The Interesting Case of Sir Richard Acland, M. P. (1941)

From the January 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the October issue of the Socialist Standard,  some remarks were made about Sir Richard Acland’s views, based on a letter written by him to the News-Chronicle. In a subsequent letter to the Socialist Standard Sir R. Acland suggested that instead of criticising his brief letter to the News-Chronicle we should consider the full statement contained in his book, “Unser Kampf” (“ Our Struggle ”—Penguin Edition, 6d.).

The argument of “Unser Kampf” is that the war against Germany will be long and costly unless the military weapon is backed up by propaganda that will appeal to the German people. It is of no use, he says, to threaten the dismemberment of Germany as this would rally the German workers round Hitler. As he proposes instead that we should proclaim “common ownership” as our “new order” it may appear that he has reached the Socialist standpoint. When, however, the book is examined it is found that though the author imagines he has broken with capitalism, his alternative, far from being the revolutionary one he believes it to be, is a naive, impossible scheme for imposing radical reforms on the capitalist world.

Sir R. Acland can see some of the features of capitalism, the inequality of incomes, the restrictions on production, the monopolies, unemployment, etc., but he gives no sign of understanding that the monetary system, the production of goods for sale, the system of wage-labour, the existence of property incomes through exploitation, and the competition for world markets are all part and parcel of capitalism : he does not see that if the capitalist private property basis is abolished and common ownership is introduced all the rest go too. If Sir R. Acland can contemplate “common ownership” without this necessary consequence of it, the reason is that he does not really mean common ownership. His scheme is that industry (in the first place banks, insurance companies, railways,, mines, steel, and a few other industries, p. 145) shall be taken over by the State and that the owners shall receive compensation on a graded basis providing a maximum annual income of £3,000 a year (p. 100). This would be for the life of the shareholder, but with the alternative of a somewhat smaller income which shall continue for the life of his children too. This payment of compensation he justifies on the ground that it would be both unwise and unfair to leave the former owners “to fend for themselves in the labour market like anyone else” (p. 98). This is a curious argument. Sir R. Acland does not appear fully to realise that property incomes, including these compensation incomes, can only exist through the exploitation of the workers who produce the wealth. And if this “ new order ” really offers to the whole population a satisfactory life, why should it be “unfair” to the capitalist that they should enjoy its blessings too?

What is still more revealing is that Sir R. Acland believes that “common ownership ” exists in Russia (p. 76). He says nothing of the vast inequalities of income in that country but claims that “no one in Russia sits back and draws income in respect of the ownership of property ” (p. 91). He does not seem to have heard of the enormous National Debt in Russia running to thousands of millions of roubles, through which investors can sit back and draw investment income. Or perhaps he would argue that this is not income “in respect of the ownership of property”? Yet it is not essentially different from investments in State loans in other countries where the capitalist State has industrial undertakings under its control.

He envisages that under his scheme there will be “for at least the first century or two ” better pay for “ better work or more skilful or responsible work ” (p.110). In other words, like the Bolsheviks. Sir R. Acland wants the retention of a privileged group. He fails to offer any justification for this, and does not consider the kind of methods that would have to be used to force an enlightened working class to accept it. Does he imagine that the low-paid hewers of wood and drawers of water in Bolshevik Russia willingly consent to the arrangement by which the Party men, technicians, administrative officials, writers and artists, and other favoured groups receive incomes dozens of times larger than their own miserable wage? If he wants to enforce the same system he will need the same forcible methods to compel its acceptance. He does not state a reasoned case for wanting this inequality to be perpetuated.

“Common ownership” as used by Sir R. Acland is a term that he also finds it possible to associate with Nazi Germany. He thinks it likely that the German army leaders and the Nazi Party leaders may “deprive the German owners of their swollen profits and of their grip on industry” (p.90). Then “there would,” he says, “ be common ownership in the hands of the Nazi Party." Well may the workers say that if "common ownership” means what exists in Russia, and what is possible under the Nazis, they do not want it.

One curious omission from the book is any denunciation of the State capitalist concerns that exist already in this country. Is Sir R. Acland unaware that the workers in the Post Office and in the London Passenger Transport Board are treated in essentially the same way as workers in any other capitalist concern? Yet when he is denouncing capitalist monopoly (p. 45) and gives a lengthy list of instances, he does not mention these. On the other hand, he writes approvingly of the Post Office (p. 105), and has no criticism of Labour Party plans for State capitalism except their speed of application.

For the conduct of international affairs Sir R. Acland wants an international armed force (p. 135). He does not get down to the vital question how, under conditions as they will actually exist after the war, of a continuing fierce struggle for markets and capitalist groups are to be persuaded or forced to for the control of strategic points, etc., the interested accept any international control unless it falls in with their interests. On his own showing the adoption of what for him is “common ownership” will not solve the problem of war, since he accuses “common ownership” Russia of aggression against the Finns "as damnable” as the German invasion of Poland (p. 148). He even accepts the possibility that Russia may enter on a “ Napoleonic stage ” of attempted world conquest and expansion (p. 85).

In short, as Socialists, we can only say that the solution for all the problems that Sir R. Acland takes in his field lies in Socialism, i.e., a system of society based on common ownership in the real meaning of the term. This cannot be achieved by some swift campaign to get the population to accept “the new morality” (p. 144) and change the Government (p. 139), but only by the steady, thorough winning over of the working class internationally to Socialism.

In order to remove any misunderstanding it must be pointed out in conclusion that Sir R. Acland is quite wrong in his acceptance of the view that “the Russian doctrine” is “ Marxism ” (p. 91).

It will be interesting to see where Sir R. Acland's well intentioned and courageous, though misdirected, investigations of capitalism will lead him. At present he is a Liberal whose conceptions are likely to be as unacceptable to the Liberal Party as they are to Socialists. The Labour Party will not like his independence and the Communists denounce his criticisms of the Russian onslaught on Finland 

Edgar Hardcastle