The Bailiffs (1997)

A Short Story from the January 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

When I was about twelve years old the bailiffs came to our house. While everyone was out they let themselves in the front door by a key which hung down inside the letterbox on a piece of string, carried out two worn-out old armchairs, a shabby old sofa with the springs poking through the cushions and a wobbly dining-room table and chairs, loaded them all onto a van and drove off. On our return from visiting a neighbour my mother and I found an empty living room.

I knew nothing whatsoever about bailiffs and so instantly thought we had been burgled, but my child's mind could not at first take in what anyone would want with such old rubbish. Even now so many years later I can picture the furniture, the old armchair I curled up in to read my books, the sofa my younger brother and I used as a trampoline when our Dad wasn't at home, the table we sat up to for meals or to play games of draughts and ludo, and I still cannot imagine the kind of men who would be prepared to do such a thing. Were they fathers themselves? Were they so much in need of a job that they would willingly, without heart or conscience, without one kind thought for us, take all the comforts we possessed? Nowadays of course I know that they would; I know that the system divides workers, encourages us to think ill of each other, to compete with each other, to blame the unemployed for their predicament, to disparage the homeless and the poor. Indeed now there is a telephone line so that all we need to do if we know some unhappy soul who is seen to leave the house too early in the morning to  be unemployed is to make a phone call and suggest that he or she is picking up a little extra in order to supplement their dole. So yes, why shouldn't the bailiffs have come to our house and nicked all we had? This was 1946 mind! So what;s changed?

The bailiffs came to our house because my mother could not find the money for the last few monthly instalments on the furniture. She had almost finished the payments which was why our few precious sticks were so well worn, but during those last few months my younger brother and I had need of clothes and shoes. Not that my Mum would have expected the bailiffs to work that one out. After all they were only doing their job! So my mother put her face in her hands and wept. Normally she should have sat down to do this but as there were no chairs this gesture lost some of its usual power to disturb me. She said "I wrote and told them about it, they knew."

Meanwhile I wondered if the bailiffs would look like Hollywood gangsters, but when I was unwise enough to express this view aloud my mother said I was being "very silly". Then I remembered that I had left my Richard Crompton book, William The Anarchist, under one of the cushions on one of the chairs, and so our loss became even more acute for me. It was a library book and I was intimidated by the assistants at our local library; they looked very strict and I constantly felt that if I did not bend to their authority then they may expel me from membership and I would fail to fulfill my ambition to read every single book in the junior section by the time I was fifteen.

Later my father came home from work and we sat on the floor to eat our stew. Dad believed his children should know why such a thing had happened, so he talked about the "nature of capitalism" which explanation few of us grasped and my mother pointed out that Karl Marx wasn't going to pay the bills, was he? For some reason this remark caused much hilarity between my four brothers and in next to no time they were all trying to outdo one another with their witticisms. As a little girl I was anxious to know about the "nature of capitalism: so didn't think my brothers were very funny. Altogether it was a strange evening; Mum gloomy, Dad thoughtful, and me still worrying about my book.

The next morning a table appeared as if from nowhere on our garden path. In the afternoon three bandy-legged chairs arrived outside our front gate. And of all things a pot of home-made jam was deposited on our front doorstep. An even more battered sofa than the one the bailiffs had taken was offered to us by a woman at number twelve. "Thought you could make use of it" was all she said.

My brothers and I helped Dad haul the "gifts" into the house and arrange them in the living room. We tried out the chairs and bounced on the sofa. My mother said it was very kind of the neighbours, but I watched my father leave the room and go out into the back garden.

He was pretending to do some weeding. "It's a bit like socialism, isn't it, Dad?" I asked. He was sniffing (exactly the way I did when I was crying privately). He kept his head averted but just the same he put an arm around my shoulder. "Not quite, Liz, but it'll do for now" he said.

Heather Ball

Trapped in a Blind Alley (1973)

Book Review from the August 1973 issue of the Socialist Standard

World Crisis: Essays in Revolutionary Socialism by John Palmer and Nigel Harris. Hutchinson. £2.25

This book is a collection of essays by prominent members of the group known as International Socialism. The basic argument of the book is summed up by Duncan Hallas in the final essay, "The Way Forward."

Basically the case rests on the analysis of the world crisis . . . and particularly on the thesis that, in the changing conditions of capitalism, reformist policies will be less and less able to provide these partial solutions to the problems confronting the working-class that they have been able to provide in the decades since the Second World War.

In other words, the road to reform is closed; the capitalist class can no longer afford to grant the improvement in working-class conditions which it had done in the past. Does this mean, then, that IS do not include reforms in their programme, and base their support on the sole issue of establishing Socialism? Of course that would be expecting too much. Duncam Hallas, in the same essay, states clearly that "the development of a programme (includes) a detailed statement of partial and transitional aims." And the book is scattered with phrases like "connecting the concrete issues that workers face with a generalised perspective." (Higgins and Palmer, Introduction).

Why, therefore, does IS put forward demands for reforms when they believe rightly or wrongly, that these demands cannot be met, instead of putting forward  a demand for Socialism? The answer is, of course, that they believe that it is only by being led up the garden path of reforms and smashed against the brick wall of capitalism that the workers will learn "through their own experience" that capitalism cannot give them what they want. Of course we would accept that socialist ideas arise from the struggles engaged in under capitalism by the working class, but the idea of making "impossible demands" shows a definite contempt for the working-class and their ability to understand socialism.

Predictably enough, another false idea expressed was that of violent insurrection. Paul Foot devoted his energies to an analysis of "Parliamentary Socialism," concluding that democracy is all a sham and that the French workers had shown the way in May, 1968. One of his main mistakes was in assuming Parliament and the vote are inherently reformist, and that revolution must mean a bloodbath on the streets. He states, for example, that the Independent Labour Party "lost its socialist impetus through the insistence on Parliamentary priorities," and that the Communist Party had degenerated since the 1930's when it had "sustained itself . . . by a revolutionary attitude towards Parliament."

This line of argument shows a great deal of confusion. The vote can be used to maintain capitalism, to achieve certain reforms, to destroy democracy (as in the case of Nazi Germany) or to achieve Socialism, depending on the consciousness of the working-class. There is therefore no such thing as a "revolutionary attitude towards Parliament." The ILP, of course, never had a "socialist impetus."

Given the rejection of Parliament, the only alternative IS seem able to offer is syndicalism. Paul Foot writes of the need of the workers "to seize the factories and offices". Tony Cliff says the shop stewards are "the pillars on which any real revolutionary socialist policy must be" (T. Cliff, "The Class Struggle in Britain"). Such beliefs are extremely dangerous—any attempt by IS or any other group to institute "seizure" of the means of production would be suppressed by the State, no doubt at the expense of a good deal of working-class blood; IS would discover, through their own experience, where the real power lies in society.

It would be mistaken to believe that there is nothing of value in this book. Though most of the contributors seem to be trapped in a blind alley, Nigel Harris in part of his essay "Imperialism Today," comes very close to the correct socialist position. In his analysis of armed struggle in backward countries he states:

Marxism is irrelevant to success in guerrilla warfare . . . Marxism dissolves into pre-Marxist populist socialism, the closest analogies to which occur in Narodnik  thought in Tsarist Russia.

He concedes that revolutions in such circumstances are made by small minorities relying on élan and slogans, and that Fidel Castro, for example, was a radical liberal rather than a socialist. Harris therefore comes very close to our position, that groups such as the Vietcong are the equivalent of nineteenth-century bourgeois revolutionaries, seeking only to establish capitalism. We give them no support, but for Nigel Harris the dilemma remains—why does his organization give them "unconditional support"? In his fifty-page essay, he gives no answer at all, except for the pious remark that "socialists instinctively feel a warm sympathy for those struggling for national independence."

Inevitably, there are constant references throughout the book to Lenin and the Russian Revolution. Nowhere is it explained, however, why a revolution which took place fifty-five years ago in a backward, pre-industrial country in which a decaying feudal regime collapsed under the strain of war has any relevance to conditions in Britain or any advanced capitalist country to-day. All the other standard IS ideas crop up regularly—the false Lenin theory of imperialism, the equally false crypto-Keynesian theory of the "permanent economy," the peculiar obsession with productivity deals. When all is said and done, however, the IS gap still looks to the Labour Party for its philosophy. It was fitting, therefore, that Duncan Hallas, on the last page of the book, should state that "there are still genuine socialists active in the Labour Party". Needless to say, he did not name any.

Brendan Mee 

The People You Meet No. 3 — Just a Housewife (1950)

From the January 1950 issue of the Socialist Standard

She came to the doorstep and eyed me with mixed suspicion and anger—anger because I had interrupted her housework and suspicion because she knew I had something to sell. Before the war five or six men called every day selling everything from toothbrushes to vacuum cleaners, cash down or on the never-never; now they are re-appearing.

:Good morning," I ventured, and received a hard get-to-the-point look. Quickly I gabbled that I represented the S.P.G.B., that I had called to acquaint her with the organisation and ultimately to sell her a copy of the STANDARD.

"Politics!" she snapped, "they're the old man's business, and he's out." He wasn't. He was in the garden chopping wood. Household tasks were far more important.

"But surely you are concerned with the problems of war, poverty and unemployment?"

That struck a chord. She wiped her hands on her pinafore and showed some interest. "Things are better to-day than they ever were," she claimed. "You're young. You don't remember." And then she told this story.

In short, she was brought up in one of those grim industrial areas that cluster around Manchester. The eldest of several kids she cared for the rest while her mother was at the mill. "It was cheaper for them to employ women," she explained. Her father just languished till he joined the Army and was killed in 1914. "I was lucky," she said. "My chap came back and we were married in 1919." For a few years luck was with them and they managed to keep a home together and produce four children. Eventually, early in 1931, he fell out of work. The dole, the Means Test, the bun house—and then they decided to try their luck in the south. It was just the same down here. They sold more and more of their furniture and wares. "I had a breakdown—the old man grew sullen and miserable and young Johnnie went into a sanatorium for nearly three years." But as time went on work grew more plentiful till in 1939 he started at K------s. "And he's been there ever since."

"I don't know much about politics," she reaffirmed "but it seems to me that Labour has done better after this war than the others did after the last one."

I pointed out that the favourable conditions of the labour market since the war was not due to the good work of a Labour Government but due to the existence of ready markets; that already it was becoming difficult for the capitalist, in face of American competition, to sell his goods: that unemployment figures were steadily rising; that a slump is almost inevitable.

It didn't sink in. Living from day to day had set her thinking the same way. Women! It is not enough to leave these matters to the old man. Politically, he is as ignorant as you are.

Your experiences are as vivid as his. When you see the shops full and your purses empty, when, in spite of your efforts, you see your kids suffer from undernourishment, when your sons are called off to war, ask yourself the reason why. Examine the world in which you live. Who knows, you may even set the old man on the right road.

Ronald.

Editorial: The American Conventions (1964)

Editorial from the July 1964 issue of the Socialist Standard

The two big American parties are now about to hold the Conventions—the Republicans at San Francisco this month, the Democrats at Atlantic City in August—which will select their candidates for the Presidential election in November.

The Conventions' job is to pick the man who will pull in the most votes for his party; as such, they are themselves part of the election campaign. They usually wear a public face of enthusiastic confidence, expressed in fatuously massive banners, frenzied parades around the hall and similar ballyhoo. But behind this facade, in guarded rooms, the reality is grimly faced and tense bargaining often goes on, as the delegations trade their support in exchange for pledges of political patronage.

The Democratic Convention promises to be a triumphantly straightforward affair, a formal endorsement of President Johnson as their man. Johnson has so far demonstrated that he has most of the faculties which capitalism's leaders normally require — physical toughness, political skill, ruthlessness, a flair for publicity and what we can very loosely call a little bit of luck.

Since he took over in November last, Johnson has built himself onto one of the biggest vote winners his party has ever had: the public opinion polls consistently give him the support of about three-quarters of the American electorate. If there were any argument about his nomination, this fact would clinch it. There is no reason to suppose that at Atlantic City next month the banners will wave, the button badges will be worn, the cheer leaders will carol, for anyone other than Lyndon B. Johnson.

The Republicans are in different straits. Not for over twenty years have they selected a candidate who did not stand for what are called "liberal" policies—a measure of state insurance, medical aid and so on. This was why nobody took Senator Barry Goldwater seriously when he was announced, some months ago, that he was in the race for the nomination.

But Goldwater, like Kennedy in 1960, has demonstrated that an initially doubtful candidate can break down the forces against him by proving his ability to attract votes in primary elections. While his opponents in the Republican Party have been divided among themselves, the Senator has been systematically amassing delegates' votes.

He goes to San Francisco as the favourites. Of the men who are expected to stand against him, Rockefeller has shown that he has not got the requisite voting pull. The big opposition to Goldwater may therefore come from one of the men who, although they have yet to intervene in any force, would probably dearly like the nomination: Nixon, Scranton, Lodge.

It will be a tough fight, for the Senator's bandwagon is now rolling briskly along. His policies may strike some people as inane and irresponsible but a great many others approve them. Goldwater's victory in California came after his famous indiscreet advocacy of the use of nuclear weapons in Indo-China - and even after he made things worse by appearing to be confused over exactly what he had said.

The industrial areas may dislike his opposition to unemployment and sickness insurance but millions of other Americans support him on this, because they think that such schemes undermine what they are pleased to call their self-reliance. Goldwater gives the impression that he would like to see the United States lose interest in Europe: this is an idea not unfavourably received by the American electorate. The Economist of 6th June last speculated: " . . . even President Johnson might be pressed to cover his right flank by saying things that created the same impression."

All this could mean that Goldwater is not such a vote-loser as some of his party think. At the moment, so certain does their defeat seem to be, that they have little to lose, and Goldwater has been the only man up to now who has shown that he knows how to get down to the grass roots of ignorance.

If he does get the nomination he will probably be supported, by the customary cynical balancing act, with a "liberal" candidate for the Vice-Presidency. This would be designed to take the edge of Goldwater's more wild views so that he could gather votes from a wider circle, in the same way that Johnson's Southern origins were supposed to compensate for Kennedy's New England brashness.

On this score again, the Democrats do not have the same problem as their opponents. Johnson is so much all things to all men, he fits in so well in the business of universal vote-gathering, that he has no electoral edge to take off. He needs nobody to balance him; the post of Vice-President is, therefore, probably at his disposal exclusively.

Whoever fights it out in November, the election will be the usual depressing affair. The American voters will give their verdict on all the familiar issues of reform and futility, ignoring the real issue—Capitalism or Socialism—which faces them all the time.

When the banners have been put away, when the ticker tape has been swept up, when the drum majorettes are resting their aching legs, and when the next President is settled in the White House, Capitalism will grind on, spreading confusion and despair on all sides.

Backwaters of History (1953)

From the September 1953 issue of the Socialist Standard

The five men were silhouetted against the bright, grey, morning sky as they walked steadily, in single file, with spades and shovels on their shoulders, up the gentle slope of the hillside. They halted and gathered in the group, talking, gesticulating, looking around and pointing. Then they walked away in a different direction and were lost to sight behind the hill.

It was the first day of April in the year 1649. The five men were quite ordinary humble artisans or labourers, living in the village of Cobham, in Surrey. Only one of them had any reputation outside the locality in which they lived; William Everard had been cashiered from the army—from Oliver Cromwell's army—and was known for his religious zeal. Stewer and Colten were well known locally but the other two had so little fame that their names have not been handed down to us. 

On the lower slopes of St. George's Hill, on the side by Camp Close, the men spent the day digging, breaking the soil into a fine tilth and sowing parsnips, carrots and beans, When their work was finished they gathered  up their tools and made their way back to their homes. That simple day's work had far-reaching results and qualified the five men for honourable mention in every worth-while history of the working class.

The following Monday they were back at their digging in the same place, accompanied by nine or ten new recruits. By Friday the group was over thirty strong. On Saturday they went to Kingston-on-Thames to furnish themselves with seed corn and they arranged to have ploughs for their future work.

On the 16th of April, Henry Sanders of Walton-on-Thames, a local landowner, reported these doings to the Council of State. The Council of State instructed the commander-in-chief of the army, General Fairfax, to send a force of horse troops to Cobham to dispel this "Disorderly and tumultuous" assembly whilst it was still a beginning and before more dangerous consequences grew.

The men of Cobham, together with others who had followed their example at near-by Walton-on-Thames, offered no resistance to the soldiers. They were pacifists. They were arrested and the leaders, Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard, were taken before Cromwell and Fairfax at Whitehall. They stood before the Lord General with their hats on, claiming that he was but their fellow man.

They stated that for many years the people had lived under oppression and tyranny. The remedy was to cultivate the wastelands, the common land and the parks, everyone working and living communally. They did not intend to touch any private land or to break any fence or enclosure, only to till the common and untilled land.

Another local landowner, a Mr. Drake, summonsed them and they were tried by a jury of local wealthy freeholders at Kingston Court in August, 1649. They were not allowed to defend themselves and were all fined £10 each. Their cattle were injured by hired ruffians. A Puritan preacher was sent to Cobham to stir the local population against them. The few huts that they had erected were pulled down, their spades and hoes were cut to pieces, the land they had dug and sown was torn and trampled so that no corn could grow, the men themselves were maltreated.

For over a year the settlement at Cobham persisted. Propagandists were sent out to other parts of the country and another settlement was commenced at Wellingborough and some support was found in Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire. But the support was slight and after a year of digging and a year of persecution the movement died out in early 1651.

The members of this movement called themselves the "True Levellers" but because of their experiment at Cobham and elsewhere they became better known as "The Diggers." The prime motivator of the movement, Gerrard Winstanley, was a cloth manufacturer. He continued his activities after the Digger movement had faded out and during the last years of his life he was a member of 'The Society of Friends," better known as "The Quakers," which had been founded by George Fox in 1652. A number of other members of the Digger movement likewise joined the Quakers, and continued to suffer for their beliefs.

During the 16th century and the early part of the 17th the early merchant capitalists in England had been gaining in numbers, wealth and political power. Their struggle against their feudal class enemies culminated in open hostilities between themselves, entrenched in the Parliament, and the Feudal Aristocracy lined up behind the Monarchy. Both sides resorted to armed force, and the Parliamentary troops under Oliver Cromwell, Thomas Fairfax and Henry Ireton finally triumphed over the Royal forces under King Charles I and Prince Rupert. The king was beheaded without having abdicated, as evidence that it was the monarchy and all it stood for that was defeated and not merely the king.

The wealthy capitalists raised their troops from amongst the small merchants and artisans of the towns and from the ranks of the small working class of those days. To ensure support from these social elements they were fed on propaganda for religious and political freedom. In the Parliamentary army, amongst the small merchant and artisan element, there grew up a movement known as "The Levellers" which demanded a political freedom in excess of what the wealthier capitalists were prepared to admit. An extreme section of the Leveller movement, supported mainly by agricultural workers and calling itself the "True Levellers" demanded a form of utopian communism. The digging experiment was an attempt at propaganda-by-deed by this extreme element.

In an age of pamphleteering, Winstanley and other diggers supplied many pamphlets. Their writings are cloaked in religious phrases for it was a time of religious fervour. Yet they saw clearly that there could be no real freedom whilst there was private property.

"True freedom lies where a man receives his nourishment and preservation, and that is in the use of the earth  . . . A man had better to have no body than to have no food for it . . . True freedom lies in the free enjoyment of the earth."

(Winstanley. The Law of Freedom.)

They recognised the real function of religion as propounded by the church.

"While men are gazing up to heaven, imagining after a happiness or fearing a hell after they are dead, their eyes are put out, that they see not what is their birthrights, and what is to be done by them here on earth while they are living . . . And indeed the subtle clergy do know that if they can but charm the people . . . to look after riches, heaven and glory when they are dead, that then they shall easily be the inheritors of the earth and have the deceived people to be their servants. This . . . was not the doctrine of Christ."

(Winstanley. The Law of Freedom.) 

They saw the real cause of war and, vaguely, of class struggles.

"property and single interest divides the people of a land and the whole world into parties, and is the cause of all wars and bloodshed and contention everywhere."

(Winstanley. The True Levellers' Standard Advanced).

". . . Rich men receive all they have from the labourer's hand and what they give, they give away other men's labours, not their own"

(Winstanley. The Law of Freedom.)

There are many writings to show the kind of society the Diggers aimed to establish. Just one quotation will suffice.

"Shall we have lawyers?
"There is no need for them, for there is to be no buying and selling; neither any need to expound laws; for the bare letter of the law shall be both judge and lawyer, trying every man's actions. And seeing we shall have successive Parliaments every year, there will be rules made for every action a man can do."

(Winstanley. The Law of Freedom.) 

Four of the Diggers' foremost persecutors were Members of Parliament who had been expelled by Cromwell for their Royalist sympathies. But they were still secure in their land ownership and were back in Parliament. Cromwell and those he represented were showing that, as far as they were concerned, the revolution had gone far enough. They held political power and they were prepared to use it to suppress their erstwhile supporters more ruthlessly than they had suppressed their former class enemies. In fact, they were prepared to compromise and ally with their former enemies to subdue the aspirations of their extremist followers.

Winstanley expresses the situation well:

"While this kingly power reigned in one man called Charles, all sorts of people complained of oppression . . . Thereupon you that were the gentry, when you were assembled in Parliament, you called upon the poor common people to come and help you . . . That top bough is lopped off the tree of Tyranny, and the kingly power in that one particular is cast out. But alas, oppression is a great tree still, and keeps off the sun of freedom from the poor commons still."
(Winstanley. A New Year's Gift for the Parliament and Army.)

Winstanley, in his writings, as in the few writings of other Diggers, realises the need to propagate his ideas and to gain support for them from a majority of the people. But none of them challenged the political supremacy of the wealthy capitalists. Instead they appealed for a change of heart. The more wily of the capitalists recognised at the outset the need to capture and hold political power to ensure the domination of their class over society. With the political machine in their hands their opponents on all sides were powerless.

The capitalist class still recognises that, and clings to political power tenaciously. It will continue to impose its will on society until the working class deprives it of that power and proceeds to remodel society in keeping with working class interests.

W. Waters.

Recommended books for students: -

M. Beer. A History of British Socialism. Part I Section 5.

C. Hill and E. Dell. The Good Old Cause. Part 12.

M. James. Materialist Interpretations. Essay in "The English Revolution," Edited by C. Hill.

H. Holorenshaw. The Levellers and the English Revolution.

E. Dell. Gerrard Winstanley and the Diggers. Essay in "The Modern Quarterly," Spring 1949.

E. Bernstein. Cromwell and Communism.

Berens. The Digger Movement in the Days of Commonwealth.

The People You Meet No. 2 — Punchy (1949)

From the December 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

He came into the meeting, took one look at the speaker and threatened to knock his b——y head off. Seeing me selling literature, he assured me of a likewise fate. Normally I should have been scared stiff. but we all know Punchy. About six times a year his battered face grimaced at the speaker and his glassy eyes glistened at the prospect of a fight.

At one time he was a promising young boxer. He was naturally well built and the years he had spent in the rough streets of dockland in the years that followed the First World War had taught him to use his fists. They had also taught him that in this world a man is judged not by what he is, but by what he is worth. So when he left school, with neither education nor trade, he sought a fortune with the skill of his fists.

Round the booths as a free lance he picked up a pound here, thirty bob there till he was eventually taken up by a manager. Visions of championships rose before his eyes—Southern Counties, British, European, and who knows, even the World! "But first we've got to build you up," they told him. So once, twice, three times a week he climbed into the ring to punch hell out of declining veterans. The flattery, the cajolery and most of all the money, kept him going. He did eventually reach the top—the top of the bill at many back-street boxing halls up and down the country. There for a while he reigned but there were times when his sight grew blurred; bells rang in his ears. Defeats on points became knock-outs. The rot had set in. On the road down he became the human punchbag which carried other youngsters to the top. Gradually his fights grew less and less and only whiskey kept him going, till he completed his tour and returned, physically injured and mentally scarred, to the gutter from which he came.

Now, as veteran of more than 400 bouts, he lives from day to day, sweeping the arena, selling programmes, and scrounging fags and beer from those who recall his former "greatness."

Sport! —a word which symbolises the human being at play for mental stimulation and physical satisfaction. Where is the sport here with young men being punched into insensibility for a few shillings to satisfy the warped desires of their fellow-workers and make a pile for the promoters? Where is the sport where the player is goaded beyond his capacity by fear of poverty?

Not only is this in the field of boxing. In every sport the professional is gradually squeezing out the amateur—and even the amateur must play to the gallery for support. The field of football affords an example of this transition. Just like every other worker the player is exploited to an ever-increasing degree, and the better he is, the more of an attraction he becomes the more he is bound in his peculiar form of slavery.

Sport is the medium by which men and women display their skill, the co-ordination of mind and muscle, but to be fully appreciated it must be spontaneous and joyful. In a system of society where all goods and services, including the service of entertainment, are produced for sale and profit, the greater an athlete becomes, greater is the pressure exerted upon him by the businessman. Sport gives way to viciousness and cunning.

Punchy cannot be saved. The most he can hope for is the chance to spend the rest of his days in kind hands, well fed and cared for. But it is in our hands to save others, and in doing so to save ourselves, for this, revolting as it may be, is only one of the minor anomalies of capitalism. The answer to them all lies in the establishment of Socialism, a system of society that will make life itself a sport and a pleasure.

RONALD. 

No War But The Class War! (2003)

Book Review from the October 2003 issue of the Socialist Standard

No War But The Class War! Libertarian Anti-Militarism Then and Now. Edited by Anna Key. Kate Sharpley Library. 2003.

Some purchasers of this short, 20-page pamphlet might find it a bit of a con since, though it opposes militarism, it does not oppose violence. Far from it. It praises violence and advocates this as the way to confront the State. We ourselves are not pacifists, but we always make it clear that we think that Socialists should only contemplate resorting to violence reluctantly and as a last resort should an anti-socialist minority attempt to prevent by violent means the implementation of the democratically-expressed will of a majority for socialism. So you will find no glorification of violence—such as the talk of “armed joy” by the sick individual who wrote this pamphlet's last contribution—in our literature

The items in this collection of anti-militarist leaflets and articles start from an appeal to conscript soldiers in Spain in 1896 not to go and fight in Cuba to a leaflet against the recent war in Afghanistan. The contrast between the early and the later ones is striking, with the early ones coming from the heart in contrast to the more intellectual later ones. Not that the message in the earlier ones is that coherent or, frankly, sensible.

There are two contributions from the pre-WWI French anti-militarist militant, Gustave Hervé, who wrote a book called Leur Patrie (in English “Their Country”, but whose English version is called My Country Right or Wrong). One starts off well enough, excellently in fact:

  “For anybody who is not satisfied with words, or anybody who wants to forget for a moment the fantastic definitions of the Country which have been taught him at school, a Country is a group of men living under the same laws; because they themselves or their ancestors have been brought willingly or by force, more often by force, to obey the same sovereign, the same government. Patriotism groups men according to their land of origin, as decided by the vicissitudes of history; within every country, thanks to the patriotic link, rich and poor unite against the foreigner. Socialism groups men, poor against rich, class against class, without taking into account the differences of race and language, and over and above the frontiers traced by history”.

But it then goes on to advocate, as the working-class response to the outbreak of war, an armed uprising to attempt to overthrow capitalist rule: “Insurrection rather than War!”

The early SPGB (since we were founded in 1904) was aware of Hervé views and commented on this particular slogan in the July 1907 issue of the Socialist Standard:

“Certainly no one country's exploiters are so superior to the rest that the workers should sacrifice themselves in defending them; but it is equally certain that if the proletarians were to rise in armed revolt against their rulers immediately on the outbreak of war, while the master class controlled the armed forces of the nation, and while the workers were yet unable and unready to assume control of Society, they would be courting a shambles that would make war peace by contrast.” 

“Since, therefore, Hervé's statement implies that the workers even though they are not in a position to successfully emancipate themselves should nevertheless sacrifice themselves in a fruitless and bloody attempt to do so on the outbreak of war, it is necessary to dissent from that position of his declaration.” 

“The particularly anti-militarist propaganda of Hervé has undeniably an educational value, and to that extent it is to be welcomed.”

It has to be added that, when the first world slaughter did break out in August 1914, Hervé rushed to join the French army to defend “their Country”, a fact referred to (but without naming him) in the next following article in the pamphlet: “the same man who had once proclaimed 'insurrection rather than war' now exhorts his comrades to defend the 'civilization' of the exploiters”.

Hervé later became a fascist. He wasn't the only pre-WWI anti-militarist militant to take this road, the most notorious being Mussolini. The publishers of this pamphlet, with its talk of “armed joy” and “transforming life arm in hand”, might like to ponder whether the glorification of non-state violence is not in the fascist rather than the “libertarian” tradition.

There's not much wrong with the slogan “No War but the Class War”. But there's a lot wrong with “No War but Civil War” which is how this pamphlet interprets it.

Adam Buick

150 Years of The Communist Manifesto (1998)

From the February 1998 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Communist Manifesto remains a good introduction in their own words to the ideas of Marx and Engels. Here we summarise its contents and put it in its historical context.

It was not until the 1870s, when Marx gained some notoriety, that interest began to be expressed in his earlier works, including the Manifesto. It was first republished in German in 1872, then several other languages before the 1888 English edition. Marx refused to re-write it for the changed circumstances because, reasonably enough, he claimed that it had become a historical document which nobody had a right to alter. However, for the reader lacking an understanding of the context in which it was issued, it is all too easy to suppose that it was entirely a communist Manifesto. Yet if we are careful to distinguish the historically specific from the universal we can then see the communism (socialism) in the Manifesto.

It was translated into English by Samuel Moore (who had translated volume 1 of Capital) and "revised in common" with Engels for the "authorised" 1888 edition. However, this "authorised" version contains a large number of small but important alterations to Marx's original text. Compare the published version with translations of the original wording reproduced here, especially in section two. (See The Communist Manifesto, a Norton Critical Edition edited by Frederic L. Bender, 1988. Contains Prefaces, annotated text, sources and background information.)

The original title, Manifesto of the Communist Party, indicates that it was written for a particular organisation with particular purposes, at a particular time and place. Karl Marx (but not Engels) was commissioned to write the Manifesto by the Central Committee of the Communist League, a small London-based organisation of German refugees, in November 1847. The Manifesto was published in late February 1848, at about the same time as the revolutions of 1848 began-first in Paris, then in Berlin and many other European cities. The occurrence of widespread uprisings throughout Europe owed nothing to theManifesto, though members of the League were not alone in anticipating such an event. The contributory factors were food shortages and starvation brought about by the spread of potato blight, chronic unemployment and falling wages caused by recession, frustration at the feudal bastions of reaction in government, and revolutionary nationalism. In most cases it fell to members of the "petty bourgeoisie" (shopkeepers, artisans, small farmers) to organise revolution. They had suffered economic hardship in the previous few years, had the most to gain from a more progressive regime and potentially had the political clout to bring it about. The big capitalists had not as much incentive, having done well in the industrialisation sweeping Europe, and so often tended to ally themselves instead with the forces of conservative reaction. It was in this context that Marx and the League issued their Manifesto.

The famous opening declaration, "A spectre is haunting Europe-the spectre of Communism", was something of an exaggeration. Marx borrowed this already well-known imagery from Lorenz von Stein's book on communism in France, published in 1842. After the opening the Manifesto is then divided into four sections:

Bourgeois and Proletarians; Proletarians and Communists; Socialist and Communist Literature; Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties.

Bourgeois and Proletarians

The bourgeoisie (capitalist class) "historically, has played a most revolutionary part". They have pursued their class interest by gaining political control of the state, which "is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie." The bourgeoisie, by pursuing its own self interest, has brought about great advances in technology and production. "The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of the globe." But the bourgeoisie has also created the proletariat (working class) and this class will in turn become the "gravedigger" for the bourgeoisie by recreating society in the proletariat's interests. "All previous movements were movements of minorities, or in the interests of minorities. The proletarian movement is the independent movement of the immense majority, in the interests of the immense majority" (original wording).

Proletarians and Communists

The Communists (meaning members of the Communist League) are distinguished from the other working class parties by the way "they point out and bring to the front the common interests of the entire proletariat, independently of all nationality."

The Communists are "the most resolute section of the working-class parties of every country" (original wording). Theoretically, "they have over the great mass of the proletariat the advantage of clearly understanding the line of march, the conditions, and the ultimate general results of the proletarian movement".

The Communist League wants to eventually abolish "bourgeois property" (private ownership of the means of production) and this also entails "the abolition of buying and selling." The bourgeois family must also be abolished ("prostitution both public and private") and nationality ("working men have no country"). The first step in the revolution by the working class is "to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class, which is the struggle of democracy" (original wording). The proletariat will use its political power to take, "by degrees", all capital from the bourgeoisie, "centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the state" and "increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible".

The practical measures for achieving this "will of course be different in different countries." Nevertheless, "in the most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable." There then follows ten measures, including the "Expropriation of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes" (original wording), "a heavy progressive or graduated taxation" (original wording), "abolition of all right of inheritance", "centralisation of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly", "centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State", "extension of factories and instruments owned by the State", and "free education for all children in public schools".

When, in the course of development, class distinctions have disappeared, and "all production has been concentrated in the hands of the associated individuals, the public power will lose its political character" (original wording). Political power is merely the organised power of one class for oppressing another. When the proletariat, organised as the ruling class, "abolishes the old conditions of production" (original wording) it "will thereby have abolished its own supremacy as a class."

In its place we will have communism: "an association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all."

This second section of the Manifesto is controversial, with the measures at the end being mistakenly interpreted by some as communist (socialist) measures in themselves when clearly they are not. Two points should be made by way of clarification. First, the Manifesto was written with Germany in mind (though not exclusively). This was made explicit when the Central Committee of the Communist League issued its "Demands of the Communist Party in Germany" in late March 1848. This seventeen-point programme expands on the Manifesto's ten-point programme to the changed German conditions. It starts: "All of Germany shall be declared to be a single and indivisible republic." It adds at the end, above the signatories (which included Marx and Engels): "It is to the German proletariat, the petit bourgeoisie, and the small peasantry to support these demands with all possible energy." In short, Marx, the League and the ten measures in the Manifesto were encouraging a bourgeois-democratic revolution.

In the circumstances of the time it seemed logical to Marx and the League that they should accept that for the moment their interests coincided with those of the bourgeois democrats, until such time as the absolutist regimes had been overthrown, and should then continue their struggle against the new bourgeois regimes. It was assumed that "the bourgeois democratic governments" could be placed in the situation of immediately losing "all backing among workers" (Marx's address to the Communist League, 1850). Second, when the Manifesto was reprinted for the first time in 1872, Marx and Engels stated in the Preface that "no special stress is laid on the revolutionary measures proposed at the end of Section II. That passage would, in many respects, be very differently worded today." For instance Germany had become a unified bourgeois state the year before. In fact, many of the measures have since been implemented within capitalism.

Socialist and Communist Literature

In this section Marx discusses various other contemporary types of "socialism" and "communism". The Critical-Utopian Socialists (St. Simon, Fourier, Owen) are praised for revealing the class division in society, but are utopian because they refuse to advocate a class politics. This is understandable, given the level of development at the time the utopians wrote in the early nineteenth century. Nevertheless, their practical measures point to the abolition of class antagonisms: "the abolition of the distinction between town and country, of the family, of the carrying on of industries for the account of private individuals, and of the wage system, the proclamation of social harmony, the conversion of the functions of the state into a mere superintendence of production". The reference to the abolition of the distinction between town and country, and family, in the former case is evidence of an ecological critique of the way capitalism centralises and concentrates living space, in the latter case it is evidence of a critique of the gender roles imposed on women and men in a class society.

Position of the Communists in Relation to the Various Existing Opposition Parties

The Communist League fights for "the attainment of the immediate aims, interests of the working class; but in the movement of the present, they also represent the future of the movement" (original wording). The Communist League "turn their attention chiefly to Germany, because that country is on the eve of a bourgeois revolution." The Communist League "openly declare that their ends can be attained only by the forcible overthrow of all social orders up to now. Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose in this but their chains. They have a world to win.Working men of all countries, unite!" (original wording).

The final injunction to forcibly overthrow the old social orders was framed within the context of absolutist regimes with little or nothing in the way of a franchise. In such circumstances it did seem that force was the only way of bringing about change. Later in life Marx argued that the universal franchise meant that the working class might be able to bring about change peacefully by force of numbers.

The Manifesto was also written before Marx had sufficiently worked out his theory of value. A reference to wages tending to the bare physical subsistence level should not be taken as a theoretical proposition, but rather as a rhetorical flourish. The latter applies to some other phrases, such as the inevitability of workers' power.

Setting to one side the capitalist measures at the end of section 2, we can extract Marx's ideas on communism (or socialism, since Marx made no distinction between the terms as systems of society) which remain valid as a Manifesto for the twenty-first century:

• Communists (Socialists) want to abolish private ownership of the means of production, buying and selling, the wages system, the economic enforcement of the family unit, the concentration and centralisation of living space and the state.
• Communists (Socialists) want to replace this with democracy and a free association in which the self-development of each individual is the condition for the development of everybody.
• Communism (Socialism) must be world-wide, because it is replacing a system which is world-wide.
• It must be brought about by the revolutionary political action of the working class.
• It must be brought about by the majority of the working class, not minorities.
• Communists (Socialists) are the most determined and politically organised section of the working class, but they are not a vanguard leading the working class.

Lew Higgins

Cooking the Books: Comic Capitalism (2014)

The Cooking the Books Column from the December 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

The word ‘capitalism’ is well and truly back in circulation. At one time if you used it you were taken for a Communist. Not any more. Even stand-up comedians have incorporated it into their routines. One is Liam Williams who was given a page in Time Out (October 7-13) to tell jokes about capitalism. Actually, they were largely at the expense of those who defend capitalism.

Defining capitalism as being where ‘the means of production and trade are privately owned and operated for profit’, he has somebody called Mo%^&$fucker! object

‘The only alternative is a primitive economic system involving trading with stones or shits.’

Socialists have often heard this objection as ‘so you want to go back to barter?’ No, we don’t. Socialism will involve the disappearance of money but also the disappearance of all ‘trading’, all buying and selling. As the means for producing wealth (useful things) will be commonly owned so will the wealth produced.

The question will then be, not how to sell it (how can owners sell what they own to themselves?), but how to distribute it, how to share it out. Socialism doesn’t mean going back to barter. It means going forward, now that the technology and skills exist to produce enough for all, to distribution in accordance with the principle of ‘from each their ability, to each their need.’ People co-operate to produce what they need and then have free access to it. Money becomes redundant and does need to be replaced by anything.

Williams then deals with a more subtle defence of capitalism:

‘Capitalism is now the dominant economic model. It’s actually a product of nature, like maths and human song.’

This is the familiar ‘human nature’ objection to socialism. If socialism is unnatural, then capitalism is natural. Actually, capitalism is neither natural nor eternal. It has not always existed but is a product of social and historical evolution. It came into being, in western Europe, in the course of the 15th to 16th century when countries began producing for sale on an outside market that none of them were able to dominate or control but, on the contrary, had to adapt to in order to survive economically. This set in motion a process which led to one group of people (a small minority) acquiring money seeking profitable investment and another group (the vast majority) of landless people seeking to sell their ability to work to get money to buy what they needed to survive.

Capitalism has now spread all over the world.  It  is still a system of production by workers employed for a wage or salary by those who own means of production and working to produce wealth for sale with a view to their profit.

He mentions Thomas Piketty’s book Capital in the Twenty-First Century which, he says, ‘shows how the gap between rich and poor is widening dangerously’ and adds ‘but even he thinks outright anti-capitalism is nonsense’. He goes on:

‘Most figures of political and intellectual influence agree that his proposals (including a global confiscation tax on the absurdly rich) are unfeasibly idealistic.’

It is not clear whether or not this is another joke at the expense of defenders of capitalism. In any event, it is true that Piketty’s proposals are ‘unfeasible’ as capitalism can’t be reformed to stop the rich getting richer.  That’s a by-product of the accumulation of capital out of profits which is what capitalism is all about.

Action Replay: Your Name’s in the Book (2014)

The Action Replay Column from the December 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

What do you do if you are a top sportsperson and age or fitness lead you to retire? You could extend your career a little by moving to a country with a lower standard of play, or you could try to become a coach or manager or pundit. Alternatively, or perhaps in addition, you could write a book, or rather have one ghost-written for you (rather like the many memoirs by actors, musicians or TV ‘celebrities’). You could give your side of various arguments and settle some old scores, as well as making a few bob. There have been a couple of prominent examples in recent weeks.

Cricketer Kevin Pietersen has ‘written’ KP: My Autobiography: to a large extent it is built around his annoyance at being blamed for the fiasco of England’s Ashes tour to Australia in 2013–14, which the team lost 5-0. It accuses the team’s coach, Andy Flower, of being basically useless, and hints that captain Alastair Cook was too weak for the job. But in particular it singles out divisions in the dressing room and an alleged clique of three top bowlers and a wicket-keeper who could be very nasty to other players. Pietersen was England’s most prolific run-scorer of all time, but that is not the book’s focus.

Then there’s footballer Roy Keane’s The Second Half (ghosted by novelist Roddy Doyle). By the time the book was written, Keane had already had a bit of a dodgy post-playing career, as manager and then as pundit. Despite his success as a player with Manchester United (including seven Premier League titles), the book has a great negative deal to say about United manager Alex Ferguson, and in particular about the way Keane left the club. In a TV interview Keane criticised his teammates, and Ferguson basically tore up his contract (costing him a sizeable sum of money). There’s also material on his arguments with some of the other United players.

Many workers who aren’t top athletes will be accustomed to some form of office politics, with cliques and rivalry and people getting at each other. It seems that even at the top of the sporting tree, where the pay is beyond what most people dream of, similar things take place.

Paul Bennett

The Parade (1987)

From the Winter 1987-88 issue of the World Socialist

Swaying kilts and swinging arms,

Skirling bagpipes, Beating drums,

We're marching on parade.

With measured beat

Of soldiers feet,

Spit and polish and tunics neat,

We give the passers-by a treat

When we are on parade.

Swaying kilts and swinging arms,

We're marching on parade.

Our sweethearts wave,

The know we're brave,

We are the sons our mothers gave,

We do not think of soldiers graves,

When we are on parade.

Skirling bagpipes, beating drums,

At last we reach the church.

Thou shalt not kill,

Least not until,

The priest has blessed the guns.

Skirling bagpipes, beating drums, 

Mud and blood and battles won. 

It was kill him Jack - Bayonet or gun, 

We wondered what we've all become, 

The world's no different - just the same, 

So was the killing all in vain?

Sid Catt

Pathfinders: Watch This Space . . . (2014)

The Pathfinders Column from the December 2014 issue of the Socialist Standard

Space flight dominated last month’s science reporting, with the embarrassment of an exploding Antares rocket and a crashed Virgin Galactic plane being rapidly pushed off the front page by the media hoo-ha over the Philae probe, which bounced around on a comet, sent back half a dozen pictures, drilled a hole then expired.

The Philae landing was undoubtedly quite a feat, like pinging a peanut across a continent and having it land in an eggcup. A tweet immediately went viral inviting cynics everywhere to complete the phrase ‘they can land on a comet but they can’t… (e.g. stop war, solve world hunger etc) but such cynics are missing the big picture. Drilling into a comet could tell us whether our water came from outer space, and even more importantly, whether life could have come from outer space, and even more importantly than that, whether humans can feasibly strip-mine speeding space rocks so that fat future profits can also come from outer space.

Now UK news services are abuzz with a new crowd-sourced bid to send a British probe to, er, the moon and drill a hole in that too (BBC Online, 19 November). The enthusiasm seems quite out of proportion to the aim, but it’s a chance to put one over on the Chinese and besides, space travel is a good deal more sexy than fixing Earth’s problems. Indeed it tends to bring out the silly or downright suicidal in some people, as witness last year’s Mars One project. Not a space probe but a Dutch company, Mars One sought volunteers for a one-way manned trip to Mars, the costs being recouped through TV coverage and sponsorship deals. Not one person in their right mind would go for this, you would think, especially as you had to pay a €30 deposit. Over 200,000 people signed up. Socialists might be desperate to escape the capitalist prison, but we’re not that desperate. The only red planet we want to live on is this one.

… Oddity

A cover version of David Bowie’s famous song Space Oddity, done by a Canadian astronaut in a very odd accent aboard the International Space Station, has been reposted to YouTube after having been taken down due to licensing restrictions (BBC Online, 4 November). Bowie himself had no objection to the cover, describing it as ‘poignant’. What stood in its way were the rules of terrestrial capitalism. As the singer, Chris Hadfield, explained: ‘The Space Station was built by 15 countries, and depending on where I floated while singing and playing, whose copyright laws applied? Which Space Agency owned the recording? Whose jurisdiction was I in?’

If aliens ever visit and like any of our pop music, let them beware. It’s a minefield down here.

Toys R Us(eless)

Continuing the space theme, the Telegraph was recently keen to report the apparently astounding fact that ‘There is more computer power in some of this year's top Christmas toys than the first moon mission’ (5 November). Big deal. There’s more computer power in your washing machine too, and your phone, and if you’re a true early adopter, your glasses.

At the risk of resorting to Christmas grumpy mode, what is all this computer power doing? Making crappy dolls to emulate babylike simpering tones while talking to your iPad, and plastic dayglo smart watches that store 900 photographs an inch wide. How cool, how awesome! What a load of utter rubbish, all designed to last two weeks and all designed to cost a fortune, paid out by overworked parents who can’t afford it but are trying to make up for ignoring the kids all the rest of the year.

What would children really want for Christmas, if they had the knowledge and imagination to ask for it, and any expectation whatsoever of getting it?

They might want their two front teeth, like the old song. More likely, they might want parents who aren’t permanently stressed out with bills, debts, overwork and each other. They might want siblings who can be friends instead of rivals. They might want to live in a house that it’s affordable to heat properly in winter, in an area where they won’t get beaten up by local gangs if they go to the shop. They might want a say about whether they have to go to school, about where they go, and what they do when they get there. They might want to feel safe, and secure, and understood, and cared about. They might want to feel that they have a future worth looking forward to, that strangers are just friends they haven’t met yet, that they are not too fat or too thin or too stupid but just right, that alive is a good thing to be.

But this year, if they’re lucky, they’ll just get capitalism rammed in their stocking, just like every other year. Ho ho ho.

The only way is ethics?

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges recently produced a report arguing that doctors have an ethical duty to prevent waste in the NHS (BBC Online, 6 November). It’s not hard to understand the argument. Billions are wasted every year that could pay nurses more or buy extra equipment. Doctors of course being no strangers to ethical codes but frequently being utter strangers to budgets, the AMRC naturally thought a spot of moral arm-twisting was in order.

The idea of waste being ‘unethical’ is a fairly novel one, considering how profligate nature itself is. But it’s not the first thing to be morally stigmatised by a civil society anxious to change our behaviour – two recent examples being smoking and drink/driving.

Since socialists are anxious to change the behaviour of civil society, perhaps we ought to use ethical arguments more. The trouble is, the whole subject makes us slightly nervous, because of the problem of moral relativism.

What’s ethical to you isn’t necessarily ethical to him or her. And while ethics can be based on empirical reasoning, as with the doctors, it doesn’t have to be. It could be based on mystical dreams, or God’s word, or a Hollywood film script. Building a case primarily out of ethics is like building a shed primarily out of blancmange.

Some scientists think that moral relativism is a myth and that we are hard-wired to be moral, pointing to the activities of mirror neurons in the brain’s motor cortex, which fire off in sympathy at certain observed behaviours in others and trigger similar responses in us. The strongest of these effects is seen in yawning, however, an activity not normally related to questions of morality unless you’re intensely bored with the subject.

Still, there’s not much doubt that people are only motivated to act when they perceive that something is ethically ‘wrong’, not just scientifically ‘incorrect’.  The Proto-Indo-European root steig (prick or pointed) gives us stick, stigma and instigate. What other behaviours can we expect to see stigmatised in the future, with a view to changing behaviour? Using fossil fuels, probably. Eating fat or meat or sugar or being a couch potato, possibly. One key social norm which we would be in a hurry to see stigmatised is the ‘right’ of a small group of people to exist as a parasitical social elite at the expense of everyone else and the environment. It’s about time people realised that’s not just incorrect, it’s damn well wrong.

PJS

The People You Meet—Gilbert (1949)

From the November 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

Gilbert is a very bright young man. Religiously he studies the columns of the Times and the Guardian and shocked his father by ordering the Daily Worker. Regularly he subscribes to the Tribune and the Statesman, and of course was one of the first to buy "Orwell's 1984."

He had been a subaltern in some minor county regiment—though he is very much opposed to any future war. His check shirt, brown corduroys and meerschaum pipe can be seen at every so-called "peace rally" in Trafalgar Square and other places. For a short time he wore a big white badge—"Britain's Youth for Peace." Someone once suggested that on the reverse side it read "Strike Now in the West," but that's by the way.

Yes, Gilbert considered himself a progressive! When the dockers were on strike he organised (such a brilliant organiser, my dear!) a fête and jumble sale in aid of their funds. When the city recruiting campaign was at its peak he showered leaflets at a well-known general. He even scowled at the commissionaires outside the American Embassy.

But in spite of this bravado, Gilbert was really a sensitive lad. Lured into the East End one Saturday night by some of his venturesome comrades, he was really shocked at what he saw. Every pub was crowded with coarse, loud animals, singing, drinking and loudly laughing at crude jokes and indelicate gestures. On the pavements pommaded youths and powdered lasses jostled for each other's attentions. Thousands poured out of the dog tracks.

Thank God for people like Gilbert, thought Gilbert. "These people—wh'why, th'they're—er—indescribable—more like beasts." Then he was consoled. Once he and his friends had achieved the revolution they would soon straighten their ideas out. They would teach them culture and respect for the intellectuals.

Poor Gilbert—for he is more to be pitied than blamed. He, with his empty intellectual snobbery, is just as much a child of his environment as the workers he deplores.

But they are the workers. What if they are in a pub or at the dogs on a Saturday night? What if the pavement is their marriage market? On Monday mornings they are the dockers, the turners, the mechanics; they are the laundry workers, the factory hands, the shop assistants; in short they are the folk who run this system of society from top to bottom. True they are not fully class conscious; true they still vote for the Labour Party, but let any employer attempt to molest their individual wages or conditions and you'll seem fight like tigers.

These are the people who will achieve the social revolution. Each day brings fresh evidence of the anomalies of Capitalism: each day opens some worker's eyes. As the wheel of Capitalism with its  ever increasing slumps and wars accelerates, so their realisation grows. One day it will reach its crescendo and the revolution will take place—not because of or for Gilbert—but in spite of him.

RONALD.