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On 23 Mar 2019 at 14:15, Juan Andres Gallardo via Marxism wrote: > > No Imperialist Intervention in Venezuela! Declaration of the > revolutionary > organizations of workers, women and youth from Latin America, Europe > and > the United States that make up the Fracción Trotskista-Cuarta > Internacional > (FT-CI) / Trotskyist Fraction-Fourth International (TF-FI). > > https://www.leftvoice.org/oppose-the-coup-of-trump-and-guaido-worker > s-must-lead-the-fight-against-imperialist-aggression-and-the-misery- > to-which-they-are-subjected The title of the appeal is "Oppose the Coup of Trump and Guaidó: Workers Must Lead the Fight Against Imperialist Aggression and the Misery to Which They Are Subjected " Read as a whole, this appeal opposes Trump, Guaido, and Maduro, which is correct, and it has some sharp denunciation of the present situation. But it would be hard to use this appeal as a basis for what should be done, because it combines contradictory elements.On one hand, it presents itself as simply against the opposition from the right, so Maduro or the regime isn't even mentioned in the title of the appeal. On the other hand, it talks of "the country´s economic and social catastrophe, and the weariness of the masses with the anti-worker, anti-people and repressive economic policy of Maduro". But what should be done? It ends up proposing steps which would lead towards immediate workers' power, but through a movement that is based on simply being the most resolute in opposing the coup. How does it reconcile these points? The more it tries, the more it gets into difficulties. It says it is not giving "any endorsement of or political support for Maduro government", but doesn't characterizing the crisis overall simply as an attempt at a right-wing and imperialist coup imply at least some temporary support for the government? On the other hand, some of the struggles it suggests would, if they could be carried out, lead to immediate, irreconcilable clashes with the Maduro government and its police. Moreover, the full list of demands suggests that the movement could, by mobilizing against the right-wing coup, end up carrying out the Trotskyist transitional program, which is supposed to lead to workers' power. It can't get out of these contradictions, because it is unwilling to give a realistic estimation of the balance of class forces at this time. It has an unrealistic description of how far the internal class struggle has gone in Venezuela. It doesn't describe the existing trends in the opposition (other than a certain description of the right-wing), and it doesn't talk concretely about the situation with the present left-wing opposition and left-wing critics. It also doesn't realistically evaluate what could be done economically in Venezuela at this time. Instead it simply describes all sorts of demands, without any estimation of how far the masses could take up such demands or carry out such organization at this time or of what socialists should do given the disorientation and weakness in the workers' movement. It doesn't separate demands into the immediate and the more long-term. At one point, it talks of the "absence of a working-class alternative" in Venezuela, while elsewhere it describes a movement that is already at an extremely high level. This failure to describe the concrete situation in the class struggle is something seen repeatedlly in Trotskyist appeals. It's based on Trotskyism having reduced tactics to a single pattern to be applied to all situations, on pain of deviating into "stage-ism", which is supposed to inevitably be Stalinist reformism. Some notable excerpts: "6... With severe shortages, the astronomical devaluations of the bolivar and hyperinflation, and starvation wages that have sunk down to $5 a month, people´s living standards have fallen dramatically. The full brunt of this crisis is being most brutally felt by women workers and the poor masses. Another element of this policy saw Maduro move to violate collective bargaining agreements in both the public and private sectors, which alongside this genuine massacre of historic wages and rights, provides capital with one of the cheapest sources of labor in the world. Massive layoffs in private companies have also been endorsed and sectors of big business exempted from paying taxes. The government´s repressive response to workers´ struggles has included the imprisonment of union leaders and the use of vigilante groups to intimidate them. This whole scenario has allowed the right to win a new mass social base, capitalizing on the massive rejection of the government in the absence of a working-class alternative." "9. The alternative is a mobilization of the working class and the poor masses against the attempted coup and any form of imperialist interference, and against all austerity measures, whether implemented by the Maduro government or through Guaidó´s "Country Plan". Those of us who have signed this declaration maintain that Venezuela must be governed by its workers and that they must begin a throughgoing reorganization of the economy that attacks the interests of the capitalists and imperialism in order to satisfy the most pressing needs of the people." >From the demands: "Freedom for all workers imprisoned for taking part in struggles and an end to the trials of workers, peasants, poor people, students and indigenous people prosecuted for protesting; and the dissolution of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB), the FAES special police units and all organs responsible for repressing the people; among other indispensable measures against the current collapse." denounces the austerity and repression from the Maduro government, claims i --- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
