The Limerick Soviet (song)

 There was much more to the workers' history of Ireland than nationalism.

This is our planet. We want it back

 

We need to abolish the out-moded and old-fashioned division of the world into nation states. Instead we need to cooperate on a world basis to meet our material needs and energy requirements. Only in a socialist society will the community be able to make decisions about energy production which are based on what is safe and in the human interest instead of decisions based on, and limited by, economic considerations. Only in a socialist society, when human beings can relate to each other as one family and not as units of labour to be exploited or national enemies to be destroyed, will the threats of environmental or military destruction really be removed. Socialism needs mass understanding and support — and then the world will be changed.  We in the World Socialist Movement can envisage a socialist party growing in the future along with many other expressions of working class organisation including trade unions and workers’ councils. We have never stood aloof from the industrial scene and class struggle, as our critics keep repeating until such claims have become an urban legend for many on the Left. However, what we strictly adhere to is that decisions about industrial disputes and work-place agreements are to be made by those directly involved and not by outside-the-union political parties.

The working class will organise itself to expropriate those who live parasitically upon it. It will link itself with the workers of every country, to achieve this internationally, when the workers understand their class-interests. Force is the foundation of capitalist domination, and that force is obtained through Parliament; capitalist control there means capitalist control everywhere. The workers therefore have nothing to gain by supporting any party which seeks to maintain that control. Concessions and reliefs may have been granted in the past by both parties, but none of these concessions, none of these vaunted reliefs have altered the general position of the workers in society. They are still slaves, and while Conservatism, or Labourism has their loyalty they will remain slaves. The workers alone can free themselves from the burden of their condition—this they can do when they wish by organising on a class basis. The SocialistParty preaches the abolition of the private ownership of the means of life. That is the only way of ending the war of classes.

‘The Socialist Party seeks to build an inclusive united working class movement as the next stage in the class struggle. Socialist Party members understand that a shorter work week and the creation of a new union organisation will not topple the capitalist system. But, as a first step, it would provide an example and a base of operations. The object is to continue the education of the worker, to secure badly-needed immediate improvements in working conditions, and, thus, through the organisation, to further the solidarity of the working class and to prevent premature violence. The workers’ revolt can commence on a regional basis, the socialist revolution must be national, continental, and, ultimately, world-wide. Let us determine that that demand for a new idea in the workers’ minds shall not be the sterile idea of nationalism but with the one fruitful conception for humanity, the idea of socialism, the aim will be to make the whole earth a common human possession.

The immediate task is to make socialists and the conditions for propaganda have never been more favourable. After the most devastating war in history, capitalism is still torn by dissension and struggle. It is as useful to write in dust as to work for peace on a capitalist basis. The way to prevent war is to establish socialism. Let us not bow our heads and complain of betrayal; let us organise together for the establishment of a worldwide society—Socialism. A socialist world is possible now, to-day. Make it a certainty by joining the Socialist Party to-day. Workers, for your own sakes and for humanity's sake study socialism. Then, when you understand it, you will organise to establish it and so emancipate yourselves from the shackles of wage-slavery. Clearer than ever before stands out the great fact that there is no hope for real peace in the world until these various sections of workers recognise the common fundamental character of their slavery and set to work to remove it, thus ending the enslavement of the human race by the establishment of socialism.

We Call It Socialism

 The alternative to the present capitalist system of profit-seeking and monetary accumulation involves:

· the absence of any property rights, private or state, over natural and industrial resources needed for production;

· the existence of a non-coercive democratic decision-making structure;

· the guaranteed access for all to what they need to satisfy their needs;

· the orientation of production towards the direct satisfaction of real needs in a flexible and self-regulating way without the intervention of money and buying and selling;

· the organisation of work as a voluntary service under the democratic control of those working in the various production units.

We call this system “socialism”, but it is the content, not the name, that is important. In any event, it obviously has nothing in common with the state capitalist regimes (as in the former USSR or China) or proposals for state control (as by the Labour left) which are often erroneously called “socialist”.

The means by which the new society can be achieved are determined by its nature as a society involving voluntary co-operation and democratic participation. It cannot be imposed from above by some self-appointed liberators nor by some well-meaning state bureaucracy but can only come into existence as a result of being the expressed wish of a majority—an overwhelming majority—of the population. In other words, the new society can only be established by democratic political action and the movement to establish it can only employ democratic forms of struggle.

Because the present system is, as a system must be, an inter-related whole and not a chance collection of good and bad elements, it cannot be abolished piecemeal. It can only be abolished in its entirety or not at all. This fact determines the choice as to what we must do: work towards a complete break with the present system as opposed to trying to gradually transform it.

Gradual reform cannot lead to a democratic, ecological society because capitalism is an economic system governed by blind, uncontrollable, economic laws which always triumph in the end over political intervention, however well-meaning or determined this might be. Any attempt on the part of a government to impose other priorities than profit-making risks either provoking an economic crisis or the government ending up administering the system in the only way it can be—as a profit-oriented system in which profit-making has to be given priority over meeting needs or respecting the balance of nature. This is not to say that measures to palliate the bad effects of the present economic system on nature should not be taken but these should be seen for what they are: mere palliatives and not steps towards an ecological society.

The only effective strategy for achieving a free democratic society in harmony with nature is to build up a movement which has the achievement of such a society as its sole aim. We recognise a huge mistake among those wanting to see changes for the better — not that positive changes are undesirable but simply that tinkering with a mechanism can't be the best way to fix the problem. Anyone drawn to the idea and principles of socialism will not be looking to 'fix' any problem caused by capitalism, whether technological, scientific, or whatever, but will be wanting and seeking because it's obviously necessary if the planet is to remain a viable planet for survival, the end of capitalism.  Socialism has no borders. It is essentially global. It cannot be otherwise. The abolition of nations will not mean that cultural variety will be destroyed. Indeed, it is nationalism which all too often suppresses minority cultures. In a socialist society the richness of cultural customs will make the world a better place, just as the absence of armies and bombs and passports — all features of a world divided — will make the world secure.

 A socialist world will not be one in which there will be no problems left to solve. But, free from the fetters of production for profit, the sole basis of creating goods and services will be the satisfaction of human needs. Without several nations competing to make the same product, without rival research institutes in different nations each trying to make a discovery without others knowing what they know, the world will be able to unite its energies for the first time ever. The waste, duplication and tension of a society cut up into nations will give way to one world, one people and one common aim of mutual survival and comfort.

Socialism Now

Only with the introduction of socialism will the problems of capitalism end. As revolutionaries, we should fight the collective war between us and the ruling class, not play the hostage game at their bargaining table. We have nothing to say to our rulers on how to run capitalism, we should not be drawn into fighting their battles. We advocate a world without borders, social classes, leaders, governments and armies. A world without money or wages, exchange, buying and selling. Where people can give freely of their abilities and take according to their own self-defined needs. A global system in which each person has a free and democratic say in how their world is run. It is workers who produce everything society needs and provides all of its services. Capitalism is a barrier to the fair and needed use of the world’s productive forces. In a world of potential abundance, profit imposes widespread artificial scarcity.  We have always said that socialism can only be established by a conscious, participating working class organised not only politically to capture and destroy the State machine but also outside parliament ready to take over and run industry and society generally.

Capitalism cannot be reformed in the interests of the world’s billions, because reform does not address the basic contradiction between profit and need. Governments cannot be depended upon because they only act as an executive of capitalism. An expansion of democracy, while welcome, makes little difference if candidates can only offer variations on the same policies. Capitalism must be abolished if we as a species are to thrive. No amount of reform, however great, will work. Change must be global and irreversible. It must involve all of us. We need to erase borders and frontiers; abolish states and governments and false concepts of nationalism. We need to abolish our money systems, and with it buying, selling and exchanging. And in place of this, we need to establish a different global social system – a society in which there is common ownership and true democratic control of the Earth’s natural and industrial resources. A society where the everyday things we need to live in comfort are produced and distributed freely and for no other reason than that they are needed. Socialists build that new world, by building an understanding of what socialism will be like.

We feel no shame or guilt in inviting you to join the Socialist Party. It is no boast when we say that it is the only political party in this country worthy of working-class support; the only party whose sole object is the overthrow of this system whereby the majority of human beings —the working class—produce the wealth of the world for the small minority—the capitalists—who own it. Our organisation is small, but it is based on principles sound and irrefutable. Socialists would ask where is this common-sense in working men who continue to vote for political parties representing the capitalist class. It is indeed a strange state of affairs when we live in a society which is capable of producing an abundance of goods for the benefit of all men, yet that production is restricted artificially because a minority of men and women who form the capitalist class, can see no profit at the end of the day. Workers after all produce all the goods and services, they run the capitalist system from top to bottom, and yet they own virtually nothing of the means of production except their right to defend themselves in times of war, and the right to be subservient to them in times of peace. We believe that the human race is gradually learning the simple lesson that the people as a whole are wiser for the public good than any privileged class. we can only attempt to educate our fellow-workers, as we in our turn have had our eyes opened to the nature of society, and what makes it tick and explode.

Socialism is the complete antithesis of capitalism. In a socialist world private and/or state ownership of society’s means of life will give way to social ownership and production of goods and services solely for use. So goods and services will no longer be produced as commodities for sale and profit. Accordingly, there will be no role in a socialist society for a means of exchange; hence, the entire, utterly wasteful commercial sinews of capitalism will be obsolete. The classless, wageless, moneyless society envisaged in the socialist aphorism: “From each according to their ability; to each according to their needs” will become a reality. A world free from the corruptive influences of money and power where the government of people will give way to a simple administration of things.

Such a society – founded on co-operation instead of competition – could not be established by guns, bombs or violence. It can only be established and only maintained by the conscious democratic action of the majority. Such a majority would be the democratic foundation of a free, socialist world. If the question of counter-revolutionary violence is hypothesised then obviously that violence would have to be eliminated; as socialists have traditionally said “peacefully if we may; forcefully if we must”, but, given the conditions created by a socialist-conscious majority, the capitalist reaction would be deprived of material nourishment.

It’s Time to Move On

 

 ‘It is time for mankind to ensure itself of material abundance by establishing a free, self-managed world society of productive labour, thereby freeing its mental powers for perfecting its knowledge of nature and the universe’ Anton Pannekoek, A History of Astronomy, 1951.

We live in a world which has the potential to adequately feed, house and provide clean water and decent medical care for every single man, woman and child on Earth. The resources exist to banish material want as a problem for members of the human race. Yet millions throughout the world are malnourished, live in squalor or are actually dying of starvation or starvation-related diseases. The things that are desperately needed — food, clean water, housing, sanitation, transport, medical services and so on — can only be provided by useful labour, of which there is an abundance throughout the world. Useful production must be freed from the constraints of profit and class interests. Only useful labour applied through world cooperation in a system of common ownership can solve the problems of world poverty. World socialism could stop the dying from hunger immediately, and provide the conditions for good health and material security for all people across the Earth within a short time. World socialism will operate with one simple and ordinary human ability which is universal — the ability of every individual to cooperate with others in a world-wide community of interests.

Many people still believe that hunger is caused today by over-population and that if there were fewer people in the world, then, and only then, could they be adequately fed. This is not so. In the first place, the resources and technology exist now to feed the world’s population many times over. Second, even if the population did decrease substantially, there would still be a hunger problem, since hunger like homelessness is essentially an economic problem, a poverty problem.

The only genuine opposition movement in the world to capitalist war was and is today the revolutionary organisation of the Socialist Party. Nationality is a development of capitalism. Militarism and war are inseparable from capitalism and can only be understood against the background of commercial rivalry. Socialism will have no State apparatus, no frontiers and no military machine. The understanding and unity of the world’s working class must come before a socialist transformation of society is possible. 

Nationalism is the perversion of believing in a shared identity in the interest of some local elite. To move forward the dispossessed majority across the world must now look beyond the artificial barriers of nation-states and regional blocs, to perceive a common identity and purpose. Dividing up society into more and more pieces, more separate entities create more divisions, more fears and suspicions and when the globe is totally criss-crossed with walls and fences we shall become so paranoid, afraid and suspicious of each other that we finally close our minds? The frontierless world begins with frontierless minds. The challenge is to dismantle the barriers that shackle and dehumanise us. A mind without boundaries can value the vision in which all have a home.

The Socialist Party repudiates the myth that humans are inherently anti-social and non-cooperative, and states emphatically that human nature is no barrier to a sane socialist society.

Socialism is not a fantasy world any more than any other untried idea is a fantasy. Socialists cannot draw up detailed blueprints for a society which will have to be democratically organised by the men and women who establish it. However, we can—and do—examine the possibilities which a socialist world will allow humanity to bring about and we are certain that a society where production is for need will be far better than one where production is for profit.

 ‘ All men are brethren. We denounce all political and hereditary inequalities and distinctions of castes… We believe the earth, with all its natural productions, to be the common property of all… We believe that the present state of society, which permits its idlers and schemers to monopolise the fruits of the earth and, the production of industry, and compels the working class to labour for inadequate rewards, and even condemns them to social slavery, destitution, and degradation, to be essentially unjust… We condemn national hatreds which have hitherto divided mankind… Convinced that national prejudices have been, at all ages, taken advantage of by the people’s oppressors to set them tearing the throats of each other when they should have been working together for their common good, this society repudiates the term ‘foreigner.’ We recognise our fellow-men, without regard to country, as members of one family, the human race, and citizens of one commonwealth, the world’ (Manifesto of the Fraternal Democrats, 1845).

Looking Forward

 What sort of world awaits the working class in the future? Will it be a brand new world free from class privilege and wage-slavery; a world of social equality, security and happiness? Our message is the only message of hope in a world that appears to be on the verge of catastrophe.

The World Socialist Movement exists to achieve a society of communal ownership. The workers are a global class. At one level they may be in conflict — when they compete as individuals for scarce jobs, for example — but at the collective level of their class, their interests are in unity. Above nationalism, above any prejudice of race or sex, working people throughout the world must assert their essential unity in the work to overthrow capitalism and establish socialism in its place.  It will be a significant step on the way, when they cease to think in terms of national or regional solutions to world problems and begin to think globally. Does capitalism deserve to continue any longer? It brings toil, misery and desolation, in peace and in war, to the mass of the people. It is time those who bear the sufferings took time to think about how those sufferings could be abolished. The only way to do so is to destroy the source from which they flow—the private ownership of the means of production. Instead, we can co-operate to provide a good life for all while avoiding damage to the environment.

 People in socialism will enjoy freedoms of decision-making and action that are denied to us under the capitalist system. With all people in harmony with their shared interests, the division of the world into rival capitalist states will be replaced by a democratic administration organised on a world, regional and local levels. 

in the socialist world, there will be no boundaries to countries. The world will become a single unit. It will not be necessary for people to fight for food or a “standard of living,” or any of the thousand and one reasons given from time to time to various nations in order to gain the support of the people in a war. In the socialist world, the people will produce food and build houses for all. The natural wealth of the world is more than enough to amply satisfy the needs of all humans, be they Asian, African, American or European. There need be no shortages. The root cause of world poverty is to make sure that the “real world” continues to be one in which human beings needlessly die and the Earth is systematically ravaged in the name of profit.

We, socialists, stand for a society based on mutual aid and solidarity, the cooperation of all people worldwide on the basis of free decision-making and participatory democracy. We believe that others share our concern for the well-being of people in our society, and for the well-being of the planet itself. We are part of a long-established independent democratic movement which seeks by persuasion and worldwide peaceful political organisation to transform our present society into one fit for humankind.

The problems of our world cannot be solved within the existing structures of production and government. Our world is divided into national areas dominated by class minorities in each country. The ruling class and their political representatives, by reason of a combination of historical circumstances, governmental, military and ideological control or influence, are able to keep the majority of the world's population in subjection and subjugation. Socialism is a new world society where the means of production are commonly owned and where governments and systems of exchange, whether barter or money, have been replaced by democratic administration at local, regional and world levels: a society where there could be decentralized co-ordination of production with free access according to to need.  We want people not to be thinking in national terms but to consider the socialist proposition of a world community without frontiers.

Socialism cannot be established in one country. Even under capitalism, the Nation-State has become too small a framework for capital’s expansion. The World Socialist Movement does not defend national sovereignty or promote separatism. Our criticisms of capitalism are precisely that it has divided the world into competing nation-states whose conflicts mean trade wars and armed conflicts. Nationalism in one country begets its echo in others. What we want is not national independence but world socialism without frontiers.

War is completely unnecessary. We are living in a world that has enough resources to provide plenty for all, to eliminate world poverty, ignorance and disease, and to provide an adequate and comfortable life for everyone on the planet. Yet under capitalism resources are squandered on armaments, of individual as well as of mass destruction, and, as now, in actual war. Even in times of peace – as the armed truce between wars is called – capitalism's pursuit of profit pollutes and plunders the planet and upsets the balance of nature with potentially devastating consequences. The economic law “no profit, no production” applies implacably, resulting in millions dying of hunger and related diseases every year simply because it is not profitable to produce the food to feed them and, in fact, often while the food that could feed them is destroyed so as to maintain prices and profits.

The World Socialist Movement opposes war and capitalism which breeds it: 

 · We place on record our horror that capitalism has once again provoked the orgy of death and destruction known as war.

· We extend the hand of friendship to our fellow workers who our political masters have designated as targets for destruction.

· We pledge to do all within our means to bring the slaughter to an immediate end.

· We pledge ourselves to continue to work for the establishment of a world socialist society of peace and cooperation.

· We call upon fellow workers everywhere to join in the struggle for World Socialism.

One World, One People, For World Socialism!

Humanity is suffering

 At a time when nations, led by madmen, charlatans and hypocrites, are suffering the blows of greedy profiteers, the Socialist Party is once again making a sincere appeal to all reasonable and practical individuals to try to avoid total destructionof civilisation and to to turn their efforts toward a rational and humane form of social organisation.

By social revolution we mean the abolition of money. By social revolution we also mean the the free availability of the means of production for all. By social revolution we mean power in the hands of everyone through worldwide cooperative associations, ensuring an equitable distribution in the interest of all. In order to best accomplish this task, we are looking for more people to join us in the Socialist Party.

We are at a crossroads of overlapping crises. Humanity is at risk because of the senseless profit-seeking mentality capitalism imposes on us. Capitalism is no longer capable of organising the production and distribution of goods that people need. Its logic of profit and capital accumulation prevents a more just and egalitarian society. The capitalist system is being increasingly shown to be  environmentally unsustainable. Responsible for much of the environmental crisis are large transnational corporations, which do not respect borders, states, governments, or the rights of peoples. Governments  provide protection for the corporations.  The  media serve their corporate masters’  interests.

We live in a world where happiness is fleeting and everything and everybody is disposable. People say the economic and social system is broken, but it isn’t. The system is rigged. It generates increasing wealth for the already rich and powerful at the expense of the majority of the people on this Earth. Billionaires and corporations measure success by their bank balance, or by share prices. Where we see climate breakdown, poverty and injustice — they see nothing but profit. It is the relentless pursuit of profit for the few which is causing the misery of the many, and pushing the planet to the point of no return. Exploitation is the central feature of capitalism.  The only path of escape is for the workers of the world to unite in opposing capitalism and recognise their fundamental unity as a class and wage war on, not with, their exploiters.

Nationalism is used to inspire populations to sacrifice in the interests of their local capitalist rulers. The history of competing interests between various governments, the huge manipulations of events and policies and the disregard for the well-being of ordinary citizens is lost in propaganda and patriotic posturing. Capitalism kills, and war is the most extreme example. Capitalists send working class men and women into battle against one another. Capitalists are willing to spill our blood whether in Ukraine, Yemen, Syria, or in many other conflicts. 

 Capitalism is driving war, climate disaster, disease, poverty and hunger, racism and sexism. Why can’t abundance be shared among all workers equitably? Capitalism, run by the dominant class for their own profit, simply can’t allow it because such a system undermines profits. Why should workers tolerate such chaos? We need to put an end to capitalism, and together we can. Demonstrating in protest marches is not enough. We must create a worker-run society. We must build a whole new model of society, one we run in our interests - a society that maximises the well-being and talents of the people of the world, free of profit, racism, nationalism and sexism.