Socialist Action Canada’s Program
Updated June, 2022
Abolish Capitalism
To build a society organized to meet human needs, capitalism and its patriarchal institutions must be abolished. Poverty, exploitation, sexism, oppression, and war are rooted in international capitalism (imperialism). Imperialism has led to barbaric wars, nuclear weapons which can annihilate the human race, and ecological destruction which threatens our future survival.
For Socialist Democracy
Socialism should extend democracy and self-organization at all levels. Socialist society is based on collective ownership and democratic control of the means of production.
Our vision of socialism has nothing in common with Stalinism, a repressive authoritarian system in which the privileged bureaucrats stole power from the workers. We believe in a multi-party socialist state which guarantees and respects democratic rights.
The capitalist class will employ its police, courts, bureaucracy, and army to attack democratic and egalitarian change. Therefore, the capitalist state must be broken up and replaced by democratically elected institutions of the working class and its allies.
For International Socialism
Socialism can be created only by ending world scarcity. We must organize labour and resources and develop production on a world scale, not within a single country.
But the working class can and must take power within existing state boundaries. It must extend the revolution by offering political and material solidarity with workers’ struggles abroad. In advanced capitalist countries, we must expropriate and disarm our own imperialist ruling class to establish workers’ power.
We welcome popular, democratic uprisings in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Asia against the remnants of the Stalinist bureaucracy and against the emerging mafia capitalist ruling class. We oppose the restoration of capitalism and call for a workers’ revolution leading to the re-establishment of social ownership and the creation of a genuine socialist democracy.
For Women’s Liberation
Our vision of socialism is not rigid. We learn from the lessons of contemporary social movements, most especially the women’s movement.
Without the participation and leadership of women, there will be no socialist revolution. Without women’s liberation, there will be no socialism.
We support and participate in the autonomous women’s movement, and stand for socialist and feminist action.
Against Canadian Imperialism,
For Self-Determination for the Quebecois
and Indigenous People of Turtle Island
We believe that Canada is an imperialist state, part of the G-8 club which exploits the people of underdeveloped nations. The Canadian state was founded on the national oppression of Indigenous peoples and the Quebecois. The Quebecois have been subject to 200 years of economic, social, cultural, and linguistic oppression, and denied the right to national self-determination, that is, the right to form their own independent state. We defend the right of the Quebecois and aboriginal peoples to self-determination. Within Quebec we support independence but we oppose the bourgeois nationalist Parti Quebecois and Bloc Quebecois. We support the formation of an independent mass workers’ party.
We oppose Canadian imperialism. Our loyalty is not with our ruling class but with the workers and oppressed people around the world.
For Independent Working Class Political Action, For a Workers’ Government
As socialists, we urge our class brothers and sisters to break with the capitalist parties, fight for their own independent class interests and elect governments of workers’ parties.
In English Canada, the New Democratic Party is the only mass party based on organized labour. It is a liberal reformist party committed to a slightly more humane version of capitalism. We fully support struggles to win reforms but believe the NDP leadership has a pro-capitalist program that goes against the genuine interests of the party’s working-class membership and its voters.
A vote for the NDP is a class vote against the bosses’ parties. Likewise, we advocate union affiliation to the NDP, to strengthen the labour character of the party. Inside the NDP we struggle for socialist policies, internal party democracy, and a Workers’ Agenda including a commitment to mass extra-parliamentary action, which is critical to the development of a socialist alternative to capitalist rule in this country.
Build Movements,
Build a Revolutionary Party
We support and participate in the day-to-day struggles of trade unions, the autonomous women’s movement, the lesbian and gay movements, international solidarity groups, anti-racist groups, student and community organizations, environmental groups, and all those acting for progressive social change.
Building movements is necessary but it is not enough. These struggles will not lead to the overthrow of capitalism by themselves. The victory of the socialist revolution requires conscious leadership based on a revolutionary program.
We strive to build a revolutionary mass working-class party, one based on the political gains of 150 years of workers’ struggles.
Socialist Action Canada
Socialist Action Canada is a cross-country revolutionary socialist organization in political solidarity with partisans of the worldwide Trotskyist movement who have remained at the forefront of workers’ struggles against capitalist oppression and Stalinism. We strive for the formation of a Revolutionary Workers’ International.
Socialist Action Canada is based on the democratic principle of full membership debate on program and strategy, followed by real unity in action.
We are fighting for a world fit for human beings, and for a mass revolutionary party to lead the struggle to victory. If you agree with what we stand for, we invite you to join us!