Friday, May 31, 2019
Why Wait? Why Procrastinate?
 |
| Socialism Now |
The
world's future looks grim. But do not despair, the future is in your
hands.
When
enough of us join together determined to end inequality and
deprivation we can transform elections into a means of doing away
with a society of minority rule in favour of real democracy and
equality. Our common efforts could feed, clothe and house every man
woman and child on Earth without exception but we are held back
because the owners of the world demand their cut before they’ll let
us use the world’s resources. The iron laws of No Profit, No
Production and No Profit, No Employment are a cage for us.
If
you agree with the idea of a society of common and democratic
ownership where no-one is left behind and where things are produced
because they are needed, and not to make profits for some capitalist
corporation or to enrich some bloated millionaire, join with us to
achieve this.
Capitalism
is controlled by the capitalist class. The establishment of socialism
is the historic mission of the working class; but socialism can only
be established by abolishing capitalism. From this it follows that
the interests of the capitalist class are in direct opposition to
those of the working class. These two classes, as classes, have no
national boundaries—not only because they exist wherever capitalism
reigns, but also because both capitalists and workers wander all over
the globe, the one in search of profits, the other in search of a
living, through the medium of work. To establish socialism the
working class have to wrest power from the capitalist class, and
therefore the fight for Socialism, and its establishment must be
worldwide. Only those who understand the principles of socialism can
give strength to the revolutionary movement.
We
rarely call upon the workers to do anything but think. We also ask of
our fellow-workers that they end their allegiance to all other
political parties who have brought them, and can only bring them,
strife and misery, and that they turn their attention to the message
of the Socialist Party that shows the only means by which present-day
evils can be abolished. Having severed this allegiance to other
political parties the path to the understanding of socialism will be
easy.
The
Socialist Party repudiate and oppose the political careerists who
treat the working class with contempt. They have never had the
interests of the working class at heart; many have been concerned
with their own personal individual escape from wage-slavery and all
of their political ambitions and efforts have been to that end. We
have no more use for their quackery and
double-dealing.
Those
in the Socialist Party are determined people. We know what we want
and we know how to get it, and nothing will stop us. Our record is a
clean one. We have nothing to be ashamed of. We do not hide and we
can defend all our actions since our Party was formed. We stood alone
in two world wars, unflinching in our opposition to them, when other
political parties were swept away in the hysteria of patriotism. We
alone proclaimed the world-wide solidarity of the working class and
extended hands in fraternal greetings to workers in all parts of the
world whatever language they might speak and to whatever country they
might belong.
We
know that our interests are those of the workers all over the world,
the abolition of capitalism and the establishment of socialism. In
that mission we will willingly and gladly co-operate with them. The
day of the social revolution is getting closer. Let every worker,
however limited his or her opportunities, strive to gain more
knowledge of the science of society - Socialism.
Fellow-workers,
we are doing our share. When are you going to do yours?
Chomsky on Trump
Noam
Chomsky is credited as being somewhat of a savvy political
commentator and in this interview he tries to explain the Trump
phenomena and expose much of the fallacies his supporters still hold
about him. Despite much of the media's depiction of him as clown
Trump
could very well be re-elected in 2020 as his approval ratings still
appear to show strong support for him.
Chomsky comments:
“...he
is a highly skilled politician, with a good sense of how to gain
popular approval, even virtual worship in some circles. He certainly
has taken control of the GOP, to quite a remarkable extent. He’s
been very successful with his two constituencies: the primary one,
wealth and corporate power; and the voting base, relatively affluent
fairly generally, including a large bloc of Christian evangelicals,
rural whites, farmers, workers who have faith in his promises to
bring back jobs, and a collection of others, some not too admirable.
It’s clear why the primary constituency is mostly delighted.
Corporate profits are booming. Wealth continues to be concentrated in
very few hands. Trump’s administration is lavishing them with
gifts, including the tax bill, the main legislative achievement,
across-the-board deregulation, and rapidly increasing fossil fuel
production...To keep the rest in line is sometimes easy, among them
the Christian right, white supremacists, ultranationalists and
xenophobes, and those in terror of “hordes” of immigrants. It is
easy to throw them occasional chunks of red meat. But sometimes
maintaining their allegiance takes the kind of demagoguery at which
he is expert. Thus many who are understandably aggrieved by the
economic policies of the neoliberal years still seem to feel that
he’s the one person standing up for them by shaking his fist at
those they blame for taking away their jobs: immigrants and “the
scheming Chinese”...”
Chomsky
continues his analysis:
“...It’s
quite true that huge numbers of jobs have fled to China, but who is
responsible for that? China? Is China holding a gun to the heads of
Apple, GM, IBM, GE … and forcing them to ship jobs to China? One
can’t even say that it’s the fault of the managers of the
corporations. Their responsibility, in fact legal obligation, is to
make profits for shareholders, and that purpose is served by shifting
jobs to China, Mexico, Vietnam, Bangladesh. Those who object to these
practices should be demanding that such decisions should not be in
the hands of management and the board of directors, but rather in the
hands of those who actually do the work of the enterprise, as
democratic principle might suggest. Perhaps along the lines of a 19th
century writer whose initials are K.M. But somehow one doesn’t see
this interesting idea explored in mainstream commentary.”
He
continues:
“...Another
charge is that China steals U.S. technology by forcing firms to hand
over secrets as a condition on investment (already dealt with) and by
violating World Trade Organization rules on intellectual property
(TRIPS)... Putting aside the legitimacy of these highly protectionist
devices, which raise patent protection far beyond the historical
norm, we can ask who gains and who loses if, say, China uses
discoveries in U.S. research labs to produce cheaper drugs than the
corporations that have gained the patents, or to develop a better
alternative to the Windows operating system? American consumers gain,
while Big Pharma’s huge profits are somewhat reduced and Bill Gates
might decline slightly in the ranks of richest men in the world...”
On
the economy Chomsky points out “...The “economic boom” is a
continuation of the slow recovery that began under Obama...The
tax cut, of course, exploded the deficit, which can now provide a
pretext for cutting social spending. The
continuing increase in employment has led to a slight increase in
wages, with opportunities for those at the lower end of the income
scale, but it doesn’t come close to making up what has been lost
during the period of stagnation from the early ‘80s....Jobs
are growing slightly faster in Trump-supporting rural and exurban
counties than in the urban mostly Clinton counties. At the same time,
real wages declined slightly in Trump counties and increased slightly
in Clinton counties, in both cases a decline from the Obama years...”
Full
interview at the Truthout website
Thursday, May 30, 2019
The Lords Reward
A Labour peer claimed almost £50,000 in attendance and travel expenses covering every single day the House of Lords was sitting last year, despite never speaking or asking any written questions, a Guardian investigation reveals.
Unlike MPs, who receive an annual salary, peers are entitled to a daily allowance of £305. Parliamentary staff note peers’ attendance when they arrive, but no record is kept of how soon after that they depart.
The former trade union general secretary David Brookman was among dozens of other lords and baronesses who never took part in a single debate, while almost a third of the 800 peers barely participated in parliamentary business over a 12-month period
But attendance data alone can be misleading because some peers rarely or never participate in parliamentary business despite attending frequently.
The steel company magnate Swraj Paul attended on 157 days and claimed more than £47,000 of allowances, but only spoke once. Lord Paul said there was no requirement in the rules for lords to participate in order to claim allowances. “I take a lot of interest in the House of Lords, but there is a lot more to be done than making speeches,” he said. Asked for an example, he replied: “Thinking, etc, and giving my point of view to colleagues.”
The median allowance claim by peers was £30,180, though some peers claimed substantially more than that through more frequent attendance or through travel expenses.
Fact of the Day
The US military—with its nearly 1000 bases worldwide and insatiable reliance on fossil fuel to keep all of its ships, planes, tanks, trucks, and jeeps running—is the single largest source of carbon dioxide emissions (the gases causing climate change) in the world.
The Pentagon’s carbon footprint is 70% of total US emissions.
US military uses more oil than 175 smaller countries combined.
The Pentagon’s carbon footprint is 70% of total US emissions.
US military uses more oil than 175 smaller countries combined.
For the sake of humanity
Neoliberalism is a term coined by opponents of the policies pursued by many governments since the 1980s of privatisation and deregulation, of allowing market forces to operate with less state interference. “Neo” because it was seen as a revival of the anti-state, laissez-faire philosophy of 19th century liberalism.
"Climate disruption is upon us, and it is progressing faster than our efforts to address it," said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres in Vienna at the climate-focused R20 Austrian World Summit. But the scope of the task at hand is huge, explained Guterres, as it necessitates a total transformation of all aspects of society. "What is needed for effective mitigation and improved resilience," he said, "is quite simply a rapid and deep change in how we do business, how we generate power, how we build cities, and how we feed the world." Another key change, said Guterres, is to stop using taxpayer funds to prop up the coal, oil, and gas industries.
"We need to tax pollution, not people, and to end subsidies for fossil fuels," said Guterres. He also debunked the wrongful assumption by some that fossil fuel subsidies improve people's lives. "There is nothing more wrong than that," he said. "What we are doing is using taxpayers' money—which means our money—to boost hurricanes, to spread droughts, to melt glaciers, to bleach corals. In one word—to destroy the world. "As taxpayers," continued Guterres, "I believe we would like to see our money back rather than to see our money used to destroy the world."
At the two-day summit climate activist Greta Thunberg said that "for too long the people in power... have gotten away with stealing our future and selling it for profit."
"We are not going to let you get away with it anymore."
Their comments came a day after the Pope spoke to a group of financial ministers from around the world and urged them to back the goals of the Paris climate accord.
"We must achieve what we have agreed upon, for our survival and well-being depend on it." Among the worrisome signs he pointed to are that "Investments in fossil fuels continue to rise, even though scientists tell us that fossil fuels should remain underground." The pontiff referenced the increasingly frequent extreme weather events, which he said "are only a dire premonition of things much worse to come, unless we act and act urgently." Among the tasks the Pope said the financial ministers should take are "to put an end to global dependency on fossil fuels" and "to open a new chapter of clean and safe energy, that utilizes, for example, renewable resources such as wind, sun and water. Time is of the essence," Pope Francis added. "We await your decisive action for the sake of all humanity."
Not
a day goes by without the problems of the environment being featured
in the media. The Socialist Party holds that only socialism can set
up the relationships of cooperation, the freedom and the rational
control over our affairs which can get us out of the mess we’re in.
Everybody must be aware of the tragic absurdity of the situation.
We’ve got the urgent need to eliminate these harmful carbon
emissions. We are held back by the economic constraints of the
market system. We cannot do it because the profits of a privileged
class minority who own and control the means of life come before the
needs of the community. There are no sane grounds on which this can
be justified. The only way to get out of the mess is to establish
socialism which will be based on common ownership, production solely
for need and democratic control. With common ownership all means of
production and distribution and all resources will be held in common
by the whole community. If you want a world of cooperation and
responsibility then all these means of life must be brought under the
democratic control of the whole community on the basis of common
ownership. In socialism we would not be bound to use the most labour
efficient methods of production. We would be free to select our
methods in accordance with a wide range of socially desirable
criteria, in particular the vital need to protect the environment. It
wouldn’t matter if ecologically benign methods of producing energy
required more allocations of labour than destructive methods as we
wouldn’t be producing commodities which have to compete in price
for sales in the market. We’d be free of all that.
A
“steady-state” society is something we should aim at. What it
means is that we should construct permanent, durable means of
production which you don’t constantly innovate. We would use these
to produce durable equipment and machinery and durable consumer goods
designed to last for a long time, designed for minimum maintenance
and made from materials which if necessary can be re-cycled. In this
way we would get a minimum loss of materials; once they’ve been
extracted and processed they can be used over and over again. It also
means that once you’ve achieved satisfactory levels of consumer
goods, you don’t insist on producing more and more. Total social
production could even be reduced. You achieve this “steady state”
and you don’t go on expanding production. This would be the
opposite of cheap, shoddy, “throw-away” goods and built-in
obsolescence, which results in a massive loss and destruction of
resources. This is something that socialism could do. The
market, however, can only function with a constant pressure to renew
its capacity for sales; and if it fails to do this production breaks
down, people are out of employment and suffer a reduced income. It is
a fundamental flaw and an insoluble contradiction in the Greens argument that they want to retain the market system, which can only
be sustained by continuous sales and continuous incomes, and at the
same time they want a conservation society with reduced productive
activity. These aims are totally incompatible with each other.
There
can be no justification, on any grounds whatsoever, for wanting to
retain an exploitative system which robs workers of the products of
their labour, which puts privileged class interests and profit before
the needs of the community, which robs the soil of its fertility,
plunders nature of its resources and destroys the natural systems on
which all our lives depend. The only alternative is socialism. We
must concentrate all our efforts on the work of building up a
majority of socialists. It might seem a big job because our numbers
are small, but we wouldn’t need many more for us to become a strong
voice in the community and every new socialist makes the work easier.
Stop tinkering with capitalism - Get rid of it completely
Can
a leopard change its spots. Some believe so in that investors will
altruistically sacrifice short-term self-enrichment for the future of
the planet and its people. It makes for good PR, but the truth is
more complicated.
Exxon
Mobil Corp shareholders on Wednesday rejected a proposal that would
have forced the company's board to create a special committee on climate change.
Shareholders
also defeated measures requiring the company to report the risks of
climate change at chemical plants on the Gulf Coast in the United States and to report political contributions and lobbying.
Under
CEO Darren Woods, Exxon has launched major expansion programs to find
and produce new reserves of oil and natural gas, as well as to expand
the company's refining and chemical footprint. Exxon has projected
shale production of 1 million barrels per day at the Permian Basin
around western Texas, the top US shale field, as early as 2024.
Shareholders
in recent years have pressed Exxon - the largest publicly traded oil
producer - to define a path toward meeting the goals of the 2015
Paris Agreement to limit global warming.
But the company has yet to commit to any targets.
Chevron
Corp's shareholders overwhelmingly rejected three
environmental resolutions: proposals to create the company's own
board committee on climate change, to report on reducing carbon
footprint, and to report on the human right to water.
Ethical funds are just a fraction of the £4.5tn investment industry.
An example is that the world’s five major tobacco companies are thriving, profitable and increasing sales. With divestment, someone with a lot less scruples, a lot less concern over long-term impact becomes the principal investor.
The
fossil fuel divestment campaign makes demands that no corporate
executive could ever meet. They must: stop searching for new
hydrocarbons, stop lobbying for special breaks from government, and
commit to leaving their existing reserves in the ground. The
consequences to share price from announcing such policies is greater
than the threat posed by green investors taking out their money.
All
over the world capitalism plunders and wastes the Earth’s
non-renewable mineral and energy sources. All over the world it
pollutes the sea, the air, the soil, forests, rivers and lakes. All
over the world it upsets natural balance. Clearly this destruction
and waste cannot continue indefinitely, but it need not; it should
not and must not.
It
is quite possible to meet the needs of every man, woman and child on
this planet without destroying the natural systems on which we depend
and of which we are a part. The methods that would have to be adopted
to achieve this are well enough known:
The
practice of types of farming that preserve and enhance the natural
fertility of the soil;
The systematic recycling of materials (such as metals and glass) obtained from non-renewable mineral sources;
The prudent use of non-renewable energy sources (such as coal, oil and gas) while developing alternative sources based on natural processes that continually renew themselves (such as solar energy, wind power and hydroelectricity);
The employment of industrial processes which avoid the release of poisonous chemicals or radioactivity into the biosphere;
The manufacture of solid goods made to last, not to be thrown away after use or deliberately to break down after a calculated period of time.
The systematic recycling of materials (such as metals and glass) obtained from non-renewable mineral sources;
The prudent use of non-renewable energy sources (such as coal, oil and gas) while developing alternative sources based on natural processes that continually renew themselves (such as solar energy, wind power and hydroelectricity);
The employment of industrial processes which avoid the release of poisonous chemicals or radioactivity into the biosphere;
The manufacture of solid goods made to last, not to be thrown away after use or deliberately to break down after a calculated period of time.
So
what stands in the way? Why isn’t this done? The simple answer is
that, under the present economic system, production is not geared to
meeting human needs but rather to the accumulation of monetary wealth
out of profits. As a result, not only are basic needs far from
satisfied but much of what is produced is pure waste from this point
of view—for example all the resources involved in commerce and
finance, the mere buying and selling of things and those poured into
armaments.
A
sustainable economic system, one that respects the laws of ecology,
can only be instituted if production for the market is completely
abolished through the establishment of the common ownership and
democratic control of the means of production and replaced by
production solely for use. The relations between productive units —
and between local communities — then cease to be commercial ones
and become simple relations between suppliers and users of useful
products without the intervention of money, buying and selling, trade
or barter. Activists in Extinction Rebellion who want a radical transformation of the world can
stick to their principles but come to realise, as the Socialist Party
has done, that a sustainable society can only be achieved within the
context of a world in which all the Earth’s resources, natural and
industrial, have become the common heritage, under democratic control
at local, regional and world level, of all humanity.
The
whole system of production, from the methods employed to the choice
of what to produce, is distorted by the imperative drive to pursue
economic growth for its own sake and to give priority to seeking
profits to fuel this growth without consideration for the longer term
factors that ecology teaches are vitally important. The result is an
economic system governed by blind economic laws which oblige
decision-makers, however selected and whatever their personal views
or sentiments, to plunder, pollute and waste. This growth-oriented
and profit-motivated capitalist system exists all over the world. If
needs are to be met while at the same time respecting the laws of
nature, then the capitalist system must go. If
we are to meet our needs in an ecologically acceptable way we must
first be able to control production—or, put another way, able to
consciously regulate our interaction with the rest of nature—and
the only basis on which this can be done is the common ownership of
the means of production.By common ownership we don’t mean state
property. We mean simply that the Earth and its natural and
industrial resources should no longer belong to anyone—not to
individuals, not to corporations, not to the state. No person or
group should have exclusive controlling rights over their use;
instead how they are used and under what conditions should be decided
democratically by the community as a whole. Under these conditions
the whole concept of legal property rights, whether private or state,
over the means of production disappears and is replaced by
democratically decided rules and procedures governing their use.
It
is possible to envisage, for instance, the local community being the
basic unit of this structure. In this case people would elect a local
council to co-ordinate and administer those local affairs that could
not be dealt with by a general meeting of the whole community. This
council would in its turn send delegates to a regional council for
matters concerning a wider area and so on up to a world council
responsible for matters that could best be dealt with on a world
scale (such as the supply of certain key minerals and fuels, the
protection of the biosphere, the mining and farming of the oceans,
and space research). Any attempt on the
part of a government to impose other priorities than profit-making
risks either provoking an economic crisis or the government ending up
administering the system in the only way it can be — as a
profit-oriented system in which profit-making has to be given
priority over meeting needs or respecting the balance of nature. This
is not to say that measures to palliate the bad effects of the
present economic system on nature should not be taken but these
should be seen for what they are: mere palliatives and not steps
towards an ecological society.
The
only effective strategy for achieving a free democratic society in
harmony with nature is to build up a movement which has the
achievement of such a society as its sole aim.
Bernie Sanders and Workers Control
The
idea of "workers' control" or "industrial democracy"
is now being discussed in American political circles. Even some of the more far-sighted employers now support
the idea of "workers' participation” or “worker directors”.
Bernie Sanders, the progressive presidential hopeful, is set to
introduces plan that encourage employee-owner businesses and would
require corporations to reserve a seat at the boardroom table for
employees to extend work-place democracy ensure that the work-place
have a say in decisions that affect their day-to-day lives. Of course
this is not a particularly new proposal. The highly conservative
British Civil Service incorporated employee consultation as far back
as 1919 when it introduce what is called the Whitley system of
management.
It
is not the job of socialists to protect the profit advantage of any
individual company but to support improvements in the conditions of
the workers as a whole and to bring an end to the private profit
system altogether.
Workers
control is only meaningful in terms of a socialist economy
democratically determined and administered by not just work-places
but local communities and larger society otherwise workers’
control means workers are deprived of all effective social control.
This entails that ownership of industry cannot remain in the hands of
the capitalists. Only common ownership would guarantee workers'
management and workers' control in the individual plants. If by
“workers’ control” it is meant control of the ownership and
distribution of the wealth the workers produce, it obviously cannot
be under capitalism. Capitalism is a system based on private
ownership; so long as capitalists own, they control.
However,
Bernie Sanders is engaged in the re-invention of the wheel,
resurrecting ideas from the history of the labour movement and
presenting those past ideas as something new. If Sanders wishes to be
seen as a genuine socialist he should not be supporting capitalism
regardless on how a nice a face has been put on it but rather he
should be calling for the abolition of capitalism. Worker-owned
enterprises and cooperatives are perfectly compatible with capitalism
and operate like any other business or institution which extracts
surplus value and produces for exchange. As nice as Sanders make it
sound at the end of the day they remain capitalist enterprises, and
as socialists it is vital that we recognize this fact, because if we
don't go after the heart of capitalist production then all we end up
with is a capitalism-without-capitalists. Operating in a competitive
market economy, workers have to exploit themselves as if they were
exploited by capitalists. While this may be more palatable, it does
change the fact of their subordination to economic processes beyond
their control. Profit production and capital accumulation control
behaviour and perpetuate the misery and insecurity bound up with it.
While there cannot be socialism without workers’ control, neither
can there be real workers’ control without socialism.
To assert
that gradual increase of workers’ control in capitalism is an
actual possibility merely plays into the hands of the ruling class to
disguise their class-rule by false social reforms.
Wednesday, May 29, 2019
NO WAGE BENEFIT FROM TAX CUTS
 |
| THE REAL TRICKLE DOWN EFFECT |
While the Republican tax law has not done much for workers or the overall economy, it has sparked a wave of stock buybacks, which primarily benefit rich executives.
"There is no indication of a surge in wages in 2018 either compared to history or relative to GDP growth," the congressional research arm found, a conclusion that is consistent with recent survey data showing Americans have not seen a paycheck boost from the Trump tax cuts.
The CRS report suggested that worker bonus announcements by major corporations immediately following the passage of the GOP tax bill in 2017 may have been little more than "a public relations move."
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/05/29/virtually-no-wage-growth-surge-stock-buybacks-study-offers-more-proof-trump-tax-cuts
Our future means understanding capitalism
If
any have any doubts about the strength of the economic tide the world
environmental movement is attempting to swim against, the
environmental movement themselves best illustrate the quagmire in
which capitalism leaves them. The Extinction Rebellion arguments and their
policies are based on the assumption that under capitalism political
parties in government can do what they like, and make a positive
difference for the whole of society. The motivation is good, but
unfortunately, the assumption is false. Capitalism is not open to
manipulation so that it benefits the majority; it’s a system that
is very tightly structured to benefit only the wealthy few. Support
for the environmentalists means not only ignoring market forces but also
ignoring an obvious contradiction in their argument. The
contradiction is this: with market forces essentially causing and
creating a sick society how can you realistically expect those
self-same forces to solve it by proposing a form of eco-capitalism?
The greens have chosen to ignore this and continually assert that
they can make the market system a nicer kind of capitalism. But
capitalism will still be capitalism, with no fundamental change in
how we live and how we could live as it will be business as usual.
The
main obstacle to reducing global warming is capitalism, where
production is geared to profit, and production costs have to be kept
to a minimum. Measures to curb emissions may increase the latter and
place firms at a competitive disadvantage. Also, in many cases, it is
more cost effective to import materials from abroad, which requires
the burning of fossil fuel in transporting them. Nation states and
trading blocs also seek to compete with each other on the best
possible terms, and in some cases endeavour to protect their
profitable extractive industries. Attempts to tackle climate change
in the context of a world market economy will, at best, achieve only
limited results.
Capitalism
is the cause of a range of environmental issues the world is facing,
but can a socialist alternative resolve these issues? Would a
socialist alternative have to curtail growth or could it administer
an environmentally sustainable version of growth? In socialism, where
production can be rationally organised according to human need, we’ll
have the best chance of successfully curtailing global warming.
Removing poverty and deprivation requires
growth, yet most XRs would argue that any growth is unsustainable. Many
seek ‘degrowth’
– in order to save the planet. This may or may not be necessary in
the long run but in the short run, to eliminate world hunger,
ill-health and shanty towns, the production of necessities will
surely need to be increased.
The
Socialist Party puts the argument that it is impossible to tackle
environmental problems without effective global planning and
cooperation, a prerequisite for which is eliminating the conflicts
that result from scarcity. The Socialist Party contends that the
growth needed to remove scarcity can be green and sustainable, but only if organised
in the context of a democratically planned socialist economy. One
where production and distribution is based on human need and not
markets and profits, where buying and selling is abolished and with
them consumerism and all its associated waste, where any economic
growth can be constantly assessed for the impact it will have on
nature and society.
The
Socialist Party further argue that not only is pollution and
environmental destruction caused by the profit system but also that
it is the science of ecology that explains the processes by which
pollution and environmental destruction resulted from releasing waste
substances into the rest of nature at a rate and in amounts that it
cannot cope with; that science and technology, far from causing the
problem, provide the knowledge and techniques that can be used to
solve it given the right social and economic framework; and, last but
not least, that this framework is a less centralised society that
produces to meet human needs not for profit, which could only be done
in a state-free, money-free, socialist society. The
only way to green the planet is to first make it the common heritage
of all of us. Then we will be freed from the tyranny of market forces
and money and in a position to consciously regulate our relationship
with the rest of nature in an ecologically acceptable way.
