We stand for socialism

 Around the world humanity is saying "Enough" and is beginning to move. Though our lives and conditions be different; though we live in different parts of the world; though our struggles take different forms; ours is a common goal — an end to the oppression and exploitation of man by man. For most of us democracy remains a word without meaning. We are cut off from the ability to make decisions affecting our own lives. The global corporations determine all the key questions. Despite the relative quiescence of the working people, it is clear that their very life situation forces them to come repeatedly into conflict with the system. They find themselves in daily conflict with the employers in the struggle for decent wages and security. 

Capitalist parties have always told us that they could manage the problems of society by just a little oil there, a tightening of a screw here; no need to get rid of private property, the profit motive or the wages system. Far too sweeping they said; it may be alright for later on, but we must deal with this or that problem right now. These same parties go from door to door asking for votes. They will point to their glowing records of social service and endeavour, and promise to cure what they promised to cure at the last election and the one before that, and before that, and before that . . .Politicians who have been conspicuous by their absence from their community will turn up, enquiring about the needs of their electorate. They do these things because they need the workers’ votes to give them power to run capitalism as they think best. While the workers support capitalism, the problems of poverty, bad and short supply of housing, crime and unemployment will continue. In its struggles on the international field, capitalism will often produce a war of some sort or the other.

As socialists, we argue for workers’ revolution across the world and take as our primary duty the fight against the capitalists where we live. We must fight to build a labour movement that can link up with the working class across the world to make revolution against the capitalists.  We won't give up and we will always fight to make our words and our struggle, against all forms of oppression, visible. We are not in the front line with capitalists, we are in the front line to change society. Only solidarity and mutual aid will allow us to resist. We think that it’s time for a society satisfying the necessities of all, to care and protect nature to guarantee life. We can end this system, putting all production and distribution means into the hands of the people, replacing the market economy for a self-sustaining socialised economy.

For nearly 120 years, members of the Socialist Party have done everything in our power to illuminate the day-to-day fight of the exploited to create an understanding of our goal  - socialism. We are convinced and committed socialists because we see capitalism as harmful to the vast majority of our own and the world’s people. This system we live under, by its very nature, grinds the poor and working people, sets one group against another, and acts violently against people at home and around the world when they resist. We sow the seeds of socialism as the method of achieving a more just, more cooperative and more peaceful society. Capitalism today hurts, divides and exploits the vast majority of our people for the sake of profits and power for the few. Socialists offer an alternative which can meet basic needs of people and which is based on cooperation. Socialism offers a future free from the fears of poverty, sexism, racism, dog-eat-dog competition, joblessness, and the loneliness of old age, a society that allows each person to create and produce according to her or his ability and to obtain what she or he needs. We advocate and work for socialism–that is, common ownership and collective control of the means of production (factories, fields, utilities, etc.) We want a system based on cooperation, where the people build together for the common good.

The Socialist Party believes that the working class will drive the transformation of society because it is at once the most dehumanised and alienated class, yet potentially the most powerful, since the functioning of society depends upon it. We have to find new directions, new roads. We have to organize, and participate in the world-wide movement for the right to be human. In every country, people are escaping from the traditions of the past and are working against war, poverty and injustice. We live in a world torn by crises and wars. The great wealth of the world—the factories, farms and mines —are owned by a tiny minority. We live in a society which puts a price tag on everything. Increasingly disillusioned our fellow-workers are beginning to question every aspect of the society around them. We seek new paths forward. We strive for social change. The world can be changed. For humanity it must be changed. How can the world be changed? Certainly no elite will serve the task. We do not want to replace one group of masters with another. Nor do we want the patronising assistance of those whose real interests lie with the present system. We must look to those whose interests lie in change—to the working people, the people who work in the factories and offices of our society. They built the society—and they too are cut off from power and progress by the tiny minority that owns the wealth. The bosses need the working people—but the workers don’t need the bosses.

As socialists we believe in the great task of transforming this society and of building a new world. We stand for a world which can eliminate poverty and hunger and war; a world in which freedom is more than a word in a textbook; a world in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the producers themselves and the products of mankind are available to all. We stand with the oppressed, with all those who struggle for a better world. Only when we have economic democracy, when production is planned for use and not for profit, when the right of all to share in the abundance of our country is established - only then will democracy be truly established.

A new world has to be created — a world which will put people before profits, which will create a participatory democracy at every level. The potential of mankind virtually limitless, if it is freed from economic and social oppression. We have no illusions that the way will be easy, no visions of quick success. But the future belongs to humanity and socialism.

The revolutionary use of the vote

 The vote is a gain, a potential class weapon, a potential "instrument of emancipation" as Marx put it. Despite Lenin's distortions, Marx and Engels always held that the bourgeois democratic republic was the best political framework for the development and triumph of the socialist movement. This is another early socialist position we see no reason to abandon.

Certainly, political democracy under capitalism is not all that it is purported to be by many supporters of the system and it is severely limited, from the point of view of democratic theory, by the very nature of capitalism as an unequal, class-divided society. Certainly, "democracy" has become an ideology used to give capitalist rule a spurious legitimacy. But it is still sufficient to allow the working class to organise politically and economically without too much state interference and also, we would argue, to allow a future socialist majority to gain control of political power.

In a vote between lesser of two evils, "Vote Cholera or Vote for Typhoid", (btw, someone once said "Those who choose the lesser of two evils soon forget that what they chose is an evil".)

Not voting at all is valid, but casting blank ballots or some other form of actively announcing not voting is better .One or two spoilers/blank voters can be ignored, tens of thousands or even millions could not be - especially if backed by a vocal movement explaining the situation. (see the Argentinian example, for instance , http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1598855.stm ). In Britain, Canada and most of Europe, etc we don't think we've any fundamental objection to the electoral system; the provisions for voter registration, nomination of candidates, counting of votes, declaration of result,etc can be inherited by socialism and, with modifications, continue to be used. We also think, of course, that the present electoral mechanisms can be used to express and count, more or less fairly and accurately, a majority desire for socialism. So we've no interest in running down the system as such. The way to show that you accept the electoral system but reject the sham choice is to go and use it but not vote for any of the candidates.

There is nothing inherently elitist about the electoral approach. It is how you use that approach that makes it elitist. The World Socialist Movement (WSM) is not asking people to vote for them so they can solve the problems the electorate have to contend with. The WSM it is saying quite clearly that workers need to understand and support socialism themselves in order for it to come about It cannot be imposed from above. Furthermore, we constantly makes the point to workers in elections that if they dont understand or support socialism then they should not vote for the WSM. The WSM does not propose to come "into office", ie to form a government and so does not propose "to vote itself into office". Nor to we propose that other people should "vote us into office" either. What we do propose is that people should, amongst other things, use the vote in the course of the social revolution from capitalism to socialism; that they should, if you like, vote capitalism out of office. To do this they will need to stand recallable mandated delegates at elections but these will be just this: messenger boys and girls, not leaders or would-be government ministers, sent to formally take over and dismantle "the central State". 

The situation we envisage in which a majority vote in socialist delegates is one where the revolution, in respect of socialist ideas has already begun to accelerate. The vote is merely the legitimate stamp which will allow for the dismantling of the repressive apparatus of the States and the end of bourgeois democracy and the establishment of real democracy. It is the Achilles heel of capitalism and makes a non-violent revolution possible. What matters is a conscious socialist majority outside parliament, ready and organised to take over and run industry and society; electing a socialist majority in parliament is essentially just a reflection of this. It is not parliament that establishes socialism, but the socialist working-class majority outside parliament and they do this, not by their votes, but by their active participating beyond this in the transformation of society.

Basically, there are only three ways of winning control of the State: (a) armed insurrection; (b) more or less peaceful mass demonstrations and strikes; (c) using the electoral system.

The early members of the WSM adopted, in the light of then existing political conditions, for (c), but without ruling out (b) or even (a) should these conditions change (or in other parts of the world where conditions were different).

But this was never understood as simply putting an "X" on a ballot paper and letting the Socialist Party and its MPs establish socialism for workers. The assumption always was that there would be a "conscious" and active socialist majority outside Parliament, democratically organised both in a mass socialist political party and, at work, in ex-trade union type organisations ready to keep production going during and immediately after the winning of political control.
Having adopted (c), various other options follow.

Obviously, if there's a socialist candidate people who want socialism are urged to vote for that candidate. But what if there's no socialist candidate? Voting for any other candidate is against the principles. So what to do? The basic choice is/was between abstention and spoiling the ballot paper (by writing "socialism" across it). The policy adopted and confirmed ever since was the latter, ie a sort of write-in vote for socialism.

The first step towards taking over the means of production, therefore, must be to take over control of the state, and the easiest way to do this is via elections. But elections are merely a technique, a method. The most important precondition to taking political control out of the hands of the owning class is that the useful majority are no longer prepared to be ruled and exploited by a minority; they must withdraw their consent to capitalism and class rule-they must want and understand a socialist society of common ownership and democratic control.

We need to organise politically, into a political party, a socialist party. We don't suffer from delusions of grandeur so we don't necessary claim that we are that party. What we are talking about is not a small educational and propagandist group such as ourselves, but a mass party that has yet to emerge. It is such a party that will take political control via the ballot box, but since it will in effect be the useful majority organised democratically and politically for socialism it is the useful majority, not the party as such as something separate from that majority, that carries out the socialist transformation of society.

They will neutralise the state and its repressive forces and as stated there is no question of forming a government , and then proceed to take over the means of production for which they will also have organised themselves at their places of work.

This done, the repressive state is disbanded and its remaining administrative and service features, reorganised on a democratic basis, are merged with the organisations which the useful majority will have formed to take over and run production, to form the democratic administrative structure of the state-free society of common ownership that socialism will be.

This is perhaps a less romantic idea of the socialist revolution but a thousand times more realistic. Which is why we think this is the way it will happen.

When the time comes the socialist majority will use the ballot box since it will be the obvious thing to do, and nobody will be able to prevent them or persuade them not to. At that time it will be the anti-electoralists who will be irrelevant. A real democracy is fundamentally incompatible with the idea of leadership. It is about all of us having a direct say in the decisions that affect us. Leadership means handing over the right to make those decisions to someone else. We have at our disposal today the very means, in the form of modern telecommunications, that could enable us to resuscitate the ancient model of Athenian democracy on a truly global level.

Social Democracy was Socialism

It was William Morris long ago who said the job of socialists is to make socialists.

"It should be our special aim to make Socialists, by putting before people, and especially the working-classes, the elementary truths of Socialism; since we feel sure, in the first place, that in spite of the stir in the ranks of labour, there are comparatively few who understand what Socialism is, or have had opportunities of arguing on the subject with those who have at least begun to understand it; and, in the second place, we are no less sure that before any definite Socialist action can be attempted, it must be backed up by a great body of intelligent opinion - the opinion of a great mass of people who are already Socialists, people who know what they want, and are prepared to accept the responsibilities of self-government, which must form a part of their claims."

The Socialist Party does not so easily dismiss the electoral process

What’s our case for elections?

We don't want your vote IF you think socialism means nationalisation, higher taxation, welfare state, national liberation, legalising marijuana or whatever. In short, we don't want your vote if you think we need to keep and act within existing capitalism.

We tell you we can't do anything for you. We don't promise you anything. We say that if you want socialism you've got to act for yourselves. We can't establish it for you.

We're not making any promises, if you vote for us, you're the one making the promise to work towards abolishing capitalism and the wages system

Whether Scotland is in or out of the UK, or whether we use the British pound or the euro, doesn't make any difference to workers daily lives. For Shetlanders or those in the Western Isles, Holyrood as remote as the Westminster parliament, and people know they have no control of what happens. Neither have the politicians. Nobody controls or can control the way capitalism works.

The Socialist Party position is to enable any and all who would join the struggle to abolish capitalism to be able to signal to their fellow workers that that is what they want to do. We stand for the sole purpose of emancipating the working class, not soft-padding the chains of capital. We only want the votes of those who understand what socialism is, and actually want it and are prepared to do something about it. We're not leaders, we're not looking for followers, we're only standard bearers.

A vote for the Socialist Party is a vote that says you are ready to signal to your fellow socialists that they are not alone. A signal to your fellow workers that some people take the actual idea of socialism seriously, rather than relegating it to some bedtime fairytale never-never land once the work of running capitalism is supposedly done.

Democracy under capitalism is reduced to people voting for competing groups of professional politicians, to giving the thumbs-up or the thumbs-down to the governing or opposition party. Political analysts call this the ‘elite theory of democracy’ because all that the people get to choose is which elite should exercise government power. This contrasts with the original theory of democracy, which envisages popular participation in the running of affairs and which political analysts call ‘participatory democracy’.

The most we will get under capitalism is the right to vote, under more or less fair conditions, for who shall control political power - a minimalist form of democracy, but one not to be so easily dismissed, since at least it provides a mechanism whereby a socialist majority could vote in socialist delegates instead of capitalist politicians.

Bourgeois democracy is the best we can hope for under capitalism, but it is not the ideal model possible for the revolutionary. Capitalist democracy is not a participatory democracy, which a genuine democracy has to be. In practice, the people generally elect professional politicians, who they merely vote for, and then let them get on with the job.

In other words, the electors abdicate their responsibility to keep an eye on their representatives, giving them a free hand to do what the operation of capitalism demands. But that’s as much the fault of the electors as their representatives - or rather it is a reflection of their low level of democratic consciousness. It cannot be blamed on the principle of representation as such.

There is no reason in principle why, with a heightened democratic consciousness (such as would accompany the spread of socialist ideas), even representatives sent to state bodies could not be subject, while the state lasts, to democratic control by those who sent them there.

The Socialist Party has never held that a merely formal majority at the polls will give the workers power to achieve socialism. We have always emphasised that such a majority must be educated in the essentials of socialist principles. It is the quality of the voters behind the vote that, in the revolutionary struggle, will be decisive. The institution of parliament is not at fault. It is just that people’s ideas have not yet developed beyond belief in leaders and dependence on a political elite.

What the Socialist Party proposes is that people should use the vote in the course of the social revolution from capitalism to socialism and vote capitalism out of office. To do this they will need to stand mandated delegates at elections, but these will just be ‘messenger boys and girls’, sent to formally take over and dismantle ‘the state’, not leaders or government minister wannabes.

The vote is merely the legitimate stamp that will allow for the dismantling of the repressive apparatus of the state and the end of bourgeois democracy and the establishment of real democracy. This should not be understood as simply putting an X on a ballot paper and letting the Socialist Party and its MPs establish socialism for workers. There must also be that ‘conscious’ and active socialist majority outside parliament, democratically organised both in a mass socialist political party and at work in various forms of ex-trade union type organisations ready to keep production going during and immediately after the winning of political control.

The Socialist Party is a political organisation that has a membership who don’t require a leadership to make its decisions, that has an executive council which doesn’t determine policies, that has a general secretary whose role is to administer and not to control. As a matter of political principle, the Socialist Party holds no secret meetings, with all its meetings, including those of its executive committee, being open to the public. Thus emulating the society it seeks to establish.

The Cry of the People

“And yes, we do need hope, of course we do. But the one thing we need more than hope is action. Once we start to act, hope is everywhere. So instead of looking for hope, look for action. Then, and only then, hope will come.” - Greta Thunberg 

Many people these days will tell you ‘socialism is dead’, usually with the collapse of the USSR. However, the reformists do not know what they want; they are everything and nothing. It is amazing these days to see how many and how diverse are the people who mean to change the world. Those ‘world changers’ find that they do not suddenly decide to change the world and—hey presto!—it is changed. They offer us a new world…but later…far, far later.

The support of the majority of the population is necessary for the socialist transformation of society. No social order will personal freedom be so assured as in a society based upon communal ownership.

In his first draft of ’The Civil War in France’ Marx wrote that ‘the general suffrage, till now abused either for the parliamentary sanction of the Holy State Power, or a play in the hands of the ruling classes’ was ‘adapted to its real purposes, to choose by the communes their own functionaries of administration and initiation’

Engels wrote to Paul Lafargue in 1892: ‘Look what a splendid weapon you have now had in your hands in France for forty years in universal suffrage if only you’d known how to make use of it!’

In ’The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State’ Engels recognised that ‘the possessing class rules directly through the medium of universal suffrage’, but only for so long as the working class is ‘not yet ripe to emancipate itself. To the extent that the proletariat ‘matures for its self-emancipation’, it ‘constitutes itself as its own party and elects its own representatives, and not those of the capitalists. Thus universal suffrage is the gauge of the maturity of the working class.’

For Marx and Engels the democratic nature of a socialist revolution depended on its enjoying the support of the majority of the people. The majoritarian nature of the proletarian movement was emphasised, as we have seen, in the ‘Communist Manifesto’, “The proletarian movement is the self-conscious independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority." The winning of a majority was considered essential by Marx and Engels not only on grounds of expediency, but also because of the democratic nature of the socialist project. In a revolution, wrote Engels, where it is a question of a complete transformation of the social organisation, ‘the masses must themselves already have grasped what is at stake, what they are going in for with body and soul’.

Socialism offers the only solution to the contradictions of capitalism, so every serious attempt to find a way out leads surely and inexorably to socialism. From the old World to the new World means a change, a very great change, and those who propose to take the job in hand had better make a study of Marxism, if they wish to know how to get on with the job. The interests of working people in all countries are the same. Society's crying need is for the international unity of the working class to abolish capitalism and substitute for it a cooperative world of abundance and freedom. It is the need for dignity, for progress, for survival. The people of the world can have socialism if they want it or they can choose, in one way or another, extinction.

The aim of the master class is to keep the workers ignorant, for an ignorant subject class, not knowing how to act in their own interests, can be more easily and inexpensively kept in subjection than an educated one. In fostering this ignorance the first thing to be done is to preserve the inertia of the mind – the tendency of the mind to run in an unchanging direction. Fellow workers, there is but one meaning attaching to class rule, and that is class plunder. As long as you are ruled poverty will be your lot, for those who rule over you can always plunder you and always will. You are ruled, not by kings, but by those who possess the land, mines, factories, machinery, railways, and other means of production and distribution, and just because they possess those things. Since you are denied access to those things all the doors of life are shut against you except that of the labour market. You must become wage slaves – must sell your energies to those who own the productive forces. This means that goods are produced for profit, and that profit, that wealth you produce but which is taken away from you, goes to glut the market and to throw you out of work, so that you and your children starve when the warehouses are fullest.

The remedy for all this is to take these means of production and distribution away from their present owners and make them the property of the whole community. Food will then be produced to feed people, not for profit, and clothes to clothe them, and houses to shelter them. All able-bodied adults will take part in the necessary social labour, and all will partake freely of the wealth produced.

Month after month, year after year, our fellow-workers appear to be too satisfied with the capitalist system—or too apathetic — to want to put an end to it. They seem to look with an almost fatalistic resignation on the possibility of another recession. We, too, hope that the day will soon come when they will realise that whether at the forthcoming election they vote Labour or Tory politicians into power; they will still continue to live under capitalism and will have to suffer the worries and indignities of that system. When that day comes—and it cannot come too soon for us—they will decide to abolish capitalism and establish socialism. To do this the workers must first study socialism and organise to capture political power, in order that the political machinery may be used to end for ever the class domination which political power alone upholds. To try and bring that day nearer is the aim and work of members of the Socialist Party, its companion parties in the World Socialist Movement and friends and sympathisers around the world.