Letter: Wanted — A Prescription For Socialism (1973)

Letter to the Editors from the April 1973 issue of the Socialist Standard

Wanted — A Prescription For Socialism


Dear Sir,

This letter is meant as a complaint — a pretty strong complaint.

I subscribe to the Socialist Standard. I read in the inside front cover the declaration of principles — all very tidy and compact. There is one thing missing, a vital statement of practical policy.

By this, I mean the change that will have to take place from our present day capitalist to the socialist society of the future.

If real socialist power was won in Parliament eventually, what events would we see follow? How would the means of production be converted into the common property of society and how would democratic control by the whole people be enacted? These, I think are vital questions — if Socialism is a viable proposition, then we need to have concrete answers to these fundamental questions. Perhaps one day you will have a little space in the Socialist Standard for them.

R. Ackerman, 

London, E.1.

Reply:

The precise events that would follow the winning of political power by a Socialist working class would be up to them to work out in the light of then existing circumstances. A small number cannot prescribe the future will of the majority; the arrogance of doing so can lead to the all-too-common dictum “This is how it will be — whether you like it or not”. The matter is entirely in the hands of the future Socialist majority. Our practical policy at the moment is to do all we can to hasten the growth of the necessary Socialist majority without whom there can be no Socialism. We can say, however, that the use of political power to convert the means of production into common property and to bring them under the democratic control of the whole people will be done quickly and democratically.

Editorial Committee.

Editorial: The Fruits of "Practical Politics" (1952)

Editorial from the October 1952 issue of the Socialist Standard 

The advocate of Socialism has varied opponents but on one thing they are almost all unanimous, that Socialism is not practical. They will concede that is is a noble conception and attractive but say that it fails to meet the needs of the world we live in today; it does not offer practical solutions to the urgent problems that must be tackled at once. These critics sweep aside as nonsensical the Socialist answer that there are no solutions to these problems short of changing the foundations of human society the world over. Let us then examine two aspects of the work of the "practical men” in this country, first their handling of the housing problem and second their endeavours to save us from war.

When the first world war began the Government and the chief Opposition parties agreed that the only practical thing to do in order to prevent rents from rising rapidly was to control them by Act of Parliament. The motives of those who supported this development were mixed. Some thought of it as a means of protecting the standard of living of the poor, while the Government had in mind principally the desire to discourage all-round strikes for higher wages, because this would interfere with the prosecution of the war. But they all agreed in telling us that it was a fine thing and should be continued, as indeed it has up to the present day though with loopholes and with permitted increases of rent in various circumstances.

They still claim that it was a fine thing; or at least they did until some of the consequences that they had not foreseen began to demand attention. So now a widespread call has been made, with backing in all three main parties, that something must be done. A “Reform” is needed—for the purpose of undoing the problem created by the first reform. For it has been discovered by investigators that almost as fast as new houses are being built old houses are falling to pieces because the rents allowed to the landlords of many rent-controlled houses do not make it worth their while to keep the houses in repair.

The results of an inquiry made by the News Chronicle ”lead to an estimate " that each year 200,000 houses—roughly the same number being built—become obsolete.” (N.C. 26/8/52.)

The local authorities have power (as the result of other social reforms achieved by the “practical men”) of demanding that repairs be carried out. So a new problem has arisen, of the owners of decrepit property finding ways of unloading their worthless property in order to escape liability. The local authorities take over some such properties, carry out the repairs and seek to levy the cost on the owners but are often unable to get "anything like the total amount” (Manchester Guardian 30-8-52).

The Manchester Guardian writer continues:—

“More adroit and less scrupulous owners succeed in conveying their property to men of straw who, for a consideration, will accept ownership of half a tottering terrace. One such, in Manchester, against whom the local authority, in theory, could make a considerable claim as the owner of a number of houses, is an inmate of a social welfare institution."

The same writer records that many of the houses "unfit for habitation” that continue to be inhabited because the occupants have nowhere else to go ” “are owned by small property owners, often the sons or grandsons of thrifty working men brought up to believe that bricks and mortar were a sound investment.”

But although the practical men have discovered that their original scheme has solved nothing and are calling for a new solution, they do not know what to do.

"Obviously,” says the Manchester Guardian, "the extreme dilapidation of much working-class housing in our industrial centres is not to be remedied by an adjustment of rents, still less by the removal of any restriction, which would merely add rack-renting to the burden of squalor and discomfort” And the writer ends his article with the remark: “To raise them would bring a swelling flood of complaints. How, anyway, can one raise the rents of property on which, since it has been condemned, no rent at all is just?”

We may leave the practical men who sought to solve the housing problem under Capitalism to reflect on the folly of their utopianism. Socialists told them, long before, that the housing problem, like the poverty problem in general, is insoluble within the framework of the capitalist system. In particular we would remind supporters of the Labour Party of their stupidity in thinking that you can improve a social system the driving force of which is the making of profit by cutting out the land and housing capitalists’ prospects of making profit.

How sensible is re-armament?

Let us now look at the problem of war. In a speech at Woodford Mr. Churchill congratulated the trade unions on backing re-armament and hoped "that our policy of keeping our re-armament within the bounds of national solvency will also commend itself to sensible men and women throughout the country.” (Times, 8/9/52.)

Here we have our "practical men” again, this time called " sensible.” Just how sensible is re-armament? To those who live in Britain and America and their allied countries it appears to be a sensible proceeding when the population are crying out for more and better food and clothing, not to mention habitable houses to live in, to devote labour and resources to the manufacture of weapons of destruction. Their justification for this odd view is that it has to be done because the Russian Government likewise is devoting fabulous sums to the manufacture of atom bombs, warplanes and all the other terrifying weapons of war.

But in Russia other “practical men"—as like their British counterparts as peas in a pod—are deluding themselves with the same specious argument.

They all (in both camps) admit that it is folly, but plead that it is necessary folly, caused only by the unreasonableness of the governments on the other side of the Iron Curtain. And all of them excuse themselves by saying that they are at all times ready to discuss at the round table “reasonable” proposals for the nations to co-operate.

Here the socialist intervenes once more with some real practicality in the form of facing the facts of the world we live in. The world is a capitalist jungle in which all the nations—for all are capitalist—struggle and arm and fight to preserve themselves from going under. They can do no other. The idea that nations in the capitalist world can co-operate on a friendly basis is purest utopian self-deception. Nations cannot co-operate for all are driven on by competition for markets, materials, strategic frontiers, etc. The only co-operation they can envisage is that induced by fear, the fear that drives them to huddle together in the rival camp.

Again the socialist insists that the only solution is to end the world jungle of Capitalism, but to achieve that it is necessary for the world’s populations to turn their backs on Capitalism and all its ways.

Is this practical? It is the only practicality for the human race. Is it immediately possible? Not until the socialist message has been widely accepted. And in this respect all the countries are in the same plight that the populations in the main fear and dislike the consequences of Capitalism but do not reject Capitalism itself. Mr. Churchill was speaking the truth when he claimed of the Tory and Labour parties that “ four-fifths of both parties agreed on four-fifths of what should be done.” They are still living in the world of make believe of thinking that what should be done is to try and reform Capitalism into something beneficial to the human race.

It is the task of the Socialist Party to win over the working class to the conviction that Capitalism should be ended and Socialism instituted in its place.

Our Practical Policy (1938)

From the July 1938 issue of the Socialist Standard

Readers of the Socialist Standard are far greater in numbers than the membership of the “Socialist Party.” At this time of the year especially, when more meetings are held and more of our literature is sold, the official organ of our Party reaches a still wider circle. The result of this activity reflects itself in wider discussions at our meetings and in the letters we receive from critics.

Now there is one very curious thing about certain of our critics, whether well or ill-acquainted with the Socialist Party’s case. They show as keen a desire to agree with the Party position as they do to disagree with the Party’s exposition of it. A few words in explanation will illustrate the apparently unconscious mental contradiction. Every issue of the “S.S,” includes a statement of our Object and of our Declaration of Principles. The latter, to all but very simple minds, is bound up with , the Object — Socialism. These are a lucid and logical statement of the essential facts about capitalist society, and describe the basic action necessary for its removal and for the establishing of Socialism.

The type of critic referred to often shows some acquaintance with the doctrines and teachings of Socialism to the extent that they will not quarrel with our definition of Socialism nor our Declaration of principles. They will even compliment us on their clarity and will express approval of them —“but” and it is the qualifying ‘‘but” which exposes our critics. In fact, they show that what they agree with is a form of words. They completely fail to interpret the Declaration of Principles in the light of the realities of the modern political world.

What is Policy ?

Consider some of the familiar arguments of our opponents, remembering, too, that they are also the arguments of some professing friends. “The Socialist Party has been in existence for thirty-four years and has done nothing . . .” “After thirty-four years the S.P. has only one candidate for. Parliament . . . ." “The Socialist Party has no policy—has never had a policy.” Like the proverbial Irishman who is “agin the Government,” the obstinate negator offers the same difficulty as trying to get to grips with a shadow. But never let it be said that we evaded the job. We will try to be simple, to avoid phrases, to avoid giving offence by appearing to be clever when really we are merely stating an accurately tested truth. Now: The Socialist Party is organised for Socialism. It has defined Socialism. The definition of our Object, “. . . the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth . . . " appears in every Party publication. The attaining of that Object is the task of the Socialist Party. Logically there could be no other. To achieve this object the Socialist Party must first concentrate upon the making of Socialists. There can be no other policy at this stage, because, simply, there can be no Socialism without first there are Socialists. Nor do our critics who profess to agree with us, "but”— tell us what they consider the policy of a Socialist Party should be. They do not because they cannot or dare not. They cannot because to deny the obvious necessity for the making of Socialists before Socialism can be established would stamp them as being incapable of interpreting the political world with the .weapons of Socialist understanding. They dare not because any alternative policy would reveal its reformist and capitalist character and expose the ignorance of its supporters. Let us not be misunderstood. The making of Socialists is not the end all in Socialist policy. But it is the only policy for the moment. There will come a time when the detailed working out of the necessary steps for the dispossessing of the capitalist class will have to be made. But this will only be practical policy when there are sufficient Socialists for the task. The need for it will, in fact, quite obviously, arise out of the conditions of the time. Just as now the first essentials of Socialist policy, the making of Socialists, arises out of the conditions of the present. Doubtless the working out of a detailed policy for the future, aimed at and showing the step-by-step process by which a Socialist working class would effect the dispossession of the capitalists and the overthrow of their system, would be an interesting task. It would, however, in view of the smallness of the Socialist movement and the fact that the structural administration of capitalism is subject to change, be almost purely academic, and most certainly useless. Even the working out of a tactical policy for pursuing the fight with our opponents in the political field is not even an immediate practicable question because: (1) there can be little struggle with opponents who mostly choose to ignore us and (2) because we have little effective backing from the workers. With regret, but without pessimism, it must be admitted that the immediate task of Socialists is chiefly propagandist, that is to say, explaining and interpreting the events of the capitalist world with Socialist knowledge and understanding. This burden we carry out with all the difficulties of voluntary organisation. We have, therefore, no time for unreal grandiose planning. We are busy working-men who, with Engels, would say: "The man who has something serious to say cannot compete with those who have all day to gossip in.” It is, however, the absence of detailed plans which confuse would-be critics (many who style themselves Socialists) of the Socialist Party.

No plan appears to them to mean no policy.' They are wrong and misled by interested leaders whose positions depend upon producing plausible plans purporting to aim at a short cut to social salvations What is not recognised is the irrefutable fact that the subject social position of the worker is bound up with' the Capitalist social system and will only disappear with capitalism, and that any policy which is not directed to bringing capitalism to an end is useless from the Socialist point of view.

The Day-to-Day Struggle

Almost a term of abuse now is the charge that the Socialist Party does not take part in the “day-to-day struggle.” The charge is, of course, untrue. In relation to our numbers our members are engaged in trade union activity comparable to those in any other political organisation. Some of our members hold official positions in their trade unions. Heavy demands are made on the time of our speakers in visiting trade union branches in order to state the case for the Party. Trade union activity is encouraged to its fullest extent. At all times Socialists enter the struggle on the economic field conscious of its limitations. But more often our critics have in mind the struggle on the political field when they charge us with ignoring “the day-to-day struggle.” In that field the struggle is represented to centre around the struggle for peace, democracy, and so forth. We are represented as having no interest in these things because we refuse to line up with the conglomeration of parties in the Labour Movement which is organising to demand them. It is not understood that the amount of democracy possessed by any section of the workers is the result of its struggles with its own capitalist class and independent of the struggles between sections of the capitalists; that when workers are able to impose peace upon the capitalist world they will have achieved such a degree of understanding that they will be in a position to impose far more than that. There is never peace in the capitalist world, only Socialism can guarantee peace. But let us look at the so-called working-class parties with whom it is assumed we should have some common interests and a common policy.

The Communist Party: It is committed to the policy of advocating the military alliance of Great Britain, France and Russia. This has been interpreted by one British Communist writer (T. A. Jackson) as willingness to defend the British Empire. In France the same policy found its expression in Communist advocacy of a Popular Front, which in reality is a premature anticipation of the war-time need of a coalition of all parties in order to defend French capitalism. Though Maurice Thorez has gone further and has said: 

“ Our policy of the People’s Front was not a transitory or temporary tactic, or an electoral pact, but an application of the fundamental principles of Marxism and Leninism, an alliance that will last between the working class and the middle classes'' (Discussion [Communist monthly], July, 1937).

Imagine a parallel picture applied to England. The Communist Party, the Liberals (including Mr. Lloyd George), and “progressive” Conservatives, like the Communist Party’s new sweetheart, the Duchess of Atholl, all included in a Popular Front which is represented to be an alliance between the working class and the middle classes that will last, and as an application of Marxism!

So far as the Labour Party is concerned its difference with the Communists seems to be that it will not have anything to do with them. But, like the Communist Party, it is committed to "Collective Security.” What that means can be measured by the statement of the Minister of War in the British Government that “Britain would only fight in ? future war with allies, that is to say, within a system of Collective Security.” All that need be said about the I.L.P. is that they are at present attempting to negotiate electoral arrangements with the Labour Party. These “working-class” parties are certainly engaged in the day-to-day struggle— but for the benefit of the capitalist class, not for the working class.

It is sheer self-delusion and a misrepresentation of Socialist principles to suggest that because these parties have their origin in the working-class struggle and screen their reform activities with high-sounding working-class sentiment and what appear to be Socialist phrases and slogans, that Socialists can make common cause with them.

The Socialist attitude on war, as on other major questions, is so fundamentally different from that of these parties that it would be a betrayal of Socialist principles and working-class interests to pretend that there could be any point of contact between them and us which could provide a basis for common policy, and no Socialist has any illusions about it. This position, we know, results in our isolation and prevents us engaging in activity which to masses of workers appears to be in their interests. The plaudits provoked by demagogic appeals to political ignorance and popular sentiment are attractive to the weak and the unstable. For us, for the moment, lies apparent isolation and unpopularity—but independence. The ability to endure it in the face of the attractions of demagogy is a test for real virility.

The Making of Socialists

Spontaneous discontent with capitalism rarely in itself makes a Socialist. Something else is necessary. That something is the assimilation of ideas—Socialist ideas. The extent to which the workers are able to do this depends on many factors, but the chief one is propaganda. In a clear field, without the strains and stresses of capitalist propaganda pulling in the opposite direction, Socialist propaganda would easily win a rapid and decisive victory. Whilst all prophecy is speculative, the facts of history are pertinent. In the earlier days of capitalism capitalist propaganda was brutally anti-Socialist. When the Labour movement came into existence (after two hundred years of capitalism) a gradual change took place. Capitalist propaganda is now more subtle and has learned how to use pseudo-Socialist phraseology to serve capitalist interests. Hitler and Mussolini are excellent examples of the use of this trick. The British capitalist class are able to use the British Labour Party and its doctrines for the same purpose. How far the working class will have to acquire Socialist knowledge to nullify the influence of capitalist propaganda will depend upon how far that propaganda exposes itself. Enough to say that at the moment a worker has to be well grounded to escape that influence. But the capitalist has to be everlastingly on the look-out for new ways of preventing the worker from seeing his social relationship as it really is.

Each new effort on the part of the capitalist class expresses a weakening of its influence. As this goes on it will be easier for the worker to interpret the world in the light of his interests. The stresses and strains of capitalist propaganda will lessen their pull. At a given point the acceptance of Socialist ideas must become more general and consequently develop more rapidly. No one with a knowledge of historical movement would deny the possibility of reaching that historical stage within our lifetime. Those who are Socialists will work for it as tenaciously as the Socialist Party has worked for it for 30 years. We have worked for it, never once betraying Socialist principles nor obscuring the immensity of the task. We have maintained our existence on a voluntary basis and have outlived organisations which had far greater resources in finance and membership. We have never been guilty of fostering disillusionment, like the Communists in 1919, when they prophesied the end of capitalism in Europe in a few months and in America in a few years.

In short, the Socialist Party’s policy is based upon a sound understanding and application of Socialist principles, which expresses itself in the immediate and urgent task of making Socialists.

Harry Waite

The Socialist Forum: Practical politics. (1931)

Letter to the Editors from the May 1931 issue of the Socialist Standard

A reader points to the extraordinary confusion that exists in the minds of the workers, and asks how we propose ever to get them to take a different line from the one they now follow, unless we are prepared to participate actively in the political side of public affairs.

The answer is, that whatever our wishes on the subject may be, we have not the choice which our correspondent assumes is within our reach. He assumes that we can, if we wish, participate in what its defenders call “practical politics,” and at the same time continue with our Socialist propaganda, instead of concentrating on the latter only. But the two things are not compatible. If the sort of “practical” work carried on by the reformist organisations like the Labour Party were to lead anywhere, it would kill all interest in Socialism, and rightly so. The workers would quite well see that if reforms of capitalism can solve their problems, there would be no need to consider the possibility of setting up a different system of society. But this “practical” work does not lead anywhere and solves none of the real problems. That is the strength of our case. Sooner or later, the workers will tire of solutions that do not solve and improvements that do not improve, and will turn to consider something else. As that occurs, the Socialist Party needs above all things that those workers who have formerly opposed us shall know that we never had any part whatever in the work of reforming the capitalist system.

The times they need a-changin’ (2023)

 

From the July 2023 issue of the Socialist Standard

At the recent first public meeting of the newly formed Yorkshire Branch, a Socialist Party speaker presented a well-informed and powerful case against capitalism and for socialism as the only viable alternative for the meeting of all people’s needs.

As a social element the folk trio of which I’m one third played a selection of ‘Celtic’ tunes. As the other two thirds of our group are members of other political parties, Labour and Green, they gave me some insight on the drive home, into the effectiveness of the talk. The Green Party member is from what might be termed the Old Labour tradition. He feels the Labour Party has betrayed its socialist past which is why he joined the Greens. Interestingly, his expressed political views are in many ways similar to those espoused by us.

He is vehement about capitalism being the root of the world’s ills, be that poverty, climate change and related issues. For him it’s not just love of money that’s the root of all evil, but money itself. Unsurprisingly he found himself in virtually complete agreement with all the speaker had to say. However, despite referring to himself, even before the meeting, as a socialist he continues to support the Green Party. While disavowing money he continues to advocate a basic income scheme as a palliative to the difficulties the money system causes. Similarly, he supports environmentalist actions as a response to the climate crisis even though he accepts that capitalism cannot be changed from pursuit of profit with all that entails, to meeting needs.

The reforms enacted by the post-Second World War Labour government remain for him socialist markers that have been, and are still being, undone to some extent by recent Labour policies, and all the more so by pernicious Conservative administrations. This is someone who, despite residual illusions about previous Labour governments, has grasped the socialist case, but cannot take the next step, away from the lure of immediate reforms, the need to feel he is taking action now that might garner electoral support.

The disconnect is a deep-seated disbelief that it is actually possible to motivate people on a world-wide scale to act in concert to profoundly change the way the world is for the common good. For him the principles of the Socialist Party are correct, but in theory only. To stand by them may be principled, but unlikely to be acted on in the foreseeable future. In the meanwhile, and who knows how long that meanwhile may be, what could be done to make life a little better in the present, rather than some unspecified future?

My Labour Party colleague again had no disagreement with the spokesman’s critique of capitalism. Yet, for all its flaws, which he accepts are real, he continues to see Labour as a more benign alternative to the iniquitous Tories, for all the failings of the Starmer leadership. Labour, for him, is the only alternative, in the practical sense, of removing the Tories from office, his primary political objective. It is irrelevant how correct the Socialist Party may be because the party is in no position to actually change anything.

If, very hypothetically, the Socialist Party were to win an overwhelming majority of MPs in a general election, his point is that unless this was repeated simultaneously throughout the world, those MPs would have to compromise to deal with the immediate situation, or stand aside. As that hypothesis is unlikely to be realised, there is no prospect of any realistic change in the foreseeable. There is a disconnect between the analysis of society’s present structure and any impending practical solution.

He felt as if he was being asked, by implication, to not participate come the next election. This, for him, would be tantamount, if it became widespread amongst Labour supporters, to leaving the door to 10 Downing Street wide open for the Tories to stroll through again.

While none of this is novel, it does illustrate an abiding conundrum for socialists. That is, while the case for socialism may well be more widely acceptable than it presently appears, the personal may be a huge block against it becoming a mass movement. A casual conversation is not scientific evidence, but still it seems to me that they expressed views that are commonly articulated. The apparent size of the task overwhelms sustained engagement.

After all, no matter how large or widespread a mass movement becomes, its component parts are individuals, and their personal perspectives, whether profound, petty or both, are significant. The influence of capitalist ideology through mass and social media weighs heavily on personal concerns. There is also the not inconsiderable conservatism of preferring to stick with what is known, however disagreeable some of it is.

Socialists are going to have to find ways of dealing with this. Making the case for socialism is difficult enough as large numbers of people do not come into meaningful contact with socialists or their sources of information. It may well be some factor beyond just the general case for socialism, such as the increasing climate crisis, that begins to focus general thinking to consider and act to bring about profound change. This may especially be so if the main political parties are perceived to be powerless in increasingly urgent circumstances.

While socialism may seem a better alternative to what presently exists, it remains in the view of all too many merely an idea that’s attractive but uncertain, lacking in anything other than the broadest of outlines. For socialists there remains the painstaking prospect of continuing to make the case, the steady erosion of the ideological wall built by capitalism. Because of the public meeting in a South Yorkshire pub, a few more, including my two band mates, have looked over that wall.

They have seen beyond and like the look of the prospect. Now the challenge is to get them to start demolishing that wall so they can take steps beyond it towards a truly democratic society that meets need not greed.

Dave Alton

Editorial: The "Practical" Politicians. (1910)

Editorial from the April 1910 issue of the Socialist Standard

Had the Labour Party intended to show the rank and file of its members how much it is in the hands of the Liberal Party, it could scarcely have shown it better than in its action over the Veto question.

At the General Election all their candidates were desperately anxious to appear as supremely "practical" politicians, and to avoid frightening the voters by standing as representatives of the working class. To occupy the latter position would mean running as Socialists, and laying before the workers the opposition of interests that exists between employer and employed. But such an attitude is denounced by these “Labour leaders ” as “unpractical,’’ “impossible,’’ and in other terms that are found so useful when argument has failed.

Therefore they went before the electorate with such a splendid position that Mr. Snowden said in the "Daily News” (3.2.10):

   “The demand for social reform which the Labour Party's persistent propaganda work has created has expressed itself very considerably at this election by votes given to Liberal candidates even against Labour candidates, because the Liberal Government was believed to stand for all that was immediately practical in the Labour Party’s programme.”

Mr. A. Peters, National Agent of the Labour Party, also said :

  “the questions of the Lords’ Veto and the Budget were almost identical with those of the Liberal Party; or to put the point in another way, it was rather too much to expect ‘the ordinary m in in the street’ to pick out the distinction.”—“Labour Leader,” 4.2.10.

Practical politics up to date! Arrange your programme so that the ordinary voter will be persuaded, by that programme, to vote for your supposed opponents, and you will have won political distinction and a reputation for hard-headedness.

But were they opponents? Curious that opponents should occupy positions so much alike that the voters can see no difference. Like a flash however comes the answer when Parliament meets. A few days before a rumour goes round that, as is usual with the Liberals, their election cry is to be dropped and the “great Lords’ Veto” is to be indefinitely postponed. The chairman of the Labour Party makes a public statement that his party will not be satisfied with such a position. When Parliament meets Asquith confirms the rumour. “What he has said he has not said.” The Irish party kick up a row, and here, apart from the merits of the Veto, the Labour Party could have floored a tactical point by keeping their election pledges and refusing to support the Government. Instead they showed their complete subjection to the Liberal party by supporting Asquith. Not only do they lock up the Government in breaking its pledges, but every Labour Member deliberately broke his own election pledge for the purpose of assisting the Labored party !

Yet the cup is not full. Scarcely has this of the unity of Liberal and “Labour” been given than Asquith, under pressure from the Irish, withdraws, and promises, more or less, to take the Veto before the Budget, and the Labour Party are left wondering how they are to find excuses for their position. Mr. Clynes tries some word-spinning in the “Labour Leader," but even that journal has to admit that “the Labour Party has failed to make the most of one of the most magnificent opportunities history can record."

This on March 4th. On the 7th Ramsay MacDonald moved an amendment on the Army Estimates, regarding wages and conditions of employment in the Government departments. On Tuesday after a long debate Mr. Haldane promised that if anyone said they were not acting up to the spirit of the (Fair Wages) resolution they would refer it to the same tribunal as in the case of contractors. Instead of refusing to take this promise the Labour Party were prepared to withdraw the amendment and leave the Government as free as before. But the Tories forced a division—then fifteen of the “practical” politicians voted for the Government and against their own amendment! Only three voted for it, the rest (including the mover) did not vote!

What farther proof can the most hardened Labourite demand of the asinine stupidity and deliberate treachery of the “practical politicians” of the Labour Party ?

"The Repair Gang" of Capitalism. (1926)

From the September 1926 issue of the Socialist Standard

Travellers in the wilds assure us that a man lost therein without knowledge of woodcraft or special means of ascertaining his position will find himself wandering in. a circle; the word circle is understood in a rather wide sense, the point being that the lost man arrives eventually at his starting point.


The planets likewise move in orbits, and a similar form would appear to characterise all blind, unconscious movements, political ones included. Thus, that outstanding phenomena of modern times, the "Labour” movement, presents almost innumerable instances of parties or sects, returning, after prolonged journeyings in the labyrinth of confusion, to the place of departure.

Take as an example the case of the I.L.P. We have heard a lot from that quarter recently about "Socialism in our time!” Does not this call to mind the early days of that body over thirty years ago? According to its leading lights then, the Social Democratic Federation of the time was not practical and did not present actual living issues to the masses. It was absorbed in revolutionary theorising to the exclusion of a definite line of action. The I.L.P. was going to change all that. It was going to bring Socialism into actual being.

It went about the business by seeking the support of the Trade Unions for candidates run on a programme of reform such as nationalisation of various industries with a living wage for all. So far as getting their candidates elected goes, the I.L.P. have been undoubtedly successful. The Trade Unions have found the money, and the I.L.P. found the men. Over a hundred of the Labour M.P.’s are drawn from its ranks. Yet even on the threshold of political success, with a parliamentary majority at no very distant date dazzling its eyes, disillusion creeps into its ranks.

The experiment in "Labour” Government, carried on with the connivance of the avowed capitalist parties, showed quite a number of the rank and file of the I.L.P. that, so far from leading to Socialism, their leaders had precious little time for even the I.L.P.'s reformists nostrums. Hence these nostrums are trotted out and restated with all the vigour and fervour of fanaticism just as though a new discovery had been made. We have the "practical” I.L.P. once more trying to find a comfortable half-way house between the capitalist Liberalism of its leaders and the vague, sentimental yearnings of its followers for “Socialism.”

No fundamental change in the object and policy of the I.L.P., however, is dreamt of. The simple fact that Socialism can only be established by a Socialist working-class is ignored. The leaders are criticised not because they are leaders, but because, in the eyes of their followers, they are not "good” leaders. The bewildered following look around for other leaders, but do not realise that similar results must follow. All leaders are "good” (i.e., make extravagant promises) so long as they are still on the climb. Their intentions may be benevolent or merely ambitious, but in the long run their actions are determined by the conditions of their existence. These conditions are: capitalist society, and a blind following, which, though dissatisfied therewith, does not understand how to overthrow it.

The policy of capturing the machinery of the Trade Unions while ignoring the necessity for Socialist education of the rank and file of the workers, has led, and can lead, to nothing more than the elevation of a series of "leaders” to office and favour with the master-class. If working-class history is any guide, it is only a matter of time before each little group of "leaders,” as it arises, follows its predecessor along the path to "responsibility” (to the capitalist class) and practical inability to reduce Utopia to a working formula.

A knowledge of the economic laws of capitalist development would prevent the workers indulging in day-dreams about "a living wage,” and would impel them to organise for the abolition of the wages system. The absurdity of attempts at compromise on this point was glaringly exemplified by the "Labour” representatives before the Coal Commission. These champions of nationalisation put forward elaborately worked-out schemes, only to be driven to admit that these same schemes would not solve the "wages-problem” with which the Commission was confronted. In short, the workers have nothing to look forward to under capitalism but intensified exploitation and insecurity.

As Socialists, we are not concerned with the dilemma raised at the I.L.P. Conference by the suggestion that industries not paying a "living wage” should be nationalised first. According to McDonald, this implied the taking-over of bankrupt industries first! The delegates forthwith became involved in a conflict between their devotion to their "ideals” and the necessity of being “practical,” i.e., making a State concern show a profit. It is sufficient to show, however, the essentially capitalist outlook of the I.L.P. As Socialists, we advocate the conversion into common property of all industrial undertakings which are indispensable for the provision of the wants of the workers, and we see no reason why the workers are obliged to pick and choose, in a piecemeal manner, the industries to be dealt with. That process is only necessary to the "Labour” politicians who know that they have no mandate for Socialism, and are thus obliged to frame a programme which will suit the interests of some section or other of the capitalist class.

The I.L.P. has climbed to influence by angling for Liberal votes. Having got them its representatives are necessarily bound to come to terms with the master-class. Any attempt to introduce Socialism with a non-Socialist electorate is foredoomed to failure, and it is only the dupes of the "Left Wing ” that imagine otherwise.

The Communist Party are another bunch who move in circles, and seem proud of it. Twenty years ago, the Social Democratic Party catered for those who delight in combining reformist action with revolutionary phraseology. Then, as now, there were not lacking short-sighted members of the working-class who imagined that they could rally their class round a programme of "immediate demands ”; they never knew quite what to do as a body at election time, but were usually to be found supporting “progressives” of all shades. The S.D.P. became the B.S.P., from which, after the war, the Communist Party sprang. We have witnessed a diverting exhibition of political hysteria on the part of this body, followed by an equally amusing volte face before the cold douche of experience. Now they are back again once more on the old familiar ground of "immediate demands,” plus support of the Labour Party. The "Communist” of to-day is but the Social Democrat of twenty years ago, under another name.

The Socialist Party was formed with a definite revolutionary objective expressed in unswerving tactics. The scientific method as applied by Marx and Engels has been its guide. Hence for us there has been no wandering in circles; no futile attempts to advance before we have accumulated the army for the attack. That we are satisfied with our rate of progress we do not, for one moment, pretend; but we have at least the satisfaction of knowing that if the workers exhibit the signs of confusion, it is not due to our propaganda.

That, at any rate, has been clear and definite. When the workers learn to see in Socialism their only hope, when they realise that it can only be gained by their own efforts in the teeth of the opposition of their masters, then we know that they will march forward as one body, blundering neither to right or left, till their emancipation is achieved.

Eric Boden

Have Socialists a Constructive Policy? (1928)

From the October 1928 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists are accustomed to have the charge levelled at them that their criticism of present-day society is purely destructive.

“What is your constructive programme?" we are plaintively asked when our opponents have tired of carrying on the hopeless defence of their own.

We might answer them very fittingly by the single word, Socialism, and refer them to our definition of the term, which heads our declaration of principles; but this seldom satisfies their insatiable curiosity. They want more details. Strange to say, it rarely occurs to them to press for details when dealing with the champions of the various parties which secure their support.

A few rhetorical flourishes and numerous judicious appeals to sentiments associated with “this glorious Empire," or “the people of this country," as the case may be, are quite sufficient to “bring the house down" at the average Tory, Liberal or “Labour" meeting. It is only the Socialist, apparently, who produces among his audience that state of discomfort which usually accompanies the process of thought; and he frequently piles on the agony by asserting that, apart from Socialism, no programme is worth the support of the working class.

At this point the patience of many workers breaks down altogether and it matters little whether they call themselves Conservatives or Communists, they cannot refrain from contrasting their own “practical" outlook, as they term it, with the “theoretical" vision of the Socialist.

The Socialist, however, does not rely upon his imagination for the evidence against the existing social order. Never in the world's history has any system been so effectively damned by the public utterances of its supporters as has capitalism.

Take, for instance, the following extract from the speech of Mr. Percy Lee, Master Cutler of Sheffield, on the occasion of the opening of the recent Exhibition :—

  You all know that during that period (the War), we became. I suppose, the greatest arsenal in the world. . . . This meant a large increase in our various plants and . . .  it has left us in a much more efficient state so far as manufacture is concerned than we were before. Our only difficulty is to make full use of this increase in plant and obtain fuller employment for the number of men who still remain with us.
   I may say we are at the present time turning out more goods from Sheffield than we ever did before the war . . . during which we lost many of our overseas markets and at the same time we have found since many new competitors who were forced to manufacture for themselves (“Sheffield Telegraph,” 7/7/28).

Here we have it definitely admitted that the world's capacity for production of iron and steel has increased enormously; yet, instead of the producers reaping any benefit thereby, something approaching thirty thousand men are walking the streets of Sheffield looking for a job.

The workers pile up wealth in heaps and then stand and starve while it rots. What do our practical and brainy masters suggest as a solution? Simply that things should remain the same, only more so.

For nearly a generation the Conservative Press has toyed with the notion of Protection under various guises, but has never yet offered any explanation for the mammoth totals of unemployment periodically reported from the U.S.A. The Progressive parties, from the laburnum-hued Liberals to the crimson Communists, pin their faith to some degree of publicly-enforced efficiency; but in whichever direction we turn for evidence that their plans solve their problems it fails to materialise. In Germany, in Australia, in .Russia (despite Liberal, Labour or Communist administrations) the workers are faced with an exactly similar situation so far as wealth production is concerned.

Let the extreme case serve as an example. “In spite of the rapid growth of industry, unemployment has steadily grown," says the Central Council of Trades Unions in Soviet Russia in the pamphlets on the subject published by their Commission for Foreign Relations. The figures given are: January, 1922, 160,000; January, 1924, 1,240,000; January, 1927, 1,310,000.

In that country of “nationalisation without compensation and with workers' control" the worker cannot even control his job and lines up for his “dole" of 16 roubles or 10 roubles a month, according to his category. (Vide above pamphlets.)

The reason is simple. No matter what party administers capitalism the basis of the system remains the same. That basis is the class-ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution. The small class which owns pays to the large class which does not own wages for their services in industry, etc. The large class produces far more than its wages will buy; more, in fact, than even their masters, with all their extravagance, can consume.

This ever-growing surplus chokes the markets, causes plants to lie idle and puts thousands upon the industrial scrap-heap. All kinds of excuses are given to the workers for this state of affairs.

The iron and steel manufacturers tell their employees that the price of coal will not enable them to face foreign competition. It is too high. The coal-owners tell their wage-slaves that they cannot pay a “living wage "; the price of coal is too low! Prior to the strike in 1926 they were told that wages had to come down owing to the bad state of trade. Ever since then they have been told that the bad state of trade is due to the strike. The workers are first overwhelmed by means of the wealth they have produced; then they are told that their plight is due to the fact that they don't like it.

The fact of the matter is that no section of the master-class and no political party which administers or aspires to administer the present system has any solution or can have any solution to the class conflict. The workers suffer poverty because they do not own the means of wealth production.

The only logical remedy for such a state of affairs is that they shall become the owners; but that involves the destruction of existing property rights, the taking away from the master-class of their economic privileges. The Socialist Party is the only party which bases its policy on this objective, which arises by necessity from the class struggle.

We plead guilty, therefore, to being destructive—of capitalism.

As for constructive programmes, society is not an artificial structure like a house or any other building, the details of which have to be planned beforehand. The details of its structure are adjusted in the course of its development.

It is not our task to anticipate the decisions of the men and women of the future upon problems which we can only imagine and cannot definitely foresee. The forerunners of the present capitalist class overthrew feudalism, but they did not and could not map out the development of capitalism in advance. They could only remove the political and economic obstacles to that development. Our position is somewhat similar.

The productive forces of society are held back by an outworn form of property. The human element is divorced from the mechanical element by the fact of the capitalist ownership and control of the latter. Our task is to bring the workers and their tools together again, not merely industrially but legally; not merely for production, but for the enjoyment of their products.

This will provide a new incentive to production, not the profit of the few, but the provision of the means of life for all. That, fellow-workers, is our constructive programme.

Eric Boden