SPGB Lectures and Meetings (1977)

Party News from the November 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

Blogger's Note:

R. Weidberg wrote under the name of 'Ronnie Warrington' in the Socialist Standard.

The World's Starving Millions (1975)

From the October 1975 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is estimated that the awesome number of 460 million of our fellow human beings are suffering from severe malnutrition. What is worse, this estimate is based on the peak level of per capita food supplies before the situation began to deteriorate so seriously in 1972; since then the number of severely malnourished people must have greatly increased. (Report of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, 1974.)

So the horrifying story continues. In space men link up, with machinery costing more than those 460 millions could ever dream of, whilst on earth hunger and famine spread inexorably. In a world of space link-ups is there any scientific reason why there should be starvation? The answer is a resounding “No!” 

Dr. Magnus Pyke (Secretary of the British Association for the Advancement of Science) in an address published in New Scientist (10th July 1975) points out that scientific ability has more than kept pace with population expansion. “For the world as a whole,” he says “the production of food has — the figures show — outstripped the increase in population numbers.” It is estimated that whilst the world’s population over the next ten years can be anticipated to grow at the rate of 2.1 per cent, per year, the world’s food production will increase by 2.7 per cent, per year. And according to Dr. Pyke there is enough food around to feed the human race: “. . . food is available to prevent hunger world wide.”

So what’s the problem? Dr. Pyke argues that it is not know-how that is the difficulty:

The thesis I am propounding is that while the knowledge and power over events which science can provide can make great things possible, there are certain human problems in the solution of which science is incompetent.

Unfortunately Dr. Pyke does not tell us what are those “human problems”. Instead he gives us an idea as concrete as hot ice-cream. He says the starvation problem is basically the result of

. . . fundamental incapacity to deal with the relations between man and man, with human miscalculation and misfortune, and with Acts of God such as the failure of the monsoon two years running . . .

He has hopelessly contradicted himself. Having talked about “human problems” the solving of which are necessary, he is now talking about miscalculation, misfortune, and (spare us!) “Acts of God.” About

as scientific as dry rain. He ends up calling for the extension of the equivalent of the British Welfare State throughout the world.

As a scientific analysis of the ability of man to produce food, Dr. Pyke’s address clearly shows man’s capacity to produce an abundance of food. As an explanation of hunger alongside surpluses of food he takes the listener nowhere.

Two things are clear. One, there is the ability to produce a surplus of food; two, millions of people are starving (not just in “underdeveloped" countries either).

The reason for this conundrum is the economic system that man now uses. Instead of food production aiming to feed the people of the world, it is directed at one thing only, profit and accumulation of wealth for the owners. Although the scientists like Dr. Pyke often appear not to see this, the politicians who are elected to run capitalism can, when they choose to. For instance, Mrs. Judith Hart MP, former Minister of Overseas (Under) Development said that British farmers wanted to help towards solving the problems of shortage of food. But on what terms:

Our agricultural industry does not mind very much what it produces, as long as it gets a fair return.

(The Times, 21st July 1975)

And there is the difficulty in a nutshell. Producers don’t care what they make or how they make it. So long as it sells at a profit, capitalism will make it. The starving millions can’t “buy” food because they can’t fulfil that essential condition. So the capitalists invest in other things which bring a “fair” (i.e. profitable) return. Such as armaments for the governments of the starving.

The solution to the appalling problem lies in our hands now. But it demands, not as Dr. Pyke in childish simplicity suggests “a world welfare state” (isn’t the British one bad enough?), but a world working class, consciously determined to establish Socialism.

Ronnie Warrington

Letter: Crime Passionel (1975)

Letter to the Editors from the March 1975 issue of the Socialist Standard

Crime Passionel

Ref. the January issue of the Socialist Standard and the article “The Real World Outside”.

The writer of the article says, quote: “Socialist society will have no more need of prisons, than it will have of bombs”. Whilst agreeing with this statement, and the fact that 90-odd per cent of imprisonments are inflicted on people for theft, or for acts committed in the pursuance of them, which would not happen in a Socialist Society.

In a Socialist society however, some misdemeanours will still occur. How are these to be dealt with?

For one example, crime passionel, i.e.: A man desires a woman, but the woman rejects the man’s advances, preferring to live with another man, and not at all interested in the rejected one at all. In blind jealousy, the rejected man inflicts bodily harm, possibly death on the favoured one, or on the woman herself, or on both. Would nothing be done by society in a case like this? Would it be treated purely as a personal affair between the parties involved?

Regarding the criminally insane. Severely mentally disturbed people of a violent nature, would still have to be locked away, in a prison of one sort or another. No doubt with better conditions and facilities than at present, but a prison nevertheless.

J. Cardin

Merseyside.

Reply

J. Cardin raises so many interesting points that we would need a whole issue of the Socialist Standard to deal with them fully. Within the space available, we can only say this: the example of “crime passionel” is dangerously loaded with the prejudices of capitalist society. For example, you assume it is a man (not a woman) who is blindly jealous. Why? Can we suggest it is because so much of the advertizing etc. we see round us, shows woman as part of the complete man, instead of a full human being in her own right? This “blind jealousy” you talk of is usually the result of the conditioning of a perverse environment, where man assumes property rights over “his woman”. And “blind jealousy” is a phrase leaving so many questions unanswered. Why do people go off their rockers? May we suggest that one of the fundamental causes must be life under capitalism with all its stresses, and distorted values.

Why assume that the rejected one would “inflict bodily harm” on the former lover and his or her new lover? If you love someone, you don’t inflict harm on that person, or on the object of his or her affection. And if you don’t love, will you care enough to inflict harm? It is only property society which overloads basic human emotions with absurd and dangerous complications, causing absurd and dangerous reactions.

You do contradict yourself! You agree with our point that Socialist society will not need prisons in your second sentence, and then in your last sentence assume there will be prisons in Socialist society. Let us solve the riddle. There will be no prisons in Socialist society. If people commit violent acts upon their fellows it is almost certain they are mentally ill. If people are mentally sick (“criminally insane” is a brutal expression of property society) they will receive the same attention as the physically sick that is the best treatment possible.

Finally may we refer J. Cardin to the September 1974 Socialist Standard where some of these points are dealt with at more length in the article “Law and Society.”

Editors.

SPGB Meetings (1975)

Party News from the March 1975 issue of the Socialist Standard

Letter: Socialism's Economics (1977)

Letter to the Editors from the December 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialism's Economics

The article on socialism in September’s SS (p. 166-7) went beyond the evidence on human desires in the hypothetical new society. But it clearly declared that many wants may have to go unsatisfied. It did not indicate how such decisions would be reached. It pointed out that Socialism would be similar to capitalism in being a system of co-operation and social production, but it did not show what we could put in place of the price system as a means of economic communication. People would have to work, but how would they know when enough is enough? In short, where is the socialist economics that will make an economy based on common ownership viable?

“RAW" tells us (1) that it must be technically possible to keep people free of deprivation and (2) people need to have socialist understanding. He tells us that the first requirement has been met even though people like the Hyde Park questioner may feel deprived. The second is a different matter. Capitalism did not have to solve this, RAW says. Perhaps he thinks the knowledge that even children have mastered to buy sweets should not count as knowledge. On this I do not agree. However, what about the knowledge we will use to economize our wants in the new society? This seems to have been ignored by RAW.

Workers are only “forced” to work in capitalism because they want to live. The same “force" would exist in any society that depended upon effort to supply needs. The two obstacles facing the SPGB are different from the ones RAW mentioned. They are: (1) A viable socialist economics that would theoretically expound the new society as modern economics expounds capitalism. (2) A political theory of how to manage law and order in the new society. I think it is fair to say that while they remain unsolved Socialism remains a half-baked idea.

David McDonagh 

Birmingham

Reply:

We are afraid that the trouble is that like many people, you feel that a harmonious system like Socialism is really too good to be true and therefore spend your time looking for all possible faults (which is fine) but find problems which won’t exist (which is unnecessary). You bring up the old difficulty: "What if everyone wants a Rolls Royce etc? Chaos must reign!” Under capitalism though, most people know they will never even ride in a Rolls, let alone own one, so that’s fine! The rich who rule the earth, can drive the Rolls Royces, and the people who build them can wait for the bus, and so that's fine! What you don’t grasp is that we will only have Socialism when the majority of people are socialists; that is people who know what Socialism is, and are determined to get it. Such people will not wreck Socialism because society may not be able to afford to produce Rolls Royces. The “economics” that you seem to require is in part a result of looking at the future. Socialism, with the conditioned eyes of the present, capitalism. Socialists who go through the revolutionary process of establishing Socialism will work in their own interests sorting out their material requirements. It may sound simple, but it is not only the SPGB that says it is possible to solve all the material problems i.e. it is technically possible to do so. It is only socialists though who have suggested the practical way of doing so. Why not spend your time thinking about the real problems that afflict us now, and not the imagined ones of the future? And join with us in getting rid of the cause of these problems?

So far as your question of law and order is concerned, there is not space to go into that here. We would refer you in particular to The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State by Engels, which shows that law is a product (and therefore a problem) of property society, and will be of no relevance to property less society, i.e. Socialism.

Editors.

Property Society — Russian Style (1977)

From the October 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

When Lenin and the Bolsheviks seized power in 1917 they were not making a revolution. The revolution had taken place some months earlier when the Tsarist regime was finally toppled together with the abandonment of feudalism, the build-up of capitalist production relations, and the recognition that this was to be the new form of society. All this had started before the Bolsheviks disbanded what democratic rights then existed in Russia and took control of the state machine. The Lenin coup speeded up this development.

However, Lenin and his conspiratorial clique claimed that they were about to do the impossible—establish Socialism without first having gone through the phase of capitalism. To this day, the Russian dictators claim that the present form of society is something to do with Socialism; is somehow the opposite of what happens in the West. The old joke is absolutely correct—“capitalist society is the exploitation of man by man, but in Russia it is the other way round”.

Almost as soon as Lenin had gained control of the state, the SPGB was able to point out that whatever else might be going on in Russia, it could not be the establishment of Socialism. Information about Russia was scarcer than it is today, but the SPGB had a sound understanding of the way society developed. We were able to point out that the two fundamental requirements for the establishment of the common ownership and control of, and free access to, all wealth and the means of producing it were missing. First, the potential of production in abundance, something which is only possible after capitalism has built up the productive forces; and second, mass Socialist consciousness, that is people ready to take over all wealth in society owned privately or by the state, with the knowledge of how to set up and run Socialist society. In 1977, sixty years later, it is clear to all that capitalism exists in Russia.

Capitalist constitution 

The hall-marks of capitalist society exist there; large amounts of property owned by certain sections of the community with the corollary that other sections do not own property in any meaningful sense, money, and buying and selling, a wages system, production for sale at a profit, a state machine backed up by armed force, and a system of law. This is capitalist society. The Russian Constitution (adopted by the 8th Congress of the Soviet of the USSR on December 5th, 1936, though slightly amended since) proudly and unashamedly boasts of all the major features of capitalism.

A few examples will make the point. To begin with, take the Russian legal system (of which the constitution is a part). Laws first developed when private property first appeared; they exist to maintain private property in the hands of the minority. All laws have this fundamental purpose. The more advanced the society, the more complicated and “mature” its legal system, and the Russian legal system is as complex and thorough as any. The need for a constitution and all that goes with it (judges, police, courts etc.) is only necessary for advanced property society. Their legal system is so similar to that which exists in Britain that W. Wilson MP, after a recent visit to Russia, could write:

The hard wooden seats and the long straight corridors of Leningrad City Court were no different from the wooden seats and long corridors often found in English Courts. The citizens of Leningrad who sat on those benches had the look of fearful expectancy that appears to be the never-changing mien of those who sit and wait outside English Courts. Inside the Leningrad City Court the occupants of the Bench could have been English provincial magistrates. The defendants — two waitresses charged with defalcation of the restaurant takings — appeared little different from two English waitresses in similar circumstances. (Law Society's Gazette, 10th Nov, 1976.)

The same misery and indignity that is imposed on the working class by the capitalist class the world over! Wilson concludes: “There are many aspects of Soviet criminal law that are on all fours with English criminal procedure.”

“Fundamental rights”

This conclusion is detailed in the Russian Constitution: capitalist relations are to exist, by law! The Constitution is divided into thirteen Chapters dealing with aspects of Russian property society. For example. Chapter 1 deals with “The Social Structure”, Chapter 2 “The State Structure”, Chapter 3 “The Highest Agencies of State Power”, Chapter 9 “The Court Structure” and the very revealing Chapter 10 is headed “Fundamental Rights and Duties of Citizens.” Each Chapter is divided into numbered subheadings (articles) covering the detailed matter of state power and administration. The Russian Constitution boldly protects individual liberties but this is meaningless. The Russian ruling clique has shown such scant regard for the “fundamental rights” enshrined in the Russian Constitution that it is right to say these “liberties” do not exist. Nevertheless, it is instructive to see what the Constitution says they are. In Article 125 of Chapter 10 It is provided as follows:

In conformity with the interests of the working people and in order to strengthen the socialist system, citizens of the USSR shall be guaranteed by law (a) freedom of speech; (b) freedom of the press; (c) freedom of assembly and meetings; (d) freedom of street processions and demonstrations.

Those people with any knowledge of western constitutions might think all this is suspiciously familiar. It is. Why is it necessary for the constitution to “declare” these “interests” of the “working people”? Does it mean that these so-called rights could be withdrawn, cut down, or totally ignored? In a Socialist society such meaningless declarations of good intent will be as unnecessary as they are absurd. In a free society there will be no possibility of forcing anyone to do anything, or taking away anything from anyone. If I want to speak, write, assemble with my friends, or march and demonstrate there will be no possibility of anyone preventing it. Socialism will be a voluntary society: the opposite of the coercive form of society that exists in Russia and the so- called “liberal” or “democratic” forms of society that exist in the west. There will be no need for constitutional claptrap.

The system of wage-labour is an essential feature of capitalist society. It is one of the fundamental characteristics that separate capitalism and its form of private property exploitation from every previous form. Right in the centre of the Russian Constitution (Chapter 10, article 118) the wages system is solemnly set forth in these words: “Citizens of the USSR shall have the right to labour, that is, the right to a guaranteed job with payment for their labour in accordance with its quantity and quality.” Article 12 of Chapter 1 makes sure the Russian worker does not miss the point: “Labour in the USSR shall be an obligation and a matter of honour for every able-bodied citizen in accordance with the principle ‘He who does not work, neither shall he eat.’ ” Thus the Russian proletariat is told that it is an honour to produce wealth for the rulers!

Wages and profits

The Council of Ministers of the USSR publishes each year a booklet called USSR in Figures. Their tables for 1975 give average wage and salary levels (“the average wages and salary plus allowances and benefits per worker”) and states that a minimum monthly wage of 70 roubles has now been agreed. Income tax has been abolished for those earning less than 70 roubles (so much for the minimum wage?); also taxes have been reduced for those workers earning less than 90 roubles per month (p. 182/3). The converse of wages is profits. Profits are produced for the capitalist class throughout capitalism by paying the worker less in wages than the value he has produced. The balance left over is appropriated by the capitalist class, and spent as revenue, or accumulated in order to reinvest to produce more profits and so on. The booklet actually prints tables of profits (p. 45) and proclaims that these have increased by 9.6 per cent, against 1974 figures! The Russian workers have made it possible for their exploitation to continue and increase. What capitalist government would not be proud of such efforts?

For a country that claims to have established Socialism many years ago, it is notable that the Russian rulers constantly have to remind their wage slaves that Socialism has been established. The first page of the rules of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (adopted in 1961 and amended in 1966) states: “Under the direction of the Communist Party exploiting classes in the Soviet Union have been liquidated, and the moral and political unity of Soviet society has been formed and strengthened. Socialism has triumphed fully and finally.” Chapter 1 of the Constitution, concludes that in the USSR “the principle of socialism shall be carried out; from each according to his ability, to each according to his labour.”

Socialism has not been established in Russia—it could not have been. When it is established, the world over, the principle will be from each according to his ability right enough, but to each according to his need. Need will be determined by each individual according to his own requirements, not according to his pay-packet. The wages system, money, buying and selling, constitutions, law courts, police and jailers will be unnecessary. The conditions for establishing socialism are now the same in Russia as the rest of the world. It needs a working class politically educated to take the necessary steps for their own emancipation.

Ronnie Warrington

Filthy Rich (1976)

From the September 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

One of the main points of the argument put forward by the SPGB is that capitalist society is divided into two classes; the working class, the largely propertlyless majority, and the capitalist class, those who own most of the wealth produced in the world and the physical means to make more of it. It is easy to identify the working class. For example you can see them at certain hours of the day pouring into the factories, offices, shops, mines railway stations etc. in order to work. That is why they are called workers. They receive at the end of their week or month’s work, a pay packet or salary cheque — the price at which they have sold their labour-power to the boss. Basically this will permit them to purchase sufficient to allow themselves and their families to subsist until the next pay packet. That’s simple.

But it is sometimes not quite so easy physically to identify the capitalist class. True you see the odd chauffeur driven Rolls with its owner frequently sprawled across the back seat, the assembly at Ascot, and those going in and out of Claridges, the Ritz etc. But some highly paid workers will use Claridges, so that can be confusing. And many members of the working class will go to Ascot to mimic the pastimes of their class exploiters. So identification lines can become blurred. In particular, when wealth ownership itself has become a most complicated and intricate network of title to deeds, bonds, shares etc. it all adds to the difficulty of identification It is no wonder many people are confused and ask the SPGB “Who are the capitalist class?” “Where are the capitalist class?” and so on.

Where there's a will

Well ironicaly, one of the easiest methods of identifying someone’s class position is not by the facts of his life, but by the effects of his death. When a worker dies, after funeral expenses have been paid, the H.P. company sorted out etc. there is not usually much left. Very often nothing at all. Born with nothing, the worker dies with nothing, leaving “not a rack behind” as Shakespeare put it. But the death of a capitalist is a different matter. For one thing it is noted in the papers — it is news. The Times for example runs a short daily column headed “Latest Wills”. Now these are not any old Wills — when you die, not only will they not bother to write your obituary in the Times, they won’t put in their latest Wills column how much you left to your family and friends. But a glance at the column for any day will show something interesting. The paper’s column for Wednesday July 14th 1976 (chosen entirely at random) is quite short. It reads as follows:

Lord Elphinsone of Drumkilbo, Meigle, Tayside, a first cousin of the Queen, has left estate totalling £890,907 gross according to his will published in Perth yesterday. It included £178,019 abroad. Other estates, include . . . Atkin, Mrs. Anita Constance Irene of Tonbridge £163,424; Bennett, Lady of Highgate, wife of Sir Thomas Bennett £143,390; Hawkin, Mrs. Levu Colin, of Caine, butcher, £345,293; Segravc, Mr. Charles Rodney of Chobham £515,275.

(The figures do not show the tax that will be payable on the deaths. Equally they do not show the amount the individual may have “disposed of” prior to death in part to avoid taxes. The true representation of the individual’s wealth may be much higher than the amount given.)

Another column which frequently pinpoints the capitalist at his hour of death is the obituary column. You don’t need to have done anything of note to merit an entry — provided you were very rich. J. Paul Getty died on 7th June this year. Some of the points about him which appeared from the Times of the next day are the following; at his death he was “estimated” (i.e. he was so rich they could not even count all his money and it had to be guessed) to be worth £1,000 million; he “lived simply amid considerable splendour at Sutton Place, near Guildford, the Elizabethan mansion set in 1,000 acres”; lest this home was not “simple” enough (how much more fawning can the capitalist press be than to say he lived “simply” — the reporter ought to visit some working class homes, or look round his own, and then see if Getty lived simply) he was having another house built for him at Malibu California where “he had built a museum to house his £100 million art collection”; by the age of 21 he had “made” 2 million dollars (but he had of course a rather good send off from his millionaire father), and by the same age he had had 2 divorces, (3 more marriages and divorces to follow); this displeased his “earnest Methodist” father, so much so that when the father died, he gave Getty only 500,000 dollars of his estate of 10 million dollars; but fear not, our hero was “not disheartened by the smallness of the legacy for he already had 4 million dollars of his own”; and on and on.

Thrift and Humbug

Like so many members of the class that has no social function whatever other than to accumulate the wealth produced by workers, Getty was fond of giving his opinions to all who cared to listen (and he was so rich many people did listen). The capitalist press repeat these pearls so that the swine before whom they are cast and who produced the wealth for him can be suitably impressed by the wisdom of their masters. For example; “The advice he was prone to give to others he had followed himself. This was to ‘be thrifty, save a little money and have a small surplus for investment’.” Or what about this gem: “He did not believe in charity. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, 'why I should distribute money right and left to people because they ask for it’”! well, quite right too! after all, if the world is so madly organized as to allow most people to live in want and provide Getty with such a crazy superabundance why should he be such a damn fool (as his methodist father with his religion humbug would no doubt have put it) as to give it back to them?

That’s one sadly deceased member of the parasite class. What about some living ones? The death of Getty brought forth speculations as to who was the richest person in the world now that both Getty and Howard Hughes are dead. As the Sunday Times reported (9/6/76) there is no shortage of candidates. Some of the most obvious candidates are to quote the Sunday Times “comparatively hard up”. Into that category they put people like Henry Ford, Woodruff of Coca Cola, Benton of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Forest E. Mars of Mars Bar fame and Dewott Wallace of Readers Digest. Some of the legendary wealthy American families (Rockefellers and the like) can’t compete for the title either because they have been too “busily giving their money away to distant members of the family in a desperate effort to avoid tax.” One possible candidate is Al Tajir. He is the ambassador to Britain from the United Arab Emirates and also their advisor on oil. He “has accrued his vast wealth from a variety of sources — mining in Africa, property in Western Europe, businesses in the Persian Gulf and Lebanon . . . he did once boast that whereas many governments would find it hard — if not impossible — to raise a billion dollars . . . it would take him only a morning” However the Sunday Times suggests that the man who must take the crown is currently little-known 78-year-old American, Daniel K. Ludwig.

Although it appears that Ludwig is somewhat coy about disclosing the extent of his interests (and he may not know — as Getty is supposed to have said, “you can’t be that rich if you know how much you have got”, it seems they include the following: “The American company National Bulk Carriers, a huge fleet of tankers, a shipyard in Japan, a large share in the National Mortgage Bank in America, a deep water port in Florida, a big interest in potash in Ethiopia, iron ore in India, oranges in Panama, a million acres of Venezuela, 3 million acres of Brazil and large chunks of Australia and the United States.”

A Bijou Nest

Another quietly comfortable family is the “Royal”. Despite the cries of poverty from them that have in recent years tugged at the worker’s heartstrings, the owners of the little home standing in the exclusive 40 acres of ground at Buckingham Palace (an estate agent’s dream) can’t be that hard up. They have recently bought a small present for their son-in-law and daughter. It is, according to the Daily Mail (24/6/76 a “730 acre property — complete with trout lake, a conservatory as long as a cricket pitch, 200 acres of mature woodland, a 530 acre farm, a folly and stables.” Mind you according to the report the stables probably need doing up, the kitchen (not that the dear couple can be expected to be doing that much washing up themselves) needs a coat or two of paint, the billiard room has a “dusty unused look and has been used as a store” (how low can you get?) and in general the 5 principal bedrooms, five secondary bedrooms (for the staff) and the four reception rooms clearly need tarting up. No doubt the locals will be able to see Anne and Mark on Saturday afternoon, their shirt sleeves rolled up to their royal elbows, scrubbing away for many years to come. No wonder the Queen only paid a bargain £750,000 for it.

Enough has been said to show that the capitalist class are still alive and well and thriving off the wealth produced by the workers. Though whether it is possible to identify them makes no difference to the system itself, or those that suffer from it. Whether you see your exploiter or not, he still exists. The workers in the so-called nationalized industries do not “know” their boss. Nonetheless they are still working for the sole benefit of a class other than their own, and it is from their work that all that wealth (only some examples of which have been mentioned in this article) comes. The wealth is produced not by the brains of the capitalist class but by the work of their employees. Quite simply what happens is that when the worker draws his wage, he does not receive from the boss the equivalent of what he has produced for him. He gets back just a proportion of the amount he has produced. The balance, i.e. the profit, is pocketed by the capitalist class and used to allow the Gettys and the ordinary rich to thrive. And they will continue to suck like the social leeches they are, until the working class as a whole say “Enough!" and decide to end property society once and for all.

Ronnie Warrington

Papal bull (1979)

From the November 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

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

Medieval pageant

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

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

Hypocrisy

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

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

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

Property baron

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

Bad for business

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

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

RAW/VM

Cuts in Education (1976)

From the July 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

Once again capitalism is going through a pretty severe crisis. There is of course nothing new in this. Nor is there anything unusual. On the contrary, it is merely evidence of the normal working of capitalism; a society in which crisis is as endemic as weeds to a flower bed. Marx pointed out over a hundred years ago, that capitalism would inevitably move in phases, one of which was crisis which is what is happening now. When capitalism in Britain or elsewhere gets into a financial crisis its government must turn to anything which offers a prospect of saving the situation, one vulnerable arm of expenditure is education. The direct benefits of investment in education are not as evident to all the capitalist class as is investment in plant or machinery. It takes some considerable time to get any return on the expense of getting children ready for “the work of life” (one of the Oxford English Dictionary’s definitions of education); at least ten years in school to make a labourer, considerably longer for a worker with a technical degree, even longer for a scientist capable of inventing a new type of warhead. So capitalism cuts.

This cannot be in the long-term interests of capitalism. Advanced capitalism needs well-trained labour. Without it, the individual capitalist state may fall behind its competitors in world markets. But long-term interests seldom enter into it. To make his workers redundant, close his plant etc. means less profit for the capitalist, yet nevertheless the capitalist class finds itself doing just that. So also with education. The dictates of this crazy system do not allow for common-sense (even from the point of view of capital). For one thing there are no jobs available for all those expensively-trained students (especially those coming out of so-called higher education). The Times reported (16th January 1976) over 1750 vacancies in colleges, universities and polytechnics which could not be filled in the south-east alone. From the point of view of the capitalist class, with a situation like that, why not cut?

So the hatchet men of the capitalist class (currently the Labour party) start looking for ways of saving the capitalist class’s money. Apart from straight cutting, a future hatchet “person”, Mrs. Thatcher has been suggesting one way for the capitalist class to have its cake and eat it. The method? Easy; you have more colleges, universities etc., without the State paying for them. Which is in effect what she recommended when she open the new University College of Buckingham. This was launched in February of this year as the first "private” university to be started this century in the UK. It is private because there are no direct “public funds” being used for its establishment and maintenance as distinct from other universities in the country. Of course in the long run if this experiment survives, most of the money will come from the capitalist class anyway, but for the moment the state is not being asked to fork out directly. Which is what Mrs. Thatcher meant when she said that she hoped in the future universities would be “encouraged to take their destinies more into their own hands and to embark upon institutional adventures which do not involve the lobbying of public opinion or government departments.” (Times Higher Education Supplement, 13th February 1976). She means of course those that do not require direct public funding.

But apart from this limited possibility, the capitalist class must look at the situation as it is. It must have been clear to the capitalist class what education was costing them. In the financial year 1975/76 for example the total cost of education (admittedly including “libraries, science and arts” government figures) will be £6,164 million. The only item of government expenditure which would cost more this year is the one misleadingly called “social security”. The remedy was to cut £618 million for next year and £1,000 million from the education budget for the following two financial years.

The effects of the cuts were predicted in the run-up to the publication of the government White Paper on public expenditure. One result forecast by the Times education correspondent (23 January 1976) was a large number of staff redundancies; hardly a difficult prediction since there was a serious unemployment problem in the teaching profession before the cuts were introduced. Among the other estimated effects from the cuts are higher school meals charges, reductions in the numbers of students undertaking higher education courses from an estimated 800,000 to 600,000 in the year 1981, a standstill on staff appointments, a reduction in the target for the number of teachers, a standstill on the numbers of children able to attend nursery education etc.

The reaction of the teacher unions was as predictable as the results of the cuts themselves. Fred Jarvis, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, was typical. He complained about the wastage: it had cost millions of pounds to train teachers who were to be made redundant. “The amount of public money wasted in training them would be about £50m. ‘This is the economics of Bedlam’, he said.” (The Times 20 January 1976.) But it is the economics of capitalism, which unfortunately he and most of his members continue to support. Most of the unions talked of “action” to oppose the cuts. Teacher unions received motion after motion with “demands” for no cuts, opposition to redundancies, opposition to closures, etc. The National Association of Teachers in Higher and Further Education for its 1976 conference has a list of 111 motions almost all of which relate to opposition to the cuts, or financing and salaries. All about as effective as trying to stop Concorde by throwing paper darts at it.

In all the loud and useless flannel of the unions, there are few signs of any realization that the chaos in their lives and those of their children is the result of the capitalist system. For example the Technical Journal for December 1975 when commenting on the disastrous effects the cuts would have in higher education grudgingly acknowledged that as the funding of much of further education “is closely linked to industry, this sector of education has always encountered the occasional potential redundancy situation due to such factors as a declining industry.” Although that could qualify for the understatement of the year, it nonetheless demonstrates something of an awareness (as yet alas, dim) that anarchy in production must lead to havoc in human existence.

Of course it often used to be possible for expensively trained teachers who were suddenly made expensively unemployed to leave the UK and find work abroad, at least in some of the Commonwealth countries. But just as capitalism is world-wide, so also are its periodic crises and so also therefore is unemployment. The Observer (8th February 1976) reported that it is no longer possible for British teachers to get jobs abroad. It even warns teachers against accepting jobs if lucky enough to be offered them. The article ends by pointing out that in the USA teachers can find education authorities running out of money and not having sufficient to pay the wages! So much for “successful” capitalism.

The SPGB is not joining in the campaign to oppose cuts or redundancies. It is pointing out to workers instead, that the cutting down in teachers and resources, while schools are short of both, is yet another of the endless dilemmas created by a social system where cost is paramount. The dilemma in this case is for those who protest at cuts but cannot suggest where the money is to come from, and will go on supporting capitalism which creates such problems.

Ronnie Warrington

Our Comrade Overseas (1974)

From the June 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Over the years since the formation of the SPGB, parties with the same Object and Declaration of Principles as ourselves have been established in other parts of the world. We have close contact with these parties in our efforts to put to the working class the necessity for world common ownership and free access. Like the SPGB our companion parties are small, but they are keeping to the fore the aim which can transform the world from its present crisis-ridden state. The contradiction between great wealth and the possibility of production in abundance on one hand, and mass deprivation on the other, grows more startling daily. These contradictions will one day throw up Socialist consciousness in the minds of the working class, like a world-wide volcano.

For this consciousness to arise, the working class will have to drop its adherence to reformist movements which come forward with their bankrupt promises to slay the dragon of capitalism, bit by bit. Capitalism must either be abolished by the deliberate action of workers, or it will remain. It cannot be reformed to work in the interests of the majority. It is up to the working class to free itself from the degradations of capitalism and establish Socialism. The function of the SPGB and its companion parties is to explain to the working class what capitalism is, what Socialism will be, and how workers themselves are the instruments for effecting the transformation. As Engels put it in his Socialism: Utopian and Scientific—

“To thoroughly comprehend the historical conditions and thus the very nature of this act, to impart to the now oppressed proletarian class a full knowledge of the conditions and of the meaning of the momentous act it is called upon to accomplish, this is the task of the theoretical expression of the proletarian movement, scientific Socialism.”

Below is a brief history and guide to our companion parties.

Socialist Party of Canada

The party’s origins go back to 1905, shortly after the inception of the SPGB. However it was a false start. The party, whilst containing Socialists, also attracted a large group of social reformers and its relationship with the SPGB had to be severed. The Russian Revolution exploded the apparent unity of the party, and the few remaining members only managed to struggle on until 1926. However, in 1931 another group of Socialists got together and formed the present party based on the uncompromising demand for immediate world Socialism. In 1933 the party started the journal The Western Socialist. Because of pressure by the wartime government in October 1939 the Western was handed over to the WSP of the US, who have since published it on behalf of both parties. The party is now working overtime in its efforts to spread Socialist understanding in North America. In 1970, having acquired an old offset press, the branch in Victoria started to publish its own leaflets, and their own journal Fulcrum now appears regularly. Recently the French-speaking area of Quebec has been subjected to a battery of Socialist propaganda. The results have been encouraging. In 1973 Socialisme Mondial first appeared; written in French, it is now available in France and Belgium as well as Canada.

World Socialist Party of the United States

The party was founded in Detroit in 1916 and then called, “The Workers’ Socialist Party of the United States”. The party was helped into existence by two members of the SPGB, Moses Baritz and Adolph Kohn, on the run from the British government’s war machine; their energy and drive forced those Socialists in the Detroit area to break away from the Socialist Party of America to form a party based on the Socialist platform only. Because of wartime conditions and the great distances between American cities they reverted to being a “Socialist Education Society” and continued — doing valuable work — in this form until they could re-start the WSP on a solid basis.

In 1929 their first publication appeared, and the present-day WSP was founded on 8th September 1930, with headquarters in New York. It was not until 1939 that a party journal was established on a firm footing. This was the Western Socialist, which the party took over from the Socialist Party of Canada. It is still going strong today. In the 1940s the party’s name was changed to its present name to avoid confusion with one of the numerous Trotskyist organizations in the USA. The party’s main activity now is publishing and distributing The Western Socialist (it goes to libraries and colleges throughout the US), and regular radio and occasional television broadcasts.

Socialist Party of New Zealand

The party was founded in 1930, although prior to that date there had been considerable Socialist propaganda in the country. In 1919 the party’s forefathers, The New Zealand Marxian Association, invited Moses Baritz to the country to do a series of talks. Baritz took the movement over there by storm; in a series of devastating lectures Baritz put the whole pseudo-socialist and pro-Russia movement to flight. Baritz was deported for his pains, but he had given the Socialist movement in New Zealand a great fillip. In 1934 the party’s first journal was produced which ran for five issues, and again in 1944 another journal came out which lasted four years. Now the party’s journal Socialist Viewpoint comes out bi-monthly. The party’s activity apart from Viewpoint is now concentrated round elections. In 1972 the party entered its first candidate in the New Zealand general elections, and intends to contest the 1975 general elections with, it is hoped, at least two candidates.

Socialist Party of Australia

The party was founded in 1928. However, a considerable amount of Socialist activity had taken place before then. Several seamen who had contact with the SPGB were active in Australia. Bill Casey and Barney Kelly, who were among those sailors and others propounding the Socialist analysis after the first World War in Australia, were sent to the Red Trade Union International in Moscow (in about 1921) as delegates of the seamen’s union. On their return the seamen’s journal refused to publish their report because it pointed out that what had taken place in Russia in 1917 was not a Socialist revolution. Moses Baritz (he seemed to get everywhere) also showed up in Australia in the early 1920’s like a Socialist tornado. By the time the party was formed, there was a certain amount of experience of activity to go on. Shortly after the party’s formation, members began to distribute the Socialist Standard. The Labour government of the day demonstrated its commitment to democracy by banning it for some time. In recent years it has been a struggle for the party to keep going. Vast distances between individual members make concerted party action difficult. However, the party distributes companion party journals and issues and distributes leaflets wherever possible. Individual members, as with members of all the Socialist parties, do all they can to put forward the Socialist case.

Bund Demokratischer Sozialisten of Austria

The party was formed in 1959. It emerged out of a loosely-knit group that had previously been operating in Vienna. Almost immediately the party began publishing a stencilled paper then called Das Freie Wort. In 1966 it officially adopted the SPGB Object and Declaration of Principles; now, as Internationales Freies Wort the paper is well established on a quarterly basis. A major influence on the Bund was Rudolf Frank. He had come under the spell of what he called “the SPGB university” prior to 1914 and his enormous experience helped greatly. Until his death, he played a large part in the writing and editing of the party’s publications. As well as distributing their paper, the party has good contacts with youth organizations and tries to spread Socialist understanding in every area possible.

World Socialist Party of Ireland

Formed in 1959, the party had an active and healthy existence until the recent outbreak of violence in north and south Ireland. The branches in Belfast and Dublin which had been doing stirring work distributing the socialist standard and generally pricking the political balloons of the apologists for capitalism, a task begun years earlier by Mick Cullen, (a thorn in the side of all anti-Socialists), have largely gone quiet since the start of the recent troubles. Socialists can only hope that the “normality” of British capitalism’s conditions will soon return to Ireland, to allow our comrades there the chance to take up again the cudgels of Socialism.

Socialist Group in Jamaica

The group was formed in the early 1960s almost entirely as a result of the pioneering efforts of a comrade who had been living in England for some time and having come into contact with the party’s Birmingham branch became a Socialist. When he returned to his home in Jamaica he devoted himself to spreading Socialist understanding. After a considerable struggle, the group managed to obtain a duplicating machine. Their journal Socialist Review now appears whenever possible, and is a credit to the devoted band of Socialists over there. 

Ronnie Warrington

Abuse of a revolutionary by the bourgeois press (1979)

From the Fall 1979 issue of The Western Socialist

If one thing is certain it is this: that no writer in history has been more misrepresented by his friends or vilified and abused by his foes than Karl Marx. For example, his “friends” the Russians misrepresent him to help them continue the massive fraud that Russia has something to do with socialism or communism. On the other hand, his avowed enemies don’t consider at what he said, merely at what his supposed friends said he said. And as that is usually so awful, the press find it useful to present Marx to the working class as a sort of bogey man, in a way mothers used to frighten children. What concerns socialists is not some defence of Marx as though his works were holy writ. But we are interested here for two main reasons: first, because we think truth is important; second, because although the case of the WSP is our own unique point of view, we are the first to acknowledge our debt to Marx. It was his towering achievements that enabled the founders of this party to place socialism on a sound basis.

So let me take two prime examples of abuse of Marx from the British bourgeois press to illustrate the point. The first from The Times in an article by Philip Howard called “Keeping cool in these muddy Marxist waters” (12/29/76). This article explains that the word “Marxism” has been used indiscriminately and suggests that the term ought to be used to describe followers of the political and economic theory of Marx. Howard then gives the reader the “three principles” of Marx. It is fair to say that the first principle is approximately correct but trite, and that the second and third principle given by Howard are wrong. The first principle says Howard is that Marx held that “labour is basic to wealth,” Now this is not a doctrine of Marx, but a truism that was obvious long before Marx was born. What Marx did, however, was to point out that capitalism functions on the basis of the work of the working class being paid for (in wages) by the capitalist class, at less than the worth of the things (commodities) the workers produced for the capitalists. This difference between what the worker produces for the capitalist and what the capitalist pays the worker is what Marx called “surplus value,” (I come back to that below) and is the source of profit.

The second principle of Marx according to Howard is “that economic determinism governs human activities in every sphere.” Rubbish! Marx said no such thing! Economic determinism means that every human action, in particular the human actions involved in the development of human society, i.e., history, are purely the result of the economic relations in society. Put simply the doctrine means men have no say in their destiny. This is not what Marx said at all. On the contrary, Marx said that men make history, though they do not necessarily do so as “free agents.” They can only make history out of the circumstances at hand. To take a simple example: it is impossible to build a machine that will fly, until scientific development has reached a certain level. Economic determinism is a doctrine designed to demonstrate that human action is irrelevant to social change. The horrors that have been practiced in its name by the Soviet block owe nothing to Marx.

The third principle of Marx according to Howard is “that historical development . . . must lead to the violent overthrow of the capitalist class and the taking over of the means of production by the proletariat. the real problem here is the word “violent.” Marx (and Engels) made it clear that in those countries where political democracy prevails (for example in the USA today) the revolution to establish socialism must be democratic and peaceful. Indeed, the socialist revolution cannot occur in any other way. The “violence” notion is an invention of others, usually used to justify the purported establishment of socialism in the face of the opposition of the majority. But socialism can only be established by the majority of the world’s working class, in the full knowledge of all that the establishment of socialism entails. This means that the socialist revolution must be a peaceful one. Violence is only necessary where understanding is absent. This is the WSP’s point of view, and there is nothing in Marx’s mature works that dissents from it.

So Howard, having started out to present the alleged principles of Marxism, ends by spreading as much confusion as possible. But then slandering Marx is no new thing for the bourgeois press. The right-wing Daily Telegraph naturally is not above such things. They published an article on Marx by Robert Conquest called ‘“A Little Bit of Poison”. (4/30/77) If for that title you read “A Huge Host of Invention” you will have an idea of the article’s purpose.

Conquest’s article says that Marx was wrong from the word go (though in the same article Conquest says Marx is refuted by 1900!). The article begins with a classic piece of villainy — identifying people who CLAIM that what they stand for has something to do with Marx, as representative of Marx’s ideas. Conquest starts with Wedgwood Benn (the British Labour Party politician) and ends, predictably, with Lenin and the Russian monstrosity. Conquest first says that Wedgwood Benn and the faction of the Labour Party that he represents has something to do with Marxism. How incredible it is that this myth still persists. The Labour Party (Wedgwood Benn and the others) is a party committed to one system of society only, capitalism. It was formed to obtain political power for the purpose of trying to do the impossible — improve capitalism in the interests of the working class. Seventy-three years after its inception, here is the Labour Party today still feebly trying to do the undoable, make capitalism work for all. Mr. Conquest has nothing to do with Marx’s main aim; i.e., the analysing of capitalism in monumental detail for the purpose of showing the working class that capitalism is not in their interests.

To get to the end of Conquest’s article, he deals with Russia and the Leninist distortion. The World Socialist Party has pointed out time after time the ludicrous nature of the suggestion that what took place in Russia in 1917 and has been taking place since has anything to do with socialism or by implication with Marx. There is no need to set out at length again the reasons the WSP and its companion parties has given for pointing out that the Russian revolution was not socialist. Anyone who wants further information on this subject is welcome to write to the party, and references to extensive party literature dealing with the subject can be supplied. Suffice it to say here that the Russian working class in 1917 was in no way ready to establish a world of common ownership.

Between these two extremes of ignorance and prejudice Conquest turns his mighty attention to Marx’s analysis of the class struggle and the importance of surplus value. Conquest claims that Marx analysed society in terms of class struggle, and then in his later research discovered that in modern times the class struggle “is rooted in the fact that all profit is extracted — as ‘surplus value’ — from the workers”. This argument says Conquest “is purest metaphysics. No evidence was presented”! This last libel borders on the fantastic. To claim that Marx’s economic analysis is wrong is one thing. If such an argument were supported by reasoned discussion it could be examined on its merits. But lack of evidence! Has Conquest ever tried to lift the 3 volumes of “Capital” and the 3 volumes of “Theories of Surplus Value,” let alone read them? The painstaking way Marx evidences his arguments is so formidable that it has a lot to do with Marx’s work being so lengthy. (Incidentally, Marx himself was not above a joke at his own expense on this score. While working on “Capital” he wrote to Engels. “I am stretching out this volume since those German dogs estimate the value of books by their cubic contents”!) He “stretched out” all 3 volumes of “Capital” by including a large amount of data, mostly from government sources, all justifying his theoretical contentions. To claim that Marx had no evidence for his arguments on surplus value is the despair of the ignorant abuser.

Marx’s writings still merit close study and critical attention. They explain to the working class why it is that capitalism cannot and does not work in their interests. The WSP argues that the only conclusion to be drawn from Marx’s work is that as capitalism can’t solve the problems it raises, a different sort of society must be established. To that end, Marx’s writings are as relevant as when first written. The writings of the Conquests and the Howards on the other hand have no relevance today, and are forgotten tomorrow.

R. A. Warrington

SPGB Meetings (1977)

Party News from the October 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard 

How Many Shares Have You? (1975)

From the September 1975 issue of the Socialist Standard

How often have Socialist speakers heard the absurd defence of Capitalism that, because anyone can now own “shares” in companies, everyone is a capitalist. The argument goes on to claim that therefore the working class are no longer the deprived majority of society.

W. S. Gilbert would no doubt have retorted “if everyone is somebody, then no-one’s anybody”. And of course, even if it were true that most people own a handful of shares it would not alter one iota of our fundamental criticism of capitalism. Our criticism is that capitalism is incapable of solving the major social ills that it constantly creates. All it does produce are profits for the capitalist class and problems for the working class.

But the claim is false. It is by the possession of shares that the capitalist class in advanced western capitalism (a different arrangement prevails under Soviet capitalism — no less anti-social) claims most of its ownership of the means of production and of the commodities that are produced. Shares are either owned by individuals or by companies, unit trusts (the so-called “institutional shareholders”) and the like.

As far as individual shareholdings are concerned, there is no doubt that the overwhelming majority of the population don’t own any. In his book Unequal Shares A. B. Atkinson says that 5 per cent of the population own over 96 per cent of the privately held shares and 1 per cent own 81 per cent. That does not leave much for the rest of us. Clearly the majority of workers have never seen a share certificate, let alone owned one.

With institutional shareholdings the position is more complicated. A good deal of the shares are owned by companies whose shares are themselves privately owned. “But what about pension funds and the like?” the defender of Capitalism plaintively bleats. “They are held for the benefit of the workers, for retirement money, injury pay etc. In effect, these are owned by the workers.” Rubbish.

According to the Royal Commission on Income and Wealth (Report No. 1, 1975) only 12.2 per cent of the total number of shares quoted are owned by Pension Funds. These funds are established by large firms like ICI or Fords for sound economic capitalist reasons. And they are set up to benefit the companies (i.e. the shareholders).

Indeed it is a well established principle of British Company Law that all moneys must be used by the company for the benefit of the shareholders only. When the old News Chronicle was closing down in the early 1960s the directors wanted to pay some of the money realised from the sale of the company’s assets to the work force as compensation for their loss of jobs etc. The high court stopped them. Money given to workers was not being used in the best interest of the company it said. The only way the money could be lawfully distributed was to the shareholders.

So in order for these “pension funds” to be lawful, the company must show that they are in the best interests of the company’s owners. And they are. There are many reasons why it is of direct benefit to the company to have pension funds and it would take a whole issue of the Socialist Standard to explain them fully. But some of the more obvious ones are these: —

1. It is another bait for the work force, just as luncheon vouchers or sports facilities etc. are. Workers know too well the miserable pensions the state will pay them when they retire and “non-contributory pension schemes” are one of the things the employer can offer to supplement a low wage.
2. Once employed the worker is encouraged to feel that he has a “stake” in the company and that if he leaves he will lose his right to a pension or it may be reduced.
3. Above all, the money in pension funds belongs to the company. Admittedly it cannot actually be spent by the capitalist class, but then neither can machines. When profits are “ploughed back” into a business these are not lost to the capitalist class. On the contrary, they represent a greater accumulated share of capital than was represented by the company’s assets before. A pension fund is as much a part of the capital of a company as is the factory or the stock-in-trade, and this will be reflected in the value of the shares on the stock exchange.

Capitalism doesn’t give workers shares, it only gives them crumbs. Socialism will mean free access, not unequal shares.

Ronnie Warrington

Socialism—What it is, and how to get it (1977)

From the September 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

The other political parties, who claim to stand for Socialism or Communism (identical terms), never trouble to define either. Most of these parties regard it as unnecessary. The SPGB has always been careful in defining Socialism. Our object, containing our definition of the new society that will one day replace capitalism, is prominently reproduced in all our literature. Likewise the method of obtaining Socialism—this too appears on all our literature in our Declaration of Principles.

Socialism is like capitalism in that it is a system of society where human beings cooperate to produce things that people require. There the resemblance ends. Socialism means that everything in society is owned by everyone and available for use to everyone. There will be no ownership of wealth in any form; the concept will become meaningless to humanity. As Marx put it: “From the standpoint of a higher form of society, private ownership of the globe by single individuals will appear quite as absurd as private ownership of one man by another.” Capital Volume 3, p. 776, Lawrence & Wishart edn.)

Production will take place by people voluntarily applying their energies to satisfy the needs of themselves and others; material and mental needs. All wealth that is produced will be available to all, to take according to their own judged requirements. The only reason for production will be to satisfy that need. As there will be no private ownership, there will be nothing to prevent people using the resources of the world in their own interests. Likewise there will be nothing to stop people taking from the resources of the world.

World Society

This society must be a world society. It is quite meaningless to think of capitalism existing in the UK as distinct from the rest of the world capitalist scene. The system of society that is to replace capitalism will also be a system of society for the whole world. World resources must be freely available for Socialism to work.

People in Socialist society will have to produce things they need. It is a precondition to society itself that men cooperate to satisfy their requirements as living creatures. But the purpose of production will be completely different from that under all forms of property society. The object of production, looked at as a social whole, will be to increase the wealth of society itself, not of one class. If that is not the outcome then, unless there are some very special reasons, that particular line of production will be suspended.

So that whereas under capitalism the wealth of society is increased by the production of arms, or bombs, or useless luxuries, or pointless (to the majority of people) office blocks etc., in Socialist society there will be no question of producing anything other than something that fulfills the requirements of people. It won’t be possible to sell anything, so all that is produced will be produced for use. And in a world- harmonious system, no one will have any use for armaments. In this form of society people will democratically decide what is required in the interests of all. There is an argument for saying that in the first few years after the revolution, production will concentrate on building up the immediate pressing requirements, such as food and shelter, which capitalist society has kept in short supply. Once that temporary problem is overcome (if it actually proves to be a problem) society will produce everything required to the best of the technological possibilities available at the time.

Distribution will be a simple process under Socialism; once the absurd complications of capitalist social relations have been removed, there is no reason for it to be otherwise.

Free Access

Access to everything that is produced will be free and unrestricted. There will be no limitations on individual consumption, augmented by laws, backed by armies and police forces. The only restraint on consumption will therefore be social, that is, society will not produce what society cannot afford. Today’s society produces much that most people cannot afford. “Supposing everyone in Socialist society wanted a Rolls Royce? and their own Buckingham Palace and thirty-seven meals a day?” says the absurd questioner at Hyde Park almost every Sunday. “How would Socialist society cope with that?” The answer is simple—so far as we can tell, with current technological possibilities, it wouldn’t!

There is no reason to suppose that such absurdities will exist in a free society. Why should they? What the questioner fails to realize is that he is imagining that Socialist society will be the same as capitalist society, where the ownership of Rolls Royce, or a house like Buckingham Palace, actually means something. Such ownership concepts will have vanished once the revolution takes place. Besides, in a Socialist society, where distribution is organized, the number of things like cars actually required by society will probably be far fewer. What’s the point in having a car standing outside your front door all week, if you have no use for it until next week, when you will be able to take one for as long as you need it? When ownership is social, it will also be efficient.

Socialist society will not have class ownership of wealth. As it will be a voluntary non-coercive society, with no limits on individual consumption, it follows that there will be no compulsion on anyone to produce anything. A human being as a part of society will not be compelled to make his whole existence dependent on producing more for somebody else. So why should people work? There are many answers. Perhaps the most important for people emerging from capitalism is this; just as Socialism is a voluntary society when established, so also is its actual establishment. It will have been established by the majority in the interests of all. As it is absolutely necessary for man to produce (without that there is no survival) then it seems reasonable to suppose that people who have taken the trouble to set up this (system of society will do all that is necessary to ensure that it thrives. In fact the objection to Socialism “no-one will work” illustrates that the person that is making the objection has not understood the nature of Socialism and what is required to establish it. Society must produce: and this applies to a voluntary society. If people do not accept that proposition, i.e. that it will be necessary for each person to “do his bit for the common good” then Socialism cannot be established yet.

Human ‘Nature’

In fact, once Socialist society has been established, more fundamental reasons will emerge making sure that society does not commit social suicide by failing to produce. Without wishing to sound puritanical, man must work. First, without work, man is not man. One characteristic that distinguishes man from all other forms of life is that he consciously acts on nature; animals can only unconsciously react to it. If there is such a thing as “human nature” then its first feature is the desire to use energies to satisfy the needs of oneself and others. Second, work will be a pleasure; it will not be a “job”. A job today is something unpleasant, to be avoided (as the capitalist class avoids it) because it is made so unpleasant by the requirements of society. The worker cannot avoid a job, and consequently he has to work in order to live, instead of wanting co live to be able to work, i.e. use up energies in a fulfilling way. Not only are the majority of jobs performed by the working class today unnecessary (except in terms of capitalists’ profit-making), they are usually terrifyingly boring.

The most satisfying moment of any creative activity (having a useful end-result) is by definition, denied to the worker. The product of his joint labour with others when completed is automatically taken from him. It belongs to another class — the capitalist class—to whose interests, the worker, is diametrically opposed. In Socialist society, people will do things that are pleasurable because they want to do them, and because they have the satisfaction of doing something useful. In time, the distorted distinction between work and play will vanish. To the people who grow up in Socialist society working for themselves and others will seem natural, satisfying and an absolute requirement of “the good life”.

There are two obstacles to be overcome before this type of society can be established. First, it must be technically possible to produce sufficient of the requirements of life, to enable all to live without fear of want or deprivation. This requirement was satisfied a hundred years ago. It is certainly not an obstacle today. Second there has to be a substantial majority determined to establish this new form of running human affairs. Understanding has not been necessary for the establishment and running of capitalism (and other forms of property society) since the majority are compelled in one form or another to cooperate. In capitalist society, the workers are forced to sell their labour-power. Capitalism functions if a minority understand the total workings of society, so long as the majority understand how to produce. Socialism will require the substantial majority to cooperate in its establishment. To do that, the working class needs to understand how society works and why Socialism is in their interests. There are two irresistible forces at work doing just that. The first is capitalist society itself— its operation shows to the workers that it cannot function in their interest. The second force is the world Socialist movement.

Ronnie Warrington