We stand for the transformation of human society, from its current basis of greed, exploitation, war, oppression and environmental destruction, to a commonwealth of social ownership, solidarity and human freedom, living in harmony with our planet’s ecosystems. Such a transformation requires the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism and its replacement by socialism – a classless society based upon a worldwide system of democratically planned production to meet human needs.

In fighting for revolutionary change, we base ourselves on the scientific theory of social development developed by Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, as further developed and expanded by subsequent generations of revolutionary socialists. We seek to learn in particular from the experiences of the Russian, Vietnamese and Cuban socialist revolutions, and from the Bolivarian socialist revolution now unfolding in Venezuela.

Capitalism is a system of social production in which the wealth created by working people (wage and salaried workers, working farmers and other independent producers) is appropriated by a small minority of exploiters, who own the industrial, agribusiness, financial and media corporations. The working class is the only social class that has the potential to replace capitalism with socialism, not only because its organisation and centrality to production under capitalism give it the ability to do so, but because it is the human embodiment of socially cooperative labour.

To maintain its exploitation of the working people, the capitalist class creates numerous systematised social inequalities that work to prevent the exploited uniting – racism, sexism, discrimination based on national or ethnic origin, persecution on the basis of sexual orientation, discrimination based on religious views, health status or age or mental or physical ability, etc. We oppose all such forms of oppression, and support the oppressed in their efforts to overcome it, and their right to organise and conduct their own struggles for liberation from oppression.

Exploitation and oppression cannot be finally overcome while capitalism continues to exist. But partial victories against them can be won, and can contribute to the weakening and eventual overthrow of capitalism. We support all reforms that improve the situation of working people and the oppressed, that increase their ability to organise and their self-confidence and willingness to struggle against the capitalist rulers. We support the defence and expansion of democratic rights, which provide the best environment for organising working people to fight for their interests, and which the capitalists oppose for that reason. But capitalist parliamentary “democracy”, even in a wealthy developed capitalist country like Australia, is a sham. Through control of the state (army, police, courts, government), control of the mass media and control of the economy, the capitalists ensure the rule of a wealthy minority over the rest of society. To replace capitalism with socialism, working people need to be organised as the ruling class. This cannot be done through reforms to the existing institutions of state power. It will require their replacement by radically new institutions that can arise only out of the revolutionary mobilisation and organisation of the working people themselves.

The parliamentary system limits working people’s participation in the political system to casting ballots as atomised voters once every three or four years. We stand for the replacement of parliaments by a system of genuine democracy – the “rule of the common people”. Such a system would be based upon grassroots organisation of working people, with elected representatives being paid no more than the average skilled worker and subject to recall by their electors at any time.

Capitalism has “united” the world, but as a global imperialist system in which a minority of rich, developed, nations exploit the rest of the world’s nations through the “normal” working of the capitalist world market. The super-rich families that dominate the economies and politics of the developed nations, headed by the US capitalist rulers, use their countries’ military machines to impose war and other forms of terror against countries that refuse to bow to their dictates. We oppose imperialist military or economic aggression in all its varied forms, and support oppressed nations’ right to determine their own destiny without imperialist interference.

While socialism will be a system of worldwide cooperation, the capitalist ruling classes must be defeated in each country by that country’s own working people. The greatest enemy of Australian working people is the Australian capitalist class. In order to lead the struggle against that enemy, we seek to contribute everything we can to building a mass-supported revolutionary party, composed of the most class-conscious and determined fighters for workers’ power and socialism. This will be both possible and indispensable when the contradictions of capitalism, generating ever more severe social crises, here and around the world, intensify the class struggle in Australia.

For more information about the Revolutionary Socialist Party, visit http://www.dsp-rsp.org/rsp