Capitalism is capitalism is capitalism

Capitalism is capitalism all the world over, with its gulf between the exploiter and the exploited. Riches at one end of the scale presupposes poverty at the other no matter whether in China or the West. When the worker is fooled as to where his or her real interests are, and, as a consequence is induced to work like a maniac, it is the capitalist who, growing wealthier, congratulates the worker. This task of misleading the worker is made easier when the workers can be induced to believe that they are a partner in the enterprise and that their interests are no longer opposed to those of the exploiter. When productivity increases, the workers may themselves gain a greater amount of goods without any radical change in their state relative to that of the master class. 

It is time working people took their fate into their own hands. They will find that they can do so much better than those whom they call leaders, but who, in reality, are lackeys of the capitalist class.

Nowadays every government, every political organisation proclaims itself for peace, against war, We are told that our rulers strive ceaselessly for peace, but the aggressive rulers of some other country threaten us. In certain circumstances war is a necessary evil—we are struggling for freedom, human dignity—in fact, we make war for peace. The ruling classes of every country and their governments are themselves the people who make peace, human dignity, real democracy and so on, possible. 

Maybe governments misunderstand each other’s desires? But they possess information services, often secret, much more reliable and detailed than those at the disposal of the general public. Often it is convenient for them to pretend ignorance or lack of understanding.

The aim of war is the protection and advancement of the economic interests of the capitalist classes of every country, each in competition against the others—for example, to protect or gain markets, sources of raw materials, trade routes. Those who control these powers must aim to protect and extend their own spheres of influence. Each power either is or would like to be an imperialist power, but the ambitions and interests of one state often must conflict with those of another. Political discord occurs, and when one government judges that “national interests,” that is, capitalist interests, are intolerably threatened, war explodes. We are against every war, against both sides of every war. Wars are struggles between capitalist interests; no army fights for the interests of any working class. Only in a truly socialist world-wide society will war disappear, because while the capitalist world social order lasts, the roots of war remain. So the only way to lasting peace is through a new world system—without classes, nations.

National struggles, especially when they are waged by the very weak against the very strong, are always seen in a romantic light. They are the material for songs and romantic novels and the new masters that emerge from such struggles are not adverse to the fictions and heroics which later purport to be history—"history” which becomes an important ingredient in the fog of ignorance essential in the exploitation of the “nation’s” working class.

Our purpose here is not to deny the bravery and self-sacrificing of those who contributed these qualities in the so-called fight for freedom. Such qualities were not the preserve of one side in the struggle—they are to be found in the unfortunate combatants of any war; often, sadly, they are to be found in inverse ratio to the amount of reasoned political thought on the part of their contributors. Our object is to show that whatever the ideas, or lack of ideas was the maintenance of the same old failed system of capitalism out of which all working class problems arise.

One of the reasons some workers support nationalisation is that they falsely identify the capitalist state with the interests of the community as a whole. Their nationalisation is still stronger than class consciousness. The break-up of existing nationalised industries, would not be an advance, and might cause some dislocation and redundancy which justify the workers involved opposing such measures without their deceiving themselves as to the real nature of the organisation and ownership of the nationalised industries.

Failure of nationalisation (whether partial as in this country, or almost total as in Russia) to prevent competition, insecurity, destitution and other ills affecting workers has made some of its one-time advocates disillusioned and apathetic whilst others have searched for explanations and new formulas to apply. Emerging from this has been a renewed and extended interest in ‘Workers’ Control' and ‘Workers’ Self-Management'. This is against the grain of both national Bolshevik and Social-Democrat organisation and politics but it is still not a solution, it too will fail to deliver the expected results.

It is essential for socialists to show how these developments point to the practicability and need for Socialism. It would be irresponsible, however, to advocate either nationalisation or workers’ control in the name of “developing consciousness through struggle” as so many self-proclaimed revolutionaries do. To associate with the particular reforms demanded is to be associated with their failure. Since measures such as ‘nationalisation’ and ‘workers’ control,” although originally in the working class, are generally only enacted to the extent and in such a way that they benefit the capitalists, by supporting these measures socialists would be helping to delude our fellow workers into thinking that real gains had been made. When the coal mines were nationalised, the miners believed that a great victory had been won, the capitalist politicians thought otherwise. It took a lot of redundancies, wage reductions and strikes to convince the miners of the true position.

Democratic control over industry and society as a whole can only be achieved by the abolition of the capital-wage-labour relationship, by making all the world’s resources the common property of mankind. Anything short of this is at best a palliative, at worst a total failure even proving detrimental to workers’ interests. 

The Socialist Party and revolutionary socialism.

The Socialist Party favours active participation in election campaigns. It does not deceive people into believing that socialist freedom can be achieved by nothing more than a ballot. But it seeks to use every election campaign to acquaint workers with its principles and ideas. Socialism cannot be achieved, and the workers cannot effectively promote their interests, without class consciousness. Class consciousness means an understanding working class, a self-confident and self-reliant working class. The left-wing vanguard parties seek to substitute themselves for the self-reliance of the working class and rely on bureaucratic manoeuvres in order to control the workers “for their own good,” in place of the conscious, mass action of the workers themselves. It seeks to preserve their leadership by curbing and stifling the workers and preventing them from acting independently with their organised strength. The Workers Party is not a sectarian organisation but it confines itself to the advocacy of the socialist ideal. The Socialist Party is opposed to all exploitation and oppression.

Wars are inevitable under capitalism. Only socialism will bring permanent peace. Socialism means peace and freedom for the entire world. It is the party of peace, not war; of the brotherhood of the peoples, not the slaughter of the peoples. Capitalist society is based on violence and war and cannot exist without them. Pacifists preach a doctrine which thinks they can turn wolves into lambs. The Socialist Party is internationalist. Capitalism is a world system, and it can be thoroughly destroyed only on a world scale. It is internationalist because it understands that the class-free socialist society cannot be established within the framework of one country alone. If capitalism has developed a world market and become the dominant world order, socialism cannot conceivably be restricted to one country, no matter how big it is. Socialism is world socialism, or it is not socialism at all. Just as socialist economy could not c0-exist side by side with a capitalist economy in one country, so a socialist nation could not co-exist side by side with capitalist nations in one world, one or the other would have to win in the end.

 It considers nationalisms as regressive and reactionary and instead promotes the brotherhood and equality of all peoples of the human race as the highest social aim. It is internationalist because it considers that national frontiers have become a obstacle to further social progress and a direct contributing source to conflicts and wars. The Socialist Party endeavours to promote the worldwide organisation, unity and solidarity of the working class. The Socialist Party itself is only the link, in the UnitedKingdom, of a chain of similar parties and organisations that aim to establish an international union of revolutionary socialists - a World Socialist Movement.

The Socialist Party is champion of democracy. We are critics of capitalist democracy only because it is a class democracy. Genuine democracy is possible only upon the basis of economic democracy. It does not follow that the Socialist Party is indifferent to democracy under capitalism. Nothing of the sort is true. The struggle for socialism can best be conducted under conditions that are most favourable to the working class. The most favourable conditions are those in which the working class has the widest possible democratic rights. Hence, it is to the interests of socialism and of the working class to fight for the unrestricted right to organise, the right of free speech, free press and free assembly, the right to strike and the right to vote, the right of representative government, and against every attempt to curb or abolish these rights. The more extensive and less restricted the democratic rights, the greater the opportunities for the Socialist Party to speak, to write, to meet, to organise. The same applies, of course, to the working class as a whole. The social position of the workers, and their class interests, make them the most democratic class in society. It is the capitalist class which is, by the very nature of its position in society, anti-democratic. Its monopoly of wealth and power denies the common people real equality. . The more critical the position of capitalism and the sharper the class struggle, the more the capitalist class seeks to restrict even the formal democratic rights. It fears the consequences of the workers being able to meet freely, speak and write freely, organise, vote and demonstrate freely. To keep itself safely in power, it is compelled to reveal its fundamentally dictatorial rule more openly by cutting down political democracy and resorting to naked force.

The road to freedom is marked out by the principles of the Socialist Party and revolutionary socialism.

The Future Belongs to Us

The State, for us socialists, is not any social organisation whatsoever. As soon as there are in a society a possessing class and a dispossessed class, there exists in that society a constant source of conflict which the social organisation would not long resist, if there was not a power charged with maintaining, to use the phrase, the “established order,” charged, in other words, with the protection of the economic situation of the possessing party, and therefore with the duty of ensuring the submission of the dispossessed party. Now, from its very birth, this has been the role of the State. With the division of society into classes, the State has evolved with the development of that division. As soon as it is understood that the State is not an independent organism. In short, one can abolish the State only after having suppressed classes. Statism tends to turn everything over to the State which is a body apart from individuals and above them.

Capitalism, by its method of production, has brought isolated workers together and constituted them as a class in society. Capitalism has made the workers a class in themselves. That is, the workers are a distinct class in society, whether they recognise this fact or not. Historical development calls upon this class to reorganise society completely and establish socialism. To do this, the workers must become a class for themselves. They must acquire a clear understanding of their real position under capitalism, of the nature of capitalist society as a whole, and of their mission in history. They must act consciously for their class interests. They must become conscious of the fact that these class interests lead to a socialist society. When this takes place, the workers are a class for themselves, a class with socialist consciousness. Our fellow-workers require an understanding of capitalist society, their position in it, and the need to replace this society with socialism? 

To help imbue the workers with this class consciousness, or socialist consciousness that is the function of the Socialist Party. It is composed of those workers who already understand the nature of capitalism and the historical task of the working class. Their aim is to develop the same understanding among all the workers, so that they no longer fight blindly, or with only one eye open but with a clear and scientific knowledge of what their class enemy is, of what the working class itself really is and of what it can and must do in society. They and their party therefore have no interests separate from the interests of the working class as a whole. It defends working class interests from every capitalist attack. It supports every working class fight. It makes clear to the workers the full meaning of their fight. It shows how even the local struggles, against one capitalist, are really class struggles against capitalism; how the local struggles must be extended and expanded if the workers are to win a victory. It points out the political meaning of the economic struggle. It shows how the workers must organise as a class to take political power, and use it to inaugurate socialism. It combats the open and the insidious ideas of capitalism so that the working class as a whole may be better equipped to fight its enemy. It aims to improve the position of the working class, to strengthen it, to clarify it and supply it with the most effective weapons in the struggle, in order that it may most speedily and successfully win the final battle for socialism. A socialist party is needed to win the working class to the principles of socialism and the struggle against capitalist exploitations and oppression. Socialism will never come by itself. It must be fought for. Without an organised, conscious, active revolutionary socialist party, the triumph of socialism is impossible. The Socialist Party represents a long and rich tradition. It is proud of the fact that its principles  are founded on the teachings of great thinkers of the international working class, such as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Our analysis of capitalist society has never been successfully refuted. Our principles set forth for the working class to achieve socialism have passed the most critical tests a hundred times over. The Socialist Party was formed as an independent organisation in 1904. But its roots reach much further back.

The Socialist Party champions the idea of revolution. Does that means violence, bloodshed, killing, destruction? Will this this revolution, be accomplished by violence? What is a social revolution? It is the replacement of one ruling class by another. History is filled with such revolutions and in almost every case they made possible the progress of society. The socialist revolution is simply the overthrow of capitalist despotism and the establishment of the cooperative commonwealth. Members of the Socialist Party are not bloodthirsty maniacs. A socialist would indeed be a lunatic to want bloodshed and destruction when the aim is an orderly society.

Once we achieve socialism, instead of government there will then be simply an administration. Free men and women, the producers will decide in common everything concerning production, and instead of being the puppets of economic forces beyond their control. Capitalism created the conditions and forces for the socialist movement: the necessary technical basis, science and the working class itself. That is its major contribution to social progress. It also provokes the working class into action and is the involuntary promoter of the class struggle. Workers draw strength from the indispensable part they play as the principal force of production, the creators of all wealth and profit. Labour asserts itself as the only creative force in society that carries the future along with it as it rises. Socialism cannot “grow into” capitalism through the co-operation of classes. Socialism must overthrow capitalism. Instead of being softened, class antagonisms and the class struggle must be emphasised. Instead of compromise with capitalism, relentless attack upon the whole capitalist regime. Some today have forgotten this lesson; others have still to learn it.