A note to a friend (2022)

From the December 2022 issue of the Socialist Standard

I am rather hoping that anyone reading this article does not share the views contained within, at least at the outset. If they do, then perhaps they might be persuaded to take a different, and perhaps more challenging, view of how society could be organised. So, with this in mind, whether you are inclined to vote Conservative, SNP, Labour, Green, Liberal or indeed any party that believes that capitalism can be made to work in the interests of people and society, then I wish to share my thoughts with you as a friend, a fellow human being and someone who, if we met by chance, would chat about our families, interests and worries in much the same manner as most friends do.

Friends, at least close friends, tend to share problems – the concern I feel at the moment (and it is increasing year on year) is that I am beginning to lose hope for humanity and society in general. It is rather a ‘dangerous’ state of mind to share with others as they tend to immediately categorise you as a depressive or ‘miserable’ or the new media moniker ‘doomer’ and, to be frank, they probably feel uncomfortable in your company – and who can blame them? Often, and this phrase is conveniently trotted out, they say ‘you’ve got to have hope or what’s the point of living?’. Well, I absolutely love life, but that’s just the point – right now, I feel I am living a life of sorts but being denied the life that I, and I should say every other person in the world, including you, should be living. By most standards my life (or existence) is comfortable enough so perhaps you might think I should be thankful for what I have, but thankful to whom? Society in the past (at least since agrarian times) has allowed those in power – I guess by dint of wealth, armies and the power of religious doctrines – to gain control over the majority of people. The form of society has, to some extent, changed, but this still holds true: in fact, now far fewer powerful and wealthy individuals control the entire world society. Incidentally, and I felt this was a good time to mention this, those that are ‘controlled’ and who are forced by dint of circumstance to obey society’s rules are referred to as ‘workers’ a bit like an insect colony and clearly indicating that another (much smaller) group of people are not ‘workers’ – why should that be? Why do not all human beings co-operate for the general well-being of society as a whole? Yes, work will have to be done obviously, but people could be doctors, artists or scientists as well as other useful pursuits, but they would be called ‘people’, not ‘workers’.

So why am I feeling a loss of hope? Well, and I hope this doesn’t make me sound too arrogant, but I genuinely believe I know the answer (and I should point out that I am not for one minute claiming that this was my idea) – in fact, there are others that share these ideas for a solution but, as I mentioned, I want to share them with you and not them. But, being confident that you have the answer doesn’t mean that others will agree with you – on the contrary, when I have discussed these ideas, even with people close to me, they can get very agitated even aggressive at times. To be fair, very few people are comfortable with change and when one suggests that the awful things that are hardwired into current society (or to be specific capitalism) could become a thing of the past, they give you a look, either of pity or they immediately spring to defend our current way of living, because not to do so means discarding a lifetime of conditioned thought, whether through schooling, media or by indoctrination through the workplace and clearly they are uncomfortable with this prospect.

Another reaction – when the person says ‘Oh, that’s utopia or just pie in the sky’ is quite odd really, particularly when, on occasion, the very same person will agree that warfare, starvation and homelessness (to name just a few of capitalism ’s ills) are dreadful, but still vigorously defend the very system that spawns such abominations. In fact, in the most recent copy of Resurgence, Jonathan Porritt stated that for society to change entirely (i.e a new world order) was, to quote, ‘Cloud cuckoo land’. Well, for what it’s worth, my opinion is that to think that capitalism can be made to work is cloud cuckoo land on steroids.

Before sharing my solution with you – and I use the term somewhat guardedly as the longer the car- crash that is capitalism goes on, the more difficult it will be to set a form of recovery in motion – I need to open up a little. I mentioned earlier my feelings of hopelessness and despair: I have thought about this in considerable depth and, I have to be honest, it comes down to a complete inability to understand why so many people, the vast majority actually, believe that our current system can be reformed, altered, tinkered with or somehow adjusted and thereby be made to work in the interests of humanity, the environment and the other species with which we share the planet. To me, the problem always demands the same answer – get rid of capitalism. So why do we not dispose of it?

Well, if there is one amazing thing about capitalism, it is its astonishing ability to ‘self-reinforce’ or to put it another way, to brainwash people into thinking that it is the only game in town. It is, in my opinion, a system that defies logic in as much as it is killing the very people who, with absolute enthusiasm, support and nourish it.

Please allow me to share some examples of things that send me head into my hands and question my sanity …

In July, BBC news reported that America’s Joe Biden flew to Saudia Arabia to persuade Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to produce more oil. This news item followed an extreme and ‘unprecedented’ weather warning which, with temperatures expected to exceed 40˚C in the UK, will lead to many deaths as people are unable to cope with the heat. Scientists tell us (and have been doing so for years) it is a direct result of the burning of fossil fuels. I can honestly say that not a day goes by when the BBC news does not contain an item which, in any sane society, would give rise to immediate and serious concern and trigger action to address the consequences (often major climate-related issues), and that is not then followed by some item of trivia such as a ‘celebrity’ divorce case for example; both are given equal weight and often the ‘divorce case’ more. This was exactly what happened on the Today programme on July 12, when Sir James Bevan, Chief Executive of the Environment Agency stated on air that ‘the biodiversity crisis joins the climate crisis as an existential threat to our survival …’. This was followed by coverage of back-stabbing Tory tales as the candidates began the fiasco of bad-mouthing their opponents in the race for leadership of the party, none of whom has made any commitment to addressing the climate or any other existential threat. Incidentally, the biodiversity issue was not mentioned again that day and I could not find it on the BBC website – obviously not that important.

The subject of mental health has, however, over the last few years, occupied regular coverage in the media. As someone in my mid-sixties, I don’t remember this at all in the past – one would hear about people suffering with mental illness, but certainly not at the level it seems to be happening now. The young seem to be particularly badly affected, and who can blame them? I have to be honest here and admit to really struggling with this myself, to the extent that on occasions sleep becomes a welcome escape from the world and the idea of waking up becomes less and less appealing. Some have suggested that I might be suffering from depression; I am utterly convinced that this is not the case, although I do feel despair, anger and an absolute feeling of helplessness at having to bear witness to the horrific destruction of our very means of survival as a species that is being wrought day in, day out when, so easily, it could all be changed; it doesn’t even need a violent revolution – just a simple understanding and belief by the majority of the world’s population that capitalism needs to be ended. But it seems my feelings of being alone, apart from a very small number of other people who share these views, continue to feed the sense that perhaps I have been unfortunate enough to have been born into a species incapable of organising itself in a manner that does not put profit and the power of a tiny group before its own well-being – let alone that of the environment.

Maybe I’m being over-sensitive, maybe I should share that sense of confidence and optimism voiced by some that somehow it will all be fine – but I don’t, even leaving aside the awful spectre of climate breakdown now playing out before our very eyes alongside whether someone should have had a party or not. Should a society be comfortable with homelessness, extreme poverty or the plundering of the Earth’s resources in the pursuit of profit? Indeed, can any society call itself ‘civilised’ if it needs charitable organisations set up to address these issues? Most of us, I imagine, feel that subtle sense of personal guilt, usually reinforced by the sad and plaintive tone of voice employed by the ‘celebrity’, when asked on the Radio 4 Appeal to give a fiver for some poor child to help give it education/medicine/water/clothes – it’s not dissimilar to our religious leaders (who are also given a platform on the BBC) whose ‘Thought for the day’ usually points out that ‘we’ are responsible (personally that is) for various destructive ills, and that by believing in the supernatural these ills will miraculously disappear. There’s never a mention of what is actually causing all these awful things to happen, and thus, once more, to the listening public it becomes the ‘norm’ and ‘human nature’.

I realise that by sharing these thoughts, unlike in a conversation, a reply cannot be given. I apologise for that and in all honesty, I want someone to give me a reason to have hope when all the evidence I see around me incontrovertibly confirms anything but a hopeful outlook. I expect you are thinking ‘but what about all the people who are doing good things?’ or ‘change has to come slowly and we can only do what we can in our own small way’ – when I hear these sentiments again and again (and I have for the last 50 years), I do wonder why I bother trying to suggest that a new world order could be created almost immediately; a society where there are no leaders, no money and where all produce, whether food, clothes, houses, medicine, infrastructure, furniture and all other things produced by human effort are made freely available to those that need them, and are of a standard that will last and be of the best that the designer and maker can produce, and as a result be proud of. Just imagine a society when money, an ‘economy’, profit and everlasting ‘growth’ were things of the past – can you imagine this? If profit was no longer a motive (or to be more accurate an essential force) driving the creative species that is our human race then, we could, with absolute certainty, make these things history which, in time, we as caring people would shudder to think ever existed.

Warfare

There would no longer be ‘countries’ to fight over, or more specifically the wealth or trade routes contained within their borders. Instead, there would be different regions where people chose to live, happy with their links to the land and proud of the knowledge and skills particular to that place. Neither would they or anyone else be forced into killing their fellow humans in the interest of a money class or ‘for their country’.

Slavery (yes, it does still exist)

Who would feel the need to force someone to travel miles to work for some criminal employer if ‘employment’ ceased to exist? All of us would work by sharing more menial work with other personal skills that we felt best able to do to contribute to the well-being of society as a whole.

Hunger

Ask yourself why people are hungry now in this society. Is there enough food to feed all people – yes. So why do they starve then? The simple two answers are:

Farmers do not grow food for people to eat. Before you get defensive here, I remember as a child seeing reports of heaps of cauliflowers at the side of fields being covered with kerosene to make them inedible. There had been a glut and so they had been dumped as they could not be sold at a profit, and so people had started helping themselves. Remember, profit comes before hungry people. There have been countless similar occurrences since – pigs recently.

Starving people can’t afford food. If food was produced for people to eat, no one need go without. It would be wonderful if farmers grew food for people to eat but they don’t, they grow food for profit – even the organic vegetables at the ‘farmer’s markets’.

Homelessness

Homes would cease to be investments or stand empty next to people begging on the streets. There would be no need for poorly designed houses crammed cheek by jowl to make the most profit out of a small, often unsuitable space and no need to fell beautiful trees to make room for the last ‘executive’ house. Would everyone want a palace? Well, would you? Would you not feel a little odd having a place with 20 bedrooms, 6 bathrooms and 4 kitchens? Would such a ‘house’ be better suited for those who desire a more communal life? Perhaps artists, or others with a shared interest. Anyway, think of all the housework you would have to do. After all, servants would also be a thing of the past.

Species decline and climate breakdown 

It is true that ridding society of the dreadful legacies of capitalism and the profit motive would, in some cases, be impossible. Extinct creatures cannot be brought back, rainforests or glaciers cannot be replaced, but one could reasonably hope for some sort of recovery; there would no longer be the need to put profit before the environment (which happens now). No more would the ‘economy’ take preference over acres and acres of ancient woodland to shave a few minutes off a train journey and to provide jobs. Goods would be made to last and not to fail and thus massively reduce waste – possibly entirely.

Crime

It is unlikely that in any form of society anti-social behaviour would cease to exist entirely, but I would suggest that the vast proportion of ‘criminal acts’ involve property or the taking of someone’s money in one form or another, eg scamming, people trafficking, burglary, fraud, poaching would cease. In a society where goods were made freely available for use, how could one steal?

Poverty

Need I say more? If there was no money there would be no poverty. The list could go on. There are so many parts of our current manner of organising society that are dreadful, whilst at the same time totally unnecessary. Humans do not have to live this way. Can we change? If the majority of people, which is how things are right now, believe that an ‘economy’, profit and the money system is the only way and can be reformed, and thus benefit all humanity, then please tell me how. No past reforms have worked – everything is getting worse, not better. Should we, or can we, just let an abstract idea continue to play out before our eyes while we sit and witness the destruction of beauty and the last vestiges of what makes our planet such a wonderful place? Surely we are more than that. Surely we are now at a time when we can truly cooperate with each other – all people – and share with absolute equality the wonder and wealth of the world. Are we really not able to do this? Many people have said that it will take an apocalypse to bring about world change. That does seem an awful thing to contemplate – countries on fire, trees dying in their millions, people fleeing countries desperate to find safety, people dying in their thousands of starvation, vast areas of the world becoming uninhabitable and children and civilians being blown limb from limb as their fellow human beings unleash unimaginable horrors with weapons of war. Yes, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that … Well, I did say I had the answer, arrogant maybe, but it’s quite simple really … you. And if that sounds accusatory, I apologise, it isn’t; it’s just that I can’t change society on my own.

Glenn Morris

For New Readers (1971)

From the October 1971 issue of the Socialist Standard 

What we are not

The Socialist Party of Great Britain is not the Labour Party, nor do we support the Labour Party. In our view the Labour Party used to be an organization with confused and vague ideas about changing society and improving the lot of working people. It has now become little different from the Conservative Party — another “team” to administer capitalism.

We are also opposed to the so-called “Communist" Party and to the Trotskyists.

We have to explain these points because unfortunately the word “Socialism” has been used in many different ways, often very woolly, whereas we are quite clear about what we mean by Socialism, and about how to get it.

The Socialist Party of Great Britain is connected with parties and groups in other countries. It is democratically run, with all members having an equal say, and no secrecy.

What we mean by "Capitalism"

By capitalism we mean commercial society, society based on buying and selling. This exists all over the world, with the exception of pre-capitalist societies which still survive, for instance tribal communism, and subsistence-level peasant societies. Capitalism rules in Russia, China, Cuba, and other countries falsely claimed to be “Socialist” or “Communist.”

Capitalism has not always existed, and it will not exist for ever. Capitalism is not an evil conspiracy (though as a matter of fact, it is fertile ground for evil conspiracies) but a type of social order which has been necessary for the progress of our species.

The function of capitalism was to put human beings through a great deal of anxiety, loneliness, boring work, shoddy food and housing — a generally insecure and frustrated existence — in order to screw wealth out of them. Capitalism developed science and technology with brilliant success, united the world (for communications purposes) into a “global village” and trained more people than ever before to a high level of knowhow and adaptability.

But capitalism has not, in the main, fully applied its science and technology for the benefit of the majority of the population, and in our view it cannot. Capitalism has not united the world politically — wars go on all the time, and a Big War which would exterminate the lot of us gets steadily less unlikely. Capitalism has not employed its knowledge and expertise in useful, dignified and happy productive activity, but has put a curse on work.

Capitalism has created a potential abundance of wealth, capable of satisfying human wants on a scale heretofore undreamed of. But capitalism cannot realize its own potential. This is because the capitalist economic system is best suited to rationing scarcity by means of the market. It goes haywire at the threat of abundance — as witness the “problem” of millions of tons of “surplus” food in a world where over ten per cent of the population is starving.

Who the workers are

To many people “the working class” is defined by occupation or education, or even by trivialities like accent or table manners. These may be useful classifications for some purposes, but to the Socialist “working class” has quite a different meaning, based on the analysis of Karl Marx. By this definition, the working class is composed of those who do not own enough to live off their possessions, and therefore have to sell themselves. The working class is a class of wage-slaves. This includes the great majority of the population, if we count dependents (such as housewives and babies) and trainee wage-slaves (such as schoolchildren, apprentices and students).

Capitalism has tidied up classes. All other classes apart from capitalists and workers (such as peasants) readily dwindle away under capitalism — usually by their members being recruited into the working class. Workers are exploited. By this we don’t mean that they always live in Dickensian conditions, or that foremen stride about brandishing whips. We mean simply that workers are a source of wealth, which is taken from them. This may seem fairly obvious, but many people appear to live in a make-believe world in which captains of industry” or “financial wizards” or (increasingly) “the authorities” somehow “give” workers employment.” The fact is that the world’s wealth produced by the working class, but does not belong to them. In Britain, for example, 10 per cent of the population own over 90 per cent of the wealth and get 99 per cent of the property income. The rich and powerful (the capitalist class) have interests opposed to those of the workers. They gain where workers lose: if wages rise, profits fall. And of course, the capitalists will lose their privileged position in Socialism, where all men and women will be social equals.

It is the working class which must establish Socialism, because they are the majority of the population, because they do all the essential work of operating capitalism and are therefore trained to a high degree, and because they are driven by their conditions of life to challenge the status quo — though to date it has usually been fairly easy for workers’ discontent to be channelled in a reformist, rather than revolutionary, direction.

Defeatists and self-styled “realists” are apt to point at that the majority of workers are “contented” or apathetic” — though of many workers it might be truer to say that they are worried so sick that they do not care. What the pessimists forget is that capitalism is a dynamic society, indeed a revolutionary society, of perpetual agitation and change.

Many workers adopt the motto: “Anything for a quiet life.” But most of them find this impossible, capitalism takes them by the scruff of the neck, gives them a good shaking, and says: “You cannot have a quiet life.” Just as we are about to close our teeth upon the dangling carrot, it is whisked away by war, slump, job re-organization or other arbitrary authority. There is of course no guarantee that workers will turn to Socialism as the answer to their problems. All we can say is that certain long-term trends in capitalism make it increasingly likely that they will. For the moment they may take refuge in television, drugs, mental and psychosomatic illness, feelings of personal guilt and feverish pursuit of “success.” It is up to the Socialist to dis-illusion people.

What unions can do

As long as capitalism stays, there will be class struggle. Workers don’t ask for it. Socialists don’t delight in it. Strikes, and other forms of “industrial action” are unavoidable if workers are to defend their living standards, and occasionally raise them.

We advise workers to be “militant” in the sense that they should press for the highest wages they can get, and should not soft-pedal this struggle because capitalism has started one of its wars or because the government says there is a crisis. But trade union militancy in itself does nothing to threaten the continued existence of capitalism, though it may threaten particular regimes or schemes of capitalism.

Strikes are necessary for our defence, but severely limited even for this. The general level of wages is largely fixed by the pattern of capital investment, and negotiable only within relatively narrow limits. The operation of capitalism’s trade (and employment) cycle is a running tide in relation to which the militant trade unionist is little more than a King Canute. In addition, trade unionism by itself may set one group of workers against another.

One of the immediate consequences of the growth of a mass Socialist movement will be a more effective trade union movement, which will take no notice of hallucinations like “the national interest” or “inflationary spirals.”

In keeping with our opposition to leadership, we say that the people best qualified to decide the tactics of a particular strike are the workers directly involved, who have to live with the consequences. It is not the function of our Party to lay down a detailed trade union strategy — indeed our trade unionist members may have differences of opinion about this. There are however two general aims which Socialists pursue: working class democracy and unity. Whereas governments of capitalism worry themselves about “giving unions more power over their members”. Socialists are more concerned with giving the members more power over their unions. Parochial craft or regional interests should be subordinated to the interests of all the workers.

The Conservative government’s Industrial Relations Bill could not have been killed by trade union action, because such a large number of workers were either in favour of it, or indifferent. (Many of those opposed quibble only about details, and would support anti-union measures by a different ruling party). If this were not so, the government would not have dared introduce the measure in the first place. Lacking Socialist understanding, workers find scapegoats for their problems. Union-bashing wins working class votes. Enforcing the Act is another matter. Whether the mass of workers will remain so docile then remains to be seen. In any case, we see here an example of the trade union struggle being hampered by the lack of a strong Socialist movement, based on widespread Socialist understanding.

Reforms?

Capitalism never runs out of reforms. On the contrary, it needs perpetual reforming. Capitalist political parties do not declare that the existing state of affairs is fine. On the contrary, they use words like “radical,” “dynamic,” "revolutionary” etc. to describe the reforms they advocate.

A Socialist party does not, of course, oppose all reforms any more than it advocates them. On the contrary, Socialists recognize that reforms inside capitalism may sometimes benefit the working class — though never by as much as one per cent of what is claimed for them!

But it is not the function of a Socialist party to campaign for reforms, or to seek support on the basis of reforms. Historically, we have seen parties which started out with Socialism as an aim, converted into run-of-the-mill capitalist parties (for instance, the German Social-Democratic Party) because they fell for the easy line: "Why not advocate revolution and reform — just in the meantime?” This must attract the support of those who want reform, but aren’t too interested in revolution. A “Socialist” party which grows in strength ahead of the real extent of Socialist understanding among the workers, is likely to be placed in a position where it is forced to administer capitalism, or go in for political trading with capitalist parties. For a party to canvass the support of non-Socialists is the first step to becoming a party of non-Socialists.

A Socialist party analyses closely the likely effects of reform measures, and gives a sober assessment of the extent to which they will benefit or injure the majority of the population.

Revolution?

Because Socialism will be a democratic society, in which the majority will get its way, with full rights of dissent and arguments for minorities, it follows that Socialism can only be set up democratically. That is to say, Socialism cannot be handed to the majority of people by an elite which thinks it knows what’s good for them.

Although Socialism is the culmination of trends within capitalism, this does not mean that Socialism will somehow come about irrespective of people’s wishes. On the contrary, one of the ways in which capitalism tends towards Socialism is by creating a large organized, informed working class. It is these people (i.e. it is we, the workers) who will establish Socialism, but we will not do it by accident or improvization: we will do it consciously, because we want it and see the necessity for it.

The chief job of Socialists at this stage is therefore to spread Socialist ideas, and expose the false remedies of capitalism. At present Socialists are in a tiny minority, but as we have pointed out, capitalism is unlike previous societies in that it is a system of constant agitation and rapid change in which nothing is sacred and no ideas are safe.

“Revolution” to the Socialist is not a violent thing, with street fights and barricades. Such a view of revolution is nineteenth-century. Today, no barricades could possibly stand up to the might of the modern state, and in any case there is no need, because in the advanced countries, where workers are most numerous and highly-trained, capitalism, is forced to give them certain political rights. We can see in the present-day Russian Empire what happens when an increasingly advanced form of capitalism is lumbered with an outdated political apparatus; more and more unrest and instability, which can only result in the granting of democratic reforms.

Socialists are not pacifists, and we are in no position to guarantee that the Socialist revolution will be altogether free from violence. Violence is improbable, but will depend upon the behaviour of the minority who are still opposed to Socialism. If there are people reactionary, desperate and foolish enough to use violence to obstruct the plans of the Socialist majority, then defensive action of some sort might have to be taken against them.

What we mean by Socialism

Socialism means the end of buying and selling, the end of money and the wages system. As long as these things remain, there will be economic crises, wars, bitter class struggle and day-to-day violence. In our opinion these problems cannot be cured by charities, social reforms or a personal “change of heart” on the part of individuals. Neither can they be solved by nationalization or "workers’ control” — since these are merely different ways of administering the same economic system.

Socialism will mean sweeping changes in many spheres of life: education, the family, social administration — but these will all be based on the abolition of production for sale (what Marx called “commodity production”), and the introduction of democratically planned production according to people’s wants.

Socialism will be a society of voluntary co-operation. There will be sexual freedom and equality. Work will be voluntary, and people will take freely what they need to consume. This is technically feasible because capitalism has already developed the potential for abundance.

Socialism will be a fully democratic society, with complete freedom of expression for everyone. And, of course, Socialism will be a society without economic classes — there will be no capitalist class and no working class.

Socialism can only be world-wide. “British Socialism” is a flat contradiction. Attempts to set up Socialism in one part of the world would have to fail — the remaining capitalist powers would see to that, if nothing else. On the other hand, the world is now so closely united in terms of communications, fashions and the rapid flow of ideas, that if the people in one place were ready for Socialism, the rest of the world could not be far behind.

A world community founded on common ownership, and democratic control — in our view this is the only solution to the major problems of modern life. We ask you to give it serious consideration if you desire an end to war, poverty and oppression.

Is this possible? The revolution begins when you decide that it is.

David Ramsay Steele

Classic Reprint: To a New Reader (1959)

From the August 1959 issue of the Socialist Standard

The journal which you are now reading is published each month. For many years it has appeared as surely as night has followed day. Just as surely, each month a copy drifts into the hands of many who have not read it before. This copy has drifted into your hands for the first time, maybe at a street-corner propaganda meeting, from one of the all-too-few newsagents who stock it, or from one of the enthusiastic workers who sell it in the streets and at railway stations. It would be fair to assume that you are an anti-Socialist or non-Socialist; that you bought the Socialist Standard because a particular article caught your eye, or because some question dealt with by a speaker interested you. Probably you did not buy it because you wanted to learn about Socialism. You “know” all there is to be known about that, don’t you? And yet, fellow-worker, you are reading a journal you have never seen before, describing itself as the official organ of the Socialist Party, which claims to be the only party in Great Britain organised for Socialism. Moreover, you will find in these columns the opinion implicitly and openly expressed that the reason for workers not supporting the Socialist Party is because they do not understand Socialism. Your reactions we can imagine. It is the first time you have read the Socialist Standard, and, after all, you did think you knew about Socialism. You think us arrogant? And our claim to be the only party organised for Socialism just advertising ballyhoo, as it were. To call attention to our wares. Fellow-worker, our claims are not arrogant; we are not engaged in ballyhoo. Workers organised in this party are THE Socialist Party of Great Britain and the only workers organised for Socialism.

What is Socialism?

You, fellow-worker, “know” all about Socialism, don’t you?

You “know” that Socialism means “share and share alike,” that is to say, that you should share your belongings with your neighbour. And knowing your neighbour, you decide against Socialism. You “know” that Socialism means some vague mush about “loving your neighbour,” and again looking at your neighbour you feel uninspired. You “know” that Socialism means the destruction of initiative and inventiveness, and being young (or not so old) and ambitious you feel that the present order of things should not be upset. You “know” that Socialism means that woman would occupy a degraded position in the social arrangement. For hasn’t the Morning Rail often turned your stomach in its description of the free love of the Socialists and the nationalisation of women. You ”know” that Socialism has been tried in different parts of the earth. After all, the self-styled “Socialists'' have said so.

Quite bluntly, fellow-worker, you know little or nothing about Socialism. In truth, if Socialism did mean the things which these mangled ideas try to express then the working men and women who are organised in the Socialist Party would turn to some other more intelligent pursuit.

Production for use

Socialism does not mean sharing out either goods or income. Such a conception implies a fixed amount of social wealth, out of which each took an equal share. Socialism means something fundamentally different from that. It means the social ownership of the means for producing wealth. Consider for a moment the factory in which you work. Each worker, out of perhaps many thousands, has his particular job to do. Yet no one worker produces the finished article, which the factory, as a whole, produces. Each worker plays his part, but the product is the result of the indispensable work of all. Production is a co-operative process. As in the factory, so in society generally. The work and life of the community is carried on by the workers as a whole. No one worker or group of workers is independent of the rest. One worker can play his part in steering a ship, but the labour of many thousands is required to build it. The worker who steers the ship could not do so without the builders. Production is social.

Yet outside the productive process is the class who own the means of production. It takes no part in social production and is unnecessary to it. Socialism means the social ownership of the social means of production. This will eliminate the owning class. Quite a simple proposition to conceive, but profound and revolutionary in its implications. Far from Socialism meaning the sharing-out of some imaginary fixed quantity of wealth, social ownership will release the powers of production from the fetters of private ownership. It will bring into productive activity an enormous number of workers now engaged in unproductive labour. Production will expand to correspond to the people's needs. The people will take from the social store as they have need. Initiative and inventiveness will have the chance to thrive, instead, as now, of being dependent on the ability of the worker to sell his abilities to a capitalist. Cut-throat competition for jobs will no longer exist and the mushy sentiment of brotherly love will have an opportunity to acquire real meaning.

So we could go on, stating and answering the common objections to Socialism. But we want to do more than that. We want your interest. Whilst we tell you that you know nothing about Socialism your interest is perhaps not easy to obtain. But be patient. Ask yourself what time you have devoted to a study of the question. Is your conception of Socialism the result of independent thinking, or has it acquired shape from the influence of biased or coloured sources more interested in misrepresenting it? Think that out and be wary. Perhaps you have not had the time to study Socialism. However, you are reading the Socialist Standard and we assume that you want knowledge, and want to assist in removing the social evils of capitalism if you knew how. We know that only Socialism will solve these problems. We know that Socialism will come. Make up your mind about that. More, the time will come when there can be no ordered intelligent living, no progress, no harmony in social relations; national or international, without Socialism. The lessons of the Socialist message will be learned through the experience of bitter struggle. That struggle can be eased and shortened by the spread of Socialist understanding. That is our responsibility. Yours is surely to examine our case. And that is what we ask you to do.

Socialist Standard

In the course of years we have answered all known objections to Socialism in the Socialist Standard. We can let you have back numbers if you wish. Read the Socialist Standard for the next twelve months and you will be much nearer an understanding of our position than you are to-day. One issue may modify some popular misconception in your mind, but it would be insufficient to convince you of the soundness of our case. One prejudice we are certain will disappear—that working men and women cannot understand the meaning of the apparently complicated events around. They can. You can. We have. And we lay no claim to more than average brains. But we have devoted many years to the study of Socialism. We know something about it. You know little. Quite naturally; we should be in a similar position regarding a subject to which you had devoted long study. We are not of superior intelligence. We do claim, however, that we have found ourselves on the road to Socialism (perhaps, in the first place by accident) and that you would be with us with a little guidance. We are workers drawn from representative occupations, miners, mechanics, carpenters, busmen, clerical workers, artists, house-wives, and so forth. We have a case—the case for the social ownership of the means and instruments of production. Study our case and we are certain that you will soon be in the fight for Socialism.

Harry Waite

Reprinted from Socialist Standard, January 1938.

To a New Reader (1956)

From the May 1956 issue of the Socialist Standard 

There are many parties, both large and small, appealing for your support to-day. Some of them do so with the claim that they are Socialist parties, but you have no touch-stone to guide your judgment. You are bewildered by the multitude of parties who all claim that their object is to help you. In fact, there is only one way out of your dilemma—to help yourself by gaining a little knowledge of the society you are living in; its basis, its capacities, and its contradictions.

In a story of the life of King Edward VII., that is printed in the Evening Standard (4/4/1956), we are told that he lived in a "glittering world of wealth and privilege, from one end of Europe to the other." That referred to the first ten years of the present century, when the majority of the people, the workers, worked for wages that only gave them a precarious existence and a large proportion lived in slums. While the glitter was still there the world was plunged into devastating war that brought misery to minions of people.

In the issue of the Evening Standard that prints the above there is also a reference to the recent death of F. Jay Gould, the American multi-millionaire, from which we learn that, according to his second wife, “Those were fabulous days. He built a villa for us at Maison-Raffite." Later they took a chateau with 100 rooms, where they lived throughout the 1914-1918 war. The hunger matches of the twenties and the crisis at the beginning of the thirties permitted him to wallow in his millions. Now his relatives are fighting over the division of the spoils he has left behind him.

Thus, throughout the present century, a relatively small number of people have lived in a glittering world of wealth and privilege whilst the vast majority have lived in a world of toil and penury. Why are there these two worlds? Must it always be so?

Man is spoken of as being a social animal. He associates with others of his kind—forms part of a society. A society is a group of individuals bound together by a common principle. The larger sense in which the word society is generally used refers to the common principle of obtaining a living. Whatever is referred to as “social" concerns man in his connection with other men. Thus when we say a thing is socially produced we mean that a number of men produce different parts of an article and their combined efforts produce the finished article. That is the way almost all we eat, drink and wear, is produced to-day, and workers from all over the world produce different parts of the final product. No Capitalist need spend an hour in this work, and very rarely does. But by reason of their ownership of the means of production the Capitalists, as a class, own the products. Thus the products are socially produced but privately owned.

You are living in a society to-day in which the things produced, and the tools by means of which they are produced, are privately owned: that is, owned by one individual or by a relatively small group of individuals—either a single Capitalist a small group of Capitalists, or the Capitalist investors in a State concern. The aim of the Socialist is to make these things social property; to convert these privately owned goods and tools into goods and tools commonly owned by the whole of society. He who acts in such a way as to bring this state of affairs into being is a Socialist: he who acts in a way that hinders progress to this end is evidently not a Socialist, no matter what he may call himself.

Owing to the private ownership of the means of production the majority of the people of this country are unable to obtain the things they need except by working for those that own them; the Capitalist class. These two types, owners and non-owners, masters and workers, broadly speaking make up modern society. They form two distinct classes, one of whom depends for a living upon working, and the other upon owning what is produced.

You, to whom we address these lines, belong to the working class. Whether you are paid wages or a salary, you depend for your living upon selling your mental and physical energies to an employer. Between you and your employers there exists a constant struggle over the destination of the wealth you produce. By wage-claims, strikes, or threatened strikes, you struggle to obtain as large a share of the wealth you produce as possible. It is a share you think of, you don*t think of obtaining the whole, because you think of and argue about a “high” or a “low" wage. Your thoughts are bound up with the wages system. The employers on their side resist your wage claims and try to pay you as low wages as possible. This struggle over the division of the wealth you produce is an expression of what the Socialist calls the class war. In spite of the so-called full employment it has been carried on unceasingly since the end of the second Great War. All the time wages were chasing rising prices, and the process looks like continuing indefinitely.

As long as you accept the present class ownership basis of society there is no hope of a fundamental improvement in your conditions. Wars, slumps, bad housings and the other evils that are a permanent feature of your lives will continue, no matter what political party is in power. There is only one road to salvation—the establishment of Socialism. When the wealth produced, and the tools by which it has been produced, have been made into the common property of society there will be no more war, nor will anyone lack either food or shelter. Each will give to society of his best and receive in return the best society can give, regardless of age, sex or occupation.

We are members of the working class, and we want you to join us and help us to carry on the struggle for Socialism. Why are we anxious for your aid? We are in the same mess as you are, and we cannot get out of the mess except by the same way as you. We want Socialism because it offers us the only means of leading secure, healthy and comfortable lives; but we cannot get Socialism until you want it. Therefore we want you to want Socialism and to join with us in the struggle to obtain it: then we will all have an equal opportunity of enjoying the best that life can offer.

Gilmac.

Letter: Fascism and other things. (1924)

Letter to the Editors from the June 1924 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Editor,

“Socialist Standard.”

Dear Comrade,

Whilst I cannot claim to be a new reader of your periodical, The Socialist Standard, I generally peruse it from the front page to the back page in the hope of gleaning some information or enlightenment on current economic problems. Therefore, I read with some trepidation the article by one styled “Gilmac” in your April issue entitled “To a New Reader.” After giving a short discourse on the present-day position of the worker, and informing him, indisputably, that “wealth is produced by means of privately-owned means of production ” etc., etc., etc., he proceeds, “to emulate the prophets (?) and to indulge in a little idle surmise,” as he so aptly puts it. Having assumed that we have elected the requisite number of delegates to Parliament, we then proceed on three main lines of investigation.

1. Ascertain the needs of the population. (A matter of compiling statistics.)
2. The means available to satisfy these needs. (A matter of compiling statistics.)
3. The labour required to do the necessary work. (A matter of compiling statistics.)

In fact, all that we have to do is to “sit tight” and compile statistics, a relatively simple matter, as he states (although he does not say what it is relevant to).

It appears to me that our comrade has, to use an aphorism, started to build the roof of his house before he has laid its foundations.

Firstly, by what means does he propose to get the necessary delegates (Socialist) into Parliament?

Tentatively, I will answer this question by stating, presumably by education on lines laid down by the S.P.G.B.

Then what will happen when this educational policy becomes a serious menace to the Capitalist class : which means its ultimate extinction? Naturally that section of the community will immediately protect itself to its utmost resources, employing the whole forces of the Capitalist State to this end. The Facisti will come out of its lair with an abundance of cans of castor oil and other relics of the Inquisition, and the S.P.G.B. will be driven underground. Far be it from me to cast cold water upon the rosy prospect of endless statistics which our comrade pictures in his endeavour to emulate the prophets, but if I were a new reader I could not derive much inspiration or information from his article.

May I prevail upon you, Comrade Editor, to enlarge upon this fundamental and vital matter of policy, without being referred to the issue of the “Standard” for the year 1849? 

Yours fraternally,

W. R. Saunders.

Reply:

The Editorial Committee has passed your letter on to me for reply.

Really, friend, I must protest. You certainly did not peruse the article in question from the first line to the last with thoroughness. Had you done so you would not have aimed such criticism at it. You will, I am sure, forgive me for pointing out that before the foundations of a house are laid the architect must consider the nature of the roof. I was showing that the roof would be quite alright. I did not pretend to deal with the method of overthrowing capitalism. My object was simply to show that the evils existing were evils of Capitalism, and that once the workers were in a position to establish Socialism the method of procedure would be comparatively simple.

I will not refer you to the “Standard” for the year 1849 (you have doubtless read numerous articles in previous issues dealing fully and completely with “this fundamental and vital matter of policy”) but I will refer you to the article criticised. In it you will notice that I point out how simple it will be to so arrange production and distribution as to satisfy the needs of the population. Now you say this conveys nothing to you. If you are an old reader of the “Standard” then the points mentioned are well known to you and, therefore, perhaps of no immediate interest. But you must not forget that the article was addressed to a new reader, and he, presumably, knows nothing of Socialism. He cannot conceive of production and distribution being carried on without capital, trading, taxation, wages boards and the like. The new viewpoint put before such a reader may lead him to see that there are other ways of producing and distributing wealth than the present way, and may, therefore, convey much to him. After all, the constant argument of the average worker is “You cannot do without the Capitalist.” “Who is to pay our wages”? You see, the average worker is concerned a good deal with the “roof.” I set out to show him that the roof would be quite sound.

And now you will pardon me again for reminding you that whatever methods you consider will have to be adopted to overthrow Capitalism, you will still have to carry out the aforesaid investigations on the morrow of the Revolution, i.e.,

1. Ascertain the needs of the population.
2. The means available to satisfy those needs.
3. The labour required to do the necessary work,

It is no good, you cannot escape the statistics friend. The Russian Bolsheviks learnt to their cost the tremendous importance of statistics in their reorganisation.

It is so simple friend, isn’t it? Yet it is “information” to many people, if not to you.

Now for the questions you ask, neither of which were dealt with in the article as they were outside the particular subject.

You wish to know how we propose getting the necessary Socialist delegates into Parliament ? Briefly, stated, we propose doing so by convincing a majority of the working class electorate of the slave position they occupy to-day ; that their interests and the interests of their masters are opposed and can not be reconciled ; that their only hope of obtaining permanent improvement in their condition is by establishing Socialism ; that in order to establish Socialism they must take the State power out of the hands of the Capitalists, and the only way they can do that is by sending a majority of delegates to the seat of power (Parliament) with instructions to take from the Capitalists this power that they wield ; once having obtained control of the State power it will then be necessary to set about establishing Socialism.

Now for your second point—and, by the way, it is a prophecy! You assert that “the Facisti will come out of its lair.” Would it not have been better to have examined the conditions out of which the Facisti arose, and see if similar conditions were likely to exist in England?

Before dealing with the Facisti, I wilt make a few preliminary remarks.

When the Socialist Party has grown sufficiently to become a serious menace to the Capitalists and inspires the latter with alarm, they will undoubtedly use all available methods to extinguish Socialist propaganda and hinder the development of the Party. But there are certain limitations to the methods that can be employed. Methods that would bring chaos into the system will be avoided, as the Capitalists themselves would go down in the ruin. They dare not make any serious permanent alteration in the method of carrying on the system, with the object of hindering the worker from giving expression to his wishes. The main social functions are not carried out by Capitalists, but by officials elected to various bodies; among which are the Parliamentary, County and Local Bodies. An important interference with the method of appointing officials to such bodies, operating for any considerable length of time, would put the system out of gear and the Capitalists out of their present position. Anarchy will not suit the Capitalists. This fact is forcing Mussolini to modify his methods now he is in power.

Italy is a comparatively young nation and the nationalist spirit is still strong there. After the War, work in the industries that had catered for war fell off and, as in other countries, unemployment suddenly grew to tremendous proportions. The organisation of the large corporations had improved ; waste was cut down to an extent never attained before; machinery and mass production methods had undergone a hot-house development; and these corporations had obtained such a firm control over industry that many of the smaller fry had been ruined and thrown into the ranks of the working class though still retaining a vivid recollection of and hankering after their former privileged position.

Immediately after the War, the workers flocked into the trade unions under the influence of the war-time promises of the Capitalists and the peace-time promises of the “men-of-action.” But they were very soon disillusioned of their hopes. The industrial movement that culminated in the occupation of the factories had a disastrous ending, and the “land for the peasants movement” collapsed.

The Fascisti, at first a small and insignificant group, promised the Italian workers a classless state, a state above parties, which would consolidate Italy’s war gains. It further promised a new electoral law, equal suffrage for women, the eight-hour day, progressive income-tax, and demanded an enquiry into war profits. It also organised a trade union with the object of harmonising the interests of employers and employed.

This policy attracted to its support employers, disbanded soldiers still suffering from patriotic fever and lack of employment, ex-officers, disappointed town workers of all kinds, peasants, and ruined small masters who thought they saw in the new movement a chance of re-establishment. The growth of the Fascisti was assisted by the compromising and barren policy of the Italian parties that laid claim to the intellectual leadership of the workers, and by the clandestine assistance of the Government. In the main, the movement represented, as far as the workers were concerned, a clutching at straws. Intimidation of workers, of course, was resorted to, but the support obtained by this means was small compared with that freely given.

There were other important factors in the situation, but space will not permit me going further into the matter.

The Fascisti movement then, was composed of a mixture of opposing elements, and it flourished by Governmental favour. Since success has come to it the internal opposition is becoming more and more insistent in spite of the recent victory at the polls. It is made up mainly of workers and it has been unable to fulfil the promises made to its poorer adherents.

In due course Fascism will break down of its own weight and the class antagonism between master and worker, employer and employed, will become more clearly demonstrated than ever. Even the military force it has organised contains the seeds of collapse, and will soon prove a broken reed in the day of trial. Fascism, therefore, far from stopping the growth of Socialism, is only a momentary halt—like the Communist movement—before a leap forward. Mussolini has been compelled by conditions to modify more and more his dictatorship, and though he may for a time interfere with electoral methods, conditions will force him to allow more opportunity for the carrying out of the wishes of the mass of the population or pay the penalty—involve himself, and the class he represents, in ruin.

Now for your question as to what the Socialist Party would do if the Facisti comes “out of its lair,” etc., etc. The Socialist Party would do the same as it did during the War, assuming its support were comparatively small—put the Socialist position at every reasonable opportunity, and wait for the inevitable receding of the wave. No working-class party could do more.

But be very careful to note the “if.” Conditions in England are not so favourable to the growth of Fascism as they are abroad. And further by the time the Socialist Party had become sufficiently strong to menace the Capitalists’ position and move them to the action you suggest there would be a very strong body of class-conscious workers in this country who would have no reason for disillusionment, and a still larger mass of workers who would be nearing the Socialist position—conditions which were not present in Italy. At such a time then the development of Fascism in England would be very unlikely.

Gilmac.

To a new reader. (1924)

From the April 1924 issue of the Socialist Standard

You work hard when you have employment, you search hard when you have not employment. Your very existence depends upon your finding and keeping employment. Yet, in or out of employment, your daily life is hard, crammed and cramped with hard work and skimpy of enjoyment. From infancy to old age you are surrounded with poverty and the manifold miseries that are due to poverty. While you work and live amidst privation others are idle and enjoy the best the world has to offer.

Poverty is not a disease imposed by nature ; it is not due to a shortage of wealth but to the way in which wealth is distributed. It is born out of particular social conditions and its existence to-day is due immediately to the way in which wealth is distributed. The way in which wealth is distributed depends upon the method of production, so that this is the fundamental cause of poverty.

To-day wealth is produced by means of privately owned means of production (land, machinery, and so on), consequently the wealth produced belongs to those who own the means of production. The workers work upon and operate the means of production but they do not own a fraction of the wealth produced.

The economic evils that exist are caused solely by the fact that the means of production belong to private individuals and not to the whole people. The only solution of these evils is to change the basis of society ; transfer the means of production from the hands of private individuals to the whole of society—change private ownership of these things into social ownership. That is Socialism.

Perhaps you think that this solution, the Socialist solution, of your evils is too easy to be correct. Perhaps present arrangements appear to be too complicated to allow of a revolutionary change without tremendous friction.

If you will consider the matter carefully for a little while you will discover that much of the complication existing to-day is due to, and bound up with, the making of profit.

The fog surrounding international exchange ; the fickleness of demand and supply; the credit system; taxation; Wages Boards ; and the multitude of other things that are such perplexing problems at present, and which in turn are given as the cause of low wages and unemployment, are all problems bound up with a system in which business is carried on for private gain. You can satisfy yourself of this fact by turning to the older systems of society that flourished during barbaric times. There you will find that the problems mentioned above did not exist. These older societies had other problems, chief of which was the lack of the means to produce wealth easily.

If the means of production and distribution are owned in common by the whole of society and used to meet the needs of the whole of society the necessary measures to be taken to secure the requisite production and distribution would be comparatively simple.

Let us assume for a few moments that the majority of society have considered that Socialism is desirable and have elected delegates to Parliament to make the change. What would be the steps to be taken once these delegates had obtained control ? We will emulate the prophets and indulge in a little idle surmise, on the assumption that general conditions will be as at present on the morrow of the revolution.

First of all three main lines of investigation would have to be followed. It would be necessary to—

1. Ascertain the needs of the population.
2. The means available to satisfy these needs.
3. The labour required to do the necessary work.

Let us take these three items in turn and examine them.

1. It would be necessary to divide the country up into areas according to the distribution of the population, and to find out the kind and amount of goods required for different areas. The skeleton of such an organisation already exists to-day in the form of Urban, Rural and County Councils.

It would only be a question of compiling different kinds of statistics from those which are compiled to-day. The main things we require are food, clothing, and habitations.

2. The means available to satisfy the above needs would include land, raw material, machinery, and transportation facilities—roads, canals, railways, sea routes, air routes. Again a question of compiling statistics.

3. It would be necessary to find out the number of workers, the various kinds of skill, and the distribution of the workers over the country.

In the above three directions it would be a matter of compiling statistics. The vast amount of statistical work that is done at present and its nature show that the organisation for doing such work is already in existence and would be available.

Once having compiled and collected the statistics (a relatively simple matter) it would be necessary to distribute the work according to workers and resources, and spread the work approximately equally over all so that more work would not be demanded from one than from another.

It may be urged that England is not a self-supporting country and that once dealings are entered into with people abroad complications would arise. Here it must be borne in mind that all over the world the degree of advancement in the important countries (those that would really matter) is roughly about the same. By the time the majority of the people in this country had arrived at the idea that Socialism was desirable, the people in other countries would be near, if they had not actually reached, the same view. So that a fundamental social change in England would rapidly develop a corresponding change abroad and ease the necessary international dealings. While each country must settle its own social problem, yet each cannot do so without involving the world in its operations. Hence the international character of Socialism.

At the moment of writing a matter is occupying considerable attention in the newspapers that may provide us with an illustration of the complexity of affairs at present.

Within a few days two wild fluctuations occurred in the ratio of English money to French money. The French franc was quoted at 2½d. not long ago, then it suddenly went down to 2d., and at the moment of writing it has suddenly risen to 2½d. once more. These fluctuations, we are assured, are extremely dangerous to business. The production of goods, and buying and selling, are interfered with, and the existence of empires is imperilled. So we are informed by the newspapers. Now surely this is curious and perplexing. Raw materials exist in abundance, workers are walking the streets for lack of employment, yet we are pinched for want of the necessaries of life, and the reason given is that certain purely financial operations are clogging the wheels of production.

The point to be borne in mind is that financial operations are built up on the production and distribution of wealth, and that without such production and distribution there would be no financial operations. On the other hand production and distribution of wealth can exist, and has existed, without financial operations.

When the workers of the world take control of the production and distribution of wealth on their own behalf there will be no room for the financier and the latter’s operations will no longer interfere with the production of the things necessary to life. Born out of profit-making he, and all his tricks and entanglements, will go out with the going out of the profit-making system.

Gilmac.

More for a new reader. (1923)

From the July 1923 issue of the Socialist Standard 

We presume that you know little of Socialism. Perhaps you have a dim idea that Socialists are terrible people whose deliberate aim in life it is to overturn everything ; destroy your most cherished ideals out of sheer downright devilment. Let us have a little heart-to-heart talk on the subject. We will not hold your attention long, but we may perhaps assist you to see things in a different way from what you usually see them.

There are many parties appealing for your support, some of whom do so on the ground that they are Socialist parties. “How am I to know which is the right one?” you may ask. You are bewildered by the multitude of parties who all claim that their object is to help you.

There is a well-known proverb that contains an element of truth. It runs : “God helps those who help themselves.” Therefore avoid those who make a great fuss about their desire to help you : seek rather for information from those who urge you to help yourself.

Man is spoken of as being a social animal. He associates with other men—forms part of a society. A society is a group of individuals bound together by a common principle. The larger sense in which the word “society” is generally used refers to the common principle of obtaining a living. Whatever is referred to as “social” concerns man in his connection with other men. It is the opposite to individual or private. For example, when we say a thing is privately produced we mean that one man produces it without assistance ; when we say such a thing is socially produced, we mean that different men produce portions of a thing and their combined efforts make up the finished article. Likewise, when we say a thing is privately owned, we mean one man or a small group of men own it; but when we say it is socially owned, then we mean it belongs equally to the whole of those forming the society.

You are living in a society to-day in which the things produced, and the tools by means of which they are produced (in other words, the wealth of society), are privately owned : that is, owned by one individual or by a small group of individuals—either a single capitalist or a small group of shareholders.

The aim of the Socialist is to make these things social property : to convert these privately owned goods and tools into goods and tools commonly owned by the whole of society. He who acts in such a way as to bring this new state of affairs into being is a Socialist : he who acts in a way that hinders progress towards this end is evidently not a Socialist, no matter what he may call himself.

Owing to the private ownership of wealth the majority of the people of this country are unable to obtain the things they need except by working for those that own them; and these wealth owners can employ whom they please and discharge whom they please, so that the mass of the people depend for their existence upon the desires or fancies of a comparatively few masters. The majority of people are therefore slaves of the wealth owners, because unless they act as the latter wish they are liable to be sacked and lose the wages upon which they depend for getting the necessaries of life.

These two types of people, masters and workers, broadly speaking make up society. They form two distinct classes, one of whom depends for a living upon working, and the other upon owning what is produced.

The workers, then, are wage-slaves. The masters are capitalists because they own capital—wealth (tools and so forth) which they advance with the object of getting back more wealth than was originally advanced or laid out. History will tell you that the wealth the capitalist advances was originally obtained by robbing the mass of the people of their land and liberty.

It may perhaps surprise you to hear that a few hundred years ago there was neither a landless man nor a beggar throughout the whole of this country. When you hear that and see that the mass of the people are without land and practically beggared to-day, you may wonder how such a change has come about. If you want further information of this, go to the nearest library and look for a book entitled, “Industrial History of England,” by H. de B. Gibbins. It is a book of only about 250 pages. In it you will find much valuable information of early and recent conditions in this country. You will learn how the land was stolen from the people and passed into the hands of a few individuals; how the people were ruthlessly driven off the land and herded into manufactories ; how finally, after many trials and troubles, the one-time member of a peasant commune, owning his land and tools in common, became the wage-slave of to-day, owning nothing but his power to labour, and compelled for his living to sell this power to the present master class, the descendants of those who robbed his forefathers.

So much for the “original” capital of the masters. The extra wealth they obtain over and above that laid out is due to the fact that you produce a quantity of wealth to-day that suffices to pay your wages, make, good what is necessary for further production, and still leave a substantial amount over on which the master and his family and those that minister to the enjoyment of him and his family, live upon. You thus produce surplus wealth—wealth that keeps an idle class in luxury. You keep parasites.

Between you and your masters there is a constant struggle going on over the destination of the wealth produced. You struggle to obtain as large a share of the wealth you produce as possible. It is a share you think of, you don’t think of obtaining the whole, because you think of, and argue about, a high or a low wage. Your thoughts are bound up with the wages system. The masters on their side resist your desire for high wages and pay you as low wages as they can. This struggle over the division of the wealth you produce is an expression of what the Socialist calls the class war.

It you have followed the argument so far, it must be obvious to you that the masters will not give up their privileges without a bitter struggle; a struggle that can only end when you have obtained control of the whole of the wealth you produce; in other words, when you have established Socialism.

The masters, in their fight to keep their privileged position, employ any weapon that they think will assist them. The all-powerful weapon is the machinery of Parliament, which gives them control of the Army, Navy, Air, and Police Forces—those forces which they employ against you when particularly bad conditions drive you to go out on strike. This power you give to your master at election time when you vote them into Parliament.

This Parliamentary weapon, however, has one drawback ; it is inclined to be a rather open illustration of the opposition between your interests and those of your masters, and is likely to bring to your notice the fact that the modern State is on the side of privilege and against the oppressed.

There are other weapons the masters employ that are less obvious and frequently very effective. Religious teaching is one of them. You are led to believe that some supernatural power hath ordained it that man shall eat his bread in the sweat of his brow, and you are assured that you are the man to whom this precept refers. You usually forget to ask : “What of the master who works not and yet eats plenty?” You are taught that life on this earth is a purgatory through which you must pass in order to reach the paradise somewhere above. In fact, you are taught to think little of, and not worry about, the trials and tribulations of your short life in this world, as it will be all made up to you in the next. But you will notice that those who subscribe most to religious bodies, and who are most anxious that you should accept the religious outlook, take no chances, but avoid the trials and tribulations of this world, leaving the “hereafter” to take care of itself.

Now you can easily see how useful it is to the master that you accept a view such as that outlined above. Being assured of an endless good time hereafter, providing you work hard and obey those who are over you, you are likely to be content with a slave position here below ; working under bad conditions at low wages without protesting, allowing your masters to enrich themselves to what extent they wish.

Among other methods that suit your masters’ interests are those that keep your mind occupied with petty details ; multitudes of so-called “remedies” for minor evils that waste your time and energy to such an extent that you are prevented from applying the one sweeping solution for all your troubles—the abolition of the cause of your troubles, and that is, as you have seen, the private ownership of wealth.

When the wealth produced, and the tools by means of which it is produced, have been made into the common property of society, no one will want either work or food, because all will give to society of his best and will receive from society the best it can give, regardless of age, sex, or occupation.,

We are members of the working-class, and we want you to join us and help us to carry on the struggle for Socialism. Why are we anxious for your aid? Are we moved by a desire to help you? If you have followed carefully the position outlined above you will see that we are in the same mess as you are, and that we cannot get out of the mess except by the same way as you. We want Socialism because it offers us the only means of leading healthy and happy lives; but we cannot get Socialism until you want it. Therefore we want you to want Socialism and to join with us to fight for it, then we will all have an equal opportunity of enjoying the best that life can offer.

Gilmac.

To a new reader. (1923)

From the May 1923 issue of the Socialist Standard

I have sometimes thought of compiling a little book. I should set about it thus : I would ask a great number of the people I met in a casual way what they understood Socialism to mean. The result would at least be interesting. Some would dispose of the matter in one word. “Bosh !” they would say—or “Rot !” These would be the foolish. Others would say : “Well, it means practical Christianity, or universal brotherhood, or some such idea.” These possibly would be well-meaning people, but, as you will see, misinformed. Some there would be who would tell a long rambling tale, that Socialism was a beautiful dream about a dim and very distant future, but that all we could hope to achieve in our time would be to make life more and more bearable by means of reforms. Others, again, would say : “Just as the present State owns and manages the Post Office, or the Municipality owns the trams, the electricity works, the water supply, and the rest of it, so should the mines, the railways, canals, and even the factories be publicly owned.” Others,—but enough of the others ; perhaps you yourself are one of the others. Possibly you have seen or heard the word Socialism ever since you can remember anything, and still have only the foggiest notion of what it all means. Let us talk it over together.

Many people are afraid of anything with “ism” on the end of it. They think it is bound to mean something “cranky.” They are not logical in this belief, for the words “Baptism,” “Methodism,” or “Nationalism,” do not alarm them. Let us hope you are not one of those whom words frighten. After all, it is the idea behind all words that matters. You have only to mention the word “science” to some people, and they begin to look bored. And yet science is only reasoning from facts instead of jumping to conclusions.

Take a simple illustration. Who does not wonder at the beauty of the stars that twinkle over our heads on any clear night? For countless ages they have filled mankind with awe and wonderment. Thousands of years ago, the primitive shepherds guarding their flocks from prowling beasts of prey, saw the same stars as we, arranged in much the same “patterns.” In one part of the night sky they clearly discerned Orion, the mighty hunter, with club uplifted to attack the Lion. At his heel were his two dogs, Sirius and Procyon. In another part of the heavens were the Great Bear and the Little Bear; in another, Cygnus, the Swan. There were Castor and Pollux, the Twins; the Fishes and many other wonders. Between wandered the planets, and these had an influence over the lives of the little mortals who watched and studied them. Some were good or lucky stars; others were evil, malevolent stars. Quite a huge body of literature arose about them. The study was called Astrology. Gradually the movements and changes of the heavenly bodies were seen to follow a certain order. These rules or laws of movement were set down, and many men of all races tested them, and added to them, until at last the mighty hunter, the Lion, the Bears, the Swan, and all the rest of the menagerie faded from the sky, and the new definite knowledge of man about the stars became the science of Astronomy.

The same process took place with medicine. In olden days when a person took the fever or caught a mysterious illness in some way, they used to open a vein and draw off a quantity of blood, in the hope that the malady would run out with the blood. The medicines that used to be prescribed are enough to make one shudder. It seemed that nothing could be really effective unless it were horrible. And thus we read of concoctions of spiders, and toads, and vipers’ tongues, dead man’s skin, burnt hair, and all sorts of putridity. Health was indeed a blessing in those days. But as men observed and thought more deeply, they found that illness was caused by dirt, by bad air, by absence of sunlight, by wrong living; and having found the causes of ill-health, the remedies quickly followed.

Other funny old fellows of the past were the Alchemists. They were fond of making all sorts of messes with all sorts of substances. One of their great beliefs was that somewhere there could be discovered or compounded the Philosopher’s Stone, and with this it would be possible to turn lead into gold. Needless to say, their search was unsuccessful, but out of the mass of information and knowledge they collected there grew up our modern Chemistry, one of the most exact and marvellous of our sciences.

And what has all this to do with Socialism? you will ask. I will tell you. It is because Socialism has had a similar history. You will be prepared to admit, I hope, that science is not at all a formidable word, and are further prepared, I trust, to see what there is in the claim of Socialism to be considered scientific. Very well. Now one of the first difficulties we have to deal with is that of prejudice. Most of us are filled with ideas that were implanted in us when quite young, fed and nourished in later years by newspapers and periodicals. Take history, for instance. All we were taught and remember is that the first people in these islands were the Ancient Britons. They stained their bodies with woad and looked upon the mistletoe as sacred. Then the Romans came and conquered them, but eventually had to leave rather hurriedly, leaving them to be harried by hordes of Angles, Jutes and Saxons. Later followed the Danes, and we were told some jolly little tales of King Alfred burning the housewife’s cakes, or disguising himself as a harper and secretly visiting the enemy’s camp. Then came the Normans, and we got tales of the curfew, of Hereward the Wake, and other worthies. And so on through the whole gamut: Richard the Lion Heart; the Black Prince; the Princes in the Tower; Henry the Eighth and his many wives ; the Reformation ; King Charles; Oliver Cromwell; Henrys, and Williams and Georges galore ; the whole interspersed with a great number of awful battles, in which the English were victorious five times out of six. This is History as it is taught to workers’ children. Simply legends, episodes and resounding names. But for upwards of a hundred years History has been treated more scientifically. Instead of looking upon it as a catalogue of entertaining events, men now ask, Why did this event happen, or that? Why did the Roman Empire flourish, and then decay? Why did the Reformation affect not only England, but Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Norway, etc.? Above all, what great driving motive caused different nations to act similarly? How did the discovery of America affect the world? Why have institutions like slavery, feudalism, religion, tribes, kingship, etc., been common to all races of mankind, although separated by thousands of miles, and with no possibility of contact? The answers to all these questions would take us too far in a brief article, but this may be said : Mankind, without distinction of race, has always lived in groups or communities. All have broadly followed the same lines in their progress upward to civilisation. Some, like the Australian Blacks and the Red Indians, were left behind, and have become overwhelmed by more progressive races. The main line of progress has led from Savagery, through patriarchial society to Feudalism, or through handicraft to Capitalism. Each change has been marked, and actually caused by, changes in the methods of holding property, more particularly in the means of living. The stage we are now in is that of Capitalism. This, you will see at once, is quite independent of whether we have a King or a President; whether Lloyd George is a good man or a bad one; whether we are Catholics, Protestants, Atheists, Buddhists, or nothing in particular. Capitalism has three distinguishing features. First, the land, both the surface and the minerals beneath it, is privately owned. The earth and the fulness thereof are in individual hands; Second, the wonderful and ingenious tools, or machines, by which Nature’s raw material is converted into wealth, are owned by individuals or small groups of individuals. Thirdly, the class to which you and I belong are compelled, in order to live, to hire our power to labour to those who have put a fence round Nature. The price of our hire is our wages, and our wages are determined by the cost of living. Not to make too long a story of it, the Socialist says in view of the obvious fact that this system does not work to the benefit of the vast mass of the people, it is time we substituted something more scientific. He points out what should be obvious to anyone with an unwarped mind. If, without access to Mother Nature, man perishes from the planet, is it not elementary common sense to suggest that the earth’s great storehouse should be common property; that is, socially owned instead of individually owned? The Socialist is one who urges this social ownership. Even the tools and marvellous machinery by which the raw material becomes wealth, he claims are a social product and a social heritage. In every one of them is embodied the toil, the thought, the invention of thousands of separate human beings. They in turn owed all they possessed to the society of which they formed part. The Socialist says these tools are social; they should be socially owned. And the next point. If you think over the words “working class,” has it ever struck you as curious that such a term has arisen? The working class, those who do the work. If all worked, the term would have no meaning. Therefore there must be a class which does not work. And yet the class which does not work consists of immensely wealthy people. Without work, of course, there is no wealth. How curious, then, that the working class is composed of people who have no wealth. The wealth they produce is taken from them by those who own the earth and the means of living. A little has to be returned to them, to enable them to live. This is called wages. Without it the workers would die, or they would rise and destroy their masters. Either way the Capitalist system would come to an abrupt and violent end. Wages, therefore, are on the average just enough to keep the working class alive, and not unduly discontented.

It is not sufficient, however, that the working class should simply become indignant at their treatment or discontented with their lot. Clever men have looked into history and have seen that Capitalism grew out of feudalism, and feudalism out of chattel slavery, simply because the one was a logical development of the other. The stages of human society have followed one upon the other, just like steps, and mankind has only reached the higher by means of the lower. It is idle, therefore, to be merely angry or indignant at what is, after all, a natural growth. As was mentioned previously, society has changed in the past whenever the methods of producing wealth have changed. Our present method is by tools and instruments that are privately owned. It is because of this that the resulting wealth is also privately owned, and the workers consequently poor. The evils that follow this system are obvious. Overwork and unemployment, low wages and insecurity, dog the footsteps of the workers from childhood to premature death. They can only be remedied by abolishing this individual ownership of the means of life, and substituting ownership by the whole people. This would be social ownership, or Socialism. If you will read this journal regularly you will see many articles, telling how this change is to be brought about, and disposing of the objections and difficulties many people bring forward. If you are interested we shall be glad to see you at any of our meetings, and if you are convinced of the truth of the Socialist position we shall be still more pleased to welcome you as a member.

W. T. Hopley

To New Readers. (1930)

From the May 1930 issue of the Socialist Standard

Our object is the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by, and in the interests of, the whole people. Let us examine this object a little closer.

First of all, what do we mean by common ownership? Do we propose taking over all the means of production, etc., and then dividing them up amongst the whole people? Of course not. Mills and factories, railways and steamships, are all too large and too complicated to admit of piecemeal division. In fact, one of the benefits capitalist production has conferred upon society is just this: that it has organised production on a large scale, though the process has brought misery to millions of workers and small proprietors. If we were to attempt to “divide up” existing wealth, therefore, we would have to take a step backward in development and revert to the primitive productive methods of our forefathers. And even if it were possible to take such a step backward, we would then be faced with two hopeless tasks: (1) To produce enough to satisfy the needs of the present huge population, without the productive, transport and other facilities that exist to-day; and (2) with private property of a primitive kind in existence to prevent the regrowth of huge amalgamations, such as exist to-day.

So for the above reasons, and a host of others, we do not propose a “dividing-up” policy. What we do intend is that all the means of producing and distributing the things we need shall be taken over and administered as the common possession of one huge family—the human family. In other words, that each will be free to eat, drink and clothe himself according to his needs, and that in return each will contribute his services to production according to his capacities and the requirements of the times. This will involve the organisation of production according to plan. That is, it will be necessary to determine roughly : (1) The production required; (2) the raw material and machinery, etc., required; (3) the amount of work required to ensure the necessary production; (4) the allocation of the population to the work required.

Now the early stages of this alteration will obviously not be easy; it will involve an internal readjustment that will be great or small according to the size and mental clearness of the majority in favour of Socialism. Once a real beginning has been made, however, the tremendous surplus of working energy society possesses will soon make itself plain, and the call upon each individual for necessary productive work will be small. As we have often pointed out in these columns, one has only to pause for a moment and reflect upon the appalling waste of labour to-day involved in useless competition, in advertising, in Army, Navy, Police and Air Forces, in pandering to the tastes of a luxurious, bored and debauched ruling class, and finally—apart from myriads of other ways—in the tragic comedy of hundreds of thousands looking for work, while hundreds of thousands are in want.

When the new society has settled down to production on the new plan of organisation there will be ample leisure for each individual to employ himself in ways productive of pleasure. To some leisure time devoted to invention; to others the devotion to the different arts will be the outlet for their superfluous energies. Others again will like to spend some time in travel and it is just here that the new arrangement promises most. Modern industry has so simplified production that it has reduced the part of each to a comparatively simple one, and the tendency in this direction is still rapidly proceeding. Hence, under Socialism, as long as there is sufficient man (or woman) power in a given centre, it will not matter how often or how rapidly people change from one place to another. In the early days of capitalism it was customary for the handicraftsman to spend a part of his training in travelling from town to town, gaining experience before settling down, hence the name “journeyman.” In like manner, in the future, a worker will be able to cover the whole globe, working here and there, and dull, drab routine work will disappear.

This is not an idle dream. Ponder upon it, and you will find it is possible, inevitable and the glorious legacy of ages of suffering.

Gilmac