Letter: Achieving Socialism (1977)

Letter to the Editors from the April 1977 issue of the Socialist Standard

Achieving Socialism

I have read the Socialist Standard for seven months now and find it most interesting, and my political sympathies lie with the SPGB. However, there are three points I would like to raise with you.

Firstly, I note that it is the SPGB's aim to establish Socialism by the ballot, not the bullet—Socialism can be achieved by the workers using their vote en masse. You also contend that Socialism must be world-wide. How then do you reconcile these two circumstances—the vast majority of workers do not have the free vote to use, whether they be in China, Africa or India. In this case, surely, Socialism cannot be achieved until the whole population of the world has a free vote to use.

Secondly, you must accept that a basic education is required for the vast majority to understand Socialism and then make it work. However, the large majority of the world is either uneducated or indoctrinated with other ideas.

From these two points I contend that, although Socialism is the best answer for the world, the world is not ready for Socialism because the vast majority of the population is uneducated and does not possess the vote.

Thirdly, you make great issue of the fact that capitalism and Socialism are diametrically opposed to each other—the armed forces, police, government and press are all instruments to ensure the continuance of capitalism. Why then are the SPGB and its companion parties allowed to exist? Surely, as the SPGB is dedicated to the destruction of capitalism, it would be in the interests of the ruling class to abolish all parties opposed to them?

Timothy Eldridge

Welwyn Garden City

Reply:

1. Socialism will be a world-wide system established by a politically conscious majority. We should expect support for it to grow first in the “advanced" industrialized capitalist countries, where the contradictions of capitalism are most glaring and the need to replace it most obvious. Here, in America and most of western Europe for example, political democracy is well-entrenched. This is no accident. Capitalism demands free movement and a free flow of information, and this is the form of political organization which enables it to function most smoothly. The pressure for a democratic state comes from the capitalist class—which then exhorts workers to regard this “freedom” as an end in itself. We can see this from events in Spain and Portugal, and the holding of General Elections in India and Pakistan. A growing Socialist movement will itself have profound effects on the political situation in the world at large. As it gathers pace workers anywhere will be able to see that this is where their interest lies and will organize politically. A working class aware and organized enough to work for Socialism could take the establishment of political democracy in its stride.

2. We agree that political education is necessary before we can get Socialism, and that at the moment most workers are politically ignorant since they believe problems like poverty and unemployment can be solved within capitalism. The main job of the Socialist Party is to combat all the political parties which spread and reinforce this belief. But the case for Socialism is not complicated; it can be understood by anyone of normal intelligence (the majority, by definition). And once again capitalism works in our favour It makes ever more apparent the possibility of an abundance of wealth without being able to make it a reality. Sooner or later this must be understood.

3. The idea of Socialism arises from the material conditions of capitalism, and would continue to exist even if the Socialist Party were formally suppressed. Suppression means difficulties, expense and unpopularity for governments supplying it. Other people than Socialists advocate free speech and would oppose any such move. For our part we recognize that freedom of discussion is necessary for the growth of Socialist ideas and we therefore argue with our opponents rather than trying to silence them. Finally, policemen and soldiers are themselves workers who will not remain immune to Socialist propaganda. But after the capture of political power through the ballot box they will in any case be controlled by the working class through Parliament so that there can be no question of effective resistance to the setting-up of the new society. And when that has been done the coercive forces will cease to exist.

Editors.

Letter: Put baldly (1993)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Editors,

With regard to Dave Perrin’s letter in the September Socialist Standard, at the risk of engaging in pedantry I am bothered by the use of the phrase “the Socialist Party therefore encourages workers to struggle where necessary to establish political democracy under capitalism". Even allowing for the caveats in the preceding comments which make clear our purpose in utilizing this democratic facility (severely flawed though it be from a socialist point of view), to urge workers to put an end to capitalism, it seems to me that the phrase "encourages workers" put baldly this way would indicate that the Socialist Party has this as a definite plank in its policy whereas, of course, as David Perrin himself points out, we are concerned with capitalist political democracy only as a means that can be used to end capitalist society and this must be our clear caveat always.

M. Judd,

Keston, Kent

Reply:

Our policy on this question was reaffirmed at our 1990 Annual Conference: "that the Socialist Party of Great Britain wholeheartedly supports the efforts of workers everywhere to secure democratic rights against the powers of suppression. Whilst we avoid any association with parties or political groups seeking to administer capitalism we emphasise that freedom of movement and expression, the freedom to organise in trade unions, to organise politically and to participate in elections, are of great importance to all workers and are vital to the success of the socialist movement" - Editors.

The Forum: Is the ballot-box a necessity of the present system? (1914)

Letter to the Editors from the July 1914 issue of the Socialist Standard

We have received from a correspondent in Berlin the following query, which we were unable to deal with earlier on account of pressure on our space.

[To the editor.]

Dear Sir,—Will you please answer the follow­ing question in the next number of “S.S.”

In No. 113 “S.S.,” page 35, third column, you criticise the quotation: “If putting a piece of paper into a tin box would effect a revolution, you can bet your boots that the State (i.e., the bosses) wouldn’t supply the box” (“Daily Herald,” 27.11.13), as follows: “Which is quite forgetting the fact that the ballot box is a necessity of the present system, and is provided by the masters as a receptacle for the votes of the working class after they have been kidded into voting for them. When this method no longer suits their purpose they may endeavour to change it.”

Now, (1) if it is a fact that the ballot-box is a necessity, then it must also be a fact that the present system cannot exist without it. (2) The State (i.e., the bosses) therefore, cannot change this method even if it does no longer suit their purpose, or else you are wrong by stating it is a fact that the ballot-box is a necessity of the present system. (3) If again, it be no necessity, has your organisation an alternative to voting?

Sincerely yours,

KROLL.

—————————-

Reply:

The use of the term “necessity ” in a Jottings paragraph must, of course, be taken in a relative sense. While the existence of capitalism without the ballot-box may be conceivable, no evidence of its existence without it has yet been known.

Under the circumstances in which capitalism came into existence, the ballot-box was a necessity for its establishment, and its use and value to the capitalist system grow, rather than diminish, with the development of that system.

The reason for this is clear to the Socialist, or anyone else who has made a fair study of capi­talism. With the increasing complexity and interdependence of the various parts, it becomes more and more imperative to extend the delega­tion of various functions to larger numbers of the working class. This is the more necessary as the capitalists have long ceased to be capable of running capitalism, and have to depend upon the working class to do it.

Every extension of this delegation requires that, sooner or later, an extension of the basis of representation must take place. Hence the con­tinual, if somewhat lop-sided, “democratisation of the franchise ” that is sometimes pushed for­ward by Liberals and sometimes by Tories. The only alternative in front of the capitalist class is chaos. Unable to manage capitalism themselves, they must arrange for the workers to do it or see the system collapse.

Now the more desperate, or stupid, of the capitalist class may attempt to change the ballot-box in the last stages of the struggle, but it will then be too late in itself, while the majority of the class will waver, hesitate, flounder, and—be overwhelmed by the workers.

What Kroll fails to see is that a factor of a system may be forced out of that system—with resultant collapse—and yet be a “necessity” for its smooth continuance. Hence the statement, though brief, was correct in essence. The Ballot is a necessity for the smooth working of capi­talism. Conceivably it could be removed, but only at the cost of the collapse of the system.

The Socialist position is, therefore, obtain control of power through the use of the ballot, because it is the easiest, speediest, and surest way.

ED. COM.

Government by the few for the few (2024)

From the August 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

Manifestos have been published, promises have been made and intentions made opaque by the vagueness that always accompanies the usual mixture of hope, cynicism and downright duplicity displayed by establishment politicians. We can now all sit back and await the inevitable failures, betrayals and hypocrisy of a new government.

This is not a statement of cynical bitterness or even one resulting from the betrayed hopes of the past but merely a recognition of what the state (of which the government is merely the executive) was created for and how it has evolved. We are always told at election time that the people have the power to create political change by voting for one political party or another – this lies at the heart of the claim that ours is a ‘democratic’ country. Many believe the last 14 years of Tory rule has been a failure but the rich have become richer, the state has become ever more powerful and the Washington oligarchs couldn’t be more pleased with the government’s subservience to their imperial needs. From a ruling class perspective the Tories have delivered everything they desired.

Of course, there have been the odd ideologues who actually believe the propaganda and seek some kind of radical right-wing changes (Braverman, Truss, Patel etc.) who have rocked the boat but they have been seen off and it was business as usual. These individuals, together with their left-wing counterparts like Corbyn, Galloway and Abbott, really seem to believe that government action can improve people’s lives. Perhaps a reality check is timely for those idealists and for anyone who still believes that a government can be a vehicle for the profound change that our society so desperately needs.

The origin of parliament

The relationship between the King and his barons had, since medieval times, been a tense struggle for money and power. On many occasions actual wars broke out, and there were subsequent attempts to reach a settlement between the King and his court and the barons and their private armies, of which the most famous were a series called Magna Carta. The King was obliged to call on the advice of the kingdom’s magnates before raising taxes or going to war etc. This is the origin of governance through parliament.

As the nation-state became increasingly centralised during the Tudor period the financial system grew ever more complex requiring a specialism that was quite alien to most aristocrats. The ‘House of Commons’ became ever more important as it consisted of those who knew how to exploit the labour force for profit and so contributed the lion’s share of taxable revenue. This evolution was accelerated by the political revolution of 1642 and subsequently, despite an attempted counter revolution by the King in 1688, the capitalist class through their representatives in parliament became the dominant political and economic power. However, the purpose of the government did not change as its primary purpose remained to serve the economic needs of another tiny parasitic class.

Governments and the states they control have never existed to serve the needs of the people as a whole but only to preserve the wealth and power of parasitic elites. The first rule of any parliament is: thou shall not over-burden the wealthy with taxes, and so the running of the nation’s infrastructure is always accomplished with the least expenditure possible. The second rule is to ensure that no laws should be passed that in any way impede profitability, and so ensure that those who create wealth never have direct access to it, but only through a system of rationing called wages and salaries. Despite this, many political idealists continue to believe that social improvement is possible using the state and its government. But why this political illusion and the normalisation of this political lie?

Republicans ancient and modern

The capitalist class’s need to legitimise their form of government has a long history. Many ‘gentlemen’ historians of the past, and some even today, look back to the likes of Cicero as a hero of republican virtues, struggling against malign populists and demagogues like Catiline and Julius Caesar. He allegedly stood for constitutional values and anti-tyranny, but this overlooks his involvement with the murder squads that were sent out by the Senate to destroy anyone who spoke of reforming the system to benefit the people. His hands were drenched with the blood of those who challenged the oligarchs in control of a Senate (government) that ensured their continual accumulation of wealth and power.

There is no evidence that Catiline or Caesar ever intended to destroy Rome and we have only Cicero’s words to that effect. Of course he never mentioned the class interests that he served and all his rhetoric about the ‘Republic’ merely obscured his real motive to preserve the power and economic interests of the patrician elite. All reformers were demonised as wreckers of society – sound familiar?

Any governments who call themselves republics are essentially the same as their ancient counterparts. They believe in an elite that are entitled to rule through tradition and, usually, inherited wealth. Although the UK calls itself a constitutional monarchy it is, in fact, no different from the capitalist republics described above – the monarch is one of the wealthiest capitalists of them all. So the tradition for all capitalist governments is to talk continuously about democracy whilst ensuring its impossibility. But the gloomy gothic corridors of power within Westminster are not the only, or even the most important, centre of political power.

Since the Second World War the ruling class of this country have aligned themselves with the interests of the Washington oligarchs and so become willing subjects of US imperialism. No UK ‘foreign policy’ is decided without consulting this military empire (aka NATO). Even after Brexit, the EU together with the WTO and the World Bank have a significant impact on what Westminster can do economically, and this leads us to another great power on the global stage, the multi-national corporations. Their lobbying of governments is unceasing and connections with politicians, corrupt or otherwise, is undeniable. Many of the same individuals are involved in these organisations which can deservedly be called ‘the establishment’. They all share a common interest in defending their trade-routes, market share, cheap labour, natural resources etc. from the other capitalist cabals of Russia and China. But all of them are subject to the ultimate power of the anarchic fluctuations of capitalist economics which none of them, it would seem, have much understanding of.

The excuse of the recent Tory government for its manifest failures were the COVID pandemic and the war in Ukraine – both of which might have been predicted but would anyway have been ignored by the overriding necessity for economic ‘growth’ and bigger profits. Given all this one is tempted to ask, what is the point of national governments? The oligarchs of ancient Rome, like Cicero and Cato, could tell you why – to preserve the illusion of national/tribal communal interest and deny class division so as to exclude the majority from power.

Starmer is no different from his war-mongering predecessor Blair and will do anything to placate the power of the ‘establishment’. Like Cicero he will claim to be a protector of legitimacy and justice but will be infinitely flexible when he is required to excuse genocide in Gaza or persecute the sick and the unemployed. Remember, the parasites and their defenders like the Labour Party depend on the masses of workers to produce the means and wealth for their own continued exploitation. The real historical power belongs to us workers and we must turn away from these hypocrites, liars and fools and take responsibility for this world into our own hands.

Wez.

Elections worldwide (2024)

From the July 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

Elections are not just happening in the UK this year: around the world there have been national elections in South Africa, Bangladesh, Mexico, Taiwan, Indonesia and Pakistan already. The United States is due to have an election in November. There have even been elections in Russia and Iran and European Parliamentary elections. There may be more, but what is certain, is that a majority of the human species will vote in national-level elections at some point in this year.

This is something worth taking on board: particularly for ourselves as socialists who maintain that a worldwide revolution is possible. It becomes conceivable that in one particular year, socialist movements could win elections not just in a preponderance of states, but with a majority of the species on the planet.

This is the first time in recorded history that so many people will be engaged in this way, and the likelihood is that such occurrences will become more common. Yet, despite the spread of democracy, we still see the overall rule by a minority. The capitalist class holds sway both within and between states. The evidence is that democracy is a form of government that supports and promotes minority rule.

The first factor to take into account is the very division of the world into nation states. Many electrons have been sacrificed in recent stories about Georgia’s new Foreign Agents law (widely seen as a pro-Russian imposition to cut out western NGOs and other bodies). Yet, the UK has recently passed a similar law which makes it an offence to work as an agent of a foreign government. As it is worded, it’s not entirely inconceivable that were a part of the World Socialist Movement to win an election anywhere in the world, it could lead to our members being proscribed (as we would be acting as part of a single worldwide organisation).

On top of that is the process that can be most easily demonstrated in Russia and Iran. In both countries, great steps are taken to restrict who is able to stand, with candidates being vetted by an electoral commission. Whilst in the abstract, this could lead to protest votes being cast for smaller parties (since there are multiple candidates in the elections) the bombardment of propaganda is one-sided so people feel there is no point to voting against the incumbent (or, in many cases, will be persuaded that he is the best candidate).

In Iran, this results in very low turn-outs, down to 40 percent. In Russia, there are suggestions that the vote is inflated by outright ballot fraud and box stuffing (there are no independent observers in Russia, so it’s hard to say).

This process still happens in the ‘open’ democracies in some ways, where the barriers to standing are financial, time availability and co-ordination. Concentration of wealth gives the capitalist class minority the head start in being able to organise around winning elections.

Counting the ballots is a vulnerable point in electoral politics, hence why Donald Trump has been able to maintain his claims of voter fraud. This technique was pioneered in Kenyan Presidential elections, and works by filling the airwaves with claims of cheating, backed up by having enough energised supporters to mean the claims cannot be easily ignored. Clearly, this approach is backed up by clever psychological studies of group behaviour. All over the world, skilled professionals are paid precisely to game any election rules to try and support one faction over another.

Even where such blatant fixes aren’t in place, the whole structure of representative elections is actually stacked towards minority rule. In practice, parliaments and legislatures only ever have one vote: who is the government? Handing power to an individual executive in practice creates an elected monarch. The so-called division of power much vaunted by liberal doctrine simply frees up the executive branch to behave as it wants, with parliaments being oversight committees on the activity of the executive.

That is not to say they have no influence. Parliaments can threaten to obstruct the executive and rob it of authority. Indeed, this is a way in which minority politics operate, since it is in the interest of parliamentarians to form minority factions which threaten the overall majority, and quietly exact policies from the executive in return for their continued loyalty.

Likewise, the existence of the executive allows for a band of courtiers who jockey for position and patronage: they have privileged access to information (especially timings of announcements) and the ability to co-ordinate easily because their numbers are small and they are personally known to one another. They can offer each other jobs and opportunities to make contacts.

Here again, the inequality of wealth rears its head. The small number of courtiers can themselves be courted, and if not outright bribed, they can be made aware of the revolving door between politics and business: comfortable sinecures await those who prove sufficiently pliant to business interests. If they all move in the same circles, they form a common way of looking at the world which means they do what is needed without even having to be asked.

Informal networks and factionalising are almost inherent to human society and cannot be eliminated, but the more open and diffuse the decision structures are, the less these traits can have an effect on the outcomes of decisions. The fact that the billions who vote are in effect insulated from the day to day decisions by the election of intermediaries in parliament simply exacerbates the opportunities for scheming and domination.

Election and delegation of defined functions would continue to be an essential part of running a society based on common ownership, as would (indeed) some representative bodies. The abolition of concentrated private wealth and the active participation of the billions in ensuring that as many decisions are taken as closely as possible to the public gaze means that we can look to transforming the current means of deception and fraud into a means of liberation and effective administration for us all.

Pik Smeet

Organization and Socialism (1976)

From the June 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

Since the nineteenth century the capitalist world has been swamped with organizations. Political parties, trade unions, religious sects and nationalist groups have gained mass membership or support. All these organizations have been expressions of conflict, dissatisfaction or grievances among sections of the population. Trade unions were formed to try to safeguard the interests of groups of workers against pressure on wages by the employers. As capitalism brought under its sway more and more of the population, so did the belief spread among these workers that organizations like trade unions were necessary to protect their interests. Consequently these organizations grew, both in number and support.

But the workers were wrong in believing that these organizations could solve their problems. Because the organizations were based on attempts to solve economic problems only within the existing capitalist system, they took on the character of that social system. They lost democratic intentions which existed at their origin and became bureaucratic. Leaders arose to control them. Workers found that they had to accept organizational structures which reflected the class society they lived in.

In Germany, the Social Democratic Party gradually dropped the pretensions which a small number of members had for changing society. It adopted the objectives of the German trade unions, which were to gain immediate benefits for their working-class supporters within the capitalist system. The consequence of this was that the class nature of capitalism with its division of society into capital and wage-labour, owners and producers, leaders and led, was reflected in the structure of the Social Democratic Party. A large bureaucracy arose to control the organization.

Some theorists, like Michels in his work Political Parties have seen this development as an inevitable result of organization. But in arriving at this view he neglected the type of society in which the organizations have arisen. He saw their structure as reflecting the nature of man rather than the nature of the particular society. In looking at them without accounting for either the capitalist basis of society or the reformist objectives which the organizations had, he neglected those factors which determine their fundamental structure.

Many organizations have complained of apathy among the working class. Attendance at meetings of trade unions, political parties and other organizations has declined; “Leftists” and other reformists have declared that the lack of interest displays a lack of political consciousness among people. But all it shows is the absence of understanding. “Leftists” look to the odd clauses in the manifestos of reformist parties, like the Labour Party, to try and show that these parties are not reformist but have socialist origins. They fail to see that the original role of the organizations, and one they maintain, was as an expression of the wish for reforms of capitalism. They fail to see that the leadership nature of organizations was and is a reflection of these reformist aims.

What a decline in active involvement in these organizations shows is that numbers of the working class no longer believe that devoting their time to participation in reformism is worth while. Socialists agree with them. We have always advised the working class that involvement with these organizations can never solve the basic problems of society. At most, trade unions make gains which can quickly be eroded by developments like inflation. The reforms which political parties implement are introduced largely to facilitate the further development of capitalism. Even the National Health Service, that “sacred cow” of the Labour Party, has primarily served to ensure that the illnesses which workers have do not result in an excessive loss of labour-power from productive employment.

Socialists say that in the light of the failure of these organizations to solve the fundamental problems facing the working class, people should now take a further step and put an end to the capitalist system, which has been the cause of their problems throughout the period of mass organization. The Socialist Party of Great Britain has continuously and consistently put forward that those problems can only be solved by the establishment of Socialism. Throughout the SPGB’s existence it has opposed all other political organizations because it recognizes that the aims of these organizations were limited to obtaining reforms within capitalism. But unlike other organizations, the members of the SPGB do not see the political party and its structure as being maintained within a Socialist society. It exists solely to work for Socialism among the working class in order that they themselves can abolish capitalism. Consequently the organizational structures which reflect the class basis of capitalism will not be transferred to Socialism. Because it means that everybody will own and control the means of production, instead of a minority as in capitalism, the democratic structure of Socialism will reflect the very different purpose of the society. This is the aim of fulfilling human needs, as opposed to the aim of capitalism, which is to produce profits for a minority of the population.

M. D.

Not so democratic (2024)

Book Review from the June 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism. By Martin Wolf. Penguin £12.99.

The basic argument here is that market capitalism and liberal democracy belong together, albeit in a difficult relationship. Both supposedly involve equality of status: the right of people to a voice in public affairs and to buy and sell what they own. Market capitalism drove economic growth, we are told, and led to pressures for ‘universal suffrage democracy’. But in recent decades increasing inequality and personal insecurity mean that democracy has become fragile and been partly replaced by ‘demagogic autocracy’, as populism becomes more influential. Yet both democracy and capitalism can be renewed, resulting in a bright future again.

There is a great deal of useful information here, and Wolf sometimes reveals the true nature of capitalism. For instance, between 1980 and 2016, ‘the real incomes of the global top thousandth rose by 235 percent’, while real incomes have been stagnant for large parts of the population. Most people are just ‘one disaster away from ruin’, with very little by way of savings. Companies ‘possess enormous economic and political power’, and there is a ‘huge imbalance of power between footloose corporations and local workers’: this last refers specifically to multinational companies moving jobs abroad, but in fact applies far more widely.

The rise of the market economy is said to have led to pressures for election-based democracy. But there is nothing about ruling-class resistance, with no reference to Peterloo, Chartism or the suffragettes, for instance. Universal suffrage arrived fairly late, first in New Zealand in 1893, in the UK in 1928 and the US only in 1965. The valid point is made that democracy is a continuum, not an either–or matter, but it implies more than just the ability to vote, and capitalism has an inherent imbalance of power between the owning class and the working class. And has market capitalism (with competition and private economic initiative) really been the predominant version of capitalism over the long term? Wars were fought to open markets in other countries to Western trade, and slavery played a crucial role, as did protectionism. There was supposedly an era of ‘mixed economy’ from the 1950s to 1970s, which changed to free markets from the 1980s (with a concomitant increase in inequality, as noted above), but in reality the state always interferes in some way, in defence of the interests of the ruling class.

Unfortunately, Wolf has no idea about alternative systems. He thinks that socialism means state control over the economy, and the idea of degrowth is dismissed with little argument, since it could only be implemented by a global dictatorship and would supposedly mean reversing centuries of human history. His solution is to use ‘piecemeal social engineering’ to achieve aims such as a rising and sustainable standard of living, equality of opportunity, and the ending of special privileges for the few. But of course the last of these would not mean an end to the wealth, power and influence of the one percent, as the power of the capitalist class is built into all varieties of capitalism, a system that can never be truly democratic.

Paul Bennett

How democratic is ‘Democracy’? (2024)

From the February 2024 issue of the Socialist Standard

Writing in his 1946 essay, Politics and the English Language, George Orwell made the following remark about democracy:

‘In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of régime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning’.

As Orwell noted 78 years ago, democracy is felt to be a political system that is good, and therefore when people wish to imply that a political system is good, they call it democratic. The question of democracy, however, like all political buzzwords, is in need of detailed and sober scrutiny by socialists, both for its connection with the capitalist society of today, and with the future socialist society to which we aspire.

Democracy in context

In considering democracy, we must be clear not to confuse fact and fiction. The ideas of the age do not represent reality, but are just that: illusions we tell ourselves (or are told about ourselves by others). As Marx and Engels cautioned in The German Ideology, we must not allow the ‘idea’ to become the ‘active force, which controls and determines [our] practices’. In this sense, socialists do not believe in democracy in the same way we do not believe in god.

In speaking of democracy we are thus talking not about a philosophical ideal, a utopian vision towards which we should be constantly striving, but an actual system existing in reality. It is not the job of socialists to perfect ideas, but to critique ruthlessly all that exists.

Democracy is often said to have originated with the Ancient Greeks. Certainly ideas of voting and the consent of the governed have existed throughout history. However, we must remember that for most of its history, democracy in the form of voting has been merely a method of sharing power between members of the ruling class. Ancient Greece was the democracy of slaveholders, and the English Parliament was the democracy of landlords.

It was not until 1832 that the vote in Britain began to be extended – rising from 1 percent of the population to 7 percent. Universal suffrage was not achieved until 1928, after a political conflict lasting over a century to fully extend the vote to working-class men and women. In America, blacks were excluded from voting until the 1960s under Jim Crow laws. Swiss women did not gain the right to vote in federal elections until 1971.

For most of its history, therefore, democratic forms of government have gone hand in hand with highly repressive and authoritarian political systems, in which the majority of the population have been prevented from voting even under republics and parliamentary governments.

How democratic is democracy?

The current form of democracy – liberal democracy – is based upon an idea of a separation between the private sphere and the public sphere. The public sphere is the realm of politics, civil rights, law-making; the private sphere is that of economic transactions between free individuals. At the risk of oversimplifying, we may say that Enlightenment philosophers such as Thomas Paine and John Locke saw a free society of individuals based on mutual agreement as the natural state of humanity. To them, the public sphere of states and laws was a necessary mechanism where people surrender some of their natural freedom to join forces and protect themselves and their property by mutually submitting to a central authority, namely a government.

This idea lies at the heart of modern democracy: the bills of rights and written constitutions that exist in almost every country on the planet, limiting (at least in principle) the powers of governments, flow directly from this philosophical idea that Private individualism is good and natural whereas Public collectivism is at best a necessary evil.

What liberal democracy fails to address, however, is the power individuals hold over each other. Individuals do not exist freely in relation to each other on a level playing field; even without the presence of a state, inequality and injustice would still exist in any society where ownership and control over resources is limited to a single class. Under a class-divided system, freedom in practice means the freedom of ‘man to exploit man’. The ‘rights’ to own property and make contracts protected by constitutions mean, in practice, the right of the capitalist class to hold us hostage to their economic power. Marx wrote at length on this dichotomy between liberal democracy’s promise of freedom and its reality of class exploitation, for instance in On the Jewish Question:

‘Practical need, egoism, is the principle of civil society and shows itself […] as soon as civil society gives complete birth out of itself to the political state. The god of practical need and personal self-interest is money’.

Under capitalism, political democracy provides the fig-leaf of economic dictatorship.

Something worth fighting for?

Socialists look to the ballot as providing a secure way forward for the transformation of society and the dissolution of class distinctions. At the same time, however, we must not shy away from the uncomfortable realisation that democracy does not mean freedom. Far from it, the history of democracy shows that it is not only compatible with, but comfortably well-suited to, sustaining class dictatorship.

As the German Social Democrat legal scholar, Hermann Heller wrote in 1928:

‘Through financial domination of party, press, film, and literature, through social influence over schools and universities, [the rulers] are able, without using direct corruption, to influence the bureaucratic and electoral apparatus in such a consummate fashion that they preserve every democratic form while achieving a dictatorship of content.’

Herman Heller died five years later in exile in Madrid. The Weimar Republic in Germany was overthrown by the Nazis, with the backing of Junker landowners and the big industrial bourgeoisie. Before all else, the Nazis ruthlessly suppressed the leftist SPD and the KPD; arresting their politicians, closing down the left-wing press, and ransacking the offices of trade unions.

Since the invention of universal suffrage, every person has one vote, and each vote is counted once. This does not mean that all votes are equal. The capitalist class own the media, the movie studios, the printing presses, and they sponsor the universities and research institutes. They have far easier access to scholastic qualifications and government jobs, and unlimited publicity through advertising, pop culture, and news media to reinforce the sanctity of the capitalist mode of production. As Marx and Engels outlined in The German Ideology:

‘The class which has the means of material production at its disposal, has control at the same time over the means of mental production, so that thereby, generally speaking, the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are subject to it’.

There are no easy answers to how socialists should navigate past these obstacles. However, in grappling with difficult questions of democracy and class conflict, we must remember what is at stake. On the one hand stands a ruling class which history shows to be violent, amoral, and ruthless. On the other stands the mass of the world’s population, robbed of the value they create by this class, and living in or just above destitution, and ultimately, it is to end this that we fight. Not for the democracy of the ruling class, but for a socialist world free of exploitation and the violence its maintenance necessitates.

Uther Naysmith

Capitalism and the Illusion of Freedom (1995)

From the December 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard

The right to vote may be taken for granted by many workers today but it should never be forgotten that we had to struggle for it in the past

In Britain ideas concerning freedom, liberty and democracy can be traced all back to the 17th century. Between the 1640s and 1688 the propertied classes struggled to free themselves from the economic constraints imposed upon them by an absolutist monarchy.

The English Civil War was a class war and despite the rhetoric of the leaders of the parliamentary army that they were fighting for the liberty of the individual against an unjust government their major purpose was to establish a measure of self-government for the propertied classes. It was the men of property who gained new freedoms in the 17th century . Christopher Hill states what these freedoms were and who most of them were at the expense of:

“The men of property won freedom freedom from arbitrary taxation and arbitrary arrest, freedom from religious prosecution, freedom to control the destinies of their country through their elected representatives, freedom to buy and sell. They also won freedom to evict copyholders and cottagers, to tyrannise over their villages, to hire unprotected labour in the open market ” (The Century of Restoration 1603-1714, p. 265).

The mass of the population failed to make any gains either political or economic. The Duke of Albermarle is quoted as saying that “the poorer and meaner people have not interest in the commonweal but the use of breath".

The capitalist class, their representatives and spokesmen in the 17th and 18th centuries at least made no pretence of applying liberty, freedom and the right to elect governments to the mass of the population. These rights were restricted to property-owners and a conscious link was recognised between property and the role of government. John Locke, for example, argued that the executive would forfeit its rights if it endangered the stability of property, for its very existence rested on its role to maintain property.

Glorious for some

The reforming political grouping of the late 17th and early 18th centuries was the Whigs, in opposition to the Tory ideology which argued for a monarchy standing above the law. The Whigs wanted government under the Rule of Law by a parliament consisting of Monarchy, Lords and Commons. They were not democrats and did not advocate political democracy for the mass of the population.

After the so-called “Glorious Revolution” of 1688, and the receding of the threat of an absolutist monarchy, the Whigs became less reforming. When confronted by the idea of an extension of the political franchise to the so-called lower classes the Whigs were quite clear as to who they considered had the right to decide on who formed die government: those who owned freehold property. Thus one Whig argued: “It is owned that all governments are made by man and ought to be made by those men who are owners of the territory over which the government extends. It must likewise be confessed that the FREEHOLDERS of England are the owners of the English territory, and therefore have a natural right to erect what government they please ” (Quoted in H.T. Dickinson, Liberty and Property, pp. 86- 90).

By the late 18th century', and following the French Revolution, the property-owning class showed what they thought of democratic movements. Both inside and outside parliament many favoured the imposition of repressive measures to prevent the spread of radical ideas. Several showed their contempt for ideas concerning the sovereignty of the people. Edmund Burke argued:

“The sovereignty of the people was the most false, wicked, and mischievous doctrine that ever could be preached to them . . .  The moment that equality and the sovereignty of the people was adopted as the rule of government, property would be at an end, and religion, morality and law, which grew out of property would fall with it."

The useful majority in society had a long time to wait before their struggle for democratic rights would make some progress. Until 1867 in fact, when the Reform Act added 400,000 borough voters nearly doubling the borough franchise (but women, paupers and farm labourers were still denied the vote).

Safe to extend the vote

The question is why was it at this point that the franchise was extended to a large section of the working class? The early part of the 19th century had seen militant working class agitation both industrially and politically. This period saw the Luddite risings and mass demonstrations seeking political reform, including the famous Peterloo massacre of 1819. Following several unsuccessful strikes by various groups of workers in the 1820s the idea of general unions also began to gain ground.

The failure of the 1832 Reform Act to give the working class the vote added further momentum to ideas about general militant industrial organisation. This movement culminated with the formation in 1834 of the Grand National Consolidated Trades Union. For Bronterre O’Brien the aim of general unions was to bring about: 

"an entire change in society—a change amounting to a complete subversion of the existing order of the world. The working classes aspire to be at the top instead of at the bottom of society—or rather that there should be no top or bottom at all."

The 1830s also saw the development of the largest and most important working class political movement up till then. Chartism. However the defeat of Chartism in the 1840s signalled the incorporation of militant organisation into the mainstream labour movement which was itself being integrated into capitalist society.

Thus the 1850s saw the development of the so-called “New Model Unions”, more centralised, bureaucratic and more eager to protect their funds than to engage in militant action. By the 1860s the leaders of several of these trade unions had set themselves up at the head of the movement. This group, known as the “Junta”, sought acceptance for the trade unions into the capitalist order. In 1862 they formed the Manhood Suffrage and Vote by Ballot Association declaring: 

“Let our advocacy be firm, intelligent and persistent, not a sowing of the seeds of discord, but a promotion of the growth of union; not an exciting of class against class; but an endeavour to extend the welfare of all."

Therefore by 1867 the extension of the franchise to sections of the working class was no longer fraught with danger. In fact with fresh agitation breaking out in 1866 for parliamentary reform many members of the ruling class felt that denying the working class the franchise was providing workers with an issue to unite around. A further consideration was that granting the franchise to a section only of the working class would divide and weaken them.

Real democracy

Political democracy and the law developed from the seventeenth century according to the needs of a property and developing market economy. In other words, they developed in line with the interests of the property-owning class and had nothing to do with anything like the moral superiority of democracy over dictatorship.

The extension of the vote to the working class was not “given” but was won by years of struggle. It was conceded, even if only partially, only at a point when it would probably have been more dangerous for the ruling class to continue to deny it and at a time when large sections of the working class had been integrated into capitalist society.

Extending the vote to workers under capitalism is not the same thing as establishing real democracy. Meaningful democracy in a world where the means of producing and distributing the things we need to live are owned and controlled by a tiny minority is at best a sick joke. Real democracy under capitalism is an illusion. The limited democracy we do have can however be used as a tool to bring about a worldwide system where the Earth’s resources are owned and controlled by its inhabitants. When that goal is achieved, and only when it is achieved, can we start to talk about living in a true democracy.

Ray Carr

Capitalism: incompatible with democracy (2020)

From the October 2020 issue of the Socialist Standard

We continue from Part One, our explanation as to why capitalism is not and cannot be democratic

The ownership of the mass media is merely the start of the problem. Another way of constraining democracy is by limiting what is seen as being suitable for discussion. Liberal Democracy (LD) does not normally limit discussion by outlawing ideas and throwing people who fail to conform into gaol or worse, although this may happen in certain circumstances. Instead it falls more into the category expressed by Marx that the dominant ideas in society are those of the ruling class. The dominant mode of thinking is instilled in people gradually from a young age via institutions such as the family, education system and cemented by the mass media. What this encourages is a limited range of permissible opinions which are, to a large extent, an endorsement of capitalism and its system of market ‘democracy’ so that in general such opinions are held as being natural common sense whilst ideas and opinions that fall outside of this remit are seen as being illegitimate, illogical and irrational and perhaps even dangerous. Try to discuss an alternative which fundamentally challenges the major features of capitalism and you are likely to be ridiculed or considered as a dangerous subversive. In any event getting a serious discussion of them on to the mass agenda is as difficult as running through a brick wall.

When capitalism is seen to be failing in some way as, for example, in the 2008 financial crisis then the system is often subject to a more critical examination and questions may be raised about its future. However, such an examination will be extremely limited as in the instance of the events of 2008 there had to be scapegoats – certain individuals got out of control; it was due to a minority of greedy people, and the like. The system itself will not be subject to a serious critique. The alternatives put forward will be something like increased economic regulation or perhaps more state intervention in the economy whilst the core features of the system, production for profit, capital accumulation, employment (wage slavery), the market economy, these, if discussed at all, will only be in the margins, not on the main agenda.

On that main or mass agenda the only alternative to capitalism is a reformed version of that same system. The process of limiting the discussion to a pre-set agenda is undemocratic as it places restrictions on the alternatives open to us in solving ongoing problems. So this is part of the process of constructing reality. We have all come across terms such as ‘we have to live in the real world’ or ‘there is no alternative’. The nonsense being peddled here is that the ‘real world’ equals capitalism to which there is no ‘alternative’. It is almost as if the capital system has always existed and will always exist, as if it is the one and only reality.

It is continually the case that political language is used to obfuscate the real meanings of concepts. For example take the word ‘free’, we are very often confronted with the terms ‘Free World’, ‘Free Trade’, ‘Free Markets’, ‘Free Enterprise’. These terms most definitely hide more than they reveal. What the word ’free’ means in the face of capitalism has nothing to do with the majority of the people in the so-called ‘Free World’ being free. In fact the opposite is the case. The world-wide capitalist system presents a situation where the mass of people are at the best tied to the dictatorship of capital. The other so-called ‘freedoms’ (trade, markets, enterprise), whilst presented in the rhetoric as a system where small businesses or the self-employed operate via their own hard work to exchange their goods (commodities) via ‘free’ mechanisms, are in reality part of a process which is dominated by a few major corporations and the world market. Capitalism is a world-wide capitalist economic system, a system that leaves millions throughout the world not only far from ‘free’ but in poverty or even starving. This of course includes people living in the major power of this illusionary ‘Free World’, the United States of America. In addition, this is the system that results in wars all around the planet but never mind because capitalism gives you the ‘Freedom’ to die for your country, meaning the part of the world you were born in.

Profits – capitalism’s main priority

Real democracy is not possible under capitalism. However, democracy is continually used by countries which operate under the banner of ‘Liberal Democracy’ as a propaganda tool. A country under this heading will enter into trade agreements, providing they are profitable, with totalitarian regimes, who are known to have appalling records in areas such as human rights. Western capitalist countries have therefore entered into such agreements with countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and China. They do so with no scruple whatsoever as the opportunity to trade and make profits is of far more importance than concepts such as human rights or democracy.

In addition, major economic powers operating under this banner have not been slow in acting to remove from power democratically-elected governments when their economic interests are threatened. Iran in the early 1950s and Chile in the early 1970s are major examples, though there are many others. In the latter case, whilst the election of the Popular Front government had nothing to do with establishing socialism, which would require an entirely different set of circumstances, it is nevertheless difficult to recognise as democratic a system that overthrows democratically-elected (in their terms) governments and replaces them with dictatorships. As indicated, there are many other cases of similar actions and this is a subject that deserves more attention.

It is also the case that an LD such as Britain has a rather dubious internal record in certain areas of human rights. Since the end of the 1970s there have been countless Acts passed on the industrial relations front, all designed to hinder workers taking collective industrial action to defend their terms and conditions of employment; so much so that we reached the point some years ago where it is almost impossible to organise collective action which can be both legal and effective. This applies as much to Labour governments as it does to Conservative ones. In addition, there has been a series of Acts over the same period that make it extremely difficult for protest movements to stay within the law whilst organising meaningful campaigns.

A democratic society requires a democratic base

Dictionary.com defines democracy as: ‘A form of government in which supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system’. It describes the United States of America and Canada as examples of democratic countries. The Cambridge English Dictionary states that democracy is ‘The belief in freedom and equality between people, or a system of government based on this belief, in which power is either held by elected representatives or directly by the people themselves’. It then states that the early 1990s saw the spread of democracy to Eastern Europe. There are many other similar definitions to these and it is not really surprising that in the current environment they relate to LDs.

Such definitions limit democracy to political systems of government but remain silent on the most basic and important feature in society, namely, how the means of production and distribution are organised. Concentrating on the political system limits the concept of democracy because it is constructed on the base of present-day society and the political system operates to defend that society’s structure. So, where there is a lack of control for the vast majority at its most fundamental level, no political system can overcome that undemocratic nature and it is not designed to do so (but this does not mean that it cannot be made to contribute to this purpose under the right conditions). This is the main reason why the so-called democracies that operate within capitalism are not democracies.

The type of definitions of democracy outlined above are just defending capitalism. For example, Dictionary.com talks of a ‘free electoral system’ but it is only free in a very limited sense, most people have the right to vote for the political party of their choice, but as we have pointed out it is not free from bias in the realm of acceptable ideas. How can it be when it is constructed on an economic dictatorship at the base of society? Likewise the Cambridge English Dictionary definition speaks of ‘a belief in freedom and equality between people’ but freedom and equality between people is completely absent in terms of the organisation and ownership of wealth production and distribution.

In fact this is where the inequalities within society stems from and they cannot be healed by the political system, especially one which is designed to perpetuate such fundamental divisions. Both definitions have reference to power being held directly by the people but this is quickly diluted to elected agents or representatives acting on their behalf, the capitalist reality is that those agents or representatives are acting in the interests of capital accumulation and definitely not in the interests of the majority.

Socialism and the use of the political process

If socialists regard the political process on offer in LD as undemocratic, then why do we advocate that it is possible to use it in order to replace minority control with common ownership? Should we not logically reject the empty rhetoric of capitalist democracy entirely and favour something similar to a modern system of workers’ councils? Should we not recognise the limitations of the political process and the possibility that, if the socialist movement grows to an extent that it forms a large minority, that the right to use the limited democratic system might be closed off to us?

In addressing this, two points need to be considered. Firstly, it would be a mistake to dismiss a process that, for now at least, gives us the opportunity to put forward the socialist case as an alternative to the capitalist system. This process offers us an opportunity to put forward that perspective and is therefore an important way of winning more people over to the socialist movement. If it offers this advantage then why not use it? Secondly, just because we advocate using the political process does not mean we rule out using other democratic methods alongside it and which would supplement the political process. In fact we never have ruled it out.

There is a common misconception amongst many that the World Socialist Movement (WSM) advocates using political means alone to bring about socialism and rules out all other forms of organisation. For example, some years ago Leftcom when reviewing our pamphlet What’s Wrong with using Parliament? suggested that the reason for the pamphlet was to ‘restate their belief that socialism can only come about via parliament’. There is a lot of difference in saying that parliament can be used in bringing about socialism to saying either that it would have to be used or must be used in all circumstances. What we in the WSM insist on is the need to organise on a democratic basis.

If you wish to achieve a free and democratic society you have to use democratic methods, as the means for achieving something will determine the end result. So we oppose as utopian and dangerous the idea that a well-organised and conscious minority can lead a majority who lack socialist understanding to the freedom of socialism/communism. We of course do not know what precisely will happen in the lead-up to socialism but would think it highly likely that, as socialist consciousness develops in various parts of the world, workers will create several different forms of organisation. One would be a movement to represent them at the political level. This would probably vary depending on the differing circumstances in various parts of the world. But there would be other forms of organisation, perhaps something like workplace and neighbourhood councils. Industrial organisation such as unions would take different forms to those around today, reflecting an increased socialist awareness. Lastly, we might even see people in some places creating their own parliament, a ‘peoples’ parliament’, more advanced and effective than what exists today. Whilst we do not want to engage in too much crystal–ball gazing the point is that socialists accept that, when workers begin to engage with socialist ideas in far greater numbers than we have today, they will form various types of organisations to help achieve their goals. What must also be pointed out is that in such changed circumstances parliament would not be the dung heap that it is at present. For us the key is democratic means, whatever the differing forms of organisation that may develop.

The path towards a genuine democracy is a path leading away from capitalism whether of the state or so-called private variety and towards a society run by people for people, using the most advanced productive capacity and technology available to directly satisfy human needs whilst giving regard to protecting and nurturing our planet which is the source of life itself. The time to act towards that goal is now. We do not suggest that the road towards this alternative society will be easy but it is necessary and urgent.

RDC

Letter: Democratic rights (1990)

Letter to the Editors from the October 1990 issue of the Socialist Standard

Democratic rights

Dear Editors.

In the Socialist Standard (September 1989) you wrote that the Socialist Party of Great Britain “wholeheartedly supports the efforts of workers everywhere to secure democratic rights against the powers of suppression”.

I fail to see how democratic rights can be achieved within the framework of world capitalism. The capitalist system, state or private, East or West, is not democratic. It is a form of class dictatorship, with a minority capitalist class in power and control over the exploitable working class majority.

The capitalist class cannot be in the business of handing out democratic rights and risk losing control, but they do when necessary and under pressure make concessions and legislate reforms. Governments which are the executive committees of the capitalist class call these overtures and reforms "democratic rights". Which is a lie, because they are civil rights dressed up to make capitalism look better and they can easily be rescinded.

Socialists should not ignore civil rights. Some can be appreciated and be useful and all are part of social understanding. They do not however lead to democratic rights. Only a socialist society can produce democratic rights.

A sane system of society or real democracy. real communism or real socialism, all have the same meaning and intent which could materialise about the same time.

The only democratic right achievable under capitalism could take place when the working class through a workable majority captures the political apparatus of the capitalist class to gain political control, so that the working class is able to replace capitalism with socialism.

From this premise a democratic right can only be established by a majority, in the interests of a majority.

John F. Ahrens 

Vancouver, Canada

Reply:

Our correspondent is confusing political democracy and a democratic society.

Capitalism is not and can never be a democratic society because, as he says, it is based on class power and privilege, social inequality, and exploitation. A real democracy, where everybody would have an equal say in decision-making about all aspects of social life, including and in fact particularly the production and distribution of wealth, is only possible in a classless society of common ownership.

Capitalism can, however, accommodate a limited degree of political democracy in the sense of allowing every adult equal voting rights to decide who shall occupy various political posts at national and local level. Political democracy is by definition confined to a very limited sphere of decision-making and even here can never be complete as it is distorted by the social inequality that is at the basis of capitalism: those with money can and do pay to get more publicity for their views and views that favour them. As in Animal Farm, under capitalist political democracy "all are equal but some are more equal than others".

Despite these limitations and distortions the existence of political democracy under capitalism—and the various “democratic rights” that accompany it such as freedom of speech, publication, organisation, and assembly—is an advantage for the working class as it provides the best framework under capitalism for the socialist movement to organise and grow. This is why the Socialist Party supports the struggles of workers living under political dictatorships to obtain "democratic rights" as before the war in fascist countries and recently in East Europe.

Editors.

Vote for yourself for a change . . . (1983)

From the September 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

The capitalist system is fundamentally undemocratic: it does not run in accordance with the wishes and needs of the majority, but to satisfy the material interests of the small minority who accumulate rent, interest and profits. In Britain, capital ownership is confined to a very small minority: not only does one per cent of the population own more of the accumulated wealth than the poorest eighty per cent put together, but they have access to areas of power, information, communication and luxury goods and services which are not within the price range of the vast majority. Three quarters of all daily newspapers in Britain are owned by just three massive companies. The statistics of inequality are similar throughout the capitalist world; indeed, there are countries in Africa and South America where the ownership and control of the means of wealth production and distribution are in the hands of a few powerful families who, between them, determine the destinies of millions of human subjects.

It is nonsensical to speak of genuine democracy within a capitalist world when the vast majority of people — the working class, who do not own capital, but must live by selling our labour power for a wage or salary — is excluded from control over the resources and productive machinery of the earth. The workers have never been consulted as to who will own and control the vast multinational companies; there are no referenda called before the commencement of trade wars in which thousands of workers’ lives are wasted; the editorship of the Guardian or The Nine O’clock News has never been a matter for working class election; the millions who are starving in a world of potential abundance were never asked to cast a vote for malnutrition.

The workers run capitalist production and distribution from top to bottom but have no ownership or control. The minority, who live in affluence on the backs of the wealth producers, are in no position to determine precisely how capitalism will run. They are, of course, entitled to ensure that decisions made are socially beneficial to themselves rather than the workers, w'hose economic interests are diametrically opposite, but they are not able to plan the system with any accuracy. Capital, as a social force, is uncontrollable even by the capitalist class. For example, most capitalists would love to have a society where there was no war, no unemployment and no working class discontent. The anarchy of the profit system does not allow the bosses to govern the system: it governs them. So. capitalism is undemocratic not only because the majority class of people is alienated from the means of living, but also because it is impossible to plan capitalism on the basis of democratic decisions for the market, with its profit priorities, is a dictator which cannot be controlled by votes.

The only way to establish human control over society is to create socialism, which will be a democratic world society based on common ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution. Once we have done away with classes, markets and profits we will be able to take hold of this global village called the world and run it in direct accordance with democratically expressed human needs. The way that socialism will be organised will have to be decided consciously and democratically by the working class at the time of the establishment of the new system: we in the Socialist Party of Great Britain are unable to lay down blueprints for the next stage of social evolution. We can, however, make some comments about the advantages of worldwide socialist democracy.

Firstly, the new system would enable humanity to collect and use information on a global basis. At the moment countries duplicate the storing of necessary information about production and distribution; they often spend their time trying to mislead trade competitors as to what the real situation is or keeping secret knowledge which could make world production much more efficient in relation to human needs. World information authorities which exist at the moment, often under the auspices of the United Nations, are often ignored by governments because the statistical possibilities publicised by such bodies all too frequently are in conflict with the market capacities of capitalism. So, in a world socialist society there would be worldwide collection and storage of information relating to production and distribution. Such information could be handled with case by the computer technology which has already been invented, but which is presently used for the useless purposes of military communication and world trade.

Secondly, socialist society will utilise the information technology which has been developed within capitalism in order to allow every human being to have a say in matters which they feel to be important. Of course, not every person in a socialist society will want to be involved in every decision; democracy does not mean that all people must contribute to all decisions made by society, but that all people will be able to do so. On hearing this, the opponent of socialism has often asked whether it will be the case that every human being in a democratic socialist society is going to meet together in Wembley Stadium and put up their hands for or against a particular proposition. We would doubt very much whether four billion people are going to fit into Wembley Stadium — and we doubt even more whether the inhabitants of Peking or Mexico City will know the nearest tube station to Wembley! Of course, those who present such an objection are hopelessly caught up within the primitive thinking of capitalism which only allows them to envisage democracy in terms of some sort of grand tribal ritual. Society now has technology to enable human beings to sit in their homes and buy food from the local supermarket by pushing a button; business conferences are held with executive managers sitting in front of television cameras in London, Tokyo, New York and Moscow. These modern means of communication must be placed at the disposal of the whole community, who will make decisions on all the available evidence. Such decision-making will sometimes involve the entire world population but. needless to say, it will not require four billion people to decide whether to build a dual carriageway on the stretch of motorway between Hexham and Newcastle.

Thirdly, socialism will create a democracy where those who disagree with the majority will be free, within the confines of implementing the majority decision, to live in accordance with their own desires. It is quite possible that upon the establishment of socialist society there will be some people — perhaps millions — who are religious: they would be able freely to indulge in their primitive superstitions. Under capitalism, to be a nonconformist is to face problems ranging from psychological persecution to capital punishment; socialism will depend on the right of men and women to assert their individuality, but will require them to remember at all times that democracy is the only workable alternative to tyranny.

Democratic political action

There are two accusations which are often thrown at socialists: one is that we are Utopians who want to create a society of perfection; the other is that we are undemocratic and seek to impose our aims on a society which does not want it.

Socialism was only a Utopian proposition when it was detached from the concept of democratic change. The old Utopians, like Owen. Fourier and Saint-Simon wanted the new system, but imagined that it could exist without a socialist community to run it. It is only when a majority of the world’s workers understand and want socialism that it becomes a practicable proposition. The new system will not be free from problems but — and this is the essential qualification — a socially conscious world community will be infinitely more capable of dealing with those problems than is the present working class which is alienated from real social power. The socialist proposition depends entirely on the capacity of men and women to think consciously and to act responsibly. That is why, when the defenders of capitalism have been defeated in discussion on every single aspect of their outdated social system, as they invariably are, they always resort to the final argument of the anti-socialist: It's Against Human Nature. Of course, if they were correct and humanity was incapable of mass consciousness there would be no possibility of creating a democratic society. Curiously enough, many of the historically paralysed minds which assert confidently that humans are incapable of running society for ourselves insist that they are convinced democrats. We have all met the opponent of socialism who is sure that he or she would be quite capable of acting consciously within a democratic world society, but you'll never get everyone else to behave so intelligently. Capitalism's ideology of anti-democracy is based on the myth of inherent inequality; once workers realise that what they can understand, want and do others can also we will be ready to make our move to the next stage in history.

Do socialists seek to impose our aims on an unsuspecting majority? Alas, we could carry on insisting that socialism can only be established democratically until Ronald Reagan's hair turns grey; there will always be someone who will not believe us. Opponents of socialism will point to the Bolshevik revolution and to those anti-democrats who support its tactics today and, quite correctly, conclude that such socialism has nothing to do with democracy; it simply changes one ruling class for another. We go further and say that such so-called socialism has nothing to do with either socialism or democracy. It is nonsensical to imagine that you can impose social liberation on a majority of people who are content with the system of exploitation, oppression and misery. The socialist task is to take the discontent which capitalism inevitably engenders within the working class and to educate the discontented to reject the system which is the cause of their social problems and to establish socialism. Of course, capitalism is an undemocratic system and therefore socialist persuasion and education is made very difficult by the virtual monopoly by the capitalist minority over the means of education and communication. But we have on our side a valuable weapon: the experience of the working class which does not conform to the false ideas thrown out by the capitalist propaganda machine.

There will be no socialist revolution without socialists. The socialist revolution, unlike all those before it which have depended on the substitution of one ruling minority for another, will require a conscious majority. But it requires more than that: there can be no socialism without democratic political action. What form will that action take? Where democratic elections are held, workers will need to use our votes, not to elect the representatives of capitalism, but to elect delegates whose sole mandate will be to transfer the legal ownership and control of the means of wealth production and distribution from the minority to the whole community, without any distinctions of race or sex. Of course, capitalism's elections are never going to be completely democratic, but they are sufficient barometers of social consciousness to be used by the working class for the purpose of capturing political power. In those countries where democratic elections do not exist socialists must use their energies to create such institutions, either by putting pressure on the state or — perhaps — by setting up their own rival democratic institutions which the ruling class will be unable to ignore. In Britain, however, the political task of socialists is to capture power by means of the democracy of the ballot box; the fact that the ballot boxes are under the legal control of the capitalist class does not deny their validity as an instrument of revolution, any more than the potentiality of a blade to cut one’s throat denies its usefulness as an instrument for shaving.

Those who claim to be democrats and support the undemocratic system of capitalism are no more democrats than the Russian dictatorship is socialist. Democracy, in its fullest and most exciting sense, has yet to be tried by the inhabitants of our society. At the moment, to want power is considered a greedy and rather unpleasant aim; that is understandable, because power under capitalism means power to deny power to the majority. Socialists want power to produce what we need to survive, to live in comfort and to be free. Let those who stand against us tremble: the democratic revolution will not go away as long as men and women have brains in our heads. 

Steve Coleman

Should We Fight for Democracy? (1938)

From the September 1938 issue of the Socialist Standard

How often have we had to deal with the accusation that we do not change our policy to suit the needs of the moment? There has always been some burning topic, some pressing problem, which our opponents have told us demands immediate attention and for which we should abandon our insistence on Socialist propaganda for the time being.

The abolition of the House of Lords, unemployed agitation, the abolition of the Means Test, all have had their turn and have faded out to give place to fresh “immediate problems." Surely, the fact that these “ immediate problems" still remain unsolved should have convinced our opponents that we state the truth when we say that only Socialism can provide the solution to the strife and trouble of the world to-day ?

Experience seems to be a slow teacher, for, so far from having learnt, our opponents seem to have forgotten even those elementary lessons which capitalism taught with so much brutality and severity during the slaughter years of 1914-1918.

1914—and To-Day

The slogans which lured millions of British, French, and other workers on the Allies' side, to their doom, were: “Save poor little Belgium," “Smash Kaiserism," “ Make the world safe for democracy."

On the opposite side men were marching to the motto: “Destroy Russian barbarism," "Down with Perfidious Albion!" etc. To-day, when the reverberations of these slogans and the sound of the guns which gave them practical effect have hardly ceased, we are told that once again democracy is in danger and some political parties assure us it may be necessary to defend what they are pleased to call “our liberties" with our lives.

“ Aggression ” or “Defence" 

One of the main arguments advanced to-day is that the world is divided into two sets of countries, one composed of those nations who are quite satisfied with what they possess and harbour no designs of “aggression," and the others, the “have-nots," the dissatisfied, who aim to steal territories wherever they can.

Quite apart from the fact that this theory ignores completely the means whereby some nations became "haves" and others “ have nots," there is, from the Socialist point of view, a more fundamental error. It lies in the assumption that nations are homogeneous communities composed of people who all have a share in the country of their birth and habitation. This, of course, is not true. Countries and their resources, whether big or small, with or without colonial possessions, do not belong to the people as a whole; they are the property of a small section, a wealthy minority. The bulk of the people in all countries are without property in the real sense of the word, and they depend upon the wealthy class to give them work or doles in order to live. This simple, elementary fact would appear to be unknown to all excepting Socialists, and consequently left out of account in all their speculations. Once accept the Socialist analysis of the capitalist world and its division into property-owners and property-less, the phrases “aggression” and “defence” can have a meaning only to those who own property. For it is clear, then, that the loss or gain of territory cannot affect those people who do not own it.

What, then, is left in the argument of the recruiting agents—and, remember, their ranks now include even those erstwhile rabid opponents of British Imperialism, the Communists—that in countries like Britain and France, a freedom of expression is allowed, the rights of people to express their political opinions by means of speech and vote, and that this freedom would be at stake were this country, for instance, involved in a war with Germany, a country where democracy has been crushed, free speech abolished, and voting has become a farce.

Do Socialists Value Democracy

It is necessary here to define our attitude towards the differences that exist between the “ Democracies ” and the Fascist countries, differences we have never denied but to which we have always applied a Socialist perspective. This Party knows the value of free speech. It appreciates fully the advantages and utility of the vote. In principle and practice we have always shown our appreciation of these “rights,” won, let it be understood, only as a consequence of working-class struggle against a ruling class that approaches these questions, not from the point of view of an abstract principle of human rights, but mainly on the grounds of expediency.

In the past we have consistently defended free speech and the vote against people many of whom pose to-day as the foremost champions of democracy. But we deny that the interests of democracy anywhere can be defended or promoted by a war; in fact, we deny that the question of democracy can ever be the real issue over which a war will be fought.

Why Wars are Fought

As we have explained, the divisions of the world’s population is into those who own it and those who merely exist on it, by permission of the owners; an explanation that cuts rights across national boundaries. When it is further understood that political power, the power that controls the armed forces, is in the hands of the owning class or those who represent their interests, the issue becomes crystal clear.

For it is obvious that a class which in every country cares nothing for the people whom it exploits, and keeps them in poverty-stricken oppression, will only use its armed forces, upon which it lavishes so much wealth, when its interests (i.e., property) are threatened. Until then, capitalist politicians may declare their abhorrence of the methods used in “ less civilised ” countries, but the capitalists they represent will continue to deal indiscriminately with the objects of their horror.

So the United States has sent Germany thousands of tons of aerial bombs, Russia has supplied Germany with ferro-manganese, an indispensable war material, and France sends thousands of tons of iron ore to Germany.

The latter, by way of returning the compliment, presumably, in turn, has supplied China with considerable quantities of arms.

In Capitalist Peace or War, Profit is Paramount

Many people seriously believe that if Britain were defeated by Germany in a war, Hitler would impose Fascism on this country, presumably by a military occupation. They show little understanding of how Fascist movements came into existence, nor of the mass-backing necessary to help them to power. Political oppression cannot be imposed upon a people against their will; and military occupation, even if it were practical or intended, which is very doubtful, could not have the effect of making Britain a Fascist country. On the other hand, those who argue that Germany's defeat would result in the downfall of Hitler cannot be certain that his downfall would not be followed eventually by another dictatorship. Remember the downfall of the Kaiser!

One thing is certain. The moment war breaks out democracy will be abolished in all countries participating, and we would, in effect, be defending one Dictatorship against another.

Limitations of Capitalist Democracy

The above only shows the fallacy of treating the advantages of free speech and the vote as an end in themselves, instead of understanding the position of the workers under capitalism and using the weapons of democracy for the purpose of overthrowing the class and system which make a mockery of the words “ Freedom ” and “ Democracy.” Of what value is free speech if we do not utilise it to make workers conscious of their interests—what benefit the vote if the workers are content to use it only to vote one capitalist government out and another in? That way is certain to discredit the democratic method, to disillusion workers who expect their problems solved under capitalism. For poverty cannot be talked away by “ Capitalist Democracy "—it can only be removed by Socialism.

Sid Rubin