8. Prospects¶
Core Argument¶
Trotsky opens with a scathing critique of the Daily Herald’s moralising over Liberal leaders who betray their principles by adopting a bourgeois lifestyle, exemplified by Mrs Lloyd George’s lost necklace. The Labour paper warns that the party’s existence depends on restraining its own leaders from such corruption. Trotsky dismisses this as puerile: morality flows from politics, not the reverse. Labour leaders like Snowden, Clynes, and the Webbs openly advocate class collaboration, while the Herald stays silent when Thomas dines with railway owners. Such men must be exposed and driven out, not hushed up. The Conservative government under Baldwin also preaches conciliation, reflecting both the strength of the British proletariat—which forced this stance—and its weakness in leaving MacDonald and Thomas at Labour’s head. This conciliationism is compelled by European capitalism’s need for post-war stability, but it cannot resolve underlying contradictions.
The Labour Party’s practical programme is essentially Liberal, especially in foreign policy, echoing Gladstonian impotence. Free Trade is obsolete; Singapore must be fortified if imperialist plunder continues. MacDonald introduces cowardly amendments to capitalism that solve nothing. All three parties are conservative, fearing industrial conflict above all. Free Trade is finished, but protectionism is equally untenable for Britain: it signals the beginning of mortification for the oldest industrial country. The only alternative is a socialist overturn, requiring the party to be purged of both reactionary protectionists and reactionary free traders.
The Independent Labour Party, a minority of 30,000, rules the Labour Party and thus exercises a real dictatorship over millions. This rise prepares the path for the Communist Party, which will not grow slowly but will suddenly occupy the Independents’ place. The contradictions between the masses and the conservative Labour leadership will mount catastrophically. The Communist Party can take the lead only through implacable conflict with the trade union bureaucracy. The left wing of the Labour Party is incapable of leading a revolutionary struggle. The Independents will evade the question of conquering power, preferring gradual nationalisation by purchase. But the bourgeoisie will fight to the death; a revolution is inevitable, and the longer the Fabians restrain development, the more terrible the explosion will be.
The British bourgeoisie, hardened by island existence, Calvinism, colonialism, and national arrogance, is being forced into the background by an irreversible process that creates a revolutionary situation. Compelled to retreat before America, it is filled with bitterness that will erupt in civil war. The cold cruelty previously directed at colonised peoples will reveal its class nature and be turned against the proletariat. The revolution will awaken deep passions in British workers, long suppressed by social conventions, the church, press, and sport. The British bourgeoisie will have powerful US support, while the proletariat will rely on the European working class and oppressed colonial masses. Victory is guaranteed for the proletariat with correct revolutionary leadership. The Communist Party must become the party of proletarian dictatorship; any alternative deceives workers. This is the main conclusion.