Some questions regarding Socialism

The Socialist Party has for over a century welcomed questions from opponents, sympathisers and others. Engels nearly 165 years ago wrote of one frequently encountered objection: "When one talks to people about socialism or communism, one very frequently finds that they agree entirely with the substance of the matter and declare communism to be a very fine thing; "but" they then say, "it is impossible to ever put such things into practice in real life." The 'human nature argument' brings a wry smile to Socialists whether they joined the movement six months or sixty years ago. Unsurprisingly therefore you will find it addressed in the frequently asked questions of our website.

Earlier this week an enquirer sent us a number of questions by e-mail, including several about the nature of Socialism. Given that he asks whether it can "be implemented without tyranny" and if "freedom of thought and expression be maintained" his understanding of what Socialism means clearly differs from ours. Let history shed some light on this issue. The term ‘socialist’ is found for the first time in the Owenite Co-operative Magazine of November 1827, where it stands for a society of common ownership. Marx and Engels used the words ‘socialism’ and ‘communism’ interchangeably to refer to a society of common ownership. Marx and Engels gave few other details about what they thought socialism would be like. However, they both wrote at length about what they thought socialism would not be like via a critique of ‘other socialisms’. The ‘other socialisms’, according to Hal Draper, were:
*Utopian Socialism. Saint-Simon, Fourier and Owen gave useful criticisms of existing society and interesting possibilities for a future society, but they were politically naïve about how this was to come about.
*Sentimental Socialism. Not a school of socialism as such but a tendency to be found in various schools, substituting the power of love, humanity or morality for the class struggle
*Anarchism. Stirner, Proudhon and Bakunin were criticised for failing to see the authoritarianism inherent in the anti-democratic nature of anarchism.
*Reactionary Anti-capitalisms. All those who yearn for a pre-capitalist ‘golden age’ of harmony, plenty etc., as found for example in the writings of Thomas Carlyle.
*Boulangism. After General Georges Boulanger in France, an arch-opportunist and a forerunner of ‘National Socialism’.
*Bismarckian Socialism (or ‘State Socialism’). In late nineteenth century Germany the Bismarck regime introduced nationalisation and social-welfare reforms. To a large extent this was an attempt to undermine and ‘steal the thunder’ of growing support for the reformist German Social Democratic Party.
It is this latter Bismarckian, statist conception of socialism which has become world famous. But the policies pursued by such ‘socialist’ regimes in practice - nationalisation, social welfare provision, free compulsory education, etc. - have also been pursued by openly pro-capitalist governments. There is nothing inherently anti-capitalist about these reforms, or any of the measures pursued by any Labour/Social Democratic/’Socialist’ government worldwide; and, indeed, as a whole they were merely a form of state capitalism. We in the World Socialist Movement stick to our principles and the original meaning of socialism: common ownership, democratic control and production solely for use. We do so not because we are dogmatic but because our socialist theory consistently provides an insightful analysis of the contradictions of capitalism, because of the repeated failure of the alternatives put in to practice, and because the prospect of socialism as the meeting of our real needs provides the motivation

The Socialist Party is thoroughly democratic, just like the leaderless global system of free access and production for use it urges a majority of workers to establish. Tyranny, the struggle for 'human rights' and freedom of expression will only be found in accounts of capitalism and earlier social systems. But just as our conception of Socialism is very different from that presented in the mass media, so is our perspective on democracy - a term which originated in ancient Greece where it meant rule by the citizens (which excluded the majority - foreigners, women and slaves). In the modern Western world, ‘liberal democracy’ means little more than regular elections in which competing political parties put up candidates for government office, offering voters the chance to choose between marginally different sets of policies. This is to be preferred to those conditions in countries where even these limited rights do not exist. However, ‘liberal democracy’ does not constitute a meaningful conception of democracy. Socialists argue that all governments, no matter how well-intentioned or enlightened, in trying to administer the capitalist system as a whole (‘the national interest’), usually pursue policies that favour the capitalist class. It is in this sense that the United Nations has declared 15 September as the ‘International Day of Democracy’.

In socialist society the machinery of government of the states of the world can have given way to democratic administration at local, regional and global levels. Real democracy will involve equality between all people with regard to the control of the use of the means of production.

Our enquirer asks about the nautre of production in a Socialist world (a topic explored in detail in 'Socialism as a Practical Alternative') before raising another issue, "the failure of socialism in the Soviet Union." The Russian question has a shorter pedigree than that relating to human nature, but over ninety years of responding to this it is much longer than any Socialist would like. Lets us therefore be clear and state again that Socialism has never existed in Russia or anywhere else. The Bolshevik left, however, maintain that the revolution of November 1917 was socialist. But, as the Socialist Standard at the time and subsequent years show, this position is untenable:

‘Is this huge mass of people, numbering about 160,000,000 and spread over eight and a half millions of square miles, ready for socialism? Are the hunters of the north, the struggling peasant proprietors of the south, the agricultural wage slaves of the Central Provinces, and the industrial wage slaves of the towns convinced of the necessity and equipped with the knowledge required, for the establishment of the social ownership of the means of life? Unless a mental revolution such as the world has never seen before has taken place, or an economic change has occurred immensely more rapidly than history has ever recorded, the answer is “No!” ’ (Socialist Standard, August 1918.)

‘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” (The Chief Task of Our Times)… If we are to copy Bolshevik policy in other countries we should have to demand State capitalism, which is not a step to socialism’ (Socialist Standard, July 1920).

‘Both Trotsky and Stalin draw up their programmes within the framework of state and private capitalism which prevails in Russia’ (Socialist Standard, December 1928).

‘[all the Bolsheviks] have been able to do is to foster the growth of State capitalism and limit the growth of private capitalism’ (Socialist Standard, July 1929.)

Since the collapse of the Russian Empire after 1989, state capitalist monopoly has given way to a Western-style ‘mixed economy’, with many of the former Party bosses as bosses of the new privatised businesses. Now that the sham of Russian ‘socialism’ has passed into history, workers in Russia can join in the struggle for the real thing.

Engels concludes: "If the workers are united among themselves, hold together and pursue one purpose, they are infinitely stronger than the rich. And if, moreover, they have set their sights upon such a rational purpose, and one which desires the best for all mankind, as community of goods, it is self-evident that the better and more intelligent among the rich will declare themselves in agreement with the workers and support them..." Our question is, why do not you join us in seeking to make a world of free access possible?