Only the
Union makes us strong
Workers Liberty supports
student unionism.
It's a good place to learn
how democracy works. If you don't like what's going on, you join in and
have a say, see who you can persuade of your point of view. For full-time
students at least, there's no training ground like student associations,
for learning how to be active, how to speak, how to lobby, how to organise.
Trouble is that all these
students who've learnt how to organise in a democratic, participatory context
might go on to think that democracy should work that way in Australian
society too. And we couldn't have that now could we - imagine if the country
were a democracy of producers and consumers, deciding what to do, because
of what might be best in the collective interests? Imagine no-one having
the privelege of getting to decide who isn't or is employed, what they
make and under what conditions. Imagine a society where no one had the
power that goes with private ownership which confers special power to make
these decisions. The private owners are the ones who take away free choice
from the rest of us who are not students, for the rest of our lives. And
David Kemp has the hide to claim to be championing freedom of choice.
Union solidarity is the
only way to stand up for freedom, for those of us who own no capital!
No VSU !
Independence for Kosova!
Hundreds of thousands of
ethnic Albanians have been 'ethnically cleansed' by the Serb chauvinist
state and Kosovan Serb militia. Vast numbers of refugees have fled from
Kosova across minefields, mountains and rivers to the relative safety of
Macedonia, Montenegro and Albania. The number of ethnic Albanians who have
been set on the move is well over a million, (from a population of around
2 million). Pec and Pristina are in ruins. Thousands have been killed or
raped. What is happening to the ethnic Albanians of Kosova is a gigantic
outrage against humanity.
In Serbia NATO bombing has
caused civilian deaths as bombs and missiles miss 'military targets' and
hit flats and housing estates. Serb civilian loss of life is a tragedy
but the left must understand that the greatest outrage in this conflict
is being committed against the Kosovars.
Why is the West fighting?
The West began the bombing
of Serbia to enforce the terms of Rambouillet - a squalid deal which 'offered'
the ethnic Albanians continued oppression within the Serb dominated rump
Yugoslav state.
The West had no real objection
to Milosevic's repression of the Kosovars - they simply objected to Milosevic
acting in so brutal a way as to provoke a conflict that drew in - 'destabilised'
- Albania, Macedonia and other neighbouring states. They want stable rule
in the area to facilitate capitalist profit making.
The West opposed an independent
Kosova as they believed it would be a source of instability and tension
in the region. The West has been clumsy, reckless and stupid. They may
now have to put ground troops in to Kosova.
No socialist or democrat
should trust NATO or the West to adequately protect the Kosovars. One likely
result of NATO's intervention is an agreement with Milosevic whereby Kosova
is partitioned - Serbia keeping the North and the South being turned into
a vast refugee camp.
Who will liberate Kosova?
The only force that will
liberate the people of Kosova are the Kosovars themselves. All socialists
and democrats must back the Kosovar's right to self-defence against Serb
chauvinist ethnic cleansing. If the West is serious about defending the
Kosovars it will arm the Kosova Liberation Army (KLA). It should do so.
But the US does not want the KLA or the Kosovar people to act independently,
fighting resolutely for independence.
Socialists must champion
workers' unity in the region - and workers' unity can only be built if
workers from different areas and ethnic backgrounds respect and champion
the national rights of others.
The most rational form of
relationship in an area where there is an intermingling of populations
is self-determination - possibly on this Swiss model of self-ruling cantons
- within a federation. For a free federation of the people of the Balkans!
The tyrant in Belgrade
NATO's bombing is not necessarily
aimed at getting rid of Slobodan Milosevic, this tyrant whose police-state
methods have not in the recent past prevented him having stable relations
with the western governments. The West will compromise with Milosevic if
they can.
The bombing has hit Serbian
workers and peasants as well as Serbia's ruling class and military machine.
It has strengthened Milosevic's political position by strengthening nationalism.
Immediately NATO has shored up Milosevic's regime and helped create an
ultra-nationalist Serb backlash.
Milosevic has already used
the war as an excuse to purge opponents and clampdown on internal dissent.
A fully-fledged military-based dictatorship may will be the result of the
bombing.
The big powers
NATO is demonstrating that
the USA-EU can bomb whomever they like, wherever they like, whenever they
like. Clinton is seizing the chance to solidify his political position.
Blair craves the reflected 'glory', accruing from this 'tough' police-type
action.
What Blair and Clinton say
they want to achieve - to protect the Kosovars - is unlikely to be achieved
by what they are doing.
The 'left' is a disgrace!
Serbia is not an oppressed
country 'fighting imperialism', as some on the left seem to believe. Far
from it, it is itself a minor, local imperialist power, of a primitive
ethnic tribalist type.
The left should not have
allowed itself to associate with Serb nationalist-Stalinist campaigns which
simply demand 'Stop the bombings' - because the organisers are for Serbia,
and against the Kosovars. The 'left' is lining itself up with the racist
Serb state whose demand is also, simply, 'Stop the bombings'.
The Stalinist-SWP-pacifist
left is opposed to Kosova's independence and to arming the Kosovars. Alex
Callinicos in the latest Socialist Worker says 'An Albanian nationalist
army, hardened by war and enjoying mass support in refugee camps throughout
the Balkans, could threaten the integrity of half a dozen states throughout
the region.' This is a disgrace.
The real left supports the
democratic right to self-determination and the right of the oppressed to
self-defence. The Kosovars need their independence now more than ever.
Kosova is 90% Albanian, and should be independent if its people want it
to be - which they clearly do. The rump Yugoslav state must get out of
Kosova!
Don't trust NATO!
The idea that NATO action
will do good is seductive. But the harsh reality is that Clinton and Blair
deal in brutal big-power politics. In their calculations, the rights of
a people like the Kosovars loom very small: the proof of that is that they
do not support the rights of the Kosovars to independence, and they do
not arm the KLA.
The left and the Serb-Kosova conflict
Three people around a table in a back-street
pub in London (but the positions they espouse could be found in Sydney,
Melbourne, Canberra or Brisbane). They have come from the Friends Meeting
House on Euston Road, where Tony Benn MP, the one-time bishop Bruce Kent,
the journalist Paul Foot and others have spoken against NATO's bombing
of Serbia. The three are old college friends who have not seen each other
in a long while... (reprinted from Workers Liberty magazine, number 49(?) Socialism
is workers power
Socialism is possible only from the self-organised
working class realising its power as an alternative to that of its masters,
the capitalist ruling class. The Paris Commune was the first brief experience
of working-class power. It was democratic and egalitarian, forming the
basis for Marx of his views on the need for workers' power to smash the
capitalist state.
Repeatedly working-class movements have
begun to form themselves into soviets or councils, as potential alternative
regimes:
Russia in 1905 and 1917
Germany in 1918-19
Barcelona 1936
Hungary 1956
Chile 1971
Portugal 1975
Poland 1980-1
In Russia, 1917, the workers took power,
but were overwhelmed in the 1920s by a bureaucratic counter-revolution.
Elsewhere the possibilities of working-class freedom were crushed. But
those possibilities existed. And they will exist again!
Socialism means a society restructured
according to the working-class principle of solidarity. It means an economy
of democratic planning, based on common ownership of the means of production,
a high level of technology, education, culture and leisure, economic equality,
no material privileges for officials, and accountability. Beyond the work
necessary to ensure secure material comfort for all, it means the maximum
of individual liberty and autonomy.
Working-class socialism - counterposed
by Marx and Engels to all forms of "reactionary" or "bourgeois" socialism
- builds on the best of what capitalism has achieved, in technology, economic
coordination, communications, education, democracy and individual liberty.
Revolutionary socialism can be far freer and more democratic than capitalism
could conceivably be - through integrating economic and political power
in democratic structures, through accountability and provisions for political
participation, and through extensive political and individual liberties.
At the same time a socialist regime would have the power and the will to
allocate sufficient resources for all human needs, so that no individuals
or groups would be cast off and cast out as dregs, as they are under capitalism.
Socialism is only possible as the result
of direct action by the working class. When the current ruling class, the
capitalists, took power from the feudal kings and lords, they did so gradually,
using wealth they already owned under feudalism, and creating institutions
(such as the Universities) to develop their own class so that the actual
revolutions were accomplished without much difficulty. The working class
has fewer advantages. We own no property in advance of a successful revolution,
while our enemies control all wealth. The working class has only its strength
in numbers, and the added strength it gains when it acts in solidarity.
We will have to forge our own tools; build our own organisations.
To an extent the working class in many
countries has already started this process. The trade unions were the product
of long struggles by the working class for the right to build their own
organisations to protect them from the arrogant power of the bosses. The
unions represent the working class - but incompletely, unsatisfactorily,
binding the class to capitalism. But the unions still remain the major
organisations of the working class, the major vehicles of class struggle.
There is no short-term prospect of them being replaced by new organisations.
Socialists who recognise socialism as the act of the working class must
focus on the trade union movement, rather than on "radical" movements without
a working-class or socialist perspective. But we must develop the unions,
transform them, reinvigorate them with socialism.
To accomplish all this the working class
needs a party - an organisation which fights against the ruling class on
all fronts of the class struggle: the industrial front (the workplace,
the trade unions), the ideological front (the realm of ideas, publications
and theories) and the political front (challenging the right of the ruling
class to control our lives). Such an organisation would be large in number,
democratic in decision making, and effective in action.
The AWL is not that party - we are small
in number, grouped mostly in only one country (the UK) and limited in our
impact. But no-one on the left today can claim to yet have the numbers
necessary. And the first stage of building a revolutionary party is to
have clear ideas which the working class can test out in practice. The
AWL has those ideas - we apply them as best we can, and invite all socialists
and workers to test them out: if they work for you, then join the AWL.