Workers and Youth Unite to Fight for a Socialist Future
The CWI supports the youth strikes and mobilisations on 20 November called for by the International Youth Walkout Against War. Events are confirming the timeliness of the N20 initiative. The uprising of the youth in France has seen half a million on the streets. It is now the reference point for those building for N20 across Europe. On 7 October, students in Liège in Belgium organised protests in solidarity indicating the possibility for action to spread and underlining the potential of N20. The mass protests in Spain, sparked by the brutal eviction of a pensioner, have attracted hundreds of thousands. In Germany there have been four days of school strikes against the government’s conscription policies. Students were the driving force of a mass movement in Serbia that developed into a general anti-government uprising. Young people have been to the fore across Europe in protests in solidarity with the Palestinian people, against the growth of right-populist parties, against state repression, militarisation and in protests demanding climate action. But it is not only in Europe that a new generation is moving into action. Young people have played a decisive role in mass movements in the neocolonial world in recent years. This continued this summer in India’s “Cockroach” youth movement which, as we write, has entered a new phase in the face of a government crackdown.
A new generation is gaining crucial experience that mass action works and governments can be forced to retreat and to change policy. In France and Spain concessions have temporarily been won although they do not go far enough and have been insufficient to dampen the mood to continue action. But the protest movements are also deepening the political crises facing the ruling classes and increasing pressure on already fragile governments. In Serbia and in Spain early elections have been called as the ruling classes seek to regain control of the situation. France is six months away from a decisive presidential election. The youth movement and the election are already intertwined, with Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s left-populist France Unbowed’s (FI) support for the youth winning it authority. The Union étudiante, a national student union with links to FI, is one of the N20 initiating organisations.
Each of these movements is shaped by national features and have their own specific demands. But they are also all products of the new era of global capitalist crisis – an era of intensified political and class polarisation and struggle, of militarisation, war and conflict, of climate crisis and breakdown. The nature of the challenges facing humanity leads many young people to embrace the idea that ‘their’ struggle is part of a wider one against a system that is robbing them of a future. Many explicitly identify capitalism as the culprit and are looking toward socialist ideas as an alternative. Recent opinion polls, show that 57% of 18–34-year-olds in the US view socialism “positively”, in Britain 53% agreed that socialism “is the ideal political system” and in France 29% consider “communism an idea with a future”. What the young people polled understand by socialism (or communism) will vary massively but it gives a glimmer of the huge potential for building significant socialist and revolutionary movements in the advanced capitalist countries.
The CWI is committed to making N20 as successful as possible. In Europe the CWI is campaigning on the ground amongst young people and building support for N20 in broader youth organisations and wider workers’ movement. Socialist Students, the student organisation that CWI members in Britain play a key role in building, was one of the participating organisations at a youth and student assembly in cologne in June, which put out the call for an international youth strike on 20 November.
Successful Europe-wide youth protests would be a crucial milestone in the class struggle more broadly, establish a crucial point of reference for young people and act as an inspiration across society helping to galvanise the idea of a fightback.
In countries like France and Spain, N20 is not now a lever to help initiate a movement, rather the task is to campaign for the existing movements to make the date their own. For this to be successful, N20 needs to be presented with a clear role in advancing the demands of the struggles unique to these countries whilst broadening the political outlook, at least of the most active and militant youth. The mobilising slogan for N20 – “Fight for Our Future, Not their Wars!” – allows all issues impacting the future of young people and causing concerns and fears for the future to be used to build support.
Events are demonstrating that mass movements of young people will be a feature of this era as they have in past periods of heightened class struggle. Movements can develop around issues directly effecting the majority of young people, such as the quality of the education they receive, huge student fees and debts, job opportunities post-education, housing, conscription policies etc. They are also likely around issues that place a general question mark over the future, including climate change and war. N20 can play an important role as a new reference point for the young people the campaign succeeds in reaching and a springboard for future action.
The only way the vast majority of young people can win a future is to struggle for the end of the capitalist profit system and its replacement by a democratically planned socialist economy. War is a product of capitalist society. The only way to banish it from human history is to end the rule of the capitalist class. Only in a socialist society can the needs and aspirations of young people be met and the future of planet Earth secured from climate disaster and war. This is the meaning the CWI argues to be given to the slogan “Fight for Our Future”.
But the CWI understands that it is only the working class that is capable of carrying through the socialist revolution. Fortunately, the potential for young people to be convinced of the power of the working class to transform society is greater today than at any time in the last thirty-five years. For the generation awakening to political consciousness and moving into struggle now the working class is again a visible force in society. It is more likely today that young people’s parents, other family members, neighbours, teachers and lecturers have taken strike action. This process is still at an early stage, but already the workers’ movement has an influence on the outlook of young people. The popularity of the idea of a ‘strike’ is back in popular consciousness, even if the experience to fully understand the power of these weapons is still being acquired. This is preparing the ground for young people to draw revolutionary Marxist conclusions about the role of the working class in transforming society. This is being reinforced by workers and unions in France taking action and linking up with school student protests. In Spain, the largest trade union confederations have called for a general strike on 11 November. In Ireland, a public sector general strike took place on 14 October. In Britain unions representing a quarter of a million workers are balloting for national action.
The CWI is in favour of building independent mass youth organisations as vehicles for young people to organise themselves. We believe that to achieve their demands youth organisations need to consciously stand on the side of workers in the class struggle and politically in favour of a socialist alternative to capitalism. The youth cannot of course wait for the workers movement before organising struggle on the issues impacting them. Young people can and will win important victories as France is showing. But these gains will be bigger the more young people are able to successfully link-up with the working class in action.
The fate of any youth movement is ultimately tied to the ebbs and flows of the class struggle and the advances and retreats of the workers’ movement. Young people have a crucial role to play in strengthening and rejuvenating working class organisations like trade unions. They can also play an important role alongside the working class in building militant mass working class political parties armed with socialist programmes. We call on young people to get involved with CWI sections and help build for N20. We also encourage young people to join us and develop themselves as revolutionary activists steeled in the ideas and methods of Marxism. In fighting to win support for the ideas we have outlined here, young people can play a crucial role in the struggle for a socialist society.