The SPGB Summer School begins today, Friday, 16 August. It is taking place at the University of Worcester.

Bookings are no available to attend in person but the four talks planned will be streamed over Zoom: https://zoom.us/j/7421974305

All timings are GMT+1

Political Consciousness: From Society to Ideology ‘Our understanding of the kind of society we’re living in is shaped by our circumstances: our home, our work, our finances, our communities.

Recognising our own place in the economy, politics and history is part of developing a wider awareness of how capitalist society functions.

Alongside an understanding of the mechanics of capitalism, political consciousness also involves our attitude towards it. Seeing through the ideologies which promote accepting our current social system requires us to question and judge what we experience.

Realising that capitalism doesn’t benefit the vast majority of people naturally leads on to considering what alternative society could run for the benefit of everyone.’

The Socialist Party’s weekend of talks and discussion explores what political consciousness is, how it arises and what we, as a class and as individuals, can do with it.’

What’s on and when.

Friday 16 August

1915 Keith Graham on Political Consciousness: What Can We Learn From Marx?

Saturday 17 August

1000: Brian Gardner on “They are many, we are few” The Political Consciousness Of The Capitalist Class?

1400: Paddy Shannon on Political Consciousness: Could GenZ Be Onto Something?

1915: A Q&A with Cat Rylance: An Introduction To Communist Future

Sunday 18 August

1000: Darren Poynton on Socialist Consciousness, Solidarity And Democratic Virtues

It’s reported that ‘Pay for the bosses of Britain’s top companies has increased to the highest level on record and now outpaces the compensation of the median full-time worker in the country by 120 times, a new studyhas revealed.

According to the High Pay Centre, a UK think tank that focuses on the causes and consequences of economic inequality, the median FTSE 100 CEO was paid £4.19 million ($5.34 million) in 2023.

This is the highest level of median executive pay on record, and an increase of 2.2% from 2022. The median earnings of a full-time worker in the country, meanwhile, stood at £34,963 last year. The annual compensation of UK executives is thus higher than what the median worker is able to earn in a lifetime of employment.

The number of FTSE 100 companies awarding eight-figure pay packages of over £10 million more than doubled, from four firms in 2022 to nine in 2023.

The report indicated that the highest paid FTSE 100 chief executive was AstraZeneca’s Pascal Soriot, who topped the list for a second year running, with compensation of £16.85 million in 2023, up from £15.3 million the previous year. This is 482 times what the median UK full-time worker makes.

The researchers argue that excessive spending on top earners by leading firms is making it harder to fund pay increases for the wider UK workforce.

“The huge pay gap between executives and the wider UK workforce is a result of factors such as the decline of trade union membership, low levels of worker participation in business decision-making and a business culture that puts the interests of investors before workers, customers, suppliers and other stakeholders,” said Luke Hildyard, the director of the High Pay Centre.

“These developments have been very good for those at the top but it is more questionable whether they are in the interests of the country as a whole,” he pointed out.’

On the 13th August, 1961, the construction of the Berlin Wall began. It remained in place, cutting of West Berlin, Federal German Republic from East Berlin and the German Democratic Republic until 1989.

The extract below is from the Socialist Standard February 2011

‘The Berlin Wall demonstrates how capitalist states can contain and control their populations. The construction of the ‘Wall of shame’, as the West Berlin state dubbed it, began on the 13th of August 1961. The state capitalist élite of East Germany declared that it was erected as a defence against fascists who were conspiring to impede the ‘will of the people’ from the building of a socialist state – which is a contradiction in terms. Its real function was to prevent the mass emigration of East German workers to the private capitalist workshops of the West. However, by 1989 the economic decline of the Russian empire led to a change in policy by their ruling élite, and access to Russian coercion was to be denied to the puppet states. It was this that brought about the tumbling of the Berlin Wall.



Amid the rejoicing some people in power were not as jubilant as the East Berliners, and millions elsewhere. Margaret Thatcher, wary of a united Germany, was reported to have pleaded with President Gorbachev ‘not to let the Berlin Wall fall’, and to ‘do what he could to prevent it happening’ (The Hindu, Sep 15 2009). Similarly, the French President, François Mitterand warned Mrs Thatcher that a unification of Germany could lead to them making ‘more ground than Adolf Hitler had’, and ‘that Europe would have to bear the consequences’ (London Times, 10 September 2009). Both quotes offer an insight into how the competitive nature of capitalism affects the thinking of its leaders, and directly works against the overwhelming majorities’ hopes, dreams and desires of living in a humane world.’

Andy Matthews

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/search?q=berlin+wall

The below is from the Socialist Standard November 1970 and describes the visit of a socialist to a ‘socialist’ country.

‘When socialists visit so-called socialist countries it can be a particularly nauseating experience, because socialists proceed with their eyes open and with a background of understanding. What they sec is a variety of capitalism, which more correctly might be designated as fascism. One should not forget that the Nazis called themselves socialists (National Socialist German Workers Party) The label on the bottle does not always denote the medicine inside.

I have several times been to the so-called “Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia”, but have never seen anything remotely resembling socialism there.

The workers of Yugoslavia arc paid wages, and there is at present much unemployment— just as in other capitalist countries. Money is used as a means of exchange because there is buying and selling — a fundamental of capitalism. This may be new to non-socialists, but indicates to us the true nature of the economy.

Outside the trade union hall in Belgrade, I watched hundreds of workers trying to get into the hall to see an important chess match. At that moment, an enormous car came along — a veritable palace on wheels, and a sort of combination of a Rolls-Royce and a Cadillac. One should appreciate that the average car in Yugoslavia is well below the standard here. I concluded that this car must be that of President Tito. When it pulled up I noticed the Soviet flag flying on the bonnet, and out stepped the Russian chess team, immaculately clad just like film stars. The Yugoslavs beamed at them as if they were from Mars.

When the chess tournament started there was the usual speeches from the platform by the local mayor and other dignitaries, who proudly welcomed the Russians (and others) to the “Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia”, and one speech after the other kept referring to the “Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia”.

I once asked a railway official (who was both interpreter and guide) where 1 could see any signs of socialism in Yugoslavia. “Yes”, he said, as if pleased with my simple question. “Just come with me”. He took me to the square outside the station which was decorated with Russian and Yugoslav flags, following some agreement between those countries at that time. “There”, he said proudly, “that’s positive signs of socialism”. When I told him that flag waving (as socialists saw it) was a sign of jingoism or patriotism, he failed to appreciate my standpoint.

The German Democratic Republic

The crossing of the East German territory when travelling to Berlin by plane presents no difficulties, for one flies straight in. But when going by train, one has to traverse the Eastern zone, known by the false name of “German Democratic Republic”, for no democracy exists there.

In 1946 when the G.D.R. was formed, the Communist Party received only 20 per cent of the vote which gave them power; and in 1953 Russian tanks faced and butchered a mass of hostile workers during an uprising. There can scarcely be anything democratic after that affair.

When the train stops at the West German frontier, the passport authorities quickly walked through the corridors, and their work was finished in a few minutes. Then the train goes on through two or three miles of no-man’s land to the Eastern frontier. The passport inspection is quite another thing here. 1 counted no less than twenty-four officials who swarmed into the train or played a part in the inspection. Two soldiers with rifles were standing at each end of the train, and I noticed a policeman with a large Alsatian dog standing on the line near the end of the train. Then he let the dog off the lease, and the dog went under the train from end to end, for obvious reasons.

Four other officials climbed on top of the train and opened the vents and covers where the water for the toilets is taken in, walking the whole length of the train to perform this task.

The delay caused by this thorough search took up about an hour, and the train was nearly empty. Reports have it that three or four hours delay are not unusual.

From West Berlin foreigners (but not West Berliners) can visit East Berlin by special coach. Passport details, and the amount of money one has, are all checked and entered on a large form which has to be signed before one is allowed to board the coach.

“Check Point Charlie” is a special entry point on the Berlin wall. The wall itself is about ten feet high, with concrete blocks and barbed wire to decorate it realistically. There are notices of mines, and soldiers arc patrolling it on the Eastern side; while on the Western side is an electrified wire fence in case one has managed to beat the other obstacles. The atmosphere of the concentration camp dominates everything ; and I began to wonder, as a socialist, what 1 had let myself in for.

At “Check Point Charlie” everybody had to descend from the coach and line up with “permit disc” bearing a letter and number (and in numerical order — like in army or prison), while the East German guards checked every detail of passports, visas, and the form which had been signed in the Western zone. This took about an hour, and frequently visitors are sent back because their passports are not in order for the East section. When one has scaled all these hurdles, you re-board the coach and are permitted to go through from “Capitalist Berlin to Socialist Berlin”.

East Berlin, which remained far behind West in re-building, has now surged forwards and there is a mass of buildings completed, and many still being built. The Russians pillaged all they could lay their hands upon, and Fast Germany suffered as a result. While the West was receiving Marshall Aid, East Berlin was being ransacked and made to pay for the war. No wonder the East Germans wanted to escape to the West.

The coach stopped only once during its three hours in East Berlin, and that was in the middle of a park where there was no possibility of contacting anybody. The real purpose of this stop was for toilet requirements, although the official guide made it appear that the purpose was to visit an enormous war memorial, guarded by Russian soldiers. The Russians evidently knew that if they did not guard their monuments in Hast Berlin, the workers would soon demolish them.

We were several times warned that cameras and newspapers must not be taken into East Berlin — so democratic is their regime.

With all the propaganda and security of this police state, there was absolutely nothing remotely resembling socialism— only a nauseating hypocrisy.’

Horace Jarvis

https://socialiststandardmyspace.blogspot.com/2016/03/a-visit-to-eastern-europe-1970.html

Extreme Right or Wrong

They gathered with weighty stones in ham fists,

With petrol bitter all along sour tongues,

With words made incendiary by deep wrongs,

And eyes blindfolded with flags that insist

Upon such myopic obedience

To the visceral, that’s so black and white

Consideration for colour is sleight

At best, when outrage remains too intense.

Meanwhile the vision of those leading the blind

Along their dead-end path is all too clear,

They have power in sight, the power of fear,

Preaching the past as the future’s declined.

First there’s anger, but that moment will pass

Until the next night of breaking glass.

D. A.

The SPGB holds no truck for capitalism Or for capitalists. Neither do we hold truck with disorder aimed at individuals. We do support fully free speech and abhor attempts by States which, for their own purposes, look to limit it.

Does this mean we should stick up for billionaires when they appear to be resisting more authoritarian control over 1984 State type behaviour? Musk and his social media company, X (formerly Twitter) are apparently at odds with the British Establishment over comments made by Musk. Whether this is a damp squid, time will tell. As we pointed out in the previous SOYMB post, link below, the solution to the ills of capitalism and Big Brother governments is in the hands of the working class.

‘London’s Metropolitan Police commissioner has threatened to charge foreigners for “whipping up hatred” online, naming X owner Elon Musk as someone who could be prosecuted. The warning comes amid a nationwide crackdown against supposed hate speech following a spate of right-wing riots.

“We will throw the full force of the law at people. And whether you’re in this country committing crimes on the streets or committing crimes from further afield online, we will come after you,” Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley told Sky News.

Asked whether the Metropolitan Police planned on charging people posting on social media from other countries, Rowley replied: “Being a keyboard warrior does not make you safe from the law,” and named “the likes of Elon Musk” as potential targets for investigation.

As of 10 August, more than 700 people* had been arrested and more than 300 charged over their alleged participation in the riots, which kicked off after a teenager of Rwandan descent killed three children and injured ten others in a stabbing spree in the town of Southport late last month.

Initially sparked by a false rumour that the knife man responsible for the stabbings was a Muslim immigrant, the demonstrations grew into a wider backlash against Islam and mass immigration, culminating in rioters setting fire to a hotel housing asylum seekers in Rotherham.

Of those arrested, more than 30 have been charged with online offenses, such as sharing footage of the riots or posting content that – according to the Crown Prosecutorial Service – “incites violence or hatred.”

Critics, including Musk, have accused the government of stifling free speech, and of operating a “two-tier” justice system, in which white British suspects are punished far more severely than immigrants.

Musk shared a post on Saturday highlighting the disparity between the cases of Steven Mailen and Mustafa al Mbaidib. Mailen, 54, was sentenced to more than two years in prison on Friday for shouting and “gesticulating” at a police officer during a violent demonstration in Hartlepool last week; Al Mbaidib, a 27-year-old Jordanian national, was fined £26 ($33) last month for assaulting a female police officer in Bournemouth in May.

“Sure seems like unequal justice in the UK,” Musk wrote on X. The billionaire also shared a series of memes comparing British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to a Nazi officer and the British government to the totalitarian dictatorship of George Orwell’s ‘1984’.

Starmer is considering amending Britain’s Online Safety Act to punish social media companies that allow the spread of “legal but harmful” content, The Telegraph reported on Friday. The act, passed by the country’s previous Conservative government, was originally set to include such a clause, but the passage was ultimately pulled after Business and Trade Minister Kemi Badenoch complained that it amounted to “legislating for hurt feelings.”’

Latest internet figures suggest 945.

See also https://soymb.com/2024/08/the-full-force-of-state.html

Thank Starmer we have a Tory government, oops, Labour Party, to protect us from the “Far Right thugs” who share the same nationalistic aim as him of keeping more “illegal immigrants” out of this scepter’d isle but choose a different method.

You may very well think that the attempts at ‘humour’ and irony here are not at all funny, but are puerile and lacking in any kind of wit. We don’t find these events in the least bit risible either — neither the methods of the rioters nor the reaction of the State.

The wheels of justice grind slow, but grind fine (Sun Tzu) ‘tis said. Not when you’ve upset The Powers That Be they don’t. Then they move at the speed of a Japanese Bullet Train.

In August, the Crown Prosecution Service’s X account (formerly Twitter) gave lots of examples of how quickly the State would respond.

‘Think before you post’ exclaimed one of their tweets. ‘Content that incites violence or hatred isn’t just harmful — it can be illegal.’ ‘You can also be prosecuted for sharing this material’

What is the intended message here? Be good little girls and boys and post pictures of fluffy bunnies only on social media otherwise some size-ten boots will be round to kick your front door in?

Under Section 127 of the UK Communications Act 2003 several individuals have already been imprisoned for posting tweets.

The Right Honourable Peter Kyle, the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology wants X readers and Elton Musk to know that up with it the state will not put:

‘The internet cannot be a haven for those looking to sow division in our communities…social media has provided a platform for this hate. We have been clear that these companies have a responsibility not to peddle the harm of those who seek to damage and divide our society, and we are working closely to ensure they meet that responsibility.’

Subtext, Elon and your ilk, better start taking more notice of the global states who find ‘free speech’ a nuisance and at odds with our determination to continue government ensures a compliant, subservient populace.

He also added, we will be introducing a Ministry of Truth to ensure that the only lies and misinformation which appears on social media with be state-sanctioned. Okay, he didn’t actually say the last bit. It’s called satire, Your Honour.

The Home Office X account posted the porridge which the state can inflict for various offences: Prison for rioting, up to ten years; violent disorder, up to five years; inciting racial hatred, up to seven years and criminal damage, up to ten years.

Obviously, the ‘protests’ were not aimed directly at subverting or overthrowing the capitalist system itself, and even if they were (which of course they weren’t) they would be pathetic and miserable. If you are planning a ‘revolution’ this is a pitiful way to go about it.

Capitalism operates for the benefit of the few due to the efforts of the many. A member of the working class is anyone who has no choice, if they want to survive, but to sell their mental or labour power to someone prepared to buy it and exploit it. Whether or not they think they are superior to the ‘masses’ the apparatus of the state is also run by the working class. The civil service, the ‘justice’ system, the police, the military, the media — all the organs of state oppression and power couldn’t operate without the involvement and cooperation of the working class.

What is likely to be the aftermath? An even more authoritarian government? Even more legislation than already exists imposing restrictions on social media, free speech, physical protests and the enforcement of even more chains. Already anti-Far-Right protesters too have felt the full force of the law.

The power which capitalism wields globally will only be consigned to the dustbin of history with the implementation of a society based upon production for free use, not profit. This will only be achieved when a majority realise and understand socialism is the only feasible alternative to the existing iniquitous system.

Percy Bysshe Shelley’s 1819 poem has as much resonance today when applied to the global working class, ‘Rise like Lions after slumber, In unvanquishable number, Shake your chains to earth like dew, Which in sleep had fallen on you –Ye are many – they are few.’

 Friday 9 August 19.30 (GMT + 1)

*DID YOU SEE THE US NEWS?*

*Host: Darren O’Neil*



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

‘Key organisers of Bangladesh’s student protests have said Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus should head an interim government after long time Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina resigned and fled the country.

“We want to see the process rolling by the morning,” Islam [protest leader] said late on Monday. “We urge the president to take steps as soon as possible to form an interim government headed by Dr Yunus.”’

https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/8/6/bangladesh-protesters-want-nobel-laureate-muhammad-yunus-to-lead-government

Update: ‘Bangladesh’s Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus will head the country’s interim government after former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stepped down and fled the country amid a mass uprising against her rule led mostly by students.’

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/8/6/nobel-laureate-yunus-to-lead-bangladesh-interim-govt-presidents-office

The below is from the Socialist Standard December 2006

‘This year’s Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to Muhammad Yunus, an economics lecturer and banker from Bangladesh. The spread of “micro-banking”, which he thought up and put into practice, was judged to have contributed to world peace.

Leaving aside whether he should have got the Economics rather than the Peace prize, what is micro-banking? Actually, it is not all that different from ordinary banking in that it is still based on a bank lending out money that has been previously deposited with it. The difference lies in who the money is lent to. The Grameen bank, which Yunus set up in 1976, lends to poor self-employed people.

The established banks in Bangladesh had shunned such people because, being so poor, they had nothing to offer as collateral for any loan and so were not considered credit-worthy. In order to start up or keep themselves in activity, poor self-employed people had to resort to local money-lenders who charged usurious rates of interest. A typical example would be the woman in the story about how bank got set up:

“In the village of Jobra, Dr Yunus met a woman who made bamboo stools. Because she had no assets and was unable to borrow from conventional sources, she had to resort to the money lenders. For each stool, she borrowed the equivalent of 15p to buy the raw bamboo. After repaying at extortionate rates of interest she made barely 1p on each stool. This woman was hard-working and talented but was being held back by a lack of access to finance. Inspired by her story, Dr Yunus started a series of experiments and lent tiny sums of his own money to villagers. They used the money to set up small businesses such as basket weaving and raising chickens. He found that his borrowers — mainly women — repaid in full and on time” (Times, 1 September).

What Yunus had shown was that the poor self-employed can be credit-worthy. Banks based on his principles lend out very small sums for a year which have to be repaid, with interest (at just above the ordinary banks’ rate), from current sales. While a means of freeing the self-employed in countries like Bangla Desh from the clutches of the money-lenders, micro-banking is not a solution to global poverty. Not only because not everybody in such countries could become a basket weaver or a chicken farmer or a maker of bamboo stools, but because those the bank lends to remain poor and dependant on the vagaries of the market.

Nor is there anything anti-capitalist about the scheme. The Times described Yunus in an editorial (14 October) as “the Adam Smith of the Poor” and their correspondent in Dhaka reported:

“Professor Yunus insisted that he was not against the free market, but that he wanted the market to be free for everyone ‘I am a free-market guy and even the poor should be part of the free market’, he said. ‘Two thirds of the population of the world are not able to participate, so it is not free’”.

The way the Grameen bank works also confirms the Marxian view that banks cannot create credit out of nothing. Like other banks it can only lend what has been deposited with it. If certain banking theories were correct—that if you deposit £1 in a bank, it can then lend out £9 rather than only 90p—then Professor Yunus would have been able to help the poor self-employed of Bangladesh by a mere stroke of the pen. But if he had tried to run his bank on this theory it would have rapidly gone bankrupt, and the only prize he would have got would have been a booby prize for either stupidity or naivety.’

https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2006/2000s/no-1228-december-2006/cooking-books-2-poor-womans-banker/

 ‘On August 6, 1945, the United States of America dropped an atomic bomb upon Hiroshima, Japan, the equivalent of 20,000 tons of TNT which flattened the city, killing tens upon tens of thousands of civilians. Another date had been added to history’s gruesome chronology of horror. While Japan was still trying to comprehend this devastation three days later, the United States struck again, this time, on Nagasaki. The US atomic destruction of 140,000 people at Hiroshima and 70,000 at Nagasaki was never “necessary” because Japan was already smashed, no land invasion was needed and Japan was suing for peace. General Leslie Groves, head of the Manhattan Project, prohibited US commanders from commenting on the atomic attacks without clearance from the War Department. “We didn’t want MacArthur and others saying the war could have been won without the bomb,” Groves said.

 President Harry Truman, said on Aug. 6, 1945, “Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese Army base. … That was because we wished this first attack to avoid, insofar as possible, the killing of civilians.” In fact, the city of 350,000 had practically no military value at all and the target was the city, not the base three kilometers away. With a callous disregard for human life Hiroshima was specifically selected as a target with an environment likely to cause the most damaging effects and indiscriminately kill or injure the greatest possible number. Many of its buildings were composed of paper, wood and straw. Mock-up structures built from similar materials had earlier been erected in the Utah desert for testing incendiary potential. Also, Hiroshima had been spared any previous aerial bombardment so that the precise effects of the explosion could be determined. The bomb was dropped at 8.15 am, without prior warning. In the rush hour when the maximum number of people were exposed.



One of the most commonly accepted beliefs is that, horrific though it was, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki saved millions of lives by bringing about a swift end to the war without the need of a bloody invasion. The US Strategic Bombing Survey by Brigadier-General Bonnie Feller concluded:

“Certainly before 31 December 1945 and in all probability before 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bomb had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.”



The  estimates of projected invasion casualties – ranging from “hundreds of thousands” to “millions” – were post-war exaggerations designed to contribute to the public justification for the dropping of the bombs. Major General Curtis E. LeMay expressed the truth a few weeks after  surrender of the Japanese. “The atomic bomb,” he stated, “had nothing to do with the end of the war”. He was not alone in his opinion.



Admiral William Leahy, the wartime Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, wrote in 1950, “It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material success in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender….”



President Dwight D. Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, said in his memoirs he believed “that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary.”



Was it necessary to drop the bomb? The decision to do this flowed from two words: ‘Unconditional Surrender’.  After the dropping of the bomb, the Allies gave the undertaking not to abolish the Imperial system in Japan which the Japanese leaders had been haggling for in their peace offers. The Japanese condition if it had been accepted would almost certainly have brought about Japan’s surrender without the bomb being dropped at all. American leaders knew well in advance that the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was not required to bring about Japan’s surrender.



Socialists argue that it is senseless to imagine that the problem of war will be solved by advocating the banning of this or that weapon, or even of all weapons. It is not just a matter of ‘Ban the Bomb’; but to end all wars and that means ending the economic rivalries between national ruling classes that cause them. Capitalism promotes—nay, it encourages—the situations that result in war. Let us make our position quite clear. We have no objection to the banning of nuclear weapons.  But we do have an objection to people getting killed by other methods. The saturation bombing of Hamburg, Dresden and Tokyo, generating the new military tactic of fire-storms. We can’t realistically comprehend the horror when, in one night alone, 100,000 died in a 1000-bomber raid on Dresden. And those who substitute “more humanitarian” alternatives to war should be minded that  500,000 children of Iraq whose young lives were taken by the  consequences of twelve years of crippling sanctions that kept a despot in power and a people too dispirited to revolt.



At the end of it all, these desperate, separate cries to end this or that terrible evil in the world all add up to the cry to end capitalism.’