British Socialism: An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical ProposalsBarker, J. Ellis
History
British Socialism: An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals
Barker, J. Ellis
Socialism; Socialism -- Great Britain
continue, and indeed become more accentuated as the development of
machinery and other wage-saving methods proceeds, calls the attention
of the Government to its neglect of the interests of the people in not
grappling with this social evil, and urges it to at once embark upon
work of public utility with the object of (a) absorbing the present
unemployed labour, (b) laying the foundation for a permanent
reorganisation of industry upon a co-operative basis.'"[379]
The Socialists have been anxious to convince the workers that
unemployment is due to the private ownership of land and capital, and
that all unemployed should be relieved by the State because "A really
adequate system of helping the unemployed will completely alter the
relation of power between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. It will
make the proletariat masters in the factory. If the workers sell
themselves to-day to the employer, if they allow themselves to be
exploited and oppressed, it is the ghost of unemployment, the whip of
hunger, which compels them to it. If, on the other hand, the worker is
secure in his existence, even when not in work, then nothing is easier
to him than to disable the capitalist. He no longer requires the
capitalist, while the latter cannot conduct his business without him.
When the matter has gone so far as that every employer, whenever a
dispute breaks out, will get the worst of it and be forced to yield,
the capitalists may certainly continue to be managers of the
factories, but they will cease to be their masters and exploiters. But
in that case the capitalists will recognise that they only carry the
burdens and risks of the undertakings without receiving any advantage,
and will be the first to give up capitalist production and insist on
being bought out."[380] "The right to work is a charter of industrial
freedom, the emancipation of labour from capitalist tyranny. Till it
is obtained there can be neither social nor moral progress. When it is
obtained all other things become possible."[381]
The British Labour Party has drafted a Bill which, asserting the right
to work, makes provision of work for the unemployed compulsory and
enables the local authorities compulsorily to acquire land with a view
of setting the unemployed to work.[382] The Annual Conference of the
Independent Labour Party of 1907, going a step further, demanded the
erection of a national department for creating work and giving a
living wage to the unemployed. It resolved:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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