1. Capitalism or humanity? In the first half of the 21st century, after more than 200 years of capitalist domination, humanity faces a series of inter-related crises which imperil the very existence of our species and our planet. Two billion of the Earth's seven billion population lack adequate nutrition, sanitation, healthcare or education. The world faces a catastrophic energy crisis, as finite resources are depleted without the development of safe, sustainable alternatives. At the same time, burning fossil fuels is warming the planet and changing climate patterns with potentially disastrous consequences for us all. Wars continue to devastate human lives on a massive scale, while the existence and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction carry the threat of even greater horrors to come. Communists hold capitalism primarily responsible for these crises, for taking the planet and its peoples towards the edge of the abyss.
The development of capitalism and imperialism
The term 'capitalism' was coined by its early advocates, not by its opponents. It denotes a type of society in which capital—money invested in producing and distributing commodities—largely dictates economic, social, cultural and political development. The owners of capital—the capitalist class—employ labour power as a commodity, extracting surplus value from it which forms the basis of capitalist profit. This is made possible because human beings have the capacity to produce more value at work than the value of the wage they need to sustain and reproduce their labour power. The resulting profit provides the capitalists with their main sources of income in the form of share dividends, money interest and commercial rent. The super-exploitation of slave labour in the colonies provided much of the raw material— especially cotton—and the capital vital for the industrialisation of Britain in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. As capitalism developed, its drive to maximise profit revolutionised industry, commerce, science, technology, culture, politics and society in general. In the most advanced capitalist countries, a small number of large combines, trusts and syndicates between them came to monopolise each major branch of the economy. This compelled them to find greater investment outlets abroad for their growing capital. In particular, they sought to monopolise sources of raw materials and cheap labour, thereby preempting imperialist rivals. More and more of these monopolies established themselves as transnational corporations (TNCs or ‘multinationals’), locating at least some of their operations abroad. This extension of their economic power into colonies and semi-colonies was backed by the power of the state of their 'home' country. Thus capitalism entered its 'imperialist' stage towards the end of the 19th century, the chief characteristics of which are monopolisation, inter-imperialist rivalry, colonial and neo-colonial super-exploitation, wars of national liberation, and socialist revolution. The conflict between British, German, French and other imperialisms culminated in the bloodbath of the First World War. In the Russian empire, the corruption and incompetence of
Page 2 Programme of the Communist Party. Draft new edition