Party News: Eine Welt — Eine Menschheit — Sozializmus! (1968)

Party News from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

This is the theme of the current (April/May/June) issue of the “Internationales Freies Wort”, the German language Socialist journal brought out by our comrades of the Bund Demokratischer Sozialisten in Austria and their friends in Germany and Switzerland. This special 6-page issue is directed at workers in West Germany. There are articles from Australia, Britain, Canada and the United States, thus bringing out the international nature of Socialism. Other items discussed are the rise and fall of the German Social Democratic Party and Rudi Dutschke, the student leader and recent victim of an assassination bid. Also the third part of “Russland 1917-1967. Eine sozialistische Analyse”. Order your copy, price 1/- (postage extra), from the Socialist Party, 52 Clapham High Street, London, SW4.

Letter: Practical steps towards Socialism (1968)

Letter to the Editors from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Dear Sir,

We would make our planet a better place to live at if we go on contributing our mite for making it a Socialist planet. Not mere seminars, forums or intellectual get-togethers on Socialism are enough, but some concrete steps towards Socialisation are required. In this respect I may, especially mention the establishment of certain villages and towns, on voluntary basis, based on socio-economic set-up, in which farmers and workers may work on mutually co-operative basis. Socialist schools and educational institutions may be set up to educate the people on the socialist principles. This I am suggesting, because it will facilitate our process of Socialisation. Moreover on a large scale basis, i.e. countrywide campaign, in the very beginning seems rather impracticable.

Remesh C. Sharma, 

Phagwara, Punjab.

Reply:
We are familiar with arguments like Mr. Sharma’s for setting up co-operative communities within capitalism as a means of gradually replacing it by Socialism. However, we do not think that this is a practical proposition for the industrialised world, with its various powerful states, we now have. The major problems of today are world problems and can only be solved by the establishment of a world community, without frontiers, based on common ownership with production solely for use, not profit. A Socialist planet, as Mr. Sharma puts it.

Small co-operative communities might provide a pleasant way of working and living for a few, but they can never be a solution to the problems of wage-workers who live in big cities and work in big factories and offices. To establish Socialism requires the building of a strong, worldwide movement directed at winning political power for Socialism, in each country. Winning political power before carrying out the social revolution converting the means of life from class to common property is essential. For class property is maintained and protected by political power. To try to by-pass the state, thus leaving it in the hands of the enemies of Socialism, would have disastrous results.

We agree with Mr. Sharma that discussion alone is not what is wanted. We say that Socialism is possible now, and act on this assumption by devoting our energies to preparing the working class to win political power. Frankly, we think that setting up communities within capitalism is a waste of valuable time and energy.

Editorial Committee.

Southern Journey (1968)

Party News from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

To arrive in Jamaica at 10 o’clock at night in 90 degrees of heat and humidity after leaving London 10 hours before at 35 degrees is a shattering experience, but this disappears when a slight, bewhiskered Jamaican holds out his hand and says “Welcome to Jamaica, Comrade Edmonds”; when a tall, brawny lad with an infectious smile grabs your bags, puts them in his car and within minutes you are sitting in a beer garden being introduced to various people and discussion begins.

Such was our meeting with Cornrade Dolphy and Comrade Barry—I never did find out his other name. The following day we were allowed to rest and in the evening a visit to a club and we sit down to discussion again. Someone walks up. “Hello there, George”. “John,” says George, “this is Bill. He’s interested in the Party”, and so another participant.

The following day, we are picked up early by Barry and George and travel 80 miles into the mountains to talk to a sympathiser who accepted the Party’s case, but was sceptical about the here-after. As an ex-Roman Catholic, I was able to convince him—I hope—that it was fear that was his problem, and we parted with agreement. This was the pattern of the whole of our stay.

Jamaica of course is a country of Montego Bay with its holiday resort, writers and retired millionaires, whilst Kingston, where we stayed, is the commercial town with the poverty and unemployment very familiar in the Carribean area. The United Fruit Company has major control of the Island’s agrarian economy, which is primarily sugar, bananas and coffee. The Daily Gleaner spends much of its time acting as referee between the two political parties’ attacks on each other for graft.

I must here pay tribute to the late Comrade La Touche. They speak of him with much regard and he must have contributed to the growing group of Jamaica.

And now a different kettle of fish; Wellington, New Zealand. Seeing the Airport, we were confronted by a large sign “Trotts here tonight”. For a moment, I thought politics were very active. Unfortunately, it was horse racing and not Trotskyists. However, our welcome to Wellington was as enthusiastic as Jamaica if not as colourful. One cannot speak too highly of Comrade Ron Everson and the band of Socialists who are doing a job of work in New Zealand. I think a remark of Com. Everson will suffice to explain—“I retired from work”, he said, “I couldn't propagate Socialism and work.” This is indeed true. With the assistance of his wife, Amy, he carries out the work of secretary, literature secretary, organiser and chief seller of Standards and Westerns—indeed a full-time job. He also has a “room for Socialism” in his house in Wigan Street where every Thursday they hold classes, and it was enlightening to see a group of young Comrades with a group of older members. As Ron says, we are getting old —we need the young 'uns, and I think they have some excellent tutors and material.

We visited several old members including Comrade Rolfe Everson, who alas died since I arrived home. I also was introduced to the Dockers’ Club and gave a talk on War, Want and Waste. It should have lasted an hour, but as it was raining, most of the lads were standing by, so the meeting went on for four hours.

Johnny Edmonds

50 Years Ago: Decimal Coinage (1968)

The 50 Years Ago column from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

This little volume (Sterling Decimal Coinage. By Walter L. Craig. London. Effingham and Wilson 2/6) is an exhaustive enquiry into the matter of the adoption of a decimal coinage for the British Empire. The author’s reasoning is very cogent, and he incidentally shows how vested interests and official muddle-headedness and red tape stand in the way even of the capitalists doing the best for themselves.

Not that we are concerned about a decimal system of coinage. Its obvious efficiency as a labour-saver may be admitted, but is hardly likely to appeal to the unemployed clerk in the post-war days. Also, we are expecting to establish Socialism before Mr. Craig gets even a good start with his scheme to revolutionise the coinage, and under Socialism . . .  we shall have no use for either MILS or L.S.D. There will be neither giving or receiving of change, nor weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth over the too late discovery of a bad ’un. And if, as Mr. Craig says, the ha’penny has killed the farthing—poor mite! — Socialism will kill the damned lot.

From the Socialist Standard, June 1918.

Better late than never (1968)

Party News from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the 1966 General Election one of the Socialist Party of Great Britain candidates stood at Hampstead. The sitting Tory, former Home Secretary Henry Brooke, was also opposed by Ben Whitaker for Labour and a Liberal. We organised for the evening of Sunday 27 March a meeting to which we invited the other candidates to take up the Socialist challenge. None did, explaining either that they had a prior engagement or that they never campaigned on Sunday. Whitaker, however, (who presumably felt he had most to lose by the opposition of a Socialist candidate — he was mistaken, mind you, because Socialists do not vole Labour when there is no Socialist candidate) did send a representative. She was Constance Lever, a regular contributor to the journals International Socialism and Labour Worker. She said that she agreed with our banners around the platform--“Production For Use”, “Workers of the World. Unite" and “Abolition of the Wages System"—but went on to say that nevertheless workers ought to vote for Labour, not the Socialist, candidate. Whitaker, in fact, defeated Brooke and is now the MP for Hampstead. We recently heard that Constance Lever has left the Labour Party. We trust she is sorry for the part she played in helping Labour to power.

Labour Worker, by the way, is changing its name to “Socialist Worker”. They explain: "It is a measure of the complete capitulation of the Labour government to the demands of the bankers and bosses that the paper has to change its name to avoid any possible confusion with the Wilson anti-working-class administration”. We would say rather that it is a measure of complete opportunism to start a paper with “Labour” in the name when the Labour Party is popular and to change it when the Labour Party becomes unpopular.

Socialists in Haringey election (1968)

Party News from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Haringey branch put up three candidates in the Stroud Green ward, Hornsey, for the local borough elections on 9 May. 3.000 election manifestos were delivered in the ward, and another 5,000 in the rest of the borough. The Socialists were opposed by three Tories, three Labourites, one Communist and a student from the Hornsey College of Art.

During the campaign the Tory leader, Councillor Rigby, referred to Labour as “the Socialist Party”. We immediately sent off this letter:

   “We note that in a letter published in the Hornsey Journal and Wood Green Herald today you write about “the Socialist Party” when you obviously mean the Labour Party.
   You are perhaps aware that our organisation, which has been known as the Socialist Party since its founding in 1904, has been active in the area now called Haringey for many years, We did contest the Greater London Council elections last April under our own name, and we are contesting the Stroud Green Ward in the Haringey Borough elections on 9 May. You will appreciate that to refer to one party with the name of another, especially during an election which both are contesting, can only cause great confusion, and could even have legal repercussions.
   We request, therefore, that you please call the Labour Party “the Labour Party" and only use “the Socialist Party" if you wish to refer to our party. We would also request you make this known to your candidates and party workers throughout the borough.
   In order to clear up before election day some of the confusion your letter may have caused, we are sure you will not object to our sending copies of this letter to the local press."

Rigby acknowledged this letter. So if he does it again we can denounce him for dishonesty and for deliberately causing confusion. We also tried to expose one of the Tory candidates (since elected councillor) as a defender, and perhaps even an exponent, of race prejudice. The pro- Tory local press would not publish our challenge as the Tories were obviously out to get the “immigrant vote”. Lewis, one of our Tory opponents in Stroud Green, was in fact an immigrant from the West Indies.

The result was:
Lotery (C) 2,026: Stansall (C) 2.021: Lewis (C) 1,923; Wehrfritz (Lab) 604; Young (Lab) 576: Akerman (Lab) 572: Baker (Com) 122: Coles (Ind) 69; Buick (Soc) 52: Carter (Soc) 49: Lee (Soc) 49.

East Was East (1968)

Book Review from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Japanese Miracle Men by Ralph Hewins (Secker and Warburg, 70s.)

In this book Ralph Hewins gives the “great man” version of Japanese industrial recovery since the Second World War. The majority of his heroes are over seventy years of age. Their careers generally reflect the successes and failures of Japan in the commercial brawls of capitalism.

During the period covered by this book Japan has been dominated by America. At first America set about dismantling war industries and trying to limit the power of the ruling class by introducing American-style trade unionism and democracy. This tended to play into the hands of the pro-Russia “communists”. These measures were relaxed during the Korean War when Japanese industry became an important supplier of war materials to the American forces. From then on Japanese industry prospered and soon surpassed its pre-war outputs. High quality and technical innovation has now replaced cheapness and imitations, which were previously the hallmarks of its industries. They have gradually dominated Far Eastern trade so that an industrial nation such as Australia has become a satellite supplying raw materials.

Japan is noted for industrial relations based on paternalism, where the worker is expected to stick with his firm for life and the employer to hold on to his workers through thick and thin. Promotion is based on seniority which may explain the great age of Japan’s industrial elite. This is gradually giving way to the western pattern of management with promotion supposedly based on merit and the work-force kept in line with the demand of the market. Hewins’ “wonder-men" show the universal nature of capitalism when talking of wages and trade unions:

The trade unions are wrong. There is no object in dividing 10,000 yen among 10,000 people equally: it is better if one person conrols the 10,000 yen so that it can fructify.

Which typifies the philistine outlook of capitalists everywhere—and of Hewins, who eulogises them.

Joe Carter

White Collar Unionism (1968)

Book Review from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Union Character and Social Class by R. M. Blackburn, (Batsford. 55s.)

In Britain those who work for wages and salaries—employees, to use a neutral term —are popularly divided into “middle class” and “working class”, roughly those who work in offices and those who work in factories. Clerks tend to look down on factory workers, while they themselves are regarded as unproductive pen-pushers. Socialists say that all employees have a common interest as members of the same economic class, which we call the working class. So when we use the term “working class” we mean much more than the popular usage.

Trade unionism, and strikes, are things associated with the “working class”. But many in “middle class” jobs, because of their economic position as wage-earners, are under pressure to get together to discuss wages and working conditions with their employers. Only they see it as degrading to be in a Trade Union. How is this conflict between economic pressure and “middle class” values resolved? For resolved it is, as the rise in white-collar unionism over the past twenty or so years shows. Recently we’ve seen official strikes by teachers, airline pilots, post office and bank clerks.

In this book, Blackburn argues that in assessing to what degree trade unionism has spread amongst a group of workers, you must take into account not only how many are in unions, but also the character of those unions. Basically, how militant are they? To test this suggestion he examines economic organisation amongst bank clerks, traditionally regarded as the aristocracy of clerical workers. Bank clerks are in rival bodies: the National Union of Bank Employees (which is affiliated to the TUC, but not to the Labour Party) and various internal staff associations such as the Midland Bank Staff Association. Eight out of every ten are in one or other of these organisations (three in NUBE, five in the staff associations).

But can these staff associations be called “unions”? It is true that they were set up to keep NUBE’s predecessor (which had the respectable title of Bank Officers' Guild) out of the banks. Originally membership of these associations was compulsory and free (so they were financed by the employers). To call such outfits unions would indeed be wrong but, over time, both the union and the associations changed their character. The BOG joined the TUC in 1940 and became in 1946, on amalgamation, the National Union of Bank Employees. Wartime compulsory arbitration forced the staff associations to reform in order to qualify as genuine employee organisations: membership became voluntary and dues had to be paid.

This was a small step towards independence. In 1950 they got a sanction they could use against the bank employers: the right to take a dispute to outside arbitration. This they have done once or twice. However, the banks still prefer the less militant staff associations to NUBE. Only three recognise the union (Barclays, National and Williams Deacons) and the last two have no staff association. At the end of last year NUBE struck against the clearing banks for recognition. The only previous strikes had been in 1963, one against a Pakistan bank in London, and the other against the Trustee Savings Banks in the Provinces.

Thus the general trend towards white-collar unionism has gone on in banking as elsewhere. But it has taken the form not only of the growth of the declared union, NUBE, but also of the growing activity and independence of the internal staff associations. Blackburn’s book, though not meant for the layman, is an interesting study of trade unionism. It shows how the economic position of workers under capitalism forces them to set up bargaining organisations, and how these need not necessarily be associated with support for left-wing ideas. Indeed a recent NUBE General Secretary was a Tory and it is significant that it is the white-collar unions that have been least taken in by Labour’s appeal, on the grounds of loyalty, for wage restraint.

Adam Buick

Unions in the Civil Service (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

A branch committee member of one of the civil service unions describes how civil servants, too, are members of the working class:

Many workers have some odd prejudices about the civil service and those who work in it. They imagine workers employed to help run the capitalist state machine do less work, are higher paid and have better conditions of employment than any other section of the working class. Workers who believe this should ask themselves one question: Why do civil servants organise themselves into trade unions? The answer, of course, is simple. Civil servants, like other workers, are faced with the various problems involved in being a member of the working class. In fact, it is interesting to note that about 8 out of 10 non-manual workers in state employment belong to trade unions.

Most of the unions to which civil servants belong are called “associations" but this does not alter the fact that they have basically the same function as any other trade union, namely, to protect and improve the working conditions of their members. One such union is the Civil Service Clerical Association (C.S.C.A.) which, although affiliated to the TUC, is not (to the members' credit) linked with the Labour Party. It has about 160,000 members and covers workers employed in such jobs as Clerical Officers (some of the lowest paid workers in the country) and typists. Its members also include minority civil service grades such as Air Traffic Control Assistants and Teleprinter Operators.

You might think that working at an international airport like Heathrow is glamourous and exciting but the items which the CSCA London Air Traffic Control Centre branch deals with are all too familiar to workers in any job, i.e., wages, hours worked, fatigue breaks, etc., etc. Although the branch has about 150 members there is the usual disturbing problem of apathy and the branch is mainly run by the efforts of the active members on the branch committee. At the same time workers employed there do just as much grumbling and groaning as anywhere else, even about the supposed inactivity of the union.

In local union negotiations the class struggle which takes place between capitalist and worker tends to be obscured by the myriad of staff regulations and by the two sides being called the “official” and the “staff” side. But the official side can be just as uncompromising and obstructive as any other employer. In a recent “rate-for-the-job” dispute the union was demanding an allowance for workers doing a job previously done by a higher-paid civil service grade. The official side, in true capitalist fashion, delayed and side-tracked the issue for as long as possible whilst unrest grew amongst the workers. The deliberately complicated procedures for settling pay claims means also that rises are often subject to long delays which are obviously in the interests of the employers.

Despite apathy in the branch, active members are often aware of their position as wage and salary earners and a glance at the CSCA Conference Agenda confirms this. There are several healthy resolutions on pay, hours and strike policy.

The Parasites (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Have you ever wondered where organisations like the British Council for Peace in Vietnam and the Movement for Colonial Freedom get their money from? A member explains how their supporters in his union branch use dubious means to help:

Before the First World War, Labour Party leaders hit upon a convenient way of financing their political careers: they paid themselves salaries out of union funds. Unfortunately for them, a railwayman’s branch secretary called Osborne, who as a Liberal objected to financing Labour MP's, took them to court and won. The courts ruled that unions could only spend their funds on industrial matters. But the 1913 Trade Union Act allowed the unions to set up separate political funds, providing they gave their members the chance to opt out. This contracting-out of the political levy lasted till 1927 when the Tories, after the General Strike, changed it to contracting-in. Labour changed it back again in 1946.

Many, but certainly not all, unions have political funds which they use mainly to affiliate to the Labour Party and to sponsor their own Labour candidates. Members of the Socialist Party naturally contract out of this levy. However, the local branches of some unions use money from the general, as opposed to the political, fund to finance obviously political organisations. This is easy where the branch is based on a geographical district rather than the place of work. Only a few members usually turn up and it is they who decide policy and how the funds are spent.

A case in point is a white collar union whose members work in scattered offices in the centre of London. Average attendance at the monthly meetings of this 300-strong branch is less than 20, and some of these are people who have retained their membership for political reasons as they are no longer employed, at least not in offices covered by the branch. Although none of the officers are members of the so-called Communist Party (the rule-book in fact discriminates against them) a hard-core of regular attenders are. It is easy for them to vote money to the various organisations they fancy. For instance, in one month last year they voted, from the general fund, £5 to the Anti-Apartheid Movement, 25s. to the Movement for Colonial Freedom, £2 subscription to Pensioners’ Voice and 10s to Voice of the Unions. At the next meeting they bought 8s. worth of MCF raffle tickets and donated £5 to the British Council for Peace in Vietnam, allegedly for an ambulance. Now the 1913 Act defines political expenditure, apart from election work, as money spent “on the holding of political meetings of any kind, or on the distribution of political literature or political documents of any kind”. Since they money they donate to AA, MCF or BCPV will obviously be used to help pay for meetings and leaflets this branch would seem to be coming very near to breaking the law. It is significant that some other unions, SOGAT at the national level for instance, contribute to the British Council for Peace in Vietnam and to Amnesty in Spain from their political fund. They take more care. But there is a reason why the Communists prefer to use the general to the political fund. Contributions to the political are very low (1d. a week in this union, of which half goes to the branch). At branch level, this money is used to affiliate to local Labour parties, so that the financing of “leftwing” groups on the scale practised just could not be sustained; it would break the political fund. One month, and this admittedly is exceptional, out of a total expenditure of over £46 more than £20 was spent on political donations; nothing was spent from the political fund, the balance of which was about £11.

What happens, then, is that a few hundred clerical workers contribute to the local branch funds believing it is going to be used for industrial purposes: to maintain an organisation to press for better wages and working conditions. Whereas in fact a handful of regular attenders use much of these contributions to finance “left-wing” groups. In a sense, this is the members’ own fault. It is only because they take little or no interest in union affairs that a left-wing clique, generally Communists, can take them for a ride. But there is another aspect: the cynical behaviour of the left-wingers who loudly shout about morality but use dubious means to get money.

This whole trick is repeated up and down the country and provides a considerable part of the funds of the left wing organisations mentioned.

Obituary: Bill Hegney (1968)

Obituary from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

We regret to have to report the death of Comrade Bill Hegney at the age of 51. Bill joined the West Ham branch in 1945 through contact with other members. He immediately began looking for work to do in the Party. He set about the job of equipping himself with knowledge attending meetings and lectures all over London and attending classes at Head Office in History and Economics.

He read every piece of Party literature he could lay his hands on as well as many of the more advanced works of Marx and Engels. A few months after becoming a member he took on the job of literature secretary for the West Ham Branch, a job he held for many years and in doing so he was an ever present at the outdoor and indoor meetings run by the Branch, and on very many occasions he took the platform as Chairman. He worked particularly hard during the time of the Party’s Parliamentary campaign in 1950 when we contested the East Ham South Constituency, when he had control of literature sales for the Branch.

Bill Hegney by nature was a quiet person, more a listener than a speaker, but when he did speak he revealed that he had a sound knowledge of the Party’s case and could always explain World events from a Socialist point of view. He was the steady reliable type of member, and his passing is a great loss to the Party and to the Newham Branch in particular.

Members like Bill are not easy to replace.

French Revolution (1968)

Book Reviews from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

History of the French Revolution by Jules Michelet (edited by Gordon Wright) University of Chicago Press. 32s

The Crowd in the French Revolution by George F. Rudé OUP Paperback 8s. 6d.

At some stage in the year 1789—the precise moment is debatable—there occurred in France a great social and political upheaval. This French Revolution gave rise, in embryonic form, to important concepts such as the class struggle, revolutionary dictatorship and, in the later stages, “elitist egalitarianism" in the form of Babeuf’s Conspiracy of the Equals.

Those, however, who see the revolution as a popular, egalitarian movement have failed to understand its true character. The French Revolution was a successful attempt by the bourgeoisie to destroy the feudalism which shackled their economic enterprise with old-fashioned regulations and which denied them the political rights they felt were their due. Throughout the, revolution’s course it was the bourgeoisie which controlled the various legislatures and executives, and its results were trade and commerce emancipated from feudalism, a law banning any trade unions (le loi Le Chapelier) and a system of indirect election benefitting the well-to-do. This was, of course, before Napoleon imposed upon the revolution the dynastic ambitions of the Buonaparte family.

There are, indeed, those who have protested that the first National Assembly, far from being a body composed of strictly bourgeois elements, was in fact packed with lawyers and other members of the liberal professions. But lawyers have always represented the interests of trade, commerce and industry—activities which are essential to their prosperity. The doctors, journalists and other professional people who sat as legislators were all notably in sympathy with liberal economic doctrines, and they were always shown to be afraid of popular uprisings such as that in Paris in July 1789. Thus the professions had effectively allied themselves with merchants, industrialists, bankers and agriculturalists, and could be relied upon to serve their interest.

These two books represent, in widely differing form, attempts to understand the role of the common people in the revolution. Michelet’s History first appeared in seventeen volumes in the 1840’s (of which this edition is a continuous selection). As such it is a good example of, and a grand monument to its age. Michelet is as much French Romaniticism’s representative historian as Victor Hugo is its representative literary figure. With a vigorous style, full of life, Michelet gives us his impassioned, apocalyptic and panoramic view of the revolution as the climax of the spiritual battle between the Catholic Order and the “principle of Justice”.

Unfortunately, in his eagerness to present the revolution as the victory of a united force—“the people”—Michelet overlooks important points of detail and produces certain inaccuracies. So insistent is he, for instance, in asserting that the revolution was a spontaneous outbreak of “Justice” and “the People” against a misery and oppression which he paints very eloquently, that he overlooks important differences in the interests of the bourgeoisie and “the people”, the main one being the contradictory demands of free trade and controlled bread prices.

Michelet’s book, however, has certain valuable aspects. It contains a brilliantly eloquent denunciation of Christian theology and extremely shrewd assessments of the true character of the so-called Absolute Monarchy and the mediaeval church in France.

Totally different in character and outlook is George Rudé The Crowd in the French Revolution. Originally published in 1959 and now available in paperback, it was described by one historian as “a significant book which opened up some entirely new sources and showed how statistical precision can be brought to the study of riots”. It is indeed a close study of the behaviour and composition of the Parisian crowd. Rudé, writing from the Marxist viewpoint, is concerned with breaking away from the tradition which until recent times treated the crowd, as he says, “as a disembodied abstraction and the personification of good or evil”, and with examining the crowd in a more scientific spirit. (The book is amply supplied with tables showing the composition, geographically and class-wise, of the crowd and the prices of various commodities at different stages of the revolution).

The crowd, or sans-culottes—called thus because they could not afford breeches—was a heterogeneous body, composed not only of the working class but of small shopkeepers and independent craftsmen as well. Rudé paints a picture of a working class still in transition between feudal and capitalist societies, and not truly distinct from other sans-cullote elements.

However, although the wage-earners in Paris had as yet developed little class solidarity, they did have a vague idea of their cohesion as a class. The breakup of the guild system had accentuated the gulf between masters and journeymen, and there had been a strike as early as 1724. Disputes over wages and conditions continued up till 1789. However, the large demands which food made upon a man’s wages produced a situation where the crowd was concerned more with keeping down prices than with raising wages.

Rudé points out that a variety of motives existed for the crowd’s revolutionary actions, among them dismay at high prices and uncertain food supplies, a belief at first in the king as its champion against the aristocracy and the church, and then in a republic. The crowd was not a totally inarticulate mob merely seeking immediate economic gains. Although economic factors may have influenced them, strongly and often, these went hand in hand with beliefs, however unsophisticated, in political principles.

In this context, Rudé well notes that the bourgeoisie, even at that early stage, were determined to prevent the wage earners gaining any influence, and that, although “whenever it (the crowd) advanced . . .  the aims of the revolutionary bourgeoisie, it has been represented as the embodiment of all popular and Republican virtues”, the bourgeoisie were unwilling to share power with this “virtuous” body. Property qualifications were required from would-be representatives. Rudé also points out “the ferocity with which the bourgeois . . .  of the National Guard dispersed the Champs de Mars demonstration” (a protest at Louis XVI’s flight from France).

Rudé’s book is an informative and extremely readable study of the popular aspect of the French Revolution.

Amit Pandya

Russia and Britain (1968)

Book Review from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Impact of the Russian Revolution in Britain, by R. Page Arnot (Lawrence and Wishart, 45s.)

Page Arnot's book is a well-documented account of the way events in Russia in the period 1917-1921 were received in Britain—the reactions of the government, the Press, political parties and trade unions. It deals with the Communist seizure of power in Russia, the new government’s withdrawal from the war with Germany, its handling of desperate economic problems, the civil war, and the armed intervention by the British and other governments, and shows in parallel how different groups in this country opposed or supported the Russian Government, organised protest demonstrations and so on.

Undoubtedly in 1917 large sections of the propertied class were badly frightened (just as their predecessors had been at the time of the French Revolution) by the thought that the example of the overthrow of Czardom and confiscation of property, added to war-weariness and industrial strife, might endanger property rights in Britain. Even if they had known then (and most of them did not) that in the long run Russia just like France, would settle down as part of the world capitalist order, they would have feared that in the short run they could expect a few very troubled years. This book will help those who want to recapture the political fears and hopes of the time.

What it lacks is an understanding by the author of what was really emerging out of the confusion of those early years. He shared the common delusion that 50 years ago Socialism was just about to emerge in Russia, Britain and elsewhere.

Edgar Hardcastle

An unofficial Workers' Committee (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Are unofficial committees made up of wreckers? Does the Communist Party finance them? Do the communists and trotskyists work together? A member, formerly associated with one such committee in the printing industry, describes how it worked:

The printing unions, as is well known, are amongst the strongest in the country and are especially well-organised in the national newspapers in Fleet Street. As is also well-known, there are a number of craft unions which feel themselves threatened by the general printing union, the Society of Graphical and Allied Trades. SOGAT organises certain craft sections and also warehousemen, semi-skilled printers, clerks and cleaners. By the autumn of 1966, after the passing of the anti-union Prices and Incomes Act in August, active unionists were growing dissatisfied with Labour. Sensing this mood, a few anarcho-syndicalist printworkers decided to call a public meeting of printworkers to discuss what ordinary trade unionists might do to oppose the wage freeze and the anti-union laws.

At a second meeting, held in a Fleet Street pub on 25 October, thirteen printworkers, mainly SOGAT members, met to discuss the formation of an unofficial workers' committee. Those present besides the anarchists were two trotskyists of the "international socialism" brand, and a few ordinary pro-Labour militant unionists. The promoters had intended that any committee should come out clearly against the Labour Party but the trotskyists opposed this. The week previously, a delegate meeting of the 10,000 strong London clerical branch of SOGAT had carried a resolution calling upon the SOGAT EC

to prepare the Union for a policy of independence from all Governments and political parties and, to this end, suggests that the EC ballot those members who pay the political levy as to whether our present affiliation to the Labour Party should continue.

The trotskyists, both of whom ironically were members of unions not affiliated to Labour, dismissed this. One of them, journalist Paul Foot, said that these people had voted against affiliation because they did not see the point of paying money to a party that froze their wages, and not because they wanted fundamental social change (which was quite true, but their reason seems sensible enough). Foot described this as "mere trade union consciousness". The time to leave Labour, he said, would be when the workers were deserting it for a revolutionary policy.

After much discussion, in which those opposed to Labour made it quite clear that the disaffiliation issue must be raised as this was one of their reasons for proposing an unofficial committee, a compromise was agreed. One of the aims of the Association of Rank and File Printworkers which was established that evening was "to campaign within the printing unions for a ballot of the membership on the question of continued affiliation to the Labour Party". The other aims were: to fight the wage freeze and anti-union laws, including encouraging "sympathetic industrial action" should Labour invoke the penal clauses of their act; one union for printing; and to work with other "rank and file movements".

The Labour government used their anti-union Act three times against printworkers, each time playing on other workers' prejudices against people they believed to be higher paid: against printers and clerks in the national newspapers, against some inkworkers (who, incidentally, did break the law by forcing their employers to pay them more despite the Order. Significantly, the government did nothing) and against clerks in the news agencies. After issuing a journal, the Printworker, the Association, through a SOGAT chapel (as the workshop or office unit is called in the print), organised a meeting to protest against the wage freeze. A left-wing Labour MP. Sid Bidwell (ironically once an IS trotkyist), agreed to speak but withdrew when he learned that the Branch Secretary had declared that, under the rules of SOGAT, a chapel had no right to call a meeting.

At the meeting, held on 29 March and attended by about 70 people, including SOGAT officials Brady and President-elect Flynn, a resolution to organise a strike on 30 June was carried by 36 votes to 12. Brady, a branch secretary, argued that the union leadership was militant enough but they could not act without the support of the members. He felt that most members were apathetic and would not follow a militant lead. Although this was probably true, it was not well received by the meeting. Brady's dilemma was that of all elected officials who want to be militant—elected by a minority of union activists they are responsible to an apathetic majority. Other, conservative officials readily use the apathetic majority to oppose the militants. A committee of eight, including two dissatisfied supporters of the Communist Party, was elected by the meeting to organise any action.

The committee decided to organise a march through Fleet Street on May Day proper, a working day as it fell on a Monday. Some other workers' organisations, mainly influenced by IS trotskyists, agreed to take part and on the day some 200 hundred people marched. A meeting, held after the march, again voted to strike—this time on 3 July, the day the government was expected to invoke Part II of their Prices and Incomes Act, giving them power to delay wage increases. By now it was evident that some members of the Association had grandiose plans for organising a national rank and file movement that would use industrial action against the government. That this was a totally unrealistic aim was soon grasped and it was later agreed to drop industrial action and concentrate on spreading the aims of the Association amongst printworkers.

The Cameron Report on unofficial committees in various London building sites which came out last year refused to believe Lou Lewis, a Communist unofficial leader, when he said that his committee was financed by donations and collections from supporters. The report called him a liar and implied that the Communist Party provided the money. The Report, due to ignorance of working class organisations, could not believe that unofficial committees really had so informal an organisation as they seemed. Though it is true that informal organisation (no constitution, no dues, no minutes) does carry with it the danger of take-ovwer by eltist groups like the Communists and trotskyists, the Report's charge is not backed by any evidence. Certainly, the Association of rank and File Printworkers was financed entirely from donation, collections and sales of the Printworker.

In fact, the Communist Party was opposed to the Association. As the June issue of the Printworker noted:

Already within the Printing industry the people who took part in the demonstration are being branded as 'communist troublemakers'. In fact, although individual members of the Communist party attended the demonstrations and actively worked to make it a success, the official Party made no secret of their opposition to it, and in fact went as far as to describe it as 'adventurist'.

Jack Dash also advised dockers not to take part in the May Day march through Fleet Street.

Present Communist Party industrial policy is to organise discontented workers behind Labour's left and left-wing union leaders like Cousins, Scanlon and, for that matter, Briginshaw of SOGAT. This was one of the reasons why the Association turned down a proposal, sponsored by an IS trotskyist (and Gunther can make what he likes of it!), to join the Liaison Committee for the Defence of Trade Unionism, in which the Communists are very prominent.

The theory of the most active members of the Association tended rather to the syndicalist idea of so-called direct action, scorning all political action as useless. Some of its members, and once again they were wrong, saw the Association as a rival and possible replacement of the existing "bureaucratic" unions. From a Socialist point of view (and of course each Socialist Party members makes up his own mind as to what organisation or action is best suited in the place or industry where he works) unofficial committees are a useful adjunct to the unions, putting pressure on the officials from below to act more in the interest of the working class. Certainly they are not an alternative to the unions. 

 

 

Blogger's Note: 

Though unsigned, this article was probably written by Terry Lord.

The Review Column: Why Students Demonstrate (1968)

The Review Column from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Why Students Demonstrate

As any surviving Suffragette will agree, demonstrators, in their time, are rarely popular—a fact which contains the seeds of its own consolation. Most workers, accepting their lot, are quick to condemn anyone who tries to disturb their apathy with protests drawing their attention away from the television set and onto social problems.

So it is that the students are denounced wholesale, as long haired layabouts who dissipate wildly generous grants in promiscuous sex and punch ups with the police—and their horses.

This, of course, is a maliciously distorted picture. The majority of students scrape by on meagre grants, and have to swot hard for the simple reason that, being workers, they must pass their exams on schedule. Even the small minority who may go in for violent demonstrations are by no means the dirty villains they are made out to be.

It is more than a formality to condemn the violence of some of the demonstrations. There was certainly some inexcusably ugly behaviour from the students when the pro-Smith Tory M.P. Patrick Wall went to speak at Leeds University last month. This sort of activity gets nobody anywhere, although it does arouse sympathy for Wall.

It is not being kind to the students to point out that an inescapable—and useful—feature of youth is its desire to reform the world, confident that it can do better than the mess which, it thinks, its elders are responsible for. At the same time a student has every encouragement to investigate and discuss the world—and under capitalism that means world problems, like nuclear war and poverty.

Perhaps some of the scorn for students springs from the suspicion that they might be thinking, probing and responding more than the ordinary worker in his semi-detached.

But how much cause for concern have they? The demonstrations are at the moment about the wrong issues—about the symptoms of capitalism's malaise instead of its root cause. The real issue, the one worth demonstrating about, is whether we keep capitalism or have a society fit for humans to live in.

The Local Elections

With each successive test of their electoral popularity, the Labour Party falls to undreamt-of depths. The results of last month's local elections almost defy belief; it is impossible to imagine what emergency, what gimmick, would be enough to save them in a general election.

Perhaps we are at a turning point in political history—no less than the break up of a major party of capitalism and a consequent reshaping of the political set-up. It is not surprising that Labour's debacle has come so soon after the triumphs of 1964 and 1966. This has happened before; in 1906, for example, when the Liberals swept in on a landslide on massive promises of reform.

The anarchies of capitalism, its disputes and conflicting interests—and finally the First World War—exposed the Liberal pledges, soured their image and in the end finished them as a political force. What would follow, if a similar fate befell the Labour Party? At the moment there is no sign of a comparable alternative; if none emerges the Tories will be opposed by only fragments—by what remains of the Labour Party, by a few Liberals and Nationalists and, who knows, perhaps by some neo-Nazi M.P.s.

Another major reform party may grow out of the ashes of Labour's defeat, but the experience of this government, if of no other, should have been enough  for the working class. It should teach them that no capitalist party can solve their problems, that capitalism cannot be run in their interest, that this social system smothers and kills the strongest of reformist intentions.

It should be a standing warning against political promises and tricksters, and persuade the workers of the urgency of establishing a new society.

Integration into What?

In the uproar which followed Enoch Powell's odious speech, it was inevitable that certain facts on immigration should be overlooked.

It would be idle to pretend that there no problems connected with a movement of population—within, as well as across, frontiers. But at most the immigrants may aggravate problems in housing, hospitals and schools; they cannot cause those problems because they already exist. Immigration may expose social inadequacies, which can also be uncovered by events like war and slump. And, as usual, the people who face up to the problems and deficiencies of capitalism are the working class; not racialist politicians living in comfort, dreaming of Greek poetry in Belgravia.

We should also not forget that the immigrants themselves may be ignorant of the facts of their situation. They plead for integration; it is pertinent to ask, integration into what? The assimilation of the immigrants would mean that they join the labour market on the same terms as other workers, that they can be legally swindled by the insurance and hire purchase companies on the same sort of agreements as the native born, that they can take on the lifetime debt of a mortgage at the same rates of interest as anyone else.

Their children will be trained, in schools and universities, to take their place as workers alongside others, They will be subjected to the same degrading exploitation. the same poverty, the same waste of their lives in servitude to the master class.

Immigrants have as much to learn as the rest. As they become integrated into the working class they must realise their social situation. and that no worker can escape the repressions of capitalism.

They must also come to understand what has to be done about it.

The Socialist Party and the Second International (Part 2) (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Last month we described the early attitude of the Socialist Party of Great Britain to the Second International when we saw ourselves as part of the intransigent wing of international social democracy.

There was a good deal of discussion on the question of the International by the delegates to the Socialist Party's first annual conference in 1905. T.A. Jackson pointed out that the British delegation had been the largest of all at the Amsterdam Congress and that it was "composed of persons opposed to the principles of this Party." For all that, Fitzgerald argued that the Socialist Party "should keep steadily fighting at the Congress for the principle that only Socialist parties should be admitted to the Congresses. When this had been done for two or three Congresses many of the other parties would adopt this view" (!) This, of course, was nothing more than wishful thinking. Parties like the SPD were not likely to adopt policies which, if applied rigorously, would have excluded themselves from the International. The only chance of their taking this step would have been for them to first adopt a Socialist programme—but this would have meant somehow overcoming the objections of the vast majority of their members and supporters, who were committed to capitalism almost to a man.

In the end the Conference instructed the executive committee to draw up a series of resolutions embodying the following points:

1. That only Socialist organisations recognising the class was in theory and practice should be represented at International Socialist Congresses.
2. That disputes between the carious parties in each country as to the genuine Socialist nature of their organisations should be settled by the Congress itself.
3. That the Socialist Party should endeavour to raise these questions on the floor of the Congress.

The executive committee carried out its orders and a statement along these lines was sent to the International Bureau in July 1905. Particularly interesting was its explanation, for the benefit of the Bureau, of just what features distinguish a Socialist party.

Socialist bodies (must) accept the essential principles of Socialism: socialisation of the means of production and distribution; union and international action of workers; Socialist conquest of public powers by the proletariat organised as a class party, recognising and proclaiming the class war, running all candidates upon this basis, and adopting an attitude of hostility, under all circumstances to all individual members and sections of the Capitalist Party.  

The next few months saw a number of clashes between the Socialist Party and several leaders of social-democratic parties abroad. The first was in October 1905 when Paul Brousse and a group of municipal councillors from Paris, all members of the French "Socialist" Party, were entertained by the Liberal-controlled London County Council during a visit to Britain. A protest telegram was sent to the National Congress of the French party and this was backed up by a letter in which the general secretary explained that this "interchange of capitalist municipal courtesies" would be utilised by the Liberal party to obtain the votes of the British working class at the approaching general election. In fact, this election sparked off a much bigger row when, after the Liberals had been returned, Bebel of the SPD sent a telegram to Reynold's News saying that he "welcomed the result of the elections". The executive committee's first reaction was to give Bebel the benefit of the doubt and assume that he was being misrepresented. After the general secretary had written to him, however, he replied that he had been correctly reported and that "by the way of explanation I wish to state that concerning 'progress internally' (a phrase which had appeared in Reynold's) I have above all in mind possible progress in the amelioration of the working class position."

On receiving this the executive committee passed a resolution with the ominous wording "That action be taken regarding A. Bebel  . . . " Nonetheless, measured against the Socialist Party's normal handling of this sort of dispute, Bebel was treated very gently. Although an "emphatic protest" was sent to the SPD leader and the German party's daily, Vorwaerts, the editorial in the Socialist Standard (April 1906) suggested that "our comrade Bebel" has "allowed himself to be betrayed into an act calculated, because it lent the countenance of approval to what was merely a capitalist victory, to defeat the purpose of Socialist propaganda . . . " This was a rather charitable explanation when it is recalled that Reynold's sent Bebel a pre-paid telegram form inviting him to write whatever comments on the elction he chose. Bebel's reply to the Socialist Party's criticism was characteristic. He made matters worse by attempting to justify his talk of progress with a reference to the "entrance of representatives of the Socialist Party into Parliament". By this he meant that a few members of the Labour Representation Committee (the Labour Party's forerunner) had been elected. He also fell back on the bluff and boast technique which the frock-coated leaders of the SPD always used when their arguments ran out: "Let no one ascribe to me what, in consideration of my past career, nobody dare impute." (6)

Shortly afterwards Lafargue was taken to task for an article he had written in the SDF's Justice along the lines that Socialists throughout the world recognised that the election of the Labour MPs was a "victory of International Socialism". The Socialist Party's reply was something of a classic and still bears repeating sixty two years later.

We cannot agree that the election of the nominees of the Labour Representation Committee were working class victories. We have shown them to have been achieved partly in alliance with capitalist Liberalism, and wholly by a class-unconscious vote. Does our comrade believe that because Trade Unions stimulated into political activity by certain legal decisions having the effect of endangering the financial reserves of their organisations, have entered into a loose association for the purpose of recovering a position they had thought themselves secure in, that, therefore, they have established themselves upon a definite class basis in opposition to the political expressions of capitalist interests? Why, every indication gives a flat denial to the supposition . . . it is idle and mischievous to endeavour, as both Bebel and Lafargue have done, to invest the movement with an importance that may only be correctly applied to an enlightened proletarian organisation on well defined class lines.(7)

The boot was on the other foot when, the following year, Neumann analysed the results of the German elections in the March 1907 Socialist Standard. While social-democrats throughout Europe were rejoicing at the quarter of a million extra votes which the SPD had secured, the Socialist Party of Great Britain was pointing out that this was no indication of a spread of Socialist ideas among the workers in Germany. Neumann emphasised that the reformist rubbish in the SPD's programme would have induced countless supporters of capitalism to vote for social-democratic candidates. Therefore "the German Socialist Party have pursued and are still pursuing a policy taht has resulted in conveying a false impression as to the real extent of class-consciousness among the German proletariat." Yet there was still a conciliatory tone in all this: 

Let us hope that the criticism given in a fair, comrade-like spirit, will be of some assistance in bringing the oldest section of the international labour movement to the reconsideration of their tactics and their adopting in the near future a position of 'no compromise', and of hostility to capitalism every time and all the time.

The Socialist Standard was also hopelessly exaggerated in its estimates of the number of Socialists in the  SPD. As well as referring to "the pleasant fact that a small but steadily growing faction of the German Party has for some years put forward a tremendous effort to induce the Party to abandon its policy of reform and compromise", it was suggested that "there is every reason to believe that in at least the twelve constituencies where the Socialist vote was in 1903 between 52 to 58 per cent of the electorate, and where at the recent elections there has been throughout an increase of 2 to 3 per cent, that there are many who thoroughly understand the working-class position." All the same, the trend was for a definite hardening of attitude and there was a good indication of how far this had gone when, a few months later, Bebel was again attacked in the column of this journal. He had given an interview to a French reporter in which he had argued that, as long as the danger of war existed, every country must have armed forces to defend itself against invasion. Watts' reply in the Socialist Standard(8) appeared under a headline of "German Party Leader as a Jingo"; this time there was no references to "our comrade"!

Once again there was a lengthy discussion on the International at the third annual conference of the Socialist Party in 1907. This mainly centred on whether delegates should be sent to the 1908 International Congress in Stuttgart. Some members argued strongly for representatives at the Congress. Fitzgerald was one of these and his point was that in this way we could gain information about parties in other countries similar to ourselves. Neumann went further, suggesting that "if we could get in contact with these others we could organise the nucleus of an International Congress that would that would be Socialist". But a majority of the delegates were doubtful that anything useful could be achieved in light of our previous experience and Killick probably spoke for most when he argues that if men like Ferri, Michels, Guesde and Lafargue really were thinking along our lines then they, being stronger, would have taken the initiative. Bearing in mind what eventually became of the "left wing" of the social-democratic movement, this showed a good deal of insight. At any rate the Conference decided not to send delegates to Stuttgart but recommended the executive committee to "use their best endeavours to get in touch with those abroad who occupy our position".
(to be concluded)

John Crump

NOTES

6. Vorwaerts—15/3/1906. Socialist Standard—April 1906.

7. Socialist Standard. May 1906

8. Socialist Standard. June 1907.

Enoch Powell: aftermath or prelude (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Alice has stepped through the looking glass. The London dockers have cheered right wing Tory M.P. Gerald Nabarro. Jack Dash has tried to stop a strike. Dockland Communists have taken a couple of clergymen down to the East End for, presumably, moral support. These were some of the immediate results of Enoch Powell's infamous speech.

One of the many ironies in this situation is its central character. Perhaps it is no coincidence that Powell, whose first name is John, should want to be known as Enoch, with its suggestion of an arid crank, too eager to pronounce harsh judgement. (Quinton Hogg once called him "a sort of Mao Tse-Tung of Toryism".)

Powell has always acted the part of Enoch. It is doubtful if many of his recent supporters are familiar with his opinions on issues other than immigration, or would understand what he was talking about if they tried to find out.

How many dockers, for example, would agree with what he wrote about the usefulness—or rather lack of it—of trade unions in the Sunday Times of September 6 1964:

(the remuneration of labour) is rarely affected appreciably, upwards or downwards, by combination; and then the effect is more or less temporary and purchased at the cost of the general public, including other workers.

How many Smithfield porters would support his attitude on price control:

. . . and management had no business to accept any such responsibility for keeping prices stable or reducing them. The duty of every management was to conduct the business in a way which was likely to maximise the return on the capital invested. (The Guardian, 29/1/64.)

How many of those who now think they back Enoch would go along with what he wrote about hospital waiting lists in his book Medicine and Politics:

It might (!) be thought macabre to observe that if people are on a waiting list long enough, they will die—usually from some cause other than that for which they joined the queue. Short of dying, however, they frequently get bored or better, and vanish. 

 Nobody knows if Powell has ever tried to make a joke, but if he has that passage was not one of his attempts. It was written, with much more in the same heartless vein, by a man who was once Minister of Health.

There is plenty of evidence to support the view that Powell has an unrepentant contempt for popular opinion. The question is, now, is why he has suddenly played for the mass vote, using the well known demagogue's trick of throwing a mass of mud knowing that most of it will stick? Why did he use forecasts of immigration which were loaded and distorted? Why did he talk about the man who fears that in fifteen or twenty years the black man will have the whip hand over the white in Britain? Why did he trot out the story of the lonely, harassed widow who cannot be found, even by Powell himself?

This was the first case of a prominent British politician—a prospective Prime Minister, no less—stimulating, and appealing to colour prejudice. Powell's was a cunning speech which gave him a hero's reputation but it was a dangerous game he was playing.

What justification is there for Powell's reputation - How consistent and honest is he?

Most of his vociferous supporters have probably forgotten that during his term as Minister of Health the Health Service was eagerly recruiting immigrant workers of all types to plug the gaps in its manpower. They are also probably unaware that Powell has always stood out for the free movement of labour, for example in this speech to the Parliamentary Press Gallery in February 1964:

We are fearful of the big movement of population and of industry without which industrial progress is not possible. We are timid in the face of change in almost any form.

Immigration, of course, is a "change"; it is also a "big movement of population".

Then there was Powell's famous resignation in 1958, often cited as evidence of his integrity, with Peter Thorneycroft and Nigel Birch. (Duncan Sandys criticised the resigners, Nabarro accused them of "rocking the boat"; Macmillian dismissed the whole matter nonchalantly, as a "little local difficulty".) The point of dispute was the proposal to increase government expenditure during the next year. Powell was quite clear where he stood on this; in a speech to his constituency party after his resignation he aid:

If Mr. Thorneycroft's conviction that Government spending should be limited to its present level could be legitimately criticised, then it should be on the ground that it was too lax, not too strict . . . (The Times, 10/1/58.)

It is instructive to consider what followed this great stand on principle. In 1958, public authorities' current expenditure, that is, the combined central government and local authority expenditure, was £6,524m. This kept in rising until in 1960 it reached £7,441m. On principle, then, Powell should have stayed out of government. But in 1960 he managed to stifle his misgivings and accept office as Minister of Health, Government spending continued to rise—in 1961 it was £8,136m. and in 1962 £8,668m. But Powell hung on to his job.

He did, in fact, get in another resignation of sorts, after the Tory magic circle selected Douglas-Home to succeed Macmillan. Powell gave no reason for his refusal to accept office so it was widely assumed that he objected either to Douglas-Home (unlikely—politicians learn to embrace men they loathe) or to the method of his selection, which so clearly excluded the Powells of the Conservative Party.

Whatever his objections, Powell had no difficulty in forgetting them when he wanted to; after the Tory defeat in October he suddenly found it all right to join Douglas-Home's Shadow Cabinet and there he stayed until Heath sacked him after his Wolverhampton tirade.

These manoeuvres can be simply explained if we forget the theory that Powell is a man of rock-;like integrity and accept him as a normal, ambitious capitalist politician. His withdrawal after Macmillan's retirement came after a struggle for the Tory leadership. He came back into the Shadow Cabinet—and perhaps, in his own estimation, into the leadership stakes—when Douglas-Home was clearly on the way out and subsequently he stood, with little hope, in the election which gave Heath the job. Now Heath's standing is in doubt; there is strong criticism of him in his party for not making the most of Labour's predicament. If Labour begin to pick up their support again this criticism will intensify. This is typically a time for Powell to strike and now that he has done so we may be sure that a fierce and ruthless battle is raging behind those urbane Tory exteriors.

The danger is that Powell has started something which he will not be able to control. The appetite of racialism grows by what it feeds on; each tightening of immigration control in this country has come after a political panic—Smethwick, Duncan Sandy's scare over the Kenyan Asians and so on. What will happen if other politicians join Powell's bandwagon and if the working class begin voting in any numbers for organisations like the National Front and Union Movement? Already it is possible, and reasonable, for The Observer to comment "We must only be calm, but must also be willing to have our teeth knocked out in defence of tolerance." (28/4/68). In this atmosphere it cannot be said that it can't happen here. 

Parallels can be taken too far, but there are undeniable similarities between the present political situation in this country and that in Germany in the Thirties, There is a discredited Social Democratic party, whose responsibility in the failure to solve a chronic economic problem has brought widespread disillusionment with democratic politics. There is a popular impression, as the troops come back from East of Suez, that this country has suffered a military defeat.

There has not yet been a slump to rival the pre-war crash, but there are signs that a catastrophic collapse need not be far off. (The Economist of May 4 cheers us all up with its opening words: "It is possible that there will be another international currency crisis within the next few weeks.") There is an easily identifiable racial minority to take the blame for all working class problems and frustrations. Finally, there are now politicians in power or close to it who are trying to exploit the situation, as Schleicher and Von Papen did in Germany.

One fact that seems to have been overlooked is that Enoch Powell, an openly declared enemy of the working class, is no more than another capitalist politician. There is no reason to think that he will succeed where others have failed; a Powell government—or even a Powell dictatorship—would no more solve the problems of the British working class than have the Wilson government or the Hitler dictatorship did the problems of the German workers.

The abiding question is what the working class may be willing to go through before Powell is no longer their hero. We are now living in the unpleasant aftermath of his venomous speech. Is it a prelude to something even nastier to come?

Ivan

Nothing to offer (1968)

Book Review from the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

A Future for British Socialism? Ed. K. Coates (Centre for Socialist Education. 5s.)

Before the Labour Party Conference in Scarborough last year the Leftwingers organised a teach-in. This book—whose title is an obvious dig at Wilson—is a verbatim report of that meeting. Speeches never read well and these are no exception. Only two or three of the speakers seemed to have grasped what is going on: that the Labour Party government is out to cut living standards and, to this end, has also to hamper the weapons we have to resist such cuts, viz., our trade unions. V. L. Allen, author of Militant Trade Unionism, alleged that Labour was moving toward a Corporate State, and correctly pointed out:

"The Labour government in fact has rescued the capitalist system out of a crisis situation by doing things which the Conservative government were incapable of doing, by buttressing up the system with legislation which the Conservatives couldn't possibly have got through, concerning the unions and the control of incomes . . . In fact, the Labour government has been more loyal than the king in this respect. It's done things which I think even the Conservatives would not try to do to trade unions, and to the freedom to strike, and to the right to organise collectively."

J. Mortimer, of DATA, later said of Labour that "in a manner almost unprecedented in British political history, they have undermined fundamental trade union rights".

New Lefter Blackburn has realised that Labour is not even a gradualist party, that it no longer even pretends to be changing capitalism to Socialism by futile, piecemeal reforms.

"Some pessimists in 1964 said this was a Government which was simply going to solve the problems of British capitalism at the expense of the working class, and at the time that sounded like a somewhat dogmatic, possibly even ultra-Left, assertion. But curiously it wasn't Left enough, we can now see in the year 1967. In fact, the Labour Government, though it may have attempted to solve the crisis in British capitalism at the expense of the working classes, has quite visibly failed to do so." 

But still they are loyal to Labour! Blackburn goes on to raise the important issue of how anybody who stands for the interests of the working class can remain associated with Labour:

"Now it seems to me that in this situation, where there's been a wholesale sacrifice of even the attempt to reform capitalism, that we must ourselves ask what is our role in the Labour Party and in the Labour Movement. We must ask ourselves whether we, by our continued activity within this party, are actually encouraging the illusion that this party is a reforming party."

His answer is, wrongly, no. Of course the so called Leftwing, in staying with Labour, helps to keep that party in power and enable it to continue its attacks on our living standards and trade unions.

Adam Buick 

Running fast to stay still (1968)

From the June 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

On the occasion of the Centenary of the Trades Union Congress we publish this special survey of the trade union movement in Britain.

A Socialist member of the executive of one of the unions in the printing and paper industry comments on the trade union scene: 

The attitude of the unions today seems to mystify most people. In fact even Socialists find it difficult to keep up with the contradictory poses taken up by different trade union leaders. Some seem to be in favour of a form of wage freeze. Many fight even the suggestion of voluntary wage-vetting by the TUC. It is less of a mystery when you realise that some unions would be quite satisfied if they could get even a small rise like 3 per cent every year, while other unions reckon they can get a little more because of their extra bargaining strength. Only a few are concerned with refusing to surrender the principle of free and unrestricted bargaining over the price of the labour-power of the workers they represent.

What has changed over the past hundred years? Certainly not the class struggle between worker and owner. The TUC in its Economic Review for 1968 points out that it is a myth that some kind of wealth levelling has been going on: they have discovered what we have been saying all along, that ten per cent of society still own 90 per cent of property and receive each year over 25 per cent of personal income after tax.

There is one change, however, that has taken place since the war, and that is a change in attitudes resulting from a period of relatively full employment. Most employers have been forced by their economic need for labour power to take up a more liberal attitude to the workers and the institutions that represent their interests. The state has been influenced, too, to give more prestige to union "leaders", and these gentlemen are consulted before the government takes any decision that might affect the economy. We all know that the government does not take much notice of what they say, but the process of consultation goes on, and the unions do have their representatives on many government bodies. But this prestige may only be temporary and may vanish should the economic winds blow any chillier. At the moment however Woodcock can still gain the ear of the Prime Minister and trade union leaders can be found taking lunch with the representatives of big business.

This has affected unions at all levels. The leaders themselves are flattered. The rank and file's reaction is very mixed. Union members are not Socialists. In fact many are not even politically interested. Most of them think that their economic interests are tied up with those of their employers. For when the firm they work for is doing well their employer is more willing to pay out; and of course when trade is poor the reverse is true. This attitude reflects itself nationally; most union members are patriotic. Then, most do not go to union meetings or use their votes so that it is anybody's guess who is going to end up as the professional representative of the workers.

There are three distinct levels in union life: the professional, the active rank and file member and the card holder. All three levels seem to be in a different world. The professional is the "realist", doing a job of work for which he is reasonably well-paid. The active rank and file members do union work for poor pay (if any at all) and so need some other stimulus like ambition, or political ideology. Amongst this group will be found the "communist", the trotskyist and all the other mixed-up leftwingers. All of these latter for one reason or another seem to think that capitalism can be made to work against its own economic laws; that capitalists can be made to pay out wages beyond the profitability of the company and still not withdraw their capital; that the commodity labour-power can be separated from the economic laws governing commodities generally. All of them dig their own graves for it is difficult enough to get workers to fight for moderate demands. After a while most workers will find local leaders whose leadership is a little less demanding. Sometimes gains are made locally but this happens just as often in industries where the union representatives are less eager to sing their own praises. In fact in most cases it is circumstances rather than people that dictate the course of events. But, when all is said and done, capitalism still remains in the saddle.

This perhaps gives some logic to such things as a Royal Garden party to celebrate a hundred years of economic struggle against the capitalist class during which the forces of the state were always ranged against the workers. When the TUC leaders sit down to dine with the Queen at the Guildhall we may well wonder if they will be celebrating one hundred years of trade union struggle or just indulging their own ego (anybody who has been at one of these trade union celebration dinners will suspect the latter).

What of the future? This is the real issue for we could spend pages listing the faults of the unions today. This would not serve much purpose as these faults are those of the working class generally - lack of interest, economic ignorance, call it what you will. A union is not a Socialist organisation but has to struggle within the society of which it is an institution - capitalism. As soon as union membership starts to take a class attitude to social problems then the days of capitalism will numbered. Meanwhile Socialists, who reject capitalism, follow the same pattern as the others, struggling for a small improvement in conditions they know can be lost overnight. But to stop struggling would only make the worker worse off than he now is.

Socialists work for an improvement in working class understanding, and a consequent improvement in the quality of trade union membership. If this happens and the unions become less nationalistic, then they have many useful international contacts that could be used for the further spread of Socialist knowledge. Working against the Socialist today are those with a vested interest who prefer the workers to want leaders, those in fact who make a damn good living out of the fact that workers depend on leaders.

So, what will the working class be celebrating this year? The passing of a hundred years? If, so, a hundred years of what? We can read of the aspirations for a better world of the early union members. The Brotherhood of Man was a term many used. Compare this with the nationalistic attitude of most unions and you are left wondering just what the working class has learned in a hundred years of organised class struggle. Or you see the great institutions the workers have built up by trial and error, and realise that people who can organise like this will have no difficulty in organising Socialism.