Waterloo

 

Waterloo, what does the word conjure up? To fans of popular music it could be both the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest winner that set the Swedish group Abba on the road to fame and fortune. Or it could be The Kinks 1967 song Waterloo Sunset where Terry meets Julie at Waterloo Station every Friday night. The assumption that the two were based upon Terrence Stamp and Julie Christie both well known actors has been debunked. A trainspotter might have a soft spot for the London Waterloo Station opened in 1848.

The Station was opened 33 years after the battle of Waterloo, 18^th June 1815, when the Seventh Coalition defeated the army of Napoleon Bonaparte. For military buffs and wargamers this represents a classical military encounter that can be replayed again and again.

Waterloo, what does the word conjure up for socialists? This extract from the Socialist Standard of June 1909 in an article repudiating the Great Men of history theory.

‘A favourite subject in debating societies is: what would be the present condition of England if Napoleon had won the battle of Waterloo, or Europe if William the Norman had lost the battle of Hastings, or of European civilisation if the Greeks had been beaten at Salames? These questions carry us into the heart of the question of genius and its effect upon social and economic conditions. Carlyle, of course, would answer: without the existence of these mighty men the history of the world must have taken different channels, their influence was incalculable. The Socialist, however, will say: it mattered little to the mass of the people, the working class, whether Napoleon won or was soundly thrashed at Waterloo. National boundaries to-day might be slightly or greatly different, but it is probable that the application of steam power to manufacture would have been the same, and this application caused a revolution more radical and permanent than any ever made by a mighty warrior. Napoleon was beaten at Waterloo, and we are surrounded by social and economic inequality and injustice. Had he won we should still be living in a capitalist state—and one need not say more than this. For the working class that great battle did not mean a higher or a lower standard of living, but, as was usual with all such conflicts, it implied: which nation shall be the paramount buccaneer? For is not capitalism making uniform the lives of the working class in all countries? As Hervé has so well put it, “There is at present no country so superior to any other that its working class should get themselves killed in its defence.”’

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2018/06/the-great-man-fallacy-1909.html

Gustave Herve’s comment is even more apposite today when both countries and individuals consider themselves to be ‘great’. The delusion of these entities equals that of Malvolia. Unfortunately, such delusions carry horrible consequences of all of us who are based firmly in reality.