Swan Song of the Communists (1944)

From the February 1944 issue of the Socialist Standard

Amazing Speech by American Leader

Readers of the London Daily Worker (January 12 and 14) will have learned that the American Communist Party is about to die—at the hands of its own leaders; though whether the leaders do this because Moscow is no longer interested or because Moscow wants it that way has yet to be disclosed. After a quarter of a century of misspent effort and of innumerable twists and turns of policy dictated first by dependence on the early and erroneous theories of the Bolshevists, then by the shifts and changes of the foreign policy of Russia's rulers, the American Communists are returning to a point even further back than that from which they started, the once despised beliefs of the reformist labour movements. Having promised to show the discontented workers how, by following the Communist lead, they could speedily achieve their emancipation, the American Communist leaders after 25 years are now shepherding their flock back into the fold.

After the delegates at a Party Convention had obediently signified their approval of changes proposed by their leaders, the full significance of the new departure was disclosed by the Secretary, Mr. Earl Browder, at a mass meeting in New York called in commemoration of the twentieth anniversary of the death of Lenin. The Times (January 12) reports that the response to Browder’s speech was “ less than enthusiastic.” The audience, not being drilled and disciplined like the Party delegates, may have reflected that the real purpose of the meeting was not to praise Lenin’s theories, but to bury them. The decision to wind-up operates on May Day. The Communists are going to give up any pretence of being an independent political party. Under some such name as “American Communist Political Association,” they are going to accept and work loyally within the traditional two-party system.

This is all because, in the words of Mr. Browder, Allied victory in the war will mean "not only prolonged world peace without precedent in history, but also the flourishing of economic relationships, co-operation and development of economic well-being and social reforms . . .” (Daily Worker, January 12, 1944).

Here is an extract from the Times' report of Browder’s speech at the mass meeting

   Saying that the American people were ill-prepared for socialism, and that post-war plans with the aim of establishing socialism in the United States would not unite the nation but would further divide it, he announced that, for the sake of promoting unity here, so that the policies agreed on by the United Nations at Cairo, Moscow and Teheran could be put into effect, Marxists would not raise the issue of socialism “in such a form and manner as to endanger or weaken that national unity.”
   Mr. Browder added that the Communists had eliminated such measures as nationalisation of the banks, the railways and the coal and steel industries, would change the name of their organisation to "the American Communist Political Association,” and would support in future the candidates of one of the two major parties. Reactionaries, he said, were trying to spread confusion in the democratic and progressive camp by championing free enterprise, but Marxists would not help them by opposing the slogan of free enterprise with any counter-slogan. He went on:—
   “If anyone wishes to describe the existing system of capitalism in the United States as free enterprise, that is all right with us, and we frankly declare that we are ready to co-operate in making this capitalism work effectively in the post-war period with the least possible burdens on the people. We do not draw political lines of division for the 1944 elections on any form of the issue of free enterprise.”—(Times, January 12, 1944.)

Other points are brought out in the lengthier Daily Worker report (January 14). One is that the Communists are going to support “a great united effort in the 1944 elections to guarantee the continuation of Roosevelt’s policies. . . .”

 
They will “not be operating as a 'party'—that is, with their own separate candidates in elections except under special circumstances when they may be forced to act through 'independent candidates.’ ” They are, however, “not . . . entering any other party. The Communists are not joining the Democratic party; the Communists are not joining the Republican party; we are not endorsing either of the major parties, and we are not condemning either of the major parties. We are taking a line of issues and not parties, and choosing men as they stand for or against those issues, without regard to party labels.” (Italics ours.)

An important point to notice is that this new line is not a merely war-time measure: "We are now extending the perspective of national unity for many years into the future. It is no longer an ‘emergency situation' but is merging into a 'normal situation ' " (Browder, Daily Worker, January 14).

About the agreement by Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt at Teheran to "work together in war and in the peace that will follow," Browder makes the remark that "Capitalism and' Socialism have begun to find the way to peaceful co-existence and collaboration in the same world." Those whose memories carry them back four years to the period of the Stalin—Hitler pact of 1939 will recall that this is just the line Communist propaganda was then taking about the friendly co-existence of Bolshevist Russia and Nazi Germany! When that period ended in 1941 the American and British Communist parties dropped their peace slogans and the theories on which those slogans rested, and were ordered into line with the foreign policy of Roosevelt and Churchill. The new turn means that they are now falling into line in home affairs as well.

To see the matter in perspective, let us turn back the last Presidential election in 1940, to see what Browder had to say then about Roosevelt and Willkie and the two parties they represent.

At that time the Communists were opposed to the war. They denounced it as an Anglo-American plot "to make the world safe for Wall Street and the City " (Daily, Worker, November 30, 1940) The American Party was praised on the ground that "alone of all the political parties, the C.P. of the U.S.A. has exposed the imperialist character of the war and has warned against both Roosevelt and Willkie " (Daily Worker, October 28, 1940).

In a speech reported in the Daily Worker on October 11, 1940, Mr. Browder declared that Roosevelt and Willkie, though they were rival candidates, had the same foreign policy (based on that of Great Britain), the policy of encouraging Hitler, pushing Germany into war with Russia so that Russia would be destroyed, and at the same time Germany would be so weakened as to remove her as a threat to Britain. "Only the Communist Party," he said, " has proposed and consistently fought for a foreign policy for our country which could replace the disastrous policy now being followed."

So much for foreign policy—now for his earlier views about the home policies of the Republicans and Democrats. In 1940 Mr. Browder, himself a Presidential candidate opposing Roosevelt and Willkie, issued a statement explaining just what part the two parties play in making America safe for capitalism, and denouncing the traditional two-party system which the Communists have now decided to accept.

The 1940 conventions of the Republican and Democratic Parties restored once more the traditional "two-party system" by which Wall Street (finance, capital and the great monopolists, the "sixty families," the " economic royalists"), controlling both major parties, invites the masses to choose the label under which they shall be exploited and oppressed for the ensuing four years. For the masses of the American people there is no way to advance their interests through either Republican or Democratic Party." (Daily Worker, October 28, 1940.)

On November 4, 1940, the Daily Worker, alleging that at the previous election in 1936 "Roosevelt himself was hoping that the New Deal would bring him Communist votes," went on :—

   But to-day neither Roosevelt nor Willkie will get Communist votes; their policy "of crushing civil liberties, planning a huge arms programme, and drawing nearer to participation in the war is too obviously directed against the liberties of the people.

Just at that time the American Communist Party was compelled, through the restrictive Voorhis Act, to resign from the Communist International, but while doing so it "reaffirmed the adherence of the Party to the policy of working-class internationalism” (Daily Worker, November 20,1940). Now, with the Communist International destroyed on Moscow orders the American Communists are going to back the two parties of capitalism, controlled as they are by Wall Street and big business, and thus join in the game of inviting the workers "to choose the label under which they shall be exploited and oppressed for the ensuing four years."

Some of the possible reasons for the decision can readily be guessed. Their failure to make any headway in elections may have been one factor; in 1932 they polled 103,000 in the Presidential election, but in 1940 their candidate polled only 46,000 votes. More important, however, will be the desire to follow a line suitable to the present foreign policy of the Russian Government. It is obvious that the Russian Government during the past year has been concerned to make itself popular in U.S.A. and Britain, and to avoid doing anything that would strengthen the hands of political groups opposed to the Russian alliance—hence the efforts of Russia's supporters to secure wide publicity for the new recognition of religion and the disbandment of the Communist International. The Manchester Guardian (January 12, 1944) considers that the winding up of the American party is another step which "will make for better feeling towards Russia."

Fully to understand the complete change of policy since 1940, it has to be remembered that at that time, when the Communists were opposed to the war and opposed to Willkie and Roosevelt, they (and doubtless their inspirers in Moscow) had a very different opinion about the way world affairs were going from the one forced on them in June 1941 when Germany invaded Russia. Mr. Browder, in October 1940, thought that the foreign policy he ascribed to Britain and America had failed, and that Russia would be able to keep out of the war because "the Soviet Union had grown too strong and too consolidated to offer a tempting field for military adventures for a Hitler, who likes to have his victories assured before he goes into action." (Daily Worker, October 11, 1940).

Events were soon to prove Browder wrong. Russia was not strong enough to stand alone, without American and British help. Mutual dependence of the three Powers called for a revised Communist Party policy. Subsequent changes, including the present attempt of the American Party to operate alongside Democrats and Republicans, have been in harmony with the position of the Russian Government internally and in its foreign relationships. That, and not the incredible belief in a new world of peace, progress and class harmony which Mr. Browder professes to cherish, is likely to be the real reason why his party has been called upon to make itself a laughing stock by repudiating the fundamental creed on which it was founded. Whether it will establish any sort of stability on the new basis, and whether further developments of Russian policy will lead to still further changes, are two questions time will answer.

We may speculate whether the British Party will follow the American example. The Manchester Guardian points out (January 12):—

  The arguments for it are much the same. Before the Communist International died the maxim of the Communist parties of the world was, of course, "When father says Turn, we all turn." Will our British Communists, like the Americans, prepare to lie down gracefully?

Maybe this time, however, the American and British Communists will turn in different directions, if we may judge by the editorial comment on the American changes published by the Daily Worker on January 13, 1944. The editorial argues that it is a mistake to interpret the American political system in terms of our own because in U.S.A "there is no Labour Party or organised political Labour movement." The main task in America to-day and in the immediate post-war period, says the Daily Worker, " is not the transformation of the social system but the rallying of all progressive forces in order to prevent reaction from turning that mighty country from the path of Teheran." The editorial goes on to give fulsome praise to Roosevelt's New Year speech, which, it says, calls America to a "noble fulfilment" of its destiny. The Daily Worker finds that both the Republican and Democratic parties "include reactionary and progressive elements," yet it plumps for supporting Roosevelt, leader of the Democrats. In view of Browder's 1940 statement that there is nothing to choose between the two parties, this distinction between Tweedledum and Tweedledee is not convincing. Nor is the Daily Worker's argument that things are different in this country because we have a Labour Party. In 1929 (see "Class Against Class"), and for several years afterwards, the Communist Party habitually referred to the Labour Party as the "third capitalist party."

It remains to be seen therefore what new line the British Communists may be required to take—and what peculiar justification they will, in that event, discover for taking it.

To enlighten them in their task of seeking to justify their own and the American Communists’ policy of supporting capitalist parties in the name of national unity, we bring to their notice the following passage from "Class Against Class," the General Election Programme of the Communist Party of Great Britain, 1929:—

    "Three parties—Tory, Liberal and Labour—appeal to you in the name of the " nation." . . . .  No party can serve two masters. No party can serve the "nation" so long as the nation is divided into two warring classes—one which owns the wealth and one which produces the wealth and does not own it. No party can serve the robbers and the robbed at the same time."

Edgar Hardcastle

Really? (2018)

Book Review from the March 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

'A Party With Socialists In It. A History of the Labour Left'.  By Simon Hannah. (Pluto Press. 2018. 250 pages)

It was Tony Benn who wrote that ‘the Labour Party has never been a socialist party, though there have always been socialists in it’ which Hannah has taken as the title of his book. The first part is true but the second depends on what you mean by ‘socialist’.

When it was founded  in 1900 as the Labour Representation Committee, the Labour Party was to be a group of MPs, separate from the Liberals and Tories, to press for legislation in favour of trade unions and their members and didn't actually become the Labour Party, as a parliamentary group, until it had some MPs elected in the 1906 general election.  It didn’t even claim to be socialist. However, one of its constituent parts, the Independent Labour Party (ILP) that had been founded in 1893, did. In 1918 the Labour Party adopted a new constitution which included the famous Clause IV, which committed it (on paper and in the very long-term) to full-scale nationalisation; it also allowed individuals to join directly rather than via the ILP or the Fabian Society, which marginalised the ILP which eventually, in 1932, broke away and so was no longer 'in' the Labour Party.

Hannah’s history is that of the ILP up to 1932 (which he sees though rose-tinted spectacles), the Red Clydesiders, Sir Stafford Cripps and the Socialist League, Bevan and the Bevanites, Benn and the Bennites, and, now, Corbyn and the Corbynistas.

But were they socialists? They certainly considered themselves to be but understood socialism as the implementation of Clause IV. As this envisaged the nationalisation of ‘the means of exchange’, it implied the continuation of production for the market and the wages system; in effect state capitalism. Basically, they were leftwing reformists.

Hannah himself, an ex-Trotskyist, sees socialism as nationalisation under workers’ control but this is no way forward as, given production for the market, workers would be forced to run their industry on capitalist lines. He describes Benn’s politics as ‘greater democracy, greater worker involvement in industry, and a more accountable political class’ and Corbyn’s as ‘anti-neoliberal without being anti-capitalist.’ Both true.

Adam Buick

Exploitation (1974)

From the January 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

From the time of his first arrival in England Marx was surrounded by what was then the most advanced section of capitalist society in the world, and the one showing the greatest contrast between affluence and abject poverty. There were available to him numerous works on economics and government reports, all of which Marx made use of and acknowledged in his book Capital. The following quotation from Vol. I demonstrates this:

  Once for all may I here state, that by classical political economy, I understand that economy which since the time of William Petty has investigated the real relations of production in bourgeois society, in contradiction to vulgar economy, which deals with appearances only, ruminates without ceasing on the materials long provided by scientific economy, and there seeks plausible explanations of the most obtrusive phenomena for bourgeois daily use, but for the rest, confines itself to systematizing in a pedantic way, and proclaiming for everlasting truths, the trite ideas held by the self complacent bourgeois with regard to their own world, to them the best of all worlds.

To Marx capitalism is a system of commodity production, and commodities are the unit of capitalist wealth. The Marxian analysis of capitalist production commences with the analysis of the commodity. A commodity is a useful article, a use-value, produced not for its usefulness to its producer but for exchange. Masses of commodities are put on the market where they exchange for one another. The equation of commodities with diverse use-values in exchange implies the possession of some common quality, otherwise equation would be impossible. All commodities, whatever their differences of use or appearance, are the products of labour: all of them embody a certain amount of human labour and so can be equated with one another.

There are many different kinds of labour, such as the labour of the tailor and that of the miner; they are but different ways of expending the mental and physical energy needed for the production of social wealth. Commodities not only exchange, but exchange in definite quantity—two tons of coal may exchange for one suit of clothes, and not two suits for one ton of coal. This quantitive exchange relationship of commodities is determined by the relative values of the commodities exchanged. A commodity has value to the extent that it contains social labour. In the illustration just used, a suit of clothes is twice as valuable as a ton of coal because there is contained in the suit twice as much social labour as in the ton of coal.

A valuable commodity such as gold is valuable because a considerable amount of social labour is taken to produce a small quantity. If gold were produced with the same expenditure of social labour as is taken to produce chairs, gold would have no more value than chairs. As labour is measured by time, the length of time taken to produce a commodity determines its value. If a suit of clothes is produced in ten hours and is exchanged for two tons of coal, then it follows that the time taken to produce a ton of coal is five hours.

It must not be imagined that Marx argued that the time taken by an individual to produce a commodity determines its value: that would mean otherwise identical commodities produced in different times having different values.

Capitalists do not buy Labour
The capitalist system of production is a system of profit-making. The capitalist expects to, and usually does, receive a greater amount of money at the end of the productive process than he originally put into it. If, as has been stated, commodities are exchanged at their value, the commodities produced for and sold by the capitalist must have a greater value than those purchased by him (raw material, machines, labour-power, etc.). Moreover, the increase in value must take place during the process of manufacture, in which process the commodities he purchases are turned into the finished product he sells. The increase in value implies the addition of labour. But does not the capitalist buy labour along with the raw material, machinery and other means of production, as a commodity at its value?

The capitalist does not buy labour; the commodity he buys from the worker is labour-power. The distinction between labour and labour-power is not a quibble but a fundamental distinction. The power to work or labour is what the worker sells, not the actual work he performs for his employer. Labour-power is a peculiar commodity because it has the power to produce a greater value than its own. The value of labour-power is determined by the value of the necessities for its own production. For example, a worker who consumes commodities containing four hours of labour can work for eight hours, and by so doing creates twice the value of his own labour-power. Because the capitalists have monopolized the ownership of the means of production, the workers are forced to sell their labour-power to them in order to live. In other words they are able to exploit the peculiarity of labour-power described above, and to take from the worker the surplus value created in production.

The existence of a free working class is a necessary condition for capitalist production. Before the workers could be turned into wage-slaves they had to be “freed” from the land and the instruments of labour: they had to be property-less in the means of production. In England this was accomplished by ejecting peasants from the land, and the seizure of common lands. There was thus created a class with no other means of existence than the sale of labour-power to the capitalist employers.

Once there exists the relationship of wage-earner and capitalist, it tends to perpetuate itself. By spending his wages as he must, the worker is forced continuously to sell his labour-power. The capitalists, because of their monopoly of the means of production, are able continuously to buy it and appropriate the surplus-value it creates. This surplus-value is divided into rent paid for land and buildings, interest paid for loans of money, taxes paid to the State for services performed on behalf of capitalism as a whole, and profit. Part of the profit is consumed by the capitalists, and part is reinvested in production.

The rate of reinvestment of profit is determined not by the whims of individual capitalists but by social forces over which they have no control. Competition and market conditions tend to reduce the prices of commodities. To meet this threat without reducing profits, capitalists endeavour to enlarge their businesses so that the costs of production can be reduced; this means the introduction of more efficient machinery, the speeding-up of the work process, and the effecting of economies made possible by large-scale production. Those capitalists who fail to do this will be in danger of being forced out of business.

The growth in size of businesses makes competition even more severe. Small concerns are always in danger of failure; only the largest and best-equipped are able to survive the struggle. Competition, by killing-off the small and less efficient concerns, concentrates control in the hands of relatively few large capitalist monopolies and also causes a continuous improvement in technique and an increase of productive capacity.

However, the same growth creates many problems. At first it requires an increase in the numbers of workers employed, but with advancing technical improvements the rate of employment falls whereas the rate of increase in the numbers of the working class tends to rise. Though these tendencies are offset by others, they are always at least potential pressures against the perpetual need of the working class to be employed. At all times the market for labour-power is subject to the factors which cause market conditions for all commodities to fluctuate. The capitalists have to look for fresh markets in non-capitalist (i.e. undeveloped) countries; and finally the whole world is brought into the stream of capitalist economic life.

Constant and Variable Capital

Technical improvements change the composition of capitals. A larger share is invested in means of production (machines, raw materials, etc.) called by Marx constant capital, and a smaller share in the purchase of labour-power or variable capital. This changed composition produces very important results. The capitalists reckon their profits on the whole of their capital, and any increase of capital that does not result in a corresponding increase of labour-power employed (since that is the only commodity which can produce surplus- value) results in a fall in the rate of profit.

A capital of £100, of which £80 represents constant and £20 variable capital, produces a surplus of—say— £20 and a rate of profit of 20 per cent. A capital of £200, of which £180 represents the constant capital and £20 is the variable capital, with the same exploitation of the workers, will still only produce surplus-value of £20: which means a lower rate of profit, that is 10 per cent.

As more and more capital is assuming the shape of machines (constant capital) and in proportion less is being invested in the purchase of labour-power (variable capital), it follows that the rate of profit is a falling one. In the highly industrialized countries, despite the intensification of exploitation by speeding-up and other methods, there is a continuing long-term tendency for the rate of profit to fall. To help overcome it, capitalists export capital to less advanced countries where the proportion of labour-power required in relation to the total capital is high and, as a result, the rate of profit is high also.

As the capitalist industrial system spreads over the world, the problems become wider in extent and more severe in their effects. To protect their interests the capitalists are compelled to form trusts, combines and mergers, and endeavour to restrict or eliminate competition and to restrict production to the requirements of the market.

Though the main purpose of these moves is the abolition of competition, it is never accomplished. Trusts and combines are usually national or semi-international in scope, though we are now witnessing the growth and power of multi-national concerns. Though all the producers supplying home markets might be organized in trusts, the capitalist market is the world market, and there the national and semi-international trusts struggle against one another. The effects of such international competition are far more harmful than those of competition between numerous small concerns. Thus, the contradiction between the order and efficiency of production, and the anarchy of the market, becomes and is irreconcilable: the economic crisis becomes a feature of capitalism. The contrast between the relatively increasing poverty of the working class and society’s increasing power for producing wealth becomes greater, as does the contrast between the social character of production and its private or class ownership and control.

In order to resolve this contradiction, the class—that is, the working class which is at present exploited and will continue to be exploited so long as wealth is produced as commodities—this class must take control of political power. This is the power which at the moment makes it perfectly legal for the capitalist class to appropriate the surplus-value produced by the combined efforts of the working class. It must be used now to convert the property relationship in the means of production from the present private or class ownership to one of common ownership: so that wealth—that is, useful things— may be produced because they are useful and necessary. And so society can go forward to its next goal, Socialism.

Robert Ambridge

Grant Allen: A Tribute to His Scientific Work (1919)

At the time of publication, The Proletarian was the paper of the Proletarian University of America. It's editor John Keracher, and its leading supporters Dennis Batt and Oakley C. Johnson were still part of the left-wing of the Michigan State Socialist Party. The Proletarian Party was not to form until the spring of 1920. The author of this article, Adolph Kohn, was an SPGBer who left Britain during World War 1 to avoid being conscripted and was involved in radical circles in and around Detroit. One of the pen-names he took during this period was 'John O'London'.

 From the May 1919 issue of The Proletarian

Many of the ablest thinks of the revolutionary movement are forgotten except by a few. Social science has given us notable pioneers whose work and memory are neglected because they did not serve in a popular cause. Karl Marx set an example in giving due recognition to his fore-runners. In “The Poverty of Philosophy” (1847) he is careful to acknowledge the able work of the early socialist of Ireland—William Thompson—whose “Inquiry into the Principle of Human Happiness” (1827) was a book on surplus value, remarkable for its time. John Gray, author of “The Social System” (1831) and J. F. Bray, who wrote “Labor’s Wrongs and Labor’s Remedy” (1839) were both rescued from oblivion by Marx’s international lectures and studies. How easily gifted workers for socialism are eclipsed in our memory can be gathered from the few who recall the writings and activities of Peter Lavroff and Felix Volkhovsky who did so much for the Russian revolution and died in exile before they saw the Promised Land of their ideals. So too, men like Paul Lafargue and women such as Eleanor Marx Aveling never received one-tenth the attention given to less able if more popular stars in the socialist firmament. And the same is true of natural science. Lamarck the deep and original thinker of evolution who died in abject poverty has been practically forgotten by those who praise Darwin to the skies. Professor William Kingdon Clifford, the brilliant essayist of evolution and rationalism, died when young and his spirited warfare against superstition and ignorance is now hardly known. Half a century ago in the days when Darwinism was fighting for its life, the soldiers of science used no kid gloves and called a spade a spade unlike our respectable and apologetic rationalists and men of science now living. And in sheer abiltiy and quality of effort they are unequalled in this age of cut-throat commerce and break-neck-speed industry. Modern America is the country, par excellence, where instruction is plentiful but ideas scarce. The record of the fine work and unrewarded genius of such a thinker as Grant Allen should be useful to stimulate study and illustrate the truths we teach.

Born in Canada in the memorable year of 1848, Grant Allen came from Celtic stock. His father was an Irish clergyman who later revolted against the compulsory reading of the Anthanasian Creed with its damnation clauses for those who honestly disbelieved. His mother was Scotch of French parentage and thus the Celtic spirit of lively, alert and fluent power combined with scientific knowledge to make Allen the man he was. Life as a boy amongst the flora and fauna of the “Thousand Islands” of Eastern Canada, taught him much of that fine grasp of plant and animal life which blossomed later into the scientific studies which have charmed and helped our generation. Those flower and bird and insect rambles ripened into his “Evolution at Large,” “Flowers and Their Pedigrees,” “The Colors of Flowers,” “In Nature’s Workshop,” “Common Sense Science,” “Science in Arcady,” “Falling in Love,” “Story of Plant Life,” “Colin Clouts Calendar,” “Vignettes from Nature” and many others. These books combine charm and simplicity of language with the latest science such as not even Huxley could excel.

Adverse falls in family affairs cut short his Oxford University life and drove him to private tutorship— the last hope of a university man. Spencer, Darwin, Huxely, Tyndall, and others were making scientific history and Grant Allen saw his life work in the same field. He began to accumulate materials for an investigation into the History of Religion but he had to spend his days in a bitter struggle to provide food and shelter for himself and wife and child. He became Professor of Moral Philosophy at Spanish Town Government College, Jamaica, but British capitalist domination did not arouse the negro to education and Allen’s classes lacked pupils and he was jobless again. So like many others he found that unless you prostituted your education to the service of the few—poverty stares you in the face. As Jack London has so bitterly recorded—you can make more money writing rubbish than scientific books.

People spoke of London’s “Call of the Wild” and “White Fang” as good dog stories, whereas they were written as applications of Spencer and Darwin’s teachings on heredity and the struggle for existence. Grant Allen incorporated truths of science—heredity, ethnology and psychology in his stories but people saw the romance and tragedy and understood nothing more. Like Jack London—Grant Allen had to satisfy popular “taste” and his own pressing needs by writing potboilers such as “Hilda Wade,” “The Typewriter Girl,” “The African Millionaire,” etc. “What’s Bred in the Bone,” “The Great Taboo,” “Rev. John Creedy” were written to embody scientific principles but publishers wanted “light stuff” and the talented man of science bitterly turned his back on the real work of his life for many years. As soon as possible, however, he began to write books which pleased himself and will please many generations to come—if they value knowledge.

In his earlier days he had written many magazine articles such as “The Positive Aspect of Communism,” “Socialism and Natural Inequality,” “The Genesis of Genesis” and many articles on woman’s share in primitive social life, in debate with Lester Ward whose theories of the female being the original sex Allen disagreed with. His study of original materials gave us “Anglo-Saxon Briton”—a history of social institutions and social evolution in early Britain—not a history of kings and heroes but a great advance upon the history-writing methods of his day. Andrew Lang —the prominent writer on mythology—said of Allen’s “genius, the most versatile, beyond comparison of any man of his age. Had he been able to devote himself entirely to physical science, as he desired, it is not for me to conjecture what he might have added to the sum of human knowledge. But”—here the tragedy—“he had to live by his pen—by scientific work he could not live.”

Allen found more money in writing guide-books to Italy and France than by his most brilliant studies in science. He stopped writing a “Philosophy of History” based on the facts of evolution in order to write such novels as “All Shades” to keep from starvation. Long study of physics caused him to plan the original work on “Force and Energy” which he was compelled to issue privately in 1873. Publishers did not care to speculate. The theory of attractive force and repulsive energy foreshadowed many ideas which are commonpalce in our day. Jack London and Grant Allen had in common profound regard for the writing of Herbert Spencer who influenced the views of both these men considerably. Spencer had nothing but high praise for that now scarce book of Allen’s “Physiological Aesthetics,” an original treatise on the origin of the pleasure we derive from natural and artificial products. Allen showed that the foundation of all sensation is in the laws of nervous action and that all aesthetic feeling is finally based on sense delight, tastes, smells, touches, sounds, forms or colors. Dedicated to Herbert Spencer the latter said it was a valuable development of evolutionary thought. Spencer tried to get Allen a position as educator, but in vain. Not more than three hundred copies of the book were sold and Allen lost two hundred and fifty dollars through advancing science. In 1879 he published that remarkable study in psychology—“The Color Sense.” Darwin, Wallace and Spencer esteemed it a valuable investigation into that difficult problem of comparative psychology—The Origin of a Color Sense. After ten years Allen obtained one hundred and fifty dollars from the book and he sarcastically said: “As it took me only eighteen months, and involved little more than five or six thousand references, this result may be regarded as very fair pay for an educated man’s time and labor, and should warrant the reproach of the thoughtless critics for deserting the noble pursuit of science in favor of fiction and the filthy lucre.”

Allen’s journalistic work on the staff of “London” came to a sudden end with the collapse of that paper and he accepted the drudgery of compiling an index for the Indian Gazeteer. This was done to the end that he could later devote hmiself to his late work on the inquiry into the origins of religion, and after twenty years’ patient study, collection and comparison of materials he published the book that took him ten years to write—“The Evolution of the Idea of God” (1897). The title was suggested by Herbert Spencer and the book is one of the greatest proofs of the earthly origins of Gods and belief in “Spirits” ever written. Huxely and Spencer, amongst many others, considered it a masterpiece, though the view Allen took of the origin or religion differed in some respects from his contemporary investigators. Those who are familiar with the great work of Frazer “The Golden Bough”, Tylor’s “Anthropology” and Spencer’s “Sociology” will find easy indications of the foundations of Allen’s views.

Allen adopted the essentials of Spencer’s position that religion arose among savages in Ancestor Worship. Answering the question, “By what successive steps did men come to frame for themselves the conception of a deity?” Allen summarizes the evidence of the early beliefs of savages, past or present, and the testimony of historical documents and ancient monuments. How did men come to believe first in many gods —polytheism? How did men come to remove most of their gods until eventually certain races believed in one single, supreme and all-powerful God? And from that how did the advanced races and civilizations conceive of God as a trinity with a human person as one of its three forms—The Origin of Christianity? Allen followed the main conclusion of Spencer but added to it and modified it many ways. He adopted the view that ghost worship was the foundation of belief in gods, and the worship of corpses and not the association of spirits with non-living things was the first form of practiced religion.

The conception of the life of the dead was shown to pass through three stages, corpse worship, ghost worship and shade worship, and were associated with the three stages of mummification, burial and cremation. “In its origin,” says Allen, p. 16, “the concept of a God is nothing more than that of a dead man, regarded as a still surviving ghost or spirit, and endowed with increased or supernatural powers and qualities.” The worship of the sun, moon and the stars is not primitive, but a later derivation. Many writers hold that religion grew out of fear, but Allen shows that does not answer the question, why men revered and worshipped their gods as a beneficient and generous father. Allen demonstrated that religion consists not in ethical theory but in ceremonial practice and custom—prayer, propitiation, praise, offering, etc. “In its simplest surviving savage type, religion consists wholly and solely in certain acts of deference paid by the living to the persons of the dead.”

In England the Rationalist Press Association published a twelve cent edition of this wonderful book, and in a short time one hundred thousand copies were sold to working men—much to the dismay of a historic enemy—the church. Those who want to understand the reasons for socialists taking their stand on the scientific grounds of criticism of religion must read Grant Allen. For two years Allen went from publisher to publisher, but they were afraid to publish until a relatively obscure man did so. After Allen’s death the materials for a second volume were found and published as they stood under the title of “The Hand of God”— a study in the “Worship of Death”. This is a brilliant addition to the earlier work and contains many essays on modern evolution.

The little book on “Charles Darwin” by Grant Allen is one of the best studies ever written, and as Spencer well said, is one of the few books on this subject that is fair to Darwin’s contemporaries and accurate in its views. It shows the credit due to Spencer for his presentation of cosmic evolution and to Darwin for his discovery of the origin of species. It shows also how every great mind depends upon the society of his time for his success.

The barbarous religions and social conventions of his time found a burning critic in Grant Allen. The hypocrisy of “respectable society”—the idiotic and property relations between the sexes gave us articles like the “New Hedonism” and those poems on the woman victims of a rotten system, printed in his charming “Lower Slopes”—the only book of verses Allen issued.

When he felt the hardest part of his sordid struggle with poverty ending Allen embodied his views on the marriage and social question in two novels—written to please himself—not his publishers. After a long struggle he succeeded in getting a publisher and “The Woman Who Did” and “The British Barbarians” upset the respectable world of his time. They picture people trying to avoid the conventional codes of morality and show their treatment by the “upright” hypocrites around them.

They trace the paralysing influence on men and women of established institutions and point a better way to a brighter life. These two books are well worth attention by the seeker after real pictures of social life.

In 1898 he was asked to write an article on the Defense of the Dominion for the Canadian Yearbook, and his reply is a good lesson for the Haeckels and Lankesters of today. Allen wrote:

  “You can know very little of my aims and ideals if you think I would willingly do anything to help on a work whose avowed object is to arouse ‘military enthusiasm’. Military enthusiasm means enthusiasm for killing people. My desire in life has been not to kill, but to help and aid all mankind, irrespective of nationality, creed, language or cult. I hate war, and everything that leads to it, as I hate murder, rapine, or the ill treatment of women. I dislike slavery, however cloaked under the guise of ‘imperialism’. I contribute gladly to works designed to strengthen the bonds of amity between nations ands to render war impossible, but I cannot contribute to one which aims at making peaceful Canadian citizens throw themselves into the devouring whirlpool of militarism.”

After a lifetime of illness, Allen died on October 25th, 1898, at the early age of fifty, with much of his chief projects unfinished. , Down to his last day he was in Shelley’s words 

Singing songs unbidden, till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heedeth not.

Adolph Kohn

This article was signed under Kohn's pen-name of 'John O'London'.

Why I am striking

From the Socialism or Your Money Back blog

Lecturers are on strike again, with the first tranche scheduled to last fourteen days in all.  Cue jokes about academics sat at home not thinking, or troops being sent in to give seminars on the use of Christian symbolism in late period Anglo Saxon poetry.

I am not an academic, nor am I even in their pension scheme, the root of the conflict.  I am a university worker, and I have been standing on the freezing cold February picket line, asking staff and students not to cross it.

I understand that academics have achieved something very difficult.  The Tories have introduced a new law to make it so that public sector workers have to achieve not only a majority of those voting, but a majority of those eligible to strike must vote as well.  (Universities claim to be public sector for this purpose, but have managed to get themselves declared private sector for the purposes of procurement, because a majority of their money comes from fees now).  

The result of this is that instead of the gentlemanly dance of previous university strikes - two days here and there - the difficulty of getting a strike called at all means it has to be decisively disruptive: these are the counter-productive aspects of the Tories trying to regulate strikes out of existence, the pressure valve is gone, and it will make strikes more bitter.

The root cause is an attempt to change the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) pension from being a defined benefit scheme, into a defined contribution scheme: throwing all the liabilities of the Universities onto the vagaries of the stock market.  The scheme has already changed from being final salary to being career average related (and employer and employee contributions have both been raised in recent years).

The cause of this is under accounting rules, the scheme must be funded so that if all universities went bankrupt tomorrow, all the liabilities could be met.  This creates a phantom deficit of billions of pounds, despite all universities not being bankrupt, and the scheme currently being able to manage its liabilities.

Make no mistake, universities are far removed from the rarified world of a David Lodge novel: today they are vast DIckensian factories employing thousands of staff and servicing tens of thousands of students each.  As Boris Johnson noted in his recent farcical speech on Brexit, Britain stands a long way up the value chain, not producing raw materials or components, but designs and innovation.  Thousands of foreign, particularly Chinese, students come to the UK to study, bringin in much needed revenue.

When I discuss this matter, friends tell me that academics are lucky to still have defined benefit pensions, or that they themselves have had their pension downgraded.  For me, this makes it all the more important to put a marker in the sand to stop this downgrading of all our deferred salaries.

I understand that what is at stake here is the ability to strike at all, and to have a conscious say in our workplaces: the academics are being attacked as workers, and they recognise their position as workers by calling this strike.  They deserve support and solidarity, even at the cost of 14 days pay, because anything that makes employers think twice about downgrading terms and conditions of their employees is a benefit for all workers, everywhere.

Capitalism draws increasing numbers into the condition of wage slavery, many academics are on the equivalent of zero hours contracts, or have to continually search for funding for their own salaries.  Of course, ending capitalism and abolishing the wages system is the necessary political act, but in the meanwhile the class struggle rumbles on, and we have to engage with the struggle to defend ourselves and pursue the best living standards we can manage under the the labour market.

If we don’t strike, we all lose: and maybe, for all those students who smile wanly, shrug and say they have to go in to lectures, the library or to study, they can learn the lesson that they too will soon be waged workers, who will need solidarity to protect them in their workplaces.

P. Soter

Cooking the Books: Greed or Need? (2018)

The Cooking the Books column from the March 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the last week of January the media reported ‘riots’, really little more than pushing and shoving,  at some supermarkets in France after the Intermarché chain reduced the price of Nutella, the nut-based spread, from €4.50 to €1.40 for a limited period. Similar scenes were reported in Wrexham in 2014 when the 99p Store there decided to temporarily sell their wares at 50p instead.

According to opponents of socialism, such behaviour confirms their view that it is human nature to be greedy and that this is what would happen in socialism where everything on the shelves of  the distribution centres would be available for people to take for free. However, there is a great difference between the situation under capitalism and that is socialism.

For a start, in capitalism some people’s income is so low that they have to buy what they need in Poundland's and 99p Stores which enterprising capitalists have set up to sell them cheap, low-quality necessaries. So, when those on low incomes learn of huge price reductions somewhere they hurry to take advantage of this and get their hands on the reduced-price goods while stocks or the offer last.

This is not an expression of some built-in human greed. In the circumstances it is actually rational behaviour to satisfy needs based on the knowledge that this is not a permanent situation and that prices are soon going to rise again.

In socialism free access to what people need won’t be a one-off but will be permanent and the stores will always be well stocked. The ‘Soledad Brother’ George Jackson put it rather well in one of his prison letters:

‘Consider the people’s store, after full automation, the implementation of the theory of economic advantage. You dig, no waste makers, nor harnesses on production. There is no intermediary, no money. The store, it stocks everything that the body or home could possibly use. Why won’t the people hoard, how is an operation like that possible, how could the storing place keep its stores if its stock (merchandise) is free?’

After pointing out that it is in conditions of insecurity that people hoard,  as ‘nuts hidden away for tomorrow’s winter’, he answered his question:

‘The people’s store will work as long as people know that it will be there, and have in abundance the things they need and want (really want); when they are positive that the common effort has and will always produce an abundance, they won’t bother to take home more than they need. Water is free, do people drink more than they need?’(Letter of June 17, 1970).

The other difference from capitalism is that nobody will be so severely rationed by the size of their wage packet or their hand-out from the state as to be only able to access low-quality things to satisfy their basic needs. In fact such low quality stuff wouldn’t be produced in socialism. Why, in a society where production will be geared to meeting people’s needs, would inferior goods that don’t satisfy these needs properly be produced?

Editorial: Privatisation No Better (2018)

Editorial from the March 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

The recent collapse of the construction company, Carillion, has put the government's Private Finance Initiative (PFI) policy under the spotlight. Under this policy, private companies are contracted to finance and manage public sector projects, such as building and maintaining schools and hospitals. On completion, the building or service is leased back to the government, which then must make an annual payment for a period of 25 or more years. The main advantage for the government is that much of the costs can be kept off the government balance sheets.

PFI was first introduced by the Conservative government in 1992 following a deep recession when public sector finances were tight. The Labour government of 1997-2010 extended greatly the use of PFI, particularly in the NHS, hailing it as a means of harnessing private capital for social ends. The Coalition government of 2010-2015 continued with PFI and rebranded it as Private Finance 2 (PF2), which was supposed to provide greater transparency and accountability.

However, private contractors normally borrow money at a higher interest rate than the government and in many contracts, private companies have been able to milk as much as they can from the deal. Thus, in many cases, the total costs have been considerably higher than if the government had undertaken the work itself. PFI repayments have placed a heavy burden on many NHS trusts, reducing their ability to hire doctors and nurses and provide medical care. Also, in bidding for PFI contracts, investors have had to reduce their costs which exert downward pressure on workers' pay.

An argument for PFI was that the risk lay with the private contractors, when in fact it has been the government that has had to bail out the projects when either the firm goes bust or, as was the case during the financial crisis of 2008-2009, the banks would sometimes refuse to lend the money.

As to be expected, PFI has its critics. MPs have complained of the extra costs to the taxpayer. John McDonnell, the Shadow Chancellor, has pledged that not only would a future Labour government end the use of PFI deals but would also bring existing PFI contracts 'back in-house'. The Royal Bank of Scotland chairman, Howard Davies, when appearing on BBC Question Time, has called it a 'fraud on the people'.

Few things better illustrate how capitalism treats everything, including healthcare and education, as commodities to be bought and sold for a profit than PFI. However nauseating it is to witness private companies making millions out of essential social services, ending PFI and returning to the old system of government procurement would not resolve the problems of meeting working people's needs. Before PFI, the provision of public services were still circumscribed by what the market system could afford. As for the costs to the taxpayers, it has to be borne in mind that although workers do pay taxes, the burden of financing the state ultimately falls on the capitalist class. The real fraud that is enacted on working class people is the capitalist system itself which appropriates their unpaid labour to enrichen the capitalist minority.

Lenin's capitalism (2018)

From the February 2018 issue of the Socialist Standard

'Lenin on Cooperatives. And Other Articles on Marxism, Philosophy and Society'. By Alan Spence (New Interventions Publications, 150 pages)

This is a collection of articles published in the Trotskyoid journal New Interventions between 1991 and 2008 by a former Communist Party industrial militant who become a ‘Labour & Co-op’ reformist. The subjects range from Lenin's 1921 'New Economic Policy', through 'proletarian philosophy', the NHS, the land question in Hong Kong, to Aristotle and Ancient Athens.

As predicted by those who had understood Marx's theory of social development, once the Bolsheviks had stabilised their rule they were faced with the problem of how to feed the urban population, which, in circumstance of an isolated and economically backward Russia with an 80 percent peasant population, could only be done by allowing and encouraging capitalism to develop in the countryside. During the civil war period the Bolshevik government had simply requisitioned – taken by force – food from the peasantry. Lenin realised that this could not be a permanent policy and in 1921, with the civil war over, introduced the 'new economic policy' of encouraging peasants to move away from subsistence farming to producing a surplus for sale in the towns; at the same time the state industrial enterprises were encouraged to produce farm equipment to sell to the peasants.

Lenin openly described this policy as 'state capitalism', or the development of capitalism under the auspices of the state. It meant that the Bolshevik government was in the same position as other 'Labour' governments, except that it had come to power through a coup d'état and was determined to hold on to power come what may. Spence well describes this policy and the reasoning behind it, with which he thoroughly agrees, criticising Stalin for abandoning it in favour of forcibly expropriating the peasantry.

Spence, however, is not an uncritical admirer of Lenin. In the articles on philosophy he defends Joseph Dietzgen's view that ideas are equally a part of the real world as what is tangible, as opposed to Lenin's view that 'to say that thought is material is to make a false step, a step towards confusing materialism and idealism.' Lenin's condemnation was enough for the Communist Party to wage a campaign against Dietzgen's view as set out by Fred Casey, of the old National Council of Labour Colleges, in his book Thinking. In regretting this Spence has a point.

Adam Buick

Capitalist Hypocrisy (1938)

From the December 1938 issue of the Socialist Standard

In a letter to the Manchester Guardian Weekly (September 16th, 1938), Jawaharlal Nehru, an Indian Nationalist, asks how the British Government can claim to be interested in democracy, Czechoslovakian or any other, when it denies independence to India. He writes: —

    The people of India have no intention of submitting to any foreign decision on war. They only can decide, and certainly they will not accept the dictation of the British Government, which they distrust utterly. India would willingly throw her entire weight on the side of democracy and freedom, but we heard these words often twenty years ago and more. Only free and democratic countries can help freedom and democracy elsewhere. If Britain is on the side of democracy, then its first task is to eliminate empire from India. That is the sequence of events in Indian eyes, and to that sequence the people of India will adhere.

No, the concern of the British Government is not democracy, or the maintenance of independence of foreign states. It is the representative of the British capitalist class, and its function is to defend the interests of British capitalism at home and abroad.

British workers, beware! Appearances are often deceptive.

Democracy? Humbug!

Clifford Allen

50 Years Ago: Work and Want (1969)

The 50 Years Ago column from the October 1969 issue of the Socialist Standard

In 1914 your masters appealed to you as ‘patriots’ to save 'your country' from the fury of their enemies. To-day in flaring posters on the same hoardings they beg you to ‘save your country’ from bankruptcy. Greater production, they tell you, is necessary, and that is where you come in. They call on you to put your backs into it because you are the only producing class. Without an increase in the aggregate wealth your class, they say, must suffer deeper extremes of poverty. But is it an increase in the aggregate wealth your masters want? No, for if it were they would set the unemployed to work instead of increasing their numbers by wholesale dismissals weekly. Prices are high they tell you because there is a real shortage of wealth—of the necessaries of life. If this is true why are there unemployed? Because your masters are not concerned with increasing the total quantity of wealth; their desire is for more surplus value i.e., the difference between the wealth you produce and the wages you receive . . . What they ask from you is more work from the individual worker, in order that the total wages bill can be reduced, the very conditions that have always made for increased unemployment.

If you rely on the government’s schemes of reconstruction, in your simplicity believing in their fair promises, they will strengthen the position of their class, and correspondingly weaken the position of your class. If you support the Labour Party, they will sell your support for fat jobs. If you dream that nationalisation will save you, you will, when you awaken, find yourselves under the rule of the bureaucrat and expert—still wage slaves, exploited in the interest of all capitalists instead of that of a company or trust.

(From an article by Fred Foan in the Socialist Standard October 1919). 

The British CP (1969)

Book Review from the October 1969 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Sociology of British Communism by Kenneth Newton (Allen Lane. 50s.)

As the title suggests, this book sets out to study what sort of people join the Communist Party and why, but it does not get very far as Newton himself admits that interviews with a couple of dozen Communists is not much to go on.

Newton is fair to the Communist Party pointing out for instance that it is silly to blame them for fomenting strikes. After all, he says, when during the war they were strikebreakers and blacklegs they could not prevent strikes. He notices, as any impartial observer must, that over the years the Communist Party has dropped its mock revolutionary phrases and become an openly reformist party:

   “The British Communist Party . . . has come to accept the philosophy of gradualism and piecemeal reform, though the reforms it demands are still more radical than those of the other political parties in Britain”. 

Newton is also fair to the Socialist Party of Great Britain pointing out that, in contrast to the CP, we “demand a knowledge of socialist prindples before (we) allow applicants to become members” and also that we are a “thoroughly democratic” organisation.

There are a number of mistakes like saying the Socialist Labour Party was the largest of the groups that formed the Communist Party. In fact, the British Socialist Party was, and only a breakaway faction of the SLP joined.

Adam Buick

50 Years Ago: The Capital Levy Exposed (1974)

The 50 Years Ago column from the January 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

In previous issues we have dealt with the Labour Party’s scheme for a levy on capital to pay off part of the war debt. It was explained why the levy is merely a matter for the consideration of the capitalist class, who have to decide, on purely financial grounds, whether the levy is advisable in principle and secondly whether it would be wise to institute it so long after the war and in a period of depression.

#    #    #    #

It was . . . from a vote-catching point of view, probably a mistake for the Labour Party to make it their main plank. But for that they would have received the valuable support of the section of the Conservative Party which centres round the Observer . . . but the Conservative Observer was strongly against the levy on account of the undoubted disturbance it would cause (serious if only temporary) in the British financial world.

#    #    #    #

The leaders of the Labour Party were, of course, not blind to the political situation . . .  Mr. Snowden had only a week or so earlier tried to find a way out by proclaiming that while the levy was good, the time was not so opportune, and that the proper moment was just after the war. And then, on Saturday November 26th, Mr. Ramsay MacDonald went considerably farther, and in fact admitted explicitly what we have always said; that the levy was a device to stabilise the capitalist system . . . These are MacDonald’s words in the Free Trade Hall, Manchester :-

   Referring to the Capital Levy, Mr. MacDonald said he found it a most popular topic. It was not a special Labour proposal. Some people imagined they wanted to use it as a malign or magical leverage for the complete change of society. If he were a capitalist and opposed to Socialism, he would support the capital levy.

(Observer 25 November 1923)

During the same week he spoke at Northampton and at Bristol and showed again how little the levy had to do with the workers.

  The capital levy proposal did not come from the Labour Party in the first instance. It came from business men, economists, university professors, and others and the Labour Party had not taken it up until they had enquired into it. When the Labour Party had educated the people it (the capital levy) would become popular and would be applied by other parties.

(The New Age 29 November)

From an article “The Capital Levy— Ramsay MacDonald Supports Our Case”, by H., in the Socialist Standard January 1924.

A Letter to the Liberals (1974)

From the January 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The following letter was sent to Focus, a local Liberal Party news sheet.

It is often suggested that a change of leader and/or party might make a real difference to our everyday life. Those of us who look intelligently at the kind of social system in which we live know that it would not.

We live under capitalism which operates according to its own economic laws, irrespective of changes of government, whether it be Conservative, Labour or Liberal.

There is a basic contradiction in capitalism between social production and class ownership. For while the actual work of producing wealth is done by the cooperative labour of millions — the working class — the means of production (lands, mines, factories etc.) and the products belong to a relatively small section of society only — the capitalists. It is this contradiction that causes modern social problems since it means that production cannot be carried on to meet human needs. The economic law of capitalism is that all enterprises, whether private or nationalized, are operated for profit. If their products cannot be sold at a profit, production is curtailed or brought to a stop. All governments administering capitalism, no matter what principles the individuals profess, have as a clause of their economic policy one which enables profits to flow.

Let us look at one or two problems that this situation creates. Unemployment is an inevitable part of capitalism. Periodically hundreds of thousands, even millions, are thrown out of work for the simple reason that it has become unprofitable to employ them. The pool of unemployed can be called on in times of boom and is as such needed by capitalism. It can also at times serve the purpose of keeping down wage claims. 

People often talk of there being a housing problem, but there is no such problem. There is no reason why enough good houses for all should not be built. The materials exist, so do the building workers and architects. What then stands in the way? The simple fact is that there is not a market for good houses since most people cannot afford to pay for them, and never will be because of the restrictions of the wages system.

Is there a way out? Of course there is, but it demands self-reliance and bold thinking on the part of everyone. The economic system under which we live is man-made and can be altered by man’s action. You can go on frittering away the years in the sterile dispute whether the Conservatives, the Labour Party or the Liberals make a better job of running capitalism, or you can consider the alternative of ending capitalism and putting Socialism in its place. Rely on your own experience and recognise that capitalism has never been and cannot be made to work in the interest of the working class.

The alternative is a social system in which production of goods and the operation of services are carried on solely and directly for use, without buying and selling, profit-making or the wages system. This is what Socialism really means and its basis would be the ownership of the means of production and distribution by the whole community.

Its achievement demands understanding, organisation and democratic action by a Socialist working class. It calls for international co-operation, not of the world’s bankers, but of the world’s workers.

A revolutionary idea and hard to grasp? You have to choose. Either you take action to get Socialism or you have to put up with the consequences of capitalism. There is no third choice!

                                                                                                                   Yours etc.,

WORLD SOCIALIST.

Party News Briefs (1957)

Party News from the August 1957 issue of the Socialist Standard

Bloomsbury and Ealing Branch Meetings.—Bloomsbury Branch will not be meeting during August as Conway Hall is closed for that month. Meetings will re-commence in September on Thursdays the 5th and 19th. Ealing Branch will meet on Fridays. August 2nd and 9th, only during the month owing to the holidays of Branch members. From September 6th the Branch will meet as usual each Friday.

• • • •

May Sales Drive.—The Literature Sales Committee report that nine branches made a special effort to sell the May Standard, and 5,000 copies were sold. The Committee is planning ahead and look forward to even more successful results in their future sales drives.

• • • •

Indoor Meetings

The Indoor Propaganda season is well under way, and four of the projected six indoor meetings have already been held—one at Denison House, entitled “Russia—Success or Failure?” and a further one at Islington Co-Op Hall on “Labour’s Social Insecurity.” Comrades Wilmot, Fahy, Grant and D’Arcy were the speakers at these meetings.

The Lambeth Town Hall meeting on “Wage Freezes and Rent Increases” was held on the 15th July, and Comrades Reed and R. Critchfield were the speakers. The meeting at Ealing Town Hall held on 31st July, subject “Rearmament and Disarmament,” had Comrades May and La Touche as the speakers.

The Propaganda Committee organised a further meeting at the Chorlton Town Hall, Manchester, on the 21st July. Comrades Wilmot, Coster and D’Arcy dealt with the subject “Wage Freezes and Rent Increases.”

No indoor meetings are planned for the month of August, but a further meeting will be held at the East Ham Town Hall in mid-September, and finally the closing meeting of this present series, in October, will be at Denison House. The Propaganda Committee have already a very heavy programme for the winter, which will be submitted for E.C. approval, but the present intention will be to maintain at least two meetings per month, apart from whatever Branches individually arrange.

The support of all members and sympathisers is required wherever these meetings are held, not forgetting the necessary donations which are urgently required to keep the programme running.

• • • •

Comrade Gilmac is making a visit to America, and will attend the conference of the World Socialist Party in September as a fraternal delegate of the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Phyllis Howard

Party News (1998)

Party News from the May 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

It is a revealing commentary on the coverage the media give to minority political parties that the only national mention we have had so far this year has not been about our stance on some issue but on the occasion of the death of a former member who became a Labour MP and a junior Minister and who ended up in the House of Lords.

All the obituaries mentioned that Baroness Lestor of Eccles, who died at the end of March, and her father had been members of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. Her father was described as an actor, journalist and One Big Union organiser who came over from Canada to help "organise the SPGB", of which he became a "leading member" but the Glasgow Herald's (31 March) statement that he "became leader of the Socialist Party of Great Britain" was absurd. They did however have the grace to publish a correction.

The prize for bad journalism goes to Michael White, political editor of the Guardian, for writing (28 March) that Joan Lestor "had passed through a Trotskyite phase by 1955", but MP Tam Dalyell came a close second with his statement that her father had been a member of the "Socialist Workers Party of Great Britain" (Independent, 30 March). The Times described us as a "far left doctrinaire movement" while the Daily Telegraph wrote about "extremist dogmatism", but there was no mention of the fact that by leaving the Socialist Party to join the Labour Party in 1955 Lestor was changing her aim from socialism to the reform of capitalism. She found out the limitations of this first hand when she felt obliged to resign as junior Education minister in 1976 in protest at the cuts in nursery education spending imposed by the Wilson Labour government of the time in response to an economic crisis. She died a few days before the cuts in benefit for single mothers imposed by the present Labour government came into force and which was against everything she had fought for as a reformist.