The Passing Show: Social revolution in Japan (1963)

The Passing Show Column from the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Social revolution in Japan

Under the above heading The Times told us recently of changes in Japan brought about by the war. But if the reader expects to learn that the wealth producers, the Japanese workers, have taken over, he will be disappointed though he should not be surprised. What in fact the article deals with primarily is the rise of new propertied group and families in place of the old.

The richest man in Japan has an income of 440m. yen (£440,000) a year. He is Mr. Konosuke Matsusha, chairman of the Matsusha Electric Industrial Company. His declared income is nearly twice as large as that of anyone else in the country. According to figures based on tax returns for 1962. the 20 richest men in Japan have incomes ranging from £121,000 to £440,000. All but one are industrialists. Some of the names in the list are almost unknown to the general public and the famous pre-war names—Iwasaki (founders of the Mitsubishi combine), Okura, Mitsui and Sumito Mo—do not appear anywhere.

Of course, there has been no social revolution for the other Japanese, those whose names are always unknown. The latest figures published by the International Labour Office show average earnings in Japanese manufacturing industries, ’’including family allowances and end-of-year bonuses,” as 22,834 Yen, or about £22 16s. 8d. a month.

Bigger and Fewer Breweries

Official figures published in the April issue of Economic Trends showed how far take-overs have gone in industry as a whole. In eight years, 1954-1961, £1,600 million was spent on take-over bids, but of this total nearly half came from the 98 companies each with assets of £25 million or more, though they represent only a tiny proportion of the 2,600 companies whose shares are quoted on the Stock Exchanges of this century. Altogether 3,400 companies were taken over (most of them not quoted on the stock exchange).

One industry in which amalgamation has gone far, but with more to come, is the brewing industry.

In place of a multiplicity of breweries many of them small and local, a writer in the Financial Times (May 25) writes of the industry now being dominated by six major groups.

What the boards aimed to achieve by take-overs was to consolidate brewing and distribution in large regions and thus achieve big economies and larger profits. Local breweries are being closed down and a considerable number of the local ”milds, bitters and light ales” are disappearing, ”no longer worth producing in small quantities.” Standardisation of a smaller number of nationally advertised brews is the order of the day for capitalism in brewing. It is ironic to recall the old argument against Socialism that it would deprive us of the variety of choice that capitalism gave us. Maybe the local varieties were no better (or worse) than the TV advertised popular brands, but that is not what drinkers were told before the change took place.

Common Market under a Cloud

When the drive for British entry into the Common Market was in full and hopeful flood the line taken by its advocates was to say that all was well inside the Six and British industry must be in to share in the benefits.

It was equally to be expected that immediately entry was blackballed by De Gaulle, they should nearly all have a change of heart and say that it really did not matter after all.

Now a few months have passed and some of the earlier arguments have begun to look rather thin. In place of the supposed absence of labour disputes we have seen massive strikes in France and Germany. French farming interests which were partly responsible for the objection to British entry have now brought the French and German governments into conflict, and both of them into conflict with American farmers over the entry of their exports into Europe.

The bloom has gone off the German industrial and stock exchange boom, because of falling profit margins and stronger pressure for wage increases.

At the same time, helped by some industrial recovery and rising profits, many British capitalists and politicians are thinking that they can do better out of Europe, and British exports into the Common Market have increased, as also exports to Russia.

The fact is that both before and after, the arguments were based on wrong or too limited assumptions. The European Common Market carries no more guarantee of permanent rapid expansion than any other large or small region of capitalism, and no more able to escape wage disputes and fluctuating profit margins.

And what happens to one industry inside or outside the Market is not necessarily the experience of other industries. . While motor car exports to Europe have been rising, and the Ready Mix Concrete Company claims record sales on the Continent, one firm, Wilmot Breedon, producers of motors, aircraft engines and domestic appliances, reports that the profits made in Britain were overshadowed by the heavy losses of its French subsidiary.

So for the moment the Common Market is rather out of favour.

What Mr. Profumo did to the Stock Exchange.

One of the emptiest dreams of the capitalists is to imagine to themselves how happy they could all be if only they could go on making, profits without the constant interruption of “politics." One of a cloudless sky politics keeps blowing up. On Monday, June 10th according to the Evening Standard, the London Stock Exchange had its biggest slump since Cuba—not this time the work of one of the K’s, but of Mr. Profumo. “Dealers, nervous about the eventual outcome of the Profumo affair, marked share prices down all round."

The same issue of the Evening Standard had an article asking whether Mr. Profumo, out of politics, can hope to find an outlet for his talents in business. The argument raises diverting side issues:

A man in public office has to have a high moral character and appear totally incorruptible. . . In business, however, standards are not always that high . . . But the business world doesn’t think much of a liar, especially if he gets found out

The writer of the article, the City Editor of the Standard, asks: “If he came knocking at your door would you give him a job ? ” But there is no urgency about it:

The ex-Minister of War comes from a rich family. The Profumos have for many years controlled the £34,000,000 Provident Life Association of London.

Most of the shares are held by trusts in which Mr. Profumo has an important role. In 1961 the trusts sold some £1,000,000 worth of shares for cash in a public issue. But they still own around two-thirds of the company’s Ordinary share capital, Worth some £3,700,000 at current market prices.

Mr. Profumo, of course, is only one of the beneficiaries. But he must draw quite a useful income from the investment.

Last year Provident Life paid out £120,000 in Ordinary dividends, of which the trusts must have received a considerable share.

Edgar Hardcastle

Classic Reprint: What is patriotism? (1963)

A Classic Reprint from the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

We reprint this article from the Socialist Standard of December, 1915, written in the middle of the first World War, its message still rings true, and we know it will be of great interest to our readers.

The answer depends largely upon the point of view. From one standpoint patriotism appears as the actual religion of the modern State. From another it is the decadence and perversion of a noble and deep-rooted impulse of loyalty to the social unit, acquired by mankind during the earliest stages of social life. From yet another viewpoint, that of capitalist interests, patriotism is nothing more or less than a convenient and potent instrument of domination.

The word itself, both etymologically and historically, has its root in paternity. In tribal days the feeling of social solidarity, which has now become debased into patriotism, was completely bound up with the religion of ancestor worship. In tribal religion, as in the tribe itself, all were united by ties of blood. The gods and their rights and ceremonies were exclusive to the tribesmen. All strangers were rigidly debarred from worship. The gods themselves were usually dead warriors. Every war was a holy war. Among the ancient Israelites, for instance, the holy Ark of Jehovah of Hosts accompanied the tribes to battle. It was this abode or movable tomb of the ancestral deity that went with the Jews in their march through the desert, and even to Jericho, playing an important part in the fall of that remarkable city. All the traditions of the Jewish religion, in fact, were identified with great national triumphs.

Thus tribal religion was completely interwoven with tribal aspirations and integrity. Tribal “patriotism” and religion were identical. Indeed, without the strongest possible social bond, without a kind of “patriotism” that implied the unhesitating self-sacrifice of the individual for the communal existence, it would have been utterly impossible for tribal man to have won through to civilisation. Natural selection insured that only those social groups which developed this supreme instinct of mutual aid could survive; the rest were crushed out in the struggle for existence. Is it a matter for wonder if it be found that such a magnificent social impulse, so vital to the struggling groups of tribal man, received periodical consecration in the willing human sacrifices so common in primitive religious ceremonial ? Bound up with the deliberate manufacture of gods for the protection of the tribe and its works, there is indicated a social recognition of the need for, and value of, the sacrifice of the individual for the common weal.

This noble impulse of social solidarity is the common inheritance of all mankind. But being a powerful social force it has lent itself to exploitation. Therefore, with the development of class rule this great impulse is made subordinate to the class interests of the rulers. It becomes debased and perverted to definite anti-social ends. As soon as the people become a slave class “the land of their fathers” is theirs no more. Patriotism to them becomes a fraudulent thing. The “country” is that of their masters alone. Nevertheless, the instinct of loyalty to the community is too deep-seated to be eradicated so easily, and it becomes a deadly weapon in the hands of the rulers against the people themselves.

With the decay of society based on kinship, religion changed also, and from being tribal and exclusive it became universal and propagandist. “Patriotism” at the same time began to distinguish itself from religion. The instinctive tribal loyalty became transformed, by the aid of religion and the fiction of kinship, into political loyalty. In a number of instances in political society, as in Tudor England, the struggle for priority between religion and patriotism became so acute as to help in the introduction of a more subservient form of religion. Thus patriotism became emancipated from religion, and the latter became a mere accessory to patriotism as handmaiden of class rule.

Though universal religion did not split up at the same time as the great empire that gave it birth, patriotism did so. The latter has, in fact, always adapted, enlarged, or contracted itself to fit the existing political unit, whether feudal estate, village, township, county, kingdom, republic or empire. No political form has been too absurd for it to fill with its loyalty. No discordance of race, colour or language has been universally effective against it.

What, then, is patriotism in essence to-day? It is usually defined as being devotion to the land of our fathers. But which is the land of our fathers? Our fathers came from many different parts of the world. The political division of the world in which we live is an artificial entity. The land has been wrested from other races. The nation they call “ours” is the result of a conquest over original inhabitants, and over ourselves, by successive ruling classes. Unlike the free tribesmen we are hirelings; we possess no country.

Nationality, of which patriotism is the superstition, covers no real entity other than that of a common oppression, a unified government. It does not comprise any unity of race, for in no nation is there one pure race, or anything like it. It does not cover a unity of language, for scarcely a nation exists in which several distinct languages are not indigenous. Nor is it any fixity of territory, for this changes from decade to decade, while the inhabitants of the transferred territory have to transfer their allegiance, their patriotism, to the new nation.

The only universal bond of nationality or patriotism that exists for us to-day is, then, that of subjection to a single government. Patriotism in the worker is pride in the common yoke imposed by a politically unified ruling class. Yet it is this artificial entity that we are called upon to honour before life itself. This badge of political servitude is called an object worthy of supreme sacrifice. The workers are expected to abandon all vital interests and sacrifice all they hold dear for the preservation of an artificial nationality that is little more than a manufactured unit of discord: a mere focus of economic and political strife.

Thus one of the noblest fruits of man’s social evolution—the impulse of sacrifice for the social existence—is being prostituted by the capitalist class to maintain a system of exploitation, to obtain a commercial supremacy, and preserve or extend the boundaries of a superfluous political entity. The workers are duped by the ruling class into sacrificing themselves for the preservation of a politico-economic yoke of a particular form and colour. Many so-called Socialists have fallen headlong into this trap.

Had social solidarity developed in equal measure with the broadening of men’s real interests, it would now be universal in character instead of national. The wholesale mixture of races, and the economic interdependence of the whole world, show that nationalism is now a barrier, and patriotism, as we know it, a curse. Only the whole world can now be rightly called the land of our fathers. Only in the service of the people of the whole world, and not against those of any part of it, can the instinct of social service find its highest and complete expression. The great Socialist has pointed the way. He did not call upon the workers of Germany alone to unite. He appealed to the toilers of the whole world to join hands; to a whole world of labour whose only loss could be its parti-coloured chains. And in this alone lies the consummation of that tribal instinct of social solidarity of which patriotism is the perverted descendant.

Capitalism, therefore, stands as the barrier the destruction of which will not only set free the productive forces of society for the good of all, but will also liberate human solidarity and brotherhood from the narrow confines of nationality and patriotism. Only victorious labour can make true the simple but pregnant statement: “Mankind are my brethren, the world is my country.” Patriotism and nationalism as we know them will then be remembered only as artificial restrictions of men’s sympathy and mutual help; as obstacles to the expansion of the human mind; as impediments to the needful and helpful development of human unity and co-operation; as bonds that bound men to slavery; as incentives that set brothers at each other’s throats.

Despite its shameless perversion by a robber class the great impulse to human solidarity is by no means dead. Economic factors give it an ever firmer basis, and in the Socialist movement it develops apace. Even the hellish system of individualism, with its doctrine of every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost, has been unable to kill it. And in the great class struggle of the workers against the drones, of the socially useful against the socially pernicious, in this last great struggle for the liberation of humanity from; wage-slavery, the great principle of human solidarity, based upon the necessities of to-day and impelled by the deep-seated instincts of the race, will come to full fruition and win its supreme historical battle.

That is our hope and aspiration. For the present, however, we are surrounded by the horrors of war added to the horrors of exploitation, and subjected to the operation of open repression as well as to the arts of hypocrisy and fraud. With the weakening power of religion to keep the workers obedient, the false cult of nationality and patriotism is being exploited to the full. Like religion, patriotism has its vestments, its ceremonies, its sacred emblems, its sacred hymns and inspired music; all of which are called in aid of the class interests of our masters, and utilised desperately to lure millions to the shambles for their benefit. Thus is an heroic and glorious social impulse perverted and debased to the support of a régime of wage-slavery, and to the furtherance of the damnable policy of the slave-holding class: to divide and rule.

F. C. Watts

Church, Faith and Property (1963)

From the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Nearly one hundred years ago Marx wrote: “The English Established Church will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on one thirty- ninth of its income.”

Remembering the zeal with which the Church fought to protect its tithes over the centuries and its traditional defence of private property, Marx’s assessment was justified, and the current dispute about the 39 Articles reinforces it. The Church dignitary who raised the issue declared that he does not agree with all of the Articles but he nevertheless assented to them because otherwise he could not have got the appointment: which led other, more conscientious, churchmen to protest about him and his ideas of ethical conduct.

But if the Church’s attachment to what are supposed to have been its basic articles of faith for four hundred years is lukewarm, its interest in looking after its property is in no doubt. Its total income is now over £40 million a year, more than double the amount of a few years ago.

A large part of the increase has been due to a change of policy over investments of the Church. Commissioners who, instead of relying on prayer made use of investment experts. Their total income, which in 1952-3 was under £8 million, was in 1961-2, more than £16 million; of which £8,993,275 came from Stock Exchange Securities, £4,576,161 from Agricultural and Urban Estates, and £1,471,949 from mortgages.

Doubtless those responsible would say that they have to keep up with the times, which also accounts for their minds turning to amalgamation of the rival Christian faiths. But while they are learning from the business world about more profitable ways of investing they might also take note that amalgamation often means “take-over.” The Sunday Telegraph (9/6/63) warns its fellow Anglicans that parleying with the Roman Catholics may result in “the eventual submission of the Church of England to the Roman obedience.”

While on the subject of winds of change in the Christian world the Communists must not be forgotten. Pope John not only interested the Church of England in his discussions for unity, but also the representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, and when he died the Daily Worker in its issue of June 4, claimed that he was mourned by “hundreds of millions of people throughout the world,” among those millions being supporters of the Communist Party. Under the heading, “World Mourns Peace Pope,” the Daily Worker claimed that the Pope “opened the way to new possibilities of co-operation between Catholics and Communists for peace and social progress.”

Edgar Hardcastle

50 Years Ago: The Need for Socialism (1963)

The 50 Years Ago column from the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Today the human race is living out of conformity with its environment. The operation of social forces has separated society into two classes, with different modes of living and a different outlook on the world. The dominant class has thrown off all pretence of function and has become solely parasitic, a cancerous growth in the body of the social organism. Its presence is detrimental to the race. The only useful class is robbed of the results of its labour ; the wealth goes to feed the cancer, the useless class. Increasing powers of production, instead of giving the workers leisure and opportunities for self-development, only increase their sufferings and intensify their labour. The result of longer hours, of technical education and training, is only so much more food for society’s malignant growth, so much more wealth for the capitalist class, from which to hire the forces that overawe the workers and keep them in subjection.

The very existence of such forces, when capital has become international, reveals their purpose to the workers, whose every effort on the industrial field is thwarted by them. Antagonism that only shows itself on the industrial field sectionally and spasmodically, stands out as class antagonism when the armed forces are used against all sections of the workers in turn. The political machine then becomes a challenge to the workers ; it stands out as the symbol of capitalism, the nucleus of the capitalist State. Its control means power.

The working class have nearly exhausted the long chapter of blunders that characterised their history during the nineteenth century—machine smashing, Chartism, Liberal-Labour representation, etc. They must either begin over again or make a serious study of their real position and find that control of the political machine is within their reach and is the first step that must be taken towards freedom.

[From 'Socialism To-day' by F. Foan, July 1913, Socialist Standard.]

Parliamentary Fund (1963)

Party News from the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is the Party/s intention to contest three constituencies at the next General Election. The expense will be considerable and our coffers are empty. Full information will be published later, but meanwhile readers are urgently requested to send donations to the Party. Cheques, P.O.'s, etc. should be crossed, payable to the SPGB, Parliamentary Fund, and sent to the treasurer, E. Lake, SPGB, 52 Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4.

P. Howard (Party Funds organiser)

SPGB Meetings (1963)

Party News from the July 1963 issue of the Socialist Standard

Aphorisms of Socialism [II.] (1912)

From the July 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

Being an explanation of the Declaration of Principles of the S.P.G.B.

Aphorism II.

In society, therefore, there is an antagonism of interests, manifesting itself as a class struggle between those who possess but do not produce and those who produce but do not possess.

We saw, in considering our first aphorism, that society is divided into two classes – a class of sellers of labour-power and a class of buyers of labour-power. This division was seen to arise from the class-ownership of the means of life – those who do not possess being compelled to sell their labour-power to those who do.

This sale and purchase of labour-power resolves those who possess into non-producers and those who do not possess into producers.

Hence we have, in the terms of our second aphorism, a class “who possess but do not produce,” and a class “who produce but do not possess.”

The proposition is that between these two classes in society there is an antagonism of interests manifesting itself as a class struggle.

The very nature of selling and buying presupposes opposing interests. While sales, in the long run, are exchanges of equal values, individually they are not necessarily so. A given class or grade of goods may at one time be selling above, and at another time below, its value. In these cases the sales are not exchanges of equal values. But eventually the high and the low prices cancel each other, and so the result is arrived at that sales, in the long run, are exchanges of equal values.

The reason, if course, of this fluctuation of prices, is that their adjustment is left to the forces of competition.

It is clear that, since commodities, as such, are insensate, and have no will power to fight their own battles, it is in reality their owners who must stand in opposition to one another. It is they who resist the forces of competition when those forces are against them, and use them to their utmost capacity when they are in their favour.

It is only by this continual struggle of buyers and sellers against one another – the former to buy as cheaply as they can, the latter to sell for the highest possible figure – that prices rise and fall. Without this struggle we cannot imagine prices falling when goods are plentiful by comparison with demand, and rising when the reverse condition obtains.

This struggle, presupposed by the competitive exchange of goods which we call buying and selling, can only arise out of opposing and conflicting interests. Therefore the sale presupposes the struggle ; the struggle presupposes antagonism of interests.

Without the last, then we cannot have the first, and where the first (buying and selling) is found, there antagonism of interests must inevitably exist.

So when we show that society is divided into two classes, one of which has no means of livelihood other than selling its labour-power to the other, we have no option but to conclude that there is antagonism of interests between those classes.

Let us look at it another way. The struggle is over the possession of the product of the workers’ toil. Whatever this product may amount to, and whatever form it may take, this fact concerning it remains constant : the more of it that is taken by the producer the less there remains for the non-producer, and the larger the portion taken by the non-producer the smaller must be the amount remaining for the producer.

In such case neither side can prosecute its own interest without detriment to the interest of the other, and hence again we find that “in society there is an antagonism of interests between those who possess but do not produce and those who produce but do not possess.”

In the case of buyers and sellers of ordinary commodities, that is, of the products of labour, this antagonism of interests cannot manifest itself as a class struggle, because there is no class distinction between buyers and sellers as buyers and sellers. That which draws the class line between those who possess but do not produce and those who produce but do not possess is not the fact that the one does not produce and the other does, or that the one buys labour-power and the other sells it. It is the fact that the one possesses the means of life and the other does not.

As a matter of fact, buyers and sellers in the ordinary commodities market cannot be separated into classes as such, for every buyer becomes a seller in his turn. So the antagonistic interests, here, can only manifest themselves in a series of struggles between individuals or groups of individuals.

On the other hand, in the labour market the buyers and sellers are only such because of the class distinction. There, buyers and sellers are by this very fact separate classes. The seller only becomes a buyer by becoming a possessor and so passing into the other class, and the buyer only becomes a seller by becoming dispossessed and so being precipitated into the propertyless class. And this changing about is comparatively rare in the latter case and extremely rare in the former.

In these circumstances, then, whatever may be the differences between individual workers as competitors for the sale of labour-power, and between non-producers as competitors in the purchase of labour-power, the two classes, as long as they exist as such, must always be opposed to each other as buyers and sellers.

The breach between the individuals of the same class may to some extent be closed, for it is largely a superficial breach. It has been said that the more one class takes of the product of labour the less falls to the lot of the other class. This means that class interests must be antagonistic. Between individuals of the same class, no such thing is true. One worker does not necessarily get less because another gets more, nor does the increased share of one capitalist necessarily leave less for another. The capitalist does not ordinarily increase his wealth by taking away from his fellow capitalist, but by subtracting from the worker.

The sectional interests, therefore, differ from class interests in this, that though they are often antagonistic, they are not fundamentally so. The class interests, on the contrary, are fundamental and must inevitably clash.

As further urging the point, it is recognised among both classes that the conflicting interests of sections may be reconciled to some extent by substituting combination for competition. Hence we have rings, trusts, combines, mergers and associations on the capitalists’ side, and trade unions on the workers’ side.

The conflict of sectional interests, then, since these interests are sectional, can only manifest itself as sectional struggles; but the antagonism of class interests must, from its class nature, exhibit itself in the form of a struggle between the classes.

This class struggle is not fought out with the same degree of consciousness at all times, for which reason it does not at all times wear the same aspect. In the earlier days of the capitalist system its nature was masked. There did not exist the same clear line of distinction between the two classes. Men were unconscious of the secrets of capitalist production, and therefore could not realise the irreconcilable antagonism of interests between the classes in society.

The reasons for this are many, but they all have one foot upon the same stone : the stage of development of the means and instruments for producing wealth.

Thus these means and instruments had not then reached the giant proportions and stupendous costliness which forbid the worker ever hoping to become possessors of them and so lifting themselves into the class above. Such uprising on the part of individual workers was in the early days of capitalism so common an occurrence as to largely obscure the class struggle, and it is quite conceivable that men could not easily discern a class barrier which was so easily surmounted, or regard as a class apart that circle which was every day being invaded by members of their own class.

Again, there were not such extremes of riches and poverty to impress the incongruity of the wealth distribution on the minds of the victims of a vicious system. The productivity of labour was comparatively low, and for that reason the share taken by the producer and the non-producer respectively was not as glaringly disproportionate as to compel thought.

And still again, the development of the system had not yet reached that level at which it sets the owner of the productive wealth free from any participation in their operation. The rise and development of joint stock companies have had the effect of largely banishing the owners of the means of production from the arena of production. Their personal command over their productive wealth has given place to personal command over their stocks and shares. They are so far removed from production that they cannot possibly be supposed to have a hand in it. But the earlier capitalists, from their closer connection with industrial operations, never appeared to stand in the position of superfluities. Their co-operation seemed to be a necessary part of the productive operation, and therefore the share they took of the product did not appear as surplus-value plundered from the workers, but as wealth which the masters had assisted in producing.

These things prevented the working class from realising that they were the producers of all wealth, that the capitalist class were parasitic, existing upon the robbery of the workers, and that there was an irreconcilable antagonism of interest between the two classes and therefore a class struggle. So the struggle was fought out without any great conscious direction.

But the development of the means and instruments of production, and the consequent and attendant development of the methods of production, have stripped the capitalist system of most of its secrets. Men cannot let go unchallenged for ever a system in which an astounding increase in the productivity of human energy accompanies the appalling poverty of those who carry on production. Men cannot observe without thinking the growing detachment from industry, the heaping wealth and luxury, the increasing idleness and uselessness, of those who own the means whereby they live. Men cannot witness without rising knowledge of the class division, the strengthening of the barrier which shuts them ever more completely out from the circle of luxury, leisure and comfort which increasingly mock their poverty and insecurity and the hopeless futility of all their weary labour. Men cannot see the forces of competition harrying all into combinations and organisations, but always, always, organisations and combinations of masters and men apart, of masters and men opposed — men cannot see without a dawning of light, a conception of the class struggle, a strengthening of class feeling, and the birth and uprising of a new understanding and principle to guide and direct the class struggle. In other words, the development of the capitalist system itself gathers up all the scattered, inarticulate forces fighting a ragged battle which they only half understand, and welds them into a solid army prosecuting an ordered struggle for a clear and definite purpose – the industrial development, in short, makes the Socialist and the Socialist movement.

So the class struggle, as time goes on, assumes a different aspect, in strict correspondence with the changing visage of capitalism. When the capitalist class stood as revolutionaries before the capitalist system, their victory was essential to further progress, and therefore was good for the race in the long run. But immediately they had overthrown the reactionary system of the period and established a new system, that system in its turn, and the class who ruled under it, became reactionary.

And as this reactionary character has become more pronounced, as the system and the class have become a greater clog to progress and more fruitful of social injury, so the character of the class struggle has become more revolutionary. While the fight for the possession of the wealth produced under the system is not less bitterly maintained, the class struggle finds its highest expression in the movement for the overthrow of the capitalist system of society, with its antagonism of interests, and the emancipation of the working class from thraldom.

This, then, is the true meaning of our statement that there exists a class struggle in society. It is a struggle on the one side to maintain and on the other side to abolish a social system.

A. E. Jacomb

Nods to the Blind . . . . (1912)

From the July 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

On the 15th of the present month that famous scientific scheme of exploitation known as the National Insurance Act will come into operation. Most of its objections having been “overcome,” it only remains to apply the “technical adjustments,” then will the much-to-be-envied working class enjoy the fruits of “one of the greatest Socialistic measures that has ever been placed before the House,” as one Labour faker has it.

As to who will ultimately benefit by this “Socialistic” measure, it needs very little analysing to show. It will be the employing class and not the workers. In fact this is admitted, as one will find on reading the daily papers. Here is an instance. At the annual meeting of Messrs. Wilkins, fruit growers and preservers, Tiptree Heath, Essex, held in April, the announcement was made that the firm had decided to pay the whole of the contributions of the workpeople under the National Insurance Act. It was stated that this action would cost the firm £300 a year, but the directors considered they would be well repaid by the increased efficiency of their employees !

Both the I.L.P. and the Labour Party claim credit for having forced this “Socialistic” piece of legislation. If these parties are anxious to take the credit for having helped to impose a fraudulent Act upon the working class, then, I say, by all means let ’em have it !

* * *

At the time of writing these notes the transport workers’ strike is in a very precarious condition. As one followed the various phases one could not help being struck by the pitiful helplessness of the whole thing. The sudden order to “down tools” ; the hasty joining together of forces ; the procession of 100,000 men to demonstrate the “omnipotent power” of the workers ; the impassioned harangues of the “leaders” ; the negotiation that led to nothing ; the intervention of the Government; the stinging rebuff by the masters ; the final surrender of the strike leaders by offering to provide a monetary guarantee of their good behaviour if only they were permitted to return to work: all these go to show the utter futility of the versatile tactics of Tillett & Co. So long as the workers both inside and outside of the unions are led by the nose from one position to another and back again, so long will it spell disaster for them. Having regard to the increasing strength of the employers’ combinations, it follows that the workers will have to take a clearer and more comprehensive view of their position.

* * *

Sir E. Clarke was compelled to admit during the course of the negotiations that, whereas the men had broken agreements on two points—apparently through a misunderstanding—the masters had deliberately broken agreements on five points, and made a profit out of it !

He might have added that the masters will continue to make agreements, and break them as fast as they are made.

* * *

The hostility of the master class is directed against trade unionism, not because of its present ineffective policy, but because of the ultimate possibility of it becoming politically enlightened through the permeation in its ranks of class-conscious, revolutionary Socialism. The master class are already class conscious—that is, conscious of the interest of their class—and they will resist to the utmost any encroachment upon their privileges. Hence their fierce endeavour to crush all attempts at working-class organisation. Such attitude is exemplified in a speech, made by Dr. Harrison, J.P., at Garstang (5.6.12). In dealing with the Transport Workers strike he is reported to have said :

“I would use the police to the utmost limit and if they were not enough I would employ the armed forces of the Crown to shoot down the peaceful picketers like dogs ” !

There is a brutal frankness about it which should not be lost upon the workers. It is not surprising as it is typical of the class whose representative and mouthpiece he is. All the same it is useful in that it helps to point out what the S.P.G.B. has consistently pointed out for years,—that there can be no compromise or conciliation between the two classes—that it is war to the death.

* * *

Replying to Mr. H. G. Wells apropos of his article on “What Labour Wants” (quoted “Daily News” 5.6.12.), Mr. John Ward, MP remarks: “I am bound to say that I have never in all my experience met with any evidence of jealousy on the part of the working classes in reference to the employment (!) of the wealthy. All the elaborate pictures of envy, hatred, and uncharitableness are practically the outcome of the imagination. In their special way the working people get as much pleasure out of life as the wealthier classes.”

Of course they do ! The pleasure is all theirs, John. And believe me, they haven’t a bit of thought for the rich. Look what ingratitude they show when the rich come along and offer to share their profits with them, or take them into partnership. It really isn’t good enough John, and I’m glad you’ve had the courage to speak your mind. Look at the fun they’ve been having just lately—going on strike, fighting inoffensive bobbies, upsetting the equilibrium of trade, in fact, playing the very devil generally. Of course, it’s all a part of their pleasure “in their special way.” When they are not having fun of this description I suppose they are busy with motor-cars, their yachting trips and their racing stables, which they quite overlook the cares and responsibilities that the unfortunate rich are compelled to undergo. You see, John, the question of what to do with their income is such a serious one, they haven’t time to spare a thought for anyone but themselves. Selfishness, of course. But the time is coming, John, when the rich will be relieved of their “employment” and its consequent anxieties and responsibilities, and given a rest. In fact, I believe the need for them will be abolished altogether. So you can console yourself, John, with the thought that their woes will soon be over. I can assure you they’ll get all that’s coming to them.

* * *

An amusing feature of the recent bye-election in the Holmfirth Division was the similarity of the election addresses of the Liberal and the Labour candidates—both standing for practically the same thing. Amusement gives way to disgust, however, when we reflect that the Labour candidate was ostensibly there in the interest of the working class. But experience of this type of political representation only shows that it is the Liberals that they really represent and whose interests they serve.

Some of the items included in the programs were Home Rule, Free Trade, Welsh Disestablishment, no taxes on foodstuffs, Adult Suffrage and Nationalisation of Mines—none of which can affect the worker’s position, except, perhaps, to make it worse.

Unfortunately it is still possible to capture a large portion of the working-class vote by the dissemination of this labour-faking rubbish. Spread the light !

* * *

Owing to the monopoly by about two companies of the petrol supply of this country the price of petrol has risen 50 per cent. in twelve months, with the result that the small dealers and consumers are in a state of “unrest.” Various schemes have been suggested in order to prevent the big robbers from taking too much plunder. The “Autocar” suggests the question of petrol production “is now a matter of national importance and should therefore be undertaken by the nation.” The “Daily Mail” (11.6.12) says : “Even if it meant going into production, refining, transport, and distribution is not the great body of motorists rich enough to do this for its own profit ?”

The chameleon like “Daily Herald” refers to it editorially as “the latest trend towards Socialism,” but to me it seems only to show that when the interests of one section of the buccaneering class are threatened by another, they are prepared to adopt co-operation, nationalisation, or any other proposition providing only that it pays.

* * *

In the biography of the late King Edward by Sir Sidney See, just issued, there occurs the following passage:

“King Edward cannot be credited with the greatness that comes of Statesmanship and makes for the moulding of history. Neither the Constitutional checks on his power nor his discursive tastes and training left him much opportunity for influencing political affairs. No originating faculty can be assigned to him. For the most part he stood with Constitutional correctness aloof from the political arena at home. On questions involving large principles he held no very definite views. He preferred things to remain as they were. … A man of the world he lacked the intellectual equipment of a thinker, and showed on occasion an unwillingness to exert his mental powers.”

Yet this is the person whom Blatchford—on the occasion of his eulogy of King Edward VII. (“Clarion” 20.5.10)—had in mind when he said the nation needed a man !

* * *

At the recent conference of the Church Socialist League at Bristol a delegate defined Socialism as “the economics of God” ! Shade of Marx ! I always did think their policy was of the “Ignis fatuus” order !

Father Bernard Vaughan laments that under Socialism “there wouldn’t be enough money to go round.” The inference, of course, being that under the present beautiful system there is enough to go round. Well, I daresay there is, but it doesn’t go round. It doesn’t get the chance. The robbers are there first. Hence the priests and other parasites.

* * *

F. E. Smith, K.C., in the June number of the “Oxford and Cambridge Review,” bluntly admits that he has never believed that Tariff Reform would remedy present day evils. Neither have we.

Tom Sala

Asked & Answered: Two false statements and a conundrum. (1912)

Letter to the Editors from the July 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

Two false statements and a conundrum.

[To the editor.]

Nottingham, May 21, 1912.

Sir,—Arising out of your reply to my question in the last issue, there is just one point I should be pleased if you will make clear.

In the article entitled “The Socialist and Trade Unionism” the writer clearly shows that the functions of the political and economic organisations are distinct and separate.

Now according to your Declaration of Principles the S.P.G.B. is a purely political party, since the aim is the expropriation of the capitalist class from political power in order to establish Socialism.

I should like to know how by merely taking economic action it constitutes it an economic organisation ?

L. Shearstone.

Reply:

The writer of the article you refer to tried to make clear that the functions of the present economic organisations—the trade unions—and the political organisation of the workers—the Socialist Party—are different. That he failed to make this clear is probably due to the fact that he developed what he calls his “style” by studying a burr-walnut piano case in foggy weather. But try and get the sentence with which we explain his intention well soaked in and fast dyed.

What you say about our Declaration of Principles seems to indicate that you have been studying it in foggy weather, so there’s a pair of you. The aim of the S.P.G.B. is its Object, and its Object is clearly stated above the principles. Do you mind reading it, Mr. Shearstone ? Thank you. Now if, as you seem to think, the character of an organisation is determined by its aim or object, have you still the “neck” to say that a party with such an essentially economic object is a “purely” political party ?

With regard to the question with which you close your communication, you must explain yourself more fully. Since we buried our tame thought-reader we have been rather at a loss in dealing with whydiddles.

Editorial Committee.

Asked & Answered: More questions about our position. (1912)

Letter to the Editors from the July 1912 issue of the Socialist Standard

More questions about our position.

E. J. Higgins (Philadelphia) asks the following questions arising out of our answers to his questions in our May issue.

(1) —“Wherein is the wideness and advantage for revolutionary purposes of the platform of Parliament? Are you assuming that the capitalist Press would publish your speeches?

(Answer.) We know that the Press to-day is carried on for profit and for profit only ; and if anything furthers the sale of their papers they will publish it. We know from past experience how sensational they consider speeches of revolutionists and the prominence they give them, hoping, very often, to frighten the non-Socialist workers by accentuating the “extreme” nature of the speeches published. But if they were to change their tactics and engage in a conspiracy of silence, we should win all the same. The fact that no reference to Socialist members’ speeches appeared would sooner or later raise in the minds of the exploited the question : “Why this silence?” The very silence itself would be eloquent and cause workers to seek for themselves in the proletarian Press the speeches delivered, thus bringing more toilers into our camp. The danger of silence would soon alter our masters’ tactics, though, of course, whichever way they turned they would be but marching toward their graves. In fact, by reporting the speeches delivered in opposition to our members they could not help referring to our point of view.

(2) “Do you hold that the State which so long as the workers are disorganised on the industrial field must fulfil its real function as an engine of repression—do you hold that your ‘advance guard’ will be able to turn an engine of repression into an engine of emancipation? ‘Will the capitalists let you do this?”

(Answer.) The implication that the repressive functions of the State cease with economic organisation is opposed to history and every-day experience. Organise how and to what extent you like and the repression continues. We claim that the political machinery can be used by the toilers to control the armed forces and thereby give the workers power to enter into the ownership of the land, factories, railways, etc. The point as to whether our masters will allow the toilers to do it begs the question of their power to stop it.

The masters depend upon the political power put into their hands by the votes of the workers, and when the flux of time, with its influence upon the toilers’ minds, puts into power the working class through its delegates, then the masters face defeat, for the power over the supplies for and the movements of the armed force passes into the hands of the working class. You may say that the masters ere this will destroy constitutional government, but when they do that they commit suicide. Under the naked despotism and barbaric rule of governments without a Parliament and a Constitution, the smooth working of trade and commerce is impossible. Mexico is a good example of this.

(3) “Is it your opinion that the capitalists are looking for pretexts to make the State fulfil its function as an engine of repression; that they are concerned with our method of expropriating them and will not bother so long as we are doing the expropriating ‘peacefully,’ or as the little pope of the S.L.P. would say, in a ‘civilised manner’ ?”

(Answer.) Socialism can only come by the consent of the working class, that is, at least a majority of them. If we neglect the present institutions and fly off to “violence” we do provide our masters with arguments whereby they can retain the support of our fellows. By showing that we refuse to try the Constitutional means first we are branded as “Terrorists” in the minds of the toilers. Thus the coming of Socialism is retarded. If, on the other hand, we are willing to try political action, then the blame is upon our masters should they attempt to repudiate and destroy their own machinery of government. Not only do they outrage those who sympathise with our aims but all others of our class as well. Hence.—Nemesis !

Adolph Kohn

100 Years of Reforms (1945)

From the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

We are indebted to “The Economist” December 30th, 1944, for the opportunity we are taking of quoting, somewhat more fully than is customary with quotations. The article which appeared in the above issue was called “Condition of the People.” We feel the editor of this shilling weekly (beyond the reading range of the average worker), will not begrudge us the liberty we are taking of so freely quoting from its columns. Our plea, in justification, being to draw attention to their review, their comments.

Now for the quotations with our few brief comments by the way.

“A hundred years ago a young and ardent revolutionary, Friedrich Engels, wrote a book on ‘The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844.’ In the closing days of this year, it seems appropriate to attempt a review, however sketchy, of working class conditions in 1944…..

Indeed, to draw any detailed comparison between conditions in 1844 and 1944 would be a waste of time, since there can be no comparison between two incomparables. When Engels wrote his book the total population of the British Isles was less than 20 millions. People lived and worked under primitive barbarous conditions, herded together like cattle in their tenements, they were illiterate, half starved, filthy and diseased. The only relaxations were liquor, horse play and sex. Typhus and the yellow fever spread through the infested dwellings, but the toll of life was no matter because workers were plentiful and cheap.

“. . . . The infantile mortality rate was as high as 155 per thousand . . the average expectation of life in the labouring class in Liverpool was only 15 years. Not for nothing were the 1840’s known as the hungry forties. . . . There are still dark satanic mills in Lancashire and the West Riding. London still has its East End, Glasgow its Gorbals, and Manchester its Ancoats.”

Just one comment may be made here : —

Despite the amenities of life which the more fortunate workers of our day were able, before the war, to experience compared with a hundred years ago, the war years, notwithstanding their fuller employment and purchasing potentialities, find the workers, nevertheless thwarted in a variety of ways, from enjoying a higher standard of living. A few obvious factors may be mentioned; the rationing and coupon system (restricting purchases to bare necessities), black marketing racketeers, which the Government are incapable of controlling, theirs being an unconventional way of buying and selling, with the profit motive the one and only objective —i.e., Capitalism. The “black market” therefore, rules on the luxury or “extra comforts” line.

On top of all this is the aggravated misery of average home life occasioned by the bomb, black out, plus overcrowding which housing shortage causes.

Astutely, the ruling class have also fostered, on a gigantic scale, “national savings,” thereby encouraging the workers to “deny for the sweet by and by.”

The “Economist” continues : —

“But whatever the improvement in health and nutrition, the problem of the rich and the poor, the inequalities of wealth have not been eliminated. Disraeli’s ‘Two Nations,’ still exist. The most recent estimate of the distribution of property, that of Mr. H. Campion, shows that in 1936, out of a total of 16-17 thousand millions of private property …. approximately 85 per cent. was held by 1.8 million persons, or 7 per cent. of the total adult population. Moreover, three quarters of the adult population possessed less than £100 worth of property and 1.5 per cent. of the adult population had property of £10,000 and over. These estimates show that whatever levelling up at the bottom may have taken place and however the relative share of the middle classes in property may have increased, the property structure of Society has not altered fundamentally. (italics ours).

“Mr. R. Titmuss in his “Birth, Poverty and Wealth,” showed that before the War, the infant mortality rate among middle and professional classes was 33 per 1,000 live births, compared with 77 among unskilled labourers.. The class divisions are even sharper in Education. The calculation that only 2 per cent. of the population go to public schools, yet 57 per cent. of the members of Parliament come from the public schools is a striking illustration of the existence of privilege.”

The “Economist” quoting from “Birth, Poverty and Wealth” ibid :—”unsatisfactory sites of homes and villages, insufficient supplies of water, unsatisfactory provision for drainage, grossly inadequate provision for the removal of refuse, widespread absence of decent sanitary conveniences, the persistence of the unspeakably filthy privy midden in many of the mining areas, gross overcrowding and huddling the sexes together in the congested industrial towns and villages, occupation of one roomed houses by large families, groups of lightless and unventilated houses in the older burghs clotted masses of slums in the great cities.”

As the “Economist” says, “the above is not a passage from Engels, it is an extract from the report of a ‘Royal Commission on Housing in Scotland in 1917’ quoted in the 1944 report of the Scottish. Housing advisory Council, with the comment that: ‘these evils have been only slightly mitigated by housebuilding between the two wars.’

“. . . . 40,500 houses in Scotland still have no independent water closets and no sanitary conveniences of any kind. Conditions in Scottish mining areas, according to the recent report on the Scottish coalfields ‘can only be described as deplorable.’ The facts disclosed by the evacuation survey ‘Our Towns’ in 1943 can only be understood against the demoralising background of slum conditions. Public opinion was understandably appalled at the descriptions, unemotionally related by trained social workers, of the dirty and verminous children ridden with scabies and other skin diseases, with disgusting sleeping and feeding habits, of the negligence and fecklessness of their parents. It showed how ignorance and folly were exploited by all kinds of money lenders, clothing clubs, insurance touts, quack doctors and vendors of patent medicines …. they belong to the ‘submerged tenth’ the ranks of the unemployables and the ‘irreducible minimum.’”

The “Economist” concludes on a note of appeal to authority, the Government, to be progressive in a policy of social reform. The “Economist” puts it like this, to quote again from their article : —

“‘Progress’ said Herbert Spencer, ‘is not an accident? It is, or should be, conscious policy, and that policy should be directed towards raising the level of the lowest paid. . . . The year 1945 which should bring the end of the War, will provide an unparalleled opportunity for progress towards these aims . . . reforms in education, health, housing and social insurance . . . family allowances. . . . Whatsoever Government is returned to power it will be committed to this programme of social reform.”

Concluding and summing up the “Economist” says :—

“But to say that there has been progress since 1844 is not enough, the question is whether the advances in social conditions have been commensurate with technical and scientific progress of the nations productive capacity, and the answer, on all the evidence can only be in the negative.” (italics ours).

The above quotations should be a reminder to the working class in their political struggle for emancipation from Capitalist exploitation. A hundred years of reforms, in which Conservative, Liberal and Labour have played their part in advocating, not forgetting the “revolutionary” reforms of the Communist Party.

The Socialist Party again reminds the working class that so long as the means of life remain the private property of the capitalist ruling class, they must remain enslaved to that class. It is the function of the defenders of private property to advocate and institute reforms, thereby prolonging the privilege of the capitalist and their apologetic professional political decoys. Likewise, it is equally necessary for the working class party, the Socialist Party, to be uncompromisingly hostile to, and independent of all other political parties. Because we are convinced of this truth, we are confident, that the workers will join with us in the task we have in hand. That task is the establishment of Socialism—the common ownership of the means of production and distribution—a revolutionary objective, to avert which capitalism will offer every reform under the sun. For such reasons the Socialist Party need not waste time in their advocacy.

Billy Iles

The Yellow Peril (1945)

From the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Miss Hoare was mentioned in the Daily Express of April 18th, 1945, as a person with quaint ideas. She has lived in Japan for 26 years, including nine months after the war started. This is what she had to say: “The Japanese are a most lovable, courteous and kind people. I was never afraid of them. I loved them and they loved me.” She went on to say that the Westerners have driven the Japanese into war and that before that they were peaceable, self-supporting and content. Historically it is true that Japan used to be isolated from the outside world, but it is not the Western world which now has driven the Japanese into war, it is capitalism. It was owing to the fact that a certain section of the ruling-class of Japan set out upon a programme of capitalist expansion with the object of obtaining cheaper raw materials and access to markets that the Japanese are at war. All war under capitalism is brought about for the same reason whether it is by Japan, Germany, Britain, Russia, or any other up-to-date country.

The workers of Japan, owing to their political ignorance support war in the same way as the workers of other countries support it. Until they understand the working of the present system of society they will continue their support. British fellow workers please note.

Chester.

How They Dealt with the Election Paper Ration (1945)

From the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the House of Commons on the 9th May the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Supply, in answer to a question, said :

“The Government have given instructions that paper …. is to be made available for the General Election at the rate of one ton for each candidate …. the quantity to be increased by one quarter for independent candidates. . . . The headquarters of the established parties will, in addition be allowed paper at the rate of one ton for each candidate run by the party. In the case of the small parties, an additional five tons will be licensed. . . .”—(Official Report, 9th May, 1945).

The party having already decided to run a candidate in Paddington North, an application had been made for additional supplies of paper prior to this date.

On the 22nd May we were informed by the Ministry of Supply that:

“. . . . The allocation for Party Headquarters is restricted to the recognised parties having representatives in the House and the Socialist Party of Great Britain as such is not therefore entitled to any allocation for this purpose. . . .”

In a further letter dated the 29th May, the Ministry of Supply said that if we decided to put up a candidate he would “be entitled to a quota on the basis allowed to Independents. . . .”

It is not the purpose of this article to complain at the treatment meted out to us by the parties of capitalism, who, in possession of governmental power, have always been prepared to use it to suppress wherever possible the views of their opponents. Knowing them, we do not expect them to do otherwise. We do, however, place on record the purposeful ambiguity of the statement in the House of Commons which, when subsequently amplified by the Ministry of Supply, excluded from the ranks of “established” parties an organisation which has been in continuous political existence longer than most of the political parties at present represented in the House of Commons.

The care which the large political parties of capitalism claim to have for democratic institutions becomes a mockery when they use their governmental power to withhold from a minority organisation a large part of the material which they themselves consider to be necessary for the presentation of their own points of view.

Finally we wrote to the Speaker of the House of Commons drawing attention to the facts set out above and received from the Speaker’s secretary, Mr. Ralph Verney, the following negative reply.

“Dear Sir,

The Speaker asks me to acknowledge your letter of the 2nd June.

The Speaker’s responsibility to give opportunity for the expression of the views of a Minority is confined to the House of Commons; he cannot interfere with the decision of a Government Department, such as the Ministry of Supply, as to whether the issue of any particular commodity can be extended.”

Readers of the Socialist Standard will appreciate from the foregoing statement the difficulties under which we labour in making known the Socialist case at this Election.

Executive Committee, S.P.G.B.

By the Way: Women’s Sickness in Wartime (1945)

The By The Way Column from the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Women’s Sickness in Wartime

A committee headed by Mr. S. Wyatt, D.Sc., working under the Industrial Health Research Board of the Medical Research Council, have made a study of certified sickness absence among 20,000 women in industry. They concluded that: —

“Psychological disorders were most frequent and severe among married women with family responsibilities and among those employed since early in the war. . . . Leaves granted every three months to soldiers stationed in Britain eased the strain for some women, and many remarked that they had never had so many holidays, and doubted whether they could carry on without them.”—(Evening Standard, March 16th.)

They may confidently anticipate a very long holiday very shortly. As their trouble, according to the committee, is largely “psychological” (blessed word), they won’t mind themselves, or their soldier husbands, being on the dole.

“Freedom from Want” (40 per cent. Freedom)

Profits of the Dunlop Rubber Co. for 1944 amounted to £2,615,700.

The dividend on Ordinary stock is maintained at 8 per cent. The profit for 1943 was £2,765,797.

Ever-Ready Co. Net profit £588,935. Final ordinary dividend of 25 per cent. again makes 40 per cent.

Pressed Steel Earnings : after £420,000 for tax net profits up from £180,390 to £195,005. Ordinary dividend maintained at 27½ per cent. by final payment of 17½ per cent.—(Glasgow Evening News, May 16th, 1945).

Another Atrocity Camp

Under the heading “Objectors Camp found” the Evening Standard (April 28th), reports as follows : —

“American troops clearing out a pocket near the city of Wewelburg, miles behind the front, discovered a military installation no one dreamed existed in Nazi Germany—a camp for conscientious objectors.

How many people inhabited the camp is still unknown, for only 41 men survived at the time it was discovered. It was operated by S.S. troops, and also served as a concentration camp and crematorium.”

“Single Out—and Destroy”

A document has come into your correspondent’s hands which could not have been adversely commented on two weeks ago (May 17th). It is Montgomery’s letter to all officers and men in 21st Army Group on non-fraternisation.

Apart from repeating the current fairy story that World War II. broke out because the Peace Conference, after World War I., was “soft,” and the troops of the Armies of Occupation in 1919 were simpletons (“many soldiers were adopted in German households”): it goes on “There are Allied organisations whose work it is to single out, separate and destroy the dangerous elements in German life.” This is almost word for word the formula for the Gestapo, the Ovra, in Italy and the Ogpu in Russia. In other words, it is the time-honoured task of that hated institution—the secret, police. Thus the Ogpu was proclaimed “The Flaming Sword of the Revolution, to destroy its enemies.”

The convenient thing for the secret police which are called the “Security Police” in the British Army is, that they very largely decide who is the “dangerous element.” God help any poor devil with a funny nose, cross eye, crippled leg or some other abnormality which makes him conspicuous—as Marx indicated quoting the reports of British correspondents after the crushing of the Commune of Paris, 1871, unless he has wealthy or high-born German friends.

Thus the British Army has removed the “Gestapo”—and replaced it by the “Fiesepo”—Field Security Police.

Horatio.

Figures and Facts (1945)

From the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

“Why cannot we spend as freely for peace as we spend for war?” is the subject of an article by Norman Crump, City Editor of the Sunday Times, which appeared in the Daily Sketch, for May 28th, l945. He has much to say on trade and taxation, amongst it is the following :

“In 1942 people getting not more than £500 a year earned between them £5,200,000,000. Those getting £2,000 a year or more only got in the aggregate £540,000,000, or little more than one-tenth of the money earned by the relatively poor. If the Government wants more money it must go where the money is. The people with moderate incomes have the bulk of the money to-day, and so it is unavoidable that they should have to bear the brunt of such taxation as the Government, whom they return to power thinks fit to impose.”

It is often said that “figures cannot lie.” It is easy to prove that they can, but it is easier still for liars to figure and get away with it. We are not suggesting that Norman Crump is lying, or even that his figures are incorrect. On the contrary, we accept his figures; if anything giving him credit for understatement rather than exaggeration. Impressive, however, as the quotation—and indeed the complete article—reads, we cannot blindly accept the inference he draws from the figures. Let us see how they work out.

£5,200,000,000 contrasted with £540,000,000 gives an impression of a huge difference until we compare the recipients 22,000,000 and 34,000; or until we divide the £5,200,000,000 among the 22,000,000 “workers in factory, mine or farm”; Mr. Crump’s own description of “the people with moderate incomes.” When we find that the average earnings per year are £236, or just over £4 per week. Which provides the recipients with a very meagre living nowadays.

Next Mr. Crump says : “if we are to pay for our needs it is calculated that for every two tons of goods we exported in 1938 we must export three tons after the war. But in order to export we must persuade the rest of the world to buy our goods. And no one will buy them from us if he can buy them more cheaply elsewhere. It follows that excessive taxation would cripple our export trade by making our goods too dear in overseas markets. And if our export trade were crippled we could no longer import all the food and raw-materials which we need.”

Well, the cat is out of the bag and we know the worst. Instead of the new order they were promised the workers get the same old order. The pace being stepped up to increase production one-third over pre-war rate. There is no escaping the logic of Norman Crump’s reasoning. If markets at home, or abroad, are to be secured, our prices must be lower than our competitors. Whether the cheapness is accomplished by modernizing machinery or by speeding up the workers, the latter have to bear the burden. In the first case the new machinery displaces labour, and in the second they are worn out and flung on the scrap heap more rapidly.

That is the way capitalism works. Competition for markets. Producing and selling goods cheaper than the other fellow. It is what the Allied armies have been fighting for: “Our way of life.” What is this “way of life” so many millions have sacrificed so much to preserve for so few to enjoy? A system in which the means of life are owned by a relatively small class of capitalists, and the overwhelming mass of the people, the working-class, are enslaved by them.

We all know how the system works. Competition between workers to obtain and keep jobs, disputes and strikes daily over wages and conditions, wages being clamped down around the cost of living, and unemployment reaching astronomical figures with the almost continuous periods of slump. On top of all this comes the imperative demand that production per man-hour must be increased by one-third, and a hint from Norman Crump that any Government they may elect can do no other than tax their already meagre incomes.

This problem of markets is only part of the whole set-up. This plain talking to the workers that they must work harder and produce more cheaply, merely a piece of impertinence from an idle class to the class that produces wealth in all its forms. War invariably speeds up the pace of capitalist development. New devices and adaptations to the existing machinery of production have been prolific and far-reaching. With their application to peace-time industry many workers will be displaced, and competition for jobs will be keener.

Norman Crump is not the only man to tell the workers that they are in for a hard time. Responsible men of all three political parties have been warning them that there is no soft time coming. Nationalization cannot save them. With the Labour party’s claim that only nationalized industries can attract sufficient capital to make them efficient goes all hope, nursed by the ill-informed, that nationalization is socialism. Efficiency for capitalist industry is the Labour Party’s goal, as it is the goal of the Tories, with their slogan of free enterprise. From the worker’s view-point there is little or nothing to choose between them. The vile things they say about each other are, no doubt, largely true. The good things they say of themselves together with their promises are best ignored. In any case their promises will be forgotten after they are returned. The 1945 election presents the same spectacle of unreality for the workers as any that have preceded it during the capitalist era. The shallow nature of the issues. The utter lack of any deep principles affecting the well-being of the mass of the people, and the complete indifference to indisputable evidence that our way of life is in violent conflict with our environment and the scientifically established laws of social evolution.

During the war leaders have held the centre of the stage. Their foresight and planning for months, and even years ahead have been given the widest publicity, after the event. The ensuing victory being, of course, proof of their judgment and resource.

But the leader’s job in war is quite different to that of the leader in peacetime. Slogans are easily thought out to keep the workers minds on the job. Bait in peacetime confusionist propaganda of a subtle order must be adopted if the workers allegiance to capitalism is to be retained. If his thoughts are to be turned from contemplation of the sordid nature of his existence, and the possibility of establishing a system of society where the means of life will be common property, and he with his fellow workers will be able to plan life for themselves within the limits imposed by nature only. This is going to be a full-time job for the leaders of all capitalist parties. But they are on the losing side, because their ideas, when examined, are empty of realism. Like Norman Crump they can only offer a choice between two forms of capitalist government, neither of which release the workers from wage-slavery; and the liability to military service in defence of capitalist rights.

F. Foan

Parliamentary Fund (1945)

From the July 1945 issue of the Socialist Standard

Your Donations Needed

During the election campaign in North Paddington the Socialist case was made known at a very large number of meetings, indoor and outdoor, and through the printing of election addresses, posters and leaflets. This cost money and our Parliamentary Fund is now depleted. North Paddington was our first Parliamentary venture. It is only a beginning. We shall need money for further elections. Send your donations now to E. Lake, S.P.G.B., Rugby Chambers, 2, Rugby Street, London, W.C.I.