News in Review: Too Simple (1964)

The News in Review column from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

AT HOME: Too simple
Peter Simple, the Daily Telegraph engaging columnist, is one of the few unrepentent reactionaries still in business. The bluest of Tories now profess to be progressives, but not Simple. He hates science, looks with suspicion upon anything labelled as progress.

His mythical community of Stretchford is a typical new town where masses of workers have been dumped and where their standards of culture and ignorance have taken control. His satirising of the popular press, through the medium of Jack Moron, is positively savage.

It is almost inevitable that, because he flinches at ugliness, because he probes constantly for left wing humbug, because he hates mob ignorance, Peter Simple should sometimes hit a nail on the head. This is what he wrote on December 18th last:

  Teenagery is an industry. It brings immense profits to those engaged in it. It is as much a typical feature of our civilisation as the indiscriminate use of agricultural poisons, the destruction of the seemliness and beauty of our surroundings, the plague of motor-cars. None of these things would be a problem if there were no money to be made out of them. It is useless to appeal to the better nature of those who profit from the teenage industry.

Simple has no answer to the problem but then he is not the sort of man from whom we expect answers. Indictment is his field: “There is no money,” he says, “in decency.”

It is too much to expect the Daily Telegraph to benefit from their columnist's flash of insight and realise that the ugliness and the futility of the world is caused precisely by the fact that all production is carried on because someone hopes to make a profit from it. But that is the truth of the matter.

As long as capitalism lives there will be the soulless wastes of Stretchford and there will be the sort of people who gobble up the spew of Jack Moron. And, presumably, there will be Peter Simple to look on it with a weary, irascible eye, hating it all but nevertheless supporting it.


ABROAD: Kenya, too
Everyone should now be accustomed to the nauseating acts which are played out whenever another country gets its independence. The celebrations among the people of the country, who appear to be happy in the delusion that they have gained something from the substitution of one set of rulers by another. The extreme nationalism of the new government — often imposed with a heavy hand. The back slapping and banqueting, between men who were only recently denounced as insatiable terrorists and the representatives of the government which so denounced them. All very familiar and all very sickening.

So it was when Kenya became independent, last December. An estimated £400,000 was spent on the celebrations, including a Miss Uhuru beauty contest which Mr. Jomo Kenyatta left in a huff because the band did not play the Kenya National Anthem when he arrived. Persuaded to return, the new Prime Minister warned that non-Africans must respect the African personality (wasn’t there a man, before the war, who used to say the same sort of thing about the Aryan personality, at big rallies in Nuremburg and other German cities?) and said that if the band had not been Africans they would have been deported.

The Duke of Edinburgh attended a garden party where four former Mau Mau generals also turned up, but the Duke did not leave because his job was to stay and be chummy. Mr. Kenyatta had his photograph taken dancing with the rather bewildered looking daughter of Commonwealth Secretary Duncan Sandys, who had presumably been briefed by daddy to do the honours to the ex Mau Mau leader. Mr. Kenyatta received a telegram from Sir Alex Douglas-Home which looked forward to welcoming him at the next Commonwealth Prime Minister’s Conference in London.

Now with all this mateyness flying about nobody would think that not so long ago Kenyatta and the other Mau Mau leaders were reviled by the British government as primitive savages, heads of a secret society with disgusting initiation rites, terrorists who delighted in orgies of violence. This is the sort of propaganda which was put out in the past about other nationalist movements —about EOKA in Cyprus and the IRA in Ireland, for example.

In each case it eventually suited the British ruling class to come to terms with the nationalists. The propaganda changed and the nationalist leaders were welcomed to the circle of international rulers; their past, no matter how bloody, was forgotten and they soon became respected men. Kenyatta is only the latest of yesterday’s enemies to receive this treatment.

The state of Kenya is beset with all the usual problems of a newly independent African country and the future of its people is not bright. Whatever hardships they may suffer, we may be sure that there will always be plenty of official hypocrisy for them to consume.


BUSINESS: Buses for Cuba
It was not surprising that Washington expressed its regrets at the contract under which the Leyland Motor Corporation will supply four hundred buses to Cuba. Castro is perhaps America’s biggest and blackest bogy man at the present.

But equally it is not surprising that Leyland are eager to do business with Castro. They are no exception to the rule that production under capitalism is carried on for profit and they are ready to send their goods anywhere, if they think that the return is good enough.

Leyland are not, of course, the only vehicle manufacturers with this idea—the Cuban deal was settled in the face of competition from German, French, Japanese, Spanish and Czech salesmen. The struggle for export sales, in this case, is obviously at least as fierce as for the home market.

Governments, as a rule, encourage their industries to export and often offer all manner of financial incentives to them to do so. there are exceptions to this, though—when the overall interests of a country's ruling class make it inadvisable for them to trade with another country, a government will often restrict or forbid exports to that country.

So it is at the moment with the U.S.A., which has a long list of countries on its black list, including Cuba.

But some industries chafe under these restrictions. In this country, for example, there is more than one pressure group which advocates the development of trade with the Eastern bloc, even at the risk of upsetting the Americans. These groups arc not interested in the politics of the thing: they are concerned only with the fact that the Iron Curtain countries and China might well be a very profitable market for them to exploit.

There are at present no British restrictions upon non-strategic trade with Cuba and, for Leylands, selling buses there has for a long time been an attractive proposition. Over eight hundred have been sold since the war and Leylands are hoping for another order for a thousand. The firm also say that the Cubans pay their bills promptly and reliably, which just about seems to clinch it as far as the bus makers’ interests go.

And if these interests clash with the wishes of the State Department, that only goes to show what a confused system we live under. Capitalism's alliances are supposed to make the world a safer and more settled place. But even within those alliances there are all manner of divided interests, of stresses and strains and—often—open rifts.

A Guide for ambitious candidates (1964)

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

As the next General Election draws nearer, there must be many Members of Parliament, and many who aspire to become M.P.s, anxiously casting about for material for their election addresses and for the public meetings at which they will have to present themselves to the voters. These addresses and meetings are full of pitfalls for the unwary, the unsophisticated — and the honest. This guide is offered to assist such candidates through their campaigns.

Progress: All candidates must stand for progress. It is a good plan to say, at all appropriate moments, that we cannot put back the clock, or that we must be always forward looking or some such other meaningless phrase. If you are challenged to state what you mean by progress, mention automation, television, synthetic fibres, and so on. You may also be able to get away with earth satellites and nuclear energy, provided nobody in your audience is bright enough to connect these with inter continental ballistic missiles and hydrogen bombs. But if there are such people present you will probably have a difficult evening anyway, because they are bound to have some awkward ideas on progress and might even question whether what you call progress means better lives for the mass of the world's people. If they do, get the chairman to say that you must cut your reply short because you have another meeting to attend.


Housing: You are bound to be asked about housing. If your questioner is someone who is homeless, or about to be evicted, or is living with several children in a couple of rooms in a basement, you can exploit his plight in your reply. Lean forward, adopt a very earnest expression and assure him that you, and only you, can guarantee him a decent home. Labour and Liberal candidates can use the question to flay the government; Tories can turn the point by quoting suitably doctored statistics on the rate of house building, slum clearance, and so on.

All candidates should in any case have a supply of such figures readily available—they always sound very impressive. In particular, make play of your party's intention to do something about housing in the future. It is not advisable to dwell upon the past—somebody might point out that slums are developing faster than houses are being built and that no government has ever been able to solve the problem, although all of them have promised to do so.


Prosperity: This can be treated in the same way as housing. Compare pre- and post-war levels of wages, hours of work, and so on. Make sure that the figures you give for the average wage do not take into account any of the lower paid industries and that it includes payment for overtime, bonuses and such like. On the other hand, your figure for the length of the working week should be a basic one; it should not include overtime because this would show that the working week is longer now than before the war.

Promise to stop prices rising. Conservatives can excuse the rises which have happened since they came to power by blaming wasteful administration by the Attlee government. Labourites can attack confidently on this issue, provided nobody remembers their own record. Liberals also have a pretty free hand here, because of the length of time since they held power and the remoteness of the chance that they will ever get back.

Ignore any questioner who wants to know about the ownership of the means of production and the proportionate division of incomes; these issues are too fundamental, imply airily that prosperity for everyone is just around the corner, provided we all pull our belts in, work harder and keep our wages in check. If anyone is unkind enough to point out that your party has always made this promise, avoid the point by chiding him for being obsessed with the past and not looking forward to the glorious, progressive future.


Health and Education: You have a lot of scope here. Refer to the National Health Scheme as a great and merciful step forward in human welfare. (Tories will have to go easy here and forget that they originally opposed the Scheme.) Become indignant about the bad old days, when poor people could not afford to pay the doctor, the dentist and the optician. On no account go into the reasons for the Health Service, lest you reveal the fact that it is just another method of keeping the workers as fit as possible for better exploitation.

State that the best medical treatment is now available to everyone, but do not go too deeply into this, as there may be in the audience, say, a mother who contrasts the attention she got when she had her last child with that which the ladies of the Royal Family get when they produce. Somebody may also mention that Aneurin Bevan, although he fathered the Health Scheme, did not die in a ward full of other people, just like any unprivileged member of the working class. You can evade this one by attacking the questioner for besmirching the name of a dead man.

On education, mention the fact that more people than ever go to university and imply that this is because they are better off. Do not get involved in arguments about which income bracket tends to get to which university and whether a working class student goes there for the same reasons as does a rich man's son. Do not be afraid to mention public schools; in fact, you may be able to stir up some applause by pointing out that Churchill and Attlee were the products of those schools and asking what we would do without them. (On no account mention Profumo, who went to Harrow; he will not help you make your point.)


Young and Old: This is an opportunity for you to appear at your most humane. State, with the air of a fearless discoverer, that young children are the adults of the future and hint at the great burden of public service which you now bear and which you will one day pass on to them. Follow this by saying that is why you are happy that children today are taller, heavier, stronger, etc., etc., etc. You may be sure that only a very determined heckler will want to know why industry is so interested in healthy children.

At the same time you must make it clear that old people do not escape your concern. Speak at some length on the labours they have performed and upon the nobility of a long life of hard work. You may even cultivate the ability to produce a tear, or at any rate a catch in the throat, at such moments. But make sure that these can be interpreted as only the results of manly sympathy and not of weakness.

Make it plain that you are all too well aware of the sufferings of countless old age pensioners and do not refer to the fact that this is the lot only of retired workers. Promise that a vote for you is a vote for higher pensions. All candidates, provided that they are careful in their selection of historical evidence, can attack their opponents on this score. But all of them should avoid mentioning the inconvenient fact that, in spite of the decades of promises, the conditions of old people are still a social disgrace.

Peace and Disarmament: Every candidate must stand for peace. Even if you actually advocate a war—for example, over Suez in 1956 or the Polish Corridor in. 1939—you must make it sound as if you are only in favour of wars to preserve peace. (Most audiences will fall for this one.) Say, of course, that you stand for just and honourable peace and do not be drawn into the trap of defining these terms. If you find yourself in a discussion of the fact that previous peace treaties have only drawn out the frontiers over which the next war has been fought, blame this onto the lack of acumen of bygone statesmen, or upon the perfidy of foreigners. Let your listeners believe that you are above such mistakes.

Speak with pride of pacts like the recent Test Ban Treaty — imply that you, or your party, had a hand in it, whether this is true or not. Do not discuss the real reasons for the Treaty, nor the fact that it has been signed only by those nations who have bombs, but do not at present want to test them and by those who have no bombs and are not likely to have them. If a member of your audience points out that France and China, who are the countries most likely to want to test bombs in the near future, have not signed the Treaty, reply by suggesting that this is exactly the sort of behaviour to be expected from dirty foreigners like de Gaulle and Mao tse-Tung. You will find that, for most audiences, this is an acceptable line.

Foreign Affairs: Although you must be careful to say that you deplore racial discrimination, it is usually pretty safe to play up to your audience's patriotism by implying that all foreigners are vaguely odd and that the only really trustworthy person is a Britisher. Make sure that in at least one spot in your address—more, if the applause warrants it—you refer to This Grand Old Country Of Ours. Speak of the conquests of other nations with asperity—few people will remind you of the unpleasantly bloody history of the British Empire.

Refer to our Exports as often as you can and give out the usual propaganda about how important they are—but do not say to whom they are important. Give details about the successful export efforts of some foreign industries—Japanese shipyards, Continental dambuilders, and so forth—and suggest that this is a scandalous situation. Somebody in your audience may remind you that this country is one of the world's great exporters and that in any case the success or failure of a country's exports have little or no real effect upon the conditions of the majority of its people: in which case you are having a very unfortunate evening indeed.

Yourself: You must present an image of a sober, responsible family man who, although he has great talents, is still one of the ordinary people. Make it clear that your opponents are not supplying what you think is the right type of leadership and that things would be much better if the leaders were changed. You should not have much difficulty here; most of your listeners will have accepted that they need political leaders. Get the chairman to introduce you as The Next Member For This Constituency, but do not wait too long for the applause after this, lest the audience remain embarrassingly silent.

Do not shrink from shaking the dirtiest of hands, kissing the wettest of babies, lingering on the most heavily cabbage-scented doorsteps. Above all, do anything, go anywhere, promise anything, if it will win you votes.

And Finally . . . Don’t Worry! The promises you make may be wild, but perhaps you won’t be elected anyway. And if you do get in you can always think up excuses for breaking promises (blame the Russians, the French, the Chinese, or your political opponents) and in any case the trick worked, didn’t it?

But above all, remember that ever since capitalism came onto the scene political parties have lied and swindled their way into and out of power. The people who have been tricked have always forgotten the lies and the broken promises and have continued to vote for capitalism. So if you don’t get in, some other fraud will.

Ivan

The Development of Capitalism in Russia (1964)

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

Those who have read Lenin’s Left Wing Communism. An Infantile Disorder, will recall that in an appendix he attacks the anti-parliamentary Italian “Lefts.” This group, despite its extremist position, remained a part of the Italian section of the Third International until it was excluded by Stalin for supporting the Russian Left Opposition. This year the French followers of this group have brought out a very interesting pamphlet on Russia entitled L’Economie Russe d’Octobre à Nos Jours, which is summarised below. Note that in what follows we are summarising the pamphlet and not necessarily expressing our own opinions.

Lenin’s plans
Before the Bolsheviks seized power in October, 1917 Lenin developed the theory that, as the Provisional Government was not prepared to carry the bourgeois revolution to its conclusion, the proletariat must take power. Once in power the proletariat would have to put into practice a number of immediate economic measures. These measures would not be socialist, but state capitalist. Lenin was impressed by war-time Germany where a form of state capitalism had been operated in the interests of the German capitalist class. What the proletariat in Russia must do, said Lenin, was to operate a similar state capitalist system but in their own interests.

War Communism
Once in power the Bolsheviks introduced these emergency measures ― confiscations, requisitions, various controls, rationing, nationalisation of the banks and the establishment of a state monopoly for foreign trade. None of these measures was in any way socialist or, indeed, regarded as such ― at least not in Russia. At this time the government was a coalition of Bolsheviks and Left Social-Revolutionaries (the peasant party). In agriculture the Bolsheviks were forced to grant the SR demand for the division of the landed estates among the peasants instead of their own demand for the nationalisation without compensation of landed property. In fact, as Lenin pointed out, there was nothing that could be done against this as the peasants had already expressed their views by seizing the land.

When the Soviet Government introduced its New Economic Policy in 1921 a number of Communists, inside and outside Russia, denounced this as a betrayal of socialism. As a matter of fact, however, there was nothing peculiarly socialist about this period of so-called “war communism”. The measures adopted were those which any bourgeois government would have adopted in the similar circumstances of civil war, foreign intervention and the threat of famine. One of the measures of this period which particularly attracted Communists outside Russia was the forced requisition of agricultural produce from the peasants when needed as this implied the abolition of the market. But there was nothing socialist about this. The Soviet Government used the system which had been developed in feudal Russia for distributing corn in time of famine. Thus the requisitions of this period, far from being a form of Socialism, were simply the reappearance of a mediaeval phenomenon caused by special circumstances.

The New Economic Policy
By 1921 it was obvious that the expected world revolution had failed to materialise (due to the betrayals of the Social Democrats). This meant that the Bolsheviks had no choice: they had to let Capitalism develop in Russia. The Soviet Government realised this and adopted the policy of “state capitalism” developed by Lenin in 1917. This was defined as the development of Capitalism under the control and direction of the proletarian state.

Figures showed that in 1919 industrial production was only one-seventh of the pre-war figure. The virtual ending of the civil war allowed Capitalism to be developed again with the full approval of the Soviet Government. A number of the emergency measures taken in the period of “war communism” were rescinded to facilitate this development: some factories were handed back to their owners and a tax in kind was substituted for the forced requisitions. The Government saw as their main enemy the petty-peasant economy and decided to rely on Capitalism to do the work of destroying this for them. Lenin realised that there were dangers involved in this, but unlike those who accused him of betrayal he was a realist. He knew he had no choice. In his report to the XIth Congress of the Communist Party in March, 1922 Lenin quoted a passage from an émigré bourgeois newspaper which read :

  What sort of state is the Soviet government building? The communists say that it is a communist state and assure us that the new policy is a matter of tactics: the Bolsheviks are making use of the private capitalists in a difficult situation, but later they will get the upper hand. The Bolsheviks can say what they like; as a matter of fact it is not tactics but evolution, internal regeneration; they will arrive at the ordinary bourgeois state, and we must support them. History proceeds in devious ways. (Our emphasis.)

Lenin commented that this was quite possible and went on,

  History knows all sorts of metamorphoses. Relying on firmness of convictions, loyalty and other splendid moral qualities, is anything but a serious attitude in politics. A few people may be endowed with splendid moral qualities, but historical issues are decided by vast masses, which, if the few do not suit them, may at times treat them none too politely. (quoted p. 57)

Lenin thus realised that nothing the Bolsheviks could do could prevent the development of Capitalism in Russia or, even, the degeneration of proletarian rule into the “ordinary bourgeois state”. This is precisely what did happen in Russia. The “vast masses” behind Stalin working for the ordinary bourgeois state triumphed over the “splendid moral qualities” of the Left and Right Oppositions struggling to preserve proletarian rule.

Agriculture
In 1928 occurred the famous “turn to the Left” and Stalin began his policy of “de-kulakisation “. The kulaks, or rich peasants, were to be eliminated and peasant farms “collectivised”. This policy was opposed by both the Left and the Right Opposition because they saw this as a step backward. They regarded it as the worse possible compromise with the peasant economy. For it smashed private capitalism in the countryside. But this private capitalism was a progressive force which NEP had wished to encourage precisely because it would lead to the weakening of the peasantry.

Stalin’s “collectivisation” had the opposite effect. It has led to the stabilisation of peasant economy. For the collective farm is a static form which shows no tendency to evolve toward the expropriation of the peasantry. Khrushchev by denationalising the machine and tractor stations has strengthened the peasantry even further. The collective farm is nothing new in Russian history. In the middle ages there existed similar peasant corporations, the cartels, where the more important means of production were held in common while the peasants retained their individual house and surrounding land, some livestock and tools. This is precisely the position of the collective farm today — and the importance of the private plot for Soviet agriculture should not be underestimated. In 1960 33 per cent. of cattle were raised on family plots, 48 per cent. of cows, 31 per cent. of pigs and 22 per cent. of sheep (p. 80).

Soviet agriculture has been in a state of chronic crisis since Stalin’s forced collectivisation. The table below shows that, except as far as pigs are concerned, the figures for the various types of livestock per inhabitant the situation was worse in 1960 than in 1916.

A similar situation exists with regard to grain production: “the production per inhabitant was 576kg in 1913; it had been 610 kg in 1960 (1950?), but only 588.6 in 1959” (p. 119).

Three sectors in Soviet agriculture can be distinguished today : State capitalist (the State farms), private capitalist (the collective farms in their co-operative aspect) and sub-capitalist (the family plot).

LIVESTOCK (millions)       
                       1916    1960

Cattle              58.8     75.8

Cows              28.8     34.8

Pigs                 23        58.6

Sheep/Goats    96.3     132.9


INDEX OF LIVESTOCK (per head) 
                       1916    1960    % change

Cattle              100      82        -18.00%

Cows              100      77        -23.00%

Pigs                 100      163      63.00%

Sheep/Goats    100      98        -2.00%


Industrial Development
The Russians and their apologists are very fond of pointing with pride at the figures showing industrial development in Russia and saying that only a socialist economy could do this. But consider the figures :

Years      Average annual increase per head

1922-28             23%

1929-32             19.2%

1933-37             17.1%

1938-40             13.2%

1941-46             -4.3%

1947-51             22.6%

1951-55             13.1%

1956-60             10.4%

It is quite clear from these figures that not only is the law of the decreasing annual rate of increase verified for Russian capitalism as for others. But they also show that war and invasion provided a stimulant to expansion as in other capitalist countries. Nor is the increase due, as the modern Trotskyists claim, to State planning. The figures show that the highest annual rate was achieved in the years 1922-8 when there were no plans. The same figure would have been realised if the 1918-22 civil war had been lost and a huge trust of Western enterprises had developed the country instead of the Stalinist State. The figures were achieved as “the result of the revolutionary elimination of mediaeval obstacles to economic development, and (were) not at all the product of red or white brains” (p. 91).

Conclusion
All we know about the Russian economy has shown us that the development of production there has followed the directing lines of capitalism in passing through its two stages: revolutionary installation of bourgeois economic and social structures first; consolidation of these structures afterwards. Between 1928 and 1952, Russian pre-capitalism has become a fully-developed capitalism and this process has transformed Russia into a modern and “civilised” country.

Apologists for Russia call this “the construction of Socialism.” Furthermore, the fantastic development of production they call “communism” and they insert between these two stages the transition from “Socialism” to “Communism,” which in fact is only the stabilisation of the capitalist forms of production and life” (p. 130).

The present Russian vision of ever-rising wages and ever-falling prices seems to show that they want to deal with “commodities, value, money, and all the features of capitalist production forever.” But this has nothing to do with the “communism described time and time again, from the first erudite texts of the young Marx to the theoretical analyses perfect in their conciseness, of the fundamental book of our doctrine, Capital ― this communism will finally realise the end of capital, of wages, of commodities, of money, of the market and of the firm” (p. 131, their emphasis).

We would agree with this conclusion. There are, however, a number of views expressed in this pamphlet which we would not endorse. We would not agree that Russia had a “proletarian state” until the Left Opposition was defeated. Even under Lenin it was quite evident that the Soviet Government because it was developing capitalism was coming into conflict with the Russian working class. Nor would we agree that the rule of the Bolshevik organisation was equivalent to the rule of the working class. In October, 1917, not the working class but the Bolshevik organisation seized power. Certainly at the same time interesting makeshift organs of administration, the Soviets, appeared, but the Bolsheviks soon saw that their power was replaced by the rule of the Bolshevik Party. The Russian revolution was, in our view, essentially a bourgeois resolution. Of course, peculiarly Russian conditions determined the particular form of this bourgeois revolution ― a revolutionary intelligentsia leading the working class and peasantry against Tsarism and the bourgeoisie ― but its content was unmistakenly bourgeois. This is why Bolshevism should be seen not as a working class trend but as a bourgeois-revolutionary theory using Marxist terminology and concepts.

The pamphlet can be obtained from “Programme Communiste,” Boîte Postale No. 375, Marseille-Colbert, France, for 4 New Francs.

Adam Buick

Why prices go up (1964)

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is not the purpose of this article to go into the basic questions of the relationship of value and price. It is sufficient to remind the reader that there are underlying factors which determine why different articles have different prices; why, for example, an ounce of gold sells for more than an ounce of silver, or a pound of bread, or a ton of coal.

This article will only explain why prices and the general price level change from time to time, apart from the underlying value factors.

There are a number of popular beliefs about prices, all of them wrong. One is that prices go up because trade unions ask for higher wages. Another is that prices are determined by manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers having a free hand and being able to charge what they like. Another is that high prices are caused by taxation. Lastly there is the belief that prices always go up.

The last can quickly be disposed of. After the first World War, prices reached their peak in 1920 and then came down with a run. Within a few months they dropped by a third, and the decline went on more slowly for several years. And during the nineteenth century there were several periods of falling prices.

Pinning the responsibility for high prices on the trade unions is just as easily disproved by the facts. Trade unions are always “asking for” higher wages, so if this belief were correct prices too would always go up; which they don't. In 1921 when trade unions were forced to accept wage cuts of about 33 per cent., the members were still passing resolutions asking for wage increases.

“Asking" isn’t the same as “getting." When trade is bad and prices are falling, employers fight trade union demands and stand up to strikes and resort to lock-outs. If they didn't, their profit would disappear and they would go out of business. Under Labour Government, from 1947 to 1951, wage rates were not even keeping up with the rise in prices, partly of course because many workers were influenced by government appeals to them not to strike for higher wages. The rise of prices then obviously could not be explained by what the unions were doing.

If, in all the years since the war, it has been easier for trade unions to get higher money wages than it was before the war, this is due partly to low unemployment but also because, for other reasons which will be explained later, employers have been able to count on a more or less continuous rise in the prices of what they were selling.

The people who think that price rises are caused by the trade unions say that they know this to be true because they can see it happening: a rise of wages, then a rise of prices. What they overlook is that when two events happen more or less at the same time it does not have to be true that one thing causes the other. They can both be the result of some other change, and this is often the correct explanation of price rises and wage rises. When a period of slack trade, falling production and heavy unemployment is followed by a recovery of sales, expanding production, and falling unemployment, manufacturers and retailers are in the position of being able to put up their prices, and at the same time the unions are better able to press for higher wages. It just happens that sometimes one comes first and sometimes the other. This has been given striking proof in the recent increase of engineering wages and the way the employers have reacted to it.

The manufacturers have, it is true, used the increase of wages as their justification for putting up their prices, but as has been pointed out by those in a position to know, many of the price increases have been larger than the additional wage costs which are supposed to have caused them.

The President of the Purchasing Officers’ Association, in a recent letter to the Daily Telegraph, complains that while the wage increase on an annual basis represents a rise of 3.9 per cent., members of his Association “have reported demands for increases in the prices of many goods varying from 2½ per cent. to 8 per cent. Our inquiries show that the average wage claim is in the order of 7 per cent.” What in fact has happened is that the market for their products has improved and the manufacturers are able to take advantage of increased demand by putting up prices; the wage increase is just a handy excuse.

But not all of them are in this favourable situation. The Birmingham Small Arms Company which makes motor cycles, scooters, machine tools, etc., is not putting up its prices. This isn’t because it has not the same excuse as the others, but because its particular market won't bear it. The engineering wage increase will add over £300,000 a year to B.S.A.’s wages bill and according to the Chairman other costs are rising too. So why not put up their prices? The Chairman, Mr. Eric Turner, thought of this but found it could not be done. He told his shareholders at their Annual Meeting on December 5th last that for B.S.A. “almost all the additional costs would have to be borne out of profits, as it was not possible to increase the majority of their selling prices.” (Daily Telegraph, December 6th, 1963.)

This, of course, is the answer to those who think that manufacturers can fix what prices they like. A year earlier the Chairman of B.S.A. had reported that the firm’s profit had dropped to nearly half what it had been because of shortage of orders.

Then we have the belief that high prices are caused by taxation. The firms which use wage increases as an excuse for putting up prices will just as glibly use the excuse of high taxes. The cinema proprietors are a case in point. The Daily Mirror on January 3rd announced that Ranks are putting up prices of admission by 3d. or 6d. Granada are doing the same. But the interesting thing about it is that although rising costs are given as the reason, something which must affect all of them, Ranks are putting up prices only at 190 out of their 390 cinemas and A.B.C. “have no plan for a rise in prices.” The reason for this selective treatment was indicated in the Financial Times on January 4th. It is that while in the industry as a whole the trend is still in the direction of falling attendance at cinemas, "Many cinemas have been doing better business in recent weeks, stimulated by a run of popular films.”

In short, where the proprietors can hope to be able to get more revenue by higher charges they are putting up the prices and where they can’t they leave them alone in spite of their rising costs. In some areas the closing down of some cinemas enables the others to charge more.

Before I960, when the cinema tax was abolished, the cinema proprietors used the existence of the tax as an excuse for their prices. This is worth looking into. In 1956, the year in which Government revenue from the cinema tax was at its peak, it reached £34 million, but with the rapid decline of audiences (largely caused by the competition of television) hundreds of cinemas were closed. The Government then progressively reduced the tax before eventually ending it. And according to the Ministry of Labour, this is what happened to cinema prices. In 1957 tax reduced; cinema prices go up. In 1958 tax reduced again; cinema prices unchanged. In 1959 cinema tax again reduced; cinema prices go up. In 1960 cinema tax abolished; cinema prices unchanged but go up in 1961 and 1963 and now again in 1964. Just before its abolition in 1960 the tax was bringing in revenue to the Government of £8 million a year.

When it was ended in the 1960 Budget the Daily Herald (April 5th, 1960) had two news items. One was “prices will stay the same.” The other was a statement by Rank’s managing director: "I’m absolutely delighted,” as well he might be. £8 million might be hardly worth the cost and trouble of collection to the Government but was a godsend to the companies. In the years after the war the cinemas had a near monopoly of popular entertainment and where there is monopoly control of supply together with a big demand, prices can be pushed up to produce abnormally high profits. In such a situation the Government can step in with a tax to skim off all or much of the excess profit. It was not the cinema tax that caused prices to be high in the boom years, but the near monopoly. When the cinemas lost their appeal and much of their audiences, they were no longer getting abnormally high profits capable of providing a worthwhile special item of Government revenue.

Many of the aspects of prices so far dealt with applied in the nineteenth century and apply today, but there is one factor operating now which was absent then. In the nineteenth century the currency was by law fixed at a constant relationship with gold, a gold sovereign contained approximately a quarter of an ounce of gold. Bank of England notes were freely convertible into gold and notes could be obtained for gold. The general price level was in consequence affected by changes in the value of gold. A rise in the value of gold (assuming that the values of other commodities remained unchanged) would show itself in a corresponding fall in the general price level, and a fall in the value of gold (due to the discovery of more easily worked deposits, or improved methods of extraction) would show itself in a rise of the general price level, as happened round about the beginning of the century.

But in the past thirty years the note issue has not been convertible into gold and the gold equivalent of the currency notes has been progressively reduced.

The stages in this process have been the devaluing of the pound from being the equivalent of $4.86 to $2.80; the reduction of the gold content of the dollar itself to about one half in 1934; and the steady and enormous increase of the number of pound notes in issue that has gone on since 1938. In effect the pound now represents about one-twelfth of an ounce of gold in place of approximately one-quarter of an ounce at which it was fixed in the last century. The effect has been a more or less continuous rise in the general price level so that retail prices are now over three times what they were in 1938.

This is the major cause of rising prices: not the trade unions, or the unfettered will of manufacturers, or the amount of taxation, but the currency policy of successive governments.

Edgar Hardcastle

50 Years Ago: The Troubles of Shipbuilding Workers (1964)

The 50 Years Ago column from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

An ancient occupation, that of a shipwright. According to a gospel-grinding chippy of the writer's acquaintance, it dates from one Noah, who is supposed to have built an ark to keep a menagerie from getting wet feet. An obstinately bigoted and reactionary body of men, the Ship-constructors and Shipwrights Association. Much the same as other craft unions, of course, no better and no worse. Officered by such Labour jackals as Alex Wilkie, M.P.; John Jenkins, ex-M.P., and other equally ignorant shepherds of two-legged sheep, it is not to be wondered at that these one-time aristocrats of Labour find their economic position as bad as that of the docker, whom they secretly despise.

Modern developments in the shipbuilding industry enable the shipwright to see his skill gradually leaving his conceited carcase and inhabiting various machines, while our ultra-respectable mechanic, when not pawning the few remaining tools he needs, perforce becomes a fixer of machine made parts. This not only applies to shipwrights, but to all other artisans. It is the capitalist method of production and is therefore inevitable.

Shipwrights, like all other workers, have to learn that they arc only tolerated at all upon the earth because they are useful in the wealth producing processes of their masters. When, by the development of machine production, their slight remaining skill is absorbed by the machine, shipwrights will be things of memory only, their tasks divided and sub-divided among machine operatives.

From the Socialist Standard, February 1914

1964 Electoral Campaign (1964)

Party News from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

VERY URGENT. We wish to contest as many constituencies as we can in the next General Election. It is our hope to put at least three candidates in the field and a deposit of £150 has to be put up for each. We therefore need £450 for this alone in the next few weeks in order to be assured that, if an election takes place early this year, this sum will be in hand. In addition, we need at least another £350 to cover the cost of printing, hall hire and so on. Thus, in all, we need not less than £800. Will all those who support us and wish us well, please make a tangible gesture of such support by sending quickly as large a sum as they can to the Party Treasurer, E. Lake, 52 Clapham High Street, SW4, clearly stating that the contributions are for the Parliamentary Fund.

The Coming Election (1964)

Editorial from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

It would be a very dull person indeed who did not notice a certain something in the political air; a flurry of optimistic statements from members of the government, a series of sober suggestions which are supposed to help improve the world from the opposition. The two great political parties resemble nothing so much as a couple of shopkeepers who, anxious to attract the larger share of a spending spree, are frantically decorating their windows with every tawdry piece of tinsel they can find in their lumber rooms.

Mr. Harold Wilson, for example, recently made some proposals about disarmament. Speaking at Belper on 9th January last, he suggested, among other things; an international freeze on defence spending, restrictions upon the supply of nuclear weapons to the two Germanys, an agreement to ban all bomb tests. Now it is immediately obvious that there is absolutely nothing new about these suggestions. It is also obvious that they could equally well have come from any of the other capitalist parties and that in any case, because they take no account of the basic cause of modern war, they are quite impractical.

In the same way Sir Alec Douglas-Home, because he is the man in charge, must walk around with a perpetual sunny smile, as if the future were golden with hope. His New Year message held out the prospect of better schools, roads, houses, hospitals; exciting progress, splendid opportunity, and a great victory. The condition, upon which these hopes are based is, of course, the necessity for the electorate to show their gratitude for twelve years of Tory government, for the wage pause, for the housing difficulties, for the international crises, by sending a Conservative majority back to Westminster. The Tories will do all they can, by way of promises, to ensure that that is the result of the election. Lord Blakenham's foreword to their last annual report pledged that the party's policy committees "will strive, in the years ahead, to make whatever adjustments of policies may be needed so as to optimise their electoral attractiveness."

The reason, we need hardly say, for all this frantic activity is that this is general election year—indeed, by the time this issue of the Socialist Standard is in our readers' hands it may well be that the date of the election has been announced and the battle has commenced.

There is no point in our trying to predict who will win—even if that were possible. But we can confidently forecast what will follow the election, whichever party forms the next government.

The working class will continue to struggle over their wages and other working conditions; in other words there will be more strikes and similar disputes. The government will attempt to hold wages in check and to persuade the working class that any rise they may have should be only a small one, and one related to a more intensive productive effort. There will be more tension on the international field—more clashes at places like Berlin, Cyprus, Borneo. There will be more conferences on how to ease these tensions and how to disarm capitalism. None of them will come to anything.

The working class, afflicted by the usual struggle to live, will become dissatisfied with their new government and may express this dissatisfaction by defeating government candidates in by-elections and replacing them with those of another party pledged to carry on the capitalist social system. This dissatisfaction is an inevitable part of capitalism because the problems which give rise to unrest are also part of the private property system.

The only solution to this calamitous muddle is the establishment of Socialism. It is simply not possible for any leader to make glamorous promises about that because the key to Socialism is the knowledge of the people who will set it up. In the election campaigns of the capitalist parties, knowledge is an alien word. How many people, among the mass who are hypnotised by the tinsel, will stand out by knowing and understanding and voting for Socialism?

Can we trust the population experts? (1964)

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

No doubt there have always been people curious about what the future will bring and other people willing, for due reward, to satisfy their curiosity.

Before our era the foretellers of the future—the prophets, the oracles, the astrologers, the fortune-tellers and palm readers—claimed some special inspiration; nowadays the role has been largely taken over by the politicians and newspapers, who in turn rely on the scientific experts. In a period of about a hundred years their expertise has been more and more supported by the mass of statistics produced mainly, but not entirely, by government departments. And this statistical material is popularly, but quite erroneously, accepted as giving additional authority to the forecasts.

Recently the Tory Government issued a White Paper indicating how the amount of Government expenditure will increase some years ahead, backed by figures; but this is no more reliable than the Tory statement at the 1951 election that they were appalled by the way the Labour Cabinet had increased government expenditure arid would cut it down; a promise completely falsified by events. No government knows what situation it will be dealing with in five years' time; nor do the statisticians.

There is a famous saying that figures can't lie but liars can figure. Whoever said this was worrying about the wrong thing. It isn't so much the liars who feed us wrong information about the future as the confident “experts" who believe they are speaking the truth. Nowhere has this been more glaringly shown than in the field of forecasting the size of the population.

Probably there were people in this country about the year 1330 who went around saying that the population would be much larger twenty years ahead, not knowing that the Black Death would wipe out a third or more of them. They did not have the benefit of statistics about the way the birth rate and death rate had been moving in past years, but it wouldn't have made their forecasts any better if they had. Our modern experts have not even the excuse of a major calamity to explain theirs.

About the beginning of the 19th century quite a lot of the economists shared the view of Malthus about the need to restrain the birth rate because of the supposed inability to provide rapidly growing supplies of food; they failed entirely to foresee the enormous growth of population that took place during the century and before long their views were discredited and largely forgotten.

Just a century later the Malthusian view had a rebirth with Keynes and other Cambridge economists. Keynes started it in his Economic Consequences of the Peace, published in 1920. He feared that overpopulated Europe could no longer feed itself and was faced with a declining standard of living. Other books were published surveying the problem and suggesting the need to seek a solution in a smaller and stable population. Among these was Population, by Harold Wright, with a preface by Keynes (1933).

Although there were other economists, including Cannon and Beveridge, who contested the Keynesian view, it became increasingly the fashion in the nineteen-thirties to predict that the population of this country would rise for a few years and then go into a decline. Some of their predictions were published in a book called The Home Market, 1939, which had the unintentionally ironical sub-title, A Book of Facts about People.

The purpose of the book was to enable manufacturers to know what size they might expect their potential market to be in the years ahead so that they could plan accordingly. It had a foreword by Mr. Frank Pick, Vice-Chairman of the London Passenger Transport Board, who saw in the provision of information the means of avoiding “lack of balance between supply and demand." (Can it be that this may have been responsible for the deficiencies of transport in London?).

The book’s population estimates were those of Dr. Grace Leybourne, but readers were assured that similar estimates had been made by Dr. Kuczynski and Dr. Enid Charles, two other authorities. And what did the stars foretell? The population (excluding Northern Ireland) was then about 46,350,000. The forecast was that it would reach a peak of 46,500,000 in 1941, and then drop by 4 millions to 42,700,000 in 1951 and by another 3 millions to 39,400,000 in 1961.

In fact the population (again excluding Northern Ireland) had reached 51,350,000 by 1961. Instead of falling by 7 million after 1941 it had gone up by about 5 million!

They also tried their hand at foreseeing changes in the age group. They were right about the increase in the proportion over age 65, but quite wrong about the numbers of children. They thought that the number of children under 15 would have dropped in 1961 to 5½ million: it actually turned out to be 12 million.

If perhaps London Transport were misled by the pre-war experts as to the likely size of the travelling public in London, the Education authorities must have been shattered to find that they had to provide for double the number of school children the experts expected.

After the war the government set up the Royal Commission on Population which in its report in 1949 was very cautious about the future, merely saying that the total population would probably go on growing for at least one or two decades, “though the increase in this period is not likely (immigration apart) to exceed more than a few millions.” (Para. 632.) The Government then entered the tricky field of forecasting future population itself, but it hasn’t been any luckier than the experts of “private enterprise.”

It started in the 1956 edition of Annual Abstract of Statistics, in which it estimated that the population (excluding Northern Ireland) would be 51,796,000 in 1960. The actual figure for 1960 turned out to be 587,000 higher than the estimate. Not perhaps a very big error, but large enough to cause headaches to anyone who made plans based on the smaller figure. As the Minister of Health recently complained, how could he be expected to build sufficient maternity accommodation when “the birth rate was rising more rapidly than any experts had foreseen.” Naturally the longer the forecast the larger the error may turn out to be.

In the 1956 edition of the Annual Abstract the population to be expected at the end of the present century was given as something under 53 million. But in the 1962 edition this had been amended to 68 million, a trifling 15 million more. They are not the first to risk forecasting how many people there will be in this country at the end of the century. A Fabian pamphlet, Our Ageing Population, published in 1938, opened by quoting an estimate of the Population Investigation Committee that if “there is no change in the present trend of the birth and death rates" the population at the end of the century will be 17,700,000!

So we are on firm ground at last. It will be 17,700,000; or maybe 53,000,000 or 68,000,000; or some other number, larger or smaller.

Edgar Hardcastle

A One-Act Monologue: Samson and the Philistine (1964)

Samson Captured by the Philistines by Guercino (1619).

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

(Scene: After Samson's capture and blinding. Samson pauses on his treadmill, rattles his chains, and mumbles something about the class struggle. A runty, quick-eyed fellow stands at some distance from him, smiling jovially and fingering a barbed whip. As he begins to speak, his mien and gestures resemble those of a carnival pitchman.)

Samson, your groans are dated; what do you mean, class struggle? There's no class struggle. Look how far 1 have elevated you above the abject, miserable state you were in a century ago, when 1 first blinded you and put you in chains. You think you have it bad now; why, without me you could never have it so good. Apparently you’ve forgotten when you trod the mill eighteen hours a day, barefoot over sharp rocks, with spikes on the inside of your collar. Apparently you've forgotten the bite of the lash on your back, it’s been so long since I've had to lay it on. Remember the bread you used to eat then? Full of alum and chalk? Remember the goads and tortures on your flesh when you raged and wouldn't tread the mill? And look at you now, lapped in luxury; the sharp stones gone, fur on the inside of your collar instead of spikes, sandals to keep your soles from getting calloused—why, 1 haven’t whipped you for years. Next thing I know you’ll be wanting mink gloves and gold toothpicks. What don’t I do for you? Look at me, all kindness and benevolence. Instead of a lash I hang sweet-smelling carrots in front of your nose. Don’t you prefer them, or would you rather have the lash back?

Samson my boy, you’ve grown sleek and strong since 1 switched you to meat and potatoes, and you do so much more work! Do you not also have frequent rest periods, and are you not now only obliged to tread eight hours (maybe ten or twelve if we count overtime and moonlighting) instead of the former eighteen? Haven’t I given you the freedom to change your manacles every four years? Haven't 1 given you the freedom to criticize the workmanship of your collar any time you want? Haven’t I given you the freedom to eat your meals on time? Haven’t I given you the freedom to worship whichever of my overseers you choose? You look so healthy since I've been treating you better, you may last me another hundred years. You’re a fine specimen, Samson; I couldn’t have gotten a, better commodity if I'd scrounged the labour market forever.

I throw you scraps from my plate every Christmas and let you frolic with the female slave on the other treadmills. 1 give you scholarships and time off so you can study treadmills and learn how to make your work easier, and all 1 ask in return is that you also make it go faster. And you don’t appreciate any of it. You just rattle your chains and growl, and stop your treadmill to ask for more scraps. Now really Samson, how do you expect me to get my grain ground when you act that way? Have a little kindness. What do you want to do, make a slave out of me?

Nicky Krusher and Blastro use the lash on their hands. It could happen here, you know.

We could get along so well if you would only stop this growling and keep your hair cut. What’s this malarkey about your being propertyless? Don’t I give you food, sandals, and hides to wrap yourself in on cold days? Don’t I supply the treadmills? Don’t you own your own chains? And what do you mean I don’t earn my living? I worked hard enough to catch you and blind you. didn't I? It's a day's work just to keep you plodding around, let alone the accounts I have to keep of what you produce for me. So you think you don't need me. huh? I’d like to know who’d keep you working for me, who'd hang up the carrots in front of your face, who'd lay on the whip when you needed it, if it wasn't for me?

If only you would drop this class struggle thing, we could be so happy together—you making the goodies and I consuming them. I would always keep fresh carrots in front of you and throw you all my extra scraps, and if you worked hard enough I'd even sell you a gold ring for your nose. 1 tell you what, I’ll make a deal with you, a contract: a fresh bone every Christmas if you stop being angry and get to work. Straight business proposition. How about it? Don't we have a lot of common interests?

(Samson rattles his chains and looks at his hands. What does he see? Will he ever see again? There is a good chance, if he wants to. Everything hinges on his morale, you know.)

Stan Blake

(World Socialist Party of the United States)

The Trial of Charles de Gaulle. (1964)

Book Review from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Trial of Charles de Gaulle. by Alfred Fabre-Luce, Methuen, 30s.

Only English readers well up in French politics are likely to face this book on equal terms. And we doubt whether all that number of French readers would have coped so easily either, had they been able to read it; which they were not, by the way, since it was banned in France.

The trouble comes from unfamiliarity with most of the personalities, and the complexity of the events; all capitalist politics are unsolved, we know, but French politics must be the most involved of the lot. The machinations, the intrigues, the conflicts of interest, the complex struggles for power, are really intimidating to the outsider.

Things are not helped by the author's device of a mock trial for the General; the result of this is to allow free scope to the much greater latitude in French courts for fact to be mixed with fiction, and to make it all the harder to sift the real from the opinion and the hearsay.

The idea of political trials does not come too startlingly in France, where they have a long history going back to before the Revolution. We are reminded in the introduction, in fact, that it is not so long ago that a hundred members of the Vichy government were put on public trial, including the former head of state, Pétain. Some of the accused, like Laval, actually ended up before a firing squad. In contrast, the last such trial in England goes back to 1805.

From what we are able to gather, however, Mr. Fabre-Luce himself seems really to be opposed to the idea of political trials and only uses the mock-up of one against de Gaulle to bring the General and his activities into the arena of public debate. In particular, the only punishment postulated for the accused, should he be found guilty, is a vote of censure.

The author extends the device further by allowing de Gaulle to remain silent during his trial, using as actual precedents Pétain and Salan, who also kept silent at theirs. This gives him full scope to marshal the arguments for and against the accused, mostly in the form of real statements by real persons, though he also brings in a few fictional characters; even these, however are used as convenient mouthpieces for real statements representing other general and well-known points of view. The whole thing is done very cleverly, the atmosphere of the trial being particularly well captured.

As for the arguments, suffice it to say that telling points are made, and others seem to be made, by both sides. But, perhaps because one is a very much detached observer, the only feeling at the end is of indifference and unreality. Both accusers and defenders seem obsessed with a personality—de Gaulle. For some, he is the personification of all that is noble, all that is right, all that is good; for the others he is the embodiment of evil, Satan incarnate. For his defenders, he represents salvation; for his accusers, he is the agent of damnation. Leader or devil? Military genius or upstart colonel? Far-seeing prophet or arch-traitor? Liberator or renegade?—these are the terms in which the debate is conducted. It is altogether too superficial and unconvincing.

The result may be witty and entertaining, but it does not get us very far. All the fine words and stirring speeches, the scintillating arguments and witty exchanges, fail to make us forget the harsh realities of French life during the past thirty years—the misery of a second world war in twenty years, the hardships and terms of the occupation, the agony of Indo-China, the criminal folly of Suez, the bitterness and bloodshed of Algeria. Clever fantasies of word battles mock-fought over the alleged motives, virtues, and failings of one man have no relevance to problems such as these.

As a polemical exercise, the book can be given full marks. But for what it tells us of importance concerning the political and economical realities facing French capitalism and—much more important—the French working class, it impresses not at all.

Stan Hampson

A New Religion for China (1964)

Book Review from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Centre of the World: Communism and the Mind of China by Robert S. Elegant, Methuen, 42s.

China is the latest recruit to world capitalism. The ruling-class there have taken over a whole bag of tricks from their fellow ruling-classes of the West and brought them up-to-date for the ruthless exploitation of their workers, both civilians and soldiers. They have used the technique of convincing the Chinese that the system of society there is communistic and that the government is a workers' council acting for the workers. They have used expert propaganda to train their workers, or at any rate some of them, to be super-patriotic and ready to fight and die for the motherland; Chinese workers are now trained to believe that they are a kind of master race and that the rest of the world are barbarians; they have become super-employees, working fantastically long hours with many doing two jobs. School children and students, in addition to their classes, have to work long hours on farms or construction jobs.

China, the land where compromise was for centuries the order of the day, has now gone to extremes in almost everything imaginable. No more of those succulent meals, at least not for the working-class. Every place of employment has its canteen, including the communal farms, where small portions of rice and vegetable gruel are served, occasionally with a microscopic amount of meat. But money talks there as anywhere else, and for the wealthy there are black-market supplies at the usual high price. There is food rationing throughout China. The Chinese family, for centuries the closest- knit in the world possibly, has been broken-up, the children taken over by creches, the parents separated from each other and forced to sleep in dormitories near the job. All this they are being trained to view as more important than the family.

The agnostic Chinese have also been given a god—Mao-tse-tung; a bible—the collected works of Lenin, Stalin and Mao-tse-tung; priests, the omnipresent Communist Party cadres who supervise the workers politically not only on the job but in the street committees, trade union meetings, etc.; and an inquisition more gruelling than anything the Jesuits ever devised. Like the Christians in the West, they have a heaven that will never materialise; the Chinese pie-in-the-sky is the Socialist State towards which they are supposed to be going via this vale of tears. Tighten your belts a bit more, the Chinese workers are told, and you will be one step nearer the promised land. This exhortation seems to ring a bell here! But all this is for the workers only—the ruling-class do not need it.

Mr. Elegant in his book goes back to Confucious in his research on the unique Chinese conviction of superiority, as he terms it. He traces the history of China from 1600 A.D. and describes in detail the past decade, analysing such aspects as the Peoples' Communes, Mao and the other leaders, the Sino-Soviet dispute the structure of both the Communist Party and the Peoples’ Republic. Here, in a fascinating portrait of a powerful new force in the world today is a blending of scholarship, journalism and political commentary. This reviewer was most impressed in face of the vast and detailed knowledge of the author but, despite the fact that Mr. Elegant is a newspaper correspondent and perhaps should be expected to know better, he does not understand what make the society we all live in tick.

He doesn’t see the world as it is, divided into opposing groups, the workers and the ruling-class, whose interests are diametrically opposed. He sees the world divided into good people and bad people, good leaders and bad leaders. He sees two opposing systems of society, the free world of the West, and he is on their side and they are good; and the dark satanic world that lies behind the iron and bamboo curtains. That he regards as bad, and he hates their social system, which he mistakenly believes to be basically different from the capitalism of the West. This view colours his comments throughout the book, which can only be regarded as just one more addition to the muddle-headed spate of pro-capitalist propaganda with which we have to cope in the meagre columns of the Socialist Standard.

It is little wonder that non-Socialist readers who peruse books of this type are induced to loathe the very connotations of the word Socialism, not knowing that China is the latest example of a backward country, pitchforked by events into the maelstrom of a world of capitalism already developed, and using the quickest method of catching up with the others. It is not Socialism that they arc criticising but the growing-pains of this youthful capitalism.

Frank Offord

Branch News (1964)

Party News from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

Lewisham Branch, in anticipation of the General Election, have a full programme of meetings and activity arranged for the next few months. Their first meeting is at the Bromley Library Lecture Room. High Street. Bromley on “What is Socialism”. The date—Friday, February 28th at 8 pm (Full details are advertised in display panel in this issue). The following meeting at the same, venue is titled “Wages and Inflation", and is on March 20th. Intensive work will be put into Bromley by the branch with the help of other London members prior to the General Election when it is hoped that the Party will be able to contest the Bromley constituency. When the date of the election is known, members from all over London will make a special effort to assist in Bromley, but meantime all help will be welcome by Lewisham Branch.

We are happy to acknowledge donations from the following: Ethel L. Lee Haing, Sydney. Australia (£39 16s. 9d.). Mrs. P. de Cleve. Wellington. N.Z. (£1). “A Sympathiser” from Sunderland (10/-). and from Vienna, our comrades Frank and Pelinger £1 10s. each. It is particularly pleasing to learn that comrades so far away, whilst working hard under difficult conditions to spread the Socialist message, in addition contribute so generously to our funds.

Paddington and Marylebone Branch have a very full programme arranged right up till April. Full details in the meetings column. Glasgow also have a very full programme in preparation for the General Election. Details of their immediate meetings are advertised in this issue.

We regret that a printing error was made in Branch News in the December Socialist Standard. Under activity in Swansea reference was made to the “ Anti-Panzer Group”—this should have read the “Anti Nuclear Group”

We are very sad to learn of the death of our comrade Mark Bredon of West Ham Branch. Due to illness he had not been around very much of late, but he will be well remembered for his visits to Head Office and Conferences despite great difficulty in walking. He had been a Party member for more than thirty years.

Phyllis Howard

A Tale of Two Parties (1964)

From the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

Once upon a time there were two Communist Parties. One was in Great Britain and was called the Communist Party of Great Britain: CPGB for short. The other was in New Zealand and was called the Communist Party of New Zealand: CPNZ for short. Ordinary simple people could see no difference between the two parties. But one day while they were watching their flocks they saw three wise men coming from the East, from Peking. The wise men said there was a difference. One was “revisionist” or bad; the other was “revolutionary” or good. So the simple people tried to guess what this could be. They knew the CPGB was nationalistic for they had read in a pamphlet on the Common Market:

Members of Parliament should be told in no uncertain terms that they were not elected to sell out British trade interests and British independence.

But they knew that the CPNZ was nationalistic, too, for it said it stood for “New Zealand Socialism.” One of its pamphlets, What Will Socialist New Zealand be like? said.

In every way our Socialism will start on a one hundred per cent. New Zealand basis. It will bear the trade mark of our very adaptable and resourceful people— “Well Made, New Zealand! ’’ 

and the simple people laughed when they read:

We have produced athletes like Lovelock, Halberg and Snell, who can take on the world's best and beat them hollow. Our All Blacks are feared throughout the Rugby world.

For a moment they thought that a “revolutionary” Party supported the All Blacks while a “revisionist” Party supported the British Lions. But the wise men said no.

Then they remembered that the CPGB wanted a Labour Party government and a few Communist Party M.P.’s. Perhaps this was the difference, they thought, perhaps the CPNZ is against its Labour Party. When they remembered that the leader of the Labour Party in New Zealand had once said, “there is no place today for what used to be known as the class struggle," they were certain. The CPNZ must be “revolutionary” because it opposed the Labour Party. But they were wrong. For someone told them that in People's Voice, the CPNZ’s journal, they had read:

Our policy is to work for the return of Communist M.P.’s to Parliament and in electorates where no Communists arc standing we will support the return of the Labour candidate to defeat the National candidate. (6.11.63).

Now they were at a loss. What could this difference be? And then they notice something. They noticed that whenever there was a recession the CPGB used to say that trade with Russia was the answer while the CPNZ used to say that trade with China was. At first they thought that there was nothing here. After all, they said, Great Britain is nearer to Russia than to China and New Zealand is nearer to China than to Russia. But then they found that Russia and China were quarreling and that the CPNZ again thought that China was best. Then they understood. What makes a Party “revolutionary" or “revisionist" is not whether it is internationalist or nationalist, not whether it opposes or supports the Labour Parties, but whether it supports China or not. How wise these wise men were, they thought. And the wise men agreed.

The Chairman of the wise men then said, “Yes, we are wise. We don't care what the home policy of a Communist Party is so long as it backs our foreign policy. You see, we don't really care about theory. We are just using it to win support for our foreign policy in Communist Parties which are hostile to us. I will be frank. Our dispute with Russia is not one of ‘revolutionaries' and ‘revisionists.’ It is a sordid and cynical struggle between two States." (Thunderous applause and cheers. Standing ovation).

The simple people went away a little wiser.

Adam Buick

The Passing Show: Magic of the New Year (1964)

The Passing Show column from the February 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

Magic of the New Year

The beginning of last month was the signal for church bells to ring out, for everyone to wish everyone else a happy new year (probably few believing that they would achieve it), and for silly people to risk a chill and throw themselves into the fountains at Trafalgar Square. Every year it happens with monotonous regularity—every year it is just as futile and stupid.

It all stems, of course, from the time-honoured illusion that somehow the advent of a new year automatically wipes out the mistakes, horrors and heartbreaks of the last 365 days. A sort of magic aura surrounds this arbitrary dividing line, with the old year depicted as a very old man plodding wearily to his grave, and the new year as a lovable little baby—as if youth itself were any guarantor of our fortunes. A new leaf has been well and truly turned, and the way ahead is clear.

What a false idea, but it is one to which most people cling and to which politicians, press and pulpit all pander, although it depends on whether you are a member of the government or opposition party, just what sort of new years message you utter. For instance, Prime Minister Douglas-Home thinks that we are in for a year of "splendid opportunity . . .  five years of exciting progress . . .  prosperity widely shared . . . etc. But Liberal Leader Grimond talks of increased inflation and " . . . a decisive year for Great Britain . . .”

Further afield the new U.S. President Lyndon Johnson tells Mr. Khrushchev of his confidence that “peace on earth, goodwill towards men . . .  we can make it a reality," at the same time as his French opposite number de Gaulle is announcing his determination that France shall have the H-Bomb as quickly as possible. You see what a silly season it is? A time, in fact, when anything can be said and excused, no matter how senseless, because nobody really means what he says then, anyway.

And what, belatedly, do we think of the prospects for 1964? Why, the same as for any other year or at any point in any year. It doesn’t take an Old Moore's Almanack to tell us that capitalism will continue, and its problems with it. For most of us it means a drab and insecure life, and as much as ever the threat of war hanging over us like an angry black cloud. Nothing very magic in that.

Profit trends in 1963

For most of us drabness and insecurity, but for a minority just the opposite. This is the standard condition of capitalism with which we are so familiar, but now and again it is thrown into relief by a news item such as the Guardian report of January 1st. This tells us that 1963 was a good year for company profits with a net rise of over 12 per cent, in the case of 199 firms listed in Exchange Telegraph’s statistics service during December last.

The total for almost 4,000 companies exceeds £1,450 millions and is over three per cent. higher than 1962. Just shows, doesn’t it, the exploitability of the working class—and this in the year of the great freeze-up and close on a million unemployed earlier on.

But not for them

There is one thing (among many others) on which all the capitalist parties agree, and that is the need for “wage restraint.” They have all said it—in fact Mr. Grimond is in favour of a national maximum and of sanctions against firms who “grossly exceed what is justified.” All sorts of arguments are used to try and persuade workers that the less they have, the better off they will be.

But when it comes to M.P.s’ salaries, we hear a very different story. It was not long after the last war that they voted themselves a rise of £400 a year, and now a three-man committee is going to look into the whole question of M.P.s’ and Ministers’ pay, with the promise of an early report. This has the support of all parties in the Commons. What is the betting that: (a) the committee will recommend an increase, and (b) it will be speedily voted into existence by the grateful members? And will you hear then of any argument about restraint? Not very likely.

Colonial “Freedom"!

The oppression in Ghana worsens almost daily. A judge there has been dismissed for bringing in a verdict which displeased President Nkrumah, and the acquitted prisoner has been re-arrested under the Preventive Detention Acts. He’ll be lucky to get out in ten years.

The president is not resting there, however. He is seeking by referendum to confirm his dismissal powers, and it’s a fair bet he will get his way because opposition to his wishes is a punishable offence. Then one more nail will have been driven into the coffin of whatever limited political democracy once existed.

We cannot help remembering at a time like this that we were urged to support the struggle for the establishment of Ghanaian independence, and it was the Movement for Colonial Freedom who assured us that it would hasten the removal of the old colonial yoke and the birth of democracy. The Socialist Party was not popular because we refused our support, but our arguments are the same now as then, and subsequent developments have proved the soundness of our stand.

So let us repeat that colonial freedom means freedom for the rising native ruling class. The workers in Ghana and elsewhere are becoming painfully aware that they have changed their white bosses for ones with darker skins, that is all. It is no part of our job to encourage the establishment of capitalism, whether democratic or dictatorial. Our aim is a world of Socialism, and then democracy in the fullest sense of the word will be a reality.

The Movement for Colonial Freedom is obviously not a Socialist body, but even the limited freedom which they hoped for in Ghana has not emerged. It is a time for them to eat their words. But more than that, it is a time for them to seriously consider the case for Socialism.

Eddie Critchfield