Kshama Sawant wins in Seattle

Seattle City Council candidate Kshama Sawant, a “Socialist Alternative” insurgent, has unseated four-term incumbent Richard Conlin, with the latest batch of mail-in ballots nearly tripling Sawant’s lead to 1,148 votes. A year ago, Sawant was running against the Legislature’s most powerful Democrat, House Speaker Frank Chopp, charging that the “Democratic Party-majority government” had slashed billions from education programs while bestowing tax exemptions on “rich corporations.” Congratulations must go to Kshama Sawant and her campaign. While this doesn’t signal the rise of socialism in the USA it is something we should pay attention to for sure. The Sawant victory comes exactly 97 years after Seattle voters put their first outspoken radical into office, Seattle School Board member Anna Louise Strong. Strong would write about the Wobblies, oppose U.S. entry into World War I and eventually end her days in China, where she was on friendly terms with Mao Zedong. While the Occupy Seattle organizer is about to occupy an office in the council chambers, ballots are still being counted in several close races. One big ballot measure is still hanging, while other contests appear narrowly decided. The $15-an-hour minimum wage proposal in SeaTac, already under legal challenge, leads by exactly 53 votes. The margin was cushioned by 12 votes in Thursday’s count. The proposal for taxpayer-financed elections in Seattle, Proposition 1, has climbed in the late vote count. Unlike Sawant — who overcame a 6,193-vote election night deficit — Prop. 1 hasn’t quite climbed enough. The “No” side still has a lead of 2,656 votes. Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn has come up in the late count. The air went out of the room at McGinn’s election night party when returns showed him with only 43.6 percent of the vote. Sen. Ed Murray is already into transition, but McGinn has since made it respectable. He now has 47.07 percent of the vote. The campaign has captured the attention of the US left nationally, which has been looking for something to stir it from it’s post-Occupy hangover. The unexpected result has led to clamouring for more Sawant-style campaigns—could this be the beginning of a left electoral turn? Yet socialists have frequently run for office and rarely come close to victory. Was the Sawant campaign simply an isolated incident of, as ABC put it, “left-leaning Seattle, where police recently handed out snacks at a large marijuana festival and politicians often try to out-liberal each other?” The fact that fellow Socialist Alternative candidate Ty Moore ran a similarly close campaign in Minneapolis would suggest otherwise. Despite their party affiliation, it would be a mistake to view the Sawant and Moore campaigns as indicative of a groundswell in support for socialism, however defined. Sawant’s success owes itself to concrete policy proposals, such as a highly popular call for a $15/hour minimum wage—a ballot measure that was too-close-to-call in nearby Seatac. Moore, an organizer for Occupy Homes, focused heavily on the issue of foreclosures. Instead, what the results indicate is that increasing numbers are open to left electoral alternatives to entrenched Democratic Party politicians. Sawant gained ground throughout the campaign by relentless attacks on the four-term incumbent Richard Conlin, who Sawant claimed represented “big business interests.” In the post-Citizens United, post-2008 era, the Democratic Party’s corporate fealty is difficult to hide from the working class, who are increasingly financially squeezed. A recent poll indicates that 60% of voters, including half of Democrats, believe that the two major parties “do such a poor job that a third major party is needed.” With support for Congress at an historic low, much of the disgust at the political establishment can also be seen at state and local levels, making incumbents like Conlin unusually vulnerable. Prior to election, only 28% of Seattle’s voters approved of city council. While the Sawant campaign does not necessarily presage a revival of socialism, is does indicate that socialism is not a dirty word—at least in certain parts of the country. 53% of Democratic-leaning voters have a positive view of socialism, compared to 55% for capitalism and 44% for big business. In a heavily Democratic city like Seattle, to embrace the socialist label thus does a progressive candidate little harm. Not only did the label not harm Sawant, but it may have helped, by foregrounding the issue of class and attracting media attention and national fundraising. The two campaigns also demonstrate the importance of organization. Socialist Alternative brought a national organization and full-time staffers to concentrate almost exclusively on three local races (including Seamus Whelan’s unsuccessful candidacy in Boston). The Sawant campaign made use of hundreds of volunteers. Yet despite Socialist Alternative’s organizational strength, their results would not have been achievable in isolation. Critically, Ty Moore landed the endorsement of the SEIU, while Sawant received the endorsement of several unions. Sawant’s insurgent campaign posed tough questions for local progressive Democrats, with several prominent Democrats ultimately endorsing her. Sawant raised over $100,000, significantly out-fundraising Conlin in the campaign’s final weeks. This number should give prospective socialist candidates some pause; at roughly a dollar a vote, Sawant’s campaign was on the efficient side. While it is worth noting the large-scale city-wide nature of the race, this is the type of fundraising that serious third-party challengers will require. Finally, both campaigns benefited from exceptionally strong candidates, with a history of local activism, Sawant with Occupy Seattle and Moore with Occupy Homes-Minnesota. Will owe her slim victory to an impressive ability to communicate with voters on everyday issues. It was also to her advantage that she was familiar to Seattle voters, having run unsuccessfully against Washington House Speaker Frank Chopp in 2012.

Socialists and elections

Over the few years I’ve been involved in politics on the left I have come to notice those who choose to stand in elections on the left more often than not the Marxists that are Trotskyists and so on tend to disguise their true ideas in elections. For example many align themselves with reformist programmes and cozy up to left wing bureaucrats in order to curry favor and support. Many will not reveal their true intentions beyond a few catchy slogans in fact. It is almost like the word socialism cannot be used it would scare off those sympathetic to our cause if we mention the S word the line goes. Personally I find this very disingenuous and downright insulting in many ways to think that workers are too stupid to vote for socialism is a bit patronizing if we're honest. Its not ultra left to talk about socialism or what you really stand for. If you explain how you intend to get there people will trust you far more I’d suggest. People are not stupid and will see through you in the end. It is this vanguardist idea again though that socialism needs to be brought into the workers minds without a revolutionary party they will never gain any higher level of thinking than "trade union" consciousness. For me this is one of the reasons I felt awkward at times during elections in a trotskyist party I felt I was having to speak down to workers all the time when really they wanted to know what we were really for and what is our end goal. When I stood in a election for TUSC this year I stood on a "no cuts platform" as they call it and looked to oppose the cuts but there was no room for socialism in the programme I stood under apparently I was told TUSC have a basic programme which is basic for a reason this reason I could not work out why are we hiding the fact we are socialists and want to change society from people? Yes Socialist is in the name TUSC, Trade Union and Socialist Coalition but it was not prominent much in our literature I felt. For workers they are straight forward people they simply to know what you stand for and how you will help them if they back you. If you feel that electoral politics is your thing and I am no longer sure it is for me but if it is for you then good luck but hiding your true ideas is dishonest in my opinion. Calling yourself a socialist is one thing but it’s not a dirty word to use like it maybe once was. I am not sure real change can come through the ballot box anymore many of the gains we as a class have made have come through mass struggle from below but not through a vote. Even the 1945 Labour government who are as popular on the left still sadly as really they didn’t go that far at all and had other downsides of course were forced to do much of what they did through struggle and pressure from below. The old phrase if we don’t give them reform they will give us revolution has been very key over the years with those at the top in positions of political power having to bend to the demands from below to r remain in power if they did not they would have been removed. One interesting election campaign I’d like to draw people’s attention to is Kshama Sawant Of the CWI in the USA in Seatle which has been seen over the years as a more progressive city but her fantastic campaign has gained a fair bit of momentum and congratulations from this blog must go to her. If she does go on and get elected we will be watching with close scrutiny as we have seen how workers in positions of power change and get sucked in by the system in time if they are not careful. Kshama Sawant's $15 a hour as a minimum wage really caught a mood out there it would seem but yet this in itself is a reformist demand and while these sorts of demands are fine in the short term and will gain popular support in times of austerity and cuts to pay and jobs this should only be seen as a start of a programme which looks to one day abolish wages all together in place of a system which meets people’s needs and produces for everyone’s needs. In Seattle, Sawant’s campaign helped put the “Fight for 15” - strikes and protests of low-wage workers for a $15/hour minimum wage - at the centre of political debate. Socialist Alternative energetically built this movement, aiding victimized striking workers and countering arguments against raising the minimum wage. When labour organisations placed an initiative on the ballot to raise the minimum wage to $15 in the suburb of SeaTac, the Kshama Sawant campaign energetically supported this movement, contributing to the ballot initiative’s historic success. While a new workers party is not even close in the US this campaign highlighted above does show how an idea can catch on. Even though this timid and reformist idea got a echo it cannot be ignored but we must also warn of the dangers of putting faith solely in elections and our elected leaders as a historic president. We must continue to build resistance and direct action on the ground. Organising ourselves independent of a leadership is important. As it is also important to keep all our struggles rooted in the rank-and-file democratic committees while trying to prevent them to be co opted for someone’s gain.

How fast food workers in the USA are fighting back

Fast-food strikes spread to seven cities www.socialistworld.net, 30/06/2013 website of the committee for a workers' international, CWI Fighting poverty pay Pete Ikeler, Socialist Alternative (CWI supporters in the US) “$15 an hour and a union.” In the past six months, this call has captured the attention of not only hundreds of low-wage workers who have taken job action but also millions more who’ve seen their courage. In November last year, 300 workers at New York City fast-food chains went on strike for a day and held a surprise rally in Times Square. Similar actions have since taken place in Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Washington, D.C., and, most recently, Seattle. And this against the backdrop of the most sustained worker organizing effort at the nation’s largest private employer, Walmart. Something is clearly stirring among America’s low-wage workers. Working in fast food, at an average hourly wage of $9.18, is not only unrewarding in money terms – for many, it’s also a daily grind of degradation and managerial abuse. At a Jimmy John’s in St. Louis, workers have been made to wear signs saying “I made three wrong sandwiches today,” or, “I was more than 13 seconds in the drive thru” (The Nation, 5/10/2013). One striking McDonald’s worker at the April rally in New York stated that, after approaching his manager about a $200 shortfall in his paycheck, he wasn’t refunded, but suspended for a week! Experiences like this are more the rule than the exception: A report published in May found that out of 500 NYC fast-food workers surveyed, a whopping 84 percent had experienced wage theft in the past year (The Nation, 5/16/2013). Low Wage = High Profits Meanwhile, fast-food and other low-wage outfits like Walmart are reeling in the profits. In 2012, McDonald’s took in $5.5 billion, Yum! Brands $1.6 billion, and Starbucks $1.4 billion in profits; Walmart topped them all at $17 billion! (Fortune 500, 2013) The rest of us – in fast food, retail, or elsewhere – are stuck with declining wages and less union protection, or outright joblessness. Labor force participation is now 63 percent – lower than in 1978 – real wages are below their 1973 level, and only 11 percent of U.S. workers are union members – the lowest rate since the Great Depression (Bureau of Labor Statistics). A large part of this story is the offshoring and automation of manufacturing jobs, combined with wage suppression and speed-ups, but an equally large share of blame lies with the massive expansion of low-wage service industries. Just retail and fast food alone, which by no means encompass the entirety of this sector, employ nearly 19 million workers, or 14 percent of the workforce (Bureau of Labor Statistics). This enormous group of workers is no longer an anomaly, an “aberration” from those with “standard” living-wage jobs; they are the foundation of the 21st century working class, and their conditions the ominous future for all of us unless we mount a militant fight-back. Thankfully, signs of resistance from this very group of workers have been flooding in over the past months. Following the NYC walkout and rally in November, steady organizing was conducted by workers, unions, and community activists to build for a repeat NYC rally and another in Chicago, both in April. Then in the first half of May, similar actions exploded in St. Louis, Washington, D.C., Detroit, and Milwaukee. And on May 30, fast-food workers at Burger King, Taco Bell, and other companies in Seattle walked off the job. Workers Demand $15 an Hour All of these actions have raised the demands of $15 an hour and the right to unionize. According to Josh Eidelson of The Nation, they “share several common characteristics: Each is a one-day strike by fast food workers, backed by a coalition of unions and community groups, targeting major companies throughout the industry and mobilizing a minority of the workforce in hopes of building broader support. While different local organizations have been involved in each city’s actions, the Service Employees International Union [SEIU] has played a significant role in all of them,” (5/15/2013). The demand for $15 an hour is indeed a huge step forward. At a time when the national minimum wage – even when observed (and, often enough, not) – is a measly $7.25 per hour, the idea of achieving an hourly rate more than double that – which could provide for a livable existence – has clearly inspired many to take part in these actions, but many more are needed for concrete gains to be won. Tactics so far have consisted of one-day actions involving a minority of each store’s workforce, with the central goal of gaining publicity rather than stopping the flow of profits to franchises and corporations. This approach is designed to avoid the black hole that is official NLRB organizing – a process that, even if successful at individual stores, could be easily overturned by large corporations like McDonald’s, Burger King, or Yum! Brands simply canceling franchise contracts and closing unionized stores, as Walmart has done in the past. Fighting Strategy Needed While useful at this stage, one-day actions and publicity stunts are not enough to win union recognition, stable scheduling, or significant wage gains. The main task going forward must be to both broaden and deepen worker involvement. Not only should many more fast-food and other low-wage workers actively join these campaigns, independent worker committees empowered to plan, strategize, and organize future actions should be set up at once. Once these are firmly in place, the next stage must involve economic leverage, a way to stop the flow of profits to franchisees and corporate heads. The best way to do this is through long-term, majority strike actions involving large numbers of stores, possibly at a city-wide or even national level, possibly involving the transport workers, who are a key link in the supply chain, and certainly involving customers, who should be reached out to, won over to the workers’ side, and persuaded not to patronize struck stores. Only sustained work stoppages at a level big enough to impact corporate profits will ultimately be sufficient to bring giant fast-food companies to the bargaining table. Developing the struggle along these lines will not be easy, especially given the structure and history of the main organization behind these efforts, the SEIU. For its path-breaking foray into fast-food organizing, the SEIU can only be applauded. Unfortunately, however, the union’s record in achieving solid gains for members and developing rank-and-file democracy is severely lacking, as the current struggle of its California health care local against a militant, more democratic offshoot makes clear (Labor Notes, March 2013). SEIU’s leaders also have close ties with pro-corporate Democrats and a track record of steering activist campaigns, like Occupy Wall Street, toward electoral support for this bankrupt party. At the Seattle fast-food worker rally, SEIU organizers invited Democrat politicians to speak but denied speaking rights to Socialist Alternative candidate Kshama Sawant: the only candidate openly fighting for a $15 an hour minimum wage! For these reasons, the thousands of fast-food workers who are now taking courageous steps toward unionizing should beware of the SEIU’s dark side and proven willingness to sell out members for short-term leadership gains. It is thus all the more important for workers to form their own committees within and across workplaces to spread the struggle and strategize future actions. The potential of this movement is huge. Success in organizing even a few key chain stores in major cities would provide inspiration to millions of hyper-exploited workers in this country; bigger successes at the national level or across entire corporations could have an outsize impact on the general wage structure among industries, helping to reverse the decades of declining living standards workers have seen since the 1970s. Finally, success along these lines would alter the balance of class power under U.S. capitalism: a system that puts profits before basic human needs. If this system can’t afford to pay us $15 an hour and provide us with basic workplace rights, then maybe it’s time to say, “We can’t afford this system!”

Cuts kill, con-dems must be stopped in their tracks

Steven Bottrill, whose disabled mum Stephanie killed herself because of the bedroom tax, said: "Hopefully now someone will listen. Someone will realise what has gone on and change things." Studies by charities, as well as the NHS and the DWP, have shown that suicides and suicidal thoughts have increased among disabled people due to benefit cuts With the governments so called work programme it is failing people badly especially the disabled. According to charities for the blind, not a single blind or visually-impaired person has found sustained employment through the Work Programme. Capitalism always blames its victims. Now, more than ever, claiming benefits is portrayed as scrounging rather than being a right. This adds psychological despair to the harsh reality of scraping by on a pittance. Threatened and attempted suicides, as well as actual deaths, have doubled among 24-35 year old men in the UK since 2008. Last year there were deaths among sick and disabled people who had been subjected to the profit-driven bullying of Atos. Figures published in the Lancet showed UK suicides jumping 8% in the immediate aftermath of the financial crisis. Suicide rates have risen nearly everywhere except Sweden and Finland. In Algeria, Portugal, Greece, Tunisia and Italy suicide is a growing problem, with deaths three times higher among men than women. Few of these deaths make headline news but the government has the evidence. Richard Colwill, from mental health charity Sane, said: "No one should be surprised that factors such as unemployment and job insecurity can push people who may be already vulnerable to take their own lives. Life events like redundancy, bankruptcy and the relationship breakdowns that often follow can cause bouts of mental illness." Claimants slashing their wrists in jobcentres or setting themselves on fire is not deemed as newsworthy by the right-wing media as sensational headlines about benefits fraud. But government figures state only 0.5% of Disability Living Allowance claims are fraudulent. Before the crisis, Greece had the lowest suicide rate in Europe: 2.8 per 100,000 inhabitants. Suicides have since doubled and attempted suicides have also increased. Debts, joblessness, job insecurity are the key reasons given, but it is also the sense that the future holds nothing better. In the US, suicide rates rose dramatically in high unemployment areas. Macomb County, Michigan, with 13.7% unemployment, reported almost 40% more suicides compared to before the recession. Researchers at University of Chicago found that mass layoffs in America caused an immediate rise in suicides, followed by a bigger spike six months later when unemployment insurance ran out. In Ireland, suicide rates increased by 25%, while in Japan, a 2008 study found one in five members of the population admitted contemplating suicide as the recession began to bite. Many people are finding themselves in a place where nothing seems certain anymore, as if the world around them has gone mad. Economic crisis is turning into a mental health crisis. The absence of a generalised struggle is a contributing factor that reinforces the idea that 'there is no alternative'. This despair is a product of capitalism - a system that is sick and rotten to the core. It must be replaced, by socialism, through mass struggle, to give people a purpose and sense of worth that this society cannot. The number of US deaths from suicide surpassed the number of deaths from car crashes in 2009 Over five million Americans lost access to health care due to losing their jobs in the recession. 750,000 have turned to binge drinking, while the number of anti-depressant prescriptions have soared Suicides and bad health have increased far more in countries that have slashed health and welfare budgets A University of Cambridge study found that for every 1% increase in unemployment, there is a 0.8% increase in suicides by under-65s With extracts from http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/766/16715/22-05-2013/cuts-kill-con-dem-benefit-reforms-mental-health-and-suicide

Climate change a real and now concern, capitalism must go !

Pollution and production for the sake of production Concentrations of carbon dioxide, the most important of the human-made ‘greenhouse gases’ contributing to global warming, appear to be reaching catastrophic levels. Published last week, the latest findings from Hawaii’s Mauna Loa observatory strongly indicate that the average daily level of CO2 in the air has risen to above 400 parts per million, its highest level since the Pliocene period some 2.6 to 5.8 million years ago. A staggering thought. The research data from Mauna Loa goes back 800,000 years to the age of the oldest fossilised air bubbles extracted from Dome C, an ice-bound summit in the high Antarctic. During this pre-industrial period, CO2 concentrations fluctuated between around 180ppm during the ice ages and 280ppm during interglacial warm periods. In other words, we have a massively accelerated pace of change in terms of natural history - there has never been anything like it (as far as we know). And the problem is literally getting worse by the day. Since the measurements started in the late 1950s, the rate of increase has picked up from about 0.7ppm per year to 2.1ppm per year during the last decade. Effectively meaning that CO2 in now rising 100 times faster than the increase that occurred when the last ice age ended - a situation that is clearly unsustainable and threatens to totally wreck the planet’s ecological system, which is already severely damaged by capitalist exploitation and plunder. Furthermore, the Nature Climate Change journal on March 12 published an extensive study outlining how more than half of common plant species and a third of animal species are likely to see their living space halved within seven decades on current CO2 emission trends. The species extinction rate is now the highest in 65 million years, with the prospect of cascading extinctions, as the last remnants of vital ecosystems are removed - bird species are dying out at 100 times more than the ‘benchmark’ or ‘natural’ rate. As for the output of greenhouse gases, the study warned, they are putting Earth on track for a 4°C temperature hike by 2100 - chiming with figures produced by the United Nations-established Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has projected increases in average global temperature of up to 5.8°C for the same period. The implications are calamitous. For example, experiments conducted at the International Rice Institute have led scientists to conclude that with each 1°C increase in temperature, rice, wheat and corn yields could drop 10%. You could argue, if so inclined, that the newest statistics concerning CO2 concentrations are hardly surprising, given the sheer amount of coal being furiously burnt around the world right at this very moment. The biggest emitters, naturally, are the United States, China and India - all competing in the ‘dog eats dog’ global race. However, we have now entered a new danger zone - our natural environment is being radically altered. Just think about it. The 400ppm figure is one that belongs to a different era in every sense of the term. As revealed by Mauna Loa and others, the last time we saw comparable levels of CO2 in the atmosphere was about 4.5 million years ago, when the world was warmer on average by 3-4°C than it is today and 8°C warmer at the poles. A time when the tundra in Siberia and Canada was covered in lush forests, savannah and lakes spread across the Sahara, and the Arctic was ice-free - and where the sea level was 20 to 40 metres higher than today, far above most of the world’s major cities. Alarm bells should be ringing everywhere. In a way, we have created - or recreated - a prehistoric climate under modern industrial conditions: what a perverse achievement. Unless drastic action is taken in the very near future, preferably immediately, cities like London, New York and Tokyo are in danger of being drowned like something from a CGI-heavy science fiction movie. Enjoyable as fantasy, or moral fable, but not so as reality. If the advanced countries cannot prevent such a disaster, and there is no reason to think that they can, then what will happen to the poorer countries? An apocalyptic scenario. Bangladeshi peasants, for example, cannot move their farms a mile or so up the road - it is someone else’s land. Capitalism, in reality, is a system uniquely designed not to cope with the ecological crisis that is so obviously gripping the planet. Given its very nature, predicated on production for production’s sake - not on the basis of satisfying rational human need - it is constantly throwing more fuel on the fire. Contrary to a relatively widespread view, capitalism is not the result of countless individual actions taken by ‘bad’ or ‘greedy’ people. Instead it is a form of uncontrolled human relation based on the self-expansion of exchange-value, and this inner dynamic imposes itself on its personifications - ie, the capitalists, who ultimately are slaves to capital just as we in the working class are. Yes, obviously, other past social-economic systems damaged various aspects of the environment - deforestation under the Romans and so on. But capitalism does it on a vaster and more terrifying scale. It is a destructive and wasteful mode of production, which seeks only to make profit - anywhere, anyhow and by any means necessary. Left to itself, capitalism will ‘industrialise’ to the point of self-destruction, making the air unbreathable and the rivers dead with toxic sludge. Conversely, it will effectively leave underdeveloped whole areas of the globe, where it calculates no profit can reasonably be made. It should be pointed out that Marxism is ecological to its very core. Karl Marx fought to overcome the “metabolic rift” between humanity and nature, between town and country, which itself was a reflection - and product - of capitalist class rule over the workers, of dead labour over living labour. Any Marxist who is not an environmentalist - not fighting for a genuinely sustainable planet - is clearly not a Marxist. There are those on the left who peddle the notion that there is a ‘left’ Keynesian solution for present society - ‘green’ jobs, ‘green’ growth, etc. No, it is still capitalism based on growth for the sake of growth. Still the absolute primacy of the profit motive. In short, a reformed capitalism cannot save the planet - so capitalism must go. Only a socialist planned democratic economy can base itself on the needs of the people and also the planet in a sustainable fashion. With thanks and extracts from Eddie Ford’s article at the weekly worker

US: After the Boston tragedy - No to racism & repression

A socialist alternative piece: This past week in Boston has been almost surreal—a horrific attack occurred on Marathon Monday that shouldn’t be seen in this city or anywhere in the world. Countless acts of solidarity occurred starting with people running towards the explosion to help the hundreds caught in the path of devastation. Marathon runners endured another two miles to give blood, and countless Bostonians opened their homes to the stranded. Solidarity messages were sent to Boston from the people of Kabul to Baghdad to Yankee Stadium [base ball stadium in New York]. Meanwhile, the health care companies are charging massive amounts for necessary surgeries while victims are forced to beg for donations from other working people while the billionaires profit from this tragedy. One of the three deaths from the bombs was an 8-year old child, Martin Richard, from the working-class neighborhood of Dorchester. The photo of Martin with his homemade poster calling for peace after the racist murder of Trayvon Martin has been beamed around the world and become one of the defining images associated with this tragedy. Unfortunately, Martin Richard’s death was followed by immediate racist acts. On Monday, a student from Saudi Arabia was tackled for “acting suspicious” by running away from the explosions and “smelling like explosives” immediately in the vicinity of the Marathon finish line. Much of the first day of the investigation was wasted focusing on this false lead fueled by racist profiling. The news media, particularly CNN, whipped up Islamophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment throughout, publishing the Saudi man’s information and also continuously giving false reports of suspects and arrests. One such report said that a suspect on the run was a “dark-skinned man”. That same day, Boston Police were seen stopping and searching young African-American and Latino men in an atmosphere of a militarized society. War, Violence, and Terror Socialists completely condemn this terrorist outrage. Whatever the motives of the perpetrators, such acts are utterly reactionary. The primary victims were ordinary working people. Terrorist methods like the Boston bombing create fertile conditions for right-wing forces to whip up racist and nationalistic moods in society, which only serve to weaken the working class and further the interests of big business. The media is speculating that the perpetrators of this attack were possibly motivated by right-wing Islamic terrorist ideology, specifically the grievances of the predominantly Muslim Chechen people against the brutal Russian oppression of their country. If such claims are true, the attacks carried out in Boston will not succeed in undermining U.S. imperialism or the imperialist powers’ oppression of the people of Chechnya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine and the Arab world. In fact, its real effect is to undermine the struggle of the Chechen people and all oppressed peoples, strengthen the power of the U.S. state, and give the ruling class in the U.S. and internationally an opportunity to clamp down on democratic rights. While completely opposing terrorism and right-wing political Islam, the working class and socialists cannot support the racist police-state methods of U.S. capitalism or its imperialist policies abroad in the name of “fighting terrorism.” The ruling elite cynically aims to exploit ordinary people’s anger at terrorism. Instead of racist scapegoating, we need unity of all working, young, and oppressed peoples to address the root of these problems. The same week as the Marathon tragedy, fourteen people were killed in West, Texas at a fertilizer plant and hundreds injured. This plant has been the site of ongoing safety violations. Meanwhile, twenty-two US veterans commit suicide every day. Working people need to unite against corporate domination to ensure workplace safety, adequate treatment for mental illness, and free quality health care. This struggle can unite us across ethnic, racial and religious lines. The approach of working-class unity can become a counter-weight to religious and ethnic violence not only in the US but also internationally. Marathon Heroes Carlos Arredondo is now known from pictures and countless media stories as “the man in the cowboy hat." He ran towards the explosion to rush people to ambulances and to medical professionals. His actions undoubtedly saved lives on Marathon Monday. One man that Carlos saved was the first to give a description of “Suspect #1” that was killed in a shootout with police on Thursday. Carlos is an immigrant and an activist that lost his son, Scott, who was a soldier in Iraq. At the height of the anti-war movement, Carlos was a fixture at Boston protests. Carlos and his partner, Melida, could also be found at Occupy Boston events. Other unsung heroes include the workers in the Massachusetts’ Nurses Association (MNA), a union that struggles to keep safe staffing ratios to provide quality care for patients when the big hospital chains try to “cut costs.” MNA nurses cared for the victims of this attack and will continue with a campaign for safe staffing. Seamus Whelan, MNA activist and Socialist Alternative candidate for Boston City Council said, “After this horrible attack of terror and tragedy, we see the need for guaranteed, quality health care. Nurses, in order to care better for our patients, will be at the forefront of Obama’s proposed cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.” Immigration Debate The corporate politicians in the halls of power were planning a debate on immigration this year. This tragedy is being used by the right-wing media to whip up anti-immigrant sentiment. This could stall the debate or push it to the right. The youth who are alleged to have committed this horrific act were immigrants who had lived in the U.S. legally for ten of their formative years. Immigrants or Muslims as a whole shouldn’t be scapegoated for this. Already, a Muslim woman has been attacked in Malden, a working-class city where she lives just outside of Boston. Contrary to the media propaganda, the truth is that most mass killings in the US are actually carried out by non-Muslim white men. Any attacks on the civil rights of immigrant workers would affect all of us by strengthening the hand of reaction against all working people and youth. Anti-democratic, “anti-terrorist” legislation that claims to be targeting “terrorists” or immigrants will later be used against activists fighting corporate power, as has been seen in recent years with the FBI and police using their expanded post-9/11 powers to repress Occupy, anti-war, and union activists. Socialist Alternative stands for full and immediate citizenship rights for all undocumented workers. This is a far cry from Obama’s guest worker “immigration reform” which is designed as a gift to corporations that want a cheap labor source constantly threatened with deportation, and creates a very long, expensive and humiliating process for the undocumented to gain citizenship while denying legal status to a minority of those currently undocumented. If immigrant workers are given citizenship rights, then it would strengthen their confidence to fight for higher wages and better benefits. This would strengthen all workers at the bargaining table and in struggles against budget cuts. Immigrants have helped build unions in the U.S. before, and they can do so again. Lockdown and Relief On Friday, nearly one million residents of Greater Boston were ordered to stay in their homes and not leave. We were told this would help the search to find the remaining 19-year-old suspect on the run. Streets were abandoned, turning Boston into a scene that looked like a post-apocalyptic movie. The suspect was caught shortly after this order was lifted because a man in Watertown, a suburb that was the site of the shootout, went outside and immediately found the suspect in his boat. There was a massive outpouring of joy and relief that this was all coming to an end. The effects will still last though. The ruling class will have a window of opportunity to push through new “anti-terrorist” legislation that will increase the repressive powers of the state, along with efforts by the right-wing to whip up racist, anti-Muslim, and anti-immigrant moods. However, attitudes are not the same as after 9/11 when there was widespread support for war and limits on civil liberties. When Socialist Alternative in Boston put up a table Saturday, just one day after the “stay in your homes” order, we weren’t confronted with hostility. Our signs read “Defend Civil Liberties” and “No Attacks on Immigrants." Most people are worn out by this rollercoaster and are looking for answers. At root, it is a capitalist system that creates the alienation, war, poverty and feeling of powerlessness that leads to such heinous acts. It is also the power of the solidarity of working people that can overcome this calamity and the system that breeds it.

Join the Worldwide Movement for Socialism!

By SocialistAlternative.org Capitalism is an international system in decay. Multinational corporations want to produce their products at the lowest possible costs. This overarching desire for short-term profit leads to low wages and crumbling benefits. On a world scale, the actions of the reckless massive energy companies and the waste of an ever-expanding global market have led to an environmental crisis of momentous proportions, resulting in the highest temperatures ever recorded, the melting of polar ice caps, and an increased intensity of storms. These global problems must be met with international solutions and a worldwide movement. Socialist Alternative stands in political solidarity with the Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI) – an organization in over 40 countries fighting for fundamental change – in arguing for a socialist transformation of society. The crisis of capitalism is reaching a dramatic phase, with more and more people looking for solutions to poverty, racism, sexism, declining benefits, environmental destruction, and mass unemployment. The root of these problems is a system that thrives on low wages, slashed social programs, and divide-and-rule tactics to attack oppressed people. The capitalist system provides no way out of this devastation. The super-rich put the pain caused by this crisis onto the backs of workers and youth by laying people off and cutting education, health care, and pay while at the same time bailing out the banks. Still, the crisis continues and deepens as the super-rich globally sit on trillions of dollars that they refuse to invest, while hundreds of millions of people lack jobs and the basic necessities of life to survive. The CWI and Socialist Alternative propose democratic socialism as a means to alleviate this madness. Socialism isn't about dictatorships, one-party states, or a loss of basic rights. Democratic socialism is about using the resources of society for the good of the vast majority rather than just for the profits of a few. Through democratic control of the resources of the top corporations, we could decide to invest in clean energy rather than environmental devastation. We could put all the unemployed to work and use new technology to reduce the working week without loss of pay rather than as a further weapon in the hands of the bosses to speed up the workforce and boost profits. We could decide to use our human potential for education, health care, and housing rather than war, discrimination, and waste. We support and demand improvements in the lives of ordinary people immediately, but we also realize that it will take mass movements to win reforms. Socialists participate in movements to inspire others that an alternative world can be built and that by mobilizing the tens of millions who have an interest in fighting for a new and better society we can build more powerful and dynamic movements. We need democratic structures in our movements and we need bold socialist demands so we can speak to all those pushed down by the capitalist system. In every movement, we need to realize that the capitalists will take away any positive gains we can win as long as we leave their power and control intact. Likewise, the rich and powerful would aim to isolate any people or country that moves in a socialist direction. The capitalists have a global market, and they don’t want anyone setting a “bad example” by using the resources of their country for the benefit of the 99% rather the rich elite. This is one reason why the CWI organizes internationally, to provide solidarity and support for movements worldwide and also to learn lessons from the struggles in Greece, South Africa, England, Brazil, and elsewhere. Internationally and in the U.S., working-class power can be built out of movements to defend our rights and fight for a better world. Democratic, fighting unions, new political movements of the 99%, and our protests in the streets can be the building blocks of a struggle for a socialist society. This means movements need to be linked up with a clear program of demands, and activists must learn from historic and international struggles. Through movements and political education, we can raise consciousness. The CEOs and big shareholders want us to think that they create the jobs and that we can’t survive without them. In truth, working people produce everything, provide all the services, and distribute everything. All the super-rich do is control the profits and work on ways to further exploit and divide us. In short, bosses need workers and we don’t need bosses. Taking the economy into the hands of working people can be the basis for providing full employment, countering environmental destruction, and starting the process of ending discrimination. Socialists have as our aim an end to the dictatorship of big business and the beginnings of a society based on real democracy and an end to oppression. Join Socialist Alternative and help build the growing movement against capitalist misery worldwide.

World economy faces ‘chain of crises’

THE US ECONOMY – which is one of the few to regain the production levels of pre-2008 – has slowed to its weakest pace since 2009, growing at less than 2% while the world’s biggest economies have lost steam simultaneously. If the Republicans refuse a deal with Obama, if the US topples off the fiscal cliff, this could almost automatically plunge the world economy – which is basically stagnant – into a new deeper recession. The interests of capitalism should logically compel the Republicans to seek a deal with Obama. But the political system in the US, designed originally for an 18th century population of predominantly small farmers, is now completely dysfunctional, along with the Republican Party. Obama, in one of his more revealing outbursts speaking to American bankers in 2009, stated: “My administration is all that stands between you and the pitchforks”. But in the election, this did not earn him the support of the American bourgeois as a whole who favoured Romney in the main. This just goes to show that a class does not always recognise its own best interests! It is the strategists and the thinkers of the ruling class, sometimes in opposition to those that they supposedly represent, who are prepared to stand up for the best interests of the capitalists and chart a way forward. The problem for them today is that the choice is between different roads to ruin for capitalism. The decay, their loss of confidence, is evident in their refusal to invest, as well as the warnings from the hallowed institutions of capitalism: the IMF, the World Bank, etc. Their predictions of a quick escape from the present crisis have been dashed and they have now swung over to complete pessimism. Cameron and the Governor of the Bank of England warn that the crisis might last another decade; the IMF whistles a similar tune. The theme first employed in Japan of ‘zombie banks’ is now used to describe not just the banks but the economies of America, Europe and Japan. And like Japan, bourgeois economists are predicting a ‘lost decade’ for some countries and for Europe as a whole. A comparison with the 19th century depression from 1873 to 1896 is being made, at least for Europe. Martin Wolf in the Financial Times mused, “is the age of unlimited growth over?”, extensively quoting from a new study, Is US Economic Growth Over? Faltering Innovation Confronts the Six Headwinds. (NBER Working Paper no 18315) This raised the vital question of the role of innovation in the development of capitalism, and particularly in driving forward the productivity of labour. The authors of the above study concluded that there have been “three industrial revolutions” since 1750 that have been crucial in the development of capitalism. The first was roughly between 1750 and 1830, which created steam engines, cotton spinning, railways, etc. The second was the most important with its three central inventions of electricity, the internal combustion engine, and running water with indoor plumbing, in the relatively short period of 1870 to 1900. Both these revolutions required about 100 years for the full effects to percolate through the economy. After 1970, productivity growth slowed markedly for a number of reasons. The computer and internet revolution – described by the authors as industrial revolution three (IR3) – reached its climax in the dot-com era of the late 1990s. But its main impact on productivity, they say, has withered away in the past eight years. They conclude that since the year 2000 invention has been largely concentrated on entertainment and communication devices that are smaller, smarter and more capable but do not fundamentally change labour productivity or the standard of living in the way that electric light, motorcars or indoor plumbing did. This is not to say that there are not the potential inventions for enormously lifting productivity but the dilemma is the current state of capitalism in decline, which is incapable of developing the full potential of the productive forces. The tendency for the rate of profit to fall – and actual falls in profitability – discourages the capitalists from taking up inventions which can develop the productive forces. Then there is the problem of ‘demand’ which in turn has led to an ‘investment strike’, with a minimum of $2 trillion of ‘unemployed capital’ in the cash piles of US companies. And, on top of this, exists the colossal debt overhang. Satyajit Das in the Financial Times berates the American bourgeois who “seem unable to handle the truth – the prospect of little or no economic growth for a prolonged period… Ever increasing borrowings are needed to sustain growth. By 2008 $4-$5 of debt was required to create one dollar of US growth, up from $1-$2 in the 1950s. China now needs $6-$8 of credit to generate one dollar of growth; an increase from $1 to $2 15-20 years ago”. Capitalism faces not one crisis but a chain of crises. They are trying to reconcile the working class to the prospect of little or no growth and therefore of severely reduced living standards, as Greece demonstrates. We must counter this through our programme and emphasise the limitless possibilities – evident even today – if society was organised on a more rational, planned way through socialism. Europe’s intractable crisis THE ECONOMIC CRISIS in Europe is the most serious facing world capitalism. So intractable does the crisis appear, with austerity clearly not working, that a spat has broken out, with the IMF warning against the ‘excessive austerity’ applied by national governments in Europe with the benediction of the EU authorities and the European Central Bank (ECB). On the one side the ECB has sought to implement, like the US Federal Reserve and the Bank of England, a form of Keynesianism through the purchase of government bonds as well as cheap loans to some banks and countries. On the other hand, these very same authorities – the ‘troika’ – have been the instruments for austerity policies. They have been stung by the implied criticism of the IMF, which has pointed out that a negative ‘multiplier effect’ operates when severe austerity is implemented – cuts in government expenditure, loss of jobs, etc – and therefore reduced income to the state. The ECB and national governments counter with the ‘absolute necessity’ to cut state spending, accompanied by all the other measures of austerity, privatisation, etc. Despite all the pleas and expectations of growth, austerity has had the effect of snuffing out even the economic embers that remained during the crisis. It is true that Keynesian policies have failed to generate growth. In the current situation, it is like ‘pushing on a piece of string’. This has led born-again Keynesians, such as former Thatcherite monetarist Samuel Brittan, to lobby for bolder measures; he advocates what amounts to a giant game of ‘treasure hunt’ in a desperate attempt to get the economy moving again. He suggests, only half-humorously, that hordes of cash should be buried and then the adventurous souls who discover it will then go out and spend it! There is no indication of this happening, however. The largesse that has been distributed so far has been used to clear debts not to increase spending. This is an indication of the desperation of the ruling class for some improvement at this stage. Keynesianism has been partially tried and failed but this does not mean that, faced with a revolutionary explosion, the capitalists would not resort to far-reaching Keynesian measures. Concessions can be given and then the capitalists will attempt to take them back through inflation at a later stage. Even now, the EU authorities are attempting to avoid the default of Greece by suggesting that more time is given for its debts to be paid off. This will not prevent the savage attacks on the Greek working class, which are being applied remorselessly by the EU. Nor will it solve the basic problems of Greece which will still be lumbered with colossal debts. Therefore, a Greek default is still likely, which will have huge repercussions throughout Europe, including Germany, which is heavily indebted to the banks of other countries. It is even possible that Germany itself could take the initiative of leaving the euro, such is the political opposition within Germany itself to bail-outs. Even the proposal to give Greece more time to pay off its debts is meeting with opposition from the German capitalists because it means writing off a small portion of their debt. It is possible that, in relation to Spain and some other countries, the ‘can will be kicked further down the road’. But eventually the can will become too big to kick! Therefore, a breakup of the eurozone still remains on the cards. Even the Chinese express alarm at the turn of events in Europe with a top Chinese official, Ji Liqun, sitting on top of a massive state-controlled sovereign wealth fund of £300 billion, warning that the European public are at ‘breaking point’. He had previously argued that Europeans should work harder but now recognises that the depth of public anger could lead to a ‘complete discarding’ of austerity programmes. “The fact the public are taking to the streets and resorting to violence indicates the general public’s tolerance has hit its limits”, he commented. “Unions are now involved in organised protests; demonstrations and strikes. It smacks of the 1930s”. Not least of his unspoken concerns is that the example set by the European working class could spill over into China itself as well as his fear for Chinese investments in Europe. Greece is the key EUROPE IS THE key to the world situation at the present time, where the class struggle is at its sharpest and with the greatest opportunity for a breakthrough for left and revolutionary forces. But if this is so, then Greece is therefore the key to the situation in Europe, with Spain and Portugal not far behind in the chain of weak links of European capitalism. As Trotsky said of Spain in the 1930s, not one but three or four revolutions would have been possible if the Greek workers had a farsighted leadership and mass party at their head. A Greek computer programmer on the day of the recent general strike commented to the Guardian newspaper in Britain: “Personally, I’m amazed there hasn’t been a revolution”. British TV also commented that just 3% of the population actually supports the austerity measures of the government and the troika. With all the agonies that the Greek people are being forced to endure, by the end of the present austerity programme the debt of Greece will still be 192% of GDP! In other words, there is absolutely no chance that this debt will be paid. Nevertheless, endless austerity is the future that capitalism has decreed for the Greek people. All the conditions for revolution are not just ripe but rotten ripe. Nineteen one-day general strikes – out of which four have been 48 hour strikes and the rest 24-hour strikes – testify to the colossal reserves of energy of the Greek workers and their preparedness to resist. However, they have concluded that, in the teeth of what has been a magnificent struggle, the troika and the Greek capitalists have still not budged and it is therefore necessary to turn to the political front, towards the idea of a left government able to show a way out of the crisis. This is despite the fact that there is scepticism towards Syriza and its leadership on the part of the masses. Significant sections of the masses are prepared to support Syriza, which currently receives as much as 30% in some of the polls, but are not prepared to join and actively engage within its ranks. There is an element of this in many countries. Big disappointment at the failure of the workers’ parties has led to extreme scepticism towards them, even those formally standing on the left. There is a willingness to support left formations and parties in elections, but not to devote time and energy to engaging in their ranks and building them. Workers have been disappointed in the past and fear being let down once more. This mood, of course, can and will be changed once they see these parties actually carrying out what they promise. Instead of moving in a leftward direction, however, left parties in general and Syriza in particular have tended to move to the right, watering down their programme and opening their doors even to ex-leaders of social democracy who have played an open strike-breaking role in the very recent period. In the circumstances of Greece, the flexible tactics employed by our Greek comrades, while remaining firm programmatically, meet the needs of a very complex situation. We have to have an eye not just for those left forces within Syriza but also to the sizeable forces outside, whom in some cases are re-evaluating past political positions. We cannot give a timescale as to when the present government will collapse – as it surely will – with the likely coming to power of a Syriza-led left government. But we have to prepare for such an eventuality with the aim of pushing such a government towards the left, while at the same time helping to create democratic popular committees which can both support the government against the right but also pressurise it into taking measures in defence of the working class. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that a new significant semi-mass force can emerge through the tactics in which we are presently engaged. This will involve not just a concentration on developments on the left and in the workers’ parties but also against the danger posed by the far right and specifically from the rise of the fascist Golden Dawn, whose support recently rose to 14% at one stage in the opinion polls, but has now declined to around 10%. One of the reasons for this is the formation of mass anti-fascist committees, which we have helped to initiate and have drawn in workers, youth and refugees. This work assumes exceptional importance and could be a model for the kind of situation that may confront the working class in many other countries in the future. If the working class and the left fail to carry through a socialist revolution, history attests to the fact that they will pay a heavy price as a consequence. The social tensions which exist in Greece cannot be contained forever within the framework of ‘democracy’. There is already a veiled civil war with more than 90% of the population pitted against the ‘one per cent’ and this can break out into an open conflict in the future. Some far-right elements in Greece have mooted the idea of a dictatorship but this is not immediately on the agenda. Any premature move that seeks to emulate the 1967 military coup could provoke an all-out general strike like the Kapp putsch did in Germany in 1920 and a revolutionary situation. Also a coup would not be acceptable at this stage to imperialism, the ‘international community’, in this era of ‘democracy and conflict resolution’. The capitalists, in the first instance, are more likely to resort to a form of parliamentary Bonapartism, like Monti’s government in Italy but more authoritarian. The fraught economic and social position of Greece will demand a much firmer and more pronounced right wing government than in Italy, with the powers to overrule parliament in an ‘emergency’. If this does not work, and a series of governments of a similar character are incapable of breaking the social deadlock, and if the working class, through a revolutionary party, fails to take power, then the Greek capitalists could go over to an open dictatorship. We have to warn the working class that we still have time in Greece but we have to utilise this in order to prepare a force that can carry through socialist change. The response throughout Europe to the strike on 14 November illustrates how the struggles of the working class are bound together. If the Greek workers were to break the chain of capitalism and appeal to the workers of Western Europe, at the very least to those in southern Europe, there would be a big response to the call for a socialist confederation – probably involving Spain, Portugal and maybe Ireland in the first instance, if not Italy. China at the crossroads US IMPERIALISM HAS identified Asia as a key area – more important than Europe, for instance, strategically and economically – shown by the fact that the first visit of Obama after his victory in the US presidential election was made to the region. This was partly to reaffirm the economic stake of US imperialism but also served as a warning to China of the importance of US military strategic interest. It was felt to be necessary because of the new military assertiveness of China, which was revealed in its recent naval clashes with Japan over uninhabited disputed islands. Japan is beginning to build up its military forces, of course, for ‘defence’ alone! This means that Asia will become a new and dangerous theatre of military conflict with the rise of nationalism and the possibility of outright conflict, where the contending powers will be prepared to confront each other, with weapons if necessary, in order to enhance their influence, power and economic stake. China is the colossus of Asia, the second power in the world after the US. How it develops will exercise a big, perhaps decisive, effect on the region and the world. And China is certainly at the crossroads, as its ruling elite well understands. Like many a ruling group in history, it feels the contradictory tensions swelling up from below and is unsure how to deal with them. Chinese scholars described the current situation of the country to The Economist as “unstable at the grassroots, dejected at the middle strata, and out of control at the top”. In other words, the ingredients of revolution are brewing in China at the present time. The spectacular growth rate of 12% is a thing of the past. It is now like a like a car stuck in snow: the wheels churn but the vehicle does not advance. Growth has probably contracted to between 5% and 7%. The regime claims that there has been a certain ‘recovery’ but it is not expected to return to double-digit growth. This will automatically affect perspectives for the world economy. A growth rate above 10% was only possible through a massive injection of resources, at one-time amounting to a colossal and unprecedented 50% of GDP invested into industry. This, in turn, generated discontent: resentment against growing inequality and environmental degradation as well as communally-owned land being illegally snatched by greedy officials. These and the sweatshop conditions in the factories have generated enormous opposition from the masses with 180,000 public demonstrations in 2010 – and it is has grown since then – compared to the official estimate of 40,000 in 2002. The removal of the ‘iron rice bowl’ and attacks on healthcare and education have added to this discontent. This has forced the leadership to reintroduce a modicum of health cover. How to handle this volcano and which route economically to take haunts the Chinese leadership. The village of Wukan rose a year ago and successfully fought running battles with the police to reclaim land which had been stolen from them by the local bureaucracy. This was symptomatic of what lies just below the surface in China, a subterranean revolt that can break out any time. On this occasion, the local officials retreated but, also, the protesters did not follow through with their movement. It seems that this incident and many others are “small uprisings that continually bubble up across China”. (Financial Times) Many of the protagonists naïvely believe that if only the lords in Beijing knew the scale of corruption, they would intervene to stamp it out. Something similar occurred in Russia under Stalinism. The masses initially tended to absolve Stalin of any responsibility for corruption of which he was ‘unaware’. It was all down to the crimes of the local bureaucracy but not Stalin himself. But the arrest of Bo Xilai and trial of his wife have helped to dispel those illusions. He has been accused of abusing his position by amassing a fortune, accepting ‘huge bribes’, and to have promoted his cronies to high positions. Bo, as a member of the top elite – a princeling, a son of a leader of the Chinese revolution – is accused of complicity in murder, bribery and massive corruption. This naturally poses the question of how he was allowed to get away with this for so long. In reality, it was not these crimes – true though they probably are – which led to his arrest and impending trial. It was because he represented a certain danger to the top elite – in going outside this ‘magic circle’ – and campaigning for the top job. Even more dangerous was that he invoked some of the radical phrases of Maoism, associated with the Cultural Revolution. In so doing, he could have unconsciously unleashed forces that he would not be able to control, which could go further and demand action against the injustices of the regime. And who knows where this could have ended? The Chinese regime is in crisis. It is quite obviously divided as to the next steps – particularly in relation to the economy – which should be undertaken. One princeling commenting to the Financial Times put it brutally: “The best time for China is over and the entire system needs to be overhauled”. Bourgeois commentators in journals like The Economist, the Financial Times, the New York Times, etc, have recently resorted to the terminology which the CWI has used in describing China as ‘state capitalist’. They do not add the proviso that we do, of ‘state capitalist, but with unique features’. This is necessary in order to differentiate our analysis from the crude position of the SWP and others, who incorrectly described the planned economies in the past in this fashion. The direction of travel of China is clear. The capitalist sector has grown at the expense of the state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in the past. But recently, and particularly since the stimulus package of 2008, there has been a certain recentralisation with economic power tending to be concentrated more in the state sector, so much so that SOEs now have assets worth 75% of total GDP. On the other hand, The Economist described China in the following fashion: “Experts disagree on whether the state now makes up half or a third of economic output, but agree the share is lower than it was two decades ago. For years from the late 1990s SOEs appeared to be in retreat. Their numbers declined (to around 114,000 in 2010, some 100 of them centrally controlled national champions), and their share of employment dropped. But now, even while the number of private companies has grown, the retreat of the state has slowed and, in some industries, reversed”. It is clear that a ferocious discussion is taking place behind closed doors amongst the elite. ‘Reformers’ favour a more determined programme of dismantling the state sector and moving more and more towards the ‘market’. They are proposing to lift remaining barriers to the entry and operation of foreign capital. The new ‘leader’ Xi Jinping, despite his ritualistic incantation of ‘socialism with Chinese characteristics’, is rumoured to support the reformers. On the other hand, those who have proposed an opening up, both in the economy but also with limited ‘democratic’ reforms, seem to be side-lined. Studies have been made of how former dictatorships like South Korea allegedly managed the ‘cold transition’ towards ‘democracy’. These took place when the boom had not exhausted itself and even then was against the background of mass movements. China’s proposed ‘transition’ is taking place in the midst of a massive economic crisis. China’s rulers are rumoured to be avidly studying Gorbachev’s role in Russia. He began intending to ‘reform’ the system and ended up presiding over its dismantlement. Serious reforms from the top will provoke revolution from below in today’s China. It cannot be excluded that a period of very weak ‘democracy’ – but with power still in the hands of the old forces, like in Egypt today with the army and the Muslim Brotherhood in power – could develop after a revolutionary upheaval in China. But this would be merely a prelude to the opening of the gates to one of the biggest mass movements in history. Conclusions FOUR TO FIVE years into a devastating world economic crisis, we can conclude that there are very favourable prospects for the growth of Marxism. With the necessary qualification that consciousness – the broad outlook of the working class – has yet to catch up with the objective situation, it can still be described as pre-revolutionary, especially when taken on a world scale. The productive forces no longer advance but stagnate and decline. This has been accompanied by a certain disintegration socially of sections of the working class and the poor. At the same time, new layers of the working class as well as sections of the middle class are being created – proletarianised – and compelled to adopt the traditional methods of the working class of strikes and trade union organisation. The potential power of the working class remains intact, although hampered and weakened by the right-wing trade union leadership as well as by social democracy and the communist parties. The CWI has not made a decisive breakthrough as yet in any country or continent. However, we have retained our overall position in terms of membership and especially increased influence within the labour movement. There are many workers who are sympathetic to and watching us, and on the basis of events and our work can join us. We must face up to the situation by educating and preparing our supporters for the tumultuous next period in which great opportunities will be presented to strengthen the organisations and parties of the CWI and the International as a whole.

America to join the austerity project of the ruling class around the globe

We hear today of the president of America giving in to the hard right the Tea party who demand hard deep cuts to cut the US's deficit and deal with their huge trillion dollors of debt.

President O'barma who was before using his stimulus package of tax cuts and investment in roads and transport projects has seemingly ground to a halt. The debt celling has been reached and the USA look like they will narrowly avoid a default on their debts as they will agree to raise the debt level for now.

But how ong will this last will they have to revisit this at a later date?

But what is clear now that President O'barma has put his neck on the line and looks to be agreeing for the need for deep savage cuts in public spending in america.

We all know this means austerity and if America is cutting spending too the rest of the world will suffer no doubt. This could however trigger a trade war with China who look to capitalise on this move by America. It is unclear what affect this will have on China it will be interesting to watch.

But what is clear to millions of working class people in America is that cuts to things like Medicare and help for the poor will be cut. All this just like in Europe and the UK to pay for the mess the rich ruling class has got itself into.

Capitalism will always find a way of surviving and more often than not makes the working class pay for something it did not create.

So ordinary working Americans must be prepared for large scale cuts in living standards and a drop in pay and jobs significantly. They must show the feeling of Westconsin where recently there has been mass struggles with unions and the police caving in and joining with the strikers. The struggles in Westconsin must be broadened out across the great nation and spread to every town and city. Only a mass collective action of the working class can push back these cuts and austerity.

Aswell as this ordinary Americans will need a political voice which they do not have at present. With Republicans and Democrats seemingly offering no alternative to cuts. Just like in Britain there is no mass workers party speaking for the interests of ordinary working people. A formation of such a party is needed in America to linking up with the international movement for the need for socialism across the globe replacing this horrible rotten capitalist system which has clearly failed.

Tough times lay ahead for all of us as i have previously blogged about but now is the time to resist and stand up to be counted. Its time to take sides and decide what kind of future world we want to live in. I know where i stand. On the side of the workers. do you ?

CWI summer school- world capitalist crisis

This week, CWI supporters from over 30 countries are attending a CWI Summer School in Belgium. As well as comrades from across western and eastern Europe and Russia, visitors are attending from North and Latin America, Nigeria, Malaysia, Hong Kong and the Middle East.

Below, is a summary of a plenary discussion on world perspectives.

Socialistworld.net

Niall Mulholland, from the International Secretariat of the CWI, introduced the wide-ranging plenary discussion on world economy and inter-imperialist relations by explaining how every part of the globe is affected by the deepening economic crisis. Due to globalisation, no continent has been able to escape and none of the fundamental problems have been resolved.

The ruling class worldwide is attempting to keep their priviledges at the expense of the working class and their rivals in other nation states. This means the development of new revolutionary movements and the developing possibility of global tensions and conflicts.

Capitalism is a system of extreme inequality. In the USA the top executives had a 38% increase in their bonuses in 2010, whilst two million people are currently on the verge of starvation in east Africa. Speculation in food prices has catapulted an extra 44 million people into poverty this year alone.

But the famine in east Africa is not an ’act of god’. Scientists believe that the region’s successive droughts may be linked to climate change. Local conflicts and imperialism’s meddling in Somalia have also contributed to the famine tragedy, as has the destruction of traditonal pastoral and sustainable ways of living by big business agriculture.

The environment is a vital part of perspectives today and forms a crucial part of the CWI’s programme, particularly now that the UK, China, Russia, and India all have plans to build more nuclear power stations. Environmental issues can shake governments and even bring them down.

In Australia, the Labour Party/Green government introduced a very unpopular carbon tax. Unpopular because the costs of the tax will be simply passed onto the working class by big business, while carbon emissions are set to increase.

To end famine, environmental disaster and poverty requires the reorganisation of the world economy based on social need, which is becoming more urgent as the capitalist crisis is prolonged.
New recession?

Until recently many economists were talking about an economic recovery – looking at the financial markets and the growth of the economies of Brazil, India and China. Now they have discovered that the world economy is locked in crisis. The global economy is in a period of stagnation but unless there is a fundamental change, the cycles of ’boom’ and ’bust’ will continue. But the general trend is now for weaker, shorter growth phases in a general depressionary period of world capitalism. The wastefulness of capitalism can be shown through one fact alone – global unemployment has increased by 27 million since 2007, to 205 million worldwide.

The barbarism of capitalism can be seen in the thousands who have died in the drug gang related violence in Mexico. Thousands of soldiers are engaged in occupying cities, carrying out torture and killings in the name of the “war on drugs”.

The response of the ruling classes to the 2007/8 finacial and economic crisis was to bail out the banks and launch a stimulus package but that has brought a new set of problems. The government deficits forced a reduction in social spending, while the big corporations, the banks and households are mired in debt.

In the US, Obama’s stimulus package is exhausted. His 2010 tax cuts have been wiped out by the increase in the cost of oil and rents. The bursting of the housing bubble has resulted in a cut in household wealth. There is a depression in the contruction industry and in household spending. US companies are cutting production and sacking workers. Over 24 million people are unemployed or underemployed. The number of people needing food stamps has increased by 50% from 2008 to 2011, so 45 million people – nearly one in seven people in the US - need help to get enough food to eat.

The ruling class everywhere is trying to destroy the social gains won by the working class in the post war period and there are more cuts planned.

The breakdown in negotiations between the Repubicans and the Democrats in the US over the economic programme has alarmed the markets and the IMF has warned that even just a crisis of confidence in US solvency can trigger a new global recession.

The Democrats argue for cuts and a small increase in the taxation of the rich, whilst the Republicans, under pressure from the Tea Party on the Right, only want huge cuts. One third of the republicans in the House of Representatives were only elected in 2010 and are vulnerable to Tea Party pressure, so they fear losing their seats if they go along with the Democrats.

Given the dire consequences of a default, even a temporary default, compromise is likely, but it will not bring a long term resolution to the US economic crisis. The US ruling class have no short term strategy, let alone a long-term solution, in the face of this systemic and protracted crisis of capitalism.

The US workers have no choice but to fight and they have already shown this in Wisconsin in the mass struggle against the right wing governor’s anti-union attacks and social attacks. But the failure to stop these assaults, largely due to the union tops not developing the mass struggle, also illustrates the need to build an independent party and fight for a change in the trade unions.
China

China is also prone to the global contradictions of capitalism. The 2008 crisis resulted in a drop in its exports, which cost 23 million jobs. Fearing social unrest, a stimulus programme was introduced by state directed banks, resulting in fast growth which boosted the markets and which also resulted in rising prices.

For three years, China seemed to avoid the world economic crisis but its overheating economy has created new problems and contradictions, not least huge ’bad debts’. The development of industrial production was dependent on loans from state banks, while local authorities borrowed heavily to invest in infrastructure. By the end of 2010, the debt in local government was equivalent to 40% of GDP.

Property speculation has meant a rise in prices and a surplus of housing stock. Yet millions of people cannot afford to buy or rent.

Brazil, Australia and Canada supply a lot of the raw materials for this growth in China. But that means those countries are vulnerable to a downturn in the Chinese economy. Equally, any slow down would mean an attack on the wages and conditions of the Chinese working class.

The ongoing economic crisis and the relative growing strength of China, sees a stepping up of big power rivalaries and tensions.

The ruling class in Pakistan has been developing increasing ties to China, while their counterparts in India are linking up more with the US – worsening the tensions between those countries.

The US ruling class aims to try to impose compliant regimes in vital geo-strategic regions of the world and to control oil reserves and other vital resources. In Afghanistan they have become reliant on warlords, as the occupation and puppert Karzai government lacks any real popular support. Obama plans to withdraw 33,000 troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2012, but around 70,000 will stay. They also have 50,000 US personnel in Iraq, in 53 military bases.

There is increasing tensions within the Russian elite in the run-up to presidential elections, mostly around economic policy and the approach to the west. President Medvedev is more pro-western and ’free market’ orientated. Both Prime Miniser Putin and Medvedev want to stand in the elections but both are facing falling support in polls. In the context of growing discontent amongst the massses in Russia, the struggle between Putin and Medvedev could become explosive.
Chavez

In Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez’s serious illness has brought to the surface the competing factions in the regime. Chavez is still popular due to his social reform programmes, including in health and education. But suppport for the ’Bolivarian’ regime is declining against a background of electricity cuts, corruption, a housing crisis and one of the highest murder rates in the world. A new layer of the ruling bureaucracy is becoming enriched.

Chavez has announced he will stand for another six-year term but if his health worsens and he is out of the country for pro-longed peroids, it can open up a power struggle. This will give a boost to the reactionary opposition. And if the Bolvarian revolution unravels, it will have a big effect on Cuba, which relys on Venezuelan oil.

The only way to defend the social gains which have been won in Venezuela and Cuba, is for the working class to organise in defence of the revolution: taking the economy under the democratic control and management of the working class and spreading the revolution across the Americas.

The polarisation between the rich and poor across Latin America has fuelled the class struggle. In Brazil, there have been battles against corruption and tens of thousands of teachers and students marched in Chile on 30 June in defence of public education.
Industrial struggles in Africa

In Africa, the struggles of the working class have been boosted by the revolutionary movements in north Africa and the middle East. In south Africa, a recent three-week strike of engineers resulted in concessions. South African fuel workers are now in battle. These movements shook the pro-market ANC government but the COSATU trade union federation failed to co-ordinate the strikes effectively and to spread the action to meet the needs of millions of workers and poor.

In Nigeria, a three-day general strike over wages has been called off but this issue has the potential to explode again, given the terrible poverty conditions facing millions.There have also been “unprecented” protests in Malawi, where 75% of the population live on less than one dollar a day.

These examples show the potential for workign class resistance to develop. But there is a big gap between the needs of the working class and the level of conciousness amongst workers worldwide. The CWI aims to link struggles of workers worldwide, to campaign for and where possible help build new mass fighting parties of the working class and to also build the forces of Marxism.

During the plenary discussion, speakers from around the world gave inspiring reports of social and workers’ struggles and also about the development of the CWI.

In Australia, exporting raw materials to China and Japan has resulted in a boom in the mining industry, but also a lop-sided aspect to the economy. Mass conciousness may lag behind Europe and elsewhere but this period of relative quiet will not be maintained due to the crisis that will also hit Australia. The Labour Party minority government is at an historic low in the polls, following the imposition of the carbon tax. If there were an election tomorrow the opposition Right would win but only to launch an even more serious attack on the working class. A European-style revolt could develop in Australia. It suffers the same underlying problems of debt and one third of all jobs are identified as “unstable”.

Malaysia has been a fast-growing economy in recent years but it is not immune to the crisis. Exports of raw material, such as rubber to China, resulted in a 7% growth in 2010. But Malaysia is highly dependent on more powerful economies. Once the country is flooded with cheap Chinese goods, the local market will not be able to compete. Meanwhile the government is looking for further ’liberalisation’ – dismantling price control and slashing spending.

Paul Murphy, a Socialist Party MEP (member of the European Parliament), from Ireland, gave an inspiring report of his recent visit to workers in Kazakhstan. Using his position as an MEP, Paul was able to give concrete support to striking oil workers, who are waging one of the biggest industrial battles of workers in any ex-Soviet country since the collapse of Stalinism.

Kazakhstan is the richest country in the world in terms of its natural resources per head of population, but nearly all the money goes to the ruling elite. The oil workers labour in desert conditions, with very hot summers and very cold winters.

The workers are striking over wages, for the right to form independent trade unions and for the release of their union’s lawyer, who were jailed when the dispute began.

Thousands of workers have been on strike for two months with no strike pay and many have to support a family of eight or nine people. Some have been on hunger strike for 40 days in protest at the bosses.

The full force of the state has been used against the workers. Hundreds have been, in effect, locked out and some have received death threats.

Paul Murphy was warmly welcomed at mass meetings of the striking workers and he was able to help in negotiations with the management. Expecting a token visit from a compliant MEP, the top management were shocked when Paul argued vehemently on behalf of the workers.

All of this was reported prominently in the non-government Kazakh press, which helped to boost the confidence of the workforce. The task now is to build support internationally. Paul promised the company that if they did not begin meaningful negotiations there would be a massive international campaign against them.

Meanwhile, the Kazakh government know this is not just an economic strike – it is inspiring workers across the country.
Environment

One of the big questions facing the working class worldwide is the environment. Pete from the Socialist Party (England and Wales) explained that the National Academy of Sciences in the US concluded that emissions of greenhouse gases “stabilised” since 1990. But a 40% cut is needed in the next ten years to tackle global warming.

There has been a massive export of pollution to China. Between 2002 and 2008, greenhouse gas output in China rose from four to seven gigatonnes.

China consumes half of the world’s cement, coal, steel and iron ore and it is the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases.

The majority of Greens argue for a huge cut in consumption, condemning workers in China and other countries like India to eternal poverty. At least the Green Left activists blame the world’s imperialist powers for this situation.

The Chinese government opportunistically echoes this argument. It develops renewable energy sources but as a part of a profit-driven attempt to become the world’s leader in renewable energy.

The CWI argues that there is no long term solution to the environmental crisis on the basis of private profit. Competitive markets downgrade the environment. We need a democratic plan of production, in harmony with the environment, throughout the world.

There were many other interesting contributions to the discussion, including from Hong Kong, France, Bolivia, Venzuela, Brazil, Israel, Russia, Nigeria and India.

Tom from the US explained how the protests in Wisconsin were a small indication of the fighting spirit of workers; an upsurge from below against attacks on the trade unions, pensions and other social benefits. The protests included thousands of unorganised workers and young people.

The election of right-wing governors, last November, has escalated the attacks on workers. The Democrats in many areas are using the Tea Party as a cover for their attacks on workers.

In Wisconsin, Socialist Alternative supporters called for a one-day general strike, whereas the union leadser argued that further action would “risk losing popular support”and refused to build the action.

But Wisconsin was one battle in a war – the next battles will be on a national level. The working class are being asked to pay for the crisis on Wall Street. The CWI is arguing in the trade unions for independent candidates against the cuts.
Ireland

In southern Ireland, Joe Higgins, a Socialist Party TD (member of the Irish Parliament) hit the headlines this week responding to the Fine Gael/Labour government’s announcement of a new €100 a year ’household tax’. Joe Higgins and the Socialist Party call for a mass campaign on non-payment and have called a national forum on 10 September to organise that struggle. This got blanket coverage in the media. In contrast, a Sinn Fein TD, quoted in the press, warned that “a boycott is very dangerous”.

Summing up the discussion, Clare Doyle from the CWI International Secretariat, observed that the CWI has members in more countries than ever before and that there were more of those represented at the CWI School.

It was clear from the discussion that the ideas of struggle and revolution are spreading. Capitalism is in such a deep and prolonged crisis that the ruling elite in every country is worried about the future. One glaring indication of the depth of the crisis is the record price of gold.

Dictatorships worldwide were shaken by the fall of Mubarak in Egypt and Ben Ali in Tunisia. Futher strikes and protests will erupt, often despite of the trade union leaders. Our task in the CWI is to build our forces and a leadership worthy of the sacrifice and fighting spirit of those workers.



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