Money Available. For Profits Only.

In a tale of chasing the Arctic Riches (New York Times, Sept 13) we are told that the Kremlin has spent billions and come up empty. Shell has already spent $7 billion and seven years ago a conglomerate of Shell and other companies paid $2.7 billion for leases in Alaska. Apart from the ridiculous idea of buying parts of the earth, it shows that there is a tremendous amount of wealth available when the odour of profit wafts through the air, but not a lot for human needs. John Ayers

Recession For Who?

On the topic of the Workers' Party of former president Lula da Silva and current president Dilma Roussef of Brazil promised prosperity for the people and delivered for a while. Lately, though, things have turned sour as a recession eats up the gains made – usual story for the worker. However, under the rule of the Workers' Party, the country's banks have had a wonderful time. The combined annual profits of the country's top four banks have grown 850% in the twelve years of the Workers' Party rule from just $2.1 billion to over $20 billion. Some recession! John Ayers

Abundance for all

Socialism is not the politics of poverty but the politics of abundance. Socialism presupposes the abundant availability of material goods to ensure full satisfaction of human needs. The scientific and technological revolution which is working wonders in today's world is only creating necessary material conditions for humanity's inexorable march towards socialism. The development of automation has the potential to obliterate the difference between manual and mental labour. The grounds are being laid, all we have to do is to wrest control of the means of production from the capitalists so that productive forces can grow unhindered and undistorted. Mankind’s inventive genius has developed technology to the point that abundance is possible to all. Between that abundance and its enjoyment an obstacle is interposed. That obstacle is the capitalism, and its defenders and beneficiaries, the capitalist class. The removal of the brake of private ownership which shuts down factories, plows under crops and stultifies the scientists and, instead, putting in its place the social use of natural resources and the productive plant, will mean an immediate and substantial improvement in the standard of living of people. That improvement can be continuous. The specter of insecurity will be removed. The undemocratic economic domination of the few over the many will be at an end. No one can predict the cultural advances which may follow this release of the human spirit. The material and technical resources unquestionably exist in the world today where everybody could have a comfortable and attractive home, abundant food, decent clothing, opportunity for recreation and education, security against accident, sickness, and old age; and the sense of independence and self-respect that goes with these things. What we actually have, however, is widespread poverty. This appalling contrast between what might be and what is does not, in our opinion, spring from superficial causes. It arises from the nature of the economic system – capitalism – under which we operate.

Under capitalism, the working class surrenders its decision-making power over the work process to the employers. The capitalist’s problem is, always and everywhere, to squeeze out of the labour-power he has hired the fullest use he can. All the means by which ‘science’, and ‘rationality’ are applied to the work-processes of capitalist enterprise are means aimed at the crucial goal of capitalist production: managerial control over the work-force, in order that the rate of accumulation of surplus-value may be as high as possible. Capitalism develops its own special kind of ‘division of labour’ which  has several great advantages for capitalist management: labour-power is cheaper, management control over the labour-process is enormously enhanced while the workers’ control over the labour process is thereby reduced proportionately – for workers are more easily replaceable, like machine parts. Work is ‘de-skilled’. Characteristically, ‘automation’, ‘modernisation’, ‘rationalisation’, ‘scientific management’, and the like have the effect, above all, of displacing from one sector of production after another great masses of workers, who ‘become available’ for hire in other, more labour-intensive branches of capitalist work. Capital never stands still but invades more and more branches of human production.

Technology is rational and planned but capitalist production as a whole is economically irrational and socially unplanned. Social planning is realisable only by releasing the newer collective forms from the fetters of the older relations, which means socialism.

Democracy, as we use the term, means a community of men and women who are able to understand, express and determine their lives as dignified human beings. Democracy can only be rooted in a political and economic order in which wealth is distributed by and for people, and used for the widest social benefit. With the emergence of the era of abundance we have the economic base for a true democracy of participation, in which people no longer need to feel themselves prisoners of social forces and decisions beyond their control or comprehension. A social order in which men and women make the decisions that shape their lives becomes more possible now than ever before; the unshackling of humanity from the bonds of unfulfilling labour frees them to become full citizens, to make themselves and to make their own history. This is your choice – capitalism which means chaos or a socialist world which means a higher level of civilisation and culture.

Proof Of Failure

Apartheid ended in South Africa twenty-one years ago and since then the governments have been of the indigenous black population. Despite this, many are disappointed with the pace of change. One young black student graduated top of his class in high school but when he got to university he found that of the fifteen students who owned cars in his dorm, only one was black. When test results came in, black students ranked at the bottom. South Africa is eighty per cent black but they make up only one quarter of the university students and just five per cent of the faculty. The percentage of African university students has risen just six per cent to 24 per cent since 1994. This shows that no matter what government is in, if the system is capitalism, no real changes will be made.John Ayers

A Cause Of Conflict

A recent issue of the Toronto Star focused on the discovery of combined oil and natural gas deposits In Guyana said to be worth $50 billion and at least ten times Guyana's Gross Domestic Product. Nicolas Maduro, president of Venezuela, immediately said the area where the deposits have been found belong to his country. Tensions are now high between the two countries. If that doesn't prove that economics are the cause of conflict and war, what does? John Ayers

The Socialist Party for a socialist world

We believe that the years immediately ahead are the most critical we have faced – the years of decision. As long as the few own the sources and means of life — they will corrupt our politics, they will enslave the working class, they will impoverish and debase society, they will do all things that are needful to perpetuate their power as the economic masters and the political rulers of the people. Nothing is more humiliating than to have to beg for work, and a system in which any man has to beg for work stands condemned. The slogan “We want work!” takes attention away from the main job, that of wiping out the capitalists and their entire work system. How can you attack the system which hires labor and exploits it, when you are clamoring for work under that system, demanding and beseeching it. These people who shout “We want work!” fail to realize that it was precisely because everyone was working that we have such terrible crises. The workers were being exploited harder than ever, they were turning over vast amounts of stuff to the bosses who had to sell this stuff and could not. Not being able to sell their goods at a profit, the capitalists were forced to close down their plants because the workers had produced too much, because they had worked too hard, because they had not fought for a greater share of the produce. The slogan “We want work!” implies that what is wrong with the present system of society and what has caused the depression is not overwork but under-work. Or, on the other hand they imply that it is not the work system that is to blame but the “system of distribution.” In both cases they attack the bosses not because he is driving the workers too hard but because he did not give them enough work. The demand “We want work!”, therefore, is a demand that blinds the workers and prevents them from seeing that they do not have to work much to eat, that the workers have produced plenty which the boss has grabbed for himself. It must be constantly kept in mind that the demand for work, is the demand to work under present social conditions, with capitalist control and direction. But what is this capitalist control? It is a control that destroys the crops, that lays waste the soil, that rots the products, that rusts the machinery, that devastates the land, that kills the humans—that is capitalist control. If capitalism is developed, it is only to raise the destructive power of the ruling class.

We, in the Socialist Party propose that society in its collective capacity shall produce, not for profit, but in abundance to satisfy human wants. Every man and every woman can be economically free. They can, without let or hindrance, apply their labour, with the best technology that can be devised, to all the natural resources, do the work of society and produce for all. Contrary to the claims socialists are not going to abolish private property. We are going to introduce and establish private property — all private property that is necessary to house everybody, keep them in comfort, and satisfy all their physical needs. A few have got it all. They have dispossessed the people, and when we will dispossess them. We will reduce the workday and give every person a chance. We will go to the parks, and we will have music, and we will have music because we will have time to play music and inclination to hear it.  You are not your brother’s keeper in this system. When we are in partnership and have stopped cutting each other’s throats, we will stand together as brothers and sisters we will go forward to the grandest of civilisation that the humanity has ever known. Only through the victory of world socialism can the vast stores of available scientific knowledge really be put to work for the full benefit of humanity.

There is a continuous class war between wage slaves and the capitalist class. So long as wages are paid by one class to another class, so long will men and women remain slaves to the employing class. Workers cannot emancipate themselves from slavery to the employing class, until they themselves cease to compete with one another for wages. Workers sell their labour power, which is the only commodity they possess, to the capitalists who own or control all the means of producing wealth, including the tools, raw material, land and money. Under the great machine methods of production the workers are controlled by their tools, instead of being in control of them. Under the capitalist system of production for exchange the producers themselves have no control over their own products. Goods are produced not directly for social purposes, but indirectly, in order to create a profit for the capitalists. If capitalists are unable for any reason to produce goods profitably, the wage-earners cease to be employed, though there may be a vast quantity of useful goods glutting the warehouses on the one hand, and millions of people who are anxious to have them on the other. Rent, profit and interest are all provided by the workers. All three are the component parts of the labour value embodied in saleable commodities by the labour power of the workers, over and above the actual wages paid to the toiler, and the cost of raw materials, incidental materials, etc., needed by the capitalist for the conduct of his business.    Production for profit and exchange by wage labour assumes the existence, from historic causes, of large numbers of people who are divorced from the land and possess no property of their own. The only way to solve the growing antagonism between the two great classes of modern society is, by substituting co­operation for competition, in all branches of production and distribution. This involves a social revolution, peaceful or forcible.

The capitalist is in business for the profit and does his best to increase the mass of profit and the rate of profit. He can do this either by winning more markets or by reducing the cost of production or by speeding up the circulation of his capital, or all these. In short, in order to increase his profit the capitalist must expand his business and produce more stuff at lower cost. To do this he must accumulate capital and reinvest part of his profits back into the business. This accumulation of capital is the basic law of capitalism. Because of it, the factories grow larger, the industries become greater, little business turns into big business in this in turn develops into huge corporations and multinationals. To raise their profits, the capitalists began to "rationalise" their industries, that is to bring scientific invention and method into production more than ever. All of science was called upon and real technological revolution took place in every field. All sorts of automation appeared. Standardised production became the rule and products were turned out on a mass scale. Hand in hand with all these methods to increase the productivity of labor went all sorts of clever schemes to speed up (that is to increase the intensity of labour) and to increase the hours of labor wherever possible. The capitalist likes to see the workers work. It means his wealth, capital will be increased and that he can try to beat his competitor down better.

The chief method by which the capitalist can lower the cost of his production is through cheapening the value of labour power. This is done by introducing new machinery which can enable the worker to produce an ever-increasing quantity of goods in less and less time and with the same effort. Thus the introduction of machinery which increased not only the actual production but also the productive capacity of industry had two effects: if the market did not expand as rapidly as production increased, then workers were thrown out of work. Secondly, the amount of goods that were turned over to the employer, over and above the amount set aside for wages and replacement of capital, became increasingly large and increasingly difficult for the boss to get rid of.

Why is it necessary that human beings should work at all? In order that the world may be supplied with goods, of course. Do we therefore rejoice when the world is so supplied? Oh, no, that is the greatest disaster we can imagine, for then we would be thrown idle, owing to over-production. We must labour in order to supply the world, and when the world is supplied we must starve because there is plenty for all and our labour is not needed. Science and invention by increasing the productivity of our labour lessens the period necessary to stock the world’s markets, and thus, at one and the same time, lessens the period during which our labour is required and increases the duration of our compulsory idleness. One insoluble difficulty of capitalism is to devise a method whereby the march of science and inventive genius can assist industry without menacing the bread and butter of the working class. When capitalism has made the private interest coincide with the common weal; when machinery becomes in reality ‘labour-saving’, and not as at present, wage-saving; when an overstocked market means for the worker a well-stocked larder, and not idleness and hunger, then it will be time for our enemies to tell us of our future difficulties. But under capitalism that time will never come.

The Socialist Party is for a socialist world which will apply all technological progress not for war, bringing misery to the many and the enrichment of a few, but for building a life of peace and plenty for all. It aims at the rational reorganisation of economic life. Socialism then is an endeavor to substitute for the fight for existence with, instead, the organised co-operation for existence.

Obituary: John Higgins (1980)

Obituary from the February 1980 issue of the Socialist Standard With the death of Johnny Higgins on the 4 December 1979 there passed into history an important contributor to the socialist movement in Scotland. Johnny founded the Glasgow Branch in 1924 and for many years was an indefatigable lecturer, debater and tutor on Marxism. That apart, he worked hard for the formation of branches and groups in Edinburgh, Hamilton and Bo'ness, and in his job as a commercial traveller—he continued working into his late 70s—made contacts for the party from Dumfries to Wick. He was 81 when he died. In the summer of 1929, when I had just reached 18 years of age, full of juvenile naivete with a smattering of Tressell, Jack London, Wells, Shaw and Russell, I went to Jail Square in Glasgow Green to listen to all the so-called intellectuals. There was a man with a bowler hat and umbrella who was knocking hell out of all and sundry. His language, logic and erudition entranced and overwhelmed me. That was my first encounter with Johnny Higgins. I bought my first Socialist Standard a week later and, thinking that all members had to be of the calibre of Johnny, delayed my joining the party for six years. In all my early years in the party he was my tutor, guide and exemplar. Johnny was absolutely fearless. In late 1935 Moses Baritz, in his usual overpowering manner, addressed Collet's Club (exclusively members and sympathisers of the Communist Party) on Opera and the Materialist Conception of History. A month later John Strachey was speaking at the same venue, peddling the nonsense of a "socialist" Russia. Johnny challenged him to debate, to the manifest fury of the audience. Johnny his back on the platform and informed the hecklers that he was addressing the organ grinder, not his monkeys!  Johnny, like me and many other members was born in one of the worst quarters of Glasgow, Plantation, and he I went to the same Catholic school, full of statues and vermin. For 25 years until my illness and his age prevented it, he traversed from North Glasgow to the south side to see me. He was cremated in Maryhill. The Internationale and The Red Flag were played by an obliging organist and I gave a valedictory address on behalf of the party. His departure has left a gap in all our lives. Our condolences to his daughter, Mamie, and his son, Jack, who is overseas. For my part I can hardly envisage my few remaining years without him. T A Mulheron

When we say "we" and not "I", there will be plenty for all

You can’t be a socialist

No matter how you try

Unless you think in terms of “we”

Instead in terms of “I”

There is plenty for all in this world of ours – plenty of everything that goes to make a healthy and happy life. The technological capacity to produce more and more wealth with a less and less expenditure of labour, is growing every day. Every improvement in machinery means that all mankind could gain greater wealth and greater leisure. Yet the workers alone do not benefit by this. What they produce escapes from their hands into the grasp of others; they are forced to compete against one another for a bare subsistence wage; the new technology they make and use if not employed at a profit are not put to use. All of us – could enjoy a standard of comfort and a wholesome, happy, leisurely, yet active life, such as has never been known on the planet. Yet we are told it is utopian and visionary to urge that the workers should turn the machinery which they make and operate, the land which they till, the goods they produce, to the advantage of the whole community. Socialism cannot be introduced piecemeal. All the experiences of socialists have proved this. The real job today is to spread the ideas of socialism, organize the workers in their own political party, and establish a workers’ government that will wipe out capitalism with its waste and be able to plan production and PLENTY FOR ALL.

In previous societies the master sought the slave, but now with capitalism the slave seeks the master. He or she stands in line, offering to work for less food than his or her fellow worker. Occasionally in once a great while he or she rebels – all for a chance to slave. Today the slave struggles for a chance to work, for employment. Before the slave would revolt to flee drudgery and toil; then soldiers were called to keep the slaves at work. Then, stringent laws providing for terrible punishments like crucifixion, hanging, quartering, mutilating and flogging were meted out to any slave or serf fleeing his work. Now police beat the protestors calling for the right to work, demanding jobs.

There are two sorts of unemployment, the unemployment of the blue-bloods, the parasites, those leeches who while unemployed waste millions in ostentatious luxury. Then there is the unemployment of the wage-slave – a terrible nightmare that haunts the mind of the worker. As he or she sees the jobless-line lengthen, however worn-out and sped-up he or she may be, there will be an extra burst of energy so that he or she may not be the next one told that his or her  “services are no longer required”. Capitalism uses much more efficient method than the lash to make us work harder. That is hunger. We are told that we are free and the bosses are free. He is free to offer us terms of any kind – we are free to starve unless we accept these terms. As we work, we create profits, such huge profits that even in their wildest extravagances the bosses cannot spend them. So there proves to be no more market for that commodity we are hired to produce; no more profits can be gotten so the free boss lays off the free worker to freely starve in the midst of a land of full warehouses which the worker filled. Capitalism, greedily demanding more and more profits, puts faster machines into the shops which produce goods and profits at a faster and faster rate. More workers are thrown on the streets.

During periods of unemployment, there is an increase of prostitution, murders and theft. Our politicians rail at the morals of the people and point at the mounting crime wave, but of course do not dare to examine the economic cause or the capitalist system. During periods of unemployment, disease, death rate and suicides increase. Among workers these are always high, but during hard times they rise to terrible levels. Fed on adulterated foods, shoddy clothed, poorly housed, the workers become more vulnerable than ever to disease. During periods of unemployment the wages of those at work are slashed by the boss. The answer to any resistance is: “there are plenty outside who want your job.” These are but a few of the effects of unemployment upon the workers. Every worker must ask himself: What is to blame?

The skilled worker says it is the machine that reduces the need for the qualified trained artisan; older workers accuse the younger worker and vice versa; men and women vy for jobs; whites compete with the blacks: the native born resents the foreign immigrant; Tory voters say it is the Labour government and likewise Labour voters say the Tory government is at fault.  None of these are true. The youth, the women, the black, the foreigner, whatever party is in office. While one group blames another, the bosses have a hearty laugh as they see us divided and thereby powerless, workers quarreling among themselves.

Only by overthrowing the system of capitalism will unemployment be done away with. The society of socialism alone can eliminate the terror of unemployment. Capitalism will be replaced plenty for all. Our task in the Socialist Party is not to traffic on the ignorance and backwardness of our fellow workers, not to attempt to win them unawares and by stealth, but on the contrary, to enlighten them and to show them the necessary steps to take along the road to socialism. We do not compete with the populist demagogy of fake “promises”. Far from granting more concessions, the ruling class are actually wiping out all the previous “sops” granted to the workers. Socialist says that progress consists not in smashing the corporations, these giants of industry – which cannot be done, anyway – but in making them the property of the whole people, those who produce all the wealth of the world. Owned by the toiling people, by the workers, the poor agricultural labourers, the dispossessed and all the poor, these giant industries could produce plenty for all. That is the road to socialism, to a world system, of peace, security and freedom.

The Facts of Life under Capitalism

Under capitalist ownership, the capitalists make profits by keeping as much as they can, and paying out as little in wages as they must. They pay the workers the smallest wage they can bargain them down to. On the average, that amounts to a wage which is just enough to get along on, the smallest amount a worker can afford to work for. Even, for a large part of the workers, it amounts to “not enough … to raise healthy children or maintain their own vigor.” And this is the case even in the most prosperous capitalist country. It is the very system of capitalist ownership and wage labor which sets this ceiling on the standard of living. This same system prevents production of abundance. To force the workers to work for low wages the capitalists need a permanent group of unemployed workers as a threat. Every worker must know that there is a man out of a job that the boss can put in his place if he demands higher wages. This ever-existent unemployed group under capitalism Marx named the industrial reserve army.

The fact is that the capitalists not only want profits, but are in a bitter struggle with other capitalists for profits, a struggle in which the loser is destroyed. If there is any surplus the capitalist must spend it on merchandising and advertising to swell the sales of his product. The system doesn’t give the capitalist freedom to pay extra wages to the workers, even if he wanted to. Capitalism will not tolerate even a gesture to lessen the workers’ fear of unemployment which is part of the essential mechanism of the system. They know they have to keep the reserve army of unemployed, the low standard of living for all employed workers that goes with it, and the low level of production and the chronic crisis that follows from it. Capitalist employers are in business and must be, to make money for themselves, and not to make goods for society. They can afford to start production only when they can sell their goods and end up richer than they started. If production will not increase their wealth they don’t permit any production. It is better to close down and keep what they have, rather than spend money producing what they cannot sell. For sales to increase their wealth they need a market; but they can’t get richer by passing out their own money to make the market for their own goods. They wouldn’t be ahead a penny. Therefore, they have nothing to gain by paying any wages above the least that they can bargain the workers down to. The more they have to pay the workers, the less is left for profits. As long as capitalism remains capitalism, surplus capital will never be used for the purpose of raising the standard of living of the masses, for this would mean a decrease in profits for the capitalists.

If the capitalists merely hoarded their profits, the system would run into a crisis at once because all this vast buying power would be withdrawn from the market. To keep the system running the capitalists must be able to keep their profits and spend them too. They do that by spending their increased money-capital for capital equipment, additional machines and factories. Thus their accumulation of wealth can really grow, and only such growth can avoid a crisis for the system. Yet capital investments through the building of new factories is possible only as new markets are found for the increased output. The growth of the home market is soon used up; and the capitalists must look abroad as areas for growth. Once there is no profitable use for capital at home, it will be used to increase profits by exporting the capital.

 Rickets is a disease of poverty, preventable by proper food – of which there is plenty in the world and of which, under a socialist system, there could be even more. The reason for that is that under socialism food would be produced for use, for the good of all humanity. Under capitalism, food is produced primarily for profit; needs are completely secondary. Today in this modern world the return of rickets is a testimonial of social injustice. For today there could be plenty for all the world. Mankind has learned the secrets of the air, the sea, the surface and the bowels of the earth. Mankind knows its way around atoms and electrons. We has fashioned machines which are miracles of production. The world is teeming with millions of able hands willing to build and operate those machines for production of abundance. Wonderful means of transportation by air, sea and land are here for the people and for their mutual benefit to share according to their needs.

The profit-grubbing obstructionism by the capitalist class must be ended. The working people will finally to oust the capitalists and establish a socialist world. Only the working peoples of the world can cure the problems of the world. For the peoples of the world to arrive at the longed-for destiny of humanity to produce the things of life in abundance, we must rid ourselves of the motives of capitalist profits. Humanity needs a socialist world!

Black Lives Matter even in Scotland

One of the policemen involved in the restraint of a black man who died in custody has a history of violence and racism, it has been alleged. Sheku Bayoh, originally from Sierra Leone, died after being arrested in Kirkcaldy.

The BBC has obtained statements alleging that PC Alan Paton carried out a sustained attack on his own parents at their home in 2005, while he was on duty. The attack was said to have left his mother, Ann Paton, now 61, unconscious, and his father, John Paton, 65, severely bruised and battered. Paton's parents elected not to pursue a complaint, after being assured by senior officers the matter would be dealt with internally.

Barry Swan, Paton's brother in law, told the BBC he had witnessed the aftermath of the alleged attack, and wanted to let the Bayoh family know about the police officer's past said: "What kind of person can actually do that to their own parents?... A frail old man who'd basically been put through something he should never have been put through, he was literally black down one side. You knew instantly it wasn't one hit, he'd bee kicked, he'd been stamped on. He'd had a major kicking.”

Swan also alleged that the Paton had admitted to being racist in the weeks since Mr Bayoh's death saying "He out and out admitted that he was a racist, that he hates them, as he puts it - all the blacks. It's not right he's a police officer."

CCTV evidence shows Mr Bayoh approaching the police at about 07:20. pictures show that he did not have a knife. At least two officers, including PC Paton, who until now has only been known as officer A, said that they believed they could be facing a terrorist incident.

At least four and up to six officers, including PC Paton, were immediately involved in the encounter. CS spray and police batons were used and within about 30 seconds, Mr Bayoh was brought to the ground, face down. Handcuffs and leg restraints were applied. PC Paton and a colleague known as officer B, who were two of the first on the scene, were understood to have a combined weight of about 43 stones. Eyewitness reports suggested that officers were kneeling and lying on Mr Bayoh in order to restrain him. Less than five minutes after the encounter began, Mr Bayoh was noticed to be unconscious and one officer radioed for an ambulance. A further five minutes later, the ambulance still had not arrived, and an officer reported to base that Mr Bayoh was no longer breathing. A post-mortem examination revealed a series of injuries over his body, face and head, including a deep gash across his forehead.

Tiny blood spots, or petechial haemorrhages were discovered in his eyes - a sign of potential asphyxia. The post mortem examination declared he had died after taking the drug MDMA, while being restrained. But a report by a renowned pathologist is expected to say the cause of death was positional asphyxia - effectively being suffocated as a result of the position his body was in. Positional asphyxia is a common cause of death in police custody where restraint is involved.

The Bayoh family lawyer, Aamer Anwar said that there had been a smear campaign against Mr Bayoh in the days after his death. He said: "The attempt to criminalise Sheku Bayoh in his death - the dead can't answer back but his family have answered for him.

"He wasn't 6ft plus, he was 5ft 10in. He wasn't super-sized, he was 12 stone 10 pounds. He wasn't brandishing a knife at a police officer. He didn't stab a police officer. In fact he wasn't carrying a knife when the police officers attended. He didn't attempt to stab anyone, and he wasn't found with a knife on him. Those are the actual facts."

Crime Is So Rampant In Parts Of The US

Thirty-five American cities have reported increases in murders, violent crimes, or both this year. In one city alone, St. Louis, there has been a sixty per cent increase in murders so far this year. Crime is so rampant in parts of the US (and not only there) that the police cannot cope. Though socialists do not condone crime, we understand its causes, the major ones being private property and poverty that forces people to commit crimes often to survive. In a system of free access to all, crime will be virtually eliminated. John Ayers

False hope in reforms

You shouldn’t take much stock in a news story that shows no proof of their “claim”. After all, without proof, they are just “claims.” Don’t buy into it. Don’t assume they are true because you saw it on the news. News is scripted these days, literally. Scripts are sent around that most major channels report. They get photo-genic people to tell you what they want you to be told. They “spoon-feed” you information but it doesn’t make it truth. Workers don’t need a crystal ball to see their future. The capitalists and their state, in their never-ending grasp for higher profits, are willing to inflict misery upon the majority of working people. The problem is that people accept capitalism and its logic and therefore see no alternative to the current misleaders who defend that system at all costs. The media provides workers with blinkers to see only what their masters wish them to see.

The capitalist owner of industry has only one reason to run his factory – profit. Under capitalism, the needs of the people for various goods are not the PRIMARY purpose of production. All he asks is: “Which will pay more?” The fact that the millions of people depend upon industry for food, clothing, housing, furniture, transportation, communications and amusement is of interest to the capitalist only as the “market” in which he can realise a profit. He runs his factory as he pleases. If there is profit in production he hires and offers overtime. If profit falls off, he throws his workers into the street. He operates without social purpose. His only gods are the Almighty Dollar and Dividends. Capitalism kills and cripples millions in its wars, in class strife and civil war, in hunger and freezing, in industrial accidents and disease, in malnutrition and child labor, in poverty and crime. It destroys the wealth of society and wastes the labour potential of millions. That is why capitalism is more destructive than all the earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, cloudbursts, tidal waves and volcanic eruptions ever visited upon earth from the beginning of time.

Capitalism created a class of owners pitted against a class of workers – at war with each other – engaged in a CLASS STRUGGLE with each other. It is the system of COMPETITION – It is the system of dog eat dog, the law of the jungle. Capitalism pits worker against worker in bidding for a job. It pits capitalist against capitalist in the fight for profits. It pits workers against capitalist in class struggle for a share in what is produced. It pits capitalist nation against capitalist nation in war. It pits manufacturers against consumer, landlord against tenant, farmer against city dweller, white against black, Gentile against Jew. Jew against Muslim. All in the mad race for a crust of bread, for survival, for security. In an age when plenty is possible for all! Ask yourself WHY?

Socialism is a call for sharing and caring. Socialists do not rape the planet and do not worship efficiency at the expense of people and nature. All socialists work for humanity’s fulfillment. By "Revolution", we mean the establishment of world socialism and a humanity freed from the bondage of capitalism. Producers in spite of being the most necessary element of society, are robbed by their exploiters of the fruits of their labour and deprived of their elementary rights. A radical change, therefore, is necessary and it is the duty of those who realise it to reorganise society on the socialist basis. Unless this thing is done and the exploitation of man by man and of nations by nations is brought to an end, sufferings and carnage with which humanity is threatened today cannot be prevented. All talk of ending war and ushering in an era of universal peace is undisguised hypocrisy.

The answer to is not reforms but a new society which will have real solutions for all based on human needs, not profits, by expropriating the capitalist class and thereby using all the resources of society for the benefit of all, it would ensure an advancing standard of living for all the people. Many workers believe that the government can deliver concessions for them. We point out that under capitalism such a hope is unrealisable. Capitalism cannot sustain a renewed welfare state and its attacks will inevitably increase if we allow the system to continue. The reformists display little sense of the realities of capitalism with many believing that the growth of the welfare state will turn into socialism as time goes on. Faith that capitalism can be reformed is prevalent yet only presents an acceptance of austerity, cloaked in the illusions of a false promise of future prosperity.

Choking in Corstorphine

Latest statistics show the concentration of nitrogen dioxide in the air in St John's Road in Edinburgh has the worse air quality in Scotland due to traffic congestion and  is now almost double the legal limit.

Average nitrogen dioxide levels for the first half of 2015 rose from an average 59 micrograms per cubic metre to 72, compared with the legal limit of 40. NO2 levels have exceeded 200 micrograms on 35 occasions this year. The "safety standard" allows the N02 levels to go over the limit only 16 times a year.

Friends of the Earth said the figures were "appalling" and they reinforced the case for refusing plans for a new supermarket in the street. 

Thousands of Scottish people are dying prematurely because of poor air quality.

Shrinking Lakes And Temperature Increases

On July 31, 2015, the temperature in Bandar Mahshahr, Iran reached 72 degrees on the humidity index that combines moisture and the temperature to state what it really feels like. Actual temperature was 'only' 46 degrees Celsius. In Iraq, a government was sacked over its inability to deliver air conditioning. The first decision by Iran's new government under president Hassan Rouhani was not about the nuclear power deal but to deal with the country's shrinking lakes. Lake Oroumieh, once home of the biggest salt water lake on earth has shrunk eighty per cent in the last decade. In Pakistan, more people have died from the heat this year than from terrorism. (All from The New York Times, Aug 30) Climate change and how to deal with it is appearing on the political agenda of those countries who are feeling the effects. It will be interesting to see how capitalism will deal with this, or not. John Ayers.

Understanding Capitalism

Today the whole world is in the grip of capitalism. Millions of workers are unemployed and reduced to near subsistence standards of living. It is an astonishing that in a world where science and technology have developed to an advanced stage there could be plenty for all, there is a growing poverty and hunger. Not only are untold millions unnecessarily materially deprived but the human species has even developed an antagonistic relationship towards its environment by poisoning the atmosphere, polluting the oceans and ravaging the land so that now nature has turned against us. At the root of all these problems is the exploitation of some people by other people - the capitalist class exploiting the working class. All of the deprivation and conflict are brought about by a society divided into oppressors and oppressed. No lasting solution to any of these problems will be found while capitalism is allowed to survive in the world. For the working class the only way forward is to struggle to bring about a class revolution and begin the struggle to eventually build a socialist society where exploitative class divisions and all the evils that go with them are abolished. Either we achieve a socialist transformation of society or our civilization will eventually be destroyed. There is nothing inevitable about the further advancement of the humanity. The only real, lasting way forward is socialism but whether or not this road is taken is a matter of decision for people themselves to make. In the world today only the working class has sufficient objective interest in the overthrow of capitalism and the strength to carry out this revolutionary task if it chooses to do so. The working class has it within its power to overthrow capitalist society and in so doing to pave the way for the liberation of the whole of humankind. The Socialist Party is dedicated to the cause of socialist revolution in Britain as part of the world-wide struggle against capitalism. We do everything within our power to stimulate the working class to overthrow its capitalist masters. If we do not move forward then we will move backwards. The choice before us is “Socialism or Barbarism”.

The future of the working class in Britain is unavoidably bound up with the development of the world as a whole. Only if we conduct our struggle against capitalism on the basis of being just one contingent of the international working class will we achieve ultimate victory. The capitalist classes of the different countries are in rivalry with each other in their struggles to dominate the world. The very character of capitalism drives the capitalists to continually search abroad for new sources of cheap raw materials, cheap labour and new markets and this eventual gives rise to wars.  

The working class has no interest in making peace with its own rulers so as to weather the storm of any economic depression. On the contrary we have every interest in stepping up and intensifying the class war to overthrow this oppressive and exploitative capitalist system. Taking the road of tightening our belts to help our masters through the recessions of this rotten system simply perpetuates a class-divided and oppressive society.

Central to the capitalist economic system is the exploitation of workers by capitalists, the chief means of production – raw materials, machinery, buildings, transport, etc. are owned and controlled by a small minority of capitalists. This determines that the great mass of people, the working class, have no choice except to work for capitalist employers so as to earn a money wage to buy the goods and services, the commodities, necessary for them to survive. On the face of things this relationship between capitalist and worker seems to be a fair and equal one: the worker agrees to do so many hours work for the capitalist and in return the capitalist agrees to pay a certain amount of money in wages. In reality this relationship is an unequal and exploitative one because the wages paid to the worker are less than the value of what he or she produces. The difference between the value of what workers produce and what they receive in wages constitutes the profits of the capitalist employer. Massive exploitation of the working class is an integral part of the capitalist economic system and will persist for as long as does capitalism.

Not only do capitalist exploit workers but the system operates in such a way that capitalists constantly have to try to exploit workers even more. Different capitalists producing the same kind of commodity are competing with one another in the market to sell their products. Failure to sell the commodities produced by his firm means bankruptcy and ruin for a capitalist and the main way of ensuring steady sales is to offer given commodities on the market at a price below that charged by other capitalists. If a capitalist is to reduce his prices without reducing his profits then one way is to increase the hours of work of his employees without paying them any more wages. Sometimes employers get away with this move (for example, in the car industry paid, time for tea breaks and cleaning up have been abolished), but in many countries where many workers are organised in trade unions, it is not easy for capitalists to force workers to accept such an increase in the degree to which they are exploited. Another ploy is to speed up the rate of work, increase its intensity, and thus reduce the cost per item by forcing the workforce to produce more commodities in the same time as before. In the car industry this generally takes the form of speeding up the rate at which the production assembly line moves. Again, this does happen but in a given type of production there is usually a very definite limit to which the pace of work can be increased and anyway workers are likely to resist such a move.

Another way, in fact the most important way in which capitalists try to gain an advantage over each other is by introducing new and more efficient means of production, technological innovation. The capitalist employer in a given field of production may be able to reduce his costs of production by introducing new production processes which enable output per worker to rise and thus cost per unit to fall. This allows the employer to sell his commodities at a price lower than that of his competitors while at the same time increasing his rate of profit on the capital he has invested. This advantage does not last long because the other employers will also quickly adopt the new production processes so as to be able to compete and stay in business. As the new production processes become introduced throughout an industry the proportion of total capital which is spent on raw materials, machinery, etc. rises while the proportion spent on employing labour power, on paying wages, falls. The consequence of this change is that since capitalists can only extract surplus value from those workers they employ directly and the number of these is falling, their rate of return on their capital falls as well. Paradoxically the greater efficiency in production brought about by developments in technology means a falling rate of profit for capitalists and redundancy for workers. Such is the inbuilt unavoidable absurdity of the capitalist system of production: its enormous productive power brings it grinding to a halt. The only way in which the working class can permanently rid itself of these cycles of boom and slump is to get rid of capitalism and replace it with socialism. The only way out of economic depression for the capitalist class is to do whatever is necessary to restore the profitability of capital. One way or another, this means intensifying the exploitation of the working class.

It is important to realise that capitalists are not always looking for ways to increase the degree of exploitation of workers because they, the capitalists, are inherently greedy but that they do this because of the way in which the capitalist economy operates leaves them with no choice if they are to stay in business. Similarly, if workers are not to be worked to death and totally impoverished then they have no choice except to take a common stand together against capitalist employers so as to resist employers’ attempts to exploit them even more. This is done by forming trade unions to defend wage levels and working conditions. In Britain a greater proportion of workers are in trade unions than in any of the other advanced capitalist countries. Even so it is obvious, especially with the onset of an economic depression, that trade unions only have a very limited capacity to defend the living standards and working conditions of the working class. While trade unions are a necessary means of defence of the working class against the capitalist class it is also the case that they pose no fundamental challenge to the whole capitalist system. Trade unions do not challenge the right of capitalists to exploit workers but only the degree to which this takes place. Even the most militant trade union struggles, involving workplace occupations and clashes with the police, pose no fundamental challenge to the dominant position of the capitalist class. If the working class does not rise above the level of recognising the necessity to organise industrially, of a trade union consciousness, then it will be doomed to an eternity of struggle with the capitalist class.

The whole of capitalist society is organised around the capitalist economy. The modern family is structured to produce and discipline the workforce, labour power. The state passes laws and maintains the police and armed forces So as to keep the working class in line. Education and the mass media are powerful means of spreading the ideas and outlook of the capitalist class, bourgeois ideology, among the working class so as to get them to accept the capitalist system. Religions promise the good life in this world for those who knuckle under to oppression and exploitation in this one, and so on. Capitalist society in its totality is structured so as to preserve the exploitative relationship between the capitalist class and the working class which lies at its heart. Nonetheless this same system contains within itself forces which periodically throw it into crisis and open up the possibility of its final overthrow arid replacement by a society where oppression and exploitation do not exist.

As with all class societies, there is a fundamental division between the small but immensely rich and powerful monopoly capitalist class who own and control the chief means of production and the great majority of people, the working class, who own and control no means of production except for their ability to work, their labour power which they are forced to sell to the capitalist class in return for wages. The relationship between capitalists and workers is unavoidably and inherently exploitive and oppressive because capitalist profits are derived from paying workers less than the value of what they produce. It follows that all the time a class-divided capitalist society exists there will be a continuous, never-ending class war between capitalists and workers. The main enemy of the working class, the target of the revolution, is the capitalist class. While there are differences within this class on what is the best way of controlling the working class so as to perpetuate the rule of capital they stand united in their determination to uphold its reign.

These people are the real rulers. Many people believe in democracy, and that everyone should have a say in how the country should be run, what laws should be passed etc. In reality this is an illusion, a clever and subtle illusion which is propagated by the capitalists. It is they and they alone who have real power over the destinies of the great mass of the people. The employing class own and control all the means of production, that is the factories and all the other places where wealth is created by means of the exploitation of the working class. In this way the ruling class dominate the economic life of the whole people. Yet economic domination in and of itself is not sufficient for them to maintain an all-round rule. They also need to dominate in an ideological way, that is, they need to mould and shape the very thinking of the people whose bodies they already control: They need to rule both hearts and minds. The ruling class need to manipulate and restrict the consciousness of the working class so that their world-view is seen as the only possible way of seeing things and is the natural order of things which can never be altered. So in order to maintain economic and ideological control, that is - total control, over the great mass of the people, the boss class have created a number of agencies of social control. One very important agent of ideological control is the bourgeois state. More specifically the idea that this state is fair and neutral; that it is the same for everybody, rich or poor, that it stands above the class divisions in society. Yet in truth, the bourgeois state is the instrument of control of the employers and investors who exercise a dictatorship over the working class. The range of activities of the capitalist state has been expanded in response to the growing instability of the whole capitalist system and a corresponding desire on behalf of the ruling class to keep control at all costs. The working class can only take control of its destiny by taking political action to capture the bourgeois state and then to abolish it as an institution of class rule. As the working class abolishes capitalist relations of production and replaces them by non-oppressive, non-exploitive ones then the alienation characteristic of capitalism will begin to disappear. As the great mass of people gain control of their productive activity and the products of their labour so their antagonistic estrangement from each other and their aversion to work will be overcome. Productive activity will become once again a creative, fulfilling and truly human activity. The division between work and non-work will gradually disappear and people will freely choose what to produce rather than being constrained by immediate necessities.

Workers in Britain are just one part of the global working class and our revolutionary struggle is essentially an international one. Although we have an immense task in front of us it is one worth tackling for ’the proletariat have nothing to lose except their chains, they have a world to win’.

Protect Nature

Environmental groups have claimed Scotland's natural environment and wildlife are in "serious trouble". A total of 23 organisations compiled the "Responses for Nature" report and have now called on the Scottish government to take urgent action. The organisations, which include RSPB Scotland and the Scottish Wildlife Trust, said conservation laws need to be fully implemented.

The report is a follow up to the 2013 State Of Nature UK-wide report, which warned that 60% of 3,148 species studied had declined in past 50 years, and 31% had declined strongly. More than one in 10 of all species assessed were under threat of disappearing from the UK's shores altogether.

Stuart Housden, director of RSPB Scotland, said: "In 2013, our State of Nature report demonstrated that nature was in serious trouble. As NGOs, we naturally asked ourselves 'What should be done about that?'

Housden may well place his faith and trust in government action. The Socialist Courier blog confidently predict that he (or his successor) will be mourning the failure of those recommendations and lamenting over the inaction of governments to protect Nature against the encroachments of commerce. We advise Housden to seek out an alternative economic system if he wishes to have Nature conservancy as a priority. 

Build a New Society

Movements continue to arise to confront the absurdities emanating from capitalism, with all its damaging consequences. If all these campaigns fail to link up into a generalised struggle against capitalism then their failures will far outweigh their successes. As corporations become larger, they seek out markets and cheap labour and resources in every corner of the world. Governments try to help out local capitalists by prying open foreign economies. In their endless search for greater profits, human needs, the environment and basic services are all treated as barriers to profits which must be removed. The pressure for change will not abate but this, does not mean that the inspiration behind this pressure will necessarily always be progressive. Some of it, even much of it, if recent experience is any guide, will in some countries be reactionary, racist, xenophobic, and steeped in the worst kind of religious sectarianism. Socialism must seek to distinguish itself today by having a better recipe. In countries where capitalist democracy prevails, socialists will advance their cause within the existing constitutional process, by means of a combination of electoral and extra-parliamentary activism. Socialists will express their aims as the creation of truly democratic and egalitarian societies which cannot be realised without the dissolution of the existing structures of privilege and the transfer of economic power from private hands into public ownership (but not state/government ownership.)

We are living under a system which is more and more clearly revealed as the enemy of humanity. It has vast productive potential, but produces only poverty for the majority. It brings hunger and starvation. It imposes draconian cuts in living standards on the already poor, simply in the interest of still greater profits for the capitalist class. Capitalism is responsible for the thoughtless destruction of the environment. Its armaments industry monopolises most of the world’s research and development and cynically profits from a series of wars of unparalleled destructiveness. The root cause of all this is capitalism’s guiding principle, the quest for profit, which takes precedence over any human interest. Capitalism threatens the future of humanity. Capitalism brings nothing but misery and exploitation to people of all lands. From the standpoint of the vast majority of the world’s people it is already an obsolete system, and the productive forces and technology it has created needs to be turned to the benefit of humanity as a whole under a new social system. Capitalism cannot be reformed. It has undergone many changes in its history, but these have simply meant finding new ways to exploit the people. The only solution is to destroy it and build a new social system. Today the destructive threat of capitalism is so acute that humanity cannot afford the luxury of a lengthy process of experimentation on the road to socialism. This means that we have to be very serious in learning from the movement’s past mistakes. Socialism was often erroneously seen as economic growth minus capitalist crises, and state ownership was seen as a definition of socialism rather than seeing socialism as a different way of organising daily life. The Labour Party has always been an instrument of capitalist rule over the working class.

The profit motive is incompatible with safeguarding the world’s resources. So long as it is profitable, environmental destruction is perfectly 'logical' under capitalism. Humanity’s problem is not limited resources but the waste of resources which is an essential part of the process of capital accumulation. The environmentalist movement has been valuable in highlighting and researching many of these specific problems. The movement is a diverse one with some Green Parties integrated into the system but there are many groupings which rely on their own strengths and local or international mass action, advancing the view that sustainable life systems living in harmony with nature are a real alternative to the exploitative system. This trend is positive. Socialism will provide the opportunity for a society planned for the majority rather than for the profit of a minority. By taking environmental issues seriously we can realistically plan to build a society in tune with land and nature. Worldwide, an upsurge of socialism is bound to come. It is more and more apparent that profit is a crazy way  by which to organise the world’s resources.

Marx and Engels explained that only the working class could be the force bringing about the necessary revolutionary transformation of society. We must be under no illusion about the difficulty of overthrowing capitalism. Our vision is of a party which does not claim a monopoly of correct ideas but which brings together those who agree upon a common objective - the task is to abolish capitalism and bring about a socialist society. We lay down no blueprint except for some general context on how this will be achieved because the socialist society of the future will draw its strength from the new organisational forms thrown up in the course of its struggles. Democracy is not something invented by the bourgeoisie, its roots go back to the earliest struggles of working people against the ruling class. The new society of the future will carry this to fruition. Socialism can only be realised by pooling the ideas and concrete experiences of workers the world over and in the coming period our duty is to build links between forces committed to socialism, to share experience and support one another to lay the foundations for a new society!

Little rest and recuperation for the doctors

An investigation found that nine out of 11 Scottish health boards expected their junior staff to work for as many as 12 days straight. Junior doctors in Scottish hospitals are working more than 100 hours before they get a day off. Figures obtained by the Glasgow Herald under Freedom of Information laws show that nine out of 11 of the main Scottish health boards were still asking junior doctors to work more than 12 days in a row.

An investigation into the 2011 death of a 23-year-old junior doctor killed in a car crash, Lauren Connelly, found she had been working long hours at the Inverclyde Royal hospital which may have contributed to her death. Her father revealed in the weeks leading up to her death that she had covered long hours - including one stretch where she worked 107 hours in 12 days. Since his daughter’s death, Mr Connelly has been campaigning for health boards to properly enforce the European Working Time Directive which guarantees employees cannot be forced to work more than 48 hours a week. The health authority which employed Dr Connelly, Greater Glasgow and Clyde, was said by the newspaper to be one of the worst offenders, asking its doctors to work 114 hours at work between days off.

It comes as junior doctors across the UK are preparing to strike over plans to cut their overtime pay by up to 30 per cent.

Dr Kitty Mohan, co-chair of the BMA’s Junior Doctors Committee, told The Independent that the doctors felt "palpable anger and frustration" over the plans.

Dr Clifford Mann, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine said the proposed changes had implications for “the future of medicine and patient care as a whole”.

More On The Environment

More on the environment – an international group of scientists have calculated that if we burn all the coal, oil, and gas resources available, the Antarctic ice sheet will melt entirely triggering a global sea level rise of more than fifty metres. It would take thousands of years to unfold but would reshape the face of the earth. The scientists believe that any more than a two degree warming would set in motion a melting that would be unmanageable. Another reason, they say, for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. John Ayers.

Shriking Water Lakes

On July 31, 2015, the temperature in Bandar Mahshahr, Iran reached 72 degrees on the humidity index that combines moisture and the temperature to state what it really feels like. Actual temperature was 'only' 46 degrees Celsius. In Iraq, a government was sacked over its inability to deliver air conditioning. The first decision by Iran's new government under president Hassan Rouhani was not about the nuclear power deal but to deal with the country's shrinking lakes. Lake Oroumieh, once home of the biggest salt water lake on earth has shrunk eighty per cent in the last decade. In Pakistan, more people have died from the heat this year than from terrorism. (All from The New York Times, Aug 30) Climate change and how to deal with it is appearing on the political agenda of those countries who are feeling the effects. It will be interesting to see how capitalism will deal with this, or not. John Ayers.