Who Controls Science?

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South Korean missiles supplied by US imperialism It goes on to show how the NC did not regardeleft and 'right" within the Labour Party as meaningless terms as Gale suggests:

«Whilst in the initial stage of the witch hunt (against the newly-formed SLL) we suffered some casualties through expulsions from the Labour Party, nevertheless, we have been able during the past year not only to make good these losses but in addition to organise defence of cause to around the promotion of a policy for implementing this clause. This has brough our comrades into closer relationship with some of the Left centrists in the 'Victory for Socialism' organisation, whom we can influence and from whom we can recruit." (Trotskyism V. Revisionism, pp. 50-52)

A few years later took place the mass expulsion of the SLL-led Young Socialists from the Labour Party. This obviously changed the situation within the Party and squashed once and for all the idea of simply "taking control" of it by a revolutionary party standing on principles. We do not want to ape the actions of the SLL - but rather to draw attention to the sectarian revisions the WRP have now made on the nature of the Labour Party, and the method they once defended.

PRACTICE

The Workers Socialist League does not support a capitalist government. It is our intention to fight to break the working class from their reformist leadership and we say this can only be done by demonstrating in practice the role of the Labour government and those that cover up for them.

But let the WRP answer the following questions. If every Labour government is a capitalist government and nothing else, then why has the WRP and the SLL called on the working class to vote Labour back into power at every election since the war? Moreover, since in the past the WRP have pursued the same policy as ours, that is demanding that the 'lefts' fight Wilson and the right wing, why have they suddenly dropped this policy in favour of the abstract demand to force the Labour government to resign?

They could only justify this change of policy if they could demonstrate that this Labour rom previous Labour governments But they themselves quote Trotsky to the effect that all Labour governments defend capitalism rather than take the revolutionary road. That includes Wilson's 1964 and 1966 governments as well as the present Wilson administration. Why did the SLL not call for the removal of the last Labour government by the working class?

It is no good the WRP listing all the terrible things that this Labour government is doing, with the implicit (and on occasions the explicit) support of the Tories and then suggesting that this coalition in all but name makes this Labour government different from previous governments.

In 1966, Wilson launched a series of attacks on the working class, including the notorious proposes Policyanior stre and the vicious attack on the leaders of the 1966 seamens strike. There can be no doubt that at the time he received the support of the Tories in all these actions which were aimed at making the working class pay for economic crisis which was at that time beginning to emerge in a big way.

It is not the WSL that is breaking from the «entire programme, analysis and strategy of Trotskyism" as Gale falsely accuses us, but the WRP.

Trotskyists do not simply proclaim general truths in the hope that if they repeat them often enough, the class will eventually catch on. working hat is why it is not good enough for Gale to quote a passage in which Trotsky points out that the "lefts' of his time were just as incapable of carrying out socialist policies as the right wing led by MacDonald. And it proves nothing for him to declare that it is not enough to expose the lefts, they must be actually removed He knows the WRP at this point can not remove either left or right wing MPs and that his words are mere bluster. Of course the lefts have to be removed but this cannot be done by telling workers that Trotsky demonstrated 50 years ago that the 'lefts' are no better than the rights.

Before the lefts can be removed they have to be exposed. The way to expose them is demand that they carry their words into actions fight to remove Wilson and the right wing, form a government and implement socialist policies. It is through the struggle that the working class puts up to place these demands on the 'left' MPs that the possibility of winning large sections of the working class away from reformism becomes a reality, for if it is demonstrated in practice that the Benns and Heffers of this world are in fact no different from the Wilson and the Jenkins, then the question of an alternative leadership is immediately posed to the most class conscious layers of the working class. By seeking an idealist short cut round this struggle the WRP ensures it can remain only on the fringes of the Labour movement, and can never develop the revolutionary party necessary in the coming period.

Marx writes in Capital: "Moreover, all progress in capitalistic agriculture is a progress in the art, not only of robbing the labourer, but of robbing the soil; all progress in increasing the fertility of the soil for a given time is a progress towards ruining the lasting sources of that fertility. The more a country starts its development on the foundation of modern industry, like the United States, for example, the more rapid is this process of destruction. Capitalist production, therefore, develops technology, and the combining together of various processes into a social whole, only by sapping the original sources of all wealth — the soil and the labour." (Vol. 1, p. 506)

The technical level of production has advanced enormously since the period in which Marx wrote Capital, and the one-sided development of science and technology under capitalism now contains great dangers. The purpose of this article is to consider some of these and attempt to place them in perspective PERSPECTIVE It the working class were to be badly beaten by the bourgeoisie and capitalism were to survive its present crisis, there would begin a new chapter of capitalist progress. The consequences of this would be incalculable. In 1923, Trotsky wrote:

man with new technological methods and means, natural science makes man himself all the more powerful, and consequently all the more destructive, in the arena of war between nations and classes. If the workers had agreed to accept the conclusion that their liberation would come through natural science - without class war and revolution - then, undoubtedly, the bourgeoisie at a certain level of development of natural science would have put to work those methods of psychological technique that would have strengthened the reflexes of subjugation in the exploited and those of domination in the exploiters." (Problems of Everyday Life, p. 204)

During the Vietnam war, the American government spent huge amounts of money on 'social' research in an attempt to inspire 'loyalty' in the Vietnamese peasantry Ihis was distinctly unsuccesstul, but they keep trying and given time and money, the results under other conditions could be very different. Nobody knows.

In their struggle for survival, the capitalist states may alternatively resort to nuclear war. The US military are constantly striving to develop their nuclear weapons to the point where they could win a decisive victory over Russia or LATEST ADVANCE The latest advance is the 'strategic cruise missile' , which is evidently accurate enough to destroy enemy missiles in their silos. The counter to this, apparently, is to develop mobile launching pads, but it is obvious that if the USA ever does obtain a large advantage, then the chance of nuclear war will increase greatly.

Apart from this, the crisis may become so severe that the USA could turn her nuclear weapons against one of her so-called 'allies' to eliminate them as competitors and redivide their share of the capitalist world market.

Irreversible pollution of the oceans also threatens the existence of society. At present, unknown quantities of untreated wastes are being dumped in the oceans with an absolutely minimal amount of knowledge about their effects.

.. an international body of marine biologists assembled at the 1971 Pacem in Maribus Conference concluded unanimously that marine life was in serious danger of destruction hu pollution"

And the plant life in the oceans is responsible for about 30% of the world's production of oxygen. The solution to the problem is; of course, to ensure that only properly treated wastes are discharged.

66 •.. there seem to exist microbes capable of destroying and degrading almost any material mankind can produce. We understand but little of the biochemistry of these processes, and, indeed, we have only a vague knowledge of the microbes involved... The fragments of knowledge we have concerning the roles of methane bacteria, detergent- and plastic-degrading bacteria make it clear how rewarding a sustained and basic investigation of microbiological disposal processes could be; the problem is, who will pay for it." (Postgate, Microbes and Man, Who indeed, and, even assuming the research is done, which capitalist nation is going to buy an expensive new sewage system to protect the oceans while all the others carry on dumping?

SCANTY DATA

The widespread use of fluorocarbons as aerosol propellants has been pointed to by some scientists as extremely dangerous. (1 say some scientists, because the available data is so scanty that no definite conclusion is possible.)

It may be that fluorocarbons are depleting the ozone layer in the atmosphere, which shields the earth from ultraviolet radiation. If this layer became seriously weakened, then the resultant increase in radiation might cause an 'epidemic' of skin cancer. That is the risk. But nobody knows.

Some states have passed antipollution laws; clearly, no capitalist class wants to ruin its natural resources and thereby handicap itself in international competition. But even within any one country, there is far from a rational use of resources because any measure which will hit hard a particular section of business (e.g. the chemical industry) are going to be met with stiff opposition from that section.

On an international scale this problem is magnified: there is more likely to be war over ocean pollution than co-operation in eliminating it.

And finally:

.. the appearance during experiments in viral genetics of a polio virus with the full virulence of, for example, Mahoney 1, and of a serological character quite distinct from any current human parasite might represent a very serious danger Any escape into circulation that was not immediately dealt with could grow into the almost unimagineable catastrophe of a 'virgin soil' epidemic of poliomyelitis involving all the populous regions of the world." (F. M. Burnet in the Lancet, January 1st, 1966.).

In 1973 a technique was disfirst experiments, they added ger which confer resistance to an: biotics such as penicillin, but a kinds of additions are possibl They evena added toad genes i bacteria!

BACTERIA

At the present level of inor ledge, the properties of most these 'hybrid' bacteria are totall unpredictable before they are mad Realising the potential hazards i this, the scientists who made tr discovery wrote to leading scientif journals calling for a moratoriu: on certain types of experiment usi the new technique.

This raises the question oi i= control of scientific research. A policy decisions in this area are. = course, taken by the bourgeoisie. major problem for the working cla and students is simply to know whi is going on. All capitalist state have their secret military labor: tories, and the industrial laboratori are accountable to no-one.

But even the so-called 'bastion of academic freedom', the univers: ties, are not quite what they appea In 1968, for example, it wa revealed that 13 British universitie had research contracts with one c other of the chemical and gerr warfare laboratories at Porto Down.

Most of these contracts looke quite innocent in themselves: "Th effect of drugs on neuro-muscula transmissions and contractile forc of mammalian skeletal muscle* (University of Bristol) sounds lik an important piece of huma: research until you find out tha the Chemical Defence Experimenta Establishment paid for it.

In 1973 it was discovered tha Southampton University was run ning courses on counter-insurgenc for members of the armed forces In America, the situation is ia worse.

The abolition of "busines secrets" in science and the establish ment of workers' control are there fore essential for eliminating th: dangers that have grown up.

EVO TI NO

But science and technology ar much more firmly under the cor. trol of the bourgeoisie than, 1° example, motor car production. s this could not be achieved apa: from the revolutionary overthro• of capitalism by the working class.

In this struggle scientists, inte ectuals and students must pla! role. To resolve the crisis, n= simply of the working class, but = the culture of all mankind, demari the building of revolutionary leade: ship for this fight.

A discussion article

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Many crocodile tears were shed at the Trade Union Congress over the level of youth unemployment; yet the trade union leaders, by openly collaborating with the Labour government and backing the state pay laws, ensures that the working class shoulders the burden of the capitalist crisis.

Even on Scanlon's own admission, the resolution he moved at Blackpool demanding increased training facilities for youth cannot shorten the length of today's growing dole queues. Capitalism in decline can offer nothing to the great mass of working class youth but unemployment, poverty, and labour offer, instead of class while its "lieutenants of programme and leadership, mere empty rhetoric.

This came in the form of Scanlon's speech on the question. "What a waste" , he said, "what a condemnation of our society and ourselves if this level of unemployed school leavers is allowed to continue" But by leaving the youth leaderless the trade union bureaucracy has indeed condemned itself to every young worker who joins the 1,250,000 unemployed.

BLACK YOUTH

The central problem facing working class youth is unemployment. Hardest hit are black youth, of whom 30% are unemployed as school leavers. Over 158,000 school leavers are unemployed, including many who left last Easter - an increase of 280% on last year's figures. The trend towards long term unemployment is also certain for many arèas, and the spectre of youth unemployment would be even greater but for the raising o the school leaving age.

A secure future for unemployed outh cannot be found by further reforms - by further "training" , by unemployment subsidies or any до future today because capitalism has no future, save through the rushing defeats of the working class.

For this reason both right and left wings of the labour bureaucracy can offer no policy to inspire the struggles of workigg class youth. Instead, while expressing their platitudes of "sympathy" , they make every effort to exclude youth representation in the unions: "Opportunist organisations by their very nature concentrate their chief attentions on the top layer of the working class, and therefore ignore both the youth and woman worker" [Trotsky: Transitional Programme] The bureaucracy fear the mass mobilisation of the working class youth who could represent a powerful lever in the struggles of the working class which they daily struggle to head off. The youth, who have not experienced the demoralising betrayals in the workers movement of the 1930s, and who have not been party to the formation of an opportunist trade union leadership reared in the boom period, (although they plainly lack experience in the organisations of the working class) come forward with a readiness to fight.

Youth's fighting spirit will only be harnessed by a revolutionary leadership which adopts the correct political approach to youth. Both Lenin and Trotsky stressed that the question of a political approach - how revolutionaries take a prog ramme of transitional demands to youth - is decisive in winning youth to the revolution.

Youth face the problems which confront the working class as a whole in a special way. The young unemployed worker is deprived not only of a job but of any possibility of material and social independence. Capitalism cannot offer youth a trade, only a succession of dead-end jobs. It fetters youth's independent development by barring all access to higher education, intensifying the division between mental and physical labour, and at the same time forces youth into financial and social dependence on the family All this accentuates the instability and disorientation of the youth. Their opinions are yet to be formed on questions such as the family, marriage, jobs, unionisation or politics. This makes youth as a stratum open to new ideas, and today simultaneously prone to the influence of various "cults"

With the creation of the so-called "youth market» , capitalism fosters "youth" itself as a cult. These cults provide no long term solution to the subjective problems of youth's development. Hence the never-ending succession of them. Yet the revisionist left groups base their interventions amongst youth by entirely capitulating to this cult image of youth, to an abstract concept of "youth" and "youth culture"

Failing to recognise the roots of youth oscillation betseen various bourgeois cults, the IS group saw the basis for its youth work in any manifestation of spontaneous activity by youth, such as skinheads, etc. It placed its emphasis on mindless activity. For example, the front page article of one of the first issues: of its youth paper, Rebel, read: «Talk about revolution - let's see action"

Likewise the Stalinist youth movement the YCL set about to foster socialism as a cult for youth: "The whole point of YCL ideology is to build a new socialist society. To portray a new society we need to capture other goung people's imagination" [29th Congress Document] Rather than struggle against the spontaneity of youth, and win young workers to revolutionary politics the Stalinists and revisionISts try to latch on to the same youth cult fostered by capitalism.

Their youth sections address youth in general, and fail to face up to the problems of working class youth. In a liberal way, they water down their own opportunist politics for youth. There is a necessary conflict between the standards necessary for the revolutionary movement and the cultural background of working class youth. A struggle for development is necessar! to raise the youth's level of understanding to enable the construction of revolutionary leadership. But this problem cannot be overcome by pretending there is no gap, and pandering to the political backwardness of youth. "There are not two politics, one for youth, the other for adults. Insofar as youth carry on politics - and that is their duty - their politics must be adult" [Trotsky, 1934- 1935 Writings] YOUNG SOCIALISTS The central weakness of the WRP's Young Socialists, which it many ways stands head and shoulders above the youth cigai isations of these other groupü, is the centrist politics of the WRP leadership itself. The youth movement has only : fictio. 1 independence, aid its campaigns are directed like those of the WRP, not into the mass organisations of the working class - putting demands in the trade unions and fighting for support - but simply to an abstract concept of "building the YS".

For this reason, despite the real history of principled struggle established by the YS in the struggle against the Labour Party bureaucracy resulting in the mass expulsions of 1964, and the continuing strength of the organisation in the following period, with campaigns winning broad support and respect in the workers' movement the WRP YS has been unable to bring forward a trained leadership cadre or politically develop the forces it attracted in its periodic campaigns.

Similarly with the Militant grouping within the Labour Party YS, a separation between the repeated calls for. the maximum programme ot socialism (nationalise the top 250 monopolles) and their daily coexistence with reactionaries within the Labour Party results in a one-sided development of youth, persuading them that policies which require revolution can be attained through manoeuvres and resolutions in the reformist Labour Party.

But youth will only be won to a revolutionary party if they can see its relevance to their own circumstances. A programme to fight youth unemployment must start from the programme on unemployment argued for in Socialist Press number 16, but the form has to be adapted to cater for the special problems of youth.

It is not enough to raise with youth the demand "work sharing on full pay" . A large proportion of youth are out of work. For them it is not just the defence of existing jobs, but the creation of new ones. That is why the trade union bureaucracy's acceptance of the employer's device of "natural wastage" to cut the labour force is such a betrayal. Unemployed youth Youth's right to a job has to be part of every struggle over redundancies - the maintenance of recruitment and the extension of training and release schemes paid for by the employers but under the control of trade unionists and and young workers representatives. This must be fought for along with the demand of work-sharing on full pay.

To fight for these demands in the trade unions, youth must have their own representatives. We call for youth commissions to be established in all branches of trade union organisations, and imposed on the trade union bureaucracy, which must study the demands of youth and recruit and educate young workers. Similarly delegates from young workers must be brought on to Trades Councils to play a leading role in organising the unemployed youth.

The Tories recent call to employ youth on subsistence wages in "community work" to patch up the rumbling social services must be answered by a campaign for an expansion of useful public works under workers management, with employment at trade union rates.

Youth have a right to economic independence from the family. They must not be used as a cheap labour force. We demand the adult rate for apprenticeships - the application of the principle of equal pay for equal work - but under on the let for thing seed.

wages pegged to an index of prices worked out by trade union committees.

In the context of the mounting unemployment, we would support the raising of the school leaving age, but the costs must be carried by the capitalists, not the working class. Raising of the school leaving age must be linked to a fight against existing overcrowding and bad conditions in schools, and thus SOC IALI. ESS, Wedr Sep embe to a fight for a sliding scale of education expenditure.

For working class families, hit in this way by the loss of a potential wage packet we demand that students be entitled to grants, tied, on a sliding scale, to a working class cost of living index to be supervised by workers representatives - not a means test.

These demands do not constitute a finished approach to the fight to organise the working class youth and win them to revolutionary politics. They will be developed by the WSL out of the experience of coming struggles. But we raise -these demands now because the fight must begin -both among youth and older workers. They must be taken up actively by every trade unionist.

RESOLUTION

As the resolution of the 1938 conference of the Youth of the Fourth International makes clear:

"The struggle for these demands cannot be separated from the struggle for the demands of workers as a whole, both employed and unemployed.....

"The struggle to drag out of capitalism those reforms which aim at developing the class consciousness of working youth is closely linked with the struggle for workers control of industry and factory committees. The struggle for public works is closely linked with the fight for the expropriation of monopolies, for the nationalisation of credit, banks and key industries.....

"It is within the framework of the transitional programme of the Fourth International that the present programme should be developed and applied. It is under the ensign of the proletariat fighting for power that the Fourth International will win tie demands of exploited youth".

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"While increasing the power of man over nature and while arming