Toward A New Freedom

Today the whole world is in the throes of the deep crises of capitalism. General living standards are falling and a growing proportion of the people of the World are under-nourished and actually starving. It is an astonishing paradox that, in a world where science and technology have advanced to the stage where there could be plenty for all, there is a growing amount of want and hunger. Not only are millions unnecessarily materially deprived but the great majority of the people of the world are oppressed in various ways. Capitalists oppress workers, states oppress whole classes, some nations dominate other nations, men oppress women, etc. Even those people who escape the worst excesses of oppression and exploitation often find that their lives are empty and meaningless; they experience severe alienation.

 Capitalism is poisoning the atmosphere, polluting the oceans and ravaging the land, and surely nature is turning against us. Although the human species has shown itself able to radically change itself and the world it lives in, it has not yet brought these processes under full conscious control. None of these things are isolated and are all interconnected in one way or another with this system of economics that rules over us. Our species has developed to the point where, if we so choose, we can harmonise ourselves and our environment so as to bring about our further development in a positive direction.

At the root of all these problems is the exploitation of some people by other people and it is the capitalist class exploiting the working class. All of the deprivations and conflicts, in the last analysis, are brought about by a society divided into oppressors and oppressed. No lasting solution to any of these problems will be found while capitalism survives in the world. The only way forward is to bring about the socialist revolution and build a society where oppressive and exploitative class divisions and all the evils that go with them are abolished. 

Today humanity stands at a turning point: either we develop the revolutionary socialist transformation of society or we may eventually witness our civilisation destroyed. There is nothing inevitable about the future advancement of mankind. The only real, lasting way forward is socialism. If we do not move forward then we will stagnate or move backwards. The choice before us is “Socialism or Barbarism”. 

Capitalists are not interested in production to benefit the peoples of the world or even their own people. They are interested only in profits. If the productive forces in the world were to be utilised for the purposes of construction, the entire planet could be transformed and the standards of living and level of culture raised to undreamed of heights. This is not possible under capitalism. Plenty under this system can only produce crises of over-production, slumps and unemployment, because of the basic necessity of the capitalist class to make profits. This springs from the economic laws of the system, not the desires, good or bad, on the part of the capitalists. Only the unity of the workers, leading to world socialism can produce a “One World” which can abolish want and oppression and war.