by Eric Trevett
HUMAN beings first emerged and developed from a class of primates that
had a large family group social structure and at all stages of
development humans have always been social beings. Early humans
maintained the collective group because isolated individuals, especially
if they were mothers and infants, could not survive.
Humans have always been social beings and in the first phase of human
existence they survived on the basis of food gathering and hunting.
Their diet would probably have included insects and their life was very
harsh.
Science and art were both based on observing nature. Gradually over the
millennia the knowledge acquired from these observations led to animal
husbandry and arable farming being established. The ability to learn
from experience and pass on knowledge proved that humans could do what
no other animal could aspire to. Humans developed the power to be able
to foresee the future and consciously make changes in their mode of
living and to the environment generally.
In changing the world early humans changed themselves. Without this the
continuous advance in knowledge up to modern science and technology
could never have been achieved.
The point is that in the womb of primitive society development was
taking place that created the opportunity for a new society to be born.
Trade was established as nomadic herders met each other, or met settled
arable farmers, and exchanged goods. This was done at first by straight
barter but later exchange was made easier by the first coinage. Gold
discs carrying an image of a cow to show they represented the exchange
value of a cow but were easier to carry about in a pocket or bag.
This gave rise to the beginnings of the notion of private property and
wealth that could be accumulated — not by tending animals or working in
the fields or crafting implements or ornaments but simply by buying the
products of other people’s labour at one price and selling them at a
higher price.
This undermined the tribal principles of common ownership and gave rise
to the possibility that, like cattle and sheep, people could also become
private property — slaves. The most common routes to becoming a slave
were either being taken prisoner in a war or falling into unpayable
debt. This was the beginning of slave-based societies, where one class,
the owners of the slaves and the means of production, controlled the
labour of the slaves to create more wealth for themselves. Society
divided into classes.
Slave society had to impose its authority on the slaves and created a
state or armed bodies of men to coerce slaves against rebellion or
absconding. Slave societies were very labour intensive. Huge numbers of
slaves worked under the direction of people who were beginning to
acquire knowledge of mathematics and engineering, leading to remarkable
achievements. People began to use horses and produced war chariots and
complex giant catapults as weapons. Building, mining and the production
of food and other commodities became organised on a large scale, leading
to creations like the Roman systems of roads and aqueducts — some of
which still stand today.
The advancing technology also led to the possibility of new forms of
exploitative society, like feudalism, which gave serfs a motive to work.
Under slavery the workforce has no incentive to work.
The economic factor has always been basic to the development of the
character of society and the ideas and forces for a new society grow in
the womb of the old society. It is a common factor in feudalism and
capitalism.
In order to change it is necessary to unleash new productive forces to
satisfy the needs and desires of successive ruling classes. The factor
of exploitation was easy to see in the circumstances of slavery and in
the development and revolutionary transformation of feudalism, where the
serf was tied to the land to serve the lord of the manor’s
requirements. But they also had a certain degree of freedom and could
develop cottage industries.
Through feudalism and capitalism the development of technology has
enhanced the productivity of the individual worker leading to the
accumulation of more wealth for the ruling class.
The merchant capitalists and bankers took advantage of peasant revolts
and discontent to take control of the state machine and they demoted the
landed aristocracy. This development was used to increase the
exploitation of the working class.
The seeds of capitalism came with the development of trade on a local
and international scale. Britain emerged as a major capitalist country
and colonial power but this could never have happened without its
rupture with the Roman Catholic church. The Roman Catholic church was
against usury and lending capital with an interest charge. Released from
that bondage the British ruling class was able to build mighty fleets
and not only conquer but occupy other countries in Asia, Africa and the
Americas and so have access to raw materials used in the manufacture of a
variety of goods and to markets to sell the commodities.
By contrast Spain and Holland plundered the seas in search of gold and
occupied territories in Africa and America. A measure of Britain’s
dominant position is to look at old maps of Africa and Asia and note the
predominance of the pink bits that showed countries under British
subjugation — out numbering those of France, Germany, Belgium and so on.
Britain was regarded as the workshop of the world.
The increasing demand for wool, which was accelerated by the
introduction of the factory system, undermined what was left of feudal
practices in rural areas as the enclosure movement — the privatisation
of land — to create more and more sheep pastures. This drove peasants
from the land into urban areas where they were persecuted and
disciplined to become factory workers. Throughout the period there had
been some revolutionary changes in technology.
Most productive work and services were still labour intensive compared
to modern practices and this was the case up until the Second World War.
Water power, coal and steam gave way to electricity and the internal
combustion engine. Engineering made great strides after the Second World
War. In older factories when an overhead belt drive broke down, a whole
line of machines would be put out of action. This system has been
replaced by machines that stand independently and have their own power
supply.
New technologies have allowed some capitalist enterprises to rise to
become monopolies and become giant global powers. And the state machine
has been reinforced along with this rise. And alongside that there has
been the ideological campaign to popularise capitalism, using religion,
praising the monarchy and making the armed forces part of the coercive
legal system.
At the same time they have taken advantage of the divisions in the
labour movement. Reformism, which means limiting working class struggle
to gaining improvements within the capitalist system, became the
dominant theoretical trend within the working class. We still have a
long way to go.
But bearing in mind that the economic factor is basic to realising
change and where revolutionised technology is being used to maximise
profits and reduce costs possibilities for change are increasing.
Capitalism is incapable of solving the economic and political crisis
that we are enmeshed in. The creation of a xenophobic and racist party —
the United Kingdom Independence Party in addition to the basic fascist
British National Party reflects the divisions within the Tory party and
also the divisions within the ruling class itself.
Fascism is still capitalism under a harsh anti-working class
dictatorship that cannot resolve the crisis of capitalism and uses
racism, militarism and jingoism to persecute minorities and raise the
threat of war.
“They shall not pass,” was the statement of the anti-fascist movement
before the Second World War. The validity of it today is relevant for
all democratic people’s ideas and organisation.
One of the main aims of the capitalists’ use of new technology is to
reduce production costs by reducing labour costs, which means cutting
the workforce.
There is a balance between the introduction of new technology and the
labour power required for the production of wealth. Labour power is
being discarded and the aim of the ruling class is to establish a small
technologically equipped highly paid elite workforce.
Technology has made it possible for the use of heavy metals to be
replaced by the use of lighter metals, plastics, fibre glass and
composites.
The answers to the new developments are far reaching. Experience has
shown that the approach of the Luddites, who destroyed new technology,
is not the answer.
The capitalist system is bankrupt, corrupt and viciously opposed to the
trade unions and the whole working class movement. The current austerity
policies reduce living standards and this exacerbates the deepening
crisis by undermining any possibility of creating an expanding economy.
It is the historic role of the working class, united and led by the
revolutionary party to replace capitalism. There is no future for the
working class in seeking a crisis-free capitalism. The working class now
has the freedom of necessity to ensure a social revolution takes place.
The alternative would be an increasingly authoritarian, brutalised and
ruthless capitalist class keeping the working class down.
In socialist society new technology will be used in the interests of the
workers and to strengthen world peace. Poverty, nationally and
internationally, will disappear.
Under socialism the arts and sciences will flourish. It will be possible
to invest in green, renewable sources of energy and possibly to produce
nuclear energy safely and desalinate sea water to irrigate crops. There
would be a real prospect of overcoming and reversing the effects of
climate change under the new system of socialism.
We are confident that the international struggle against the cuts and
the austerity programme will lead to rising class awareness and the
rebirth of revolutionary socialist and communist parties.