Working-class” is not a dirty word

Capitalism, by its method of production, has brought isolated workers together and constituted them as a class in society. Capitalism has made the workers a class in themselves. That is, the workers are a distinct class in society, whether they recognize this fact or not. To establish socialism the workers must become a class for themselves. They must acquire a clear understanding of their real position under capitalism, of the nature of capitalist society as a whole, and of their mission in history. They must act consciously for their class interests. They must become conscious of the fact that these class interests lead to a socialist society. When this takes place, the workers are a class for themselves, a class with socialist consciousness.

The problems facing the majority of people will never be solved within the confines of the capitalist system. Crises are intrinsic to capitalism and the ruling class will always seek to place the burden of them on the shoulders of the working class. The only solution is a fundamental change in the very structure and organisation of society. But the conditions for socialist revolution do not yet exist. The major problem is that the persistence of working class consciousness is not matched by a growth in socialist consciousness. The reasons for this are complex. The ruling class uses every possible avenue to promote capitalist concepts and ideals in order to prevent dissatisfaction from being turned against capitalism itself. Reformism also plays an important role in impeding the development of socialist consciousness. The lesson drawn from years of class struggle is the necessity to organise revolution and not reforms. Our argument against the Left and the policies is not that some palliatives would not benefit and ameliorate the conditions of the working class, but that measured against the criterion of achieving socialism which is, after all, is the goal of socialists, they fall far short. In other words, we would argue that whatever the rhetoric or the campaigning vigour of the left-wing they nevertheless remain wedded to capitalism.

The Socialist Party is guided by its basic revolutionary goal of fundamentally changing capitalism and achieving a just and equitable society. Marx correctly analysed the history of human society and projected a vision and the possibility of a classless society. Throughout history, there have been men and women who dreamed of changing society. They saw the poverty, the oppression, the persecution and hatred that prevailed in the world and concluded these evils should and could be abolished. To do so we do not change men and women into saints and angels to love their neighbours but simply to change the social system. It is impossible to have a society where love between human beings prevails unless you have a society where the struggle for economic existence is done away with. Everywhere in society division and strife prevails. Socialists conclude that before mankind can develop to a point where the relationship between one human being and another will be on a decent basis, society will have to be altered. In the Communist Manifesto there is found the following statement:

“All previous historical movements were movements of minorities or in the interest of minorities. The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority in the interest of the immense majority.”

We reject the idea that one nation or one people is superior to any other nation or any other people. To us all human beings are equal. Capitalist society is constituted on the principle of “dog eat dog” and there are many who try to benefit themselves at the expense of others. The prejudices that exist are a product of the social system and not inherent in human nature. The brotherhood of man will be made possible and real under a socialist society which will do away with economic conflicts.

Marx, therefore, accepted the necessity of convincing the majority of the people to accept the ideas of socialism. The Socialist Party, likewise, wants a majority of the people to accept our ideas. We want to take over the means of production peacefully. The only real possibility of avoiding violence is for the workers to organise so strongly that the minority of capitalists will not attempt the use of violence. Our task is to inform our fellow-workers of our ideas because we want to educate the majority of the people to understand and accept our ideas. We can use only the power of persuasion and no other power. We are, of course, not pacifists. As much as we hate the violence that exists in society, if we see no alternative we will apply the force of the majority to disarm a violent minority. Members of the Socialist Party are dissatisfied not with their personal misfortunes but with the social system, with the evils that exist under the present social order. Rather than care for their individual interests, members thinks of mankind’s, of society’s well-being in general. The agony and the death of millions of our fellow human beings from hunger and disease or in senseless wars are not abstractions to us. We feel the pain keenly and we react to them and we try to create a world where destruction and war and poverty and disease will not be the lot of mankind. We, in the Socialist Party, have educated ourselves and our studies have led us to certain conclusions and we have come together to propagate those conclusions. We proclaim that it is possible to build a new world guaranteeing every human being a decent livelihood and a chance to develop his or her individuality, free from economic worries, free from the dangers of war. We say that we have reached an epoch where mankind must go forward to socialism or else back to barbarism. This social system has reached a point of decline where no road other than the road to socialism will lead mankind into a peaceful world.

Our message will be in vain if we are incorrect in our general analysis. All our pamphlets, all our papers, all our speeches will be for naught unless we are correct in our fundamental theory. But if we are correct in our fundamental theory, all efforts to silence our voice and thwart our agitation will not avail. The strength of our ideas lies in the fact that our general predictions, based upon the laws operating in society, are coming true. Our principles have withstood the test of time and events. Therefore, we still have hopes that the people will come to accept the ideas of socialism. The more democracy we have, the greater the chances are for a peaceful transformation. Our ideas will conquer the minds and the hearts of the people because there is no road to peace and plenty other than the road of socialism.

Harmony?

An article in the Toronto Star of June 18th focused on just how insane things can get under capitalism. Lulu Island is a five kilometre long, man-made island running along the coast of Abu Dhabi. In the 1980's Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer planned to make it a leisure park. His planned attractions included an aquarium, conference centre and marina. None of these were built and when plans to build them were revived they were quashed by the economic downturn. Now the place is closed to the public. 

This doesn't mean its uninhabited. No sir. We live under capitalism where anything is possible. It's home to 165 stray cats. According to Susan Aylutt, who leads the aid group, Animal Welfare Abu Dhabi, "the flora and fauna live in harmony with each other and everything lives in harmony with the cats." 

Let's just be pleased that somewhere there is harmony under capitalism. 

 John Ayers.

Climate Change Has Claimed Its First Victim!.

Australia researchers said rising sea levels have wiped out a rodent that lived on the Great Coral Reef. The Bramble Cay melomys was so called because it lived on Bramble Cay, an atoll on the northern part of the reef. The seawater destroyed the animal's habitat and food source. So this destruction of species has begun and will until we do something about it – and "we" doesn't include capitalists who pussyfoot around with their treaties which, as the most, slow it down. 

Each group of politicians is responsible to the capitalist class of their countries, all of which want the maintenance (an ironic word) of capitalism because it simply means profit. 

Only an economic system which doesn't contain the profit system can stop and reverse the effects of global warming. 

 John Ayers.

The Times Are Changing

HUMAN EVOLUTION

We are living in troubled times. It seems that madness have gripped countries and cultures. It seems that hate and anger is all around us, fed by a misplaced paranoia often fanned by vested interests. For members of the ruling class there is an ever-present need to divide and conquer, to subdue true freedom. They are a worldwide force which wants to control global resources without regard to anything or anyone else and seek to maintain the status quo at all costs; a status quo that has served them well, whilst consigning hundreds of millions to poverty or near poverty. Many dominated by both the mainstream political arena and the media and lacking real vision turn to the mythical “golden ages” of the past for answers to all the issues facing humanity. Anger can lead to distorted reason and irrational decisions and actions. Anti-immigration and a perverted sense of nationalism being the most obvious ones. The misconception that “they” are taking over – migrants and refugees, that is – threatening our communities and national identity; fears stirred up by manipulative politicians and a dishonest media. Too many people settle for this divisive order rather than a harmony of working together. There can be little doubt that we are living through extraordinary times infected by uncertainty.

But we also have positive events, in which large numbers of people are becoming politically engaged. Huge numbers of people, discontented and alienated, have been taking to the streets calling for fundamental political, economic, and social change. Global movements for change have declared that freedom and social justice are fundamental human rights, that the current economic model is fundamentally unjust, that sharing needs to be seen as a guiding social and economic principle. They are the voice of the marginalised majority – so long ignored and who now demand that they must be listened to and heeded. As capitalists and politicians resist the calls for change, refuse to listen and continue to act in the same old ways, frustration and anger are increasing. The majority of humanity have been systematically disempowered. Hundreds of millions of people worldwide are sick of economic inequality and social injustice and don’t trust the corrupt political system.

True democracy is participation – responsible participation. People in substantial numbers are uniting, forming groups, organising and acting, recognising that the responsibility for society rests with them. It means voting, but it also means voting based on the issues in an informed way. People everywhere see the inadequacy of the current economic and political system. More and more people now possess the imagination and courage required to initiate the far-reaching changes needed to tackle the major issues of the day: Climate change and peace; the movement of people – migration and refugees; obscene levels of inequality, the desperate need for a new and just economic system based on sharing, and the cultivation of social justice, a society free from the conditions that lead to wars and conflict. There is a real possibility that a new form of politics will evolve out of the popular democratic movements springing up that recognises humanity’s essential unity and is driven by a commitment to address the needs of the people and to build a new fair society, based on cooperation. The impulse for social change is across the planet and people everywhere are responding. It is a question of when, not if, fundamental change will take place. It is a good time to be a world socialist and glimpse the cooperative commonwealth on the horizon. We live in a time when the existing system is rotten and collapsing and when mass disaffection is growing. However, this is also a period when the alternative begins to appear.

Brexit - A Socialist Comments.

The vote in Britain to leave the E.U., in other words, Brexit, caused a variety of reactions. Let us, dear reader, look at some.

Many who voted in favour of leaving, did so because of the insular British fear of foreigners. As one so delicately put it, "We don't want no more bloody foreigners coming 'ere taking our jobs." Yet most of their fellow members of the working class who have emigrated there are from commonwealth countries. Furthermore, it's been clearly shown where there is high unemployment immigrants reduce it. They have the same needs as everybody else.

One Muslim writer in the Toronto Sun, June 28th, thought some who voted leave, were worried terrorists might come into Britain if they stayed. Some voted to leave because they said: "Why should we take orders from Brussels? We want to take them from London." As if it matters who exploits a worker. Mostly his/her orders will be from the bosses' office.

The majority of the leave votes were cast by the older people who were retired or didn't have long to go. This angered the young who felt they wouldn't be able to work in the E.U.

In Scotland, where 62 per cent voted to stay, there is talk of another referendum on whether or not to stay in the U.K.

The Toronto Star of July 9th reported the Canadian government is now worried the trade deal that they had been recently negotiated with the E.U. will not go through.

In the Toronto Metro News of June 27th, it said Britons who had businesses in Europe were worried about losing them. As one pub owner in Spain said, "we're very scared because I've been here 23 years. I've got my house, my kids were born here, they went to a British-Spanish school, I've got a bar, I've got a lot to lose."

In the same newspaper a young Canadian woman in London, whose goal was to acquire an E.U. Passport, thought she wouldn't be allowed to work there. To quote, "I cried. It just signals a society that is full of fear and intolerance and hate and no longer aligns to my personal values." Those feelings certainly played a part in the leave vote, especially as the fascist U.K.I.P. were extremely vocal in favour of leaving, as were many parties on the left, 14 in fact. So one must clearly wonder if there are any differences between parties of the left and right, especially when they all stand for the continuation of capitalism.

Though we don't know how this whole matter will play out regarding the details, we can be sure it will still be business as usual for the capitalist class, which means continuing exploitation and poverty for the working class.

The effects of Brexit were immediate, causing trillions of dollars, pounds, yen, and marks to be lost on the world's stock markets. Look at all the above and what does it show? Problems for most people. If any find themselves better off, it will only be marginally so.

All of the above problems can be swept away easily as anything by the establishment of a society without markets, without buying and selling, without money, where we would all be better off. So why not vote to leave capitalism, to leave it behind. 

John Ayers.

'Green' Capitalism

THE DELUSIONS OF THE GREEN CAPITALISTS

Scotland’s environment agency, Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa), has warned the country’s industries and farmers that their waste and inefficiency is now the biggest threat to the environment, overtaking pollution. The regulator’s chief executive, Terry A’Hearn, will urge businesses, farmers and manufacturers to adopt a “one planet prosperity” policy designed to cut their energy use, greenhouse gas emissions, waste and resource use. Developed economies such as the UK’s are now consuming resources at a rate close to three times the planet’s actual capacity. “I’ve been extremely clear that if we have only one planet, we have to be really, really smart about how we use it,” he said. 

The aquaculture sector would be among the first to be approached by A’Hearn to establish new “sustainable growth agreements” which he said will be central to his new one planet strategy. Scottish salmon farms are repeatedly criticised by environment campaigners and other marine industries for heavy use of toxic chemicals to combat sea lice and disease, and seabed pollution caused by fish excrement.

All over the world, there is a feeling that something is deeply wrong. Humanity is being driven to the brink of extinction by social problems? All the poverty, the climate devastation, the perpetual war, and consumption fetishism we see all around us have roots in today’s capitalist society. The problems are self-replicating, according to the laws of capital accumulation. Yet economists and politicians deny we have any problem. Our so-called leaders talk about economic growth-at-all-costs as the only viable solution to mass poverty, wealth inequality, the climate crisis and other planetary-crises.

If we say that wealth comes from ecological function instead from buying and selling, then we have a system in which all human efforts go toward restoring, protecting and preserving ecological function. That is what we need to mitigate and adapt to climate change, to ensure food security, to ensure that human civilizations survive. Our economic system must reflect reality. We could have growth, not from stuff, but growth from more functionality. We have to be very careful not to commoditise nature. We need to naturalise the economy. Technology has enabled a massive level of exploitation to serve the rapacious appetite of profiteers. However, importantly, it has also enabled us to begin to achieve common ownership, created networks of production and distribution, permit democratic participation and decision making as tools by which people can assume control over our lives and communities. It is only a failure of imagination and will that requires us to continue down the path where everything is owned by all.

In capitalism, the state’s primary role is to secure the interests of private capital. The institutions of global capitalism – from the World Bank and the IMF down to the compliant nation states (or supranational unions like the EU) – facilitate private wealth accumulation that results in the unemployment, poverty, population dislocation, environmental destruction and bad food and bad public health) that have become acceptable as necessary for growth (the accumulation of capital) and it is all taken for granted by mainstream politicians and the media mouth-pieces. The system’s sole interest is to increase profitability and further the cause of the powerful capitalist class. They try to convince the public that an increasing concentration of wealth in the hands of a relative few – via, for instance, de-regulations, privatisations and lower labour and environmental protection standards – is for their own benefit because it is good for ‘growth’ and the GDP. Yet the effects and outcomes of these policies across the world are plain to see: the increasing power of unaccountable financial institutions, record profits and massive increases in wealth for elite interests while for the rest of us, disempowerment, austerity, job losses, the erosion of rights, weakened unions, cuts to public services, environmental degradation, trade deals, such as TTIP, CETA, and TPP. Governments use the euphemism ‘business friendly’ to express a willingness much of the above. The more ‘compliant’ national governments make their populations and regulations to world trade, the more ‘business friendly’ a country is. A ‘free’ market is code for letting powerful corporations be in control and dictate terms to the market on tax, subsidies and patent law. The ‘free’ market only exists in the warped delusions of those libertarians who churn out clichés about letting the market decide.

We need to realise that there is no ‘us and them.’ There is just us. There is one earth and one humanity. We have to act as a species on a planetary scale because we will all be affected by climate change. We have to come together to decide: What do we know? What do we understand? What do we believe as a species? Class conscious awareness is the beginning of the solution.

Something Fundamentally Should Be Done About It.

There's not a lot of wonderful things happening lately. In Britain the Brexit vote caused stock markets to plunge trillions of dollars. Five cops were shot dead in Dallas. Suicide bombers killed 36 at Istanbul airport. In the U.S. they seem ready to elect a racist moron as president. In Venezuela starving people were shot dead as they stormed grocery stores to get food which their fellow working class people produced. In Africa and Asia women are being violated by the armies of war lords. Global warming continues unabated. Doesn't it occur to anyone that something is fundamentally wrong in society and that being such something should be done about it – fundamentally. John Ayers.

This is Socialism

There is a widespread popular perception that socialism is an authoritarian coercive system, and the experiences from history of so-called “communist” parties who had power have justified that belief. The misconstrued phrase of Marx, “the dictatorship of the proletariat”, reinforces this impression.  The Socialist Party rejects any understanding of class dictatorship that implies a dictatorial form of government, that identifies the dictatorship of the proletariat with an ever-expanding one-party state apparatus. The “dictatorship of the proletariat” is at heart simply the re-wording of the Communist Manifesto’s “The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority.” The Socialist Party identifies socialism not simply just as the common ownership of the means of production and distribution but also with the democratic control and the participation of people over the administrative and social institutions of their communities. The Soviet Union did not by any criteria represent socialism. Instead of common ownership of means of production, state ownership of means of production was adopted. Wage labour, money, exchange economy, and the separation of the producing class from the control of the means of production, all remained.

The capitalist world cannot simply be ignored, in a live-and-let-live attitude, while we try to build our new society elsewhere. A socialist revolution will never happen automatically, blindly, because of the inexorable materialist laws of history. Capitalism must be explicitly replaced by something else. It will happen, and only happen, because we want it to and because we know what we’re doing and how we want to live. We must always keep in mind how we became slaves; then we can see more clearly how we can cease being slaves. We were forced into wage slavery because the ruling class slowly, systematically, and brutally destroyed our ability to live autonomously. By driving us off the land, changing the property laws, dismantling community rights, destroying our tools, and so forth, we were forced onto the labour market and into the cities and factories in order to survive, our only remaining option being to sell our ability to work for a wage. Socialism reverses this process and it will be a new society where we live without working for a wage or buying and selling the products made by wage slaves and instead embrace cooperative work and producing for people’s needs. This strategy does not call for reforming capitalism although on occasions we can sometimes, in some places, win certain concessions from it (usually only temporary ones) and some (usually short-lived) improvements in our lives, but we cannot reform it piecemeal. It calls for totally replacing capitalism. We intend substituting an entire way of life. Millions and millions of people must want radical change and possess a pressing desire to live free and to live in democratically-controlled communities, to participate in their administration. Otherwise, we are doomed to perpetual slavery and possibly even to extinction.

This vision is not new. The goal of socialists/communists/anarchists has always been to restore community. Marx defined socialism as a free association of producers, and as a system in which the free development of each is a condition for the free development of all. The aim has always been clear: to abolish wage slavery, eradicate a social order organised solely around the accumulation of capital for its own sake, and establish in its place a society of free people who democratically and cooperatively self-determine the shape of their social world. The heart of socialism is free association - in our neighbourhoods and workplaces. There is no way that we could create the free associations we want without confronting ruling-class power.  If we destroy capitalist relations and its institutions and structures before we have created for ourselves an alternative means of survival we will be creating chaos and disorder, recipes for self-destruction. We cannot destroy capitalism by staging protests and demonstrations. Demonstrations barely even embarrass capitalists, let alone frighten them. Demonstrations are just a form of petition usually. They petition the ruling class regarding some grievance, essentially begging it to change its policies. Demonstrations only last a few hours or days and then, with rare exception, everything goes back to the way it was. If demonstrations do win an occasional concession, it is usually minor and short-lived. They do not build an alternative social world.

You can rampage through the streets all you want, burn down your neighbourhoods, and loot all the local stores to your heart’s content. This will not go anywhere. The blind rage will burn itself out. When it’s all over, these rioters and aspiring insurrectionists will be turning up for work like always or standing again in the dole line. Nothing has changed. Nothing has been organised. No new associations have been created. What do capitalists care? They can afford it. All they have to do is wait for the fires to burn down, go in and arrest people at random, and then depart, leaving the "rioters" to cope with their ruined neighbourhoods as best they can. Maybe we should think of something a little more damaging to capitalists than burning down our own neighbourhoods.

Forward to the socialist revolution

All over the planet, people are organising and attempting to find solutions for the planet’s survival. All over the world, there is a feeling that something is deeply wrong. Connect the dots and we can see interlinked reasons why the global system of capitalism is no longer fit for purpose and now redundant. There is no way out except by transforming the capitalist system. Too many of our so-called leaders are talk about economic growth-at-all-costs as the only viable solution to mass poverty, wealth inequality, the climate crisis, and other planetary-scale crises humanity must confront. But we must first look at the mode of production — i.e. how value is created and wealth is distributed. The World Socialist Movement stresses the need to share knowledge and for mutual aid to create a cooperative and solidarity economy, focused on social justice. Profit is seen as justifying the destruction of life and communities. Compassion is absent as fellow beings endure deprivation, suffering and misery. People are impoverished so that others can be wealthy. Fellow humans are used as “disposable” commodities. These are the dots that we must connect in order to help usher in the post-capitalist world. Through the socialist revolution, men will enter 'the realm of freedom', says Marx. Marx also designated the working class the ’grave-diggers of capitalism’ – the emancipation of the working class is the act of the working class itself. Capitalism is now in a state of almost permanent crisis. Only a socialist revolution can prevent the relapse of humanity into barbarism.

The interests of the capitalists and of the working class are irreconcilable. Capital must accumulate in order to survive. It grows by keeping for itself the surplus value produced by workers after they have reproduced the value of their labour power, their wages. Surplus value is the source of all profit. The unending search for surplus value, for profit, is the motive force of capitalist production. Capitalism can produce only for profit. Capitalists cut their costs of production mainly by stepping up their already vicious exploitation of the working class. They cut their wage bills by reducing wages and sacking workers. They also make the remaining workers work longer hours (or shorter hours as the case may be) and they increase the intensity of labour. The cut-throat competition between vying capitalists, particularly at times of crisis, means that eventually factories using outdated machinery will inevitably be closed down unless the owners can make a profit by installing new machinery, and have the capital to do so. In many cases, they cannot. Competition among capitalists to minimise losses is very fierce. In this battle, the winners as well as the losers lay workers off and further reduce living standards. And so repeatedly the capitalists are forced by the laws of capitalist production to dismantle the means of production on a massive scale and make thousands of workers unemployed.  They take advantage of the existence of this vast “reserve army of labour” in the struggle over wages to attempt to hold down still more firmly the wages of the working class as a whole. The working class are required to fight all attempts by the employers to shift the burden of their economic crisis onto their backs and must resist all wage cuts, lay-offs, speed-ups, and cuts in government welfare services. The State is a machine for the oppression of one class by another and exists to protect the class interests of the small exploiting minority. The Labour Party is a capitalist political party. This is determined by the class it serves politically and the class character of its ideas and policies. The Labour Party claims to be the party of the working class but in deeds, it serves the bosses. The trade union movement is the defensive struggle of the workers against their employers, geared only to look after the workers' immediate interests. But soon the workers learn that their oppression is common and that their resistance must be collective. They form true labour parties – genuine socialist parties.

Working class power is the essential condition for far-reaching social change. The duty of socialists is clear beyond any scope for misunderstanding. They have to win over the whole world. The historic mission of the modern working class movement is to abolish class society and to build in its place a higher form of social organisation: Socialism. Only the full support of working people can open the way to socialism. Our task in the Socialist Party is not to fight for better terms in the sale of labour-power, but to fight for the abolition of the capitalist system that compels the working class to sell themselves as wage-slaves. We must teach the workers that their fundamental economic interests can only be satisfied by the destruction of the entire capitalist system and the creation of a socialist society.

The Calton Weaver (music video)

Eight years of CND (1966)

Eight years of CND (1966)

Today is Hiroshima Day and so it is fitting that we -re-publish a past article upon nuclear weapons and how to rid us of them. 

From the April 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

For CND the great days are over. Nowadays, almost the only sign that it ever existed is the annual Easter demonstration. And yet, in its day the campaign made a terrific impact on the British political scene. Its slogan and adopted symbol were universally recognised; it was half of an argument which split the mighty Labour Party from top to bottom and which consistently hogged the headlines and correspondence columns of the National Press.

CND was the marvel of a time notorious for its political apathy, but the wonder is not that it happened at all, rather why it took so long to materialise. From the moment Rutherford split the atom it became simply a question of time before the warlike, capitalist society would utilise this new source of energy for its own destructive ends.

Nevertheless, those thirteen years between Hiroshima and the formal launching of CND need some explaining. After 1945, most people felt that the Bomb would never be used again. The “aggressors” had been vanquished and anyway only the USA possessed the secret. The outbreak of the cold war plus Russia's entry into the Nuclear Club aroused fears which were aggravated by the Korean conflict and the development and subsequent testing of the vastly more powerful H-Bomb.

With the Lucky Dragon episode the volume of protest gathered force during the early 'fifties. Later on, literature and the cinema reflected this trend; Robert Jungk’s book Brighter Than A Thousand Suns, set many a mind working, while the film, Hiroshima Mon Amour, evoked horror by its display of grossly mutated children born of parents who were radiation victims.

Anti-nuclear groups sprang up everywhere and the Suez affair in 1956, helped swell the ranks. The same year, Khrushchev’s revelations about Stalin’s Russia, followed by the brutal suppression of the Hungarian uprising, brought new recruits already well versed in the business of protest. Likewise, disgruntled “left-wingers” saw in the disarmers a lever with which to alter Labour’s defence policy. Add to these religious groups, Anarchists,etc., and we have the ingredients of what eventually emerged as the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in February, 1958.

But the majority were not politically involved at all. Mostly, they came from what is wrongly called a “middle-class-background”—Teachers, Students, Clerks. They were not even social reformers, accepting the world more or less as it was, with one reservation—Nuclear weapons Many did not even oppose conventional weapons, considering these, at any rate, necessary to defend “our” country. Alex Comfort, a prominent Campaigner, summed up this attitude at the inaugural meeting when he said .. .

“If we are asked, as we will be, ‘What is your alternative? How else do you think this country should be defended?' We may indeed propose alternative policies. But we are bound to reply, ‘Whatever policy may be right, this one (Nuclear weapons) is wrong'.” This simplicity of aim was epitomised in the slogan which, today. CND is trying to forget—“Ban the Bomb.”

So CND was united by the slenderest of threads and even then only sometimes. The Communist Party, for instance, was prepared to march against the Bomb—provided it was British or American. When Russia resumed testing in 1961, CND held a protest demonstration in Glasgow culminating in an attempt to hand a petition to a visiting Russian Diplomat. The Communists were conspicuous by their absence.

And although the British Party’s Report of its 1963 Conference could say ... “We deplore the tendency of the peace movement to divide, to break up into rival groups on questions of tactics in the struggle,” it did not mention that the Japanese Party had just split the movement in Japan by refusing to condemn Russian tests as well as American.

It seemed to them that they must succeed, as even the famous—scientists, entertainers, clergymen—added to the clamour for Britain to unilaterally renounce nuclear weapons.

Indeed, the point was reached where CND could claim that a third of the population shared their view, but significantly this opinion was never tested at the Polls. The reason is not hard to find. Many of the campaign's supporters were committed to the various political Parties and it was to these, in the final analysis, that they owed their allegiance.

A Mr. Feltz discovered this when he considered standing as an official unilateralist at Barnet at the General Election. He subsequently stood down because he found . . . “CND supporters' loyalties greatly divided. After I had addressed them, I received a telephone call saying they had decided not to alienate themselves from the Labour Party.” (Guardian, 21/2/64). More recently, various CND'ers were engaged in a public squabble over whether or not to support the Labour candidate at the Hull North By-election.

This pre-occupation with the Labour Party provides the key to the Campaign’s efforts to win that Party over to its point of view. If 1960 was CND’s high-point then this was because of its “victory” at the Labour Conference that year, when a unilateralist resolution, backed by leaders of several of the largest Trade Unions, won a majority of votes.

Those CND supporters in the unions were illogical. They knew that, in this jungle-world of conflicting economic interests Nation and Nation, Employers and Employers, are engaged in an endless struggle. All very well Ted Hill of the Boilermakers prattling about Britain facing the world “armed only with moral dignity of purpose,” but he had no answer to his opponents’ invitation to try negotiating with the Employers on the same basis.

Predictably, Gaitskell and the majority of Labour MP’s, recognised a sure-fire vote-loser when they saw one, refused to accept the verdict and by organising a little more efficiently easily reversed the vote the following year. Many CND'ers, dismayed by this, turned to non-democratic action such as sabotage, and when this failed to produce results, dwindled away to the extent that a much-ballyhooed National demonstration at Faslane in 1964 could muster a mere seven hundred supporters.

To-day, CND simply does not know where it stands. The initial idea of unilateralism has been replaced by policies which are extremely vague; its one-time adherents are hiving-off to the futility of reformist politics or to frustrated inactivity.

Has CND achieved nothing, then? What about the Test Ban Treaty? Campaigners like to think that their activities influenced the great powers to agree to a cessation of testing, but the facts are that both sides stopped testing only because each saw it as being in its own interests to do so. Mr. MacNamara, the American Secretary of Defence, claimed that the Moscow Treaty meant that the USA . . . “can at least retard Soviet progress and prolong the duration of our technical superiority.’' The Russian Government denied this, insisting that it was they who stood to gain in a military sense from the Treaty (Guardian, 14/8/63).

Whatever happens, if one side feels it is losing on the deal, then the tests will be restarted notwithstanding the most solemn pledges.

Can we not even agree that whatever its faults, CND fulfilled a useful function by drawing attention to one of Capitalism’s horrors? But the Bomb was too big an issue to be ignored forever and for CND to claim all the credit for the growing awareness is to emulate the Rooster who imagined his crowing brought the Sun up every morning.

And could we not, by joining the March, have used the opportunity to gain recruits? Actually, we did gain new members without marching a single step; we did this by simply selling our literature and discussing. More important, we played no part in perpetuating an organisation which we knew to be wrong and would inevitably lead to disillusion on a grand scale.

Always, there are groups in protest against some aspect or other of this social system. CND’ers come into this category. They leave intact the very thing which spawned nuclear weapons—the private property basis of Capitalism—so their cause is hopeless.

Supposing the Bomb could be banned. If two Nations, possessing the necessary technical knowledge, should quarrel seriously enough over the things wars are really fought for— markets, sources of raw materials, strategic Bases, etc—and even supposing they commenced fighting with “conventional,” “moral” weapons, would not the losing side set its scientists to producing nuclear weapons in order to stave off defeat? If history is anything to go by, the side which was winning would use the Bomb and justify this by claiming it had brought hostilities to a speedier conclusion.

It would require several volumes to deal with every “solution” which CND’ers have dreamt-up over the years. From World Government or alignment with the “uncommited Nations” (some strange bedfellows in this lot), to “disengagement” and the farcical “Steps Towards Peace,” every straw has been clutched at.

Anyway, even if it were possible, Capitalism minus the Bomb would not solve the problem of war; a world based on the common ownership of the means of wealth production, alone, will do that. So, being after something fundamentally different, we have no alternative but to oppose CND.

One final point. We do not deny the sincerity of many campaigners; the energy and ingenuity they displayed in tackling a job they considered important provided further proof that once working men and women get on the right track Capitalism’s days are numbered.

Vic Vanni

The Socialist Party will not falter

The fundamental purpose of the Socialist Party is not to preserve capitalism in any shape or form. But do we have a blueprint for a socialist society? Not in detail or the specifics of all the minutia but we can envision generally what such a society looks like. Socialism means expanding democracy, not just in the political sense but also in an economic sense – freedom from want and deprivation. The only real solutions to the attacks on the working masses by capitalism, is the socialist revolution. The defence of even the present working class living standards comes because capitalism will yield its minimal sops and reforms only out of fear. Under capitalism human society is condemned to a series of bitter struggles; class against class, nation against nation, and individual against individual. Inevitably, therefore, the great majority of the people, instead of being inspired by a common social purpose, are forced to struggle for their own individual and selfish interests. Moreover, since capitalism condemns the majority of people to poverty or insecurity, there is a continual waste of human talent and ability. The first and fundamental contrast between socialist and capitalist society is that with socialism all the means of production and distribution are owned in common. Production, that is to say, has become socialised. Thus the exploitation of one class by another is ended and no longer can one small class to live on the labour of the majority of the people. Inside socialism, production is organised to meet the needs of the people and not to provide profit for a single class. It will, therefore be possible to plan production; and so to increase enormously the amount produced.

The task of the Socialist Party is to help to turn our socialist aspiration into a socialist reality. Many of our fellow workers are under the influence of capitalist ideas, therefore the battle of ideas is an important part of the class struggle. The exploitation of wage labour by capital and the extraction of surplus value is the essence of capitalism. The working class had no alternative but to overthrow capitalism.  It is the workers of all countries, who have the cure for the crises of the capitalist system, it is workers who are the gravediggers of capitalism and the builders of socialism. The mission of the working class is not to line up behind their ruling class and fight for the interests of our exploiters. It is not to preserve the capitalist order and reduce its struggles simply to the gaining of reforms. The mission of the working class is to destroy the old social order and usher in the new world of socialism, to rescue society from the sufferings of capitalism, to emancipate all the oppressed, and end the exploitation of man by man. The working class must wage its day-to-day struggles; if it does not, the workers will be, in the words of Marx, “degraded to one level of broken wretches, past salvation”. But these everyday struggles must not be over-exaggerated; they must be waged with an objective in mind - the aim of accomplishing the socialist revolution. The compass for where we are headed should have socialism as its destination. We need to keep this end in sight and not to lose our way. This socialist system is not a utopia or dream, as many try to suggest. It is often argued that, however desirable such a society may be, it could never be made to work, because, whatever changes are made in the form of society, human nature will always remain fundamentally the same: there must always be rulers and ruled, rich and poor, employers and employed. This argument springs from ignorance of the facts. The study of history, and the observation of primitive communities still living in the world, prove that in the earliest kind of society not only were the land and the tools (what are called the means of production) regarded as the common property of the tribe, but everyone shared in the common tasks of production, as well as in the product of their labour. There was common ownership, and therefore no classes. 

Socialism will be a classless society, in which all the means of producing wealth are owned in common. Instead of being divided into workers and employers, rich and poor, society will be an association of free people, all making their special contributions to the well-being of society, which in return will supply them with what they need in order to live full and happy lives. Such a society can be summed up in the slogan: “From each according to ability, to each according to needs.” For this to be possible, socialism must be based on abundance. Production will be organised in such a way that there is plenty of everything for everybody: not only food, houses, and so on, to satisfy material needs so that people can lead fulfilling lives. Socialism is not something which can be established in one country, isolated from the rest of the world. On the contrary it must be embrace by all the peoples of the world; and in so doing it will put an end to war. Many institutions which we accept today as essential, such as police and prisons, employers and workers, soldiers and civil servants, will have disappeared. Because no wars can take place in a truly global society there will be no need for armies. Because it will be a community of plenty, where there is enough for all and therefore no advantage can be obtained by theft or other forms of crime, all need for courts and police will have disappeared. In other words, the State, which is the sum of all these institutions and organisations, will itself disappear. Instead of one section of society ruling and oppressing another, men and women will have grown accustomed to living together in society without fear and compulsion. Work, instead of being simply a means of earning a living, will have become the natural expression of men’s lives, freely given according to their abilities. Moreover, the nature of work will itself have changed. Through the development of science and technology much of its drudgery will have disappeared and every man and woman will develop their mental and physical capacities to the full. Thus, for the first time, humanity, will be united in a world-wide family.

Let us pledge ourselves to work towards this goal. 

We follow ideas, not men

The essential theories which Marx and Engels developed have been proved correct again and again. The Socialist Party adhere to the basic conceptions of Marxism because they have proved to be true. No better set of ideas has been shown to be superior and not through lack of trying to think of better ones. On the contrary, these attempts have been numerous but have failed to improve on the original. Unemployment and poverty neither radicalises the working class nor pushes it towards socialist solutions. The overwhelming majority of unemployed workers can be categorised as ‘resigned’ or ‘broken’. Without objectives and well-developed ideas of their own. The chronic un- and under-employed tend to support any social movement that offers assistance or make the best promises for a better future.  The left had little to offer besides education and enlightenment.

The kind of “socialism” under which everybody would receive the same pay, an equal quantity of meat, an equal quantity, of bread, would wear the same kind of clothes and would receive the same kind of goods and in equal quantities—such a kind of “socialism” is unknown to Marxism. Rather the principle is from each according to ability, to each according to self-defined needs. It is obvious that people’s needs vary and will vary in socialism. Socialism never denied that people differed in their tastes, and in the quantity and quality of their needs.

We have seen that the capitalists all over the world try to solve the crisis for themselves by throwing the burden of the crisis upon the workers through wage-cuts, reductions in welfare benefits, speed-ups in industry, lengthening or shortening of working hours, tax laws to benefit the wealthy and by intensifying their competition against foreign competitors through trade wars, etc. The major social contradiction of the capitalist system is the conflict in interest between the owning capitalist class and the producing working class. This gives rise to class struggle, the capitalists always seeking to more intensely exploit the workers, and the workers struggling to retain the products of their labour. The class struggle, as we have already seen, becomes ever sharper with the intensification of the general crisis of capitalism, and it eventually culminates in the socialist revolution. The capitalist class has always endeavoured to soften this contradiction. But the facts demonstrate that it is no more successful in accomplishing this than it is in its efforts to wipe out the other basic economic contradiction of capitalism, the conflict between the capitalist modes of production and distribution. In spite of all the efforts of the capitalists to quench the class struggle, by damping down or beating out the workers’ opposition, it flares up ever broader, more vigorously and more menacingly to capitalism. It has always been a policy of the capitalist class, especially in the imperialist countries, to split and weaken the working class.

The problems of the impoverished and deprived cannot be solved by charity and the benevolence of the privileged. There is no solution to the social problems of the working class other than their emancipation from the poverty and deprivation itself as a whole. Even if the charity organisations multiply a hundredfold and work non-stop day and night, they can still not sufficiently tackle the sufferings and miseries of humanity. There can be no salvation within the capitalist system. Charity is no solution to this calamity of hunger and homelessness. The charity of the rich and powerful is like that of a thieve who rob a home at night and before fleeing, leaves a few coins on the table for the house-holder to buy some crumbs in the morning and because of this kind gesture of the robbers, the victims should feel indebted and grateful. We who create and produce all the wealth are the ones being plundered by the capitalist class. Our knowledge, our skills and our grasp of science and modern technology, if all that is brought under the democratic control and management of those who toil, the whole humanity can be gifted with bountiful abundance. The liberation of mankind would eliminate want once and for all. Those billions now struggling for food, shelter, and clothing will start to explore new horizons. That is socialism. It is a simple solution. Charity is a demeaning symptom of capitalism's failure to adequately provide for everyone.

Capitalism is the motor now driving the world towards ecological collapse, threatening us all. Insatiable growth and consumption are destroying the planet and will doom humanity in the long run -- but without ceaselessly growing production and insatiably rising consumption, we would have economic collapse in the short run. The problem is that the critical decisions that affect the environment, decisions about what and how much to produce, about resource consumption, about pollution -- are not in society's hands and not even in the hands of the government. Those decisions are in private hands, mainly in the hands of large corporations. CEOs have no choice but to make systematically wrong decisions. Corporations aren't necessarily evil. They just can't help themselves. The unplanned, anarchic production for the market, single-minded pursuit of profit maximisation at the expense of all other considerations is running at full throttle filling the world's water and air with toxic and warming pollution, and propelling us towards extinction. The common good of society is ignored for the pursuit of individual economic self-interest.

Global wealth is created by the combined labour by hand and brain of hundreds of millions of people. The current economic and political system allow a tiny minority to own and control that wealth. That is why we have billionaires while most of us struggle to make ends meet and hundreds of millions live in abject poverty. This system allows a massively disproportionate share of wealth to be narrowly concentrated. The resources of the billionaire philanthropists are created by the social effort of the producers, and in a rational economic system, those resources would be available as of right for the good of society and not dependent on the whim of private individuals. Instead of relying on any billionaires to distribute the wealth created by the labour of millions of workers that wealth should be allocated democratically according to need. Moreover, by socialising the means of producing such wealth, massive extra resources could be generated to meet all the needs of humanity for food, shelter and a decent life.

Commonly the word “socialism” is used as a political trick. Reformers of capitalism often call themselves “socialists” or are frequently accused of being “socialists”. It is suggested that countries with large government welfare programmes are socialist or where industry is nationalised makes them socialist. State ownership is not socialism because  the workers are still not the masters of their labour conditions and they still are separated from the production process. The workers remain wage-earners; wage- slave. The capitalist relationship is not abolished. The Socialist Party will not deem its work done till capitalism is removed and replaced.

The People’s Platform

With socialism, we can use the world’s resources, and the accumulated knowledge and skill of our fellow workers to change the face of the planet, to create a world in which poverty, exploitation, and war are just bad memories. It is with that goal in mind that we in the Socialist Party set out. The Socialist Party have no illusions of grandeur. We are a small political organisation with a limited audience at the moment. We have no illusions about the scale of the task, or about the limitations imposed by our size, influence, and talents. We don’t regard ourselves as the elect, the bearers of the truth. We know that only the working class can transform society. We don’t seek to put ourselves in place of that class. We seek only to make workers conscious of their interests and their power and to direct that power at the capitalist system. We appeal to all who agree with us, to join us. People have two roads to follow: Either the road of capital, towards steadily worsening living conditions and increasing misery or the road of revolution and socialism.

A socialist revolution worldwide will mean that the problems of world poverty can be tackled and overcome in a coordinated way and that people will move freely over the face of the globe. It will mean harnessing of all the world’s resources for the benefit of united humanity, will become a reality. Few can deny that the world today is in a constant state of upheaval. That is reflected in the widespread turmoil and conflict not only in the developed industrial nations but also in developing nations throughout the world. The Socialist Party has repeatedly demonstrated that the capitalist system does not and cannot work in the interests of the majority. It is a social system in which society is divided into two classes—a capitalist class and a working class. The capitalist class consists of a tiny minority—the wealthy few who own and control the instruments of production and distribution. The working class consists of the vast majority who own no productive property and must, therefore, seek to work for the class that owns and controls the means of life in order to survive. The relationship between the two classes forms the basis for an economic tyranny under which the workers as a class are robbed of the major portion of the social wealth that they produce. Against this insane capitalist system, the Socialist Party raises its voice in emphatic protest and unqualified condemnation. It declares that if our society is to be rid of the host of economic, political and social ills that for so long have plagued it, the outmoded capitalist system of private ownership of the socially operated means of life and production for the profit of a few must be replaced by a new social order. That new social order must be organised on the same basis of social ownership and democratic management of all the instruments of social production, all means of distribution and all of the social services. It must be one in which production is carried on to satisfy human needs and wants. In short, it must be genuine socialism.

For many on the Left, the working class can’t understand the idea of socialism: only the party can. And socialism is not judged by whether the working people rule, but by whether the new rulers can plan the economy in the name of the “objective interests” of the people where the intellectual Leninist elite battles the capitalists with the goal of better managing the economy for the ignorant masses. We need socialism more urgently than ever. But it won’t come through the vanguardist parties of the Left.

Help us build a world in which everyone will enjoy the free exercise and full benefit of their individual faculties, multiplied by all the technological and other factors of modern civilisation. Despite the many threats to workers’ lives, liberty and happiness today, despite the growing poverty and misery that workers are subjected to, a world of peace, liberty, security, health and abundance for all stands within our grasp. The potential to create such a society exists, but that potential can be realised only if workers act to gain control of their own lives by organising, politically and industrially, for socialism. We can sympathise with any organisation, party, or group that sincerely advocates the self-emancipation of the workers. Even when they themselves are not yet interested in revolutionary ideas, radical groups could discuss on their own how the working class might organise, production, distribution, and control over society. Socialist ideas and the socialist revolution are still evolving.

Workers Can Build a Better World

Why do you wish to be governed over? All government is over us in the interests of the minority capitalist parasite class, regardless of the Left/Right spectrum of the political parties. Why do you need a leader? If you need a leader you are a slave. The Socialist Party, Britain's oldest socialist party, and its second oldest political party, does not have, never has had and never will have, a leader. It is a slavish, sheep-like, and an abdication of one’s personal responsibility to require one:

 “I would not be a Moses to lead you into the Promised Land, because if I could lead you into it, someone else could lead you out of it.”― Eugene V. Debs

"The emancipation of the working classes must be conquered by the working classes themselves. We cannot, therefore, co-operate with people who openly state that the workers are too uneducated to emancipate themselves and must be freed from above by philanthropic big bourgeois and petty bourgeois.’ - Marx and Engels

The Socialist Party doesn't support either Corbyn or the notions of leadership and has damn all to do with Momentum or the Labour Party. It doesn't matter whether the politician is an honourable person or a shit one. They are only in charge of you, as you have abdicated responsibility by agreeing to be governed over. They are not in charge of economic events. That is left to the anarchy of the market system.

Trying to work out why the ruling class and their paid for and bought media should be so apparently unfairly opposed to Corbyn (when he's only a harmless reformist advocating what Harold Wilson did 60 years ago), we wonder whether the vote in parliament on Trident gives a clue -- they don't want the main opposition party, which has a chance of forming a government, to be unilateralist? It might be a coincidence, but they encouraged the SDP breakaway in 1981 which effectively ruled out a possibly unilateralist Labour Party from getting into government in the likely future. They want nuclear weapons because, in the capitalist world of competing states, "might is right", so this is of vital interest to them.

This charade of democracy doesn't alter the relations of production, doesn't alter waged slavery, doesn't alter the 90-95% producing all the wealth and the 5-10% profiting from this to become stinking rich, with a waged ration for the 90-95%.

All capitalist economies are determined by the realisation of profit … Profit is the raison d’être. As a result, if profits are declining, or by scrapping unprofitable plant or machinery profits will increase, it is quite usual for productive capacity to be scrapped. Profit can ONLY come from the exploitation of the vast majority. The illusion of democratic control over ungovernable economic forces scarcely addresses this point. It doesn't alter outcomes one iota though. The rich will still be rich and the rest of us will still be waged slaves producing all the wealth.

As long as you keep settling for a reformed capitalism, you will get waged slavery, if you are lucky, a food bank if not. A ration or a hand-out. The capitalist parasite class will be laughing all the way to their conspicuous consumption of the wealth you produce, while you go to work.  Capitalism cannot be reformed or tamed to work in the interests of the majority.

A commonly owned and democratically controlled, production for use, shared planet run by ourselves with free access and recallable delegation where administrative tasks require some specialisation does do so. We don't need money in a production for use society.

Capitalist democracy even with reforms, doesn't address the intense competition between rival capitalist blocs, locally, regionally and globally over markets, trade routes and raw materials which ultimately leads to war, either in the global confrontations of the last century, the war science arising from those at Nagasaki, Hiroshima, or the ever ongoing proxy wars. It doesn't address the limited apparent 'normalisation' of acceptance of the only 'choice', as being between two evils, as natural outcomes, nuclear annihilation or conventional annihilation.

A commonly owned and democratically controlled , production for use, shared planet run by ourselves with free access and recallable delegation where administrative tasks require some specialisation does do so. It is past time for a societal upgrade to a post-capitalist system. Cuba, Sweden? Still capitalism with waged slavery for the majority and riches for the minority. The Daily Mail and every other capitalist newspaper, don't even acknowledge what communism is. They think state capitalism is communism. Communism and socialism, essentially mean the same, is a democratic, production for use, post-capitalist society, with common or social ownership (not the state ownership) of all the means of producing and distributing wealth in conditions of free access and democratic control by us all without elites. Government over the people will cease to exist and instead we will have administration, by us, locally regionally and globally, over things and resources with recallable delegation where specialism is necessary.

"From each according to their abilities to each according to their needs"

Wee Matt

Break the Chains of Wage Slavery - Fight for Socialism

There is a worldwide yearning for human dignity. The majority of people are disillusioned and have deep questions about the prospects of life under capitalism. It’s easy to play on people’s fears and prejudices and to point fingers at certain groups. In the past, it has been ‘the Jews’, ‘the Irish’, ‘the blacks’, ‘the Poles’ or some other easily identifiable target that was blamed for society’s ills. Imagine what life would be like if capitalism was no more and had been replaced by a genuinely socialist society. Imagine a society in a sustainable ecological balance, with material abundance and social equality, a society where social relations were premised on human solidarity, not capitalist exploitation and competition where people are set against each other, but a world where production for profit, driven by accumulation of capital, has given way to production for use. With the establishment of socialism, for the very first time in history, the greater our knowledge, the greater will be the direct benefits to the majority of society. Our aim in the Socialist Party is to reach out to the majority to create an independent, mass workers movement for socialism. We put forth the socialist case that revolution is the only alternative to more suffering and misery.  The working class must emancipate itself. No one can do it for them. We in the Socialist Party cannot function as “social workers” who, instead of advocating that the workers themselves fight for their interests, try to patch up the problems of capitalism and make life a little “better” for the workers. To avoid social, environmental and economic collapse, the world needs to move beyond capitalism. Socialism is where we all put all our resources together and work for the common good of us all and not just for the benefit of the few. We are sharing the wealth within society. We need to stop robbery. We need to free ourselves from this system based upon wage slavery. Capitalism cloaked itself in a libertarian guise by proclaiming that the freedom of the market is the only realistic way to achieve this more general liberty. What we need is economic democracy or we will never be free.

You hear union members and their leaders demand fair pay for work. If you walk into a store and buy something for ten dollars you would expect to get back something worth that ten dollars. You wouldn’t expect to buy a single stick of bubble gum; it would have to be something of the same value. At the same time, you cannot expect to get a brand new iPhone for that money. The labour market works in a similar fashion. Those who are there to make the purchase are the employers, the bourgeoisie, who have capital and are in need of workers to manufacture their products and provide service. Those who seek to be hired, who seek an opportunity to sell their “commodity,” are the workers. This “commodity” that they sell to the capitalist is their labour power. This seems like it could be a fair trade, yet workers continue to demand fairer wages, and the capitalists continue to make higher and higher profits while they refuse these demands. How can this be?

Profits cannot be made from the increasing prices of goods alone, the “free market” rules this option out. After all, if a single capitalist increases his prices, he will soon discover that others sell the same goods of the same quality but for less money. Naturally the majority will go for the cheaper offer and the one selling at a more expensive price will have serious trouble getting rid of his goods and making money. If all the others decide to or are forced to increase their prices, this will affect the single capitalist as well, being that he can’t live off his money alone but has to buy commodities like everybody else. We can conclude that increasing prices can be a temporary means to gain profits for a short time in certain sectors of the economy, but they can never be the sole source of capital.

Let us again consider the labor market. The capitalist invests a certain amount of money to hire the worker $56 for 8 hours of work, a wage of $7 dollars an hour. However, the value of the product of this labor will net his boss $200. So is this extra $144 the work of magic? Of course not. The Marxist Labor Theory of Value explains that value is created by labor power. The amount of spent labor power is measured in time, therefore the value of a commodity is determined by the time necessary to produce it. This means that the value of the worker’s labor power can be measured in the amount of goods and, thus, money he needs to keep himself alive and going, to maintain and restore his ability to work after a long day on the job. Therefore the capitalist is compelled to pay him the bare minimum wage needed for survival (sometimes more, sometimes less), $56 in this example, yet the ratio of the amount needed for the basic maintenance of the worker to the hours needed to earn this much is unlimited. Essentially, the capitalist is able to extract more hours from workers while only compensating them to a minimum and reaping the larger part of the value created by the worker.

In our example, the worker would only need to work for approximately 2 hours and 14 minutes to produce a value of $56, but the capitalist hired the worker for a certain period of time, 8 hours here, and during this time all value produced belongs to the capitalist. The workers are paid not for their labour, but for using their labour power to perform work for the capitalist, and they do so with his means of production. The moment they start working, the product of their labor belongs to their employer, no matter if less (which would most likely get the worker fired) value or more value is produced in that period of time than is embodied in the money the workers have received.

This additional, unpaid labour, is called surplus labour and the value it produces without the worker being compensated for it is called surplus value. The extraction of surplus value from the working class is the basis of the capitalist system. Every capitalist’s goal is to extract as much surplus value as possible as it is the basis of their profit. The only way to press more and more surplus labour from a worker is to either reduce the time he works, to gain capital through investment and/or to increase the time the worker works “for free,” without receiving any payment. To put it bluntly: the higher the wages are for workers, the lesser the profit for the capitalists, and vice versa.

Now the question raised at the beginning can easily be answered: are fair wages possible under capitalism? Can a worker receive the full equivalent of the work he performs in a capitalist society? The answer is no; it is entirely impossible as it would leave no surplus value and thus no profits for the capitalist class, and thus render their existence impossible. It would become obvious that they are superfluous parasites, feeding off of the blood and sweat of the working people and living on the unpaid labor of others. The wealth of a selected minority is based on the exploitation of the majority’s hard work. To expect fair wages under this system is like expecting the abolition of slavery in a slaveholder society, as Marx points out. The moment the slaves are freed, we can no longer speak of a slaveholder society; the moment the working class receives the full value it produced, our society has ceased to be capitalist.

Taken from here

Time for revolution

Capitalism has generated within itself a socialised process of production. It has laid the actual, material foundations for the socialist transformation of society. Ideas arise from actual life. They are not innate in man. Their basic determinant is in the material conditions by which man gets his living. Thus all epochs of society have had their own system of ideas, their own belief-system. Ideas have a powerful influence on events. That socialist transformation of society will not come about of itself. It will come about by stages through the actions of men. Those actions will be guided by theory. All facts, natural and social, show that absolutely everything is in the process of movement, of coming into being and passing out of being.  Marx and Engels could not have arisen in times of feudalism because the social process had not yet reached the stage where there was sufficient development. The mass impoverishment generated by capitalist industry gave birth to socialist ideas. Marx and Engels who introduced the idea of development into socialist thought, and perceived the working class not only as it was but also as it was becoming. Through the development of industry the working class would grow in numbers and organization, while gaining constantly in intellectual and moral power. In this way workers would achieve the power to emancipate themselves. To be sure, it would have to be educated to this. But this education, as Marx and Engels understood, could not be brought about by men who proclaimed themselves the schoolmasters of the workers, the vanguardists but through the experience of the class struggle, forced upon the wage earners, by the conditions under which, they lived. The task for socialists was to help it understand the nature of capitalist society.

The working class, under capitalism, are all the people in this society who do not own property or investments or a business from which we can make money from, and therefore we have to sell our time and energy to an employer - a boss. We are forced to work from necessity of requiring the means to survive – to pay for our food, clothing and shelter. Work takes up the majority of our lives. Our work is the basis of this society. Employment and the society that grows out of it are alienating and miserable for us. Even if we enjoy parts of our job we experience it as something alien to us, over which we have very little control. Employers and bosses want to get the maximum amount of work from us, from the longest hours, for the least pay. We, on the other hand, want to be able to enjoy our lives: we don't want to be over-worked, and we want shorter hours and more pay. We are constantly fighting against the imposed conditions of our lives. This is class struggle. Work being forced on us like this compels us to resist. Simply standing up for our own interests brings us into conflict with bosses, and bureaucrats everywhere. By resisting the imposition of work, we say that our lives are more important than our boss's profits. These everyday struggles are a requirement for our survival. The experience of those who are forced to labour and who struggle against the society based on toil, creates certain kinds of ideas. A class conscious working class are those worker who struggles to do away with employment and class divisions, and the society built around them. This attacks the very nature of capitalism, where profit is the most important reason for doing anything, and points to the possibility of a world without classes and privately-owned means of production. We are the working class resisting our own existence. We are the working class struggling against work and class. When we are actively fighting for our own interests, these ideas solidify into an anti-capitalist perspective. We are in an emergency. This is no time for gradualism. Urgency is now of the essence.

Across the world, the capitalist class through its ownership of wealth holds economic and political power. Apart from a few personal possessions and perhaps, if lucky enough, a house without a mortgage attached to it, the vast majority of workers own nothing but their labour power, their ability to work. The wealth is produced by those who work by hand and brain, far in excess of the wages they are paid. The surplus goes to the capitalist owners or shareholders as profit. This is capitalist exploitation, the basis of all forms of rent and interest. A capitalist system is inevitably marked by gross inequality. People are divorced from the process of decision-making.

Two courses are open. Either the present trend will continue. Or steps must be taken to secure full command of the world’s resources, wrest power from the few, end exploitation and use the wealth produced by the people for the welfare of the people. There is no middle way. The only path of advance is towards socialism. Socialism is logical. Socialism means democratic control and common ownership of economic resources, of means of production and distribution. Politically it is power in the hands of the people. Socialism will enable the community as a whole will share and gain from all increases in productivity, all the progresses in science and application of technological discoveries. By ending exploitation it allows people to make their own future. The goal of socialists is to establish the rule of the working people in place of rule by the owners of property.