INGLEWOOD, CA, February 28— “No good landlords in a capitalist system!” This and other antiracist chants rang throughout neighborhoods here during a car caravan against racist gentrification and displacement of mainly Black and Latin residents.
Fighting for a communist world requires having confidence in, and relying on, the working class. It means developing collective planning, organization and discipline so that it becomes second nature to our members and our class. And, it means giving bold, communist, political leadership in the class struggle.
In a small way, the struggle by a local tenants’ union and a non-profit organization to reclaim a house by and for an evicted family has become a political training ground for Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members and our fellow working class fighters.
Racist gentrification attacks all workers
With the building of So-Fi, a brand new football stadium, and starting construction of an arena for the Los Angeles Clippers basketball team, the predominantly Black and Latin city of Inglewood has become a center of gentrification in the Los Angeles area. Since 2016, skyrocketing property values have led to huge rent increases that preceded a 2019 rent control law. Even with the law, the city administration’s complete failure to enforce housing code regulations has continued to allow blood-sucking landlords to force tenants to move and then jack up rents.
Another aspect of racist gentrification has been the appearance of small-time crooks like Trojan Capital Investments, buying up “distressed” mortgages, evicting working-class homeowners and then selling to make a bundle on their blood money investments. The need for multiracial, working class unity in this city could not be more evident.
Connecting past struggle to present
The caravan planning committee, made up mostly of young Latin members of the tenants’ union, drew enthusiasm from a community-building workshop held the prior weekend. That event highlighted the historic role of the Communist Party-led Unemployed Councils, which led the 1930s Depression-era fight against evictions, houselessness, unemployment and racism.
That presentation, given by a PLP member, displayed pictures of the conditions faced by the working class, and how our class fought back then They highlighted the similarity of those conditions to  present-day hunger, houselessness, unemployment, looming evictions and police terror. The speaker also underlined the communist-led, anti-racist, multi-racial unity of those past struggles. Though that communist-led movement won some reforms, it failed to overthrow the entire capitalist system with revolution. But it’s capitalism that is the cause of the evils our class faced then and still faces now. The whole damn capitalist system has to go.
Almost 50 people in 35 cars participated in the caravan, part of an escalating campaign to force Trojan to return the house to the family at a reasonable price. We also brought the message of tenant/homeowner unity to help energize our class brothers and sisters in the fight against gentrification. The campaign organizers had previously canvassed the surrounding neighborhoods. Workers responded enthusiastically to our signs and message, taking literature, raising their fists and even joining our militant chants. The caravan ended at an apartment complex directly across from SoFi. One of the tenants at the complex spoke and exposed the lousy, mold-ridden conditions that the landlord there refuses to repair.
From the chants to the warm solidarity shown to the tenant and homeowner speakers, the energy and spirit of the young people who organized the caravan was on full display. One speaker attacked the role of local poli-tricksters in promoting racist gentrification, and vowed to keep up the fight to defeat this scourge to the working class. Another called for ridding the world of a system where housing remains a commodity. All of the speakers have been working closely with members of PLP on this campaign. They have been extremely open to our call for revolution.
Communists will lead the working class to victory  
Going forward, we have great opportunities to build our Party. About 25 people at the caravan took the latest copy of CHALLENGE. The campaign to reclaim the family’s home will continue. Mass evictions, temporarily put on hold by the bosses’ phony state “moratoriums”, will inevitably raise their ugly head again.
Meanwhile, inter-imperialist rivalry between U.S. and Chinese bosses will lead to world war. These cataclysms will require a mass response from the working class, led by our Party, taking inspiration and learning from both the strengths and the weaknesses of our predecessors in the old communist Party-led movement.
The “hard knocks” experiences of the working class will validate the slogan that “the only solution is communist revolution.” Through the small struggles of today, we are training ourselves and the working class how to seize and hold power, and build a world where decent housing and everything else, which workers will collectively produce, will be shared according to need.J