The SPGB has just brought out a pamphlet of two short articles on socialism by Sylvia Pankhurst from the ealy 1920s with an introduction. Available from 52 Clapham High Street, London SW4 7UN - price £1.00 + £1.50 p+p (UK inland) by cheque or paypal (spgb @ worldsocialism.org). Also from online store.
When does the free on line
When does the free on line version go up?
The online pdf version of the
The online pdf version of the 'Sylvia Pankhurst on Socialism' pamphlet may be viewed here:
https://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/Sylvia-Pankhurst.pdf
I think her seminal work is
I think her seminal work is here?
https://www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurst-sylvia/communism-tactics/index.htm
With this
Under Communism all shall satisfy their material needs without stint or measure from the common storehouse, according to their desires. Everyone will be able to have what he or she desires in food, in clothing, books, music, education and travel facilities. The abundant production now possible, and which invention will constantly facilitate, will remove any need for rationing or limiting of consumption.
Every individual, relying on the great common production, will be secure from material want and anxiety.
There will be no class distinctions, since these arise from differences in material possessions, education and social status — all such distinctions will be swept away.
There will be neither rich nor poor.
Money will no longer exist, and none will desire to hoard commodities not in use, since a fresh supply may be obtained at will. There will be no selling, because there will be no buyers, since everyone will be able to obtain everything at will, without payment.
The possession of private property, beyond that which is in actual personal use, will disappear.
There will be neither masters nor servants, all being in a position of economic equality — no individual will be able to become the employer of another. …..
……The revolution can only come when conditions are ripe for it; but opportunities may be missed: the rising may fail to take place at the opportune moment, or it may fail by mismanagement of the proletarian forces. A partial success may be achieved, and if Capitalism is not completely destroyed, it may afterwards re-establish itself, as it speedily did in Hungary, as it is gradually doing in Russia.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurst-sylvia/communism-tactics/ch01.htm
However she initially supported the Bolsheviks and Lenin’s state capitalist programme.
Publishing and endorsing a translation of the below in 1918;
…..What is state capitalism under Soviet power? To achieve state capitalism at the present time means putting into effect the accounting and control that the capitalist classes carried out. We see a sample of state capitalism in Germany. We know that Germany has proved superior to us. But if you reflect even slightly on what it would mean if the foundations of such state capitalism were established in Russia, Soviet Russia, everyone who is not out of his senses and has not stuffed his head with fragments of book learning, would have to say that state capitalism would be our salvation. …..
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1918/apr/29.htm
This article of hers suggests
This article of hers suggests that she thought that a moneyless, wageless socialist/communist society could have been established in one country, even an economically backward one such as Ireland then was:
https://www.marxists.org/archive/pankhurst-sylvia/1922/ireland.htm
The point is, though, that she had a clear idea of what a socialist (or communist, the same thing) society involved, which Leninists abandoned not to say distorted to fit in with their state-capitalist conception of future society.
whichfinder wrote: The online
whichfinder
Great. Thanks!