Bijou Drains
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I take it from your use of the term least, you clearly understand that in many ways all careers involve conflict with the system and that in a sense, no matter what we do we are in conflict to some degree.
I have been a social worker, working mainly within children’s services for most of that time and although their are very obvious conflicts, the work I currently do, supporting and training foster carers does have some connectivity to some principles of socialism. That is that most foster carers do not do what they do for finance, they generally do it out of compassion for the children and young people they care for. The carers I have trained and supported over the years demonstrate to me on a almost daily basis the fact that human beings are more than capable of cooperating and working in the common interest of other.
Perhaps something in that line of work might be something you could consider.
BD – How many people does it take to decide to change a light bulb in L Bird’s concept of a Socialist Society?
L Bird – half the population of the entire world plus 1
L Bird- “You seem to be using the term ‘workers’ to mean ‘people who go to work’ as opposed to ‘people who don’t go to work’,”
No I’m not, I was just checking that you weren’t either, although by your definition, “by ‘workers’ a Marxist means an exploited class of proletarians” workers won’t exist in a socialist/communist society, unless you think that exploitation and class will continue in a socialist society.
I’d argue within any workers’ councils (should we ever see them!) – L Bird
You argue for world wide democracy, however you seem to be implying by the use of the terms workers’ councils that only workers would be involved in decision making, i.e. non workers would be excluded. Non workers could include students, the retired, the infirm or indeed the work shy(I’ll declare an interest here, as I have always been a bit of a lazy bastard). Apart from the obvious question of the utility of the term worker in a classless society, are you also arguing for democracy along the lines of the De Leonist model of decision making in workshop groupings?
It may be that you are using the terms in another way, but some clarification would be helpful.
To be fair, Brian, economising and economics, are two completely different things.
I agree with Adam, the phrase Political Economy most succinctly sums up Marx’s definition of the discipline he studied.
Whether the also rans that call themselves economists nowadays are worthy of that title, or are even have the intellectual integrity of the likes of Smith and Ricardo is a whole new different debate.
I am frequently amazed at the lack of basic understanding that the “economics experts” on TV display so regularly, with no sense of shame.
I heard one a few years ago who stated that the aim of economics was for all countries in the world to have a positive balance of trades, where they exported more than they imported, I mean, for crying out loud!!
It seems strange to me that for years I’ve been arguing that we should get professionals in to do the things we’re not particularly skilled at, or willing and able to do from within the membership, but the EC pick one thing that members are probably pretty reasonably skilled at and we have offers to do & then propose to get someone in and pay them?
To me we should set aside a weekend in January or February and ask if members want to come down/go up to HO and spend the weekend doing tasks identified by the premises committee, combined with perhaps a bit of political activity and definitely a piss up. To me this seems like a good way to promote comradeship, save the party a few bob and involve ourselves in positive socialist activity, to quote a phrase.
I was talking to a small businessman from Northern Ireland last week and for him this was the dream solution, as part of the UK they would have access to all (if any) trade deals that the UK have as well as having free access to the UK, they would also in effect be part of the EU for trade purposes. It would make Northern Ireland a very attractive part of the world to set up manufacturing plants in.
The names of all EC members are in the minutes of the EC meetings, which are published on this forum on a monthly basis.
Here is a link to the last EC minutes:
https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/forum/topic/july-2019-ec-minutes/
all meetings of the EC are open to the public, as are all SPGB and WSM meetings. We have no secret meetings or have any business which is not available to all party members. As Robbo states some members take on pseudo names on the forum and elsewhere because of personal and employment issues.
Hope that helps.
By the way whatever happened to Bill Valinas (read surname backwards)
It’s not just a possibility it happens all of the time. I remember back in the day there was a comrade from Iran who had come to similar conclusions as us and I believe had even got himself to Hyde Park Corner and was putting forward Socialist Ideas, completely oblivious to ourselves.
“A book festival is being held in Wigtown between 27 September and 6 October 2019 and K&S branch have booked a pitch at the festival when 3 or 4 of its members will be running a Party stall during the first few days of the event. ”
Dave – What dates are you planning to run the stall on?
It might be possible for me to get across from Newcastle depending upon timing. Just to check it is Wigtown, not Wigton?
