How we are Different (3/4)

The SPGB argues that it is about engaging people with the vision of socialism. There is nothing automatic about social change, it has to be struggled for. The Left relies upon a notion of the inherently revolutionary nature of the working class and that through the class struggle this inherently revolutionary character will show itself. Although, it hasn’t. It's also flawed because it shows no reason why, due to the failure of reform, the workers should turn to socialism. Why, since it was people calling themselves socialists who advocated that reform, don’t they turn against it, or even to fascism? Under the model of revolution presented by the Trotskyists the only way the working class could come to socialist consciousness is through a revolution is made by the minority with themselves as its leaders.This, then, explains their insistance about needing to “be” where the mass of the working class is. It is the reason why a supposedly revolutionary party should change its mind to be with the masses, rather than trying to get the masses to change their minds and be with it. They do not want workers to change their minds, merely to become followers. Their efforts are not geared towards changing minds, or raising revolutionary class consciousness.

To repeat, we see little wrong with people campaigning for reforms that bring essential improvements and enhance the quality of their lives, and some reforms do indeed make a difference to the lives of millions and can be viewed as “successful”. There are examples of this in such fields as education, housing, child employment, work conditions and social security. Socialists have to acknowledge that the “welfare” state, the NHS and so on, made living standards for some sections of the working class better than they had been under rampant capitalism and its early ideology of laissez faire, although these ends should never be confused with socialism. However, in this regard we also recognise that such “successes” have in reality done little more than to keep workers and their families in efficient working order and, while it has taken the edge of the problem, it has rarely managed to remove the problem completely. Socialists do not oppose reformism because it is against improvements in workers’ lives lest they dampen their revolutionary ardour; nor, because it thinks that decadent capitalism simply cannot deliver on any reforms; but because our continued existence as propertyless wage slaves undermines whatever attempts we make to control and better our lives through reforms. Our objection to reformism is that by ignoring the essence of class, it throws blood, sweat and tears into battles that will be undermined by the workings of the wages system. All that effort, skill, energy, all those tools could be turned against class society, to create a society of common interest where we can make changes for our common mutual benefit. So long as class exists, any gains will be partial and fleeting, subject to the ongoing struggle. What we are opposed to is the whole culture of reformism, the idea that capitalism can be tamed and made palatable with the right reforms.

If the view remains that the struggle for reforms is worthwhile then imagine just how many palliatives and ameliorations will be offered and conceded by a besieged capitalist class in a desperate attempt to retain ownership rights if the working class were demanding the maximum socialist programme of full and complete appropriation and nothing less. Reforms now derided as utopian will become two-a-penny in an attempt to fob off the workers. Perhaps, even, capitalism will provide a batch of free services, on the understanding that this is “the beginning” of a free society, but,of course real socialists will not be taken in.

What is at stake here is not a question of tactics or strategy but principle. We believe, to paraphrase Lenin’s words but reverse their meaning, that workers, exclusively by their own efforts, are capable of a socialist consciousness. Workers are human beings and individuals in themselves; they are not dumb masses to be tricked, led, deceived, and lied to, for the greater good. That’s why, actually, we are not sectarian and the Left are. We join workers struggles as workers. We take part in the democratic process as equals with our fellows. We do not join for purposes of our own; we have no programme of demands hidden up our sleeves to be produced at a later date, nor a one-party dictatorship to produce as a nasty surprise at an even later date. That’s why, when we join workers struggles as individuals and not as a leadership party, and reject the Left, we are not being sectarian — quite the opposite. We are being principled socialists.

What genuinely puzzles Socialist Party members is why the Left cannot (or refuses to) comprehend our position. We understand theirs perfectly well, one in which workers generally will not become socialists all by themselves, but will, at times, engage in struggle to protect their own interests. Therefore, socialists should organise into political parties that also engage in these struggles with the view of leading the workers to victory, in the first instance, and into support for the party in the second. As the party builds up such support, it will then be in a position to seize power on behalf of the working class and put in place ‘socialist’ (actually, state capitalist) measures. Now, as a broad brush and short statement, is this true or false?

A similarly simple and broad brush statement of our position is that fellow-workers do not need any advice or leadership from socialists when it comes to struggling to defend their own interests within capitalism. They do it all by themselves all the time. However, such struggles have their limits within capitalism: they cannot go beyond the law of value, and the combined forces of the capitalists and the state can almost always defeat them if they put their mind to it. Workers who realise this tend to become socialists. As they become socialists, they see the necessity for going beyond such day to day struggles (these unavoidable and incessant guerilla battles, as Marx put it) and the need for a political party aimed solely for socialism. This political party must not advocate reforms, not because it is against reforms (how on earth could a working class party be against reforms in the working class interest?), but because it wants to build support for socialism, and not for reforms. Simple, isn't it?

We are not and nor are the working class fooled by rhetoric of a re-hash of transitional programme. Nor are we taken in by the claims of party democracy, one that is based upon Leninist “democratic centralist” lines in which the executive committee are the policy-making leadership, upon a hierarchy where each layer of leadership has power over the levels below it, with the party’s national leadership – the members of its central committee – at the top. Power in the hands of the leaders and in practice reduces the rank-and-file members to a mere consultative role. The welfare state – most particularly its health service component – originally represented an advance for many workers, though it was certainly not introduced with benevolence in mind. We have never said that all reforms are doomed to failure and do not really make a difference to workers’ lives? There are many examples of ‘successful’ reforms in such fields as education, housing, child employment, conditions of work and social security. The Socialist Party does not oppose all reforms as such, only the futile and dangerous attempt to seek power to administer capitalism on the basis of a reform programme – reformism.

It seems unlikely that the working class and its organisations are strong enough to stop austerity measures being imposed, let alone imposing their own demands. But we must start from where we are. Boris Johnson and the new government will be expecting that we'll just take whatever’s coming to us. We must try to prove them wrong. Where socialists have their most vital contribution to make – a clear idea about alternatives is not mere utopianism, but an important ingredient in inspiring successful struggle. An upturn in class war is the only basis on which socialism can begin to make sense and seem like a credible and possible alternative to capitalism for the working class as a whole.

We welcome any upsurge in the militancy and resistance and organisation of our class. But we also know, from bitter experience, that work of an altogether quieter, patient, more political kind is also needed. The skirmishes in the class war must be fought if we are not to be reduced to beasts of burden. But as human animals capable of rational thought and long-term planning, we must also seek to stop the skirmishes by winning the class war, and thereby ending it. As revolutionaries, we do not advocate reforms, that is, changes in the way capitalism runs, such as alterations to the tax system. Reforms, no matter how‘radical’, can never make capitalism run in the interests of the workers. Nor should supporting reforms be some kind of tactic pursued by socialists to gain support from workers, for workers who joined a socialist party because they admired its reformist tactics would turn it into a reformist organisation pure and simple. To attract support on the basis of reformist policies but really aim at revolution would be quite dishonest to get workers’ support on the basis of saying one thing while really wanting something quite different. History showed us the fate of the social democratic parties, which despite a formal commitment to socialism as an “ultimate goal”, admitted the non-socialist to their ranks and sought non-socialist support for a reform programme of capitalism rather than a socialist platform. In order to maintain their non-socialist support, they were themselves forced to drop all talk of socialism and become even more openly reformist. Today the social democratic parties are firmly wedded to capitalism in theory and in practice. We say that this was the inevitable result of the admission of non-socialists and advocating reforms of capitalism. That is why we have always advocated socialism and never called for the reform of capitalism. We are not saying that all reforms are anti–working class, but as a socialist party advocating reforms, it would be its first step towards its transformation into a reformist party. Regardless of why or how the reforms are advocated, the result is the same: confusion in the minds of the working class instead of growth of socialist consciousness. 

The institution of government does not feel threatened by appeals to it to act on single issues – even if those appeals take the form of mass public protests. On the contrary, government only feels a sense of power and security in the knowledge that the protesters recognise it as the supreme authority to which all appeals must be made. As long as people are only protesting over single issues they are remaining committed to supporting the system as a whole. But government will take quite a different view when large numbers of people confront it not to plead from a position of weakness for this or that change or addition to the statute book, but to challenge the whole basis of the way we live – in other words to question the inevitability of buying and selling and production for profit, and to actively work from a position of political strength for its replacement by the socialist alternative. In such circumstances, the governments aim will be to buy off the growing socialist consciousness of workers. In other words, reforms will be much more readily granted to a large and growing socialist movement than to reformers campaigning over individual issues within the present system. Not of course that the growing movement will be content with the reforms the old system hands out. To those who still say that, while they ultimately want socialism, it is a long way off and we must have reforms in the meantime, we would reply that socialism need not be a long way off and there need not be a meantime. If all the immense dedication and energy that have been channelled into reform activity over the past 200 years had been directed towards achieving socialism, then socialism would have been established long ago and the problems the reformists are still grappling with (income inequality, unemployment, health, housing, education, war. etc.) would all be history. It is only when people leave reformism behind altogether that socialism will begin to appear to them not as a vague distant prospect, something for others to achieve, but as a clear, immediate alternative which they themselves can – and must – help to bring about.

We do not require lectures on political unity from those on the Left who are well-deserved of the title 57 Varieties, having mostly been made up out of splits of splits of splits. Why should we join a host of other political non-starters that have come and gone in the past.

We have no objection to workers and socialists gettting involved in fights for partial demands but don’t believe the party should do that. We regard the strategy of transitional demands as elitist and manipulative, as well as just downright silly. The party’s task is NOT to “lead the workers in struggle” or even to instruct its members on what to do in trade unions, tenants’ associations or whatever, because we believe that socialists and class-conscious workers have the capacity of making decisions for themselves. If this sounds difficult to understand, it’s because you haven’t risen beyond a Leninist level of consciousness. To the question of a united class we hold that within trade unions for practical reasons for unions, in order to be effective, must recruit all workers in a particular industry or trade regardless of political or philosophical views. A union, regardless of type, to be effective today must depend primarily on numbers rather than understanding. We dismissed the chances of large numbers of workers, pragmatic proletarians, resigning from established unions for small radical organisations that can show no evidence of power, which is an immediate question for them. We were castigated for such a position by the so-called radicals of the syndicalist movement who liked to call us the sectarians. As the current recession within capitalism continues, squeezing and stamping down upon the working class ever more relentlessly, alongside the growing realisation of the failure of all forms of running the system; then there is definitely a growing POTENTIAL for the escalation of struggle towards the overthrow of the system. However, how many times has the potential been there in past moments of escalated struggle and capitalist crisis only to disappear or to be channelled into reformist, pro-capitalist directions? Discontent over wages or conditions can be a catalyst for socialist understanding but so can many other things such as concern about the environment or war or the threat of war or bad housing or the just the general culture of capitalism. The SPGB does not minimise the necessity or importance of the workers keeping up the struggle to maintain wage-levels and resisting cuts, etc. If they always yielded to the demands of their exploiters without resistance they would not be worth their salt, nor be fit for waging the class struggle to put an end to exploitation. Successes through such actions as striking and protests may well encourage other workers to stand up for their rights more but the reality remains that the workers’ strength is determined by their position within the capitalist economy, and their victories will always be partial ones within the market system. Only by looking to the political situation, the reality of class ownership and power within capitalism, and organising to make themselves a party to the political battle in the name of common ownership for their mutual needs, will a general gain come to workers, and an end to these sectional battles. Otherwise, the ultimate result of the strikes will be the need to strike or demonstrate again in the future.The never-ending treadmill of the class struggle. Workers can never win the class struggle while it is confined simply to the level of trade union militancy. It requires to be transformed into socialist consciousness. I see little evidence of the Left engaging with worker on the question of socialism but find ample proof that leftists feeds the working class with false illusions. Our general position is well known; we oppose all restrictions imposed by decaying and outmoded capitalism. We oppose passports, we oppose the attempt to restrict the free movement of labour, the capitalists idea of “Fortress Europe” etc. But truth is concrete and on this issue we have to take account of the different levels of consciousness of the proletariat. We cannot put forward, in the manner of the sects, the bald slogan of “open borders” or of “no to immigration controls” or a variant of this, things to all people thats supposed to be a principled position.

 Our Party rules are openly published for all to see. Thinking is not and never has been a violation of socialist discipline. Marx believed that, as the workers gained more experience of the class struggle and the workings of capitalism, it would become more consciously socialist and democratically organised by the workers themselves. The emergence of socialist understanding out of the experience of the workers could thus be said to be ‘spontaneous’ in the sense that it would require no intervention by people outside the working class to bring it about. Socialist propaganda and agitation would indeed be necessary, but would come to be carried out by workers themselves, whose socialist ideas would have been derived from an interpretation of their class experience of capitalism. The end result would be an independent movement of the socialist-minded and democratically organised working class aimed at winning control of political power in order to abolish capitalism. As Marx and Engels put it in the Communist manifesto, “The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority.” This is not the same analysis advocated by Lenin or Trotsky. The Left put forward a whole raft of reformist demands that on paper might seem to be appealing. The only problem is that there is no plan to actually achieve these demands – they are “pretend” demands. Trotsky himself called these kind of demands “transitional demands” – the idea being to look at everybody else’s demands and make bigger demands so they sound great.

Occasionally, they might achieve a demand which will make them seem sincere, however the idea isn’t to achieve these demands – it is to not achieve them! This is the Troskyists’ grand master plan to make workers dissatisfied, so the latter will become revolutionary and flock behind their political leadership. In other words, the workers are to be the infantry led by the Trotskyist generals. The Left have real aims quite different to the reform programme they peddle. In this they are being as dishonest as any other politician, from the left or right. The ultimate result of this is disillusionment with the possibility of radical change. Genuine socialists get tarred with the same brush. When someone comes across the Socialist Party for the first time, a common reaction is to consider us as just another left-wing political organisation. The Left use similar terminology to us, talking of socialism, class struggle, exploitation, etc, and invoking Karl Marx. But digging a little deeper will show that our political position is very different from that of the Left. The Socialist Party is not on the Left. There is so much manipulation, dishonesty, and downright erroneous thinking connected with the Left that we would not wish to be associated with them in any way.

How we are Different (2/4)

Members of the SPGB will of course individually engage in the struggle to stop cuts to their jobs, to keep their kids schools open, to stop their university fees rising, to oppose their hospitals closing, as individuals and as local community members but we don’t parachute in as an organisation to create and control such resistance – we do not offer ourselves up as the leaders of it. We do not seek to lead such struggles but limit ourselves to urging workers to organise any particular struggle in a democratic way under the control of those directly involved.

There are two kinds of reformism. One has no intention of bringing about revolutionary change. The other being the one that cherishes the mistaken belief that successful reforms will somehow prepare the ground for revolution are to be seen as necessary first steps on the long road to eventual revolution. That socialist consciousness will develop out of the struggle for reforms within capitalism: when workers realise that they can’t get the reforms they have been campaigning for they will turn to the “cadres” of the Fourth International for leadership. Quite apart from the fact that this has never happened, this argument is more of a rationalisation by shamefaced reformists who imagine that they are revolutionaries. “The movement is everything, the goal nothing” sums up it. The Left may claim that it enjoys the best of both worlds by both supporting reforms and advocating revolution. But in fact its revolutionary posturing. Left-wing reformists always claim how much better everything would be if only they were in power. Everything would be better: the NHS, the environment, the economy, education. And how is all this to be achieved? By two old Leftist illusions; taxing the rich and nationalisation disguised as public or social ownership. The aim of the Left has always been to establish state capitalism, the profit system planned centrally by a miracle-performing state. Yet the source of the wealth would still be the surplus value wrung from the working class.

Lacking an honest revolutionary stance for a new society, the Left becomes caught in a pointless circular battle with an economic system that is based on exploitation. As long as the accumulation of capital takes precedence, either in the hands of the individual capitalist or state institutions, the primary concern of exploitation of labour and making profit will take precedence over the concerns of human need. The Left downplays the idea of directly challenging the system and organising an alternative political economy and is working instead on the terrain of capitalism. “Socialist activists” have claimed impressive “successes” and “victories” in every field except one. History have proven beyond any shadow of doubt that they have not remotely convinced the workers of the need for socialism. From the activities carried on in the name of socialism, the one thing conspicuous by its absence has been any mention of the socialist case. The efforts of “socialist activists” has been geared to an attempt to reconcile the irreconcilable contradictions of capitalism.The Left-winger behaves as if he was Moses, laying down the commandments in stone for ignorant followers to obey. Left -wing propaganda offering leadership presents the worker as an inferior incapable of thinking, organising and acting and imbues further the master-and-servant mentality of the worker. Left organisations start from the premise that workers are too stupid to understand or want socialism by their own volition. Therefore, revolutionary ideas have to be introduced from outside the working class by all-knowing “professional revolutionaries” who will lead workers to the promised land.

The Socialist Party is not of the Left. There is no such manipulation or dishonesty. We have always been opponents of nationalisation. We do not advocate that the working class should experience the disillusionment of yet another Labour government to realise that it would be once again anti-working class. It is interesting how small the memberships of the other so-called revolutionary parties are. It makes a shambles of the misconception that the SPGB is small because of our procedures or lack of participation in “the struggle”, or our “unsound” or that favourite criticism aimed at us for being too “dogmatic and sectarian” that we lost members and influence. This is a historic and social phenomenon. The myriad parties of the Left all have serious declines in membership. It can be ascribed to a public’s apathy that arises when high hopes raised by social reform programmess only lead to disillusionment.

Are socialists supposed to unite with those who want to reform and administer capitalism? Or do we unite with those who claim socialism can be established by a well-meaning leadership without a class-conscious working class? Do we unite with those who see socialism as a system based on state-control and state-ownership of industry, a cetralised command economy and lastly, do we unite with those who refuse to recognise the importance of capturing the State machine as the path to socialism? Revolutionaries must reject this appeal if they are to remain revolutionaries. If there is no common ground upon which agreement can be reached then there can be no unity.

Our analysis of the Left is not based upon some narrow sectarianism — it’s based upon principle. We do not, nor have we ever, supported capitalist parties, especially those that dress up in militant garb in order to hoodwink the workers. The Left is an expression of all the political mistakes made by the working class last century — from the Labour Party to the Soviet Union. We do not doubt that well-meaning individuals get caught up in such chicanery for no other reason than a desire to see a better world. However, sentiment can never be a substitute. “Unity” has no meaning unless based on the common realisation that its sole object is to introduce socialism. A socialist organisation will get nowhere without a firm grasp of democracy, sound Marxist principle, a disdain to conceal its socialist objective, and a membership in full possession of the facts about current society and the revolutionary alternative. Unlike the Left we openly advocate common ownership and democratic control. It is not the wish of the Socialist Party to be separate for the sake of being so. It is ridiculous to think of a rivalry between socialist parties competing to emancipate the workers. If another socialist organisation appeared on the scene, then the only possible action that we could take would be to make immediate overtures for a merger. We would offer them the open arms of comradely greetings and unity. But the position is that we cannot be a popular reform party attempting to mop up immediate problems, and revolutionary at the same time. We cannot have a half-way house; nor can we accommodate the more timid members of our class who abhor what they describe as “impractical” or “impossible” policies, and spend their time looking for compromises. We do oppose all the so-called working-class parties which compromise with capitalism and do not uphold the socialist case. The socialist case is so fundamentally different, involving as it does the literal transformation of society, that we must expect mental resistance before socialist ideas have finally become consolidated in the mind.We have seen a century of cruelly extinguished hopes of those who heaped praise upon the state-capitalist hell-holes which posed as “socialist states” which pseudo-socialists promoted. We have witnessed a system which has persistently spat the hope of humane capitalism back in the face of its advocates. The progressive enthusiasm of millions has been stamped out in this way.

How different it could have been if all that work which has gone into trying to reform capitalism had gone into struggling to abolish it? Historically, reform activities have dissipated the earnest energies of so-called socialists from doing any socialist work, whatsoever. The need for reforms is an all-time job. The SPGB is not going to do anything for the working class except to arouse their fervor, determination and enthusiasm for socialist objectives. Working-class understanding is at a very low ebb, therefore the membership in the SPGB is puny. Apart from the feeble voices of the Socialist Party, the great mass of the workers are not exposed to socialist fundamentals. Nevertheless, the greatest teacher of all is experience. Eventually, all the groping and mistaken diversions into futile efforts of reforming and administering capitalism will run their course. People learn from their mistakes. Necessity is the latent strength of socialism. Truth and science are on the side of socialism. Socialism is no fanciful utopia, but the crying need of the times; and that we, as socialists, are catalytic agents, acting on our fellow workers and all others to do something about it as speedily as possible, the triggering agent that transforms majority ideas from bourgeois into revolutionary ones. The seeming failures, the disappointments and discouragements, the slow growth, only indicate that socialist work is not an easy task. What makes socialist work stirring and inspiring is not that there are short cuts , but that there is nothing else worth a tinker’s damn.

If our critics persist in claiming that the masses require “revolutionary leadership, we can see from the spontaneous struggles of the “Arab Spring” or the Spanish Indignados or the Occupy Movement that protest and resistance does not require political party leadership. In fact, in most revolutions, for example Russia in 1905 and February 1917, the fall of the Soviet bloc, political parties were never initially in the forefront.

Nor is there is any reason in their interactions with capitalism that dictates that workers in struggle must necessarily become revolutionary socialists. Experience could just as easily turn us to the populist right. Our interaction with the world around us is mediated by ideas. How are we supposed to become a “revolutionary” without engaging – and eventually agreeing – at some point with the IDEA of socialism? Most on the Left believes class struggle militancy can be used as a lever to push the workers along a political road, towards their “emancipation.” How is this possible if the workers do not understand the political road, and are only engaging in economic struggles? The answer is the Leninist “leaders in-the-know” who will direct the workers. But these leaders lead the workers in the wrong direction, toward the wrong goals (nationalisation and state capitalism), as the workers find out to their sorrow.

 Instead of standing clearly for socialism, the Left have aped official Labourism, seeking to influence non-socialist workers through tactical manipulation rather than convince them to change their minds. They argue that the ‘united front’ for instance, provides an opportunity for ‘revolutionaries’ to discuss and convert reformists and that the immediate aim of the ‘unity’ is to provide the most effective fighting organisation for both reformists and revolutionaries. Vanguardists accept the notion that the workers are incapable of developing socialist consciousness, and so the ‘revolutionaries’ have to work with reformists in order to influence them and draw off the most active workers into their own ranks. That there is an ‘uneven consciousness’ among workers that necessitates the need for leaders and for an organisation that can bring it together with non-socialist workers in the name of immediate given ends, be those organisations trade unions or anti-cuts alliances. The reality is that any sort of success involves hiding the disagreements between their constituent organisations, specifically about means and motives. They succeed by making demands that are supported by significant numbers of workers, meaning that any ‘revolutionary’ content will be buried into the need for immediate victory. As such, it is small ‘c’ conservative, taking political consciousness as it is found and seeking to manipulate rather than change it. Such a tactic affords the Left an opportunity to extend their influence. As a tiny minority, they get to work with organisations which can more easily attract members and can thus be part of campaigns and struggles that reach out well beyond the tiny numbers of political activists in any given situation. But the relevant fact remains that, despite providing all this assistance, the ‘revolutionaries’ are incapable of taking these campaigns further than the bulk of the members are willing to accept. 

The SPGB, however, argue that minorities cannot simply take control of movements and mould and wield them to their own ends. Without agreement about what it is and where it is going, leaders and led will invariably split off in different directions. We say that since we are capable, as workers, of understanding and wanting socialism, we cannot see any reason why our fellow workers cannot do likewise. The job of socialists in the here and now is to openly and honestly state the case rather than trying to wheedle and manoeuvre to win a supposed ‘influence’ that is more illusory than real.

The Left’s formula can be summed up in the following:

1) The working class has a reformist consciousness.

2) It is the duty of the “Revolutionary Party” to be where the masses are.

3) Therefore, to be with the mass of the working class, we must advocate reforms.

4) The working class is only reformist minded.

5) Winning reformist battles will give the working class confidence.

6) So that, therefore, they will go on to have a socialist revolution.

7) The working class will learn from its struggles, and will eventually come to realise that assuming power is the only way to meet its ends.

8) That the working class will realise, through the failure of reforms to meet its needs, the futility of reformism and capitalism, and will overthrow it.

9) That the working class will come to trust the Party that leads them to victory, and come a social crisis they will follow it to revolution. No other possibilities for worker to take as a perceived solution such as fascism, or nationalism or religion?

How we are Different (1/4)

Some critics of the Socialist Party find its position on having an political organisation leader-free naive and Utopian. Some accuse the Socialist Party of being deliberately mendacious by denying that it has an Executive Committee as well as “leading” members such as those who have in-depth understanding and good communication skills who acquire more influence within our organisation with individual qualities such as political insight and who possess more forceful personalities and stronger commitment than its “ordinary” members.

To begin with, policy decisions are made by conference and then by a party referendum of the entire memberhip and not the Executive Committee whose remit is to put into action the decisions of the members. An EC that is not even permitted to submit resolutions to conference. All conference decisions have to be ratified by a referendum of the whole membership. Our General Secretary has no position of power or authority over any other member being simply a dogsbody. There is a crucial difference between electing delegates and representatives. Delegates only have as much power as is mandated to them and can be recalled. Representatives have power abdicated to them wholesale. Mandating delegates, voting on resolutions and membership polls are democratic practices for ensuring that the members of an organisation control that organisation – and as such key procedures in any organisation genuinely seeking socialism.

Critics of the Socialist Party misunderstand our position.

Writers or speakers are NOT leaders. Their function is to spread knowledge and understanding, as teachers. Quite different from that we must have leaders (great men) to direct their followers (blind supporters) into a socialist society. Socialism is not the result of blind faith, followers, or, by the same token, vanguard parties. Despite some very charismatic writers and speakers in the past, no personality has held undue influence over the SPGB. Simply check the two published histories of the Party to see on just how many occasions and on how many issues those so-called leaders have not gained a majority at conferences or in referendums. 

We actually have a test for membership. This does not mean that the SPGB has set itself up as an intellectual elite into which only those well-versed in Marxist scholarship may enter. One purpose of it is to place all members on an even basis. The SPGB’s reason is to ensure that only conscious socialists enter its ranks, for, once admitted, all members are equal and it would clearly not be in the interest of the Party to offer equality of power to those who are not able to demonstrate equality of basic socialist understanding. Once a member, he or she have the same rights as the oldest member to sit on any committee, vote, speak, and have access to all information. Thanks to this test all members are conscious socialists and there is genuine internal democracy, and of that we are fiercely proud.

Consider what happens when people join other groups which don’t have this test.The new applicant has to be approved as being “acceptable”. The individual is therefore judged by the group according to a range of what might be called “credential indicators”. Hard work (often, paper-selling) and obedience by new members is the main criterion of trustworthiness in the organisation. In these hierarchical, “top-down” groups the leaders strive at all costs to remain as the leadership , and reward only those with proven commitment to the “party line” with preferential treatment, more responsibility and more say. New members who present the wrong indicators remain peripheral to the party structure, and finding themselves unable to influence decision-making at any level, eventually give up and leave, often embittered by the hard work they put in and the hollowness of the party’s claims of equality and democracy.

Socialism can only be a fully democratic society in which everybody will have an equal say in the ways things are run. This means that it can only come about democratically, both in the sense of being the expressed will of the working class and in the sense of the working class being organised democratically – without leaders, but with mandated delegates – to achieve it. In rejecting these procedures what is being declared is that the working class should not organise itself democratically. Indeed we are critical of trade unions but we are also supportive of them.

The SPGB has always insisted that the structures and tactics of organisations that the working class create to combat the class war will be there own decision and will necessarily be dependent on particular situations. Again a read of our actual history would reveal that unlike other organisations such as the Socialist Labour Party (SLP) or Communist Party(CPGB) we have never promoted the idea of forming separate trade unions. The SPGB avoided the mistake of the SLP – and of the CPGB during the “Third Period” after 1929 – of “dual unionism”, i.e. of trying to form “revolutionary” unions to rival the existing “reformist” unions (though some SPGBers have been involved, as individuals, in breakaway unions.

The working class get the unions, and the leadership, it deserves. Just as a king is only a king because he is obeyed, so too are union leaders only union leaders because they are followed. To imagine they lead is to imbue them with mystical powers within themselves, and set up a phantasm of leadership that exactly mirror images the same phantasm as our masters believe. So long as the workers themselves are content to deal with such a union system, and its leaders, then such a union system and its leaders will remain, and will have to react to the expectations of the members. The way to industrial unions, or socialist unions, or whatever, is not through the leadership of the unions. The unions will always reflect the nature of their memberships, and until their membership change, they will not change. Unions are neither inherently reactionary, nor inherently revolutionary. The only way to change unions is not through seizing or pressurising the leadership, but through making sure that they have a committed membership, a socialist membership. We countered the syndicalist case “The Mines to the Miners!” or “The Railways to the Railwaymen!” by pointing out the socialists want to abolish the sectional ownership of the means of life, no matter who compose the sections, and not reinforce it.

The Socialist Party is not antagonistic to the trade unions under present conditions, even though they have not a revolutionary basis but we are most hostile to the mis-leading by the trade union leaders and against the ignorance of the rank and file which make such mis-leading possible. Workers must come to see through the illusion that all that is needed in the class war are good generals. Sloganising leaders making militant noises are powerless in the face of a system which still has majority support – or at least the acquiescence – of the working class. It would be wrong to write off the unions as anti-working-class organisations. The union has indeed tended to become an institution apart from its members; but the policy of a union is still influenced by the views of its members. It may be a truism but a union is only as strong as its members.

Most unions have formal democratic constitutions which provide for a wide degree of membership participation and democratic control. In practice however, these provisions are sometimes ineffective and actual control of many unions is in the hands of a well-entrenched full-time leadership. It is these leaders who frequently collaborate with the State and employers in the administration of capitalism; who get involved in supporting political parties and governments which act against the interest of the working class.

Socialists from the SPGB take part in every struggle in the economic field to improve conditions. We are as militant as anybody else. The SPGBer is involved in the economic struggle by the fact that we are members of the working class which naturally resists capital. But this is not the same thing as stating that the Socialist Party engages in activity for higher wages and better conditions. This is not the function of a socialist party. We recognise the necessity of workers’ solidarity in the class struggle against the capitalist class, and rejoice in every victory for the workers to assert their economic power. But to struggle for higher wages and better conditions is not revolutionary in any true sense of the word; and the essential weapons in this struggle are not inherently revolutionary either. It demands the revolutionising of the workers themselves. If there were more revolutionary workers in the unions—and in society generally—then the unions and the host of other community organisations would have a more revolutionary outlook.

This does not mean that we say workers should sit back and do nothing, the struggle over wages and conditions must go on. But it becomes clear that this is a secondary, defensive activity. Participation in the class struggle does not automatically make workers class-conscious. Militancy on the industrial field is just that and does not necessarily lead to political militancy, but ebbs and flows as labour market conditions change. The real struggle is to take the means of wealth production and distribution into the common ownership.

We don’t support reformists, either when they genuinely but mistakenly believe that a minimum wage can be tripled, pensions doubled and a massive public works programme for paid from increased taxes on profits implemented under capitalism. Or because they are practising the Machiavellian Trotskyist tactic of “transitional demands”, of trying to lead workers in reformist struggles which they (but not the workers) know are unachievable in the hope that when these reforms are not achieved the workers will turn to them who as a vanguard will lead them in an assault on the state, overthrow it and set up state capitalism.

We convey the truth: that capitalism can never be made to work in their interest and that the only way out is the establishment of socialism as a system of society based on the common ownership and democratic control of productive resources, production solely and directly for use and distribution on the principle of “from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs”.

Destitute in Scotland

The mass eviction of asylum seekers in Glasgow by the private housing provider Serco has begun. The action had been threatened for more than a year and is being challenged in the courts. Serco first announced the plan to evict 300 asylum seekers in Glasgow – all of whom have been told they cannot stay in the UK – last July, but put the action on hold following widespread condemnation.  Serco told BBC Scotland the firm would not budge from their timetable.

Glasgow City Council's leader Susan Aitken warned the move could lead to a "humanitarian crisis" 
Susan Aitken said: "I remain deeply concerned about the impact of lock changes and a UK government policy which both demands its contractors force people from their homes and simultaneously prevents local agencies from helping those facing destitution. We have, repeatedly, raised these concerns with the government and sought its support in averting the potential humanitarian crisis that will unfold if hundreds of people are made homeless on the streets of Glasgow with no right to even the most basic state assistance. Glasgow has benefited from immigration and its involvement in the dispersal program. However, these inhumane practices are against the express wishes and values not only of the council, but also the citizens and communities we serve."

A coalition of refugee and housing charities, including Shelter Scotland, urged Serco to halt the evictions until litigation was completed, describing the plan to remove hundreds of refused asylum seekers as “inhumane” and warning that it would lead to a homelessness crisis in the city. 

Shelter Scotland charity's director Graeme Browne added: "We're talking about a group of people who don't have access to homelessness services and who will become destitute if locked out of their homes.

The Scottish Refugee Council is concerned that Serco may be targeting isolated and vulnerable individuals: neither of the first two evictees were in contact with refugee services or aware of the possibility of obtaining a court order to halt their evictions.

Asylum seekers and case workers who describe the psychological toll of living with the threat of eviction on a daily basis for over a year. 

A spokesperson for the Scottish Refugee Council tweeted, "Stop spreading fear and anxiety in Glasgow. People have enough to cope with."

The hardships faced by the refugees facing eviction are “unfathomable”, says Lindsay Reid, a casework adviser at the Scottish Refugee Council. “They have lost their homes, families, culture and way of life, then they come here and there’s a second loss of their basic rights and no ability to establish a life for themselves.” Reid describes a “stagnant” existence in which individuals cannot provide for themselves and so must depend on charities or faith groups to access food, basic toiletries and clothes. “For people who had established lives, who have the skills, experience and intellect but no avenue to use them, the level of frustration is palpable. They feel less than human. We see a lot of suicidal ideation and attempts.”

“If I go back home now and the locks are changed, what can I do?” asked Ahmed, a 33-year-old Syrian who came by lorry to the UK in 2011 and has received a notice to quit letter from Serco. “I have no idea what I would do next. There are so many other people suffering like this too.”  Ahmed is in the bizarre situation of having been denied assistance to return to his home country after the refusal of his 2015 application for voluntary return, made in desperation at the length of time he was wasting in the UK asylum system – yet he is about to be made destitute in Scotland.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jul/26/glasgow-asylum-seeker-evictions-serco-homelessness-crisis

Capitalism — thy name is hypocrisy.

The world, we are told (by the propagandists), wants peace and the way to guarantee peace is through the maintenance of a strong standing army. A modern nation must be prepared to fight in order to meet its economic requirements — fight or go under in the fierce dog-eat-dog struggle of capitalism today. Modern war is the clash between nations (or groups of nations) over the protection of existing economic markets and the sources of raw materials.

All wars have economic causes. Without a single exception, all wars are wars for trade. They are caused by bankers, merchants and business men. As business is the cause of wars, it may be well to say that business is hell. Wars are caused by conflicting commercial interests. In all countries to-day, whatever may be the outward forms of their governments, whether supposedly ruled by President, Mullah, or King, the real rulers are those who control the industrial resources of the nations. The stand of the Socialist Party is when we are robbed and the robbers fight over the booty, that fight is none of our business. When nations fall foul over the spoils, or over the wealth taken from labour, the fight is none of labour’s business. This is a ruling class quarrel and there is no interest at stake requiring that the workers take sides. The duty of the working class is to line up in the Socialist Party for the abolition of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. Only then will wars and the prospect of wars be ended. The real cause of war cannot be found either in accident or in ideology. There is a much more basic reason both for war and for the weapons necessary to wage it and this reason can be summed up in two words, economic rivalry. It is the clash in the markets of the world, the mad scramble for cheaper sources of raw materials, the attempt to oust each other from spheres of influence, that is responsible for the mounted missiles of destruction. Only by getting rid of capitalism in all of its forms, with its need for markets and exploitation of labour can war be eliminated from the world. Whether "accidental" or not, the sole responsibility for the next war, as for all modern wars, is capitalism.

We can apply our understanding of the causes of struggle to an effort to change the world. Rather than attempting to adapt to conditions in the struggle for survival, the task is one of changing the conditions in order that the conflicts and strife which are an everyday feature of today shall be resolved. The question of nuclear weapons or chemical and biological weapons as opposed to "conventional" weapons is irrelevant. The only weapon required to save the world from obliteration is the weapon of knowledge, in the hands and heads of the majority. Search it out and obtain it, for with it we shall begin to live as human beings rather than as pawns in a life and death struggle for domination over the resources of the world. With the proper application and use of understanding, these resources will be restored to humanity as a whole. We, who are not consulted today, shall with our knowledge and our political action decree that the means of life shall be commonly owned by all mankind and that mankind shall finally be released from the horror of war and the horror of capitalism, in general. That's what we can do about it!

The way to genuine peace lies through an awakening by the working class of the world to its class interests. When enough working people realise there is nothing but death, mutilation, and destruction for them and their families in fighting their masters' wars, they will take steps to organise a sane system of society — a system of society based upon production for use rather than for sale on a market. The working class in each nation, on the other hand, owning nothing but its ability to produce and being forced to sell this ability to the capitalists or the capitalist state, has nothing tangible to gain from warfare. War is not in the interest of the working people. No war is. The social forces which cause war are an inexorable part of the economic competition associated with capitalism. For a world without war, we must change from a system of competition to a system of co-operation — socialism.

Know your enemy

Governments administers capitalism for the simple reason that it cannot do anything else. The Labour Party is an organisation which stands for the reform, and not the abolition, of capitalism (yes, even a Jeremy Corbyn government); it asks for votes to run capitalism and when it is in power it cannot exceed this mandate, even supposing that it had the knowledge and the desire to do so.

The Labour Party does not care about the consciousness—or the lack of it—which is behind the votes which sends it to power. Just like any other capitalist political party, it will accept any support as long as it can achieve its main object of becoming the government. Socialism will come only as the result of  a conscious action by the world working class. This action will be backed by the knowledge of what socialism is and how it must be established. The entire structure of capitalism exists only because the working class wills it so. It is the working class who man the forces of coercion and who regularly vote the representatives of capitalism into the seats of power. It is the working class who organise and administer the capitalist social system, from one end to the other. When they realise that they can run society in their own interests, when they decide to take away the power and privilege of the ruling class and to establish Socialism, there will be nothing which could stop them.

When the working class have this knowledge, they will elect socialist delegates with a mandate to take all necessary steps to end the capitalist social system and to replace it with socialism. Because of the knowledge of the people who have elected them, the delegates will have no power to do other than they have been instructed. This will be a massive, universal movement—it will not and cannot be confined to any one country or group of countries.

Socialism will mean the end of the private ownership of the means of wealth production. There will be no separate nations to compete against and to bargain with, each other. Society’s wealth will move freely over the world, from the places where it is produced to the places where it is needed. The entire operation will be in the interests of human needs.

What the Socialist Party offers is a vision of an alternative society, one which is based on the democratic control and common ownerships of the collective wealth of society. We reject the false solutions of the reformists to solve the problems that capitalism creates and also the left-wing proponents of state-capitalism. The Socialist Party rejects the belief that capitalism would inevitably and with scientific certainty lead to the socialist revolution. A revolution arises not simply from discontent and unrest about social injustice. But a revolution is coming. New ideas of reorganising society based on the new relations of production are being put forth to challenge those who believe capitalism is eternal, a revolution to end poverty and inequality once and for all. The coming social revolution must place the means of production in the hands of the people.

The foundation for a whole new world will be abundance, created by people working for the common good rather than the profit of the few to forever end poverty, exploitation, oppression and war. Either the system must change or the people will perish. For the first time in history, humankind can produce such abundance that society can be free from hunger, homelessness and back-breaking toil. The only thing standing in the way is this system of exploitation. The struggle today is for a revolution for a better world. We seek to excite our fellow-workers with a vision of a world of plenty with the resources to devote the energies and talents of its people to satisfying the material, intellectual, emotional and cultural needs of all. We will inspire working people with an alternative, a society organised for the benefit of all, a society built on cooperation. 

The Socialist Party places well-being of its people above the profits and property of a handful of billionaires. When the class which has no place in the capitalist system takes control of all productive property and transforms it into common property, it can reorganise society so that the abundance is distributed according to need. We call on you to join us in this cause. A party such as ours is the deadly enemy of the ruling class, condemning capitalism as a system of exploitation.

To a socialist one thing is clear about Boris Johnson becoming prime minister. Whatever happens — workers will have nothing to gain.