The daily worker., 1924-05-03
nature Of the society and civilization
it seeks to perpetuate.
"Swari"


never been clearly defined, but its i'm
plications can be gathered from the
writings and speeches of its chief ex-
ponent, as well as of his immediate
disciples. 1t rests, not upon the status
quo, but upon reversion to a pre-
vious state,-an imaginary Golden
Age, when the horrors of capitalist
civilization from which it seeks
to escape, had not yet been born.
Swaraj or "Self-Rule" as applied to
India means reversion to the pre-
British, even the -Musulman era. 1t
aims to go back to the Vedas7, to
which history accords a respectable
age varying from three thousand to
fifteen hundred years. It's symbol is
the wooden plough and the "Charka, .
or spinning-Wheel. 1t denounces mo-
dern civilization and industrialism in
round terms and prescribes for the
entire humanity the remedy it would
apply to India. But this complete re-
versal of the existing order is not to
be achieved by violence. Violence is
the very negation of the doctrine Of
"Satyagraha," (soul-force) which
seeks to overcome hate by love, force
by non-resistance, and whose only
weapon is incorporation with exist
ing institutions until these change
themselves.
Tho the outlines of Swaraj are
vague, the implications are very clear
Capitalism would revert to landlord
ism and handicraft production. The
wheels of time will turn not forward,
but back. There will be no elimina-
ton of classes; Mr.. Gandhi believes
that the rich and the poor are al
ways with u.s." He is positively
against class-strife. But he would
soften and ameliorate exploitation and
injustice by the application of the
principles of religion and human
brotherhood. Philanthropy. would take
the place of social justice.
Leninism.
Lenin's goal of the Social Revolu-
tion, as its name indicates, implies the
complete overthrow of capitalist So
ciety and its substitution by the Com
munist society, wherein the means of
production, distribution and exchange
pass to the hands of the producing
class, which for the first time in his
tory would be freed from the yoke of
exploitation. Social production for use
would replace production for ex-
change and profit. The laborer will
receive the full value of his toll Pri-
vate ownership in the means of pro
duction, including land, will cease to
exist. Only he who performs socially
useful labor shall be counted as a
member of society and entitled to its
rights and privileges. HE who would
eat, must work" Modern means of
production, evolved by the capitalist
order-machine production and all the
conquests of science over nature-will
be preserved and improved upon for
the benefit of all mankind, not for
small class, as heretofore.
BY the overthrow of capitalism, i'm
perialism, its highest and ultimate ex-
preston, will also disappear. Sub
Ject races and nationalities will for
the first time receive the right to de-
velop unhampered in their own way.
The emancipation of the peoples en-
shaved by imperialism is a necessary
corollary of the emancipation of the
classes enslaved by capitalism. In
ternational rivalries, hatred and COM
petition, leading to war, will disap-
pear, and with them the need for war
itself. Science and human life will
no longer be prostituted to the serv-
ice of destruction. but to the evolution
of the human race.
With the abolition of private prop
erty and the universalizing Of the op-
portunity for education and useful
service, classes will cease to exist, and
a classless society, or rather a soci-
ETY. composed OF but one class, that Of
socially useful workers, will come into