It is the actual, vivid belief
in its possibility which inspires them. They are much
criticised for this belief by the political Socialists
who consider that the battle is to be won by obtaining
a Parliamentary majority. But Syndicalists have
too little faith in the honesty of politicians to place
any reliance on such a method or to believe in the
value of any revolution which leaves the power of the
State intact.
Syndicalist aims are somewhat less definite than
Syndicalist methods. The intellectuals who endeavor
to interpret them--not always very faithfully--
represent them as a party of movement and change,
following a Bergsonian elan vital, without needing
any very clear prevision of the goal to which it is to
take them. Nevertheless, the negative part, at any
rate, of their objects is sufficiently clear.
They wish to destroy the State, which they
regard as a capitalist institution, designed essentially
to terrorize the workers. They refuse to
believe that it would be any better under State Socialism.
They desire to see each industry self-governing,
but as to the means of adjusting the relations between
different industries, they are not very clear. They
are anti-militarist because they are anti-State, and
because French troops have often been employed
against them in strikes; also because they are
internationalists, who believe that the sole interest of the
working man everywhere is to free himself from the
tyranny of the capitalist.
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