President Biden recently tweeted in support of “even more resources to secure the border,” contrasting himself with “MAGA House Republicans” who are proposing to “slash funding for border security.” He’s positioning himself to the right of the more explicitly xenophobic and far-right “MAGA” branch of the Republican Party and their fear-mongering about fentanyl. 

The Biden administration’s record shows that this statement doesn’t come out of nowhere — it’s implemented anti-immigration and violent border policies the whole time after cynically campaigning for humane immigration policies in the 2020 election. While in the 2020 elections, Biden was forced to give lip service to immigrants’ rights due to mass mobilizations against Trump’s draconian immigration policies, now Biden is showing his true xenophobic colors. 

This comes after a recent agreement with Justin Truedau that makes it easier for the U.S. and Canada to turn away asylum seekers. Furthermore, Biden has been deporting Russians who are escaping Putin’s draft seeking asylum and only a few months ago announced severe restrictions on asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border. The increasing emphasis on militarization of the borders comes in the context of the global refugee crisis, largely fueled by imperialist intervention, the climate crisis, and environmental extraction.

Earlier this month, in his proposed budget for fiscal year 2024, he bragged on the White House fact sheet about having “secured more resources for border security than any of the presidents who preceded him.” Let’s be clear. Biden is bragging that he is funding ICE, border walls and other border patrol more than Donald Trump. Biden claimed that he would “rebuild a safe, orderly, and humane immigration system that was gutted by the previous Administration,” although he has largely continued with Trump’s draconian immigration policies, including keeping kids in cages. 

Who can forget the images of border agents on horseback whipping Haitian asylum seekers? Or how last summer over 50 migrants were found dead in a trailer in Texas in sweltering heat?

This is “lesser evilism” in action, despite cries and crocodile tears from Biden and the Democrats about “kids and cages” and needing “humane immigration politics” when election season rolls around. Even the “progressives” of the Squad haven’t supported immigrants’ rights. Instead, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez is promoting the poverty draft, trying to get low income Black and Brown kids to enlist in the military. 

We need a party of the working class with a socialist program and internationalist perspective, independent of both Democrats and Republicans that fights for the attacks on migrants, for immigrants’ rights, abolishing ICE, freedom of migration, and open borders. Let them all in!

The post “Lesser Evil” Biden Wants More Border Patrol Than MAGA Republicans appeared first on Left Voice.

“Did you get an alert?”

My wife looks up at me from her phone when she asks. I glance at mine. I didn’t get an alert. Neither did she. But her phone has started buzzing like crazy with messages. Friends are asking: “Do you have enough water?” I remember this feeling; it’s panic. 

It’s Sunday. I’m out with my kids and my wife. We’re at a botanical garden about an hour outside Philly. The sun is a hard diamond and it’s the only thing in a vacant sky. The kids are in a good mood. They’re running like mad and their jacket buttons flash in the sun like burning magnesium. 

The last time I felt panic this bad was March 2020. There was no soap or toilet paper. Everyone was getting sick. A lot of the workers who stock the food shelves or drive it to the stores were too sick to come to work, or they were dead. The papers ran stories about whether food supply lines would hold up. Back then, the bosses called workers heroes. That was a long time ago.

This time, there’s poison in the water. We only hear about it Sunday. But it happened three days ago — on Friday. I glance at my kids. The panic makes your fingertips tingle.

When I finally get the alert from the city government, it’s 5:00 p.m.. 

I open the Spider-Man water bottles, and I dump them out. I wonder what the water will do to the grass. 

Don’t Drink the Water

We leave the garden. Our friends tell us: don’t go to city supermarkets. There’s a run on water. My neighbor works at one. She says people are fighting over the water. The shelves are empty. We start calling supermarkets to see if they have any.

We go to a supermarket outside the city. It’s a very wealthy place. It’s the kind of neighborhood where the CEOs of Comcast and Urban Outfitters live. The parking lot is filled with Mercedes. No one there is too worried; their water is clean. 

But the workers there catch on quick when they see our shopping cart packed with water. “You from Philly?” one asks. Another worker, a lane over, says, “Are you OK?” We tell them the story. “Get home safe,” they say. The guy in the Brooks Brothers polo and the leather loafers — he’s walking to his Mercedes — doesn’t look up.

We have to Google what happened Friday. This is what we learn: the Trinseo Altuglas chemical plant dumped thousands of gallons of poisonous chemicals into the Delaware River on Friday. We’re told it’s an accident, a result of “overflow.” If you’re not from Philly, you might not not know the Delaware runs the length of the city’s east side, and most of its drinking water comes from it. 

No one knows how much went in. Articles say it’s “at least” 8,000 gallons. But the company’s spokesperson said there’s no way to know for sure. Triple that? The corporation’s bosses have no idea.

It’s a “latex finishing chemical.” It includes the same material — butyl acrylate — that poisoned Palestine, Ohio in the train derailment from a few weeks ago. That disaster felt far away from Philly yesterday. Though one supermarket here has been selling water bottled in Palestine, Ohio — with the same chemicals in it, maybe. Not so far away after all.

When the chemical plant’s bosses respond, they sound bored by the inconvenience. The company is “conducting a thorough assessment of all our systems … to close any gaps,” says the CEO. 

We get another alert from the city on Sunday night. It says that we can still drink the water — but only until Monday night. The chemicals are taking their time. The alert says we should start filling pitchers and leaving them around the house. 

It doesn’t say when we can drink our water again. 

The Cure for Panic Is Revolutionary Hope

Welcome to capitalism. Poison water is the cost of profits for the bosses. It’s not hard to see why. A business needs to maximize its profits to out-compete other corporations. That means: slash costs, reduce the workforce to a minimum, speed up everything. 

And that’s only become more true in the last forty years. That’s when the ruling rich enacted a historic frontal attack on workers and oppressed people, using a model of government policy and economics called “neoliberalism.” It means, among other things, dismantling unions so that working class people can’t fight back. 

This has made it easier to organize production and transportation according to the “just-in-time” model. In other words: make profits flow faster by weakening workers, speeding up processes, cutting down lag time. All of this really does accelerate profits. It also makes the entire supply chain far more fragile. Breakdowns come next. Poison isn’t a bug — it’s a feature. This time it’s poisoned water in Philadelphia. A few weeks ago, it was the poisoning of water (and air, and soil) in Palestine, Ohio. Last year it was poisoned baby formula. In 2014 it was the poisoned water flowing through pipes in Flint, Michigan.

In Philly, it’s like we’re looking through a viewfinder toy, seeing, in miniature, what a system based on profit does to the people who do all its work — the working class — and the environment. 

A new UN report says the destruction is speeding up. A Washington Post headline sums up that report: “World is on brink of catastrophic warming.”

The world is likely to pass a dangerous temperature threshold within the next 10 years, pushing the planet past the point of catastrophic warming — unless nations drastically transform their economies and immediately transition away from fossil fuels, according to one of the most definitive reports ever published about climate change.

The environment isn’t the only thing that’s changing. In other places — like France — working people are showing us a very different path forward. Thousands on thousands are going on strike and fighting in the streets against the bosses and the politicians who work for them. There, it’s about a bogus pension reform. But we’re going to need a response like that here. The “French March” shows us: we have a right to revolutionary hope. It’s hope in ourselves to change the world. 

Eduardo Castilla said it right: “In our chaotic world, the future can only be built in the streets.” There’s a cure for panic and it’s fighting back. No CEO and no politician in a party for millionaires is going to help us. They had their chance, and they couldn’t and wouldn’t. With more and more intense environmental disasters, we are the ones we have been waiting for.

My kids will start to feel the panic soon too as they grow up. They probably already do at some level. I can’t stop that. But they’ll feel something else too: they can be part of the fight to change this wretched system. Later, they’ll take their kids to a museum and show them a rotted Trinseo Altuglas sign, and explain. 

If we want our own kids to be able to drink the water and save the planet, we’re going to have to fight it out with all the real weapons at our disposal: strikes, marches, pickets — and a revolution to get the ruling rich out of power. For a society run by working people. It’s been done before. 

The post A Chemical Plant Just Poisoned Philadelphia’s Water: A First-Hand Account of the Crisis appeared first on Left Voice.

“We want to show that not even the bankers’ children agree.” Behind the young man is a combative scene: dozens of students blocking the entrance to the Lycée Louis-Le-Grand, one of the most renowned educational institutions in France. Founded in 1563, its classrooms have witnessed the passing of history through personalities such as Molière, Voltaire, Robespierre, Saint-Just, Jean Jaurès, Victor Hugo, Baudelaire, Durkheim, Jean-Paul Sartre, Pierre Bourdieu and Raymond Poincaré, among many others.

Even the children of the French elite are claiming their place in the fight against Macron, declaring war on this pure representative of the aristocratic French ruling class. On Thursday, March 23, they were part of the millions who took the streets of France. The numbers on the streets spoke volumes: it is estimated that, together with the half a million young people who marched throughout France, 400 high schools and some 80 universities were either completely or partially blocked.

In addition to opposing President Macron’s pension reform, they are also marching to stand in solidarity with the striking workers. This growing worker-student unity has taken shape amid the mobilizations in support of the Paris garbage workers. The police repression was almost immediate, with the state seeking to prevent an alliance between workers and students — one which has an important history in France. In this repressive operation, our comrade Leo, member of Le Poing Levé and Left Voice’s sister organization in France, Révolution Permanente, was arrested.

Memories of May 1968 emerge in the smoke of the barricades and are recalled as a combative present. It emerges, as Walter Benjamin said, as the memory that flashes in an instant of danger. Each barricade reminds us that class struggle is the motor of history.

The French bourgeoisie has been fighting against this socially and politically dangerous memory for decades. In an attempt to erase the 1968 rebellion, it rewrites history through a conservative lens. Enzo Traverso recalls the radical history of the French May: “The new role played by young people, the biggest general strike in France after 1936, millions of workers occupying the factories; all this is crushed by this culturalist vision of the 1968 phenomenon.”

To bury the revolutionary substance of the French May implied, likewise, burying the idea of revolution; to turn it into rubble and sweep it under the rug. This conservative revision of history goes back far beyond 1968. It stretches back in time to the Russian and even the French revolutions¹Traverso himself problematizes the reading of the Revolution of 1789 by the conservative Francois Furet. In Traverso, Enzo, Revoluciones. 1789 y 1917, después de 1989, in La Historia como campo de batalla, Buenos Aires, FCE, 2012..

These turbulent days were also a reminder of the class character of the State. In peaceful times, democracy is presented as the “best possible political shell for capitalism.” But in great national upheavals, its coercive nature is exposed. State power appears, at every turn, as “special bodies of armed men at the service of capital.” The French Executive, reneging on the formalities of parliamentary representation, stands as the direct will of the interests of the ruling class.

Macron’s contempt for the opinion of the masses has increased the hatred and radicalism of vast swaths of the population. As noted by the journalists of Liberation, “the loathing inspired in the demonstrators by the personality of Emmanuel Macron” has skyrocketed. For millions, the name of the French president became synonymous with “arrogance, conceit, contempt.”

The Gravedigger at Work

Every attempt  — political and ideological — to deny the possibility of revolution operates against the working class. It seeks to silence its social power, its centrality in the mechanisms of wealth production, its capacity to move the world. Time and again, it tries to put workers into vague categories such as “the people”, the middle class, or the poor, taking into account the disparate socioeconomic levels that cut across the working class as a whole²The internal divisions of the working class itself are a strategic problem that revolutionary Marxism addressed from the very beginning..

Countering this obfuscation, the working class in France has been displaying their social power for weeks. The threat to paralyze the country — wielded by different actors of the labor movement — demonstrated this power to disrupt the rhythms of French capitalism. The massive mobilizations and the national strike days made this threat all the more real. However, if this dynamic does not unfold at a larger scale, it is due to the enormous political limitations imposed by the trade union bureaucracies. Macron should be thanking them.

The radicalism of the most militant sectors of the workers’ movement has been nourished by this growing discontent. Like the workers of the Normandy refinery, who this Friday called to strengthen the picket lines in defense of their right to strike. By halting the distribution of fuel, they are showing their potential to disrupt the Paris airports. By paralyzing production, they are demonstrating their capacity to strike a blow to the national and international trade of this imperialist European power.

Included in this growing militancy are sectors such as the energy workers, garbage collectors, teachers, and transport workers. All this fighting power can only offer any hope if it is developed toward a general strike with a political character; if, through coordination and grassroots organization through action committees, it succeeds in forcing the bureaucratic leaderships to put up a persistent fight that can defeat Macron and the capitalist power that backs him.

Right to Revolutionary Optimism

October 1939. The Second World War is just beginning. The world population watches, almost helplessly, a new, brutal struggle between the imperialist powers for world hegemony.

In this critical scenario, reviewing the latest negotiations between France and Germany, Leon Trotsky writes: 

Both of them, Coulondre ³Robert Coulondre was the last French ambassador to Germany before the Second World War. and Hitler, represent the barbarism which advances over Europe. At the same time neither of them doubt that their barbarism will be conquered by socialist revolution. Such is now the awareness of the ruling classes of all the capitalist countries of the world. Their complete demoralization is one of the most important elements in the relation of class forces (…) these gentlemen are convinced in advance of the collapse of their regime! This fact alone must be for us the source of invincible revolutionary optimism! ⁴Trotsky, León, Again and Once More on the Nature of the USSR. In Defense of Marxism and other articles, Buenos Aires, Ediciones IPS, 2019, p. 83.

Eight decades later, imperialist France navigates the horizon of disorientation. Its executive power, embodied in the weakened Macron, faces a massive social rebellion that, for now, shows no sign of weakening. Social revolution is not, as yet, on the immediate horizon. However, in the heat of the struggle on the streets, we can see that this ruling class has no future to offer the vast majority. If this is happening in the world’s seventh largest economy, as well as the seventh largest military power, what is left for the poor nations of the planet?

A week ago, we wrote that the world is facing the economic tensions of an increasingly unstable capitalist system. This Friday, the shock came from Germany, just a few hundred kilometers east of Paris. This time, the crisis hit the giant Deutsche Bank. There is no peace for the old continent, which saw Credit Suisse collapse a few days ago.

The geopolitical terrain is not looking any more promising for the global bourgeoisie. The protracted war in Ukraine is still far from over. Xi Jinping’s visit to Moscow proposes another formal challenge to U.S. domination. It is proof to the world that global tensions are mounting.

On this chaotic planet, the streets of France offer a promise of the future. At workplaces, schools, and universities, the French March defends the right to an invincible revolutionary optimism.

Originally published in Spanish on March 25 in La Izquierda Diario.

Translation by Emma Lee

The post “French March”: The Right to Revolutionary Optimism appeared first on Left Voice.

Joe Biden is deporting Russians who came to the United States to escape Putin’s draft. The Guardian reported this on March 18, despite the president not making any official announcements or indicating when the deportations began. Notably, it’s a reversal of the U.S.’s policy to suspend deportation flights to Russia over the past year.

These deportations are a heinous attack on people refusing to fight in a brutal capitalist war. Following Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, hundreds of thousands of Russians fled the country. Every person fleeing the proxy-war in Ukraine deserves the right to escape the meat grinder for Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs.

The Biden administration’s move comes as it also capitulates to the isolationism and xenophobia of the Far Right in the United States. The extreme policy of refusing to provide asylum for Russians has long been used against refugees escaping conflict and oppression throughout the Global South, much of which has also been fueled by U.S. intervention. For example, the past two years alone have seen the Biden administration rejecting asylum for refugees from Haiti and Afghanistan, two countries the United States played a central role in destabilizing.

Biden’s move shows that even as capitalists fight wars with each other, they remain united in oppressing our class siblings. Biden knows that Putin has imposed severe repression on Russian anti-war protesters and this fate no doubt awaits those he is deporting. Those who are not imprisoned will be sent to the front to either be killed or ordered to kill members of their own class in Ukraine.

Socialists must support anyone who refuses to fight wars for capitalist interests. We must also stand with the Russian working class that was not able to escape. The Russian invasion of Ukraine is a reactionary offensive. This is why we call for Russian troops out of Ukraine. However, we understand that most of the Russian troops being sent to fight on the front lines are working class and oppressed people. We encourage them to fraternize with Ukrainian soldiers, against Putin who has sent them to a battlefield to be killed and maimed. By building this solidarity, soldiers on both sides can unite against their real enemies, the capitalist regimes pitting them against one another.

As socialists in the United States, we must denounce the violence that the United States is imposing on working class and oppressed people in Russia and Ukraine. From deportations to sanctions to funding and arming the Zelenskyy regime, the United States’ role in intensifying this proxy-war, and thus also the death toll of our class siblings, is undeniable.

We stand with Russian war resisters facing deportation from the United States or any other country where they seek asylum. We stand with Ukrainians who refuse to fight in Zelenskyy’s war effort, which serves NATO’s interests first and foremost. This is not the working class’s war. Ours is against the capitalist system which pushed Eastern Europe into a war being played out in Ukraine, but which threatens to expand and set the stage for greater conflicts.

The post Joe Biden Is Deporting Russians Who Escaped Putin’s Draft — Let Them All In! appeared first on Left Voice.

France is currently in flames. Millions have been taking to the streets to protest against the government’s anti-democratic measure to raise the retirement age. Across the Rhine, Germany — where there tend to be far fewer strikes — is also set to experience a historic strike.

Starting on Monday at midnight and lasting for 24 hours, hundreds of thousands of workers will be on strike. This is set to be the biggest strike in Germany in more than 30 years. It represents a convergence of different struggles in progress.

On the one hand, the railway workers’ union EVG (not the same as the train drivers’ union GDL) is demanding a 12 percent raise for their members. Three decades after a partial privatization, the state-owned railway company Deutsche Bahn is in permanent crisis, with workers desperately holding together a system that has been hollowed out by under investment. The participation is going to be so high that management announced the cancellation of all trains in the country.  

On the other hand, the service sector union ver.di is negotiating a contract for public-sector workers. The TVöD contract covers 2.5 million employees of federal and city governments — in all kinds of workplaces, from hospitals to daycare centers to government offices — and the union is demanding 10.5 percent more money for everyone. The governments are only offering raises of 5 percent — which, since it’s below the inflation rate, would mean across-the-board wage cuts.

Other strikes are taking place now as well. Just last week, thousands of Berlin teachers were on strike for two days demanding smaller classes. Before that was a massive strike at the privatized German postal service. There, the ver.di bureaucracy announced a terrible compromise at the last second — a “raise” below the inflation rate, so a de facto wage cut — even though 86 percent of union members had voted to strike for as long as necessary until the full demands were won. This is a warning that the union bureaucrats are not to be trusted.

Faced with the “Mega Strike” on Monday, the capitalists’ representatives are attacking the right to strike, crying that the population “is being taken hostage” by unions. But the situation is the exact opposite: the only hostage-takers are the bosses. They threaten millions of working-class people: if you don’t keep working, for ever-lower wages, you’ll be thrown out on the street. But in the strikes, we see that workers are rejecting this blackmail. They are showing who is keeping the economy running: by simply folding their arms, they are able to bring everything to a standstill.

Different governments in Germany — whether they are led by social democrats, conservatives, greens, or even “The Left” — are all claiming that there is not enough money for wage increases to match inflation. But these same parties had no problem providing €100 billion for the military. At the same time, German corporations are making record profits. These capitalist politicians tell working people to “tighten their belts” to support the war effort — but they would never even dream of touching corporate profits.

On Monday, buses, trams, and subways in different German cities will stand still. Higher wages for workers in public transport companies are essential to recruiting new workers and overcoming the desperate shortages of personnel. And that is in turn essential for reducing carbon emissions in the transport sector. This is therefore also a climate strike.  That’s why Fridays for Future and other climate activists have declared their support for it. The German government, which includes the so-called Green Party, is only interested in building freeways and subsidizing the car industry.

Unlike in France, it is unusual in Germany for different strikes to take place on the same day like this. Germany has one main union confederation, the DGB, with almost six million members. Yet the affiliated unions are involved in constant bureaucratic wrangling and almost never work together. Even during the “Mega-Strike” in Berlin, for example, the EVG and ver.di are planning to march separately.

The “mega-strike” is thus a result of huge pressure from below in Germany’s large but largely passive unions. Inflation has made it essential for workers to fight for wage increases. At the same time, workers in France are showing that fighting can get results, inspiring their class siblings across the border. But there is another important lesson from Paris: a one-day strike will not be enough. The “Mega Strike” deserves full support — and can only be a start for a real struggle to make the capitalists pay for their crisis.

The post <strong>On Monday, Germany Will Experience a “Mega-Strike”</strong> appeared first on Left Voice.

On Thursday, millions of working class people once again took to the streets of cities across France to protest, march, and strike against a set of recently-passed pension reforms that would force them to work for longer and retire later. French president Emmanuel Macron, who used his executive privilege to push the reforms through parliament without a vote, has argued that these changes are required to maintain the supposedly generous French pension system. For Macron, who has bet his legacy on these reforms, raising the retirement age from 62 to 64 is necessary to counter falling birth rates and the shrinking number of French workers paying into the pension system. But these demographic arguments are little more than political cover for the return of a familiar program of neoliberal austerity that was temporarily interrupted by the pandemic, one designed to squeeze more out of the French working class in order to shore up a sputtering economic system that has long outlived its utility. 

While Macron has been pushing pension reform and other austerity measures (including cuts to unemployment benefits) for years now, he is hardly alone. Across Europe, advanced capitalist countries from the UK to Italy, Spain, and Germany have resumed or signaled a willingness to return to pre-pandemic levels of austerity, meaning significant cuts to social services and pensions in particular, even amid continued inflation and interest rate hikes that will only make cuts more painful and public debts even more difficult to manage. As economist Micheal Roberts told Spectre in October, rising interest rates are likely to lead to even more austerity in “advanced economies as governments cut back on post-COVID spending and try to reduce rising debt levels, both private and public.” 

Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which has praised Macron’s cuts, continues, as it did even during the pandemic, to force countries in the Global South, such as Haiti, Ghana, and Argentina, to impose staggering austerity measures on their citizens in exchange for debt relief and loans, all in service of increasing the balance sheets of rapacious national and international companies and corporations, which have been struggling to find new sources of profit for decades. This ongoing attempt to squeeze ever more out of the global working class, however, is nothing new. As Jason Koslowski explains, it is part of a much bigger crisis of profitability and stagnation that has only increased since the 2008 economic crisis.

In the United States, which temporarily increased public spending dramatically during the pandemic, rising interest rates and inflation are also leading increasingly to talk of a return to austerity measures. These measures are already being pushed in local state and city municipalities, where public sector workers are losing wages thanks to inflation and budget cuts. In Los Angeles, for instance, thousands of teachers and school staff walked out earlier this week in a joint strike to protect their wages. At the federal level, like in France, there are also proposals to cut social security spending or further extend the age at which retirees would receive full benefits from 67 to 70. The Washington Post Editorial Board recently joined the fray with an editorial claiming not only that Macron’s cuts are necessary, but that the United States should follow suit. 

Thankfully, the French working class is not having any of it, and what began as protests against the pension reform bill are now quickly transforming into calls for Macron’s resignation. These demands are, in turn, leading a huge percentage of the French population, the vast majority of whom oppose the reforms and benefit cuts, into direct confrontation with the current government, a situation in which the very question of working class power might be put on the table. In this regard, the uprising of French workers we are witnessing represents not only a revolt against the pension reforms, but in many ways, against the very logic of capital accumulation, which the reforms are meant to support. In scenes reminiscent of the spirit of the May, 1968 protests that rocked the foundations of the French Republic, millions of workers and students have taken to the streets to demonstrate, airports and bus depots have been shut down, teachers and students are holding mass assemblies to vote on the strike, thousands of tons of garbage continue to pile up in the streets of Paris and other cities, and oil shortages are spreading across the country. 

Although so far held back by the conservative leadership of the union coalitions directing the strikes, which have refused to make any demands beyond the repeal of the pension reforms, the protests are growing considerably and spreading to other sectors, including non-unionized workers and students, and there is a growing movement independent of the union leadership that is beginning to take more militant actions. On Thursday, workers and students from across the Normandy region came out to successfully block the forced requisition of oil workers at the largest refinery in France. Protesters in Bordeaux, where King Charles was scheduled to visit later this week (he has since canceled the visit), set the Town Hall ablaze. And rank and file workers across the country have been meeting to organize committees to build toward a permanent nationwide general strike.

As our correspondent in Paris put it:

“This week, the people of France are beginning to take things into their own hands…and we are seeing a radicalization and a sense of urgency not seen since the Yellow Vest movements back in 2018, but this time, the working class is in the driver’s seat giving the weight of the strike weapon and thus a revolutionary potential to this struggle. Many of the sectors going on strike today have never even been mobilized before.” 

Building on this revolutionary potential and taking it to its logical conclusion is a task for the entire working class in France and abroad. Already, workers in Germany have rallied in support of their French comrades, and on Monday, rail workers and public sector unions across Germany will be leading their own massive strike against austerity wages. 

In the United States in particular, where public pensions (social security) are also under fire; where more than a million people have died from Covid; where life expectancy has dropped more than three years since 2019; where working people and people of color face increasing levels of exploitation and oppression, cuts to social programs, austerity, and rising police violence; the need for independent mass strikes and demonstrations like those in France has never been clearer. Indeed, as the people of France are showing, it is the workers, not the capitalists and the state, that make the world run. 

But defeating the logic of austerity requires a defeat of capitalism itself, and therefore what we fight for, our strategy, matters just as much as how we fight. Strikes and working class methods of struggle are key, but just as in France, the working class cannot allow itself to be guided by the union bureaucracies or the reformist parties of capital. If we want to create a world run by the working class, without austerity and without want, we must work to build independent working class parties for socialism in the United States and everywhere.

The post France: On the Frontlines of the War Against Austerity appeared first on Left Voice.

In the midst of the energy strike in France, the fuel shortages affecting the southern and western regions of the country are creating a dire situation at the country’s airports. On Wednesday evening, the French government decided to intervene at the largest refinery in France, Total Normandy. Under threat of imprisonment and excessive fines, the state attempted to force the strikers back to work to ship kerosene to the airports. These anti-strike measures called “requisitions” are a legal weapon used by the French state to stifle collective worker action and save capitalist profits.

Faced with this offensive on Wednesday evening, the refiners at CGT Total Normandy called all the union members of Le Havre to a rally in front of the refinery. More than three hundred strikers from all the industrial zones of the region (dockers, port workers, SNCF, Chevron, and others) as well as students stayed out all night to prevent the requisitioned workers from returning to the site and to stave off the police.

“These requisitions are about to fall through. The challenge for them today is to recover the 73,000 m3 of kerosene we have in our tanks. The Paris airports are a shitshow — they only have two days of kerosene in pure stock left. They went into downgrade mode. They canceled 30 percent of the flights. They are asking the medium-haulers to work double-duty. They are in a critical situation,” said Alexis Antonioli, secretary general of CGT Total Normandy from the refinery on Wednesday night.

“We shouldn’t have any illusions about this,” he continued. “The government will do anything to break the strike. They’ll do anything to get kerosene, whether it’s from us, the CIM, or Exxon. They are going to try to recover the whole storage. They are completely panicking — the strikes are continuing, the mobilization is strengthening, and the momentum among the youth is growing.”

On site, the demonstration of solidarity with the workers allowed the unions to thwart the maneuvers of management, who tried to requisition workers who had just returned to the picket without giving them any advanced warning. To prevent this, the strikers decided to disrupt the shift changes. 

Antonioli announced, “If they want us to come back, they have to drop the requisitions. We’ll monitor the facilities, but that’s all we’ll dot. We won’t ship any product. Faced with these attacks, we’re taking take a harsher tone and we’ll refuse to do any shift changeovers.” 

At the same time, workers at a petrochemical plant located opposite the rig voted to shut down facilities at two of the units and called for the shutdown of other facilities.

Management tried to negotiate with the strikers on Wednesday night, proposing to lift the requisitions if they agreed to end the strike, but the workers refused outright. After nearly 24 hours on the picket line, workers called a rally after the demonstration in Le Havre to continue organizing solidarity.

On the picket line Thursday, Alexis Antonioli explained, “We’ve had no police interventions  nor requisitions because we’ve stopped them. But if law enforcement does intervene, it will be similar to what happened in Fos-sur-Mer. Only solidarity will prevent the requisitions!”

In the face of repeated attacks by the government, which is diving headlong into authoritarianism, the refinery workers of Total Normandy and their supporters are leading the way. The trade union leadership must follow their lead and urgently position themselves to denounce these requisitions and concretely organize the response, putting all means possible toward building solidarity and organizing a general strike.

First published in French on March 23 on Révolution Permanente. 

Translation by Stacey Bear

The post Despite Threats of Arrest, Refinery Workers in France Refuse to Break Strike appeared first on Left Voice.

On Tuesday evening at the Flèche d’Or, an abandoned train station turned public venue located in a Parisian neighborhood with a long history of militant struggle, the atmosphere was brimming with support for a general strike among the cross-sector workers in attendance. A similar spirit was felt in the remote meeting held at the same time. At the previous meeting, the discussions had focused on the need for a marching strike and preparations for renewable strikes for March 7th. Since then, the situation has changed radically. 

“There is a leap in the political crisis,” explains Adrien Cornet, of the CGT Total Grandpuits, in his introduction. “This is tipping into a pre-revolutionary situation with actions that we never imagined, such as CFDT members burning puppets bearing the government’s effigy in Dijon, and thousands of people protesting at Place de la Concorde saying they didn’t want to go home.”

The meeting began with nearly twenty sectors giving reports on the state of the movement in their sectors and companies, with workers at the state-owned railway companies RATP and SNCF; garbage collectors and sewage workers; nuclear power plant workers at Paluel and Nogent-sur-Seine; electric workers at RTE and Enedis; metalworkers at Airbus, Sidel, Safran, Stellantis/PSA; airport workers at Roissy and Orly airports, workers from Sanofi and Saint-Gobain, education workers, and of course, youth. 

Across all industries, the movement is becoming increasingly radical, with more and more sectors undertaking renewable strike action. Garbage collectors, refiners and energy workers have been taking the lead. Even in companies where renewable strikes are not yet desired by the majority, all workers have expressed a growing anger after Macron’s use of 49.3, an undemocratic constitutional tool that Macron used to push through the bill without a parliamentary vote. 

“The 49.3 has triggered the involvement of new sectors and workers that we would never have thought to enter a social movement. We are in an exceptional phase that I have never known in 22 years of work. We are in an insurrectionary moment, and it’s about time,” said Cédric Liechti, of the CGT Energy Paris. It’s been a similar refrain from all the striking workers: the renewable strike and renewed radicalism have changed the situation in just a few days.

“We can win!” is a widely-held sentiment — which is one of the major changes in the mobilization. One woman railway worker explains that there has been a subjective change among the strikers; before, workers went on strike “because we have to resist;” now, workers are on strike “because we can win.” 

Adrien Cornet of CGT Total continues: “Faced with this situation, we have a cross-union leadership that pursues a strategy of defeat: isolated strikes week after week. With the teachers’ strike, Laurent Berger and Martinez (the general secretaries of CFDT and CGT, respectively) say that we must not disturb the baccalaureate.” 

But none of the strikers and union leaders at the meeting underestimate the difficulties. One of the main obstacles is the police repression of the demonstrations. Another is requisitions, a legal weapon of the French state that forces workers back to work under the threat of six months in prison and a 10,000 euro fine, crushing the right to strike. Faced with this, the network’s call is clear: workers must “constitute a vast network of solidarity capable of facing the repression,” particularly through organized gatherings in front of police stations during arrests, or in front of factories in case of requisitions of strikers.

“We are facing an organized and armed repression, as we saw in Fos-sur-Mer.” For the strikers at the Nogent nuclear power station, the assessment is clear: “Each time we’ve had strength in numbers, we’ve forced them to back down. We must be ten times, a hundred times more numerous. We must resist them, even if they strike at us!” The same goes for Alexis Antonioli from the Normandy refinery: “Faced with requisitions, there is only one solution: the masses in front of the factories to prevent them.”

Hence the importance of the picket lines to ensure that the resistance continues in the face of all forms of repression, to hold the blockades, and to organize points of agreement. Guillaume, a sewer worker at the Paris City Hall, testifies to the strong support for the garbage collectors in front of the blockade of the TIRU — a meeting point of students, unemployed people, retirees, strikers, all determined to come to the aid of the requisitioned garbage collectors. Charles Carlhant, general secretary of the CGT EDF of Nogent calls for these pickets “to become headquarters of strike action, where each sector can link their struggles.”

These increasingly radical methods of struggle have also led to more radical demands. Facing a desperate regime, whose brutality only reflects its weakness, workers believe it is possible to win demands far beyond the withdrawal of the pension reform. This is obvious to Guillaume: “What are we fighting against? Against this pension reform? What about after that? We are fighting against the precarity of the working class and marginalized sectors of society!”

For Cédric Liechti, these days and weeks present an opportunity to start “social recovery”: “We will have to win weeks of paid vacations, retirement at 60 years for all, 55 years for the hardest jobs, for women, and for the most precarious, without any condition of years of service.” 

Among these precarious sectors are obviously immigrant workers, who break their backs in the most thankless jobs; who are condemned to work until death, unable to reach the number of years required for a full pension. The march against Darmanin’s immigration law (which would give the government greater power to deport undocumented people) on March 25th should be celebrated as the first victory of the movement, which led to a shift in the balance of power to definitively bury the project. More generally, it is a clear example of the solidarity of the labor movement with migrants who are dying because of “Fortress Europe.”

Finally, after having discussed the struggle against the repression and how to spread the strike, notably by combining extension of the demands and militant work by going to seek the sectors which are not yet on permanent strike, the network moved the discussion to how to build the network in the movement. 

“This network must be cross-sector, consisting of young people, artists and intellectuals, where everyone puts their positions at the service of class struggle to make this government give in!” says Anasse Kazib from the Bourget yard in the Paris Nord station. “The cross-union leadership of Berger & Cie don’t like what’s happening at the moment. They’re going to look for the first opening to save themselves, and we’re going to have to pick up our comrades in front of the depots, the refineries, the technical centers, and so forth. To avoid that, we have to start preparing to build the Network for the General Strike, with action committees everywhere across the whole country. We must aim to build real cross-sector coordination, organizing all the sectors on strike, with a leadership that will fight until the end!”

The strategy of action committees is as concrete as it is urgent — we must gather workers in all localities determined to fight at the level of what the situation demands. This Network for the General Strike, which is currently composed of a few hundred workers and trade unionists, must spread throughout the country to build the general strike.

Originally published in French in Révolution Permanente on March 22.

Translated by Emma Lee

The post “We Need Action Committees Everywhere”: Building for a General Strike in France appeared first on Left Voice.

Chinese president Xi Jinping has just completed his first visit to Moscow since the Russian invasion of Ukraine a year ago. This visit, which involved almost three full days of talks with Russian president Vladimir Putin, comes at a pivotal moment in the war. Both Russia and Ukraine are looking for funds and equipment to restart their war machine. A de facto war has transformed into a war of attrition, with neither side managing to gain ground despite the latest advances of the Russian paramilitary group, Wagner, in Bakhmut.

A Visit amid the Specter of War in Ukraine

For some weeks, Beijing has been strengthening its interference in the Ukrainian conflict, trying to create an image of a privileged diplomatic interlocutor for the Russian side, in the face of the United States, which is fully committed to the Ukrainian side and is doing everything to prolong the war indefinitely. After its successful diplomatic coup in restoring relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia,¹On March 10, 2023, in a deal brokered by China and after seven years of severed ties, Iran and Saudi Arabia reached an agreement to reestablish diplomatic relations and reopen embassies. The joint statement released by Iran, Saudi Arabia, and China further stated, “The agreement includes their affirmation of the respect for the sovereignty of states and the non-interference in internal affairs.” China would like to do the same in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. In many ways, China has several advantages. It has important commercial relations with not only Russia but also western Europe, which constitutes a major diplomatic lever. But it faces hostility from NATO allies who see it as too close to the Kremlin and, in the long term, as a competitor in the U.S.-dominated world order.

Beijing outlined a proposed peace plan on February 24, but many analysts perceive it as too vague and unworkable. Nonetheless, both sides were open to the proposals, which was a slap in the face to Western diplomacy. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has shown interest in a diplomatic resolution from China, but the refusal to mention a withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine (including the Donbas) in this peace plan means that, in the final analysis, it will remain null and void. In reality, Xi’s proposed plan is mainly an attack on U.S. hegemony and its “Cold War mentality.”

For Putin, the stakes of the visit are twofold. First, he needs to break Russia’s isolation, but also his own. Only a few days ago, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant against him, meaning that the signatories of the Rome Treaty are obliged to arrest him if he travels to any of the 123 member countries. Ironically, the United States could not arrest him under the terms of the treaty, since it has always refused to ratify it — after the law was enacted in 2002, the U.S. even authorized the invasion of the Netherlands, where the ICC is located, if a U.S. citizen is detained in The Hague.

Second, Putin urgently needs arms and equipment. But Chinese arms shipments to Russia, which the United States believes are imminent, may not take place — at least through traditional channels. China’s position of so-called neutrality in this conflict is important diplomatic leverage. Putin has little to hope for on this front. According to some analysts, Xi would rather extract meager concessions from Putin on the Ukrainian front, and thus strengthen his role as mediator between the two warring parties.

Strengthening Bilateral Trade Relations and a Geopolitical Alliance

The “boundless friendship” between Russia and China, as presented in a statement made during Putin’s visit to Beijing a few weeks before the start of the Russian invasion, soon found its limits, as Beijing still refused to officially support the “special operation” in Ukraine and bowed to Western sanctions. Nevertheless, the pseudo-alliance of circumstance has generally held up, contrary to the hopes of some U.S. analysts: the loss of earnings caused by the sanctions against Russia has been partly made up for by an explosion in economic relations between the two countries. China, for example, has become the leading importer of Russian oil, taking the place previously occupied by Germany. In addition, Chinese exports have also greatly increased, especially of semiconductors, via indirect routes. These chips are of vital importance to Russia, since it uses them for its armaments.

Moscow has thus found in China a commercial partner to compensate for Western sanctions and to maintain its war machine. For its part, Beijing is more than happy to buy Russian oil at reduced prices. This is the main objective of Xi’s visit to Moscow. Beyond the real desire to present himself as a peacemaker in Ukraine, the central goal for Xi’s visit is to strengthen bilateral economic cooperation between the two countries. China needs oil in large quantities, and the circuit of oil from Saudi Arabia (its main supplier) and liquefied natural gas from Qatar is long and full of pitfalls: the Straits of Hormuz and Bab-el-Mandeb, the Strait of Malacca, and finally, the South China Sea.

The presence of the world’s largest hydrocarbon basin, in western Siberia, is pushing China to revise its transportation routes and detach itself from the China Sea, which is surrounded by the United States’ allies. To this end, one of the main points that should be broadly discussed is the launch of a new gas pipeline, the Power of Siberia II, which will bring gas from Siberia in a direct line to China, crossing Mongolia. This point of discussion is of primary importance for China, and important for Russia as well, but it is seldom explored in the mainstream media, which maintains its focus on the Ukrainian question.

In many ways, the meeting between Putin and Xi is more important for the latter: China is being undermined by existing and upcoming trade embargoes, and is thus looking for new partners. The task is difficult, however, since most Chinese companies prefer to deal with Europe. Finding opportunities in Russia is proving complicated; for the moment, the evolution of trade relations has been limited to the hydrocarbon and semiconductor markets. The two heads of state have every interest in diversifying imports and exports between the two countries.

While they present themselves as lifelong friends, the “alliance” between Xi and Putin, and between China and Russia, is an alliance of circumstance rather than an organic closeness. Russia vitally needs China’s support, albeit relative, in its conflict, be it political, financial, or military. Concurrently, China is seeking to reduce its commercial dependence on an increasingly hostile West and on the countries of the Gulf, whose exports are conditional, based on the control of the straits that separate them, particularly the Strait of Malacca, a “hot spot of world security.” Furthermore, China is seeking to create a position as a privileged interlocutor in the conflicts that cross the world, particularly with the BRICS and the “Global South.” The next step for Xi Jinping could thus be a discussion in the coming days with Zelenskyy, a first since the beginning of the war.

The reactionary and hostile policy of the Western imperialist powers, starting with the United States, has pushed China and Russia closer together. And even if this rapprochement seems based on establishing a defensive position for both countries, it is not a minor detail. On the contrary, it is an important event for international relations and competition between states. Yet China and Russia’s opposition to the policies of the Western imperialists does not make them “anti-imperialist” powers. Indeed, Moscow and Beijing are seeking their own ways to impose the interests of their capitalist classes on the international scene, and therefore they are deeply reactionary and anti-worker powers. The workers’ and revolutionary movement does not have to choose between these two reactionary “blocs” but must instead seek to create an independent class alternative within the framework of these international frictions and tensions.

This article originally appeared in French on March 21, 2023 on Révolution Permanente.

The post What’s Behind Xi Jinping’s Visit to Moscow? appeared first on Left Voice.

The powerful social movement that developed in France in response to President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms has arrived at an impasse. This is due to the lack of determination of the inter-union coalition and its search for an impossible compromise with the government. In this context, Macron’s Bonapartist attack, using one of the most authoritarian levers of the Fifth Republic (article 49.3 of the constitution) has not only revived the mobilizations against his regime — it has amplified them and changed their character.

Far from the “peaceful” and “responsible” movement of which the union leaders boasted, the struggle is now developing in ways previously constrained by their control of the strikes and demonstrations. We are now entering a “pre-revolutionary moment” that could change the balance of power between the classes in France.

A Government in Crisis, Incapable of Governing

The potential of the current political and social crisis is linked, on the one hand, to the sudden governmental crisis within the framework of a deep crisis of the regime and, on the other hand, to the radicalization of the mass movement. The first determining element here is the weakness of Macron. He not only lacks popular support, but also represents a minority within the assembly. 

Charles de Courson, independent centrist deputy and central architect of the cross-party vote of no confidence which Macron survived on Monday, affirmed ahead of the vote: 

What is certain is that this government will not be able to govern anymore. I am not sure that the President of the Republic has considered all the consequences of his decision. The country will become more and more ungovernable. I think that the current government is in agony. We are talking about a change of Prime Minister: that seems obvious to me, but it will not solve the fundamental problem. It is going to be very bad, in the National Assembly, in the Senate and in the streets.

This situation is also developing in the context of the deepening organic crisis of French capitalism. Against the backdrop of the crisis-ridden two-party system that had previously ensured France’s political stability, the Bonapartist Macron administration had tried to win some gains for the dominant class by attacking the retirement system. Macron’s inability to do so democratically not only weakens the essential role of the presidential regime of the Fifth Republic — it opens the way to a polarization and political tension that is increasingly difficult to resolve within the institutional framework. 

Growing Discontent and Militancy

The second aspect and central element of the “pre-revolutionary moment” is the radicalization of large sectors of the proletariat. For the last three days, countless riots have been taking place in different parts of the country, with numerous demonstrations and actions. Many have been spontaneous, while others were called by the local or departmental trade unions in response to workers’ radicalization.

According to an article in Le Figaro titled “How the Executive is Trying To Stop the Mechanics of Chaos,” these protests are similar to those of the Yellow Vest movement that rocked France in 2018. “‘Spreading like a virus, public spaces and some vehicles have been hit,’ said a field officer who noted in these sporadic actions ‘a lot of resemblance with the actions of the “Yellow Vests,” when the movement began to spiral out of control.’” Although the demonstrations of the last few days are, in some ways, similar to the 2018 revolts, important distinctions remain: they have not reached the same levels of violence, and, crucially, the current mobilization encompasses different layers of the proletariat.

Unlike the uprising of 2018, which was concentrated in suburban and semi-rural areas, here, the movement extends across the entire nation. Even the base of the unions is affected, including the most reformist, as shown by the action of trade unionists of the CFDT in Dijon, burning mannequins with the effigy of the government (an action condemned by the union’s general secretary Laurent Berger). As the deputy of the Marne, Charles de Courson, said: “Today, the trade unions tell us that they are not sure they can ‘hold the troops’ for long, as they used to say. We began to see the first outbursts last night. The risk is that the unions are no longer able to manage the movement.”

Still, the main difference from 2018 is that, unlike the Yellow Vests movement, today’s protests are taking root in the workplace. By taking place essentially outside of workplaces, the Yellow Vests movement did not challenge the essence of the wage relationship. In contrast, the current mobilization sees the labor movement directly involved with its traditional methods of struggle, the strike and pickets, and thus raises a whole series of demands and aspirations. From the rejection of the reform to the questioning of living and working conditions, discussions amongst protesters are pushing back against the deep logic of neoliberal capitalism and developing a potentially anticapitalist character.

While a whole series of strikes are continuing in the energy, petrochemical, port, and, to a lesser extent, railway and sanitation sectors, these elements again raise the possibility of a mass general strike dynamic. This had already been posed after March 7 but had not been able to materialize because of the restrictive approach of the inter-union. Moreover, in reaction to Macron’s deployment of article 49.3, we have seen a radicalization of the strike in the Normandy refinery, the largest in France, which led the strikers to decide to shut down the site. We are also seeing the first signs of the emergence of wildcat strikes, such as the one at the Chatillon SNCF train car maintenance center.

This generalization of the strike is partly due to the weakness of the leadership. On Friday, actions emerged at several Amazon locations in France to protest against the development of the mandatory annual contract negotiations with the bosses as well as against the pension reform. In several car factories of the PSA group, angry temporary workers have carried out sporadic work stoppages to protest bosses’ refusal to grant bonuses linked to the company’s profits despite giving them to permanent employees. This situation could become explosive, and struggles like these could increase in the coming days. 

Other fronts may also open up. As Arnaud Benedetti, associate professor at the University of Paris-Sorbonne and editor-in-chief of the political and parliamentary review in Le Figaro, underlines: 

The acceptability of 49.3 has taken a hit; witness the demonstrations that have formed in Paris and in many provincial cities since its announcement. It could be that this pension reform is one regressive reform too far… The challenge in this turbulent zone we have crossed into will be for the executive branch to do everything it can to prevent the university and high school youth from joining the social movement en masse. If this were to happen, we would be approaching the shores of a major crisis…”

The Main Obstacle: The Leadership of the Labor Movement

In the face of this political and social crisis, the union bureaucracies are acting as the last line of defense for the Macron regime and the Fifth Republic. Although the president’s brutality and the radicalization of the base have forced the inter-union’s leadership to call for a new day of demonstration on Thursday March 23, it is avoiding like the plague any calls that could take advantage of the political crisis to defeat Macronism.

While those on the frontlines of the struggle in the streets are beginning to call for Macron’s resignation, the inter-union continues to confine the current movement solely to the demand to withdraw the pension reform. This cowardice was made explicit by Marylise Léon, general secretary of the CFDT: “We did not want to mobilize at the beginning of the week, because we would have been stepping on the political calendar.” When asked about the motion of censure that will be discussed and voted on this Monday in the National Assembly, she replied: “We ourselves are not taking a position on this. Our agenda is not to bring down the government. Our agenda is the withdrawal of the reform.” When questioned on the different television platforms in recent days, the leaders of the CGT expressed a similar position.

This refusal to politicize the struggle is an obstacle to the development of the movement, at a time when it is possible to go on the offensive against the government and against Macron. More than ever, the slogans of “Macron resign” and “repeal of the Constitution of the Fifth Republic” are on the order of the day, along with the defense of a radical democratic program to facilitate the struggle for a government of the workers and the popular classes.

It is thus safe to say that the main obstacle for the pre-revolutionary “moment” to turn into an openly pre-revolutionary or even revolutionary situation lies in the conservative and institutional leadership of the workers’ movement.

Action Committees for the General Strike!

In order to overcome this contradiction, it is necessary to build an alternative pole of leadership of the workers’ movement that strengthens and coordinates the strikes, that gives them perspectives and the determination to achieve victory. This is a determining element for the situation to be able to make a revolutionary leap by spreading the actions to build the general strike.

Despite the surge in the radicalization of the movement, it still lacks bodies of self-organization. This absence can be explained in large part by the fact that, until now, the movement has been shaped by the calendar and the decisions of the Inter-union. If the movement acquires an autonomous and independent dynamic, the inter-union will have less and less control. 

If this situation continues to intensify, the strikes, demonstrations, street confrontations, and riots will become more and more inevitable. As Révolution Permanente, Left Voice’s sister organization in France, we support all these developments, and the struggle to unify them in order to build a general strike. This is the purpose of the formation of the Réseau Pour la Grève Générale (Network for the General Strike), which is beginning to have a certain echo in the vanguard, as shown by the successful meeting at the Bourse du Travail in Paris on Monday March 13, before the situation escalated.

At the next meeting of the Network, on March 21, we will defend the fact that its militants, partly striking workers from different hot spots of the current struggle, are working to generalize the creation of action committees for the general strike, open to all militants and currents of the workers’ movement who wish to defend and build such a perspective. 

With Révolution Permanente, we affirm the need to advance in the construction of a democratic representation of the sectors in struggle, coordinated at the base to equip themselves with a common politic. This is the only way to go towards a real general strike, and to offer a revolutionary alternative to the timid politics of class conciliation of the inter-union. This is the central challenge of the coming days.

First published in French on March 19 on Révolution Permanente. 

Translation by Antoine Ramboz

The post Battle of the Pensions: Toward a Pre-Revolutionary Moment in France appeared first on Left Voice.

My journey to becoming a socialist and a Trotskyist started with a visceral hatred of war, and U.S. militarism in particular. While I often think of this hatred as somewhat instinctual, I can trace it back to a vivid memory from around the lead-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. I remember so clearly my mom complaining that the U.S. had no right to go to Iraq. That it would just make everything worse. 

I’m sure I didn’t appreciate the significance of that at the time or understand at all what was happening. I would’ve been 6. But in hindsight, I can’t emphasize how important it was to hear that early on. That U.S. intervention and war in particular would make everything worse. It did. 

To me, war and U.S. imperialism became the most blatant, most savage, most impossible to conceal contradiction of capitalism, even before I really understood what capitalism was. Middle school is when I began calling out that contradiction, almost begging anyone around me to see the U.S. military for what it truly was, not some valiant force for good made up of brave, noble individuals, but a massive institution which destroys and kills in an unnatural, mechanistic, callous fashion, solely in service of the ruling class. 

I would learn quickly just how much people did not want these contradictions exposed. The homophobic and misogynistic slurs and social isolation I got as responses made it clear that this is not just an institution people don’t criticize, it is an institution that is culturally protected and praised to shield it from criticism.

Now the “War on Terror” is “over,” even as a U.S. military presence remains in Iraq and the country remains poisoned as a result of biological weapons and the whole region destabilized as a result of occupation and intervention. I’m thinking about all of those in our class who will not be part of the reframing we hear from the very bourgeois press and capitalists responsible for the invasion. The Iraqis whose lives were quickly snuffed out. The ones whose deaths were dragged out, being incinerated, tortured, bleeding to death, being poisoned, being starved, dehydrated, deprived of shelter. Being born with birth defects because of white phosphorus and dying within the first 30 minutes of life. And while I always want to center the Iraqis who are always erased or dehumanized in the U.S. framing of the war and today are still suffering the worst devastation, I still think about my class siblings in this country who were mostly kids either trying to pay for college or duped by a flood of propaganda, just to be sent into Iraq to be killed themselves or maimed and traumatized and end up homeless, while the oil companies and weapons manufacturers far away from any fighting reaped the spoils of war.

Now the era of the “War on Terror” is over, but capitalism is not, so war is not. In fact, we’re threatened by even greater war as shown by the meat grinder in Ukraine. And even though the U.S. isn’t yet ready to fully commit to fighting a war with major powers like Russia or China, we see it preparing, already dividing our class, pitting us against each other again, sending Russians who fled Putin’s draft back to be tossed into a proxy-war it’s fueling, stoking anti-China chauvinism which has fueled a rise in racist violence against Asians. 

I’m scared of what it will look like when the United States decides it is ready to fight directly. Few people alive have ever witnessed a world war. I won’t try to wrap my head around it. I know it will be a nightmare. I know it will be one of the most reactionary things we ever see. I know it will be one of the biggest challenges socialists in the U.S. face, holding firm against it, refusing to be divided or sold on hating and wanting dead our class siblings in Russia, China, and anywhere else the U.S. ends up fighting. 

But I’m inspired that we can resist. Unlike in middle school, I’m not alone in this fight to stoke hatred and opposition to this evil institution and the system it serves. The military’s own recruitment crisis shows this. Left Voice’s anti-war interventions and growing anti-imperialist sentiment in the United States show this. The anti-war efforts of our comrades in Germany and the Spanish State show this. Our comrades and class siblings raising all hell in France, an imperialist country, shows this. Everyone who reads our pages who could’ve easily capitulated to NATO or the Russian invasion, but who stood with our class instead shows this. I believe one day we’ll foster so much class hatred and international class solidarity within the belly of this imperialist beast that we will organize ourselves to end it and build a new society. And when that happens we’ll march into the White House and the Pentagon and the offices of The New York Times and CNN and every space that was used to destroy Iraq. And we’ll use them to honor all the victims of the invasion and occupation. This history will not be buried. Their deaths will not be in vain. People will remember U.S. imperialism and war for the blatant, savage, impossible to conceal contradiction of capitalism that it always was, and they’ll hate it, and they’ll love that it was defeated.

The post 20 Years Since the U.S. Invasion of Iraq: A Reflection from a Socialist in the Heart of Imperialism appeared first on Left Voice.

On Thursday, the French government invoked Article 49.3 of the country’s Constitution to force through President Macron’s deeply opposed pension reforms. Sometimes referred to as a “nuclear legislative weapon,” 49.3 allows a bill in Parliament to be passed without a vote or parliamentary support¹49.3 further states that only a motion of censure that is signed by at least 58 MPs and submitted within 24 hours can stop the law from being accepted.. It is a decidedly antidemocratic offensive and a glaring example of a parliamentary process that has imposed many attacks on working-class people. Now this latest attack opens a deep political crisis.

Macron’s pension reform raises the minimum legal retirement age from 62 to 64. It also stipulates that people will need to have worked at least 43 years to be entitled to a full pension, meaning that women (as well as other marginalized and racialized sectors of the working class) who may have to step away from the workforce will be cornered into working longer and for less.

Less than a year after his presidential reelection, and after six months of negotiations and compromises with the Republicans, Macron failed to gain majority support to pass this attack on the working class. The president’s resort to 49.3 demonstrates that this measure is unpopular not only among the population but also in Parliament.

Mobilizations all over France have responded to this underhanded show of weakness. In Paris, thousands of people flocked to demonstrations, many called by the “Inter-facs” (or inter-university coordinating body). Similarly, in Marseille, Grenoble, Lyon, Strasbourg, Lorient, Clermont-Ferrand, and many other cities, protests brought together thousands of people.

Whether mobilized by trade unions or political organizations, these rallies were marked by strong elements of spontaneity, expressing fervent radicalism and a refusal to stop the mobilization. “We have to answer the call of history. Being here tonight is just the beginning of what can happen. We can be even tougher. The pacifist strike is no longer acceptable,” explained Jordan Robichon, of CGT Energie on the Place de la Concorde. Founded in 1895, the General Confederation of Labor (or Confédération Générale du Travail-CGT) is a national trade union center (the first of the five major French confederations of trade unions). CGT Energie is the union branch composed of workers in the electricity and gas industries. Robichon’s words expressed a state of mind widely shared by the demonstrators after two months of a mobilization heavily supervised by the Intersyndicale, or “inter-union.” Intersyndicale” refers to an “inter-union” — an unofficial structure having no legal status and unable to exercise the rights of a union organization. Each member organization maintains its sovereignty and is committed to the decisions of the inter-union only after having given its consent.

Union leaders could not be more at odds with the situation and these aspirations. In the evening, the union leaders proposed a strike and national mobilization on March 23, a meager proposition in contrast with the unwavering protesters flooding the streets. Although collective anger was widely expressed on Thursday throughout France, and on Monday motions of censure will be examined — with the possibility of proposing the overthrow of the government — the Intersyndicale deliberately chose not to call for demonstrations either on Saturday or Monday in order to avoid any radicalization of the mobilization.

This attitude highlights the inter-union’s prolonged refusal to “politicize” the battle of the pension reform, as well as its opposition to building a real relationship of forces through the strike and the street. In other words, the response of the Intersyndicale is exactly the opposite of what we need in the face of a weakened government. The rage and the strength of our class must continue to express itself in order to demand the immediate withdrawal of the reform, the departure of Borne (France’s  prime minister), and the resignation of Macron, in the same way as was chanted by the Yellow Vests and in many demonstrations. The government’s weakness is an opportunity to go on the offensive, with perspectives to build the balance of forces by relying on the striking sectors that continue to block a part of the economy: from the garbage dumps to the refineries via the energy workers and the railroad workers.

We cannot wait until next Thursday to continue the struggle: the militant trade union and political organizations determined to push back the government, the general assemblies, the networks of strikers — all must reinforce the frameworks of self-organization and coordination and call for actions starting Friday and the coming days. Macron is in great difficulty: we must seize this advantage so that the reform is withdrawn, as well as use this momentum to think beyond the current situation and figure out how to achieve much more.

Since the beginning of the movement, there have been many grassroots aspirations: on pensions, wages, working conditions, public services, and more. We must raise all these issues and thus broaden the demands of the movement. After a day marked by a new autocratic decree, we must also strategically envision abolishing the Presidency, the Senate, and to the whole antidemocratic regime of the Fifth Republic. The system must be replaced by a single chamber, concentrating legislative and executive powers, one whose elected representatives are impeachable and paid the average salary.

All these are policies that the mass movement has the strength to impose, as the demonstrations of the last two months have shown, provided it adopts a strategy that breaks radically from the one that has dominated until now.

The post It is Possible to Win: The Pension Reform Crisis in France appeared first on Left Voice.

On Thursday, March 9, dozens of trans youth walked out of their high schools in New York City to demand an end to anti-trans laws and to say that trans lives matter. They marched through the streets of New York City chanting “Trans lives matter,” “Queers don’t deny, Stonewall was a riot,” and more. The action ended with a speak-out by over a dozen youth who talked about the need to struggle for trans rights and to fight anti-trans rhetoric and legislation. The action was organized by NYC Youth for Trans Rights. Nurses from NYSNA attended, standing in solidarity with trans youth, as well as teachers from the MORE caucus in New York City.

Left Voice is publishing speeches by student activists about the fight for trans rights. If you are a trans youth who would like to publish a speech or an article, please contact us on Instagram or Facebook, or by emailing contact@leftvoice.org

Hi, everyone. My name is Elle, and I’m from Arkansas. I moved here about two years ago as a trans woman, started transitioning in Arkansas — if you guys don’t know where that is, it’s right above Texas. It’s a shitty-ass place. There are laws already in place there, basically saying that if you go outside dressed like any of you, or like me, you could get arrested. We can go to jail for who we are today.

I was raised in a religious family — people that were supposed to give me love and acceptance and a safe place to be, and they didn’t. I woke up on my 18th birthday with my mother in my face saying, “If you wanna be a woman, get the fuck outta my house now. Go to school and never look back.” And I did. I’ve become a woman without them. In fact, I’ve always been a woman.

But who I am today proves that we are supposed to be here.

When I was 18, I tried overdosing because I truly didn’t believe that I was supposed to be here, but I woke the fuck up. Five days, I was in a goddamn coma, but I woke the fuck up! We are supposed to be here. We are supposed to be fucking queer! We are supposed to be trans.

I love each and every one of you, and I’m so happy that you all came out today, because this is my first fucking protest ever. I was too scared to be who I am. Even as a trans woman, I never told anyone. I always said that I was a woman because I’ve had experiences where saying that you are trans means having a shotgun pointed to your face. We shouldn’t be in that place anymore, it’s twenty twenty fucking three, and we have people in our government saying that we should be eradicated? Do they not realize that if we all just fucking died, the world would just stop? Do they not realize that we are a larger part of the economy and of the world than they think that we are?

We are your politicians!

We are your economy!

We are the people that run this world.

They don’t see that, so let’s fucking make them see it.

The post “We are your economy”: Trans Youth Walkout and Speak Out appeared first on Left Voice.

Three years ago this month, the City University of New York (CUNY) pivoted to remote operations during the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic. When the university began to gradually reopen in-person operations after vaccines were widely available, dining services on many campuses — which students rely on for affordable meals — remained closed. At the same time, wages have not kept up with inflation, and budget cuts from the city and the state are gutting many of CUNY’s other services. Not only are affordable campus dining options important, but students and workers are struggling more than ever to afford basic needs.

At the CUNY Graduate Center, a team of students and workers operating as “Reclaim the Commons” is working to force CUNY to reopen dining services in their eighth floor dining commons space. It’s a collaboration between student government representatives; elected delegates from the Graduate Center chapter of PSC-CUNY (the faculty, staff, and graduate assistant union); rank and file union members, many of whom organize with the group Rank and File Action; and students without work assignments. The first step has been to organize “The People’s Pantry,” a food pantry and coffee station operating out of the dining commons. The People’s Pantry has so far raised thousands of dollars from members of the community and hosts weekly hot meals on Wednesday nights. 

The Pantry is just one step in a campaign to restore dining services, transfer the responsibility of funding the food pantry to the university, assert community control over the space, demand transparency around the missing $900,000 in funds allocated in 2021 for kitchen repairs, and protect the right to political expression in the dining commons space. Universities prefer to keep radical ideas confined to the classroom — a politicized space puts these ideas into practice in direct confrontation with the bosses.

What began as two tables with some food on top has since expanded to a collective organizing space. Above the food tables (which now also include hygiene and safe sex supplies, plus a shelf of free books), there are signs with demands: Free CUNY, fix the budget office, pay international students, expand the childcare center, admins resign now! On bulletin boards flanking the tables, there is a whiteboard counting how many days since the expiration of the PSC-CUNY union contract, a big “STRIKE! STRIKE! STRIKE!” sign, a Palestinian flag, and a clothesline full of anonymous stories of sexual harassment and other experiences of misogyny at CUNY. Another table includes blank union cards ready for signing.

One bulletin board also has a “The Management Wall of Shame,” which includes printouts of emails sent from management to Reclaim the Commons activists in which they try to shut down the Pantry, reach out to PSC central leadership to go over the heads of chapter activists, and limit the number of union members who would be allowed to attend the most recent labor-management meeting. 

On February 15, the Graduate Center’s President, Robin Garrell, held a “community meeting.” Pantry activists wrote slogans on paper plates and held them up during the meeting, after taking a solidarity photo for the striking TUGSA workers. After this meeting, administrators attended the potluck at the pantry and made a small contribution, promising to begin funding weekly lunches in the dining commons. This promise never materialized. 

One weekend in February, the administration tried to force the People’s Pantry to temporarily relocate while the music department held auditions in the dining commons. The Reclaim the Commons team refused. Management then put up temporary barriers blocking the view of the pantry and its political messages, as well as blocking access to the supplies for anyone who needed food or beverages over the weekend.

On March 15, the administration tried to stifle the pantry’s political speech again, announcing that the dining commons would be “closed” for several hours while facilities staff “set up” for the Graduate Council meeting scheduled to take place in the space. Reclaim the Commons activists refused to leave, holding the space and recruiting other students and workers to join them. The administration backed down, didn’t force them to leave, and instead canceled the meeting only two hours before it was scheduled to begin due to “space limitations.” It was obvious from the start that this was a lie — the meeting had been booked for months, the room is plenty big enough for the Grad Council, and one of the auditoriums was in fact also available. It seems likely that this was a ploy to avoid the prospect of a new No Confidence vote on the senior administration, after the previous No Confidence vote was invalidated by the administration on technicalities about quorum.

Graduate Council members decided to still meet and then joined Reclaim the Commons activists in paying a visit to President Garrell’s office, where a security guard was posted. Garrell shared that the “real” reason the meeting was canceled was at the CUNY legal department’s advice due to threats of potential “disruption.” As neither the Graduate Council reps, nor the student government reps, nor the union chapter, nor Rank and File Action activists, had planned any disruptions outside of bringing up issues within the normal functioning of the meeting, this seemed to also be a lie. 

Graduate Center PSC chapter president Zoe Hu, a graduate student worker, pointed out that blaming the cancellation on hypothetical student activism is an attempt to divide students from faculty when in reality, many faculty and staff are involved in running the pantry as well, and the Graduate Council includes student representatives from each academic department. According to the union’s summary of the meeting, Professor and renowned prison abolitionist Ruth Wilson Gilmore “added to what Hu had said, and summarized that the traditions of CUNY are to disrupt meetings, [and] characterized the whole approach of how the administration was treating the GC as criminalizing.”

President Garrell expressed confusion at this term, accused activists of not respecting her integrity, protested that she is working hard and it’s difficult to balance a budget, and made the ridiculous statement that “none of you have lived through a pandemic.”

In the past, the student government has successfully submitted requests from chartered student organizations to use student government funds for catering Wednesday night dinners in the reclaimed commons space. These requests, for money already allocated to the Doctoral and Graduate Students Council and nominally under its control, must still be approved by Brian Peterson, the Senior Vice President for Administration and Finance. In the days since that meeting with President Garrell, student government reps noticed that their requests for room reservations and release of funds are no longer being approved. For the time being, it’s unclear whether this is deliberate repression or a coincidental administrative backlog, a natural consequence of requiring a single administrator’s sign off on every financial decision at the school.

In another meeting requested by the administration with student government representatives and Reclaim the Commons activists this past week, management revealed that it is discussing how to open a separate, bureaucratically organized food pantry, with restricted visiting hours, hidden away from the university community, and perhaps requiring sign-in sheets and other documentation. This is a direct rejection of the coalition’s demand for the administration to fund the People’s Pantry and, more importantly, an attempt to wrest political control of the space away from students and workers. Management knows the space isn’t just about providing food — it’s an organizing space, a union space, a space dedicated to fighting the bosses, from campus administrators all the way up to the governor. The politicized space evokes the possibilities of a university under student and worker control, and directly confronts and shames the bosses in a space that the university sometimes rents out to other organizations.

The People’s Pantry organizers are demanding community control of the space — of course management would never voluntarily consent to funding a space dedicated to organizing against itself. But this is exactly the point — the establishment of the food pantry has always been just one step in the bigger campaign, designed to provide a much-needed service while directly clashing with the administration in a fight for much bigger changes in the workplace. It’s precisely the function as a political space that makes it so valuable to students and workers, and so dangerous to the administration. 

Upcoming events in the commons include a panel on abortion rights activism in the Dominican Republic, LGBTQ+ Night at the People’s Pantry, and a cross-campus organizing dinner to discuss mobilizing PSC members around the union’s next contract.

The post CUNY Administration Cracks Down on Student and Worker-Run Food Pantry appeared first on Left Voice.

On March 18, members of Left Voice attended anti-war rallies in D.C. and Detroit initiated by ANSWER Coalition, CODEPINK, and The People’s Forum, and endorsed by more than 200 organizations. With ever-increasing NATO involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war, the threat of a new world war looms larger than at any point in recent memory. A strong anti-war movement is urgently needed, and we welcome the current mobilizations. 

With many socialists in the United States capitulating to NATO’s imperialist aims in this war, it is progressive to clearly denounce NATO and the role of U.S. imperialism in particular. This becomes especially important as the war rapidly escalates with Poland now sending fighter jets to Ukraine, Finland slated to join NATO, and all parties preparing for greater conflict, as represented by the Biden administration’s recently proposed $880 billion military budget — a proposal which clearly seeks to prepare the resources of U.S. militarism for conflict with China.

Recently, Far Right figures like Ron DeSantis and Matt Gaetz have used populist rhetoric to paint their violent “America First” nationalism as “anti-war.” It is vital that the Left claim the mantle of true anti-imperialism by rejecting isolationism, domestic state violence, and anti-China chauvinism being pushed by sectors of the Right. The March 18 rallies played an important role in denouncing U.S. imperialism and NATO and taking space away from Far Right opportunism.

At the same time, we do not support all of the slogans put forward by Saturday’s protests. We do not agree with the call for “negotiations” which create illusions that bourgeois governments can, or would, “be reasonable” and find a just solution. We also disagree with the tacit apologia for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, expressed by the rally organizers’ choice to not mention Russia in any of the demands for the March 18 actions. The working class should support neither side in this reactionary proxy war. We call for building a working-class, internationalist, anti-war movement which clearly rejects the policies and politics of NATO, Russia and the Zalenskyy government.

Rather than calling on the nationalist, anti-working class governments to barter a peace deal, our main appeals should be addressed to the working masses who are being forced to fight and die. The international working class has the power to end the war through mass action, including strikes and labor-boycotts of war materiel. Soldiers — both Russian and Ukrainian — could take the lead by fraternizing with each other and refusing to fight. Instead of remaining silent about Russia’s reactionary aims of the war, socialists have an obligation to build international class solidarity by denouncing these attacks and calling for Russian troops out of Ukraine, as well as demanding NATO out of Eastern Europe. 

Left Voice attended these rallies because we saw it as an important space to discuss anti-imperialism, internationalism, and a working class perspective for world peace. A truly just peace will arise only when working people bring an end to capitalism – a system that breeds war and oppression. Below we publish a flier which we distributed at the March 18 rallies in D.C. and Detroit with the anti-war program we believe we must all take up.

*********************************************************************************************************

Neither NATO nor Putin – No to Capitalist War

U.S and NATO out of Eastern Europe

Russian Troops out of Ukraine

For an Independent and Socialist Solution in Ukraine to Confront Russian Occupation and Imperialist Domination.

Neither NATO nor Putin

One year ago, in an escalation of longstanding tensions with murderous imperialist NATO, Russia invaded Ukraine. This set off a series of events that has thrown the world into a new stage of global conflict in which the growing competition between great capitalist powers is played out on the battlefield. The war is bigger than Russia and Ukraine: the U.S. and NATO intervene to weaken Russia and reestablish their imperialist domination. The working class and oppressed across the world have been thrust in the middle, bearing the worst consequences of repression, sanctions, displacement, inflation, famine, and the destruction of war. We must be clear that this war does not serve our interests.

Russia’s invasion is a further attempt to subjugate Ukraine and expand its influence in the region to find new avenues for its capitalists. The war has been used to violently oppress Ukrainians and also to conscript and repress Russian youth, workers, and the most marginalized sectors of society. In the face of this reactionary move, we must demand Russian troops out of Ukraine. 

But this is not the only dimension of the war. The conflict takes place in the context of a crisis of the Neoliberal world order led for decades by the United States. Capitalist challengers are vying for better positions in the conflicts to come.

The United States and NATO do not care about “Ukrainian self-determination.” They see the war as a means of weakening Russia and checking the growth and influence of China. The United States and NATO have used the war in Ukraine to send billions of dollars, tons of weapons, and military training to Ukraine. They have strengthened ties to the Zelenskyy regime and increased Ukrainian dependence on the West.

They have used the war to increase their military budgets and a massive program of rearmament. These will be used as tools of repression against the working class and poor internationally. Funding the police, ICE, and other violent institutions of the state, increased defense spending also means more attacks on workers and oppressed people in the United States. Not one penny or one person for capitalist war! For an end to imperialist rearmament!

The impact of wide-reaching sanctions on Russia – just like the sanctions the U.S. imposes on Venezuela and Iran — are brutal for the millions of working and poor people who live in Russia but did not choose Putin’s reactionary offensive. We must fight for an end to all sanctions which are a tool to repress our class siblings across the world. 

Critically, the war has also been used as justification to strengthen the alliances within NATO — with the United States at the helm — and to expand NATO influence in Eastern Europe, thereby strengthening the foundations of their domination. U.S. and NATO out of Eastern Europe! 

This is a reactionary proxy war being fought by two capitalist camps. Our fight is not against the workers and oppressed in Russia or Ukraine — it is against the system that produces wars and exploits us.

For an Independent and Internationalist Solution to the War in Ukraine

What is the way out of this war? It is not by siding with Russia, which has invaded Ukraine for the gain of its capitalist class and violently represses dissent. It is not by siding with the Zelenskyy regime and the U.S. and NATO behind it; Zelenskyy allies with the U.S. and NATO to make new profits for Ukraine’s ruling class and repress workers and dissent. The U.S. and NATO seek to reassert a Neoliberal world order that they dominate.

This means that we cannot trust capitalist governments to negotiate an end to a conflict their rotten system created. Negotiations do not lead to peace but to capitalist governments redrawing the world in their interest while the working class and oppressed face the consequences. A true solution to the conflict means undermining the very system that gave rise to it, mounting an offensive against Putin, NATO, and Zelenskyy. The international working class must pave the way forward through class struggle; because it is this class that is forced to fight the wars, that makes everything we need for society to run, and that creates the profits capitalists covet.

What can end the war is the coordinated efforts of the international working class and massive mobilizations against the war. We have small but significant examples of what is possible — in the anti-war protests in Russia and Europe; in worker actions against arms shipments in Italy, Belarus, and Greece. But the seeds for a larger fight are also being planted. Capitalist governments’ intent to put the costs of the war on the working class and oppressed have sparked protests across Europe, Latin America, and Asia — particularly in the U.K., France, and Peru. These struggles can become a crucial part of efforts to connect social crisis to the war and fight our class enemies together.

In the United States, a staunchly anti-imperialist policy is indispensable. It is crucial to link this perspective to a burgeoning labor movement that is fighting against worsening living conditions produced by this capitalist, global Neoliberal system. Generation U — for union — is fighting for unions and better working conditions, against exploitation and oppression in the workplace. Imagine if they took up the fight against the war, connecting imperialist aggression abroad to exploitation and repression in the United States. We must reclaim a militant anti-war struggle from within our schools and workplaces, and in the streets. A decade or more ago, the AFL-CIO, as well as independent unions like the dockworkers of the ILWU, passed resolutions against the hated U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, joined anti-war protests, and took workplace action.

Today workers and oppressed people in the U.S. must stand up against this reactionary war and the part played by our imperialist government, which oppresses our class siblings in Palestine, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, Iran, Afghanistan, Eastern Europe, and the rest of the world. For us in the heart of the imperialist beast, we must use all our strength to fight to end this reactionary war and ring the death knell for U.S. imperialism.

The post Neither NATO Nor Putin: An Anti-war Program for an Anti-war Protest appeared first on Left Voice.

After a steady drop in intensity throughout February, the sixth day of national mobilizations against Macron’s latest pension reform announced itself as a profound reinvigoration. With 700,000 in the streets of Paris and 3.5 million nationwide, according to the CGT, France’s largest union confederation, March 7 surpassed January 31 not only in terms of size, being the largest day of protest in at least 40 years, but also in terms of character. Whereas previous days had been relegated to isolated, symbolic strike actions, this, for many, marked the first day of a grève reconductible, or a “renewable” strike (that is, an ongoing, democratically decided strike, discussed and renewed actively by the workers at regular intervals on the picket lines, as opposed to limited one-day strikes, or other more passive strike strategies, usually imposed from above). The renewable strike took place in several sectors, many of them strategic. And it’s with March 8 in mind, International Women’s Day, falling conveniently the day after, that many on the ground hoped to push the movement to take up not only the withdrawal of the pension reform but also a set of urgent positive demands concerning the whole of civil society, so as to generalize the conflict by speaking to all the oppressed and exploited segments of France who are being forced to pay for the crises of the state and the bosses, most immediately the economic consequence of the capitalists’ war in Ukraine. 

Yet after a historic two weeks of protest, Macron’s administration has pushed through their reform by using an antidemocratic parliamentary article in the Fifth Republic’s constitution called the “49-3” that allows the executive to bypass a vote in the National Assembly. This comes as a widely unpopular move with over 80 percent of the people of France opposing, including nearly half of supporters of Macron’s Renaissance party, and over 70 percent now calling for the government’s resignation. Here we will recount the notable mobilizations that led up to this moment, and look at where the French working class may go next. 

A Intransigent Constant: The Union Coalition

The strategic turn towards renewable strikes starting on March 7 is largely the result of organic pressure from below, given that 65 percent of the French population supports an open-ended strike against the pension reform. The inter-union coalition, however, has maintained a firm hand on the movement. It imposed a pause in strike activity during the February vacation period, and has maintained its conciliatory stance toward the government, as well as its refusal to extend its demands beyond repealing the pension reform. This is beginning to reveal the contradictions of the current situation. Philippe Martinez, general secretary of the CGT, supported the call of certain unions to renew the strike beyond the national mobilization dates (in a highly equivocal manner), yet he did nothing to support them on the ground, maintaining the unity of the conservative union coalition, with Laurent Berger, secretary general of the CFDT, holding fast to his opposition to any generalized strike that would meaningfully bring the economy to a halt.

A letter by the union coalition addressed to Macron on March 9 asked him to meet with the union leaders, in order to settle things behind closed doors at the Elysée Palace, despite the huge on-the-ground mobilizations supporting a more offensive strategy, such as calling for a general strike, which is very much in the coalition’s power. The wording of this letter also voices the union bureaucrats’ fears that the situation may turn “explosive” if Macron fails to negotiate with them, perfectly portraying their misgivings at a radicalization and generalization of the movement that would take the reins out of their hands and into those of the workers themselves, while simultaneously showing the need to push things in that direction (the government having since refused to negotiate).

These explosive elements are very much in the air, ready to take flame. There remains widespread opposition to the reform and the Macron administration in general, as well as support for the mobilizations. A study published in Le Monde finds that those in precarious private-sector subcontractor jobs are just as much involved in the mobilizations as their salaried counterparts (at nearly 15 percent, a virtually unprecedented rate), and that there remains an untapped 15 percent of active workers who have not yet participated in mobilizations yet say they are “ready to do so,” with youth and especially impoverished precarious workers overrepresenting this reserve. The union coalition refuses to address these segments of society who are concerned not only by the reform but also more immediately by the rising cost of living due to inflation and stagnant pay, which is fueling much of the mass discontent with the French government.

Were this movement to take up the demand of a universal retirement age at 60 (and 55 for physically demanding jobs), as well as indexing salaries to inflation, calling for the generalization of the strikes to be taken up on the ground by all sectors, it would definitively be setting alight these “explosive” segments. Yet if the fight remains in the unions’ hands and the contradictions don’t blow up in their faces, the strikes on the ground may fizzle out and the threat of a mass disillusion from actions and protests could take hold, laying the groundwork for further antisocial reforms to more easily pass through and a resurgence of the Far Right as the alternative to the status quo. For a more thorough discussion of the strategic impasse and the movement’s potential, have a look at this discussion by Juan Chingo and Romaric Godin.

March 7: The Workers Dig In

For now, the strikes are holding. Several key sectors, from electric to oil to the ports to transport to sanitation, called for renewable strikes on March 7, to be discussed and renewed at least for March 8 in solidarity with International Women’s Day. Some went further, announcing a two-day strike, to be renewed if necessary, such as the oil depots and refineries of Le Havre, Donges, and Normandy, with many other sites renewing every eight hours. March 7 saw some impressive strike numbers, even if not all sectors went on to renew their mobilizations. One sector that saw a surge in strike participation was public service workers, back up to the levels seen on January 19, the first day of mobilizations. Private-sector workers (who are often slower to go on strike due to higher work instability) were back up to their levels at the previous height of the strikes on January 31, with many even announcing strikes beyond March 7, such as meat-processing workers, who called a week-long strike.

In transport, the workers at the state railway company, SNCF, were on the offensive, and in the subways the workers of the Paris public transport system RATP made sure that only one out of six trains was running. Both workplaces went into open-ended strikes. Starting early in the morning, major roadways were blocked in many commercial and industrial areas throughout France in impressive collective inter-professional actions. In aviation, 20 to 30 percent of flights were down, with 50 percent of plane refuellers on strike nationally, and 100 percent of airport workers on strike in Marseille, Tarbes, and Strasbourg. At Charles de Gaulle Airport, there was a massive picket of nearly 1,000 crowded outside the terminals, with speeches highlighting the highly political nature of this fight, with anti-racist and feminist speeches coming not only from activists and students but also from many of the workers. Energy workers jumped back into the struggle in huge numbers, with 80 percent or more on strike in numerous worksites. By noon, the EDF declared a loss in the nuclear sector of 9,900 megawatts of power, equal to the power of a dozen reactors, and 7,000 megawatts in hydroelectric; a full 21,000 total by day’s end was boasted by the CGT energy union. Given these actions and the millions in the streets by afternoon, March 7 was a stunning show of force.

March 8: Bread, But Roses Too

The inherent link between women’s oppression and labor exploitation was impossible to ignore this year, with many seeing March 8 as a natural continuation of the fight against a pension reform already seen as a deepening of the inequalities between men and women workers. The morning saw the pickets of those who had called for renewable strikes the day before, in the refineries, in sanitation, etc. Numerous ports were blocked by the dockworkers, with workers in other sectors joining from energy, rail, and aeronautics. Trash pickup was largely on hold in Paris, Ivry, Moselle, and Sète. Electrical workers pursued numerous “Robin Hood” actions, turning off the electricity at an Amazon distribution center, Blagnac airport, the Stade de France, and the Minister of Labor and Employment Olivier Dussopt’s home. A highway blockade and consumer solidarity action making the tolls free was violently repressed by riot police, who similarly reacted at many of the other blockages throughout the country by workers. Even workers at the Louvre staged demonstrations with evocative images of pickets in front of the Mona Lisa and Winged Victory.

After the pickets, there was a pointedly political air in the streets, with the reform fight very much on people’s minds, pushing a record-breaking number of people, from feminists to trade unionists to students, onto the pavement. Marches in Paris were lively with flash mob actions such as the one introduced by actress and activist Adèle Haenel, known for her roles in Portrait of a Lady on Fire and 120 Beats per Minute, who dedicated the performance to the women of Iran, before going on to join a contingent of nearly 1,000 from the revolutionary feminist collective Du Pain et Des Roses, a sea of purple flags engulfing the boulevards. Equally impressive marches were well on display throughout France. And everywhere there was solid union turnout, showing the worker solidarity that should underlie all struggles against oppression.

March 9: Students Strike Back

Students had already been steadily multiplying in the streets throughout the mobilization dates, and their participation since February 7 was nothing short of spectacular, with 300 high schools and 22 universities blockaded by students throughout the country. But students have been organizing their own protests beyond the union calendar since the beginning, and February 9 was their day of the week to shine, with thousands flooding the upper-class 10th district of Paris, and thousands more marching throughout France. Starting early in the morning, numerous high schools and universities were blockaded, with students choosing to show their support for the striking workers, who visited from nearby workplaces such as the refineries, incinerators, metros, and train stations. Given the precarity that students are facing with inflation, deteriorating working conditions, and appalling living standards; the recent cuts to student benefits such as for food and housing; and Macron’s recent proposal to impose a two-week military training program on all students to bolster “patriotic values” during a period of mass discontent and mobilization — given all this, the students are rightfully mad and could prove a radicalizing force that could politicize the movement by pushing forcefully for more than the demands and tactics proposed and held in place by the union heads. Since March 9, student support for and links with striking workers has only grown and deepened, whether on the ground or in the general assemblies.

March 13: One Week On

One-third of the natural gas terminals have been on hold for over a week now. Lines of cars are amassing at the slowly emptying gas stations. Major industrial and commercial zones remain blockaded nationally. On March 13, oil, electric, and rail workers were holding strong, with several sites voting to renew their strikes all the way out to March 16. Walking through Paris, one saw mountains of garbage dotting the streets in even the wealthiest and most touristy neighborhoods, an impressive sign of the importance of the sanitation workers, 40 percent of whom have been on strike for over two weeks now nationally. The three major Parisian incinerators have been blockaded, thousands of tons of trash going uncollected per day, and the strike renewed for another week, despite government threats of imprisonment for strikers who refuse to go back to work (in classic fashion, Berger, the above-mentioned head of France’s most conservative union, the CFDT, distanced himself from any such actions). This tactic of “réquisition” (forcing strategic-sector workers to go back on the job or face prison time) called against sanitation workers was used against the refinery workers during their historic strike in November, and the minister of transport this week has also responded with threats of arrest for any strikers in the refineries this time around. This is, however, a risky move that largely blew up in the government’s face in terms of public opinion in November — the strikers won much sympathy when people saw the repression they were facing.

Monday evening saw a meeting called by the Réseau de la Grève Général (Network for the General Strike), an initiative largely put in place by militants at Left Voice’s sister organization, Révolution Permanente. This meeting brought together over 600 trade unionists, students, and antiracist and feminist activists, with 700 tuning in via livestream. At this meeting, Frédéric Lordon, French philosopher and economist at the French National Center for Scientific Research, noted that “domination often compels in the dominated an underestimation of the fragility of the opponent they are facing.” Indeed, when one finds oneself at war, and this is a class war, one must never make the mistake of overestimating one’s enemy. These kinds of threats and the police repression seen at the protests and blockades, as well as the visibility of the collective force of the working class, which is entering a period of subjectivity unseen in decades, should illustrate the comparative weakness of the Macron government, which is having to negotiate deeply unpopular reforms in a losing parliamentary alliance in order to manage French capital.

March 16: Tick … Tick … Boom?

Following major actions by millions of students and workers on nearly every day since March 7, this Thursday, March 16, Macron pushed the pension reform through the French National Assembly. His Renaissance party, having failed to secure a majority in the last election and finding difficulties in retaining a bloc with their closest allies, Les Républicains, resorted to utilizing an antidemocratic parliamentary maneuver known as the “49-3” to get it done. The use of this constitutional article was an inciting factor in generalizing the mass discontent before the Yellow Vest movement in 2018, which often underlined the undemocratic nature of the French Fifth Republic, and we’re already witnessing a similarly massive and spontaneous backlash today. Thursday evening saw mobilizations of thousands in nearly every major city immediately following the passing of the reform. A demonstration at the prefecture in Marseille erupted into a wildcat protest. An inter-university march in Paris joined thousands of workers at the Place de la Concorde who then battled against shields, batons, and tear gas by pulling bags out from the thousands of tons of uncollected trash and throwing them at the riot police. And numerous other unofficial protests took place in Grenoble, Lyon, Strasbourg, etc, with chants and slogans calling for the resignation of the Macron administration (a call which is resonating, as noted above, with over 70 percent of the population). The use of the 49-3 reveals a profound political crisis in the Macron regime as it has convinced neither the French population nor even the parliament. The strategic response to such a move will prove decisive. Time is of the essence.

We know well the positions of the leaders of the union coalition, who are revealing their colors as bureaucrats through-and-through, with their sole proposal moving forward being yet another symbolic single-day action to be held next week, on March 23, allowing the immediate outrage against the government to dissipate. Even before the 49-3, Berger was already saying publicly that if the reform were to win a majority in parliament, the CFDT would fully accept the result. Martinez to his credit had vaguely alluded to further actions on the part of the CGT and called for a popular referendum to be held… the day before the National Assembly vote, on March 15 [excuse this writer’s exasperated tone]. Their incapacity to offer anything new may begin a process of large-scale recognition of their utter strategic failure. None of the protests Thursday night were called by any of the movement’s leaders. They instead reveal an energy and initiative surpassing anything Berger or Martinez has yet to offer.

But the groundwork that goes into winning a struggle such as this goes beyond anything even the most well-intentioned union bureaucrat can accomplish, and that’s the patient work being done in the increasing number of general assemblies and picket lines, where workers are discussing among themselves how to bring their colleagues into the fight, how to bring in the unorganized or unengaged sectors, of whether to renew the strikes, of what demands the movement should be taking up, of the inherently political nature of this fight, etc. The question of salaries, for example, remains central to this struggle even if the union bureaucracy, the bourgeois media, and the Macron government are refusing any connection between the two.

The meeting held by the Réseau on the evening of March 13, and now the thousands taking to the streets of their own accord, beyond the union’s calls, loudly affirms two things: First, there is a willingness to extend the strikes, to bring the economy, and therefore capital, to its knees, to generalize the massive energy expressed by millions of people in France. By nightfall, workers at Total Normandie, the largest refinery in the country, producing a quarter of all French oil, voted to halt all operations by the weekend. These refineries cannot simply be turned back on; once they’re stopped, it could take days or weeks to get production back up to capacity. Such actions will ripple out to the gas stations by month’s end, likely pushing other sectors to join in, and it is up to students and other workers to come to their aid when the government and the bosses inevitably fight back. 

Second, something must be done to break the strategic impasse brought about by the union coalition and the failed “guerrilla” parliamentary strategy of the institutional Left, led by La France Insoumise. Many of those on the ground recognize this impasse, and there is a readiness to build something from below, in the unions, in the streets, and in mass general assemblies led by workers, students, the precarious and oppressed. 

The current movement proves the political weakness of its adversaries. The French workers are not alone; this is, of course, happening in tandem with the massive strikes we’re seeing against the decay of the neoliberal period internationally (whether in Brazil, Peru, Britain, Germany, Portugal, Greece, etc.). A victory in France would ignite the hopes and imaginations of the working class the world over. It is imperative to make use of and build upon the current rapport of force, which remains in our favor, to go on the offensive, to take advantage of the widespread rage of the moment by posing the question of abolishing the presidency and the senate — in short, the entire edifice of the antidemocratic Fifth Republic, as the Yellow Vests did in 2018. We can draw on the entire radical history of France and the international worker’s movement to put forward a revolutionary perspective. Indeed, it is up to us all to ensure that the movement doesn’t fizzle out, but instead leads to what the union bureaucrats, the government, its police, and its media all fear: an explosion.

The post France: Macron Bets On His Presidency as Millions Rise Up appeared first on Left Voice.

It’s official. TUGSA has voted, and by a margin of 344-8, the six-week-long strike of grad workers in Philadelphia is over. It ended in important victories. 

For more coverage from the front lines of this strike from Left Voice, see this, this, this, this, this, and this. 

As a teacher looking in from the outside — I’m an adjunct in the faculty union here at Temple — it seems to me one of the most important wins is: TUGSA defeated a brutal anti-union campaign. Early on in the strike, Temple’s administrators stripped grad workers of healthcare and tuition remission. They returned healthcare to the workers before the strike even ended, a sign that the bosses saw they were losing. Now tuition remission has been returned as well. If Temple had won using those kinds of measures, it would have had a devastating effect on union struggle, especially in higher ed, across the country, like in the looming Rutgers strike.

There’s another big win too. TUGSA destroyed the system of “tiered” wages for its members. That system of tiers left some making significantly less than others in the bargaining unit. That’s no small feat. Dividing members of a union against themselves is the order of the day when it comes to union busting. Getting rid of tiers is a key demand other unions are fighting for, too, but one many haven’t yet been able to win. 

Grad workers also won more bereavement and parental leave, as well as an important  raise in pay. In the first year of the new contract, they’ll make 23.1 per cent more; by the end, in 2026, grad workers will make about 30 per cent more overall, moving them from $19,500 to $27,000.  

The deal isn’t perfect, to be sure. For example, the wage bump takes grad worker pay closer to a living wage in Philadelphia, but won’t take it all the way there (according to MIT’s living wage calculator). 

From the outside, it seems that more could have been won.  A key reason is that my own faculty union didn’t throw its full weight into the struggle. I’ll come back to this in a minute.

Lessons from TUGSA

First we should talk about one of the most important things about this strike, which is how TUGSA won what it won — a militancy, creativity, and cunning that could inspire others in the U.S. labor struggle, especially at colleges and universities. 

TUGSA made no end of trouble for the university bosses. Its members built big, loud, disruptive pickets. Crucially, over the course of the struggle TUGSA’s rank and file intensified those pickets, from “normal” ones (marching, chanting, singing, but allowing people to and fro) to “hard” ones.  Grad workers set up a series of pickets to block trucks and to stop scab drivers from entering buildings. They linked arms — letting students and others in and out but blocking the UPS supervisors. It worked. 

Solidarity was key. In February, TUGSA linked up with undergraduates — like the union for undergraduates, TUUWOC — who staged a 2,000 strong walkout that ended by surrounding the president’s office. When the university hired wildly unqualified teachers as scabs, the grad workers helped spark a class-action lawsuit by parents against the university. TUGSA helped push the leaders of my own union (for faculty, librarians, and others) to ramp up its “anti-scabbing” message. Rank and file faculty organized across their departments and colleges to flood the bosses with signed statements of support for TUGSA. 

Momentum was building throughout the semester. It crested in March, when the “hard” pickets  started and when my union (TAUP) started organizing for a “no-confidence” vote in Temple’s President Wingard. Exhibit A: the sadistic way he responded to the strike. 

By itself, a no-confidence vote can’t dethrone the leader of a university. But it can start the process. It became clear that President Wingard was rattled. Once proceedings towards a vote started, he sent an alarmed email to the university — and gave the vote free publicity — to say that harsh austerity moves are needed for the sake of the university. 

This is not the kind of message you send  to win over students, or grad workers, or faculty. It was a message to his bosses, the Board of Trustees, a kind of public pleading for his job. It’s no coincidence that this deal was struck amid the whirring of the machinery of that no confidence vote. 

They Could Have Won More — with More Solidarity

It’s clear, in other words: TUGSA won what it did because of the solidarity and militancy that it built up.  But I think it could have won more — like if my union, TAUP, threw its full bulk into the fight. 

To be sure, there were key ways TAUP stood behind TUGSA, like delivering food and beginning to organize a vote of no confidence in the president. We should sneeze at any of this.

But right when the strike first started, my union leaders’ messaging was almost ambivalent. An early email said that many of us would not need to scab, though maybe some might — not exactly a full-throated rejection of scabbing. It was only on February 8th, weeks into the struggle, that this line was hardened, in an all-union email, to (to quote the subject line) “Say no to scabbing.” 

More importantly, there were just too few of us on the pickets next to TUGSA. Some of us were there, for sure, though not many. Especially early on, our leadership told us time and again that joining the pickets would violate our “no-strike” clause in our contract. 

For background: it is normally not forbidden to walk on another union’s pickets. That’s a first-amendment right. And yet our leadership had agreed to a no-strike clause in our contract which is so wildly prohibitive that it expressly forbids even constitutional activity like walking on a picket. Grad workers told me again and again: a mortal fear of that clause has been drummed into my union’s rank-and-file. 

First of all, a no-strike clause should never have been accepted in our contract in the first place. It should have been fought tooth and nail. The power of workers like us comes from the fact that we do everything that a business needs to run: teaching and grading, sweeping and cooking, coding and pouring coffee. We’re the ones who make the bosses rich. We flex our muscles by refusing to work, and giving up the right to strike means we agree to fight with our hands tied behind our backs. No wonder our bosses love the no strike clause. 

And certainly any clause like this — probiting constitutional activity like walking on another person’s pickets — should have been laughed out of the room at any bargaining session. Why wasn’t it? Besides, there was absolutely no way for the university to tell if any of us were on the pickets. They were so busy scrambling for scabs the entire strike, they had no time or personnel to even check up on us. The bosses’ threat here was totally empty, and that became clear from day one of the strike. It would have been child’s play for our leaders to organize contingents of teachers, “under the table,” to the pickets, and they refused.

But there’s a deeper reason for such timidity at play here. For years, my union’s leadership left us unprepared to fight the way we need to — so when a strike was knocking on our door asking for our help, we didn’t know what to do. “Strike” is almost a dirty word for our union leaders in any meeting I’m at — even though our contract, with its “no strike clause,” ends in October. Three years ago, at our last contract, leadership told us that TAUP isn’t ready to strike; it’ll take time and careful preparation. But that was three years ago, and in that whole time they never started preparing. Now we’re facing down our next negotiations this year, and now we’ve been left unprepared to fight the way we’ll need to for a better contract — let alone to walk the pickets and support other strikes.  The Temple bosses were vicious to TUGSA, and TUGSA only won through a strike they’d been preparing for for years; their strike is how they won what they did. 

Is there any chance we could win a deal anywhere close to TUGSA’s without a pitched fight?

But all this points to the problems with top-down “business unionism” that’s been the norm in the US labor movement, not just my union, for far too long. It’s a model that says: unions don’t need to fight and strike to win, they just need to trust the wiles of union leaders, and their political allies, the Democrats, who will do the fighting for us. Unions made a harder pivot to that approach than ever before starting in 1980. The last forty years show: this is a strategy for losing. It served as the midwife to perhaps the most catastrophic decline in the U.S. labor movement in its history.

But imagine Imagine a different situation. Imagine my union had been preparing for our own strike for the last three years — building up a network of “strike captains” in every department, and creating escalating rallies to ready ourselves, to screw up our courage, for when our contract runs out this October. Now jump forward to the TUGSA strike this past January. All of a sudden there’s a strike on our doorstep and it starts knocking. Now we’d have a union that had been training itself to not be afraid but to fight, practicing basic skills like rallying and creating a communication network to mobilize ourselves in big numbers. 

In that world, it’d probably be pretty hard to stop a lot of us from being on that picket line. We already know TUGSA built up its numbers through years of strike prep. Imagine how much TAUP’s numbers would have increased. Our membership, in fact, did jump during the TUGSA strike. With those bigger numbers and with more prep, who knows what else we could have done, too — like a sickout. When I was in the IWW we used to say: there’s no such thing as an illegal strike, just a strike that has the power to win, or one that doesn’t. 

Imagine, in that alternate universe, how much stronger the TUGSA strike would have been — and how much more TUGSA would have won. And it’s not just about TUGSA. Any union winning big at Temple is good for every union at Temple. And across Philly, and for unions in the United States in general. Big wins raise the floor across the board, and they spread inspiration like sparks. 

The TUGSA strike offers a key lesson, in other words: militant pickets and active solidarity mean victory, and the more the better. It’s a lesson that my own union, and every union, should pay attention to.  

Ripple Effects

TUGSA ended its last “Strike Daily Debrief” like this: “We will see you all at the Rutgers picket lines…” 

The Rutgers faculty down the road from us in Philly is preparing for its own strike. At the University of Pennsylvania, undergrads are unionizing. So are medical residents at Penn. But not just in Philly. UTLA, the primary ed teacher union in Los Angeles, looks like it might go on strike in the near future. 

TUGSA’s strike goes way beyond TUGSA. It offer lessons not just for my own union at Temple. It could very well be a spur and lesson for education unions, or any other kind. 

See you on the picket lines! 

The post Temple’s Grad Worker Strike Ends with Important Victories  appeared first on Left Voice.

On Wednesday March 15, tens of thousands of teachers and education workers rallied at the steps of Los Angeles City Hall.  The joint rally of K-12 teachers (UTLA) and education support staff (SEIU 99) was organized to announce plans for both unions to go on strike, with SEIU 99 taking the lead in the fight for better wages, improved staff to student ratios, and an end to harassment by administrators. The mood was lively, with a mariachi band made up of teachers playing for the crowd, teachers and support staff dancing to the music, and pockets of teachers and education workers striking up impromptu chants and banging on homemade drums. When the two unions together announced there will be a joint strike March 21-24 this month, the crowd erupted with applause! There was an air of solidarity and optimism as SEIU workers mingled with UTLA teachers. 

Teachers and support staff have been pushed to exhaustion, forced to work with fewer teachers and more students at wages that do not meet the cost of living. Roybal high school teacher Tiffany Wallace told Left Voice of the stark disparity between education workers’ wages and the massive salary of the head of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). The LAUSD superintendent, Albert Carvahlo is being paid a salary “higher than the governor of California, while teachers are barely scraping by, surviving off of the Dollar Tree.” With inflation and teachers leaving the profession because of stagnant wages, current workers are expected to do the work that two teachers used to do. Superintendent Carvahlo is acting like a vampire, sucking the lifeblood from education workers while pulling down a yearly salary of $440,000.  An important demand of the strike is that wage increases at least match the rising cost of living. 

SEIU 99 has been without a contract since 2020 and their wages have been reduced even more by increasing costs of living. The average pay of school support staff is $20,000 a year. These are poverty wages for the school’s teacher’s aides, cafeteria workers, and bus drivers. 

The strike, set to take place from March 21 thru March 24, will be significant as the Los Angeles Unified School District is the second largest in the country. It is unfortunate that the union bureaucracy is insisting on a three day strike instead of an open ended strike. Limiting the strike from the jump allows the bosses to prepare, plan around, and attempt to undermine its power. 

An open-ended strike, like the one that UTLA teachers held in 2019 kept the power in the hands of the workers, who did not go back to work until their demands were met. That 2019 strike is still very much on the minds of the teachers who participated, and likely was part of the high teacher turnout for the rally on Wednesday. 

The planned UTLA and SEIU strike is an important escalation in the ongoing struggles of municipal workers across the city and the state to confront rising inflation and the out of control cost of living increases that have made California unaffordable for working people and must be defended. For this strike to succeed however, will require more than the enthusiastic participation of teachers. In order to win these unions will have to win the support of the broader working class families that they serve. And UTLA rank and file have been working to build those ties by supporting popular struggles like the 2020 Black LIves Matter protests. In fact, it was during the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement that UTLA members fought and were able to reduce the school police budget by 31%. UTLA also engaged and organized with students, parents and community to continue to oppose cops on school campuses. Support from an active, progressive union like UTLA could bolster the bargaining power of SEIU 99. 

This strike of the two unions comes on the heels of several higher education strikes across the country, including at the University of California schools, Columbia University,  and Temple University, which all won meaningful gains as a result of strikes and job actions. The success of higher education strikes like these could bring more inspired life into an incipient movement. 

The strike, led by SEIU 99, is also a sympathy strike by UTLA. Sympathy strikes are at times deemed “illegal” by the National Labor Relations Board. That means both UTLA and SEIU 99 are taking a bold step to challenge the Los Angeles public education system and labor laws. It is a powerful move during a self-described “pro labor” Biden administration. Biden who broke the strike of railroad workers along with Republicans and The Squad are agents of capital. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), is often presented to workers as impartial, but in reality has a history that undermines U.S. workers. Any pro-worker stances taken by the NLRB are because workers at Amazon, Starbucks, REI and more have forced the NLRB to act. Yet even with the pressures of Generation U. forming unions, the NLRB does not enforce laws against bosses’ union busting or other illegal practices, and is severely underfunded. 

Workers must defend ourselves against the bosses. If the education workers win, their demands could inspire workers in the public sector and private sector to take similar actions in solidarity. In France, as this article is being written, there is a national general strike with workers defying austerity measures by the Macron regime. It is possible in the U.S. to take up the fight of education workers as a fight of the entire working class. This fight is the only way for us to secure decent enough wages to survive comfortably, full employment so we aren’t breaking our backs as one person doing the work of three, and a workplace free of harassment by bosses who retaliate when we speak up about working conditions. The labor movement should take up this strike and support the workers involved. Workers must fight for our right to strike whenever we deem necessary and repeal anti-union and anti-worker legislation like right to work or the Taft Hartley Act. Workers should prepare for extending the strike if their demands are not met. The rest of the labor movement then must also prepare to support and fight alongside these workers until they win. Wednesday’s massive rally shows the workers are ready to fight. The rest of the labor movement must support them.  

The post Teachers and Education Workers Set to Strike! Tens of Thousands Rally in Los Angeles  appeared first on Left Voice.

One year after Russia’s disastrous invasion, the war in Ukraine remains a subject of intense debate on the Left. With rare exceptions, the arguments put forward in these conversations inevitably lead toward one of two positions: either support for the NATO-backed Zelenskyy government or defense of the reactionary Russian invasion. Left Voice and our sister organizations in the Trotskyist Fraction (FT) have from the start rejected this false choice. We have made it clear since even before the 2022 Russian offensive, that there are no progressive sides to the conflict in Ukraine, and that the only solution is through the revolutionary action of the working classes of all the states involved — including Russia, Ukraine, and of course, the United States and its NATO allies in Europe. 

As revolutionary socialists organizing within the heart of global imperialism, Left Voice recognizes that our program has to start by denouncing the bloody role that the United States and its NATO allies have played in the Ukrainian conflict. To this end, we have consistently opposed U.S. and NATO sanctions against Russia and arms shipments to Ukraine, and continue to support the use of working-class methods of struggle to end or block the shipment of U.S. and NATO weapons to the Zelenskyy government. The reactionary Russian invasion in 2022 has been a disaster for the working people of Ukraine and Russia alike, and we therefore also continue to call for the immediate withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine, and urge our working class siblings in both countries to turn their weapons against their own bourgeoisie. 

But this war is bigger than just Russia and Ukraine and it is impossible to fully understand the implications of the war without looking at the totality of the situation. The 2022 invasion and the massive rearmament of Europe that followed have marked a new stage in a growing conflict that has become a proxy war between the imperialist states of the U.S. and NATO on one side, and an emerging alliance between Russia and China on the other. While some on the Left see this new pole of Russia and China as a check against U.S. imperialism, neither country is anti-imperialist, and neither has anything progressive to offer working people and the oppressed. A military victory for either side would have disastrous consequences for the working class in the countries involved in the war, including Ukraine.

***

In the spirit of open and comradely discussion, we recently published a series of articles in debate with our position on the conflict. Among those was a recent polemic by Rob Lyons and Scott Cooper that, among other points, strongly criticizes our position on the war. Lyons and Cooper argue that our position, particularly around the reactionary nature of the Russian invasion, is theoretically and historically confused. According to the authors (who astoundingly engage with only one line of one article by Left Voice), our description of the Russian invasion of Ukraine endorses the imperialist discourse of the United States and NATO and contributes to the undoubtedly anti-Russian chauvinism of much of the U.S. populace, and that this is part of the failure of the majority of the U.S. Left to oppose NATO and to build an anti-war movement. In their article, they take specific issue with our characterization of the beginning of the current war:

The unsigned Left Voice article referenced above opens with: “It’s been nearly one year since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, starting a war that has brought death and destruction and displaced millions.” This is wrong as history, as theory, and as revolutionary politics practiced within the leading imperialist power of the world. And by attributing its “start” to Putin, it lends credence to the talking point of Western imperialism: that the war in Ukraine is “Putin’s war.”

In our view, the authors are forcing a polemic based on a single sentence without engaging with any of the actual analysis, politics, and program that the Trotskyist Fraction and Left Voice have been putting forward since the war began. This would hardly be worth refuting, since anyone can look for themselves at the dozens of articles that have been published in Left Voice on the war since the Russian invasion. Unfortunately, this is the least of the problems with the argument. More disconcerting is the fact that the article as a whole obscures one of the crucial aspects of the current war by downplaying Russia’s agenda, politics, and objectives in invading Ukraine, and by lacking a class analysis of Russia’s role in the contemporary world order. This failure to fully understand the totality of the situation of the war in its global context ultimately leads Lyons and Cooper to a campist position toward Russia, a nationalist position toward the Russian-fueled war in the Donbas, and a decidedly confused application of Lenin’s theory of revolutionary defeatism that necessitates a thorough response.

Neither NATO Nor Putin

Among the majority of the U.S. Left there are effectively two conflicting positions on the war. On the one hand, there are groups such as the Tempest collective, which have capitulated to NATO interests and argue that the war in Ukraine is a war of national liberation against what they mistakenly characterize as Russian imperialism. This tendency argues that it is necessary for socialists to support US-led NATO interventions and, in the most extreme cases, to demand even more weapons and funding for the Ukrainian army from the countries that are part of the alliance. In this way, they are calling for the triumph of the pro-NATO Zelenskyy government. 

On the other hand, groups like the Party for Socialism and Liberation, and to some extent, the International Committee of the DSA, see Russia’s invasion as a largely defensive action, often ignoring or downplaying the country’s obvious strategic and economic interests in Ukraine. The most extreme positions in this camp, such as that of the Internationalist Group, believe that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine represents a sort of anti-imperialist resistance to the designs of NATO and U.S. imperialism and call for working people to, as one article puts it, “Defend Russia and China Against War-Crazed U.S. Rulers.” This sector tends to focus exclusively on NATO’s warlike and expansionist policy, without regard to Russia’s disastrous role in the larger global conflict that is unfolding. 

While Lyons and Cooper claim at the end of their polemic that there is no progressive side in the war, their analysis of the “causes” of the current invasion, and their inaccurate depiction of the larger Russo-Ukrainian conflict, end up downplaying Russia’s agenda, politics, and interests, and hence misunderstand the character of the war. This deep confusion about the nature of the Putin regime and its relationship to Ukraine also invariably lends credence and support to the arguments of those in the pro-Russian camp who see the Russian invasion, and the pro-Russian separatist movements in the Donbas, as somehow a challenge to global imperialism. 

Indeed, reading the article it would appear that the authors believe the current war has little to do with Russian aggression, but is, simply put, an inevitable product of “U.S. imperialism’s ongoing war against Russia.” Employing a decidedly mechanical application of historical materialism, they trace the conflict between the United States and Russia all the way back to the U.S. purchase of Alaska and the U.S. intervention in the Russian Civil War, and only later discuss the period of NATO expansion directly following the breakup of the Soviet Union and the capitalist restoration of the former Soviet Republics. For Lyons and Cooper — who make no distinctions between the Russia of the Tsarist regime or the former Soviet Union, and the capitalist Russia of today — it is historic U.S. Russophobia and NATO’s ongoing expansion that are the exclusive drivers of the current war, while Putin’s reactionary invasion last year is treated as little more than an anecdote. 

A Proxy War Amidst Imperialist Decay

The problem with the article is not only what they argue, however, but also what they leave out. Ignoring Trotsky and Lenin’s method of understanding war, they completely omit that the current conflict in Ukraine is taking place in the context of 1) the crisis of neoliberalism and globalization and the historical decline of U.S. hegemony and 2) the growing confrontation between the United States and China as an emerging capitalist power that is challenging the world order that prevailed during the decades of neoliberalism. Even if the article goes backwards in an attempt to periodize the relationship between Russia and the United States since 1867, it remains a rather ahistorical argument that does not take into account the specificities of the context in which the Ukrainian tragedy is currently unfolding. 

In other words, the analytical method of the article is flawed from the beginning, since it fails to take into account the totality of the situation, without which reaching any correct conclusions about how the working class should respond is impossible. In contrast, our analysis and the analysis of the FT are guided by the dialectical methods of Lenin and Trotsky. One such example of this method can be seen in Trotsky’s analysis of the invasion of Czechoslovakia during the prelude to the Second World War in 1938: 

During the critical year in September, we have been told, voices were heard even at the left flank of socialism maintaining that in case of “single combat” between Czechoslovakia and Germany, the proletariat should help Czechoslovakia and save its “national independence” even in alliance with Benes. This hypothetical case did not occur – the heroes of Czechoslovakian independence, as was to be expected, capitulated without a struggle. Even irrespective of its international ties Czechoslovakia constitutes a thoroughly imperialist state. Economically, monopoly capitalism reigns there. Politically, the Czech bourgeoisie dominates (perhaps soon we will have to say, dominated!) several oppressed nationalities. Such a war, even on the part of isolated Czechoslovakia would thus have been carried on not for national independence but for the maintenance and if possible the extension of the borders of imperialist exploitation. It is impermissible to consider a war between Czechoslovakia and Germany, even if other imperialist states were not immediately involved, outside of that entanglement of European and world imperialist relations from which the war might have broken out as an episode. A month or two later the Czech-German war – if the Czech bourgeoisie could fight and wanted to fight – would almost inevitably have involved other states. It would therefore be the greatest mistake for a Marxist to define his position on the basis of temporary conjunctural diplomatic and military groupings, rather than on the basis of the general character of the social forces standing behind the war. We have repeated hundreds of times the priceless thesis of Clausewitz that war is but the continuation of politics by other means. These politics from the very first day of the creation of Czechoslovakia had an imperialist character.

The conflict described by Trotsky here is, of course, not the same as that between Russia and Ukraine. What matters, however, is his method. Only by looking at the totality of the conflict — the “entanglement of European and world imperialist relations” — and the class nature of the various hypothetical combatants is he able to arrive at a clear understanding of the invasion of Czechoslovakia and its relation to the broader struggle of working-class revolution. Applying this same method to the current war in Ukraine is crucial if we wish to fully understand the situation and avoid the mistake of rushing to directly or implicitly endorse either side in this proxy war.

While we agree with Lyons and Cooper that the war in Ukraine did not develop out of thin air, and that Putin’s invasion was quite obviously not the beginning of the conflict (an argument they attribute to us by a willful misreading of one line in one article), we strongly disagree that the war is merely the mechanical continuation of previous hostilities between the United States and Russia. In contrast, we understand that the Russian invasion of Ukraine marked a qualitative shift in the conflict. And this shift has been determined as much by the world historic situation of economic crisis, the decline of U.S. imperial hegemony, Russia’s increasingly aggressive posture as a regional power, and the rise of other global economic and military powers like China, as it has by the ongoing conflict with Russia over NATO expansion, which is merely one part of a much more complicated story. As Claudia Cinatti explains: 

In short, the international dimension of the war is central…[and] the involvement of the great traditional imperialist powers and emerging powers — with the United States and NATO on one side and China and Russia and their various allies on the other — in the conflict shows the potential outlines of future confrontations in the global dispute for hegemony. 

Within this context, the Ukrainian war is best understood not as an inter-imperialist war, or simply a war of NATO aggression, but as a proxy war between competing capitalist alliances, in a period of economic crisis and imperialist decay. 

During the years of the neoliberal boom after the fall of the Soviet Union, U.S. imperialism managed to maintain its military hegemony through a series of local conflicts disguised as “humanitarian interventions” or “wars against terrorism.” But the crisis of neoliberalism and the decline of U.S. hegemony that followed has brought war to a new scale. The Russian invasion of Ukraine, driven by the interests of an entrenched oligarchy which has picked clean the bones of the former workers’ state, marks the beginning of a new type of war, concomitant with the global crisis in which we find ourselves. This is the first military challenge to the U.S.-led multilateral global order of neoliberalism. In this context, the Russian invasion of Ukraine is not secondary but an event that poses a qualitative change in the current geopolitical tensions. 

By challenging NATO’s post-war borders, Russia has precipitated a military crisis whose scope is still difficult to predict. Most importantly, behind Russia, a new emerging power, China, with strong imperialist features — evidenced by its increasing influence in Africa and Latin America — is challenging U.S. economic and military hegemony, raising the specter of greater confrontation in the future. While Russia sees the war and its increasingly close relationship with China as an opportunity to reestablish itself as a global power, the U.S. and NATO see the conflict as a way of strengthening their hand against China and weakening Russia. The various gradients of the “campist” Left, including the soft campism evident in Lyons and Cooper and Lyons article, objectively lead to the recreation of the idea that China and Russia would represent a “progressive” multipolar order. They are blind to the fact that however much the Russia-China alliance challenges U.S. hegemony, it does not, by any stretch of the imagination, challenge the imperialist system. 

Based on this characterization, for us the current war has a reactionary character, and there is no progressive camp. Therefore the international Left cannot align itself either with the United States and NATO nor with Russia or China as if they represented the lesser evil.

Politics by Other Means 

As Matias Maiello argues, understanding the nature of the current war involves understanding the politics behind the military plot: 

It may seem commonplace to say that Lenin’s appropriation of Clausewitz’s view of war as a continuation of politics by other means is fundamental to Marxism. But, as is often the case with common sense, it is sometimes less common than it seems. What are the implications of that famous formula? That in order to analyze a war (especially if an independent policy is to be derived from the analysis), it is necessary to examine all the previous politics of the various actors that are “continued” in the conflict “by other means.” Let us take a look. Very briefly, the politics that Putin is “continuing” with the invasion of Ukraine consist of recreating Russia’s status as a military power through the reconfiguration of its army and the development of its weaponry, and increasing the national oppression of the people of bordering countries, in line with what the czarist and Stalinist regimes did. Some past milestones of this reactionary Russian nationalist policy include the war with Georgia for the control of South Ossetia, the offensive against the Chechen people, and, more recently, the interventions to support reactionary governments in Belarus and Kazakhstan. The politics continued by NATO, which have been called into question by “realist” theorists such as John Mearsheimer, is its expansion toward Eastern Europe to “encircle” Russia after the fall of the USSR. In 1999, it expanded to Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic; in the new century’s first decade, to Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, Albania, and Croatia; and then to Montenegro in 2017 and North Macedonia in 2020. These politics have also included its interference in the “color revolutions,” seeking to capitalize on revolts against authoritarian regimes to expand its imperialist influence. These included the “orange revolution” in Ukraine in 2004 and its continuation in the Maidan uprising of 2014.

While it is undeniable that NATO’s ongoing encirclement of Russia and its attempts to draw Ukraine into its orbit are an important element of the current conflict, this is hardly the end of the story — as Lyons and Cooper would have us believe. Russia’s invasion in 2022 was not only a response to NATO expansion, but was an escalation of its own ongoing politics toward Ukraine — a politics designed to retain the country, particularly the industrial regions of the East, as a semi-colony under Russian control and influence. 

Since the completion of the capitalist restoration of the former Soviet states, Ukraine has been subject to exploitation by both Russian and Western capital. The Ukrainian oligarchs have in turn tried to balance their own interests amid these competing forces, politically vacillating back and forth between the two in a reactionary way that has divided and weakened the working class, and has exacerbated the differences between the East and West of the country. The Putin regime, the United States, and the European Union have all, unsurprisingly, used these growing cleavages to their advantage, at the expense of the Ukrainian people. Europe, for instance, with the help of U.S. money and influence in the form of “pro-democracy” NGOs, has sought to impose debt peonage and liberal reforms upon the Ukrainian economy from abroad, and have used their influence to promote pro-western leaders and political organizations, even those with unsavory nationalist or neo-Nazi politics. Meanwhile, Russia has used the threat of economic and military violence to impose its own debt upon Ukraine, has openly interfered in elections, and — after the overthrow of the Pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych in the euromaidan protests of 2014 — promoted, trained, and armed separatists in the regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, an act that led to almost a decade of war in the Donbas and eventually to the larger Russian invasion in 2022.

Strangely, Lyons and Cooper spend an inordinate part of their article arguing that the reactionary war in Donbas is one of national liberation, rhetorically counterposing it to claims from groups like Tempest about Ukrainian national liberation from Russia. For them, though they do not say so directly, the war in Donbas is the “real” war of liberation, arguing that it is from out of this conflict that a revolutionary defeatist movement might arise. But this is little more than a fairy tale, since it is clear that the few, often right-wing Russian nationalist or even Nazi-aligned militias that have actually participated in the war are now entirely beholden to Russian power and control. Like many others before them, they seem to have fallen for the fringe propagandists of the Putin regime and the campist Left, who have argued that the separatist statelets in the East were defending anti-fascism or were proto-socialist. But as any socialist should be able to clearly see, the idea of national liberation —whether Ukraine’s so-called war of liberation against Russia or the Russian-managed separatist war in Donbas — has been used by both Russia and NATO as a mere pretext for continuing their struggle for influence and control of Ukraine and its people — that is, as a continuation of politics by other means. Since 2022, NATO has poured at least $80 billion into weapons for Ukraine to supposedly defend the country’s national sovereignty. Meanwhile, Russia has sent thousands of troops and heavy weapons into the Donbas since the Euromaidan in 2014 in a clear effort to use the grievances of the Russian-speaking minority of Ukraine to permanently destabilize the country, ensuring that Ukraine’s bids to join NATO or the EU would be impossible thanks to a lack of territorial integrity.

For an Independent Internationalist Working Class Solution to the War in Ukraine

Whoever wins the war in Ukraine, the consequences will be disastrous for workers and the oppressed. The Russian invasion against a semi-colonial country, infinitely less well-armed than Russia itself, is not beneficial for the working class of either country. NATO’s offensive, its territorial expansion, and the historic rearmament of all its members — in particular Germany — won’t bring liberation to our siblings in Ukraine. These acts of war by our oppressors mean only more hardship for the masses of Europe and the world. More violence, more death, more refugees, and more economic and environmental crises. Add to this the growing threat of future conflicts and proxy wars between the United States, NATO, Russia, and China, and it is clear that the working classes of the world must confront the war at home in all of its manifestations, responding to these wars and crises with revolutions of our own.

To this end, Left Voice and the Trotskyist Fraction support the building of anti-war movements in Russia, Ukraine, the United States, and Europe to end the manufacture and distribution of weapons for imperialist wars and to confront our own national bourgeoisies with a program of revolutionary action. Among its demands, such a movement must fight for the abolition of NATO, an end to the rearmament of Europe and all weapons shipments to Ukraine, for the cessation of sanctions against Russia, for the immediate withdrawal of Russian troops from all Ukrainian territories, and for an independent policy in Ukraine to confront both the Russian occupation and imperialist domination.

The post Understanding the Global Context of the Ukrainian Conflict: A Response to Our Critics appeared first on Left Voice.

Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front opens with an astounding five-minute cold open: in the French countryside, a German soldier known only as Heinrich is forced to climb out of his trench and charge, against gunfire and mortars, toward the enemy. As his comrades fall left and right, we don’t even see what happens to the faceless young man. After the title, we see Heinrich on top of a pile of dead bodies. The camera then follows his uniform: it is cleaned, repaired, and returned to Germany, then promptly handed over to the next wave of recruits.

This portrayal of the war machine, utterly indifferent to individual fates, perfectly captures the spirit of Erich Maria Remarque’s 1928 novel. The 17-year-old Paul Bäumer and his friends, blinded by their teachers’ nationalist propaganda, volunteer for the war. At the front, they experience boredom, terror, and the absolute senselessness of the slaughter. The final page of the book contains the moral (today, we would probably call it the “twist”): on the day Paul is killed, the daily report of the general staff says only, “Nothing new in the West.”

Unfortunately, the film does not stop after this brilliant intro. It goes on for two and a half more hours. The spectacular production captures the horrors of the war with overwhelming violence and also tiny details: when a mud-covered soldier steps into a puddle, the splashing water is dark red, revealing that these are pools of blood. The very modern soundtrack evokes dread. And Albrecht Schuch is Germany’s best actor.

While many of the characters are the same — we meet Paul, Frantz, Kat, Tjaden, and so on — the filmmakers decided to “improve” the story, changing it beyond recognition. We are supposed to see the war from the perspective of individual soldiers. All their suffering is “nothing new.” But the film is set in the final days of the war, and the battle scenes are interspersed with the armistice negotiations. The scenes of high politics include genuine historical figures like the liberal politician Matthias Erzberger, and as well as fictional composite figures like the general Friedrich.

This was probably intended to add historical context for an audience that, unlike Remarque’s readers, won’t remember what happened in 1918 too well. But owing to this change, Paul’s travails are no longer situated in the endless slog of trench warfare. No, the story now takes place at the war’s most consequential moment.

How did World War I end? Netflix would have us believe it was thanks to the bravery of liberals like Erzberger, who is shown imploring the generals to cease the slaughter: “Over 40,000 killed in the last few weeks alone!” he proclaims with a sigh. In reality, though, Erzberger was an enthusiastic supporter of the carnage for years — he personally campaigned for German annexations. It was only in 1917 that he realized, after the U.S. had entered the war, that Germany had no chance of winning. In other words, Erzberger was just a pragmatic imperialist and chauvinist. He was in favor of mass slaughter as long as there was a realistic possibility that German capital would profit from it — and he wanted peace once the balance of forces turned against his side. No wonder today’s liberal bourgeois love him.

Omitted from this film is what actually ended the war: the November Revolution. A massive workers’ revolution began with a sailors’ revolt on November 4, 1918, and quickly spread across Germany. This film mentions briefly that the kaiser abdicated, but it offers no explanation of what caused Wilhelm II to do so. On November 9, the kaiser’s palace in Berlin was surrounded by hundreds of thousands of workers during a general strike and insurrection. The revolutionary fervor shook the entire army and navy. The hours-long film references this in a single line about “soldiers refusing to follow orders.”

The story’s new ending is bizarre. Hours before the armistice is set to take effect, General Friedrich orders Paul and his regiment to attack the French lines. This is a case of “dangerous half knowledge” (as a German idiom puts it): a Netflix writer must have heard about a genuine historical incident without quite understanding it. As the end of the war came into sight, at the end of October 1918, the German navy’s high command ordered some 80,000 sailors to head out to sea for a final — and hopeless — battle against the British fleet. What happened next is crucial: the sailors refused. They arrested their officers and raised red flags on their ships. This event, known as the Kiel Sailors’ Mutiny, was the start of the revolution.

This was the situation throughout the military, and the officers understood that well. In the film we learn that the head of Germany’s Army High Command, Paul von Hindenburg, was pressing Erzberger to sign the capitulation. Why? The film offers no explanation. In his memoirs, Hindenburg recalled being told at the end of September that “revolution was at the door” in Germany if the war continued.

If we imagine a situation like the film’s conclusion, in which Paul and his comrades are ordered to go on a suicidal and senseless assault during the final minutes of the war, we can be pretty sure what would have happened. The soldiers would have taken their guns and shot the general before heading home to fight for a revolution and get rid of everyone responsible for such an inconceivable slaughter. Instead, director Edward Berger wants us to think Paul would keep killing on command — the war has apparently turned him into a murderous psychopath incapable of anything but attacking French soldiers. While the novel wanted us to empathize with its everyman hero, the film’s conclusion makes that impossible.

In a time when trench warfare has returned to Europe, All Quiet on the Western Front is more relevant than it’s been for a long time. But the point of the book is that soldiers are not mindless automatons who are condemned to suffer and kill and die until liberal politicians save the day. It’s the opposite: soldiers and the working class in general can end capitalist slaughter and create a new world. I am currently reading the excellent autobiography of Fritz Zikelsky,¹Fritz Zikelsky, Das Gewehr in meiner Hand. Erinnerungen eines Arbeiterveteranen (Berlin: Verlag des Ministeriums für Nationale Verteidigung), 1959. who was drafted into the German army in World War I. He describes the same horrors — but also how the troops increasingly fought back against their officers, until finally disarming them. This kind of real history is what we need up on the silver screen. But I wouldn’t expect it from Netflix.

The post Turning the Greatest Anti-war Novel Ever into Bourgeois Propaganda appeared first on Left Voice.