Voice From The Back: Behind The Fine Words (2010)

The Voice From The Back Column from the September 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Behind The Fine Words

Recently in a show of strength the USA and South Korea mounted an exercise in and around the Sea of Japan. It consisted of 20 ships, 200 aircraft and 8,000 military personnel and was supposedly a response to the sinking of a South Korean vessel by North Korea. Like all such military displays of power it was accompanied by fine words. They were “protecting the democratic South against the tyranny of the North”. China, an ally of North Korea viewed it as “an intrusion into an area not far from Chinese territorial waters”. It is much more likely that the correspondent Giles Whittell was much nearer the real economic truth behind the fine words when he reported – “The military display that may or may not have struck fear into the hermit dictatorship north of the 38th parallel has angered Beijing as it seeks to assert sovereignty over nearly 1.5 million square miles of the South China Sea, rich in oil and mineral deposits” (Times, 28 July). Behind the fine words, as usual, lurks the profit motive

Progressing Backwards

During the last ninety years or so the working class have been promised by reformist politicians that if only they were in power the working class would enjoy a better standard of living. Foolishly they have swallowed that piece of nonsense and have endured a world war, countless local wars, massive periods of economic slumps, poverty and unemployment. One of the major promises of the reformers was that of improved health care but what is the reality? “The gap between the health of rich and poor is greater now than at any time since modern records began, a study shows. Government initiatives have done little or nothing to close the gap between the life expectancy of poor people and those who are wealthy, researchers from universities in Sheffield and Bristol, writing in the British Medical Journal, said. They looked at deaths between 1921 and 2007” (Times, 23 July). Ninety years of progress according to the reformers – ninety years of futility is more like it!

Bargain Basement Exploitation

“One of Britain’s fiercest and most ostentatiously successful business men has been enlisted to spearhead the Government’s attack on public spending. Sir Philip Green, a man with a reputation for making brutally effective commercial reforms, has been asked by David Cameron to lead a no-holds barred examination of departmental budgets” (Times, 13 August). In his personal life Sir Philip is anything but frugal or economic. He spent £5 million on his 50th birthday party, £4 million on his son’s bar mitzvah and £30 million on his yacht. We imagine what impressed Cameron about Green was his ruthless exploitation of his workers. Here is an example of how fortunes are made in the retail business. “Indian workers are paid just 25p an hour and forced to work overtime in factories used by some of Britain’s best-known high street stores … Some of the biggest names on the British high street are at the centre of a major sweatshop scandal. An Observer investigation has found staff at their Indian suppliers working up to 16 hours a day. Marks & Spencer, Gap and Next have launched their own inquiries into abuses and pledged to end the practice of excessive overtime, which is a flagrant breach of the industry’s ethical trading (ETI) and Indian labour laws” (Observer, 8 August). It is estimated that Green has a fortune of over £4 billion made in such firms as BHS, Topshop, Evans, Miss Selfridge and Dorothy Perkins – that exploitation rather than his personal lifestyle is what has impressed the cost-cutting Cameron.

Half A Million Homeless

Politicians love nothing better than coming up with catchy phrases that they reckon will be taken up by the media. Over the years we have had “The war to end all wars”, “A land fit for heroes”, “You never had it so good”, and more recently Mrs Thatcher’s “A property owning democracy”. The war to end all wars led to an even bloodier conflict, a land fit for heroes turned out be a land where only a bloody hero could survive and Macmillan’s never had it so good only applied to the owning class. Thatcher’s property owning democracy seems particularly ironic when we learn of this prediction. “More than 500,000 people will be added to social housing waiting lists and nearly 300,000 jobs will go under proposals to cut the housing budget by up to 40 per cent, say campaigners. The National Housing Federation says ministers risk “shutting the door on an entire generation of low-income families” by cutting cash for affordable homes” (Times, 26 July). Empty political slogans don’t solve the problems of poverty, unemployment or homelessness – only workers understanding about socialism can do that.

“Humanitarian” Slaughter

Capitalism is a blood-thirsty rapacious society, so it is no accident that its supporters have had to invent euphemisms to cover up its carnage. In recent years we have heard of “collateral damage”. This is used when a school or a hospital is blown up. To cover up the madness that leads to troops killing their own numbers we have “friendly fire”. The Israeli government have sunk to a new level even for them with the following news item. “The Israeli military has imposed restrictions on the use of white phosphorous munitions, which led to civilian deaths and casualties in Gaza last year. Israel told the UN that it would deploy them only when approved by a “humanitarian affairs officer” (Times, 22 July). What would be the job description of a “humanitarian affairs officer”? Someone adept at describing burning to death from white phosphorous as a “pleasant, almost painless termination” perhaps?

The Growth Of Inequality

One of the great illusions of the 21st century is that only in the past had we this awful set-up where “robber barons” intent on grabbing more and more wealth out of the poor exploited masses had their existence. How 19th-century we are led to believe, because we do not live in such a society today. But do we ? “Many of the great fortunes of American history – those of the Rockefellers, Andrew Carnegie and the Fords – are now mighty foundations that have long outlasted their founders. Recent years have seen the greatest disparity of wealth in America since the Golden Age of the 1920s. A recent study found that the top one per cent of Americans now receive 15 per cent of the country’s total income – about double the rate of the 1960s and 1970s” (Times, 5 August). Capitalism was based on the exploitation of the working class by the capitalist class in the days of Rockefeller and Carnegie – it still is.

Blogger's Note:

The 'Behind The Fine Words' piece was not in the print edition of the Standard but is included in the website edition of the Standard.

The Appeal to Dives. (1906)

From the June 1906 issue of the Socialist Standard

To the glory of the Daily News and the increase of its circulation, a “Sweating Exhibition” was opened in the early days of last month, under the distinguished patronage of certain serene or royal highnesses who were graciously pleased to express their heartfelt sympathy with the condition of the victims of the system which their royal highnesses are also pleased to uphold, and of which they are the more or less picturesque figure-heads. We read that when she saw these brave workers Princess Henry was moved several times to say, “Oh, terrible ! terrible ! terrible !” and again “Shocking ! shocking ! shocking !” And these ejaculations seem to have so greatly affected the Daily News gentlemen that they forgot to reject the advertisement which has appeared at intervals in their journal check by jowl with the lavishly worded reports of the proceedings of their Sweating Exhibition—a large displayed advertisement which sets out the advantages of somebody’s suits at 21s.

All through the month of May the exhibition has, with the assistance of a weirdly polyglot committee of high church dignitaries, low church ecclesiastics, broad church clerics, non-conformist church pillars and a host of laymen of every church and no church—a committee ranging from my lord bishop to plain Harry Quelch—kept its doors open. The well-to-do folk in goodly numbers have followed the lead of the royal personages and passed through the tastefully arranged hall and after closely inspecting; the horrors of sweating with all the horrors carefully eliminated, have passed out again having remarked “oh, terrible ! terrible” and also “dreadful! dreadful !” which it seems is the proper thing to say in the circumstances. And the soul of the Daily News has been much gratified thereat; and the sweated workers on exhibition have (vide the Daily News) been equally gratified ; and the columns of the Daily News have been filled with much good “copy;” and a firm has written expressing their great indignation that the boxes used by them should have been discovered in process of manufacture under sweating conditions and has donated a sum to the exhibition ; and the Daily News has secured a wide and valuable advertisement out of the undertaking; and what with one thing and another it has been most excellent good business.

It was a great idea to fix upon the West End for the show. It was done purposely to attract the well-to-do. All that the well-to-do wanted was to have their consciences shaken up a little. Once effect that, and something was bound to happen. It was useless going to a poor neighbourhood as had been proven by the lack of success of the previous exhibition which had been holden in the East End. The conscience of England, rich England, that is not poor England which does not matter, could not be reached from the East End. Certainly much interest was aroused by the East End Exhibition. Representatives of large firms unable to understand how their trade rivals could undersell them, came and were astounded at what they saw. It cleared the air for them and they went away no longer seeing as through a glass darkly. Yet the sweating did not stop. On the contrary, it seemed to increase. Perhaps it was that the City firms, knowing their rivals’ secret, had been forced to adopt their methods. Its a poor Exhibition out of which nobody gets a wrinkle.

Therefore, the Daily News show came to the West End in order to lash the moral consciences of the rich and if a West End conscience expresses itself under the lash in “shockings” and “terribles” the show has done it. The Daily News people at any rate have no doubt about it. Their Exhibition “has rendered a great service to humanity;” it has successfully appealed to the moral conscience of England and has raised such a storm of indignation that, if the land is not filled with fugitive sweaters hastening without the revengeful reach of relentless wrath, it clearly ought to be.

Nevertheless, the truth compels the admission that sweating still continues and must continue so long as the worker is compelled to sell his or her labour-power on the market as a commodity and has no control over the disposal of the wealth which the labour of the worker alone produces. Just because it is inevitable that the exigences of profit manufacture,—the necessary accompaniment of capitalism,—should demand that a large proportion of labour should be redundant on the market; just because, that is, capitalist production would be impossible without an army of unemployed to keep wages down, it is inevitable that the pressure of want should force numbers of these workers to sell their labour-power at starvation prices. Not all the waves of indignation and “moral feeling” that can be conjured out of a community, can affect that result even though the community were ten thousand times more susceptible to “moral” appeals than English people are. Given capitalism, there is no escape from the mind-blunting, heart-racking misery which the annals of toil shew as their dominant and most persistent feature.

Exhibitions such as the Daily News has organised are useless—worse than useless, because the only effect they have or can have is to temporarily stimulate the flow of ludicrously impotent driblets of charity to the end that the evil plight of those unhappy persons whose condition has been brought under notice, may be in some measure palliated, and the time when drastic and adequate action may be taken, delayed. To delay that time may or may not be the deliberate intention of charity dispensers and their following, but it is indisputable that their action contributes to the dissemination of the idea that there exists a “moral conscience” which when occasion demands, can take on tangible soup-and-blanket expression sufficient to satisfy the immediate demands of the acutely impoverished. In other words, the response of the charitable is the excuse for Governmental indifference to the poverty problem, is the force that blunts the agitation of those concerned to press that problem upon a reluctant public attention and, what is of far greater importance from our point of view, helps to obscure that class issue which it is our business as a Socialist Party to keep boldly defined, and so fosters confusion in the minds of the working class. As against the Daily News and its circulation raising sensationalism, we urge that nothing short of the overthrow of capitalism itself and the establishment of Socialism can effect the eradication of poverty and all its attendant horrors. Only when the working class understand that they are poor because they have no control over the machinery of wealth production and, therefore, have no control over the wealth which they alone produce ; only when they have recognised that fact and appreciated the unalterable antagonism existing between themselves and the capitalist class in control of the machinery of wealth production, which that fact necessarily connotes, only then will they understand that by organisation on class lines and by waging unceasing war upon the dominant class until they have achieved complete victory and secured possession of political power and through that the possession also of the means of life can they ensure for themselves freedom from the possibility always present with them to-day, of reduction to the ranks of the sweated and even below. Until then, the fear of abject poverty will haunt them perpetually. Until then, sweating, as even a Daily News writer has been obliged to confess, will continue. The leopard cannot change its spots nor the Ethiopian his skin. An appeal to either to do so would not be more preposterous than the appeal to capitalism to abolish sweating is,

Agra.

Blogger's Note:

There's an interesting post which gives more background on the “Sweating Exhibition” at the following link.

Proper Gander: Fashion Victims (2023)

The Proper Gander column from the December 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

Online clothes retailer Boohoo has found its niche as a go-to site for image-conscious teenagers and twenty-somethings looking for a bargain. Its business model is that of ‘fast fashion’: producing versions of the newest clothing trends and getting them on sale cheaply and quickly while the style is still the latest and demand is at its highest. The working practices Boohoo has adopted to achieve a speedy turnaround have attracted complaints which prompted an official review of the company and its supply chain. Published in early 2021, this found that the allegations of poor working conditions were largely true. Boohoo responded by vowing to overhaul its methods, and detailed how in its ‘Agenda For Change’ plan. An edition of BBC One’s Panorama: Boohoo’s Broken Promises aimed to show that the agenda hasn’t been followed and not much has changed.

Reporter Emma Lowther goes undercover at Boohoo’s head office in Manchester by getting a job as an admin assistant. Her colleagues’ roles are to negotiate deals with smaller companies which make and supply the togs which Boohoo flogs. She uses her hidden camera to film other staff saying they lie to suppliers about invented rival offers in order to secure the cheapest deal. And even after a contract has been agreed, Boohoo staff have later imposed further reductions to the price.

The starting point for a deal would be low anyway. Boohoo’s clothes are often made in factories across Asia where workers’ pay is lower, conditions are shoddier and methods are more polluting than usually found in Western countries. Reports of workers making clothes for Boohoo in dismal circumstances haven’t only come from outside the UK, though. Boohoo and other traders use dozens of suppliers in Leicester, whose staff have held protests for more job security and higher wages. Another undercover reporter gets a job at one supplier, MM Leicester Clothing Limited. He covertly films people being shouted at by a manager who demands that they work late on an order. The rush is due to Boohoo wanting the ‘lead’ time between when it orders its stock and when it receives it to be as short as possible.

In January 2022, Boohoo opened its own flagship factory at Thurmaston Lane in Leicester, supposedly to demonstrate the reformed practices of its ‘Agenda For Change’. Panorama suggests that Thurmaston Lane is more like a PR-friendly front, distracting from how Boohoo still favours different sources for its stock. The ‘centre of excellence’ which is Thurmaston Lane only makes 1 percent of garments sold by Boohoo, and hundreds of orders contracted from there were really made in other factories in Leicester and Morocco with lower costs and standards. Boohoo says that this doesn’t break any rules as although it has banned subcontracting within the UK since 2021, it allows contracting, which it claims is what it’s doing, as Thurmaston Lane is part of Boohoo and can therefore contract out.

Boohoo’s various tactics for securing cut-price deals from its suppliers mean that one of the brand’s dresses costs the company £4.25 each to buy in from a UK supplier. This is then sold on to consumers for £15, making a hefty profit for Boohoo’s owners. The documentary features Peter McAllister and Chris Grayer, specialists in the field of ‘ethical trading’. McAllister describes this margin as ‘completely bonkers’, while Grayer calculates that a ‘fair’ amount for Boohoo to buy each dress for would be £7.23, allowing the supplier to make 10 percent profit. Boohoo’s lawyers’ justification for the big mark-up in the cost of the dress is that its suppliers still make a profit and their staff are paid at least the minimum wage.

Boohoo’s approach has been pushed by its multi-millionaire co-founder and Executive Chairman Mahmud Khamani. Following the review of Boohoo’s practices which preceded its ‘Agenda For Change’ programme, he has meant to be getting less involved in the company’s day-to-day running. But he still has an ‘iron grip’ by sending out arrogant motivational videos to staff and personally approving all deals with suppliers. He and the other senior staff featured in the documentary share the same sad motivation: to make money by maximising the exploitation of those lower down the chain.

Lowther lasts ten weeks working in Boohoo HQ before getting sacked for making mistakes, and she’s even less likely to get a good reference now they know she’s a journalist. McAllister and Grayer say that what her footage and research has revealed is ‘unacceptable’ and ‘unethical’, flouting multiple rules and guidelines about how companies are meant to function. Regulators, along with professionals like McAllister and Grayer, want Boohoo (and, by extension, capitalism) to be run in a ‘fair’ way: decent working conditions, sufficient wages, honest trading. This utopian aim doesn’t take into account how legislation can only ever try to make exploitation less unpleasant, nor how strong the drive to cut costs and corners to maximise profits is. Boohoo has gone further than other companies with how exploitative its methods are. Its approach has worked, if measured by how in 2022 it had sales of £1.7 billion from 18 million customers. Panorama’s investigation illustrated some of the objectionable aspects of the fast fashion industry: misleading deals, appalling workplaces, forced overtime, low wages, which together enable high profits for the few. But the documentary’s findings didn’t damage Boohoo’s standing. Its share price rose a little in the days after first broadcast, suggesting that its tawdry practices fit in well with how the market operates.

Mike Foster

Slavery in Bangkok (1984)

TV Review from the March 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

Song of the Shirt 1984

A recent report on ITV’s “World in Action” programme showed the misfortunes of employment in the “sweat shops” of Bangkok. Here for less that £1.00 a day, girls often as young as eleven or twelve manufacture clothes for sale in the West. The hours are long, usually fifteen a day, and many work through the night. Food is provided by their benevolent employer, who of course makes the appropriate deduction from their wages. Often the girls sleep on the premises, which can shelter as many as one hundred and have no chairs, tables or even beds. The girls are often beaten and abused by their employers. So why put up with such conditions? The only alternative in the sex capital of the world is prostitution. Brothels arc plentiful and girls as young as ten or eleven are individually numbered and priced depending on their age and maturity.

The clothes produced by these “sweat shops" are sold through stores such as Debenhams, C & A. Littlewoods and Great Universal Stores, whose profit last year was £200 million. By patronising such stores, are we supporting those who are enslaved in the Far East? What should we do? Perhaps only buy those goods manufactured in “respectable" European countries? Is it realistic in a world whose values are dominated by money to expect that people will pay more for clothes produced elsewhere when they can save by purchasing the cheap clothes produced in Bangkok?

Ironically, if the working class were prepared not to support the capitalists who enslave such people, there would be nothing in the shops for them to buy. Slavery is not confined to the Far East. As society is presently constituted we all sell our abilities to other people. Our “democratic” society tells us that we must spend our lives producing wealth for others if we are to live at all. In return for the sale of our abilities and talents, capitalists will provide us with the means by which we can survive and produce yet more wealth for them. So what is the alternative? In a rational society, people would both produce and possess the wealth they create. Such a society would create the things that were needed, rather than for profit. This would be a socialist society.

Ian Stuart

‘Made in Leicester’ (2020)

From the September 2020 issue of the Socialist Standard

People often associate sweatshop conditions in the clothing industry with Bangladesh or Cambodia but one consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic has been to reveal garment factories in Leicester which can very easily be described as sweatshops.

‘Labour abuses’ (breaches of labour laws) and sweatshop conditions are occurring across the UK’s garment manufacturing industries, campaigners warn. In the factories of Leicester, there are as many as 10,000 mostly immigrant workers who are reportedly paid as little as £3 an hour. During the pandemic many have been forced to work with no protective equipment, and it is said to have contributed to a spike in coronavirus cases that resulted in a second lock-down in the city.

Human rights barrister and leading expert on human trafficking, Parosha Chandran, said, ‘I think this is an example of the type of exploitation that has been going on up and down the country during Covid. If that’s the estimate of what’s happening in Leicester, then what’s happening in Birmingham? Or Nottinghamshire? Or Manchester? Or London? Modern slavery is not just confined to one place in the Midlands. It’s going on everywhere…’

A 2018 report found breaches of labour laws similar to those uncovered in Leicester in garment factories across Greater Manchester. Machinists reported being paid £4 an hour and said their payslips were doctored to make it look like they had worked fewer hours than they had actually put in. ‘The way the market is at the minute, it’s the person who produces the good cheapest who gets the order,’ one said.

‘Exactly the same labour abuses that the government and brands are professing shock and horror over in Leicester are happening at scale across the country,’ said Emily Kenway, an adviser at Focus on Labour Exploitation.

‘Again and again we see the same coercive practices impacting on the most vulnerable workers who have no way of getting their voices heard and who are forced to accept whatever conditions are pushed on them by their employers, who have little to fear from the authorities,’ said Thulsi Narayanasamy, a labour rights researcher.

The number of health and safety inspectors employed by the Health and Safety Executive has dropped by a third from 1,495 in 2009 to 978 in 2017, with funding reduced from £239m to £139m over the same period.

‘If employers know that they won’t be inspected, face penalties and lose business then you’re creating conditions for abuse,’ said Dominique Muller, senior campaigner at Labour Behind the Label.

Downward pressure

There exists a relentless downward pressure exerted by the global fashion industry on the workers at the bottom of the supply chain. The resulting falling price paid to suppliers has led to a substantial decline in pay rates and working conditions over the past 10 years. Garment workers have been kept working in unsafe conditions for low pay by a fashion industry seeking to maximise its own profits. The buying practices of fast fashion include turning a blind eye to sub-contracting and allowing forced and unpaid overtime. These practices have encouraged the erosion of garment worker rights by employers.

The fashion industry profits from these breaches of labour law by their suppliers. Despite decades of government regulation and ‘fair trade’ policies, sweatshops have continued to prevail because of the introduction of a marketing model called ‘fast fashion’, constantly changing clothes styles, designed for one night-out, destined for the charity shops the following morning. Consumers are buying more clothes and discarding them faster than ever. Clothes have become disposable throwaway products. Shoppers look for the lowest priced clothes and retail outlets look for larger profit margins. The knock-on effects of this in the supply chains are either accepted by consumers or obscured by marketing campaigns peddling ‘ethical’ sourcing.

Anna Bryher, advocacy director for the campaign group Labour Behind the Label, said: ‘Women at the bottom of supply chains bear the brunt of fashion’s unrelenting push to be fast and cheap…It’s obscene.’ She added: ‘Women making our clothes in Bangladesh are routinely and systematically abused and harassed.’

A recent report by a US Senate committee found Bangladesh was backsliding on garment workers’ rights. Union leaders faced intimidation, hampering their ability to investigate claims of threats and abuse, mostly of female workers.

The pressure for brands to get fashions from catwalks on to shoppers’ backs and deliver profits for investors, can lead to a rivalry to secure the cheapest source – a phenomenon referred to as ‘chasing the needle.’ If wages rise and conditions improve in one region, companies look elsewhere to keep costs down. In Ethiopia, for example, wages are much lower than the rates paid in Bangladesh and it has led to the Ethiopian government making almost a virtue out of its low labour costs.

Worker organisation

As shoppers have become more aware of labour abuses, companies have been forced to scrutinise labour practices at the various factories involved in manufacturing their products and committing themselves to addressing problems from fear of consumer boycotts. Such approaches obscure the importance of building worker power to counteract sweatshop conditions. Consumer campaigns are limited in their ability to lessen sweatshop conditions and non-respect of labour laws. Some boycotts have led companies to cancel contracts, leaving workers in a worse position, facing unemployment.

Prioritising projects that promote workers’ ability to organise collectively is crucial for securing better conditions. Worker-led efforts, rather than corporate- or consumer-led ones, shift the focus to the ideas, needs and collective action of the workers themselves. Workers self-organising, both inside or alongside trade unions, is critical to achieving freedom of association and collective bargaining. Instead of relying upon governments, corporations and consumers, worker organisation challenges the relationships of power and authority and lessens the risk of labour abuse.

Rubaiyat Hossain in her film, ‘Made in Bangladesh’ tells the story of Shimu Akhtar, a young woman making clothes for Western clothing companies whose indignation at the working conditions she is forced to endure leads her to try to unionise the factory. Hossain says she wanted to go against the stereotype of the poor, exploited factory worker.

  ‘I wanted to show that these women are active agents, fighting for their rights and demanding to be heard,’ she says. ‘Too many people think of Bangladeshi women as victims sitting behind a sewing machine, but it is thanks to female garment workers that Bangladesh is now a middle-income country. And these young women are not victims, they are often feisty, young, spirited women who are fearless and brave…’

ALJO

Voice From The Back: Brazilian Genocide (2005)

The Voice From The Back column from the July 2005 issue of the Socialist Standard

Brazilian Genocide

Brazil had an estimated six million indigenous people when the Portuguese arrived in 1500. Today there are 700,000 out of a population of 183 million. Indian tribes have been frequent victims of massacres and agents from Brazil’s National Indian Foundation fear that more tribal groups are in danger of genocide. They base this on a local court ruling lifting the protection order on tribal lands that allows loggers and ranchers new access. “A boom in prices for South American beef, soy and timber has sparked a surge in land grabs directed against indigenous groups by ranchers and loggers in other parts of the continent as well.” (Times, 18 May) More profits equal more deaths, it was ever so.

The Crazy Society

Only capitalism with its rapacious drive to make money could produce the following crazy situation. “White wristbands sold by the Make Poverty History coalition were made in Chinese factories accused of using forced labour, it has been disclosed. The fashionable white wristbands, worn by celebrities and politicians, including Tony Blair, were made for a coalition of charities as a symbol of its 2005 campaign to end extreme poverty.” (Independent, 30 May) As long as there is a couple of bucks to be made, there is nothing the owning class won’t stoop to!

The New Elite

“South Africa’s mining magnates and millionaires have been meeting in the imposing Rand Club in downtown Johannesburg for more than a century. … Built on the wealth of the largest goldmine in the world and the sweat of black labour, the club’s membership was, until a few years ago, closed to South Africa’s blacks. But these days, there’s a new breed of tycoon walking the club’s wood-panelled corridors and sipping whiskey in its stuffed leather chairs. A black elite has crossed over from politics and the ruling African National Congress (ANC). Rand Club members over the past few years have included Cyril Ramaphosa, 52, one of South Africa’s richest men, who was once touted as a possible successor to Nelson Mandela, and Tokyo Sexwale, also 52, another politician turned capitalist.” (Time, 6 June) The result of all those years of sacrifice and effort by workers to get rid of apartheid has come to this! 

Rich Pickings

The gap between the rich and the rest of society is widening all the time as the research in the USA by The New York Times indicates. "A new breed of fabulously rich American is leaving the rest of the country far behind, in part because of President Bush’s tax cuts. The “hyper-rich”, 145,000 taxpayers earning an average $3 million (£1.65 million) a year, have seen their earnings soar while their tax burden has decreased significantly in recent years. Their share of the national income has doubled in the past 20 years while 90 per cent of taxpayers have seen their share fall.” (Times, 6 June) The report goes on to give some examples of the wealth of these capitalists – Bill Gates, Microsoft owner $48 billion, Warren Buffett, investment magnate $41 billion, Paul Allen, Microsoft co-founder $20 billion and five members of the Walton family (Wal-Mart owners) $18 billion each. Land of the free?

How The Other 5 Percent Live

As you worry about paying the rent, the mortgage or your payments on the credit card think about the owning class and their problems. “Mrs Wildenstien told her lawyers; during a cruise in the West Indies, the family’s yacht was caught up in a storm. The crew tried to enter ports in Haiti and San Domingo but these were too small for the vessel. Finally, they struggled into a bay in one of the Virgin Islands. To mark their lucky survival, Daniel bought the island.” (Observer, 12 June) See how lucky you are, fellow workers. You don’t own a yacht too big to get in to Haiti or San Domingo, do you?

By The Way. (1919)

The By The Way column from the March 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our old friend (!) Lord Soapsuds has been busy of late advocating his pet scheme of a six hour day as the solution for industrial unrest. Writing recently in a journal called "system" he said that "what is called industrial unrest is, in my opinion. a healthy sign; it means that the worker is reaching out, is using the betterment of yesterday as a stepping-stone for something higher." I hope this "healthy sign" will develop, but not exactly along the lines laid down by the Soap King. He wants to run his machines and their attendants practically the whole 24 hours by a system of several shifts. No, we do not want to turn night into day in the factory hells of England. If Leverhulme and the class be represents will do night work we may later consider the other portions of the day.

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However, this propagandist of the new order really surpassed himself later on. He is great on the subject of "kidding." Mark what follows :

  "There is no finer material than the British workman, and if he is treated properly there is no finer producer in the world. We must reduce his hours of labour and increase his rate of pay. He must have a good home—a piano if he desires it, houses with gardens, and, if he wants it, a motor car." —"Daily News," January 15th, 1919.

Now there you are, my fellow wage slave, doesn't that sound nice? No more will you be told that you are "too old at forty," for our soap magnate says that capital and labour are the Siamese Twins of productive enterprise. Of course it really would be interesting to learn what part of the productive process he is engaged in. For instance, whether he contributes the socially necessary labour in the soap-making or the margarine department. As most people know, he has just bought the island of Lewis, but the chronicler omitted to state what portion of the earth's surface fell to the lot of the twin brother. Doubtless his allowance is in France.

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An example of our rulers' business ability was recently brought to light. Small wonder that there was an outcry about the shortage of ships. Let me quote:

"SAND SENT TO EGYPT.

Two stories of official ignorance or stupidity were related by Mr. W. H. Garrison on the occasion of the Royal Colonial Institute Christmas address to a juvenile audience at the Central Hall. By order of the War Office a ship wholly laden with sand was sent out during the war to Egypt ! The sand was there put into bags in order to bank up trenches. One could hardly imagine the disgust of the men told off to unload it." —"Daily News' January 4th, 1919.

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On Tuesday, February 11th, the new Parliament was opened. A great portion of King Capital's speech was devoted to the C 3 homes of the C 3 population, and my Lords and Gentlemen were informed that "We must stop at no sacrifice of interest or prejudice to stamp out unmerited poverty, to diminish unemployment and mitigate its sufferings, to provide decent homes, to improve the nation's health, and to raise the standard of well-being throughout the community." After a passing reference "that the gifts of leisure and prosperity may be more generally shared throughout the community," I observe the following, which seems to be troubling our capitalist masters : "It is your duty, while firmly maintaining security for property and person, to spare no effort in healing the cause of the existing unrest." 

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We have often been told that slavery cannot exist under the Union Jack, and the type of free and enlightened Britishers who wear anti-German badges and penny flags in their coats really believe it. But let us look at this picture taken from the sister isle :

SWEATED BELFAST WOMEN. 

Mr. Devlin regards the demand for a 44-hour week in the shipyards as a most hopeful sign, and he believes the movement will succeed, but it is to the shocking case of the sweated women workers in Belfast, the women out of whose misery and ruined health the great linen industry has been built up, that he intends to devote much of his energy during the coming year. These women, about 20,000 in number, work on an average 56 hours a week under the most trying conditions of moist heat. Many start work at 6.30 in the morning and do not finish till 6.30 at night. A large proportion, little better than children, are half-timers, doing three days at school and three in the mills for a wage that is insufficient to keep body and soul together. "The patience of these poor creatures and their dumb acceptance of a life that has little to offer but bitter drudgery are wonderful, and inspire one at the same time with anger and profound admiration," Mr. Devlin testified. —"Daily News," January 24th, 1919.

Doubtless the man who won the war made the world safe for democracy, and commenced to "cleanse the land of poverty and want" some ten years ago by speech-making, has been prevented from studying the conditions of the Belfast workers owing to his activities as strike-breaker.

--0--

The following advertisement appeared a little while ago in a Liverpool evening paper :

  "Discharged young soldier (one with foot off may suit), to assist in light trade; must be able to stand without crutches for an hour or two ; hours 9 to 7; wages 15s," — "Daily News," January 25th, 1919.

Needless to say, the appearance of the above led to a demonstration by some disabled soldiers, who went to interview the advertiser. After informing him that they had a suitable man they enquired as to whether he considered the money offered a living wage. The advertiser explained that it was a future partnership he had in mind, The crippled soldier was called in and was offered 30s. a week if he would take an interest and give all his time to the business, but the terms were refused.

--0--

The quotation given below appeared in the International Notes of the "Labour Leader,'' and emanates from Italy.

"When will Socialists learn that capitalism is by instinct predatory, that no true League of Peoples is therefore possible, except under Socialism, that Socialism will only be established by Socialists, and that Socialists must place the whole of their faith and reliance in themselves, and not in any capitalist or despot, however benevolent."

The above would have read better and been more precise had it appeared thus: "When will the pseudo Socialist," etc. However, I commend it to the Thornes, Lansburys, and others of that ilk who delight in labelling themselves Socialist, but spend their time bolstering up capitalism.

--0--

That inveterate gas-bag, Windy Churchill, is finding some of his chickens coming home to roost. There was a time when he blustered about digging the German Fleet "out like rats." But the British Fleet, for the maintenance of the efficiency of which Windy had been responsible previous to the war— at a good many thousands a year—had its chance, and Admiral Jellico has been compelled to issue a "defence" showing why he did not seize his opportunity. The Admiral compares the instrument which had been provided him by the windy braggart with that of the despised German, and the result must make many worshipper of the hero of Sidney Street wonder what he, as First Lord of the Admiralty, took his thousands for. The Admiral says that the British ships were out-classed in search-light power, inferior in range-finders, insufficiently provided with destroyers, not so well protected against dropping fire, and so on. In short, the egregrious failure of the war had proved such a failure preparing for war that the British Admiral dared not close with his enemy.

Yet this guy, who went on from blunder to blunder, from Antwerp to Gallipoli, till even his thick hide could not save him from the public's jeers, and who, in order to rehabilitate himself, had finally to resort to that magnificent piece of bluff—the melodramatic reminder to the military authority that "my regiment is in France"—this fellow who had to fly to the funk-hole for shelter from the derision brought down upon his head by his own clumsy incapacity, is one of the chosen few who alone can "carry the country through the difficult times ahead." "There is something rotten in the State of"—capitalism when such empty-headed noodles are the best the country can find to run the show. The "directive ability" superstition which our masters are so fond of talking about gets a nasty one on the snout here.

The Scout.

Pieces Together: Religious Nonsense (2010)

The Pieces Together column from the June 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Religious Nonsense

“Women who wear immodest clothing and are promiscuous are to blame for earthquakes, an Iranian cleric said. The explanation for tremors in one of the most earthquake-prone countries came after President Ahmadinejad predicted a quake and suggested that many of Tehran’s 12 million residents should move. Hojatoleslam Kasem Sedighi was quoted by Iranian media as saying that adultery increased quakes and the only solution was to take refuge in religion” (Times, 20 April).

Right-Wing Nonsense

“The demonstration was marked by the same rhetoric that has galvanised the Tea Party movement and which crowds hear from Sarah Palin on an almost daily basis: disgust with Mr Obama’s agenda, rage at his health reform legislation, Government bailouts, accusations of a socialist White House and an unconstitutional takeover of American life by Washington. ‘We are in a war,’ said Larry Pratt, president of Gunowners of America. ‘The other side knows they are at war because they started it. They’re coming for our freedom, for our money, for our kids, for our property. They’re coming for everything because they are socialists’” (Times, 20 April).

"Lazy" Workers (1)

“The image Microsoft doesn’t want you to see: Too tired to stay awake, the Chinese workers earning just 34p an hour. Showing Chinese sweatshop workers slumped over their desks with exhaustion, it is an image that Microsoft won’t want the world to see. Employed for gruelling 15-hour shifts, in appalling conditions and 86F heat, many fall asleep on their stations during their meagre ten-minute breaks. For as little as 34p an hour, the men and women work six or seven days a week, making computer mice and web cams for the American multinational computer company” (Daily Mail, 18 April).

"Lazy" Workers (2)

“A study of 6,000 British civil servants found that those who regularly worked 10 or 11-hour days were up to 60 per cent more likely to suffer heart disease or die younger than those who worked shorter hours. The research, published online in the European Heart Journal, found that people who worked three or more hours longer than a seven-hour day put their health at risk, possibly as a result of being more stressed and having less time to unwind” (Times, 12 May).

Film Review: Walmart – The High Cost of Low Price (2011)

Film Review from the December 2011 issue of the Socialist Standard

Walmart – The High Cost of Low Price (Tartan DVD. A Robert Greenwald Film)

Almost everyone has heard of Walmart (Asda in the UK) but many are unaware of the effects of its practices on populations around the world. Owned by the Walton family, who collectively are worth around $100 billion, Walmart has the world’s largest work force of any private employer. This makes this in-depth scrutiny of the impact of globalisation for profit highly pertinent.

Impoverishment, destruction of communities and non-unionised and illegal work practices figure strongly as do the sometimes clear, sometimes opaque links to government policy-making in the USA.  Walmart moves into town promising employment, builds a megastore structure and hires staff, displays every commodity that can already be found in town (and more), undercuts local prices and very soon oversees the closure of long-established, formerly successful small family businesses – causing unemployment, ghost towns and impoverishment of communities. If a community is strong enough to fight and either prevent the actual build or force closure then Walmart simply ups sticks and moves a few miles outside the town or county border and the end results for the community are the same.

There is a strong anti-union imperative within the company and such a climate of fear of punishment among employees that it was very difficult to find current workers in the US ready to speak out on record. Ex-employees, however, were less reluctant. National employment laws are different around the world.  One example of workers defying the Walmart no union rule was in Quebec, Canada, where they were successful in forming a union (according to local law) with the result that Walmart won anyway – they just closed down.

How is it that Walmart can give such cheap prices and offer two for the price of one? Benevolence from a caring, hugely profitable megabusiness? No, they simply pass the cost on to the farmers or other suppliers. He who pays the piper…  The film doesn’t stop at covering the retail side of the business; also there are interviews and filmed information from China, Bangladesh, Honduras and Saipan (US territory) to reveal the impact of the Walmart style of sweatshop labour and conditions around the world.

This film could be an excellent stimulus when viewed together by a group prepared to discuss and further understand the ways in which capitalism systematically works against workers, against regulations, against communities and for the ongoing accumulation of the few.

Janet Surman

Immigrant struggles (1984)

Book Review from the September 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

Immigrants and the Class Struggle: the Jewish Immigrant in Leeds, 1880-1914. Joseph Buckman. (Manchester University Press. £19.)

This excellent and readable book examines the economic and social life of the Jewish immigrant community in Leeds between 1880 and 1914. The community comprised refugees from Russia and other parts of Europe, who were to provide a cheap and pliable source of labour for the tailoring and slippermaking trade in Leeds and elsewhere. By the use of Yiddish sources and untapped statistical material such as factory reports, a vivid picture emerges of the social and economic relations in the Jewish community over this period.

The author argues that far from being one happy family, the Jewish immigrant community developed class antagonisms resulting from the capitalist mode of production. Buckman is highly critical of the commonly held view that the growth of the Leeds factory system in the tailoring industry led to progressive improvements for the workers. The alien tailoring trade was subordinate to the indigenous factory system, which was to undergo deskilling, division of labour and cheapening of products. Under such conditions and with for the most part a hostile host society, it was to take 35 years of struggle — until January 1912 — before they achieved a reduction in their working day to nine hours. In the tailoring trade socialists, anarchists and progressive trade unionists made some real gains in workers' organisation but the slipper trade over this period was a different story.

The forces driving wage labour against capital in a relentless competition for profits involved the intensification of working conditions in doomed pre-industrial type of manufacture. Despite valiant attempts to organise workers in the slipper trade in Leeds between 1896 and 1903, the wages had fallen by 50 per cent and a horrific 18 hour day was commonplace. Faced with the hopeless task of struggling against the machine, the Jewish workers replaced the host workers and eventually slippermaking in Leeds declined.

This book shows that capitalism is synonymous with suffering and misery. However, the class which does all the useful work in society has the power to organise for their own emancipation and put an end to sweat shops and the other misery of the wages system once and for all. 

W. McLellan

The race to the bottom (2010)

From the June 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Could Western corporations do without sweatshop production?

Sweatshops are workplaces where the working conditions are extremely poor and health and safety laws are not enforced or are non-existent. News reports of fires which have killed dozens of people because fire doors were locked in sweatshop factories are not uncommon. Wages are very low, there may be bullying and intimidation, especially of anyone trying to improve conditions. Hours are long and the work itself may be very demanding and even dangerous. Sick workers cannot take time off and are penalised if they leave the factory. Sub-contractors for European, Japanese and American corporations refuse their staff breaks, monitoring the times they go to the toilet and harassing and humiliating staff. Profit comes before safety, before any quality of life the workers may have, before any idea of comfort.

Developing countries are producing an increasing amount of the world’s manufacturing production. This is symptomatic of the new international division of labour, whereby Western countries close their factories at home, where wages rates are higher, and invest in factories in the ‘Third World’ as the labour costs are so much lower. Unfortunately for the ‘Third world’ workers, it was not undiluted joy at the prospect of having jobs and a bit of money. The labour costs might be cheaper because the cost of living is cheaper, but the wage rates can be so low that workers find it hard to survive in Thailand and Cambodia for instance.

Western corporations used to be able to distance themselves to a certain extent from the conditions in their sub-contractors assembly plants, because of the geographical distance between, say, Britain and China. People in Britain did not necessarily realise that when they bought an item of clothing from Umbro, a British company, it was actually made in China in sweatshop conditions, conditions that would just not be acceptable in modern day Britain.

Campaigns by Human Rights agencies, such as Oxfam and the Clean Clothes Campaign, have publicised the conditions suffered by workers in the sweatshops. Although companies may try to say that they are not responsible for the conditions of work in the firms they sub-contract out to, campaigners have appealed to the sense of fair play and compassion in consumers. Although not all consumers are worried by the idea of sweatshop conditions for the people who make their clothes, the corporations do not want a bad image in the media and have produced corporate ‘codes of conduct’ and company policies which try to improve their standing in the public eye as well as (maybe) alleviate some of the worst problems.

How far they have managed to clean up their image or help people in sweatshops in the developing world is debatable. According to Oxfam, the ‘race to the bottom’ was inevitable as you cannot have very cheap clothes and also give your workers a decent standard of living. Although British workers also suffered from sweatshops in the past, a mixture of increased unionisation, philanthropy and labour laws helped to improve conditions for the working class.

The question of how far can Western corporations distance themselves from sweatshop production can only really be understood by looking at the bigger picture, which is: why is the pursuit of profit, to the detriment of all the finer things in life for the working class, so all pervasive?

The main goal in capitalism is the pursuit of profit. Profit is put before needs. This is why millions of people do not have enough to eat – they simply don’t have the money to buy food. The world is quite capable of growing enough food for everyone and more, but no money means no food for poor people. Poor people are stuck if they cannot improve their wages and conditions due to merciless capitalists, unless they either migrate legally or illegally to another better paid job in another country.

According to philosopher Iris Marion Young, we cannot blame consumers directly for the misfortune of the sweatshop workers, but we can accept political responsibility and change the process. She said that, although many individuals are involved, from the manufacturers to the consumers, they should all play their part in improving the lot of the ‘Third World’ workers. This is unrealistic in a capitalist world. Capitalist corporations are there to make money and all we can do is alleviate the symptoms – unless we cure it completely by changing the economic system in which we live. There will always be someone who wants to make even more profit, by forcing poor conditions on the workers, or moving the factory elsewhere to where the labour laws are laxer, as happened from Mexico to China, when some macquiladoras (or assembly plants) in Mexico were closed so the capitalist corporations could find cheaper labour elsewhere. And consumers may not even know where else to buy their clothes.

So, although Oxfam and the Clean Clothes campaign have brought the attention of the media to the practices of manufacturers, still people cannot see it for themselves ‘next door’ so are immune to the suffering. The suffering is too far away. They would help their next door neighbour but that is in close proximity. People at a distance are ‘out of sight, out of mind’. When even photos can be taken different ways, people would be overwhelmed if they did not block out some charitable appeals.

Some people think that the third world workers can work themselves out of poverty, in the way of the ‘Asian tigers’, without realising that the odds are stacked against them and they cannot repeat the success story of say, Hong Kong. The workers are very much subjugated and repressed in these assembly plants. It is difficult to see where they could help themselves, anyone found trying to start a union is quickly out of a job.

The Western corporations are just trying to do what they have to do in capitalism: make the biggest profit they can. If they don’t their rivals will undercut them and they will eventually go out of business or be taken over. It is a dog-eat-dog world, and whereas people have to acquire visas and passports, corporations and capital have relative ease of flows across the world. Money eases the wheels of commerce, but the migration of people can be very much resented and resisted, as in Mexico with the self-styled American Border Patrol.

Capitalists, who make up the richest 5 percent or so in the world, may not be ‘bad’ people: they may give to charity, go to church and be kind to children and animals. But back at work, the system makes them behave in a ruthless race to make the biggest profits. If they don’t, they go under. Charities like Oxfam and the Clean Clothes Campaign are just whistling in the wind. They may dampen down the worst excesses of the capitalist profit-seeking, but they can never stop exploitation until and unless they help to usher in a world, where people are free to enjoy their lives instead of making millions for the very few rich capitalists at the top.

Veronica Clanchy