Vodka-cola (1979)

Book Review from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

Co-production deals between Western enterprises and East European governments are becoming big business and attract a lot of notice in the press. These deals now represent 10 per cent of East-West trade and are rapidly growing in number and importance.

Co-production is distinct from normal East-West trade, which is handicapped by the fact that it doesn’t allow the Eastern bloc to buy all it needs. The West doesn’t want payment for exports in roubles or other Eastern currencies as these are practically worthless. Russia has been paying for much of its imports with large amounts of gold but as this tends to reduce its price then Russia’s trading position simply worsens, while other Eastern countries have little or no gold anyway.

Barter deals are hopelessly inadequate as Western exporters rarely want the commodities being offered in exchange. Even so, barter does exist. Pepsi-Cola, long reviled by communist propagandists as a “monopolist”, has built a plant in Russia capable of producing 74 million bottles a year for Russian consumption. Since Pepsi wouldn’t take roubles and Russia needed its gold for American wheat, payment is made in Vodka and Pepsi were given the monopoly for selling Russian wines in the USA.

Despite Kruschev’s boast that Russia would surpass the West economically within 15 years, she has fallen further behind and the gap is widening all the time. To catch up, Russia and her satellites need Western technology but cannot acquire enough of it for the reasons given. Also, they already owe the West such a staggering debt (at least 80 billion dollars) that they cannot count on extended credit forever.

However, steps are being taken to rescue the Eastern bloc from its predicament, for a price, by none other than Western big business —the very “multinationals” who are supposed to be the mortal enemies of “international communism”. Just how and why this is being done is explained in a new book, Vodka Cola, by Charles Levinson. (Gordon and Cremonesi, £7.90.)

In the book Levinson lays bare the reasons for the current “detente” between the West and the Eastern bloc. This has nothing to do with either side learning to love the other but is dictated by their respective economic needs. The East must modernise its industry in order to keep its population passive. After all, expectations of a better life must be met someday. For Western big business there is the glittering prospect of a potential new market of 400 million people, plus the opportunity to switch its production away from a unionised, high-wage, strike-prone labour force to one which is state regimented, low-wage and forbidden to strike.

So the last thing the multinationals want to do is disturb the status quo behind the Iron Curtain. Any growth of political freedom there would produce genuine trade unions and the inevitable inroads into profit margins. Hence their enthusiasm for detente. Levinson also points out that the agreements signed by Eastern and Western politicians are only political window dressing. It was the businessmen of both sides who made the real breakthrough and all the politicians have done is merely help smooth the way for future deals. When it comes down to it, ideological differences are demolished by economic realities.

These co-production deals enable the West to sell the East what it needs and get paid, not in dud currencies or shoddy, inferior products, but in cheap Eastern made goods manufactured to Western standards which can be sold on the world market at a fat profit.

Co-production takes a variety of forms:

LICENCING: until the early 1960s only a few licences to use Western technology were purchased in the East. Now there are several thousand. These were previously paid for in scarce hard currency but now payment is likely to be in the products being made under licence. For example, Fiat, Volkswagen and British Leyland have been paid for their licences in vehicles and parts.

BUY-BACK: this means that industrial giants like Renault of France and Montedison of Italy will supply—in this case Russia—with an entire car factory and chemical plant and be paid in cars and chemicals for sale throughout the world. The Eastern partner is also helped to market its share of production through distribution companies specially set up for the purpose. In this way much needed hard currency flows back to the East to enable it to buy more of what it requires.

LEASING: the Eastern bloc also uses equipment rented from Western companies. So far this has not happened within Russia itself, but its merchant fleet has leased thousands of cargo containers and other equipment from the West, so privately owned means of production and distribution exist in part of the Russian economy. Levinson’s view is that leasing will increase because of the advantages it offers the East, among which is the acquiring of modem technology without spending huge amounts of hard currency. He predicts that it is only a matter of time until leasing will be allowed within Russia.

The list of “monopolists” involved in co-production deals makes fascinating reading: General Motors, Exxon (Esso), Ford, Unilever, IBM, Krupp, ITT (played a leading part in setting up Pinochet’s regime in Chile), Coca-Cola, Du Pont, Westinghouse, ICI, Union Carbide, Fiat . . . Many of them are bitter opponents of trade unionism in their own plants and all of them, needless to say, collect their share of the surplus value created by the Eastern workers employed in the various projects.

Cyrus Eaton, the American multimillionaire, revealed how it is done when he explained his 40 million dollar 50/50 deal for building a tyre factory in the East in 1970. The communist state partner would own and operate the plant. Eaton’s half would be in tax-haven Switzerland and would market the tyres in the West. Eaton says

“This enabled the Eastern country to earn hard currency and because of lower labour costs the venture can sell tyres cheaper than Western countries can. The plant in the East sells the tyres to the marketing subsidiary at cost —thus leaving profits to the joint marketing subsidiary.” (p. 87.)

Nice one, Cyrus.

All of this must have its effect on Western jobs. Naturally, the co-production partners deny this and claim that the increased trade will provide the West with 2 million new jobs. But the Eastern products, because they are made by low-wage labour, consistently undercut similar Western products. Indeed Western manufacturers and trade unions are forever protesting about “dumping” on Western markets. In Britain the footwear, textile, tailoring, motor car and TV tube industries, to name a few, have been badly hit by cheap imports from many countries and thousands of jobs have been lost. So while the British Communist Party demands action to “fight unemployment” their Eastern counterparts are busily contribute: it.

Unfortunately for the Eastern bloc the present type of co-production deal cannot fully solve their problem. The technology they are buying tends to be second rate and outmoded by Western standards. The West will not hand over the latest developments because it feels it does not have sufficient safeguards as things stand. For example, equipment and know-how supplied under one deal can easily be pirated and used by the East for other projects of its own, so Western companies are increasingly demanding a 50/50 share in the ownership of the plants as well as the products and profits. Because the Russians have refused to allow this they have failed to clinch several important deals. The Russian government’s refusal stems from an unwillingness to lose face: how would it be able to explain away such a blatant example of private, as opposed to state, ownership of part of “socialist industry?

Hungary and Rumania have gone some way towards meeting this problem. Although not allowing Western-owned plants, they do permit Western companies to own a large share of the profits of the joint venture (payable of course in hard currency). Volvo of Sweden has an agreement with Hungary for the assembly of Volvo cars with 48 per cent of the profits going to Volvo shareholders. This represents legal ownership of part of Hungary’s means of production. In Poland the government has gone all the way; foreign companies can legally own the entire project and if the deal is terminated then company can take out its original investment plus its share of capital gains.

The pressure on Russia to come some sort of compromise is enormous. Russia apparently needs the latest in mini computers but IBM and other suppliers are refusing to provide them. They want to protect their technology by retaining control over its use and means joint ownership of the project where it is being used. Only in this way can the company prevent its technology being applied outside of the contract.

Levinson frequently refers to the theories of Karl Marx and seems to have understood these better than most writers. For example, he says

“The end result of co-production operations is profits for the capitalists, and this means that the socialist enterprises are involved in creating the surplus value which Marxism regards as the basis of the capitalist class’s exploitation of the worker.” (p. 261.)

If the words “Eastern state capitalist” had been substituted for “socialist” then we couldn’t have put it better. He mistakenly attributes the failure of Russian nationalisation to “Marxist ideas” but continues

“Nobody (in Russia), unfortunately, had raised the minor question, ‘Whether the business be private or nationalised, how does it profit the worker who is subjected to the same authoritarian labour methods in either case?’ ” (p. 224.)

Although the book contains several other mistakes regarding Marx’s views, these cannot obscure the value of Levinson’s work as an aid to understanding how business, East and West, operates and what its priorities are. And we cannot help noticing that the analysis of modern society by Levinson, and many others outside our ranks, is very similar to our own. Nowadays, you don’t have to be a socialist to be struck by capitalism’s glaring contradictions and antisocial nature.

Vic Vanni

Blogger's Notes:

Charles Levinson replied to this review in the March 1980 issue of the Socialist Standard.

In connection to Levinson's book, the following might be of interest to some readers. In 1981, there was a fictional adaptation of the book entitled Beloved Enemy. Directed by Alan Clarke (who also directed Scum, The Firm and Elephant) and adapted for television by David Leland, it was transmitted on the BBC as part of the Play for Today series of dramas.

Beloved Enemy is available to watch on YouTube:

Political Notebook: The tale of the arrogant man . . . (1979)

The Political Notebook Column from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

The tale of the arrogant man . . .

The Liberal Party goes on a lot about ‘The Great Spirit of Liberalism’ which it so passionately cherishes. In his essay ‘On Liberty’ John Stuart Mill argued that liberals should be prepared to debate all subjects from every point of view so as to arrive at the correct conclusion.

Cyril Smith is a Liberal MP. So when Bolton branch of the Socialist Party of Great Britain was looking for a defender of capitalism to debate with, they wrote to him anticipating a liberal-minded response. Smith replied thus:

Thank you for your letter. No, I do not provide audiences and publicity for my political opponents, much less ones with whom 1 totally disagree.

Firstly it is supreme arrogance on the part of the Liberal Party to imagine that we would have to rely upon the personality of Cyril Smith to provide us with an audience for a debate. Secondly we wonder which of his political opponents Mr Smith does not ‘totally disagree’ with. Thirdly it is a pity that the Honourable Member for Rochdale’s mind is not as broad as his backside.

. .  And the ignorant man

Dr Rhodes Boyson MP does not claim to be a liberal. He is a firm believer in the highly disciplined inculcation of the correct attitudes in schools and Universities. Which in layman’s terms means that he believes in training children to be efficient wage slaves. He recently received a letter of criticism from one member of the Socialist Party of Great Britain (who presumably had a second-class stamp that she could find no better use for). She received a reply which demonstrates the confusion of the MP for Brent North’s mind. He wrote, “You may have noticed that, since the socialist reform and the comprehensive schools came in, less working class children are going to University.’’ 

What socialist reform does he mean? Socialists have never concerned ourselves with the reform of the capitalist education system. Rhodes Boyson makes the fundamental error of referring to Labour as a socialist party. He then goes on to use another incorrect definition of socialism:

All one would need is to look round the world where Socialist Governments are in control and see the inequalities there are far wider than in Britain . . .

Which socialist governments does he mean? If he is referring to the state capitalist dictatorships which the SPGB has consistently opposed, we would have expected him to show great admiration for the system of suppressing free trades unions, enforcing the law by means of brutal terror and organising education on the basis of strict discipline which has been mastered by the Russian and Chinese regimes. They are, after all, the very policies which he advocates in the name of freedom. Rhodes Boyson is clearly a man of many illusions, such as that Labour is socialist and state capitalism is socialism. He shares his illusions with millions of members of the working class. But Dr Rhodes Boyson is currently a government minister with responsibility for Higher Education. Talk about the blind leading the blind.

Free Press? Free Speech?

Copies of the following letter were sent to The Guardian, The Bolton Evening News and The Manchester Evening News. As they would not publish the letter, we reproduce it here.

Dear Editor,

That Britain is supposed to be a free country in which all shades of political opinion are given an opportunity to be heard is one of the more persistent myths of capitalism. On Saturday 28th September a crowd of over one hundred people in the Bolton shopping precinct were given a chance to observe socialist freedom of speech in action. An outdoor meeting of the Socialist Party of Great Britain was in progress; the speaker was presenting our party’s case for a society based upon the common ownership and democratic control of the means of wealth production and distribution; a number of interested people were usefully and critically joining in what is a traditional and long established medium of free discussion. Then the police arrived. Not because they suspected our speaker of being a criminal or because they believed that there was any danger of violent disorder or even, because as members of the working class, they wanted to find out what was in their interest. Their announced intention was to stop the meeting because it did not have the prior authorisation of the police. One and a half hours later, after a long wait in an interview room at the Bolton Central police station, two members of our party were charged, nominally for causing an obstruction to the highway (which did not occur until the police arrived and shoppers came to see what was going on), but in fact for attempting to address people in public without consulting the police.

There are two principles involved here. Firstly, the opportunity to set up a platform and address a crowd without police authorisation has been an accepted political tradition in Britain for most of this century. If it is now to be denied to us, may we know whether this is a government decision or, as we suspect, a further example of the increased use of police powers at the expense of the freedom of the weak and the powerless? Secondly, we consider that the freedom of assembly of those of us who are prepared to commit rational ideas to public scrutiny in the shopping centres, the parks and the factory gates should be recognised at least as much as the freedom of others to hold military processions, commercial displays, slogan-shouting demonstrations and pre-election walkabouts.

When our members appear in court they will plead ‘Not Guilty’. If the magistrate is typical he will accept the word of the police regarding the obstruction and will be indifferent or hostile to the principle of freedom of speech as it affects the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Next time I am on an outdoor platform and I am told that such a privilege would not be allowed in Red Square (which is part of a system that we have consistently opposed since 1917), 1 shall remind those present that state oppression is not confined to the state capitalist dictatorships, but is alive and kicking on the streets of Bolton.

Steve Coleman

Papal bull (1979)

From the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

The weekend visit of the Pope to Ireland at the end of September was a spectacular occasion. Following a careful build-up by the media, ‘his holiness’ landed to a reception that football stars and pop groups dream of. Crowds were estimated at more than one million; people collapsed in the crush and women gave birth in the excitement; and a mint was made from the sale of blessed knick-knacks, from gnome-like effigies to embossed papal scribblings. The whole show was managed with a TV professionalism that must have made Lord Grade envious.

Medieval pageant

But the visit was not just a twentieth century version of a medieval pageant — although it was about as relevant. Desperate politicians and churchmen fell over in the rush to humble themselves at the papal feet. A revitalisation of the catholic faith (and obedience) was hoped for by some; and they all prayed for an end to the misery of the war in the north that spills over into the south. Well briefed by his Vatican ministers of state, the Pope knew he had been sent to create the illusion that the catholic church somehow cares about peace. It is noteworthy that, while papal visits to politically sensitive spots have the effect of reinforcing the status quo (the American visit took in the slums of Harlem and the Bronx), the area must not be too sensitive. Northern Ireland, for example, was not left off the itinerary because workers there weren’t suffering enough.

The Pope sought, in the course of his stay, to impress upon the Irish people the need to reject “materialism “in favour of “spiritual values”. By this of course, he did not mean that the capitalist class in Ireland should cease their insatiable quest for profit, but that the workers should reconcile themselves to their poverty. Neither could he find it in his heart to remind his flock that the organisation he represents is one the richest in the world, and invests a portion of its loot in that most worldly of profit-making enterprises, the arms industry. The Economist magazine estimates the Vatican’s wealth at around 9,000 million dollars, while the American economist Nino Lo Bella (in his carefully researched book, The Vatican Empire) states that the Vatican state now possesses assets equal to the gold and dollar reserves of France. So much for Christian charity.

Hypocrisy

The first major speech was at Drogheda where, predictably, the Pope pitched into the cameras and the swooning crowd with a long plea for peace. Unfortunately, the history of the catholic church exposes this for the hypocrisy it is; from its inception it has either directly waged war or urged others to do so, often being active on both sides at once.

But leaving aside the blood-drenched hands of the Church of Rome, what relevance did the Pope’s visit have to workers of Ireland? How does his message bear on the political reality they, and workers everywhere, face?

The first thing to note in all this is that god, whom the Pope is supposed to represent, does not exist. The Pope kept calling for prayers for peace: “a prayer from the heart for the peoples who live on this earth, peace for all the people of Ireland. He can hardly have forgotten catholic church has been continuously praying for peace (except of course when involved in wars, when it prays for victory) ever since its establishment. There is only one possible conclusion: if that god of theirs is not deaf he is a very good non-listener. Not that the Pope’s own confidence in god very deep. He was so concerned for own skin that, rather than leave his protection to a non-existent deity, he wore a bullet-proof vest throughout the the trip (Sunday Mirror 30.9.79).

Property baron

If one thing is abundantly clear it is that peace is not going to be brought to Ireland (or anywhere else) merely because some descendant of a medieval property baron dressed in a funny hat drops from the sky to ask for it. The Irish situation ration is a complex result of more than one hundred years of barbaric treatment of a largely peasant by mainly absentee capitalist landlords (all of them no doubt good christians). The misery has been whipped up by this same catholic(and by the protestants) into Irish bog of prejudice that is not going disappear in the face of a disingenuous mass of words, however, very much in the interest of the capitalist class as a whole that workers heed the advice of the Pope, so that a minority may continue to live lives of idle luxury amidst poverty. The catholic church, like all other religious bodies, is an enemy of the workers and a long-time friend of ruling classes. Its oppressive and exploitative nature is a reflection of ignorance and superstition.

Bad for business

Clearly it is no longer the wishes of any but a small, demented handful that the atrocities in Ireland continue. The Capitalist class in the north and south are fed up with their property being destroyed and their expensively trained workers maimed and killed. The disruption of trade is bad for business and makes capitalist politicians look as in effectual as indeed they largely are.

The majority of workers on both sides of the border do not want the killings either. They suffer from them and are certain to lose, whichever side wins. The one thing that is absent from the argument about war and peace in Ireland is this: what are the prospects for the Irish working class? The Pope could not be expected to point out to the workers that apart from the fact that one group of workers is busy killing another, both sides support the same social system. He omitted to mention that this means a society of exploitation of the majority; of second rate existence for the class that produces a first rate existence for the exploiters. A world of insecurity and, inevitably from time to time, violent conflict. The Pope’s message boiled down to a plea to the working class to behave like good little workers and stop disrupting the arteries of profit with unnecessary clots of blood.

RAW/VM

Harvest hunger (1979)

From the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

While millions starve, it is a fact that humankind possesses the technical potential to feed everyone. Yet this potential is not being realised because of the restrictions imposed upon production by the present world system of buying and selling. In this system, food (and indeed, anything else) is produced only on condition that a profit will be realised if there exists what the economists call ‘effective demand’ (human need backed up by ready cash).

This point was forcefully made in a BBC Radio 4 International Assignment broadcast of November 11 last. In what turned out to be an astonishingly frank expose of the absurdities and contradictions of the production for profit system, BBC correspondents from all over the world reported on the gathering of the world’s harvests. The presenter began by pointing out that last year’s bad summer may seem to have had a disastrous effect on food production, but that in fact modern techniques were such as to have all but eliminated the consequences of bad or unexpected weather conditions.

Hence, we learned, most parts of the world had had a bumper harvest, and even in South East Asia, where severe flooding had limited rice production, use was being made of the massive crop from the previous year, much of which had not been put on the market.

In America next, farmers had reaped record’ harvests yet faced the problem that with so much food about, prices were being forced down, and they were having to lobby the government to fix higher prices. In view of this, the government had warned them to keep production down for this year (1979). In the meantime, part of the American grain crop had been sold to the Russians, whose own production could easily cover domestic needs but who preferred to leave their own fields fallow and import food more cheaply.

Conversely, many producers the world round had actually grown food but couldn’t afford to put it on the market as the price was too low. They would therefore stock it, hoping for a better price later, let it rot in the fields, or destroy it.

The presenter’s conclusion on all this was that we had a “world bursting at the seams with food, but beset with problems of distribution”. The situation was described as “paradoxical” in so much as those who had got the food couldn’t sell it, and those who needed the food hadn’t got the money to buy it.

With India’s ‘Green Revolution’, the programme went on, vast progress had been made in agricultural activity over the past twelve years. There was now a permanent stock of 21 million tons of grain (more than the whole annual production of the UK), yet malnutrition was still rampant. In addition, vast acreages still remained unexploited through lack of fertilisers, insecticides and modern techniques generally.

The correspondents in Africa and South America had the same kind of tale to tell. “In Nigeria”, one reported, “it’s said that if you plant a broom handle it will grow.” But here too, he went on, production was severely limited, this time by the system of land tenure in operation.

After pointing out that in a century’s tune the world’s population should stabilise at twice the present level, with the need for three times the present output, the presenter concluded with a question put to an academic expert on the subject; “Can the world feed us all?” The academic’s reply was: “Yes, if exploitation is rational, and even at the present level of technology.”

The key words in this reply are, of course, “if exploitation is rational”, for in a world where the means to produce food, and indeed everything else, are the property of a small minority of human beings competing to sell their produce at a profit, exploitation of resources car. never be rational. It can only be carried on in the overall interest of this small owning minority. ‘Rational exploitation” can only come about when the means to produce food and other goods are the common property of the whole of humanity and are used co-operatively in a system of free access and democratic control.

In the meantime, the small minority will continue to have it their way. Their political control, either through state dictatorship as in Russia, China and Cuba, or through representative government as in Britain and the USA, safeguards their economic position while assuring continued waste and artificial shortage in all parts of the world.

It is up to the vast non-owning majority to take this political control for themselves and to use it to create a non-class divided society which will release the rich abundance of food and other goods which the earth has to offer.

Howard Moss

50 Years Ago: Work for All (1979)

The 50 Years Ago column from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Sunday Pictorial, October 6th, 1929, gives prominence to an article by Mr. G. Ward Price, who, according to the headlines, “shows that industry is suffering from several definite ailments. If it were “rationalised and brought up to date, we should not have a capable worker unemployed. There is no mystery about what is wrong with the great British export trades,” says Mr. Price. “Their costs of production are too high.”

Further, he says, “There are only two “remedies for unemployment. . . . One is the compulsory rationalisation of our big industries on lines of which America and Germany furnish the example, and the other is the reduction of Trade Union restriction.”

Mr. Price may be guilty of some slight exaggeration when he says the result will be jobs for every capable worker. That fulness of employment has not yet been reached by America or Germany, although, he says, they furnish examples of rationalisation we might copy.

There is no question with the capitalist about reducing unemployment. So far as he is concerned he desires to increase it. If he rationalises his concern he reduces the number of workers employed while increasing the amount of the product. He may not, it is true, reduce the number of workers in his own factory, but workers must be displaced somewhere if he succeeds in capturing markets previously held by his competitors.

[From an article “Work for all” by F. Foan, Socialist Standard November 1929.]

Letter: Taking the Oath (1979)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

Taking the Oath

From what I understand, after reading the August issue of the Socialist Standard, the SPGB views Capitalism with implacable hostility, and that no compromise with such a dreadful system is possible. It appears that abolition of Capitalism and the implementation of Socialism is the sole object of the SPGB. Further you mean to achieve this desirable state of affairs democratically by means of the Ballot Box.

A condition for an elected MP to take his seat in the House is the swearing of the Oath of Allegiance to the Sovereign and his or her heirs. The dilemma of the first elected Socialist MP will be whether to refuse to take the Oath, in which case he will not be allowed to represent his Constituency, or to swallow his principles and swear allegiance to the popular face of Capitalism.

Why do you advocate membership of Trade Unions, albeit on a voluntary basis? I refer to the August issue of the Standard page 143 last paragraph. Surely it must be clear to everyone that Trade Unions are as much a part of Capitalism as the Board of ICI.

Firstly the TUC is not interested in doing away with the present system as the elevation of several Union leaders, over the years, to the Peerage is proof enough. After several years of covering the ruling class with buckets of manure they rush to don the robes and insignia of a clique they profess to despise.

Secondly most strikes and industrial disputes arise over pay claims. Now if, as you say, we are wage slaves then why ask the workers to support an organisation that merely thickens the chains? Your position on this issue seems to be that if the worker cannot have the whole loaf then a thicker slice will do. This is reform pure and simple towards which you are bitterly opposed. Your reasoning escapes me.

Lastly the closed shop gives the Unions the same power as the factory owner, namely depriving the worker of his livelihood. If the worker doesn’t like the deals cooked up between the boss and the Union reps then the threat of dismissal from the Union is more than enough to bring the disgruntled into line. I have seen this threat applied several times and it is most effective. If the bosses and the Trade Unions ever see the logic of their respective positions and combine then it will be a sad day for the working class. Both sides have the same aim—the efficient running of the Capitalist system. To think otherwise is merely to bring 1984 to reality. It is well on the way.

P Steed

(Tyne and Wear)

Reply:

You correctly state that we are uncompromising in our opposition to attempts to reform capitalism, and that we view socialism as an immediate objective. Our case on trade unionism is not inconsistent with this.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain and the trade unions have a common origin in the class struggle. The former is the organised expression on the political field of the conscious recognition of the that struggle by workers. So long as capitalism remains it is necessary that workers combine democratically to offer the utmost resistance to worsening pay and conditions. Such action can achieve benefits or preserve living standards from being depressed, but it must be pointed out that this pressure on workers is inevitable. Industrial action in support of a wage claim is not an example of reformism but part of the class struggle, which exists independently of the will of particular groups in society.

It is true that the TUC is steeped in capitalist ideology and that the effectiveness of trade union action has been blunted by support for the Labour Party. It does not follow from this, however, that workers should cease to combine in unions against the employing class and accept wage cuts. (This is not a new phenomenon, incidentally — at the time of the General Strike we praised the solidarity of the workers and condemned the conniving treachery of TUC leaders.) The class struggle involves all workers, whether they are conscious of it or not; our task is to point out that they are only half participating and must organise politically for their emancipation.

The Socialist Party attitude to the closed shop was stated in the Socialist Standard you refer to: “whatever may seem to be the advantages of compulsory trade union membership imposed by the union or the employer, the interests of the working class are best served by seeking to expand union membership on a voluntary basis only”. The existence of the closed shop does not weaken our support for the principle of trade unionism.

If we are to refuse to take Oaths, then there is no chance for controlling parliament. Socialists are not simply waging war against detailed grievances in the system. They are fighting against the system as a whole. As political action is necessary to establish socialism we cannot stop at taking Oaths imposed upon us by the ruling class. The taking of Oaths has never prevented them being ignored when interests dictated it; if it did, the ruling class could keep on imposing conditions which they think socialists will refuse.

Editors.

Letter: Not amused (1979)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

Not amused

Let’s be serious. . .

After reading SC’s wide-ranging expose of the entertainment industry (“We are not amused,” Socialist Standard, August 1979) I felt I was being a real traitor to the working class when, against my better judgement, I was conned by the Two Ronnies into emitting a tiny snigger.

Waves of guilt led me to tear my favourite Picasso print from the wall. I made sure that The Onedin Line was switched off immediately I walked into the sitting-room. And I became really nasty when they tried to condition me with a spot of catchy reggae on the jukebox in my local pub.

In short, I realised what a naive and philistinic twit I have been all these years for deluding myself that we shall still be able to enjoy silly jokes, trendy art, TV serials, songs, dances and general merriment—even, dare I say it, fat ladies wobbling their bums-when socialism is established.

Tom  Price, 

Daventry Northamptonshire

Letter: [Also] Not amused (1979)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

[Also] Not amused

I am writing because I take very strong exception to an article in the August issue of your party journal, “We Are Not Amused” by SC. It is anti-working-class.

If SC wants to announce that entertainment is commercially based: that isn’t news. But he presents this profound information in the form of one long sneer at the working class. Anything they enjoy is mindless and only “someone else’s values” pushed at them by the capitalists. “Some kid themselves that they’re cultured”—of course, the workers are incapable of any culture of their own!

I’ve read and heard all this before, from middle-class “intellectuals” of whom SC obviously thinks he is one. He even puts in “bloody” and “bum” to show he knows how to talk down to ignorant workers who (between visiting strip clubs and watching “Crossroads”) might read the Socialist Standard.

“Someone else’s values”? Sorry, but I can’t see the difference between ITV’s and SC’s.

However, my question is; Are they endorsed by your party as the publishers of the Socialist Standard.

J Wolveridge 

London E1

Reply:

One task of the Socialist Standard is to expose the inherent contradictions of the capitalist system. Many articles deal with what capitalism is, why it cannot run in the interest of the working class and what it must be replaced by. We also spend a considerable amount of space exposing the means through which mystifying ideas are expounded, such as the political parties, the churches, the schools and the universities. The intention of the article, We Are Not Amused (August 1979), was to demonstrate not only that ‘entertainment is commercially based’, but that its “values are only put before a mass audience by courtesy of a class whose interest is hostile to yours, whose values will be hostile to yours”.

A number of commercial TV stations, theatres and newspapers are run at a loss and paid for from profits accumulated by capitalists from other industries. This occurs because the entertainment industry has valuable political, as well as simply commercial, advantages for its owners.

It is not necessary to be a “middle class intellectual” (whatever that may mean) to express the view that the working class does not possess a culture of its own. The ruling culture of any property society is that of the ruling class; The only meaningful culture for the subject class is that activity which leads to the erosion of the ruling ideology. Crossroads, The Two Ronnies and strip clubs do not constitute an independent working class culture. There can be anti-establishment entertainment (the article mentioned the satire programmes of the 1960s), but that is insufficient without a commitment to political action.

It is wrong to deduce from the article that jokes, art, TV serials, songs and dances will not exist in socialist society. The difference then will be that people will freely create these activities not buy and sell them.

On the matter of values, it is significant that ITV is currently involved in an expensive battle with its employees which largely relates to the control of programme output; we hold the view that the means of communication should be the common property of the people.

Editors.

Blogger's Note:

'J. Wolveridge' was Jim Wolveridge, who co-wrote the book Muvver Tongue with SPGB member, Robert Barltrop.

Letter: Pioneer (1979)

Letter to the Editors from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

Pioneer

The “mystery” of the Party’s first Branch in Scotland, Fraserburgh (Socialist Standard, September) may be solved by the fact that a vigorous campaign was carried on between 1900-1908 in that area. This was the work of James Leatham (1865-1945), by trade a printer but most of his life a speaker and writer on behalf of Socialism. A biography Portrait of a Socialist Pioneer (People’s Press, Aberdeen) has been written by Bob Duncan, a history teacher. Leatham published the first Socialist journal in Scotland The Workers’ Herald. Later he printed and edited the Gateway in Yorkshire as well as Turiff (Scotland).

Leatham belonged to the Social Democratic Federation, I believe. He invited Keir Hardie, anarchist Peter Kropotkin and his hero, William Morris, to speak in Aberdeen where he was born and brought up. Due to his speeches and activities he was sacked with winter coming and a wife and bairn to keep. Later he set up a printer’s business in Aberdeen, where he produced the Workers’ Herald in 1891.

An amazing man indeed!

John Keith (Aberdeen)

Blogger's Note:

As mentioned in the September 1979 article cited above, the Fraserburgh branch of the SPGB was listed in the Socialist Standard from August 1910 until May 1911. There is no James Leatham listed in the early Party membership records, but here is a list of the six members who were recorded as members of the Fraserburgh branch:

• William Anderson
• S. Ford
• William Lawrence
• A. Macdonald
• William Noble
• J. A. Noble

Standard Leeds OK (1979)

Party News from the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

After unsuccessful attempts to sell socialist literature in Bradford two members of West Yorkshire branch switched their attention to Leeds City. Sales were slow at first but now persistence has paid off. We sell between fifteen to twenty copies each Saturday. We have found that our “special offer” deal of the current Socialist Standard plus a back-issue, for “only” 20p, also pays rewards.

The main reasons for the increased sales of the Standard in Leeds are our perseverance, the new design of the journal and our gradually acquired “selling technique”. The latter consists of shouting our message like a couple of political barrow-boys: “Labour No, Socialism Yes!”. . . “Abolition of the Wages System! . . . “Capitalism No, Socialism Yes!” . . . “Labour-Tory; same old story!” . . .

Selling socialist literature in the streets is often illuminating and amusing. We frequently get abuse from fellow workers, ranging from a basic “Eff off, mate”, to a “Go back to Russia”. The first type of insult receives the reaction it deserves—we ignore it. The latter type of advice usually gets the reply: “If we tried to sell our communist literature in Red Square we’d be arrested”.

Recently, the Tories have ventured forth in Leeds selling their new comic, which they have the nerve to call Democrat. One member approached one of these lackeys of the ruling class and, respectfully touching his forelock, asked ‘”Ow’s life up at the ‘All, Sire?” He defiantly replied that he was a worker, lived in a council flat and had six kids to support. Clearly a case of ragged trousered philanthropism.

Also selling their wares in the precinct are the predictable group of “Socialist” Workers, sporadically shouting about the “Right to Work” and the need for a minimum wage. This contrasts sharply with the neighbouring shouts of “What bloody Right!” and “Forget minimum wages, support their abolition!”

The final rival group we usually is the Young National Front, looking menacingly militaristic in their bovver boots, cropped hair and sun glasses. Recently, we approached one of the Aryan Race asking him if he wanted to buy a Standard. He proudly referred to the fact that he and his mates “smacked up” the SWP paper sellers every Saturday. However, after a wasted attempt to explain the gist of Socialist thought, he abruptly ended the conversation stating that the SWP were hardly “democratic”, which was a true enough statement, but somewhat ironic coming from him. Finally, before he went on his way, we entered the worst deal of out and swopped the last Standard for National Front News (price 8p, for pages of racist rubbish) whose presentation resembled the Socialist Worker paper in layout and design, as did their complete lack of understanding of the cause of social problems.

However, despite such aggressive competition, literature selling in Leeds has recently left us with a greater sense of satisfaction as we leave for home with all our Socialist Standards sold.

If you are one of those people who buy the Socialist Standard from us in Leeds and you sympathise with the Socialist case, then please follow up your interest by getting in touch with us to find out more about Socialism. If you agree with the ideas you’ve read, don’t just sit there, get up and join!

RB (West Yorks)

Letter: Vodka-Cola (1980)

Letter to the Editors from the March 1980 issue of the Socialist Standard

Vodka-Cola

I should like to express my appreciation for your letter of 11th November and the review of “Vodka-Cola” in the November issue of the Socialist Standard.

I also very much appreciate your positive comments on “Vodka-Cola”, which will be the core conflict of the ’80s between democratic socialism and authoritarian state capitalism.

I also appreciate your comments in the utilisation of the term “socialist” and the loose handling of “Marxism” in the text. I share entirely your definition of the USSR as an example of state capitalism -and not socialism. And, of course, the entire tenor and objective of “Vodka-Cola” is to confirm what you state that the means of production and the distribution of its output have now largely been accumulated by small elitist minority groups whose interests converge on the exploitation and the expense of the majority of the population, and especially those who relate to society through their earned incomes.

Charles Levinson

Geneva

Peru and England. A Comparison. (1912)

From the August 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

The world has lately been startled by the publication of sensational reports of the methods by which a British rubber company, operating in Peru, obtains its rubber.

The nauseating details which have found their way into the papers do not by any means exhaust the catalogue of atrocities inflicted upon the company’s Indian victims, or sap the infinite variety of the tortures used to terrorise these poor people into superhuman exertion in the collection of rubber ; nor do those widely publicised details touch the limits of ferocity laid bare in the Government Blue-Book.

This, however, is not meant in the sense of the degree of physical suffering involved, for it is inconceivable that the agonies of roasting the feet over a slow fire (as quoted by the newspapers) can be transcended, even where the torturers go the length of smashing up a man’s organs with a stick, or inserting burning brands in a woman’s body in a part which even a Blue Book only dares hint at. But these details which the British Press even cannot lift the veil on, add to all the other horrors some inkling of the filthy-mindedness that goes hand-in-hand with British capital, to win dividends for British Christians and the like.

It is not the purpose here, however, to treat the public to a recital of the sickening story of mutilation and murder reported by Consul-General Casement, but to direct attention to horrors no whit lees sickening which are mere everyday affairs much nearer home than the forest glades of Peru. Those who are so startled and shocked to find that the inhumanities which make the names of the old-time Spanish “conquerors” stink in the nostrils, still survive in British capitalism; those who are horrified to discover that the tale of the Congo has been re-written with but varied detail in the solitude of Western forests, those who have observed with pained surprise, the agonised convulsions of a harmless and innocent people being done to death in Southern America, transforming themselves into the sensational throbbing of rubber shares in Throgmorton Street at the time of the great “rubber boom,” do not need to throw their imagination half way round the world in order to find something to move their “bowels of compassion” or stir their righteous—very righteous—indignation.

As a matter of fact murder and brutality—like charity, according to the account of those who know all about it—begin at home. Not only, mark you, the murder of the Peruvian Indians, whose doom is pronounced in the London board rooms by silk-hatted directors and cosmopolitan financiers. We do not have to turn to the diocese of the Bishop of the Falkland Islands (who is now in England trying to raise funds to further the interests of British capital in Peru and the vicinity, instead of being in his diocese supervising the decent burial of the corpses British capital is providing there), one does not, I say, have to go to that Bishop’s diocese to find matter for “thrills” and “shocks.”

No, there is not one of the atrocities related in Blue Book Cd. 6266 that cannot be paralleled in the diocese of the Bishop of London, or in the diocese of any other English Bishop. There is not one page of this voluminous report, reeking with bloody tragedy, that might not have been made to carry as tragic and as bloody an inscription by any faithful hand that should have set itself the task of chronicling the history of any single day in any of the great manufacturing towns of highly civilised, free and Christian England.

Capitalism is very much the same thing in all its operations and in its every sphere of influence. What is good or evil under it is determined only but its result upon profits—by its effect upon ruling interests. Capital, as Marx says, comes into the world dripping from head to foot, from every pore, with blood and dirt. And one Dunning many years ago wrote :—

“With adequate profit, capital is very bold. A certain 10 per cent. will ensure its employment anywhere ; 20 per cent. certain will produce eagerness ; 50 per cent., positive audacity ; 100 per cent. will make it ready to trample on all human laws ; 300 per cent., and there is not a crime at which it will scruple, nor a risk it will not run, even to the chance of its owner being hanged, if turbulence and strife will bring profit, it will freely encourage both.”

So outrage is inherent in the system—nay, that is but half stating the case : outrage is the foundation and corner-stone of the system. The great primal outrage is the seizure by those who rule under the system, of every means by which men might support themselves in any form of independence. Upon that great, tragic outrage—the closing of every avenue of life against the worker, the whole system of robbery, violence and violation rests. And that robbery, that violence, that violation, is as complete, cruel, and shameful here in England as anything Consul-General Casement travelled so far to put on record.

Violation of Indian girls ! It is common enough in any factory district in England for girls to have to submit to the bestial attentions of their foremen and male overlookers. They have to choose between that and starvation. It is a fact well known to the employers, who do not interfere (as has been admitted) because it smooths the way to prostitution, which is the necessary adjunct to the low wages paid by the factory masters. It is a fact also well known and confessed by our legislators, as is proven by the provision made for its interdiction in a projected Bill.

In offices things are much the same, and in large drapery establishments every “encouragement” (such as locking the girls out in the street all night if they are not in by a specific time) is held out for their girl assistants to resort to certain means of augmenting their scant wages.

Notwithstanding that the method is differed the violation at home is as brutal and shameful as that in Peru. In the latter case the weapon made use of is physical force: in the former starvation In the one case the tormentor has possession of the woman’s body, in the other case of her means of livelihood. The compulsion is pretty complete in both cases.

We must not allow ourselves to be led astray by the old capitalist defence that “this is a free country.” The freedom of these girls to leave their employment is merely the freedom to starve. That is the freedom which belongs to every wage-slave. It is the freedom which followed naturally upon the enclosure of all land and the seizure of all the means of living. The capitalist has no need to hunt the forests of this country for workers : he has shut them out of the fields and forests, and left them only the freedom to starve. This freedom the capitalist would not interfere with if he could. It is the greatest asset he has. The slave has not got it, hence the slave must be fed, cannot be trusted with delicate machinery, cannot be speeded up to the requirements of the modern factory system. The lash never has been able to compel anything but the quality of labour most nearly approaching that abstract conception, the “purely physical”—it cannot induce the exercise of “gumption.” Only when the workers are free to starve, and liable to be thrown out on the street to do it, do they become fit and proper instruments for the economical manipulation of the modern machinery for producing commodities.

Hence the masters cherish the workers’ freedom to starve even more than do the workers themselves. It is the basis of all their exploitation, their standby in every difficult situation.

And similarly it is the basis of the whole awful position of the workers. Because this freedom is their only alternative, they present themselves for sale in the labour market. Because they have only the freedom to starve they face death in the mine and torment before the battle-ship’s furnaces. They give up their whole lives to unrewarded drudgery in sordid and bestial conditions, submitting to the vilest prostitution of their labour in the performance of slave tasks, all because they may starve if they don’t.

And at every turn they are offered the same alternative by which it is pretended the women may save themselves from violation, but which, nevertheless, cannot save any workingman from handing over his body, nay, his life, to exploitation, cannot afford one of them escape from a prostitution as vile (if we could only see it thro’ the unaccustomed eyes of the savage) as any that women are subjected to through their sex.

The other atrocities reported from the rubber districts all have their parallels in any capitalist country. The police brutality at Liverpool and Manchester and year ago, when scores of people of both sexes and all ages were maimed for life; the murders at Tonypandy, Belfast, and other places, the kicking of pregnant women quite recently at Canning Town, show very plainly that when it comes to dealing with resistance to their plundering, the master class know not the slightest difference between the Indians of Peru and the working class of England. Rubber is not more bloodstained than coals. Dying Indians are not more contemptuously thrown into the bush to expire than are our miners bricked up in the blazing pits to burn. The Waste of Indian life is no more extravagant than that of shunters on British railways, and callous brutality cannot anywhere outdo that displayed in certain capitalist hospitals, where healthy working-class children are innoculated with filthy diseases and reduced to noisome masses of corruption—because they are cheaper than calves. And where, in the whole of the Consul-General’s report, can a more stupendous crime, a more ghastly butchery, be found recorded than has been recently witnessed in the streets of London, where the shipping masters have deliberately set themselves to crush a hundred thousand men into submission by starving their wives and children ?

Let us be clear in our comparison. Let us get the true perspective. The Indians, the evidence in the report tells us, are so used to being flogged that they do not so much mind it. Let us make sure that our familiarity with the brutality of our daily existence does not blind us to its real horror. The Indians, while they have their forests, have to be hunted and captured. This, as we understand it, is illegal. But generations ago the workers of this country were captured by depriving them of their means of living. Hence if they won’t submit to the masters’ terms they are legally free to starve. It is this illusive difference in the aspect of the cases which blinds us to their essential similarity. Under the cloak of legality the workers of the whole civilised world are enslaved and starved and bludgeoned and raped to satiate the lusts of a parasite class, and when we see our own condition reflected in a savage race, and only revealed because the savage, having his means of livelihood in his native wild wood, has to be exploited by “illegal” means, we are astonished and shocked.

The only remedy, both for ourselves and for the Indian, is to take away from the capitalists the means of life and make them the property of the community, first capturing the political power by which they hold their sway.

A. E. Jacomb

Editorial: Dockers Betrayed. (1912)

Editorial from the August 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

For ten weeks the London Transport Workers have been out on strike ; not for fresh demands, but merely to retain what they had “won” last August. Sir Albert K. Rollit, the Lord Chief Justice, and Sir Edward Clarke have “awarded” them various increases, but the employers have simply ignored them.

Last August the Dockers had a splendid opportunity. The Carmen, Railwaymen, and the Provincial, as well as the London, Dockers were out. Yet immediately Sir G. Askwith, Burns, Masterman, and Buxton had signed “terms of settlement” they were ordered back to work.

The leaders babbled of a glorious victory, and gloated over the fact that not a penny of strike pay was distributed ; but not one of the “advances” ever saw the light.

The Transport Workers, like most workers, are ignorant of science. They merely wanted the agreement “honoured” and looked no further afield. Their ignorance is reflected in their choice of “leaders.” Did they understand their real interests the Tilletts, Goslings and Wilsons would long since have been unemployed. The Strike Committee ordered a national strike, but when the unions affiliated to the Federation (who had never been consulted) refused to comply, the worth of the democracy and leadership of the Federation was seen.

During the ten weeks the Government were not idle. They drafted thousands of armed as well as mounted police into the strike area, sent gunboats into the Thames, and mobilised reserve men all over the country. Hundreds of soldiers were sent to places like Grays and Tilbury. Mr. McKenna boasted that they had supplied more police protection for blacklegs than any Government before. The result was that ships were loaded and unloaded despite the strike.

The Shipping Federation raked up blacklegs from all parts. They swore they would never give in. They organised a system of pooling liabilities, and laughed at the men because they had the Government behind them. They knew they could flout the men while the police and soldiers were at their command.

The Dockers hoped great things from the nationalising of the organisation of the Docks. When the Port of London Authority was established they thought casual labour had gone for ever. Instead it has increased. A leading member of the Government went from the Board of Trade to the Chair of the Authority, and has shown himself as callous as any Tory, not even excepting the late tyrant of Penrhyn.

Liberals and Tories alike have engaged in the calculated starvation of the men and their families. Meanwhile Labour Members stood cheek by jowl with Lord Devonport, watching the Fleet from the deck of the “Armadale Castle.” And while starvation grew apace on the banks of the Thames, Asquith and Redmond talked of Home Rule on the banks of the Liffey. They played he game of the masters. Every suggestion, therefore, met with the firm refusal of the employers. They had evolved their scheme and it did not include surrender.

The fearful sufferings of the toilers could not be surpassed in any age or clime. Radical “Reynolds’s” (July 14) says: “Little children of the East End dying like flies. Mothers starving.” It goes on to quote Father Ring, a local clergyman, thus:

“Bad as the conditions were a fortnight ago they are unfortunately worse now. Landlords are fixing eviction orders on the houses, and this is driving the poor people almost mad. Not only is the East End racked with hunger, not only has every stick of furniture been pledged in many instances, but a new horror is at hand. The matron of a local lying-in home told me that seven babies born in the institution during the strike period had died, in her opinion entirely through the pressure of the strike. Having parted with every stick of furniture, mothers have been unable to provide themselves with the nourishment necessary for the preservation of their own health and the lives of their infants.”

The strike leaders played the game in the usual style. They told the men funny stories, prayed to God, boasted, foamed and bounced. Right up to last Saturday afternoon they told the men to stand firm and assured them they were winning. But when the union funds were gone, when the leaders had led their dupes into a cul-de-sac, they scuttled.

The leaders met at the “Royal Hotel,” Mile End, and announced the strike over. They issued a manifesto calling upon the men to return to work. The manifesto reads like the usual betrayal. The men were ordered back to work unconditionally, but they were never consulted about it. The Strike Committee declare that all agreements must be maintained in their entirety. This in spite of the fact that the employers have definitely refused to carry out their side. It means the men are ordered to do all the giving and the masters are to do all the taking. The former are to go back to work at the complete mercy of the Shipping Federation. Being without funds in their union, the masters know they can’t resist. So for a start they have told the men that they must sign on as casual workers, not as permanent men.

No wonder 30,000 strikers in Southwark Park voted unanimously against return. Will Thorne, Ben Tillett, Harry Gosling, and Jack Jones were told to their faces by the strikers that they were traitors and turncoats, and that they had sold the men. The men in their rage tore down the notices declaring the strike at an end, and demanded a ballot; but heedless of the men’s anger the Strike Committee met again and reaffirmed their unanimous decision declaring the strike off and ordering the men back to work.

Though many of the latter may still stand out, the official order to go back will no doubt, have the effect of smashing the strike, so that the leaders who have done the masters the good service of depleting the unions’ treasuries, at the end of the chapter of tragedy have done them another excellent turn in the capacity of strikesmashers.

Slowly but surely, by twos and threes and at odd times, the men will present themselves to be humiliated by the masters.

Yet the leaders have not yet exhausted their effrontery, for with an almost cynical touch they wind up their manifesto with the statement that the Transport Workers’ Federation is “the workers’ only hope.” Could deception be more glaring ?

The men must drive these misleaders from their present position. They must learn the lesson of the class struggle ; they must insist upon democracy. The small power of strikes and the mighty political power of the masters must be realised ere victory can be won. The fight must be waged, not around agreements and recognition, but upon the question of whether slavery shall continue.

The workers then will have no use for Compulsory Arbitration and Emigration advocates like Ben Tillett, and Bottomley’s friend, Liberal candidates like Harry Gosling, and Tory gold candidates like Jack Jones of Camborne will again have to flit by the back door.

Aphorisms of Socialism: [III.] (1912)

From the August 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

Link to Aphorism II.

Being an explanation of the Declaration of Principles of the S.P.G.B.

Aphorism III.

This antagonism can be abolished only by the emancipation of the working-class from the domination of the master class, by the conversion into the common property of society of the means of production and distribution, and their democratic control by the whole people.

The arguments which were used to support the previous clauses really left little to be said to establish this. It having been shown that the antagonism of interests arises from the ownership by the master-class of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth, it follows that until those means and instruments cease to be possessed by the capitalist class the antagonism of interests must continue to exist.

So long as the means of life belong to a class, that class must be in a position of privilege; and its interests as such must necessarily be different from, and in opposition to, the interests of the class who are without privilege. The reason for this is that the privilege is based upon the possession of something which is vitally necessary to the latter class.

It is this necessity upon which the whole social structure, in its present form, hangs. The only way open to the non possessors to live, so long as the privately owned means of life are adequately guarded, is by selling their energy to the possessors. To enforce such sale is the sole object of the private ownership of the means of living by a section of society, and this necessarily places them in antagonism to those whom they coerce into wage-slavery.

It is quite clear. then, that if we wish to abolish the antagonism of interests and the class struggle existing in society to-day, we must reverse the condition which gives rise to it. We must reduce the varying and opposing interests to a common and identical interest.

This cannot be done by making the interest of the workers the same as that of the master class, for that is an exploiting interest, and then there would be no one to exploit—in other words, we cannot all be employers. Neither, of course, can we all be employees. So the only way is to find a new position for both classes.

The way out of this is, according to our aphorism, by the conversion of the means of production and distribution into the common property of society of the means of production and distribution.

This would at once strip from the master class all the powers by which they hold their privileges, and it would at the same time strike from the workers’ limbs the shackles which bind them to their slavery. It would equalise, in all matters relating to the enjoyment of the social wealth and services, all the units of society.

To-day the vast majority of men must work for wages because they have no other opportunity of gaining a livelihood. If they go unbidden into the fields to dig, or into the factories to spin and weave, they are charged with trespassing or worse. But take away from the possessing class the ownership of the means and instruments of production and distribution, make them the common possession of the whole community, and immediately they become accessible to the whole community. The avenues of life then are open once more to all those who are willing to pay the natural price of existence – the cost in effort, in expended energy, of the means of subsistence.

But it does more than this. When it sets the workers free from the necessity of selling their labour-power it extinguishes utterly the opportunity of the master class to live without working. No longer can they lock, bolt, and bar the gates of the world against a section of society. So, being unable to purchase labour-power, and unable, from lack of means of production, to exploit it even if they could purchase it, there could exist only one means of living open to them  – they would have to work.

Make no mistake about it, when you strip the master class of their possessions you blot out every vestige of class distinction between them and the working class. Such class distinction does not attach to them as human beings but as owners of property. It is an attribute of property, not of humanity. Even to-day we see that when one of the master class loses his property he loses his class distinction and his class privilege. And if he loses his wealth to his butler or his gardener, his class distinction passes with his fortune to his menial.

So the conversion of the means and instruments of production into the common property of society will not only emancipate the working class. It will also dethrone the ruling class and make them one with their erstwhile slaves. With the abolition of classes the antagonism of interests ceases to exist. Standing upon the common ground of undifferentiated units of society, the interests of all must concide. That interest, on the economic plane, will be to satisfy as many social needs as the general opinion holds to be worth the cost. This, of course, resolves itself into the economical expenditure of labour power. This, then, would become the common interest of all the members of the community, displacing the antagonism of interests which prevails in society to-day.

A. E. Jacomb

Jottings. (1912)

The Jottings Column from the August 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

“It is astonishing to the ‘businessmen’ to find how ‘practical’ the ‘Socialist dreamer’ is when he is on public committees. His ideas nearly always work out best as ‘business propositions.'” 

The above is culled from the columns of “Justice” (29.6.12) in order to give wider publicity to the self-condemnation of the B.S.P. which is therein contained. Any comment would spoil it.

* * *

The Anti-Socialists are fond of indulging their vivid imaginations by weaving tales to the effect that ability is bound to make its way while competition prevails, and that under Socialism talents would cease to be used for the common good because of “a lack of incentive.” How ability is rewarded under the existing order may be judged from the Civil List Pensions for any year.

Take the financial year closing March 31st, 1912, for instance. There are 17 awards to 19 persons, total amount, £1,200 per annum. Eight of the persons whose qualities are the basis of award are still alive ; three of these have been awarded their pensions on account of ill health and necessitous circumstances, and of the remaining eleven awards to dependents of well-known workers in the realms of the graphic arts, literature, research, and science, eight receive their pensions because of “reduced circumstances,” “inadequate means of support,” necessitous circumstances and “ill health.”

Of course these 19 cases are only an infinitesimal portion of the vast number where talent fails to get its due reward under capitalism.

Professors Tyndall and Huxley for a large portion of their lives were very poor, Herbert Spencer had to struggle long with poverty, and Karl Marx had to depend upon the kindly aid of Engels. A rather striking illustration is the case of Colonel Robert Hume, R.E., a brilliant officer, who, according to Sir William Butler, “was finding brains and knowledge, geographical and other, for Ministers and Statesmen whose names figured largely in the European congresses that preceeded and followed the Russo-Turkish War. He frequently sat late into the night at home, working a sewing machine to keep his children in clothes.”

This was the man who “coached” the Ministers in charge of foreign affairs at the time of the Russo-Turkish War, 1877.

Talk about “the reward of ability” and “incentive to gain” ! Ye gods !

* * *

By an error, in the paragraph in last month’s issue dealing with the B.S.P. and the St. Rollox bye-election, the word “Liberals” appeared instead of “Tories.” This will be sufficient intimation to those readers who know the old S.D.F. policy of “voting against the men in office”.

* * *

Substantiation of the Socialist explanation of the why and wherefore of war is to hand in the comments of the “Daily Telegraph” (11.7.12) on Sir E. Grey’s speech on the relations between England and the foreign powers. I could not, for instance, add much to the following :

“The solid truth—if only it could be realised abroad—is that we have no vaulting ambitions or schemes which can run counter to the aspirations of neighbours unless these aspirations are essentially inimical to our welfare. The real rivalry of nations in this generation is the rivalry in commerce.”

* * *

The “Manchester Guardian” (8.7.12) also assists in the confirmation of our contention that wars to-day are fought in the economic interest of the capitalist class. Dealing with Mr. J. W. Graham’s book “Evolution and Empire” it says :

“With remorseless logic Mr. Graham traces the economic interests moulding Imperialism and enforcing a policy of armaments as an instrument in this sordid game. He shows how the loan-monger, the concessionaire, and the investor become more and more the directing influences in foreign policy, utilising for their profitable ends the ambition of politicians and sentimental patriotism of the peoples. . . . The pressure of surplus goods and surplus capital for foreign markets is everywhere at work making history. . . . Nothing that Mr. Graham can say about the waste and folly of modern warfare disposes of the fact that it may pay, or seem to pay, powerful interests within the several nations to expose these nations to risks and sacrifices of unknown magnitude in order to gain their private profitable ends.”

This is plain speaking.

* * *

When some of us have criticised the B.S.P. from evidence appearing in “Justice,” exception has been taken to the evidence on the ground that “Justice” is not the official organ of the party. The first number of the official organ of the party is to hand, and judging from the report of an Executive Council meeting held July 8,1912, the same confusion repudiated in “Justice” is to figure as officially certified. Take this as a sample:—

“Some correspondence and a resolution were read announcing the intention of the Aberdeen branch to attack the I.L.P. locally: decided to write the branch that such action was contrary to the decision of the Conference to send fraternal greetings to the I.L.P., and the branch must refrain from such action or withdraw from the Party.”

Which makes the “Appeal” leaflet of the B.S.P. lie when on page 3 it says :—

“The British Socialist Party, therefore, refuses to consider any reforms as beneficial which presuppose the continuance of poverty.”

For in so far as the I.L.P. stand for reforms which are only necessary because of a continuance of poverty, to that degree do the B.S.P. acquiesce in the workers being misled when they prevent their branches opposing the fraudulent campaign of the I.L.P.

* * *

Take also the matter dealt with on page 3. (“Bye-Election Policy.”) :—

“Consideration was therefore given to the bye-election proceeding at Holmfirth, but in view of the presence of the Labour candidate and the absence of any branches in the division, it was decided to take no action.”

From which it can only be assumed that the B.S.P. is unnecessary since it is not to oppose Labour candidates and the I.L.P. Especially is one driven to the conclusion that the B.S.P. is entirely superfluous when one considers that it is “a union of Socialist (!) forces which have hitherto been divided on method and detail” (“Appeal,” page 1). For if the I.L.P. is reckoned a Socialist organisation by the B.S.P., and its method and detail have not altered, why the B.S.P. ?

J. B.

Correspondence. (1912)

Letters to the Editors from the August 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

F. S (Queensland). — As all the laws, including “eminent domain,” are accepted, or made, and enforced by the capitalist class through their control of political power, it is evident that when it suits the interest of the capitalist class as a whole (or the majority thereof), they will be quite prepared to take over any industry from its particular owners and run it to suit themselves.

This has been shown in the case of the Post Office and Telephones.

Probably compensation would be paid, though this is only distributing the burden on the whole capitalist class by way of taxation, instead of letting it fall on the particular capitalist.

(2) Probably most of the anxiety on the part of many scientists to deny the term “materialist” applied to themselves is due to snobbishness and conceit. A “materialist” is usually looked upon as a “vulgar” or “low class” person, or something worse. Hence the haste of the scientist, who wishes to stand well with “society,” to repudiate any suggestion that he is a materialist. Hence also the hair-splitting and attempts to find infinitesimal shades of difference in the descriptions of what are at base he same set of facts.

When to this is added the fact that many of them depend directly upon the capitalist class for their living, it will he easily understood that they do not care to offend their employers.

J. F.

W. Ward (Watford). — Our declaration of principles embodies the minimum points on which the Socialists can unite. The class struggle in society so clearly recognised in our principles is repudiated by the actions of the B.S.P. Realising that the interests of the Liberal and Tory sections of the master class are opposed to those of the working class, Socialists can never ally themselves with or support those parties, but must ever oppose them. What other word, then, but “treachery” describes the advice given by the B.S.P. to the workers during the St. Rollox and S. Hackney bye-elections, urging them to vote for the Tory party ? You say the B S.P. is opposed to compromise, but their actions belie you. You say they believe in getting Socialism “in portions, which in due course must mean the whole,” showing again that they do not accept the class struggle as their guiding principle, for Socialists know that the masters’ interests being opposed to ours, they will not give us Socialism “in bits.” Socialism will be established by the working class when they control political power. Our work then is to convert the workers to the Socialist policy. Those who delay that conversion by leading the workers into the masters’ camp must be opposed. The “unity” of jingoes like Blatchford and Hyndman, Liberal vote-catchers like H. Quelch and Thorne, and Syndicalists like Leonard Hall, is not Socialist unity but Anarchist confusion.

Ed. Com.

T. Sawyer (Balham) and E. J. Higgins(Philadelphia) — Next month.