Letter: Our attitude on Hungary (1957)

Letter to the Editors from the February 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our attitude on Hungary

Salford, 7,


December 18, 1956.

Dear Comrades,

I think the Party’s attitude on this subject needs further elucidation. In this month’s S.S. it is considered that the revolt is not worth the shedding of a drop of working-class blood.

This seems to conflict with previous statements that the Hungarian workers were trying to improve their miserable condition. In my view it also differs from the position on the first Russian revolution recently quoted in “50 years ago.” There it was stated that the workers and Capitalists have a short way to travel together. But not in Hungary!

In any case it needs to be made clear what the workers are supposed to do under a Communist dictatorship. It won’t be smashed without the shedding of working class blood; and there won’t be any Socialism or even propaganda for Socialism till it is smashed.

It has often been said that the Capitalists will never let themselves be ousted but if defeated on the Parliamentary field would form a dictatorship. I should have thought the original success of the Hungarians against their own national dictatorship (before overwhelming Russian intervention) was a good case for the Party in that respect. I think it also might have been mentioned that the working class, even those who had been schooled only on “Communism,” showed that objective conditions still prevailed over ’phoney propaganda.

In general I did feel the S.S. was less than generous to the heroic effort which wrested power, “with bare hands” from a police state.

Yours truly,

L. E. Weidberg.

Having said the above, may I add that the general excellence of the articles in the S.S. over the years is not unappreciated by one who has left the work to others.

Reply

The article in the December S.S. to which the critic refers made it clear that, whilst expressing sympathy with the victims of the “Communist” savagery, the Hungarian revolt was fundamentally a movement in favour of Hungarian Capitalist rule, and therefore was not worth the shedding of a drop of working class blood. One reason for this is that the removal of Russian Capitalist oppression is no guarantee that Hungarian Capitalist rule would be any better in the long run.

We have learnt from experience during the last 50 years. We were urged to support the Russian armed rising against the Czarist Police State 40 years ago. The result of that rising has been the establishment of one of the most savage and oppressive police states in the history of the world. We were urged to support the German rising about the same time and the result was another form of police state equally savage. Austria and China have had similar experiences.

However much we may desire to see freedom of expression where it is denied, armed uprising is not the way to accomplish it. Once guns enter into the dispute then guns continue to be be arbiters in internal clashes of ideas afterwards, until either economic development or organised working class action compels the powers that rule to make concessions. That has been the lesson repeatedly driven home, but not wholly appreciated, during toe last 100 years of working class activity. However much we may desire to make progress there is no quicker way than this organised working class action to clear the road to working class emancipation.

Thus, although we appreciate the courage of those who were prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice rather than continue to suffer Russian domination, it is our duty as Socialists to tell the bitter truth. Firstly, that it was not a rising aimed at bringing toe workers freedom; secondly, that armed uprisings may bring a change of rulers but will not bring freedom from class rule; thirdly, that the success of toe uprising would not necessarily have put an end to the police state.

It is not true that there cannot be any Socialist propaganda until a “Communist” dictatorship is smashed. The critic himself suggests that there can be Socialist propaganda when he writes that “the working class, even those who had been schooled on 'Communism' showed that objective conditions still prevailed over phoney propaganda” The revolt was not a bolt out of toe blue. It had been discussed and organised. There is, and has been. Socialist propaganda in all “Communist” and other police states.

It is worth while bearing in mind that, according to the information so far available the peaceful agitation of the Hungarian workers by stopping work has accomplished more, at far less cost in human life, than the armed uprising did. Thus, it certainly appears that the sounder attitude for the Hungarian workers would have been to stick to that method from the beginning in order to accomplish the limited objectives they were after. Sooner than see the whole social fabric collapse into confusion the rulers would have conceded some at least of their demands. However, once an armed revolt was embarked upon bloody conflict was inevitable, with savage reprisals and the use of Russian armed might; and now the atmosphere is still there for further savage reprisals.

Another advantage strike action alone would have achieved would be this. Attacks on peaceful strikers by the police, the militia, and the army, would have made the savagery of the Russian overlords more obvious to the world of Labour. The Russian rulers would not then be able to pat forward the pretence that they were quelling an armed rising against the government.

We are surprised at the last paragraph of the critic’s letter. Over and over again we have expressed our admiration for the courage and devotion of those who took part in the rising; we have, however, been truthful in regretting that it was not done in a better cause, the freedom from all oppression. To be generous without being truthful is to invite cheap praise. We have done our best to be helpful to the working class cause by pointing out realities in order to minimise, as far as possible, useless heroism in the future. We are also mindful of the bitter fact that the victims of today are so often the oppressors of tomorrow.

The revolt did not, as our critic puts it “wrest power, ‘with bare hands,’ from a police state.” The repressive action from outside was a foregone conclusion, and the power remains where it was. Furthermore, the action was not taken “with bare hands.” A portion of the Hungarian army took part in it and arms were in the the hands of the revolters.

Finally, let us consider the reference to the extract from the Socialist Standard of “Fifty Years Ago” that appeared in the November number. It concerns the attitude of the Socialist movement in a country where there is a revolt against a particular form of repression. We would urge the critic to look at the whole extract again in order to get a clear picture of what the writer was driving at. We would particularly urge him to take note of the following selections from the extract:—

“Hence, in the other nations of Western Europe a straight fight is possible between the proletariat and the capitalist ruling class, whilst in Russia the rising capitalist class has yet its emancipation from autocracy to accomplish: so that, in contrast with practically the whole of civilised nations, the working class and the capitalist class in Russia have, in the abolition of Tzardom's tyranny, a step to go together. This historical circumstance, which is at once the strength and weakness of the Russian movement, distinguishes it from that of all capitalist countries." . . .

“ Let us then do all in our power to help our Socialist comrades in Russia in the hope that they will not be deceived as to the outcome of the present upheaval: in the hope. also, that they will sternly keep their separate identity, and distinct aim. so that the Russian bourgeoise State of tomorrow may find a militant class-organisation of Socialist workers leading the final struggle against the Capitalist class, whose defeat must herald the Triumph of Humanity."

It will be seen from the above that the struggle in Russia 50 years ago was to get rid of the semi-feudal barriers, and the Socialist movement there was urged to keep their independence and their Socialist policy. As far as Capitalist Hungary is concerned that is still the attitude for the Socialist to take. Socialists there, just as under autocratic Russia in days gone by, should stand by their Socialist objective and do what propaganda they can under existing conditions, just as, for instance, an Austrian comrade of ours did under the Nazi and Russian occupations.

Editorial Committee.

Notes by the Way: The Fabians and the House of Lords (1957)

The Notes by the Way Column from the February 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Fabians and the House of Lords

In the Socialist Standard for February, 1907, was an article about the Fabians which opened with a quotation:—

“ The government of the future will be by experts and we, naturally, want to be the experts."

This little gem had been spoken by Mr. H. Snell, of the Fabian Society.

The writer in the Socialist Standard had appropriate comments to make on this typically Fabian proposal for running other people's lives. He began:—

"So now you know, if you did not before, what the Fabian Society are after. Their ‘Socialism’ is government by bureau, and ‘naturally’ (sweet word) they want to be the bureaucrats. ‘Naturally’ they want the plums. ‘‘Naturally’’ they want to sit in the seats of authority and arrange things for the benefit (naturally for the benefit) of the other and somewhat lower orders who do the mere producing."

Our writer hit the nail on the head when he said the Fabians aimed to occupy the seats of authority and in the course of time many of them had their little hour in the Labour Governments, where they showed that their “superior brains” could no more cope with the chaos of Capitalism than could those they affected to despise, the political aristocrats and the business men.

One of the “reforms” supported by the Fabians was the abolition of the House of Lords. They came to be glad that they hadn't succeeded because it was to be a final refuge for a number of Fabians, including Sidney Webb (who wrote the Fabian tract demanding abolition of the Lords), and Attlee, and of course Mr. Snell, who became Lord Snell of Plumstead in 1931 just about the time two million unemployed were wondering how their Fabian trained leader had managed to get things in such a mess.

Macmillan Must Go!

If we were Labour or Communist vote-catchers we would be campaigning for “Macmillan Must Go!" and telling anyone silly enough to believe it, how successful we had been with our last campaign for u Eden Must Go!"

Since the S.P.G.B. was formed in 1904 there have been ten such campaigns for getting rid of a no-good Prime Minister. There have been rather more than ten governments because some of them, after being pushed, pulled or squeezed out have managed to get back again. When we survey the list we marvel at the rich variety. Scots, English, Welsh, and half-American (Churchill); spell-binders like Lloyd-George, and others who didn’t know how to gild the lilies of oratory; philosophical types like Balfour and Asquith and "plain, blunt men" like Baldwin;; semi-Pacifists and war-mongers; business men and professional politicians; the relatively poor and the passing rich; religionists and agnostics; aristocrats and commoners; Tory, Liberal, and Labour.

There are the differences: What of the similarities? They have all had a strange belief that the country was very lucky to have them at the helm. They have all come in generously promising how much better they will make life for the people and have all gone out little lamented.

And what difference has it made in the one thing that ought to be of paramount concern to the workers, the question of establishing Socialism in place of Capitalism? Just no difference at all. That job has yet to be done and it won't matter in the least whether the next Prime Minister who tries to administer Capitalism is Mr. G., or Mr. B., Mr. X or Mr. Y.

“Why We Left the Communist Party”

A group calling themselves the Nottingham Marxist Group, has issued an eight-page leaflet under the above title. As a criticism of the leaders of the British Communist Party from the standpoint of members whose confidence was first shaken by the dethronement of Stalin and then shattered by the Russian Army's onslaught on the Hungarian workers, it is effective enough. But that is all it is. In no way does it justify the claim that the group are Marxist in outlook. Indeed the limited range of their criticism clearly shows that they are not. Their case is against “the politically and morally bankrupt leaders of the Communist Party," but not against the idea of leadership and if it were not for their view that it is in practice impossible to change the leadership they would he working for new leaders in place of the old. They fail to see that a Socialist Party has no use or place for leaders.

They condemn various comparatively recent consequences of dictatorship in Russia and Hungary, but nowhere do they show an understanding of the fact that Socialism is incompatible with dictatorship. They do not explain how it was that they accepted the dictatorship and only woke up to some of its inevitable consequences at a late stage. Above all they do not square their claim to be Marxist with their tacit acceptance of the absurd belief that the Russian dictatorship is Socialism. This ought to have been the central theme of their declaration because every criticism they make stems from the fact that the social organisation in Russia and Hungary is and always has been Capitalism. They do now see that Socialism cannot be imposed by force and they quote from an American Communist journal:—“Socialism . . .  could not be imposed on a country by those means”; but they do not face up to the truth that that was the original, impossible, aim of the Communist group that seized power in Russia, and that dictatorship and a police state were the inevitable outcome of that attempt It was then that the Russian Communists “betrayed” the principles of Socialism, not at some later date, as the pamphlet would have us believe, when the “cult of leadership” was carried to such lengths as to endanger the stability of the dictatorship itself.

The Not-so-Stupid Tory Capitalists

The Hon. William Douglas-Home, writer of successful plays and unsuccessful Parliamentary candidate standing on one occasion as a “Progressive Independent," and on another as “Atlantic Charter" candidate, wrote to the Observer (3 January, 1957) advising the Tories to apply in foreign politics the policy they have used so well at home. He described the latter as follows:—

“. . . they never seem to realise that a controlled withdrawal is precisely what they have conducted with considerable skill in domestic policy since the industrial revolution, and that to this policy, and to this policy alone, they owe their survival. Whereas any attempt to preserve the status quo would have resulted in either their total extinction or a revolution, or both.”

Strikes by Hungarian Workers

On January 13 the Russian imposed government of their Hungarian colony announced a new decree imposing the death penalty for a number of acts, many of which would in most countries be regarded as normal trade union and political activities.

The Manchester Guardian (January 14), quoting B.U.P. and Reuter despatches from Budapest, had the following:—

"The death penalty was introduced in Hungary today for anyone calling a strike, damaging factory machinery, or committing  'any kind of offence directed against the State.’ The death sentence could be ordered for distributing leaflets, or for entering a government factory without permission, according to the new regulations, announced in a supplementary paragraph to the martial law declared in December."

The News Chronicle and other newspapers gave similar versions. Only the Daily Worker (January 14) managed to twist this new decree almost out of recognition. They left out the reference to strikes and reported it as:—

“ Death sentences may be imposed on people who ‘ sabotage or interfere in any way with public utilities and other essential enterprises'. "

But if the Hungarian workers in Hungary may now be hanged for striking, Hungarian refugees in Britain have shocked a lot of people by refusing jobs offered to them and by coming out on strike. The Sunday Despatch (January 16) reported:—

"Eighteen refugees walked out of their jobs at St Albans because they were dissatisfied with their pay. They were receiving an average of £7 a week as cooks, waiters, carpenters and farm workers. Mr. G. P. Bannister, manager of the Employment Exchange at St. Albans, said: ’They expected £14 or £15 a week. Most of them want to go to America or Canada'. "

This sort of conduct will get the Hungarians disliked by the employers and before we know where we are we shall hear the Hungarians denounced as unwelcome agitators. Being spirited in demanding the right to strike in Budapest is not at all the same as continuing to behave like that here.

But British workers ought to be delighted that the refugees do not intend to become a source of cheap and servile labour. And if the incident makes British workers more assertive in trying to raise their wages so much the better.

Exodus to Canada

And while the Hungarians pour in the Britishers pour out as fast as they can, Canada-bound for preference. Rhona Churchill, in the Daily Mail (January 8, 1957), made inquiries and these are her conclusions:—

“ Emigrant applications at Canada’s London and Liverpool offices have now reached 20,000 a week.

John Bull Taxpayer has had enough.

Emigration figures had been falling off. Then suddenly the Butler austerity Budget of October, 1955, doubled the numbers, calling at Canadian immigration offices, the Macmillan squeeze Budget of April, 1956, trebled them, and Suez, with its promise of more Budget austerity three months from now, increased them sixfold.

A quarter of a million Britons, tired of being told for ten austere years: ’Belt-tightening today means prosperity tomorrow,' and, finding that tomorrow never comes, are now actively organising their escape, believing that Britain has no sound financial future to offer their children."

But while the exasperated British workers flee from the rigours of “Welfare State" Capitalism to seek paradise in Canada the Canadian Railwaymen were on strike because they too have grievances against their “free enterprise” Capitalism.

Profits and the Ugly Head of Politics

For a century or more business men, stock exchange speculators and economists have recurrently dreamed of a beautiful world in which Capitalism would function “naturally” without being disturbed by politics. The latest is Mr. A. G. Jenkins, City Editor of the Empire News (January 3,1957).

’’So much for the short-term view. Dividend limitation, nationalisation, confiscation and many other 'ations’ loom ahead when politics rears its ugly head, and for the moment this may discourage buyers of industrial ordinary shares."

Mr. Jenkins thinks Capitalism would be nicer without the serpent of politics and other “ations.” He should think again. If there were no political machine to be controlled by the politicians bent on keeping Capitalism going, our class divided society would disintegrate. One “ation” would, indeed, be taken away, but Mr. Jenkins would not be pleased for it is “exploitation," and if there were no exploitation of one class by another there would be no rent, interest or profit, no Stock Exchange, and no City Editors.

Over in Bombay the great Indian iron and steel concern of the Tata Company knows better. They don’t want to rule out politics; on the contrary they have just appealed successfully to the High Court for the right to make contributions to political party funds.

"Mr. Justice Tendolkar allowed a petition by the company for confirmation of alteration in its memorandum enabling it to make such contributions. He said that expenditure by way of donations to political parties could in the long run be economic.

”The petition said the company was at present carrying out a Rs. 750m. (£57m.) expansion programme and any further expansion would depend on Government approval. The company’s prosperity was therefore bound up with the policy of the party in power.”

(Financial Times, 12th January, 1957). 

The Indian Capitalists, who used the nationalist movement to establish themselves as a Capitalist India, learned all the tricks and devices of Capitalist rule practised by the British ruling class.

The Communists and the S.P.G.B.

Letters written to the Daily Worker by members of the S.P.G.B. have been refused publication recently. This is not in itself surprising but the reason given deserves comment. A letter from the Editor, J. R. Campbell (October 10, 1956) included the following:—

“It is true that the Daily Worker does not propose to publish letters dealing with insignificant political bodies like the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Our space is precious and we have to devote it to more important questions.” 

We can imagine the indignation of the Communists if, say the Daily Herald were to give the same reason for not publishing their letters. And of course we can guess that J. R. Campbell (responsible recently for the suppression of reports from Budapest by its own correspondent) may have other reasons for not wanting the Marxist case against his party to be put before his readers.

One small point about Campbell’s letter is that he addressed the S.P.G.B. member as “Dear Friend” and ended it “with best wishes.”

Another letter (January 7, 1957), this time signed “with all good wishes” by the Assistant Editor of the Daily Worker, Mick Bennett, informed our member that “the role and influence of the S.P.G.B. has declined over the years largely because of its conscious deliberate policy of remaining a small sect devoted largely to the theory that until all the working class have been sufficiently educated in Marxism they will not be able to get rid of Capitalism.”

This implies that the S.P.G.B. used to have more influence and was therefore worthy of the notice of Communists but, except on very rare occasions, the Communist Party has always maintained the policy of ignoring the S.P.G.B. and declining debates. But the official reason given for this in the early days was that there was no time or place for discussion because revolution, here and in the world generally, was "just around the corner.” Privately members of the C.P.G.B. were advised to keep away from discussion with the S.P.G.B.

Bennett's letter (in the last sentence quoted above) re-iterates the Communist’s case that Capitalism could be got rid of in speedier ways than by building up a movement of Socialists. What a pity we can't have from him his explanation of the total failure of Communist governments in Russia, Hungary and elsewhere, to get rid of Capitalism and introduce Socialism.

Brotherly Love from a Christian

A reader sends us an article by Pastor W. W. Kirkby. published in the Elim Evangel (December 8, 1956), called “Ambitious Russia,” which sets out to describe the imperialist aims of the Russian Government; including, so the writer says, the conquest of Israel as a main objective.

It is full of the common misconceptions about the social system in Russia (the writer of the article thinks it is Communism and that Marx was responsible for it), and about the driving force behind the Russian Imperialism (the writer naturally fails to recognise that it is like the imperialism of the rest of the Capitalist powers).

One interesting item is an alleged quotation from Karl Marx in which he is made to say that as “loving my neighbour” has not changed the world, “let us see what hatred can do.” (No source is given).

But just to show how different the Christian and his God are the article ends:—

“Four thousand years ago God declared to Abraham, the father of the faithful: 'I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee.'

. . . That principle has been carried out right down the years, and in the future God’s curse is to fall upon atheistic and ambitious Russia.”

Edgar Hardcastle

The "Prosperous" Working Class (1957)

From the February 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are often told by people who do not really understand its meaning, that poverty no longer exists. Largely they mistake poverty for destitution, and think in terms of pre-war days of dole-queues, hunger marches, and the general hardship suffered from not being able to afford sufficient food, clothing and shelter.

Workers who feel secure in their jobs at the moment must bear in mind that the era of full employment was started by the last world war, when a vast amount of industry was smashed up, and the world market at the end of it had six years dearth of consumer goods to make up, and, all the while, massive preparations have gone on for World War III.

If our measure of prosperity is to be that we have all got "jobs,” it still leaves Capitalism, with a great deal to answer for. In the first place, our jobs are not really “ours ” at all, because they can be taken away from us, and today, just as before the war, how long they last depends on how long our employers can sell, at a profit, the things we produce.

Neither poverty, nor destitution, has been abolished, and these evils of Capitalism only smite the useful people of society—the working class. Poverty is not something which depends on what Government is in power, it is a permanent condition of the wage-earning class.

Poverty can be recognised in the existence of hire-purchase; it can be seen amongst the crowds of window-shoppers looking in at the things they cannot afford; it is the reason why workers “save” for holidays, Xmas, clothing or furniture; why they live in low-rent homes; take out insurance against their old age; shop more in Brixton than in Bond Street; buy one necessary thing, and forego others; and generally live from pay-day to pay-day.

There are many other instances of the condition of poverty, but the above will be sufficient to take any heads from the clouds, in order to take a closer look at the world we workers “live’ in. Destitution is always a threatening possibility to wage-earners, as their only source of income is through finding hirers, and, as we shall see, all kinds of dire consequences can follow when the hired are dispensed with. The old age pensioners, the disabled, and the sick, ca still be found destitute, on the pittance doled out by the “Welfare State.” .

One example of the prosperity we are all supposed to be enjoying, comes from a report in the Daily Express of 15th October, 1956. In Sutton Coldfield, Warwickshire, the Chamber of Trade is starting a “Black Book” of customers who do not pay. “The idea is to protect traders from people who run up accounts at one shop, and then open accounts at others, when they cannot pay off the first In another town, housewives may be secretly investigated, and find it difficult to open accounts at a second shop, after exhausting credit at the first.” 

Mr. Raymond Broad, President of the Chamber said:—

“ Many people who formerly paid cash now want credit. Things are getting more difficult for traders."

" Some women in Axminster have been going 10 miles to Honiton, to run up new bills. But a woman who leaves her grocer, when he asks for his money, will find her new grocer more cautious,’ said Mr. Herbert Jeffery, Secretary of Axminster Chamber of Commerced."

We are sure to be told that people who cannot pay the grocer must be buying television sets or motor-cycles but, after 17 years of full employment, for workers to have to choose between paying the radio shop or the grocer, is poverty.

The Daily Express, a day later, carried an even more remarkable story. After we have been told, by Eden and others, of the terrible fate in store for "us,” if “we” lose the Suez Canal, the Express gives an account of what happened to the family of a reservist, who was called back while the Canal dispute raged. The income of Mrs. Bedford was "chopped from £14.16.0 a week, to 16/- for children’s allowances. Food ran out. Her three little daughters, Anne, aged five, Christine, three. Denise, two —began to fret, and then weep with hunger.” The mother “broke open the gas meter at her home in St. Paul’s Road, Middlesbrough. She was found out. Yesterday, she was conditionally discharged, on payment of 15/- costs. The electricity authorities have cut off the current, because she has not paid the last bill.”

It is indeed ironic that the same Capitalist State machine, which took the man away from his work, was responsible for cutting off his electricity, and imposing the Court costs on his wife. Even more remarkable, in view of the story of the Canal being vital to our survival, and the fact that we are told that the public own nationalised electricity.

The eventual allowance from the Army was £4 0s. 6d. per week, and, being a member of the working class, with no property income, Mrs. Bedford had “9d. left out of the allowance, after she had paid:—

Rent                  £1    8   9

Clothes on credit      £2    0   0 

Furniture, H.P. ... 11   0

Total                   £3 19  9

This woman had a child “ recovering from polio,” and “was expecting another baby.” Before her allowance arrived, she had taken sheets and blankets off one of the beds, and gone to the pawnbroker with them. “ He allowed me 18/-. With that, I bought bread, margarine, and milk, and gave them to the kids. They were ravenous.”

The fact that workers do not own the Empire, the oil, or the Country, is often tragically brought home. As the S.P.G.B. pointed out at its formation,“ the machinery of Government, including the armed forces of the nation, exists only to conserve the monopoly by the Capitalist class of the wealth taken from the workers.” (See clause 6 of our Declaration of Principles).

The last example we will give here, is of how the “benevolent” State treats wage-slaves from whom profits cannot be made, as they are too old. It is from a letter to the Sunday Graphic for October 14th, 1956:—

“There are large groups of humans, men and women, who suddenly cease to belong economically to the everyday world that swirls around them, almost over them. They grope and scheme for a little food, a little warmth, and, above everything else, a little security.”

The writer is a pensioner, aged 71, with a semi-invalid wife.

“ We receive a weekly sum of £3 18s. 6d., for all our needs. After budgeting for rent, gas, coal, and clothes, it leaves 6s. a day between us and starvation. And the dread of the winter is on us. The little extra something an old body craves in the winter, is beyond the few shillings needed for sheer necessities to keep alive.”

After going to a rally of the Old Age Pensioners’ Association, and listening to the speeches by the High Sheriff, a padre, and others, about what must be done, "Hope surged again,” and, after the collection was taken, “I trudged back home. My twopenny bus fare was in the plate. The heart and soul shrink from the dreary, hopeless future that stares bleakly at us. For how much longer now? Who knows? Who cares?”

As Socialists, we care about the poverty suffered by workers. We also know how long it will last. It will last as long as the working class are content to work for wages; for as long as they look for solutions to their problems within Capitalism.

Whilst a minority owns the means of production, and profit remains their goal, older workers, who have slowed down, will always have to make way for younger, faster ones. Consideration of human suffering and hardship is a luxury which Capitalism must always place as a poor second to profits. It is only with Socialism that the peoples’ needs will count first

When the means of production are held by society in common, the fruits of our social labour will be available for use. Goods of all kinds will be freely distributed without the barrier of money.

If only workers, young and old, would ponder the possibilities of this sure but simple solution, instead of allowing competing reformist parties to deceive them into the continued support of Capitalism, the misery, poverty, destitution, insecurity, and war threats, with which our whole lives are cursed at present, would be banished for ever.

Harry Baldwin

Who is the alien? The working-class view of the burning question. (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

Opportunity is a Fine Thing.

The recent world-stirring East End melodrama (in which provoking police agents seem to have pulled the strings) has afforded another opportunity to the capitalist platform, pulpit and Press to thunder against the “alien”. The pseudo-Socialist organisations and Press have, in their fear of losing supporters through this business, been profuse in their repudiation and condemnation of the “crime”, and in their praise of the armed forces in dealing with it. It is, as usual, left to the Socialist Party to point out the Socialist lesson, both with regard to the “crime” and the anti-alien agitation which it served to stir up.

On contemplating all the facts of this “mysterious anarchistic” display, the question rises uppermost in our minds: “Who are the alien impostors and criminals?” And the Socialist answer is – “the capitalist class”.

Why, the attempt to obtain property without labour is contrary to the very principles of Socialism, which insist upon labour for all and subsistence for all. But those who to-day are endeavouring to obtain wealth by filching – and with the aid of armed force into the bargain – are only carrying out the basic principle of capitalism to its logical conclusion.

Who is more honoured to-day than the successful thief, who filched millions from the product of other people’s toil? For his operations capitalist economists find such high-sounding names as “industry”, “foresight”, and “thrift”. And who is more despised and down-trodden than the worker, whose labour produces all wealth? His outrage and robbery, so long as it is carried on in the orthodox way (which converts the plunder into “rent, interest, and profit), is “legalised” by the robbers and supported by giant instruments of murder, while his aspiration to keep for himself the produce of his own toil, draws upon him every term of reproach and contempt.

Let us look back upon the record of the British Government for the last twenty years, and we shall see that the armed forces of capitalist society have been used again and again against unarmed, defenceless workers – men, women and children. In contrast to this, the modern burglar is up against the whole forces of the State, armed to the very teeth.

A Little Bit of History.

In September 1893, the Liberal Government, with Mr. Asquith as Home Secretary, sent soldiers to Featherstone, and striking miners were fired upon, some being killed and others wounded. (See Hansard, vol 17, pp. 1725-1726.) In 1894 the same Government sent a gunboat to Hull to help quell the dockers on strike in that town. In 1907 a Liberal Government again sent military with Maxim guns to Belfast, where a lock-out of dockers had taken place, and the police had gone on strike out of sympathy. In that instance again unarmed workers were maimed and murdered. And recently during a lock-out of Welsh miners, troops and police were sent to fight the masters’ battle for them, and once more wounds and death were dealt out to defenceless workers who wanted to enjoy a little more of the fruits of their toil.

Now if it can be shown that the capitalist class have obtained their possessions by robbery, that in the process of robbery thousands of workers’ lives have been sacrificed, and that in their effort to protect their ill-gotten gains they employ the armed forces of the State to butcher the workers, then it is proved to the hilt that it is the master class, and not the foreign workmen, who are the real aliens, the race apart from and antagonistic to, the people.

The last point has been sufficiently proved by the preceding descriptions of the British Government’s action during certain strikes and lock-outs. The first point is most fully and effectively established by Karl Marx, in his great work Capital, particularly in the historic chapters, which are based on documentary evidence in the British Museum. The second point, however, still requires substantiation.

And a Few Eloquent Facts.

Now according to Government statistics about 2¼ million members of the working class are annually in receipt of poor relief. That means that they are, to all intents and purposes, on the very verge of destitution. Over 200,000 workers annually meet with accidents (over 5,000 fatal) in the course of their employment, and most of these accidents can be traced to the want of life-protecting contrivances – which are not adopted by the master class because their cost would lessen profits.

In addition to this, many thousands gradually starve to death, for not all unemployed and destitute workers apply for poor relief. Thousands, too, die through over-work, bad housing, and insanitary conditions, or are driven insane by the awful economic stress of the present system of society.

So the Socialist allegation that capitalism spells the robbery and murder of the workers by an alien class is fully justified. And the workers in the East End, against whom the master class direct their epithets of “undesirable aliens”, dirty “foreigners”, and the like, and against whom they assiduously try to foster popular hatred, these workers form part of the army of the exploited. And as such they are received with open arms by the very class which, in order to cover their own plundering, attempt to direct popular anger and scorn against them, as the authors of working-class poverty.

Pocket Patriots.

When in 1905, during the debate on the Alien Bill in Parliament, an amendment was moved to keep the foreign workers out during strikes and lock-outs, the great mass of the members of Parliament, representing the vested interests of the capitalists, – the robbers living upon rent, interest, and profit – of course rejected the amendment.

The patriotism of the master class, like their professions of kindness, generosity, and magnanimity, is sheer hypocrisy. In the quest for profits all barriers are broken down, and the capitalist’s love of his country withers before a fraction percent on the yield of his capital. He has no scruples in the matter of displacing the native worker with the “alien”, provided that it pays him – any more than he hesitates to displace either with machinery, directly he can save wages by so doing.

We do not stand alone when we allege that the “alien” workers of the East End are even more completely robbed and worse treated, if that were possible, than the native workers. The Rev. Canon Barnett, of Toynbee Hall fame, writing in the Daily News of January 10th last on the “Sidney Street Lesson”, made the following statements:

“The great need in East London is that the people by receiving more respect should gain self-respect. They do not receive such treatment. The streets in which they live are not lighted or cleansed according to the standard which respectability demands. The second or third best in buildings or in entertainment are good enough for the East End, and Police Court humour and Police Court law, which most vividly represent the attitude of society, are often insulting. I doubt if it would have been possible for the police to have adopted in a West London Square, the methods they adopted in Sidney Street. Respect for the neighbours and neighbourhood would have prevented them from setting men to fire at and to burn two criminals in the open streets.”

A “Socialist” Adviser.

And what has Robert Blatchford, the jingo cat’s paw of gutter-press journalism, to say on that question? The following are from his article in the Weekly Dispatch of January 8th.

“Our wise and kindly British law was not made to deal with foreign Thugs of the twentieth century type . . . I am not discussing the existing law. I am only suggesting that the police should be legally empowered to deal with undesirable aliens immediately on their arrival at any British port. In all such cases as this, where the foreign police have warned our police against an immigrant, that immigrant should be sent to the right about turn at once. In cases of suspicion the immigrant should be detained and, failing a satisfactory explanation, should be deported.”

The above is not quote with a view to proving Mr. Blatchford to be an anti-Socialist of the worst type. His actions have fully exposed him, and very few people indeed can still believe him to be out for Socialism. His German war scare, his glorification of the Army and Navy, and lastly his present attitude on the “alien” question, show distinctly enough that Mr. Blatchford is ignorant of the very rudiments of Socialism. And that is not the most annoying feature. That which Socialists most resent is that the capitalist class should obtain from professing Socialists, advice as to measures of repression and persecution against members of the working class.

The whole Houndsditch spectacle looks as if it had been instigated by Russian police agents in order to create a popular clamour for legislation against “criminal” aliens, to the end that political offenders (especially Socialists) might have cut off their last means of escape from the savage vengeance of the knout and the appalling horrors of Siberia.

The capitalist press, pulpit and platform continually gloat over the apathy and indifference of the workers hailing from other countries to their own utter poverty, misery, and degradation, and whenever the dominant class make an attack upon the Socialists it suits their purpose to praise these “aliens” to the skies as splendid examples of “peaceable and law-abiding citizens”, On the other hand the master class, when it suits their purpose, ascribe the poverty of the native workers to the presence of “alien workers” in this country, or to the importation of labour products from abroad.

In short, it is the business of the capitalists to set one section of the working class against another in order to prevent them perceiving who are their real enemies. Hence the outcry against the “alien” which has followed upon the recent affray. But the development of the present murderous system is gradually revealing to the workers of all countries, that between worker and worker there can be no alienism, because there can be no alienation. They are bound together by the common ties of their class position – a common class interest. On the other hand, they have nothing in common with the master class, whose interests are everywhere opposed to theirs. Therefore it is the master class who are the aliens.

H. J. Neumann

So very orthodox ! (1911)

From the March 1911 issue of the Socialist Standard

So we are to have a Labour daily newspaper in London—in fact, and to be more exact, at the time of writing these words we have got it.

Fate, and kindly Fortune, spare the face of the present writer ! —who is quite innocent of wilful falsification in this connection. But inasmuch as “In the midst of life we are in debt,” mine will increase by the accretion of a two horse load of gratitude if the newcomer survives to prove me true, until these lines come before the eyes of my expectant multitude of intelligent and gentle readers. But even should Fate decide otherwise, at the time of writing we have got it.

Many things born into this world announce their arrival with sound, but few so understandably as the “Daily Herald,” which cries on the day of its birth : “We have arrived.”

Epoch-marking announcement ! An astonished world raises its cap in reverence.

“If,” the new-born pressling goes on, “we differ at all from the orthodox daily press, it will be in the fact that we shall give the correct position of affairs from day to day.” (The italics are not mine.)

There is something very refreshing about the modesty of that “If.” In these days of blatant self-assertion it does one good to meet with a little bashful diffidence. It has been charged against the SOCIALIST STANDARD (and, candour compels me to confess, not without grounds) that it somewhat aggressively flaunts the fact of its difference, in every respect possible to collingual printed matter, from the “orthodox daily press.” But the “Daily Herald” aspires to no such distinction of character—which the unkind call eccentricity. Not, of course, that it is an “Herald” angel, fearing to tread where we fools rush in.

The only point of difference, if any, between the “Daily Herald” and the “orthodox daily press,” we are forewarned, is in the matter of the presentment of “the correct position.” We know well enough what the “orthodox daily press” is, and, since we are left in doubt as to whether the newcomer is to differ therefrom, we will go together, gentle reader, in search of the “correct position,” in order to discover if the “Daily Herald” differs from the “orthodox daily press” even to the extent hinted at.

To begin at the beginning, we read, immediately under the first caption, the following :

What is this—the sound and rumour?

   What is this that all men hear,

Like the sound in hollow valleys

   When the storm is drawing near ;

Like the rolling on of ocean

    In the eventide of fear ?—

‘Tis the people marching on.

And at the end of the address “To ‘One and All'” thus poetically introduced, the “Herald” scribe soars to this Olympic altitude :

On we march, then—we, the workers,

   And the rumour that ye hear

Is the blended soul of battle

   And deliverance drawing near.

For the hope of every creature

   Is the banner that we bear:

50—48.

Shade of William Morris ! To think that his verses should have been rescued from oblivion and enshrined in such a climax as that ! “The banner that we bear: 50—48.” How sublime ! Who of us would not have made that deathless effort and have died ? With that heroic banner: 50—48, the people are marching on indeed, and it is well within the truth to describe it as “the hope of every creature”—though of course there are creatures and creatures. And how happily is the “sound and rumour” of it likened to “the wind in hollow valleys” and the “rolling on of ocean.” ! The simile is perfect. The empty windiness (or is it windy emptiness ?) is a real presence, and one can almost hear the “slop—slop —slop ” of the waves upon a slimy beach. “Deliverance drawing near : 50—48.” Ye gods, yes !

Between the pathos of the beginning and the bathos—-pardon, the swelling paean of the close, optimism runs riot. “If it is to be war,” it is declared, “well—

"We don’t want to fight

   But, by jingo, if we do,

We’ve got the men, we’ve got the spunk,

   And we’ll get the money, too ! ”

And later we read: “‘Ask and ye shall receive.’ Ye have asked—to be rejected. Very well, then, in the name of Christ, ‘KNOCK and it shall be opened unto you.'”

Here I would remind the reader again how like it is unto “the wind in hollow valleys” and “the rolling on of ocean.” Slop—slop—slop.

But this is clear : If the exhortation quoted above “differs at all from the orthodox” advice of the orthodox Press and Pulpit provided for us by a considerate and disinterested masterclass, it must be in the “capitalised” importance of the first word and the italicised emphasis of the fourth—for the rest is very orthodox.

So “KNOCK, in the name of Christ, and it shall be opened unto you” is the “correct position,” on the showing of the “Daily Herald” ; and the only difference between that paper and the “orthodox daily press,” after all, is a matter of a few “caps” and italics. We shall see.

Before we leave the introductory address we may note that it is said : “There is a Labour Party in the House, and it holds supreme power.” That, perhaps, is why, in this year of grace, those for whom the “Daily Herald” speaks have “got the spunk” to carry that glorious banner, the “hope of every creature,” the “deliverance drawing near : 50—48.”

In the 7th issue occurs this illuminating passage : “. . . belittle the effect of Trade Unionism upon character as you may, . . . the one great outstanding fact remains—it provides you [the masters] with men of stirling worth, disciplined with regard to certain rules of conduct, and ever ready, through their officials, to deal honestly and fairly with employers who are prepared to meet them on equal terms.”

That has the true, respectable ring about it. It is as orthodox as the blooming Prayer Book. And on the same page we read: “The interests of both employer and employee are so entwined that to rend asunder those interests means disaster for the dissenting party.” We can recognise here the old, old “Capital and Labour are brothers” axiom of the “orthodox daily press,” so it seems that even the latter can sometimes present the “correct position”—unless (perish the thought!) the “Daily Herald” is so far orthodox as to give a position which is not correct.

They make orthodox humour in the “Daily Herald,” as here followeth :

Imported “Weary Willie” (a machine minder) to layer on after the first week : —

“I eats well, I drinks well, I sleeps well, but when I sees a job of work coming along, I’m all of a tremble.”

A very neat little take-off of the lazy blackleg (who has committed the amazing error of taking on a job) on the part of those who love work so much that, as they say in another burst of boisterous merriment, they want to work 50 hours a week and the masters won’t let them. Again :

Man entering printing office to answer an advertisement ; he is dressed somewhat slouchy, with a choker round his neck. Inside he is met by a man in the warehouse, when the following query and answer ensue:

Warehouseman : “Empties ?”

Applicant’ “Empties be—— ! I’m not a ——carman ! ! I’m a machine minder ! ! ! ”

Note the subtle humour of this. The machine minder isn’t a union man, hence he is dressed “a bit slouchy.” Had he been a union man he would probably have supported the “dignity of sich” in a stove-pipe hat and spats, and have been mistaken for one of the masters. But the disreputable, not to say “slouchy,” blackleg—oh dear ! the excruciating humour of the wag ! —-was mistaken for a carman—perhaps a trade union carman ! And notice the indignation of the “imported” machine minder. Even he, in the depths of his degradation, and the miserable and hopeless apathy of his benighted, non-union condition, was not so bereft of all sense of what is due to the ancient and honourable profession of the machine manager (I must mildly protest against the gross familiarity of our humorist’s term, machine minder) but that he could find “langwidge” to resent the insult. I hope, for the sake of the “Daily Herald’s” aspiration to become a permanent “general Labour daily,” that the carmen will also appreciate the point.

It may be true—and probably is—that if the “Daily Herald” “differs at all from the orthodox daily press,” it is in the matter of the position presented ; or it may be that it does not differ even that much, (as would appear from the statement that the strikers do not want to stand in the way of the masters making fortunes : they want to help them !) but, for my part, I prefer the good old orthodox. Because, after all, if I must have all the vices of orthodoxy, at least let me have its virtues too.

Besides, in the “orthodox daily press” there is not quite so much of the “wind in hollow valleys” and rolling ocean’s “slop—slop—slop.”

A. E. Jacomb

SPGB Snippets: Are we slaves? (2026)

From the Socialist Party of Great Britain website

April 1, 2026

Referring to employment as wage slavery is sometimes seen as an exaggeration. After all people who work for a wage or salary are not owned by other individuals and their labour is not enforced by law and violence.

Capitalism is seen as providing freedom. But is it anything more than an appearance of freedom? While you are free to walk away from your job, you can’t walk away from the need to survive, the need for food and shelter. That’s what makes you a wage slave. The system holds you in place not with chains of iron as in the past but with chains of necessity. Only the cooperative, moneyless, free access society that socialists advocate will remove those chains.

Socialist Sonnet No. 229: Whither the Commonweal (2026)

From the Socialism or Your Money Back blog

Whither the Commonweal

Beyond flame, smoke and rhetoric of war,

Muffling hearing and dimming the vision

Of spectators lost to indecision,

Is there some greater purpose anymore?

Nothing’s resolved by strike and counter strike,

Disputation of sovereignty and borders,

The commonplace of following orders,

Whether with bow and axe, musket and pike,

Missile and drone, always the casualty

Is humanity. Victory or defeat

Figure in columns on the balance sheet

While profit’s the deciding reality.

There can be no leaders without the led

If they but choose the commonweal instead.

D. A.

Cooking the Books: Outdated measures (2026)

The Cooking The Books column from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Communist Manifesto was published on 21 February 1848. The Morning Star, the paper run by nostalgics for the former USSR, chose that date this year for an editorial headed ‘The Communist Manifesto is as relevant today as it was in 1848’. Yes, most of it is. It is a brilliant description and analysis of the development of capitalism, its role in history in bringing into existence a working class struggling against exploitation and to replace capitalism with a society based on the common ownership of the means and instruments of production. It remains today a good introduction to socialist ideas which those interested in understanding the society we live in should read.

However, it was not this part that the Morning Star considered ‘relevant today’ but the ten measures listed at the end of Chapter 2, which include: abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes; a heavy progressive or graduated income tax; centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly; centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state; extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; and free education for all children in public schools.

The Morning Star sees them ‘as a series of direct demands which challenge the material basis of existing society’, as reforms which the working class should campaign for under capitalism. But this is a misinterpretation as the context, both textual and historical, makes clear. The preceding paragraphs indicate that they were measures that the working class should implement after it had won control of political power. One of the measures — the ‘confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels’ — doesn’t make sense except in that context.

The historical context is the uprising that had broken out in Germany against autocratic dynastic rule. Marx and Engels thought that this ‘bourgeois revolution will be but the prelude to an immediately following proletarian revolution’. In other words, they were measures for the working class to implement on winning political control in 1848. This didn’t happen and, in exile in London three years later, Marx and Engels recognised that they had been mistaken and that this was never really on the cards. So the listed measures weren’t relevant even in 1848, let alone today 178 years later.

Some of them, such as a progressive income tax, a state bank, railway nationalisation, and free education, have since been implemented under capitalism; which rather undermines the Morning Star’s claim that they ‘challenge the basis of existing society’. In fact, that claim reveals that those behind it envisage existing capitalism being gradually transformed into state capitalism by a series of reforms and nationalisations.

But the killer quote that disposes of the Morning Star’s misinterpretation is what Engels wrote in the Preface to the 1872 re-edition:

‘The practical application of the principles will depend, as the Manifesto itself states, everywhere and at all times, on the historical conditions for the time being existing, and, for that reason, no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today’ (Our emphasis).

Today of course they would be even more differently worded, not that it would make sense to draw any up today since we don’t know what the conditions will be in which the working class will assume control of political power. But we can safely say that they won’t need to include any of those listed in 1848.

Preying on others (2026)

Book Review from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Hour of the Predator: Encounters with the Autocrats and Tech Billionaires Taking Over the World. By Giuliano da Empoli. Pushkin Press £12.99. (Translated by Sam Taylor)

The author was formerly an advisor to an Italian prime minister, a role which gave him the opportunity to meet various powerful people. Here he examines the actions of dictators and technology bosses; he describes many of them as Borgians, resembling Cesare Borgia, the fifteenth–sixteenth century Italian ruler who was renowned for his scheming and plotting. He sees political life as a comedy of errors, like an Armando Iannucci show such as ‘Veep’.

The main autocrat discussed is Mohammed bin Salman (MBS), the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia. In 2017 he summoned three hundred rich and powerful men to a posh hotel in Riyadh, where they were held hostage for various periods of time and, among other things, forced to pay a total of $8bn to fund MBS’s plans, which include a massive city powered by renewable energy, and a winter sports resort and floating port. The actions of Nayib Bukele in El Salvador are also discussed, but MBS really does seem to be a bit of a special case.

Da Empoli also sees artificial intelligence as a ‘Borgian technology’, as it can produce shock and awe. It is really a kind of authoritarian intelligence, transforming data into power. AI is not subject to regulatory control and ‘is in the hands of private companies that have elevated themselves to the ranks of nation states.’ Economic elites used to rely on political elites, but the new tech bosses wage war on the old political elites, preferring disruption and chaos. So AI is a political development, not just a technological one, for instance creating massive electoral databases of voters and their likely preferences.

And this is a world of violence, with global military spending increasing by 34 per cent in the last five years. Attack is now cheaper than defence, and an ‘era of limitless violence’ may lie ahead.

The book as a whole contains some interesting observations, but does not provide much by way of conclusions.

Paul Bennett

Halo Halo (2026)

The Halo Halo Column from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

Plans by the UK government to not go ahead with making Islamophobia an offence would appear on the surface to be a victory for common sense.

In March 2026 the government put in place a ‘non-statutory definition of anti-Muslim hostility.’ The government is adamant that this is an advisory, not legally binding measure and that free speech remains inviolate.

Internet AI says that this plan covers violence, harassment, and prejudicial stereotyping; it applies to individuals based on their actual or perceived Muslim identity; it will not hinder criticism of religion or beliefs, and a special representative on anti-Muslim hostility will be appointed to support implementation. How this will work out in practice remains to be seen. It will be greeted with relief by those expecting something more draconian but it still provides special measures for a specific religious group.

If you belong to a religion, which is the equivalent of an American Homeowners Association, filled with rules and regulations, then one of the cardinal rules is do not take the head honcho’s name in vain – or else!

Do that and you might find yourself getting stoned, and not in a good way. However, cursing those who follow and support a different honcho is positively encouraged.

‘Infamy, infamy, they’ve all got it in for me’ is a line from a 1964 Carry On film; ‘Blasphemy, blasphemy, they’ve all got it in for me’, doesn’t come within a light year of being as funny, but then blasphemy is certainly no laughing matter. And never has been. Merriam-Webster defines blasphemy as ‘the act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God or to something sacred’.

In modern times AI says that ninety-five countries, possibly more, still have laws that regulate blasphemy. In six countries, mainly in West Asia, the penalty for blasphemy is death. It was always thus because to attack the gods a group had brought into being was to try to undermine that society.

Thomas Aikenhead, a seventeenth century Scottish student, articulated the following statement: ‘Theology is a rhapsody of ill-invented nonsense, patched up partly of the moral doctrines of philosophers, and partly of poetical fictions and extravagant chimeras’. However, uttering these sentiments, or truths, resulted in his hanging at the year’s end of 1696. Aikenhead was the last person to be executed for blasphemy in Great Britain.

In 1977 a private libel prosecution for blasphemy was brought against Gay News and its editor. It resulted in financial damages being awarded against the defendants. In 1979 an appeal to the House of Lords against its conviction was lost. One of the judges hearing the appeal opined that blasphemy laws ought to cover all religions, not just Christianity, and would no doubt have liked to implement some medieval punishment against those who ‘cause grave offence to the religious feelings of some of their fellow citizens or are such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who are likely to read them.’

DC

SPGB April Events (2026)

Party News from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our general discussion meetings are held on Zoom. To connect to a meeting, enter https://zoom.us/wc/join/7421974305 in your browser. Then follow instructions on screen and wait to be admitted to the meeting.

Agency and responsibility (2026)

From the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

Controversy surrounded the 2026 BAFTA Film Awards, in which John Davidson, whose life with Tourette’s inspired the film I Swear, involuntarily vocalised a racial slur during the ceremony, thus generating predictable outrage. Social media rapidly framed the incident as an ‘outburst’, implying intent. The assumption of agency was immediate.

Yet Tourette’s syndrome involves involuntary vocalisations, particularly in cases involving coprolalia. Uttering socially taboo words is not a sign of personal belief but a neurological compulsion. Coprolalia occurs in approximately 10-15 percent of people with Tourette’s and involves the brain’s failure to suppress socially inappropriate utterances. The individual has no control over the content; the words that emerge are often those with the most shock value, precisely because the brain’s suppression mechanism has misfired.

Agency under capitalism

The episode offers a useful case study in how capitalist society understands, and misunderstands, responsibility. Capitalism rests heavily on the idea of individual responsibility. Workers are treated as autonomous units of labour power, assumed to be rational, self-regulating, and fully in control of their conduct. Discipline in speech and behaviour is expected as part of employability and public legitimacy.

Where agency is compromised, through illness, disability or neurological variation, this framework strains. Instead of adjusting its assumptions, society often reasserts them more harshly. The presumption of intent remains, even where medical explanation is well documented.

This reveals a contradiction. When an individual is able to conform, their conformity is praised as personal virtue. When they cannot, their difference is interpreted as moral failure.

The policing of speech

Modern capitalism places significant emphasis on regulated language. Public speech is increasingly scrutinised, not only in workplaces but in cultural life. While there are good reasons to challenge genuinely racist or abusive expressions, the framework often operates without regard to material context.

This is not an argument against challenging racist language. When someone with full agency chooses to use slurs, that reveals values and deserves opposition. The point is that agency itself must be established before moral judgment is applied. Treating involuntary and deliberate speech identically serves neither anti-racism nor disability justice.

The Davidson incident illustrates this tension. A word can be socially harmful in its historical weight and impact. But responsibility cannot be abstracted from agency. To treat involuntary neurological discharge as deliberate prejudice collapses an important distinction.

Capitalist society frequently commodifies ‘inspirational’ narratives of disability. Films, awards ceremonies and media profiles celebrate individuals overcoming adversity. Yet this celebration is conditional. It assumes that disability can be packaged into palatable form. When the unfiltered reality appears, tolerance evaporates. The disabled individual is accepted only so long as they remain manageable.

Outrage as commodity

The rapid reaction online was not incidental. Social media platforms reward immediacy and emotional intensity. Speed outruns verification. The platforms profit from engagement regardless of accuracy. A nuanced explanation of Tourette’s generates less interaction than moral outrage. The economic incentive is towards simplification and condemnation, not towards understanding the material reality of neurological conditions.

Under these conditions, moral judgement becomes performative. Expressing indignation is easier than examining neurological evidence. The result is a form of ‘gotcha’ politics that prioritises signalling over understanding.

The paradox of inspiration

Davidson’s presence at the BAFTAs was itself a product of an inspiration narrative, his life ‘overcoming’ Tourette’s packaged as cultural uplift. But inspiration requires disability to be sanitised, controlled, presented as triumph over adversity.

The moment Tourette’s manifested as it actually does, involuntarily, inconveniently, in a way that cannot be neatly celebrated, the sympathy fractured. This reveals what capitalism often means by ‘acceptance’: the disabled must perform their difference in ways that affirm rather than challenge existing norms.

Responsibility reconsidered

A socialist analysis does not abandon the concept of harm. Words carry histories; their impact is real. But an equitable response requires proportionality and context. If an action is involuntary, then moral condemnation is misdirected.

The deeper issue is the rigidity of a society that demands uniform neurological performance in public life. When responsibility is defined without regard to material capacity, it ceases to be rational and becomes punitive.

The BAFTA incident reveals a system that confuses control with virtue and compliance with morality. It treats neurological difference as character defect and involuntary behaviour as moral choice. A materialist analysis rejects this confusion and demands that responsibility be matched to actual agency, not to capitalist fantasies of the self-regulating individual.

Pablo

Proper Gander: Automation and occupations (2026)

The Proper Gander column from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

Reporter Richard Bilton is waiting on a sidewalk in Los Angeles as a couple of boxes on wheels trundle up towards him and then carry on past, with another one stopping by his feet. Lifting its lid, he finds the cheeseburger he ordered online, delivered by a robot rather than a human, and while he’s explaining this, a driverless taxi cab glides along the road, identical to one he tried out in San Francisco. Thousands of automated servants like these are already operating in several cities across America, with robotaxis scheduled to arrive in London before the end of 2026. In his edition of Panorama (BBC One), Bilton asked the question Will Robots Take My Job? and looked for an answer among academics and tech companies leading in robotics.

More complex types of robots than those on wheels are still in development, some of which promise to be particularly useful for otherwise difficult tasks, such as one designed to enter burning buildings. The humanoid robots featured in the documentary don’t attempt to look like people beyond their basic shape, with varying designs of cold, blank-faced heads reminiscent of something from Doctor Who. While prototypes can do backflips and dance, their immediate descendants are likely to end up with less vivacious careers as warehouse operatives. So far, these robots aren’t autonomous, but are controlled by a technician twiddling a joystick, and can only perform within a set of limited pre-programmed movements. Teddy Haggerty, CEO of Robostore, talks about turning this apparent restriction into a business model, emphasising the ‘remote’ in remote control. He suggests that these robots could be used in a warehouse in one country, directed by workers based in another country. The important point is that these workers are employed for lower wages than the going rate wherever the warehouse is located. Even with outlay for the upkeep of the robots, this would reduce costs to the company, maximising profits. This tactic is nothing new, akin to placing a call centre in a country where labour is cheaper than the places where the calls are going to. The robotics companies’ representatives Bilton meets excitedly describe how their humanoid robots will do the dull jobs and chores so we don’t have to. Their enthusiasm is understandable, given the ever-expanding applications of this technology, especially now Artificial Intelligence is being integrated. As James Bessen of Boston University explains, this enthusiasm gets channelled into hype. Sleek promotional videos and flashy choreographed demonstrations are intended to attract investment. Building a profitable business model is the priority, rather than providing what’s really needed and wanted by people, including the employees involved.

The only workers featured in the programme whose jobs are being directly threatened by AI robots are the taxi drivers Bilton speaks with, who aren’t impressed by the supposed merits of driverless cabs. Fast-food delivery robots have started to replace costlier people on motorbikes, and if Haggerty’s idea gains traction, more human warehouse workers will be made redundant. AI-enabled robots are also learning specialist roles such as welding, and many office duties can already be carried out quicker and cheaper by AI analysing data and drafting strategies. According to a 2024 report from the International Monetary Fund, an estimated 70 per cent of UK workers are in occupations with tasks which could be performed or enhanced by AI.

However, robots aren’t yet sophisticated enough to be swapped for large numbers of staff. Professor Aaron Ames of the California Institute of Technology points out that even the action of opening a door is currently beyond their grasp. Another reason why the growth of AI robots may not lead to mass unemployment, quoted by Ali Kashani, CEO of Serve Robotics, is that new technology expands the economy and creates more new jobs than those it supplants. Bessen agrees: ‘it’s just a mistake to think that this technology comes in and replaces the humans and everything else stays the same’, citing how next-to no occupations were made obsolete by the growth of automation in the mid-20th century. Although they don’t say it themselves, this stance reflects how capitalist production adapts according to what is likely to be profitable. For example, driverless taxis have reached the stage where the expense of manufacturing and running them is falling below current costs for traditional cabs, such as drivers’ wages, which means they are more likely to turn a profit for the companies behind them. As also shown by Robostore’s cynical idea to outsource warehouse staff, financial prerogatives override the interests of workers in how the technology is applied. Whether this leads to unemployment or creates new jobs elsewhere, it’s still in the alienating context of capitalism’s labour market.

In a socialist society, the use of AI and robotics would be guided by practicalities, as financial considerations would no longer exist. Without the framework of employment, people and robots wouldn’t be in competition, so it wouldn’t be that a robot would ‘take someone’s job’. For the same reason, people wouldn’t risk hardship if a robot or AI did tasks instead of them. It’s possible that many aspects of how society functions would be automated, reducing the amount of labour people would have to do, freeing up more time for what they want to do. AI (or whatever it becomes in the future) could monitor what needs to be produced and trigger this to happen, with robots doing the practical work. Communities and the organisations they run would be able to decide how technology is incorporated into industries and services based on people’s requirements and the circumstances at the time. The robots shown on Panorama have this potential, but as this technology is developing in capitalism, it will instead be shaped according to what benefits companies’ shareholders.

Mike Foster

Action Replay: You can’t play here (2026)

The Action Replay column from the April 2026 issue of the Socialist Standard

Probably the best-known example of a sporting boycott was that of South Africa under apartheid, which lasted from 1964 to 1992 and involved not just cricket and rugby tours but also the Olympic Games. As other examples, the US and other countries boycotted the 1980 Olympics in Moscow after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and in 1984 the Soviet Union and others boycotted the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles.

An alternative to a complete boycott has been to allow athletes from specific countries to compete, but as ‘neutrals’ rather than representing ‘their’ country. Russian athletes have only been allowed to compete as neutrals in recent Olympics, so no national anthems if they win a gold medal. Athletes from Russia and Belarus have been barred too, but at this year’s Winter Paralympics they were permitted to compete under a national flag. This is supposedly because there is now less evidence of Paralympic sport being used to promote the invasion of Ukraine.

Suggestions of a boycott have also been raised concerning this summer’s Football World Cup. Iran has been attacked by massive US and Israeli air strikes; their football team was due to play its three qualifying group matches in different US cities, and the head of Iran’s football federation wondered if participation would be possible. Donald Trump has generously said that he doesn’t care if Iran takes part, describing it as ‘a very badly defeated country’. The Iranian Minister of Sport then stated that the country would not be able to take part.

There has also been speculation about countries such as England and Germany not participating because of US global policies, travel bans and the viciousness of ICE. However, it seems likely that there may well be contracts between FIFA and the English FA about taking part, which would mean that a boycott could break any contract and so lead to sanctions.

This year’s cricket T20 World Cup also led to controversies over who should play, and where. The tournament was co-hosted by India and Sri Lanka, and tensions among South Asian countries gave rise to many problems. The Bangladesh Cricket Board said that on safety grounds its team would not travel to India, as it was scheduled to do, and requested that its games all be moved to Sri Lanka. When they refused requests to change their stance, they were removed from the competition by the International Cricket Board.

Then the Pakistan government said its team would not play against India, though it then changed its mind and the match took place. India vs Pakistan is a huge game at any tournament, so big viewing figures and revenue were no doubt a consideration here.

You can’t help wondering if boycotts really have any impact, or whether they mainly occur to make some people feel good.

Paul Bennett