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.

The social revolution is our immediate goal

The Socialist Party shows not only that socialist society is possible, but also that it is necessary. We’re the class, the working class, that produces everything. We’re the class that represents the future. The Socialist Party is not a party that says it represents everybody, both capitalists and the workers, and preaches the idea of harmony between classes, because there can’t be harmony between the slaves and the slave-masters. We have shown the need in the future society for organisation among all men and women for all needs, and the necessity in current society for the workers to struggle against their exploiters. It would be absurd if we were to admit the need for organisation for everyone. There can’t be harmony between the exploited and the exploiters because the slave-master lives by exploiting the workers – the capitalist lives by exploiting, that’s his whole existence. And we live for the day when we can break those chains of exploitation. We are not a party of both the slave-master and the slave. We are a party of the wage-slave. We openly proclaim that we’re going to break those chains. We're talking about the working class, the great majority in this society, taking control of their destiny throughout the world for the first time in history. This system, this capitalist system of wage slavery, doesn’t allow us any real choice. Wealth will only truly be placed in common when production will have been organised in the common good. he workers have no need of chiefs: they are quite capable of charging one of their own with a particular task.

We have criticised reforms and ameliorations. Our ambition is neither official nor unofficial power, and this is our claim to the sympathy of the masses. But this isn’t enough. We must act. We must prove to the world that socialism isn’t an abstract concept or a distant vision, but a principle destined to renew the world and establishing it on the foundations of well-being and human fraternity. Socialists, beginning with Marx and Engels have always supported democracy as against any form of despotism. Thus they have supported republicanism against monarchism, capitalist democracy against capitalist dictatorship. But they always recognise the limitations of the above. SOCIALISM MEANS EXPANDING DEMOCRACY

In order for the society working people will create to be just, egalitarian and equitable, it must embody socialist ideology. Our fundamental change is not to preserve capitalism but to end it. Socialism, as it was understood by Marx and Engels, is the process of creating a society that would have no need for repression and oppression because it had overcome economic scarcity. Our compass for where we are heading should have socialism as its destination. We need to keep this end in mind not to lose our way. The planned allocation of resources and human labour, in such a future society, would also ensure that no one would have to degrade themselves by working for another human being in order to survive. Instead of work being something we all try to avoid, it would gradually be transformed into one of a wide range of creative activities people engage in to make their lives meaningful. A society in which human beings could enjoy the fullness of life without the need to make others their servants, or to be servants of others. Marx and Engels predicted that the development of the productive forces under industrial capitalism would for the first time in human history build the material basis for such a fundamental transformation of society. 

Changing the System

Capitalism is running on overtime to hide the fact that time for humanity is running out. The destruction of the planet is driven by the rampant accumulation of capital which is inherent in the capitalist system thatdoes not simply exploit labour but exploits nature as well. The Socialist Party aims its arguments at the parties of compromise and conciliation with capitalism and it means unmasking the diversions and distortions of many reformists. There is no automatic socialist future, no guaranteed progress and no “final crisis” of capitalism leading by itself to the next step in social evolution. The choice between socialism and barbarism remains wide open, and its outcome depends on each one of us. Why, then, does socialism with its critique and condemnation of the destructive injustices of capitalism seem so irrelevant?

 Moreover, the exploitation of labour is intensifying. Equating environmental degradation with technology lets capitalism off the hook. The solution is not ending growth, but ending capitalism: ending production for profit and eliminating the exploitation of labour. However, most environmentalists have moved a long way from the struggle to end capitalism, and now rather advocate palliative policies for capitalist politicians to adopt. They can no longer think the future of humanity outside of capitalism by accepting and working within the system rather than transforming it. This is one of the more disturbing aspects of the ecology movement, the advocacy of a enlightened benevolence by capitalists and their politicians, preoccupied with a unending tug-of-war for government approval against the corprate lobbyists. The only alternative to capitalism's ceaseless growth for profit is a moralistic change of lifestyle choices and a reduction in consumption. Anything, in fact, except to radically intervene in the structures of exploitation of capitalism. 

For the Socialist Party, the State is no saviour but exercises power on behalf of the ruling class: "The executive of the modern State is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie. " It is only through gaining control of the state that the workers will acquire the resources and apparatuses of power to enable them to control the means of production and end capitalism.

Sweep aside all confusion of the “experts”! What we are talking about is a series of separate crises, but, in fact, the general and world-wide crisis of the entire capitalist system. Socialists are full of hope and confidence. All the paths of the class war will be joined together on a single path: the road to socialism. The task of the Socialist Party is not be to tail-end the various workers' movement or to worship it, but to raise it to a more class-consciousness level.

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

If the working class does not rise above the level of recognising the necessity to organise industrially, of a trade union consciousness, then it will be doomed to an eternity of struggle with the capitalist class. Capitalist society in its totality is structured so as to preserve the exploitative relationship between the capitalist class and the working class which lies at its heart. Nonetheless this same system contains within itself forces which periodically throw it into crisis and open up the possibility of its final overthrow arid replacement by a society where oppression and exploitation do not exist. Not only does capitalism deprive most people of the means of material wellbeing but it also means that they lose control over the process whereby they produce the means of material life; we are in a state of alienation. We need to abolish capitalism not simply to have a fatter pay packet but so as to gain control together over all aspects of our lives, to liberate the whole of humanity from alienation.

SOCIALIST CONSCIOUSNESS WILL GROW

Understanding our world

Briefly stated, the Socialist Party proposes that workers use their huge numbers at the polls to outlaw capitalist ownership and to make the means of social production the property of all the people collectively. For our fellow-workers who is troubled by the disintegration of society and the multiple perils of armed conflict, climate chaos and class conflict there is no higher contribution to the cause of social sanity than a serious study of the principles of the Socialist Party to understand the abolition of the outmoded capitalist system and the triumph of the class-free, democratic socialist commonwealth.

The Socialist Party tells the story of a robbery so colossal that it defies the imagination. Compared with it the loot taken by all the pirates of history are a mere bagatelle. The robbery is continuous and unremitting, wherever society is divided into classes, wherever one class owns the means of production and distribution to which another class, owning no tools of its own, must have access in order to live. There is nothing illegal about this robbery. Under the capitalist system, it is considered the normal "way of life." But it is robbery nonetheless. For the capitalist class uses its ownership and control of the factories and land, in the same way that a highwayman uses his gun -- to extract a tribute from its victims. It is an insidious form of legalised theft, this capitalist exploitation.

Workers labour under the illusion that the capitalist supports them, whereas we support the capitalist. What goes on inside the workplace that conceals the true state of affairs? What happens is simply this: In the first few hours on the job the worker produces in the form of new values as much as he is paid in wages for the entire working day. The worker has little way of knowing this. When the serf of feudal times was forced to yield part of what he produced to the feudal lord, he knew he was being robbed. But capitalist robbery is more subtle. The worker may perform but one minute operation in the production of a commodity requiring thousands of operations. Nevertheless, the labour has created new value equal to a day's wages in the first hour or two on the job. and this new value -- together with the value added by fellow workers -- is embodied in the finished product.

Marx gave a name to the part of the working day in which the worker reproduces his wages. He called it necessary labour time. During the rest of the working day the worker produces values for which he is not paid, or -- let us call a spade a spade -- values of which he is robbed! This part of the working day Marx called surplus labour time. For purposes of simplification, take the case of a worker who sells his labour power -- to be expended in eight hours -- for the price of $15. The first two hours of his working day are necessary labour time. In these two hours a worker produces as much as the boss pays for eight hours of labour. During the remaining six hours -- surplus labour time -- a workers produces three times as much, or $45 worth of new values. In the science of political economy we call the wealth that the worker produces, but of which he is robbed, surplus value.

What in the degree of robbery, or exploitation? It varies as conditions vary in the different countries. In a country where more advanced techniques and methods of production are applied (such as the United States), the degree of exploitation is greater than it is in less advanced countries. At first blush this may seem contradictory. Why, you may ask, should workers who are more productive receive less proportionately of what they produce than workers who are not so productive? 

The answer is simply that wages are not determined by what the worker produces. Leaving aside their temporary rise and fall due to fluctuations of supply and demand in the labour market, wages are determined by what it costs the worker to live and raise a new crop of wage slaves to take his place when he dies or is thrown on the scrap heap. 

Everyone is familiar with the expression a "living wage." Our grandfathers got a "living wage"; our fathers got a "living wage": and. normally, we get a "living wage." Thus, in terms of food, clothing, shelter, etc., we receive substantially what our grandfathers did. Yet we produce vastly more than our grandfathers and considerably more than our fathers. Why, then, haven't we advanced beyond the "living wage" concept? The answer is that we cannot advance beyond this concept, no matter how much our productivity increases, as long as capitalism lasts. And the reason is that, under capitalism, labour power is a commodity, an article of merchandise, whose price is governed by the same economic laws that govern the price of any other commodity. 

COMMODITY STATUS OF LABOUR 

Price may fluctuate according to the supply of a commodity and the demand for it in the market. Just as a pendulum swings back and forth, but is always drawn toward the centre by gravitation, price may go up or down -- but always it oscillates around its value in accord with the economic law of value.

In other words, price, in the long run, coincides with value. And the value of any commodity is determined by the amount of socially necessary labour time required to produce it. In the case of the commodity labour power this means that its value is determined by the amount of socially necessary labour time required to produce the food, clothing, shelter, etc., needed to keep the worker in working condition. He gets a 'living wage." 

THE TREND: INTENSIFIED EXPLOITATION 

But, note this: The more highly developed a nation is industrially, the less labour time is required to produce the workers' necessities. Hence, instead of the workers' share of their product increasing proportionately as their productivity rises, it is the other way around. As new methods and techniques -- such as automation -- are introduced, the articles workers consume are cheapened and wages fall accordingly. Thus the workers' relative wages (what they receive in relation to what they produce) tend to fall as productivity rises. In other words, as labour productivity rises, the necessary labour time grows shorter, thus lengthening that part of the working day when the worker produces surplus value. 

HOW THE CAPITALISTS DIVIDE THE LOOT 

For purposes of simplification we have used a single worker as an example but exploitation is not the act of any individual capitalist, or set of capitalists, perpetrated upon any individual workingman or set of workingmen. Exploitation is a class act -- the act of the whole capitalist class-perpetrated upon a class -- the whole working class.

Apologists for capitalism sometimes try to refute the Socialist Party's charges of high-degree exploitation by pointing to the net profits of corporations. But socialists have never contended that the corporations pocket all the surplus value their workers produce. On the contrary, socialists point out that before a capitalist can count his net profits he must pay off the landlord, tax collector, banker, advertising capitalist, insurance company, and all the other parasites on parasites. By the time taxes, interest, rent, etc., are deducted, net profits of the immediate capitalist exploiter may be only a fraction of the surplus value of which workers are robbed. But this in no way disputes the fact that the working class is robbed by the capitalist class of wealth so vast that it defies measurement. 

CAPITALIST HEADACHE: DISPOSING OF THE LOOT 

Now, let us examine this thievery from another angle. We measure surplus value in dollars. But the workers do not produce dollars, they produce commodities -- and a commodity, Marx tells us, is an article that will satisfy some human want and that is produced for sale. Hence, before the capitalists can enjoy their plunder, they must first find buyers for it. If they don't get rid of their commodity loot, it accumulates the warehouses and production stagnates. 

First of all, it is self-evident that the workers do not consume more than they can buy with their wages. And, as we have shown, this is just a fraction of what they produce. What happens to the remainder of labour's vast product? 

A part is consumed by the capitalists in prodigal living. Some capitalists -- the plutocracy -- live in opulence surpassing that of kings, and often maintain not one palace, but many. In every city the capitalists form a community of super-consumers. They are the patrons of the night clubs, the purchasers of costly luxuries, the members of expensive clubs. Yet. despite their prodigality, the capitalists can use up in personal consumption only a fraction of the immense wealth created by labour and appropriated by their exploiters. 

Another part of this wealth -- a much larger part -- is used up in running a huge, bureaucratic, capitalist political State.

Still another part of labour's surplus product goes into expansion of industry. But while this tends temporarily to relieve the glut, its ultimate effect is to increase the capacity to produce commodities, hence to produce surpluses. 

CAPITALISM NEEDS WASTE 

Waste is another outlet for the wealth labour produces but cannot buy back. Some of the waste is incidental to the operation of capitalism. Take real estate transactions, for example. From the standpoint of economy these are pure waste. So is insurance. And advertising. None of these activities creates a penny's worth of value. Then there is the wanton destruction of surplus crops, and the fantastic waste involved in building hydrogen bombs and other weapons. And the waste of economic anarchy and duplication of effort.

Indeed, capitalism thrives best when waste is greatest. Floods, tornadoes, droughts, hurricanes and other natural disasters may ruin individual capitalists, but they are a veritable tonic to the capitalist system, for they help to use up surpluses. 

COMPETITION FOR WORLD TRADE 

However, such is the tremendous productivity of the modern working class that, despite prodigious consumption and waste, surpluses tend to accumulate, glutting the home market. The only outlet for this surplus is -- the world market. 

Foreign markets are to capitalism what a safety valve is to a steam boiler. Continue to pump steam into a steam boiler that has no safety valve to release the excess pressure and, sooner or later, something will break. Similarly with capitalist production. Under a system of production for sale and profit, the foreign markets must drain off the surplus or it will pile up, cause economic stagnation at home, and, ultimately result in capitalist collapse. 

All industrial countries are competing for a world market that, instead of growing larger, tends to shrink as economically backward countries industrialise and establish their own systems of exploitation. Inevitably the rivals in this economic war encroach upon each other's markets and sources of raw materials, creating international friction and hatred. For a time the weapons of trade -- tariffs, barter deals, import quotas, etc. -- are invoked. But ultimately such weapons are inadequate. The struggle that begins in commerce ends in -- WAR! 

SOCIALIST SANITY 

Capitalist rulers have no ears for the voice of Socialist sanity. For Socialism -- not the phony "Socialism" of Soviet Russia, which is really a system of bureaucratic despotism, but real Socialism -- would not only put an end to the periodic wars for capitalist survival -- it would also put an end to capitalist robbery of the working class. By raising the worker out of his commodity status to that of a free human being with a voice and vote in the administration of industry, by guaranteeing to every producer the full social value of the product, in abort, by replacing capitalist anarchy and exploitation with Socialist cooperation and harmony, the world could be made into a veritable paradise of peace and plenty. 

But capitalist rulers, blinded by their class and material interests, reject this. Whatever betides, they choose capitalism with its inevitable struggle for world trade and raw material sources, with its inevitable war. Not even the hydrogen bomb with its threat of human annihilation can prevent this ultimate outcome if capitalism is allowed to remain the ruling principle of society.

What the capitalist rulers and bureaucrats are incapable of learning, the toilers of the world must learn.

There can be no peace without Socialism 

The capitalist system is the first in which a surplus of useful things is looked upon, not as a blessing, but as a curse. Below are depicted the various methods whereby the capitalists dispose of the fantastic volume of commodities the modern wage-slave class produces. It is impossible, of course, to determine accurately the proportion of labour's product used up in waste, or through expensive living by the capitalists, or in other ways, and the drawing is intended to convey this only in general terms. It should also be noted that the workers are many, the capitalists few,, and, though the working class may consume more in living, its per capital consumption is but a fraction of that of its exploiters.

The capitalist class, as a class, robs the working class, as a class. The individual capitalist exploiter does not pocket the whole loot taken from the workers. Out of the wealth the workers produce come rent, interest, fees for insurance, advertising, etc., taxes and the "pay-off" for corrupt politicians and other hangers-on of capitalism who in one way or another serve capitalist interests. When workers read of the net profits of corporations, small or large, they should always bear in mind that these represent only a fraction of the total plunder. The "pie" above is suggestive and does not pretend to convey the real proportions in which labour's product is divided.