The First Socialist International of the 21st Century

by Kiraz Janicke, Federico Fuentes, and Julio Chavez
Venezuelanalysis.com
Apr 26th 2010

During the recently concluded five-month extraordinary congress [1] of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, Kiraz Janicke & Federico Fuentes had the opportunity to discuss President Hugo Chavez’s proposal to form a Fifth Socialist International, with Julio Chavez, a delegate to the PSUV congress and a member of the congress’s international committee, which is charged with drafting a specific plan of action to form a new socialist international.


The proposal that President Hugo Chavez made regarding the formation of a Fifth Socialist International has attracted a lot of attention at a global level. I'm interested in your point of view, as a delegate and member of the International Committee of the Congress of the PSUV, why propose a 5th International and what is the importance of this proposal?

I believe that the proposal launched by the President Hugo Chávez, to raise at this time a global debate on historical relevance of the need to call on all parties, movements and leftist and anti-imperialist currents of the world to have a full discussion, is based on the characterization and in-depth analysis of the crisis of global capitalism. This leads unquestionably to the conclusion that the only way to overcome the cyclical crisis of world capitalism is, in fact, by proposing a model or a path that is completely different from the neo-liberal model, the predatory model, of capitalism. There is no other alternative than the path of transition to socialism.

Histories of the four Internationals

Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez [right] has called for the formation of a Fifth International to unite socialists around the world. The previous internationals were places of debate and action, established to strengthen the international socialist movement. Dan Swain of the British Socialist Workers Party (SWP) has writen a breif history of each one, arguing that we “can learn an enormous amount by studying them”.

The First International was forged in struggle On 28 September 1864, delegations of workers from different countries met in London to form the International Working Men’s Association. This was later known as the First International. The Second International: From class war to imperialist slaughter Divisions over the question of revolution led to the break up of the First International. The same problem was also of decisive importance to the fate of the next attempt to unite socialists across borders. The Socialist International, known as the Second International, was established in 1889. The Third International: Revolutionary hope crushed by Stalinism When the parties of the Second International voted to support the First World War many socialists were left uncertain about what to do next. From the carnage of the war, however, came a beacon of hope that inspired millions across the world. A revolution in Russia put workers in control in October 1917. The success of the revolution inspired the creation of Communist Parties across Europe. The Fourth International: Keeping the flame alive Leon Trotsky, one of the leaders of the Russian revolution, opposed Joseph Stalin’s increasing stranglehold on the Soviet Union and the Third International. As a result he was exiled from Russia. In 1938 he gathered together a small number of his supporters to form the Fourth International. You can read the full articles here on UNITYblog.

Michael Albert: Fifth International?!

By Michael Albert 


Znet January 21, 2010 
 To be a contender, “21st Century Socialist” vision needs elaboration, advocacy, and program. To improve focus and increase power, worldwide anti-capitalist organizations, projects, and movements need shared coherence and mutual solidarity. To fulfill these needs, Venezuela’s President Chavez recently announced to widespread support and also some critical response that a gathering in Caracas this April would establish a new International. [See Historic decision to form socialist Fifth International] But what might this new International look like? What might it accomplish? How might people, such as those reading this essay, and particularly people in grassroots movements around the world, relate to it?

Keep reading

Proposal for a Participatory Socialist International

From Znet

We, the undersigned, endorse the idea of a new International and urge that its creation include assessing, refining, augmenting, and then implementing as many of the following points as the International’s participants themselves, after due deliberation, decide mutually agreeable: 

1. A new International should be primarily concerned (at least) with: • economic production, consumption, and allocation, including class relations • kinship nurturance, socialization, house keeping, and procreation, including gender, sexuality, and age • cultural community relations including race, nationality, and religion • politics including relations of law and legislation • international relations including matters of mutual aid, exchange, and immigration • ecology including relations with the natural environment and other species And that the new International should address these concerns without elevating any one focus above the rest, since (a) all will critically affect the character of a new world, (b) unaddressed each could subvert efforts to reach a new world, and (c) the constituencies most affected by each would be intensely alienated if their prime concerns were relegated to secondary importance.
 

2. Our vision for a Participatory Socialist future should (at least) include that: • economic production, consumption, and allocation be classless - which includes equitable access for all to quality education, health care, food, water, sanitation, housing, meaningful and dignified work, and the instruments and conditions for personal fulfillment • gender/kinship, sexual, and family relations not privilege by age, sexual preference, or gender any one group above others - which includes ending all forms of oppression of women while providing day care, recreation, health care, etc. • culture and community relations among races, ethnic groups, religions, and other cultural communities protect the rights and identity of each community up to equally respecting those of all other communities - which includes an end to racist, ethnocentric, and otherwise bigoted structures while simultaneously securing the prosperity and rights of indigenous people • political decision making, adjudication of disputes, and implementation of shared programs deliver “people’s power” in ways that do not elevate any one sector or constituency above others - which includes participation and justice for all • international trade, communication, and other interactions attain peace and justice while dismantling all vestiges of colonialism and imperialism - which includes canceling the debt of nations of the global south and reconstructing international norms and relations to move toward an equitable and just community of equally endowed nations • ecological choices not only be sustainable, but care for the environment in accord with our highest aspirations for ourselves and our world - which includes climate justice and energy innovation
 3. The guiding values and principles informing internal strategic and programmatic deliberations of an International highlight at least the following values which includes implementing whatever structural steps prove essential to organizationally embody the values as well as possible in the present: • solidarity, to help align worldwide movements and projects into mutual aid and collective benefit • diversity, to spur creative innovation, respect dissent, and recognize that minority views thought to be crazy today can lead to what is brilliant tomorrow • equity, to seek wealth and income fairness • peace with justice, to realize international fairness and fulfillment • ecological sustainability and wisdom, to seek human survival and interconnection • “democracy” or perhaps even a more inspiring conception of “people’s power,” “participatory democracy,” or “self management,” to foster participation and equitable influence for all
 4. That a new International be the greatest sum of all its parts, including rejecting confining itself to a single line to capture all views in one narrow pattern. To achieve this the new International should: • include and celebrate “currents” to serve as vehicles for contending views, help ward off sectarianism, and aid constant growth 
 • establish that currents should respect the intentions of other currents, assume that differences over policy are about substance and not motive, and pursue substantive debate as a serious part of the whole project
 • afford each current means to openly engage with all other currents to try to advance new insights bearing on policy and program. 
 • guarantee that as long as any particular current accepts the basic tenets of the International and operates in accord with its norms and methods, its minority positions would be given space not only to argue, but, if they don’t prevail, to continue developing their views to establish their merit or discover their inadequacies
 5. Members of the new International would be political parties, movements, organizations, or even projects, where: • members, employees, staff, etc., of each new International member organization would in turn gain membership in the International
 • individuals who want to be members of the International but have no member group that they belong too, would have to join one
 • every member group would have its own agenda for its separate operations which would be inviolable 
 • at the same time, each member group would be strongly urged to make its own operations consistent with the norms, practices, and agendas of the International,establishing solidarity but also autonomy. 
 • member groups would have a wide range of sizes - but since the International’s decisions would not bind groups other than regarding the collective International agenda, a good way to arrive at decisions might be serious discussion and exploration, followed by polls of the whole International membership to see peoples’ leanings, followed by refinements of proposals to seek greater support and to allow dissidents to make their case, culminating in final votes of the membership 6. Programmatically, of course what a new International chooses to do will be contextual and a product of its members desires, but, for example: • a new International might call for international events and days of dissent, for support campaigns for existing struggles by member organizations, and for support of member organizations against repression, as well as undertake widespread debates and campaigns to advance related understanding and mutual knowledge... 
 • more ambitiously, an International might also undertake, for example, a massive international focus on immigration, on ending a war, on shortening the work week worldwide, and/or on averting climatic catastrophe, among other possibilities. It might prepare materials, undertake education, pursue actions, carry out boycotts, support local endeavors, etc.
 • general program would be up to member organizations to decide how to relate to, yet there would be considerable collective momentum for each member organization to participate and contribute as best it could in collective campaigns and projects since clearly one reason to have an International is to help organizations, movements, and projects worldwide escape single-issue loneliness by becoming part of a larger process encompassing diverse focuses and united by agreements to implement various shared endeavors. === To Endorse please: Click Here!

Historic decision to form socialist Fifth International

A meeting of 55 left organisations from 31 countries, held in Caracas on 19-21 November 2009, passed a resolution to convene a global left conference in Venezuela next April that will form an international socialist coalition (to be known as the "Fifth International").

Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela, called for the creation of "the Fifth Socialist International as a new organisation that fits the time and the challenge in which we live, and that can become an instrument of unification and coordination of the struggle of peoples to save this planet”.

President Chavez addresses conference of left parties.

Australian socialist Federico Fuentes, a conference participant, reports:

Chavez said it would be a new body without manuals and impositions, where differences were welcome. He criticised the practices of the old Communist Party of the Soviet Union, which imposed its dogmas such as “socialism in one country” on its satellite parties internationally...

Chavez said the new international should reject the failed projects of “real socialism” and social democracy. It should embody the spirit and heritage left to humanity by the founders of the first four internationals. It should also incorporate the ideas of past Latin American revolutionaries.

It has to be an international to confront imperialism, and defeat capitalism, said Chavez. He said it was necessary to work together to create a manifesto to spell out the content of “socialism of the 21st century”.

Chavez gave a swift and sharp response to a delegate’s interjection that there already exist organisations for left coordination. There exist many spaces for discussion, said Chavez, but none for concrete action. “We have wasted a lot of time, we continue to waste time, looking for excuses to justify our inactivity”, said Chavez. “I consider such behaviour to be a betrayal of the hope of our peoples.” The unity of left parties is needed, “but [of] parties that are truly left”.

Appearing below are eyewitness reports from Fuentes and his fellow socialist from Australia, Kiraz Janicke, along with a conference declaration titled "The Caracas Commitment" and a supportive analysis from a Fourth International activist in the French New Anti-Capitalist Party.

Decisions of Socialist Worker-New Zealand

On 29 November 2009 the central committee of Socialist Worker-New Zealand unanimously decided:

● The Caracas decision to move towards forming a Fifth International is of "world historic importance". Such a Fifth International will "boost the legitimacy and organisation of socialism around the world" at a time when global capitalism in terminal decay threatens the existence of humanity through climate change, mass poverty and imperial conflicts.

● Consequently, Socialist Worker-New Zealand will do all we can to support the April 2010 global left meeting to form a Fifth International.

● Socialist Worker-New Zealand is looking to send two delegates to the April conference. We are launching an appeal to raise funds for their return air fares to Caracas. You can support our appeal by making an electronic payment to Socialist Worker's bank account 115350-0685890-11 or posting a cheque (marked "Socialist Worker") to PO Box 13-685, Auckland.

● Socialist Worker-New Zealand will be talking with other socialists in New Zealand about the April 2010 global left conference. Our aim is to cooperate with all those who, like us, support the formation of a Fifth International.

● Socialist Worker-New Zealand will be urging socialists in other lands, including the International Socialist Tendency to which we are affiliated, to likewise back the formation of a Fifth International.

Solidarity,

Grant Morgan
International secretary
Socialist Worker-New Zealand
PO Box 13-685
Auckland
New Zealand
grantmorgan@paradise.net.nz
+64 9 634 4432 (10am-10pm NZT)


See also Labour Party Pakistan endorses Fifth Socialist International process.

Chavez calls for new international organisation of left parties

Chavez with Kiraz Janicke.

by Kiraz Janicke, Caracas from http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/ 23 November 2009 Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez called for the formation of a “Fifth International” of left parties and social movements to confront the challenge posed by the global crisis of capitalism. The president made the announcement during an international conference of more than 50 left organisations from 31 countries held in Caracas over November 19-21. “I assume responsibility before the world. I think it is time to convene the Fifth International, and I dare to make the call, which I think is a necessity. I dare to request that we create my proposal,” Chavez said.

Read full article

Hugo Chavez calls for international socialist unity

by Federico Fuentes, Caracas from LINKS - International Journal of Socialist Renewal 27 November 2009 Addressing delegates at the International Encounter of Left Parties held in Caracas, November 19-21, Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez said that with the capitalist crisis and threat of war risking the future of humanity, “the people are clamoring” for greater unity of those willing to fight for socialism. Chavez used his November 20 speech to the conference, which involved delegates from 55 left groups from 31 countries, to call for a new international socialist organisation to unite left groups and social movements: “The time has come for us to organise the Fifth International.”

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Fourth International leader on Chavez’s call for a new international

by François Sabado
an activist in the New Anticapitalist Party in France.

26 November 2009

During an international meeting of left parties held in Caracas from 19-21 November, 2009, Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez launched a call for a Fifth Socialist International, which, according to him, should bring together left parties and social movements. According to Chavez, who is also president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), the Fifth International must be “an instrument for the unification and the articulation of the struggle of the peoples to save this planet”. In a world political situation marked by a total crisis of the capitalist system, this is a fact important enough to be underlined.

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‘The Caracas Commitment’

Declaration from World Meeting of Left Parties, November 19-21, Caracas, Venezuela 21 November 2009 Political parties and organizations from Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania commemorate and celebrate the unity and solidarity that brought us together in Caracas, Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, and from this libertarian city we would like to express our revolutionary rebelliousness. We are glad of and committed to the proud presence of the forces of change in a special moment of history. Likewise, we are proud to reaffirm our conviction to definitively sow, grow and win Socialism of the 21st century. In this regard, we want to sign the Commitment of Caracas as a revolutionary guide for the challenges ahead of us. We have gathered with the aim of unifying criteria and giving concrete answers that allow us to defend our sovereignty, our social victories, and the freedom of our peoples in the face of the generalized crisis of the world capitalist system and the new threats spreading over our region and the whole world with the establishment and strengthening of military bases in the sister republics of Colombia, Panama, Aruba, Curacao, the Dutch Antilles, as well as the aggression against Ecuadorian territory, and the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. We consider that the world capitalist system is going through one of its most severe crises, which has shaken its very foundations and brought with it consequences that jeopardize the survival of humanity. Likewise, capitalism and the logic of capital, destroys the environment and biodiversity, bringing with it consequences of climate change, global warming and the destruction of life. One of the epicentres of the capitalist crisis is in the economic domain; this highlights the limitations of unbridled free markets ruled by private monopolies. In this situation, some governments have been asked to intervene to prevent the collapse of vital economic sectors, for instance, through the implementation of bailouts to bank institutions that amount to hundreds of billions of dollars. Said governments have been asked to stimulate their economies by increasing public expenditure in order to mitigate the recession and the private sector decline, which evidences the end of the supposedly irrefutable “truth” of neo-liberalism that of non-intervention of the State in economic affairs. In this regard, it is very timely to promote an in-depth discussion on the economic crisis, the role of the State and the construction of a new financial architecture. In summary, the capitalist crisis cannot be reduced simply to a financial crisis; it is a structural crisis of capital which combines the economic crisis, with an ecological crisis, a food crisis, and an energy crisis, which together represents a mortal threat to humanity and mother earth. Faced with this crisis, left-wing movements and parties see the defence of nature and the construction of an ecologically sustainable society as a fundamental axis of our struggle for a better world. In recent years, progressive and left-wing movements of the Latin American region have accumulated forces, and stimulated transformations, throwing up leaders that today hold important government spaces. This has represented an important blow to the empire because the peoples have rebelled against the domination that has been imposed on them, and have left behind their fear to express their values and principles, showing the empire that we will not allow any more interference in our internal affairs, and that we are willing to defend our sovereignty. This meeting is held at a historic time, characterized by a new imperialistic offensive against the peoples and governments of the region and of the world, a pretension supported by the oligarchies and ultraconservative right-wing, with the objective of recovering spaces lost as a consequence of the advancement of revolutionary process of liberation developing in Latin America. These are expressed through the creation of regional organizations such as ALBA, UNASUR, PETROCARIBE, Banco del Sur, the Sao Paulo Forum, COPPPAL, among others; where the main principles inspiring these processes are those of solidarity, complementarity, social priority over economic advantage, respect for self-determination of the peoples in open opposition to the policies of imperial domination. For these reasons, the right-wing forces in partnership with the empire have launched an offensive to combat the advance and development of the peoples’ struggles, especially those against the overexploitation of human beings, racist discrimination, cultural oppression, in defence of natural resources, of the land and territory from the perspective of the left and progressive movements and of world transformation. We reflect on the fact that these events have led the U.S administration to set strategies to undermine, torpedo and destabilize the advancement of these processes of change and recuperation of sovereignty. To this end, the US has implemented policies expressed through an ideological and media offensive that aim to discredit the revolutionary and progressive governments of the region, labelling them as totalitarian governments, violators of human rights, with links to drug-trafficking operations, and terrorism; and also questioning the legitimacy of their origin. This is the reason for the relentless fury with which all the empire’s means of propaganda and its agents inside our own countries continuously attack the experiences in Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Paraguay, as with its maintenance of the blockade against revolutionary and independent Cuba. Part of the strategy activated by the U.S. Empire is evidenced by the coup in Honduras, as well as in other destabilizing initiatives in Central America, attempting to impose the oligarchic interests that have already left hundreds of victims, while a disgusting wave of cynicism tries to cover up the dictatorship imposed by the U.S. administration with a false veil of democracy. Along with this, it is developing a military offensive with the idea of maintaining political and military hegemony in the region, for which it is promoting new geopolitical allies, generating destabilization and disturbing peace in the region and globally through military intimidation, with the help of its allies in the internal oligarchies, who are shown to be complicit in the actions taken by the empire, giving away their sovereignty, and opening spaces for the empire’s actions. We consider that this new offensive is specifically expressed through two important events that took place this year in the continent: The coup in Honduras, and the installation of military bases in Colombia and Panama, as well as the strengthening of the already existing ones in our region. The coup in Honduras is nothing but a display of hypocrisy by the empire, a way to intimidate the rest of the governments in the region. It is a test-laboratory that aims to set a precedent that can be applied as a new coup model and a way to encourage the right to plot against the transformational and independent processes. We denounce the military agreement between the Colombian government and the United States administration strengthens the U.S.’s military strategy, whose contents are expressed in the so-called “White Book”. This confirms that the development of the agreement will guarantee a projection of continental and intercontinental military power, the strengthening of transportation capability and air mobility to guarantee the improvement of its action capability, in order to provide the right conditions to have access to energy sources. It also consolidates its political partnership with the regional oligarchy for the control of Colombian territory and its projection in the Andes and in the rest of South America. All this scaffolding and consolidation of military architecture entails a serious threat for peace in the region and the world. The installation of military bases in the region and their interrelation with the different bases spread throughout the world is not only confined to the military sphere, but rather forms part of the establishment of a general policy of domination and expansion directed by the U.S. These bases constitute strategic points to dominate all the countries in Central and Latin America and the rest of the world. The treaty for the installation of military bases in Colombia is preceded by Plan Colombia, which was already an example of U.S. interference in the affairs of Colombia and the region using the fight against drug trafficking and terrorism as an excuse. However, it has been shown that drug trafficking levels have increased in Colombia; therefore, the plan is no longer justified given that no favourable results have been obtained since its implementation, that would justify a new treaty with the U.S. Today, the global strategy headed by the U.S. concerning drug trafficking is a complete failure. Its results are summarised by a rapid processes of accumulation of illegal capital, increased consumption of drugs and exacerbation of criminality, whose victims are the peoples of Latin America, especially the Colombian people. This strategy should be revisited and modified, and should be oriented towards a different logic that focuses on drug consumption as a public health issue. In Colombia, drug trafficking has assumed the form of paramilitarism, and turned into a political project the scope of which and persons responsible should be investigated so that the truth is known, so that justice prevails and the terror of the civilian population ceases. We, the peoples of the world, declare that we will not give up the spaces we have managed to conquer after years of struggle and resistance; and we commit ourselves to regain those which have been taken from us. Therefore, we need to defend the processes of change and the unfolding revolutions since they are based on sovereign decisions made by the peoples.

AGREEMENTS

1. MOBILIZATION AND CONDEMNATION OF U.S. MILITARY BASES 1.1. To organize global protests against the U.S. military bases from December 12th to 17th, 2009. Various leftwing parties and social movements will promote forums, concerts, protest marches and any other creative activity within the context of this event.

1.2. To establish a global mobilization front for the political denouncement of the U.S. military bases. This group will be made up by social leaders, left-wing parties, lawmakers, artists, among others, who will visit different countries with the aim of raising awareness in forums, press conferences and news and above all in gatherings with each country’s peoples.

1.3. To organize students, young people, workers and women in order to establish a common agenda of vigilance and to denounce against the military bases throughout the world.

1.4. To organize a global legal forum to challenge the installation of the U.S. military bases. This forum is conceived as a space for the condemnation of illegalities committed against the sovereignty and self-determination of the peoples and the imposition of a hegemonic imperialist model.

1.5. To organise a global trial against paramilitarism in Colombia bringing testimonies and evidence to international bodies of justice.

1.6. To promote a global trial against George Bush for crimes against humanity, as the person principally responsible for the genocide against the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan.

1.7. To promote a campaign for the creation of constitutional and legal provisions in all of our countries against the installation of military bases and deployment of nuclear weapons of mass destruction.

1.8. To promote, from the different social organizations and movements of the countries present in this meeting, a political solution for the Colombian conflict.

1.9. To organise solidarity with the Colombian people against the imperial aggression that the military bases entail in Colombian territory.

2. INSTALLATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF A PLATFORM OF JOINT ACTION BY LEFT-WING PARTIES OF THE WORLD 2.1. To establish a space of articulation of progressive and left-wing organizations and parties that allows for coordinating policies against the aggression towards the peoples, the condemnation of the aggressions against governments elected democratically, the installation of military bases, the violation of sovereignty and against xenophobia, the defence of immigrants’ rights, peace, and the environment, and peasant, labour, indigenous and afro-descendent movements.

2.2. To set up a Temporary Executive Secretariat (TES) that allows for the coordination of a common working agenda, policy making, and follow-up on the agreements reached within the framework of this international encounter. Said Secretariat undertakes to inform about relevant events in the world, and to define specific action plans: statements, declarations, condemnations, mobilizations, observations and other issues that may be decided.

2.3. To set up an agenda of permanent ideological debate on the fundamental aspects of the process of construction of socialism.

2.4. To prepare common working agendas with participation from Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Oceania.

2.5. To organize solidarity of the people’s of the world with the Bolivarian revolution and President Hugo Chávez, in response to the constant imperial attacks.

2.6. To commemorate the centenary of Clara Zetkin’s proposal to celebrate March 8th as the International Day of Women. The parties undertake to celebrate this day insofar as possible.

2.7. To summon a meeting to be held in Caracas in April 2010 in commemoration of the bicentenary of our Latin American and Caribbean independences.

3. ORGANIZATION OF A WORLD MOVEMENT OF MILITANTS FOR A CULTURE OF PEACE 3.1. To promote the establishment of peace bases, by peace supporters, who will coordinate actions and denouncements against interventionism and war sponsored by imperialism through activities such as: forums, cultural events, and debates to promote the ethical behaviour of anti-violence, full participation in social life, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, acknowledgement of the cultural identities of our peoples and strengthening the framework of integration. This space seeks to raise awareness among all citizens in rejection of all forms of domination, internal or external intervention, and to reinforce the culture of peace. To struggle relentlessly for a world with no nuclear weapons, no weapons of mass destruction, no military bases, no foreign interference, and no economic blockades, as our peoples need peace and are absolutely entitled to attain development. Promote the American continent as a territory of peace, home to the construction of a free and sovereign world.

3.2. To organize a Peace Parliament as a political space to exchange common endeavours among the world’s progressive and left-wing parliamentarians, and to know the historical, economic, legal, political and environmental aspects key for the defence of peace. Hereby we recommend holding the first meeting in February 2010.

4. ARTILLERY OF INTERNATIONAL COMMUNICATION TO EMANCIPATE REVOLUTIONARY CONSCIOUSNESS 4.1. To discuss a public communication policy at an inter-regional level that aims to improve the media battle, and to convey the values of socialism among the peoples.

4.2. To promote the creation and consolidation of alternative and community communication media to break the media siege, promote an International Alternative Left-wing Media Coordination Office that creates links to provide for improved information exchange among our countries, in which Telesur and Radiosur can be spearheads for this action.

4.3. To create a website of all of the progressive and left-wing parties and movements in the world as a means to ensure permanent exchange and the development of an emancipating and alternative communication.

4.4. To promote a movement of artists, writers and filmmakers to promote and develop festivals of small, short and full-length films that reflects the advancement and the struggle of peoples in revolution.

4.5. To hold a meeting or international forum of alternative left-wing media.

5. MOBILIZE ALL POPULAR ORGANIZATIONS IN UNRESTRICTED SUPPORT FOR THE PEOPLE OF HONDURAS 5.1. To promote an international trial against the coup plotters in Honduras before the International Criminal Court for the abuses and crimes committed.

5.2. Refuse to recognize the illegal electoral process they aim to carry out in Honduras.

5.3. To carry out a world vigil on Election Day in Honduras in order to protest against the intention to legitimize the coup, coordinated by the permanent committee that emerges from this encounter.

5.4. To coordinate the actions of left-wing parties worldwide to curb the imperialist pretensions of using the coup in Honduras as a strategy against the Latin American and Caribbean progressive processes and governments.

5.5. To unite with the people of Honduras through a global solidarity movement for people’s resistance and for the pursuit of democratic and participatory paths that allow for the establishment of progressive governments committed to common welfare and social justice.

5.6. To undertake actions geared towards denouncing before multilateral bodies, and within the framework of international law, the abduction of José Manuel Zelaya, legitimate President of Honduras, that facilitated the rupture of constitutional order in Honduras. It is necessary to determine responsibility among those who participated directly in this crime, and even among those who allowed his aircraft to go in and out Costa Rica without trying to detain the kidnappers of the Honduran president.

6. SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLES OF THE WORLD 6.1. The Left-wing Parties of the International Meeting of Caracas agree to demand the immediate liberation of the five Cuban heroes unfairly imprisoned in American jails. They are authentic anti-terrorist fighters that caused no harm to U.S. national security, whose work was oriented towards preventing the terrorist attacks prepared by the terrorist counterrevolution against Cuba. The Five Heroes were subject to a biased judicial process, condemned by broad sectors of humanity, and stigmatized by a conspiracy of silence by the mainstream media. Given the impossibility of winning justice via judicial means, we call upon all political left-wing parties of the world to increase actions for their immediate liberation. We call on President Obama to utilize his executive power and set these Five Heroes of Humanity free.

6.2. The International Meeting of Left-wing Parties resolutely demands the immediate and unconditional cessation of the criminal U.S. blockade that harmed the Cuban people so badly over the last fifty years. The blockade should come to an end right now in order to fulfil the will of the 187 countries that recently declared themselves against this act of genocide during the UN General Assembly.

6.3. To unite with the people of Haiti in the struggle for the return of President Jean Bertrand Aristide to his country.

6.4. We propose to study the possibility to grant a residence in Venezuela to Jean Bertrand Aristide, who was kidnapped and overthrown as Haiti’s president by U.S. imperialism.

6.5. We express the need to declare a permanent alert aimed at preventing any type of breach of the constitutional order that may hinder the process of democratic change underway in Paraguay.

6.6. We denounce the neoliberal privatizing advance in Mexico expressly in the case of the Electric Energy state-owned company, a heritage of the people, which aims through the massive firing of 45 000 workers to intimidate the union force, “Luz y Fuerza”, which constitutes another offensive of the Empire in Central and North America.

6.7. To declare our solidarity with the peoples of the world that have suffered and are still suffering imperial aggressions, especially, the 50 year-long genocidal blockade against Cuba; the threat against the people of Paraguay; the slaughter of the Palestinian people; the illegal occupation of part of the territory of the Republic of Western Sahara and the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan which today is expanding into Pakistan; the illegal sanctions imposed against Zimbabwe and the constant threat against Iran, among others.

Venezuela’s Chavez calls for '5th International' of Left Parties

by Kiraz Janicke Venezuelanalysis.com 23 November 2009 Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called for the formation of a “Fifth International” of left parties and social movements to confront the challenge posed by the global crisis of capitalism. The president made the announcement during an international conference of more than fifty left organisations from thirty-one countries held in Caracas over November 19-21. “I assume responsibility before the world. I think it is time to convene the Fifth International, and I dare to make the call, which I think is a necessity. I dare to request that we create my proposal,” Chavez said. The head of state insisted that the conference of left parties should not be “just one more meeting,” and he invited participating organizations to create a truly new project. “This socialist encounter should be of the genuine left, willing to fight against imperialism and capitalism,” he said. During his speech, Chavez briefly outlined the experiences of previous “internationals,” including the First International founded in 1864 by Karl Marx; the Second International founded in 1889, which collapsed in 1916 as various left parties and trade unions sided with their respective capitalist classes in the inter-imperialist conflict of the First World War; the Third International founded by Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, which Chavez said “degenerated” under Stalinism and “betrayed” struggles for socialism around the world; and the Fourth International founded by Leon Trotsky in 1938, which suffered numerous splits and no longer exists, although some small groups claim to represent its political continuity. Chavez said that a new international would have to function “without impositions” and would have to respect diversity. Representatives from a number of major parties in Latin America voiced their support for the proposal, including the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) of Bolivia, the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) of El Salvador, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) of Nicaragua, and Alianza Pais of Ecuador. Smaller parties from Latin America and around the world also indicated their support for the idea, including the Proposal for an Alternative Society (PAS) of Chile, New Nation Alternative (ANN) of Guatemala, and Australia’s Socialist Alliance, among others. Sandinista leader Miguel D´Escoto said, “Capitalism has brought the human species to the precipice of extinction… we have to take control of our own destiny.” “There is no time to lose,” D’Escoto added as he conveyed his support for the proposal of forming a fifth international. “We have to overcome the tendency of defeatism. Many times I have noted a tendency of defeatism amongst comrades of the left in relation to the tasks we face,” he continued. Salvador Sánchez, from the FMLN, said “We are going to be important actors in the Fifth International. We cannot continue waiting – all the forces of the left. The aspiration of the peoples is to walk down a different path. We must not hesitate in forming the Fifth International. The people have pronounced themselves in favour of change and the parties of the left must be there with them.” Other organisations, including Portugal’s Left Block, Germany’s Die Linke, and France’s Partido Gauche expressed interest in the proposal but said they would consult with their various parties. A representative of the Cuban Communist Party described the proposal as “excellent,” but as yet the party has made no formal statement. Many communist parties, including those from Greece and Brazil, expressed strong opposition to the proposal. The Venezuelan Communist Party said it was willing to discuss the proposal but expressed strong reservations. The Alternative Democratic Pole (PDA) from Colombia expressed its willingness to work with other left parties, but said it would “reserve” its decision to participate in an international organisation of left parties. Valter Pomar, a representative from the Workers Party of Brazil (PT), said its priority is the Sao Paolo Forum – a forum of various Latin American left, socialist, communist, centre-left, labour, social democratic and nationalist parties launched by the PT in 1990. A resolution was passed at the conference to form a preparatory committee to convoke a global conference of left parties in Caracas in April 2010, to discuss the formation of a new international. The resolution also allowed for other parties that remain undecided to discuss the proposal and incorporate themselves at a later date. Chavez emphasised the importance of being inclusive and said the April conference had to go far beyond the parties and organisations that participated in last week’s conference. In particular, he said it was an error that there were no revolutionary organisations from the United States present. The conference of left parties also passed a resolution titled the Caracas Commitment, “to reaffirm our conviction to definitively build and win Socialism of the 21st Century,” in the face of “the generalized crisis of the global capitalist system.” “One of the epicentres of the global capitalist crisis is the economic sphere. This highlights the limitations of unbridled free markets dominated by monopolies of private property,” the resolution stated. Also incorporated was a proposed amendment by the Australian delegation which read, “In synthesis, the crisis of capitalism cannot be reduced to a simple financial crisis, it is a structural crisis of capital that combines the economic crisis, with an ecological crisis, a food crisis and an energy crisis, which together represent a mortal threat to humanity and nature. In the face of this crisis, the movements and parties of the left see the defence of nature and the construction of an ecologically sustainable society as a fundamental axis of our struggle for a better world.” The Caracas Commitment expressed “solidarity with the peoples of the world who have suffered and are suffering from imperialist aggression, especially the more than 50 years of the genocidal blockade against Cuba…the massacre of the Palestinian people, the illegal occupation of part of the territory of the Western Sahara, and the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan, which today is expanding into Pakistan.” The conference of left parties also denounced the decision of the Mexican government to shut down the state-owned electricity company and fire 45,000 workers, as an attempt to “intimidate” the workers and as an “offensive of imperialism,” to advance neoliberal privatisation in Central America. In the framework of the Caracas Commitment, the left parties present agreed, among other things, to: • Organise a global week of mobilisation from December 12-17 in repudiation of the installation of U.S. military bases in Colombia, Panama and around the world. • Campaign for an “international trial against George Bush for crimes against humanity, as the person principally responsible for the genocide against the people of Iraq and Afghanistan”. • Commemorate 100 years since the proposal by Clara Zetkin to celebrate International Women’s Day on March 8, through forums, mobilizations and other activities in their respective countries. • Organise global solidarity with the Bolivarian revolution in the face of permanent imperialist attacks. • Organise global solidarity with the people of Honduras who are resisting a U.S.-backed military coup, to campaign for the restoration of the democratically elected president of Honduras, José Manuel Zelaya and to organise a global vigil on the day of the elections in Honduras, “with which they aim to legitimise the coup d´etat.” • Demand an “immediate and unconditional end to the criminal Yankee blockade” of Cuba and for the “immediate liberation” of the Cuban Five, referring to the five anti-terrorist activists imprisoned in the United States. • Accompany the Haitian people in their struggle for the return of President Jean Bertrand Aristide “who was kidnapped and removed from his post as president of Haiti by North American imperialism.” See also Message from Socialist Worker-New Zealand to PSUV founding conference.

Caracas to host world meeting of left parties

by Federico Fuentes, Caracas from Green Left Weekly 9 September 2009 Caracas will play host to one of the most important international gatherings of left parties in years, when delegates from across the world meet for the First International Meeting of Left Parties in November this year. The meeting has been called by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), a mass revolutionary party headed by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. The gathering was agreed upon at the recent Sao Paulo Forum (FSP) held in Mexico City over August 20-22. There, the PSUV delegation presented the proposal to organise an international meeting of left parties. The FSP was first established in 1990 at the initiative of the Workers’ Party (PT) of Brazil. At the time, the PT had a good reputation on the international left. It was forged out of the workers’ struggles against the Brazilian dictatorship and had developed into a mass workers’ party that spoke of the need to break with capitalism. Since then, the FSP has evolved in a reformist direction, although several important revolutionary parties such as the Cuban Communist Party continue to be involved. Some of the member parties — like the PT — are now in government in Latin America and are carrying out policies they once strongly denounced. The new call by the PSUV for an international gathering of left parties comes in a different context. In August 2007, Chavez said it was necessary to convene ``a meeting of left parties of Latin America and organise a type of international, an organisation of parties and movements of the left in Latin American and the Caribbean”. He added that “there is a resurgence of the consciousness of the peoples; the movements, leaders and leaderships of this new left, of this new project, this need to continue to grow”. There is a revival of socialist ideas that, at least in Venezuela, has become embodied in the actions of millions who are fighting to create “socialism of the 21st century”. Millions more people worldwide look to Venezuela as proof that revolutionary change is possible. The challenge is to see how this force can be organised, in each country and internationally, into a powerful force capable of defeating capitalism. See also Message from Socialist Worker-New Zealand to PSUV founding conference (12.2.08)

Fifth International?!

By Michael Albert 


Znet January 21, 2010 
 To be a contender, “21st Century Socialist” vision needs elaboration, advocacy, and program. To improve focus and increase power, worldwide anti-capitalist organizations, projects, and movements need shared coherence and mutual solidarity. To fulfill these needs, Venezuela’s President Chavez recently announced to widespread support and also some critical response that a gathering in Caracas this April would establish a new International. But what might this new International look like? What might it accomplish? How might people, such as those reading this essay, and particularly people in grassroots movements around the world, relate to it? Not Our Predecessor’s International Suppose a new International is an excellent venue for debate but has no practical component, or, worse, is a gathering place for big egos who mostly preen at long, aimless meetings. Or suppose a new International intelligently addresses programs and ideas, but is a vehicle for a small group to issue instructions from above. Or suppose a new International’s focus, structure, or operational procedures are conceptually rooted in past flawed macho, racist, authoritarian or otherwise oppressive practices. Even if it grew large, such a new International, built with the intellectual bricks, social mortar, programmatic inclinations, and personal habits and ideas of the old world, would not likely help us attain a new world. Liberation will not stand well on old foundations. We must plant the seeds of the future, as best we can, in our present endeavors. Most politically sophisticated people of today’s movements would not sign up with an old-style International. Even considering the relatively few eager souls who would sign up, most would not remain inspired for long. Predictably, support would not grow strong enough to win major change. We can’t win a new world without attaining wide and deep support, and we can’t attract wide and deep support offering structures and methods embodying the core ills of the past. Thus, lesson one, already familiar to most: If a new International marches to the beat of past drumming, no matter what its members might want, and no matter how courageously its members might seek their worthy dreams, the support they gain will be too limited and their efforts will be too compromised by past destructive residues to generate desirable 21st century outcomes. The Focus of a New International Issue Focus The “subject matter” of a new international should and will inevitably address all concerns which go into and are part of developing and sustaining a liberated society and world but there is no reason to think all sensible and caring people would or should agree about all such matters. Much will have to be worked out in practice. Much will differ from country to country. Maybe there is a best position - but we don’t yet know it. Maybe most people think they know a best position, but a few people differ, and perhaps the few will prove right later. This indicates that regarding unity we ought to settle only on a minimalist but profoundly important set of principles and commitments that would characterize a new International. What minimal commitments would a new International need to adopt to do its job well. Those who agree with essential inviolable commitments, could join. Those who don’t agree with them, might want to join, but couldn’t. Few would doubt that a new International should be centrally concerned with economics, gender and kinship, culture and community, politics, international relations, and ecology. Further, however, there is no need for, and we have learned in recent decades there is also no point trying to elevate any one of these focuses above the rest. They are all centrally important and powerfully entwined. Thus, it should be the case that a group in a new International might in some country, or at some time, or for some purpose, be primarily focused on one or another of these focuses, but to be part of the new International it would also have to acknowledge that their priority was just one among many, and that other priorities should inform their work as well as be informed by their work. Surely, at least these six areas of struggle must be elevated by any organization trying to create a new world because: (a) all these six central domains will critically affect the character of a new world, (b) each of these six domains is capable of manifesting influences that would subvert efforts to reach a new world, and (c) the constituencies most involved in and affects by each of these six domains would be intensely alienated if their prime concerns were relegated to secondary importance. But what minimalist political focus and commitment might a new International have regarding each of theses six broad areas of concern? What would it initially need to universally agree about each area to gain the wherewithal to really change that area and legitimately appeal to and empower constituencies most concerned about that area? Some possibilities for general agreement are that: economic production, consumption, and allocation should be classless - which of course includes equitable access for all to quality and accessible education, health care and the requisites of health like food, water, and sanitation, housing, meaningful and dignified work, and the instruments and conditions of personal fulfillment

gender/kinship, sexual, and family relations should not privilege by age, sexual preference, or gender any one group above others - which of course includes ending all forms of oppression of women, providing daycare, recreation, health care, etc.

culture and community relations among races, ethnic groups, religions, and other cultural communities should protect the rights and identity of each community up to equally respecting those of all other communities as well - which of course includes an end to racist, ethnocentric, and otherwise bigoted structures as well as securing the prosperity and rights of indigenous people

political decision making, adjudication of disputes and implementation of shared programs should deliver people’s power in ways that do not elevate any one sector or constituency to power above others - which of course includes participation and justice for all 

international trade, communication, and other interactions should attain and protect peace and justice while dismantling all vestiges of colonialism and imperialism - which of course includes canceling the debt of nations of the global south and reconstructing international norms and relations to move toward an equitable and just community of equally endowed nations

ecological choices should not only be sustainable, but should care for the environment in accord with our highest aspirations for ourselves and our world - which of course includes climate justice and energy renovation Is there room for difference and debate in what exactly each of the above points means, much less about more specific details? Of course there is. But having room for debate is good in an International that means to be a massive bloc of diverse projects each of which retain their own history and agenda. The International becomes the greatest sum of all its parts. It embodies differences as a source of strength. It avoids the temptation to become just a coalition attached only to universally agreed but least common denominator claims, or to homogenize all views into one narrow pattern. Underlying Values What about underlying values? Surely a new International would elevate solidarity as part of its ethos. An International is, after all, about aligning worldwide movements and projects into mutual aid and collective benefit. A new International should also certainly elevate diversity as a core value, both due to the obvious ecological necessity of doing so, and due to the observation that in any undertaking minority views can become majority, or what is thought to be crazy today can lead to what is brilliant tomorrow. A new International will no doubt also adopt equity as one of its core values, even if it retains contradictory “certainties” about just what constitutes equity. More, over time, presumably members will reach increased clarity about just what equity entails and requires. One possibility is, for example, that it means every person who can work gets a share of income based on his or her duration, intensity, and onerousness of socially valued labor, but not based on property, or power, or even output, while those who can’t work get special needs addressed and, beyond that, average income. Peace with justice and ecological sustainability and wisdom would surely also be guiding values. Serious movements would have no problems with that. Finally a new International will of course have to have an attitude about decisions, participation, and power. At a minimum a new International would presumably commit to the value called “democracy.” For myself, however, I would hope it would reach further to a more inspiring conception of “people’s power,” or “participatory democracy,” or “self management.” And that it will seriously assess the kinds of structural changes and innovations essential to ensure informed, confident, participation by all citizens in political, economic, and social life - perhaps also including, for example, changes in the way labor is divided and carried out, the way education is conceived and implemented, and of course the way preferences are debated, explored, resolved, and implemented. Perhaps that will prove possible, too! At any rate, given its place and time of origin, suppose a new International adopts a name like Participatory Socialist International (PSI), where “participatory” connotes that it isn’t our forebears’ International, but is really new. Suppose also that it commits to prioritizing at least economics, gender, race, power, peace, and ecology, and commits to solidarity, diversity, equity, peace with justice, ecological wisdom, and people’s power or self management. These commitments would certainly go a long way toward providing a new foundation for a new International. But what about all the many clashing views that various members would hold beyond the minimal views they would universally share? How might different positions exist in a new International in mutual respect? How might they engage in mutual careful and creative consideration? Currents in a New International How can a new International be true to its core commitments, yet also a vehicle for constant growth and development? How can a new International prioritize shared core views, yet also practice diversity and prioritize innovation? One possibility is to include and celebrate “currents” that serve as vehicles for contending views. There might be a current composed of various member organizations, projects, and/or movements who share a particular contested economic goal (such as participatory economics or market socialism, etc.), or a certain contested strategic orientation (such as electoralism or nonviolence, etc.). The International’s various currents would not be seen as a weakness undermining unity but as a strength warding off sectarianism and guaranteeing constant growth. The respectfully contending positions would all be part of the International, together interactively exploring their disagreements in hopes of reaching new insights. To establish a congenial, productive context, currents would take for granted that the intentions of other currents were good, that differences were about substance and not motive, and that they were subject to substantive debate which would be a serious part of the whole project. The International would thus welcome different currents affording each ample visibility and means to engage with all others to try to advance new insights bearing on policy and program. Currents would not have hidden agendas or think everyone else is a fool because only their own views have merit. Rather, currents would take for granted that even ideas they think odd, strange, or counterproductive, might prove useful in time, so that all views held inside the International should be respected and substantively explored without defensiveness and without doubting the motives of other International members. In short, in this formulation, as long as any particular current accepted the basic tenets of the International and operated in accord with its norms and methods, respectful dissent would be considered a strength preventing knee-jerk agreement and constantly pushing the envelope of beliefs toward new insights. In debates about policy and program, for example, currents would always be heard. Minority positions would, to the extent possible, be given space not only to argue, but if they don’t prevail, to continue developing their views and trying to establish their merit or to discover their inadequacies. The idea of a political or programmatic line that everyone follows would be foreign to the culture and process of this type new International. Members and Decisions in a New International What permits one to be in the new International? Well, the International would presumably include movements, parties, organizations, and even projects - but a strong possibility is that individuals would not join as at-large members, belonging instead only by way of their group affiliations. What kind of group could belong? I would think any group that convinced some agreed percentage - let’s say, hypothetically, 75% - of the existing membership that it sincerely accepted the defining norms of the International could belong. This could be political parties, movements, organizations, or even projects - so, for example, it could be the PSUV from Venezuela, or the Landless Workers Movement (MST) from Brazil, or the Rosa Luxembourg foundation from Germany, or even media organizations like ZCom, say, from the U.S. Members, employees, staff, etc., of each new International member organization would in turn gain membership in the International by virtue of their collective organizational membership. Individuals who want to be members of the International, therefore, but who have no member group that they belong too, would have to hook up with one. An at-large membership wouldn’t exist, at least in this conception. The benefit of this approach would be that the legitimacy of a person as a member need not be assessed by the international - but only by the member organization of the international that the person is part of. There would be no “paper” members and no mass of unattached and therefore essentially unknown members. What kinds of decisions might an International make? Every member group would have its own agenda for its own separate operations which would be inviolable. At the same time, each member group would presumably be strongly urged to make its own operations consistent with the norm, practices, and shared programmatic agendas of the International. There would be solidarity among member organizations, but, regarding their separate operations, there would also be autonomy. The International would have shared program, policies, norms, and rules to continually decide on, as well as having to decide on gatherings to hold, campaigns to support or undertake, and perhaps much else. How might such decisions be made? Membership groups would have wildly different sizes, no doubt - so in the future there could be a group with a handful of members in the International, and another group with thousands, or even millions of members. But since the International’s decisions would not bind those groups other than regarding the collective International agenda, a good way to arrive at decisions might be serious discussion and exploration, followed by polls of the whole International membership to see peoples’ leanings, followed by refinements of proposals to seek even greater support and to allow dissidents from minority viewpoints to make their case, culminating in final votes of the membership seeking to convey self managing participatory influence to all parties. The little group with five participants could have at most their five votes unless they were more heavily affected by some decision than others were. A big group with ten thousand or a million participants could have at most that number of votes - again, unless they were more affected by some choice - but member votes would not be delivered in bulk, by group, but rather one by one, each being counted individually. Online, this is no longer a technically daunting matter. Are there other possibilities? Of course. This is just one hypothetical, but desirable, possibility. Possible Program in a New International What might a new International do? A new International might call for international events and days of dissent. It might support campaigns for existing struggles by member organizations. It might support member organizations against repression. It might undertake widespread debates and campaigns to advance understanding and mutual knowledge. More ambitiously, an International might also decide on campaigns and projects of its own, financed via its membership. It might settle, for example, on a massive international focus on immigration, on ending a war, on shortening the work week all over the planet, and/or on averting climatic catastrophe. There might then be materials to prepare, education to convey, activist campaigns to carry out, boycotts to initiate and sustain, support for local efforts to engender, and even efforts to provide material aid and participants for events occurring across borders. All such general programs, would be up to member organizations to decide how to relate to, yet there would be considerable collective momentum for each member organization to participate and contribute as best it can. Thus, program decided by the International would either be about the International’s own actions or would be very strong advisories to members, or perhaps calls to them and to the broader world - not legally binding, so to speak, but powerful and effective nonetheless. Finally, regarding program, clearly one reason to have an International is to help organizations, movements, and projects escape single issue loneliness by becoming part of a larger process encompassing diverse focuses and united by agreements on various major shared endeavors. Dream, or Reality? The above is one possible rough picture. It isn’t complete and it isn’t unique. It could adapt, bend, mature, enlarge, or be refined in all manner of ways, whether before April in preparation, or after April, as an International develops. Is it only a dream that worldwide parties, movements, organizations, and projects could operate with intellectual and programmatic respect and mutual aid, with deep diversity and sharp focus, with strong solidarity and equally strong autonomy, with profound coherence and commitment and also with material and social equity and overarching self management? Yes, today this is a dream, or a wish, or a hope. But tomorrow, and literally, this April, it could become a reality. Wouldn’t that be a huge and historic step forward? NOTE: Please post any comments on the short version back on the main UNITYblog page. Thanks.

Histories of the four Internationals

Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez [right] has called for the formation of a Fifth International to unite socialists around the world. The previous internationals were places of debate and action, established to strengthen the international socialist movement. Dan Swain of the British Socialist Workers Party (SWP) has writen a breif history of each one, arguing that we “can learn an enormous amount by studying them”.

The First International was forged in struggle In the first of a new series Dan Swain looks at how socialists have organised for change globally. On 28 September 1864, delegations of workers from different countries met in London to form the International Working Men’s Association. This was later known as the First International. It was an historic moment uniting working people in a genuinely international organisation. Uprisings in Poland against the Russian empire provided the spark for its formation. British workers issued a call to workers in Paris to deliver joint solidarity. A delegation from France travelled to London. By the time the first meeting was convened large numbers of Polish, German and Italian workers were also present. Battle of Węgrów, Poland 1863 The first few years of the international saw some impressive successes. It won solidarity from British workers for a strike of bronze workers in Paris, which went on to victory. It was also crucial to defeating attempts by bosses to use scab labour to break the London tailors’ strike in 1866 and the Geneva building workers’ strike in 1868. Arguments for international solidarity had a strong resonance with workers across Europe. In 1869 mine owners in Belgium unleashed an attack on working conditions. Workers and their families rose up and were met with vicious repression. Belgian troops killed or wounded many workers. The First International organised solidarity meetings and provided legal representation for the arrested miners. They were acquitted, increasing support for the International. It was a place of intense debates. [Karl] Marx and his supporters were not the only voices. Anarchists, represented mainly by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon from France and the Russian Mikhail Bakunin were one strand.

Karl Marx Mikhail Bakunin Utopian Socialism was another. Utopians saw the route to socialism through enlightenment and education. Robert Owen, one of its key proponents, had established co-operatives and ideal working communities to show how work and society could be organised differently. Marx argued that while these were good examples, they would not lead to socialism—building isolated communities could never be enough. “To conquer political power has... become the great duty of the working classes”, he said in his first address to the International. Many of Marx’s most important political arguments were made in debates with these trends. The International’s biggest challenge was the Paris Commune in 1871. War had broken out between France and Prussia. The defeat of France led to the collapse of the government and the declaration of a new republic. In Paris workers rose up and declared their own government under the Commune. Marx offered his full support, and his analysis of it is among his most important writings. His The Civil War in France offers a powerful defence of the Commune and a stark description how far the ruling class would go to crush a revolution. The Paris Commune, 1871 These events saw socialism condemned internationally, and Marx was labelled the “Red Doctor” by the press. There was debate within the International itself. Faced with a revolutionary moment, the divisions in the International became increasingly important. Anarchists and [Marxist] socialists drew very different conclusions. The English trade unions left the International because of its support for the Commune and the British representatives resigned from its general council. They argued that change should come through parliament and trade union activity. With the loss of the British section the divisions between Marx and the anarchists became more intractable. It led to the eventual dissolution of the International in 1872. While the International had brought together workers across Europe, the division between reformists and revolutionaries was too much. It remains a crucial question in debates about building international organisations in the future. The Second International: From class war to imperialist slaughter In the second part of our series Dan Swain looks at the rise and fall of the Second International. Last week I explored how divisions over the question of revolution led to the break up of the First International. The same problem was also of decisive importance to the fate of the next attempt to unite socialists across borders. The Socialist International, known as the Second International, was established in 1889. It brought together socialist groups from across the world, the most successful being the German Social Democratic Party (SPD). These organisations were generally well rooted in the working class. They spoke of the need for revolution, and were involved in organising unions and contesting elections. The SPD participated in every aspect of workers’ lives, even organising socialist choirs and socialist gyms. It is because of calls by the Second International that we celebrate International Workers Day on May Day, and International Women’s Day on 8 March. May Day was launched as part of an international campaign for an eight-hour working day. Workers across Europe stopped work and demonstrated on 1 May 1890. Governments were forced to recognise the day as a national holiday. As capitalism underwent a period of stability at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, the parties of the Second International were able to gain legal recognition and win some major reforms. As a result, many began to draw the conclusion that capitalism could be reformed to benefit the working class. While most of these people still called themselves Marxists, and paid lip service to the idea of revolution, they began to move away from it in practice. Karl Kautsky, a leading intellectual in the SPD, was a key figure in this debate. Formally he supported revolution against a section of the party who wanted to abandon it. Karl Kautsky However, while denouncing them at party conferences, he also accommodated to them, allowing them to set the agenda. This meant the left was isolated. The leading Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin called for the reformists to be expelled from the International. He argued that having two different currents in the same organisation could only paralyse it. Revolutionaries and reformists should, and must, work together, but they need to organise separately, he said. The tensions in the International began to reveal themselves in an argument about colonialism, as the great powers grabbed parts of the world. Some delegates to the International’s 1907 congress defended aspects of colonialism, saying that it could be a force for good. Lenin proposed an alternative, opposing all colonialism. This was passed, but the vote was very close. Even worse was the debate over war. All agreed that socialists should oppose war, which resulted from the competitive nature of capitalism. But there were disagreements over how to do this. Many argued for mass strikes and uprisings, but some of the German delegates were concerned about this affecting their legal status. A compromise was reached. This said that if war broke out, it was the duty of socialists “to intervene for its speedy termination and to strive with all their power to utilise the economic and political crisis created by the war to rouse the masses and thereby hasten the downfall of capitalist class rule”. But this did not happen when the First World War broke out in 1914. The majority of SPD MPs in the German parliament, including Kautsky, voted for war. Most of the other Second International parties followed suit, voting to support their country’s war effort. This was a terrible betrayal. Lenin refused to believe the news at first, presuming the newspaper story was a forgery. Failure to oppose the war ripped apart the International. It left many confused and demoralised. However, those who did break with it and opposed the war would go on to form the backbone of a genuinely revolutionary international movement. As Leon Trotsky wrote in 1914, “The Second International did not live in vain. It carried out enormous cultural work, the likes of which the world has never seen: the education and rallying of an oppressed class. “The proletariat does not have to begin all over again… The period now concluded bequeathed it a rich arsenal of ideas.” The Third International: Revolutionary hope crushed by Stalinism Dan Swain continues our series with a look at the third attempt to unite workers across borders. Poster for the Third International When the parties of the Second International voted to support the First World War many socialists were left uncertain about what to do next. From the carnage of the war, however, came a beacon of hope that inspired millions across the world. A revolution in Russia put workers in control in October 1917. The Bolshevik Party argued for forming a workers’ state by placing power in the hands of the soviets – councils of workers based in the factories and communities. The Bolsheviks had opposed the war. After the revolution they ended Russia’s involvement. Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin had argued that revolutionaries and reformists should organise separately. The success of the revolution had proved how important this was. It inspired the creation of Communist Parties across Europe. Trotsky, Lenin and Kamenev in 1919 In 1919 these organisations were formally united in the Communist International, known as the Third International. It was formed in a period of huge social upheaval. There were mass strikes all over Europe. Soviets similar to those in Russia were formed in Berlin, Vienna and Budapest. Socialists in Russia knew that if the revolution did not spread to other countries it would be defeated. Germany, which had the largest working class in Europe, was the most important country. Lenin declared in 1918 that, “It is an absolute truth that without a German revolution we are doomed.” German sailors revolt ended World War One and sparked the German revolution. Their placard reads: “Soldiers warship Prince Regent Luitpold. Long live the Socialist Republic” However, the Communist Party in Germany was a new and relatively small one. It had only recently broken from the Social Democratic Party. Revolution was a real possibility in Germany between 1919 and 1923. But the leaders of the Communist Party made a series of tactical mistakes that led to their defeat. They squandered the trust of workers through irresponsible uprisings that were doomed to defeat. As a result of this they were too timid to take a lead at other times. The defeat of the German Revolution led to Russia becoming increasingly isolated. Lenin’s death in 1924, and the enormous damage done to Russia by civil war, created the conditions in which a growing bureaucracy could concentrate their power. Joseph Stalin, who headed the bureaucracy, asserted that it was possible to construct “socialism in one country”. This was the complete opposite of what Lenin had argued. Joseph Stalin The International increasingly became a tool of Russia. Communist Parties around the world were instructed to respond to every whim from Moscow. This led to bizarre twists in strategy. First, members of the International were told not to work with social democrats at all. Instead they were denounced as “social fascists”. This was utterly disastrous. The left was divided when unity was needed against the Nazis. Then suddenly the International switched, and Communists were ordered to seek alliances with anyone and everyone. This “Popular Front” tactic even led to Communists participating in governments in Europe and breaking strikes. As the exiled Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky put it, the International had become a “submissive apparatus in the service of Soviet foreign policy, ready at any time for any zigzag whatever”. Against this, Trotsky argued consistently for the idea of the united front. This had been a strategy put forward at the Third International’s 1922 congress. It argued that the Communist Parties must seek to work with social democratic parties in an effort to influence the majority of workers. The policy adopted in 1922 argued that the role of the International “is not to establish small communist sects aiming to influence the working masses purely through agitation and propaganda, but to participate directly in the struggle of the working masses”. The Third International brought together millions of workers under a banner committed to the need for world revolution. It inspired millions to fight for a better world. It educated generations of activists and militants, and played a key role in many struggles. The early struggles of the International still hold many important lessons for us today. However, its fate was too closely tied to that of Russia. Stalin misled the workers organised in the International as did their own national leaderships, who too often meekly obeyed every command. Also of interest, from the the British Socialist Worker newspaper: The Communist International – a major nine part series How a workers’ uprising ended the First World War The Fourth International: Keeping the flame alive Our series concludes by looking at Trotsky and the Fourth International. Leon Trotsky, one of the leaders of the Russian revolution, opposed Joseph Stalin’s increasing stranglehold on the Soviet Union and the Third International. Leon Trotsky As a result he was exiled from Russia. In 1938 he gathered together a small number of his supporters to form the Fourth International. The contrast between the founding congresses of the other internationals and the fourth was stark. There were only 21 delegates representing 11 organisations. The largest was the US section, with only 2,500 members. This was not the mass organisation that the previous internationals had been. Nonetheless Trotsky believed that the extraordinary world situation demanded a new formation. The Great Depression was feeding the rise of fascism, while Stalinism prevented workers fighting back successfully. The Fourth International argued that capitalism was entering a terminal crisis. It was no longer possible to fight for reforms within capitalism. The choice was either revolution or fascist dictatorship. The old Communist parties had been turned into tools of the Stalinist bureaucracy in Russia, and were now opposed to revolution. It was necessary to form new revolutionary organisations, however weak they might start out. Trotsky was assassinated by a Stalinist agent two years later. Unfortunately, the remaining leadership of the Fourth International stuck to this perspective even when circumstances changed. Far from collapsing following the war, capitalism went through a period of sustained growth and prosperity. Under these conditions reformist and Communist parties grew rapidly. They were able to win many reforms. Trotsky had also predicted that the war would lead to the overthrow of the bureaucracy in the Soviet Union. Instead, the Soviet Union’s influence expanded and Stalin consolidated his position. Yet in 1946 James Cannon, a leading figure in the Fourth International, announced that Trotsky was still right, “only we disagree with some people who carelessly think the war is over”. This was an extraordinary denial of reality in an attempt to stick to all of Trotsky’s words! The Fourth International debated the nature of the Soviet Union and the replica regimes it established across Eastern Europe in the late 1940s. Its position became that the Soviet Union was a “degenerated workers’ state”. The theory was of a genuine socialist revolution that had developed defects. The East European satellites were however “deformed workers’ states”, defective from birth. This created a huge problem. Karl Marx had argued that socialism must be brought about by the working class themselves. But the regimes in Eastern Europe had been instituted by Stalin’s armies, not by the workers of those countries. To argue that they were in any sense workers’ states abandoned a key principle of Marxism. These were “workers’ states” that the workers had never had any say in. Against this, the Palestinian Marxist Tony Cliff, a founder of the SWP, argued that the Soviet Union and its mirror images in Eastern Europe were state capitalist regimes, in which the workers had no control. The revolutionary upheavals that began in May 1968 created an opportunity for Trotsky’s ideas to gain influence and for organisations that looked to his legacy to grow. But by this time the “official” Fourth International was split into warring factions, and Cliff had left to form the International Socialists, the predecessor of the SWP. Unfortunately, dogmatic adherence to Trotsky’s 30-year old ideas helped many squander these opportunities. The logic of the “deformed workers’ state” argument was that socialism could be brought about by forces other than the working class, for example students, peasants or guerrilla armies. Some parts of the Fourth International did stay closer to the real Marxist tradition. Whatever the later difficulties of some his followers, Trotsky’s break from the rotten politics of Stalin’s Third International kept the flame of revolutionary internationalism alive. It is this tradition that we should gain inspiration from today.