The Socialist Forum
A correspondent writes saying that the results of the last election make him almost despair. He asks, “Can you trust the leaders of any party when in power?”
The question as to whether any leaders can be trusted not to put their personal interests foremost is one that can be answered by past experience. Working-class organisations, Trade Union as well as political, the reformist as well as the so-called revolutionary, have times out of number charged their leaders with betrayal. Some leaders have sacrificed the interests of their members for the sake of money, others for power, honours and influence, some merely under the seductive pressure of flattery. On the other hand, there have been leaders against whom no such charge has ever been levelled. We have, for example, never heard it suggested that Lenin betrayed the members of his party.
But, having said that much, have we even touched upon the real dangers of leadership? If an organisation is built up on the idea of leadership, that is, on the idea that the members need not themselves understand how to deal with their problems because their leaders will provide all the knowledge and thinking that may be required, then it is absolutely certain that that organisation cannot take action to achieve Socialism, and, further, that sooner or later it will meet its Waterloo. No leader, however wise and trustworthy, can lead a non-Socialist working class into Socialism. What the workers want at any moment and in relation to any current crisis is strictly limited by their knowledge. If the leader attempts to go beyond those limits, his members will desert or reject him. The fact that he has a better understanding than they have may actually compel him at a moment of crisis to do things, as he believes in their interest, that his members regard as betrayal. At the last General Election the position was not that the working class wanted Socialism and were betrayed by their leaders. The position was that the working class, not understanding Socialism, wanted free trade or protection, high prices or low prices, safety for the Savings Bank, a State banker private banks, MacDonald or Henderson, Lloyd George or Baldwin—in fact, anything and everything except Socialism. In such a background the question of betrayal by leaders looms large, but only because the Socialist material is lacking. When the workers understand Socialism and cease to be blind followers of leaders, there will no longer be great men with hundreds of thousands of supporters at their disposal, whose votes they can offer for sale to the capitalist class. There is no other road to Socialism except through the workers themselves having understanding of Socialist principles. That being the case, neither a MacDonald nor a Lenin can give the workers emancipation.
Ed. Comm.
A correspondent objects to the advice which the S.P.G.B. gives to the workers to write Socialism across their ballot paper. He says :—
“After the struggles the common people have had to secure a vote, I can’t quite agree to this.”
The reasoning behind our correspondent’s statement is rather curious. He says, in effect, the workers had to fight hard to get votes, therefore it would be absurd not to use them to vote for some candidate or other. But surely the kind of use to which they are put ought to have some consideration? The capitalists, or some of them, resisted giving votes to the workers because they thought, in their panicky ignorance, that the workers would use their votes to further working-class interests. A little experience showed that the workers, when first given votes, were content to use them to vote Tories and Liberals into Parliament, Had they foreseen this, none of the capitalists would have been afraid of extending the franchise.
Now, according to our correspondent, it matters less whom the workers vote for, than that they vote for somebody. But what if the only parties who at a given moment can afford to run candidates arc parties standing- for something contrary to working-class interests?
At the present time the Liberal, Labour and Tory Parties will use their seats in Parliament to maintain capitalism. The Socialist Party aims at abolishing capitalism, but cannot yet run candidates owing to the small number of Socialists and lack of funds. What else could we logically do except tell the workers not to vote for the candidates of capitalist parties ?
How could we, for example, tell the workers to vote Liberal or Labour, while at the same time telling them that Socialism is the only remedy for the social problem and that the Liberal and Labour Parties are opposed to Socialism ? To play this dishonest game would only be to involve us in the ultimate discrediting of these capitalist parties.
Writing the word Socialism across the ballot paper prevents the vote being used to support our opponents, and also places on record the growth of the Socialist vote.
Ed. Comm.