On September 17, in a desperate campaign to stop global warming, thousands of climate activists, business leaders, government officials, and “civil society representatives” will converge upon New York City for the fifteenth annual Climate Week. Co-sponsored by the United Nations, an organization born in 1945 to serve U.S. imperialism and the postwar liberal world order, the event has a bold slogan: “We Can. We Will.”
In reality, the reformists can’t—and the capitalist bosses won’t. After a summer of lethal heat waves, biblical floods, hot tub oceans, runaway wildfires, and toxic orange skies, liberal reforms cannot prevent wholesale catastrophe from climate change. Climate action has hit a wall. Greenhouse gas emissions set an all-time high in 2022, and will do so again in 2023. The rulers are wedded to heat-trapping fossil fuels for two fundamental reasons: maximum profit and inter-imperialist rivalry. From China to the United States, their system is falling into crisis. With fascism rising and World War III on the horizon, capitalism has no answers for perpetual war, massive poverty, or resurgent infectious diseases. It surely has none for the vast challenge of climate change and the racist horrors we are witnessing in real time.

Only a communist world, run by and for the international working class, can balance our needs for energy with the priorities of health, safety, and development that serve our class interests. Only the working class can be trusted to make life-and-death decisions on how to heat and power our world—to build more safely run nuclear reactors, for example. There’s no climate solution without communist revolution!

Clean energy “transition” is dead in the water
Beginning in the 19th century, coal and oil and gas fueled the rise of capitalism. They brought millions of workers out of the cold. They created modern industry and transportation—and modern wars for profit. But today, fossil fuels are Exhibit A of capitalism in decay. They’re filthy and inefficient and force multipliers of racist inequality. Climate change is deadly for workers, and for Black and Brown workers most of all. Nine million people a year die from the fine particulate matter linked to greenhouse gasses. Half a million die from extreme heat alone. In 2022, climate disasters forced 100 million workers to flee their homes. One third of Pakistan was under water.

In 2015, at a benchmark climate summit in Paris, the UN set a “binding” target for global warming of 2 degrees Celsius—or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit—over pre-industrial levels. (For context, the Earth has already warmed by 1.2 degrees Celsius.) Based on current climate policies, according to Columbia University physicist James Hansen, the planet will punch through the Paris ceiling before 2050 (“Global Warming in the Pipeline,” www.columbia.edu, 7/5). By 2100, within the lifetimes of children here today, the Earth projects to be at least 2.7 degrees hotter (climateactiontracker.org). That might not sound like much, but consider: The last Ice Age was triggered by a temperature shift of just 6 degrees Celsius. At 2.7 degrees of warming, scientists predict that the Earth will pass calamitous tipping points of no return (nature.com, 11/27/19). Coral reefs will go extinct. Polar glaciers will dissolve and drown islands around the globe (abc.net.au, 3/28/22). A billion or more climate migrants will be trapped between unbearable conditions and the bosses’ borders (economicsandpeace.org, 9/9/20).

Meanwhile, recent UN climate summits have been hijacked by Big Oil, the same monsters who for decades spewed climate disinformation alongside their carbon dioxide. This December’s conference is set for the capitalist Disneyland of Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates. Presiding will be Sultan Al Jaber, head of the state-owned energy company. Like Saudi Arabia, another immigrant slave state, the UAE is committed to unlimited exploitation of its oil and gas reserves to 2100 and beyond.

Fossil fuels and imperialist plunder
Why can’t the capitalist rulers tackle this existential threat? The short answer is that fossil fuels remain highly profitable, at least in the short term—and capitalism has a chaotically short-term outlook. After Russia invaded Ukraine, energy markets went haywire. The price of oil soared. The “supermajors”—ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, BP—junked plans to diversify into renewables. With lavish financing from the likes of JPMorgan Chase and Citi, they doubled down on their old business model. In 2022, they plowed $4 trillion of record windfall profits into dividends, share buybacks, and expanded fossil fuel production. Barely half of 1 percent of their ill-gotten gains went toward clean energy (iea.org, May 2023). Exxon spent less than $3 billion on “lower greenhouse gas emissions initiatives” and $23 billion on new oil and gas projects (euronews.com/1/2).

Even as solar and wind prices have plunged, and clean electricity runs much of the world’s power grids, the fossil fuel sector keeps growing. When President Joe Biden rammed through his Inflation Reduction Act, media cheerleaders said it could stimulate $1 trillion in renewable energy investments. They glossed over the fact that Biden also greenlit the immense Willow oil project in Alaska and three huge pipelines for natural gas. His Energy Department is ready to lease eighty million acres of the Gulf of Mexico—twice the area of Florida—for offshore drilling (cnbc.com, 11/17/21).

The U.S. and Europe, which have plundered the world for centuries with the aid of fossil fuels, are at odds with emerging economies—notably China—that want their turn at the plundering. Although China dominates the solar panel and battery industries, and soon will dominate offshore wind, it also consumes more than half the world’s coal. Over the last year, China approved an average of two new coal-powered plants per week, a source of cheap energy and jobs in a country where youth unemployment exceeds 21 percent (statista.com).
In July, President Xi Jinping told U.S. climate envoy John Kerry that future cooperation on climate would hinge on U.S. policies on Taiwan and trade. All bets will be off if the two superpowers keep sliding toward world war—oil is the life’s blood of their armies, after all. The U.S. military alone consumes more than 100 billion barrels per year (ucusa.org, 6/1/14).

Carrots, sticks, and communism
It’s easy for the capitalists to shower clean energy with the carrots of subsidies and tax breaks. But no matter how much solar and wind and hydropower is deployed, global warming won’t stop until the fossil fuel economy gets mostly dismantled. That can’t happen without some big sticks, beginning with a punitive tax on carbon.

The issue with sticks is that they hurt certain bosses’ profits. With the U.S. ruling class deeply split, and the Republican Party significantly controlled by Koch Industries, coal giant Peabody, and other domestic energy interests, Biden’s Democrats have little room to maneuver. But the primary obstacles to meaningful climate action are the lack of discipline and long-range thinking within finance capital, the liberal main wing of global banks and multinational oil companies. Nor is there much appetite for sticks on the world stage. When recent climate summits floated a “phaseout” of coal or a “phasedown” of all fossil fuels, they were vetoed by China, India, Brazil, and imperialist Russia, which gets nearly half its revenues from oil and gas.

As workers join the mass movement against climate change, we need to be clear that individual actions can’t win this monumental battle. It’s not nearly enough to compost or recycle or buy an electric vehicle—or to vote for a “green” politician. The rulers and their callous greed created this crisis; the international working class will solve it. The fight for a sustainable planet can’t be set apart from our fight to smash the racist, sexist profit system that chokes the atmosphere. A communist society, led by Progressive Labor Party, will unleash the technology and creativity we need to forge a new world, one where workers’ lives and well-being come first. Join us!

The working class lost a great fighter against racism and for working class power when Dr. Finley Calvin Campbell died at his home in Chicago on August 18. A fearless, committed, and uncompromising comrade, Finley was still organizing meetings from his bedside in the last days of his life.

Finley was born in Anderson, South Carolina, on September 23, 1934. At age eight, his family moved to Detroit, where he lived until 1952.  He was educated at Morehouse College in Atlanta and the University of Chicago, where he earned his PhD in literature studying with renowned historian John Hope Franklin.
While in Atlanta, Finley wrote speeches for Maynard Jackson, later the city’s mayor, and was on a first-name basis with historian Howard Zinn. His PhD dissertation, mentored by Franklin, is a historical analysis of the literature of Black Reconstruction after the U.S. Civil War.  During a year spent studying French at the Sorbonne in Paris, he met his first wife, Liliane. After their marriage, she had to “pass as Black” for them to be able to live together legally in Georgia.

With his impressive credentials, Finley could have made a career in politics or become one of those well-known, wealthy Black intellectuals who are so highly prized by the capitalist establishment. But Finley rejected all of that. He immersed himself in the grassroots struggle against racist injustice and against the capitalist profit system.

A vivid first impression
Progressive Labor Party first encountered Finley in July, 1971, in Gary, Indiana. About fifty members of the Party and Students for a Democratic Society were picketing outside the U.S. Steel plant on the last day before the union’s contract expired. Finley was walking down the street, having just walked out of a meeting of Black politicians because of their anti-white stance.  He lit up when he saw the protest, strode over, and joined the picket line.  Within five minutes, Finley was giving a speech and leading chants through the bullhorn. “Who is this guy?” people said. He inspired the picket line with his booming voice and his call for working class unity against the capitalists. At the time, we didn’t know that he had organized the Malcolm X Institute at Wabash College—where he was the first Black professor, and from which he was fired for antiracist activities. We didn’t know that he’d run for governor of Indiana on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket, getting thousands of votes from white and Black workers alike.  

The Party and Finley began to work together. He continued to organize activities in Indiana, including the original “Halloween against Racism” demonstration at St. Joseph’s College, complete with a powerful speech about the monsters and vampires of racism. Finley took a faculty position at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and moved there with his then wife, Vicki. During that time, with Toby Schwartz and others, he was instrumental in organizing the International Committee Against Racism. One early victory was a full-page ad in the New York Times that denounced racist IQ theories and was signed by over a hundred leading experts in the field.  

Fighting racists from Chicago to Tupelo
In 1975, Finley was a leader of the INCAR/PLP Boston Summer Project to confront the gutter racists of South Boston and integrate CarsonBeach. At a historic demonstration in Chicago, Finley was on the sound truck as we led 700 Black, Latin and white workers and students through the Nazi-infested, previously “whites only” Marquette Park. At a march in Tupelo, Mississippi, he was shot and injured by a cowardly member of the Ku Klux Klan.

In the mid-1970’s, in an obvious set-up, Finley was fired by the University of Wisconsin for his antiracist activities. His field of expertise was American Literature and race in the late 1800’s. The committee that voted him down included a Black meteorologist and a Black jazz musician. Neither had any grasp of Finley’s field, but because they were members of the school’s Afro-American Studies department, the university used them to provide cover to kick him out.

A strong voice for multiracial unity
Finley embraced the Party’s line that racism was rooted in the class conflict of capitalism. He attacked the Black class traitors who allied with the capitalist bosses and deeply believed that multiracial working-class unity was essential—both to smash racism and to destroy the profit system. He had no patience for fake-left terms such as “white privilege” and “white supremacy,” which mask the class content of racism and divide Black and Latin workers from white workers. As he recently wrote: “Remember: It was our old enemies in the revisionist and so-called black nationalist movements which revived this false term [white supremacy] as a way of confusing the working class about the true nature of their exploitation and oppression – not white supremacy, but green supremacy – finance capital. We won’t be fooled again.”

From the 1990’s until very recently, Finley taught at working class colleges and organized in the Unitarian Church to help win youth and people in the community to the antiracist struggle. From organizing study groups to raising money for international work to being a powerful voice and mentor for the Party’s understanding of racism, he never stopped fighting for the working class.

A true communist to the end
Finley did not shy away from the term “communism.” In fact, he lamented how some barely mentioned Marx and Lenin as “the shoulders on which we stand to see further.” Even when he used theological language, it was always in the context of Marxism-Leninism. He was unafraid to raise questions within our organization, a practice we all need to emulate as a necessity in building a vibrant Party. But he remained a true antiracist communist to the end. Finley was a tireless fighter, building an antiracist group of more than one hundred workers in the Unitarian Church from all over the U.S. and planning meetings up until his death. One of his last requests was for the Party to continue to get CHALLENGE to workers to whom he’d been delivering it without fail.

The struggle for multiracial unity against racism and for a world free of exploitation and oppression would have been far weaker without Finley. Our Party is so much stronger because of his decades of consistent and dedicated work.

Finley leaves behind Roberta (Bobbi), his devoted wife and partner in life and political struggle; children Phillip, Paulette, David, Kathi, and Mark; grandchildren Taylor, Bryanna, Lya, Lanny, Laïssa, and Anastasia; and a grateful international working class.

He also leaves behind his wisdom and profound commitment. He directly influenced thousands of workers, who in turn will continue to influence tens and hundreds of thousands. Finley will live on as long as the fight continues for a world free of racism and exploitation.

A memorial service in Chicago will be held on Saturday, September 23, on Finley’s 89th birthday at 4 PM (Central) in person or via zoom.

            Memorial Service for Finley
                        Saturday, September 23
          4 PM CT, 5:00 pm EST, and 2:00 pm PST
                                In-person info:
                                First Unitarian
5650 S. Woodlawn, Chicago.
Zoom info: https://us02web.zoom us/j/84617168894
Meeting ID: 846 1716 8894
Dial in: 1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)

Finley Campbell and the 1979 Tupelo Summer Project
Progressive Labor Party (PLP), and its allies in the International Committee Against Racism (INCAR), organized a Summer Project in Tupelo Mississippi in 1979 when the KKK claimed Tupelo as its national headquarters. Volunteers flowed in, among them Finley Campbell. Finley was an experienced fighter by then and inspired all the newer volunteers to give their best.

The Project built its base within the Black community. We canvassed the area with literature, organized meetings and study groups. By July, the Project called for a mass march starting in the Black neighborhood and leading to downtown Tupelo.

The Project organized its own security forces watching out for the KKK in white and blue. The marchers held a rally when they arrived downtown. An armed gunman appeared on the fringe of the crowd. He fired a round of birdshot at the two speakers, Finley Campbell and Carolyn Eubanks wounding them both. The gunman began to reload. Our security team rushed forward tackling him to the ground and giving him the beating he deserved. Instantly the police arrested the head of the security team. He was charged with attempted murder for stopping the shooter.

The local prosecutor convened a Grand Jury planning to indict our comrade by calling the victims, Carolyn and Finley, to testify about what happened!

The lawyer explained to Carolyn and Finley that our only chance in defending our comrade was for them to refuse to testify – to plead the 5th. Finley was extremely frustrated that he had to remain silent. He was a passionate orator who spoke in the powerful style of the preacher he was. He was electric. Silence Finley! Surely not! But silent he was in the cause of saving a comrade. He often talked in later years of the many experiences of Tupelo 1979. The most painful was not the birdshot—it was the time this mighty speaker had to remain silent. Finley set an example that day in Tupelo that lives on in our collective memories.