Tea and Sympathy (1983)

From the August 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

We publish below a newsletter recently circulated among employees of British Aerospace. Warton. A good time was had by all but one.

Visit to HMS Exeter

A party of 10 people from British Aerospace. Warton, travelled to Portsmouth in the early hours of Thursday 16 December 1982 in order to attend a "Day at Sea” organised by the Captain and Officers of HMS Exeter. From the welcome we received on arrival at HMS Nelson at 9.00 am on Thursday morning to the time when we sadly said "Goodbye" to our Hosts at 9.00 pm on the same day, we can say, in all sincerity, that we could have never experienced better hospitality and genuine friendship. After a very short journey to the Naval Base by Navy transport we went on board HMS Exeter and we were officially welcomed by the Officers of the Ship. Coffee was served and we were made very comfortable.

There were approximately 64 guests on board representing several aspects of the community. There were representatives from Thornton Chocolates; from Swan Hunter, where the Exeter was built; representatives from various organisations of the City of Exeter and several others. We sailed from Portsmouth Harbour at 10.30 am and we observed this from the Flight Deck. We were thrilled to see several Royal Navy Ships who also played a very important part in the recent Falklands war. Officers of HMS Exeter were accompanying each group of guests and explaining various items of interest. We were taken to the Bridge where Captain HM Balfour, MVO, and Officers were busy manoeuvring the Ship out of Harbour but not too busy to give us a very warm welcome and their thanks for our support towards them. We were shown every corner of the Ship; from Engine Room to Radar Room, from Officers Cabins to Kitchens. The whole Ship is kept in immaculate condition and the atmosphere on board is very happy, friendly and relaxed.

We sailed towards the Isle of Wight and at 11.45 am we were given a demonstration of the flying capabilities of HMS Exeter LYNX Helicopter; all the visitors enjoyed this demonstration and found it very exciting. At 12.00 noon we were shown an "Open-fire” exercise during which the newly installed guns were fired. These guns were 20 and 30mm cannons. This demonstration was also very exciting and made us all aware that Exeter was ready for any emergency. Between each demonstration drinks were served to the guests in the Officer’s Mess; no effort was spared to make our visit memorable.

At 12.30 a very' appetising lunch was served in the Officer’s Mess and after lunch, British Aerospace presented Captain HM Balfour with a cheque for £180.00, two Tornado framed pictures signed by our Chief Test Pilots and two Video Cassettes featuring the 8 episodes of the Falklands war as shown on Television in the past months. An official Wren photographer from Navy News took pictures of the presentation. Captain Balfour was very grateful for the gifts and asked us to thank everyone at British Aerospace for their part in the "Adoption of HMS Exeter".

After lunch a low flying demonstration by two Hunter aircraft was to take place but, as soon as this demonstration started, one of the Hunter’s came in very low over the Exeter Flight Deck, could not regain control and crashed into the sea killing the pilot. This tragedy caused great concern to everyone present but the Officers worked very hard once again in order to put the whole tragic incident in its true perspective. After tea and sandwiches we returned by “high speed dash" to Portsmouth at 9.00 pm when we took leave of the Captain and Crew. We spent a memorable day and we shall be forever grateful to HMS Exeter.

P. Charlesworth 

p.p. HMS Exeter Fund Committee

Johnny Mushroomseed (1983)

From the August 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

In American folk history there is a character called “Johnny Appleseed" who is reputed to have crossed the North American continent planting appleseeds and thus, in the space of a few years, bringing apple trees to America. A cartoon in The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists borrowed the idea of Johnny Appleseed to portray American nuclear policy since the Atoms for Peace programme launched in 1953. The new character was Johnny Mushroomseed who disseminated civil nuclear reactors throughout the world and in doing so created the possibility of future nuclear weapon states. This is because any nuclear reactor — Magnox, AGR, PWR or Candu — produces plutonium even though its principal function is power generation. Plutonium, or rather the plutonium isotope 239, is bomb-making material and as little as 4kgs are required to manufacture a nuclear bomb; therefore, the expanded production of plutonium resulting from civil nuclear reactors poses a serious proliferation threat. The central problem of nuclear non-proliferation has been how to have one — nuclear power — without the other — nuclear bombs. America has never been able to reconcile the interest of its nuclear industry with those of non-proliferation; in other words, profits come before the prevention of nuclear weapons proliferation.

The Atoms for Peace programme was a contrast to the first eight years of American nuclear history, when the MacMahon Act prohibited the disclosure of nuclear secrets and the transfer of nuclear materials. The fledgling American nuclear industry feared that it was in danger of being excluded from a highly lucrative market by the more advanced British state controlled nuclear industry, and it was this which contributed to the change in policy. However, there was no assessment of the political implications of selling nuclear reactors since the risks of proliferation from a civil nuclear fuel cycle were not considered relevant. The uranium route to the bomb was reckoned to be too technologically sophisticated for most states, and since plutonium produced by a civil reactor was thought to be of no military use on account of the existence of the heavier plutonium isotopes, plutonium 240 in particular (weapons grade plutonium constitutes ideally 93 per cent Pu-239) the sale of nuclear reactors did not constitute a proliferation risk.

The Atoms for Peace programme, however, let loose an avalanche of nuclear hardware and knowledge; for example, over 11.000 technical papers on plutonium were de-classified. This has, in effect, enabled such states as Brazil to produce their own nuclear weapons. In fact Brazil, according to a report in the International Herald Tribune 4 February 1983, has taken a significant step towards developing a nuclear weapons potential by producing its own plutonium in a US supplied research reactor. The plutonium was produced in the 5-megawatt Babcock and Wilcox reactor at Brazil’s leading atomic research centre on the outskirts of Sao Paolo. South Africa’s research reactor, SAFARI-1 — South African Fundamental Atomic Research reactor — was also provided by the US. and according to Dan Smith, “the aid South Africa has received under the Atoms for Peace programme has had a central role in the development of a military potential'' (South Africa’s Nuclear Capability, Dan Smith. World Campaign against Military and Nuclear Collaboration with South Africa, London, 1980, p!4). SAFARI-1 is a light water reactor which uses highly enriched uranium and was provided by the Allis Chalmers Corporation. For years the Americans rationalised their continued sale of nuclear reactors and provision of nuclear fuel on the grounds that this allowed the US to exert leverage over the recipient states and thereby prevent them from developing their own nuclear weapons.

This was to change. Although the French and German nuclear industries were based on American technologies, the light water reactor, Framatome and Kraftwerk Union began to challenge the Americans for a share of the world nuclear reactor market. Furthermore, the development of uranium enrichment plants in Western Europe by Urenco (West Germany, Britain and the Netherlands) and Eurodif (France, Spain, Belgium and Italy) threatened the American monopoly for the supply of enriched uranium. The ensuing competition undermined the already flimsy international safeguards system. In 1975 West Germany agreed to supply Brazil with a complete nuclear fuel cycle which would, theoretically, lay the basis for Brazilian nuclear self-sufficiency. Not to be outdone the American company Bechtel offered to build Brazil a uranium enrichment plant, even though official US policy sought to prevent Brazil from obtaining such a facility.

In contrast to the Atoms for Peace era of American nuclear policy, the US government was now more proliferation conscious. However, the attempts of the State Department to dissuade the West Germans from going ahead with the deal were regarded as little more than a thinly veiled attempt to protect US commercial interests rather than an expression of proliferation concern. But since the German nuclear industry has come to depend on the export market, American non-proliferation policies were unlikely to be well received. The nuclear market favours the buyer who is more likely, therefore, to prefer suppliers who are less insistent on full scope safeguards for the transferred nuclear plant and material. The recent French decision to supply enriched uranium to India might not have been reached if the French had insisted on stricter safeguards. Indeed French eagerness to conclude the nuclear fuel deal was not unrelated to the fact that:

The French were understood to be eager to resolve the Tarapur dispute quickly so that they can cultivate the government of Prime Minister Gandhi for lucrative arms contracts and deals for transfer of technology to compensate for tight Western markets. International Herald Tribune, 24 November 1982, p3.

The Americans were powerless to stop this deal going ahead.

The oil crisis of 1973 had a major impact on the energy policies of Western Europe, North America and Japan. The desire to avoid external dependence for energy supplies was instrumental in confirming the need for nuclear power largely because it appeared to offer the best road to energy independence. In terms of energy independence reactors based on plutonium were considered, even from the early days of nuclear power in the years after 1945, to be the best option; the fast breeder reactor produces more fuel than it consumes. In order to establish a fast reactor programme it is essential to reprocess the spent fuels from the earlier thermal reactors to provide the initial load of plutonium fuel. Even without commitment to the fast reactor reprocessing was, and remains, desirable because it makes more efficient use of the original uranium fuel, and when doubts exist about the future availability of uranium supplies the attractions of a fast reactor seem obvious. There is, however, a major proliferation risk associated with expanded use and production of plutonium since there is nothing to stop such material from being diverted from ostensibly civil stocks to military programmes. Accounting of plutonium is very imprecise and even a one per cent loss in the “statistical noise” would release enough plutonium to build several atomic bombs. For example, India has had a long standing commitment to reprocessing and fast reactor technology since it corresponds to a national policy of nuclear self-sufficiency. India commenced large scale reprocessing at the end of 1982. When we consider that India’s nuclear test (107m down a shaft at Pokharan in the Rajasthan desert on 18 May 1974) used about 15kgs of plutonium derived from the Canadian supplied CIRIUS reactor, the proliferation risk associated with large quantities of separable plutonium is only too apparent.

The Americans, beginning with the Ford Administration and carried on by its successor, concluded that moves toward undue reliance on reprocessing and the “plutonium economy” were events to be avoided; therefore. Carter’s nonproliferation initiative deferred American commitment to reprocessing, and the fast reactor project at Clinch River, Tennessee, was indefinitely postponed. This was done in the hope that such self-sacrifice would persuade others, primarily the Europeans and the Japanese, to do likewise. They were, however, unimpressed primarily because they had extensive plutonium projects which they regarded, especially the French, as vital to their energy security and hence political independence. Moreover, they suspected that concern with proliferation was yet another attempt by the US to regain its nuclear monopoly since the Americans were lagging behind the Europeans in reprocessing and fast reactor technology. In fact it was doubts about the reliability of the US as a supplier of nuclear materials that had provided the impetus for the development of indigenous nuclear facilities, such as reprocessing and uranium enrichment, in Europe and the developing world. In short, American opportunities to influence the behaviour of states through relationships of dependence were disappearing fast.

Profit first

Although non-proliferation was ostensibly a major issue for the Carter Administration, reflected in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978, the interests of profitability came first; for example, the US continued to supply India with uranium fuel notwithstanding India’s refusal to sign the NPT and submit all her nuclear plants to international inspection. In Hazards of the International Energy Crisis (eds. I). Carlton & C. Schaerf, Macmillan Press Ltd, London, 1982, p 11) it is argued that “the export of reactors is now vital to the economic viability of national nuclear industries and has a higher priority than the overall main goal of preventing nuclear weapons proliferation”. Even a Commissioner with the American Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Victor Gilinsky, was able to remark that:

despite international safeguards, the NPT and various international co-operative arrangements, the history of the past 25 years suggests that in reality commercial considerations have tended to dominate security concerns, complicating and even undermining efforts at control. (“‘Plutonium, Proliferation and the Price of Reprocessing", Foreign Affairs, Winter 1978/9 No.2, Vol.57, p376.)

In an attempt to forestall the dissemination of “sensitive” nuclear technology the supplier states, including America, came together in the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group. The object was to restrain the spread of proliferation sensitive technology and impose stricter safeguards on all exports. Items on the list included isotopic separation plants, reactors, reactor control rods, fuel fabrication plants, heavy water manufacturing equipment and spent fuel reprocessing facilities. However, states in the developing world have no time for what they see as the technological colonialism of this nuclear cartel. In any case, as has been shown, commercial imperatives tend to outweigh any notional commitments to non-proliferation. Furthermore, those states on the nuclear weapons threshold can no longer be denied the expertise and hardware since they already possess them; moreover, such states as India and Argentina, both of whom are outside the NPT. can now export their own nuclear materials and know-how.

The International Nuclear Fuel Cycle Evaluation Programme, largely instigated by the US. was another attempt to find a technical solution to a political problem since its aim was to find a more proliferation resistant fuel cycle. The INFCEP failed to do this, nor did it generate any new radical ideas on how to deal with the proliferation problem. Needless to say the American nuclear industry was none too keen on the restrictive policies of the Carter Administration; therefore, it was not surprising that the nuclear industry eagerly anticipated the advent of Ronald Reagan.

According to the Reagan Administration nuclear proliferation was not really a problem. Mahlon Gates, Assistant Secretary for Energy, informed the Senate Appropriations Committee that he was "pleased to announce that the Department had embarked on a course of action intended to reverse the deterioration of our nuclear industry and restore us to a position of leadership in the international community”. Moreover, the earlier decision to deter reprocessing and the Clinch River reactor was revoked. But the principal threat to the non-proliferation regime comes from US military policy. Although there is a shortage of plutonium and tritium (necessary for thermonuclear bombs) the US military expansion requires an increase in the number of nuclear warheads. Previously fissile material from older warheads was re-cycled, but with an expansion of 15,000 warheads planned, existing plutonium stocks will be insufficient. This shortage is generating pressures to reprocess spent fuel from commercial pow'er stations, which will, as The Guardian notes (10 March 1982, Reagan atomic plan ‘breaks rules’), violate the principle laid down by the International Atomic Energy Agency — and incorporated into the NPT — that civilian facilities should never become involved in military programmes. The most likely consequence of this development will be the further weakening of the already fragile non-proliferation regime. The technical relationship between civil and military technology is again proving to be the undoing of non-proliferation policies.

After almost forty years the nuclear arms race continues unabated. Civil nuclear technology figures prominently in the energy policies of many states in the developing world, and despite their assurances that such programmes are purely for peaceful purposes, bomb manufacture is within their grasp. It has been said that the nuclear genie is very definitely out of its bottle; therefore, the main aim of policy must be to put it back; however, the chances of achieving a successful non-proliferation policy, whether American or international, within the confines of capitalism are as great as finding the Lost Dutchman Mine.

John Walker

Nuclear fusion power (1983)

From the August 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

The difficulties currently being encountered in the generation of electric-power by nuclear fission, highlighted by some of the evidence being presented to the current Sizewell Inquiry, makes its long term future uncertain. From the ecological point of view, fission now stands condemned and we can safely say that it will have no part in the sane socialist society of the future. This situation is leading to a renewed interest in alternative sources of energy but current progress in one of these — nuclear fusion — has been limited by a lack of financial support, as the Scientific American reported in its July 1972 issue.

The source of energy in nuclear fusion is the same as in nuclear fission; that is. by the transformation of mass into energy. Fission takes place by the splitting of heavy elements such as uranium, and is the basis of the A-bomb. This connection with the arms trade has helped to keep fission power going despite its disappointing economic performance. In contrast, fusion involves the combination of light elements such as isotopes of hydrogen, and is the basis of the H-bomb, where the reaction is triggered by the explosion of an A-bomb. This method is obviously unsuitable for industrial use. Fusion reactions take place continuously on the sun and other large stars.

On the surface, the prospects for nuclear fusion look sky high. There is virtually an unlimited supply of low cost fuel in the form of heavy water (deuterium oxide) in the ocean. The end product of the fusion reaction is radiation free (but this does not apply to all intermediate products) unlike the hellholes where fission wastes are stored. The low mass and volume of the fuel needed makes plant layout and siting relatively problem-free. Handling and storage areas can be very small and installations need not be tied to port and railway facilities.

The nuclei of the fuel atoms are positively charged and so repel each other just as the like poles of two magnets do. In order to overcome this repulsion and put the nuclei close enough together for a fusion reaction to occur, a level of kinetic energy must be imparted to them, which requires a temperature of about 90 million degrees centigrade. In the H-bomb this is the function which the A-bomb performs. At such temperatures the gaseous state is transcended and the material becomes a charge-dominated collection of ionised matter known as plasma which at high temperature cannot be confined by material walls and has instead to be held in position by strong electromagnetic forces. In the search for a controlled fusion reaction for industrial use the crux lies in the design of a magnetic field to contain the plasma in stable equilibrium. This is the main reason why fusion research is so expensive. Attention is now being given to a laser-induced fusion technique, which requires no containment of plasma although the requirement to generate enormous temperatures remains. At the present time it is not possible to say definitely that a satisfactory solution will eventually be found, even granted adequate funding.

The radioactive intermediate product of the fusion reaction is tritium, another isotope of hydrogen. Tritium is not found in nature and has a half life of 12.3 years. It permeates metal walls at high temperature and containment will require careful detailed design. The vacuum wall and blanket structure will become radioactive during operation and require long-term disposal after the end of their working life. The internal plant structure can only be handled and repaired by complex remote control facilities. There are clearly hazards associated with high pressure, high temperature materials and high magnetic fields.

Optimistic forecasts of the nuclear fusion future should be judged against this information. The prospects of this type of work being performed in the capitalist commercial environment are not very strong, to say the least.

E C Edge

50 Years Ago: The Friends of the Russian Government (1983)

The 50 Years Ago column from the August 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

Some recent activities of the Russian Government which received little notice in the Press are of sufficient importance to be placed on record. They should be studied by those who believe that the friction between the Russian Government and some other governments is different in kind from the trade quarrels which are always taking place between national groups of capitalists and the governments they control.

We refer to agreements just made or renewed between Russia, on the one hand, and the three open dictatorships on the other — Italy, Poland and Germany . . . we have here a pretty picture of the Russian Government making agreements and seeking to cultivate “normal" and “friendly” relationships with Italy. Poland and Germany, while the governments of Mussolini. Pilsudski and Hitler carry on their normal brutal repression of all opposition, including Socialists and Communists. Are the Communists in the prisons and concentration camps of these countries expected to rejoice when they read that Russian envoys received "a very warm welcome” and that Pilsudski has graciously condescended to receive the Soviet Ambassador, and that Russia undertakes “not to participate in any economic or financial boycott" of Hitler’s Germany?

(From an editorial “The Friends of the Russian Government", Socialist Standard, August 1933.)

SPGB Meetings (1983)

Party News from the August 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

Revolution and intellectuals (1971)

From issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

Some few weeks ago this writer received a visit from a graduate university student — a personable but somewhat over-verbalized young man who is working toward his doctorate degree. Following self-introductions and the customary exchange of social amenities, our student lost no time in displaying what he obviously considered a firm theoretical grasp of Marxism and glibly spoke of such organizations as the Communist Party, the Students for a Democratic Society, the Socialist Labor Party, the Young Socialist Alliance, the Socialist Workers Party, the Progressive Labor Party, the American Youth for Democracy, the Labor Youth League, the Socialist Club, etc. It would seem that the existence of the World Socialist Party had come to his attention for the first time but several weeks prior to his visit via a handed-down, well-thumbed copy of The Western Socialist.

Intellectuals: Vanguards of Revolution?

Warming up to his subject between sips of sherry, he articulately and emphatically expressed the opinion — or more accurately speaking, the conviction that a gifted portion of the intellectuals of any given age, and not the workers or the majority of the people, are the prime movers — the engine, so to speak — of social revolutions. The latter, according to this budding intellectual with a verbal itch he could not seem to satisfactorily scratch, “will need to be led into the promised land by an intellectual vanguard for reason of their apathy and immature mentality.”

The counter arguments presented by this writer, arguments which are undoubtedly familiar to consistent readers of this journal, were augmented with the views of an intellectual — one who has been given, rightly or wrongly, the distinction of being, or having been, the only Marxist teacher in a large American university, the late Paul A. Baran, professor of economics at Stanford University — dealing with revolution and Intellectuals. These views of Baran are found in a pamphlet reprinted from Monthly Review entitled "Reflections on the Cuban Revolution.”

Baran writes that the strong stress placed by students upon the active role of intellectuals relating to revolutions has

"deep theoretical roots, and relates to two propositions which are central to both political theory and a general interpretation of the historical process. One is an Implied rejection of the principal tenet of historical materialism according to which it Is social classes that are the prime agents on the historical scene, with both the composition of these classes and their broad political and ideological outlook determined chiefly by their position in the economic structure. The other, closely connected with the first, is the assertion that the intellectuals constitute a separate social stratum, an ‘elite' above classes which plays an independent and indeed a decisive role In history . . ."

As for the first proposition above — the implication that it is not social classes that are the prime agents on the historical scene — serious students of Marx know, along with Baran, this to be false. For they have learned that history has developed through a series of social revolutions and that this development is brought about by means of class struggle.

Social Revolutions & Class Struggle

Put in over-simplified form, it is found that as the forces of production developed and new relations of production came into being which corresponded to the development of the forces of production, classes came into being. It is known, for example, that there were no classes in primitive society. But with the development of new forces of production (which resulted in, among other things, man being able to produce more than his own needs) and new relations of production, primitive society was broken up and replaced by class society — Slavery (e.g., in Rome) — consisting of slaves, slaveowners and other social classes such as the military, the religious, and the free — but impoverished — proletariat. In time Slavery deteriorated, fell apart or was overthrown by outside Invaders and replaced by Feudal society ruled principally by a landed aristocracy and the church and in which the producing, exploited, class took the form of serfs, bound to the land rather than to individual owners. Subsequently, Capitalism replaced Feudalism. [1]

Now with capitalism there arise new conflicts and class antagonisms. The accumulators of the means of production, the capitalists, through sheer ownership (stocks, bonds, etc.) forcibly deprive — by virtue of their control of the state — the sole producers of social wealth, the workers, of what they have created. Society is spilt between a minute minority of owners and a vast majority of non-owners, bringing with it class conflict and antagonism. Idealistic humanitarians to the contrary, class conflict can only be resolved by the complete abolition of classes.

Serious students of Marxism know that the dynamic of historical change is the conflict between the forces of production and the relations of production, with “the class struggle as the immediate driving force of history" (Letter from Marx and Engels to August Bebel, etc. Emphasis added.) With maligned Marx, such students hold that 

"the emancipation of the working class must be achieved by the working class itself. We cannot therefore cooperate with people who say that the workers are too uneducated to emancipate themselves and must first be freed from above by philanthropic bourgeois and petty bourgeois" — or, it could be added, freed by a gifted segment or vanguard of society's intellectuals. (Ibid)

As stated above, society in our times is divided into two classes: capitalists and workers, rulers and ruled, exploiters and exploited. One class challenges the other. But unlike the slaveowners and feudal lords of the past, the capitalist class has no rival exploiting class challenging its rule. For it is the workers, the bottom rung of the ladder as it were, a non-exploiting class, who challenge the reign of the capitalists. And the successful consummation of the workers’ challenge, carried out consciously and politically, will spell the end of class society and of the exploitation of man by man. This consummation will once and for all spell finish to the last antagonistic form of the social process of production and consequently end “the prehistory of man" and usher in “truly human history.”

Are intellectuals a separate class?

As for Baran’s second proposition — the implication that the intellectuals constitute a separate class (though Baran calls it “a separate social stratum" — apparently taking his cue from Lenin, who in turn took it from Kautsky’s theory that the intellectuals were not a class but a privileged social stratum) — serious students of Marxism know this also to be false. For they know that those who specialize in intellectual functions no more constitute a class than do those individuals who perform various administrative and executive functions. In brief, intellectuals do not constitute a class with separate class interests (though they may have group interests in common), but function, consciously or not. as an integral portion of one or other of the classes which constitute society — function in the interests of the rulers or the ruled.

Baran continues:

"There are many reasons for this hypo-statization of the intellectuals. Leaving aside the obvious, but therefore by no means irrelevant one, that the glorification of the intellectuals is most flattering to the intellectuals themselves, four considerations must be primarily borne in mind:

"In the first place, the assignment of a crucially important role to the intellectuals is a sociological derivative of an idealistic philosophic position. If intellectuals are the salt of the earth, responsible for the nature and direction of social development, then clearly it is ideas that run history. There is the further implication that these ideas are not mere reflections of processes in the material world (tensions between forces and relations of production, struggles among social classes, and so forth) but rather unfold in an emanate from the pensive heads of the ’freely floating intellectual elite' (Mannheim)."

(It might be noted in passing that Karl Mannheim, referred to above, was a German sociologist with a decided proclivity to place intellectuals in a niche quite above the common herd. Needless to say he was popular with intellectuals throughout the world).

The Materialist Conception of History

Returning to the kernel under discussion, historical materialism teaches that social ideas arise out of the conditions of the material life of society. Marx has afforded us the most lucid, compact formulation of the main elements of the concept of historical materialism in his Preface to a Contribution to a Critique of Political Economy. But for the purpose at hand, the following brief definition of the foundation of the Marxian scientific system as given by Louis B. Boudin in his book The Theoretical System of Karl Marx, will better serve. Boudin writes (p. 23):

"The Materialist conception of history maintains that the evolution of human society as a whole, and that of all human institutions, is not, as the idealists insisted, the result of the changes in men's ideas relative to the society they were living in and its institutions, which changes are brought about by the inherent law of development of ideas; but that, quite to the contrary, the development of society, including men's ideas of human society and institutions, are the result of the development of the material conditions under which men live; that these conditions are the only ones which have an independent existence and development; that the changes of the material conditions cause the institutions of human society to be changed to suit them; and that the ideas on all subjects relating to man in society, including those of right and wrong between man and man and even between man and his God, are changed by man in accordance with and because of, those changed material conditions of his existence."

As outlined by Boudin, the antithesis of historical materialism is philosophic idealism. The latter holds "that the ultimate causes of all historical changes are to be looked for in the changing ideas of human beings (Engels)." Idealists believe that there is little that cannot be changed or altered by the determined will of individuals. Idealists, no matter their label or differences, all have this in common: they appeal explicitly to moral standards which they consider common to all mankind. Marxists are not in sympathy with them. For it is their conviction that individuals actuated by this or that ideal cannot alter laws governing human history. Marxists denounce the existing system by appealing not to ideas but to history. The existing system has nothing to do with unjustness or human folly, but is the inevitable outcome of a certain stage in human history. This stage will pass. But knowing the laws governing human history and applying this knowledge will hasten the passing and lessen the friction and painfulness of the social transition.

Now it invariably happens that when socialists express the principle that social ideas arise out of the conditions of the material life of society — that is to say, the forces of production and the relations of production; the methods, in short, by which human beings in a given society produce their means of subsistence and exchange the products among themselves — non-socialists are all too prone to interpret this to be a denial of the significance and the social role of ideas. Any such interpretation is unwarranted. For by all means socialists are acutely aware and, given the opportunity, make quite clear that ideas arising from the conditions of material life of society play a most active role in material development once they come into being. The argument of the socialist primarily concerns not the significance of ideas, but rather their origin.

Intellectual leaders

Without direct comment. Baran's second, third and fourth considerations follow:

"The leadership of nearly all major social movements in history (with the exception of the most primitive peasant rebellions) has consisted of or included intellectuals by upbringing or individuals turned intellectuals in the course of their political careers. What is then simpler than to conclude that since there were always intellectuals prominently associated with revolutionary movements, the intellectuals were their cause and their engine?"

"The growing awareness among intellectuals of the irrationality, inhumanity, and degeneration of capitalism has been accompanied in many Western countries by an increasing disillusionment with the labor movement and a sharpened disappointment with its lack of political dynamism and its widespread capitulation before the capitalist order. Under such circumstances the faith in the awakening of the intellectuals remains the only bright spot on the horizon for those who seek a way out of the impasses of the status quo . . ."

". . . Treating the intellectuals as the yeast of history, counting upon them to move things off dead center serves many intellectuals as a convenient rationalization for staying in the academic or literary ivory towers, from refraining from participating actively in such political and social struggles as are actually fought in their societies."

Baran, having pointed out above the factors which, in his view, help explain why aspiring intellectuals and “intellectuals assign to intellectuals such a vastly inflated role in the historical process," and warning that the "Influence of the intellectuals on the speed, direction and outcome of social movements is not to be denied," sees the problem to be this:

"Under what historical circumstances do intellectuals become drawn in such movements. under what conditions are they capable of affecting the course of events in a particular way. and what forces determine the specific part which they play?"

Aside from a few profound-sounding discourses scattered here and there by intellectuals, the problem posed by Baran in the main goes unanswered. And with the exception of a brief sentence in the Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels offer no theory as to why intellectuals join the socialist movement. But Marx and Engels have indicated that revolutionary intellectuals are often authoritatively motivated. Such intellectuals would be chiefs, not indians. These self-chosen ones would supplant the present ruling class, but in a more benevolent manner. They believe that the conception of a socialist society is beyond the comprehension of workingmen, and that only they can bring social consciousness to the workers. In reality they have brought not social consciousness to the workers but have brought to the fore instead their own elite authoritarianism.

No, socialism will not be brought about by an intellectual elite and a proclamation of a dictatorship in the name of the workers. Genuine socialism will only be brought about by the working class, consciously and politically organized.

One has only to look about the world today to note that the old vitality of the capitalist order is in sharp decline, is losing favor in wide sections of the people. Intellectuals are definitely not our saviors, but revolutionary intellectuals, with revolutionary thought and propaganda and free of elitism, could class-rightly be our helpmates — could aid in laying to rest nowadays cancerous Capitalism. Intellectuals can be in the forefront with the working class, or perforce follow with their impotent grieving about their impotence upon the latter's heels into World Socialism.

Whether or not the arguments put forth by this writer had any appreciable effect on the mode of thought of his student caller is anyone's guess. The latter left, saying he would call again soon. But this has not come to pass as of this writing.

REN

Endnote:

[1] There were, of course, vast areas of the globe, notably northern Europe and Asia, in which Chattel Slavery was exceptional. The social system may be called Warrior Chiefdoms, with ruling and subject classes and with many vestiges of primitive communal institutions. The system is also called Early Feudalism.

Chattel Slave society was confined to the area around the Mediterranean: Asia Minor, Egypt, Greece and Rome. Chattel Slavery dominated the known world and was eventually overthrown by the Barbarians of the North, the early feudalism. The feudal society of the post Roman era evolved from the existing early feudal social relations but was greatly affected by the impact of chattel slave society.

Our position on violence (1971)

From issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

In the popular mind, “violence” and “revolution” go together like the engine and the car; revolution necessarily implies violence, and cannot happen without it. In a revolution you capture the government, dispossess the ruling class of their control over the means of production, and break their ability to resist; and since no ruling class is going to lie down and do nothing while they are being dispossessed, so the logic goes, they can only be defeated by violence.

The World Socialist Party advocates revolution (i.e., the capture of state power by workers, the dispossession of the ruling class, and the abolition of wage labor-capital relationships) without at the same time advocating violence to achieve it. This does not mean that we oppose violence on moralistic grounds, like Richard Nixon or other, genuine, pacifists or that we are fake revolutionaries who dream of a better world without being willing to do what is necessary to get it. Neither does it mean that we think the revolution will be an amiable middle-class tea party in which everyone writes the name of his candidate on the ballot, and the Nixons, Agnews, and General Kys of the world retire gracefully to their country clubs because their terms of office have expired.

Winning power

The World Socialist Party position on violence flows logically from our objectives and from our analysis of why the capitalist class are able to maintain their power and what must be done to dislodge them. Our objective is to abolish production for sale and re-organize the world’s industries and labor solely to fulfill human wants and needs. We say that wage workers are the only social class in present day society capable of carrying out this task. The socialist revolution, therefore, must be a process in which workers themselves, not leaders or vanguards, take political power and use it to abolish private property in the means of production.

The question of violence enters when we discuss how workers are to win power. The means necessary to win power are obvious once we understand why workers do not have power now. If it were true that the only reason the ruling class stay in power is their ability to terrorize workers, then it would make sense for socialists to accumulate weapons and fight terror with terror.

But their primary means of staying in power is not force; it is their control over working-class heads. This would have to be true in a system of society where workers outnumber capitalists 99 to 1, produce all the guns, clubs, bombs, planes, tanks, and napalm, and even man the armies and police forces. Workers also construct the highways, transport vehicles, communications and supplies that make it possible to use violence. The implements and methods of government violence are social in nature. They require the co-operation of masses of workers before they can be set in motion. It is clear that the ruling class hold power primarily because they are able to get that co-operation by methods other than terror, not because they own buildings full of weapons.

The ruling class control the heads of workers by controlling the nature of the ideas and opinions they hold, and by controlling the channels through which these ideas are passed on. The ideas themselves are of two main types: a) those which directly or indirectly justify capitalism or encourage behavior that capitalism requires in order to function; and b) those which blame the problems of capitalism on something other than the capitalist system, and hold out solutions other than socialism. The channels for conveying these ideas are of three types: a) established institutions, such as schools and churches, where workers go to receive formal instruction; b) mass communications media, such as radio, TV, books, films, and periodicals, that reach workers informally and are not necessarily a part of their job or social training; c) organizations which are dominated by capitalist values, such as the Boy Scouts, Junior Achievement, Knights of Columbus, American Association of University Professors, American Medical Association, and any number of company unions.

Since it is by these methods that the ruling class are able to maintain power, it follows that the chief task of a socialist revolutionary should be to undermine ruling-class ideas and values and replace them with the ideology of socialism. For without the consent and participation of the working class, it would not be possible to manufacture implements of violence, much less set in motion the troops which use them. Neither would it be possible to abolish production for sale.

The best defense

The World Socialist Party advocates the ballot as a means of achieving power because, once ruling-class ideas are defeated, no other method on a mass scale should be necessary; and if those ideas are not defeated, no violent method can be successful. This is not to say that violence will never occur at any level in the process of transforming society from capitalism to socialism, or that the ruling classes will make no attempt to resist their demise. What it means is that, once they lose control of our heads, resistance on their part will be futile. If they choose to resist, the people themselves will decide at that time the most efficient way to handle them.

In the process of trying to save their ideas from defeat, the ruling class may well issue bans on socialist activity, hire thugs to beat up members who attempt to distribute leaflets, and smash meetings and organizations of workers. As we do not oppose violence on moralistic or metaphysical grounds, it is impossible to argue that socialists should refuse to defend themselves against this kind of attack. But the best defense is to do our ideological work well enough so that workers themselves will allow and even assist us to go on functioning as socialists.

The measure of our success will be the extent to which workers refuse to co-operate with the ruling class in their attempts to cripple the socialist movement. It is useless to waste time accumulating guns for the day when the ruling class become fascist, when we could be accumulating the much more potent defense of sympathizers, supporters, members, and a pro-socialist public opinion.

The main battleground of the socialist revolution will be ideological. This is a battle that socialists can have every confidence in their ability to win. While it is pro-capitalist ideology’ which enables the ruling class to go on doing what they do to the world, at the same time ideology is the weakest link in their armor. The fact is that pro-capitalist values and explanations for what is happening to us do not fit reality. They are in no way capable of accounting for or dealing with the pollution of the air and sea, poverty, famine, waste, unemployment, war, and the general decline of the quality of life on this earth.

It makes sense, then, to attack the ideas of the ruling class, where they are weakest, rather than their armies, weapons, and administrative methods, where they are strongest. And the most valuable ideological weapon in the socialist arsenal, because it stresses the unity of all knowledge, because it provides a rational frame within which to interpret seemingly unrelated bits of information, because it fits the fact better than any other theory of society, because the dozens of books written to refute it have proven by their very number to be worthless; this most valuable weapon is the materialist world outlook.

Stan Blake

Stop Confirming Marxism

From issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

"Whenever you get vast numbers of unemployed., it is an open invitation for radical thinking" says John Ober, executive director of the Seattle Professional Employees Association, the Boeing engineers union. "We have to stop reconfirming the Marxist thesis that we can’t keep employment full without a war."

(Page 1, Wall St. Journal, 12/7/70)

Unemployment: The Poverty Problem Explained (1971)

From issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

(Edit Comm. Note: Although The Western Socialist was founded in 1933 — In Winnipeg. Canada — it has had precursors extending back to The Western Clarion of 1905. Another predecessor of our journal was The Winnipeg Socialist, published by the Winnipeg local of the Socialist Party of Canada, beginning with the issue of January, 1923. The lead article of that first edition was entitled UNEMPLOYMENT, with subtitle: The Poverty Problem Explained. Inasmuch as unemployment and poverty — some 48 years later — remain problems of great priority, the article is as timely today as when it was written. We take pleasure In reprinting this important analysis of one of capitalism’s perennial questions, working class poverty and the interrelationship between employment and unemployment The article was written by Adolf Kohn. a pioneer of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, who was organizing for the socialist movement in Canada and the United States, at the time.)

Every day the number of unemployed workers increases. The chance of getting a job becomes less and less. The army of the workless tramp the streets begging for a job. Unemployment is not their real trouble. It is the want of the necessities of life. They are hungry and face starvation together with those dependent upon them. The idle rich are unemployed, but they do not suffer poverty. Unemployment is a curse only to the working class, because they are a class without wealth. Poverty, not unemployment, is the real “problem.”

Why are the workers out of work? Why are there no jobs for them? It is because the workers have produced too much. The factories and stores are overflowing with goods for which there are no buyers. The class that owns the land, factories and mines will only allow the workers to produce when they can make a profit out of their labor.

Capitalists need unemployed army

The capitalists introduce the latest machinery and scientific devices to increase the output of the workers, and thereby to reduce the number of workers they need hire. They employ women and children because they are cheaper. Every discovery and invention, every new method of speeding up the worker is Introduced to increase profits. The very development of modern Industry, therefore, continually throws the worker out of work. All these up-to-date methods of production increase the output of each worker and continually piles up the wealth in the factories. The workers in the factories have been so busy, so industrious and so productive that they are continually faced with unemployment. Each manufacturer produces as much as possible and as cheap as possible in order to capture the market against his competitors, because he is in business for profit. Each country does the same, and the result is a world war for markets, to dispose of their products.

It is in the interest of the capitalist to have an army of unemployed. Not only to absorb some of them when business is brisker than usual, but to keep down the wages of those in work. The employer knows that with an army of unemployed outside he can speed up the employed and keep them docile. While the worker is forced to sell his energy to the owners of the factories. his wage will get lower as the competition for jobs gets keener. If he does not find a master quickly, he will starve, so he is compelled to work on the bosses’ terms.

Where unions are powerless

The power of unions to resist is very small when unemployment grows, and so the workers’ standard of living declines. The present system of production for profit is impossible without the unemployed, and the employers’ power to introduce machinery and speeding up systems will always guarantee an unemployed army for the capitalists.

A cry for a shorter work-day as a remedy for unemployment is. therefore. a cry of men who do not understand the present system. Shorter hours are an incentive to the employers to speed up and devise ways and means for getting a greater output in fewer hours. Better machinery and the saving of waste are also adopted. Employers like Ford and Leverhulme boast of greater profits since they shortened hours. No union can remove unemployment. Unions cannot stop machinery being introduced to save wages. Unions cannot stop the growth of the Trust and Combine, which always eradicates waste, and, consequently, needs less workers to do the work. Unions cannot stop the constant overproduction which closes down industry. These things are inherent in the capitalist system. They are due to capitalist ownership, and the resulting anarchy. The contradiction of co-operative production inside the factory and the private ownership of the product, causes the depressions and crises we now suffer.

Not war problem

The worker, able, ready and willing to work, is denied a chance to apply his energy and produce wealth. He has produced too much and he is. therefore, left in misery, while around him is greater wealth than ever existed before. Labor leaders talk of greater output, while the warehouses are stifling with goods. Our politicians talk of increasing "our" foreign trade while unemployment has increased along with increasing exports. England and America's great export trade has not saved them from an unemployed crisis. After the great Allied victory the workers who carried on the war are offered a day or two’s work, removing snow, to get it done cheaper than ordinary rates. The industrious workers are insulted with a charitable dole insufficient to pay the rent, provided they are medically unfit to perform the miserable relief work at a starvation pittance.

The capitalists dare not attempt to absorb the unemployed. They could not do without them. They will not offer any grants likely to make charity more desirable than the lowest paid work. It is not a war problem, for the unemployed are a constant feature of the present system. Even when work is resumed and trade flourishes again, the same large workless army will appear as a result of a superabundance of wealth produced once more.

The capitalist system has no solution for unemployment. If work could be found tomorrow for some of the workless, they would merely add to the products clogging the market. The workers cannot buy their products because their wages are but a fraction of the wealth they produce.

The only remedy

Mr. Lloyd George tells English workers to emigrate to Canada, and preachers tell them to "trust in the Lord." We tell the workers there is no hope until they establish a system of common ownership of the natural and industrial resources, in order to produce wealth for use by the producers instead of for the profit of idle owners of these resources. You must establish Socialism, but, in order to do this you must acquire the necessary knowledge of the subject. Education and organization of the working class must be carried on, so that the workers can obtain the necessary political power to change the system. There lies the road to your emancipation.

Adolph Kohn

Ecologia e Socialismo (2023)

Via the Socialism or Your Money Back blog

Three. articles from the Socialist Standard have been translated into Italian :

https://www.antropocene.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=427:stiamo-andando-incontro-a-una-fame-di-massa&catid=12

https://www.antropocene.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=422:perche-la-biodiversita-e-importante&catid=12

https://www.antropocene.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=425:half-earth-socialim-troy-vettese-e-drew-pendergrass-2022&catid=13

Obituary: Ennis “Cheerio” Clarke (1971)

Obituary from issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

Ennis “Cheerio” Clarke was born in Walmsley, England, about 1895. His parents moved the family to the Boston, Massachusetts, area sometime prior to the World War I period where Ennis remained until the late Thirties when he settled in the town of East Greenwich, Rhode Island. He made his living for many years as a professional photographer and, in a small way, as a dealer in philatelic stamps.

“Cheerio.” as he was known to just about all who knew him to any extent, met members of the World Socialist Party during his Boston days and found our political philosophy conformed with his own. He remained a member of the WSP and a convinced socialist until his death on Nov. 9, 1970. at the Veterans Home in Bristol. Rhode Island. As a draftee in World War I, where he was stationed for the duration in a training camp in So. Carolina, “Cheerio” was entitled to Veteran benefits. He was in and out of the V.A. Hospital in Providence, R. I. for a number of years before his death, the victim of cancer. He had never married.

“Cheerio” was also an accomplished amateur musician and performed creditably on the banjo, guitar and mandolin. He was well-known and liked in E. Greenwich as the following excerpt from a letter to this writer from one of his close friends, Don Rice, will attest. Our correspondent, who now lives in Ohio and edits a Quarterly “Journal of American Opinion” — SCHISM — writes:

“Trips back east won't seem the same now, without being able to stop by his studio-apartment for a visit. More than any other person, he was responsible for opening my eyes to the possibilities of alternatives. There were many in East Greenwich who were influenced by his youthful readiness to challenge old fogies one-fourth his age. He went on the wagon once for years; we kids got him drinking beer again, going out to bars or just sitting up in his studio playing guitar and singing. It never seemed odd to us at nineteen and twenty and twenty-one to have as a member of our crowd a man in his sixties. Though “Cheerio” didn't neglect those his own age. It was always great fun to sit on the courthouse wall listening to him argue with two of his regular cronies; a part-time policeman and a Jehovah's Witness. He was considered a harmless crank by many in town, but those of us who knew him well, knew that he was a good man deeply concerned with correcting social injustice and the inequities of modern life."

Which we, his comrades, would only amend by pointing out that “Cheerio’' went beyond a desire to correct “social injustice,” something that most people would profess to favor provided it could be done within the framework of capitalist society. “Cheerio” was a revolutionist in the most meaningful sense of the term, even organizing propaganda trips to E. Greenwich by his Boston comrades in order that those in E. Greenwich who cared to listen could hear and debate the case for a brand new way of life with others than himself. There were, over the years, a few such trips when at least two carloads of WSPers made the 65-mile trip from Boston.

In his final days, “Cheerio” was able to have visits from a number of his comrades, including Gilbert McClatchle of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, who was in our area last September. He was also enabled to see consummated his wish that his possessions should go to the World Socialist Party. Several of us made the trip to E. Greenwich where we removed many items, including a valuable stamp collection and a number of musical instruments, all of which are adding much-needed funds to aid socialist work.

Those of us who knew him, including this writer who visited him on a number of occasions over the last few years, will miss him. I can attest, as one who has examined much of the voluminous correspondence accumulated by Comrade Clarke — in the capacity of a sort of literary executor — that he has done his part in spreading the case for socialism. He has made his mark in the World Socialist Movement.

Harry Morrison

Obituary: Comrade Sid Earp (1971)

Obituary from issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

It is with regret that we announce the passing of Comrade Sid Earp of Vancouver, B.C., Canada, on November 23, 1970. He was taken ill in his hotel room and was dead on arrival at the hospital.

This writer can recall the time — I think it was in 1915 — that Sid joined the old, and at that time robust and vital, Vancouver Local No. 1, S.P.C. He soon made his presence felt in many ways. At the Saturday evening socials of the Local his mellow and well-placed baritone often regaled us with “Brown October Ale” and other popular vocal favorites. This earned for him the name of “The All-Red Baritone.”

In his later years, as many may recall, he traveled much, visiting comrades in England, Scotland, Ireland. New Zealand. Australia, as well as those in the United States and Canada. I remember well his filling me in with his glowing impressions of these visits and am grateful therefor.

Though not one of great means (he was a waterfront worker and received a pension on retirement — he was an expert on supervising the loading of cargo on merchant ships) he was generous to the socialist movement on many occasions. When on a visit to Boston* many years ago, he donated $1000 to the WSP.

As time goes on, we witness one more old stalwart passing. This should spur the rest who remain to greater efforts to obtain knowledge able recruits so that the shoes of those passing away should not remain unfilled.

“Bill” Pritchard.

* We in Boston have fond memories of Sid Earp.

The Joy of Capitalist "Peace" (1971)

From issue number 1 (1971) of The Western Socialist

A recent report on health and safety conditions facing workers in the U.S.A., published by a group of Black militant unionists who call themselves the League of Revolutionary Black Workers revealed the following shocking facts. The U. S. Labor Department has estimated that 75% of all workers suffer disabling injuries on the job sometime before retirement. Each year 15.000 workers lose their lives in industrial accidents. 1,700,000 workers suffer impaired or lost hearing due to excess noise levels in plants. More coal miners have accidentally died in the last 60 years than all the casualties in the Korean and Vietnam conflicts. In automobile stamping plants around Detroit an estimated 25% of the workers have lost fingers, arms, or other limbs due to accidents. In 1966 there were 13.2 disabling injuries per 1 million man-hours worked, 27,000 injuries daily, 6000 of these disabling, 250 permanently disabling and 55 deaths each day.

With 260 deaths attributed to civil disorders since 1965 the ruling class screams for law and order. With 225 deaths every week from industrial accidents the ruling class is strangely silent. With 24 million man-hours lost due to strikes in 1966 the capitalists screamed for anti-strike legislation. In the same year 255 million man-hours were lost due to accidents, but the capitalists lost their voices in the call for better industrial safety legislation.

For every worker who dies of industrial accident, it is estimated that 50 die from heart attacks on the job. Industrial diseases take a tremendous toll among workers. Black lung disease, silocosis, pneumonsoniosis, all 20-year lung aliments, have killed millions in the mines and foundries of America. In Pennsylvania alone 2000 workers die each year of black lung. Most workers in Detroit auto foundries have silocosis after 5 years exposure to the dust-ridden foundry air. Metal miners contract bladder cancer from long exposure to radioactive dust. Many workers are subjected to intense toxic fumes from chemicals used in metal plating and processing; sulphuric acid, nitric acid, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, dyes and chemicals causing bladder cancer, ozone from heat welding, dirt and oil in the air are all entering and destroying the bodies and internal organs of healthy workers.

Those workers who miraculously escape physical damage suffer nervous tensions, mental illness up to psychosis, extreme fatigue from speedup, anxiety over job security. The character of factory work, its strenuous nature, the unending repetition, the immense boredom, the noise, the nagging foreman, all lead to total alienation of the worker from his or her environment. Alcoholism and drug addiction often are the escape routes used to flee the living hell of industrial production.

In response to these conditions. all-Black unions such as DRUM (Dodge Revolutionary Union Movement), ELRUM (Eldon Avenue Assembly Plant), FRUM (Ford), and the League of Revolutionary Black Workers have been organized to combat white racism in the trade and industrial unions and to get safety and health legislation for the protection of workers. But these “revolutionary" unions are bound to fall because they are organized on a minority racial instead of a majority class basis. To create healthful, safe and exploitationless working conditions workers of every color must unite politically in an independent, working class socialist party (World Socialist Party), capture the governmental powers now in the hands of the capitalist ruling class, and thereby transform the means of wealth production and distribution into the common property of society with democratic control of the industries by the workers themselves.

Carl M. Vrooman

Quote . . . Unquote (1972)

From issue number 2 (1972) of The Western Socialist

We couldn't have said it better 

"Look at it this way. America is run largely by and for about 5.000 people who are actively supported by 50,000 beavers eager to take their places. I arrive at the round figure this way: maybe 2.500 megacorporation executives, 500 politicians, lobbyists and Congressional committee chairmen. 500 investment bankers, 500 commercial bankers, 500 partners in major accounting firms, 500 labor brokers. If you don't like my figures, make up your own. We won’t be far apart in the context of a country with 210-million people. The 5.000 appoint their own successors, are responsible to nobody. They treat this nation as an exclusive whorehouse especially designed for their comfort and kicks. The President of these United States, in their private view, is head towel boy. They prefer clever flunkies who. like most of the present White House gang, are so slippery they can enter a telephone booth and leave by the side door.

For most of us, the 210-million, the result is a tearing frustration. Frustration with unemployment, inequity, taxes and prices, to be sure, but under it all a rage at the giant, impregnable, impenetrable, anonymous, unaccountable. irresponsible,  immoveable bastions of power. And now, through the Naderites, through the blizzard of shredded documents at I.T.T., we get our noses rubbed in the whole sick operation of decadent power blocks.

The time has come to have dreams, hopes as tangible as an A.P. dateline and not far off." 

Robert Townsend in New York Times Book Review Section, April 30. 1972

From the WSPUS Radio Series: Alienated Men (1972)

From issue number 2 (1972) of The Western Socialist

Have you happened to have heard the term alienation? It Is being kicked around a bit these days, especially by psychologists and philosophers. They tell us that modern man suffers from alienation — a feeling of not belonging, that one is a lost soul who is going through the motions of living with little, if any, consciousness. And among the theories on the cause of alienation we are told that the automated and computerized society of our times is responsible.

Well, no doubt there is some truth to this but the philosophers and behavior analysts of our times seem to be largely unaware of the fact that more than a century ago Karl Marx made use of the word and, in fact, explained it in terms that make it much easier to understand. Marx saw society as divided basically into two economic classes—owners, or capitalists, and workers. Now those who owned the factories, mines and workshops, the land and all that is in and on it, were not lost souls in the sense in which we speak in those times any more than they are today. It was the working class that was alienated — alienated, as Marx explained, from the product of their toil. The workers in those times, as today, were completely divorced from ownership and a consequent feeling of interest in the commodities which they were producing. They sold their mental and physical energies to those who owned the means and instruments of production and distribution and once the agreement was made those energies and the product of their toll was owned — as today — by those who bought the labor power — the capitalist class. In fact, Marx remarked that the workers had become mere appendages of the machines and if he could see the extent to which this machine-appendage relationship has grown in the plants of our times he would roll over in his grave.

For the feeling of alienation on the part of those who produce but do not own can only have been magnified in direct proportion to the intensification of industry in the last century and, particularly, in the period since World War II. True, there are a multitude of small businesses of all sorts in America today. Including small farms. But the mainstream of production is carried on in gigantic mechanized farms and in factories such as are found in auto, steel, copper, rubber, petroleum, and chemical industries — plants that herd thousands of workers under one roof to operate the machinery from production line to office. Can there be any feeling other than alienation among those who do the work in conditions such as these?

As a specific example that has hit the front pages of the newspapers and the TV documentaries, look at the case of General Motors vs. the United Auto Workers Union in the affair of the new Vega plant In Lordstown. Ohio. G.M. estimates that it has lost the production of some $45-million worth of Vega automobiles and Chevrolet trucks because of what it calls sabotage on the part of the workers. The workers contend that they can no longer keep up with the belt. They attribute the increasing number of faulty cars and trucks to the mad greed of the Company to speed-up the process and cut down on the costs of labor.

To whatever extent both sides are right in this argument there should be no argument that the workers understand more than sub-consciously that they are mere appendages of the machinery, completely divorced from any reason for interest in the finished product. And if anybody wishes to research the advantages of a job on an assembly line — at whatever wage — let him try picking up and putting down an ash tray, for example, for eight hours! Then imagine the guy or gal on the line doing one precision task at the same time trying to keep up with a steadily moving belt.

The way to eliminate alienation is to abolish commodity production. In a system of world socialism, where the earth and all that is in and on it belong to all mankind, alienation becomes involvement.