LENIN in his book Left Wing Communism an Infantile Disorder writes about the ‘fundamental law of revolution.’ He states: ‘For a revolution to take place it is not enough for the exploited and oppressed masses to realise the impossibility of living in the old way, and demand changes;
‘For a revolution to take place it is essential…that the exploiters should not be able to live and rule in the old way. It is only when the “lower classes” do not want to live in the old way and the “upper classes” cannot carry on in the old way that the revolution can triumph.
He adds: ‘Revolution is impossible without a nationwide crisis (affecting both the exploited and the exploiters).’
He continues: ‘For a revolution to take place it is essential first, that a majority of the workers (or at least a majority of the class conscious, thinking and politically active workers) should fully realise that revolution is necessary . . . second that the ruling classes should be going through a government crisis, which draws even the most backward masses into politics.’
Today in the UK and throughout the capitalist world, rampant inflation and economic catastrophes are driving forward socialist revolutions.
In the UK, the main government party over many years is split, with PM Johnson, forced to resign, but supposedly in charge of bringing in a new cabinet to replace him and his allies.
The Daily Telegraph yesterday quoted Michael Gove, whom Johnson sacked as Community Secretary, as saying that Johnson must leave his post on Monday, while ex-Tory premier Sir John Major commented: ‘The proposal for the Prime Minister to remain in office for up to three months – having lost the support of the cabinet, his government and his parliamentary party – is unwise and may be unsustainable’, hinting that there could be a UK coup.
A pro-Johnson MP Jacob Rees-Mogg meanwhile attacked the just-resigned Chancellor Rishi Sunak saying ‘Rishi Sunak was not a successful Chancellor. He was a high tax Chancellor who was not alert to the inflationary problem.’
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has also thrown a big spanner into the Tory works.
It has warned the next Tory leader that the UK’s public finances are already smashed and that £185bn of tax increases or spending cuts will be needed over the next 50 years to offset the pressure on public finances.
For good measure, the OBR added that the loss of revenue from motoring taxes and soaring spending on old age care will see debt exceed 100% of GDP by the middle of the century and reach 267% in 50 years.
The OBR has told the Tories that debt would be pushed to 320% of GDP.
To impose that kind of debt onto the backs of workers will require a military police dictatorship in the UK, not any kind of parliamentary democracy.
This is why the ruling class are moving forward to increase military spending, to deport refugees to Rwanda, to police the internet and the media and to allow rooky police officers to use tasers.
However, the working class in the UK is extremely powerful. It will not accept such savage cuts and a military police type-government dictatorship.
As the government in Downing Street moves to establish a new regime in the UK, the working class will take general strike action to defend itself and go forward to socialism.
What is required now is the building of the WRP and the Young Socialists into mass revolutionary organisations, that will mobilise the working class to carry out the British socialist revolution and bring in a planned and nationalised economy that will be developed to satisfy the needs of the people and not to create a rabble of multi-billionaires.
The British crisis is part of the world crisis of capitalism.
The capitalist states are in a huge crisis. The development and victory of the Russian and Chinese revolutions in 1917 and 1949 has changed the world for ever.
Now the job must be to build sections of the International Committee of the Fourth International to lead the World Socialist Revolution to its victory. This will see the working class taking power in the capitalist states, and the Russian and Chinese workers retiring the Stalinist bureaucracy, restoring rule through Workers Soviets.