From the Socialist Standard, June 1987

‘Those who are experienced in such matters tell us that all brands of cornflakes taste the same. It has also been said that they all conform to a standard of nutrition which results in the package having more food value than the flakes. It is rather like this in the political field. The parties which are likely to get into power in this election all offer the same low level of social nutrition and politically they all have the same flavour. Their only difference is in their presentation – their packaging – and this is where they are in competition, their programmes and their leaders dressed, decorated, obscured so as to bear little relation to their true character.

This is the work — indeed, the preoccupation — of a band of manipulators known as public relations personnel. The first example of their work to spring in mind is Margaret Thatcher. Her transformation is now part of history. Her image-makers saw her hair and said it was all wrong; that is why some hapless hairdresser now labours daily to maintain that famous blonde, forehead-revealing sweep. Her voice, they found, displeased their ears; so she had to be induced to tone it with a soft huskiness. That neck-straining angle at which she holds her head when she is being interviewed for TV is not something she was born with; it was taught to her by those public relations people.

When they had finished they looked on their work and thought it was good. Then it was the turn of the experts in political presentation. The Labour government of 1974/79 had been notable for its confusion and vacillation; Thatcher would adopt the contrasting image of the prime minister who. through thick and thin, stuck to her guns because she had firm convictions. This was the stance she adopted during the Falklands war. while British and Argentinian workers were doing the actual fighting and dying. It should have cost her a lot of votes, among people who think it preferable to have peace in the world. Instead it did a lot to help her to victory in 1983.

Among her recent triumphs was her visit to Moscow, to talk weaponry with Gorbachev who, had he been a Tory election agent could hardly have done more to help Thatcher back to power. Thatcher argued that the talks would never have taken place but for Gorbachev’s respect for the nuclear arms of British capitalism; therefore people should not vote Labour who are in theory pledged to cut back on those weapons. Cleverly stage managed, the tour was a veritable banquet for the media, who seemed to overlook the fact that Thatcher and Gorbachev had done little more than catalogue each other’s arsenals of mass destruction. There is still no hope that the world is safe from the great powers’ capacity to destroy it many times over. The triumphant achievement of the visit was to provide Thatcher with a Gorbachev factor to help her win this election, as the Falklands factor did in 1983.

While Thatcher was strutting in Moscow, Neil Kinnock was blundering through a brief, disastrous meeting with Reagan in Washington. (Reagan has never made any secret about being an election agent for Thatcher). Labour’s public relations workers are desperate to change their image but the Washington trip turned out to be another of their recent debacles.

But the work goes on; the transformation of the Labour Party cannot be allowed to rest. Their political packaging experts have decided that their historic bondage to the Red Flag was a vote loser so they have substituted a pink rose. They symbolised the new era by changing the party’s campaign colour from red to a restful blue, grey and red. They prohibited Neil Kinnock to any longer thatch his hair across his baldness; Labour’s Mister Nice Guy, they said, must appear frank and unashamed of such things.

Under this packaging lie the same policies which have failed in the past: basically. Labour presents the same remedies for the ailments of British capitalism as it did in 1974 . . . 1964 . . . 1945 . . . Now they are able to use this tactic that unemployment, poverty, bad housing, war and other such problems have been caused by Tory rule — as if these things did not exist before Thatcher came to power in 1979.

This election will be won by the party which comes off best in the political packaging contest. Millions of votes will be cast for what the capitalist parties appear to be — what they encourage us to think they are — and not for what they actually are. Discerning workers, asking themselves how they should vote to change society in an effective way. will peel back this packaging. They will find that these parties all taste the same, that they offer an unvarying, unnutritious deception. And that — if they will forgive the phrase —- will be the crunch.’

Ivan

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2024/06/snap-crackle-pop-1987.html

In the Southgate and Wood Green constituency in London, candidates are standing from the Parties of Labour, Liberal Democrats, Conservatives, Greens, Reform, Workers Party of Britain and the ‘Trade Union and Socialist Coalition’.

A socialist elector in Southgate and Wood Green has replied to an election communication from the TUSC candidate there.

‘Dear Karl Vidol.

I am writing in response to your Election communication.

It says “VOTE SOCIALIST”, but nowhere is that term, or socialism, defined (see below). It seems to be treated as a word to describe a political flavouring, rather than a revolutionary concept. The term socialism has, unfortunately, has had many associations, most of them unpleasant, although the left usually haven’t shied away from them. You would think that if you were seeking a “socialist” vote you would offer the voters a concise definition to focus on, rather than the usual cat’s-lick-and-a-promise presented by capitalist parties.

You appear rather coy in referring to the working class, but use “working-class people” instead. The gap between rich (capitalist) class and the rest increasing is predicated on the accumulation of wealth by the capitalist class, so there’s nothing new there. The rich get richer because we—the working class—allow them to do so, not because they keep us in physical chains or deny us the vote.

Most political parties vie with each other to administer capitalism. Some, like the left, claim they are doing it in working-class interests, some are blatantly capitalist. The result is the same, unless a complete change is contemplated, capitalism will continue to roll on as usual. Of course, there may be good times, but capitalism offers no certainty. Meanwhile we are cursed with war, poverty, and worse, destitution, environmental degradation, dictatorships, and we know some of the latter the left supported in the past.

If you want to rid the world of the evils that capitalism visits upon it, then offering the working class reforms that may or may not improve their situation, and could be taken away is not the answer.

Why have you picked on Gaza for your outrage, when there are many other conflicts happening round the world?

I have never been let down by the governing parties, recognizing that their role is to run capitalism for the benefit of those who own most of the world—the capitalist class. Governments may try to persuade you that they run the country in the interests of all, but that is not their function. That doesn’t mean that some politicians may believe that they are serving the interests of all. All it means is that they have absorbed the capitalist ideology (false consciousness) that only lets you see the world as it seems, not as it is.

You say, “…a new way of running the economy to benefit the majority, not just the billionaires.” So, billionaires will still exist in your “socialist” society? This seems to be the fact, because you talk about “For real workers’ rights”, implying that the capitalist class will still be around. You also talk in national terms, but socialism can only be achieved on a worldwide basis, a world of common ownership and democratic control of the means of production, without state control. A society introduced by a majority vote of the working class, not imposed upon them by an all-knowing elite.

The only way for “every possible improvement for working-class people” is to introduce a society where the term working class would have no meaning.

“If the system can’t afford that, we need to change the system.” What change?

Julian Vein (Wood Green)’

Reproduced with the permission of the writer.

Proposing to tax the rich is a popular trope of left leaning politics. Cue the Green Party General Election manifesto. A pledge to spend £50 billion per year on health and social care by 2030. Money to be raised by a 1% tax on assets worth £10 million or more, 2% on £1 billion+ assets. This to raise £15bn a year, but only affect 1% of households. These funds would be for the NHS.

The Henley Private Migration Report points to a net loss of 9,500 wealthy individuals from Britain in 2024, over double the 4,200 who left in 2023. Between 2017 and 2023 around 16,500 millionaires migrated from Britain. In part a reaction to Brexit, a demonstration of the fluidity of capital assets, moving away from actual or perceived threats.

What price the Green Party pledge faced with a huge financial outflow. For an indication of market reaction and the political consequences, consider the ousting of Liz Truss, a Conservative prime minister. Proposals alone are enough to crash an economy if they seem likely to be enacted to the detriment of financial assets.

Such is democracy under capitalism.

The Green Party can relax, however, as they know they can promise anything they like as they won’t be anywhere close to acting on such promises.

D.A.

CAPITALISM IN NIGERIA (ZOOM)

Time to Change

Capitalism was once the young blood,

Overturning thrones, dispossessing lords.

It manufactured this world that accords

With its own ways and means, where common good

Is held to be the untrammelled pursuit

Of private wealth, even if that should be

At the expense of public poverty,

With a reserved freedom to profit and pollute.

But now this history lesson’s been learned,

That which loosed bonds becomes a binding force,

While the class presently bound is now the source

Whereby a new, better way is discerned.

Progress must transcend anachronism,

It is time for change, for socialism.

D. A.

From the Socialist Standard October 2017

‘Whenever there is an election, like last year or currently in Germany, the person in the street — the so-called ordinary voter — suddenly becomes very popular. Any number of political parties are anxious to please them and make them all manner of tempting promises, if they in their turn will agree to vote for their party’s candidate. Election time, in other words, is the time when there is an enormous hunt for Votes.

The bait which is used in this hunt is largely made up by promises. All other parties offer this bait, and the generosity of their promises is usually in inverse proportion to the likelihood of their getting power. The Labour and Conservative Parties cannot be too extravagant; the Liberals can be a little more wild; the Greens and the far Left can promise almost anything. And so on.

Most of the promises in an election are about things like modernisation, housing, education, pensions, wages and prices, war and peace. To read the literature of these other parties, it seems that all that has to be done to solve overnight all the problems connected with these issues is to vote for their candidate. They will all, it seems, bring British industry up to date, build affordable housing, give everyone a fair chance of the best education, keep prices stable while wages increase, protect the environment, banish war from the earth.

These promises sound very fine and in one election after another millions of working people vote for them. And presumably, when they do so, they think that they are contributing to the solution of our problems.

But stop and think about it.

Firstly, it is obvious that election promises are not a new thing. Political parties have been making them for as long as anyone can remember – and always about the same sorts of problems.

Now what has been the result of all this?

The housing problem remains with us despite repeated promises to deal with it. The sort of education we get is governed by the financial standing of our parents. There are still millions of old age pensioners living on the tightrope of destitution — and it only needs something like a severe winter for many of them to loosen their precarious hold on life.

Prices are rising. Wages are still stagnating. Whatever the respective level of prices and wages, we always find that our wage packet only just covers our food, clothing, entertainment and whatever else goes to keep us ticking over.

War is just as much a universal problem as ever. There are always minor wars going on somewhere, punctuated by more serious clashes such as North Korea and Syria. Over it all hangs the threat of a war fought out with nuclear weapons.

It is not accidental that the politicians make so many promises and that they have so little effect upon the ailments they are supposed to cure. The world is full of chronic problems, but this is not because political parties have notthought up reforms which are supposed to deal with them nor because their leaders are not clever or knowledgeable enough.

The fact is that the problems persist whichever party is in power — and this suggests that their roots go deep into the very nature of modern society.

We live today in a social system which is called capitalism. The basis of this system is the ownership by a section of the population of the means of producing and distributing wealth — of factories, transport, communications and so on. It follows from this that all the wealth which we produce today is turned out with the intention of realising a profit for the owning class. It is from this basis that the problems of modern society spring.

The class which does not own the means of wealth production – the working class – are condemned to a life of rationed dependence upon their wage or salary. This expresses itself in inferior housing, clothes, education, and the like.

The basis of capitalism throws up the continual battle over wages and working conditions with attendant employment disputes. It gives rise, with its international economic rivalries, to the wars which have disfigured recent history.

Every other party stands for capitalism, whatever they may call themselves. And whatever their protestations, they stand for a world of poverty, hunger, unrest and war. They stand for a world in which no human being is secure.

The way-out is a world in which everything which goes to make and distribute wealth is owned by the people of the world. Because socialism is the direct opposite of capitalism, it follows that when it is established the basic problems of capitalism will disappear. There will be no more war, no more poverty. People will live a full, abundant life; we shall be free.

But socialism cannot be brought about by promises. It needs a knowledgeable working class who understand and desire it. They alone can establish the new world system we need.

When we contest elections our candidates from the Socialist Party do not make any promises; they do not try to convince voters that they will do anything for them. What they offer is the case for a new social system. We are seeking to spread knowledge and understanding of socialism and to give as many people as possible the opportunity of voting for a world of abundance, peace and freedom.

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2017/10/reflections-on-elections-2017.html

At every UK election brainless lefties have advised workers to “vote Labour, but rely on your own struggles” or some such drivel. No surprise then that the Weekly Worker now tells us “Vote left where you can (and that includes the few left Labourites who are being allowed to stand), vote Labour where you must (ie, mainstream Labour)”.

That means urging most workers to vote for the Party of Business, in other words, to collude in their subjugation to the capitalist system.

So what should you do if you live outside the two constituencies with an SPGB candidate? If you want socialism, the only way you can express your view is by writing “WORLD SOCIALISM” across your ballot paper.

*120 YEARS FOR SOCIALISM * ZOOM 

The SPGB was founded on 12 June 1904

To join the meeting click https://zoom.us/j/7421974305