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International Viewpoint includes the full index to all issues published this year. Before you put this copy back on the shelf, take a good look at that index. And judge us on it.
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International Viewpoint #272 December 1995
3
France: General strike now!
by the editors of Rouge weekly
7 Israel: Post-Zionism
Michel Warshawsky
Ukraine: The left divided
9
Interview with Gregory Lemenko of the Socialist Party
Our authors are activists in the countries concerned. From Sri Lanka
11 Nigeria: Death of a writer to Brazil, it is they - you - who
B. Skanthakumar write this magazine. It's your
13 Quebec: Crisis continues...
network, they are your comrades. We
Michel Lafitte hope you stay with us in 1995.
18 China: after the UN conference on women
Thanks to all those who help write
Zhang Kai and Jun Xing and sell the magazine. Keep up the
19 The Indonesian left in the struggle for independence good work!
Subakat
The editors
23 Britain: Time to leave the Labour Party?
Arthur Scargill
PS We need to replace the old
27 Index to issues 263-272 equipment we use to produce
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31 Resist! International Campaign news
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France
General strike now!
EMINUTS
TARIS FEN
T. C
CGT For the first time since 1968, the conditions for a general strike are present. The government wants to dismantle the social security system, and slash the retirement
THERE IS A POWERFUL UNDERCURRENT IN SOCIETY. RAILWAY workers are on strike. So are employees at the post office, France Telecom, Electricité de France, Gaz de France, tax collectors, and students. And there is more to come. We have already seen the first meetings and discussions to prepare strikes in the private sector. For the first time since 1968, the country is covered with strike activity. These struggles are spreading within each professional group, and generalising across the economy. Their demands converge on a number of partial objectives, notably the protection of the civil service and railway workers pension systems. And there is a clear global objective: withdrawal of government plans for the reform of social security system. History never repeats itself exactly, and all analogies have their limits. This is not May 1968! But at the same time, it is more important than the hard sectoral struggles in the Post
SERI
FİLiALiSAT
= ABAND
pension. But behind these demands, and all the specific demands of each section of the struggle, there is something else. A choice of society... This report prepared by the editors of the Office -Telecom (1974), railways (1986) and health sector (1988). We are also living through a more significant event than the "greatest" strikes at Renault, Snecma, Lip, Joint français. Struggles in all these companies have, at a given moment, crystallised the social and political confrontation in the country as a whole. When we bring up 1968, it isn't as a model, but to indicate a perspective. That perspective is that of the general strike. The problem is that, while the general strike is spreading across the whole of the public and nationalised sectors, it has not spread to the private sector. The substantial participation of wage earners in the private sector is the main element which is missing, for all those who would like to transform this struggle into a general strike.
International Viewpoint n° 272 3
* France The participation of the private sector is not easy to organise. Unemployment, and the tear of unemployment, weighs heavily on private sector workers. So do all the defeats faced in the "restructuring" and "downsizing" (labour force cuts) of those enterprises which formed the bastions of the organised working class. Nevertheless, the force of the strike in the public sector, and its whole dynamic, does bring together the necessary conditions for a general strike across France. The question is is this enough?
The media portray this struggle as the amalgam
ROUGE of separate sectoral,
profession-specific and corporatist demands. In fact, the struggle reflects something shared: the feeling that, around problems with pension, social security and education systems, a new historical choice is being made. Society is changing, one way or another. The accumulation of the social consequences of the economic crisis — massive structural unemployment, constant pressure on the workforce, increased vulnerability and fragility - have increased these last few years. These last attacks on the social security system have been perceived as a qualitative shift in the government's attacks. The social security system is considered as the major social gain of all the generations of workers since the second world war. Hence the diffuse awareness that the Juppé government's plan represents a historic modification in the relationship between wage earners, the state, and the employers. This is the social and political basis of the dynamic of the struggle. The specific struggle is for the withdrawal of the Juppé plan. THE DEPTH OF THE ATTACKS OF THE EARLY 1990S HAS transformed the trade union landscape. But this has perhaps only now been exposed to the light. The leadership of the 4 December 1995
CFDT federation has lined up behind the Juppé plan. And while the struggles have set the dividing line, those on our side still don't hesitate to defend the interests of their own bureaucracy.
The FO federation is a direct victim of the Juppé plan. But it continues to negotiate with the government, in the hope of saving the major part positions in administration of the social security system. FO President Blondel calls for "the generalisation of the strikes", but is stresses that this is not a call for a general strike. This might seem like only a nuance, but he certainly thinks the distinction is important.
As for the CGT, the federation has not been up to the challenge. It is still mired in its internal contradictions. President Louis
Vlannet didn't use the opening speech at the CGT Congress
(on 5 December) to call for a general strike. He too puts the accent on "negotiations"
, and is very vague in his pronouncements on the Juppé plan. Though pressure from the congress did oblige him to announce that the withdrawal of the Juppé plan is a necessary precondition to negotiations.
The union leaderships have a major responsibility in the extension of the strike and the development of a general strike. This is why the general assemblies in workplaces, and union branch meetings, should discuss and approve motions demanding their unions' leaderships to call for a general strike, and build for it.
Of course, we shouldn't forget that, back in 1968, we had the largest general strike in French history, without the union leaderships ever having called for it!
It is still clear that the various confederations are not respecting the necessary framework of an inter-union, interprofessional co-ordinating body. Such a leadership must instead be built out of those sectors which are already in struggle. National co-ordination is a precondition for a nation-wide strike.
Local inter-union co-ordinating bodies should incorporate representatives of the general assemblies of the workers in each workplace. This is a concrete way of combining the struggle in the workplaces and the struggle for trade union unity. And a concrete step towards a self-managed struggle.
As I have already argued, the central issue 1s bringing together the necessary conditions for the extension of the movement in the direction of a general strike. The movement is still growing. It has to put down roots in those sectors which are in struggle, widen in the public, and above all in the private sector, and it has to clarify the way to go. *
The author, Francois Olivier, is a militant of the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR),
French Section of the Fourth International. This article is reprinted from the 6 December
1995 issue of Rouge (Red), weekly of the LCR.
Women's movement resurges
Forty thousand people marched in Paris on 25 there would be no amnesty for the anti-abortionists.
November. We spoke to Maya Surduts, spokeswoman But no amnesty, either, for those who "provoke"
of the abortion and contraception rights group CADAC
CADAC! WAS SET UP AS A REACTION TO THE "PRO-LIFE" commandos. We wanted to break the silence around their activities, and publicly condemn them. One of the results was the law of 27 November 1993, which made it illegal to hinder a person from exercising their right to an abortion). But we have come to see a number of faults with this law. The whole terrain is fragile: Abortion clinics don't have the same status as other medical establishments, contraception agitated to oppose the definition of self-abortion as a crime. We also reacted when the last socialist Prime Minister, Pierre Bérégovoy, said publicly that abortion was not eligible for reimbursement from the social security system "not for financial reasons, but for ethical reasons". In 1993, we realised that the right to abortion was under threat in a number of European countries. Even our campaign of information about contraception came under attack as "an incitement to abortion". In Spring 1994 we helped organise a Europe-wide meeting in Paris. We identified the close links between the anti-abortionists and the extreme right. The commando' lawyer, Wagner, also represents for the National Front. The commandos even denounce the legislation legalising abortion under certain conditions as worse than the holocaust. We realised that all the "acceptable limitations" in the 1975 law were now being exploited as weaknesses by the missionaries of the new moral order. The law said that only women "in distress" could be considered for an abortion. This kind of formulation is now allowing the right to nibble away at the content of the law, without direct confrontation. And yet, for the 20th commemoration of the legalisation of abortion, only 8,000 of us were ready to demonstrate. And this was in January 1995, a few months before the presidential election! Simone Veil (Socialist MP, former Minister of Health, author of the 1975 law) subsequently announced that abortion "is not an issue" in France. But Le Pen, the catholic fundamentalists, the evangelical charismatics, and all the others, they are in the street! The first law passed after the election of Jacques Chirac announced a general amnesty. CADAC set up a coordination of feminists, to oppose the amnesty of the anti-abortion terrorists. The government replied that pro-choice and anti-abortion militants "balance each other out". We decided to increase the struggle. For the first time, we called on all the trade unions and political organisations to act. In 24 hours, we organised a demonstration for 27 June 1995, the day parliament voted on the amnesty law The response wasn't massive, but all the organisations were represented. Prime Minister Juppé eventually accepted that
France * abortion, through distributing information on abortion. Nevertheless, we considered the event a victory. And we benefited from the considerable media interest, that day, to announce the 25 November demonstration. We began sending out information and invitations for the broad-based organising committee. We quickly realised that the situation was different from in previous periods. The trade union movement now has women in leadership positions. A gap had opened. The rules of the game in the workers movement had changed, and we had the chance to exploit them now. Everyone supported the demonstration. Even the Workers' Struggle group (LO, Trotskyist), who we had not seen at feminist meetings for about 20 years! The main vacant seat was, of course, Ms. Nichol Notat, President of the CFDT trade union federation. One more absence she will have to answer for one day... As the moment approaches, the social movement as a whole begins to speed up. We didn't know it this would help us, or if we would be bypassed. The media didnt exactly help build the demonstration. Articles about the week of mobilisations invariably missed out the 25th. On the day, the trains are on strike. But there are plenty of coaches. And planes from Toulouse. We end up on television. In the first line of the demonstration, "stars" like trade union leader Louis Viannet (CGT), Robert Hue (Communist Party President) and Arlette Laguillier (Workers' Struggle). For the first time in years, the police had allowed two demonstrations in the same place: ours, and that of the anti-abortion fundamentalists. We were worried about a provocation from the other side. Until our security team told us we had 40,000 participants behind us! Why such a success? First of all, there was a very positive dynamic outside Paris. The campaign brought activists who had never met into contact with each other. Then there were the media revelations about the far-right links of the anti-abortionists. Then the news from Poland (re-criminalisation of abortion), Ireland (referendumon the right to divorce) and Algeria, the conference in Beijing, and the mobilisation of schools and the left for Sarah (the Filipina sentenced to death in the UAE). All these elements matured the women's movement, and contributed to the success of the movement. Clearly, we have to approach the government, and place the demands from the demonstration in front of them. We must be more offensive in our demands for the complete depenalisation of abortion, the reimbursement of contraception costs, and information on contraception and abortion in all schools. And then there are all the work-related questions: a real reduction in the working week for men and women, equal pay for equal work, and creation of public service jobs. We don't really know what to do next! Notes 1. Coordination des associations pour le droit à l'avortement et la contraception Maya Surduts was interviewed by Gaëlle Lucy. This articles was first published in Rouge, 30 November 1995 CADAC can be contacted at 21 ter, rue Voltaire, 75011 Paris. Tel. +33.1.43563648
International Viewpoint n° 272 5
What alternative?
Prime Minister Alain Juppé claims "there is no alternative". The Socialist and Communist Parties by Christian Picquet
* France haon't yet proved him wrong. THE "EXPERTS" PRESENT THIS AS A PURELY SOCIAL CONFLICT, with a purely social solution. The most important thing is not to let the conflict spread into the political sphere. Socialist Party leader Lionel Jospin is so worried that he keeps exhorting the Prime Minister to discuss. "The government should treat this social problem by social means", he urges. As if the Juppé plan was anything more than a new packaging of the same austerity policy for which labour has been paying for 20 years now. Social security is one of labour's main social advances. Who still can't see that an attack on these advances is a political attack? Particularly today, when the attack on social security is the symbol of the application of strict neo-liberal orthodoxy in all the sectors of the economy. Those on strike recognise, with varying degrees of clarity, that they are struggling against a global economic and social programme, imposed on the member states of the European Union by the treaty of Maastricht. To join the exclusive club of monetary union countries, each state has to meet strict financial criteria. And since the "strong Franc" policy rules out devaluation, the only way France can meet these "convergence" criteria is
ROUGE through a brutal attack on the reforms
won by past generations of working people. These attacks aim at reducing the public deficit. This explains why Chirac and Juppé are so firm in their response to the strikers. Any significant concession would be a setback for the whole Maastricht construction. Other groups of workers would be encouraged to struggle. A shock wave across the continent would bury the whole arrogant idea of a new Europe built on the unity of its financial markets. The problem for the political elite in France is that the strike movement seems to be spreading and deepening. And the movement still has energy in reserve. The stock market has started to tremble. Part of the RPR-UDF (conservative) parliamentary majority is taking its distance from the Prime Minister. And the President of the CNPF (the main employers association) has recommended that the government make sufficient concessions to get through the crisis with most of the current government intact. The government doesn't have much room for manoeuvre. It will be very difficult to divide the strikers, or to cook up an offer which some of the main union leaderships could present to their memberships as an honourable settlement. This might lead the government to seek a political settlement to the crisis. The problem is that 62% of the 6 December 1995 population sympathises with the strikers, which suggests that the result of any referendum on social security would be against the government. In the case of new general elections, the present conservative majority would probably not be returned. Any such vote would sweep away what little remains of the legitimacy of the head of state. THE GOVERNMENT DOES HAVE ONE POLITICAL CARD. NEITHER the Socialist Party nor the Communists have a serious alternative proposal. Alain Juppé profits from every opportunity to remind us that his policies are the logical continuation of the neo-liberal and monetarist degeneration which began under (Socialist Party) President François Mitterand. Socialist leader Lionel Jospin argues that "there must be negotiations. This doesn't mean retreating on all questions. Just reconsidering each dossier one at a time." His party has no alternative programme. Nor does it support the strikes. Henri Emmanuelli and a few other Socialist MPs have joined the demonstrations, but their party is still impregnated with the "culture of government". Part of the Socialist Party openly supports the government. Now that the Communist Party (PCF) has modified its policy of "constructive opposition", they are rather more critical of government policy than the socialists are. Not that party leadership has yet put forward any elements of a possible alternative solution to the crisis. They try to steer the movement away from the perspective of a general strike. At first, the PCF was reluctant to demand the withdrawal of the Juppé plan. They have since concentrated on contrasting President Jacques Chirac's pre-election promises and post-election behaviour. PCF policy gives the vague impression of desire for an alternative. But what kind of alternative? With which partners? And how to put it into effect? All this makes one thing very clear. The rest of us have to do all we can to generate the political alternative which is so sorely missing. This means bringing together all possible forces in a movement of solidarity to the strike movement. It means doing all we can to check-mate the government with a general strike. Those who worry about "not making the crisis worse" are mistaken. There has rarely been so great a gap between the reality of this country and its institutional representation. The author is one of the leaders of the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR), French section of the Fourth International. This article first appeared in Rouge, 6 December 1995