Greasy Pole: The Year of the Idea? (1997)

The Greasy Pole column from the January 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nineteen Ninety Seven is European Year Against Racism, a year of "tolerance and goodwill", according to the grandly titled European Parliamentary Intercultural Committee, who want us to drop them a line to tell them what we are doing about it. This will be good news to what is sometimes called the Anti-Racism Industry, but it should not be quite so welcome to other groups—like refugees, children, the homeless—who may remember years in the past given over to focusing on their suffering. There is no evidence that having a year all to themselves so much as dented their problems, let alone abolished them.

For example, if anything did come out of the year for refugees it will have been completely swamped by the effects of a series of wars which have spawned their own flood of pitiful, terrified, starving people trying to flee from the fighting. Most recently this has been the case in the Gulf. Bosnia. Africa. . . . Whatever may have been done for children there is still the gruesome evidence of the neglect, abuse and violence which is meted out to them—which according to organisations like the NSPCC and the National Children’s Homes, has been worsened by the deeper poverty associated with unemployment. And when those grosser symptoms of poverty are absent there remain the diseases which are avoidable but which flourish when children are neglected or stressed or malnourished.

Health visitors
In a survey in 1995 the Health Visitors’ Association found that almost a third of their members came across cases of tuberculosis. Rickets was found in 25 cases and more than 80 percent of the Health Visitors knew of children who were failing to thrive—a phrase which can cover appalling physical and emotional deficiencies—because of undernourishment or neglect. The health visitors who are at the sharp end of working-class life have no illusions about tackling problems with special years. Their director tells us that ". . .  the many improvements in health and welfare are being undermined by the effects of desperate poverty on a national scale".

Those "many improvements in health and welfare” were based on the plans laid down in the Beveridge Report. A recent issue of the Guardian republished part of a leader written on Beveridge on 2 December 1942. It was. said the leader ". . .  a big and fine thing. It will go towards securing for the British people 'freedom from want' . . .  it will strengthen our democracy by raising the happiness and wellbeing of 'the common man”'. It is almost ghoulish to remember that now, after all the promises, the dreams and the effort. They were all killed off by the central reality that we live under a social system in which the priorities are the exploitation of its workers, the production of wealth for sale and the amassing of capital. Human interests count only in so far as they serve those priorities.

Homeless
Our final example is the homeless. They too have had a year apparently given over to eradicating their plight. Not that there was nothing being done about it already. Shelter, for example, was formed over 30 years ago; at the time it was assumed to be a short-lived organisation because the problem was accessible to reform. But that is not how it is now according to Shelter’s occasional reviews, which show that homelessness of one sort or another grows and grows regardless. It has grown in spite of the rise of the Housing Association, with its promise of cheap, good standard, available accommodation but which has been gobbled up by local councils and is now similarly strapped for cash. In some cases homelessness is not a simple problem. Its roots go rather deeper, for many young people prefer to live on the streets because they find there the sense of welcome and security which they desperately need after fleeing from a brutal, abusive or neglectful family. So they too are a part of the wider problem of a society whose very structure, from its basis upwards and outwards, cannot meet the needs of the majority of its people. And what do our political leaders have to say about this? For them 1997 will also be a special year because there must be a general election. John Major is in desperate trouble as his government is revealed, more and more, day by day, in all its impotence and venality—and in the fractiousness which springs from its impotence. If things had gone better for him Major would obviously have opted for an election before this but he has been forced to hang on, increasingly wretched, in the hope that something would turn up.

How is the Labour Party dealing with this situation? If we are to go by the actions and utterances of Tony Blair we would conclude that he has been carefully studying the Conservative Party and decided that, as they have been so successful at achieving and holding onto power, Labour's best chance of winning an election is to be as much like the Tories as possible. Some of his supporters—like the awful Jack Straw— have adopted this policy so enthusiastically that they have became more Tory, as it were, than the Tories. Straw, after all, has managed the difficult task of making Michael Howard look like a liberal, soft-on-crime Home Secretary.

Along with this ruthless reshaping of the Labour Party so that it more closely appears in its true colours as an aspiring alternative government for British capitalism, Blair has spewed out a copious stream of the most appalling guff. For example his book New Britain is a rich (if that is the word) source of the kind of meaningless ravings which politicians use to convince the voters that they are people with an inspired vision of the future. Just look at a few of his phrases: "It is about giving power to you. the individual . . . the bringing of a country together, a sharing of the possibility of power, wealth and opportunity . . .  the problems of low pay and unemployment must be tackled at source . . . "

By now our more sensitive readers will have had enough. The point is that that is nothing new in all this. There is nothing new in Major’s difficulties, nothing new in Blair’s evasive verbiage. We have to measure the value, the effectiveness of these things in the reality we experience all around us. In the homeless, in the refugees, in the sick and hungry children. The politicians’ impotence to affect these problems docs not deter them; they continue to mouth the same promises, wrapped up in the same empty claptrap.

So here, for the New Year, is an idea. We need a year when we focus, not on the separate plight of a particular group suffering under capitalism’s demands, not on the deceptions of political leaders, but on the real, basic causes of society’s problems and what we ourselves can do to change society from the basis and all that follows.

Ivan

50 Years Ago: The Nationalisation of the Railways (1997)

The 50 Years Ago column from the January 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

Naturally the shareholders clamour for higher compensation. Their special grievance is that, unlike the Bank of England shareholders, they are not being guaranteed the same income as they were getting during or before the war. In effect, they are to receive a State-guaranteed income of about £22,500,000 a year in place of a larger but uncertain sum they received as shareholders in concerns the profitability of which had been rendered precarious by road competition. How the shareholders must regret not having jumped at Nationalisation on the much better terms they would have got in 1919, when profits and share values were higher!

So much for the shareholders. What of the workers? The workers merely change one employer for another; little else is changed, for the State undertaking, as the Daily Herald specially emphasises (November 19th, 1946), has got to pay its way. The Evening Standard remarks that nationalisation cannot bring any possible benefit to the railway worker— "for him it can mean neither higher wages nor shorter hours" (November 19th, 1946). And the Observer, in like vein, says. "It . . . leaves the transport workers and the consumers to wonder what difference it can make to them except for the worse" (December 30th. 1946).

The Labour Government has kept its pledge to nationalise transport but for the workers it is all sound and fury, signifying nothing. Nationalisation is State capitalism and leaves untouched the real problem of the working class of emancipating themselves from capitalist exploitation.

(From front page article by ‘H’ in Socialist Standard, January 1947)

It Could Be You! (1997)

From the January 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

So, you think the idea of a socialist society in which everyone cooperates to provide the things which we all require to live decent lives free from poverty, unemployment, homelessness, war and want is a utopian dream; you think abolishing the wages system and along with it the slavery of employment is too far fetched to bother with, well keep doing the Lottery — who knows, you might win!

Were it not for the poverty and misery of capitalism two institutions would not exist: the National Lottery and the Socialist Party. Both are responses to real problems and genuine discontent.

The lottery exists as an illusive escape from working-class life for millions of people who have been conned into believing that becoming a multi-millionaire by gambling is more likely than being struck by lightning. The same mugs do the football pools and keep the bookies in business. They speculate upon the worst bet in the world and then pour more money into Camelot’s profits to ensure that they will be in with a chance of losing again the following week.

The Socialist Party exists because some people—very few of us at present— have asked ourselves why it is that there is poverty and misery in the world. We have concluded that it is a consequence of the way society is organised. Production for sale with a view to profit means that needs will always come a poor second to profit-making. As profits arc accumulated by the small minority of the earth’s population who own the productive resources but produce no wealth, and as unmet needs are largely those of the working-class majority who do produce all of society’s wealth, we have concluded that the profit system works against the interest of the majority of us. Capitalism is a bad bet for the working class and a safe bet for the capitalist class. The capitalists win the lottery every week. How? They pay us less than the value of what we have produced for them to sell on the market.

So, unlike the main parties which canvass working-class support, the Socialist Party says that the profit system— capitalism—the market economy—(these all mean roughly the same thing) —should not be maintained or reformed but abolished. We are an anti-capitalism party. No promises from socialists that if you vote for us you will have more chance of winning the lottery or even getting an extra tenner in your pay packet. We say unequivocally that it is the system which pays workers to produce profits for the few which is the cause of the problems facing the majority.

The right choice
Our remedy for capitalism’s problems is not better capitalism but no capitalism. We stand for unadulterated socialism. Not state capitalism like they had in Russia or China or Cuba, but a new system of society in which production is solely for use.

We contend that producing for use is both more practically efficient and democratically desirable than continuing with capitalism and all of its inevitable problems stemming from profit before need. Get rid of capitalism and replace it by common ownership and democratic control of the means of wealth production and distribution.

In a socialist society productive resources will be owned by all, without discrimination of race or sex, and will be democratically controlled by the whole community. Because production will be simply for use there will be no need for the market. There will be no buying and selling. There will be no money. There will be free access to all goods and services.

Most people would prefer to live in a socialist society, as we have described it, than the present capitalist one. Few people like the poverty and misery caused by capitalism: we know that because so many are trying desperate measures, such as giving money to the lottery, as a way out. People go in for all kinds of hopeless gambles to escape from capitalism. They borrow large amounts of money from banks to set up small businesses, most of which fail because they can’t compete with the big capitalists. They emigrate to other countries in the false hope that poverty will not be found in distant lands They steal and end up behind bars for long stretches. They prostitute their dignity doing horrible jobs which no self-respecting person would choose to do. They cheat on their friends and neighbours. They pray. All of these are more-or-less useless. There is no escape for workers from the effects of capitalism within the confines of the system.

So, what about the socialist gamble? For most people, appealing as socialism sounds in contrast with the present system, the prospect of achieving socialism is too small to be worth the risk of dedicating time to working for its establishment. It’s a tempting argument. After all, being a socialist involves hours—which can turn into years—of trying to persuade others of the logic of the case for changing the system. Trying to win a majority to socialist consciousness can meet with derision and ridicule. It involves the time-consuming effort of organising democratically and co-operating with fellow socialists. It can leave you angry at times that people who could benefit so much from socialism are wasting their efforts on useless pursuits like trying to reform capitalism or hoping that they will win the lottery.

Those who consider the gamble and decide against joining the socialists will often attempt to justify their inaction by resorting to common, but utterly false, arguments. They will say that socialism is against human nature. Even though private property, the market and money have only actually existed for a small fraction of the time that humans have lived on the earth. (Were the majority of humans who ever lived not “naturally human”?) They will say that the workers are too stupid to understand the need for socialism. In that case, how did they come to understand it—and how did we who are socialists? They will say that the media will always keep the people mentally enslaved. Now, that’s a strong argument, but history abounds in examples of people who have overcome the propaganda of religion, education and the mass media and overthrown regimes they have not liked. 

Picking a winner

The most honest argument of the person who sympathises with socialism but refuses to join the socialists is to admit to being lazy about changing society. “I'll be with you on the day,” they say, as if socialism could ever come about if a majority of people decided to sit back and wait for it. The truth is that there will be no socialism without conscious socialists, just as there could be no Socialist Party without democratically organised socialist activists. We are not active because we like being in a minority, but because we have good historical reason to believe that in time and with effort we can be in a majority.

If we are wasting our time as active socialists, the present writer’s view is that it’s better to waste time and be right than to devote energy to a growing movement which is based upon a wrong analysis of how society works and how it needs to be changed. There is some satisfaction in knowing that your political position is invincible. (And if it’s not, let our critics show us where we are wrong—enough have tried and failed.) But even so, the satisfaction of being correct is not enough.

The problem is far greater for the people who nod their heads and smile in passive agreement with socialism and then conclude that the gamble will be a waste of their time. You see, the choice is not between socialism as it could be and life under capitalism as it is. One of the special features of capitalism is its tendency to take people who are just about surviving, perhaps even in a bit of comfort, and kicking them into the ditch of dire poverty. The problem for the workers who bet on capitalism is that it could be them—not winning the lottery, but losing everything.

Think about the risks of supporting this system. What would happen if tomorrow morning you lost your job? And how many couples need both partners in employment for them to survive? What about if you or a close family member falls ill and the only way of helping them properly is to pay for private medical attention? What about if your child becomes a victim of the next Chernobyl or the next Bhopal? What if the big powers decide to fight over the spoils once again and powerful fingers start getting itchy near to nuclear buttons? What control will you have over any of those situations? It will be too late then to decide that it would have been better to have done something earlier to bring about a new system of society in which none of these problems could occur.

Just as the lottery gambler is a pathetic figure standing in a sea of filth with an empty perfume spray, so the worker who agrees with socialism but will do nothing about it is a fool to him or herself. The continuation of the profit system relies upon the inertia resulting from such folly. The future of society, as we move from a system which fails the majority to one which is sane, co-operative and practical, depends upon overcoming that folly and ignorance of the majority. And overcoming it is not up to someone else. We need more active socialists now—and it could be you.

Steve Coleman

If this be Nationalisation—! (1920)

From the November 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

The labour leaders and others who, through the Press and public platforms, have been urging upon the working class the necessity of nationalising industries (the mines in particular), have surely turned the blind eye in the direction of the Post Office. Starting as a commercial enterprise, it was nationalised and became a Government institution, to-day employing more than 100,000, and being run for profit exactly as the mines and railways are now, but belonging to "the nation."

"The nation," surely, needs definition, and it has been left to the Socialists to define the term.

Workers, it means practically the capitalist class, and the Post Office is owned and controlled by that class, just as the means of life, the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth, are owned and controlled. It needs no gigantic brain with directive ability to discover so much.

The workers of the Post Office are not wealthy compared with other workers because their particular business is "nationalised."  On the contrary they are a sweated section of the working class, and kept the more easily in subjection by the cunning method of ''grading," one grade competing with another for a bigger plum in the shape of higher pay, and being urged on by their immediate superior.

The rank and file have yet to learn that even their immediate superior is but a wage slave, living by the sale of his labour-power, in the same manner as themselves, the difference being that the supervisor receives a salary, not mere wages.

If this is nationalisation and it is applied in other industries, the working class will soon realise the uselessness of such a palliative. The only remedy is Socialism! Private ownership must give place to social ownership, and the working class must ever be confronted with the fact that the power is theirs and no other power can say them nay when they will it.

A little study each working day will convince even the most corpulent of the salariat.

Workers, think it over !

W.A.G.

Action—An Analysis. (1920)

From the September 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists are often accused by Direct Actionists and others of that ilk of being content with "talk, talk, everlasting talk." They say we are continually uttering all sorts of dire threats against the capitalist class, but that we stop at that. When it comes to action, according to them, we are non-starters.

Now what action can the workers take ?

They can with advantage take no action other than talking—with tongue and pen and print—and organising, and using the vote, until such time as they have obtained control of the political machinery, for without that control they are helpless.

There are what are known as "constitutional action" and "direct action," The meaning of the first is obviously action in accord with the Constitution.

There are various organisations—political and others alleged to be non-political—who conduct their propaganda mainly by the use of Press and platform, as a means of "peacefully persuading those who pay attention to their case to join them." That is constitutional action.

Good, so far! but another aspect of the matter now presents itself.

Two or more governments have a dispute concerning some question of detail arising out of the administration of territories under their control—usually a question of commerce. What happens ?

The disputants endeavour to settle the matter by negotiation. Failing that, one side or the other takes direct action That is to say, they declare war against the other side.

Vast masses of men with the latest equipment are hurried to the scene of action ; new inventions are brought out, and production in general is intensified. That is direct action in practice !

When the workers take direct action that is a crime, because it is unconstitutional, inasmuch as it is action against the ruling class.

But what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander ! If it be constitutional for a government to take direct action in the form of a declaration of war, it is also constitutional for the workers to take direct action on the same lines when they obtain that control of political power which is necessary to enable them to do so.

However, our critics must remember that until the workers get that control they, like us, are helpless, and we can do nothing but talk, educate, and organise.

Those who favour "direct action" appear to be unable to conceive any other form of action. When we start action of any kind other than what we are doing at present, it will be constitutional action expressed in terms of guns and bombs and bayonets. We shall use these instruments of warfare safe in the knowledge that we were backed by a Socialist working class.

We do not wish to kill anyone, and if we can accomplish our aims in a peaceful manner well and good. But if the enemy—the capitalist class —resist, then we must use all the forces of the State to enforce our will.

The issue then will not be merely a sectional squabble between national groups of the capitalist class, but it will be a question of the complete abolition of that class itself.

Direct action, as advocated by those of the anti-political school, means political suicide for the workers because it ignores the only factor which can be effective.

When the day of our direct action arrives the ranks of the conscientious objector will be considerably depleted because, whereas on the last occasion those ranks were largely made up of Socialists, in the struggle to come there will be no Socialists amongst the "C.O.'s." Instead they will be found in the revolutionary army, fighting in order to achieve "THE WORLD FOR THE WORKERS."

H. E. Hutchins

A Chapter on Dialectical Materialism (1936)

Book Review from the February 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

“The Scientific Method of Thinking", by Edward Conze, Ph.D. 5/-. Chapman & Hall, Ltd., publishers.

What was that I just heard you mention? interrupted a fellow at a public meeting. “Dialectical Materialism," impressively replied the speaker. “Then I'll have a shilling each way on that for the Derby,” said the questioner. I confess to having a certain sympathy with the fellow who mistook a principle of philosophical thought for a racehorse. The phrases connected with science or philosophy are generally so unfamiliar to those to whom the Socialist message is directed, that little excuse may be allowed for their use without due qualification as to their meaning. Those who labour to produce little for themselves and very much for other people are somewhat prone to take unkindly to abstract terms of any kind outside their everyday workaday. The average worker’s lack of education and training in science and philosophy, together 'with the anxiety attendant upon the ever-pressing need of obtaining their means of subsistence often militates against their readily grasping complex names and theories.

We feel certain that many are those who, after having listened to a discourse on any aspect of social science, have retired like Omar of old— by quitting the same door as in they went. We mention this, whilst being fully alive to the fact that unusual phrases cannot always be avoided.

But the real educationists, those who wish to instruct, as distinct from the type who would have us “see what clever fellows we are,” seldom fail to endeavour to clarify their terms of reference.

In the work under review, the author has tried to meet the requirements of simple and concise statement, though one cannot readily say that he has been altogether successful.

He is most probably aware of this himself, since he says that whilst endeavouring to avoid the clumsy phrase “dialectical materialism” in outlining its meaning, “it would have been a miracle if I had not sometimes been too simple and sometimes too involved.” Anyhow, to have attempted a clear and precise presentation of a complex theory is admirable, and one may excuse Dr. Conze for any shortcomings in this direction —a materialist could hardly lay claim to the performance of miracles. The need of the working class to grapple with and master the essentials of any line of thought connected with either their subjugation or their emancipation is an imperative one, and should, therefore, be undertaken at all costs.

What, then, is this “dialectical materialism” about which we have heard so much in certain quarters, and about which Dr. Conze sets out to tell the story. He mentions that in order to comprehensively grasp its meaning “some background of knowledge of other philosophies is necessary.” This impels us to add that if all its ramifications are to be considered in the light of and distinct from other and older philosophies a much larger volume than the one we are reviewing will have to be composed.

It is with the name of Karl Marx that the theory of dialectical materialism is directly associated since it was he who, after taking up the materialist thought of his time, gave it that particular turn and direction which distinguishes Marx’s materialism from others, particularly that line of thought described by Engels as “metaphysical materialism.” Up to and including the time of Marx, materialism had claimed its champions from the times of ancient Greece and, despite the varied forms it assumed with different exponents, materialism generally stood for an attitude of mind opposed to the traditional supernaturalism of the ages. Not that this must be understood to imply that all materialist thought prior to Marx was free from the “God idea’’ in one form or another. A thin sort of theism had dominated the minds of even such profound thinkers as Bacon and Locke—a feature which caused Marx to satirically declare, “Theism is but an easy-going way of getting rid of religion.” Nevertheless the predominant characteristic of materialist thought was the insistence upon the method of observation and experimentation of known or presumably knowable natural forces. The data for study here, whether in astronomy, geology, biology or the various aspects of human existence, rested upon, the actual material at hand and what was known and verifiable rather than by the method of approach through preconceived pre-possessions concerning “supernatural causes,” or what is known in philosophy as the a priori method of thinking.

From the time that man emerged from his apelike condition of primitive times he has always had to live by and through some working and workable arrangements with the conditions of his environment. That arrangement has been made by man himself, first out of the material of mother earth and next by the uses of such material which he has had to discover by his own unaided efforts. Mankind may have had distorted conceptions; in fact, they have had them galore, about the whys and wherefores of existence, but in the mere fact of living and causing his species to persist, the severely practical side of all human life has ultimately shaped man’s philosophies rather 'than vice versa.

That “in the beginning was action” is a sound principle or guide in philosophic thought, and one thoroughly well but broadly stated by Engels—“before there was argumentation there was action ” . . . “and human action had solved the difficulty long before human ingenuity invented it.” “The proof of the pudding is in the eating.” It is on this note that the materialism of Marx is seen to be in striking contrast with that of his predecessors or his contemporaries. Although in the ultimate sense the Socialist view of life may and does turn to a definite scientific attitude to all phenomena, whether animate or inanimate, the Marxian is primarily concerned with the activities of human society. Its rise and growth, its own laws of development, and what are its component parts form the essentials of Marxian theories. Where previous materialist thought had ignored or failed to tackle the problem of the underlying causes of social development Marx, who had studied and learned much of the world’s leading philosophical and scientific thought, applied a method of interpreting history which has borne illuminating results. The name by which Marx’s (and also Engels’s) theory of historical development has been generally known is “the materialist conception of history,” or “ historical materialism.” We have endeavoured to outline the essentials of this theory in the Socialist Standard in the past, so will let it suffice at present to refer those further interested thereto, or better still, to the works of Marx and Engels themselves.

Where, then, does the phrase “ dialectical ” come from? And what does it mean in any case? To get to reasonably close grips with the question it is necessary, we think, to look back at the leading philosophy of Germany at the time that both Marx and Engels first saw the light of day. Dr. Conze reminds us that in the work of Hegel, the most noted of German philosophical thinkers, we are presented with “a most wonderful and precious instrument,” the “dialectical method.” Dr. Conze is, of course, entitled, if he so wishes, to describe it as “ wonderful and precious,” but for many reasons we would prefer to acclaim it more modestly as very useful.

“ Dialectics,” says Dr. Conze, “ is that way of thinking which works with the assumption of a unity of opposites and of the reality of contradictions.” We do not feel seriously disposed to quarrel with this definition, but we certainly think that dialectics embraces something more than the bare definition given by our author.

The entire Hegelian philosophy rested upon an evolutionary conception of the universe. To Hegel all things are of a transitory nature, they are in a process of constantly coming into being and passing away to other and higher forms which, in turn, are subject to the same process or processes. This was identical with the leading thought of ancient Greece, but with, of course, the accumulated knowledge of the intervening centuries.

Heraclitus like many others of his times, had formulated the same law of existence that “Everything is and is not, for everything is fluid, is constantly coming into being and passing away.”

But in the domain of human society the principle by which social institutions have their being and pass away was a problem not satisfactorily met by Hegel.

Though he emphasised the law of motion in nature and human history to proceed through contradictions inherent in the nature of all phenomena, his philosophy had to conclude and subside within its own contradiction, which reminds us of the comment written by Engels when dealing with Hegel; “As regards all philosophies, their system is doomed to perish, and for this reason, because it emanates from an imperishable desire of the human soul, the desire to abolish all contradictions. But if all contradictions are once and for all disposed of, we have arrived at the so-called absolute truth, history is at an end, and yet it will continue to go on, although there is nothing further left for it to do—thus a newer and more insoluble contradiction ” (Feurbach, page 48).

Nevertheless, the dialectical method of Hegel had, if not settled a problem, at least propounded one, and Marx took up the dialectic where Hegel left it, and transformed it anew as a weapon of understanding of what the contradictions in human society consist, and what are the actual factors upon which the process of social development proceeds.

From a method of interpreting the whole panorama of life as though it were governed by the working out of an “ idea” immanent in nature and history—as Hegel had conceived—Marx turned the method into one of viewing the make-up of human history in the light of the reciprocal actions of man and his environment at different stages of history. In this we see that humanity does not effect its history out of “ ideas ” operating of their own volition as though a “ mental world ” were an independent entity.

(To be continued.)

Robert Reynolds

Link to Part 2

Engels on Housing (1936)

Book Review from the January 1936 issue of the Socialist Standard

"The Housing Question," F. Engels (Martin Lawrence, 2s. 6d.)

Numerous people who pride themselves upon their practical outlook and their absorption in so-called immediate issues would do well to read and inwardly digest this little book. Written originally as a series of articles in a German workers' periodical, over sixty years ago, it refers in particular to propositions made by two of the author’s contemporaries, viz., Proudhon, the French father of anarchism, and a certain less notable Dr. Sax, whom Engels selects as representing the typical capitalist reformer. Though the former claimed to be a revolutionary, his ideal resembled, with striking closeness, that of the reformer. Both proposed that the worker should own his own house. Proudhon suggested that, after a number of years’ payment of rent, the house should become the property of the tenant; this result was to be achieved by legislation. Sax, on the other hand, favoured Building Societies as a means of arriving at the goal.

Engels had no difficulty in showing the Utopian character of the plans of both these practical people; and further that even to the extent that the workers could and did own their own houses at that time, in Germany and elsewhere, this was the reverse of helpful to them. Once the workers became drawn into the orbit of capitalism every piece of small property in houses or land became a tie which hampered their freedom of movement in times of industrial change. At the same time, the fact that they lived rent-free merely meant that their wages were correspondingly low.

Nowadays only the élite of the working class i.e., those with permanent jobs and comfortable salaries can seriously think of becoming house-owners, and even these can often be found looking at the cracks in the ceiling and speculating as to which will terminate first, the payments or the house.

The stimulus given to industry by the war led to a rapid flow of population from the country to the towns in certain areas, and hence arose the acute post-war housing shortage. This type of shortage can be remedied in time by the operation of normal economic processes under capitalism plus State action through the local authorities. What cannot be remedied, however, is the chronic inferiority of working-class accommodation due to the poverty of the workers, a condition they share with the oppressed classes through the ages. This can disappear only through the transformation of the means of living into the common property of all.

Engels brought these points out very clearly and showed conclusively that no piecemeal treatment of isolated “questions” such as housing could achieve any permanent solution. Slums are destroyed in one district only to appear in another, for the poverty which lies at the root of the slum is not abolished by the mere transportation of the poor. Engels shows up also the severely practical nature of the interest which the ruling class take from time to time in slum clearing.

Apart from the danger of epidemics, which do not always spare the wealthy, the time comes when all the cunning of the rack-renter fails to extract more than a certain amount from the tenants of certain property. The demand for larger, centrally-situated emporiums, banks, theatres, railway stations and traffic accommodation generally, grows and forces the workers' homes towards the circumferences of the big cities. These factors are as evident to-day as when Engels wrote; but just how rapidly our rulers move in such matters may be measured by those who remember that it is just about thirty years ago since Lloyd George told us that if, when the Liberal Party were returned to office, they did not sweep the slums from the land within three years they would deserve to be swept from office. The ruling class are still sweeping slums away, and will, no doubt, be doing so on the eve of the revolution.

The point of Engels’ book is that the solution of the housing problem, as of all problems that affect the workers, lies in the hands of the workers themselves. They cannot afford to leave it to their masters to solve whether by legislation or by Building Societies. They only need to conquer political power in order to remove at once the barriers to healthier and roomier houses.

The reappearance of the book is, therefore, timely, and should in Engels' own words “provide proof of how impractical these so-called ‘practical' Socialists really are.”

Eric Boden

We Invade the Potteries. (1920)

Party News from the October 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

A New Branch At Hanley.
It it our pleasurable task to announce the formation of a newBranch—at Hanley, Staffs. As will be seen from the advertisement in the Branch Directory, the Branch meets at the Working Men's Club, Glass Street, Hanley, on Wednesday evenings. We are unable at the moment to give the time of these meetings, but enquiry of the Secretary, J. Gallagher, 10 Sidney Street, Hanley, will elicit this information. Comrade Gallagher will also be happy to give any other particulars concerning the Branch or the Party to enquirers.

All sympathisers within practical range of Hanley are cordially invited to attend the meetings of the new Branch, and, if they agree with our principles and policy, to join up and get their shoulder to the wheel of old capitalism’s hearse. They may be sure of a comradely welcome and of finding themselves in company with lads who mean business.

Letter: How Shall We "Share Out"? (1920)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

To the editor.

Dear Sir,—Will you kindly supply me with an answer to the following question ?

In a system of society based upon the common ownership and democratic control of the instruments for producing and distributing wealth should the remuneration of each member of society be determined by the social labour time (accepting skilled labour as a multiple of unskilled labour) given in the service of the community, or should the total social product be equally divided among all the members of the community.

Hoping you will find room to reply to this (to me, least) most important question,

I remain, yours, L. Thompson, 

Our Reply.

Under Socialism neither of the methods of "remuneration" given by Mr. Thompson would prevail. The immense powers of production existing to-day would, if socially owned, provide plenty for all.  When Socialism is established those powers will have reached a much higher degree of proficiency, and the best method of distribution will be to allow each as much as he or she desires of the social products. Each would contribute to, the social production according to his capacity, and it would be a waste of time and energy to measure out what each have.  To-day, for illustration, many municipalities supply water to their citizens on a “rate” and find it more economical to let them take what they require for domestic purposes than to charge according to quantity used.—Ed. Com.

Objection Overruled (1951)

From the August 1951 issue of the Socialist Standard

This article is primarily addressed to those who more or less regularly listen to our speakers and read our literature, but who are not sufficiently in agreement with us to desire membership of the party. You probably regard yourselves as being sympathetic to Socialism, because you agree with most of what we say about society at present. You may also feel rather hurt sometimes when we appear to make no distinction between you and those who consciously oppose Socialism, and who are determined to discredit every idea that even savours of it However, we have reasons for not compromising our ideas with those which we are told are close to ours, reasons which are strictly in accord with the nature of our single object of Socialism.

It is our contention that every sane person in this world is capable of understanding the case for Socialism. When we explain it to those who have previously confused it with attempts to reform the present system without changing its basis, it is extremely rare to meet any personal objection to living in a socialist society. The objections that are made are usually on behalf of other people, who are supposed to be unwilling to exchange the certainty of their shabby existence under Capitalism for “something which has never been tried before.”

We must point out that those who wait for others to express a determination to work for Socialism before seriously considering their own attitude towards it are in a contradictory position. They are like the gloomy folk who, when asked about the reason for their gloom, complain that nobody ever smiles at them. That is why we ask all those who agree that Socialism would be the basis for a fuller life than Capitalism allows, to withdraw their passive support for the latter and to join us to establish it. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that merely to assent that “of course it’s a good idea but it’ll never work ” is as obstructive to its realisation as to oppose it tooth and nail.

It is significant that most of the opposition we get at our meetings comes from members of the working class. It is seldom left to individual capitalists to defend the capitalist system. On the rare occasions that they do they invariably voice the same objections to Socialism as workers do. This is because the wage-working class and the wage-paying (capitalist) class both believe that Capitalism is a necessary system; the latter is a small minority and must exist by tacit consent of the majority of the working class.

We are often told by those who express some sympathy with Socialism itself, but think they know more “practical” ways of bringing it about, that we should join forces with o‘her parties in order to take steps towards it by implementing certain reforms. Implicit in this suggestion is the idea that socialists should attempt to gain control of the powers of government in order more effectively to propagate socialist ideas.

This theory overlooks the fact that all parties who form governments have to push their avowed long-term aims (if any) into the background, and concentrate on the day-to-day business of running the capitalist system If, like the Labour parties in Australia and New Zealand, they are defeated at the polls after a long innings, then it is falsely heralded as the failure of Socialism, to which they paid lip service.

Experience shows that there is no marked difference between Capitalism run by those who say it is desirable and by those who claim they are reforming it into something else. The lesson to be learned from this is that if Capitalism is objectionable to you, your only concern should be its replacement with a better system.

Sometimes our opponents claim that the reason socialists are at present few in number is that most people have little time to study politics. The answer to this is that all the time and effort workers waste on arguing which party should run the system of wage-slavery, should be spent in studying how to get rid of it.

There is no task more important to those who have reached an understanding of Socialism than to help bring it nearer by getting others to accept the ideas necessary to establish it. It is not “reaching for the moon” to ask that it be considered as the only practical solution to the social problems which Capitalism has failed to solve. This objection is based upon the fatalist view that all man’s development has been a process independent of his will, and that all his attempts to improve conditions have been and will be a waste of time.

On the contrary, the whole history of man shows his interaction with his environment as the source of all social change. In joining with others to change the economic basis of society the individual is helping to determine his future environment. To the socialist it is not a question of what “they will do and how it will affect him, but of what he, in conjunction with others, will do and how it will affect the whole of society.

In opposing Capitalism we oppose the ideas (and in many cases the lack of ideas) of all who acquiesce in its continuation. If we are rather severe in our attitude towards those who profess partial agreement with us, then in fairness we do not brand as “impossibles” those who most bitterly oppose our ideas, from whatever motive. The objections we may overrule, but the objectors themselves will always be looked upon as potential socialists.

Stan Parker

The Thieves Kitchen Records. (1920)

From the April 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

There has been a very flat month in the Thieves' Kitchen, and the debates, centring largely round matters of finance, offer nothing of sufficient interest to find place in these records. The Oral Answers, however, provide some food for reflection, as they usually do.

On March 20th Mr. Gwynne "asked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he is aware that the father of A. Judge, able seaman, H.M.S. 'Vectis,' sent a telegram on the 7th March to the Admiralty asking them to transmit a message to him of his mother's death; that no reply was received until the 11th March, and then to the effect that the Admiralty were unable to forward private messages to naval ratings at public expense."

The Minister admitted the truth of the facts implied in the question, which is surely a sign that the war is over. How short a period is it since nothing was too good (on paper and flag days) for "our heroic watchers of the deep" And now our bosses candidly admit that they are too parsimonious to spare a few coppers to tell one of the Jack Cornwalls that his mother was dead!

Another answer to which attention might be directed is that given to the Member for Clitheroe, who asked the Under-Secretary for foreign affairs whether he was aware that the bodies of seven murdered Jews had been found in a forest in Hungary. The answer he got was that if the facts were as alleged there was no call for the Government to interfere.

But suppose that such an allegation had been made against the Bolsheviks, what would have been the tone of the reply ? One calls to mind how much slenderer excuse served to make war upon the Dutch Republics of South Africa at the end of last century.

A. E. Jacomb

Editorial: The Stranglers. (1920)

Editorial from the April 1920 issue of the Socialist Standard

For our March issue we prepared and had put into type, an article dealing with the late atrocities in the Punjaub. This article was based entirely on the published report of the commission which was appointed to put the whitewash brush over the bloodstains. But putting it into type was as far as we could get with the business, for at that point there came into operation that vaunted prop and pillar of the British Empire, the "Freedom of the Press," to wit.

As is generally known, though this Party owns and controls its official organ, and therefore is able to, and does, keep out of its pages all matter which it believes to conflict with working-class interests, it has never yet been in a position to own and control its own printing plant, with the consequence that we are not able to print much that we otherwise would.

The present instance is a case in point. The firm which machines our paper declined to proceed with the printing of the issue, and we had to have the "wind up" article removed and another substituted for it before we could get the number published.

Of course we are not blaming the printer. It is only logical to suppose that there is some element of risk attaching to the printing of a revolutionary paper. Our hypocritical bosses, who of late years have traded so much on the word "democracy," have taken great care, while mouthing the magic phrase "Freedom of the Press," to manufacture such an atmosphere of fear as effectually strangles any shred of literary freedom that may have been left to the working class of this country. With so many acts of tyranny before their eyes, printers who otherwise would are afraid to print matter which is likely to rouse the ire of our "democratic" bosses.

Hence the hypocrites who profess such virtuous indignation and horror at the brutalities— real or alleged—of their German capitalist rivals, are able to enact brutalities equally atrocious upon inhabitants of the Empire, and we are unable to publish criticism of their dastardly crimes.

Such a position is a shameful one for a revolutionary organisaton to be in. It means strangulation. The grip of the capitalist garrotter is upon our throat, and that grip must be removed. There is only one way, and that is by owning our own printing plant and taking our own risks. That, of course, will not by any means give us freedom of the Press, but it will place us in a vastly different position in so far, that, instead of being checked by third-party fears, we shall come to grips with principles, and instead of our sneak-thief tyrants being able to effect their purpose through veiled, but none the less real, standing threats held over the heads of those we are compelled by circumstances to engage to do our work for us, they will have to face a direct issue, and deal with us on the actual substance of the matter we publish.

It comes to this, then, the time when we can free ourselves from this intolerable strangulation, the more galling because of its insidious character, must be near. We can never carry out our work in a manner worthy of a revolutionary party until we are our own printers. Those who agree with us can give expression to their opinion—through the £1,000 Fund.

"Marxists" (2006)

Book Review from the August 2006 issue of the Socialist Standard

Phil Rees: Dining with Terrorists. (Pan, £7.99.)

When I listen to BBC correspondents talking about 'Marxists', which they frequently find in remote jungles and other desolate places on the planet, I am tempted to think of Cyril.

Cyril and I were young together; he was academically bright, knowledgeable and had even what is now called 'street cred', virtues which earned him considerable grudging respect among us, his peers. His virtues became past tense, however. One summer's evening when four of us, coincidentally apprentices in Irish 'terrorism', were sitting around an open fire where we were camping outside the coastal village of Cushendall in County Antrim.

 Probably the subject led to it, I don't remember exactly, but Cyril announced with profound authority that he not only believed in fairies but that he had actually seen and heard fairies! It cost him his credibility; all his intellectual capability was eclipsed by that single absurdity.

 The author of Dining with Terrorists, Phil Rees, was, and maybe still is, a BBC journalist who has worked on Correspondent and Newsnight and who has spent gruelling spells in many of the world's trouble spots. He has dined with people who have killed their political enemies or who have - rather like Bush and Blair - set in train such killings and who for so doing or allegedly doing have become known to us through the media as 'terrorists'.

 From his experiences he gives us graphic word pictures of fearsome characters and to his credit he tries to tell their story within the context of what we have been told about them by the western media.

 Indeed that is the raison d'etre of Rees's work. It is his effort to define in 'moral' terms the meaning of the word 'terrorist' in light of the awesome legal violence used by and in the control of the modern state, and the brutal reaction that violence frequently spawns. It is a theme often pursued in the Socialist Standard and one expressed in the aphorism 'One man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist'.

 Given such honesty of purpose it is regrettable that the author demeans his work by the undefined abuse of the term 'Marxist': throughout the entire book he uses the word as though it was an essential pre-fix to the words 'terrorist' and 'terrorism' that so confuses him.

 In the fashion of the BBC and its journalists, he makes no attempt whatsoever to outline what he perceives to be Marxist or Marxism. Doubtless if he knew, he would realise just how ridiculous it is to suggest that, for example, FARC nationalists in Columbia are killing in order to establish a wageless, moneyless society of common ownership and production for use.

 Away from the often-repeated nonsense about Marx and terrorism the book is both interesting and informative but the informed reader will find Rees's belief in fairies more than a little distracting.

Richard Montague

Oliver: a Fagin Nuisance (2014)

A Short Story from the July 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

It has come to our notice that whilst researching through the effects of an unknown derelict in a London workhouse a completely unreliable socialist has come across the following two part dialogue purporting to be the work of an unsuccessful legal clerk.

F: WELL, young gentleman an’ ‘ow are we this mornin’?

O: Very well, sir. Thank you sir.

F: Ooh! We are quite the gentleman. Ain’t we, Oliver. Not rough and ready like my other young gentlemen. No not at all. Quite the gentleman.

O: When will I be going to work, Sir? Like Dodger and the others.

F: Ah work, Oliver. Perhaps you is too great the gentleman to be working with the likes of us, my boy.

O: Oh no, sir. I’ll work, sir. They taught me at the workhouse that work is an honourable thing, sir.

F: I don’t doubt it , my boy. They are the great ones the workhouse for feeding you on platitudes. And very little else by the looks of you. Taught you ‘the meek shall inherit the earth’, did they, Oliver?

O: Oh yes, sir.

F: Hee ... Hee... ‘Blessed be the poor’.

O: Oh yes, sir.

F: Taught you the parable about the rich man and the camel entering the eye of a needle, did they, Oliver?

O: Oh yes, sir. I remember that one.

F: Hee ... Hee ... That’s a good ‘un. That’s one of their finest. How does it go, young Oliver? The parable. Tell me that one. That’s a good un. No mistake. First class that one.

O: Well, sir if I recall correctly.

F: Recall? Yes that’s the fine talking. Well recall, recall, my boy.

O: Well, sir. It will be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of an needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.

F: Capital. That’s capital. Really, Oliver. And what do you make of that parable?

O: Well sir. I’m not sure. What is a parable?

F: Oh, it’s all parables in the workhouse, my boy. The widders mite, bread on the waters, the good samaritan, the prodigal son. Oh, yes very strong on parables .... and corporal punishment and hard labour...... very, very  strong.

O: Excuse me, sir. What is a parable?

F: Well let me see, Oliver. Parable is a story. Usually a very far fetched one. Usually the opposite of the real world. Cast your bread on the waters and they return tenfold. That’s a good un .... Hee ...Hee ... Cast your bread on the waters and all you get is soggy bread. But, no. Not in parables. Everything is the opposite in parables. Parables are stories. Religious stories. I suppose parables are religious fairy tales. But the camel and the needle. What does yir make of that un?  Eh, Oliver, my boy.

O: I think, sir. It means rich men would find it difficult to get into heaven because a camel would be too large to get through the eye of an needle.

F: Sharp, Oliver. Very sharp indeed, my boy. You’re a clever un, and no mistake. But, Oliver what would a camel be doing wanting through the eye of an needle? Having no acquaintance with that creature I would not know its desires ... but all parables strike me as strange. A thread through the eye of an needle. Yes that is useful. But a camel. What would you sew with that?

O: A camel-haired coat.

F: A camel-haired coat?

O: I meant it as a joke, Mr Fagin.

F: A joke? Of course a joke. And a very good un too, Oliver my boy. My aren’t you the sharp one. You should be making your fortunes on the halls. A camel-haired coat. First class.

Unfortunately the unreliable socialist informs us that the unknown law clerk’s belongings have produced no more literary gems as yet.

Richard Donnelly

A brush with the fascists (2004)

From the June 2004 issue of the Socialist Standard

Fascism was dead. Officially, it was dead. It had happened in the war, when the fascist countries had been occupied and their leaders, like Hitler and Mussolini, were killed. True, Franco was still alive and so was Stalin who was not called a fascist but was possibly worse than all the others put together. So, although there was some confusion about who was a fascist and who was not, the fact was that it was dead. Oswald Mosley and his wife had been interned in England because they were fascists and after the exposure of the barbarities of Nazi Germany no one in their right mind would ever again describe  themselves as a fascist. Now we could all settle down with a Labour government in a fascist-free world.

But the brave new post-war world had hardly blinked its way into life when uneasy memories were stirred by the arrival of some new political organisations, in different parts of London and the rest of the country, with a membership drawn from Mosley’s British Union of Fascists. In the western part of London there was the Union for British Freedom, led by Victor Burgess (whose swarthy complexion had not, apparently, excluded him from a white supremacist organisation). In the East End of London there was the British League of Ex-Servicemen, led by Jeffrey Hamm (who had been interned in the Falkland Islands). In Derby there was the Sons of St. George, in Bristol the British Workers Party of National Unity, in Manchester the Imperial Defence League.

All these groups claimed they had sprung into existence in response to a spontaneous, irresistible demand by the British people but it did not take a deductive genius to work out that there was some common ground between them – and a disreputable past. They were all aggressively nationalistic, all stridently warning of the urgent need for a defence of something called British racial purity against the encroachment of lesser, polluting, devitalising breeds. If some heckler asked what the speaker had done in the war (an obsessively common question at outdoor meetings in those days) the response would be a long lament about how unnecessary the war had been and how much better off Germany and Britain would be if they had been allies against the alien hordes. This was then developed into an attack on  World Jewry, who had conspired to bring the war about by setting the British people against their blood brothers and sisters in Germany. This argument (if it can be called that) was bolstered by the fascists  grouped around the platform joyously chanting about “. . . Asiatic, Mongolian, atheistic, communism . . .” The air trembled with the threat of violence.

43 Group

One victim of the fascist technique of emphasising their point with violence was the playwright Harold Pinter, who was an active anti-fascist. In the Observer of 6 January 2002 Pinter related his experience of being beaten up by fascists at a street corner meeting in the late 1940s. His article gave the impression that the fascists were alone in using violence as a tactic. However, he wrote that among the crowd there were “some Jews, led by ex-servicemen.” This description fits the 43 Group, whose aim in life was to disrupt, or if possible break up, fascist meetings and in the process deal out some physical punishment to the fascists. Membership of the 43 Group seemed to be reserved to those who met certain criteria. First, to be Jewish; second, to be an ex-serviceman; third, to be thickset and powerful and have a face which looked as if it had been hewed out of a rock face. In places like Ridley Road in the East End violence at fascist meetings was routine. Mosley’s son Nicholas remembered going to one in 1946 or 1947: a man on top of a van shouting like some revivalist prayer meeting; a man charging at the restraining policemen; a paper seller kicked and punched by a crowd: “It was all, once more, quite like a crowd at a present-day football match”.

Late in 1947 I had the opportunity of sampling some violence at a street corner meeting but not at the hands of the fascists. It happened one autumn evening near Trebovir Road, a side street off the Earl’s Court Road. This was a good place for an outdoor meeting as there was unfailingly a large, vibrant crowd possessed of some lurid political theories. By a kind of informal arrangement various political parties – including the Socialist Party and the UBF – held meetings on different evenings. Our meetings there on a Thursday were thrilling and scary and mostly hugely satisfying. On Wednesday evenings, if we had nothing better to do, we might go along to listen to the hysterical ramblings of the UBF’s Burgess and observe the 43 Group’s frantic efforts to bring the whole thing to a chaotic end. We made a point of silently listening to it all; we knew that the more disorder there was the better the fascists’ chance of recruiting members. (In the early 1960s the membership of the Union Movement went up to some 1,500, for some of which they credited the violence from their opponents).

Debate

One evening we left the UBF meeting early and mooched along the Earls Court Road looking for a coffee. We soon became aware that we were being followed and when we turned round we saw there a bunch of 43 Group members who were obviously not intent on wishing us a good evening. Like Pinter, we were cornered by a bunch of thugs whose pleasure it was to beat us up, except that they were not called fascists but operated on the assumption that anyone who did not heckle and scream at the fascists must be a fascist themselves and so deserved a bashing. We managed to avoid physical damage by gently informing our intending assailants that we were members of the Socialist Party, which was due to debate with the UBF at the Kensington Town Hall in a couple of weeks. Why didn’t they come along – they might learn something about effective techniques of opposing obnoxious ideas? It would have been a bit difficult, after that, for the 43 Groupers to attack us, although one or two were still clearly in favour of giving us a good hiding anyway. So we went for our coffee and spent a useful hour or so discussing the details of organising that debate.

And the debate was all we had promised them, on the pavement that evening. An audience of 650 crammed into the biggest meeting hall at the Kensington Town Hall, with another 200 or so turned away outside. The UBF had suggested that they supply some stewards to keep out “undesirables” but naturally we declined their offer of “help” and told them that all meetings of the Socialist Party were open to all members of the working class. Even fascists were welcome – they might learn something about socialism and about the benefits of a democratic meeting. We did not expect any trouble, although the 43 Group were there in force; they seemed to get all the excitement they wanted in the ruthless shredding of the UBF case by the socialist speaker. Raven Thomson, an ex-communist, represented the UBF (although he was not actually a member of it); he had the reputation of a fascist intellectual and in the BUF he had been one of Mosley’s right hand men. He can be seen in a photograph, taken before political uniforms were banned, strutting behind Mosley reviewing a Blackshirt parade, looking ridiculous in his black uniform with his cap at a rakish angle as if it had been knocked sideways.

The Alternative

We could not claim that it was as a consequence of their verbal mauling in the debate but soon afterwards there was a perceptible change in the fascists’ style of propaganda. A note of triumphant promise crept into their relentless harangues about the insidious influence of world Jewry. Have hope, they advised us: The Alternative is on the way. By that time anyone who took any interest in them knew that The Alternative was a book by Mosley, his manifesto which was supposed to carry the fascists into resplendent power. For some reason the book was greeted in some quarters as a serious contribution to political thought when it was no more than another attempt to unravel – or in this case to batter into shape – the chaos of capitalism. Mosley declared that fascism was dead – outdated, lost in the ashes of the war. The way forward now was a union in which Europe would become a nation, using (he did not say “exploiting”) Africa as if it were its estate in trusteeship “on behalf of white civilization and not on behalf of a nominal stability of Barbarism”.

Africa would provide the raw materials for a Euro-Africa closed economic system. But to operate this vast estate without the atrocities and repressions imposed in the past it would be necessary for a new type of man – a Thought Deed Man – to evolve. This would happen through “breeding, selection and environment” supplemented by training. This crackpot idea was presented in impenetrably pompous verbiage about “the union of intellect and will . . . we must give robustness to the intellect and reflection to the will . . .The future is with the Thought Deed Man because, without him, the future will not be. He is the hope of the peoples of the world”. It did not take a particularly cynical mind to unravel the fact that the person Mosley had in mind as the world’s first Thought Deed Man, all intellect and will and hope, was himself.

Union Movement

In 1948 the various fascist movements dissolved themselves into the Union Movement and launched what they fictionalised as a spontaneous drive to persuade a modest Mosley to emerge from retirement and lead the nation to glory. After a predictable show of reluctance he began eagerly speaking at Union Movement meetings and parades and demonstrations. In the early 1950s the first immigrants arrived from the West Indies and Asia, sucked over by British industries keen to undermine working class bargaining power in the days of ‘full employment’. The immigrants, easy fodder for racist paranoia, overtook  the Jews as targets for fascist mythologising and invective. Mosley’s son Nicholas remembers him speaking in the street from the top of a van, roaring about black gangs keeping teenage white English girls prisoner in attics where they were repeatedly raped. After satisfying their animalistic sexual appetites black men were supposed to prefer to dine on tinned pet food; a Mosley supporter was actually embarrassed to hear him tell another meeting that “Lassie (a popular dog food at the time) is for dogs, Kit-E-Kat is for wogs”.

Presumably convinced that this kind of mindless abuse would be popular enough to register in votes, Mosley stood for North Kensington in the 1959 general election. He claimed – another myth – that in doing this he was yielding to the irresistible demands of the people there when it was obvious that he was intent on exploiting the passions aroused in the previous year’s race riots in Notting Hill. Encouraged by his canvassers coming in night after night with stories about a massive upsurge of support for him, Mosley assumed he had victory in the bag and his supporters fantasised about the Union Movement sweeping the country. It was not quite like that when the votes were counted because Mosley, with just 2,821 out of a total of 39,912, was bottom of the poll and lost his deposit. It was, he said later, the biggest shock of his life and after the count, instead of rallying his supporters with a defiant, inspiring speech he went quickly to his car and was whisked away into the night. In 1966 he stood again, for Shoreditch, where the result was even worse for him; he polled 1,600 votes – 4.6 per cent of the total. After that he lost interest in being the Thought Deed Man, the implacable struggler against a powerful enemy. He withdrew from politics, to live in a succession of opulent houses, ending his days in a Paris mansion where he died in 1980.

BNP

Of all the words in the lexicon of politics fascism is among the most ill-defined and inappropriately used. If it has any meaning it is in the supremely escapist notion that there is a quick-fix remedy for capitalism’s shortcomings. It is also a nasty fix – the idea that political democracy is a feeble, useless way of running affairs and instead we should surrender to the dictates of strong men – the Führer, Il Duce, the Thought Deed Man. Parallel to that is the myth of national or racial supremacy, in whose baleful name so many atrocities and so much repression have been committed. If fascism is anything it is the very stuff of disillusionment, the response of workers who have tried other parties and other methods of running capitalism and have decided that, as each of them have failed, it is the democratic process which is at fault. That is what happened in post-1918 Germany and it is no coincidence that at present, with the Blair government exposed in all its helpless cynicism and the other parties promising nothing better, the BNP are winning council seats in places like Burnley and Kirklees. To complicate the lexicology further, the professed opponents of fascism are very often indistinguishable from the fascists themselves. If we hadn’t known it before then, that fact would have been brought home to us, that wintry evening on the pavement in the Earl’s Court Road.

Ivan