The Socialist 11 October 2002

Wages Not War

WHAT DO firefighters, tube workers, council workers, teachers, college lecturers, rail workers and health workers all have in common? They've either taken action or are preparing to take action against low pay.

THE PRIVATE Finance Initiative (PFI) is handing billions of pounds of public money in profits to private companies. Despite a 2:1 vote at Labour Party conference in favour of a review, New Labour is accelerating the handover of essential public services to private vultures.

ALTHOUGH THE union leaders were able to get council workers to accept a pay deal which was far less than they went out for, there is little sign of "industrial peace" breaking out for the government and the bosses. By Bill Mullins

WAR ON Iraq - what team Bush doesn't want you to know by William Rivers Pitt, which includes a lengthy interview with former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter, is a concise argument against a US-led war on Iraq.

THE DEEP gloom in the economy is spreading to the finance sector. Until recently, says the Financial Times, banks shrugged off fears about bad debts and had big profits. No more.

Share prices in the banks have plummeted on stock markets worldwide. In the USA, Bank of New York shares went down 22% while Comerica's fell by 24%.

Socialism, the weekend of discussion and debate hosted by the Socialist Party, is due to be bigger and better than ever before.

Everyone wanting to discuss developments in Britain and around the world should come along.

Every Socialist Party member should come, bringing the people you know who are looking for socialist ideas. As the agenda below shows - there's something to interest everyone.

AS WE go to press, it seems almost certain that Northern Ireland's Executive and Assembly will collapse this week. New Labour's Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid will probably suspend the institutions in the hope that they can one day be resuscitated. By Ciaran Mulholland, Belfast Socialist Party More ...

Police Raid Sinn Fein Offices: ON FRIDAY 4 October, 30 members of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) stormed into Sinn Fein's offices at Stormont in Belfast.

A NEW book by the novelist Martin Amis entitled "Koba the Dread: Laughter and the twenty million" has created a stir in the world of politics as well as literature. By Jim Hensman

Lula Close To Winning Presidency: THE WORKERS Party (PT) candidate, Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva, got the highest vote in the first round of Brazil's presidential election. ANDRÉ FERRARI of Socialismo Revolucionario (SR - CWI, Brazil) reports on this pivotal election.

Brazil: Striking Teachers Face Police Repression:  STRIKING TEACHERS in Cotia, Brazil have been brutally attacked by military police.

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Workers need...

Wages Not War

WHAT DO firefighters, tube workers, council workers, teachers, college lecturers, rail workers and health workers all have in common? They've either taken action or are preparing to take action against low pay.

The firefighters are balloting for a 40% wage rise. FBU London Regional Secretary Mike Shergold told The Socialist: "Firefighters feel that our claim is justified. The public support us and accept that we can no longer exist on the money we get. The firefighters are continuing to support the claim and back it up with strike action if necessary".

Tony Blair says that paying the firefighters a decent wage would cause "terrible damage" to the economy. But what about the "terrible damage" that a war against Iraq would cause? It would take £400 million to pay the firefighters their full claim. Yet Bush and Blair are preparing to finance a war for oil that could cost as much as $200 billion.

As usual the profits of big business are being put before the wages and lives of ordinary working-class people.

In the last year fat-cat executive pay has increased six times more than the average wage. The typical chief executive is on £933,000 a year whilst the lowest paid are expected to put up with a rise in the minimum wage of just 10p per hour to £4.20.

We need a united fight against low pay and for a decent living wage. And we need to fight for a system that puts people before profit.

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PFI Stinks

THE PRIVATE Finance Initiative (PFI) is handing billions of pounds of public money in profits to private companies. Despite a 2:1 vote at Labour Party conference in favour of a review, New Labour is accelerating the handover of essential public services to private vultures.

Cllr Dave Nellist, Socialist Group leader, Coventry city council

At the conference, Tony Blair said: "I don't care who builds them. This isn't the betrayal of public services - it's their renewal". New Labour, he said, was "putting power in the hands of the parent or patient".

Rubbish! PFI puts power in the hands of the spivs and shareholders. It's a series of Enrons in the making.

Three days after Blair's speech, schools minister David Miliband revealed that the government is now planning the rebuilding or refurbishment of all 3,780 secondary schools in the country.

All schools maintenance will be transferred to private companies, in a series of PFI deals that could be worth £45 billion over the next 10 years.

Earlier this year one PFI giant, Balfour Beatty, boasted of 18% a year profit from PFI deals. Across the board that's billions of pounds going in profits that could provide better services, more jobs and decent wages and conditions.

Even one of the Tory architects of PFI, former Chancellor Norman Lamont, now says that PFI "looks in the short term cheaper but in the long run is likely to be much, much more expensive".

The government's own architecture watchdog has warned that many of the 30 PFI schools already built are like "sheds without windows"; small with too little natural light. Many of the hospitals and schools built under PFI could be "obsolete" before the 25 years of the contract is finished.

What is really needed is not a review, but action to force the government to halt all current PFI proposals.

A new, mass workers' party urgently needs to be built to fight to return to public ownership and democratic control all those services in hospitals, schools, roads, prisons, transport etc that have been privatised through PFI.

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Unite To Strike Against Low Pay

ALTHOUGH THE union leaders were able to get council workers to accept a pay deal which was far less than they went out for, there is little sign of "industrial peace" breaking out for the government and the bosses.

Bill Mullins

Firefighters, FE college workers, London teachers, council workers, tube workers and increasingly local hospital workers are lining up in a wage offensive not seen since the 1980s.

Despite the existence of draconian anti-union laws, more and more public sector workers are preparing to take on the employers in the fight for a decent wage.

This reflects the anger from below, the embittered mood of ordinary workers who see the bosses increasingly lining their own pockets with huge wage rises whilst demanding that workers accept something far less.

The firefighters' ballot result will be announced on 18 October and strikes will probably be set before the end of the month.

The college lecturers and support staff have set their national strike for 5 November. Tube workers are due to take further strike action, this time for two days, possibly on 16/17 October.

London teachers and local government workers will also take a one-day strike possibly on 14 or 28 November, depending on ongoing ballots in the NASUWT teachers' union.

The unions are also balloting the non public sector education workers. Even though the GMB leader John Edmonds has put on hold the proposed ballot for strike action by the privatised parts of local government, the mood of these workers is clearly for something to be done about "two-tier pay" in their workplaces.

Leadership is key

Two-tier pay, where new workers recruited into the privatised parts of the public sector often end up on lower pay and conditions than those who were transferred from the public sector, has become another battlefield for strikes and industrial action.

This is the case in the health service in Scotland and Wales, where workers in private NHS companies have already taken action and in the case of Scotland won a famous victory.

All these examples demonstrate that if a clear call was made by the union leaders for joint action then it would have massive support. In London for example, the strikes over London allowances have already seen thousands of teachers and council workers on strike. Why should these workers be taking separate days of strike action?

The key to any industrial struggle is its leadership. Many public sector workers involved in this action are increasingly saying: Why don't the union leaders get their act together and link up the teachers and council workers with firefighters, college lecturers, tube workers in a common front for decent public sector pay?

A national one-day public sector pay strike would be a massive warning to the government and the bosses that unless their justified demands were met, workers are willing to take further action.

The strength of any struggle is the unity of the biggest number in action. Separate and divided action makes the chances of winning less likely. The new Left union leaders have a magnificent opportunity to take the struggle over pay forward. They should seize the time and co-ordinate action together.

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Debunking Bush's Lies

WAR ON Iraq - what team Bush doesn't want you to know by William Rivers Pitt, which includes a lengthy interview with former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter, is a concise argument against a US-led war on Iraq.

The booklet demolishes George Bush's administration's justifications for "regime change" in Iraq. It rubbishes the suggested link between Saddam Hussein and the al Qa'ida terrorist network, pointing out the obvious fact that the secular Ba'athist regime is loathed by Osama bin Laden as much as Western governments.

Ritter says the vast majority of Iraq's 'weapons of mass destruction' were destroyed by UNSCOM's weapons inspectors before they were pulled out of Iraq in 1998. (He condemns the use of these inspectors to spy on the Iraqi regime for the US) And subsequent monitoring via satellites and other means has made it extremely difficult for Saddam to procure the necessary technology to produce such weapons.

Both the author and Ritter attack the idea of 'regime change' arguing that instead of achieving "democracy" it would mean replacing Saddam with another Sunni-based dictator.

Instead, Ritter and Pitt argue that military containment of Saddam through the readmission of weapons inspectors and the lifting of UN sanctions is the long-term solution.

"This will guarantee that Hussein cannot develop any technology that threatens the region or America. As the standard of living improves for Iraqi civilians, as a viable middle class is created, the cultural and economic schisms that have defined Iraq will begin to disappear. The power of Saddam Hussein will wane."

Shortcoming

This argument is the main shortcoming. The idea of creating a liberal-capitalist unified society through increased trade and 'wealth creation' is a mirage.

Has Saudi Arabia's oil wealth transformed it from an autocratic state into a liberal democracy? Have relatively developed capitalist societies such as Northern Ireland, Canada, Belgium solved the question of nationalities, let alone less developed capitalist regions such as Israel/Palestine, Indonesia, Philippines, ex-Yugoslavia, etc?

On the contrary, the existence of class society based on the capitalist profit system is the basis for cultural, ethnic and civil strife. That's why we argue not only for 'regime change' but a 'system change'. Only through building mass workers' organisations linked to a socialist transformation of society would it be possible to unite all sections of the working class and democratise countries such as Iraq.

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The System Isn't Working

THE DEEP gloom in the economy is spreading to the finance sector. Until recently, says the Financial Times, banks shrugged off fears about bad debts and had big profits. No more.

Share prices in the banks have plummeted on stock markets worldwide. In the USA, Bank of New York shares went down 22% while Comerica's fell by 24%.

European banks also suffered in particular Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank from Germany went down heavily.

It's not just gambling fat cats being forced to slim rapidly - these employers will take it out on the working class, both as workers and consumers.

Commerzbank, Germany's third biggest bank, lost a quarter of its value last week. The Observer even compared this to the Credit-anstalt bank in Austria whose collapse in 1931 set off a decade of severe depression worldwide.

Investment bankers Merrill Lynch set off panic when an email to a credit rating agency said: "Again the market is flooded with rumours that Commerzbank amongst all its other problems sustained large trading losses in Credit derivatives. Apparently a number of banks have begun to shut down credit lines."

They didn't give details of what 'derivatives' and how they've been over-exposed, but they all add to fears about the banks' credit ratings, bad loans and worries about whether lower interest rates would hit profit margins.

Commerzbank will add to the 4,300 jobs it has already announced for the next 12 months.

A few years back capitalism's cheerleaders said the boom - particularly in the new technology sphere - would last forever. Now reality is biting back.

Capitalism still suffers from its old problems - over-investment, overproduction, and now collapsing profits.

How many banks will the crisis hit? How many jobs will go? Will banks cut down even further on credit?

Will that hit consumer spending with more knock-on effect on a troubled manufacturing industry?

Capitalism is showing that it doesn't work and the world economy stands on the brink of a double-dip recession.

We are fighting to replace this profit-driven chaos with a democratic socialist system based on rational planning.

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Socialism 2002

Socialism 2002

A weekend of socialist discussion and debate, hosted by the Socialist Party

Saturday 26 October/ Sunday 27 October, University of London Union, Malet Street, London WC1

Session A: 6-9pm Saturday 26 October, Session B: 10-12 noon Sunday 27 October, Session C: 1-3 pm Sunday 27 October.

Opening Rally

Saturday 26 October 3-6 pm

Workers fight back - Spain, Italy, France, Britain... Build the struggle for a 24-hour public-sector strike.

Speakers:

Billy Hayes, general secretary of the Communication Workers' Union

Janice Godrich, president of the Public and Commercial Services union

Dave Nellist, leader of the Socialist Party group on Coventry city council

Peter Taaffe, general secretary of the Socialist Party

Closing Rally

Sunday 27 October 3-4.30 pm

Where next for the anti-war movement?

After the biggest anti-war demonstration in Britain ever- what next? Building for the 31 October day of protest and beyond.

Speakers:

George Galloway MP

Zena Awad, International Socialist Resistance

Hannah Sell, Socialist Party Campaigns Organiser

Course 1: Stop Bush and Blair's war on Iraq.

Session A: The history of Iraq under Saddam Hussein.

Bush and Blair claim to be morally outraged by Saddam Hussein's treatment of the Iraqi people. The real recent history of Iraq reveals a very different story.

Speaker: Lynn Walsh, editor of Socialism Today, the Socialist Party's monthly magazine

Session B: Lessons of the Vietnam war.

Is it possible to build a movement powerful enough to stop a war? How can we do it? What lessons can we learn for today from the campaign against the Vietnam war?

Speaker: Peter Taaffe, general secretary of the Socialist Party.

Session C: Israel/Palestine.

While Bush weeps crocodile tears for the people of Iraq the US is ignoring the horrendous plight of the Palestinians. This session looks at recent development in the region and discusses how the Palestinians could win genuine national liberation. Speaker: Judy Beishon, International Executive Committee of the Committee for a Workers' International .

Background reading:

Iraq Since 1958 by Frank et al. £14.99

The Iron Wall by Shlaim. £11.99

Rogue State by Blum. £9.99

Course 2: Building the trade unions

Session A: Perspectives for trade union and workplace struggles.

Fire-fighters, London Underground workers, local authority workers, train drivers - the number of workers in Britain fighting to improve their pay and conditions is growing day by day. Will this trend continue and can these struggles succeed? Speaker Bill Mullins Socialist Party National Industrial Organiser.

Session B: How to be a socialist shop steward.

Speaker: Mike Forster Kirklees UNISON, personal capacity.

Session C: Return to the 1970s?

The media keep comparing the current wave of industrial militancy to the mighty battles of the 1970s. What really happened and how can we learn from it 30 years on?

Speaker: Simon Donovan Socialist Party National Committee and Waltham Forest UNISON, personal capacity.

Background reading:

Resisting Capitalism - the case for a new workers' party. £1.50

The Great Gold Rush, how to fight the privatisation bonanza. £1.50.

Teamsters Rebellion by Dobbs. £10.95

Course 3: Socialism

Session A: Would socialism achieve liberation for women?

Speaker Clare James, secretary of International Socialist Resistance.

Session B: Could Socialism prevent the destruction of the environment?

Speaker Pete Dickinson, author of Planning Green Growth - a socialist contribution to the debate on environmental sustainability (see CWI website).

Session C: Malcolm X said that you can't have capitalism without racism. Is that true? Could socialism end racism?

Speaker: Hugo Pierre, convenor of Black and Asian Socialists.

Background reading:

Socialism in the 21st Century, by Hannah Sell. £5

Fighting for Women's Rights and Socialism. £2.50

The Life and Legacy of Malcolm X. £1

Global Warning: Socialism and the Environment. £6.95

Course 4: World in turmoil

Session A: Latin America - an attempted coup in Venezuela, four Presidents overthrown in Argentina, economic crisis - what future for Latin America?

Speaker: Tony Saunois secretary of the Committee for a Workers' International.

Session B: Africa.

With 20 million starving in Southern Africa - can capitalism develop the continent?

Speaker: Kevin Simpson.

Session C: World economic crisis.

As the USA's stock markets continue to tumble, this session looks at the underlying reasons for the current economic crisis and the prospects for the future.

Speaker: Robin Clapp, secretary of the South West region of the Socialist Party.

Background reading:

Global Turmoil: Capitalist Crisis, a Socialist Alternative. The book of the Seventh World Congress of the CWI, £2.

Indonesia, an Unfinished Revolution. £1.50

Under Siege, Global Capitalism and the Socialist Alternative. £1.50

Italy: Anti-war protests fuel a new wave of class struggle. 50p

Post September 11, can US imperialism be challenged? £2

Campaigning for Socialist World, resolutions and documents from the 2002 Socialist Party congress. £1

The Tiger Strikes: South Korea. £1.50

Course 5: The lives of great revolutionaries

Session A: Che Guevara.

Thirty five years ago the Cuban revolutionary Che Guevera was murdered in the Bolivian jungle by his CIA interrogators. Today Che is still an icon of anti-capitalism. This session looks at his life.

Speaker: Naomi Byron, national secretary of Youth Against Racism in Europe.

Session B: Rosa Luxemburg.

In 1918, in the wake of the Russian revolution, a revolutionary wave swept Germany. Rosa was at its head. Tragically, she was murdered in 1919 by counter-revolutionary thugs. Today in Germany she remains a national heroine, but what did she stand for?

Speaker: Christine Thomas, Associate Editor of The Socialist.

Session C: Leon Trotsky.

Trotsky was the chairman of the first ever soviet - committee of workers' representatives - in the first Russian revolution. In 1917 he was the organiser of the October Russian revolution, the greatest single event in human history. He then created and led the Red Army which defeated the twenty-one armies of imperialism sent to crush the revolution.

But most of all, Leon Trotsky was one of the greatest theoreticians of the workers' movement.

Speaker: Paul Hunt, International Socialist Resistance.

Background reading:

Cuba, socialism and democracy, by Peter Taaffe, £4.99.

Che Guevara: Symbol of Struggle. £2.50.

My Life, Leon Trotsky. £17.45

Rosa Luxemburg by Paul Frolich. £12.99

Course 6: Strategies to overthrow capitalism

Session A: Marxism versus Anarchism - the debate in 2002.

Speaker: Hannah Sell, National Campaigns Organiser of the Socialist Party.

Session B: Does the Russian Revolution of 1917 have any lessons for socialists today?

Speaker: Ken Smith, Socialist Party representative on the Stop the War Coalition steering committee.

Background reading:

A History of the CWI/CIO. £1.50

Smash the IMF and World Bank, a Socialist Alternative to Global Capitalism. £1.

For a Socialist Europe: Against the Bosses' EU (three languages). £1.

History of the Russian Revolution by Leon Trotsky £19.99

The Rise of Militant by Peter Taaffe £9.99

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What Lies Behind Assembly's Collapse?

AS WE go to press, it seems almost certain that Northern Ireland's Executive and Assembly will collapse this week. New Labour's Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid will probably suspend the institutions in the hope that they can one day be resuscitated.

Ciaran Mulholland, Belfast Socialist Party

Each side of the sectarian divide is loudly denouncing the other as the culprit. According to Sinn Fein the problem is that Unionist politicians (and their allies in the British establishment) really do not want "any Catholics about the place". Many Catholics accept this argument.

The evidence is however that a narrow majority of Protestants reluctantly lined up behind UUP leader Trimble and initially gave the Agreement a chance. The reality is that most Protestants are now against the Agreement and Trimble's room for manoeuvre has consequently long gone.

According to Unionist politicians, the problem is that Sinn Fein have not broken from their past and remain wedded to the dual strategy of bomb and bullet. Most Protestants accept this argument.

Whilst the Republican movement retains its armed wing, there is no evidence whatsoever that it intends a return to war against the forces of the state - in this sense its ceasefire and its commitment to democracy are genuine.

As the Socialist Party has pointed out since the beginning of the peace process, it is not 'lack of goodwill' or politicians' 'inability to compromise' that has brought us to this point. The problem is that the whole basis of the agreement has been flawed from the outset.

Uneasy peace

THE AGREEMENT is based on an acceptance that division is permanent. It is an agreement to differ and an attempt to govern through compromise at the top and an uneasy peace on the ground.

The Agreement has actually strengthened division. As the Executive and the Assembly took their first tentative steps, the long-standing low intensity war of attrition over territory intensified, initially around the issue of parades.

The political process is now catching up with events on the ground. The institutions will be suspended and the next Assembly elections will be postponed - to hold elections in the present climate would only worsen the situation.

Talks will splutter into life in an attempt to put it all back together again but this will almost certainly be a fruitless task- rather like trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together.

"IRA disbandment" is set to be the new precondition for negotiations let alone agreement. But, as was the case with the previous "pre-condition" of decommissioning, even if disbandment were offered it would not be enough. The sectarian conflict over territory that is set to continue will mean that any move by Sinn Fein will simply not be believed by unionists.

A dangerous political vacuum is about to open. In an atmosphere of mutual recrimination and mistrust, and with little hope of a political way out, the ongoing low-level conflict has the potential to explode at any time.

The nightly shootings resulting from the present inter-loyalist feud are just one manifestation of the nightmare that could open up for the working class. The lessons must be drawn.

Any peace process left in the hands of sectarian and right wing politicians will fail. Yet even now there is an alternative. 100,000 people supported the anti-sectarian rallies called by the trade unions in January.

Unfortunately this massive united movement of the working class wasn't built on and that is one of the reasons for the present impasse. A new peace process is urgently needed.

Instead of an attempt to bring right-wing sectarian politicians together this should be based on the unity of working-class people against poverty and exploitation as well as against sectarianism.

Such a peace process cannot be built hand in hand with the sectarian parties or the paramilitaries but in an all-out struggle against them.

Police Raid Sinn Fein Offices

ON FRIDAY 4 October, 30 members of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) stormed into Sinn Fein's offices at Stormont in Belfast.

In any other Western European country such an assault on a party in government would be inconceivable. That it can happen in Northern Ireland says much about who is really in charge, despite the advent of devolution.

The top reaches of the British state including Tony Blair must have authorised this action. The PSNI claim that they have been investigating an alleged IRA espionage operation for over a year.

There is no doubt that the IRA were busy gathering intelligence. But the state has also been spying on Sinn Fein, they even bugged the car used by Gerry Adams during the negotiations.

And other parties, especially the loyalist DUP, have regularly produced confidential Northern Ireland Office documents without having their offices raided to find out their source. If the state knew what the IRA were up to for over a year why did they act now, rather than acting six months ago or six months from now?

The answer can only be that the raid was politically motivated. It has been crystal clear since the decision taken by the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) Council meeting two weeks ago to set an 18 January deadline for either IRA disbandment or Sinn Fein exclusion that the writing was on the wall for the Executive and the Assembly.

Understanding this the British government may have decided on one last throw of the dice. By putting the blame for the collapse on Sinn Fein they are effectively supporting the unionist demand for IRA disbandment as the only basis for a continuation of the Assembly.

Their aim may be to try and isolate Sinn Fein in order either to split some of their leadership from the IRA or else to build a case for their total exclusion hoping that the SDLP will be strengthened and will be prepared to stay in the Executive without Sinn Fein.

If this was the purpose of the raid, its effect has actually been to drive a final nail into the coffin of the institutions established under the Agreement.

Sinn Fein's position will be bolstered as most Catholics resent the raid and will blame unionism and the British government for the collapse.

The DUP will crow that they were right all along and the anti-agreement wing of the UUP will be in the ascendancy (it is probable that Trimble will go as UUP leader in the near future).

Without condoning or defending anything that the IRA may have been involved with, the Socialist Party condemns the PSNI raid. In the future such actions will be taken against anyone who threatens the status quo, including the Socialist Party.

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Who Really Fought Stalin's Dictatorship?

A NEW book by the novelist Martin Amis entitled "Koba the Dread: Laughter and the twenty million" has created a stir in the world of politics as well as literature.

Jim Hensman

This book's title relates to a nickname of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin and an estimate of the number of people that died because of his rule.

The book is largely a description of the horrors which occurred in the Soviet Union under Stalin, but includes an open letter from Amis to his father, the writer Kingsley Amis (who died in 1995 and was once a member of the Communist Party), and one written to journalist Christopher Hitchens, a close friend and one-time supporter of Trotskyist ideas.

One of Amis' underlying arguments is the familiar one that Stalin's crimes were just a continuation and logical successor of the Russian Revolution of 1917 led by Lenin and Trotsky.

That's an important view to debate, but unfortunately the book contains no serious analysis and is written almost as if its subjects were characters from one of Amis' novels - amoral individuals living illogical lives. If Amis hadn't been the well-known novelist he is, his book probably wouldn't have merited much attention.

However, given Amis' fame, what better way for the capitalist press to push this attack on the leaders of the Russian Revolution than by publicising Amis' book. A number of newspapers have in fact featured extracts from it recently.

The supposedly left-wing Guardian newspaper stated their intentions without even a hint of embarrassment in a leader article. "If Mr Amis manages to ensure that revolutionary socialism rests in an unquiet grave, then he will have achieved a necessary purpose, irrespective of whether his is a particularly good book or not".

So there you have it. Any old rubbish is all right as long as it attacks socialism!

Total fabrication

AMIS' REASONING is hardly profound. "The Revolution was a lie... An admiration for Lenin and Trotsky is meaningless without an admiration for terror... Trotsky was a murdering bastard"... etc. etc.

However, given the attention Amis' book is receiving it is worth looking at his basic arguments from a socialist viewpoint. One simple fact immediately strikes you.

If Lenin and Trotsky were merely the forerunners of Stalin, why did Lenin, who died in 1924, spend the last period of his life and Trotsky most of the last two decades of his life waging a bitter struggle against him and his policies?

Presumably they were not just evil, but incredibly devious as well! Amis apparently didn't think it worthwhile reading anything Trotsky wrote. However he does quote one of Lenin's works. This is State and Revolution from which Amis quotes the passage that what the Communist Party wanted was "unquestioning obedience to the will of a single person, the Soviet leader".

Pretty damning stuff, except for one small problem. This is a complete fabrication and nothing remotely like this appears in the work.

If Amis had actually bothered to read State and Revolution he would have found that this work lays out the principles that Lenin saw as the foundations of a democratic socialist state.

These were that (i) All officials and managers should be elected and subject to recall, (ii) No official would receive more than the wage of an ordinary worker, (iii) Popular participation in management and the rotation of duties ("all will govern in turn and will soon become accustomed to no-one governing"), and (iv) No standing army but defence organised democratically by the people.

It was these principles that Lenin and Trotsky put forward and fought to defend all their lives.

Revolution

WHO WAS Stalin and what did he represent? Again Amis doesn't attempt any analysis, other than stating the fact that he was a murderer and megalomaniac. These he undoubtedly was, but we need to ask how he came to be in the position of power that he occupied, given that he only played a comparatively minor part in the 1917 Revolution.

Lenin and Trotsky did not believe socialism was possible in the backward conditions of Russia on its own - 80% of Russia's population were peasants and 70% were illiterate. This was doubly the case in the years after the Revolution when the economy was largely destroyed by the civil war against the former landlords and capitalists and invading foreign armies.

Socialism, they argued, required the highest development and organisation of production, with a working class that could have the time and resources to run society. That's why they looked to developments in the West to provide the support to maintain the Revolution at home.

Despite mass revolutionary movements in countries like Germany these did not lead to the hoped-for revolution and the Soviet state was isolated.

It was in these conditions, with what Lenin called "the same old Tsarist state machine today, with a thin veneer of socialism spread on top", that Stalin began his ascendancy.

Stalin ideally represented and fostered the layer of bureaucrats and functionaries against the "thin veneer of socialism" represented by Lenin and Trotsky.

Although often made up of the same individuals and using the same methods that had run the former Tsarist apparatus, the key difference was that this new bureaucracy relied for its increasing privileges not on the old landlord and capitalist economy, but on the nationalised state-run economy.

The role of this Stalinist bureaucratic clique was first reflected in mistakes in domestic and foreign policy. Particularly tragically its incorrect policies and bureaucratic methods contributed to the failure of foreign revolutions which could have ended the isolation of the Soviet Union and regenerated the revolution if they had been successful.

Gradually, however, the Stalinist bureaucracy became an open anti-revolutionary force both within the Soviet Union and elsewhere, undermining and eventually reversing the principles of democratic socialism that Lenin had outlined.

Amis documents the outcome of one of the bureaucratic manoeuvrings of Stalinism, one of the most tragic in human terms, its policy on collectivisation of the peasantry.

Trotsky had argued for a gradual collectivisation based on industrial development that could provide the tractors and other resources necessary, together with a voluntary programme that could attract peasants by example.

The Stalinist bureaucracy's policy veered wildly. At first they effectively ignored the need for collectivisation then later implemented an insane policy of forced collectivisation.

This led to millions of deaths, some directly through its attempt to destroy better-off peasants as a class, and indirectly through the famines that ensued.

Purge trials

MUCH OF Amis' book describes the terrible events of the mid-1930's, the purge trials and the labour camps. Although the book's descriptions are shocking and moving, yet again Amis doesn't show the slightest scrap of understanding of what took place.

Despite the enormous human and economic cost of forced collectivisation and bureaucratically implemented industrialisation, the Soviet economy by the mid-1930s had advanced enormously, creating a powerful urban and rural working class.

The movement of this class in the direction of recreating democratic socialism posed the greatest threat to the Stalinist bureaucracy and its privileges.

Internationally (despite the terrible defeat by fascism in Germany, itself indirectly a result of the errors of Stalinism) mass socialist working-class movements, especially in Spain, presented a powerful example to the Soviet workers.

In one of the most tragic episodes for the working class internationally, Stalinism strangled the incipient revolution in Spain, leading eventually to the victory of fascism under Franco.

Within the Soviet Union, Stalin saw the old Communists who had led the Revolution in 1917 and who still retained the memory of what democratic socialism had been like, as a particular threat to him and the rule of the bureaucracy.

In a series of staged show trials, effectively this entire group were tortured into confessing that they had been agents of imperialism all their lives, then they were summarily executed.

As part of this horrific process of eliminating any potential opposition, millions of people were murdered particularly in the slave labour camps in Siberia and elsewhere.

Although Amis' father didn't join the Communist Party until 1941, Amis' criticism of him - and through him of Communist Party members and supporters at the time - has an element that can be sympathised with.

Many of these individuals were influenced by the crisis of capitalism after the Wall Street crash and the growth of fascism, which Amis doesn't acknowledge. However, they adopted an uncritical attitude towards the Soviet Union and refused to see the terrible events taking place.

Heroic opposition

THE MOST shameful aspect of Amis' book, however, is that having castigated all those who ignored what was going on, he fails to even mention those that fought the bureaucracy at the time.

He does that with good reason, of course, as the focus of this resistance was Trotsky and his supporters and he intends to slander and discredit them.

Trotsky himself paid a terrible personal price for his unbending opposition. Virtually every member of his family was systematically exterminated by Stalin's terror apparatus, culminating in his own assassination in Mexico in 1940.

Within the Soviet Union, his supporters formed the core of a truly heroic opposition to the regime. Although they realised what they faced, they remained true to their beliefs - the ideals of the 1917 Revolution.

An example was the revolutionary Guvorkian, imprisoned in one of the worst labour camps of all, the Vorkuta camp inside the Arctic circle in Siberia.

An account smuggled out from the camp relates how he explained to his fellow prisoners: "No compromise is possible with the Stalinist traitors and hangmen of the Revolution. Remaining proletarian revolutionaries to the very end, we should not entertain any illusion about the fate awaiting us".

Guvorkian with other Trotskyists incredibly organised a successful hunger strike at the camp. The account describes what happened eventually to those like him. "One time, a group of nearly a hundred, composed mainly of Trotskyists, was led away to be shot. As they marched away, the condemned sang the Internationale, joined by the voices of hundreds of prisoners remaining in camp".

Perhaps the best tribute to these heroes - and the best refutation of the views of Amis and those like him - was provided by the Soviet master-spy, Leopold Trepper.

Trepper was a supporter of Stalin, but apart from being a man of outstanding courage and resourcefulness who organised the Soviet espionage network inside Nazi occupied Europe, he was also willing to criticise his past mistakes honestly.

Trepper wrote: "But who did protest at the time? Who rose up to voice his outrage? The Trotskyites can lay claim to this honour. Following the example of their leader, who was rewarded for his obstinacy with the end of an ice-axe, they fought Stalinism to the death, and they were the only ones who did.

"By the time of the great Purges, they could only shout their rebellion in the freezing wastelands where they had been dragged in order to be exterminated".

It is from this tradition that the Socialist Party today proudly claims its heritage, and we certainly don't need to apologise to Martin Amis and his co-thinkers.

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Brazil Elections

Lula Close To Winning Presidency

THE WORKERS Party (PT) candidate, Luiz Inacio "Lula" da Silva, got the highest vote in the first round of Brazil's presidential election. ANDRÉ FERRARI of Socialismo Revolucionario (SR - CWI, Brazil) reports on this pivotal election.

MORE THAN 100 million people queued for up to seven hours in temperatures reaching 40 degrees in some areas. Most voters were showing their opposition to the current government and wanted change.

With 99% of votes counted, Lula had 46.4% of valid votes against 23.2% for pro-government candidate José Serra (PSDB - the governing capitalist party). The other main 'radical' capitalist candidates, Garotinho (PSB) and Gomes (PPS) got 17.9% and 12% respectively.

Despite his upward trend over recent weeks, Lula did not make the 50% needed for a first-round decision.

But the result is a major progress for the PT in relation to previous elections and it places Lula as favourite for the run-off on 27 October.

In the state and parliamentary elections PT candidates made huge gains at the expense of the ruling PSDB.

Lula's new image

THE PT majority leadership believes the result has shown that Lula was right to adopt his new "peace and love" image. However, the high vote for Lula is not because he is now ready to sit down for talks with everybody, or dilute the PT programme to reach electoral agreements with former enemies, or mollify international bankers.

People voted for Lula expecting profound changes. The party's roots are among the most politically conscious workers and they felt confused as to what was happening. This helped undermine the chances of a first round victory.

On the one hand Lula portrayed himself as "business friendly" - an indication of pro-capitalist intentions - while on the other hand, the PT leadership had to try and retain its working-class support.

In an effort to stir up the PT rank and file, at Lula's last rally in S‹o Paulo, the PT chairman José Dirceu even said, hypocritically, that the "long awaited social revolution was finally coming". At the same rally, Lula said that the rank and file had no need to worry, and that he would carry out the PT programme when elected.

This confusion among the 'advanced' workers is just what Serra needs to upset the PT's electoral plans and the prospects of genuine change expected from a Lula government.

Lula did not do well in the last TV debate. He made mistakes and came over as not having any position on anything so as not to cause differences with anybody. He even apologised to Serra for perhaps having criticised him and gave no firm or clearly posed answers.

Everything will be discussed and negotiated between workers, companies and government. The social pact is the answer for everything.

This approach could be disastrous in the run-off. Serra does have a position on the coming crisis. He wants to pay blood money to the international speculators, pay Brazil's debt with the hunger of the people and hand over the country to the interests of imperialism through the Free Trade Area of the Americas.

Lula should clearly pose the need for a socialist alternative that does not make the majority of people shoulder the crisis but breaks with capitalism.

Building a socialist opposition

A LULA victory would be a milestone in Brazilian history. A former-worker becoming president in this country that is world champion of social inequality! This could radicalise millions of workers and also stimulate a re-composition and re-organisation of the Brazilian left.

But although it has grown, the PT is still a minority in congress, even in alliance with the centre-left parties. If Lula wins and becomes president there will be enormous pressure to broaden political agreements with the capitalist parties including the PSDB itself.

The socialist left outside the PT did not do as well as it had expected. Two parties described as 'Trotskyist' were running for president. Zé Maria of the PSTU got some 400,000 votes (0.5%). This is double his 1998 vote but much less than expected.

In the final stretch of the campaign, Zé Maria lost the votes of people who are critical of Lula's current moderate polices but wanted a Lula victory in the first round. The PCO got an insignificant 0.05%.

In the first round the PT Left got good results and several deputies were elected at national level and in the states. Some were clearly elected on a Left position.

The positions won should be used to build a solid socialist alternative to the policy of the PT majority leadership. Building this alternative is what will determine the future of Brazil in the next period.

Socialist alternative

IN THESE elections, Socialismo Revolutionario, the Brazilian section of CWI, which is organised as a Marxist tendency of the PT, called for a critical vote for Lula and defended a socialist programme and strategy as alternatives to the position of the PT leadership.

As part of this policy, Miguel Leme ran for state deputy in São Paulo. He is a member of the leadership of Apeoesp, the state teachers union.

Miguel's campaign was not separate from struggle. In the last week before the elections, SR members were leading an important strike of municipal teachers in Cotia, near São Paulo.

Despite all the pressure to moderate the programme and win elections at any price, Miguel got 1,150 votes defending a socialist PT without the bosses.

A fuller version of André's report is available on www.socialistworld.net

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Brazil: Striking Teachers Face Police Repression

STRIKING TEACHERS in Cotia, Brazil have been brutally attacked by military police.

André Ferrari, Brazil

Some 1,500 teachers employed by the municipality of Cotia (near São Paulo, Brazil) have been on indefinite strike since Tuesday 1 October. Socialismo Revolucionario (SR - CWI, Brazil) members are playing a leading role in this developing struggle.

On 7 October a mass meeting of the teachers voted to continue the strike and undertook a mass demonstration to set up an encampment outside the city hall. This demo was attacked by cops who beat and arrested teachers.

Strike background

THE STRIKE was triggered by the announcement of a small bonus payment. This one-off payment aims to offset the absence of a wage increase to track inflation over several years. The bonus was to vary from 60 to 120 Brazilian reals ($17 to $34).

But at the same time the mayor and city hall of Cotia has been cooking the books in relation to money it has received for the local education budget from federal funds.

The teachers are aware that the money was used elsewhere and so are angry about the humiliating amount of the bonus. They are demanding a real wage increase. A series of other issues were also included in their strike demands i.e. career plans, working conditions, lack of policing, etc.

On Tuesday, despite torrential rain, 300-400 municipal teachers went on a protest march from the municipal Office of Education to the city hall where the mayor's office negotiated with a commission of municipal teachers, Apeoesp (teachers' union in the state), school students' and parents.

The mayor's tactic was to wear down the movement by playing for time - in view of the difficulties for the march caused by heavy rain. The municipal secretaries of finances and government met with the commission and just talked around in circles. The education secretary (Marco, former-member of the Workers' Party (PT) right-wing in Apeoesp and now in the local government of the PSDB - the governing capitalist party - in Cotia) delayed his arrival.

Outside, police tried to disperse the marchers but the teachers didn't move. Unanimously they decided to continue the strike.

The following day around 500-600 teachers gathered in front of the city hall. About 90% of the schools were shut down by the strike and the movement had grown.

The negotiations were not reopened and the strike meeting decided to continue the strike.

A large march then set off toward the Raposo Tavares highway - this time we had a large sound truck hired by Apeoesp central office.

First one São Paulo-bound roadway lane of the Raposo highway was blocked, then one on the other side.

There were conflicts with the state police force, traffic police and the municipal Civil Guard with intimidation, taking names, demanding ID cards, shouting, negotiations, pushing and shoving. But the teachers did not retreat a single millimetre.

This is one of the state of São Paulo's busiest highways. Blocking it was like the tactic used by the Argentinean piqueteiros (national pickets).

The march ended at the local office of education and the teachers with a sound truck went to the neighbourhoods to explain the issues to the community.

Messages of support to: the Cotia branch of Apeosp at: apeoesp@apeoesp.org.br

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