Solidaritet utan gränser – Tal och texter i urval av Olof Palme

Solidaritet utan gränser – Tal och texter i urval publicerades 2004 och är en samling texter och tal av Olof Palme som är uppdelade i fyra olika avsnitt: “Socialisten och visionären”, “Demokraten”, “Solidaritetens banerförare” och “Internationalisten”. Tillsammans ger de en överblick på Palmes politiska ideologi. Det är nästan omöjligt att föreställa sig att Stefan Löfven eller någon annan högt uppsatt socialdemokrat skulle hålla den här sortens tal eller skriva den här sortens texter. Solidaritet utan gränser vittnar om en tid när socialdemokratin, och i förlängningen den svenska politiken i stort, fortfarande hade en ideologi och en vision om ett samhälle som inte bara handlade om eventuella skattesänkningar eller skattehöjningar. Boken är helt enkelt ett dokument över en tid då man talade om politik på ett helt annat sätt än man gör idag. Samtidigt blir det påfallande tydligt att flera av Palmes uttalanden skulle kunna appliceras på vår samtid.

 

Det ideologiska mönstret (den andra artikeln i en serie av tre i Aftonbladet 1967)

Den demokratiska socialismen är för mig framförallt en frihetsrörelse. Uppgiften är att så långt som möjligt söka frigöra människan från de sociala och ekonomiska förhållandenas diktatur. Stora ekonomiska skillnader binder människorna. Därav kravet på jämlikhet. Den enskilde kan i det moderna samhället inte ensam hävda sina intressen. Därav strävan till samverkan och solidaritet. Det finns i en så upplevd socialdemokrati intet av förhärligande av staten. Samhället är ett instrument som kan och bör användas om man i det konkreta fallet på rationella grunder förmår visa att den enskildes frihetsmarginaler därigenom kan vidgas.

 

En ideologi som stimulerar människors förväntningar (utdrag från ett anförande vid Svenska Träindustriarbetarförbundets kongress 1968)

Det hålls i dessa dagar många tal där man säger: ”Vi är goda demokrater, vi har en fri press och fri opinionsbildning. Vi sätter inte människor i fängelse för deras åsikters skull – inte så många människor åtminstone.” Man glömmer då att demokrati är mer än en fråga om yttrandefrihet och sådant. Demokratin har ett ofrånkomligt sammanhang med människornas sociala villkor med jämlikhet och utjämningen mellan människorna. De senaste åren har vi fått bevittna vad som kallas en kris för demokratin i de rika västliga industriländerna. Dessa samhällen förefaller att sprängas sönder inifrån av sina inneboende motsättningar.

Demokratin råkar in i en kris, för det första om den icke förmår lösa de konkreta problem som människorna upplever såsom centrala och för det andra om de politiska institutionerna och partierna icke har en förankring i den sociala verkligheten. Om politiken icke formas av människorna själva, blir partierna propagandamaskiner, och människorna förlorar förtroendet för politiken.

 

 

Är jämlikhet att alla äter ärtsoppa på torsdagar? Utdrag från anförande vid Svenska Typografförbundets kongress 1969

Det är gott och väl att säga att alla ska ha valfrihet när det gäller utbildning, bostad, arbete, möjligheter att uppleva fritiden, men det blir ett sken om man inte skapar en sådan social och ekonomisk organisation, att alla får reella möjligheter att efterfråga de tingen, och det förutsätter en utjämning av levnadsvillkoren. Valfriheten får inte gälla ett begränsat fåtal, utan den ska vara en frihet för alla samhällsmedborgare, även för dem som idag har dåliga löner och pressade ekonomiska villkor.

 

☞ Olof Palme, Solidaritet utan gränser: Tal och texter i urval, Atlas, Stockholm (2006)

In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays by Bertrand Russell

In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays is a collection of essays written by Bertrand Russell. It was originally published in 1935. In the eponymous essay, Russell questions a central idea on which our society rests upon – the inherent value of work. This was a radical notion in 1935 and remains equally radical today. However, Russells argues that the way society is structured today basically is a strange remnant from a time before industrialization when we really did have to work in order to survive. This is not the case anymore. Yet we still cling to the idea that it is normal, if not natural, to work at least 40 hours per week; the virtue of work is really the virtue of duty and the conception of duty, writes Russell, “speaking historically, has been a means used by the holders of power to induce others to live for the interests of their masters rather than for their own.” Many would still reject Russell’s arguments but it is nevertheless interesting to entertain the idea that society, as we know it, does not have to look the way it looks today; there are other alternatives, other options, other ways to organize, that rarely get a serious chance to surface in political discussions. Russell is a convincing thinker, radical in way that is difficult to fend off. So read his essays and ask – why not?

 

In Praise of Idleness

It will be said that, while a little leisure is pleasant, men would not know how to fill their days if they had only four hours of work out of the twenty-four. In so far as this is true in the modern world, it is a condemnation of our civilisation; it would not have been true at any earlier period. There was formerly a capacity for light-heartedness and play which has been to some extent inhibited by the cult of efficiency. The modern man thinks that everything out to be done for the sake of something else, and never for its own sake. page 11 

Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish for ever. page 15

 

Scylla and Charybdis, or Communism and Fascism

Communism is not democratic. What it calls the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’ is in fact the dictatorship of a small minority, who become an oligarchic governing class. All history shows that government is always conducted in the interests of the governing class, except in so far as it is influenced by fear of losing its power. page 73

There is so much hate in Marx and in Communism that Communists can hardly be expected, when victorious, to establish a regime affording no outlet for malevolence. page 74

There are some objections – and these, to my mind, the most conclusive – which apply to Communism and Fascism equally. Both are the attempts by a minority to mould a population forcibly in accordance with a preconceived pattern. They regard a population as a man regards the materials out of which he intends to construct a machine: the materials undergo much alteration, but in accordance with his purposes, not with any law of development inherent in them. page 78

 

The Case for Socialism

Let us begin by a definition of Socialism. The definition must consist of two parts, economic and political. The economic part consists in State ownership of ultimate economic power, which involves, as a minimum, land and minerals, capital, banking, credit and foreign trade. The political part requires that the ultimate political power should be democratic. page 82

Economic security would do more to increase the happiness of civilised communities than any other change that can be imagined, except the prevention of war. Work – to the extent that may be socially necessary –should be legally obligatory for all healthy adults, but their income should depend only upon their willingness to work, and should not cease when, for some reason, their services are temporarily unnecessary. page 91

The world is in the condition of a drunkard anxious to reform, but surrounded by kind friends offering him drinks, and therefore perpetually relapsing. In this case, the kind friends are men who make money out of his unfortunate propensity, and the first step in his reformation must be to remove them. It is only in this sense that modern capitalism can be regarded as a cause of war: it is not the whole cause, but it provides an essential stimulus to the other causes. If it were no longer in existence, the absence of this stimulus would quickly cause men to see the absurdity of war, and to enter upon such equitable agreements as would its future occurrence improbable. page 101

 

On Youthful Cynicism

Causation in the modern world is more complex and remote in its ramifications than it ever was before, owing to the increase of large corporations; but those who control these large organisations are ignorant men who do not know the hundredth part of the consequences of their actions. page 128

The rulers of the world have always been stupid, but have not in the past been so powerful as they are now. page 128 f 

 

☞ Bertrand Russell, In Praise of Idleness and Other Essays, Routledge, London (2004)

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag

Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag was published in 2003, only a year before Sontag died. In the book, which in some ways can be described as a long essay, Sontag discusses the relationship between war, violence and photography. Is it possible to grow accustomed, and even indifferent, to images of war and suffering? And if so, what happens when we no longer react to such pictures? In a time when we are constantly flooded with images and stories portraying suffering that is often geographically distant from ourselves, what does it take to evoke compassion that lasts longer than some fleeting seconds and which can lead to action rather than detachment from a reality we are not – yet – forced to live in? With the war in Syria now being compared to a slaughter house and hell on Earth, this discussion and these questions seem more pressing and relevant than ever before.

 

Look, the photographs say, this is what it’s like. This is what war does. And that, that is what it does, too. War tears, rends. War rips open, eviscerates. War scorches. War dismembers. War ruins.  Not to be pained by these pictures, not to recoil from them, not to strive to abolish what causes this havoc, this carnage – these, for [Virginia] Woolf, would be the reactions of a moral monster. And, she is saying, we are not monsters, we members of the educated class. Our failure is one of imagination, of empathy: we have failed to hold this reality in mind. page 8

To those who are sure that right is on one side, oppression and injustice on the other, and that the fighting must go on, what matters is precisely who is killed and by whom. To an Israeli Jew, a photograph of a child torn apart in the attack on the Sbarro pizzeria in downtown Jerusalem is first of all a photograph of a Jewish child killed by a Palestinian suicide-bomber. To a Palestinian, a photograph of a child torn apart by a tank round in Gaza is first of all a photograph of a Palestinian child killed by Israeli ordnance. To the militant, identity is everything. page 10

It is because a war, any war, doesn’t seem as if it can be stopped that people become less responsive to the horrors. Compassion is an unstable emotion. It needs to be translated into action, or it withers. The question is what to do what the feelings that have been aroused, the knowledge that has been communicated. If one feels that there is nothing “we” can do […] and nothing “they” can do either […] then one starts to get bored, cynical, apathetic. page 101

Citizens of modernity, consumers of violence as spectacle, adepts of proximity without risk, are schooled to be cynical about the possibility of sincerity. Some people will do anything to keep themselves from being moved. How much easier, from one’s chair, far from danger, to claim the position of superiority. page 111

There’s nothing wrong with standing back and thinking. To paraphrase several sages: “Nobody can think and hit someone at the same time.” page 118

 

☞ Susan Sontag, Regarding the Pain of Others, Penguin, London (2004)