CAPITALISM IN CRISIS
FIGHT
T S I L A I C SO UTURE FOR A
P
overty, mass youth unemployment, environmental destruction, war and conflict – this is what capitalism has to offer humanity in the 21st century.
F
Despite talk of an economic recovery, capitalist governments like the ConDems at Westminster and the Stormont Executive continue to demand that workers and young people pay the price for the bail-outs of the bankers through austerity – job losses, cuts to services and privatisation.
In Northern Ireland, Oxfam have said that poverty has reached levels comparable to the Great Depression of the 1930s. Meanwhile, corporate profits are booming and bankers continue to rake in obscene profits.
While 300 million young people languish in unemployment, the super-rich have over £13 trillion hoarded in their bank accounts. £750 billion sits uninvested in the coffers of major corporations in Britain.
Brought together, this wealth – created by the labour of working people – and the skills of the army of jobless could wipe out unemployment and provide goods and services which could improve society for everyone. Yet this is impossible on the basis of capitalism – a system run in the interests of a tiny elite interested only in short-term profit.
QUB Socialist Society
JO I N TODAY!
Tel: 07821058319 e-mail: socialistsociety@hotmail.com www.socialistpartyni.net
CAPTALISM PUTS PROFIT BEFORE PLANET
As recent extreme weather patterns have shown, we face an environmental catastrophe if we do not urgently address the threat of global warming. Yet the major world powers have singularly failed to address this looming disaster. Even the modest Kyoto targets for reduction of carbon emissions were missed and a successor to that protocol has not yet been agreed.
Instead of tackling corporate polluters and investing massively in renewable energy and sustainable production, capitalist governments are aggressively promoting dangerous new practices like hydraulic fracturing (fracking) – threatened to be introduced across Ireland – in order to access more fossil fuels. Profit is being put before our planet.
RESISTANCE SWEEPS THE GLOBE
Workers and young people have not passively accepted their fate. The Arab Spring has swept decades-old dictatorships from power. Massive general strikes have rocked much of Europe and the political establishment is in disarray. The Occupy movement signalled the awakening of the US working-class. New mass movements are erupting across the globe.
None of these movements, however, have been successful in fundamentally transforming society in the interests of ordinary people. That is because they have lacked a clear political programme aimed at mobilising the power of the working-class to do away with the bankrupt capitalist system and establish a socialist society.
FOR WORKERS’ UNITY AGAINST SECTARIANISM
In Northern Ireland, sectarian division remains deeply ingrained. The number of ‘peace walls’ has doubled since the signing of the Good Friday Agreement. While they happily work together to close schools and hospital units, cut pensions and give themselves a £5,000 pay rise, the nationalist and unionist politicians whip up sectarian tensions when it suits their interests, as has been graphically demonstrated over the last year.
The sectarian parties rely on division to maintain their political support. Meanwhile, ‘dissident’ republicans and loyalist are feeding off the alienation created by mass youth unemployment and cuts to jobs and services. If an alternative is not built to unite working-class communities, a return to the nightmare of all-out conflict cannot be ruled out.
NO TO WAR & DIVISION
This system of inequality and scarcity breeds division – sexism, racism, homophobia and so on. These prejudices are used by the bosses and politicians to divide and rule. Demonisation and scapegoating of immigrants and LGBT people has been used to distract from the attacks on workers and young people.
Women are super-exploited within this system. Even in the West, economic equality is not within reach. In the media and popular culture, women continue to be objectified and treated as sex objects. This leads to rape culture and sexual violence. Meanwhile, the archaic laws which deny women abortion rights in Ireland, North and South, have had tragic consequences.
War is an inherent part of the capitalist system as different ruling elites vie for control of markets and influence. More than ten years on from the invasion of Iraq, the Middle East is a tinderbox ready to ignite because of the conflict between imperialist powers, regional elites and sectarian groups.
SOCIALISM
an idea to change the world
Socialism would mean taking the major corporations and key sectors of the economy into public ownership under the democratic control of ordinary people and using society’s wealth in a planned way to provide decent jobs, homes, education and healthcare for all while investing in green technologies to tackle the environmental crisis. We need to build parties to fight for these ideas in the workplaces, universities, schools and communities. If you agree, join the Socialist Society today!
If you agree, join the Socialist Society today!
Who are we? The Socialist Society is the radical, anti-sectarian, anti-capitalist organisation for QUB students. We organise regular meetings to discuss the ideas necessary to change the world. We campaign on a wide range of issues, both on and off campus, and involve students in the fight for a socialist future. We are the student wing of the Socialist Party, the Irish section of the Committee for a Workers’ International, which unites socialists in over 40 countries across the globe.