Unite for World Socialism (1993)

From the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Imagine a world without frontiers, without war or world hunger: a world where goods are produced and services rendered solely to meet needs, without buying or selling, without exchange or barter. Such a society organized democratically at local, regional and world levels, without governments, without bureaucratic domination, benign or despotic, could be brought into being in a short space of time. The world network for spreading information on such a society already exists in our global electronic village.

No sensible person could deny that the building of a world co-operative community which could safeguard the biosphere as well as creating a constructive and satisfying way of life for humankind is the most important issue on the agenda, not merely of Europe, but of the wider world.

Europe became dominant not because of the superiority of its people, resources or innovations, but as a result of the advantage of its being the inheritor of the knowledge and discoveries made throughout history — from the most ancient times — by the peoples of Africa and Asia. With the riches and exploitation of the natural resources and inhabitants of North and South America and elsewhere, the competing rulers of developing European capitalism and their successors established a cruel ascendancy over their own subject classes and much of the world.

Empires fall

In this century we have seen the rise and fall of empires, allegedly democratic or allegedly socialistic. Today this world system has grown more terrible in its effects, real and potential, on people and planet. Powerful states in various parts of the world, their real interests cloaked in religious or political ideology are ready to expand. So-called "Red" China, really the sleeping capitalist giant, with its overtly tyrannical government, stirs itself — and continues to pollute our atmosphere just as all the other nuclear powers have done.

The problems of our world cannot be solved within the existing structures of production and government. Our world is divided into national areas dominated by class minorities in each country, which, either by private or corporate ownership or by state bureaucratic parties, monopolize the means of production.

These ruling classes and their political representatives, by reason of a combination of historical circumstances, governmental, military and ideological control or influence, are able to keep the majority of the world's population in subjection. In the decisive areas of the world this domination takes the form of people being denied access to the means of living except on the basis of working for a wage or salary. In the major countries of the world the people who, in the widest sense, produce what we need to live are wage-slaves.

Our access to food, clothing, shelter and other needs is rationed by money. Even professional persons and those running small businesses are dominated by the capitalist system. It is a world-system based upon the class monopoly of the means of production where things are produced and services rendered as commodities for sale at a profit. Labour-power is also a commodity: its price is what we receive as wage or salary.

Democratic action

Each enterprise or grouping of capitalism, in competition with others in the market, must strive to increase the profit surplus which it makes after the investment of capital. If it fails to achieve sufficient profit to re-invest in new machinery and techniques it will lose out to more powerful groupings or nations. The class interests, values and drive for profit of this world-system have been the underlying reasons for the unprecedented destruction of life and resources throughout this century. This appalling process — made worse by new forms of pollution, including the spread of artificial radio-activity and the cutting down of the rain forests will continue unless we take the necessary democratic action to transform our way of life throughout the planet.

Socialism is a new world society where the means of production are commonly owned and where governments and systems of exchange, whether barter or money, have been replaced by democratic administration at local, regional and world levels: a society where there could be de-centralized coordination of production with free access according to need. Socialism can only be brought about by an overwhelming majority of the population, a majority which understands why capitalism must be replaced by socialism. If we are to bring into being production solely for use, where needs are self-determined, we must have a clear idea of how such a society could be established, organized and sustained.

We must also ensure that the values, methods and actions of the World Socialist Movement are fully consistent with its aims. The means by which the new society can be achieved are determined by its nature as a society involving voluntary co-operation and democratic participation. It cannot be imposed from above by some self-appointed liberators nor by some well-meaning state bureaucracy.

Immediate tasks

The World Socialist Movement must have an immediate programme to be implemented by the elected delegates of the various areas of the world subsequent to the democratic change from capitalism to socialism. This programme would have the active support and informed involvement of their communities.

All dangerous, harmful and useless production must be stopped or run down where this is not technically possible. Changes previously prepared must be made to ensure democratic and participatory relationships. Many measures essential to safeguard the planet and its people at present blocked by class interests and the profit motive would have to be initiated.

Between the present time and the orderly transformation of society aspired to by the World Socialist Movement we would undoubtedly draw the support of many of the millions of people with specialized knowledge and experience, who even now are critical of our present system. Already they are examining in detail the nature of the many problems confronting us and are considering how less damaging, more sensible ways of producing what we really need could be devised.

The first priority of the world socialist community would have to be to feed the hungry, house the homeless and care for the sick and neglected, seeking to ensure that everyone had a minimum sufficiency as soon as possible. It would have to ensure that the essential productive means were constructed in order to meet the needs of a world population no longer in thrall to the values of an acquisitive society, but which wished to enjoy individually and socially the benefits of our shared home — the very world which is the world of all of us — the place in which, in the end. we find our happiness or not at all!

Racism rears its ugly head (1993)

From the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Leninist ideologues of the SWP believe a ban on the BNP will go some way to eradicate racism. To this end they re-formed the Anti Nazi League in January 1992 to confront racist boneheads head on and to awaken public consciousness as to a "new Fascist threat". Similarly, the Anti Racist Alliance — another of the anti-racist groups that have sprung up in recent years, vying to be the standard bearers of the cause — believe making racial harassment a criminal offence and tightening restrictions on the sale of extreme-right literature will make racism go away.

Both seem not to realize that the prevalence of racist ideas is largely due to the official racism that has been perpetrated by British governments, local councils, courts, police, etc throughout the twentieth century.

Successive Liberal, Tory and Labour Governments have been at the forefront in promoting xenophobia through Act of Parliament for almost 90 years: 1905 Aliens Act; 1914 Aliens Restriction Act; 1962 Commonwealth Immigration Act; 1968 Commonwealth Immigration Act; 1971 Immigration Act; 1981 British Nationality Act; 1991 Asylum Bill. These Acts resulted in the lowering of successful applications for UK citizenship by 28 percent last year the lowest for 10 years.

Racist candidate

In 1964, a Tory candidate won the Smethwick Parliamentary seat from Labour with the slogan "if you want a nigger lor a neighbour, vote Labour". In the May 1979 election, a month after Blair Peach lost his life at an anti-Nazi rally, the NF vote fell from 19.2 percent to 6.1 percent in its strongest seat. This had less to do with public disapproval of racism and more to do with the ascendancy of Margaret Thatcher. As one Guardian writer pointed out:

The demise of the NF as a political force was mainly due to Margaret Thatcher rather than any anti-racist campaign. When she said in 1978 that the British people feared they were ’being swamped by an alien culture’, NF supporters switched to Conservative" (14 May).

November 1991 saw Kenneth Clarke, the then Education Secretary, stepping in to prevent a housing association moving five black families from inner-city Nottingham into his neighbouring suburban constituency of Rushcliffe. Clarke feared the families would be "problem families", and that their homes would become half way houses for criminals. Challenged on the matter he replied "I am not concerned about the colour of people’s skin, but you don’t put square pegs in round holes” (Guardian, 22 November 1992).

The current panic about the rising tide of fascism has been sparked by a BNP candidate, Derek Beackon, securing a council seat in the East End ward of Millwall. One BNP councillor, however no more constitutes the dawn of the Fourth Reich than did the victory of the two NF councillors in Blackburn in the mid 1970s.

Neither is racism in Tower Hamlets anything new. When the Liberals took the Tower Hamlets council from Labour seven years ago they embarked upon a discriminatory housing policy, which was attacked for its racist nature in giving priority to the sons and daughters of Tower Hamlets residents. In 1991 the Commission for Racial Equality look the Lib-Dcm council to the High Court for failing to ensure that their housing policies did not discriminate against ethnic minorities. The High Court ruled against the Lib-Dem council housing policy. However, the extent of official racism was this year to become even more evident when the Court of Appeal went on to rule against the decision, permitting the council to investigate the immigration status of applicants.

If anything, the BNP victory was the result of local disenchantment at the efforts of the three mainstream political parties in the area, and frustration caused by local levels of poverty, unemployment and deprivation. Tower Hamlets has pockets of high unemployment and last year out of a total housing stock of 67,581, 45,475 houses were found to be unfit to live in or in desperate need of repair.

Racist housing policy, though, is not confined to the East End of London. In October of this year it was announced that the Labour-controlled Liverpool City Council were to be taken to the High Court by the Commission for Racial Equality, for its failure to comply with its order to end discriminative housing policy.

Official racism is all around us, and not confined to the activities of a few East End boneheads. The whirlwind of patriotism and jingoism, for instance, whipped by the Gulf War with the help of the right wing press (Sun, Daily Mail, etc) provoked widespread violence and racial abuse in Britain, including the firebombing of 20 mosques.

In June this year, European Community Ministers agreed to strengthen the walls of "Fortress Europe" in the wake of an influx of Bosnian refugees fleeing the civil war in former Yugoslavia. At the same time the British government were detaining 200 immigrants without trial.

Hitler impressed

Those who think that the BNP are unique in their wish to make Britain "racially pure" would do well to remember that the sentiments expressed by Winston Churchill almost 90 years ago. Churchill, impressed by the theories of Social Darwinism, theories that also impressed Hitler, wanted to sterilize 100,000 "mentally degenerate" Britons who he felt were threatening to sully the British character.

These sentiments have echoed down the years, changing form as the situation demands and nowadays finding outlet, amongst other things, in official opposition to the ERM and Maastricht, "Buy British" campaigns and belligerent tabloid headlines that condone the efforts of "our boys" overseas. Anything, in fact, that might impinge upon the 'British way of life" is viewed as a threat by reactionaries from the Labour Party to the extreme right.

The calls to "Ban the BNP" and "Bash the Fash" by the ARA and the ANL must be opposed by Socialists. As Socialists we should uphold the right to platform. Once we beg the state to regulate organizations and movements we set precedents that pave the way for regulations for other organizations Gay Rights. Pro-Abortionists, single parent groups, perhaps a ban on the SWP. the RCP and the Socialist Party? Andrew Puddephatt of Liberty expresses similar thoughts: in banning the BNP. he said "there is a danger that the government will begin to ban groups which are opposed to their policies" (Guardian, 28 September).

Calling for a ban on the BNP is tantamount to admitting that the working class lacks the ability, the confidence, the ideology, the arguments to tackle racist views head on and to discredit them. At the same time, appeals to the state to ban far right groups distracts attention from the real cause of racism — the capitalist system. Those who openly promote racism can hardly be counted on to abolish it

Home Secretary Michael Howard was right when he commented on the BNP: "Paradoxically, repressive legislation might actually be welcome to such organisations".

To ban the BNP would be to force it underground, to make it a paramilitary organization and thus more attractive to its supporters who relish violence and thrive on the oxygen of publicity. In Northern Ireland a host of organizations are banned (IRA, INLA, IPLO, UVF, UDF, UFF) — this does not stop them killing hundreds of people a year and causing widespread destruction from Belfast to London.

During the ANL march on the BNP headquarters at Welling, a black police constable. Leslie Turner, was apparently singled out for a beating by ANL activists. Speaking from his hospital bed. PC Turner reflected that the BNP had a "legitimate right to freedom of speech" (Times, 18 October).

Is there not an irony in this for the SWP? That in a march they organized to confront racism a black police constable was beaten up who believed racist thugs — who also would have liked to have given him a beating — should have the right to express their views.

Perhaps the BNP could also draw a lesson from this. Of the 20,000 who took to the streets that day. the one that took a beating in protecting them was one they would "repatriate". Both parties, the BNP and the SWP, should stop their infantile bickering and single-issue policies and realize that the real cause of poverty, housing shortages, unemployment is the capitalist system, a system where profits always come first. What we need is class unity. If we must ban anything, ban capitalism!

John Bissett

Does the SWP have an answer to racism? (1993)

From the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

The number of recorded racial attacks, arsons and killings has risen dramatically over the last five years as the economic recession has deepened. Is violent confrontation the answer?

The week after the Unity march was held in October to protest against racism and the BNP, the SWP organised a meeting at the LSE entitled "Why the police protect the Nazis". The speaker was the leading SWP member, Tony Cliff. Anyone attending this meeting to hear anything about why the police protect the Nazis, assuming as the title did that this was the case, would, though, have been very disappointed. The speaker, stupidly or dishonestly, thought that it was enough of an argument to shout to the audience (1) that most police are Nazis and (2) that the police had the constitutional job of supervising the Unity march, so therefore (3) the reason why the police prevented SWP members from burning down the BNP Head Office was that the police were Nazis.

This is what logicians describe as assuming what you are trying to prove. Cliff’s argument was about as strong in its structure as the argument that God is all powerful because created the Universe. Had he been putting this argument about the police being Nazis to an audience on Any Questions or Question Time or on an outdoor platform at Speakers’ Corner, he would have been quite rightly refuted and ridiculed by any cross section of workers.

As it was, Cliff’s audience, many of whom had attended the march, seemed content to wholeheartedly agree with Cliffs rousing oratory. One irony here is that after the contentious report (commissioned by the government from the tobacco magnate Patrick Sheehy) to run the police like a business, many police officers have been wooed by the stringent law and order promises of Tony Blair. Labour’s hopeful Shadow Home Secretary; the result is that come the next general election many coppers will be voting for the same party as the members of the SWP: the Labour Party. It is a point of historical record that at general elections, after lambasting the Labour Party and all its necessary shortcomings, the SWP asks its members to vote for Labour candidates as the election of another Labour government will give workers “an inch more space to manoeuvre" than under the Conservatives.

The Unity march had been organised in the wake of growing racism in Britain and across Europe. The number of recorded racial attacks, arsons and killings has risen dramatically over the last five years as the economic recession has deepened. Workers become desperate and often, ignorantly. look for easily identifiable scapegoats. Racism is thus adopted by them and exploited by those brighter, ruthless politicians who see votes and power in it. The real problem in Tower Hamlets in East London, where Derek Beackon was recently elected as a BNP councillor, is a housing problem.

Respectable racism

It is very important to look at how racism moves from being the nasty neurosis of a few frustrated fanatics and thugs to an idea which thousands of people begin to vote for. The problem in Tower Hamlets is not so much the few skinheads who sell the BNP literature on a Saturday morning — although the threat they pose to local ethnic minorities causes a lot of fear and misery — it is the thousand people with "respectable" appearances who voted BNP in the election and the tens of thousands in Britain who could soon be doing the same thing.

What did the SWP say about this problem at the meeting? What educational and argumentative ammunition did it provide for the eager young radicals who attended to learn about how to persuade fellow workers against racism? The SWP speaker said nothing about such arguments. Absolutely nothing. Instead the 30-minute talk was devoted entirely to repealing the mantra about the police all being Nazis, and to looking at half a dozen ways of using physical force against fascists. His tirade included all the vocabulary of "barricade storming" and the need to use guns against fascist thugs who have knives. Cliff’s argument was befitting of any angry young child who had not yet understood the rôle of ideas in politics.

Fascism personified

He saw fascism as an almost physical entity, a concrete part of society, personified in the small number of identifiable members or officers of the BNP. These people had to be "taken out" (physically deterred from being fascists, by being beaten up or, presumably, killed) and then the problem would be solved. You have to surgically remove the "bad apples". In one of many moments of flamboyant rhetoric he said:

"I'll tell you this. If you have a barrel of good apples but there is in the middle of the good apples one bad apple, the good apples will not make the bad apple good."

What followed from this simplistic and strikingly inappropriate metaphor, is that if the "bad apple" of fascism currently sitting in the middle of society could somehow be surgically removed, then all the good apples would be preserved Although Cliff’s language was riddled with references to force being used against the Nazis, he nowhere articulated with any precision how far his young acolytes should go in the furtherance of their aim to "remove the bad apple". Are the fascists to be simply threatened with baseball bats to relinquish their bigotries; are they to be rounded up and locked away to rot in some secret SWP political prison camps for workers with "the wrong attitude"; or was Cliff recommending that, ultimately, these political incorrigibles should he assassinated?

This meeting, like other SWP meetings I have attended, was rigged. It could not be described as an open, honest meeting designed as a genuine forum for workers to discuss the ideas put by the speaker. The rigging works in this way. The speaker addresses the meeting for half an hour. The chairperson then invites people from the floor for any questions to the speaker or points they wish to raise. Some of these questions, as you might imagine, raise points which are very awkward for the SWP. pointing to inconsistencies in its propaganda, undemocratic features of its organisation or clearly anti-working-class conduct it urges upon its followers. Rather than require the speaker to answer each point from the floor once it has been made (and thus allowing the questioner to come back if they are not satisfied with the speaker's response), the chairperson simply takes all the questions from the floor in sequence without any response from the speaker. When the chairperson thinks enough questions and points have been raised, he or she then invites the speaker to respond to the points collectively. This sinister technique thus permits the speaker to pass over any really troublesome points, damning them with feint response. Such meetings, in the best traditions of authoritarian, deceptive showpieces, give the appearance of being open because questions from the floor are allowed but in reality the questions that the SWP would prefer not to be asked of them in public are deftly avoided by their speakers.

That was exactly what Tony Cliff did at this meeting. One of the first questioners was a young man who identified himself as having been a long-time resident of London’s East End. He said that he could not really see any substantial difference between what Cliff had urged anti fascists to do (i.e., beat up fascists) and what the fascists were doing (beating up anti-fascists and people from ethnic minorities). If what the SWP objected to in fascism was it reliance on force to further its ideas, its bullying, threatening tactics, then surely it was wrong to employ exactly those tactics in opposing the rise of fascism? A few SWP members coughed and shuffled about at this point but Cliff was saved from having to enter into any serious debate with this man because the chairperson moved immediately to the next questioner. When the time did come for Cliff to respond to the six or seven points put to him. he dealt contemptuously with the point from the East Ender. The answer, in a few seconds before hopping on to a more friendly question with a much practised agility, was simply that the force of the anti-fascists was historically justified because (a) the other side started it and (b) the force the the fascists had used before (in the Second World War) and were planning to use again was of such a high order that it would be foolish to try and respond in the realm of ideas.

We were back to the principles of gangsterism. The talk of Robert de Niro playing Al Capone in The Untouchables. "If someone comes for me with fists, I answer with a knife. If he comes with a knife I answer with a gun . . ." Many people in areas like Tower Hamlets are living in desperate poverty. There is a housing crisis. Some people from ethnic minorities do have housing and so ignorant workers are left prey to the idea that if these "immigrants" were ail shipped away then there would be plenty of houses and jobs for "British" workers. What is the best way to argue against this sort of politics? Don’t ask Tony Cliff, he doesn’t seem to know or care. At least if he has any thoughts on these matters he was not disposed to share them with anyone at the SWP meeting. Cliff had other things on his mind and sounded more like Lennox Lewis’s coach than a political thinker.

Burn it down

One of the questions was from a young man from Northern Ireland. He spoke as a member of the SWP and was very keen that the meeting should focus closely on exactly why the SWP activists on the march had been prevented from turning down Upper Wickham Lane in Welling, towards the BNP headquarters "to burn it down". There was momentary unease from some at the meeting whereupon the questioner decided to be more up front: "I mean we might as well be clear about what we w'ere trying to do". He went on to fulminate against the police and how despicably pro-Nazi their conduct was in not permitting reasonable activists like himself to go about their proper civic business with cans of petrol and flame throwers. Clearly, the state was in cahoots with the BNP. Quite who the SWP would turn to for assistance if the BNP threatened to bum down its premises is open to question.

The interesting thing about the contribution of the young frustrated arsonist was that no one sought to dissent from the aim of the march that he avowed. Tony Cliff did not say, for example, in summing up. that the SWP had not formulated any such plan. The chairperson did not publicly proclaim that the questioner was, in fact, speaking for himself alone when ranting on about the need to burn things down. The young firebrand turned out to be the kid who yelled that the Emperor had no clothes on: the naive exposer of truth.

Workers from different cultures and ethnic groups have more in common that that which distinguishes them. They are all living in relative poverty and insecurity while they are systematically robbed by the owners of the means of producing wealth (owners who come from all sorts of racial groups). Racism has not tended to develop in times of economic boom; it flourishes when the going gets particularly tough for workers. With nationalist rhetoric of mainstream politicians, racist ideas being toyed with by Labour and Liberal local councillors, and a land where, for instance, the Minister for Education advocates that the Union Jack be unfurled from every school roof in the land, vicious racism is only one goose-step away.

The arguments against racism must be put on radio phone-in programmes, in local and national newspaper letters columns, in public debates, pubs and and during doorstep canvassing. But the only effective arguments against this ugly and recurrent feature of capitalism are those which are truly socialist. Not those quasi socialist SWP banalities which end with an embarrassed instruction "vote Labour with no illusions" at the next general election. It was a Labour government in 1962 which promulgated Britain’s first piece of explicitly racist legislation. Racism is born from the poverty and nationalistic tensions of capitalism; there is no such thing as a successful campaign against racism within capitalism. That this is so is testified to by the reemergence of racism with all its terrors after it had risen and then fallen in the 1970s. The Anti-Nazi League rather unbelievably claim that racism failed in the 1970s because it was stymied by the might of university students with yellow badges chanting to Clash songs in parks. The truth is that most National Front supporters or potential voters were absorbed into the Conservative Party, specially after Mrs Thatcher assured them all in a speech in 1979 that (a) she would not tolerate our culture being "swamped" by foreigners and (b) that unlike the relatively small and shabby NF, she had the power and real prospect of putting her prejudices into action.

The growth of racism will not be broken with brute force, only bones and hope will become fractured in such a fight. In open public debate, the ignorance and bigotry behind the arguments of racism can be easily exposed, at which point support disperses more quickly than the queue at the door of the surgeon who is exposed as an unqualified impostor with a penchant for learn-as-you-go quackery.

Gary Jay

Blogger's Note:

". . . It was a Labour government in 1962 which promulgated Britain’s first piece of explicitly racist legislation."

I looked for a correction in a later issue of the Socialist Standard, but I couldn't see one. The Labour Party wasn't in government in 1962. The legislation referred to from 1962 was the Commonwealth Immigrants Act which was a piece of legislation which ". . . entailed stringent restrictions on the entry of Commonwealth citizens into the United Kingdom."  The Labour Party in opposition, led by Hugh Gaitskell, opposed the 1962 Act.

What legislation Gary Jay was perhaps thinking of was the Commonwealth Immigrants Act of 1968, which was a piece of legislation passed under Wilson's Labour Government. This was denounced in the pages of the Socialist Standard at the time as piece of racist legislation:

• April 1968: Labour's New Race Law by Adam Buick
• April 1968: 'Prejudice and Pride' by Ivan

Capitalism's code of killing (1993)

From the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Capitalism has always maintained the mythology of the ’just war’, and the church has always been the leading standard bearer for state-sanctioned murder.

It’s not all that long ago since boys’ adventure stories were about swashbuckling heroes meeting in battle on more-or-less equal terms. Raphael Sabbatini's Captain Blood or Maurice Walsh’s David Gordon were fairly typical of the type: brave men opposing one another with courage and resolution and a determination not to take unfair advantage in battle.

Such romantic nonsense is out of place against the background of modern weaponry that denies the killer the agony of watching his victim die. War was never romantic nor "fair"; individual hand-to-hand combat with pikes, lances or swords must have been hell and the science of gaining an unfair advantage over an opponent, then as now. was known as strategy.

Because war and preparation for war is a permanent feature of capitalism that accounts for massive investments of personnel and finance and because it is an utterly foul business, governments are obliged to "respectabilize” it. Thus, something of the old romanticism prevails in what is offered as history. In every' walk of life, parents, schools, churches, participation in war is elevated in the public consciousness and emotive key words, like bravery, heroism, sacrifice, dedicated, proud and patriotic are part of the lexicon of glorification used to transmute the most utterly debased acts of human savagery into something necessary and noble.

Even the "enemy" is not completely damned lest condemnation provoke interest and enquiry. His leaders can be mad or bad and his courage, dignity and honour can rarely be accepted as on a level with "our boys". Nevertheless, there is a decorum that embellishes the obscenity of war. almost a mystique to lighten the haunting futility of death and this can be extended to the enemy.

Thus, it is expected that "we" and our "enemy" will reciprocate in showing a respect to corpses that must be denied to the living. The Luftwaffe pilot shot down while slaughtering women and children in London, the RAF man show down over Dresden while carrying out Churchill’s plan to kill as many German civilians as possible, the hyped-up John Wayne dropping a 2.000kg bomb on a Baghdad street, the heroes who made history at Hiroshima; if, in death, any of these falls into the hands of "the enemy", then they will be accorded the ritual firing of rifles and blowing of bugles over their graves. The exercise gives dignity to those who work at killing and promotes the notion that they died bravely in pursuit of a noble calling.

Appalling reality

But, in the reality of war. battles are won by the gaining of unfair advantage. Obviously, a completely fair fight could have no winner and it is, thus, imperative to the opposing sides to deceive their opponent and. where possible, to introduce weapons of greater destructive capacity and to amass greater concentrations of men and materials.

Spying, with its underscore of lies, deceit, blackmail and, not infrequently, murder, is a legitimate adjunct of war; striking at the enemy’s homeland and slaughtering innocent civilians demoralizes the enemy, impedes his movement and his production of munitions and is, therefore, condoned on the grounds of saving lives. The watchword in war must be "Victory!", untrammelled and uncompromised by considerations of everyday moral rectitude. The Roman Catholic church articulates the provisions for waging a "just war" and one of these stipulates a favourable chance of winning. In common with other bodies, the churches deplore war but lend their services to succour the participants and, often, to plead with their god for the vanquishing of "the enemy".

It is remarkable that decent people who deplore violence and who might be in the forefront of those demanding stiffer sentences and the return of the death penalty for people engaged in violence are often the most vociferous supporters of armed forces and patriotic aggression. How can any rational human being defend the idea of training great masses of people to kill and arming them with guns, bombs, nuclear weapons and the rest of the obscene array destructive equipment that governments provide for the killing business?

The answer we get from apologists for state violence is that it is made necessary by the nature of our society and the fact that our potential enemies have armed forces. The latter simply acknowledges that the effect lies in the cause — because there are armed forces, we must get armed conflict. Pressed, then, to consider an alternative form of society that will not contain the seeds of conflict, these apologists are usually revealed as the most trenchant defenders of the present system.

But there are other aspects of the killing business that create a real dilemma for the upholders of the political and economic status quo with its competition and built-in propensity for conflict and war. Among these is the problem of political terrorism.

In Northern Ireland, for example, people like Archbishop Eames of the Church of Ireland frequently grab headlines with condemnations of terrorists. There are many other churchmen, politicians and others who echo Eames’s sentiments and we name him only because he is the most forceful and frequent person to condemn violence. Like the others. Eames does not condemn all violence or dissociate his church from bodies established and maintained to excel in the use of the most calculatingly efficient means of inflicting death and injury.

Forthrightly and correctly — he condemns the terrorist who leaves a bomb in a hold-all in a public place; he condemns the gunman and his organization and he argues that such behaviour is anti-Christian and that, despite the claims of loyalist killers, they are not acting for the Protestant community.

But Archbishop Eames has yet to go on record condemning governments for having armed forces, he does not condemn gunmen acting for the state and he is silent when a massive bomb is dropped on a city by a sophisticated flying machine using the most advanced technology to conceal its presence and its purpose, and, of course. Eames does not tell members of the state armed forces that their behaviour is anti-Christian.

Psychological scars

In fact the Archbishop, like his competitor colleagues in the other churches and, indeed, most of those in the forefront of the various well-intentioned peace groups, is not opposed to violence and killing. He may be moved to sadness by the lunacy of human beings killing human beings but he only condemns and disowns such behaviour when it is illegal.

Effectively, this reduces the Christian — and, it must be said, the general — concept of so-called moral reasoning to the politics of the head count and this, in turn, must raise very serious questions about the nature of capitalist democracy and the manipulation of "public opinion" by a minority-controlled public power of persuasion.

The question is particularly crucial for those of us who live in Northern Ireland, where the violence which spawned the ruthless Provisional IRA was initialed by a repressive elected government some twenty-five years ago. Now. with violence an everyday occurrence and selective condemnations ritualized by, among others, the very people whose behaviour and political ambition made it inevitable, the hypocritical utterances of people with a ready recourse to a microphone or TV camera can itself fuel violence.

Random killing

Recently, with an upsurge in the random killing of catholics by groups of loyalists operating under various fine sounding titles, a new strain of hypocrisy has emerged — from Sinn Fein, who articulate the political thinking of the IRA. According to this source, killing people because of their job or their overt political altitudes is a legitimate pursuit. On the other hand, if protestant terrorists, in order to exert political pressure, identify their targets on the basis of perceived religion, that is breaking the rules and must, therefore, be evil.

But is it? If you can departmentalize your thinking of the question you might conclude that killing someone is deplorable but sometimes necessary and proper providing the killing is within the confines of a particular code. But who determines the nature of the code and on what basis is it justified? Who is it says that it is permissible to kill perhaps millions of people in another country with a nuclear bomb because that country, or the authority within it that controls armed force, is threatening "our" markets, trade routes or sources of raw materials but it is wrong to kill people who represent an authority that abuses you or unfairly frustrates your political aspirations?

In the ease of the Provisional IRA, apart from the spurious claim to the democratic succession of Sinn Fein’s 1918 all-Ireland electoral victory, the historical morality of violence is often advanced, it is true, of course, that most states owe their existence and their power to the violence, often illegal violence, by which they were established. The "morality" of that argument is that violence is the justification of violence.

Special condemnation

As for preserving a social condemnation for the random killings carried out by loyalist gunmen, it might be asked by what logic it is permissible to shoot a bricklayer because the only way he can make a living is by selling his skills to "the enemy" but wrong to kill at random in order to frustrate a perceived harmful political design.

This is a part of the maze of contradictions you get into when you accept violence at any level. Nor can the question be resolved legalistically for, in every case, the lawful executive is itself not only an agent, real or potential. of the most ruthless violence but. in its role as what Marx referred to as "the executive committee of the ruling class". "Lawful government" is the constant agent of the many other forms of, frequently obscene, violence perpetrated on the working class.

Condemn all violence

Socialists condemn all wars and all political violence. That might seem a simplistic way of avoiding comparisons and condemnations of one form of violence as opposed to another. But it is not a simplistic formula; it is the inescapable logic of the fact that while members of the working class are pitched against one another in wars and so-called national liberation struggles, working class interests are never at stake.

All wars and violent political struggles arise directly or indirectly out of the competition and conflicts of capitalism though such conflicts are usually filtered through an ideological disguise in order to conceal their nature and as a means of enlisting working-class support.

The only struggle that concerns socialists and should concern the working class is the class struggle — the struggle between those who produce all wealth and own virtually none and those who produce nothing and own virtually everything. That struggle, we hold, can be resolved democratically when we have divested ourselves of the fictions that allow us to be enlisted as killers.

Richard Montague

Letter: LBC (1993)

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

LBC

Dear Editors,

As a great fan of "free" radio stations. I read your "Death of a radio station" article in the October issue with great interest.

What great news it was to hear that LBC has lost their broadcasting licence. I’m overjoyed.

The moronic prattlers at LBC and other licensed radio stations have a damned cheek to start shouting "unfair — disgraceful" when they have found out that the Tory Party they have grovelled round have had happen to them what happens to most of us working-class people — being shit upon (when they lose their licence).

What really annoyed me was when I read in your article that LBC groaned that the Government has no right to say who. and who may not, broadcast. LBC and the "others" didn’t have this view when on Saturday August 19 1989, somewhere in the international waters of the North Sea. Radio Caroline, from the MV Ross Revenge w'as being wrecked — not by gale-force winds but by Dutch and UK government officials, with no doubt the likes of LBC gleefully hearing about the events where DJs on board were assaulted, transmitters violently smashed with sledgehammers and the ship’s record library confiscated. Everything on board that ship was either "stolen" by UK officials or smashed to pieces. We are talking about a vessel being in international waters where the UK authorities had no jurisdiction over.

The likes of LBC were responsible for this raid. They protested (since 1983) that Caroline had no right to broadcast etc etc.

Now LBC — poor dears — are “in the same boat" so-to-speak. Well isn’t that tough.

The ILRs wouldn’t be around if it wasn’t for the likes of Caroline and the ’60s stations that broadcast offshore. Surely everybody has the right to broadcast. The airwaves are just that — air isn’t that free?

"We live in a democratic free society". So says Johnnie and his boys. Well, you could’ve fooled me!

Thanks again for the excellent article. Steve Coleman is certainly on my "wavelength".

Best wishes and thanks for an excellent journal.

Doug Sharrard,

Leicester

Letter: “Emotional Man" (1993)

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

“Emotional Man"

Dear Editors.

The October editorial headed "Cure for the fascist cancer" while expounding some fundamental truth, also contained the persistent and basic flaw that is always present in the advocation of your arguments. Your editorial stated: "Do those who seek to ban them (BNP) believe that workers are so stupid as to fall for fascist nonsense when it is countered in public by clear and logical opposition?"

The answer unfortunately is yes they can. There is sufficient evidence to show that millions of people are incapable of rational thinking.

The cause is not because people are “stupid" but because they are subject to early emotional experiences that can thwart mature development of their objective capabilities to fully overcome repressed and infantile fears in later adult life.

If this were not the case, the countless numbers who have, over many years, heard the Socialist Party, with its "clear and logical" position, would have not only rejected their own previous views but, at least most, would have joined the SPGB.

On the contrary, the observations are that millions not only flock to and vigorously support reactionary political philosophies, but in addition millions more become obsessively addicted to religious rantings of the most primitive and irrational kind.

While I am in agreement with the Socialist Party in its desire for a truly democratic world community, based on common ownership, I find that its lack of a deeper and more positive understanding of “Emotional Man", as opposed to its fixation on purely "Economic Man", is its weakest essential link.

Human beings — this should be self-evident — are not robots and mechanical, but living organisms of much complexity in their inner emotional life.

Political reactionaries (including fascists) and religious advocates always make their appeal to the irrational in "Emotional Man" that repeatedly and successfully recruits millions in each generation to their ranks. Despite the fact that those millions, as a result, act contrary to their own rational interests.

This constant seeking after substitute strong symbolic parental images, in the form of Gods, leaders and powerful nation states of "Motherland" and "Fatherland", should give a conclusive indication of the infantile and "lack of confidence" evident in the human psyche.

The source is not in his "nature" but in the "nurtured" early emotional experience. "Fascism" is not merely a political attitude but the outward expression of inner conflicts that we are all capable of living under certain anxiety conditions.

The increasing demand for Sado-Masochistic style movies and violent horror "comics" by vast numbers of young people worldwide, as some attempt at release from inner conflict, should be of great concern.

Trends are also observed in the presentation style, over the last twenty years, in the music of the young, behaviour at football events, drug-taking and drinking habits. All are symptomatic of outward and inward drives of destructive aggressive behaviour.

The development of new religious cults shows an increase in the infestation of mysticism, particularly in the young.

The danger is that these tensions can be projected onto reality with "fascist" values. As a guide to the difficulties Socialists face, if we are ever to secure a genuine and lasting democratic society, may I recommend two two works: The Mass Psychology of Fascism by Wilhelm Reich and The Psychopathology of Everyday Life by Sigmund Freud. Until Socialists fully understand and tackle these deep matters, little progress, if any, can be made for a sane society. Failure to recognise this could have the most serious consequences, in this technological age, for the future of our planet.

Lionel M Rich,

London NW6

Reply:

Who says we are fixated on "economic man"? Socialism is about improving all aspects of human life. We even have members who like the ideas of Freud and Reich (though others reject them as unsubstantiated speculations, not to say unscientific nonsense). The point is we all agree that the task of Socialists today is to make more Socialists, by reasoned argument and democratic persuasion. What are you suggesting we do in addition? Organise a campaign of mass psychoanalysis? 

Editors.

Letter: Religion and Birth Control (1993)

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

Religion and Birth Control

Dear Editors,

Termination of pregnancy and contraception are very difficult. It is misleading to link the two as the article on religion and birth control did in the October issue.

Contraception enables an individual to control family size and fertility if they wish to make this choice. Termination ends the life of another, although very small, individual.

If people stopped linking termination and contraception then maybe religious leaders would stop linking the two and hopefully realize that contraception is a good thing and that by more people having access to it without all the guilt there would be less terminations, less women dying in back-street clinics, less women becoming worn out at an early age from having many children, less deaths of infants, etc, etc.

The only religious people who will not be convinced by separating the two issues are idiots like the Pope who do not care about the unborn child, because once it is born it is then condemned to a life of poverty and even early death. The Pope and his cronies want to control the sexuality of worshippers and keep women uneducated and producing kids until they wear out.

Most Catholics I know do not agree with termination as the life of a baby is ended, however they nearly all use contraception, thinking that if the Pope cared about babies he would stop condemning contraception and positively encourage it.

It will surprise many with stereotyped views on pro-lifers that most of my religious friends support abortion and my humanist atheist friends are mostly against it.

The only way to stop termination is to make contraception easily available, give all kids a good sex education with an emphasis on equality, relationships, love, safety and respect for each other, an end to poverty, equality and choices regarding jobs and education for girls and women all over the world.

Also it is not just religious cultures that oppress women. Secular Western cultures have sick attitudes to women, on the whole we are just sex objects who must be slim and available for the use of men whenever they demand it. Women in the West are still lumbered with child care, have little choice about careers or staying at home. Capitalism forces us into crappy, underpaid jobs and at the same time we have to hold a family together. We can’t even choose not to go out to work because of capitalism. (And who wants to work for this system anyway?)

So it is not just the fundamentalists of the Vatican, Iran and the American Bible Belt who oppress women.

Ali Browning,

Bradford

SPGB Meetings (1993)

Party News from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

An audio recording of Kerima Mohideen's talk on Rudyard Kipling's Kim is available at the following link.

Letter: Profound Disequilibrium (1993)

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

Profound Disequilibrium

Dear Editors.

The article “World Recession Closes in Quickly” (October) makes the undeniable point that "the capitalist economy is in a period of profound disequilibrium". However, I feel that coupling this with the statement that it would get better may suggest to some readers that the Socialist Party holds the mistaken view that equilibrium is the normal state of a healthy capitalism, that is, one of boom.

Traditional bourgeois economic theory leans heavily on the concept that production serves consumption, and that equilibrium is achieved as all factors of production receive their just recompense in the market, which is supposed to regulate technical/organisational decisions necessary for this alleged balance.

Marx’s value theory demonstrates that capitalism's normal state is, in fact, disequilibrium. Quite apart from the anarchy of production, this arises from the fact that on the level of the whole economy capital accumulation can proceed only through the realisation of surplus value by reinvestment in new means of production, capitalists' and workers’ personal consumption being met out of the remainder of surplus value and by wages respectively.

This reinvestment is made by individual businesses under competitive pressure, and in anticipation of a market demand over and above that currently existing. It must bear a favourable relationship to the mass of capital already accumulated if the economy is to expand and they are to stay in business. Whether the rate of profit is maintained, and slump deferred, depends firstly on whether this new investment enables a corresponding increase in surplus value production. But this competitively-compelled investment in new means of production is a permanent feature of disequilibrium normal to capitalism, driving it forward beyond current market bounds and ultimately to a period of over-investment, declining profits and slump. Incidentally. I believe that it is only in this sense that Marx’s contentious reference to crises being ultimately caused by the restricted consumption of the masses can be seen as relevant.

As capitalist production is essentially production of and for capital, it is enabled to proceed only when it can produce enough surplus value to satisfy its accumulation needs, and ceases when it cannot. No equilibrium state is involved.

W. Robertson,

Brighton

Reply:

We didn't really suggest that equilibrium is the normal slate of the capitalist economy, did we?

Editors.

50 Years Ago: The Black Hole of Calcutta (1993)

The 50 Years Ago column from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Indian scene, in normal times, is a picture of a vast mass of humanity living in the grip of abysmal poverty. Utter destitution resulting in a prolonged death through starvation, or a quicker death through mal-nutritional diseases such as tuberculosis, cholera and typhoid, is the lot of Indian workers and peasants. What then must be their lot when the price of the food they require for a bare existence soars far and away above their means? What can they do but wait for death to claim them, their bony hands held out imploringly for food, on the pavements of the second largest and one of the “most prosperous” cities in the British Empire! In other parts of the same empire the granaries of Australia and Canada are full to overflowing with the wheat that would bring succour to those in need. The problem, however, according to Mr. Amery (Secretary for India), speaking in the House of Commons, October 12, 1943, was “entirely one of shipping, and has to be judged in the light of all the other urgent needs of the Allied Nations.” Yet the Allied Nations are producing ships faster than they have ever been produced before in the history of mankind, and the USA is able to boast of a production of 15,000 naval ships of all dimensions in the past three years. Well might the reader at this point exclaim, “This is madness!”

No, reader, this is not madness – simply another example of the ever present anarchy in CAPITALISM, the economic system of society that holds the world enslaved.

[From an article by "N.S." in the Socialist Standard, December 1943.]

Sting in the Tail: Winter blues (1993)

The Sting in the Tail column from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Winter blues

Every worker in Britain will shortly have a series of beautifully produced, full colour and glossy pieces of nonsense thrust through their doors.

Your husband can buy you a super collossal new washing machine. Whoopee! Your wife can buy you a new chainsaw. (Well, the kids have become a bit uppity recently.)

In December we are in the month when sellers of commodities wring their hands at the prospects of giant sales. It is Christmas, when alienated workers try to make up for their anti-social behaviour by buying their friends commodities that will never make up for that behaviour.

Inside a socialist system of society women and men will probably celebrate the winter solstice, but it will be without recourse to the nonsense of spending money as a substitute for community and love.

Not in the script

All over the world in every industry the cry is that costs must be cut because of competition. Besides low wages and more unemployment, this also means the lowering of safety standards at work and nowhere is this more apparent than in Britain's mines

The Cost of Coal (BBC2, 29 October) revealed how pressure to cheapen production is leading British Coal to fake the monitoring of dust levels, and the American system of "Extended Cut" is being introduced. This allows coal-cutting machines to cut further without additional roof support and the accident rate in American mines is much greater than in British mines.

Most people used to expect that life in capitalism would inevitably get better: incomes would grow, jobs be more secure and safety at work improve, yet the opposite is happening. Those expectations simply didn’t take into account capitalism’s built-in drive for profit and the competition it brings in its wake.

Fair Trading?

Sainsbury, Tesco and Safeway; the names ring out like a litany of praise to the benefits of competition. Or at least so they would have you believe. The facts are somewhat different.

They were all objectors to Costco, a US warehouse-style club, and its plans to open its first UK store. However a high court judge ruled against them and Costco opened its first store on 30 November.

The reason for the big three being so concerned is not difficult to deduce.

"In the US, although this may not he the same in the UK, food trades off a gross margin of around 10 percent, significantly loner than the 26 percent or so currently achieved by the operators of UK superstores" (Herald, 2S October).

It is that old capitalist story again. 
Competition is good — for other people!

Pads for proles

Prince Charles's visit to Glasgow provided the opportunity for yet another lecture on how to patch up capitalism.

HRH blamed modern tower block housing for creating feelings of "hopelessness and alienation" among youngsters and praised the traditional Scottish tenement which he thought "could, perhaps, solve many of our current problems".

The idea that tenements were full of happy, neighbourly people is an old one. Apparently, you could leave your door unlocked with safety and everybody looked after one another. After a lifetime spent in tenements, and not just in Glasgow, Scorpion’s experience hasn’t been quite like that.

The Prince urged developers to ask themselves before schemes went ahead — "Would I want to live here myself?". That’s the question he should ask himself before singing the praises of tenements, but then he was talking about homes for proles, not parasites.

Cancerous growth

Every year breast cancer kills 13,000 women in Britain, so when the breast cancer gene was discovered somewhere in Chromosome 17 there was universal excitement. It seemed that a breakthrough was on the way to understanding the disease.

Scientific teams world-wide exchanged information regularly in an effort to identify regions of the chromosome that could be eliminated. A wonderful picture of selfless white-coated devotees peering through microscopes and co-operating internationally to cure this scourge emerges. Well, it’s not quite like that. This is capitalism after all:

  "But as the groups edged closer to identifying the gene they began to split apart", said Simon Smith, head of Cambridge University research team funded by the Cancer Research Campaign. "Things have now gone quiet because none of us wants to give information to the other", he saul.
  "In an ideal world we'd be talking to each other and not holding back information. But our work is judged on what is published. If we are always second it's no good. " (Independent on Sunday, 31 October)

So the winner gets the kudos, the big financial rewards and the biggest grants. Isn’t competition a wonderful thing? Tell that to the 13,000 women and their grieving families.

Taken for granted

Towards the end of World War Two the British government set in motion plans to regain control of Britain’s Asian colonies, particularly Hong Kong, from the local politicians who would initially take over from the Japanese.

To this end SOE, part of Britain’s spy network, organized "subversive activities". Lists were drawn up of "who to bribe", plans made for "fabricating the semblance of pro-British demonstrations" and to spread dark rumours that displaying the British flag "was the best guarantee for the safety of one’s person and one’s goods" when British forces returned.

All this and more is contained in the lastest batch of secret documents to be released as part of the "open government" initiative. What is remarkable about these revelations is not so much the greed, cynicism and corruption of our rulers, but their absolute confidence that they can tell us all about it and still retain our trust in them.

Between the Lines: "Life under capitalism is a serious business . . ." (1993)

The Between the Lines column from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Life under capitalism is a serious business, but there are some laughs along the way, often at the expense of the rulers rather than the ruled. Modern political humour comes in a variety of forms, several of which have received a TV airing in recent weeks. Most aim their fire at the easiest targets of them all politicians — and with varying degrees of effectiveness.

Spitting Image (ITV, Sundays, 10pm). the long-running puppet show, attempts political comedy via the art of caricature and lampoonery. and not really as successfully as when it began in Thatcher's heyday. Its 1987 General Election special with Thatcher's cabinet rigged out in lederhosen singing "Tomorrow belongs to me" was a masterly piece of political lampoonery at a time when tomorrow really did seem to belong to them, with their market lunacies and anti-trade unionism all fuelled by the prejudices of the wide-boys in the City

Since then things have turned sour for the economy and the Conservatives alike, and Spitting Image has been struggling hard to keep up with the trend. When "personalities" abound in the realm of capitalist politics caricature is in vogue, but when confronted with the present political vacuum, it loses its bite and has to look elsewhere for entertainment.

A popular offshoot of caricature has been the art of mimickry and impression. Mike Yarwood made this popular in the 1970s with his homely impersonations of Wilson and Callaghan, but just like them, what he said was always secondary to the way he said it. Yarwood eventually took to the bottle when his principal targets left the political scene, leaving him devoid of replacements. His line in political impressionism was eventually taken up by Rory Bremner (C4. Saturdays. 10.05pm and Wednesdays. 11.05pm). Bremner. who is possibly no more talented a mimic than Yarwood. succeeds where Yarwood failed through greater flexibility and better scripts. Bremner aims at much more than simply poking fun from the sidelines and consequently his show is often one of the most overtly political on television. Its mimickry is frequently blended with satire to highlight the cant and hypocrisy of the ruling elite in society. The politician/interviewer sketches involving John Bird have been particularly effective and haven’t shirked from showing up not just the insanities of the political process itself but the market system which dictates the parameters within which politicians are bound. Bremner and his supporting cast appear to have a deep antipathy towards the market economy which can only be applauded by socialists, though unsurprisingly it has already provoked the wrath of Tory politicians and sections of the tabloid press.

A more subtle approach to political comment has recently been provided by Andrew Marshall and David Renwick's new black comedy If You See God, Tell Him (BBC 1, Thursdays. 9.30pm). In this sitcom the lead character, played by Richard Briers, has suffered a freak accident which has left him with a thirty-second attention span ideal for memorizing TV adverts, but little else. Briers’s character becomes obsessed with TV advertising, organizing his life around what he has been influenced to buy, and spending his “happiest" hours attempting to get his dishes whiter than white with the latest revolutionary brand of washing-up liquid. Needless to say, the compensation money from his accident is spent within a matter of weeks and his life becomes a market-driven living nightmare in every sense.

Just like One Foot In The Grave, which emerged from the same writing stable, If You See God, Tell Him takes the particularly frustrating aspects of capitalist life and magnifies them until they emerge at the level of obsession. The humour has a somewhat sick edge to it in parts, and will not be to everybody's taste, but it sure beats the trash usually served up as an excuse for situation comedy. And it is refreshing to see a sitcom — often the most tame form of comedy — which shows a willingness to illuminate some of the inanities and insanities of the market system.

Dave Perrin

Go for a million update (1993)

Party News from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our plans to contest four seats in next June’s elections to the European Parliament are well advanced. The candidates have now been chosen and we are preparing the information pack to be sent to the thousands of replies expected to the million leaflets that will be distributed by the Post Office.

The four Socialist prospective candidates are Ron Cook (Birmingham East), Jim Fleming (Glasgow), Clifford Slapper (London Central) and Brian Gardner (Lothians).

Those replying to our leaflet will be sent a socialist information pack containing a special issue of the Socialist Standard and leaflets on particular subjects as well as a personalized covering letter. This will be the main work of the campaign and will be organized at our Head Office in London. The plan is to have a team of up to twenty people working there over the election period and immediately after. If you would be available to help over this period in London (last week in May to third week in June) by opening letters, answering the phone, keying in names and addresses, and putting the information packs into envelopes, please get in touch with us.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all those readers, members and sympathizers, both here and abroad, who have contributed to our Election Fund. We are well on the way to achieving our target of at least £20,000. At the time of writing (mid-November) the amount paid into or pledged to our Election Fund stood at £14,883. So we still need a further £5,000

If you want to help finance this biggest ever campaign to get Socialist ideas across and have not yet contributed you can do so by sending a cheque or postal order (made payable to the "Socialist Party of Great Britain") to Election Fund, 52 Clapham High Street, London SW4 7UN.

Scargill: the Unauthorised Biography (1993)

Book Review from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Scargill: the Unauthorised Biography By Paul Routledge. Harper Collins. £16.99.

Arthur Scargill arouses mixed feelings in Socialists. On the one hand, he is one of the few public figures who says things we can agree with. For instance: "History is littered with abortive attempts to reform capitalism. You cannot reform this system out of existence. What we need is a complete and utter change of society" (p. 261) He even once told an incredulous (then plain Mr) David Frost that he stood for a moneyless society (Daily Mail. 19 September 1983). On the other hand, [he] sees himself leader with the presumption and arrogance that goes with this.

Fellow traveller

Scargill’s background was with the old Communist Party (he was a member of its youth section and stood as a candidate for them in local elections in 1960). He inherited from them the anti-socialist idea that what the workers require is the right leadership — in the case of the Yorkshire miners, his leadership.

Routledge makes out a convincing case for saying that Scargill left the CP only because he felt that membership would stand in the way of his ambition to be a leader of the Yorkshire miners' union. Alter leaving he still retained their mistaken conception of socialism as state capitalism on the Russian model. Even today his political position is nearest to that of the faction of the old CP that brings out the Morning Star.

He is also a bit of a syndicalist in the sense that he believes that workers should take mass industrial action, not just to get higher wages and better conditions, but also to bring about political and social change. Not that there is any evidence that mass industrial action has been able to override the economic laws of the profit system any more than can the reformist parliamentary action he derides.

In fact even as a trade union leader Scargill has been a distinct failure. It was his misfortune to realise his ambition of becoming president of the NUM at a time when coal was being outcompeted by other fuels and so doomed to decline as a capitalist industry. No doubt the miners had to go on strike in 1984 but the tactics adopted meant that when they were forced back in 1985 they were completely defeated: not only did they not obtain any concessions on the speed of pit closures (the most they could have hoped for) but their ability to fight another day was undermined by their split into two rival unions. After that it has been downhill all the way.

Paul Routledge, it has to be said, emerges as nasty a character as he paints Scargill to be. During the strike the State seized the assets of the NUM. So the national officials decided, quite legitimately, to set up a parallel, secret fund. Naturally these funds couldn’t be properly audited. When the capitalist press discovered this, led by Robert Maxwell (who, it later emerged, knew a thing or two about how to get his hands on unauthorised funds) they cried "scandal", "corruption". Although Scargill was exonerated of any charge of misappropriating union funds for his own personal benefit, Routledge repeats this allegation a number of times while only mentioning in passing the exoneration. This is despicable and the mark of a capitalist journalistic hack.

Adam Buick

Films (1993)

Film Review from the December 1993 issue of the Socialist Standard

Naked - Mike Leigh

If nothing else Mike Leigh's latest film provokes thought and discussion. I fell into a long, sometimes heated, discussion on the nature and meaning of this film shortly after viewing it. In short, it depicts the travels of a Mancunian initially fleeing Manchester and looking up an old girlfriend in London and later wandering around London bumping into various unusual characters: two homeless Scottish teenagers, a philosophic and lonely security guard, a fly-posterer, to name but a few. All this is handled with great sardonic wit and Leigh's usual social realism. It would be fair to say that this is a brutal film, depicting as it does a number of rape scenes, coupled with a sense of universal misogyny and a feeling of alienation gripping all the characters.

But from here my discussion came back to its point of departure. Whilst on the one hand my companion felt that this is the sort of viewing that everybody should watch, the sort of social realism that can be truly educational, the sort of film that can shake people into some vague form of action, I felt rather that the film had no "message." I saw it as the depiction of a hopeless scenario, one devoid of potential solution. The potential of the romantic ending was ignored, no spectre of a "solution" was apparent.

Powerful

This is powerful movie-making. It is not the Hollywood variety that insults its audience with fantasy solutions, rather it reflects in things as they are — to a greater or lesser extent devoid of hope. We live in an age of the politically-correct slogan, in an age of "care in the community", of "charity", of "Red Nose Days", of Esther Rantzen TV shows  . . .  the list goes on.

Well intentioned 

No matter how well intentioned some of those involved in these activities are, the fundamental reality is that they don't work. Whether one accepts the socialist analysis or not, nothing present social institutions have ever thrown up of has gone far in addressing the problems depicted in the film.

Socialists would have it that it is the system itself that is at fault, and while this is far from being universally accepted, there is no denying the seriousness of the problem around us. For me it is this blank depiction of reality, devoid of hope, that is the only "message" in this film.

G.