The world's economic resources are owned and controlled by a small elite and are supplied to the majority by the multinationals for profit. One hundred and fifty multinational corporations control and dominated the world economy and its resources. The few thousand people who control these huge conglomerates are more powerful than governments and dominate the lives of the world’s six billion people.
The majority of the world’s governments are pro-capitalist and implement political policies which aim to make it easier for the multinationals to exploit the working class and to maximise their profits. This is why there is such a similarity between the policies of different governments for example low taxes on profits and wealth, laws that facilitate big business and a globalised programme of the privatisation of public services.
The only alternative to the system of capitalism is socialism. Under socialism wealth would be owned and democratically controlled by the majority of people and would be used to provide for the needs of everyone in society.
Supporters of capitalism claim that competition is better than co-operation and that genuine democracy giving the majority of people a say in how society is organised won’t work. They counterpose the current capitalist system as a superior alternative and by doing so are praising the idea that the only way to succeed in life is through the exploitation and misery of others. The Socialist Party rejects this barbaric idea, and rejects the argument that capitalism is the highest form of society that humanity can aspire to – capitalism means poverty, hunger, misery, disease and an early grave for billions of people.
The current government are attempting to run down the public health service in favour of private healthcare. Mary Harney praised the fact that in Ireland 52% of people have private health insurance but in Britain it’s only 10%. She will be happy when the figure reaches as close as it can be to 100%. In other words when the public health system is replaced by private healthcare run and organised to make profits for big business and not to deal with the needs of the sick.
But it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the establishment parties think that healthcare is something that profits can be made from. This is simply an extension of their ideological belief that making profit should be the driving force of society.
In the last ten years Fianna Fail and the PDs have let developers and speculators run riot. House prices have increased by more than 350% but the actual cost of building a house has only increased by 50%. The housing market is controlled by the developers and the banks, who have been assisted by the government in pushing up the price of housing in order to increase their profits. The housing boom has resulted in the transfer of a massive amount of wealth from working people to the rich. Far from being more efficient or the best way to provide housing, the capitalist market condemns working class people to 40 year mortgages or leaves them at the mercy of exploitative private landlords.
On a global scale the foreign policy of the Bush regime is firmly rooted in protecting and furthering the interests of US multinationals. The control of the world’s energy resources is paramount for US big business and is the main driving force behind the war in Iraq. This war has resulted in the deaths of over 655,000 Iraqis and caused huge instability in that country which may yet end up in a sectarian civil war. This is an acceptable price to pay for the Bush regime as long as they get control of the oil reserves.
On a global basis the exploitation of workers is also intensifying. The employers are trying to pitch workers against each other in order to drive down wages and working conditions to increase profits. The globalised world economy means that the bosses are trying to use the slave wage conditions they have imposed in countries like China, India and Eastern Europe to drive down the wages of workers in Ireland by threatening to relocate industry to Asia and the East. If they allowed to get away with it this will result in a widespread "race to the bottom" for wages in Irish society but also ironically for the capitalist class a shrinking of their market as lower paid workers won’t be able to afford to buy as many commodities.
Wealth is created through the labour of working class people, but is controlled by the rich elite. The Socialist Party believes that we can create a better society and a vastly better world if the majority control how this wealth is used. Using wealth and economic capacity for the needs of people would transform the lives of billions of people. Currently 90% of the world’s population live on only 15% of the world’s wealth. Imagine what could be achieved if this wealth was used for the majority.
Socialism would end the huge waste of resources. There would be no need to spend $1 trillion a year on arms. Remove the parasitic rich elite from the equation and you would have unimaginable wealth and resources to resolve all the major problems that confront this and ever other society including climate change.
The most efficient way to utilise resources for people’s needs is through the democratic public ownership of those resources. Genuine democratic working class control of society is the oxygen that would make socialism function and work.
The Socialist Party is fully engaged in the daily struggles of working class people in order to defend people’s rights and also to win reforms when possible. Ultimately we are aiming to build a movement of working class people that can rid society of the malaise of capitalist exploitation and replace it with a socialist society.
Internationalism - Struggling for socialism around the world
The Committee for a Workers International (CWI) is an international socialist organisation with affiliated parties and organisations in over 40 countries around the world. The Socialist Party is the Irish affiliate of the CWI. Our members are involved in daily struggles to defend working class living standards around the globe.
We also take part in building democratic and fighting organisations in the workers’ movement internationally, both in terms of the trade unions and also new mass workers’ parties. In Britain, the CWI’s affiliated party, the Socialist Party has launched a Campaign for a New Workers’ Party in order to build a socialist alternative to Blair’s New Labour and its twin, Cameron’s Conservatives.
CWI members are at the forefront in campaigns against US and British imperialism’s war in Iraq. In the US, Socialist Alternative (CWI in the US) members played a key role in organising a 5,000 – strong protest demo in Boston against the Iraqi occupation on the international day of protest, 23 March.
In Sri Lanka, the United Socialist Party, the affiliate of the CWI, has been the only left organisation to consistently defend the rights of the Tamil minority and oppose the murderous attacks against them by the reactionary chauvinists in government who represent the interests of the Sinhala elite.
The USP general secretary, Siritunge Jayasuriya, who came third in the country’s presidential elections in 2005, has been threatened with assassination by thugs linked to the government. This is because Siri has intransigently exposed government involvement in the disappearance of opposition figures that have defended the rights of the Tamils.
CWI members regularly defend the rights of the most oppressed across the globe. For example Socialist Resistance members in Kazakhstan have gone to jail for helping to organise campaigns against house demolitions of shanty town dwellers in Alma Ata. These poverty stricken areas are being flattened to make way for a golf course.
Not only in Ireland but in many other countries, CWI members have been centrally involved in the struggle against neo-liberalism and privatisation.
In Greece, students, teachers and lecturers have been involved in a months-long furious struggle involving occupations of over 250 colleges and universities to stop the right wing government from changing the constitution so that it can privatise universities. Xekinima (CWI Greece) members have played an important role nationally in this movement proposing measures which would unite and strengthen the movement on a country wide scale.
The biggest problem facing many workers and young people is that they have no one to vote for in elections. All the parties represent the elite in society. As in Ireland, CWI members stand independently in the elections as well as supporting independent workers’ and community candidates who are fighting the cuts. Examples of this are the Socialist Justice Party in Sweden and Socialist Party in Australia and Britain who have won elections for local councillors.
Once elected they continue to fight for the interests of workers and young people who elected them rather than forgetting about who got them there like most politicians do.
