A striking example of mutiny (1996)

TV Review from the September 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Last month this column berated Channel Four's Secret History series for its tedious and irrelevant programme about the tactics of the British army during the Falklands war. This month we return to the scene of the crime, battered by two weeks of heroic British failure at the Olympics and endless summer repeats of second-rate sitcoms. On 8 August—like a diamond glistening in a vast cow-pat—Secret History redeemed itself with a documentary called Mutiny In The RAF. This, at least, was a secret history worth commenting about, centring on the massive wave of strikes which broke out in the RAF after the end of the Second World War in India, Singapore, the Middle East and other centres of British imperial rule. Largely due to the activities of the British ruling class, few will have been cognisant of the facts surrounding this series of mutinies against military authority, and the documentary team compiling this particular programme can be satisfied with a job well done.

The British bourgeoisie—one of the most experienced ruling classes in the world—has long done its best to hide the real truth of the various mutinies and strikes in HM Forces throughout this century. For decades it tried to keep hidden the nature of the massive wave of discontent which took place in 1919 after the so-called Great War, when soldiers and policemen went on strike and mutinied, and when sailors demanding better pay hauled down the British Ensign and hoisted the Red Flag. For entirely understandable reasons it has tried to do the same in relation to the wave of discontent of 1945-6 too. Thankfully, it has failed.

Secret History told the history of how over 50,000 RAF servicemen refused to do the dirty work of British Imperialism in its outposts of Empire any longer. Serving in appalling conditions and with little chance of demobilisation, this mixture of volunteers and conscripts refused to obey their officers' orders, substituted self-discipline for hierarchical rule, formed democratically-run strike committees and successfully spread their struggle even to section's of the Indian armed forces. They were met with bogus trials and false imprisonment, harassment from the military police and the ultimate deterrent of threatened executions. Expecting sympathetic treatment from the newly-elected Labour Government under Clement Attlee, their actions instead were met with subterfuge and repression, characteristic treatment of workers by Labour governments before and since. That they eventually met with some success in ensuring early demobilisation for hundreds of thousands was a testament to their tenacity and the power of working-class combination. Not unwisely, the British ruling class took the view that to keep such disgruntled servicemen in troubled outposts like India at such a sensitive time was to invite chaos.

It was not, of course, the case that those who mutinied in the RAF wanted socialism any more than their fellow workers back home who had joined with them to vote in the pro-capitalist Labour Party the previous year—their struggle was in fact more akin to a defensive economic trade union struggle within capitalism. Indeed, many of the strikers had been active trade unionists before the war. But what it did got to show—like many other similar incidents across the world—is that men and women in the armed forces are generally workers in uniform. They are doing an unpleasant job on behalf of the capitalist class, but then again, so do millions of other workers. And just like other workers, those in the armed forces are capable of critically assessing their own class position and of coming to the conclusion that it is at odds with the position of the bourgeoisie. This is contrary to the unhistorical and anti-materialist position of so many Leninists who don't even regard members of the armed forces or the police as being members of the working class in the first place. It can also be added—far in advance of the Leninist vanguards—workers in uniform have demonstrated time and again that they can organise democratically and collectively, without leaders, to further their own class interests. This in turn demonstrates that the armed forces, like all other sections of the working class, are capable of developing recognition of their real position within capitalism and of the necessity of socialism.

The RAF mutiny in 1946 was a case in point and its lessons must never be forgotten. Working-class self-activity and democratic organisation is the key to any struggle whether for economic defence within the system (as with trade unionism) or for revolutionary transformation. As the movement for final working-class emancipation can only be collective and majoritarian, the former will surely still have an important role to play as the training ground for the latter.

Dave Perrin

Gotcha! (1987)

From the March 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

Because we are a democratic Party all our meetings are open and our propaganda meetings organised to allow open debate. To this end visitors are given ample opportunity and encouragement to ask questions or state an opposing view. At a recent Socialist Party meeting a visitor from the SWP took the opportunity to explain how "the average bloke in the street", could be led to socialism by the SWP. Another visitor, obviously impressed, asked for further information:

Visitor: "Is the SWP a democratic organisation?"

Leader: "Yes."

Visitor: "Before I could join The Socialist Party I have to show my agreement and my understanding of the Socialist case. If I wanted to join the SWP I wouldn't have to mess about with that?"

Leader: "No, if you were at a meeting and were impressed enough you could join there and then."

Visitor: "What about the ideas I might have - I could be a racist say?"

Leader: "That could be sorted out later in the branch, at education meetings and whilst you're selling papers."

Visitor: "Obviously I wouldn't be allowed to represent the SWP or be allowed full access to the party until you were satsified about my ideas."

Leader: "That's right."

Visitor: "If I've got you right that means that you have two types of members: those with power in the party and those without. That doesn't sound much like democracy to me."

Leader: Long pause.

The visitor has attended all our meetings since but remains convinced by the argument put by the SWP. Leadership makes you stupid.

R 

Global capital (2013)

Book Review from the November 2013 Socialist Standard

The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism. By Paul Craig Roberts. Clarity Press, 2013.

Paul Craig Roberts is of interest as he is a former Assistant Secretary to the US Treasury under Reagan and an erstwhile columnist for the Wall Street Journal who has written an excoriating attack on free-market economics in this book. In particular, he criticises financial deregulation and ‘offshoring’ of jobs and says these are part of what is effectively a conspiracy by the elites in the US and other Western countries to ensure an increasing amount of wealth goes to the very rich and ever less to everyone else. At one point he claims:

‘The United States is the first country in modern history to destroy the prospects and living standards of its labor force in order to enrich the top 1% of the income distribution. Once a land of opportunity, America is being polarised by globalism into rich and poor’ (p.117).

But there is of course a problem with this viewpoint, and one he does not address. America (like all other capitalist countries) has always been characterised by massive income inequality whereby the people who own and control the means of living receive colossal incomes that bear no relation to the effort (if any) they have made, while the vast majority are exploited to keep them in their positions of privilege and power. Reading this book, anyone would think that it is only since the Clinton administration onwards that these things have been a noticeable feature of life.

In fairness, one of the more positive aspects of this book is that there are a number of interesting facts and statistics presented at various stages to support aspects of his case, including on the real nature of employment and unemployment in the US. For instance, Roberts claims the real unemployment figure is nearer 23 percent than the ‘official’ 7.5 percent. There are also interesting statistics on changes in the US labour markets and on the stagnation of real wages there.

However, real wages for large numbers of US workers have been stagnant or declining from as far back as the early 1970s and this was never fundamentally addressed or reversed by the Reagan administration of which Roberts was a part. Indeed, Roberts seems very coy about Reagan and ‘Reaganomics’ and tries to argue that the growth of laissez faire capitalism has only happened in comparatively recent times as a product of ‘globalisation’. To do this, he engages in some historical sleight-of-hand about Reagan’s supply-side economic policies, claiming that these were really about reforming the US tax system to give incentives to entrepreneurs and workers. But of course they were about far more than this – including attacks on the trade unions to ensure labour flexibility and mobility so as to reduce costs of production. Indeed, some of the very things Roberts now seems to be railing against here.

The fundamental weakness of this book though lies in the lack of solutions proffered. ‘Steady-state’ growth is lauded but there is no serious suggestion about how this can be achieved within capitalism. The most obvious soft-spots Roberts has are for national sovereignty and protectionism, yet he glides over the likely disastrous effects of the latter, which we have of course seen before, and which infamously led to the exacerbation of the economic depression of the 1930s and provoked the subsequent bloodbath of World War Two.

What Roberts has failed to realise is that capitalism has increasingly – over a period of many decades – become a truly global, interconnected system that operates according to its inherent, underlying economic laws. These are impersonal and driven by profit and the competitive accumulation of capital. Furthermore, this proverbial genie of globalised capital is out of the bottle and campaigners for national sovereignty, protectionism and the rest are never going to be able to squeeze it back in again.

Dave Perrin

Action Replay: Scrum down (2013)

The Action Replay column from the November 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

In June last year the top rugby union clubs in England and France gave notice that they would withdraw from the Heineken Cup, the competition for leading European teams. This meant that the 2013–14 event would be their last unless they changed their minds for some reason. With this competition about to start, and still almost complete uncertainty as to what would happen next season, the last couple of months have seen plenty of frantic negotiations and brinksmanship.

Behind all this are questions of power, with the clubs wanting more say in how the big competitions are run, at the expense of the national unions and the International Rugby Board. Who’s in charge would cover matters such as the number of teams taking part, and how the competition would be organised. At present, teams from six countries are involved, with regional sides from Ireland, Scotland and Wales competing. In organisational matters, England and France can be outvoted by these three countries and Italy.

And behind the wielding of power, as you might expect, is money, but with some specific variations. Heineken Cup matches have been screened by Sky for some years, and this arrangement was recently extended. But English Premiership clubs have themselves signed a deal with BT Sport that includes European games they are involved in. Under the proposed new Rugby Champions Cup, the money would be distributed in a way that benefited English and French clubs.

The uncertainty is leading to top Welsh players being signed by clubs abroad, as it is not clear what sort of contract the Welsh clubs could offer from next year. There were even claims that professional rugby in Scotland could end if no agreement were reached and the Scottish Rugby Union failed to get its annual subvention from the Heineken Cup.

Paul Bennett

‘If you look at the history of professional rugby,’ according to the chair of Saracens, ‘it has always been about this balance between union control and the clubs … The BT Sport television deal has given the English clubs more of a chance to redress that imbalance’ (Guardian, 23 September). The players and spectators barely rate a mention, of course.

Landed with Tony Blair! (1996)

Book Review from the September 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Impossibilists: Selections from the Press of The Socialist Party of Canada And One Big Union, 1906-38. edited by L Gambone (Red Lion Press £4).

It is easy to forget that before the formation of the Socialist Party of Great Britain in June 1904 there had already been in existence the Socialist Party of British Columbia, founded in 1901, but having an organised existence going back to 1895. The early history of this, our companion party in canada, is brought to life by the re-publications of a volume of reprinted articles from the Western Clarion, the SPC's first journal, as well as other journals of the period which came out of this broadly impossibilist tradition.

A few words are in order about this term "impossibilist". It emerged, of course, as a term of political abuse. Socialists who stood for the end of capitalism and no compromises along the way were seen to be demanding the impossible. Interestingly, before anyone ever used that word there was another term which was popular: possibilism. The so-called possibilists emerged in France in the early 1880s, and they were the reformists, tired of trying to bring about socialism and nothing less, who imagined that the best possible option would be to chip away at the edifice of capitalism bit-by-bit, reforming it until it looked like socialism. Over a century has passed since these undoubtedly sincere people embarked upon their futile course and everywhere reformist gradualism has ended in the most abject failure. A hundred years of demanding "the possible" or "something now" has landed the Labour Party with Tory Blair! So, if we who refuse to settle for anything less then real real socialists are impossibilists, perhaps it is time for our fellow workers to be rather more practical and demand "the impossible".

The articles which are reprinted give modern readers a good flavour of the clarity of analysis and vision of our early North American comrades. Warren Atkinson's Western Clarion article of 1906 exhibits prescient recognition of the capitalist nature of so-called public (i.e. state) ownership; Rab's 1918 article on dialectical thought is as relevant today as ever it was; John Tyler's 1919 Red Flag article deals with the myth of the Bolsheviks' "socialist revolution" (as do others in the volume), and there is also material written by Charlie Lestor during his "One Big Union" period—before he joined the SPGB. Article after after in this volume leaves the reader saying "they were right all along". And there is no shame in consistency when it is attached to validity and honest principles.

Gambone provides a useful, though incomplete, bibliography at the back, and there is a basically sound introduction, only marred by the biased sulkiness in the brief reference to the current Socialist Party of Canada. Small though it may be, at least it still exists as a relatively active party, which is more than can be said for the other movements mentioned which have expired in the course of the century. Has it ever occurred to Gambone, and those like him who celebrate the revolutionary past of the SPC/SPGB tradition while deriding its present existence, that history is of little use unless it teaches you what you should be doing now? For anyone who has come into contact with our ideas in recent years (or recent decades, for that matter) this is an invaluable guide to a hitherto under-publicised part of our past.

Steve Coleman

Sincerity is not enough (1968)

Book Review from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Frank Cousins, A Study by Margaret Stewart (Hutchinson, 35s.)

Margaret Stewart, as a Fleet Street industrial correspondent, is in an admirable position to study a trade union chief. It is a pity that she confuses her study of Frank Cousins by the continuous use of those popular but vague terms, "the left" and "the right".

In the introduction to her study Stewart poses three questions. First, why did the Transport and General Workers' Union swing from the right under Arthur Deakin to the left under Frank Cousins? Them what has been the effect of Cousins' campaign against wage restraint? Finally, is Cousins big in his own right or because he is the leader of one-and-a-half million trade unionists? The answer to these questions is to be found, mainly between the lines, in her following chapters.

Stewart shows that the great majority of union members are apathetic and do not influence union policy. Full time officers are constitutionally debarred from opposition and lay members in high office are inhibited from expressing opposing views to those of their chief. The delegates to the union's policy making conferences are influenced by an autocrat like Deakin, to whom they listened in sullen silence, or by their hero worship of Cousins, whose speeches they greet with vociferous applause. For decades past they have accepted the views of their current General Secretary and voted accordingly. When Cousins came on the stage with a new policy the delegates remained loyal and supported him. The mass of the membership did not swing left or right. It noticed no change.

The members of the TGWU, like all workers, aspire to achieve the highest possible wage. Their aspirations were held in check by a government policy of wage restraint as expounded by Deakin and are equally held in check by the same policy as opposed by Cousins. Deakin proposed it, Cousins opposes it, but it is still there.

Stewart points to the series of accidents and incidents that catapulted Cousins into the union secretary's seat in 1956. Such accidents or incidents could easily have left him in a junior office and he would have been as little heard of today as he was in 1955. He is big because he is the leader of a million and a half workers who follow him enthusiastically, mistaking his verbal fireworks and his sincerity for sound sense.

We accept Stewart's assessment that Cousins is sincere and honest but, she says, even after writing her book, she still finds him an enigma. The things that make him enigmatic are his dual loyalties. As a trade union chief his job is to promote the interests of his members. As a member of the Labour Party he feels obliged to support the Labour government even while protesting against its anti-working class policies.

That is why, as Stewart tells us, Cousins considers the union rule that precludes "communists" from holding office is silly, yet he panders to the Labourites by aggressively opposing attempts to have the rule rescinded. At a TGWU Rules Revision Conference the present writer opposed political discrimination in the union and moved for the rescindment of the rule. Cousins opened his opposition speech with the words, "Waters says he is carrying a torch for no political party. Well, I am. I am carrying a torch for the Labour Party" (Loud cheers).

When union members are on strike they expect Cousins to lead them. The Labour government wants him to keep them at, or get them back to, work. He advocates opposition to the Prices and Incomes Policy but dodges open conflict with the government by taking the municipal busmen's case to a court.

In capitalist society the interests of the working class and the capitalist class are diametrically opposed. In the ensuing struggle the workers organise into trade unions and the government, be it Liberal, Conservative or Labour, is compelled to safeguard the national capitalist interests. No man can serve both masters. If he tries, and he is not a rogue, he must appear an enigma to those who fail to understand the capitalist system.

Cousins accepted the invitation to join the Labour government because he thought he could do better serve the workers. he left it because he did not wish to be identified with policies that were to the workers' detriment. But he remains loyal to the Labour party without apparently realising his invidious position.

Stewart's brief description of the 1958 London bus strike is sound except that the reference to Sir John Elliot's magnanimity is incorrect. He did not give the members of the busmen's negotiating committee an autographed copy of his book. He only promised. No tears were shed.

We do not quarrel with Stewart's narration about Cousins 'ban the bomb' activities, his attitude to the infamous Clause Four or his brief governmental career. We do quarrel with her reference to him as a Socialist. She likens him to Keir Hardie and quotes his old assessment of himself as an "old fashioned socialist". She says his socialism is instinctive and comes from his heart as much as his brain.

At a mass rally of TGWU members in the Central Hall, Westminster in 1966 Cousins launched his "socialist plan". A minimum of £15 for a 40 hour week with three weeks annual holiday for all workers. This plan is now adopted by the TUC. It bears as much resemblance to Socialism as it does to green cheese.

W. Waters

Some Pars From America: Not read at the Peace Conference. (1919)

From the March 1919 issue of the Socialist Standard

As news of the American labour movement is so scare in these days of censorship and Press laws, perhaps the following notes from the December issue of the New York "Class Struggle," an unofficial organ of the so called left wing of the also so-called Socialist Party of America may be of interest to the reader.

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In a candid article on the recent elections it is admitted that the large vote received by the S.P. of A. at the 1917 election was more of an anti-war vote than one for Socialist principles and that this vote has now gone back to the "old parties." By this means the recent "slump" is accounted for.

Nothing seems to left of the sprinkling of Socialist legislators that were elected in the previous year in Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and California. Kansas, Idaho, Illinois, and Minnesota are again without Socialist representatives in the legislatures, and Minneopolis lost its Mayor Van Lear, which is hardly to be regretted. This precious "Socialist" who, at the beginning of the war had opposed the "infamous Public Safety Commission" as the new election approached "compromised himself and the party that elected him, by joining hands with the American Alliance of Labour and Democracy, and by speaking from its platform at a so-called Victory Meeting . . . That Van Lear took this stand not so much from a change of conviction as from openly opportunist motives, above all to get re-elected, by no means detracts from this sorry spectacle.

The article declares that the defeat of Meyer London, the late "Socialist" Congressman for New York, is "one thing to be thankful for." After telling the tale of his reactionary, pro-capitalist activity in Congress during the war the writer concludes: "His re-nomination is not to the credit of the membership of New York, even though it was prompted by the consideration that the district would be lost if another candidate were nominated in his place."

Such are the methods of the anti-revolutionary, anti-socialist ideas which permeate the membership of the S.P. of A. Is this the party which is going to overthrow the best entrenched and most unscrupulous capitalist oligarchy in the world? I think not.

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Very little news has reached this country about one of the most dastardly outrages among the many which American capital has perpetrated upon its wage-slaves. The sequel, too, is interesting. In Bisbee in Arizona, in 1917,

"four thousand miners went on strike against the Phelps Dodge Mining Corporation for a ten per cent. wage increase and a reduction of the ten-hour workday to nine hours . . .  At that particular time there was an enormous demand for metal ore, and the highest prices were being paid. The Company saw fat profits slipping away between their fingers; the strike was costing them millions of dollars. They were, therefore, prepared to come to terms on the question of wages, and would perhaps have granted a reduction of working hours. But they refused point blank to consider the recognition of the union demanded by the striking miners.

Then on the 17th June the bosses took action:

A great crowd of striking miners that had gathered about the entrance to one of the mines was surrounded by an army of police, deputy sheriffs, and gun-men, were driven, unarmed as they were, before the loaded guns of their captors, to the railroad station. There, all of them, men, women and children, were forced with unbelievable brutality into a waiting freight train, in which they were shipped across the border into New Mexico about seven hundred miles from Bisbee, where they were thrown out of the cars in the midst of an uninhabited desert. In this deserted region of New Mexico, completely cut off from all communication with their families and the world, these unfortunate men, women and children were exposed to the most intense suffering. And only the foodstuffs that were brought them by organised labour at the earliest possible moment saved these thousands of workers from a miserable death.

 It took some time before the energetic protests of labour in the West were finally able to force an investigation. It was disclosed that this dastardly crime had been committed not only with the knowledge, but with the assistance of the management of the mines and the local authorities of Bisbee. The corporation officials had paid the gun-men, while the local authorities had engaged the scoundrels who did this dirty work. Indictments followed, indictments that incriminated the highest officials among the millionaire knaves at the head of the company. Proudly the capitalist press showed that there was no class justice in the United States of America, that rich and poor were measured by the same standards, that not even the richest of the men were responsible for the Bisbee outrage would be able to escape the hand of justice.

That was six months ago. Since then things have been strangely quiet. And now comes the news that the entire matter has been dropped because of a technical error in the indictment.  (Italics mine.)

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A very interesting account of the recent food riots in Japan is given by the well-known Sen Katayama. The immediate cause of the riots was the high price of rice, the staple food of the Japanese workers. Dr. Yokoi, "the agricultural authority of Japan, says in 'Industrial Japan': 'The past five years have produced super-abundant rice crops in Japan. Statistics show that there is no shortage of rice this year.'" The article following the Japanese "Oriental Economist," declares that the high prices were directly due to the policy of the Government in aiding and encouraging export trade. The political machinery of the country functions exclusively in the interests of a few big capitalists, while the interests of the vast majority of the people and the workers are completely disregarded."

The various phases of the riots are described in some detail. They "usually began in a peaceful demonstration that went to the homes of the rice dealers or to the granaries to demand cheaper food. Invariably it was the police who met the demonstrants with drawn sabres that turned these for the most part peaceful demonstrations in furious attacks." The riots were very wide-spread, extending "over three prefectures, Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto, over thirty provinces, and in Hokkaido, the northern part of Japan. Altogether this rising affected over two-thirds of the Japanese Empire. The 'Oriental Economist' reports that there were destructive riots in 142 different localities; that in 38 places they could be put down only by armed troops. In Osaka (the Manchester of Japan) the rioting continued for three full days and nights, and it is roughly estimated that at its height a force of over thirty thousand soldiers, including cavalry, was necessary to control the infuriated masses."

"In Kure, where the chief Navy Yard of the Empire is located, the marines were called out in full strength to quell the desperate mobs, while all thoroughfares and important crossings were armed with machine guns. But in spite of the rigid military discipline that obtains in the Japanese army, it was found that a number of the marines had made common cause with the rioting masses  . . . In Kobe the populace burnt down stores, offices, and even the residences of the wealthy rice speculators. The rioters were joined in a sympathetic movement of the 8,000 workers in the Mitsubitu shipbuilding yards." It must be remembered that working-class organisations, which might have rendered the movements more effective and less chaotic and violent, are illegal in Japan.

After August 13th the Government, fearing the spread of the disturbances, suppressed all news relating to the riots. "In Osaka the Governor published an edict forbidding more than five persons walking together on the streets. In Yokohama street assemblies were limited to nine persons."

"When the Government saw the magnitude of the movement, it appropriated $5,000 000 with which rice was bought up to be given away to the poor, or to be sold at greatly reduced rates to stem the tide of popular dissatisfaction." This, however, failed to have the desired result, for the movement had developed new characteristics. "Since food riots have ceased there have been labour troubles all  over the country. The 'Oriental Economist' gives a detailed account of seven large strikes that occurred between the 1st and the 19th of August, while the daily newspapers enumerate at least 40 others." The legal machinery, of course, reaped a rich harvest. "According to the latest reports (Sept. 12) over 5,000 persons were arrested and are awaiting trial. It is estimated by the Government that the number of arrests will reach more than 7,000 before the whole matter us settled. Among them are numerous Socialists. Chief among these is Yei Osugi, arrested at Osaka. The Government is particularly desirous of incriminating our comrades as mob leaders."

The article further hints that a contributory cause of the riots was the discontent of the workers with the Government's policy of intervention in Siberia, Whether this is so or not the political sequel to the disturbances was significant, for the Terauchi Government was superseded and the new ministry under Premier Hara reversed the policy of the old ministry in Russian affairs, and openly declares that Japan desires only  a responsible government in Russia, whether it be Bolshevik or not." Of course, this eyewash may satisfy for a time the workers of Japan, but we know that a working-class government can in no circumstances be considered "responsible" by the bourgeoisie.

R. W. Housely

Putting the boot in (1985)

Illustration by George Meddemmen.

From the August 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Football has had something of a rough time of it lately. The deaths in Bradford and Brussels resulted in much talk, most of it uninformed, and even some action. Newspapers have editorialised about the malaise afflicting "our national game" and politicians from local councillors to prime ministers have put in their twopence worth.

The violence is by no means confined to British supporters. In May, when China was eliminated from the World Cup by Hong Kong at a game in Peking, spectators pelted players with bottles and vandalised cars and buses. Thirty policemen were beaten up, and over one hundred people arrested. One local bureaucrat blamed the violence on "the lack of education and discipline among a portion of the younger citizens".

Football violence is seen by those in authority as a problem which they must now do something about. The solutions suggested range from identity cards and banning away supporters to closing down stadium bars and such progressive ideas as the restoration of corporal punishment. Nobody can seriously believe that the root cause of football violence is supporters getting drunk once inside the ground. It is, admittedly, true that there would be no violence at empty football grounds, but no doubt determined supporters would manage to fight elsewhere. In the past, police, especially on the continent, have allowed ticketless supporters into supposedly all-ticket matches, rather than have them wandering around town causing trouble.

It is a truism to say that football violence is really a social problem, that it just happens to be football—rather than, say, cricket or rugby—that the hooligan element have fastened on to. Football violence is often seen as just the response of the poorest sections of the working class—the young of the inner cities, unemployed or in desperate dead-end jobs—to the frustration and emptiness of their lives. It provides them with excitement, solidarity and a sense of identity.

But this violence is by no means only the work of the skinheads or the poorest workers. An article in the Observer (2 June) discussed the new brand of violent supporters, who wear smart, casual clothes and often sit in the most expensive seats. They look "respectable" and travel under their own steam, rather than in official supporters' club trains and coaches, thereby avoiding any special attention from the police. Unofficial newsletters provide tables of teams' supporters and their reputation for "hardness". Many of these supporters come not from the inner cities but from the supposedly more affluent suburbs and new towns. Often their parents have moved out of the cities, but support for the old team has increased. This is still, however, a matter of finding something to identify with amid the barrenness and unfamiliarity of the new home. It is somehow more satisfying to claim allegiance to Chelsea or Millwall than  to, say, Slough or Milton Keynes.

Te following day, in the Guardian, Jeremy Seabrook related football violence to the policies of the Thatcher government and, more generally, to changes within British capitalism. It is clear, he wrote,

that the identity of the manufacturing centres of Britain, the function to which they owe their very existence, has been severely eroded in the past few decades. And the passionate feelings which have crystallised around football teams in these places are in large part the most conspicuous popular reaction against the injured sense of place.

As certain industries decline, he claims, workers fasten on to football clubs as something stable in their lives, lives which are being disrupted by forces beyond their control. Tory MP Edwina Currie responded that the Brussels violence was not "displacement activity but utterly amoral behaviour, deliberately fuelled by drink", the work of "vicious thugs", which had to be condemned rather than understood.

In yet another Guardian contribution (24 June), David Selbourne produced pretentious waffle which appeared to end by criticising the "Left intelligentsia" for refusing to face the truth of the violence seen in Brussels, which apparently shows where "British labour might be going" (whatever that means). Selbourne's was certainly one of the least articulate of the academic/political commentaries on the Brussels events, which clearly reveal the dearth of ideas or the merest hint of originality among the defenders of capitalism.

Fulham chairman Ernie Clay once put things more simply and forcefully: "Football has treated its public like cattle, so it is no wonder they have behaved like cattle". As capitalism treats workers like appendages of a machine, and thereby brutalises them, it is no wonder if some sometimes behave brutally.

It is sheer hypocrisy for the likes of Currie and Thatcher to condemn the events in Brussels while at the same time supporting the vicious and violent system in which they arise. The deaths in Brussels are as nothing compared to the carnage and suffering inflicted by capitalism every single day. The Bradford fire disaster, whatever its immediate cause, was certainly aggravated by the poor condition of the ground (there's no profit in safety precautions) and by the locking of exit doors (to prevent people entering without paying).

It is often claimed that football is popular because it reflects such values as excitement, physical prowess, local identity and the desire for victory. But so, after all, did the Falklands War, with its rejoicing and its hideous jingoism. The rivalries and violence of the football field are a microcosm of the competitive inhuman society of capitalism.

Paul Bennett

Political Notes: End of the Shah (1980)

The Political Notes column from the September 1980 issue of the Socialist Standard

End of the Shah

In the welter of words about the passing of this remarkably successful capitalist monster, there was a passing reference to the first time he lost his throne in the early fifties. That time it was not the Ayatollah but a nationalist called Mossadegh who had the audacity not only yo kick him off the Peacock Throne but to nationalise the British oil giant which practically owned the country.

The idea of nationalisation was of course too much for the British government, who were so angry that they wanted to resort to their old friend the gunboat. They had to be restrained from this notion by those pacifists in the Truman government of the USA (remember him? Hiroshima? Korea?). In due course the two governments managed to "destabilise" Mossadegh (the dirty tricks department of the CIA knew more modern tricks than gunboats), the "robbery" of nationalisation was put right and the Shah restored to await the Ayatollah (and Death the Great Leveller—it seems he hasn't taken his billions with him).

But the real point lies here. Who were the Blimps who wanted to send in the gunboat and who clearly hated the idea of nationalisation? Churchill? Eden? Well no—actually it was Attlee, the leader of the Labour government of 1945-51. And who were his supporters in Parliament in those days? Why the same apostles of nationalisation that we know and hate today—Wilson, Foot, Callaghan, Mikardo, Allaun—and the young Wedgbenn himself.

Russian workers

The Guardian, like the high-class reformist rag that it is, employs some of the finest leftist creeps in Fleet Street. Among them is a chap called Jonathan Steele who is now their chief foreign scribbler. Up to about ten years ago, he was their main Eastern European reporter and had been licking the boots of the so-called communist governments with great enjoyment.

Suddenly, for no reason that he could think of, this bewildered lefty found himself kicked out of a communist congress in Hungary. He never knew why and was clearly shocked that years of faithful creeping should be rewarded in this way. However, he managed to get over it and became the USA expert of the paper for the next decade. Whether he found it better or worse he never told us. No doubt he was hard put to find much difference.

However, he is now back in Moscow and clearly determined to lick even harder so that he will never be kicked out again. On July 29 he had a large spread in the Guardian with a picture of that great democratic newspaper called Pravda. And under the picture was the caption: "In a one-party state, readers' are the best guide to public opinion". Now isn't that delightful? The very fact of a one-party state means that the ruling class allows no opponents to open their mouths. Imagine the shock to the Soviet system if one day there appeared just one letter in Pravda saying: "As a member of the public, I wish to voice some public opinion. I think that free trade unions and political parties should be legalised at once. Oh yes, and that Brezhnev and the rest of the gang should be sent to enjoy the delights of the Gulag Archipelago".

A likely story, fit only for creeps like Steele—who, incidentally, has provided us with this gem: that most of the letter-writers are pensioners because they have most time. "Next in order are workers, clerks, farm workers and technicians." Now the very existence of a working class is proof positive of the existence not of socialism, but capitalism. It now seems that in Russia, they have got a socialism tat not only has a working class but apparently any number of working classes. Steele omits to tell us whether there are many letters in Pravda from readers who are not members of any working class at all. For example, Communist Party bosses.

Labour hypocrisy

Can anyone fail to be sickened by the antics of the pseudo-socialist parties? When in opposition, they denounce the governments of their countries on account of the social evils all around and when they obtain power they continue with the mixture as before—the same capitalism with the same evils. Well, the British pseudos are now bidding for an all-time record in lies and humbug.

Barely a year ago they were the governing body, gallantly presiding over rising unemployment and cuts in education and the social services. There were cuts too in the living standards of the workers they tried to browbeat in the "winter of discontent" (which they have already erased from their memories) with rises of 5 per cent in the face of inflation of more than twice that amount. And now we read headlines like: "Varley attacks 'wicked' Tories over dole queues" (Guardian July 16). How can this unctuous humbug possibly call the Tories wicked for helplessly watching unemployment grow when he knows full well that his lot were exactly the same.

That question started out as rhetorical but it might as well get the obvious answer—that all these villainous politicians can do all these things simply because the working class allow themselves to be fooled by plausible rogues. Another specimen, the man who calls himself Tony Benn (this makes him a liar even before he says anything) complains that the media is (sic) 100 per cent anti-socialist . . . attacking the Young Socialists (he means young Trotskyists) and all those who stand for full employment, disarmament and peace".

This same Wedgwood, like Varley and the rest of them, was a leading member of the last Labour government which "stood" for unemployment, armaments and wars and all the other evils of capitalism. How could those young "socialists: sit there at their meetings (Guardian July 28) and allow this conman to get away with it?

Recently Michael Foot, who was mouthing the same cant (in the same high-pitched screech) as long ago as most people can remember, said that an anti-unemployment demonstration in South Wales was the greatest he had seen. How conveniently he forgets a similar protest at a steel works in his own constituency in Ebbw Vale, when he was minister in a government about to close the place down. The outrage among the workers was so great that they refused to let him speak and there was a serious danger of violence.

Not that we condone such tactics; we look forward to the day when workers will allow these leaders to speak—and then tell them they have had enough of capitalism, and its left-wing and right-wing stooges and are going to achieve a socialist world with their own intellects and their own efforts.

*

A Labour councillor is quoted (Guardian July 15) as saying that workers "live in poor houses and in a poor environment. That was bearable while they had work" (he didn't say why). "Now that a lot of them have lost their jobs they are starting to ask questions—the process that creates wealth has spurned them and case them aside". Well spoken Labour councillor! (Even though this same thing has been going on for a couple of hundred years.) But what questions are they asking? Here's a suggestion: Who in hell needs Labour councillors? When did Labour politicians make a scrap of difference to those on the scrap heap?

L E Weidberg

Greasy Pole: Kinnock in the News Again (2013)

The Greasy Pole column from the November 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

Anyone who suffers from a sense of being unvalued, or disregarded, might find some relief in the recent experience of Neil Kinnock. Or rather the Noble Baron Kinnock of Bedwellty, previously Member of Parliament, Leader of the Labour Party and of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, European Commissioner, Chairman of the British Council...and lifelong supporter of Cardiff City Football Club, recently promoted to the Premier Division and infamous for the aggressive, disruptive behaviour of its fans. In September he went to watch Cardiff play Fulham at Craven Cottage. Although a seasoned football follower like Kinnock should have known better, he chose to sit with his family among the Fulham supporters. In the twelfth minute Cardiff scored a goal which had Kinnock, in his own words, 'wildly ... expressing great joy, standing up...' Within a minute he got some attention from the stewards who 'advised' him to move his party to the Cardiff section of the crowd, where they were greeted '...with some warmth'.

The Sun

Shortly after the exposure of his antics at Craven Cottage Kinnock was in the news again, competing with Ed Miliband for sympathetic attention during the Daily Mail campaign about the Labour leader's father 'hating Britain'. He said he had similarly suffered, especially during the 1992 general election when the Sun had devoted its front page to the infamous headline 'If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights' followed on the day after the election with the claim that 'It's the Sun Wot Won It'. He also had something to say about the Daily Mail editor, the gruesome Paul Dacre, who complained that Kinnock had avoided going to lunch with him when the only purpose in doing so would have been for Dacre to observe whether Kinnock held his knife and fork properly. This was all a part of Kinnock's assiduously constructed image of the humble son of a Welsh miner who won his way to a sparkling education and then to almost the very top in government. But it said nothing about his own readiness to attack opponents, particularly those in his own party, as abrasively as anything thought up in Fleet Street. One of Labour's leading lights during Kinnock's time, Denis Healey, praised his 'incandescent oratory', a possible example of which was his attack at Labour's 1985 conference on the Liverpool members for their 'far-fetched resolutions ... pickled into a rigid dogma, a code ...the grotesque chaos of a Labour council ...hiring taxis to scuttle round a city handing out redundancy notices to its own employees'.

In the sea

Kinnock was elected leader at the 1983 Labour conference in Brighton. To celebrate he went for a walk along the beach accompanied by his wife and a clutch of TV cameras. It turned out to be somewhat symbolic. This young, loud, fiery left winger walked too close to the encroaching tide, a sudden surge knocked him down onto the wet shingle, he quickly scrambled to his feet and turned to face the cameras laughing defiantly and waving a clenched fist to show how he would punch out anyone who denied that this was a new Labour Party. His mission was to purge the inconvenient ideas which some restless party members still regarded as essentially matters of principle. Like all that nonsense in Clause Four about the ownership of the means of production and exchange (which had to wait for abolition until Tony Blair); unilateral nuclear disarmament; local parties having too much say in making national policy; those pesky Militant people who had come into the party nursing tortuous intentions to radically change society. With the hand of the insidious Peter Mandelson on the tiller Labour navigated through two elections, in both of which they fooled themselves that they were on the verge of power (in the after-assessment of their 1992 election one of their perceived mistakes was the 'triumphalist' – taking too much for granted – style of their eve of poll campaign). In the end Kinnock's aggression against any ideas which he saw as voter-repellent was not effective. He retired from the scene with the unenviable record of being the longest-serving Leader of the Opposition to fail to make it to Prime Minister. It was not at all as he had envisaged it, that day he fell into the sea.

Peerage

But there were other, very lucrative, opportunities open to him – such as European Commissioner, which in 1976 he had described as 'a tariff club administered by an unelected commission and a bureaucracy with the principal objective of sustaining a capitalist market economy' but which, during his time in office between 1995 and 2004 (while he imposed savage cuts in staff wages and pensions) yielded him some £2.5 million in salary, expenses, pension and the like. Shortly after his term in Europe came to an end he announced that he had '...accepted the kind invitation to enter the House of Lords as a working peer for practical political reasons'. He was not deterred by his established reputation as a bitter opponent of the Upper House, for example in 1976: ' The House of Lords must go – not be reformed, not be replaced, not be re-born in some nominated, life after death patronage paradise, just closed down, abolished, finished'. In case he was misunderstood, in 1977 when the MPs walked to the Lords to hear the Queen's speech to open Parliament he stayed defiantly seated in the Commons alongside the Beast of Bolsover Denis Skinner.

Blair approval

Kinnock's story has been a bit like someone recovering from a serious illness; one after another the symptoms of all those fevered days as a troublesome, agonisingly ambitious left-winger died away to be replaced by convalescent signs of conformity. He strongly supported Michael Foot in his turn-about over the Falklands War, including the sinking of the Belgrano. And he backed the British attack on Iraq on the feeble excuse that the infamous liar Tony Blair had assured him that the Americans would safeguard the situation there after the war. Such political acrobatics were, of course, warmly approved by Blair, who noted in his book A Journey that as a result of Kinnock's leadership the Labour Party became 'broadened and ...more popular'. Nothing more needs to be said about Kinnock's relentlessly cynical betrayal of so much that he once proclaimed as promises to radically transform society to humanity's benefit. An overview of his time reveals his passionate support for Cardiff FC to be a lone example of consistency.

Ivan

Cooking the Books: Dirty Talk at the Tory Conference (2013)

From the November 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

‘Profit is not a dirty word, says Cameron’, read the headline in the (London) Times (2 October), anticipating what he was going to tell the Tory conference that day:

‘It is businesses that get wages in people’s pockets, food on their tables, hope for their families and success for the country,’ he will say. ‘Profit, wealth creation, tax cuts, enterprise: these are not dirty elitist words.’

Some of this is true, but some is not. It is true that businesses do pay people wages but it can be doubted that they provide ‘hope for their families’. And ‘wealth creation’ is not a dirty word as long as it is understood that it is those who work for a wage who produce wealth not the business enterprises that employ them and only pay them as wages a part of what they produce.

As far as the workings of capitalism is concerned, Cameron’s point is valid. For capitalism, profit is not a dirty word as it’s what drives the system. It is an incentive to the profit-seeking businesses which control production under capitalism to produce, but only up to a point – the point at which it is no longer profitable to produce any more, even if some people’s needs have not been met. ‘No profit, no production’ is a basic economic law of capitalism.

The pursuit of profits distorts production by only responding to what people can pay for rather than what they need, so the richer you are the more and better you get while the needs of those who can’t pay are not met. ‘Can’t pay, can’t have’ is another basic economic law of capitalism.

The pursuit of profits also leads from time to time to overproduction (in relation to the market not needs) and the sort of economic downward that we are now in. No wonder supporters of capitalism have to work hard to try to convince people that profit is not a dirty work.

A couple of days earlier the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, also had a go at criticising socialism, saying that for Ed Miliband (as if he was a socialist):

‘the global free market equates to a race to the bottom with the gains being shared among a smaller and smaller group of people. This is essentially the argument Karl Marx made in Das Kapital.’

Actually, Marx did say something like this, but in a speech he gave on Free Trade to a meeting of radical democrats in Brussels in 1848 rather than in Capital.

Osborne implies that, like what he accused Miliband of, Marx too wanted to try to protect people from the workings of the ‘global free market’. But he didn’t. He said he was in favour of free trade as he thought, somewhat over-optimistically, that this would speed the social revolution:

‘But, in general, the protective system of our day is conservative, while the free trade system is destructive. It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in favour of free trade.’

Socialists still look forward to the social revolution Marx was anticipating which will replace the capitalist world market by a global socialism where, on the basis of the common ownership of the world’s resources, there would be production directly to meet people’s needs rather than for sale on a market with a view to profit.

Editorial: What it Means to be Human (2013)

Editorial from the November 2013 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists argue that the current way of organising society is not the best one. This naturally means that we are interested in alternative forms of social system. We propose a classless society based on common ownership, and we present arguments to support the view that such a system (socialism) is both realistic and preferable. There are plenty of other suggestions along similar lines, such as the science fiction writer Ursula Le Guin’s novel The Dispossessed, with its depiction of a radically egalitarian and non-hierarchical world.

Various disciplines deal with different types of social organisation: politics, economics, history, sociology. But perhaps the widest-ranging is anthropology, which has been defined as ‘the study of humankind – of ancient and modern people and their ways of living’ (Marvin Harris). Which makes it a pretty comprehensive science, covering everything from biological evolution and the spread of homo sapiens around the earth to language and the development of art and religion, and much more besides. Incidentally, Le Guin’s parents were both anthropologists.

This issue contains a number of articles on anthropology, designed to explore the socialist case by discussing various forms of society, how they came into being, just how people live in such societies and whether they have anything to teach us nowadays. Are some of these alternatives just primitive set-ups that are appropriate for technologically-simple people living in small bands who survive by hunting animals and foraging for fruit and vegetables, or do they show that other systems are viable ways for people to organise themselves?

Forty years ago Marshall Sahlins published a book Stone Age Economics that began with a chapter entitled ‘The original affluent society’. Against the prevalent view that life was hard for hunter-gatherers, he argued that their wants were easily satisfied, since they desired little. Free from the influences of markets, advertising and pressures to consume, they ‘lived in a kind of material plenty’ and worked just a few hours a day. Dan Everett writes of the Pirahã, hunter-gatherers who still live in Brazil, that they ‘show no evidence of depression, chronic fatigue, extreme anxiety, panic attacks, or other psychological ailments common in many industrialized societies’.

It is clear, then, that alternatives to a system based on wage labour and capital are perfectly possible. It is not just a matter of how people get their means of subsistence, though. Anthropologists have studied many people who live in essentially stateless societies, with nothing resembling modern-day governments. The exact status of ‘primitive communism’ is a controversial area, but there is little doubt that societies structured along similar lines existed for millennia.

At the very least, the study of anthropology, the study of humankind, demonstrates that capitalism is not the sole way of running society and that alternatives, based more on sharing and caring and co-operation, are available and maybe even preferable. We hope this issue will help you to reflect on these and similar topics.

Reorganising poverty (1988)

Book Review from the March 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard

Ideologies of Welfare: From Dreams to Disillusion. John Clarke, Allan Cochrane and Carol Smart (Hutchinson)

The book traces the development of the key arguments about welfare in Britain. Intended as both an analysis of the main ideologies and as a source book, it contains extensive extracts from various publications in which positions about welfare are being argued; including a pamphlet issued by The Socialist Party. Three significant periods are examined, with a brief historical introduction to each period.

In Part One, "The Birth of the Welfare State (1900-1914)", the main arguments concern the role of the state in welfare. Supporters of the laissez-faire free market view resisted any extension of state intervention and emphasised individual responsibility. Where self-help failed the Poor Law, and the charitable relief of distress aimed at the "deserving poor", were the answer. The notice issued by the Charity Organisation Society to those who applied for assistance makes it clear that, even for those concerned "deserving", little help was forthcoming. The New Liberals were influenced by the growing body of evidence that the misfortunes of the poor were caused by inadequate incomes (rather than the inadequacy of individuals) and, following a series of electoral defeats, by the significance of the working class vote for the survival of the Liberal Party. They argued that the state was the "collective will" of society and should be used as a vehicle for social reform.

The Fabian Society also criticised laissez-faire economics and took a collectivist view of the state. Fabianism is represented by the extracts from the Minority Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor Law, which dominated the debate after its publication in 1909. It sought to end the Poor Law (as did the Majority Report) and transfer "its several services" to already existing local Authorities, to be "charged with the prevention of the several causes of destitution". The Principle of Prevention meant that "far from involving any increase of aggregate cost to the community, the abolition of the Poor Law and of the Poor Law Authority will have been a most economical measure."

In contrast to the paternalistic view taken of mothers in poor families in the Minority Report (needing the "watchful influence by inspection and visitation, advice and instruction . . . ") feminists were identifying the role of mothers as another vital factor, beside low wages, in their poverty and associated ill health. There was not a unitary feminist ideology on welfare but the central concern with the poverty and welfare of women and children was a uniting factor. Differing attitudes are illustrated in the "endowment of motherhood" (family allowances) campaign. The suggestions in the National Endowment of Motherhood (1918) pamphlet by A. Maude Royden, that the endowment of motherhood would solve the vexed question of women being paid lower wages than men and would withdraw many thousands of women from the labour market altogether, were strongly opposed by other feminists. Anna Martin, who had argued in the Common Cause in 1911 for maternity benefit to be paid to the wife, contemplated the idea of a system of child endowment with dismay - a "a temptation to sloth, self-indulgence and sensuality". The authors point out that moral issues were a vital element in feminist arguments, much of it of a conservative nature which "would probably now be regarded as anti-feminist".

In the last essay on this period socialism is described as "a political approach based on a critique of capitalist society which sees many of the social problems supposedly tackled by the welfare state as caused by the fundamental structures of that society" (p 74). While the Fabians believed that their reform proposals would lead "inexorably, if slowly, to socialism, the Independent Labour Party was committed to working through the existing structures of the state. Among the extracts is part of the evidence of the Social Democratic Federation to the Royal Commission on the Poor Law, setting out practical proposals but concluding that "poverty will be the portion of large numbers of the working class whilst the land and the wealth of the country are privately owned and industry is carried on for profit".

The debate on welfare continues. Part Three - "Beyond Consensus"  - deals with the period 1970-1985 when laissez-faire arguments, defeated at the turn of the century, appear again to be in the ascendancy. The political consensus in favour of Beveridge in the post-war period is seen as a brief historical aberration and is the subject of Part Two -  "The Beveridge Report (1942-8)".

The Socialist Party published two pamphlets in 1943: Family Allowances: A Socialist Analysis and Beveridge Re-organises Poverty. It is the first pamphlet which is considered in the essay on socialism in Part Two. At a time when there was "little criticism from any quarter" for the Beveridge Report, The Socialist Party critically assessed its proposals. We are told that the pamphlet dismisses Family Allowances "as little more than an attempt to reduce the earnings of individual workers and increase employers' profits" and that recent research "seems to confirm that the reduction of wage levels was an important consideration for the government".

It is pleasing to acknowledge that we were invited to comment on the text surrounding the lengthy extracts from our pamphlet, and that some amendments were agreed. Further clarification is necessary. The authors appreciate important facts about our position. For example -

. . . it is not possible to detach one small policy area for separate consideration. It has to be set within the wider context of capitalist development. Although the issue is discussed in terms of wage levels, the key point being made is that reforms cannot solve the problems which the SPGB argued were inherent within capitalism. (p 114)

 However the observation is made in a later essay that - 

The tension identified in Part One between socialism's strength as a critique of capitalism (and a call for revolutionary change), and the desire to present proposals which are realisable even before such change, is particularly noticeable in contemporary debates. (p 160)

which makes the following comment on the Family Allowance pamphlet a little strange -

. . . it is perhaps hardly surprising that its authors simply focused on the issue of wage levels, instead of going beyond that to identify ways in which the private costs of sustaining and reproducing labour power could be effectively socialised. (p. 114) 

The arguments used in the pamphlet are seen as forming a link with those of William Morris (the inadequacy of social reforms when revolutionary  change is required) and of the SDF. In 1904 a group of men and women came to the conclusion that having a revolutionary aim and a programme of reforms is contradictory. The issue of socialism must be kept clear. They left the SDF, which at the time was campaigning for Free Maintenance of schoolchildren, to form the Socialist Party of Great Britain. It is not our purpose to make suggestions about the "socialisation of private cost" of bringing up a family, or reforming some other aspect of life, within capitalism. Our sole object is socialism.

The "fundamental structures" of capitalist society arise from its foundation. What is required is a revolutionary change in the basis of society; the abolition of class ownership of the means of production, and, thereby, an end to production for sale and profit. The authors rightly point out that -

The utilisation of Marxist economics by the SPGB led them to take a fundamentally different position to contemporary feminists. Their analysis suggested that equality between men and women could only be achieved through revolutionary change.

This has never meant that women must passively wait for some new dawn, rather that reforms to benefit women (like other reforms) do not solve the problems they attempt to deal with -  witness the history of family allowances. The socialist revolution cannot take place without the understanding of the majority of the class which is dependent on the sale of labour power. It is for both women and men to organise consciously and politically to abolish capitalism and establish a condition of things where there is economic and social equality between all human beings. It is the way to end both poverty and "welfare".

Pat Deutz

The Socialist Party (2000)

Book Review from the June 2000 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Socialist Party of Great Britain. Politics, Economics and Britain's Oldest Socialist Party by David A. Perrin. Bridge Books, Wrexham, 2000.

By any standards, a key publication in the long history of the Socialist Party. It attempts to correct some of the “glaring errors [made] by serious analysts”, to illuminate the SPGB's “unique analysis of events in the 20th century¸ and to record the development of “distinctive arguments on a wide range of subjects”. It succeeds quite admirably in all these enterprises.

The focus is not so much a history of the SPGB, as “a history of ideas which members used to debate and orate”. The book's elegantly written 200-odd pages are thus not a record of the SPGB as a political organisation, nor yet are they about party members per se. Rather Perrin has written about the key ideas that underpinned the Party's formation in 1904, and the way these ideas have been elaborated and extended in the light of Marxian theory across the best part of 100 years. The book is also written from the perspective of a professional political scientist who is also a Party member. Not surprisingly therefore the assembled evidence which is quoted in support of its analysis is impressive, and this lends persuasive weight and authority to its conclusions. As someone who recently found himself writing a modest project on the history of the Second World War, I can confirm that historians have, for whatever reason, largely ignored the Party's distinctive contribution to ideas. This book will help to put the record straight.

All but one of the chapters examine the “genesis of eight specific contributions that it [the SPGB] has made to the development of Marxian theory”. There are chapters on: Reform or Revolution?; The First World War; Russia and State Capitalism; Economic Crises and the “Collapse of Capitalism”; Fascism, Democracy and the Second World War; The Welfare State; Keynes and Inflation; and Socialist Planning.

Each chapter follows the same essential, easy-to-follow format. The nature of the challenge is described, the SPGB's position is established and compared with that of other conflicting political positions, and the development of the Party's position over time in the light of Marxian theory is described. The writing is informed, as all good history writing should be, with the feeling that the author was present at the time and as such is able to describe events sensitively and accurately. I found the narrative thread always easy to follow, the nature of the discourse persuasive, and the conclusions reached compelling. But the text is demanding. This is not the kind of book you can skip through. On the contrary its seriousness and attention to detail demand the kind of close scrutiny which is, necessarily, typical of an academic text. I found myself reading only one chapter at a sitting, and then spending a lot of time afterwards reflecting about what I had read. But the rewards are immense, and they are also profound. Some, at least, deserve elaboration.

First, although familiar with the Party's position on reformism, war, state capitalism, the Welfare State, and so on, I wasn't as clear as I now am about how these positions had been established. I now see more comprehensively how, through time, the Party's unique stance has been slowly refined and extended in the light of experience, and by reference to Marxian theory. Reading the book has been a powerful and enriching educational experience.

Second, it is a hugely reassuring experience. At the end of each chapter I was left with the warm and comfortable feeling that the position taken by the Party was in a very substantial sense “right”. True, the rightness might not be absolute,. It might—as perhaps the Party's attitude as to why post-war governments resorted to currency inflation seems to suggest—be in need of further refining. But then this is in the nature of things. Scientific explanations, as someone once put it, are like Ford Model Ts. In time they wear out, and need updating.

Third, I am filled with admiration for the writers and speakers, the Conference delegates and the membership generally, who have collectively demonstrated that Marx provided us with more than just a body of material evidence and theoretical propositions. That, crucially, he also left us with a methodology—a methodology which allows us to go on refining our knowledge of the world in the light of new evidence, and adjusting our explanations accordingly. Each of the eight chapters demonstrates the extent of the Party's admirable responsiveness to change, and the way it has, in general, successfully used Marxian theory to develop intellectual and practical positions which were not anticipated by Marx, and occasionally—as, for example, in its attitude to “progressive” wars—actually ran counter to Marx's beliefs. This is not a picture—as some of the Party's opponents would have people believe—of a political party whose stance is dated and set in stone, but quite the reverse. The evidence shows that the SPGB has remained for the most part dynamic and alive, and true to its materialist, scientific lights, across the best part of 100 years. As I read the book I found myself feeling proud to belong to an organisation whose members have remained—in spite of all the many disappointments and difficulties, to say nothing of the personal dangers and social disadvantages—so dedicated to the continuing cause of socialism. I suspect that nothing is likely to fire younger members of the Party with resolve and personal commitment than this inspiring testament to the hard work, wit and wisdom of comrades, most long since dead.

Fourth, I was struck by the many occasions when the Party's position was articulated in authoritative articles in the Socialist Standard, and the way in which the Party's internal democracy, albeit frequently based upon no more than informal contacts and discussion, ensured that only very rarely were such statements out of kilter with what the membership as a whole thought and believed. For example “the first detailed analysis of the Russian situation appeared in the August 1918 Socialist Standard under the heading “The Revolution in Russia, Where it Fails”. Imagine. A considered response which the whole Party found acceptable in but a year. And again, in an elegant article in August 1933 Hardy showed that the “Collapse of Capitalism” theory was based on a failure to differentiate between markets for “consumer” and “producer” goods, although this distinction had not previously been the subject of public comment by the Party.

The last chapter is different. In it Perrin offers a series of measured conclusions about the Party's present stance, and details some “potential difficulties looming for the SPGB and its revolutionary strategy”. The style at this point, as elsewhere, is critical in the best Marxist tradition. The author is a member of the Socialist Party but he is not going to compromise his historical insights with an unquestioning loyalty to the Party. He concludes that:

"The main purpose of this work has been to demonstrate what became ever more apparent during the research, that far from being a moribund sect obsessed with political minutiae, bygone theories and traditions, the SPGB is rather more of a living organism than many of its detractors have assumed. Above all, it has proved capable of responding to events in an imaginative and distinctive measure while still holding true to its fundamental principles, derived in large part from classical Marxism of the nineteenth century."

Few members of the Socialist Party would probably criticise this, even if some might want to celebrate the Party's achievements more fulsomely, but the rest of the chapter is, of its nature, potentially much more contentious. In it Perrin notes that after a hundred years the Party seems “no nearer achieving socialism that it was in 1904”. He wonders why this is so, and he then enumerates some of the challenges which the Party is likely to have to face in the future if it is to be successful. He mentions:

1. Problems arising from the conflict between “scrupulous democracy” and leadership.
2. The effect of the absence of leaders on the Party's ability “to respond to the demands of the media”.
3. The failure of the Party to address “why the working class hasn't yet mustered under its banner in any great numbers, or the related issue of what real incentive there is for them to do so”.
4. The fact that the “SPGB often seems unsure about the precise role of the material interests of the working class in promoting a revolutionary outlook amongst workers”.
5. The belief that the Party has work to do “on how future socialist society could be organised”. He mentions three matters of major concern: the problem of distribution; socialism and models of democracy; and “social compliance within socialism and how socialist society could deal with anti-social minorities in a fair and democratic manner”.

Some may find all this overly threatening. I find it richly stimulating. I don't see the challenges that face the Party entirely as Perrin does, and I also think he has neglected others that are arguably relevant. But I think it is quite marvellous that he should finish the book in this kind of open, discursive way. It seems entirely true to the traditions of the SPGB. The future calls and we must respond to it openly, honestly and seriously, using those insights and perspectives which the author has shown have served the Party so well over nearly a century.

Michael Gill

America land of the unfree (1987)

From the September 1987 issue of the Socialist Standard

The drive from the White House to radio station WAMU takes about 20 minutes and passes from the mansion provided as the presidential residence of a retired millionaire B-movie actor through some of the worst slums I have ever seen. It is hard to believe that human beings inhabit some of the squalid dwellings of downtown Washington DC. There are not supposed to be poor people in America: it said nothing about them in the brochure. This is the land of the affluent workers, isn't it? Richard Montague from Belfast, a city notorious for its slum areas sighed, "Now, this is what I call a ghetto," he said. "Worse than the slums we have at home". Eighty per cent of the population of the US capital city are black workers, mainly employed in the low-wage service industries, mainly housed in the kind of rotten conditions which the tourists do not go to see.

Sitting in the radio studio was Fred Fiske, presenter of Washington's most prestigious phone-in programme. A man given to talking a lot about "the genius of American capitalism", a bully with a reputation for putting callers straight - a bigot with a microphone. For two hours Montague and I debated the case for world socialism, repeatedly confronting the confusion and distortion of our host's capitalist tunnel-vision intellect. It was a good two hours: the man who was going to put us reds in our place was put in his place. At the end of the show, as we were leaving, the news came on: four people dead, 15 injured after a tenement building in the South Bronx of New York collapsed. Ah, the genius of American capitalism.

On the road from Washington to Charlottesville Virginia are dozens of caravans. Holiday homes for American workers seeking a break in the countryside? Not at all. These were the homes of families too poor to live anywhere but in run-down vans on the side of the road. As the recession hits the USA harder and unemployment rises in the cities, this is the fate of many an American worker.

Slums in America? Homeless in America? Can this be possible in the land of the free? Not according to Professor Bornhofen, an economist whom I had the pleasure of debating against in Michigan on the question, "Capitalism versus Socialism". In stating the case against capitalism I referred to workers too poor to afford shelter: 100,000 officially homeless in Britain and who knows how many more in the USA? With all the eloquence and erudition which one would expect from high-salaried apologist for the profit system, Bornhofen responded, "That's a lot of crap. Why, I doubt if there are more than a 1,000 homeless people in America." Well, if ignorance is bliss, Professor Bornhofen should have been one of the happiest men in Michigan that day.

No homeless workers in America —1,000 at the most? Let us turn to the rich oil state of Texas. According to figures published by the National Coalition for the Homeless there are 25,000 homeless people in Houston alone. The city devotes not a single dollar of taxes to building houses or providing for the homeless, the state of Texas is second only to Mississippi at the bottom of the league tables for state provision of social services. One newspaper reports the situation in the following terms:

In the chapel of downtown Houston's Star of Hope Mission sits a Saturday night congregation that is a cross-section of the city's hardcore homeless. Tired old men are here in mix-and-match clothing from the mission closet. While the physically disabled set their sights on lower bunks, the mentally disabled engage in long conversations with no one in particular. Here, too, are groups of lean young men only a few days out of the Texas Department of Corrections maximum security facility . . . A few men in their 30s—new to the streets and ill at ease—talk to no one. All need a meal and a place to sleep . . . The mission director reads from his list of randomly ordered numbers, and those remaining show their numbered bed-tickets and file out towards the 500-bed dorm. It's a place to sleep until breakfast call at 4.30a.m. In the huge converted warehouse the roof leaks and it's cold. Every man sleeps fully dressed. All of this, three meals and a bunk—offered by what is arguably the most generous men's shelter in the state—is provided without the expenditure of a single tax dollar. In Texas the homeless live off the kindness of strangers, not taxpayers. (In These Times, 8 April, 1987)

In Dallas, the city known in this country from the the TV soap opera in which everyone is either rich or very rich, there are 15,000 homeless people out of a population of one million. According to John Fullenwinder, the Dallas chairperson of the National Coalition for the Homeless, there were just under 43,000 forced-entry evictions in Dallas last year: a rate of 165 each working day. And that is just in two cities in one of the 50 states of the USA.

All of the other obscenities of working class poverty exist in the illusory land of the free, Even the so-called affluent American workers are now caught in the trap of unemployment. The US Department of Education has reported that 51 per cent of high school graduates not entering university are without a full-time job three years after graduation. Among 18-24 year-olds, the US Census Bureau has recorded a 50 per cent increase of those living in official poverty in the five years between 1979 and 1984. Not only are the poor becoming poorer but young workers who have been regarded as economically secure are moving ever more rapidly into the ranks of the officially poor.

Poverty in the USA breeds its own problems, not least of which is racism. When workers are being squeezed extra-hard so that the rich can get richer they soon turn on one another. Violence against American blacks has been on the increase, at the beginning of this year a gang of racists beat up three black men in the white suburb of New York called Howard Beach —one of the victims was murdered. In one area of New Orleans a sheriff has become a popular racist hero for threatening to arrest any blacks caught walking or riding through the white folks' town over which he presides. ("A New Racism", The Nation, 10 January 1987).

In the USA one per cent of the population own 40 per cent of all marketable wealth. That is 20 per cent more than they owned 20 years ago. In short, the super-rich are owning and controlling more and more and more. What they possess the overwhelming majority of Americans are excluded from possessing. The power of the capitalist majority is at the expense of the freedom of the wealth-producing majority to own and control the wealth which surrounds them. That is what capitalist freedom means: they own; we don't —they are few, we are many —they have privilege, we work like horses producing profits to feed that privilege. That is the freedom offered by "the land of the free".

Steve Coleman