Step forward for Euromarch lives decline under the combined shocks of mass unemployment and worsening job security. The governments popularity actually increased to 49% during the stand off at the church. Only 19% of voters, for the moment, want "less strict" immigration laws. Only 12% support the immediate granting of residence permits to all those involved in the occupation. Among workers, only 37% of those polled by Le Monde on August 26th said they sympathised with the demands of the paperless occupiers of the church. Unemployment and prejudice
Unfortunately, some of those who defended the Africans for humanitarian reasons, tried to convince the government to regularise their situation by stressing the economic value of immigration, which would depress wages and make French goods more competitive. Lawyer Simon Foreman wrote, in Le Monde, that "men have the right to work... Leven] for half the minimum wage." These voices were heard more often than those, like Laurent Joffrin, who wrote, in Libération, that "certain sectors of the economy are particularly hungry for 'black' underground workers. The solution would be to bring these sectors into the legal
In the centre-left weekly L'Évenement de jeudi, Jean-François Kahn complained that "the "progressive' position looks a lot like the arguments of ultra-liberal economists and conservatives like Milton Friedman, or Gary Becker, one of Bob Dole's counsellors, who proposes a free market in labour migration, so as to reduce wages, and provoke the collapse of social security and minimum wage legislation. Faced with ideas like this, the working-class rejection of illegal immigration does have a certain sense." The next step
Recent activities include the September 6th protest outside Air France's office on the Champs Elysées (Paris' poshest shopping street). Transport workers' unions called the demonstration to expose the company's (profitable) role in the deportation process.
"Air transport workers are concerned because the powers that be are not attacking the real problems - be it the North-South divide, or the role of those French employers, including Air France, which themselves exploit immigrant workers through the growing web of sub-contracted services," CGT representative P. Bonnefous told the LCR weekly Rouge on 12 September. "There have also been problems in the planes, when the police handcuff, or tape the deportees to their seats. There have been heated debates inside the planes with the other passengers — many of whom come from the same countries as the deportees. Cabin crew have reacted strongly - some have refused to work on flights of this type."
This and other local actions are building momentum for the national day of action on 28 September. This meeting will demand not only an end to the expulsions, but abolition of the laws which transform legal immigrants into undocumented, "paperless" ones. *
AT LEAST FIVE HUNDRED PEOPLE ARE EXPECTED TO participate in the preliminary European meetings on unemployment, job insecurity and social exclusion. The provisional date and location is Brussels on January 17 and 18. The secretariat of the Marches (or the Belgian Delegation) must still make sure rooms in the European Parliament buildings are available)
This will be the occasion to extend the "programme" so far represented by the Florence Appeal which launched the campaign. In November and December thematic programmatic commissions will elaborate and circulate their propositions.
This will also be the appropriate moment for institutional partners to officially publiclyconfirm their support for the marches. It will also be the occasion where we launch an appropriate and effective publicity strategy. Marching for jobs
The marches themselves will take place during April, May and June 1997. Local and national initiatives may take the form of press conterences, reunions, local gatherings, demonstrations, human chains, concerts, or "feeder" marches.... Symbolic actions such as occupying vacant buildings and unemployment insurance agencies and sit-ins before ministries might be scheduled for the same day in different countries. All together - in Amsterdam
A massive European demonstration against unemployment, job insecurity and social exclusion should be organised in Amsterdam on 28 June 1997, to coincide with the arrival of marchers. The objective is to gather more than thirty thousand people from different European countries. This demonstration can wind up with a concert or a super festival
In October 1997 a meeting will be held to draw conclusions, prepare further European initiatives, and consolidate the network. What kind of march?
In September, it will be necessary to draw up an inventory of the means and capacities of each country, so that we can choose what kind of march we want.
• The first proposal is to organise different marches, originating in the most distant cities of each country, and converging in Amsterdam. They will be met in the towns on the way, providing occasions for socialisation, communication, information, further mobilisation perhaps and social festivities. This was the method followed by the French AC! marchers in April and May 1994. This method demands three months of prior organisation and a significant influx of participants on the way to Amsterdam.
• The second proposal is just to organise a one month-long march in each country. The coherence of the project lies in the simultaneity of initiatives and common program propositions. This is a more
France * circuitous sort of march, convergence being assured by the Amsterdam demonstration body. During this month, publicity campaigns on a European scale would be organised in a programmed manner. Intercommunication
Since the objective is exchange between the different organisations in different countries, the organisation of the marches must be conceived in such a way as to facilitate and encourage such exchanges. To this end, common materials will be produced, translated into several languages, and distributed at each event in the different countries.
The European secretariat has a file of signatory groups, together with a one-page description on the activities and history of each one. This list is available in our various working languages.
Groups of marchers will be transnational, so that at rest stops and local meetings we can hear the opinions of those of other countries. Publicity events and press conferences should be organised in a transnational manner so that participants and the public can readily appreciate the European aspect of
Starting in October, language training sessions should be set up so that organisers and future marchers can communicate more easily.
It might be possible to organise sponsorship. say with a union, association, or municipality which can pay for food and transportation expenses, so that unemployed activists from one country can participate in a march in another country.
From January to June a monthly paper could be put out which will report, in several languages, the various initiatives, the viewpoints of the different organisations, historical background in each country and programmatic propositions. The Web page is
• These marches will open new lines of communication between different European organisations concerned with the struggle against unemployment, job insecurity and social exclusion. The marches should result in the establishment of a durable European network of the participating organisations
• Information will be exchanged on different unemployment compensation systems at the European level as well as initiatives to combat social exclusion. The goal is to present a coherent, common program of demands which will include both structural solutions and emergency proposals. One of the long-term results of this campaign should be the publication in several languages of books concerning these propositions as well as books outlining the different systems currently in use in Europe. * Text prepared by Jean Desessard for discussion at the continental planning meeting held 21-22 September in Paris. As we went to press, 80 delegates were expected to attend. Subtitles by International Viewpoint
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