Tilting at windmills with a banjo (2010)

From the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Pete Seeger is now in his 90th year. His songs have always been better than his politics.

It was strangely moving: a frail lanky figure complete with banjo, lurching up on stage proceeded to gasp his valiant way through several of the best-known songs in the American folk pantheon. Pete Seeger at ninety, demonstrating that he can still enthral an audience. The casual onlooker would have difficulty believing that this unthreatening personage came however, ready-stamped with his own unique Government Health Warning.

“The most boycotted, picketed, blacklisted performer in American history”, he had endured a lifetime of threats, assaults, been labelled “traitor”, “Khrushchev’s Songbird” and suffered trial and conviction at the insidious hands of the House Un-American Activities Committee.

Others viewed him differently, observing his enormous contribution to the collection and preservation of traditional music and how almost single-handedly he had rescued the five-string banjo from oblivion. A devout Humanitarian, abstemious, monogamous, unimpeachably principled, he is the trust of his patriots.

Born of well-heeled, musical New England stock in 1919, Seeger’s life compass was pretty much set for him at an early age. His father, in company with folklorists John and Alan Lomax belonged to that 1930s Popular Front “intellectual” coterie who, combining Radicalism and Patriotism, embraced the Folk genre as America’s “true” music and a vehicle for awareness-raising and social change. “Communism in Twentieth Century Americanism” ran its slogan, boldly – if bafflingly.

Seizing the baton, Seeger commenced his own musical and political odyssey presently, in 1940, forming the Almanac Singers, an amorphous, motley, Leftist crew whose proclaimed aim was, nevertheless to “change the World”. Performing such numbers as “Talking Union”, they supported labour rallies and, the Hitler/Stalin Peace Pact being current, opposed the War with their “Songs for John Doe”.

When, however, Germany attacked Russia the following year, the horrified group found the bulk of its repertoire rendered instantly obsolete. A massive rethink – and rewrite – ensued. Where once it had been confrontation, strike and “Franklin D. listen to me, You ain’t gonna send me across the sea”, employee and employer alike were now urged to unite behind the Military to “Deliver the Goods” and then skip merrily “Round and round Hitler’s Grave”. Remaining a “card-carrying Communist”, Seeger was nonetheless sufficiently chastened by this experience to never again identify quite so closely with the Party’s front-line tactics, instead lending his voice to more general issues.

The post-war years were difficult ones for an American Left struggling to radicalise an increasingly affluent, and hostile, Working Class. The Almanacs disbanded and in the prevailing “anti-Red” climate, Seeger encountered not only the FBI’s close scrutiny but also frequent exclusion from union events and marginalisation within the Communist Party itself. Fleeting commercial success with a new group, the Weavers, failed to salvage his finances and he found himself obliged to scour the continent playing small venues and universities, unwittingly in the process, founding what would eventually become known as the ‘College Circuit’.

Inevitably subpoenaed by McCarthy’s HUAC, he eschewed the usual “Fifth Amendment” route; that no citizen under the Constitution need incriminate themselves, opting instead for a head-on First Amendment plea; that the Committee itself was unconstitutional. For his pains he received a 10-year sentence which although never implemented and eventually overturned, nevertheless seriously blighted his life for several years.

The 1960s saw Seeger affiliating with the current “good causes”, plucking his banjo at Civil Rights rallies (an unfortunate instrument given Negro memories of stereotypic minstrel shows) and supporting the anti-Vietnam War movement. He was however becoming perceived as “Middle Aged”, “Old Left” rather than “Hippie”, “Student Power” and his “acoustic” music upstaged by the strident, electrified offerings of the rising Dylanite generation.

Remarkably too, he continued to adhere to the broad “Soviet World View”. Having remained silent over the momentous events of 1956 – the denouncement of Stalin and Russia’s brutal intervention in Hungary – he now displayed similar reticence over its intrusions into Czechoslovakia and the obvious tribulations of working-class life in Castro’s Cuba. But knavish, duplicitous, surely not? Myopic, naïve, more probably. increasingly disillusioned, he embraced Environmentalism, focusing particularly, and continuingly, on the campaign to clean up his “Dirty Stream”, the Hudson River.

Seeger has persistently overstated the power and value of song in political struggle, citing no less an authority that Plato: “Rulers should be careful about what songs are allowed to be sung.” Pursuing the rather Hegelian notion that the idea precedes and informs the action, he maintains that the “right song at the right time can change history” and whilst, for sure, songs have a certain rallying function, no way can his assertion that they triggered the Civil Rights Movement and shortened the Vietnam War be upheld. Fellow-Almanacers Bess and Butch Hawes were much closer to the truth in pointing out that “songs; ideas can only appear when events provide the material”. Perhaps they’d been taking a peek at Marx.

Unable to fully comprehend the nature of the capitalist system he professes to despise, its impersonal, all pervading imperative for profit and the root cause of the multitudinous socio-economic and environmental problems afflicting humanity; lumbered also with a Leftist/Bolshevist mindset he has never managed to transcend, Seeger has sought solution through a whole range of single-issue campaigns and support for assorted pseudo-socialist, state capitalist regimes. A successful lawsuit, for instance, by residents against General Electrics for polluting the Hudson, laudable in itself, was hailed as a great victory for “localism” and “community” rather than an opportunity to ponder the competitive, cost-cutting forces that had brought about the pollution in the first place. And all the while, the authentic socialist model of a democratic, classless world society of common ownership and free access has awaited his perusal. Painful as it is to criticise a clearly well-intentioned if Quixotic figure, Seeger’s political life does serve as vindication of our founding principle of campaigning solely for the overthrow of capitalism and its replacement by socialism.

So what is left? Well, laying aside more than a few political stomach-turners, there is a rather wonderful body of song. We can, for example, teach subversive little numbers, “Cindy”, “Froggie Went A-Courtin’”, to our offspring and (in our cups) declaim “the warnings, dangers, love we’d ring out incessantly all over the bloody place – if only we possessed the requisite hammers”. Perhaps also, in more sombre (and sober) mood, we’ll quietly croon the hauntingly-beautiful “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?”, even if, of necessity we think of Pete himself and his ilk at the mournful refrain:

“When will they ever learn,
When will they ever learn?”

Andrew Armitage

Why doesn't big business support a national health service?

Cross-posted from the blog, Stephen's Blog.

It is often argued that a "single payer" health insurance system run by the federal government or a national health service would be in the interests of American big business apart from the health insurance companies. The growing burden of healthcare costs on the economy would be brought under control, and companies would no longer have to pay insurance premiums for their employees. Companies in Britain and Canada are quite happy with the national health service in those countries.

So why does big business not promote a real healthcare reform? This is the question asked by Doug Henwood in Issue 120 of his Left Business Observer (a publication that I highly recommend for its astute analysis of American economic and political developments; see here).

Apparently some people offer a "web of influence" explanation that focuses on interlocks (overlapping membership) between insurance companies and other companies and on the role of insurance companies as a source of finance for other companies. Henwood presents detailed evidence to show that these are not very significant phenomena.

Basing himself on testimony from researchers who have interviewed top executives on the issue, Henwood states that some (perhaps even many) executives support "single payer" in private but are reluctant to make their views public for two reasons.

First, they worry about the possible reaction of other firms with which they do business. Small companies especially are considered hostile to "single payer." They do not stand to gain in terms of costs because they do not provide health insurance to their employees, while they would have to bear part of the additional tax burden. So they would see such a reform as an attempt to shift costs from big business to small business.

Second, they are afraid of "encouraging would-be expropriators." One informant formulates this fear as follows: "If you can take away someone else's business -- the insurance companies' business -- then you can take away mine." In other words, the politics of capitalist class solidarity trumps the economics of cost reduction.

Henwood adds another consideration: "Employers like workers to feel insecure. Fear of losing health coverage makes workers less willing to strike or resist pay cuts or speedups."

At least in this case, it is misleading to view reform politics solely as an arena of conflict among diverse business interests. It is also an arena of class struggle.

Stefan

What is Real Democracy and How Do We Get It? (2010)

From the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

In a month or so the people of Britain will be asked once again to decide which representatives of the ruling class will rule over them for the next four or five years.

It is well known that the word ‘democracy’ originates from Ancient Greece and means ‘power of the people’. Such an idea, in its literal sense, encompassing economic, political and social democracy does not exist anywhere in the world. This is primarily because the planet’s resources, many of which human beings need in order to live, do not belong to the people as a whole. Instead, they are in the hands of a small, privileged, rich minority. Such extremely limited political ‘democracy’ as does exist in parts of the modern world, is scarcely even a shadow of what genuine democracy will be like when it is finally put into practice.

For real democracy: imagine a society where all the people would be of equal status, with equal, free access to resources owned by the community, as a whole (e.g. food, shelter, healthcare, education, transportation, etc.). Imagine a world with no leaders and no elite to lord it over the rest of the population. A society where everyone can have an equal say in the issues that concern them. Above all, a world, in which all the people own and share the wealth that we need in order to live.

People and Politics
Not just socialists, but large numbers of people sense the lack of democracy in present society. Huge and ever increasing sections of the electorate, not only in Britain, but globally, feel, and by now know, that with the prevailing political ideas, the outcome of elections is not going to make any real difference to their way of life.

People have not always felt this way. Those who struggled to gain the franchise in the 19th and early 20th centuries, earnestly believed that this would empower them sufficiently to provide a means of solving many of the social, political and economic problems around them. Even fifty years or so ago, many thought that their vote could bring about genuine, significant change.

Now, experience has led people to think otherwise and, although most of them will still be casting their votes, few will have any great expectations, whether they vote for Tweedledum (Conservative) or Tweedledee (Labour) or, for Tweedledum-dee-dum (Liberal-“Democrat”). In mainstream politics, apathy has grown. Although this is disconcerting for the activists of the dominant parties, the general forces of capitalism are not overworried by it.

Those who administer capitalism want the electorate to vote for the main parties, which are all thoroughly committed to the capitalist status quo. However, capitalism’s leaders have no interest in public involvement in politics, outside of election time. Of course, there are radio phone-ins, programmes such as ‘Question Time’, ‘Any Questions’, etc., but these are tightly controlled and the participation of individual members of the audience in studio discussion is very limited, to say the least. Forums on the Internet have allowed more expression of dissent, but generally in practice to smaller, well-scattered audiences, in spite of the huge potential of this medium. Capitalism’s ideology and indoctrination dominates the thinking of the vast majority of participants. If large sections of the electorate, through apathy, do not vote, capitalism remains firmly entrenched, by default.

Why people are powerless
Almost everyone would like at least some degree of control over what shapes their lives. Many know they have not got that now, and probably most of those, if they thought about it, would realise that in the past, they didn’t have that degree of control either. Simplistic, misleading explanations are concocted as to why people are powerless. These include: ‘greedy bankers’, ‘corrupt politicians who don’t listen to the people’, ‘fat cats’, the ‘nanny state’ etc.

Capitalism, on the one hand, and genuine democracy, on the other, are completely incompatible with one another. The reason for this is that under capitalism, wealth is concentrated in the hands of a very small minority of the population. This wealth brings its owners huge power, influence and lifestyle opportunities, completely unavailable to the majority.

According to the United Nations Development Programme, more than 1.2 billion people – nearly one in every five people on Earth – survive on less than $1 a day. More than one billion people in developing countries lack access to clean, safe drinking water. Contrast that with the fact that the net wealth of the 10 richest billionaires is $133billion, more than 1.5 times the total national income of the least developed countries.

A study by the World Institute for Development Economics Research at the United Nations University reports that the richest 1 percent of adults owned 40 percent of global assets in the year 2000, and that the richest 10 percent of adults accounted for 85 percent of the world’s assets. In contrast to this, the bottom half of the world adult population owned barely 1 percent of global wealth.
If we look at the U.K, it is well known that since Labour has been in power, inequality has grown even greater than it was under the Conservatives. In fact, in January 2010 a government commissioned report by the ‘National Equality Panel’ revealed that the gap between the rich and the poor was greater than it was 40 years earlier.

In 2004, the top 1,000 people on the Sunday Times Rich List were worth a total of £202.4 billion. That’s an average of about £200 million each. On the average UK wage in 2004 of £21,000 a year, it would take nearly ten thousand years to earn that much. It should by now be crystal clear that such enormous disparities in wealth ownership which capitalism generates, make any meaningful democracy unattainable, within the present setup. The only effective solution is to get rid of capitalism, the root cause of this problem and replace it by a society, in which the world’s resources are shared by the world’s population.

Boardroom dictatorship
We are told by the apologists for the status quo that we live in a ‘free’ society. However, just ask people how ‘free’ they really feel on their daily commute (slog) to their places of employment (exploitation), as they are crammed together in buses or trains, or face the predictable monotony of the traffic jam. Employment is accurately described as being exploitation since the value of what the workers produce in the form of goods and services is much greater than the value of the wages/salaries which they receive. The surplus value is pocketed by the capitalist class and is a very important source of the wealth of the ruling class.

How ‘free’ do the working class (vast majority of the population) feel when they arrive at work, where they spend a significant amount of their waking hours. Few dare to criticise their line-managers or conditions of employment. They are only too well aware of the consequences of doing so: loss of promotion prospects and/or, quite likely, the sack. Trade unions do not and cannot give the protection which left-wing reformers once hoped they could. The trade cycle of booms and slumps is a natural part of capitalism. Particularly in a slump, most workers have to keep their mouths shut about their grievances and, even when the economy is stronger, workers still have to be very wary about what they say openly.

The basic reason why the working class majority feel powerless and not really ‘free’ is because they do not own any significant amount of the means for producing and distributing wealth, which people need in order to live. According to Social Trends 2003 published by the Office of National Statistics in the UK, the top 5 percent of population own 58 percent of this wealth, while the bottom 95 percent owns only 42 percent. This is a very important statistic since it means that out of every 20 people in Britain, the wealthiest one owns more than all the other 19 put together.

Such enormous inequality, although variable in degree in different parts of the world, is very typical of the global situation. It means that the vast majority are forced by their circumstances, to become economic slaves to the rich minority. The term ‘wage slavery’ is still very apposite. When people think of slavery, a picture of Ancient Rome and Greece with their slave drivers bearing whips, usually comes to mind. Modern wage slavery is very obviously quite different from this. The whip is no longer required. Capitalism has something far more subtle and far more productively effective at its disposal. In the Ancient World, slaves were quite often brutally treated by their masters. However, because the slave was the property of the owner, it was in the interests of the owner to keep him or her in a reasonable condition, in order to work.

In contrast to this, when capitalism began to develop further, in Europe in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries and, spread to other parts of the world, the industrial working class (wage slaves) themselves were clearly not the property of the capitalist class. This meant that the capitalists had no economic interest in maintaining those, who worked for them. After all, these workers could always be replaced by others in the queue, looking for work. This was the thinking of the employers in the earlier period of capitalism and, still is today in the less developed parts of the planet. Hence, the grinding poverty of early industrial capitalism in Europe and, still today, in many undeveloped countries.
Modern capitalism, in the more economically advanced countries has been adapted subtly to suit the self-interest of the ruling class. Welfare systems have removed the worst excesses of poverty in such countries and, most importantly from the point of view of the capitalists, have to a considerable extent, removed the threats of instability for the owners of industry, caused by any organised discontent amongst workers. Such is the sophistication of modern wage slavery that, workers can often be persuaded (indoctrinated) into exercising self-discipline at the workplace, which means that line managers (more highly paid workers) often need to spend less time in supervising their subordinates.

Revolution from below
In view of the overall situation of poverty, wars, inequality, pollution etc., how do we get from the dictatorship of capital and the boardroom, to the system of real democracy described earlier? The means to reach such a society must surely reflect the composition of the new society itself.

Since the emergence of agriculture, about 10,000 years ago, private ownership of the means of production has developed, with a ruling class at each stage. Many changes have taken place since then but the key element has been private ownership of resources, by a small minority, right from slave owning societies through to feudalism and then, to capitalism. Significant political changes have been led by minorities, who have successfully imposed their will and rule on a population, very often by means of violence.

Capitalism, with its ruling class was established and developed by a minority, that is to say by leaders. In complete contrast to this, genuine democracy or real socialism, the two are synonymous, will be a society run by the whole of the people. Since it will be without leaders, this democracy will be set up by a majority of the people, consciously and politically organising themselves for a change, which they both understand and desire.

Even now, many people realise that there is something seriously wrong with the present system (wars, poverty, pollution, inequality etc.). However, it is the awareness of an alternative to this which is missing. The task of socialists is to get people to think for themselves, without the need for leaders. When more people consider the genuine socialist, democratic alternative to capitalism, those who give it support, will swell the size of the already existing world socialist movement. As the number of socialists grows, the ideas will spread among the people they come into contact with, particularly in a world where those ideas can be communicated so much more quickly than in the past. A series of political, democratic acts will be needed to establish the truly democratic society of socialism. People with a socialist consciousness will unite and upon achieving a majority, measured by voting, will be in a position to establish the new society.

World Socialism
At last, democracy will have real meaning: a society of production of goods and services for human need, with ownership and control of the means of production and distribution by all the people. Since the division into rich and poor will have been abolished, it will be a classless society. The precise, day-to-day details of the running of this future society will be up to the people at the time, but what we can be sure of is that just as there will be free access to goods and services for everyone, without any need for money, so there will be open access to the administration of society for those interested in particular issues, such as food production, health, education, building of houses, the environment and local matters.

Probably, there will be local administrations, perhaps in the form of councils, which will be reflected at wider levels, such as regional and global. The new democratic society will most likely involve participation of delegates in these councils. The consequence of this is that certain delegates could be subject to recall, if the electorate were dissatisfied with their activities. These factors would emphasise the genuine democracy and choice available to everyone.

Such a society will clearly face challenges in the need to clean up the mess created by capitalism. Swift measures will be required to undo as much as possible of the damage which has already been done to the environment by the previously existing profit system. Adequate food supplies, housing, health services and education will need to be expanded to areas of the planet previously deprived of them under capitalism. The tasks involved will obviously be considerable. However, the numbers of people available to do such work will be much greater than could ever be the case in a market economy since unemployment and the vagaries of the trade cycle will have been abolished. There will be increased automation of some tasks, and further technological development, with consideration for the environment. The scale of human energy available, accompanied by a social concern for creating the best possible working conditions, will make work a far more individually and socially satisfying affair than could ever be the case under capitalist wage slavery.

These will be enormously exciting times because at long last, human society will have evolved to the position of being able to tackle effectively the challenges facing the modern world. Immense satisfaction will be experienced by huge numbers of individuals as, on the one hand they will be able to contribute their mental and physical energies into increasing the commonly held wealth of society, whilst on the other hand, they will satisfy their own self defined needs from the common store.
The new era for humanity will have begun.

Vincent Otter

The prophet debunked (2010)

Book Review from the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Trotsky. A Biography. By Robert Service. Macmillan. 624pp.

Were Trotsky alive today, he would have the editors of this book shot. It is riddled with irritating errors. Round brackets close square; names change spelling; weird sentences like the idea that Russian radicals “took the bits of Marxism they disliked and discarded the rest” slip through; and apparently Oslo and St. Petersburg lie on the same longitude, 59 degrees North. Macmillan should be ashamed to have allowed this slapdash product into print.

This would not matter except that the representatives of Trotsky on Earth have launched a flurry of chaff to attack this biography of their idol. Forensic hair splitting has been their method, and finding faults, such as that Natalya Sederova (Trotsky’s partner) died in 1962 rather than 1960 as the book claims. This is, of course, a distraction tactic. Hardly any of their reviews deal with the meat of the book.

Peter Taaffe, leader of the “Socialist Party” (formerly Militant) performs the usual Trotskyist miracle of simultaneously denying and justifying the repressive tactics and terror of the Bolsheviks. David North of the World Socialist (sic) website cavils over trivialities, and even manages to accuse Service of anti-Semitism. North also has the lack of originality to describe Service’s text as part of the ‘School of historical falsification’ echoing his hero’s riposte to Stalin.

They don’t address Trotsky’s ordering the decimation of a battalion for cowardice. Or Lenin signing an order for 100-1000 leading citizens of a city to be hanged. The book notes Trotsky’s willingness to use authoritarian methods, and suggests that prior to 1917 he never spelled out what he meant by dictatorship, but that during the crisis leading to the Bolshevik coup d’Etat, he would speak in praise of the guillotine that made opponents of the revolution “shorter by a head”.

Service depicts, with accounts from witnesses, Trotsky as an aloof and self-centred man, who lacked political judgement to help him keep friends close. He alienated many by his manner. He was never, contrary to the received wisdom and dogma of the sects, an organised Marxist. He was a non-aligned member of the Russian Social Democratic Party, who spent the years up to the Great War trying to unify the factions but never joining any. Even when he joined the Bolsheviks, it was as a loose cannon, and that would be part of his undoing.

Service attributes Trotsky’s failure to become the leader of the revolution after Lenin to a lack of will on his part – and claims that any obstacles were surmountable. He suggests that Trotsky was not planning, nor might have been able, to use his position of head of the Red Army to seize power: but that the fear of this motivated his opponents.

What sticks in the craw of the Trots, and threatens the entire ideological edifice of their movement, is Service’s contention that Trotsky did not in policy terms differ from Stalin, and that he had indeed consciously presided over the introduction of a series of show trials of opponents like the ones used by Stalin against Trotsky’s allies. Further, he examines Trotsky’s late claim that the “backwardness” of Russian development was to blame for the “degeneration” of the revolution. In that case, enquires Service, was not the whole enterprise, including all its shed blood, a forlorn waste of time.

Despite the claims of the acolytes, this is not an entire hatchet job, Service freely acknowledges that Trotsky was a great writer and orator, and a brave man in his own personal right. It is, though, a biography, as much a literary form as an historical one, and judgement plays an important part. Service gives his opinion, and is openly critical of Bolshevism and the reader can make up their own mind.

Pik Smeet

Las Falklands

Cross-posted from the SPGB election blog, Vaux Populi

The recent drilling for oil near the Falklands has re-ignited the dispute between British capitalism and Argentine capitalism over which has legitimate sovereignty over the islands, a dispute which led to war in 1982.

At that time Michael Foot was the Leader of the Labour Party. He wholeheartedly support the war. This was how the May 1982 Socialist Standard reported the pro-war speech he delivered in the House of Commons on 30 March:

Of course the real star of the Labour benches was Michael Foot. Belying his reputation as a doddering, ineffectual bungler, the Labour leader lashed the government for their "betrayal of those who looked to it for protection" (he was not talking about workers struggling to live on social security). "We should not," he raged, "see foul, brutal aggression successful in our world." (He was not attacking the record of past Labour governments on Korea, Malaysia, Biafra, Vietnam . ..) Foot's speech was applauded by the MPs as a flag-waving, drum banging demand for war in which, of course, he would not personally be in the front line. It was, we remember, only a few months ago that he won an affectionate ovation at a Labour Party gathering by describing himself as "as inveterate peacemonger".

The League for the Fifth International (along with the other Trotskyist groups) also supported the war, but the other side. They, as they recall in a press statement issued today, supported General Galtieri sending thousands of Argentine conscripts to their death:

In 1982 Workers Power opposed Thatcher’s bloody war, and on the streets of London took a clear and unequivocal position for the defeat of Britain and the victory of Argentina.

They weren't personally going to be in the front line either.

We in the Socialist Party adopted the traditional socialist position:

THE FALKLANDS CRISIS

In face of the imminent threat of war over the potential wealth of the Falkland Islands the Socialist Party of Great Britain affirms:

1 That despite the wave of jingoistic hysteria in the press and its endorsement by Labour and Tory politicians alike, no working class interests in Britain, Argentina or the Falklands themselves can be served by war.

2 That neither the military junta in Buenos Aires nor the elected representatives of British capitalism, least of all the business interests of Coalite-Charringtons, can justify the shedding of a single drop of working class blood.

3 That the new-found outrage at the undemocratic and oppressive nature of the Argentine regime rings false coming from a government which was arming that regime until the eve of hostilities.

4 That the crucial role of Argentine capitalism in profitably making-up the notorious shortfall of agricultural production within the Russian Empire goes far to explain the support given to the junta by the local "Communist Party" and the muted criticism of it by the same circles who so vociferously denounce the similar dictatorship in Chile and its parallel suppression of trade unionism anc free speech.

We therefore reiterate that having no quarrel with the working class of any country, we extend to our fellow-workers of all lands the expression of goodwill and socialist fraternity and pledge ourselves to work for the overthrow of capitalism in all its guises and the establishment of socialism throughout the world, the only way to end war.

THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 13 April 1982

Adam Buick

Weekly Bulletin of The Socialist Party of Great Britain 136

Dear Friends,

Welcome to the 136th of our weekly bulletins to keep you informed of changes at Socialist Party of Great Britain @ MySpace.

We now have 1562 friends!

Recent blogs:

Beyond Capitalism

“All this Hard Graft no Longer Makes Sense”

Demand the Impossible

Quote for the week:

"To accept civilization as it is practically means accepting decay."

George Orwell, Inside The Whale, 1940.

Continuing luck with your MySpace adventures!

Robert and Piers

Socialist Party of Great Britain

Cooking the Books: Living without money (2010)

Cooking the Books column from the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

The on-line Guardian (25 January) put up a video “The No Money Man” about Mark Boyle who has chosen to live without money. Last year the (London) Times (24 November) in an article “Living without Money” featured “former teacher Heidemarie Schwermer” who “has lived without money in Germany for 13 years”. Both Boyle and Schwermer are associated with schemes which want people to help each other without using money. Boyle calls his “Freeconomy Community”; Schwermer’s is called Gib und Nimm (“Give and Take”).

Such groups are one way of surviving under capitalism, but they are not the solution to the social problems of poverty and environmental degradation which they are set up to mitigate. Although socialists want a moneyless society, living without money now, under capitalism, is not want we advocate.

Actually, socialists don’t want to “abolish” money. What we want is to see established a system of society where money would become redundant, as it would in a society based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means for producing wealth. In such a society the principle “from each according to their ability, to each according to their needs” could apply. People would cooperate to produce what was needed to live and enjoy life and then have free access to this.

Life without money under capitalism, where most things have to be bought, is pretty austere. Here’s how a sympathiser describes Boyle’s lifestyle:

“He lives in a small camper, makes or scavenges everything he uses on a day-to-day basis . . . He takes solar showers . . . To eat he practices the fine art of Dumpster diving and cooks on a hyper-efficient rocket stove.”

Schwermer “lives – a week at a time – in the spare rooms of members of the Tauschring [the Give and Take scheme], cleaning or working in return for accommodation.”

Very few people (in fact, to tell the truth, only a few, eccentric individuals) would be prepared to live like this. In any event, the whole of society could not. However, this is not the only way to live without money and be part of genuine cooperating community where the links between people would be human not commercial. Socialism offers this possibility without involving giving up such amenities as hot and cold running water in a warm, permanent home. But it’s a society-wide change not an individual lifestyle choice.

With the elimination of the waste of capitalism, not just in arms production, wars and preparations for war but also in the whole superstructure of buying and selling, socialist society will be able, using modern technology and socially cooperative labour on a world scale, to provide these amenities and comforts for everybody everywhere without over-burdening the environment.

We don’t want to be churlish but we must point out that both Boyle and Schwermer, and Boyle in particular, rely on what the cooperative labour of the rest of society is able to provide using modern technology. For instance, Boyle’s camper and solar panels (bought before giving up money) and what he scavenges from skips, and the heated and lit houses which Schwermer uses as temporary accommodation.

Living without money doesn’t have to involve wearing a hair shirt and using old newspapers for toilet paper. And won’t in socialism.

Tony Blair and the Chilcot inquiry (2010)

From the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Does it matter whether the Iraq War was legal or illegal?

Socialists are opposed to war because under capitalism wars are always about capitalist access to sources of raw materials, markets, trade routes, investment outlets or strategic points and places to control these. The Iraq War was clearly about oil, mainly about the threat that the regime there posed to oil supplies to Western capitalism from the nearby Gulf States but also about establishing military bases there to control access to Caspian Sea as well as Gulf oil.

So it was a capitalist war but was it an ‘illegal’ war? The concept of an illegal war only came in following the defeat of Germany and Japan in the Second World War when it was applied retrospectively to the leaders of the losing side and incorporated into the UN Charter. Before that, states simply went to war whenever some vital capitalist interest was deemed to be at stake.

The UN Charter outlaws all wars unless authorised by its Security Council except wars of self-defence including coming to the defence of an attacked state. Thus the Korean War was a ‘legal’ war because decided by the Security Council. America declared the Vietnam War legal under the self-defence clause. In fact, the US doesn’t really care what the UN Charter says and, as now by far the strongest military power in the world, doesn’t need to.

On Iraq, the US government had decided to invade and topple Saddam whatever the other members of the UN Security might think, putting its allies under pressure to decide whether or not to join in this. The evidence to the Chilcot inquiry has revealed that Blair said in effect to Bush “Britain will go along with whatever America decides”.

As the Prime Minister of a Labour government Blair couldn’t take the same cavalier attitude to the UN as the Bush administration. After all, the Labour Party had long posed as the champion of the UN. So, once the decision to wage war on Iraq together with America had been taken, the search for a ‘legal’ basis in international law had to go on alongside the military preparations.

The government’s lawyers advised that “regime change” would not be legal as the UN Charter didn’t allow this as a reason to go to war (not surprisingly as there are so many unsavoury regimes represented there). That left Iraq’s apparent refusal to abide by a previous UN Resolution instructing it to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction. The government’s spin-doctors played this for all it was worth The media went along with this, publishing a map of the Eastern Mediterranean showing the British military base in Cyprus within range of the WMDs Iraq was supposed to possess (just in case the ‘self-defence’ clause might have to be invoked). It later turned out of course that no such weapons existed.

Faced with Blair’s determination and the ongoing military preparations for invasion, the poor Attorney General had no alternative but to come up with some legal basis, however flimsy. And he duly did (apparently a previous UN Security Council Resolution allowed any State that fancied it to invade Iraq). Blair then used this to get agreement to the war through his Cabinet (only former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook resigned) and Parliament (only 149 voted against, with 412, Tories as well as Labourites, with blood on their hands) in time to fit in with the US military‘s timetable. And the war was on.

The whole business of finding a legal basis was a charade. The UN Charter is just a scrap of paper which has never stopped, and never will stop, any war. Its only effect has been to make governments that want to go to war find some loophole somewhere to wage a war they had decided on anyway.

Another interesting, and perhaps surprising, revelation of the Chilcot inquiry has been that the demand for legal cover came not just from those who believed in the illusion of an “ethical” foreign policy, but also from the chiefs of the armed forces. It was unlikely that they were afraid of ending up before a war crimes tribunal as the war was won before it even started. What it showed was that they had qualms about setting the killing machine in motion illegally, so confirming that in Britain the military is subordinate to the civilian government.

Blair’s miscalculation was to lead Britain into a war that had very little popular support. He is on record as justifying this on the grounds that leaders must lead by sometimes taking unpopular decisions. It is quite true that governments must do this. This is because they are governing a class-divided society on behalf of one of the classes – the capitalist class – which often requires them to take action against the interest of the other class – the majority wage and salary working class. Wage restraint is one. Going to war is another.

People were right to oppose the war, but the sound basis on which to oppose it is that it was a capitalist war rather than that it was an ‘illegal’ war. Even if the UN had provided a legal cover for it, it would still have been a capitalist war and should still have been opposed. No war for capitalist ends can justify the shedding of a single drop of working class blood.

Adam Buick

Editorial: X-Factor (2010)

Editorial from the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

It will have come to the attention of some workers, that the UK franchise for administrating the market system on behalf of the owners of this part of the planet (the capitalist class) will shortly be up for grabs. There is, in other words, an election on. Tenders are invited from political parties devoid of principles and eager to represent the interests of the UK capitalist class, whether in battles with capitalists from other regions, or with the demands of its local working class.

The only problem in this cosy arrangement is that a few centuries back, in order for the capitalists to triumph over the aristocracy who held power previously, the working class had to be brought on -side.

As land gave way to industry as the economic powerhouse of the state, the new boss class (capitalist class) sought liberation from the restrictions that suited the old rulers (landlords). At the same time the new working class – who actually worked in factories producing the wealth that the upper classes fought over – were not lying down. Freed from serfdom they were able to demand – and win – political freedom: the vote.

So the system has a weak link, an Achilles heel: the political authority of capitalism requires to be regularly reinforced by support at the ballot box. Once every four or five years therefore, we all get our 15 seconds of heady power at our fingertips in the form of a stub of pencil and a scrap of paper.

The first shots in the battle between the main parties have been fired. This campaign looks like being the most vacuous yet, substituting personalities for policies, and making the ‘X-Factor’ and ‘Britain's Got Talent’ look like principled mechanisms for decision-making.

For most of its lifetime Labour at least pretended to have some sort of affinity to working class interests – while expertly shafting us year after year. Thankfully, no pretence at any sort of ideological difference between the parties is maintained by anyone in the know. It used to be said that you couldn't slip a cigarette paper between the policies of the respective parties. Our preferred analogy nowadays would of course refer to a credit card.

The Socialist Party here and our companion parties in the World Socialist Movement do not fetishise parliament. But neither do we see any contradiction in including it – where it exists – as an essential part of the toolkit for making a democratic revolution. The vote in the hands of the working class has only one real use – as a means to unambiguously express majority support (when that happens) for the revolutionary change from production for profit to production for need.

We don't see the vote as the only part of the sort of peaceful and democratic revolution we seek. Far from it, but while it is there we think it should be used. Socialism will only work with the active, informed participation of the many – in stark contrast to the sideshow in people’s lives that this election will be.

First as Tragedy, Then as Farce (2010)

Book Review from the February 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

First as Tragedy, Then as Farce by Slavoj Žižek. Verso, 2009.

Has Slavoj Žižek (the superstar Slovenian “theorist”) signed a piece-work contract with Verso Books? One can’t help wondering because this slim volume brings his tally with that publisher alone to around 21 titles. This Stakhanovite output would be more impressive were it not for his notorious habit of recycling old material, like any good stand-up comedian does.

This two-chapter book is no exception: Žižek seems to have rapidly assembled it by combining his favourite quotes and theoretical hyperbole with some recent news stories from the unfolding economic crisis.

The first chapter (lamely entitled: “It’s Ideology Stupid!”) promises a “diagnosis of our predicament, outlining the utopian core of the capitalist ideology which determined both the crisis itself and our perceptions of and reactions to it.” Setting aside the question of whether ideology can determine a crisis, Žižek does at least provide some valid observations on capitalist ideology’s aims to shift the blame for a crisis away from the capitalist system itself. Yet few of his ideas strike the reader with much force of insight or novelty; and the chapter is haphazardly organized – as if Žižek’s only aim was to squeeze in as many of his treasured anecdotes as possible.

The second chapter (“The Communist Hypothesis”) lays out some of the “communist” ideas that have seasoned Žižek’s recent books. He dances around the question of how to define “communism”, however, choosing instead to locate the “set of antagonisms which generates the need for communism”.

That is at least a start, the reader might think, as it is true that communism (socialism) is not some abstract, ethical ideal, but rather the real solution to problems that cannot be resolved under capitalism. If the problems (or “antagonisms”) of capitalism are clearly explained, the nature of communism – as the solution – will in turn come into view.

But any initial hope that Žižek will eventually explain “communism” dissolves as soon as he unveils those “antagonisms,” said to be: (1) “the looming threat of an ecological catastrophe”; (2) “the inappropriateness of the notion of private property in relation to so-called “intellectual property”; (3) “the socio-ethical implications of new techno-scientific developments (especially in biogenetics)”; and (4) “the creation of new forms of apartheid, new Walls and slums” (author’s italics).

What clear image of communism can possibly emerge from such an overly specific – and basically random – list of contemporary problems?

Žižek tries to avoid getting entangled in his own antagonisms, so to speak, by asserting that the fourth one (also referred to as the separation between “the Excluded and the Included”) is “qualitatively different” from the other three, which would somehow “lose their subversive edge” without it. Of course, Žižek might have defined that key antagonism more precisely as the class division between capitalists and workers – but where’s the fun in that?

The ambiguity of the fourth antagonism allows the author to bend it to his will, in a way not possible with a clear concept like “class”. In particular, it allows Žižek to insist on the (false) distinction between “communism” and “socialism,” condemning the latter for wanting “to solve the first three antagonisms without addressing the fourth”. On that basis Žižek says that socialism is no longer the “lower-phase” of communism (as Lenin had asserted to first introduce the false distinction), but rather the “true competitor” and “greatest threat” to communism.

Given his astounding indifference to what communism actually means, it is no surprise that Žižek cannot fathom workers consciously aiming for a new form of society. The task for his brand of revolutionary is not to explain to fellow workers what communism is, why it is necessary, and how it might be achieved, but rather “to wait patiently for the (usually very brief) moment when the system openly malfunctions or collapses, have to exploit the window of opportunity, to seize power – which at that moment lies, as it were, in the street”.

Žižek insists (repeatedly) that he takes such ideas seriously – even ending the book by advising fellow intellectuals that it’s “time to get serious once again!” – but he is careful to insert just enough ambiguity and humour in his hard-as-nails Leninism to free himself from any real responsibility. Unfortunately, more than a few leftists (including the ageing “New Leftists” at Verso Books!) take Žižek’s “communist” ideas seriously, which only shows how misunderstood communism (socialism) is today.

Michael Schauerte

Beyond capitalism (2010)

From the February 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

Attempts to reform capitalism, whether through parliament or dictatorship, have failed. This leaves conscious majority revolution as the only way forward.

Long before capitalism had emerged as the dominant social order and imposed its exploitive social conditions on the working class that it had created there arose within the minds of human beings the dream of a life beyond mere survival. The dream of a freedom and dignity beyond that of some category of slave to a privileged hierarchy that controlled their means of life.

The triumph of capitalism and its ongoing development – what Marx referred to as the opening of the womb of social labour – gave strength and reality to the dreamer; opened new vistas of potential wealth and social development. Entirely new social relations nourished a new reality in which a literate and articulate working class would emerge to challenge their masters.

In the degrading squalor of 19th century capitalism men and women began debating the substance of their puny dreams; people became politicised to the extent of demanding some amelioration of their miserable conditions as well as an input into the political system that governed their lives. The working class had its martyrs who won for us the rights – limited and reversible – that obtain today within the politics of capital and labour.

Alternative system

By the mid-19th century the pioneers of the early socialist movement, and especially Karl Marx, had subjected capitalism to a rigorous investigation and exposed the fact that, while its role had been historically progressive and while it retained a capacity for improvement, it was now a reactionary system of social organisation. Not only was it based on the exploitation of the proletariat, the producers of all real wealth, by a minority parasite class but it had created, and must retain, a political system that stood between the working class and its social emancipation.

Marx did not draw up a detailed blueprint for a socialist society because such a detailed picture of socialism was dependent on the state of development of capitalism at the time of the perceived social revolution nor could he presume the democratic decisions of a socialist conscious majority following the conquest of power. More pertinently, by exposing the processes whereby capitalism carried out its exploitation of the working class he clearly laid down markers as to what would not exist in a socialist society.

As history rolled over into the 20th century there was a widespread understanding of the meaning of socialism among those elements of the working class who were politically aware. Large sections used the term socialism in the sense in which Marx had used them, viz: a world community in which society as a whole would own and democratically control its means of life: where money, wages and class would not exist and the principle underpinning the production and distribution of wealth would be, ‘from each according to their ability and to each in accordance with their need’.

Dissent among socialists was not about the nature of socialism but about the best way of achieving it. Unfortunately, this question created a graveyard of broken hopes and disillusionment. The story of those hopes and their failure has been well documented in this journal over the decades and it is not the purpose of this article to re-visit the arguments or draw personal blame for the events of the past.

Reform policies

There can be no doubt that the real casualty of the errors and internecine disputes of the past has been socialism itself. As just pointed out, aside from the means of its achievement, there was wide consensus among those calling themselves socialists as to the nature of socialism. At that time socialists and their organisations did not offer reform policies as an end in themselves but rather as strategies that would lead to the eventual overthrow of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. Among some parties it was even customary to post socialism as the core objective together with a panel of what were called 'Immediate Demands'.

Those who founded the Socialist Party opposed this view; we argued that our socialist objective imposed its own means of achievement; that socialism could only be brought into being and could only continue to function on the basis of its conscious acceptance by the widest possible majority of society – which meant, effectively, the working class. The task of the socialist political organisation was, therefore, to promote an understanding of socialism to the end of taking political control away from the capitalist class and instituting a system of common ownership rooted in democratic control.

The basis of our argument was that the material conditions for socialism existed now but it could only come into being when the working class had matured politically to the point where it could commit itself not only to its rights within the new society but, also, to its responsibilities. Leading the workers along the path of reform was not equipping them for their historical revolutionary role but was in fact establishing the contrary idea that capitalism could be made to function in the interests of the class it exploited.

Socialism today

Earnestly, we can say now, we wish we had been wrong in our analysis of the situation. We wish the British Labour Party and the Social Democratic parties elsewhere who made up the Second International and their myriad of Left-wing supporters had succeeded in chipping away at the fortress of capitalism, had demolished it and created a sane socialist society.

We wish that despite the lack of the material and ideological conditions for socialism in Russia in 1917 the Bolsheviks had performed a social miracle and that Russia and its satellite imitators had not become brutal totalitarian states where the case for socialism was treason.

We wish, too, that when we propagate socialism today we were not confronted with the argument that the awful things that happened in Russia (before that country abandoned state-organised capitalism in favour of a property-owning bourgeoisie) had something to do with socialism.

Similarly, we wish that the appalling record of failure, treachery and authoritarianism which has become more and more the political stock-in-trade of British Labour and kindred parties in Europe was not still perceived by some people as having some association with socialism.

On another plane, we wish that our class brethren were emancipated from the fetters of leadership and authority, an aspect of class society severely adopted and promoted by the disparate organisations of ‘the Left’. People who know what they want and how to get what they want do not need leaders. History, especially the history of our class, is littered with evidence of the treachery and deception of leaders; the very concept is a heritage from the various forms of class slavery in which mental servitude is an important social suppressant.

As someone remarked at the beginning of the French Revolution of 1789, “The great only appear great because we are on our knees; let us rise!”

Richard Montague

Capitalism and Michael Moore

Cross-posted from the Socialism Or Your Money Back blog,

Like Michael Moore’s other films, 'Capitalism: A Love Story', is brilliant in its way, hard-hitting and funny. He strips away the lies and hypocrisy of “public relations” propaganda to expose the ruthless predators who dominate our society and profit from the misery of working people.

And at the same time he makes us laugh. So far so good. It’s fairly clear what Michael Moore is against. But what he is for? He doesn’t seem to know himself, as he admits in a recent newspaper interview:

“What I'm asking for is a new economic order. I don't know how to construct that. I'm not an economist. All I ask is that it have two organising principles. Number one, that the economy is run democratically. In other words, the people have a say in how its run, not just the [wealthiest] 1 percent. And number two, that it has an ethical and moral core to it. That nothing is done without considering the ethical nature, no business decision is made without first asking the question, is this for the common good?” (Guardian, 30 January).

We too want democracy to extend to all spheres of social life. For us that’s what socialism is – the common ownership and democratic control of the means of life by the whole community. But genuine democracy will not be achieved by relying on economists or other supposed experts to design it.

By its very nature, democracy must be created by a conscious majority. Michael Moore seems to be saying that in his “new economic order” the wealthiest 1 percent will still exist, even though they will no longer have all the say. He also assumes that there are still going to be “business decisions”. But business decisions are about making money, not serving the common good. Any firm run by managers who care too much about ethics and morality will soon go bust – unless the managers get sacked first!

On one key point, he is right. If the situation he exposes so well is to change, it really does require a “new economic order”. An end to production for profit. The alternative is a society in which the means for producing what we need are owned in common and run democratically. A society in which productive activity is no longer “business” but simply cooperation to satisfy human needs.

This is much more than he offers on his website (www.michaelmoore.com). He says nothing there about any kind of “new order”. It’s all about campaigning for various reforms. These may well be of benefit to working people in the short term, but as they still leave capitalism in place there would always be pressure to reverse any gains made. Worst of all, and despite Michael Moore’s evident disillusionment with Obama, heurges readers to work for change through the Democratic Party – a recipe for endless failure and frustration.

One last point. Michael Moore talks only about changing things in the United States. This national focus makes it impossible even to conceive of a fundamentally new society. That’s because nowadays capitalism is a highly integrated world system and can only be replaced at the global level.

It is clear to us that society urgently needs a worldwide system upgrade…from capitalism to socialism!

Stefan

Weekly Bulletin of The Socialist Party of Great Britain 135

Dear Friends,

Welcome to the 135th of our weekly bulletins to keep you informed of changes at Socialist Party of Great Britain @ MySpace.

We now have 1565 friends!

Recent blogs:

Re-cycling food waste

Indian Earthquake: Did it really kill?

Money Must Go

Quote for the week:

"Read the paper - humdrum

Henley Regatta - page one

Eat die - ho hum

Page three - big bum

Giving a lunatic a loaded gun.

He walks - others run

Thirty dead - no fun

Foreigners feature as figures of fun

Do something destructive chum

Sit right down - write a letter to The Sun

Say... 'Bring back hangin' for everyone'"

John Cooper Clarke - 'Suspended Sentence'

Continuing luck with your MySpace adventures!

Robert and Piers

Socialist Party of Great Britain

Material World: American Public Opinion and the S-Word:Weakening of a Taboo? (2010)

The Material World Column from the February 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

In April 2009, interviewers working for the Rasmussen agency asked 1,000 people: ‘Which is a better system – capitalism or socialism?’ 53 percent said capitalism, 20 percent socialism, and 27 percent were not sure.

Although ‘capitalism’ came out the clear winner, commentators were shocked that almost half the respondents failed to give the ‘correct’ response on a matter so crucial to the dominant ideology.

‘Capitalism’, ‘socialism’ and ‘the free market’
The interviewers did not define ‘capitalism’ or ‘socialism’, so we are left to guess what respondents understood by these words. No doubt most of those who answered ‘socialism’ did not have a clear or accurate idea of what it means. Nevertheless, socialists can take encouragement from the evident ability of a sizeable proportion of people to resist indoctrination by the corporate media, which never have anything good to say about any kind of ‘socialism’. Even the fact that so many Americans do not react negatively to the S-word itself is significant: people who do not take fright at the word are more likely to be open to consideration of the idea.

A clue to how Americans interpret ‘capitalism’ is found in another Rasmussen poll (May 2009). Here people were asked: ‘Is a free market economy the same as a capitalist economy?’ 35 percent replied yes, 38 percent no. This result puzzled the hired ideologists of capital, who do equate the two concepts and like to use ‘the free market’ as a euphemism for ‘capitalism’.

Yet another poll (December 2008) asked: ‘Which is better – a free market economy or a government-managed economy?’ 70 percent preferred a ‘free market economy’ and only 15 percent a ‘government-managed economy’. This implies that there is a substantial body of people (about 17 percent) who are in favour of ‘the free market’ but against ‘capitalism’.

In the US ‘capitalism’ is widely associated with big business and ‘the free market’ with small business. Hatred for big business commonly goes along with admiration for small business. In the frequent polls that compare the approval ratings of various occupational groups, small business owners regularly come out on top, while corporate CEOs (together with politicians) end up at the bottom.

Those who are ‘against capitalism but for the free market’ are, perhaps, still influenced by the old populist idea of the good society as a relatively egalitarian community of small independent producers – farmers, fishermen, craftsmen, doctors, etc. This utopia has its roots in an idealised image of early rural colonial society in New England and Pennsylvania, before its transformation by industrial capitalism.

Young people more inclined toward ‘socialism’
The proportion of respondents who say that 'socialism¹ is a better system than 'capitalism¹ varies with gender, age, race and income. Women are slightly more likely than men to prefer 'socialism¹; people with low incomes (under $40,000 per year) more than twice as likely as people with high incomes (over $75,000); and blacks almost twice as likely as whites, with equal proportions favouring 'capitalism¹ and 'socialism¹ (31 percent each).

Variation with age is especially striking. Proportions preferring ‘socialism’ in the older age groups (40 and over) are well below average. In the 30 – 39 age group the proportion rises to 26 percent and in the 18 – 29 age group to 33 percent (with 37 percent favouring ‘capitalism’). If we focus specifically on women aged 18 – 29, we again find an equal division of opinion: 36 percent for ‘capitalism’ and 36 percent for ‘socialism’.

Why?
How might these very hopeful findings be explained?

If we believe widespread stereotype, nothing needs explaining: young people are ‘naturally’ rebellious and older people ‘naturally’ conformist. In fact, this is far from always the case. Rebellious and conformist generations tend to alternate. The young rebels of the 1960s gave way to the young conformists of the 1980s. The pendulum is now swinging back. For three reasons.

First, deteriorating economic conditions. This is the first generation of young people since the Great Depression who have no hope of maintaining, let alone improving on, their parents’ standard of living. They face a grim and uncertain future.

Second, an increasing number of young people pay less attention to the corporate media, preferring to rely on the Internet. This exposes them to a broader range of ideas, including socialist ones.

Finally, the end of the Cold War. During the Cold War, ‘socialism’ and ‘communism’ were associated with a forbidding external enemy. Advocating them marked you out as a traitor. We protested that what we stood for was something quite different, but our voice was barely audible. We hoped that with the end of the Cold War it would become easier to spread socialist ideas. We felt disappointed that this did not seem to happen. The disappointment was premature. Attitudes do change in response to circumstances – but only when a new generation comes of age. For today’s young Americans the Cold War is ancient history.

Stefan

From the March 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

In Material World February issue we didn’t mean to write that the poll showed that people with high incomes were more likely to be favourable to the word “socialism” than those with low but the opposite, so:

“Women are slightly more likely than men to prefer ‘socialism’; people with low incomes (under $40,000 per year) more than twice as likely as people with high incomes (over $75,000); and blacks almost twice as likely as whites, with equal proportions favouring ‘capitalism’ and ‘socialism’ (31 percent each).”

Cooking the Books: The yellow brick road to nowhere (2010)

The Cooking the Books column from the February 2010 issue of the Socialist Standard

“In an economy where the currency is not tied to the value of gold, the central bank can simply print more and more money, to fund the expansion of the economy and of central government. Over time, that will erode the purchasing power of the currency, but as long as that happens slowly through moderate inflation, no one seems to mind.” So the Independent (2 December) reported the views of US Congressman Ron Paul who wants to abolish ‘the Fed’, the Federal Reserve, America's central bank, as well as going back to a gold-based currency.

Paul cannot be called a currency crank. as he has a correct understanding of what causes inflation and his solution would work to stop it, if that what was wanted, even if it would be unnecessary, pointless and a waste of resources.

Money originated as a commodity, i.e. something produced by labour that had its own value, which evolved to be the commodity that could be exchanged for any other commodity in amounts equal to the value of the other commodity. Various things have served as the money-commodity, but in the end gold and silver were almost universally adopted. Paul offered a reason: “Most people think gold is beautiful, that's why it's money. It's because it's beautiful and rare and divisible and it lasts a long time. We don't use lead.” Beauty didn’t have much to do with it, but being rare (i.e. requiring more labour to find and extract from nature, so concentrating – unlike lead – much value in a small amount), divisible (so easily coined) and long lasting did.

As capitalism developed it was found that gold itself did not have to circulate, but that paper notes could substitute for it as long as those accepting or holding it could be sure that they could always change them for gold. Up until WWI in most countries the currency was gold coins and paper notes convertible into gold. The Great Depression of the 1930s led to the major capitalist countries abandoning this convertibility. Since then the currency nearly everywhere has been inconvertible paper notes.

With an inconvertible paper currency, the amount of money is no longer fixed automatically by the level of economic transactions, nor is there any limit to the amount of paper currency that can be issued. It is this that Paul objects to because, if the central bank issues more paper money than the amount of gold that would otherwise be needed, then the result will be a depreciation of the currency; the paper money will come to represent a smaller amount of gold with the result that prices generally will rise.

If Paul had his way, the Fed would no longer manage the issue of the currency. This would pass to the Treasury Department which would only be allowed to issue paper money if it had the equivalent value of gold in Fort Knox. This would be a further absurd waste of resources as much more gold would have to be mined – just to store in places like Fort Knox.

Paul thinks that a return to a gold-based currency would eliminate crises such as in the 1930s and today. This is an illusion. There was a gold-based currency up until WWI, yet crises occurred regularly, including a Great Depression in the 1880s and a hundred years ago the same sort of banking crises as today. Capitalism goes through its boom/slump cycle whatever the currency. No monetary reform can change that.