Chat with Olivier Besancenot, Moderated by Caroline Monnot

Esteban: Hello, this Tuesday's action is a symbolic last-ditch stand, isn't it?
Olivier Besancenot: No! It's another stage toward the general strike which is beginning to happen. On Tuesday night, strikes will be renewed, and there will be new demonstrations, as well as numerous blockades. The question posed now is about blocking the economy to block the reform.

Zbeul: In your opinion, is this strike a political strike expressing general discontent or a social strike focused only on retirement?
The discontent goes beyond the retirement issue, but, at the same time, it is crystallizing through it. Many workers and many young people are truly fed up with the government's double standards and are indeed seeking, through this strike about retirement, to settle accounts with the Sarkozy government from which they have suffered for too long.

Abdelmallik: What do you think will happen after the trade union action if the law gets passed?
The law isn't a law in effect until it appears in the Official Gazette. And even if it gets into the Official Gazette, the social history of our country reminds us that what the Parliament -- the Assembly and the Senate -- decides can be defeated by the street.

Fred: Even with 3 million demonstrators, does the street have the same legitimacy as an elected parliament?
Today, it's the street that has legitimacy, and the street can be more powerful than a government. That was so in 1995 at the time of the Juppé plan, and equally so in 2006 at the time of the First Employment Contract.
Moreover, our main social gains, from the beginning, were extracted by the struggles and mobilizations of our forebears. If our grandparents hadn't struck in 1936, today we wouldn't be the beneficiaries of paid annual leaves.

Odp: Do you then think that the vote of a national assembly matters less than social movements?
When did a majority of citizens vote for retirement at 67? On YouTube, you can see Nicolas Sarkozy explaining why he wouldn't touch the retirement age of 60.

Léon: Is the New Anti-Capitalist Party [NPA] pushing high school students to take to the streets?
High school students are pushing themselves to do so all on their own, and they don't need anyone else to do it for them. High school student activists can join the NPA.
Furthermore, adults, workers, parents of students are often there at high schools, demanding that security forces leave the premises and stop their provocations. And that's a good thing.

Roland: Violent conflicts at some high schools risk turning the opinion against the movement. Is it really necessary to get high school students involved?
Yes, everyone needs to get involved. And young people understand that old people working longer means fewer chances for them to find openings in the job market.
The government, by its repeated police provocations, is looking to cause escalations, thinking that it can calm down the protest by causing fear.

Emilien22: What factors lead you to compare the demonstrations over the last several days to May 68? Is such a movement possible or even desirable for France?
There is no model that can be exported from its time and place. Each struggle is unique and finds its own dynamic. But I think that a new May 68 in a 21st-century style wouldn't hurt anyone, except the capitalists and the government. But that isn't bad. . . .
May 68, beyond the barricades, was a general strike in which millions erupted onto the social and political stage. It's that eruption that we need today.

Thibaud: Strikers are blockading refineries and transport arteries. Is the strike again actively preventing others from working? Isn't that closer to your idea of "revolutionary activism"?
We are not going through a revolution (yet!). We are in a process of spreading strikes, where radicalization and expansion go hand in hand. The movement is gradually getting larger with each day of action, and, at the same time, it is getting radicalized since the government is forcing the struggle to get radical.

Marc: Does the NPA have a concrete counter-project of reform on the issue of retirement? If yes, what is it?
The NPA says no to rewriting the government's project, demanding its abandonment pure and simple. We propose retirement at 60 with full benefits and the return to the contribution length of 37.5 years, for all. To finance this project, we propose to increase the share of employers' contributions to Social Security.
3% of the GDP from now to 2050 will be necessary to finance the retirement system, according to the Pensions Advisory Council. On the other hand, every year, 17% of the wealth created in the year gets siphoned off in the form of profits, which are monopolized by the privileged few.

It is therefore necessary to share the wealth and to share the work time equally, the currently employed working less, so that everyone who is unemployed can get a job.

Victor: Which sectors do you think should be taxed more first of all, if we want to find the necessary funds to finance retirement?
Capital's revenues. What's more, every year, 23 billion euros gets lost in the form of Social Security contributions forgiven to "create jobs" (you can see how successful it has been!). Those forgiven Social Security contributions create deficits.

Georges P.: How is it that you don't seem to fear the economic consequences (for employment, growth, etc.) of the movements you are organizing or stirring up?
The current economic troubles are not the result of the general strike but the result of a system called capitalism, whose crisis, triggered two years ago by the subprime mortgage affair, has fucked up the whole machinery of economy.
What we have is a crisis of overproduction in the Marxist sense of the term throughout the major capitalist economies. One day we'll have to invent a new mode of production and consumption that can meet the needs of humanity.

Etudiant Tokyo: Do you think a referendum would be a good solution to finally review the whole thing?
At this precise moment of the conflict, no. That would be a distraction from, and an institutional substitute for, social mobilizations. If there's a more effective method than an indefinite general strike, you have to tell us, but I don't see any. The vote of citizens, at the time when the Postal Service was threatened to be privatized, worked as a support mechanism for the struggle. But in any case there's no substitute for struggles.

Serena: University students are rather weakly mobilized for the moment. Could they play a decisive role?
Don't panic, Serena, that's coming! A dozen of universities are already mobilized, and indeed, university students' protest can be a decisive element in the expansion of the movement.

MatthieuRecu: So, it's normal to blockade campuses and to prevent those who want to study from doing so?
So, it's normal for me to support the blockades, too.

Zbeul: Can Black Bloc actions be the solution rather than traditional "spiced-up (merguez) CGT demos"?
I'd rather be on the side of the Red Bloc. Besides, I very much love merguez, and I favor indefinite general strikes.

GG: Any chance of a true alliance of the Left between the NPA and the Left Front putting pressure on the Socialist Party [PS] in the coming years?
We propose to gather together all the anti-capitalist forces on the common radical principles, in total independence from the PS. The goal, for me, is not to shift the PS policy or to convert it to anti-capitalism (good luck!), but rather to challenge the PS's hegemony on the rest of the Left.

There are two major political orientations on the Left: one that is stuck in the framework of market economy, and the other that wants to leave it behind. These two orientations are not compatible in a same government, but our forces can join together to resist the Right, as is the case with the retirement issue.

Laurent F.: Mr. Besancenot, when do you plan on retiring?
At 60 with full benefits! But, Laurent, you had better believe that I'll continue to be a militant all the same.

Maroux: And how far will this escalation go?
All the way to victory. Things are coming together for the victory of the movement on the retirement issue. It's not a foregone conclusion, and there are still numerous obstacles before us. But, objectively, our camp, the protest camp, is continuing to expand while the opposite camp is becoming isolated and weaker.
The cabinet reshuffle will result in disarray. And, given the ministers already packing up their belongings, ready to leave, the street can win a decisive victory in this class struggle. As Che said, hasta la victoria siempre!

***
The original article "Besancenot : 'Bloquer l'économie pour bloquer la réforme'" was published in Le Monde on 19 October 2010. Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi.

from MRZine

Editorial - The Socialist Issue 6 - 2010 -

The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.

This little gem comes from the Communist Manifesto. Authors, Karl Marx and Frederich Engels argue that economic elites also need political control exercised through the state. The two worked together. However, this much-cited quote has led to many controversies among socialists attempting to understand the effects of this or that policy or the impact of economic elites on particular political debates.

Today, it is even more difficult to recognize how these two parts of society – the capitalist class and the state - are adhered together. The state, even isolated to its executive function, is a complex set of departments, advisors and functionaries. Private industry is equally spread out among multiple corporations, private, often competing, interests and industry groups.

Yet, moments of crisis offer opportunities to ob¬serve the links between the state and economic elites. BP’s recent oil explosion in the Gulf of Mexico did more than pour millions of gallons of oil into the environment. It ex¬posed the relationship between a multinational corporation and, by extension, the energy sector and the US government. This allowed a chance to measure the degree to which modern corporations direct the activities of the state and how such control comes about.

The spotlight of the crisis allowed people to recognize that politicians were putting the public at risk by complying with the wishes of the energy sector even before the Deepwater Horizon exploded. The Bush Administration operated the scandal-ridden Department of the Interior (DOI) as a rubber stamp for industry and a site to disseminate anti-global warming “science.” Obama has kept things low profile but equally industry-controlled at the DOI by appointing noted industry ally, Ken Salazar. Salazar’s Mineral Management Services dutifully delivered more than 250 inspection waivers to energy companies engaged in offshore drilling.

In return, the campaign contributions kept flowing and the lobbyists continued to shape policy. Campaign contributions from the Oil and Gas sector surged from about $8 million in 1990 to more than $33 million in 2008. Lobbying also increased sharply from around $51 million in 2000 to $175 million in 2009. Buying off the state has certainly become more expensive as private corporations plow deeper roots into all aspects of society creating, in effect, a corporate state.

The oil explosion grew out of this process as energy companies expanded their field of operations and legislators abandoned the public trust. As a result, ideas about things like public ownership, regulation and green energy were set aside or presented as outdated notions.

However, once the Deepwater Horizon exploded, the public could see how deeply the energy companies had penetrated in the state. BP, and not the toothless govern¬ment, was calling the shots in the Gulf – determining who got to photograph the site, which scientists could conduct tests and the speed of cleanup. The government had little to offer. BP controlled all of the experts, the facilities and the resources. At points, the Hollywood actor Kevin Costner, with his fancy oil removal machine and director James Cameron, with his fleet of submarines, seemed more relevant than President Barack Obama.

Instead of facing a nationalization order, BP CEO Tony Hayward was allowed to refuse to answer questions at a Congressional hearing one day and be an invitee to a private White House meeting the next.

But, something strange happened in all of this. After donating $70,000 to Federal candidates since 2009, BP’s campaign payoff money dried up. Once the light of public scrutiny appeared, BP ran for the exits. Politicians, especially those who had already feasted, made public declarations that they would return any check cut by the rogue energy giant. At least in the short term, one part of the tether than links corporate America to the political class was severed.

This is not to say that the US government declared its independence from the energy sector. Nor, even that they will get serious about regulation. But, that two observations may be made by returning to the idea presented by Marx and Engels. We can say that the modern state is not just an entity that manages “…the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.” This duty or relationship is not automatic, but requires the outlay of some amount of resources on the part of corporations. The process itself causes changes in the structure and function of both the state and private corporations.

Second, the key element that the state attempts to manage for economic elites, in an ostensibly democratic society, is public opinion, or mass sentiment or even people’s “common sense.” Making sure that ideas about the public ownership of vital resources are defeated is as essential as granting waivers to allow energy companies to self-regulate. And equally as dangerous.

Understanding how this link between the state and corporations operates is critical to opening the possibility that fueled the work of Marx and Engels in the 19th century. That one day the majority of the “managed” population might realize its own power and put an end to the incestuous connection between the state and economic elites. The links between oil and politics explored in this edition of The Socialist share a similar aim.

We intend to discover and expose the weak points in the relationship between economic elites and state. We do so, in order to suggest that regular people can and should exercise the kind of radical democracy necessary to save our planet, reclaim the wealth we create with our labor and open new age of peaceful global relations. In short, we think democratic socialism offers a way out of the cycle of politics where campaign contributions matter more than the public interest.

by Zelig Stern -

Michelle Jones is now a single mother of two. This was not the plan for her life. On April 20, 2010, Michelle was eight months pregnant with her second child when her husband, Gordon Jones, was killed while working on the Deepwater Horizon. Gordon died in the oil explosion that is still plaguing the Gulf of Mexico. Now, Michelle has to raise her two children without their father. Gordon’s tragic death was not an unavoidable accident or the result of random bad luck. Gordon died, along with ten other workers, because, to BP, the bottom line was more important than their lives.

Despite the large number of denials coming from corporate executives, it has become clear in the months following the explosion that BP was cutting corners on safety in order to reduce costs and increase profit. For example, BP had selected to use a potentially risky well casing as opposed to a traditional well casing because the risky model was $7 to $10 billion cheaper. Additionally, many key safety features on the rig had not been inspected since 2000, despite the fact that law requires an inspection every three years. A confidential survey taken weeks before the explosion indicated that workers on the rig were well aware of the safety hazards they faced in their workplace but were afraid to speak up due to fear of reprisals from the company. One worker, quoted in the New York Times on July 21, stated, “Run it, break it, fix it, that’s how they work.”

Besides cutting corners on safety features, in the two months prior to the explosion BP began pushing a speed-up on the workers. Jason Anderson, a toolpusher, equivalent to foreman, on the rig and one of the eleven workers to lose their lives on April 20, began telling his father in February that BP was urging him to speed-up work. This is a typical tactic for companies trying to get more out of their workers for the same amount of pay. Jason had twice before convinced BP management on previous wells not to push speed-ups due to safety issues. This time, there was no convincing them. With workers forced to work twice as fast it became increasingly difficult to follow safety procedures properly and to avoid mistakes. Between the corner cutting on safety features and the speed up, it was only a matter of time until someone got hurt.

BP does not do these things because of some malicious feelings toward workers, they do it because their number one concern is and must always be maximizing profit. Regardless of the intent, the executives of BP knowingly placed workers in conditions where it was inevitable that some would be injured or killed. To illustrate this point, apart from the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, the oil industry saw 13 fires leading to the death of 19 workers and the injury of 25 more in the months of April and May of this year alone. It is commonly accepted that when someone (usually a poor person) shoots and kills another person they have committed murder and must be punished accordingly. Yet, when an executive or manager cuts safety standards leading to a worker’s death the most they face is a fine.

The shooter is guilty of murder because they harmed the person on purpose. Yet, despite the difference of intent, knowingly, or even recklessly, endangering a workers life is still intentional. While the shooter intends to harm one person once, the executive knowingly endangers the lives of hundreds of people every day, year after year. In his book And The Poor Get Prison... Jeffrey Reiman says that these acts “are surely precisely the kind of harmful actions from which a criminal justice system...ought to protect us. They are crimes by another name.” (Reiman, 1996, pp. 65)

Yet, BP, as expected, is, at most, facing criminal fines. Murder charges are out of the question. Indicting a BP executive for murder would raise questions about the entire capitalist system. In capitalism, corporations must always seek to maximize profits on pain of going out of business - this means speed-ups and cutting corners on safety standards. As we have seen, this inevitably means that workers will be killed and, in the case of BP and others, that entire ecosystems will be put in jeopardy.

Capitalism is a mode of production that systematically commits acts of murder against the working class. We cannot wait for lawmakers to recognize the crimes of capitalism as crimes. The fundamental structure of law in capitalist society allows these abuses to continue. However, workers can defend themselves by forming unions. Through unions, we can force bosses to accept working conditions that are compatible with worker health and safety. As workers, and as human beings, we also cannot let these crimes go unpunished. We must demand that these murderers be tried for their crimes.

Until the system as a whole changes, there will be many more BP’s. As the clean up workers toil to fix BP’s mess, they face dangers and health risks much like the workers on the rig. The clean up workers, working in a “toxic sludge,” have not been given the proper training or safety equipment. Past experiences with oil clean up, such as the Exxon Valdez, have shown that exposure to crude oil leads to chronic health problems, such as respiratory diseases. So, even after the massive oil explosion, BP is showing more concern for their bottom line than the lives of workers. How many workers need to get sick, need to die, before we realize that this system must be done away with? It is time that we fought back. Capitalism itself is a crime.

***
Zelig Stern is the convener of the Labor Commission of the Socialist Party USA

The Socialist recently had the chance to sit down with“Peace Mom” Cindy Sheehan and ask her about the her thoughts on the connection between oil and politics.

The Socialist: There has been a lot of news recently about the BP oil explosion in the Gulf. There has been a real disconnect between the role of the oil companies and the US wars and the role of the military industrial complex. What connections do you see between oil and politics?

Cindy Sheehan: That’s a really complicated question. As soon as the oil explosion happened and as soon as we were allowed to know the scope of the disaster, I wrote an article called “You’ll Pry My Car Out of My Cold Dead Hands.” It’s not only our government’s and our military industrial complex’s addiction to petroleum or petroleum-based products, but it’s our own. We want to blame Tony Hayward or Halliburton, but very few people want to place any blame on the Obama administration, because you know the Bush Administration was filled with oil people. There are many people in the Mineral Management Services that Obama kept from the Bush Administration. We need to recognize the fact that Ken Salazar if a big fan of offshore drilling while being the Secretary of the Interior. Our entire economy, our entire foreign policy, our entire domestic policy seems to revolve around oil. So, we have very poor public transportation in this country. In the places where we do have public transportation, it is very expensive and not very accessible to a wide population. People who can afford it would rather drive their cars. I lived in Washington, D.C. for two weeks without a car. Washington has the best public transportation system in the country, but it is still very difficult to live in this society without a car. I don’t have a car in California either. Instead of only worrying about capping the well, and cleaning up, and hearing politicians say that we have to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, we need to reduce our dependence on all oil, natural gas, and coal. We need to move from a fossil-fuel based economy to a sustainable economy and that has to be from the top down and from bottom back up again. That is, if we want to sustain life on this planet.

by Dan La Botz -

The BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico represents the latest in a series of atrocities committed by petroleum companies against the environment and against humanity. Yet, terrible and tragic as the BP spill is, it is merely a marginal event in the long and sordid history of the oil companies in American and world history. The petroleum companies have been at the center of American politics for a hundred years, deter¬mining our domestic agenda, our environmental policy, and our foreign policy. To be an American politician was to be baptized in oil. To be an admiral or a general was to be a warrior around the globe for the petroleum industry.

Foreign Policy
By the 1920s, with the rise of the internal combustion engine and the automobile and the conversion of the U.S. Navy from coal to oil, petroleum became the most sought after commodity in the world. Oil became a strategic commodity, a necessity of modern life and modern warfare. From that time on, the oil corporations moved to the center of American politics. President Warren G. Harding’s cabinet was known as the “oil gang,” and the cabinet level corruption involved in the attempt of private parties and corporations to get at the Navy oil reserves led to the Teapot Dome Scandal for which Harding’s administration is best remembered.

The U.S. victory in World War II, as much a victory over the declining British and French Empires as it was over Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, allowed America to displace England and France as the dominant power in the Middle East. The United States became the imperial power shaping and ultimately deciding the affairs in Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. When Mohammad Mosaddegh became Prime Minister of Iran, promising to nationalize BP, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill organized a CIA coup that overthrew Mosaddegh. The coup, organized by Teddy Roosevelt’s grandson, Kermit Roosevelt, was the most notorious example of oil, U.S. politics and imperialism in that era.

The U.S. government’s foreign policy since then—whether in the Persian Gulf, Central Asia, or Latin America—has largely been driven by the desire to control oil, oil pipelines, and the strategic geopolitical points which made it possible to dominate the world’s petroleum centers. The two U.S. wars in Iraq have been principally driven by oil, though, of course, oil wars also expand into regional wars with more complicated motivations and goals within complex international relationships. None of which should keep us from recognizing that oil stands at the center of foreign policy.

Domestic Policy: The Car
The development of the mass production of the automobile by Henry Ford in 1914, powered by Rockefeller’s Standard Oil gasoline (and that of half a dozen other major oil companies), transformed the American economy. The old coal-iron-railroad complex at the center of 19th century capitalism moved into the background and the steel-rubber-glass-electrical-petroleum constellation pushed into the foreground. The automobile corporations and the oil industry worked to destroy the street cars and inter-urban transportation systems and to create instead a national highway system. The Protestant ethic of acquisitive individualism found perfect expression in the purchase of a car, which be¬came identified with personal freedom and self-expression, from the possibility of moving to the suburbs to sex in the backseat.

After World War II, Eisenhower and Congress created the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways—the Interstates—using the taxpayers’ money to provide the infrastructure of the automobile-petroleum in¬dustry. The costs of the internal combustion engine became clear by the 1960s: about 40,000 a year killed in collisions every year; environmental damage caused by hydrocarbon fuels; occupational health problems for workers who drive cars and trucks, work in warehouses, or have other long term exposures to automobile fuels and exhaust.
Yet the Big Three auto companies—GM, Ford, and Chrysler—and the Seven Sisters oil companies-- Standard Oil of New Jersey and Standard Oil Company of New York (now ExxonMobil); Standard Oil of California, Gulf Oil and Texaco (now Chevron); Royal Dutch Shell; and Anglo-Persian Oil Company (now BP)—proved too powerful to resist. Oil fairly dripped from the U.S. Congress, and Congress¬men, their palms greased and their machines well lubricated, voted for cars and gasoline over public transportation and public health.

Turning Back the Tide of Oil
America’s progressive social and labor movements since the early 1900s fought back against the oil industry and its influence on our economy, society, and politics. Ida Tarbell, the teacher and journalist, wrote about the oil trusts for McClure’s magazine and then produced her great The History of Standard Oil (1904), in which she recounted the vicious business practices through which John D. Rockefeller had built the Standard Oil company into a powerful monopoly corporation. And Upton Sinclair, author of The Jungle, also wrote the novel Oil, published in 1927, based on the Union Oil Company. It was a fictional account of the Teapot Dome scandal.

Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) can be said to have inaugurated the modern environmental movement. Her pioneering book described the way that pesticides entered into our water and soil, our plants and animals, and into our own food. Though she doesn’t discuss the petroleum industry, petroleum products formed the basis for the post-war industry of synthetic pesticides. Later, environmentalists would go directly after the oil companies for the pollution involved in every phase of the industry from exploration and perforation, to pumping and refining, to combustion and exhaust.

During the period of the 1960s and 1970s, Tony Mazzocchi, a leader of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Work¬ers Union (OCAW), played a central role in fighting the oil companies not only over wages, benefits and conditions, but also over health and safety and environmental issues. Mazzocchi, his union and other labor allies, were the mov¬ing force behind the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) in 1970. He also chaired the New York City Earth Day in that same year and was a founder of Labor for Peace two years later. In 1996, Mazzocchi went on to organize the U.S. Labor Party, believing that work¬ers could not rely on the Republicans and Democrats and needed their own party.

Continuing the Fight, Providing an Alternative
Today, we in the Socialist Party continue the fight to bring the U.S. oil companies under control. While we certainly support greater regulation of this industry—both economic regulation and regulation of all aspects of production and distribution—we recognize that oil is both too valuable and too dangerous to be allowed to continue in private hands. We need to make oil and our other national resources part of our national legacy, the collective property of the American people, not the private property of wealthy investors. At the same time, we need to begin to dramatically reduce the role of oil in our national economy, turning from coal and petroleum with their dangerous hydrocarbons, to solar energy, wind, and hydrothermal alternatives.

Turning back the oil tide will involve education, organization and class struggle. We need to continue to be an active part of the environmental movement that has played a leading role in opposing the oil industry. At the same time, we need to develop a program to speak to coal and oil workers about the need to transform the industries in which they work, while taking steps to protect their jobs and futures. While sup¬porting reforms and regula¬tion, we need, as socialists, to be raising the idea of the socialization of oil within the context of a national eco¬nomic plan and a democratic socialist society.

Oil and the petroleum industry’s profits stand at the center of the American economy, society and polity. We need to push the oil industry aside and put working people and their needs—for jobs, health care, education, and social well being at the center. We can do it by building the move¬ments against war, to save the environment, and to create a full-employment economy that pays a living wage. We need a political expression of that movement, a working people’s party as an alternative to the corporate parties. And we can do it with your help and commitment to social change and democracy.

***
Dan LaBotz is the Socialist Party USA candidate for Senate in Ohio. Find out more about the campaign at danlabotz.com

from The Socialist - Issue 5 - 2010

by Steve McGiffen -

October 18, 2010 - Somehow, despite refusing to accept invitations from what he dubs the 'left-wing' state broadcasting service, and generally playing little part in debates outside parliament, far right populist Geert Wilders has become the most popular politician in the Netherlands. This is, unfortunately, far from being an isolated event in a Europe which is seeing the rise of the far right in most countries. If the left is to combat such people, it is important first of all to understand their appeal.

Six years ago Wilders left the VVD, a significant player in the Netherlands' multi-party system, a system based on the most extreme form of proportional representation it is possible to have and therefore one which invariably calls for the formation of coalitions in the wake of general elections. The VVD, which has an agenda in relation to the economy which might fairly be described as 'Thatcherite', is liberal – in the Anglo-American sense – on what might be defined as 'moral' issues, or issues of 'personal conscience', and does not generally go in for racist rhetoric. Wilders began to differ on both these counts, embracing the anti-Muslim rhetoric of the far right whilst maintaining an attachment to most elements of the Netherlands' highly advanced welfare state.

The combination has proved a winner in a country which, despite its traditions of tolerance, has never become comfortable with its recent development into one of Europe's most multi-ethnic societies. Since leaving the VVD, Wilders has proved a skilful politician. By last June, his party, the PVV (Freedom Party), was able to pick up twenty-four seats in the 150-strong parliament, polling roughly 16% of the vote. This is despite the fact that the PVV does not actually exist. It has no members and therefore, of course, no structure. Even its MPs and local councillors are not members of anything.

This gives Wilders the kind of dictatorial power he clearly covets, and he equally clearly has his finger on the pulse of Dutch opinion. Perhaps his decision not to form an actual party was influenced by the experience of Pim Fortuyn, the last far right demagogue to make an impression in the Netherlands. When Fortuyn was murdered in the run-up to the general election of 2002, the party he left behind turned out to consist of the mixture of the sad, the weird and the downright criminal that generally makes up the numbers on the right fringe of politics. It quickly imploded and has since disappeared. Wilders also appears to have learned that you will not gain mass support in the Netherlands by attacking its welfare state, and that any proposals for cuts must be carefully thought-out and carefully targeted. Despite his origins in the VVD, he has increasingly taken up causes associated with the left and centre-left, opposing the raising of the pension age,
for example, and calling for a less technology- and bureaucracy-oriented approach to policing, for 'more blue on the street', a popular slogan which even the Socialist Party (SP), the only bona fide left party in parliament, supports.

Where he parts company with the left is in his monomaniac explanation for all social ills: Islam. Boys and young men who create a nuisance in the generally peaceful streets of Dutch towns and cities are not expressing a social alienation which might be traced to racism and a failure to deal with it, or their anxiety about a future with limited prospects for decent employment or a decent life, but are badly behaved simply because they are Muslims. Female genital mutilation, practised by a handful of heterodox Muslims and certainly neither advocated not condoned in the Koran, is claimed to be a feature of Islamic orthodoxy. The harassment of gays, which might fairly be traced to attitudes easy enough to identify in the roots of both Islam and Christianity, though scarcely shared by all adherents to these religions, is portrayed as if, again, it were an article of Muslim faith. Rowdy youths, misogyny, homophobia, all of which are unfortunate features of Dutch life - as they are in most other countries - apparently did not exist prior to the arrival of Muslims and would disappear as the last planeload of Moroccans left Schiphol. In Wilders' strange world-view, moreover, such problems form the roots of international Islamic terrorism. Terrorism is merely an extreme but inevitable manifestation of a religion which is anti-Western, anti-democratic and anti-Semitic.

Wilders' bold solution, and perhaps, from the point of view of a man anxious to maintain his popularity, his riskiest proposal, would be the annulment of Article 1 of the national constitution, which provides for the equality of citizens without regard to race, religion, gender or sexual orientation. Dutch people are generally proud of the tradition which lies behind this wording. Conservative yet tolerant, the broad middle – politically, economically and culturally - may see this as a step too far, embodying the very same attitudes which many of them perceive in Islam and which make them suspicious of it. The call is accompanied by a demand for a halt to the entry of 'non-Western' migrants and even for the repatriation of all Muslim immigrants. Other examples of Wilders' naked extremism are his call for the deployment of the army against young men who create an atmosphere of fear on the street, all of whom, he would have us believe, are of Moroccan origin, and punishment by knee-capping of the ringleaders. He wants to see a ban on headscarves in certain public buildings - and a tax on them. Strangest of all he calls for the Koran to be banned, scarcely a likely move from a country which makes a great deal of money selling armaments to Muslim-dominated states. All of this aggressive rhetoric has led to his being hauled up in court for incitement to racial hatred, as well as to his receiving death threats. Both the trial and the violent threats play precisely into his hands, appearing to confirm his views of both Islam and the hypocrisy of those who defend the rights to self-expression of Muslims while attacking his own.

As SP National Secretary Hans van Heijningen explains, “Attempts by the progressive forces to halt the rise of Wilders or, as he himself asserts, to demonise him, have so far proved counterproductive. Labelling him a 'danger to democracy', giving him the designation 'racist' or calling his performances 'offensive' have only led to an increase in his popularity as a critic of the establishment, the man who dares to put things in a straightforward fashion.”

When Pim Fortuyn arose as a political force, the SP attempted to counter his appeal by pointing out that his programme was just as neoliberal and anti-working class as that of the mainstream right-wing parties from which he sought to distance himself. This is more difficult in the case of Wilders, whose attachment to many elements of the welfare state means that he cannot be accused of simply being a neo-liberal in a new suit. The party's approach has therefore been to accept that many of the problems to which Wilders draws attention are real enough, and to attack instead his solutions.

This could not, as it turned out, succeed in stopping the electoral success of the PVV, whose 24 seats won in June put it just seven behind that of the next most right-wing party, the VVD, which topped the poll. The centre-right Christian Democrats, which have been involved in almost every governing coalition since the war, had their worst result in all of that time, winning only 21 seats. The arithmetic of this made the formation of a coalition which could muster the necessary minimum of 76 seats in parliament virtually impossible, especially as the Christian Democrats and Labour, who together dominated the last government, had fallen out so badly that they could no longer contemplate forming any kind of coalition.

As the leader of the VVD, Mark Rutte was, in keeping with Dutch Constitutional practice, asked by the Queen to form a government. In the end, he succeeded, though it is a minority government in coalition with the Christian Democrats, and the process took four months in all. Between them, the two centre-right parties have only 62 seats, and must rely on a deal, under which the PVV 'tolerates' this government without participating in it. Many Christian Democrats were opposed to any cooperation with a party which favours removing the principle of equality from the Constitution. A special congress approved the deal, however, though in the face of considerable dissent, and in the end two of the party's MPs had to be cajoled and bullied into line.

Wilders' party will thus appoint no ministers and remains free to express its ideas, but is 'tolerating' a government which will cut €18 billion of spending in four years. Though dressed up in the bogus rhetoric of waste reduction, the cuts will bear hardest, as usual, on the most vulnerable: public sector workers will see their salaries frozen, people will have to pay more for a reduced package of medical services, and development aid, which proportionally is the highest in the world, will be slashed. Some new restrictions on immigration, ill-defined at present, are planned, and the terrible menace to Dutch civilisation presented by the 170 women who currently wear the burka in public, will be brought to an end.

The SP's view is that the only way to combat Wilders is to develop a broad progressive alternative. A step towards this was taken in September when the two centre-left parties – Labour and the Green Left – along with the SP and the centrist group D66 agreed a common alternative to the savage cuts to be implemented by the government. Cuts in defence spending, the maintenance of the current levels of tax on profits, and cuts in corporate welfare would demonstrate how unnecessary, and therefore clearly ideologically motivated, are the anti-working class measures to be implemented by the ruling coalition and those who 'tolerate' it. The coalition is clearly unstable, but the danger exists that it will collapse and that Wilders will emerge from the wreckage stronger than ever.

***
Spectrezine editor Steve McGiffen is a former employee of the Dutch Socialist Party and continues to serve as its English-language translator. The photo is by screenpunk, and shows an election hoarding from the 2009 European Parliament elections. The poster with the 'voor Nederland' – 'For the Netherlands' – slogan is for the PVV. The scary looking man on the right with the very strange hair is Geert Wilders.

from Spectrezine

by Benjamin Dangl -

The recent right-wing coup attempt in Ecuador shed light on the rupture between President Rafael Correa and the country’s indigenous movements. This rocky relationship demonstrates the challenges of protesting against a leftist leader without empowering the right.

When Correa took office in January of 2007, he moved forward on campaign promises including creating an assembly to rewrite the country’s constitution, using oil wealth for national development, and confronting US imperialism. However, once the electoral confetti stopped falling, Correa began to betray the indigenous movements’ trust on many fronts, pushing for neoliberal policies, criminalizing protests against his administration and blocking indigenous movements’ input in the development of extractive industries and the re-writing of the constitution.
Indigenous movements protested a right wing coup attempt on September 30th while criticizing the negative policies of Correa, a president widely considered a member of Latin America’s new left who is working to implement modern democratic socialism. How did it come to this? The history of the dance between Correa and the indigenous movements offers insight into the current political crisis in the country.

Upheaval in Ecuador
The police uprising and coup attempt that occurred in Quito and other cities in Ecuador on September 30th was part of a protest against a law the Rafael Correa administration passed that curtails some of the police and military bonuses that are given along with promotions. The law also lengthens the period between promotions from five to seven years. Though the police were outraged at these changes, the Correa administration had in fact increased police wages from the 2006 salary of $355 per month to the current $750 per month. (The minimum monthly wage in Ecuador is $240.)(1)

Correa visited the barracks of some of the protesting police officers on the morning of September 30th. While speaking to the crowd, the president was attacked by police when he refused to back down on the spending cuts. Correa was injured by the attacks and brought to a hospital, where the police held him captive, threatening to kill him if he left. Thousands of people poured into the streets in defense of Correa and against the police uprising. Five people were killed in the conflict, and over 200 were wounded. The president was eventually rescued from the hospital by the Ecuadorian military.

One of the people charged with orchestrating the coup attempt was police colonel Manuel E. Rivadeneira Tello, who was in charge of the barracks where Correa was attacked. Rivadeneira was trained at the US School of the Americas, an infamous school at Fort Benning, Georgia where countless military and police officials from Latin America have been trained in torture and counter-insurgency techniques.(2)
On October 4th, Correa increased wages for police and military majors and captains by $570 per month, as well as implemented raises for other officials. However, Correa has not withdrawn the budget cuts that police were protesting against.(3)
One of the reasons why the coup did not succeed is because of Correa’s high approval rating, which just weeks before the coup took place, stood at 67% in Quito. Economist Mark Weisbrot pointed out in a column for the Guardian Unlimited that Correa’s government “has doubled spending on healthcare, significantly increased other social spending, and successfully defaulted on $3.2bn of foreign debt that was found to be illegitimately contracted.”(4)

The regional support Correa enjoys from other South American presidents also prevented the coup attempt from being successful. The shadow of Honduras, where a right wing coup ousted President Manuel Zelaya from office in June of 2009, was cast over this conflict. Yet in the midst of the crisis in Ecuador, the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), including its more conservative presidents in Colombia and Peru, immediately convoked a meeting and condemned the coup. This response demonstrated how isolated the coup plotters were, and was a clear departure from the era when US-backed coup and dictators dominated the region.

This regional and local backing was important for Correa, but there was one important element missing from the outpouring of support in rhetoric and in the streets: the country’s indigenous movements. Whereas a wave grassroots support for Hugo Chavez in 2002 helped make an attempted coup against that leader short-lived, and the mobilizations from Evo Morales’ social movement allies helped suppress right wing destabilization efforts in 2008, Correa was not able to count on the most dynamic social movements in the country during this coup attempt.(5)

A joint statement on the conflict issued by four of the most powerful indigenous groups in the country, including the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE), denounced the coup attempt but at the same time extensively criticized Correa. “Faced with the criticism and mobilization of communities against transnational mining, oil, and agro-industrial companies,” wrote the indigenous groups, “the government, instead of creating a dialogue, responds with violence and repression. . . . The only thing this type of politics provokes is to open spaces to the Right and create spaces of destabilization.”(6)

By marginalizing the indigenous movements of Ecuador, the statement explained, Correa was isolating himself, making him vulnerable to attacks from the right. “While the government has dedicated itself exclusively to attacking and delegitimizing organized sectors like the indigenous movement, workers' unions, etc., it hasn't weakened in the least the structures of power of the right, or those within the state apparatus.”(7)

A look at the history of Ecuador’s indigenous movements and the Correa presidency shows that the break between these two powers was a long time in the making and is likely to continue unless Correa meets the movements’ demands.
Beyond the power struggles between the dominant Latin American right and left, conflicts between corporate globalization and national sovereignty, and the ties between Washington and Latin American presidents, it is the relationship between governments and movements that deserves attention here – and in other Latin American countries – for the sake of understanding, justice and effective solidarity.

An Indigenous Movement for Survival
CONAIE was founded in 1986 by various indigenous leaders and communities to advocate for indigenous rights, access to land, autonomy, basic services, environmental protection, and political representation. The indigenous participants who made up the backbone of CONAIE were largely poor and believed the economic and political system in the country aimed explicitly to destroy indigenous culture, enrich corporations, concentrate power, and marginalize the poor majority. CONAIE sought to subvert and transform this antidemocratic and repressive society.(8)

From its beginning, CONAIE was a very grassroots organization with dispersed local bases that met to debate and make decisions collectively. Regional and national meetings continue to take place today, making major decisions about national campaigns, actions, and elections.(9) The democratic nature of CONAIE has been useful in dealing with repressive and non-cooperative governments. The direct participation of the local chapters helps to hold movement leaders and representatives accountable, and the strengthening of a cohesive indigenous identity has spurred unity within the movement. A 1992 statement from CONAIE illustrates the organization’s distinction within the national terrain of Ecuadorian movements, setting it apart from traditional union structures and working toward political “methods that faithfully reflect our own manner of arriving at consensus. The base organizations make decisions and the leadership of CONAIE serves as an intermediary
between those decisions and the actions taken.”(10)

The organization of CONAIE is based on decentralized, local communities, in part because of the isolation and self-sufficiency of rural areas. The structure of the organization allows for quick mobilization to set up road blockades, celebrations, or projects that improve the communities. This capacity is facilitated by easily accessed communication and collaboration between the decentralized grassroots base of the organization, located in small indigenous communities across the country, and the elected leaders within the organization at regional and national levels. Over the decades of its existence, CONAIE has ignited and sustained numerous campaigns and actions thanks to this organizational structure.(11)

CONAIE has utilized various tactics to achieve its goals including protests, marches, discussions with government officials, and involvement in elections and campaigns.(12) The movement’s history proves that drawing from such tactics involves an unsteady dance with the government, and a need to constantly re-evaluate strategies.

The CONAIE and Correa
In the 2006 presidential elections, CONAIE and other movements support Correa in the second round of votes as he faced right-wing candidate Álvaro Noboa.(13) While this support helped Correa win the elections, Correa turned his back on the indigenous people and Ecuadorian left almost immediately upon taking office. Though some relatively progressive policies were enacted, his administration continued and even expanded aspects of the neoliberal agenda. He worked perhaps even harder than previous governments to crush the indigenous movement and anyone who stood in the way of the government’s plan for privatization of natural resources, and the expansion of mining and oil industries.

In spite of such betrayals, Correa’s electoral victory was also largely a victory against Plan Colombia’s US-led war on drugs, the old Ecuadorian oligarchy, US-style free trade deals, and electoral fraud.(14) In October of 2007, Correa announced that his administration would not renew Washington’s lease on a US airbase in Manta, Ecuador, unless Washington allowed Ecuador to open a military base in Miami: the US refused and was thus forced to leave Manta. Correa began an audit to see which sections of Ecuador’s debt should be written off as illegitimate under international law.(15) The result was the announcement that Ecuador would not pay $9.937 billion in debt, roughly 19 percent of Ecuador’s GDP, because the debt commission he appointed concluded that the debt had been accrued illegally by past undemocratic governments, including a dictatorship from 1974 to 1979.(16)

A more controversial change under Correa was the convening of a constituent assembly to rewrite the constitution, responding to a decades-old demand from indigenous movements. CONAIE leader Luis Macas explained that this demand from the indigenous movement was based on a desire for official recognition of the various indigenous nations in the country. They demanded that the state become pluri-national to reflect the diversity of indigenous land and customs. This process was seen as more than just changes on paper. The transformation Macas and others sought had to do with structurally changing the state itself. Macas explained that the Ecuadorian state is a state characterized by a lot of exclusion of these [indigenous] sectors. There hasn’t been any integration of people for almost 180 years of the republic’s life—a vertical state, a state that legislates, a state that, in other words, hasn’t arrived for all these social sectors. We believe that the character of the state must be pluri-national, a state that recognizes each one of the existing nationalities in this country.(17)

This transformation, of course, never happened in the constitutional assembly under Correa. From the beginning of Correa’s proposal to change the constitution, many members of the indigenous movement considered the constituent assembly itself as undemocratic. For example, Correa looked to political parties, not movements, to participate in the assembly, and social movement representatives were not invited to be part of the commission that formed proposals for the new constitution. This all limited the transformative role of the constituent assembly.(18)

Following the work of the assembly, the rewritten constitution was passed by 64 percent of voters on September 28, 2008. Many Ecuadorians supported the new constitution as a tool to ensure lasting institutional and social change. The document was progressive in the sense that it expanded state regulation and involvement in the economy and management of natural resources, recognized the rights of nature, and the human right to an education and healthcare. But many such changes have been undermined by Correa’s emphasis on the extractive industry’s potential benefits for the state—in spite of environmental and territorial concerns by the indigenous.(19) The president forged ahead with oil and mining concessions that ignored the rights of indigenous communities. In many cases, such concessions were given by the state without consultation with the indigenous communities the extraction would most affect.(20)

Correa’s approach to the constitution was emblematic of the way he dealt with other pressing issues relating to indigenous demands. In the first years of his presidency, instead of working toward renewable alternatives to oil, Correa sought to expand this industry, as well as the mining sector, in order to generate funds for government programs and initiatives. As part of this strategy, Correa silenced opponents to his mining policies including the environmentalist group Acción Ecológica. Journalist Naomi Klein characterized the government’s decision to shut down this organization as “something all too familiar: a state seemingly using its power to weaken dissent.”(21)

CONAIE has not been immune to such crackdowns. Economist, professor, and former advisor to CONAIE, Pablo Dávalos noted that Correa has benefited and expanded upon past government strategies of weakening CONAIE, particularly following their destructive relationship with Gutiérrez. He said that Correa uses strategies that “neutralize the ability of the indigenous movement to mobilize and to destroy it as a historic social actor.”(22) By pushing CONAIE out of the political debate and calling on police repression to crack down on their dissent, Correa has worked to undermine the indigenous movement.

Such views were also reflected by indigenous activist Monica Chuji who worked as an assembly member in the constituent assembly as part of Correa’s party. Chuji believed Correa not only assimilated CONAIE’s radical discourse into his administration, but drew from the momentum of movements pushing for certain policies, only to then block much-needed change. Correa has utilized Ecuador’s legacy of grassroots uprisings and movements for his own political ends, Chuji said. “Correa’s regime has capitalized off of all of this. He has collected this accumulation of historic social and political demands” and is “usurping this [political] capital.” She gave the example of how social movements had been pushing for a new constitution for years but Correa took that initiative, and then curtailed its transformative potential by limiting assembly people to political parties and, once it was written, signing legislation that undermined the rights it
gave to indigenous communities.(23)

Ruptures with the State
Another disappointment for the social movements that supported Correa has been his administration’s repression of leftist activists and the criminalization of dissent. One of the first signs that Correa would use serious force against leftist protests came with a conflict in the Amazonian town of Dayuma in November of 2007. Protesters were opposing an oil company’s activity in the region by setting up roadblocks to prevent access to oil fields. They called for the government to improve their community’s standard of living and infrastructure, rather than prioritizing the needs of multinational oil companies. Correa responded by declaring a state of emergency. Police violently dragged community members from their homes, arresting twenty-three people. In a similar move, on July 8, 2008, police arrested ten activists who were protesting the construction of a hydroelectric dam on a river near their community and had occupied land near it for six
months.(24)

Movements found themselves in a tricky position, forced either to support Correa as the lesser of two evils, or oppose him and risk fueling the right’s power. As Ivonne Ramos of Acción Ecologica explained, “There is the question of public sympathy, which is complicated when you have a president with such high approval ratings. Any action that a social movement takes can be read, understood, or publicized as an action in support of the Right, since this government is supposedly a Leftist one. This has produced a climate of uncertainty over what positions to take, what actions to take.”(25)

On May 12, 2008 CONAIE decided what action to take: it officially broke ties with the Correa administration. This rupture focused specifically on their frustration with the failure of the new constitution—under Correa’s watch—to recognize Ecuador as a pluri-national state. CONAIE also protested the lack of changes in the constitution to require that communities to be impacted by extractive industries must provide their consent before those industries proceed with operations. The CONAIE statement asserted:
We reject President Rafael Correa’s racist, authoritarian, and antidemocratic statements, which violate the rights of [indigenous] nationalities and peoples enshrined in international conventions and treaties. This constitutes an attack against the construction of a pluri-national and intercultural democracy in Ecuador. Correa has assumed the traditional neoliberal posture of the rightist oligarchy.(26)
Correa’s administration later rushed ahead with large-scale extraction projects and privatization of natural resources. On January 29, 2009, the Ecuadorian government passed a mining law which doesn’t allow for community members to participate in discussions about how the extraction will proceed, and paves the way for widespread water and environmental pollution.(27)

Correa’s government has also proposed laws that CONAIE says will lead to the privatization of water in their country, limit community participation in the management of water, and lessen punishment for water pollution.(28) The launch of the National Mobilization to Defend the Water in September of 2009 saw protesters marching throughout the country, setting up road blockades with burning tires, rocks, and logs on major highways. CONAIE leaders said they were pushed to this action as they were “exhausted by the process of dialogue.”(29) Protester Ceaser Quilumbaquin said, “We are indigenous people and the majority of water comes from our páramos [plateaus]. Water is life, and the government wants to sell water to private entities.”(30)

In spite of such conflicts, Correa was re-elected president with 52 percent of the vote on April 26, 2009. While his re-election signaled a further defeat for the Ecuadorian political establishment and right wing, it presented new challenges to the indigenous movement.

On September 30, 2009, just months after this landslide victory at the polls, two indigenous protesters were killed and dozens injured in a conflict between indigenous communities and police forces regarding the proposed water law. Indigenous leader Tito Puenchir denounced the violence, explaining that the “dictatorial president Rafael Correa has declared a civil war against the indigenous nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon.”(31)

Decades after the emergence of CONAIE as a national movement, their demands and tactics are as timely as ever. The survival of the movement under Correa relies on its ability to understand this complex terrain, know the stakes of their dance with the state, and defend their own autonomy, both through pressuring the state and empowering their own territories from below.

***
Sections of this article are adapted excerpts from Benjamin Dangl’s new book, Dancing with Dynamite: Social Movements and States in Latin America, (AK Press, October 2010). For more information visit www.DancingwithDynamite.com Dangl is also the author of The Price of Fire: Resource Wars and Social Movements in Bolivia (AK Press, 2007), the editor of TowardFreedom.com, a progressive perspective on world events, and UpsideDownWorld.org, a website on activism and politics in Latin America. Email Bendangl(at)gmail(dot)com

Notes
1. Diana Cariboni, “The President ‘Is Going to Pay for What He's Done,’” IPS News, (September 30, 2010), http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53024 and Gonzalo Ortiz, “Air Force and Navy Reluctantly Backed President,” IPS News, (October 7, 2010), http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=53083.
2. See School of the Americas Watch for more information: http://soaw.org/
3. Stephen Kurczy, Ecuador's Rafael Correa extends alert, raises police pay days after 'coup attempt', Christian Science Monitor, (October 5, 2010), http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2010/1005/Ecuador-s-Rafael-Correa-extends-alert-raises-police-pay-days-after-coup-attempt.
4. Mark Weisbrot, “Ecuador's Correa haunted by Honduras,” The Guardian Unlimited, (October 1, 2010), http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2010/oct/01/rafael-correa-ecuador-coup/print
5. Raúl Zibechi, “Sudamérica para los sudamericanos,” La Jornada, (October 2, 2010), http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2010/10/02/index.php?section=opinion&article=020a1mun.
6. Jenn Moore, Report from Ecuador: Democracy Under Threat, Upside Down World, (October 1, 2010), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/component/content/article/2720-report-from-ecuador-democracy-under-threat-.
7. Indigenous Groups in Ecuador, “Llamamos a la unidad de las organizaciones sociales por una democracia plurinacional de los pueblos,” CONAIE.orghttp://www.conaie.org/component/content/article/21-noticas-portal/249-llamamos-a-la-unidad-de-las-organizaciones-sociales-por-una-democracia-plurinacional-de-los-pueblos. (September 30, 2010),
8. Allen Gerlach, Indians, Oil, and Politics: A Recent History of Ecuador, (Wilmington: Scholarly Resources Books, 2003), 69–71.
9. Ibid., 72.
10 CONAIE, “CONAIE: A Brief History,” Native Web, (December 1992), http://conaie.nativeweb.org/conaie1.html.
11. Scott H. Beck and Kenneth J. Mijeski, “Barricades and Ballots: Ecuador’s Indians and The Pachakutik Political Movement,” Ecuadorian Studies, (September 2001), http://www.yachana.org/ecuatorianistas/journal/1/beck.pdf.
12. James Petras and Henry Veltmeyer, Social Movements and State Power: Argentina,Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, (London: Pluto Press, 2005),147–149.
13. Daniel Denvir, “Wayward Allies: President Rafael Correa and the Ecuadorian Left,” Upside Down World, (July 25, 2008), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/ecuador-archives-49/1396-wayward-allies-president-rafael-correa-and-theecuadorian-left.
14. Mario Unda, Movimientos Sociales: Nuevas Realidades, Nuevos Desafios, (Buenos Aires: Observatorio Social de América Latina, 2006), 111.
15. Mark Engler, How to Rule the World: The Coming Battle Over the Global Economy (New York: Nation Books, 2008), 268.
16. Daniel Denvir, “Ecuador Defaults on Foreign Debt,” Upside Down World, (December 11, 2008), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1627/49/.
17. Nic Paget-Clarke, “Interview with Dr. Luis Macas of CONAIE,” In Motion Magazine, (August 31, 2007), http://inmotionmagazine.com/global/lm_int_eng.html.
18 Ana María Larrea, Movimientos Sociales: Nuevas Realidades, Nuevos Desafios, (Buenos Aires: Observatorio Social de América Latina, 2006), 259–261.
19. Denvir, “Wayward Allies.”
20. David Dudenhoefer, “For Ecuador’s indigenous nations: A new constitution and familiar problems,” Indian Country Today, (August 28, 2009), http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/archive/53944647.html.
21. Quoted in Paul Dosh and Nicole Kligerman, “Correa vs. Social Movements: Showdown in Ecuador,” NACLA Report on the Americas, (September 17, 2009), https://nacla.org/node/6124; and Naomi Klein, “Open Letter to President Rafael Correa Regarding Closure of Acción Ecológica,” March 12, 2009.
22. Quoted in Jennifer Moore, “Swinging from the Right: Correa and Social Movements in Ecuador,” Upside Down World, (May 12, 2009), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/ecuador-archives-49/1856-swinging-from-the-right-correaand-social-movements-in-ecuador-.
23. Daniel Denvir, “Whither Ecuador? An Interview with Indigenous Activist and Politician Monica Chuji,” Upside Down World, (November 6, 2008), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/ecuador-archives-49/1563-whither-ecuador-aninterview-with-indigenous-activist-and-politician-monica-chuji.
24. Denvir, “Wayward Allies.”
25. Quoted in Ibid.
26. Quoted in Daniel Denvir and Thea Riofrancos, “CONAIE Indigenous Movement Condemns President Correa,” Latin America in Movement, (May 16, 2008)http://alainet.org/active/24062〈=es.27 Dosh and Kligerman, “Correa vs. Social, Movements.”
28. Jennifer Moore, “Ecuadorians Protest New Water Law,” Upside Down World, (September 29, 2009), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/2136/49/.
29. Quoted in Ahni, “Ecuador’s Indigenous Movement Mobilizes for the Water,” Intercontinental Cry, (September 28, 2009), http://intercontinentalcry.org/ecuador-indigenous-movement-mobilizes-for-water/.
30 Quoted in Daniel Denvir, “Mass Indigenous Protest In Defense of Water Caps Week of Mobilizations in Ecuador,” Upside Down World, (November 20, 2008), http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1591/49/.
31. Tito Puenchir, “Two killed during protests against water laws in Ecuador,” Colonos, (September 30, 2009), http://colonos.wordpress.com/2009/10/01/two-killed-during-protests-against-water-laws-in-ecuador

from Toward Freedom

The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was a spontaneous nationwide revolt against the government of the People's Republic of Hungary and its Soviet-imposed policies, lasting from 23 October until 10 November 1956.

The revolt began as a student demonstration which attracted thousands as it marched through central Budapest to the Parliament building. A student delegation entering the radio building in an attempt to broadcast its demands was detained. When the delegation's release was demanded by the demonstrators outside, they were fired upon by the State Security Police (ÁVH) from within the building. The news spread quickly and disorder and violence erupted throughout the capital.

The revolt spread quickly across Hungary, and the government fell. Thousands organized into militias, battling the State Security Police (ÁVH) and Soviet troops. Pro-Soviet communists and ÁVH members were often executed or imprisoned, as former prisoners were released and armed. Impromptu councils wrested municipal control from the ruling Hungarian Working People's Party and demanded political changes. The new government formally disbanded the ÁVH, declared its intention to withdraw from the Warsaw Pact and pledged to re-establish free elections. By the end of October, fighting had almost stopped and a sense of normality began to return.

After announcing a willingness to negotiate a withdrawal of Soviet forces, the Politburo changed its mind and moved to crush the revolution. On 4 November, a large Soviet force invaded Budapest and other regions of the country. Hungarian resistance continued until 10 November. Over 2,500 Hungarians and 700 Soviet troops were killed in the conflict, and 200,000 Hungarians fled as refugees. Mass arrests and denunciations continued for months thereafter. By January 1957, the new Soviet-installed government had suppressed all public opposition. These Soviet actions alienated many Western Marxists, yet strengthened Soviet control over Central Europe.
Public discussion about this revolution was suppressed in Hungary for over 30 years, but since the thaw of the 1980s it has been a subject of intense study and debate. At the inauguration of the Third Hungarian Republic in 1989, October 23 was declared a national holiday.

Learn about the Hungarian Revolution - "REMEMBERING THE 1956 HUNGARIAN REVOLUTION"

by Socialist Party of New Jersey -

On September 29, 18 year old Tyler Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge three days after his roommate and a friend used a webcam to live-stream an image of Clementi kissing another man. While it is unlikely that his roommate intended to push Clementi towards suicide, the real issue is the ongoing bullying and harassment of young gay men and women that continues in our culture.

Celebrities and gay advocates in the media have seized on the suicide as a way to call the nation to action. However, the harassment of gay people is nothing new. In fact, Clementi’s death was the fifth in a string of young gay suicides in the past month.

Many gay advocates are calling for harsher anti-bullying laws, and harsher sentences for invasion of privacy. Yet, harsher punishments feel a lot like a treatment of the symptom of intolerance, rather than its cause. To dismiss the case entirely as the actions of a few hateful individuals is to miss a valuable opportunity to reflect and have a dialogue on the type of society we live in.

We must work to change a culture of heterosexism that breeds ignorance and hatred, which naturally leads to violence towards members of the queer community. As socialists, we believe in working to eliminate prejudice and bigotry in all its forms. Now more than ever, we must call for schools across the nation to adopt policies to create awareness, tolerance, and civility.

The Socialist Party recognizes the human and civil rights of all, without regard to sexual orientation.

1. We call for the end of all anti-gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender (GLBTQ) restrictions in law and the work place, the repeal of all sodomy laws, and the legalization of same-sex marriage.

2. We call on all schools to adopt policies and procedures to address and prevent student violence and to ban discrimination against GLBTQ people throughout the educational system.

3. We call for a federal ban on all forms of job discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.

4. We are committed to confronting the heterosexism that provides the fertile ground for homophobic violence, and support all efforts toward fostering understanding and cooperation among persons and groups of differing sexual orientations.

We invite you to join us.

Socialist Party of New Jersey

This video provides a detailed time line of the tragic suicide of Tyler Clementi:

by Greg Pason -

October 2nd- A Day of Spectacle, But Spectacles Can Be Good

Report

The One Nation rally will probably be promoted as a rousing success by the organizers. There was a positive vibe and trade unions from across the US delivered hundreds of thousands of rank-n-file workers, including very large number or people of color. Participants seemed more interested in the numbers and positive vibes than the speeches, which were mostly calls to “get out the vote”. As one of the organizers of the Socialist Party’s contingent, my focus was on our group, so let me give impressions on our participation and the feeders we took part in and the interactions I experienced.

Many of the feeders and pre-rally contingent’ hoped to get an early start, but many buses were late, getting caught up in the bottle neck coming into DC. I arrived at the Socialist Party meet up spot around 10:30 am. We decided to gather on Constitution between 12th (where the “peace table” anti-war contingent met) and 14th (where the “socialist contingent” met). As I passed 14th St, the “peace table” contingent was already starting with speeches. I saw Military Families Speak-out, Vets for Peace, UfP&J, ANSWER and some socialist groups gathering. From there I walked to meet up with Socialist Party members near 12th where the Socialist Contingent was gathering. SPers from Mass, Maryland, Colorado, Ohio and Memphis had already arrived.

The Socialist Contingent was an idea of Socialist Party candidate Dan Labotz (US Senate in Ohio), the International Socialist Organization, as well as members of Solidarity and some other organizations. It was not a very broad coalition, but a project that seemed to have some energy and inspired some passers by – unaffiliated with any of the groups involved- to join in. The Socialist Party came late to the call for the contingent so had not endorsed, but some of our locals and officers did.

Speeches were given by many of the organizations, including the SP’s own Dan LaBotz and SP Massachusetts member Matthew Andrews. Matthew gave a solid speech calling for a break with the Democrats, building an international movement (reporting on the recent Europe-wide general strike) and how whiles the rally calls for “One Nation” that we are actually “Two nations” rich and poor, etc. Dan spoke of left unity and the struggle ahead.

As Party members started to gather at our meeting spot, we decide to join the socialist contingent feeder, which marched to and joined with the Peace Table anti-war feeder and brought a large number of folks toward the general rally. By the time we got to the Washington Monument there were probably 300 folks marching together, with chants like “Obama’s No Socialist, We Are” turning into chants on many other subjects ranging from LGBTQ rights to the occupation of Palestine. As the feeders reached the rally, we broke up and went to our own tables (although many continued to carry Peace Table and Socialist Contingent signs).

From that point Socialist Party members gathered at our table where we distributed materials, magazines and literature. It was a great opportunity to meet with rally participants and build comradeship.

Impressions

The “One Nation Working Together” rally was a tough call for many of us. The most jaded socialist would probably call it a Democrat pre-election pep rally (not completely untrue) and the most optimistic would most likely see it as an opportunity for rank-n-file workers and activists to “show our numbers”, network and organize ignoring the stump speeches. I lean more toward the later, but questions about the former prevented most left organizations from really mobilizing.

The “peace table” (i.e anti-war feeder) seemed like a plan to re-start a stagnant anti-war movement and the “socialist contingent” was not very diverse. The decision by one group (International Socialist Organization) to mobilize big-time for October 2nd is what probably made the socialist contingent work and also made it look like an ISO rally.

Having hundreds of thousands of unionists and large percentage of youth and people of color (something that was missing from many antiwar actions) made good media. The idea of a large “socialist contingent” banner coming over the hill at the Washington monument with hundreds chanting “Obama Ain’t No Socialist- We Are” makes great video. I’m hoping this inspires people and socialist organizations can move the discussion on building a real alternative to the Democrats. The Labotz campaigns definitely a unifying campaign which I hope helps us build the Party in Ohio.

In 1994 we were in a similar situation. A liberal president and congress failed to deliver on pretty modest promises, the conservatives rallied (that time it was “contract with America”) and the country moved right-ward and the modest anti-war, healthcare and civil rights movement went quiet. It took another 5 years before the anti-globalization movement organized. Let’s hope the next mass rally is more like the anti-globalization protests, independent from the Democrats and anti-capitalist. Lets’ hope the next “socialist contingent” is more broad-based (moving well outside the mostly-Trotskyist left).

The spectacle happened, we have the visuals, now lets build a real alternative.

by Billy Wharton -

Amid the hundreds of thousands of working people gathered in Washington, DC on Saturday for the much heralded “One Nation” march there was a small group looking for more than just turning the voting lever for a Democrat in November. The newly minted “Socialist Contingent” made its presence felt at this massive march as hundreds of eager supporters carried signs calling for jobs for all and an end to the wars. Call it a small step forward for a socialist movement usually racked by internal divisions.

The One Nation march was a joint project of the AFL-CIO and NAACP and aimed to counteract the recent Glenn Beck rally by acting as a left pressure bloc on the sagging Obama Presidency. Organizers presented a post-ideological description of the event that relies on the “hope” language long abandoned by Democratic Party candidates.

Yet, the newly formed “Socialist Contingent” offered a far more radical vision of what October 2nd could be about. They were FOX News’ nightmare brought to life - Socialists! Hundreds of them! Armed with a message that we may be living in a country with two nations - the rich and the working people - instead of one.

The Contingent grew out of the insurgent Ohio Senate campaign of veteran labor activist Dan LaBotz. LaBotz accepted the challenge of becoming the Socialist Party USA candidate in that region and has converted his quest into a broader left campaign. Radical activists of different stripes have supported him and, in the process, gotten to know one another through engaging in grassroots struggle.

LaBotz imported this new sense of solidarity into the October 2nd march. Organizations such as the International Socialist Organization, the radical journal New Politics and Solidarity joined forces and invited leaders from other groups such as the Socialist Party USA and the Democratic Socialists of America. Some big names also signed on, including “Peace Mom” Cindy Sheehan, the popular Marxist economist Rick Wolff and labor radicals Steve Early and Jerry Tucker. And there are dozens of others, all united in the desire to see a new united left force enter the field.

The ideas offered by the Socialist Contingent departed substantially from those presented by march organizers. While the organizers call for demonstrators to “march into the voting booth” and vote for Democrats, the Contingent recognized that the Democrats will never fulfill the crowd’s desire for jobs, healthcare and educations for all. Instead, “independent movements must find political expression first in independent candidates,” and then in a vibrant political organization that represents the interests of working people.

Although the banner carried by this conglomeration of socialists read “Socialist Contingent on October 2nd,” a solution was offered at a post-rally meeting. Dan LaBotz argued for understanding October 2nd as the Contingent’s birthday and that participants might proudly remember the day as a first step in the direction of left unity.

An overall summary of the desires of the group came in its call to action, “we believe that those working people who make the country run should run the country.” As working people suffer from the continued effects of the economic crisis, such ideas may spread rapidly bringing with them new political openings into which future contingents can enter.

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Billy Wharton is the editor of the Socialist WebZine. His articles have been published by the Washington Post, Counterpunch and In These Times. He can be reached at whartonbilly@gmail.com