if possible, offset by the employing class, for wage increases mean an attack on profits. Hence wage increases are usually the signal for the introduction of more labour saving devices, of more machinery. Thus, very frequently, more production is squeezed out of fewer workers. The exploitation of the worker becomes more intense.

Whatever reforms are introduced, so long as the present system remains, the following evils will persist: —

1. The bulk of what the workers produce will be taken from them.

2. They will be kept on or near the poverty line, and thus forced to continue in a slave position, dependent on the capitalist class for a living. They will still stand in need of doles, old age pensions and all the other accessories of poverty.

3. It is an important point that reforms carried out to improve the lot of the worker should prove an inconvenience to the capitalist class in whose interests present-day society operates, they are, as soon as a favourable opportunity arises, either abandoned altogether or modified to the disadvantage of the workers. 

 

Because no solution is possible for the worker under capitalism, we in the Socialist Party are out to abolish it and replace it with socialism. We aim at nothing less because we know nothing less will satisfy the needs of the class to which we belong. It is also for this reason that we are opposed to all other parties, all of which, at the most, aim merely at modifications of present-day society.

 

Workers should study socialism. That is the first step towards their liberation. We are confident that a little education will convince them that only by going to the root of their problems can their position be permanently improved. They will realise the need for abandoning reform movements. They will realise the need for revolutionary action, for replacing capitalism by socialism, that is by a society wherein there will be no private property, no profit-making and no wages. Socialism is, in fact, a social system wherein the means of life belong to all society and wherein, consequently, production is carried on to satisfy the needs of society. Socialism, having no “ulterior motive,” will make unnecessary the present-day strivings for “a living wage” (which still leaves the workers robbed of the bulk of what they produce). 

Let the worker, then, change his motto. With Marx, we say, “Instead of the Conservative motto, ‘A fair day’s wages for a fair day’s work !’ they ought to inscribe on their banner the revolutionary watchword, ‘Abolition of the wages system !’ ”

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