Global Turmoil
Capitalist crisis, a socialist alternative
Section One: World Relations
Chapter Ten: Russia and Eastern Europe
Capitalist restoration in the former USSR has been an unmitigated disaster for the peoples of this region, particularly for the workers and peasants. The latest crisis is also a big defeat for imperialism, which has invested much political and economic resources in guaranteeing a ‘return to the market’. The IMF, for instance, has in the past poured in resources without the usual ‘safeguards’ and preconditions with which it intervened recently in Asia. (Most of the financial reserves given by the IMF and other western financial interests found their way into private bank accounts before being salted away into secret foreign accounts.) The general processes since the beginning of the 1990s are set out in the excellent programme produced by the CWI section in the former USSR. As that document points out, "We always warned that if capitalism was restored in the USSR, it would be a weak, sickly and corrupt form of capitalism more akin to that found in Asia or Latin America. The likelihood of a new Sweden or Germany emerging was always nil. We can only be accused of over-optimism in that respect."
The figures of economic collapse are at least twice as bad as those experienced by the USA during the Great Depression. Over the whole of the Soviet Union, GNP has plummeted by over 50%. Millions of workers do not get paid for months and sometimes years. In many areas telephones, heating, hot water and other features of a modern society no longer function. Male life expectancy has dropped to 58 years, in some regions it is as low as 43.
None of the republics has been able to resist the process of privatisation, although there are clearly differences of pace. Russia, in many respects, forged the way and is now able to boast one of the highest non-state sectors in the CIS. The Ukraine proved to be not too far behind. Workers have gained no benefit from this as the factories have been privatised and handed over to various crooks and gangsters. The prize for the most callous privatisation programme probably has to go to Kazakhstan, where the Nazarbayev regime has sold off key enterprises to the western companies that pay the largest bribes into the numerous off-shore accounts set up by members of his own family. They, in turn, shut down all the factories that cannot make a profit. Whole towns no longer work, schools can no longer teach children, homes are no longer heated in what the miners of Kentau call, "genocide of the people".
The process of capitalist restoration has been completed in all the former republics of the USSR. Even in Belarus, where pro-marketeers complain that President Lukashenko has held back market reforms, and ‘communists’ and ‘patriots’ hold him up as the saviour of ‘socialism’, it is well on the road to capitalist restoration. The gangster capitalists of the former USSR were able to dream, up to the beginning of 1998, that their ‘shock therapy’ had laid the basis for a real growth of capitalism. However, even the most optimistic pro-marketeers, such as Chubais, foresaw real growth only beginning in 2002 while in Kazakhstan the government was only prepared to guarantee economic growth by the year 2030!
There are enormous differences between regions in such a vast semi-continent as the former USSR. Moscow during the latter part of the 1990s has been relatively prosperous because 80% of investment from abroad goes through this region. However, absolute impoverishment, mass unemployment and a sense of hopelessness has gripped the great bulk of the regions and many towns of the former USSR. A colossal deindustrialisation process has taken place with most investment and growth coming from the fuel energy sector. Now, the collapse of commodity prices, particularly of oil (detailed earlier), is a body blow to the Russian economy and to the bourgeoisie. What ‘growth’ has taken place has been on the basis of the ruthless exploitation and robbery of the proletariat. As with all nascent bourgeoisies, methods of primitive capitalist accumulation have been tried, the non-payment of wages the most blatant of these.
Kiriyenko ‘the brief’
But, even before the financial and economic meltdown experienced by Russia and its political fallout in September 1998, it was clear that a massive mood of opposition was brewing to these measures and towards the Yeltsin regime. This was reflected in the removal of Chernomyrdin from government in early 1998 and his replacement by Kiriyenko as prime minister. We pointed out at the time that while the struggle between the different capitalist cliques or ‘clans’ was a factor in the change of government, far more decisive was the growing opposition of the working class to the brutal methods employed by the capitalists. The debates, votes and eventual ratification of Kiriyenko in the Russian Duma (parliament) took place against the background of decisive sections of the working class coming onto the streets to demand payment of back wages. Some sections, such as the miners, resorted to the ‘arrest’ of managers and directors and the occupation of mines and workplaces. Given this situation, we predicted that the Kiriyenko government would be blown away in a matter of months.
The trigger for the downfall of ‘Kiriyenko the brief’ was the financial and economic collapse in Russia in August-September 1998. It has been estimated that 40% of industry (as opposed to output) has been destroyed between 1990-98 in the former USSR. The underlying economic catastrophe was reinforced by the plummeting price of oil and the effects of the Asian crisis. Russian capitalism and the government of Yeltsin has been sustained by the enormous piling up of debt, both internally and also from loans from foreign banks. This colossal pyramid of debt collapsed as the rouble was devalued, losing 66% of its value in three weeks with prices on the street increasing by 150% in the same period. Bourgeois experts wailed that an area that was supposed to promise a ‘rebirth of capitalism’, threatened to become the trigger for a new recession or slump. The Wall Street Journal commented that there was some irony in the present situation whereby "the former enemy of world capitalism has now been converted to the cause only to threaten serious damage to the whole system".
The collapse of the debt pyramid has in turn led to a partial default on the $194bn which is owed by Russia to western banks. Some bourgeois experts have tried to pretend that this default will not have a serious effect. They have argued that Russia’s stock exchange is puny and is of less value than the British company, Sainsbury’s. However, this is a view not shared by Martin Taylor of Barclays Bank which has lost more than £250 million ($410 million) through the Russian default. Some of the bourgeois of the west have suggested retaliation, with threats to seize Russian assets abroad. Taylor has debunked the idea that these events will have no effect on Europe and the capitalist west in general. Already a flight to quality, in the form of government bonds, is under way. In its wake, a credit crunch, a refusal to give risky loans, is materialising.
In desperation, some bourgeois commentators have tried to pretend that the major powers of Europe will not be burnt by the Russian firestorm. After all, they claim, only 2% of German exports go to the former USSR. Much more important, however, are the repercussions of events in Russia on Eastern Europe, which have reinforced the already serious effect of the crisis in Asia (13% of German exports go to this region). Throughout Eastern Europe, the stock exchanges have suffered serious setbacks. The social and political repercussions of the economic crisis in Russia were immediately felt in the Duma’s rejection of Chernomyrdin, Yeltsin’s nominee for prime minister. During the crisis, the air was thick with warnings from Lebed that the position of Russia was worse than in January 1917, on the eve of the February Russian revolution. Chernomyrdin warned that the country would "be in flames" like Indonesia unless his government was installed quickly. Subsequently Lebed, governor of the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk and a leading presidential hopeful, has commented that the mood in the armed forces has "reached breaking point". He pointed out that some units were "seriously considering scaling down to two meals a day, and after 26 years in the army I know very well that a hungry soldier is an angry soldier". It is reported also by military sources that the army has already consumed 80% of the food reserves kept in the case of war. Top commanders have suggested to servicemen that they fish, hunt and gather mushrooms in the forests to survive until the government of Russia could afford to pay wage arrears that date back months! Tales have appeared in the media of the starvation of conscripts who have been forced to eat dog food. The mood in the army has been shown by the incident involving a young conscript on a nuclear powered submarine in Murmansk who shot eight fellow crew members before being shot by a special commando squad.
The possibility of a coup cannot be ruled out but does not seem likely in the immediate period ahead, given the installation of the Primakov government. Notwithstanding what happens at the top, the desperate mood from below can result in ‘popular uprisings’, as food shortages and starvation looms. Even potatoes, the staple diet of Russians when all else fails, will be in short supply it seems because of the bad summer. The position of the poorest, already desperate, now appears hopeless.
The collapse of the rouble means, for instance, that an old age pensioner in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, who previously eked out an existence on $118 a month, now receives closer to $41. Desperate old people have appeared on television, having just been turned away from food shops where they cannot afford to pay the price demanded, with one declaring that all that is left for her is to "go home and hang myself". But it is not just the old, the sick and those on fixed incomes that suffer. The working class and the middle class, even in relatively prosperous areas, like Moscow, have been hit hard. Credit cards are just not accepted at cash dispensing machines.
Rejection of consequences of capitalism
There is, in effect, a three-fold crisis in Russia. There is a currency crisis with the devaluation of the rouble. There is also a capital market crisis as loans and credit has dried up. This has repercussions not just in Russia but internationally as we have pointed out. Foreign investors have lost, because of the defaults, an estimated $100bn which is the "biggest credit loss ever imposed on private-sector creditors". There is a financial crisis with the complete collapse of the stock exchange and the market and, last but not least, there is a terrible, endemic crisis in the real economy. On top of this, inflation has increased, with the hard earned savings, particularly of the middle class, wiped out and with the spectre of a Weimar-type situation of hyper inflation, or even of stagflation. The state, the government, is in crisis with no real authority amongst the mass. Eighty-four percent of the population now believe that the ‘drunkard who runs the Kremlin’, Yeltsin, should be removed. The moral bankruptcy of the government goes together with the financial and economic bankruptcy of the state.
These events signify a massive rejection of the consequences of the introduction of capitalism in the former USSR. However, no clear alternative is posed before the masses. The major oppositional force, the KPRF (Communist Party of the Russian Federation) led by Zyuganov, is not a genuine party of the masses, is not a genuine workers’ party. It represents that section of the bureaucracy excluded from sharing in the spoils of the massive 1990s privatisation programme. It combines old-style Stalinists who yearn for a return of the ‘command economy’ with those, like Zyuganov, who recognise the market and stand for a ‘mixed economy’, that is, capitalism but with a considerable state sector. Even before the Primakov government was installed, Clinton on his visit to Moscow raised the spectre of a "return to the command economy".
No doubt there will be those ‘Marxists’, who have been utterly incapable of understanding the processes at work in the ex-Stalinist states, who will take this and the coming to power of the Primakov government as an indication that this is a real possibility. There is no immediate prospect of such a development. Zyuganov does not want this nor do the different elites who have been struggling, sometimes viciously, amongst each other for a greater share of the loot arising from privatisation. Under the impact of the crisis, even Yeltsin was compelled to ratify the renationalisation of eight banks, including three of the biggest finance houses. This does not, however, represent a return to the ‘command economy’. These are measures of a state capitalist character. They signify a more ‘controlled’ return to capitalism. Moreover, serious bourgeois commentators both in Russia and outside have urged the Primakov government to go a lot further and act against "wild or gangster capitalism" by renationalising significant sections of industry. The purpose of such measures, if implemented, will be to renovate such industries, paid for by the state and, therefore indirectly, by the working and middle classes, and then hand them back to the capitalists.
Growth of imperialist appetite
Although weakened by recent events, the Russian bourgeoisie will still attempt to assert itself, particularly abroad. Its growing imperialist appetite and actions are touched on in the programme of our CIS section: "The new Russian bourgeoisie will use the overwhelming weight of the Russian economy to expand their area for exploitation, use the cheaper labour found in other republics, take control of the natural resources and speed up the capitalisation process in those republics that have lagged behind.
"Already the newly established capitalist Russia is acting in an imperialist manner in relation to the former Soviet republics. Russian companies such as Gazprom constantly threaten to cut off energy supplies to the Ukraine and other republics unless debts are paid. Latin America-style debt-equity swaps are being used where the debts of the non-Russian republics are being written off in exchange for shares in industrial enterprises. Russian banks are demanding the right to take over privatised factories and Russian troops are patrolling the border to the Caucasian and some central Asian republics. The pledge that Yeltsin made to support Kuchma in the next Presidential election was directly tied to the latter’s promise to allow Russian banks to participate in the Ukrainian privatisation process.
"Moreover, attempts to form a new union are likely to reinvigorate national tensions in regions which see Russia as an oppressor state. President Kuchma discovered soon after his election that his promise to move back towards Russia threatened to cause a breakaway of the West Ukraine.
"In this sense, the demand to restore the USSR is a reactionary slogan. With capitalism restored in the different republics, reunification can only lead to further marketisation and privatisation in those republics in which reforms are lagging those of Russia. Moreover, support for the formal slogan of restoring the USSR by parties that claim to be left, in reality, turns them into supporters of Russian imperialism. This is clearly the case with the Russian Communist Party and, to a lesser degree, the Communist Party of the Ukraine. As a result, parties, which support that slogan are overwhelmingly Russian-speaking and find it difficult to win support amongst other nationalities. Simonenko, leader of the CPU, was heckled and booed as a Moscow man when he recently visited Lvov.
"In each of the republics, only when the working class organise can they defend their interests. They will find that they cannot limit their struggle to their own factory or even their own region, but will soon find that their interests are the same as those of workers in the other republics.
"Workers need to organise to ensure that if economic links between factories in different republics are re-established, they are done so in the interests of the workers themselves."
However, the mood amongst the mass of the working class is a different question. The movements in 1998 signified a massive rejection of the consequences of a return of the market. This is most noticeable amongst those groups who first embraced it nine or ten years ago. The miners, for instance, the shock troops in Yeltsin’s rise to power, have reaped a terrible whirlwind in the economic desolation of the mining areas through the return of the market. In the decisive mining areas of Vorkuta and the Kuzbass, these very same miners have swung over into opposition with many of them searching for an alternative.
The significant growth of the forces of the CWI in the CIS is a harbinger of the colossal upheavals that loom. The heroic work of maintaining a toehold in the most difficult objective conditions is now beginning to pay dividends. From the new generation who are beginning to be radicalised by the economic and political developments, have come the new members that have travelled into the ranks of our organisation. Our work with the miners and other workers has established us as a small but extremely energetic and effective force, which can in the future attract wide layers of workers.
Despite the claims of bourgeois experts that, as opposed to Russia, Eastern Europe signifies a success story for the return of capitalism, the reality is very much different. A few countries have done better than the USSR, with some growth, but also with a significant deterioration in social conditions and the economic position of the working class.
Eastern Europe
Two regions in Eastern Europe have experienced growth, as the document of the CIS comrades point out: "Estonia, due to its links with Scandinavia, attracted $295 a head from 1989-94 and the Czech Republic $289. In contrast, Russia attracted $11 a head and the Ukraine and Moldova $9." However, recent developments in the Czech Republic show that "this localised growth is not based on solid foundations. The rainstorms that swept Eastern Europe in May 1997, coinciding with the currency crisis, was sufficient to undermine the economy and trigger a government crisis."
The discontent of the mass of the people and the disappointment at the results of a return to capitalism explain the chronic political instability in all the countries of Eastern Europe. In the Czech Republic, for instance, the ODS, led by the architect of reborn Czech capitalism, Vaclav Klaus, was defeated in the general election in July by the Czech ‘social democrats’. Under his rule, Prague benefited as well as business people, bankers and young professionals. But there is bitter disappointment at the drop in living standards of older workers, pensioners, the sick and the unemployed that, according to the British Financial Times, felt "betrayed". In desperation, many of these voters turned to the Social Democrats led by Milos Zeman. Even former supporters of Klaus were repelled by the rampant corruption and colossal greed of his closest supporters and the looting of the national treasury by the capitalists.
One of the immediate results of capitalist restoration has been the opening of old racial tensions that were unresolved by Stalinism. The Roma people became one of the first victims of social changes being almost excluded from society when it comes to access to jobs, housing and even public shops or bars. Proposals for an apartheid-style segregation in the city of Pilsen, according to human rights activists, are "reminiscent of the Nazi era when Roma, along with Jews, were separated from the rest of the population". The Roma people are regularly attacked by neo-Nazis who have links with similar groups in Germany and Austria - 32 have been killed in racially-motivated attacks in the Czech Republic since 1989. Moreover, they are harassed by the police and face massive discrimination in housing and welfare. Czech Roma people have been murdered by skinheads with the compliance of the state and, in particular, the police. The general situation has led to total division of Roma and Czech communities and produced a massive emigration wave, unprecedented since the time of the USSR bureaucracy’s invasion in 1968.
The election did not give the Social Democrats an outright majority. They are, therefore, reliant on Klaus’s party. As one commentator pointed out: "It [the new government] will be swimming in a sea of problems he [Klaus] created. He can bring it down and ride back on a white horse."
On the basis of feeble Czech capitalism the political instability will continue with the parliamentary cradle rocked from ‘left’ to right and back again without any solution to the underlying problems of the mass of the working class and middle class. The Communist Party retains support, particularly amongst the old pensioners and some sections of the working class. If the Czech Republic is further seriously affected by the Russian and Asian crisis, as is likely, it cannot be excluded that the masses in desperation may, at least on the parliamentary field, give increased support to the CP. At the same time, as with the rest of Eastern Europe, the issue of a genuine mass workers’ party will be posed in the convulsive events which will develop.
The soap bubble of Poland’s success is also going to be punctured in the next period. Any growth that has taken place in the past has been creamed off by the new Polish elite, many of them ex-Stalinist bureaucrats. The presidency is in the hands of an ‘ex-communist’, Alexander Kwasniewski, but with a weak constituency of 20-30% of the former ‘communist electorate’. The Solidarity-led government has 60% of the deputies in the parliament (Sejm).
The dilemma and contradictions within the pro-capitalist Solidarity is summed up by the crisis of the Ursus factory in Warsaw and in the chronic weakness of Polish agriculture. The giant Ursus tractor factory has been targeted by the Solidarity-led government for ‘restructuring and privatisation’. They wish to attract foreign investment, but this has brought them up against the opposition of the local Solidarity union. The same conflict is taking place in the loss-making coal industry where, according to the Financial Times, "job cuts are urgently needed", and also in the steel industry. The government is looking to sack 2,500 workers in Ursus from a 12,000-strong workforce. This was rejected by the unions, which has brought the government into conflict with its base.
The position of this factory is aggravated by the crisis in Polish agriculture. Unlike in Hungary and the Czech Republic, where much land was collectivised, Poland remained, even under Stalinist rule, predominantly a country of peasant smallholdings. There are an astonishing two million farms, more than in the whole of the rest of Central Europe combined. Moreover, agriculture accounts for 27% of employment, compared with just 7% in Hungary and 5% in the Czech Republic. Even the Financial Times comments: "Most peasants are worried about the future, fearing capitalism as much as communism."
Under the pressure of the European Union, a process of ‘consolidation’ has already taken place with the number of farms falling by over 100,000 since 1988. However, opposition to a further contraction has increased amongst the peasantry, which is linking up with the fate of the workers in the Ursus factory. The leader of the Ursus workers declared: "The European Union wants to liquidate 90% of our agriculture," which will, of course, dramatically undermine the sales of Ursus tractors.
Their opposition is reinforced by the knowledge that the rich farmers and agribusiness in western Europe, particularly in Britain, are rushing to buy up cheap land in Eastern Europe. The cost of land on average is one-tenth of what it is in East Anglia in England and, with the expected entry of Poland into the EU by 2002, these foreign buyers can be expected to benefit from CAP subsidies. Although the opposition to the Solidarity-led government can lead, in the first instance, into increased support for the more right-wing, Catholic and nationalist parties, the even greater upheavals which loom in Poland will raise the idea of independent political representation by the working class at a certain stage.
Choatic and confused
The picture in the rest of Eastern Europe varies only in its degree of ‘awfulness’ as far as the working class is concerned. Extreme volatility has been demonstrated in Hungary with the ‘Socialists’, the former Stalinists, led by prime minister Gyula Horn, enjoying a landslide victory four years ago. However, in the elections in May 1998 they lost a third of their seats and were replaced by the Fidesz/Hungarian Civic Party, a right-wing party founded only ten years ago. This resulted from the brutal austerity programme of the ‘Socialists’ which, while it earned high praise from the capitalists in the west, alienated the mass of the workers and middle class. Economic and political instability is the order of the day as Fidesz is reliant on the votes of the Smallholders Party, which demagogically offered to scrap university tuition fees, build low-cost housing projects, etc. It is unlikely to remain in power for four years.
An even more chaotic and confused situation exists in neighbouring Romania. The country’s GDP plunged by 9.4% in real terms in the first quarter of the year compared to 1997. Industry contracted by 7.4% but the biggest drop came in the still sizeable agricultural sector, which experienced a 37% drop. The economy had contracted by 6.6% in 1997 and the ‘best hope’ economic scenario for this year is a drop of ‘only’ 2%, which is in all probability a gross underestimate. The major political formations are composed of different pro-market, incessantly squabbling parties with different capitalist politicians acting on behalf of opposing business and industrial interests. The Romanian president, Constantinescu, describes the conflict between the parties as "merely… over the speed of reforms". For "reforms" read privatisation and the introduction of the market.
In the run up to the resignation of the Ciorbea government in March 1998, the foreign minister was forced to resign after failing to substantiate allegations that senior politicians were foreign agents, while the transport minister was sacked for publicly criticising the prime minister.
The Democratic Party (PD), the junior partner in the ruling coalition, in power since 1996, is mostly drawn from the younger members of the former Stalinist elite. After the revolution of 1989, as with many of their cousins in the rest of Eastern Europe, these creatures moved into private business, looted state assets and set up a network of their supporters. Its leader, Petre Roman, was a close associate of former president Ion Iliescu, and was prime minister in the first post-Stalinist government from 1990-91. They are opposed in particular by the Peasant Party, which purports to represent the rural population, but stands for the restoration of agricultural land to its former owners, which would be a catastrophe for Romania.
Stirring of the masses
The political deadlock in Romania has halted the process of privatisation for the time being but international capital, through the aegis of the IMF, is exerting enormous pressure for the process to be stepped up. In all of this the condition of the masses sinks lower with endemic unemployment and inflation reckoned now to reach 151% by December.
The next period in Eastern Europe is likely to see a stirring of the masses. Even in what is left of former Yugoslavia, the largely Serbian state, the working class has begun to move into opposition to Milosevic. The ethnic conflict with Croatia and then with Bosnia and now with Kosova acted to dampen down mass protests against Milosevic despite the catastrophic fall in living standards. But conditions are so bad that opposition is now visible and growing. The economy has been crippled by years of international sanctions imposed for Belgrade’s role in the Bosnian civil war. This has resulted in more than 30% unemployment. Many workers are on forced leave with little or no pay.
In recent months across Serbia, teachers, health and transport workers, as well as arms workers have held partial stoppages. This is despite the fact that there is no coherent nationwide labour movement threatening to bring down Milosevic’s Serbian coalition of ‘socialists’ and ultra-nationalists. However, the grip which Milosevic’s Socialist Party machine has over the trade unions is beginning to weaken. In mass demonstrations workers have denounced the Milosevic leadership: "They are sick with amnesia, they eat caviar and drink whisky. How long will it last? The devil’s blood runs in their veins."
Stoppages of two hours, and week-long partial hunger strikes by some workers are resorted to in desperation at the fact that many have not been paid for more than a year. Poverty wages which amount to $27 a month and a bus pass are the norm for many. The working class is still not ready for all-out strike action but the regime is obviously concerned that the protests which have taken place so far have been led by the Alliance of Trade Unions of Serbia (SSS) which up to now has been allied to the Socialist Party. One trade union leader declared: "The Socialists want to control us but can’t… our trade union is trying to join the streams of discontent into one river that will sweep away the leadership that brought us this crisis."
The independent trade union federation is, it seems, gradually increasing its strength but is confused politically and looks towards the model of Walesa’s Solidarity trade union movement in Poland. In their confusion and desperation many workers have turned to the extreme nationalist Radical Party with its demagogy and anti-western rhetoric.
The picture of spasmodic small protests by workers can change given the further collapse of the already battered economies of Eastern Europe in the period that is opening up. Difficult though it has been for the CWI to maintain tenuous contact and a foothold in some countries, with the exception of the excellent work that has been done in the Czech Republic, in the next period greater opportunities will exist for our ideas - those of genuine Marxism. Ideological confusion is undoubtedly the major feature in the consciousness of the mass of the working class. But it is events, and mighty events at that, which will demonstrate the incapacity of an already discredited capitalism to show a way forward.
Albania perhaps best typifies the collapse and the lack of an alternative. Albanian wages, it is now estimated, are lower than the average for Africa while 70% of the workforce is unemployed. Primitive barter, payment in goods, is now the norm as the country visibly disintegrates into a ‘Mad Max’ scenario. Most of the population is sustained by cash, which is sent back by Albanian exiles in Greece, and elsewhere in Europe. At the same time imperialism is penetrating and seizing the assets of the country: 500 Italian companies already operate in Albania.
Ideological confusion still persists amongst the broad mass of the working class in Eastern Europe and Russia, nevertheless an important group of advanced workers will become more open to the ideas of genuine Marxism and socialism, and the programme of the CWI in the period that we are going into.
A socialist Millennium
We have seen that as the 1990s draws to an end, the promises made by capitalist strategists in the early part of the decade have turned to ashes. The new millennium, which was supposed to have begun with a strong triumphalist world capitalism preparing for a new century of domination, will instead begin against the backdrop of unprecedented world disorder, ethnic, national and racial tension, as well as a devastating world recession or slump. The viability of any system ultimately depends upon its ability to develop the productive forces. It will gradually dawn on the proletariat in the tumultuous events which impend, that outmoded capitalism promises only unrelieved misery. In these events, the possibility of building mass parties of the working class on the basis of a socialist and revolutionary programme will be posed.
As important, a new mass International, as envisaged by Lenin and Trotsky, can take shape. Our task is to draw all the necessary conclusions to lay the foundations for building such a force, which can introduce the greatest liberation in history, world socialism.