Imperial Pusher (1985)

From the November 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Rapidly growing drug addiction is becoming a major headache for governments in many parts of the world. Apart from the fact that the conditions of capitalism cause anti-social behaviour among some workers, much of the problem is due to the actions of governments themselves, both past and present. According to the latest (1984) Home Office statistics, the number of drug addicts in the UK rose by 26 per cent to a record 7,400. However, the head of Scotland Yard central drug squad said the figure could be five times higher. This is not high compared with other countries, but it is growing at a faster rate. Drugs are more readily available because the traffic is more profitable, and as long as this lasts drugs will be here to stay.

There is no shortage of pressure groups, ranging from politicians and journalists, to church leaders and broadcasters, all calling on the government to deal with "those evil men who traffic in human misery". All overlook the fact that the capitalist system itself both creates and deals in human misery; for them that is not the issue.

It may come as a severe shock to these anti-drug crusaders to learn that not so long ago Queen Victoria and her ministers, at least one Prime Minister (Lord Palmerston) and many members of the Houses of Lords and Commons, were in fact the evil men and women responsible not only for drug pushing, but for its production also. The gigantic scale of the operation carried out by these highly respected people makes the combined effort of the modern drug pushers look puny.

When the police or the customs seize 100 kilos of heroin or a ton of cannabis, everybody is happy. Yet these are piffling amounts compared to the tons of opium (the basis of heroin) which were shipped into China from India between 1839 and 1890. It would be true to say that the present international drugs problem owes its existence mainly to the legalising of the production and distribution of drugs, primarily by the British government in the mid-19th century and the deliberate use of armed force to thrust them onto the China market. It took three wars, covering a period of nearly 20 years to do it, but it was accomplished.

The opium wars of 1839. 1856 and 1858 broke down semi-feudal China's resistance to foreign trade, particularly to the import of opium from India. In fact, the Indian finances of the British government depended on the opium trade with China, including the contraband trade which was given official assistance and carried out openly by British and American ships. The Victorian politicians knew perfectly well that opium was harmful, but justified its forcible export into China in the interests of free trade;

  Our government in India is dependent for revenue on the sale of opium in China, as the people of England are dependent for their breakfast and their every meal on the produce of that Empire. (Economist, 30 April 1853.)

Before the East India Company, backed by the British government, started shipping small quantities of opium to China as an experiment in 1773 there was little addiction among the Chinese. Rigid laws, thoroughly enforced, prohibited the cultivation of the opium poppy and the use of the drug. Its import was banned in 1800 except for use as medicine and the death penalty was introduced in 1839 for merchants and other persons having stocks of opium. However, there was wide-spread smuggling in 1838; around 50 British and American vessels were engaged in running contraband under the protection of the British Navy. In that year, 20,200 chests of opium each containing 125 lbs (i.e. about 1,127 tons) were confiscated by the Chinese authorities. This was one of the prime causes of the first opium war. Indemnities were demanded of the Chinese. The town of Nanking was seized and the war commenced. A subsequent peace treaty ceded Hong Kong to the British government and five ports were opened to British trade, which of course included the opium trade to which the Chinese authorities were vehemently opposed. Despite their repeated protests the trade continued and expanded.

Marx, in an article to the New York Daily Tribune (25 September 1850) described it as the free trade in poison and showed the complicity of the British government with the producers, merchants, shippers and smugglers in the "hazardous operation of poisoning an Empire". He also quoted R Montgomery Martin, a devout Christian and Treasurer of the Diplomatic Consul Service in China, about the effect of opium:

  "'Why, the slave-trade was merciful compared with the opium trade. We did not destroy the bodies of the Africans, for it was our immediate interest to keep them alive; we did not debase their nature, corrupt their minds, nor destroy their souls. But the opium seller slays the body after he has corrupted, degraded and annihilated the moral being of unhappy sinners, which every hour is bringing new victims to a Moloch which knows no satiety. and where the English murderer and Chinese suicide vie with each other the offerings at his shrine." (New York Tribune, 20 September 1858.)

As the effect of opium on the Chinese was devastating they continued to resist its import and this in turn meant the continuance of the wars which had already lasted for 16 years. Finally, after the bombardment of Canton, carried out by the Bible-banging Sir John Bowring, Britain received by the Treaty of Tiensen the legalisation of the opium trade.

In 1868 the Emperor of China sent a letter to Queen Victoria, appealing to her both as a queen and as a woman, asking her to join with him in suppressing the hideous opium curse. The letter offered anything that might be desired in the way of concessions to British trade if the curse could be removed but no reply was received from the queen, nor was any sent. Obviously the queen was advised by her ministers, and they had already made their views public. In Parliament, Sir John Hobhouse said the government had done nothing to stop the opium trade because it was profitable. Lord Melbourne said. "We possess vast territories peculiarly fitted for raising opium"; he was referring to "the jewel in the crown", Mother India, where the British were supreme landlords. Lord Palmerston, Prime Minister, had declared war on China without the sanction of Parliament.

Chester Holcombe in his book The Real Chinese Question claimed that at the height of the trade some 1,700,000 acres of land were required for opium destined for the Chinese market. In 1878-79 the colossal amount of 91,200 chests of opium were imported into China; each contained 125 lbs. (about 5.089 tons), from which the British capitalist class received £8.25 million in revenue—at today's prices, worth about £239m. At one point China was receiving only opium in exchange for her two imports of tea and silk. For every chest of opium exported from India, the British government received £88.50 (now about £2,966). the Indian farmer £26-£27. and the Chinese £10.50 (Holcombe). In fact, the import duty which China was allowed to charge was fixed by the British at 1/6 (7½p) a pound—a revenue the Chinese authorities did not want. Even so, the tremendous scale of smuggling protected by the guns of the British Navy considerably reduced the revenue collected. In 1879 they took less than £1 million (£29 million today).

In 1875 the Chinese government submitted to all governments represented at Peking, practically all European governments including Russia, and also America, a detailed complaint about the opium trade and requested action to bring it to an end. Nothing was done. Now in 1985 it is the American and European governments who are appealing to the Chinese government about the smuggling of drugs through Hong Kong. Pakistan, Korea and other Far Eastern countries are also being asked to co-operate to stop the traffic. They may agree in principle, but the Nelson eye will be turned because of its profitability.

The black vampire of drugs will suck people dry as they try to escape from the capitalist system itself. The addict sees no future, but there is one. It does not lie in some strawberry fields, but in actively and energetically promoting the abolition of capitalism and its replacement by socialism.

Jim D'Arcy

A Fight to the Finish (1985)

Book Review from the November 1985 issue of the Socialist Standard

Strike, Sunday Times Insight Team. (Coronet Books £2.50)

This book is unlikely to find much favour among left wing activists, preoccupied as they are with weaving over the calamitous reality of the coal strike a blanket of myths:

• that it was all caused by the malevolent intent of Thatcher, MacGregor and the rest; 
• that Arthur Scargill was a saviour of the working class, crucified by the media;
• that the miners were struggling for "their" jobs and "their" communities:
• that the coal industry can and should be run for the benefit and comfort of the miners under a capitalist society;
• that it can all be put to rights by the election of another Labour government who will release the gaoled miners, repay the fines imposed by the courts, re-employ the sacked strikers, restore the union's sequestrated funds . . .

The British coal industry, which in its heyday contributed so much to the profits of the capitalist class, has been in continuous decline since the First World War. In 1913 there were 3.000 working pits producing some 300m tonnes a year; when the industry was nationalised in 1947 there were under one thousand turning out 200m tonnes a year. Even so, the industry in 1947 supplied about 90 per cent of the primary energy requirements in Britain. One plan after another — none of them having much basis in reality — promised heavier investment, busier pits, higher production. more secure jobs. At times — for example in the oil crisis of 1973/4 — the optimism was tinged with hysteria. In the event, the plans were undermined by competition from other energy sources, notably oil and natural gas and by 1974 coal was filling barely one third of the total fuel market in Britain. The profitability of individual pits came under the accountants' scrutiny and many of those which weighed in the wrong side of the balance sheet were closed. This happened under Labour governments as well as under the Tories and when Heath's 1970 victory threw out the Wilson government there were less than 300 active pits.

To begin with, the closures — in spite of the dramatic changes they wrought, for example in the Rhondda which was left with only one pit — were accomplished with little opposition. British capitalism at large was still booming enough to provide plenty of other jobs to miners who were offered seductive redundancy terms. In general the NUM co-operated quietly under a succession of leaders who liked to think they were craftily applying the politics of the possible. But as the slump deepened the miners' resistance to redundancy. to uprooting themselves and their families, stiffened. In 1981, by an emphatic majority, they elected as their president, the much loved, much hated Arthur Scargill.

The new NUM President had been prominent in — perhaps largely responsible for — the miners' victories in 1972 and 1974 and he appeared to be obsessed by, and to have learned nothing from, the experiences. It is difficult to explain his policies and actions other than through a resolve to engage the government in a titanic, no-compromise fight to the finish, at whatever cost. But if the government had been defeated in the 1970s. and had beat an apparently humiliating retreat over closures in 1981, by 1984 they were ready for a war of attrition with whichever trade union was prepared to go over the top. Nicholas Ridley, now Minister for Transport, contributed importantly to the government's strategy and there could have been few more obvious choices for the new Chairman of the NCB than Ian MacGregor (who had first been approached, as a prospective hatchet man for British Leyland. by a Labour Industry Secretary). MacGregor later described the strike as a poker game, in which the first one to blink was the loser: 'I don't intend to blink".

Thereafter, the government's tactics could hardly be faulted. Most vitally they kept the power stations supplied with coal by using small, non-union road transport firms and by importing coal through minor ports like Flixborough. Thus an exceptionally severe winter was survived without any power cuts. They hastily appeased other strikes — in the docks and by the pit deputies — which posed a crucial threat to their strategy. Any possible sympathy among other important unions was diverted with a propaganda campaign which emphasised the comparatively large redundancy payments on offer to the miners. They consistently harped on the NUM's refusal to hold a ballot, which was Scargill's most damaging mistake. Finally, the whole policy was asserted by a massive, massively organised, police presence which did not baulk at breaking the law in order to frustrate the pickets.

Against that the miners could oppose their courage, their ingenuity, their tradition of militancy — and Scargill's empty rhetoric. Unity they could not offer, for Scargill's refusal to hold a ballot had prevented that. As the going got tougher Scargill tried to conceal reality beneath bluster and with claims of an imminent victory, reminiscent of Hitler's last days in the Berlin bunker. The time came when with each day out the miners' resolve was bound to weaken. The NCB response to this was to harden its face, refusing Scargill's desperate appeal to return to a settlement which he had earlier refused. Perhaps the breaking point came at Christmas, when the miners' poignant celebrations were followed by a sickening sense of anti-climax. There was little else for them to do but surrender. leaving the NUM and the rest of the union movement with little strength to resist the employers' onslaughts.

This is not to say that all was well on the other side of the barricades, where MacGregor was a disaster in the cynical, slippery game of ruling class propaganda. At times the divisions in the NCB management were almost as marked as those in the NUM. What counted in the end. above the influences of any personalities, were the basic facts that coal is a commodity — produced for sale and profit — and that the endurance of workers on strike is limited by their inability to survive without an income. As happened in 1926. the miners were really starved into submission.

Strike is a compact, informative account of that year of conflict but its sympathies show through. Andrew Neil, editor of the Sunday Times, introduces the book with glowing praise as ". . . impartial and well-informed . . . accurate . .. scoop of the year. . ." while assuring us that the Insight team work independently of the paper's editorial policy, which is " . . for the sake of liberal democracy, economic recovery and the rolling back of union power''. Perhaps that is why Strike, so illuminating on some issues, gives so little attention to the savage behaviour of the police and to their other illegal policies, such as the obstruction of public thoroughfares, which have such serious implications for political and trade union activity. It is similarly scant about the stoicism and courage of the miners and their families in sustaining so long and bitter a struggle.

This is not a comfortable book for left wingers because of the lessons which can be drawn from it by the class conscious. Workers have no "right" to their jobs; they are employed only on the prospect that their labour will yield profit to the capitalists. In a class divided society conflict is inevitable but in this the strike should be a weapon of last resort, not the plaything of a leader. Strikes should proceed on a democratic decision and ideally should be brief as well as concentrated. It is vital to separate the struggles on the industrial field, which are about the division of wealth under capitalism, from that on the political field, which is concerned with the revolution to dispossess the capitalists of their monopoly of the means of life. It is on the political field, and not the industrial, that the working class is able to contest with the state, to control it for their own emancipation.

For the workers to ignore these lessons is futile and dangerous. History is a guide for future action and that of the coal strike points unwaveringly to the urgent need for a new social system.

Ivan

Eyewitness: A Socialist in China (1974)

From the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Ten months in China, October to August. Peking Language Institute, study Chinese, play table-tennis, holiday to Shanghai, visits to factories, May Day celebrations, Peking University, meet Heath, trip to Sian, back to Britain.

Thus the story of my stay in China. Among the first students to go to China since the Cultural Revolution, we were able to get closer to the Chinese people than other visitors, but even so a Wall (little rather than Great) remained. We could get beyond the pat phrases and slogans, but not to the extent that we wished.

No doubt a fair amount of this lack of familiarity is because visitors to China (the Chinese prefer to call one a “foreign friend” rather than a “foreigner”; or, if they are being polite, a “foreign guest”) are a race apart, receiving different treatment from that accorded to the Chinese themselves. It works two ways. To be served first in shops and given seats on crowded buses is all very well (and a “privilege” that it is impossible to refuse), but it does not make up for total exclusion from Chinese political processes and being unable to buy local newspapers and reference news-sheets.

In Hangchow, a friend and I were reading some wall-posters about local problems when a man came up, asked us which country we were from, and then insisted very firmly that we move on, saying, “Big-character posters are an internal affair of the Chinese.” The sometimes hysterical campaign against Antonioni’s film on China made the atmosphere particularly uncomfortable for anyone who walked around the streets with a camera. To walk about in Peking was to attract the attention of passers-by, while in some of the smaller towns rarely visited by tourists, where we were allowed twenty minutes or so to look round the shops, a crowd assembled to stare open-mouthed at us as if we were inhabitants of another planet — which perhaps we were. Chinese claims to be “internationalist” ring a little hollow after exposure to travel restrictions and to the intensely nationalistic cast of so much of Chinese propaganda.

Connected with treatment of “foreigners” was one of my deepest disappointments — the running of the Language Institute, where the “leadership” acted in a very highhanded, undemocratic and intolerant manner. Any action which they objected to was met by rejoinders that we must “obey the rules” and “respect Chinese customs” (which could clearly be interpreted to mean almost anything). Although we had been promised one when we first arrived, they refused to provide any kind of common room, or even a place for students to meet and discuss problems. They also refused to open up more than a small part of the Institute’s library — and would not believe that overseas students in Britain had the same library facilities as British students. They were quite happy to meet students’ “reasonable requests”, but reserved for themselves the right to decide what was “reasonable”.

I was therefore extremely glad to move at the beginning of May to the nearby Peking University to follow more specialist courses in Chinese history and literature. Here, in an environment enlivened by the presence of Korean and Vietnamese students of English, we were treated as adults rather than children, and covered much interesting ground. Language teaching at the Institute had been marred by an unwillingness to go far outside the texts studied, and with the emphasis merely on increasing one’s passive vocabulary, many students become bored, lazy and very disillusioned.

Fortunately there was more to life than study. For a start there was Peking itself, a city with centuries of history and many fascinating places. We went on coach trips to the Great Wall (which is truly unbelievable), the Ming Tombs, and other tourist spots. We could wander round the city’s parks and streets, searching out good restaurants and bookshops. Restaurants, by the way, provided one of the few chances to talk with Chinese from outside the academic world. Two holidays, to Shanghai, Hangchow and Nanking in winter, and to Sian, Yenan and Tachai in summer, included visits to beauty spots and also to factories and communes — these we visited in Peking too, and this enabled us to form in at least some detail a picture of how the Chinese live and work.

An average visit to a factory was organized as follows. First, an introduction to the factory, usually with statistics of size and production, by a member of its Revolutionary Committee. Then a more or less conducted tour of the workshops, followed by a session of questions and answers. Too often it was impossible to elicit satisfactory replies, but information on wage rates was easy to come by. Average wages, I should say, are less than £15 a month, while apprentices will earn half of this amount and technicians and highly-skilled craftsmen may earn three times as much. Wage levels should always be borne in mind when one reads correct, but misleading, statements about the cost of living in China — such as that a reasonable meal, including beer, can be had for 15p, or that a warm padded jacket costs £3. It is also worth noting that many different qualities of goods are available, and naturally enough they are on sale at different prices. So in China, as elsewhere under capitalism, one gets what one pays for, whether it is a matter of food, clothes or table-tennis bats.

Trade unions, which disappeared in the late ’sixties because they were found to be following the policies of the disgraced Head of State Liu Shao-chi’i, have been reconstructed in the last couple of years. But they bear little resemblance to trade unions as existing in the West, their main functions being to help solve production problems and organize the study of “Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung thought”. Thus, like other organizations such as the so-called democratic parties (which still exist but play a very minor role) they are mainly “transmission belts” by means of which Party directives and policies reach various sections of the Chinese working class.

In many factories one sees schoolchildren, perhaps only thirteen or fourteen years of age, working, for many if not all of them have to spend one month a year in a local workshop. At a knitwear factory in Peking, I asked if they received wages. The answer was no, and then another cadre interrupted to say, “But they don’t work on the night shift” !

After visits to a number of factories and conversations with Chinese students and others, the conclusion is that in China the worker is an instrument of production, a mere producer of wealth. A man will decide whether a woman is a suitable marriage partner largely on the grounds of how well she works at her job. A Chinese student told us that it is all right to have a “good time” on a Saturday night, but not on other evenings since this may interfere with production.

But only a minority of the Chinese live in cities or work in factories. Perhaps 80 per cent. of the population live in the countryside, in small villages organized into the people’s communes, which are themselves divided into brigades (normally of village size) and production teams (with several tens of families in each one). The economic status of commune members requires clarification. The Chinese call them “peasants”, but they are not peasants in the sense of agriculturalists who produce primarily for their own consumption on a family farm (owned or rented). For a start, the basic unit of production is the production team, not the single family; secondly, most land is “owned” by the collective not by the individual family; thirdly, their income is a mixture of cash and payment in kind. It is true that many commune members, besides working on collective land, also have their own private plots, where they produce for their own consumption or for private sale. But the importance of such plots varies considerably — for instance, in Hangchow we visited a brigade whose main crop was a particularly famous brand of tea, much of which is exported. Private plots and payment in kind were of minimal importance here, since it is after all difficult to live on tea. Income in communes is mainly allocated on the basis of work-points — a form of piece-work which means that commune members are more correctly described as rural proletarians.

On the communes women are not paid on an equal footing with men. Indeed the model brigade of Tachai were quite open about, and even proud of, the system they employ: for a full day’s work a man can earn up to a maximum of eleven work-points, but the most a woman can earn is eight and a half points. We were given two reasons for this. Firstly, women are physically weaker than men, and secondly, they work shorter hours since, for instance, they have to go home early in order to do the cooking!

One of the most striking discoveries after visiting several communes is the differing standards of living displayed. The tea-producing brigade mentioned above, with a crop which is dependable and much in demand, is comparatively well-off, its members living in solid two-storey houses built by themselves at a cost of about seven hundred pounds; while the inhabitants of the arid and mountainous Tachai have just one small room per family. This stark dependence on local soil conditions is chiefly attributable to the much-acclaimed policy of “keeping the initiative in our own hands”, which effectively maintains the distinction between poorer and richer areas. Chinese boasts as to their lack of reliance on outside help — whether at the local or national level — should not be taken at face value. At the Red Flag Canal in Lin Hsien, we went to a hydro-electric power station. This was held up to us as a fine example of “independence and self-reliance”, but inside was equipment from Austria, Switzerland and Czechoslovakia . . .

But inequality is apparent not merely between different areas, but among different people at the same place, say Peking. Quite apart from the wage differentials mentioned earlier, there are also startlingly different life-styles observable. It is quite common to sec people riding bikes that are literally falling apart with rust, or wearing clothes that have been patched again, while university professors wear smart suits and army officers ride around in big cars. As to the life led by the top rulers, one learns nothing.

When we arrived in China, there was a campaign taking place to “criticise Lin Piao and rectify one’s style of work”. It did not seem that this was being pursued very energetically, and so it was a great surprise when the movement against both Lin Piao and Confucius erupted to dominate newspaper front-pages and demand a great deal of time from the Chinese students. On the face of it, it is pretty unlikely — though not entirely impossible — that Lin, the former successor-designate to Mao Tse-tung who allegedly perished in 1971 after an unsuccessful attempt to kill the Chairman, was in reality a secret follower of the philosopher who lived and died in China two and a half millennia ago. If it is true, it speaks volumes for the lack of Socialist consciousness within the Chinese Communist Party. But the Chinese workers denounced Lin Piao on the sole basis of what the government had said about his deeds and beliefs. It would of course be naive to expect the Chinese authorities actually to publish the plans for Lin’s coup or extracts from his diary, but without such hard evidence it is not possible to accept the official account of the heresies claimed for him, which is what the Chinese appeared to do.

The above account is intended to be a straightforward description of some aspects of China today as seen through the eyes of a Socialist. No doubt supporters of China will object that a lot has been left unsaid, and too much emphasis placed on negative aspects. What, they will say, of the claimed achievements of new China — no homeless, no unemployed, the conquest of famine, education for all, health services where there were none before, engineering feats such as the Nanking Bridge ?

One could not deny that life in China now is far more secure than it was in 1949 after decades of civil war and Japanese invasion. Since then there have been twenty-five years of internal peace, ten years of aid from Russia, the opportunity to buy advanced technology from other countries — and a great deal of toil and suffering on the part of the Chinese working class. But while China can build bridges and huge gymnasia, negotiate to buy Concorde, and explode atomic bombs, it cannot provide decent housing and sanitary facilities for more than a tiny percentage of its population or allow its workers more than sixty non-working days in the whole year. And the basic question, surely, is how the wealth of China is produced, and the answer is that it is produced by exploited workers for accumulation and profit, just as in any other capitalist country.

Paul Bennett

So They Say: The CP Backs Britain (1974)

The So They Say Column from the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The CP Backs Britain

There is a school of thought which maintains that Socialists should view Communists and Labourites, as distinct from the Tories, as having something in common with us.

We don’t, and they haven’t. This was demonstrated in articles on the Election in the Communist Party’s fortnightly review Comment, on 7th September. What was the working-class issue in the Election ? According to Dave Cook, the National Agent:

 In the build up to the General Election, Britain’s economic position is the decisive issue, and it is around the policies to tackle the crisis that this political battle now explodes.

John Purton wrote on the same question—Britain’s Economy and the Crisis in the Capitalist World.

Purton discussed the gravity of the balance of payments situation and the need for economic co-operation with “the poorer underdeveloped oil-consuming countries”:

  Ideally, they should receive large sums of oil money, which would provide larger markets for industrial exports.

However:

  It does not mean that economic relations with monopoly capitalist countries can suddenly be abandoned or completely revised. Obviously, Britain's dependence on world trade would prevent that . . . Furthermore, the contradictions of capitalism provide a basis for a progressive government to bargain with countries of monopoly capitalism for relations which do in fact serve legitimate national interests.

So the “revolutionary”, “Marxist” CP want the working class to accept capitalism’s crisis, world trade, markets and national interests as its “legitimate” concerns. What are we supposed to have in common with this pernicious rubbish ?

Our Father's Up the Poll

The failure of the “opinion polls” forecasts of Election results has provided more talk than the Elections themselves this year. John Akass in The Sun (14th October) argued that they produce cantankerousness: the more predictions there are, the more unpredictability will be cultivated.

Very amusing, but wrong. The opinion polls are not the same as racing tips. Their daily prognoses in the campaigns inform the political leaders of, roughly, where they stand — so that each knows when a new promise or representation has to be made, if he can manage it. It is not the electors who want to upturn the polls, but the politicians.

However, the most recent one is unlikely to be changed. A poll published in the Sunday Times on 13th October found that fewer than one in three people believe that God exists. See what an advantage Wilson has over God. The latter can’t accuse his opponent of having no policy, or promise bigger and better rewards for prayer

A Worse Kind of Jungle

A question to socialists used to be: “What about the backward peoples of the world ?” It is seldom heard now because, like many other questions, it is being answered by capitalism: the tribesmen are becoming factory hands.

A talk on the New Guinea Mission, given at the Royal Commonwealth Society on 24th September, described the head-hunters’ new mode of life. Urban drift “has become a flood”, and started other floods too:

  The move to the towns is dragging in its train all the problems that have long been familiar in other countries all over the world. There is unemployment, inadequate housing, incipient slums and malnutrition. Mental illness, hitherto unknown in Papua New Guinea, is on the increase. So is crime, with juvenile delinquency causing particular concern. There is drunkenness, gambling and prostitution.

The New Guinea Mission’s speaker had a curious explanation for all the crime etc.: it is due mostly to “just plain old-fashioned sinfulness”. If it is old-fashioned, why is it a new phenomenon in New Guinea?

The correspondent who sent this item informs us that Bougainville, one of the larger islands, has a huge opencast copper mine using machines costing £50,000; and because of the copper deposits the island wants — independence. Shades of “Scottish oil” !

The Predatory Process

Some noteworthy facts about American involvement in South-east Asia were given in the Los Angeles Times Business and Finance section on 9th September:

 Direct US investment in South-east Asia was a meagre $200 million in 1950. The total grew to $2 billion by 1970, should reach $5 billion next year, and $10 billion in 1980.
 “It may be that opportunities in Europe have been decreasing but, more significantly, investment returns in Asia tend to be higher than those obtainable elsewhere”, the SRI report said. “One study found US investments returned 13% to 14% profit, and another found the median return on total equity of foreign firms in the Philippines, mostly American, to be over 31%.”

The report also describes the importance of oil in business with Indonesia: “Indonesia’s oil is in great demand due to its low sulphur content.”

Put this information beside the figure of 50,000 American servicemen killed, 350,000 wounded, and 1,000.000 Vietnamese killed to “secure” South-east Asia for “democracy and freedom”.

Superior Claimants

One of the ways in which people stake a claim to be “middle-class” is by running down the “working class” — i.e. manual workers as distinct from white- collar ones — as workshy spongers who milk the welfare services. A survey carried out recently by PEP has concluded that the boot is on the other foot:

  Our finding that managerial and professional workers are the most likely to be drawing unemployment benefit at the same time as both having no intention of taking an official job, and earning from unofficial employment, contrasts strongly with the popular image of the idle, feckless unemployed as manual workers.

(Evening Standard, 18th September)

It sounds revealing, but the revelation should go further. There is an implication that what they are doing should be stopped. We agree. Why should people resort to shifts and subterfuge for crumbs from capitalism when the whole loaf — which they helped to produce — can be claimed ? Managers and professionals need to recognize that they are members of the working class, and that Socialism is the answer.

Robert Barltrop

"Don't blame . . . " (1974)

From the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Don't blame the “wicked capitalists" for throwing people out of work. Most of them have never been near the factories, shipyards, mines, mills and offices where their unearned income is produced.

Workers — from managers to sweepers — are paid to run these places completely — including giving you the sack. Anyway most capitalists have their investments spread over a number of companies — for safety. Their stockbrokers may transfer their investments from one stock to another frequently, into whatever is most profitable at the moment.

So, if you are thrown out of work, you can’t really blame the capitalist — he is probably in the Bahamas, harming nobody — blame the order book and the stock market — the whole economic anarchy of capitalism. There are no hard feelings — no feelings at all, in fact. Capitalism just ignores people.

Leftist Hypocrisy about South Africa (1974)

From the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The evils of capitalism are inherent, so that no matter whether it is run by avowed capitalists or alleged socialists, the leopard always has the same nasty spots. One perennial result is that when leftists get into power, they do the dirty work they spent their pseudo-socialist time denouncing while in opposition. It could be said that the reverse of the question: who will do the dirty work under Socialism? is: who actually does the dirty work under capitalism? On the one hand, dustmen, miners, and other workers. On the other, the claimants for the rôle are the leftist political swindlers.

It is possible that some of them, being particularly stupid, at first think they can run the system without the dirt. But experience of office soon makes the real position clear. A government has to govern (one of Wilson’s great sayings).

Examples are legion. During the Tories’ "thirteen wasted years", Wilson and Co. went on about the nastiness of Polaris submarines with their murderous missiles. Three Wilson governments later, and not only are the appalling weapons still in Holy Loch — nobody gives a second thought. Least of all the leftist Aldermaston marchers of the great days of yore, who are now members of the Government.

Another prime example is, of course, South Africa. For many years this has seemed a soft option to the leftists. The racialist regime there is gruesome even by capitalist standards (although it could hardly be worse than those in eastern Europe; or in black African countries such as Uganda or the Central African Republic where President Bakasa personally supervises the beating to death of political opponents). So for years we have endured the spectacle of leftist politicians getting publicity out of such world-shattering matters as the admission of a South African cricket team to this country.

But then, the pseudos get into power (plush offices and black limousines). Lo and behold, one of those who screamed loudest about the cricket tour in ’70 and actually threatened to sit on the wicket at Lord’s — such heroism: he might, in our climate, have got rheumatism in his leftist arse — called Frank Judd, actually finds himself the boss of the Royal Navy. Under the orders of the anti-apartheid Judd, our gallant sailors have been in Simonstown taking part in joint exercises with the South African Navy. Does Judd think this is a lesser encouragement to the racialist regime than playing cricket with them at Lord’s? Well no, he doesn’t. The report (in the Observer — and doubtless other papers too) made clear that Judd was most upset. But the interests of British capitalism (which has enormous investments in South Africa — its third biggest customer, too) demand that the British government plays ball in a more serious way than cricket — and if the blacks don’t like it, it seems they have to lump it.

You might say that if Judd’s conscience was so offended, he could throw up his job; perhaps also his seat in Parliament and his membership of the Labour Party. How can you belong to a party which practises the opposite of what it has preached? Perhaps someone can tell me the last time a pseudo-socialist leader, realising that when in power they were doing the same dirty work as all capitalist governments, left his party and denounced it as being fake-socialist. Some hopes!

About the same time, the TUC was engaged in its annual beano. About a dozen of their prominent leaders (“Mr. Ray Buckton and Others” as the Times put it) wrote a letter to that well-known socialist journal to say how they deplored these junketings contrary to the principles of the Labour Party, etc. ad nauseam. These nauseous specimens did not challenge Wilson when he addressed them a few days later by saying that unless the operation was called off they would leave the Labour Party. All they did was to get their smug letter into print so that later, when challenged about their attitude on the fashionable South Africa issue, they could look righteous and say: “we objected”. Would Vorster be trembling because they had written their useless letter while their government was supporting him (as it did, of course, in 1970 while the idiotic cricket rumpus was going on)? Will the downtrodden black workers feel uplifted by this cant?

Before leaving South Africa, the British Lions rugby team went on a tour of Apartheid-land recently despite the pleas of Wilson and his so-called Minister of Sport, the football referee Howell, to call it off. Wilson instructed the British Embassy there to have no truck with the team and not to socialize with it; no cocktail parties, etc. (Needless to say he did not instruct the Embassy to have no truck with Vorster. That would be serious.) So the Ambassador could carry on socializing with Vorster but not with Willie-John McBride — who would naturally be heart-broken to have to get tight on South African hospitality instead of British. But what happens when the Lions came back ? Why, the Minister of Sport himself drank toasts at their reception.

What unprincipled bastards Labour are !

L. E. Weidberg.

The Brick Industry Drops One (1974)

From the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

Capitalism cannot work in the interests of the working class, nor can it be controlled. Economic problems are an inevitable result of capitalist society. You have only to pick up a newspaper (published and controlled by supporters of capitalism) to see the number of problems that face society. A good example was The Daily Mirror (July 2nd 1974) with its stark black front page, showing a pound note torn in two and asking the question, “Is Britain going Bankrupt?” The same issue of the paper went on to show how difficult it is for the ordinary Joe Soap to make ends meet.

Not only can capitalism not be controlled to eliminate its ever-increasing range of problems; it is also totally chaotic in its detailed operations. Take for example the house-building industry. Most members of the working class come up against the housing problem at some stage in their lives. They also see the adverts showing the country mansions and town developments — standing empty. They also know that despite the politicians’ promises, house-building has slowed down to its lowest rate since 1929 (Sunday Times June 30th 1974).

But the house-building industry’s blood brother, the brick industry, has really gone to town to demonstrate the total unpredictability of capitalist society. The Sunday Times (June 30th 1974) carried a big splash advert in its colour supplement headed “Brick Information”. The advert boasted of the success of the brick-building industry in 1973:

  Brickmakers had the situation well under control. Not only were the requirements of the construction industry fully satisfied, but manufacturers were able to increase their output to the point where it became possible to build up stocks against future sudden surges in demand. Faced with a steadily widening market for their output, brickmakers pressed ahead with modernisation programmes and with building of highly automated new plants to add to their existing production capacity.

The rest of the detailed advert patted the brick industry on the back for its excellent efforts. As Hamlet says: “He does well to comment it himself, there are no tongues else for’s turn”.

How cruel is fate under capitalism. No doubt the ad was booked a month or maybe more in advance of publication. The same issue of the Sunday Times carried a detailed analysis of the position of the London Brick Company, the world’s largest brick makers, which is responsible for 45 per cent. of Britain’s annual brick production. And what did it say? A booming brick industry? Not a hope.

  Last week London Brick Company announced it will cut output by 8 million bricks at a cost of 700 jobs. THE ACTION WAS NOT UNEXPECTED (Our emphasis).

Later the writer said.

Once again the bottom has fallen out of the construction industry and with it the brick industry.

Of course if it were not for the tragedy it would be hilarious. The grim reality for those who are thrown out of work in this booming industry makes it no laughing matter. Taking an overall view, it means the working class will continue to face the hardships of inadequate housing even though there are some 50,000 unsold houses on the market (Sunday Times again). There is obviously little chance of these houses being sold in the near future. So homeless workers will continue to be faced with empty houses. It just shows how futile are the politicians’ promises to deal with the housing problem. The real tragedy is that workers are still taken in by these promises.

The facts speak for themselves. The left hand, the brick industry, cannot follow what the right hand, the building industry, is doing. With millions badly housed or homeless, bricks are once again stockpiling. What more evidence is needed that capitalism cannot be controlled, let alone work in the interests of the majority? A market is haphazard and chaotic in its operation. Capitalism only knows of production for the market. The misery that follows in human terms is enormous.

By the way, in case anyone is still under the pathetic delusion that more state control can eliminate these inconsistencies, the experience of “managed” capitalism in Russia proves otherwise. The Times of July 10th 1974 reported under the headline “Soviet Brick Plan goes wrong,” the following:

  More than 5 million bricks, the entire output of a factory near Kuyibishev last year have been thrown away because no one wants them, Pravda, the Soviet Communist Party newspaper reported to-day. Five workers complained that with no orders to halt production, they had been dumping bricks straight off the production line onto the rubbish tip.

Socialism will be a system of society with one aim, the satisfaction of human needs in all their various forms. In Socialism, where the market society has been swept away, the farcical situation of surplus bricks and mass housing shortages would be impossible. If houses were needed, and the materials were available to build them, society would do so. Your commitment to socialism is required to put an end to the crazy Alice in Wonderland world of today. So, how about it?

Ronnie Warrington

Correction (1974)

From the November 1974 issue of the Socialist Standard

The article "Education For What?" (Socialist Standard, September page 160) contains an inaccuracy. It states that expenditure on education "comprises the biggest public expenditure next to that of the armed forces." In fact education expenditure exceeded defence spending in 1969 and has continued to do so since then as the following table shows: -

Russia Was Never Socialist – and Why (1997)

From the November 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

What We Said Over The Years

1920

When we are told that Socialism has been obtained in Russia without the long, hard and tedious work of educating the mass of workers in Socialism we not only deny it but refer our critics to Lenin’s own confessions. His statements prove that even though a vigorous and small minority may be able to seize power for a time, they can only hold it by modifying their plans to suit the ignorant majority. The minority in power in an economically backward country are forced to adapt their programme to the undeveloped conditions and make continual concessions to the capitalist world around them. Offers to pay war debts to the Allies, to establish a Constituent Assembly, to compensate capitalists for losses, to cease propaganda in other countries, and to grant exploitation rights throughout Russia to the Western capitalists all show how far along the capitalist road they have had to travel and how badly they need the economic help of other countries. It shows above all that their loud and defiant challenge to the capitalist world has been silenced by their own internal and external weaknesses as we have so often predicted in these pages.

( . . .)

We have often stated that because of a large anti-Socialist peasantry and vast untrained population, Russia was a long way from Socialism. Lenin has now to admit this by saying: ‘Reality says that State Capitalism would be a step forward for us; if we were able to bring about State Capitalism in a short time it would be a victory for us. How could they be so blind as not to see that our enemy is the small capitalist, the small owner? How could they see the chief enemy in State Capitalism? In the transition from Capitalism to Socialism our chief enemy is the small bourgeoisie, with its economic customs, habits and positions’ (The Chief Tasks of Our Times, p. 11).

(. . .)

Here we have plain admissions of the unripeness of the great mass of Russian people for Socialism and the small scale of Russian production.

If we are to copy Bolshevik policy in other countries we should have to demand State Capitalism, which is not a step to Socialism in advanced capitalist countries. The fact remains, as Lenin is driven to confess, that we do not have to learn from Russia, but Russia has to learn from lands where large scale production is dominant.

(. . .)

That Socialism can only be reached through State Capitalism is untrue. Socialism depends upon large-scale production, whether organised by Trusts or Governments. State Capitalism may be the method used in Russia, but only because the Bolshevik Government find their theories of doing without capitalist development unworkable—hence they are forced to retreat along the capitalist road.

“A Socialist View of Bolshevist Policy”, Socialist Standard, July 1920.

* * * * *

We have always contended that the Bolsheviks could only maintain power by resorting to capitalist devices. History has shown us to be correct. The January 1920 Congress of Executive Communists in Russia abolished the power of workers’ control in factories and installed officials instructed by Moscow and given controlling influence. Their resolutions printed in most of the Labour papers and the Manchester Guardian here show how economic backwardness has produced industrial conscription with heavy penalties for unpunctuality, etc. The abolition of democracy in the army was decreed long ago, but now that the army is being converted by Trotsky into a labour army it means rule from the top with an iron hand.

Russia has agreed to repay foreign property-owners their losses and allied Governments their ‘debts’. This means continued exploitation of Russian workers to pay foreign exploiters. With all the enthusiasm of the Communists they find themselves faced with the actual conditions in Russia and the ignorance of the greater part of its population.

There is no easier road to Socialism than the education of the workers in Socialism and their organisation to establish it by democratic methods. Russia has to learn that.

“The Super-Opportunists. A Criticism of Bolshevist Policy”, Socialist Standard, August 1920.

* * * * *

1924

The Bolsheviks will probably remain in control for the simple reason that there is no one in Russia capable of taking their place. It will be a question largely as to whether they will be able to stand the strain, for the task is a heavy one, and they are by no means overcrowded with capable men. But this control will actually resolve itself into control for, and in the interests of, the Capitalists who are willing to take up the development of raw materials and industry in Russia. The New Economic Policy points the way.

“The Passing of Lenin”, Socialist Standard, March 1924.

* * * * *

1928

Trotsky presents a long list of remedies which serve only to confirm what we have always said as to the necessity for Russia to go through capitalism. Trotsky does not admit this in so many words. In fact, he vigorously denounces Stalin’s ‘capitalist tendencies’. But when we examine his programme we find that it is all based implicitly on the continuance of capitalism in Russia until such time as a developed capitalist industry and a Socialist revolution outside Russia make Socialism possible.

Most of his proposals might have been lifted out of the programme of any trade union in Germany or England: ‘Equal pay for equal work’, less overtime; more unemployment pay; no more Government faking of labour and industrial statistics; retail prices to be brought down to the world price level; no profiteering by capitalist middlemen; no increase in the rents of working class houses; every effort to be made to lower the cost of production in order to promote the growth of industry; more taxes on rich peasants; abolition of the State sale of Vodka, etc. A long programme of reforms, but no mention of the abolition of capitalist farming, capitalist trading and capitalist investment. Both Trotsky and Stalin draw up their programmes within the framework of state and private capitalism which prevails in Russia.

“Trotsky States His Case”, Socialist Standard, December 1928.

* * * * *

1930

The facts given in this Year-Book sufficiently illustrate how illusory the communist dreams have been. Like many pious hopes embodied in the official documents and constitutions of the rest of the capitalist world these phrases have no relation whatever to the actual facts. Russian capitalism, although administered by the Communist Party, reproduces almost down to the last detail the paraphernalia of the capitalist world as we know it here.

The lesson of this is the one we have tried to drive home for so many years, that it is not possible for a minority to impose Socialism upon a majority who are hostile or indifferent; nor is it possible to remedy backward economic development by means of fine-sounding but ineffective decrees, issued by dictators.

“Russia: Land of High Profits (review of Soviet Union Year-Book 1930), Socialist Standard, September 1930.

* * * * *

1934

As Russia has not established Socialism and is not doing so in spite of the repeated statements of Communists, it has to carry on its work and build up its industries on lines similar to normal capitalist countries; it must therefore enter into normal trade relations with the rest of the world, and it does so.

(. . .)

When, in 1924, the Bolsheviks decided to throw overboard the ‘world revolution’ (except as a mere phrase to give lip-service to) and to concentrate on building up the internal resources of the country on the plea that they were building up Socialism in a single country (a complete reversal of their former views), the Communists of the world, who take their policy from Moscow, have simply been used to help on this object.

The foreign policy of Russia is aimed at living more or less amicably with the rest of the capitalist world, and they can only do this because they are building as the capitalists do. Socialism is a system diametrically opposed to capitalism and impossible in a predominantly capitalist world. It is impossible in one country alone, owing to international economic interdependence. It is international not national.

The extravagant claims held out of the success of Socialism in Russia have one by one been proved by time to be groundless and Russia is rapidly approaching the stage of taking its place as a first-class capitalist power.

“Changing Russia”, Socialist Standard, September 1934.

* * * * *

1937

Russia is not a Socialist country—its low industrial productivity and the non-Socialist outlook of the vast majority of its population do not bring such a thing within the realms of present possibility. It is based on various forms of State capitalism. Goods are produced, not for use only, but for sale at a profit. Industry is carried on largely on lines familiar to us in the Post office and other State-capitalist organisations outside Russia. The Russian Government borrows from investors (mostly Russian citizens) hundreds of millions of pounds for investment in industry, and pays them a high rate of interest on their investments; this payment to the investors being the first charge on industry. Inside the industries there are the same kind of gradations of pay as in capitalist industry generally from the mass of workers on or about the bare subsistence level at the bottom up through numerous grades to the very favoured few at the top who can enjoy the most pleasant and interesting work and live on a high standard of comfort and luxury.

“The New Russian Constitution”, Socialist Standard, January 1937.

* * * * *

1943

Certainly Russia has its privileged section of the population and they will buy (because they can afford to do so) the bulk of the luxury articles which the average worker cannot afford. These privileged people are the party officials, technical experts, writers, doctors, lawyers, etc. Some of these people receive incomes a hundred times bigger than that of the average worker. With the legality of inheritance in force, accumulation of wealth is today bound to be taking place in Russia among the wealthy. They are the exploiters, and the Dean is wrong when he says (p. 282) ‘exploitation of man by man is entirely abolished’. They can obtain their big incomes only out of the wealth produced by the workers.

“Is Russia Socialist?” (review of The Socialist Sixth of the World by Hewlett Johnson, Dean of Canterbury), Socialist Standard, July 1943.

* * * * *

1948

The reader of these reprinted articles will have seen that the attitude of the SPGB has been consistent from the start of the Bolshevik regime. We said then as we say now, that it is impossible for Socialism to be imposed from above even if the minority who hold power genuinely have that as their object.

The articles are important also to help to combat the efforts of various political groups which seek to discredit the Socialist movement by holding up Russia as a proof of the impossibility of abolishing capitalism. It is not true that Marxian Socialists at first approved of the Bolshevik dictatorship and Bolshevik policy and only later discovered that Socialism would not be the outcome. As these articles prove, the SPGB foresaw from the first that the attempt must fail.

Nor is it correct that the failure in Russia has been the failure of the men in control—though dictatorship inevitably corrupts those who wield it—it has been the failure of the whole mistaken policy of the Bolsheviks. Had Lenin lived or Stalin died the result would not have been appreciably different.

Postscript to Russia Since 1917 pamphlet, 1948.

* * * * *

1963

The 1917 Revolution overthrew Tsarist Absolutism and allowed nascent capitalist industry to develop more freely and rapidly, but only at the expense of submitting the country to a more barbarous absolutism, the Stalinist regime. Now this absolutism has in its turn become a fetter on capitalist expansion and is being cast aside.

(. . .)

Russia now has the productive forces of a developed capitalist country yet still the political regime of a developing country. This contradiction shows itself in the disagreement between the liberal and conservative elements in Russia, in the campaign against police excesses, in the demand for more freedom of expression in poetry and art, in the Liberman controversy and in anti-Stalinism. Russian industry has developed to such a stage that political and other changes are required before it can develop further. Once liberalisation has triumphed in Russia, as it will, the capitalist character of Russian industry will have become more obvious. Russia will lose its attraction in ‘left-wing’ circles. History, by destroying the illusion that Russia is Socialist, will once again have done our work for us.

“Changing Russia”, Socialist Standard, August 1963.

* * * * *

1967

The social system in Russia can be described as capitalist since the essential features of capitalism predominate: class monopoly of the means of production, commodity production, wage-labour and capital accumulation. (. . .)

A class is made up of people who are in the same position with regard to the ownership and use of the means of wealth-production and distribution. One class has a monopoly over these means of production if the rest of society are allowed access to them only on terms imposed by the group in control. This monopoly does not have to be legally recognised though in fact, as in Britain, this is generally so. Here the privileged minority, the capitalist class, have titles backed by law to the wealth they own. In Russia the ownership of the privileged minority is generally not given formal legal backing, but, as in Britain, they maintain their monopoly through control over the machinery of government. They occupy the top posts in the party, government, industry and the armed forces. Their ownership of the means of production is not individual but collective: they own as a class. Historically this is not a new development as is shown by the position of the Catholic church in feudal times. The privileged class in Russia draw their ‘property income’ in the form of bloated salaries, bonuses, large monetary ‘prizes’ awarded by the government, and other perks attaching to the top posts.

from chapter “Capitalism in Russia” in pamphlet Russia 1917-1967, 1967.

* * * * *

1988

If it is implemented—and it remains to be seen whether or not this reform will suffer the fate of previous ones—perestroika will represent a fundamental change in the form of capitalism that has existed in Russia until now. It will represent a transition from centrally planned commodity-production and exchange to a more competitive system in which the competing units would be, as in the West, legally and economically autonomous enterprises. The economic laws of capitalism will come to operate in Russia through competition rather than through the State which (. . .) has proved to be an inadequate substitute.

“Where Is Russia Going,”, Socialist Standard, September 1988.

* * * * *

1990

It is the longer-term implications of the decision to abandon the Leninist principle of one-party dictatorship that could prove to be the most significant though, as this could herald a change in the way the means of production are monopolised in Russia with the ruling class there changing itself from a class of collective owners into a class of individual owners as in the West.

(. . .)

The transformation of the Russian ruling class from a collectively-owning state bureaucracy into a class of private capitalists with private property rights vested in them as individuals certainly won’t take the form of the present members of the nomenklatura abdicating and handing over their power and privileges to the small group of privately-owning capitalists who have always led a precarious existence on the margins of the Russian state-capitalist economy. Nor would it need to take the crude form of them simply dividing up the presently state-owned industries amongst themselves. It would be more likely to take the form of the Russian government gradually introducing more and more opportunities for private capitalist investment—which only those who have already accumulated wealth would be able to take advantage of. Most of these will inevitably be individual members of the nomenklatura as the group which for years has enjoyed bloated salaries, cash prizes and opportunities to speculate on the black market (. . .).

Gorbachev (. . .) realises that it is now no longer possible for the nomenklatura to rule in the old way and that some sort of flexibility is called for, if only to be able to push through perestroika without provoking a workers’ revolt. He probably isn’t consciously working towards ushering in a Russia where the nomenklatura has disappeared as such and has succeeded in converting itself into a class of Western-type privately-owning capitalists, but it is in this direction that his reforms can now be seen to be leading.

“Russia and Private Property”, Socialist Standard, April 1990.

What Socialism Is (1997)

From the November 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

  Socialist society will be a classless, wageless, democratically-run society where goods are produced to satisfy human needs instead of being sold for profit. The administration of such a society will be decided by its citizens, basing their decisions on the needs of the community, available resources, and technology.

Capitalism fails to fulfil the already existing potential to satisfy human needs in two ways. First, it only provides goods and services if there is a market for them. Thus, houses stand empty while people are homeless, and food is destroyed and land taken out of food production while people starve. Second, trade and the circulation of money create many jobs which, although vital to the running of capitalism, would be unnecessary in a society where goods are produced solely to satisfy needs.

Banking, retailing, security services, prisons, courts, advertising and police forces are all sectors of employment which only have a role when goods are bought and sold. In addition, the need to secure markets, trade routes, and raw materials fosters industrial secrecy instead of sharing knowledge, hinders research in the scramble to make quick profits, and leads to pollution and dangerous working conditions.

Competition leads to squabbles over artificially created national boundaries. Nation states waste resources on maintaining armed forces and developing weapons of mass destruction which threaten the existence of the world. Competition between workers, especially in a dwindling job market during capitalism’s periodic slumps, leads to poverty, insecurity and xenophobia.

Even scientific advances which make work easier and less labour-intensive threaten workers’ livelihoods under capitalism as manufacturers cut their workforces to increase profits.

Worldwide co-operation

A socialist society will release the potential to satisfy human needs which the machine-age has made possible. And because it will not be limited by market forces or the need for secrecy it will be possible to co-operate on a worldwide scale for the first time. The overproduction which occurs when individual capitalists make as many goods as possible to take advantage of the market during a boom, leading to crises and slumps, will be avoided.

The systematic manufacture of shoddy goods, because that is all the poor can afford, will be a thing of the past. There will no longer be a need to artificially stimulate the market with badly made items that have to be replaced because they wear out quickly.

Housing can be planned to cater for the needs of the community instead of the present sprawl of suburban districts into green belts whilst dwellings remain empty and the rich reside in enormous houses whose main function is the flaunting of wealth and status.

Even a century ago the potential for abundance which machines had made possible enabled Peter Kropotkin to claim that if all the diversion of labour into bureaucratic and military activities were replaced by socially useful tasks then it would only be necessary to work five hours a day from the age of twenty or twenty-two to forty-five or fifty (The Conquest of Bread, 1892). Our lives could be so much more fulfilling if we had more time to enjoy our leisure instead of returning home exhausted after a hard day’s work making money for idle capitalists, only to become unemployed during a slump or expected to survive on a pittance in old age after a lifetime of wage-slavery.

Under capitalism, when new technology makes some types of work redundant, workers lose their livelihoods. But a socialist society will welcome the release of people from drudgery and, because they will no longer be wage-slaves, there will be a chance to retrain for other work which is satisfying and useful to the community. The days of spending forty years in one dreary job will be unnecessary. The citizens of a socialist community will be able to change occupations if they wish to. Of course, some people may not want to change occupations if they find the work interesting.

A society of co-operation will allow a free choice instead of the economically-driven decisions which are made now. Naturally, that doesn’t mean that we will be able to choose to be an airline pilot or a surgeon just because it seems an interesting thing to do. Skilled work will still need proper training. There will still be dirty jobs: emptying bedpans or working in the sewers will still be unpleasant, but it will not be necessary to spend all day let alone a lifetime working in those occupations. And because people will be working for the benefit of themselves and the community instead of merely to enrich a capitalist master there will be a greater willingness to co-operate and share work.

Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions will still occur: socialism will not be able to tame the forces of nature, but many people live in dangerous areas of the world today because they are refugees, either that or boundary disputes between rival nation states prevents people from moving to another area. Socialists do not adhere to the divisive views of nationalists; frontiers will disappear and there will be concern for everyone’s welfare, recognising our common humanity.

When the market is abolished

Poverty, pollution and unsafe working conditions are among the primary causes of ill-health and premature deaths for workers under capitalism. All of these causes can be eliminated when the market is abolished and we will be able to enjoy the life expectancy which is experienced by the wealthy today. But there will, inevitably, still be illness and premature death in a socialist society; there will still be congenital diseases, unrequited love, and misunderstanding between the generations. But the sick will be cared for without the price tag which condemns the old and the mentally ill to have to put up with substandard conditions under capitalism because they are not economically productive. And if there is misunderstanding in families at least it will be free of the corrosive effects of money worries which damage so many relationships today.

Socialism does not offer a panacea; there will still be problems to solve, but a democratically organised society where decisions are made by all the community, instead of being made by bosses and politicians only interested in running capitalism in the interests of the ruling class, can make decisions which benefit everyone.

The failure of capitalism to satisfy human needs is self-evident: poverty, starvation, pollution, wars, homelessness, economic crises and slumps are constant reminders of the disastrous effects of the market. Reforms, “free market” economics, Keynesian economics, and state capitalism have all been tried and have failed to solve the problems which the system creates.

A society of free access to goods and services will prevent the deprivation and social contradictions which prevail at the moment. Insecurity causes people to hoard their wealth and capitalism deliberately fosters a culture of conspicuous consumption—the guru Bhagwen Rajneesh owns 93 Rolls Royces. This obscene display of wealth occurs alongside the most desperate poverty. It is possible to grow enough food to feed the world’s population several times over if food production were organised properly and a worldwide community of socialists would be able to provide food to an area hit by a crop failure caused by adverse weather conditions.

Socialism is not a moral crusade, despite an awareness of the obvious immorality of capitalist economics, but a realisation that things need changing. When workers make the democratic decision to act in their own interests and put an end to exploitation then they can establish socialism and start to lead rewarding, fulfilling lives.

Carl Pinel

These Foolish Things: Capitalism divides (1997)

The Scavenger column from the November 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

Capitalism divides

Social differences have grown in Israel over the last 20 years, but in few places are they as visible as at Mevasseret Zion. There are in fact two communities living on top of each other. One is the old village with attractive single-storey houses where the original Jewish immigrants live.The other is a new township of luxury red-roofed villas in which live some of the richest members of Israel's political and business elite . . . Israel vies with Ireland as one of the most inegalitarian of developed countries. The boom of the 1990s largely benefited the richest 20 percent. In last year’s general election this badly damaged the Israeli Labour party in the poorer towns and cities and helped Benjamin Netanyahu become Prime Minister. 

(Independent on Sunday, 20 July.)

That’s all right, then

[Gordon] Roddick asked [John Bird] to start the Big Issue, providing the initial funding of half a million, despite a feasibility study predicting that the magazine wouldn’t work. The circulation has grown from 30.000 to more than a million readers. There is now a separate Scottish edition and 10,000 authorised vendors across the country . . . John Bird has been awarded an MBE for his efforts and also been criticised for making a profit out of homelessness. The Big Issue, the argument goes, is a business. If the massive problem of the homeless was ever solved, there would be no need for the magazine. “Of course I make money from homelessness,” he admits. “I believe in enlightened self-interest. I have been good for the Big Issue and homeless people because I'm part of the crisis” 

(The Herald, 26 July.)

Neat!

Priests have no rights under employment law because they serve God and have no employer on earth, three Court of Appeal judges ruled yesterday. They dismissed an appeal by an Anglican curate, the Rev Dr Alex Coker, against an Employment Appeal Tribunal ruling barring him from taking his case of unfair dismissal before an industrial tribunal . . . The Bishop of Southwark, the Right Rev Roy Williamson, said: "I am delighted but not surprised at the judgement, confirming what we had always understood the law to state—that a curate is not an employee." 

(Guardian, 12 July.)

It’s not over

The story of the last 200 years has been one of a struggle between capital and labour. Capital won. It is gradually becoming the most powerful influence on our lives, above that of governments . . .  Mr Blair is jogging steadily, another few miles each morning, towards a new political settlement in Britain.This will entrench capitalism, reduce welfare, balance the budget. 

(Financial Times. 26 July.)

He could be right

“Our survival is only a question of 25, 50 or perhaps 100 years," the oceanographer [Jacques Cousteau] warns in The Man, the Octopus and the Orchid. "It is absurd and dangerous for those who live in prosperity to think that the world economy is a cycle and that its riches will circulate for ever. Unrenewable resources are being squandered. Waste is building up. Valuable goods are vanishing while rubbish thrives." M Cousteau, who won multiple honours for his scientific films and books from governments around the globe, attacks politicians, scientists and world leaders with particular venom. "They pocket the cash without looking ahead, writing cheques our descendants will pay for in the centuries to come. With their pesticides and pollution, their toxic discharges and the certainty of mutual destruction . . . the scientific experts have hidden the harsh reality: The will decide whether we live or die." 

(Times, 21 June.)

The Scavenger

New Branch (1997)

Party News from the November 1997 issue of the Socialist Standard

At its meeting on 13 October the St. Ives Group decided to form itself into the West Cornwall Branch of the Socialist Party. The branch will meet on the first Monday of each month at 8pm in the Western Hotel, Royal Square (next to the Royal Cinema), St Ives. Further details from Robin Cox, 1 The Square, Lanner, Redruth, Cornwall, TR16 6EQ.