Boston, June 16–Why, at this year’s annual conference of the Marxist Literary Group (MLG), were more people than ever before talking about communism? It’s a sign of the times, the deepening crisis of imperialism and racism and war. It’s also the result of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) stepping up our fight for communism and the Party at the MLG. It’s still the Marxist as opposed to the Communist Literary Group, but by taking the Marxist work of the conference seriously we are putting communism and the question of the party more on the agenda of these mostly younger academics and grad students.
With a lot of support, we proposed for next year’s conference a reading group on revolutionary organization, so that the need for a communist party would be explicitly on the table. On the literature table this year for the first time was a stack of CHALLENGE, and our papers were all taken. Several people wanted to know more about our history, the article on the Cultural Revolution, etc. Not enough radical people know about PLP, and we are taking some simple steps to correct that at the MLG.
The conference focus this year was Capital Vol. 1 and W.E.B. Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction. To prepare, our comrades took part in three year-long study groups on Marx and Du Bois. Out of this we helped form a panel on Capital and one on Du Bois, and were often able to intervene from the Party’s point of view in the general discussions of both books.
Many people, not only PLP, emphasized that Marx’s book shows in great detail why capitalism can never be thoroughly reformed. The drive to expand capital accumulation through every corner of the world is inevitably reproducing insoluble problems: extremes of wealth and poverty; more masses of wage workers but at the same time masses of the unemployed; constant economic crisis each worse than the last; and capitalist competition leading to imperialist war. An anti-capitalist reader of Marx has to conclude as Marx did that capitalism can never be made to benefit the working class. It’s not usual to point out at the MLG that this conclusion from reading Capital entails a commitment to communist revolution. We made that point.
Racism and imperialism were not often discussed enough, although the Du Bois discussions did show how racism and capitalism are twinned both in the USA and in global imperialism. (Du Bois was an outstanding anti-imperialist voice his whole life long). Capital defines the global market as the heart of expanding capital accumulation, even in Marx’s time; and his book is full of references to the war against American slavery and the parallels between chattel and wage labor. The transition to wage slavery and the missed opportunity of a united Black and white workers’ struggle against capital is Du Bois’s great theme—inspired by Marx—in Black Reconstruction. Other panels did explore capitalist racism: one on Richard Wright, several on the so-called “surplus” (chronically unemployed) population produced by capital, others on colonial land theft. We are friends with many of these presenters and got to know others this year.
If our proposal on revolutionary organization is adopted, we can put more focus on racism and imperialism next year by bringing more Lenin into MLG Marxism, and going beyond Lenin to advocate a single global revolutionary party which summarily banishes nationalism from workers’ struggle. Examples from parties in India, South Africa and the Philippines could make the point that in our day revolutionary communism has to be organized in a single global party. Only such a party form, going further than the Comintern, can fight all the competing imperialist blocs on a global scale, in the process overcoming racism and nationalism in the workers’ ranks. PLP has a lot to contribute in MLG discussions of the theory of the party form, coming out of our analysis in documents like Road to Revolution IV of the defeat of communism in the Soviet and Chinese parties.
There was, except for us, an eerie silence about the already begun inter-imperialist global war. Perhaps because people feel powerless? Another reason to join the Party. The door is open for us to advocate that at the moment, though we are aware that we will face anti-communism here eventually. [See Box, “The New Liberal Anti-Communism”]
For our part, what we got out of the conference is best summarized by a young comrade: “This is our theory! Marxist theory belongs to us, to the communists, to the working class.” There is a problem with the MLG: theory being divorced from practice. On the one hand, it’s good that the powerful intellectual tradition of Marxism is alive and well among some academics; on the other hand, Marxism does not belong mainly to academics. As Brecht wrote once, “Communism is simple: if you’re a worker you can understand it.” Communism is also complex, but workers trained in a revolutionary party led by workers—a party like PLP where academics too are welcome—can also master its complexity.
We are encouraged by this work among intellectuals, feeling our collective power to mobilize as a class if we can bring our academic co-workers into a worker-led PLP, building the Party to fight for communism as capitalism spins off into racist violence and war.
The new liberal anti-communism
Three comrades on a panel at the 2023 MLG conference called “The New Anti-Communism” showed how anti-communism remains alive and well in new forms, even in the absence of a mass communist movement. Why? Because communism remains the greatest threat to the ruling class, and both liberal and rightist wings of the capitalist parties in the USA and Canada are united in slandering it. In its identity-politics guise, anti-communism helps to recruit marginalized workers to fight in imperialist wars against “authoritarianism,” to subdue white workers who might want to combat racism, and to provide political cover for racist attacks on the whole working class.
For one speaker, the Florida and Texas government attacks on “wokeness” as educational brainwashing (i.e., teaching about slavery, labor insurgency or gender politics) were dog-whistle accusations that recalled McCarthy-era portrayals of Communists infesting the brains of innocent Americans. Another speaker pointed out that it is wrong to point to “the right” as the main danger in such attacks on teachers and their unions, since liberal multicultural identity politics have prepared the ground for the likes of fascist Florida Governor Ron De Santis. Often, antiracist folks are disarmed against these attacks by their allegiance to divisive liberal identity politics which hide workers’ common interests.
The third speaker discussed how the Canadian government has historically manipulated the status of “refugees.” “Good” refugees have been those fleeing from communism, like those from Vietnam decades ago, or Ukrainians today fleeing a capitalist Russia falsely identified as communist through the word “authoritarian.” But refugees from places like Haiti are to be turned away at the border. Propaganda like the short TV ads “Heritage Minutes” falsely feature Canada as a land of freedom from “totalitarian” oppression, while their multicultural imagery helps the liberal ruling class depict marginalized workers as full citizens of a free country. Liberals in Canada, fascists in Florida: both use anti-communism to shatter workers’ unity, attack workers in struggle, and prepare a population of patriots for world war.
HAITI, July 2—Since January 2023, the two-year “Humanitarian Parole” program has offered Haitians, Venezuelans, Cubans and Salvadorans the possibility of entering the U.S. without going through the traditional “illegal” channels. This program, which in reality aims to reduce the number of migrants crossing the U.S. borders, has been praised by many Haitian workers and others who only dream of fleeing a country plagued by gang terror, economic misery, and political instability. Even children only talk about traveling. But the reality is that U.S. imperialism prefers to camouflage the problems that we are facing more than to really come to our rescue. In the capitalist world, solidarity is not an option: the big fish have no mercy for the little ones—the countries of the global north have no compassion for the countries of the global south. Their only aim is to squeeze profits off the cheap labor of migrants.
“I can't wait, I can't wait any longer for my approval to come,” admits a young graduate in legal sciences who is doing his second year of internship as a lawyer. He draws up a list of others like himself who have sponsors in the U.S. and have already applied to the program. He adds that many of these applicants, who have been waiting six months in limbo, are in danger of developing mental disorders from the stress, in particular depression. They are living on the edge, fearful of the insecurity created by the gangs and the rampant inflation that increasingly impoverishes them and their families. And there are others who can not find sponsors because the conditions set by Biden & Co. are very difficult for sponsoring friends and family members.
Those who do manage to leave come from all sections of society: workers (employed and unemployed), professionals, public and private executives, teachers and students. “Our country is pushing us out; we are not needed here,” said one person interviewed for this article. “It’s like we are in a pressure cooker, and the chief chef has opened the valve to let some steam out. This won’t solve the problems that the Haitian masses are facing because of the profit system.”
This is the march to Canaan, the Promised Land. Some people say it is a forced exodus even believing that the U.S. has hidden interests. Many know that what waits for them on the other side is not the gold in the streets but rather more racism, unemployment or low-wage jobs, underserved schools and hospitals, crowded and overpriced housing. So many deplore the program, but the contradiction is that it is hard to resist the urge to take advantage of it. They hope they will be able to fade into the population after the two-year “parole” ends.
U.S. Imperialists Can’t Find Other Countries to Intervene/Invade Haiti
For several months now, the “international community,” that is the imperialists and their local lackeys, have been dithering on finding a solution to the crisis in Haiti. None of the countries in the region is willing to give in to U.S. demands to field an invasionary force to restore some semblance of stability. The U.S. bosses’ decline in influence in the region is evident. Even Canada, a long-time imperialist player in Haiti, is hedging; the best they could come up with is setting up an office in the neighboring Dominican Republic to monitor the situation. The Dominican government rejected that idea, and both countries issued a toothless statement regarding their commitment to stability in Haiti.
The politicians in the Haitian bourgeoisie continue to act as if they are wearing blinders. Most working class people understand that these politicians are not their friends but are looking out for their own personal interests, looking for any opportunity for some sort of power grab. The local bourgeoisie crawls on hands and knees, in search of favor from the imperialist powers and multinational organizations.
The only solution is to stand up and fight back
You can feel the level of insecurity and fear in the masses. So when a Progressive Labor Party comrade says that she is not going to look for a sponsor to leave, that she is willing to “fight back against the capitalist system that has created this mess,” she is often met with skepticism. But using patience and all the tools of historical and dialectical materialism that she has learned in PLP cadre schools and study groups, she can say that the workers of Haiti have fought for their liberation in the past and will do so again. Capitalism and imperialism have built-in contradictions that make life a misery for one, very large class of human beings who produce all value in society. That we have not just a few Polish soldiers (who deserted Napoleon’s army during the Haitian Revolution and fought on the side of the enslaved workers), but will fight for the solidarity and unity of the entire international working class. We will build a new revolutionary communist movement that fights resolutely in the interests of our class.
This young comrade can make the difference in our ability to organize workers for communism and an egalitarian society! We have taken modest steps, engaging with our local populations in fighting against “food insecurity”—hunger through collective kitchens; organizing to provide masks and public sanitation kiosks against the Covid-19 pandemic; working together with our neighbors to rebuild homes and infrastructure after the 2021 earthquake in our area. These are all struggles that our Party initiated along with our friends to combat the local bosses who neglect the needs of workers and line their own pockets with ‘international aid.”
We can do better and we can do more. There are many more like her who would like to maintain their conviction and their composure in such troubling social, economic and political situations. In the current chaos, the ideological foresight of the members of the PLP is revolutionary. Raising class consciousness through struggle and political education is a necessity for the growth of our Party. This will be our goal this summer in our cadre school.
Long live our struggle, long live PLP. Onwards to the final victory!
Another racist assault by kkkops on Black workers
Washington Post, 6/15–Six sheriff’s deputies responding to a report of drug activity at a Mississippi home in January deactivated their body cameras before forcibly entering the house…Once inside, the…deputies allegedly handcuffed two Black men and subjected them to a night of abuse. While Michael Jenkins and Eddie Parker were subdued, the deputies beat them, hurled racist slurs and repeatedly used Tasers on the men…The deputies, who are White, also waterboarded Jenkins and Parker, pelted them with eggs and attempted to sexually assault them with a sex toy…The encounter ended nearly two hours later when a deputy placed a gun in Jenkins’s mouth and shot him, permanently injuring his face…Jenkins was transported by medics to the University of Mississippi Medical Center and received several surgeries, according to the lawsuit. Parker was arrested and transported to the Rankin County Jail on a charge of possession of drug paraphernalia…
Capitalism is always at war with workers
Al Jazeera, 7/3–The number of women who died within a year after pregnancy more than doubled between 1999 and 2019 in the United States, a new study has found, with the highest number of deaths recorded among Black women. The study, published on Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, looked at maternal deaths between 1999 and 2019 — but not the COVID-19 pandemic spike — for every U.S. state and five racial and ethnic groups. There were an estimated 1,210 maternal deaths in 2019, compared with 505 in 1999, the researchers found.Overall, the number of deaths per 100,000 live births rose from 12.7 to 32.2 in that 20-year span, while the number of deaths among Black women increased from 26.7 to 55.4. The greatest jump over time was seen among American Indian and Alaska Native women, however – from 14 deaths per 100,000 live births in 1999 to 49.2 in 2009.
East Asia bosses realize fewer babies is a problem
Economist, 6/30–Ultra-low birth rates and stiff resistance to immigration produce shrinking populations: according to the United Nations, the four East Asian territories will see their combined populations shrink by 28% between 2020 and 2075. During the same period, their combined share of global gdp is projected to drop from 26.7% to 17.4%, according to Goldman Sachs…political leaders see families as an urgent policy priority.
Xi Jinping, China’s leader, has promised “a national policy system to boost birth rates” and launched a national effort to promote “new-era marriage culture.” Japan’s low birth rate leaves it “on the brink of whether it can continue to function as a society,” according to its prime minister, Kishida Fumio…Yoon Suk-yeol, South Korea’s president, called his country’s birth rate a “crucial national agenda” in need of an “emergency mindset.” Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, has called its declining birth rate a “national-security problem”... Mr Paul Chang, a sociologist at Harvard University argues: “The changes are driven by anxieties, social problems and social conflicts,” not the triumph of the individual.
Big Fascists rediscover need for centralized war production
Foreign Affairs, 7/3–Weeks after the fighting began, the New York Times columnist Paul Krugman argued that the United States and its allies are “serving as the ‘arsenal of democracy,’...But this lofty rhetoric does not match the reality on the ground. Shortages in production, inadequate labor pools, and interruptions in supply chains have hamstrung the United States’ ability to deliver weapons to Ukraine and enhance the country’s defense capabilities more broadly. These problems have much to do with the history of the U.S. defense industry since World War II…Back then, the industry was predominantly a government-run business. President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal emphasized economic regulation and relied on “alphabet agencies” such as the Works Progress Administration to boost employment, paving the way for later wartime contracting. New Deal agencies inspired the creation of the War Production Board in 1942, which mobilized business and rationed resources for the battlefront…The government owned nearly 90 percent of the productive capacity of aircraft, ships, and guns and ammunition.
It’s been awhile, but we had our first Wine Tasting fundraiser since April 2019. We raised money for the Progressive Labor Party’s 2023 Summer Project and it was a rousing success! Over 50 comrades and friends showed up and it was quite a collective effort as many people stepped up and contributed to its success. As capitalism ravages the workers of the world more and more, it was inspiring to see a multiracial crowd of women and men committed to a better world for the working class. It was a little bit of the working class that under communism will run the world.
These Wine Tasting socials have always been fun events with a strong political component. They have helped to strengthen ties with friends that want a better world and with friends that are in struggles against racism and sexism and are also interested in that better world, communism. This year was a little different as we struggled with a short organizing timeline and also threatening weather. But the working class again came through as many people stepped up to help out. A friend collected money; she was friendly but efficient, making an important task easy. Another longtime friend took care of an auction that was meant to raise a little money. Wandering through the crowd, joking and cajoling, he raised a lot more. The food was not only plentiful, but fantastic. And people committed to taking part in the Party Summer Project.
Fight racism - organize for communism
But, most important was who came and who spoke and what was said. Many old friends showed up, but also new comrades and friends came from recent struggles. And it was clear that capitalism cannot be reformed. Whether it’s racist harassment of students in Brooklyn or the horrible, intentional racism of migrants drowning in the Mediterranean, the whole damn capitalist system has to go!
At one high school where teachers and students fought to have a memorial for a Black student who was killed (see CHALLENGE, 4/12), the struggle goes on. The same principal who took down memorial posters is the same principal refusing to provide mandated services for English language learners. On the same campus, union misleaders are pushing a racist contract proposal and attacking teachers for merely asking questions (see CHALLENGE, 7/5). Some of these teachers came to the fundraiser. One of the teachers compared how the capitalist media is so concerned about some billionaires who died in a ridiculously lavish underwater excursion, while hundreds of migrants on a sinking boat (seeking refuge from the perils of imperialism) are allowed to die in the Mediterranean Sea with no effort to save them.
Meanwhile some students and faculty from Kingsborough Community College attended. They spoke about the continuing harassment of students at their college by an administration led by liberals including a Black woman president (see CHALLENGE, 1/18). These liberals are pursuing a baseless investigation of two faculty who defended a student who was tackled and arrested at the college for trying to stop a fight. They have forced students to drop out of school and they constantly harass students in the school cafeteria. The fightback has been active and ongoing with many students attending various actions and Party events.
At this fundraiser two students spoke about how this struggle has helped them see the power of the working class when we unite and fight back. They have both joined the Party.
Join the 2023 Summer Project
This fundraiser was a small step toward a successful Summer Project 2023. We will rededicate ourselves to building a revolutionary communist movement, train new young leaders and welcome many more leaders into the PLP as we fight for an egalitarian, communist world.
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MTA & Union bosses railroad workers with pathetic contract
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- 06 July 2023 149 hits
NEW YORK CITY, July 3—It's sellout contract season at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s (MTA) New York City Transit Authority section (NYCTA). The boss-loving TWU Local 100 misleadership hurt the workers who keep the city's trains and buses running.
As with just about any "contract" under capitalism, this one is a racist slap in the face to NYCTA's mainly Black and Latin workers. It provides pathetic, below inflation wage increases, does nothing to improve the challenging time off process for some departments, forces employees to work even more hours, and joins up with the bosses' for profit Medicare Advantage scheme. With imperialist war with China and Russia impending overseas, the MTA must satisfy its Wall Street debt owners off the backs of both its ridership and workers. Local 100 is all too happy to oblige them in that goal with this pathetic offering.
NYC subway workers, 170 plus of whom died from Covid-19 moving essential workers while the racist MTA bosses disallowed us Personal Protective Equipment due to fears of "public perception," must realize that there will never be a "fair” or just contract under a system that places profit over the working class. The only way for transit workers to get what they and all workers deserve is to join together to smash capitalism and fight for a communist revolution, on and off the rails!
Paying off debt on workers’ backs
Local 100 “leaders'' are performing their class role, working hand in hand with the MTA bosses, to repay the system’s $48 billion in debt to Wall Street bankers. Decades of neglect by the city’s bosses left the subway system in a decrepit state in the 1980s (Gothamist, 6/21). During this period, MTA leadership for the first time approached profiteering banks, all too eager to lend financial handouts. This ballooning debt has continually been used to finance new station expansions, train cars, buses and track, to be repaid through increased tolls, taxes and fares. Or in other words, by the working class!
Today, the amount the MTA will pay on this debt will represent 40 percent of its entire toll and fare revenue, a number that was less than four percent in 1984.
This means the bosses' banks have written blank checks to maintain the trains and buses in a barely good state of repair. And workers are perennially forced to endure the racist service cuts that come with this crushing debt. Those cuts are set to become even worse after ridership tanked during the pandemic, as the MTA admitted to its lenders in April (Gothamist, 6/21).
Now, with another racist fare hike on the horizon (New York Times, 5/22), which would bring in more money to finance bosses’ pockets and barely the system itself, Local 100 cannot avoid the contradiction inherent in every union today: it must partner in tandem with management to produce an agreement that harms both MTA workers and the ridership!
Forcing workers to toil more
The tentative agreement expands on an employee availability clause, introduced in a previous contract, to force employees to work an additional five days. Once this goal is reached, “the parties will implement gainsharing of any additional improvement,” according to the language. This means that the union will share these profits with the MTA bosses.
Employees who work in the Rapid Transit Operations (RTO) division, that includes train operators and conductors, already have to compete against their coworkers using an automated phone system 20 days in advance, just to receive a day off. Many times, these day-off requests are denied.
Many in RTO use their sick days–which are always granted immediately–as a workaround. Management is directly responsible for many MTA workers being out, imposing harsh disciplinary suspensions and medically restricting them and making them go through hoops to return. Many workers were also out sick during the pandemic’s worst days (Spectrum News, 3/24/20).
But of course, this clause makes no mention of those factors. And as long as the trains run, why would the bosses care about the well being of those operating them? A common demand that we have repeatedly expressed to the union in years past was for more “mental” health days. Many of our trips lack sufficient recovery time and the environment we work in can be mentally challenging at times. With the agreement, Local 100 not only is attacking the workers it represents, but the working class as a whole, as they will deal with a more tired operating workforce.
Contract privatizes Medicare for healthcare bosses’ pockets
The union is also joining city efforts to strip workers of government Medicare for the racist Medicare Advantage (MA) plan (see CHALLENGE, 6/10/21). The agreement, if ratified, would eliminate the traditional option and force MTA retirees to choose one of two MA plans. In response to a backlash, union bosses have released statements claiming that the two plans will not result in diminished service and will be better than regular Medicare. But we know that Medicare Advantage places control in the hands of for profit private insurance companies that are known to deny care in several instances (New York Times, 4/28). The switch would also save the MTA money, as the government subsidizes Advantage plans more than the traditional one.
Flyers promoting the contract have said that it has no givebacks, but this effort to sell out mostly Black and Latin retirees (which was included in the document of the MTA’s proposals given to the TWU in May) clearly proves they’re lying to the membership!
Fighting back
Even with the strong likelihood that most departments will ratify the contract, as has been the case historically, many of our coworkers have denounced it on online Facebook groups and in our crew rooms. This is an opportunity to use that working class anger towards something even better than a better contract. Progressive Labor Party members in transit have been active in discussing the contract with coworkers, pushing them to vote no in higher numbers than usual, especially in the RTO department. These conversations also allow us to bring up the Party as the only way to win in the end.
The MTA workers who transport four of the city’s eight million residents daily are in a unique position to strike a blow against the bosses who generate billions in profit from our labor and tell us we need to give back more concessions, when we gave the ultimate concession during the pandemic’s darkest days: our lives!
But the union leadership will always strangle that that potential, which is why we must fight for a workers’ world.
