----- Original Message ----- From: SolidNet <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, November 29, 2000 9:24 PM Subject: Portuguese CP, 16th Congress, Theses, Draft of Political Resolution(Chpt.3) SolidNet The purpose of the Solid Net ( Solidarity Network ) is to inform on the activities as well as the ideological and political views of different Communist and Workers’ Parties on National and International issues. All articles in the SolidNet are the responsibility of the authors and in no way commit this Web Site. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, http://www.solidnet.org =============================================================== Portuguese CP, 16th Congress, Theses, Draft of Political Resolution(Chpt.3) ------------------------------------------------- From: Portuguese Communist Party http://www.pcp.pt/pcp, E-Mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ============================================================= THESES Draft of Political Resolution Draft Document proposed by the Central Committee to debate in all the organisations 1 INTERNATIONAL SITUATION 1.3. THE ALTERNATIVE IS SOCIALISM 1.3.1. It is necessary and possible to reverse, through the struggle, the current course of the world's evolution, that is, to contain and roll back the imperialist "globalisation" process, to defeat the attempts to set up a "new order" at the service of big business, to achieve a turn to the left and alternatives of social progress, to advance towards socialism. 1.3.2. In what ways is this possible, with such a disproportion of forces and in times of such an accelerated internationalisation of the productive processes and of social relations? 1.3.3. There are no easy answers nor ready-made "models" to break the huge difficulties and the complexity of the current situation. But we are sure that the course of an alternative and of revolution is the course of the working class and the masses, of their organisation and mobilisation for the struggle, for the satisfaction of their interests and most heart-felt expectations and for political power. It is, at the same time, the course of solidarity and internationalist co-operation of Communists, progressives, workers and peoples world-wide. 1.3.4. In valuing national sovereignty as an indispensable component of democracy, and the national State as a privileged and unavoidable arena of the class struggle, the PCP views the goals and the struggle at a national level as dialectically articulated with world-wide goals and struggle, the growing importance of which is recognised. 1.3.5. History, and particularly the history of the workers' movement, shows that, despite huge difficulties and obstacles, there is an accumulation of forces and processes which can evolve, sometimes very quickly, in favourable ways for the progressive and revolutionary struggle. But it also shows the dangers of underestimating the strength and determination of big capital in defending its class privileges and its hegemonic power. The process which will lead to a fundamental change in the world balance of forces will probably be a complex and prolonged one, involving huge social and political explosions, and implying bitter struggles to overcome the resistance and confront the violence of the ruling classes. To privilege and circumscribe the action to the institutions of the system, disregarding the reality of the class struggle and the Marxist-Leninist conception of the State and power, can only favour a wait-and-see attitude and lead to bitter disappointments. 1.3.6. In general terms, the present stage may still be considered as one of resistance, of the accumulation of forces, including very diversified actions and struggles, covering a very broad range of demands and goals. 1.3.7. At the same time, the advancing processes of internationalisation, co-operation and integration and imperialist "globalisation" itself, tend to bring together and to establish increasingly closer objective links of interdependence between the workers' and peoples' struggles all over the world. 1.3.8. It is the Communists' and revolutionaries' duty to act in order to expand the international and internationalist dimension of their activity, and to find the common problems, demands and goals enabling them to bring together in a broad anti-imperialist front very diversified social and political sectors that fight for democracy, national independence, peace, the preservation of the environment, social progress and socialism. 1.3.9. Considering the diversity of political, economic and social situations, and therefore the diversity of tasks which each people faces, it is necessary, urgent and possible to achieve a broad unity in the struggle against imperialism and neo-liberalism, for peace and social progress, around goals such as: 1.3.9.1. The struggle against monopolies, transnational corporations and finance capital; against imperialist globalisation and the political and economic bodies at its service; against underdevelopment, exploitation, poverty and hunger; against speculation and the free movement of capital; for the allocation of resources to development and productive investments; against privatisation; for public, universal and free public systems of health, education and welfare; for the abrogation of the foreign debt of the least-developed countries; against political and economic impositions by the most powerful countries; 1.3.9.2. The struggle to value labour and those who work; against unemployment and for jobs with rights and security; for wages and retirement pensions; for labour and social rights; in defence of workers' trade unions and representative organisations; to reduce working hours without loss of pay and rights; in defence of national agricultures and of farmers; 1.3.9.3. The struggle for a real political, social, economic and cultural democracy; the struggle for true equality between men and women; internationalist solidarity with the peoples in struggle for freedom and self-determination, or who are victims of foreign aggressions or blockades; the struggle against every expression of fascist, racist, xenophobic or obscurantist forces; 1.3.9.4. The struggle for a world of peace; against imperialism's militarist and interventionist escalation; for the dissolution of NATO and of all political-military blocks; in defence of the international system of arms-control and disarmament treaties; against the militarisation of space and the development of new weapons systems; to ban and eliminate nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction; 1.3.9.5. The struggle to defend the current International Law and United Nations Charter; in defence of sovereignty and national independence; for international relations based on co-operation, mutual advantages and the respect for national interests, for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of each State; in defence of the United Nations and of its system of organisations, as a framework for peaceful co-operation between peoples; 1.3.9.6. The struggle for an ecologically sustainable development; for the preservation of natural resources and ecological balances; against environmental pollution and desertification; for an orderly development of the big urban centres. 1.3.10. These are some of the problems, demands and goals around which the unity in action of the revolutionary, left and progressive forces, as well as the convergence of broad processes and struggles, is necessary and possible. Naturally, it is easier to draw up a list of issues than to find, at each given moment and in the heat of the moment, the specific bonds of unity which can give a strong momentum to the anti-imperialist struggle and open up real prospects of liberating advances. That requires a much broader and quicker circulation of information, a high degree of willingness and readiness for unity, greater speed in co-ordinating efforts. 1.3.11. It is also necessary to consider that the need for, and the possibility of, establishing very broad alliances to fight against the most inhumane aspects of the policies of big business and imperialism only makes sense when inserted within a broader view of the struggle against their causes and for alternative policies with a view to overcoming them. 1.3.12. Convergences and alliances involving a wide array of forces of the national liberation movement, of important social and democratic movements, and even sectors of social-democracy and of the "Green"/ecological movement are obviously desirable, even when limited in scope and duration. This is possible on issues such as fundamental rights and freedoms, denouncing the most flagrant injustices and inequalities, renewing the importance of the State's social functions, taking steps to regulate global capitalism, considering the most harmful effects of the finance economy and the most pressing problems of the Third World. But to give up, in the name of equivocal notions of "anti-neoliberalism" and "left", goals which challenge the power of the monopolies and of finance capital, the fight against militarism and war, the rejection of the so-called "right of interference" among others, would castrate an anti-capitalist and revolutionary dynamic. As for the main international instruments of imperialist "globalisation" - the IMF, WB, WTO, EU, etc. - the issue at stake is not to "democratise" or "redirect" but to fundamentally restructure, with a view to reorganising the international system of relations, to establish a new equitable and fair economic world order, with a "new world information order", a "collective security system", etc. 1.3.13. In the struggle for specific goals and reforms achievable within the limits of the system, it is necessary, in order to avoid sliding towards an inconsequent reformist short-termism, not to lose sight of the demand for profound social-economic changes of an anti-monopolist, anti-capitalist nature, nor the prospect of the revolutionary overcoming of capitalism, inscribed in the very contradictions of the system. 1.3.14. However hard people try to distort and deny it, socialism, in a conception necessarily renewed by the lessons of experience, is proving itself, day after day, as the necessary alternative. 1.3.15. Ten years after the "fall of the wall", of the defeats of socialism in the USSR and Eastern Europe, of the arrogant proclamation of the ultimate triumph of capitalism, it is obvious that the world has not become safer, more democratic, fairer, more humane. We see precisely the opposite. Capitalism is not only incapable of solving the workers' and the peoples' problems, as it is also imposing terrible social and even civilisational regressions and dragging Humankind towards great dangers. 1.3.16. And if capitalism still displays a remarkable capacity of adjustment and recovery, it is also true that it shows itself incapable of suppressing its intrinsic contradictions, beginning with the basic contradiction between, on one hand, the huge development of the productive forces and the growingly social character of production, and, on the other, the relations of production based on the sacrosanct private property. The opposition between the outstanding advances in knowledge and the brutal worsening of social and human problems, the solution to which is now within Man's reach, is a relevant expression of that basic contradiction that is urgent to overcome through social revolution and the establishment of socialism. 1.3.17. The defeats of socialism and the dangers impending over Humankind do not erase the reality that the 20th century, albeit marked by cruel dramas and violent storms, was essentially a century of huge liberating advances which are inseparable from the creative thought and the revolutionary action of Communists. 1.3.18. The defeats of socialism and the dangers impending over Humankind do not erase the reality that the 20th century, albeit marked by cruel dramas and violent storms, was essentially a century of huge liberating advances which are inseparable from the creative thought and the revolutionary action of Communists. *End*
