Upon checking out the different sites in the Links section, one will obviously ask which party should they support. As the New Union Party avidly points out, at this time it is understandable that the revolutionary movement for socialism will be fragmented. In time perhaps, after the advent of the capitalist crisis that ultimately causes the revolution, a new, far larger party of socialism will appear, which all the other parties will merge into. Then all socialists will fight united for economic freedom. Unfortunately, that is not the case presently. Right now, numerous parties exist that claim the mantle of socialism, with only three major parties that I am currently aware of representing genuine socialism, albeit with one or two differences as to how we should fight to achieve socialism and as to how the goods should be distributed under socialism. Of course, it will be up to the vast majority of the people at the time to determine which policies will be utilized, such as how to bring about socialism, how to run the system after it's established and what method will be used to distribute the output to the workers. For example, one thing that prevents the unification of the SLP and the WSP is the idea of whether the new economy will use a new medium of exchange (labor vouchers) or no such medium at all (free access); a detailed analysis of both methods, and the arguments for and against each, is provided in a seperate section elsewhere on this site. These things cannot be decided beforehand. It must be left to the people to decide after, or perhaps just before, socialism is established as to how the society will be run, and all the genuine parties agree that it is not appropriate or desirable for a small party to decide on specific details of how to run the system without the consent of the vast majority, since socialism will be a complete democracy, and not the nominal one we have under capitalism in the U.S., with a small minority (represented by the politicians) making all of the major decisions for everyone else (a genuine socialist society will have no need whatsoever for politicians). The parties I have choosen to link to, and will describe below, are the Socialist Labor Party (SLP), the New Union Party (NUP) and the World Socialist Parties (WSP).
One of the points all the socialist parties are adamant about is that no blueprint for running the future socialist society can be administered now. It must be done by the vast majority of the people at the time of the system's inception, and not by the socialist minority that exists today (as stated above). Other questions exist unanswered at this time, such as what family structure, sexual relations, popular culture, romance and philosophy will be like under socialism (I will add a seperate section in the future designed to tackle these speculative questions). We won't know these things until after the system becomes a reality. The important question as to when socialism will come about is also unknown. At the present time, no large revolutionary movement or challenge to capitalism exists; the working class of the present time remains a sleeping giant with few signs of an awakening. Many pro-capitalism advocates have predicted that capitalism has at least another fifty years of stability, and many others still hang on to the belief that their beloved system of power and privilege for the few over the many, capitalism, or at least class rule of some form, will somehow manage to cheat history and scientific advancement and continue for as long as the human race exists. We also do not know if the people will rise up before capitalism collapses, or sometime after; if it doesn't rise up beforehand, then a system of Industrial Feudalism, a.k.a., fascism, and the dawning of a second Dark Age, will surely be the result. In fact, if capitalism were to collapse tomorrow, fascism would almost certainly be the result. If the working class turns to the capitalist political government for a "solution" to the collapse of capitalism rather then finding one themselves, we can be rest assured that the government will do everything it can to preserve class rule, and to initiate the preservation of the class privilage of its masters by any means necessary.
[In fact, the government agency FEMA, which operates under the cover of providing natural disaster relief, reportedly has a larger function of taking over and running the government in case of an economic collapse, the occurrence of a nuclear war or of "mass civil unrest" (e.g., an unorganized opposition of the working class against class rule), and this, among other things, is said to involve the declaration of martial law, suspension of the Constitution along with all rights it confers to the citizens, the governmental takeover of the media, the conscription of labor and the building of large amounts of concentration camps to provide new homes for members of the working class who openly oppose these totalitarian measures].
At the present time (the dawn of the 21st century) the vast majority of the working classes of the world remain apathetic, distracted by the modern equivalent of "bread and circuses" (sports events, mindless television shows, drug use and video games), involved with futile reform measures to make capitalism easier to live with or attacking one specific problem of captitalism rather than the system itself, overcome with cynicism against the human race, ignorant of a viable alternative to class rule, misinformed about the true nature of socialism and, ultimately, still loyal to capitalism. Thus, the relatively small number of socialists that now exist can only continue with their education and agitation, and hope that the vast majority of the working class becomes class-conscious and initiates an organized resistance to capitalism (see the sections on How to Establish Socialism and The Union Question elsewhere on this site) before the final crisis of capitalism comes about, so that we can hopefully avoid a worldwide fascist reign of terror after capitalism collapses before the eventual establishment of socialism . This web site is a tiny contribution made by one socialist towards the goal of educating the working class.
Now, on to the political parties.
The most important thing to consider here is which of the many political parties in the U.S. and abroad are representative of true socialism, and who I have thus choosen to link the site to. At present, only three fit the bill. Many other "socialist" parties exist, including the Democratic Socialists of America, Socialist Action, the Socialist Workers Party (not to be confused with the SLP) and the Workers World Party. Each of these are on the World Wide Web, yet I did not link to them because they do not fit the criteria for being a true socialist party that I have listed below. I'm not saying that their sites shouldn't be visited. These sites have features and articles that often give a decent critique of the capitalist system and attacks the status quo. However, they inevitably fall into the categories explained in my section on Pretenders to Socialism...they are not truly Marxist, but are Leninist, Trotskyist or reformist (i.e., social democrats). They support either the continuation of capitalism with some reforms or with converting the capitalist system of the U.S. to the system of Leninism/Stalinism (which operates elsewhere in the world under the guise of "communism" or "socialism", and is often referred to by genuine socialists as "state capitalism"). These will not lead to true socialism, so I do not propose supporting any of these parties to the genuine socialists.
Without further ado, here is what the parties of true socialism which I have linked to all have in common with each other:
1. They describe and support the establishment of an economic system that is not divided into two contending social classes; there would be no minority class that owns all the property involved with the production or distribution of the goods in society and which thereby forces the majority class to work for them in exchange for only a tiny fraction of the wealth, while the ruling class appropriates the lion's share for themselves simply because they own. The Leninist system utilized by the former Soviet Union and China (as well as Cuba and many other tiny developing countries) do not fit the criteria of a classless society, as they too were/are divided into a tiny and very privileged ruling class that owns the industries and services, and a very large working class that does all of the labor in exchange for a very miniscule portion of the social wealth. No genuine socialist political party would support this system of "state capitalism", or refer to them as being socialist.
2. A system that functions without money; in other words, there would be no type of circulating, inflatable means of currency which can be used to purchase the means of production and distribution and be used by individuals for their own personal enrichment, and thereby acquire a disproportionate amount of the wealth in society, as under capitalism. Once again, the Leninist countries operating under the guise of "communism" or "socialism" in the world today all possess circulating monetary currency necessary to acquire the goods and services, and which limits the amount of goods the people can obtain.
3. No political government. This point cannot be emphasized enough. No true socialist party favors the continuation of the political state, or believes that the political state is anything other then an oppressive tool of a ruling class used to enforce class rule. All of the other parties of "socialism" favor the continuation of the political state, and foster the belief that the state can be goaded into administering society for the benefit of everyone. True socialists realize that the political state is not needed in a genuine socialist society, and agree that it only serves the interests of the ruling classes, and would not and cannot serve the interests of a classless society, and that the latter would be quite incapable of existing harmoniously alongside a coercive entity like a state . The SLP and the NUP have a basic outline in how the system will govern itself with the Socialist Industrial Union (SIU) program of Daniel De Leon, but the WSP do not subscribe to it, believing that it's a blueprint as to how socialism will be administered and is therefore undesirable at the present time, though the SLP and NUP refute that assertion (see The Union Question section for a description of the DeLeonist SIU program).
4. The modern reality of abundance will take over the outmoded principle of artificial scarcity; all of the genuine socialist parties agree that all of the people will achieve the full social value of everything that they produce, unlike the capitalist system, where the vast majority can only buy back a fraction of the value of the goods they produced.
5. All the genuine socialist parties support social, or common, ownership of the industries and services, with no ruling or boss class as part of the equation. Such social ownership exists nowhere in the world today.
The "socialist" parties that I didn't link to all support the continuation of the monetary system and the continuation of social classes, in addition to the continued existence of the politcal state. Hence, they are not true socialists, or adherants to true socialism as formulated by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels.
What they don't agree upon:
This one can't be broken down as simply as the other points.
Instead, I will describe the individual three parties and a bit of their history.
The Socialist Labor Party was formed in 1890, and has been publishing its official newspaper, The People, since 1891. Its original editor was Daniel De Leon, the great American Marxist, who formulated the SIU program, which has become an SLP staple (and has also been adopted by the NUP, the DeLeonist Society of America, and others). The party went through a few different incarnations since its original inception in 1876 as the Workingmen's Party before becoming a true socialist party in 1890. It has fought tirelessly for Marxism-De Leonism in its over 100 years of existence, and even ran presidential candidates up til the 1970's until the undemocratic ballot laws finally convinced them to utilize the party funds exclusively on educating the working class it supports. It's the oldest of all the true socialist parties in the U.S. It has sections in many of the 50 U.S. states, as well as in Canada, the U.K. (in the past) and Australia.
The World Socialist Parties began around 1905, and has branches in several nations, including and particularly in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Ireland. They formed entirely independently of the SLP, and do not support De Leonism, believing that it's too close to deciding on a blueprint of how the future socialist economy will be run, which is not considered desirable by them. It also favors free access over labor vouchers in deciding how the goods and services are to be equitably distributed in the socialist society, despite the fact that Karl Marx himself described and favored the use of labor vouchers (I agree with the WSP that labor vouchers should not be used; my reasons are explained in the section on How Will Goods Be Distributed Under Socialism: Labor Vouchers vs. Free Access). They believe strictly in the parlamentary approach of the working class in taking control of the industries and services, and do not believe that the economic action considered so important to the SIU program of the SLP and the NUP is necessary (I favor the SIU approach as well, since I believe it to be viable in light of the present level of industrial development; it can be tweaked and amended as needed quite easily by the future socialist society if called for; see my section on The Union Question for a description of the SIU program, and see the WSP's web site for a critique of De Leonism). In fact, the WSP doesn't seem to consider socialists who support the De Leonist program to be true socialists at all, but exclusively consider them to be "De Leonists" (however, you cannot have De Leonism without a foundation for genuine socialism first). Further, while the SLP and the NUP do not advocate or push religion upon anyone, they both believe that the choice of religion should be left up to the individual and that a socialist society will not interfere with such a personal choice (though they are adamant that the Socialist Republic of Labor will not materially support any religion). The WSP, on the other hand, is extremely hostile to religion, and supports atheism among socialists since the parties that make it up believe that religion is inherently pro-ruling class and inclined towards irrational beliefs that detract from the materialist conception of history and that a socialist society will be bereft of all religion [it's the belief of this socialist author that religion and other spiritual pursuits may adapt themselves to the new socialist society and that someone is fully capable of being religious and supportive of socialism at the same time. I am not an atheist and I do not personally believe that an atheistic or agnostic viewpoint is necessary for someone to be a true socialist. Certain nations which imposed atheism upon its citizens were every bit as pro-ruling class and dictatorial as states that did push religion. Hence, it's my belief that spirituality, albeit altered in form, may find a place in a socialist society and does not necessarily result in the rejection of the materialist conception of history.] The WSP publishes a quarterly newsletter, The Socialist Standard, that has many good articles on the subject of socialism, and it also has much free literature and books for sale.
The New Union Party was born out of the SLP by members who were apparently disatisfied with the way the latter party was being run by its administrative body, and has stated that the SLP underwent a "bureaucratic degeneration" in the mid-1960's that made it fail to serve the cause of socialist agitation in the opinions of the defectors. They started a newspaper, The New Unionist, around 1974, and formed the New Union Party itself in 1980. The party basically stands for the same things as the SLP, including a strong stance on the principle of De Leonism. Like the SLP, but unlike the WSP, they are not virulently anti-religion and they seem to support the use of labor vouchers for the future socialist society to utilize instead of free access (this author supports their stance on religion but opposes the use of labor vouchers and favors free access). They have slightly modified the interpretation of De Leonism, to include considering electing community boards to overseeing the unions in the workplaces that will be governing socialist society. The membership is independant of the SLP, yet serves similar goals. Their newspaper has since been replaced by a quarterly newsletter that is distributed to members only and the party has apparently morphed itself into the Campaign for a Working Democracy, all but eliminating the much misused term "socialism" from its program and is now in the process of attempting to form a new political party. The party's site used to have many excellant articles on socialism and the nature of capitalism, including a wonderful and extremely educational free Marxist study course, for serious historians wishing to learn the materialist conception of history and for those interested in dialectical analysis but the site has since been changed, with much of its articles eliminated (at least at this writing). The former NUP party is currently smaller then the SLP, despite being made up of many ex-SLPers. The SLP does not have a good relationship with the NUP, and has denounced it when it mentions it at all, though the latter has shown interest in uniting with similar goal parties, despite not agreeing with some of the party's policies, since they believe that the establishment of socialism as quickly as possible is more important then any minor disagreements socialists may have. It should be noted that in most of its articles, the NUP avoids using the word 'socialism' whenever possible due to the negative associations of that word fostered by the capitalist controlled media and textbooks, and prefers to use the term New Unionist society, instead of socialist society, when speaking of the future economy (though they do openly announce their party as socialist). Now that the NUP has morphed into the Campaign for a Working Democracy, they have further distanced themselves from the use of the word 'socialism' (as noted above) and they no longer seem to consider themselves a political party but rather running an educational campaign designed to attract more socialists for the purpose of starting a new party. This author used to write articles for the New Unionist during the later days of the paper's publication and I hope to keep an eye on the Campaign for a Working Democracy to see what it becomes in the future.
Which party should a socialist support?
This is a very difficult question. My opinion would be that each of the parties have articles worth reading, and all should be supported monetarily if possible. I have supported all three parties, and continue to do so. Each party has different opinions on how the future system is to be established, but the differing of opinion is natural to the human species, and under socialism, we will democratically decide which position is to be taken. That will be the true marvel of socialism...all the people will be deciding what will be utilized, the SIU system or not, the labor voucher system or free access, etc. Any of these things can be amended peacefully and democratically at anytime an existing process proves wrong for the society, and all true socialist parties agree on this. I believe that the similarities between these parties are more important than the differences. All advocate a classless, moneyless society and social ownership of the industries and services. Hence, all of the genuine parties should be supported till the day that all socialists stand united on one single front for socialism during the scientifically inevitable final crisis of capitalism.
