The Road to Revolution
This manifesto was adopted at REVOCAMP 2003 in Prague and ammended at REVOCAMP 2004.
REVOLUTION is an international revolutionary socialist youth movement.
We aim to overthrow global capitalism through workers’ revolution and replace it with a global communist system, based on production for need, not for profit.
We want to bring about a democratically planned global economy and through this create a world without classes, borders, private property, exploitation, oppression and war.
Capitalism must be overthrown
Global capitalism is a system based on private ownership of the world’s wealth by a minority class of exploiters. Production is for the profit of a few millionaires, not the needs of the majority of the six billion people on this planet.
Under this system, the world is divided into nation states ruled by capitalist politicians and manipulated by giant corporations under the guise of organisations like the World Trade Organisation(WTO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), etc. These states compete economically, politically and militarily for control of resources, territory and wealth, or form strategic alliances where they have shared interests.
All the major problems of the world – poverty, exploitation, underdevelopment of the Third World, recession, war, environmental disasters, racism, national hatred, the oppression of women and young people – are caused and sustained by capitalism. That is why it must be overthrown.
A revolutionary youth movement
Everywhere young people are coming to the forefront of resistance. In the mass rebellion in Argentina youth confronted the police on the streets and drove President De la Rua from power. On the streets of Seattle, Quebec, Gothenburg and Genoa, it was young people who played a heroic role in blockading the summits of the capitalists and fighting back against police attacks on protesters. In the West Bank and Gaza, it has been the Palestinian youth who have shown unbelievable bravery resisting the tanks and troops of the occupying Israeli Army.
Young people are naturally more radical and self-sacrificing than other layers of the population. Oppressed and pushed about in the home, denied rights at school, discriminated against at work, sent off to fight and die in capitalist wars yet denied a vote in elections, subjected to petty rules and harassed by the police, the youth of the world have much to be radical about. What is more, young people have not been through the same cycle of defeats as the older generations, have less to lose and everywhere show huge reserves of idealism and the desire for a future free from poverty and oppression.
Young people need an organisation of our own – an organisation that belongs to us and is not under the control of any ‘adult’ party or movement. We need to do it ourselves. Only in this way – by making our own initiatives, learning from our own mistakes and developing our own methods of campaigning, will we be able to bring hundreds of thousands of young people into revolutionary struggle.
REVOLUTION campaigns against every crime of capitalism. We will take joint action with all other progressive movements wherever we share common goals.
But REVOLUTION is more than just an activist group. We also resist the capitalists’ propaganda war. We fight to persuade the majority of working class youth and students that capitalism is not invincible, that the world is ready for fundamental change and that a new communist society is not a pipedream but possible and necessary.
Revolution not reform
Capitalism cannot simply be reformed into a better system. It must be overthrown by mass revolutionary action.
There is no parliamentary road to socialism. Even the most democratic capitalist countries leave military power in the hands of an unelected group of generals and police chiefs, economic power in the hands of unelected heads of corporations and political power in the hands of unelected civil servants behind the scenes. Even where elections are held – and in many capitalist countries they are not – the people are left with no control over their elected representatives between elections and no real say about the running of their lives.
REVOLUTION fights for capitalist states to be overthrown by the mass of the working class and poor people. Force will need to be used to break up the real centres of capitalist power – the armies, police forces and secret services.
In their place we want a global federation of socialist republics based on workers’ democracy. This means the rule of workers’ councils and working class defence organisations. These will be made up of directly elected delegates from workplaces and estates, drawing in the unemployed, the peasantry, the urban poor, women and the youth. All delegates will be subject to recall at any time by the people that elected them, so that they really reflect the interests and the will of the masses. To fight careerism and place-seeking, all delegates will be paid only the average wage of the people they represent. To prevent corruption and bureaucracy, any necessary official posts will be rotated.
Globalisation from bellow
Capitalist globalisation has created science and techniques that could feed, clothe, house, educate and care for every single person in the world. But private ownership means a handful become unimaginably rich while hundreds of millions are in poverty.
Far from uniting humanity, capitalist globalisation has been carried out by strong nations conquering the weak. To do this the rich Western powers use a variety of weapons, from unfair trade and debt bondage through to B52s and cluster bombs.
REVOLUTION fights capitalist globalisation by promoting the globalisation of revolutionary struggle. This means:
* We support all rebellions against capitalism, like the uprising of the Argentine working class and youth against starvation and debt.
* We demand the abolition of the trillion dollar debt owned by poor countries to Western financial institutions.
* We demand the abolition of the IMF, World Bank and World Trade Organisation. We support international mobilisations to blockade their summits and conferences, like at Seattle, Prague, Quebec, Gothenburg and Genoa.
* We support a global code of conduct for all workplaces: an end to bonded and child labour, legal limits on the working week, a mini mum wage set by the workers of each country and the right for all workers to organise trade unions.
* We oppose the ‘War on Terrorism’, which is really a pretext for the USA and its allies to wage war for control of global resources and markets.
* We promote the greatest possible international organisation of the working class: international alliances of militant trade unionists, a worldwide revolutionary youth movement, a global coalition of work ing class women’s organisations and a new Workers’ International to fight for world socialism.
The Third world
The modern Empire of the USA is different from empires that came before. Unlike the colonial empires of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, the USA does not try to rule other countries directly. The former colonies are almost all politically independent, with their own flags and governments. But beneath the mask of self-rule, they remain deeply dependent and subordinate. They are semi-colonies.
The ‘First World’ of advanced capitalist powers and its multinational corporations super-exploit the semi-colonial Third World. The IMF and World Bank put the Third World on rations. They use desperately needed loans as blackmail to make already impoverished countries carry out huge programmes of cuts in services and living standards. They extract billions in debt and interest repayments to the West from Africa, South-East Asia, and Latin America.
The World Trade Organisation fixes the rules of international commerce to help the rich nations, not the poor. Western corporations pay Third World workers a fraction of the wages they would receive in the West and suck massive profits out of them in sweatshops, which deny even the most basic rights and conditions to their workforce.
REVOLUTION demands:
* Abolish the trillion dollar debt owed to the Western banks and finan cial institutions.
* Abolish the IMF, World Bank and World Trade Organisation.
* Refuse to pay – debtor countries should repudiate the debt and refuse all repayments.
* Nationalise the multinational companies, banks, and imperialist- owned holdings under the control of the workers, without a cent in compensation to the former owners.
* Stamp out sweatshops. Ban child labour. Minimum wage, maximum working week and a code of working conditions to be fixed by the workers themselves.
* Nationalise the land and organise farming under the control of peas ants’ co-operatives.
* Massive reparations to the Third World to fund an emergency pro gramme of reconstruction and sustainable development.
* Down with military dictatorships and repressive regimes. Votes for all that are old enough to work. Free speech. For the right to organise trade unions and political opposition.
* End unemployment. Divide the available work between all those able to do it with no loss of pay.
* The capitalists of the semi-colonial countries are too weak, corrupt and tied to the West to free their countries from the grip of imperial ism. The anti-imperialist revolution can only succeed if it becomes a socialist revolution with the workers and peasants at its head.
Down with the ‘War on Terrorism’
The September 11 massacre was a pretext for the USA to launch its ‘war on terrorism’. This bloody campaign has already seen the USA murder more civilians than were killed in the World Trade Centre attacks.
In reality, the ‘war on terrorism’ is the continuation of globalisation by military means.
Just as capitalism demands the right to enter every area in the world and exploit every people in the world, so the USA now demands the right to take military action anywhere in the world, against anyone it declares a ‘terrorist’, including the governments of sovereign nations.
This global military offensive proves beyond doubt that Imperialism is not a thing of the past – it is the essence of global capitalism today.
REVOLUTION opposes the wars of the USA, Britain and other imperialist powers.
* We fight to build the biggest possible protest actions to obstruct the war effort of the imperialist countries, paying special attention to the workers, the women and the youth.
* The working class has no interest in the victory of any imperialist power. We oppose a single cent or a single person being given to the War on Terrorism or any imperialist military attack.
* We oppose capitalist standing armies and conscription – instead the people should organise their own defence.
* We campaign for full democratic and political rights for soldiers, including the right to elect their officers and call them to account.
* We demand the withdrawal of all US, British and NATO troops from over seas, including central Asia and the Middle East.
* Abolish NATO and all imperialist military alliances. No to UN ‘peacekeeping forces’, which are imperialist armies of occupation in humanitarian guise.
* REVOLUTION supports the right of semi-colonial countries to defend them selves against imperialist attack. Even where these states are ruled by reac tionary regimes, we fight to deliver solidarity to all people resisting imperial ism and to help repel the imperialists.
* REVOLUTION supports the right of states like Cuba, where capitalism has been overthrown, to defend themselves against imperialist attacks.
* Victory over imperialism will strengthen the resolve of millions around the world to resist global capitalism and US domination, and will hasten the day when reactionary Third World regimes are brought to account by their own people.
* Hundreds of people have been arrested in the name of the ‘war against ter ror.’ We believe that these arrests are racist and we will fight for the humane treatment and release of these prisoners in the US, UK and those held in Cuba in Camp X-Ray.
* We will fight against all racist laws and attacks on civil liberties made in the name of the imperialist war against ‘terrorism’. Attacks on civil liberties and the concurrent clamp-down on dissent will be used tomorrow against anti- capitalists and strikers.
Reclaim our environment
The Earth is at risk as never before. The land and rivers are contaminated with toxins, the rivers are a cocktail of poisons and the very air we breathe deteriorates by the day.
Capitalism is inherently unfriendly to the environment. Capitalists need ever greater profits to compete, so resources are used up without regard for peoples’ needs and the effects on future generations.
Capitalists are reluctant to conserve resources, control pollution or recycle, as these are often ‘expensive’ options. It is cheaper to pump pollutants into the environment than clean up.
Global warming
It is beyond doubt that the Earth’s climate is changing through human rather than natural causes. The so called Greenhouse Effect is caused by emissions of gases such as CO2, methane and CFCs. The main sources of gases are from burning fossil fuels and deforestation. Already there has been a 0.5 degrees Celsius increase in global temperature since 1890 and a 1-5 degrees Celsius rise is predicted within the next 100 years, if nothing is done. Since the last ice age (between 15 and 5 thousand years ago), the Earth has only warmed by 5 degrees Celsius.
Such a change could have serious consequences. Weather patterns will alter, leading to floods, droughts and perhaps even colder winters in some parts of the world. Sea levels will rise, as the ice caps melt.
The USA under George Bush is blocking and sabotaging global agreements designed to limit greenhouse emissions and climate change. This is because he puts the interests of oil companies like Exxon before those of the world’s population.
To defend and reclaim our environment, REVOLUTION supports:
* A planned shift away from energy production based on the burning of fossil fuels.
* Massive investment in alternatives such as wind, wave and solar power.
* A huge global programme of reforestation.
* Punitive controls and strict penalties to clamp down on corporate polluters.
* Confiscate the property and power of the big oil companies.
* Massive expansion of public transport to combat pollution caused by the growth in use of the private car.
Nuclear power
The production of energy by nuclear fission can lead to disasters of almost unimaginable proportions.
Capitalist bosses and bureaucratic managers in nuclear plants add to this danger. Because their only goal is the maximisation of profits, they often ignore basic safety measures and greatly increase the chances of accidents.
The workers alone can ensure that nuclear plants are run safely. If the workers decide that a plant is unsafe then it must be closed immediately.
REVOLUTION supports a phasing out of nuclear power, along with other destructive forms of energy production, in favour of renewable energy sources.
Revolution at school
Education is a right. It should be free and open to all that wish to use it. It should be paid for by a progressive tax system that can really solve the crisis in funding by hitting the rich; taxing their unearned income and massive profits that they gain by robbing the workers of the world. REVOLUTION fights for the creation of workers councils as democratic organs of working class power. In school, colleges and universities, we fight for students, parents and workers committees to plan education and administration.
* We oppose all private and fee-paying education and any role in schools and colleges for private corporations.
* We oppose all religious schools. We oppose all segregation of the sexes. We oppose all discrimination in schools.
* We fight all petty restrictions on students’ dress, culture, lifestyle and self- expression. We demand the right to study, discuss and organise politically within the schools and colleges.
* Abolish student debts.
* All students should receive a living grant from the age of 16.
* Schools colleges and universities to be run by democratically elected com mittees of students, teachers and education workers.
* For independent students’ unions, with all officials elected and held account able to the student body at large.
Revolution at work
The capitalists claim their system means global freedom for all. But in every country, any pretence of freedom vanishes at the factory gate.
Today as recession bites, the employers are trying to make the workers pay for the crisis. Capitalists everywhere are forcing through low pay, job cuts, longer hours, fewer breaks, speed-ups and restrictions on union rights. In the era of globalisation, capitalists threaten to shift production abroad if workers do not agree to everything they demand.
REVOLUTION supports every measure that improves the position of the workers. We try to link up all workers’ resistance into a movement against the capitalist system of wage slavery and exploitation:
* It makes no sense that some people work 14 hours a day while others can not find any job at all. The workers should decide what needs to be produced and then divide up the working hours equally amongst themselves. REVOLU TION supports all attempts to reduce the working week with no loss of pay, to 35 hours, 30 hours, 20 hours etc.
* Equal pay for equal work regardless of age, gender, nationality or race.
* Minimum wage to be fixed by the workers of each country.
* Unemployment benefits at the level of your former wage or the minimum wage, whichever is higher.
* Wages to rise by 1% for every 1% rise in the real cost of living- we shouldn’t pay for the bosses’ price hikes.
To end the scandal of unemployment REVOLUTION fights for:
* Massive state spending to create millions of jobs building homes, hospitals, schools, sanitation and transport systems - to be paid for by taxing the rich.
* Sharing out of all the available work between those available to do it with no loss of pay.
To fight the dictatorship of rich businesses over all economic life and abolish the chaos of the 'free market', REVOLUTION demands:
* Open the books and accounts of all companies to inspection by the work force.
* Nationalise all big businesses and multinationals without compensation.
* Nationalise all firms that go bankrupt, won't pay the minimum wage or announce sackings.
* Nationalise the banks, insurance companies and finance houses.
* All nationalised industries and institutions to be under the democratic control of the workers themselves.
* No compensation to be paid to capitalist owners.
Build union power
Trade unions are the basic self-defence organisations of the working class. REVOLUTION supports trade unions and organising drives to build up the power of the workers.
* Abolish all anti-union laws.
* For the legal right to strike and right to organise.
* All employers to recognise unions.
But bureaucratic union leaders get higher wages than their members and owe their position to a permanent cycle of negotiation and compromise with capitalists. They often sell out the workers in return for deals with capitalists.
REVOLUTION calls on workers to fight with the official union leaders wherever possible and against them whenever necessary.
* Strike against employers’ attacks on pay, jobs and conditions.
* Smash the padlocks – occupy all workplaces that face closure.
* For factory or workplace committees to control every strike and every action.
* For organised picket defence organisations to resist police and strike-break ers’ attacks.
* All union leaders to be paid the average of the wage of their members, to be regularly elected and subject to replacement at any time.
* For international combines of workers’ representatives to unite action against multinationals.
* Solidarity is our strength – take action alongside other workers and link our demands together.
* Where the capitalists attack the whole of working class, we fight for a General Strike to stop them in their tracks and prove the workers’ power in society.
REVOLUTION’s goal is a classless society without wage slavery.
Racism, migration and refugees
Imperialism justifies its plunder of whole continents by racism – the warped concept that the ‘white race’ is biologically superior to the populations of Africa, India and the Asia-Pacific region.
Racist ideology was developed to justify colonial conquest and slavery. Today it is used to:
- justify the continued economic dependence of the Third World;
- erect a barricade around the most developed countries and prevent workers from Africa, Asia and eastern Europe gaining access to work and housing in the west;
- to excuse lower pay and conditions for black workers than white; and
- to divide the working class along racial and national lines.
REVOLUTION fights for:
* The abolition of all immigration controls.
* Close down all detention camps for asylum seekers and refugees.
* Equal rights of citizenship for all, regardless of race, nationality or country of origin.
* Scrapping of all racist laws.
* Equal pay and conditions for all workers.
* Black people and racial minorities’ right to self-defence against racist attacks.
* Direct action by the working class to disperse fascist and racist terror move ments.
* Confronting every sign of racism in education, media, the workplace and public services.
* The right of racial minorities to organise within the working class movement to identify and confront racism and discrimination.
* A multiracial, international movement of the workers and oppressed against global capitalism.
* The right of racial minorities to caucus in working class organisations.
Smash fascism!
Fascism is the most extreme and brutal form of capitalist oppression and is used as a last resort when capitalism is in crisis.
Fascist demagogues use fake pseudo-Marxism to divert petty-bourgeois youth and workers from the class struggle. Fascism's ultimate aim is to destroy working class unity through terror and ideologies that are racist, homophobic, sexist, and anti-democratic.
Fascists have no right to speak or appear in public anywhere, anytime. The working class and radical youth need to hunt fascists from the streets, break up their meetings, block their marches, and smash their infrastructure.
The fight against fascism cannot be confined to small groups of militant fighters. It needs to incorporate broad sections of workers and youth in antifascist committees for direct action. They cannot rely on the capitalist state -- the struggle against fascism is inseparable from the struggle against capitalism.
* No platform for fascists.
* Direct action by the workers and youth to stop fascist terror.
* Self-defence organisations and anti-fascist militias accountable to the work ing class and youth.
* Drive organised fascists out of the workers' movement.
Against nationalism and the oppression of nations
The working class is an international class. There is no national solution to the crises caused by global capitalism. The capitalists often try to turn the workers of one country against another through rousing national hatreds and promoting myths of national superiority.
REVOLUTION rejects nationalism and fights for an international movement based on the greatest possible solidarity and unity between the workers of different countries.
Under global capitalism some nations are oppressed by others and are denied basic rights. Whole nations have been denied, for example, equal rights in their territory (the Palestinians), the right to speak their own language (the Kurds), the right to national independence (the Palestinians, the Chechens, the Tamils). Other nations have been divided by colonial powers, which give privileges to one section of the population and station troops to obstruct national unity (Ireland).
REVOLUTION supports the right of nations to self-determination. Where a majority of a nation demand independence, we support them. The only condition is that this must not be exercised at the expense of the rights and freedoms of another nation, working class people and minorities.
Palestine
The foundation of the State of Israel discriminated against Palestinians in citizenship rights, territorial rights, the right of refugees to return, rights to work, housing, water, services and military defence. REVOLUTION opposes Israel and demands:
* An end to Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.
* A global blockade of Israel to force an end to the repression of the Palestinians, assassinations of Palestinian leaders, bulldozing of Palestinian homes and seizures of Palestinian land.
* The right of five million Palestinians to return to their territory of origin and the abolition of Israel’s racist law of return.
* The dismantling of the Israel state by the proletarian masses of the region, Jews, Muslims and Christians, and the creation of a socialist Palestine in which Arabs and Jews can live together in equality.
We also demand:
* An end to oppression of the Kurds by Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran.
* Independence for Chechnya. Russian troops out.
* US and allied troops out of Afghanistan – let the Afghan people elect their own government.
* Self-determination for the Sri Lankan Tamils, the Kurds and the Basques.
* Britain out of Ireland now!
* End the occupation of Iraq!
Women’s liberation
Women are the majority of humanity but are everywhere victims of systematic discrimination and oppression. In many parts of the world women are consigned almost entirely to the home, denied basic democratic and economic rights, forced to carry out unpaid domestic labour and subject to oppression and violence from men.
In other countries, women bear the double burden of paid work and domestic labour, a life of unending toil. Women workers are often paid less than men are. In the sweatshops of the Third World, women workers are routinely abused, denied maternity leave and subjected to degrading treatment.
The majority of women will only be free from oppression and discrimination when the economic foundations of male supremacy are overthrown. The roots of this oppression lie in ancient class society and are continued and reinforced by global capitalism.
Only a socialist society run for human need rather than private profit will be able to get the whole of society to take on the domestic duties which today are mainly performed by women in the home.
A socialist society would plan the carrying out of childcare, cooking and laundry collectively, so that these basic tasks no longer have to be done separately in millions of isolated family units. Collective eating, laundry and childcare facilities - well funded and democratically run - could be a million times better than the provisions made in the family today. In this way, real choice, a high standard of living and real sexual equality can replace the poverty, isolation and oppression facing working class women today.
REVOLUTION fights:
* Against women’s oppression within Revolution and in any alliances and unit ed fronts we form with other groups.
* Against the objectification of women in the media.
* For equal rights for women – rights to vote, rights to work, rights to educa tion, unrestricted rights to participate in all public and social activity.
* For equal pay for equal work.
* For free 24-hour childcare funded by taxing the rich.
* For contraception on demand.
* For abortion on demand.
* For the right of quick divorce with fair economic settlements at the request of one partner.
* For a mass movement of working class women to fight alongside men against sex discrimination and the oppression of women.
* For the right of women to caucus in working class organisations.
* For the right of women and men to have economically viable alternatives to abusive relationships.
* For local action to defend victims of domestic violence and to take it seriously in a way that the police and judicial system does not.
Lesbian and gay liberation
Under the capitalist system, where the nuclear family is held up as "normality" to preserve the reproduction of the working class, gay and lesbian relationships are not given the same legal status or social legitimacy as heterosexual relationships. Gay men and lesbians are discriminated against at school or work and are blamed for the "moral decline of the nation" by the moral brigade. They are subject to homophobic abuse on the streets.
For young lesbians and gay men, being at school means facing discrimination or prejudice in the classroom or the playground because of their sexuality. Homophobic bullying is widespread in schools, from verbal to physical intimidation and abuse. Section 28, which was introduced by the Tories and retained by Labour in England, legitimises homophobic discrimination within schools by prohibiting the 'promotion of homosexuality'. It restrict the ability of educators to support and advise young people on information about their sexuality.
REVOLUTION fights for:
* Full legalisation of lesbian and gay sex.
* No unequal age limits for sex.
* Make discrimination on grounds of sexuality illegal.
* For sex education in schools to present homosexuality and heterosexuality as equally valid.
* Organise self-defence against attacks on homosexuals.
* For no distinction in law between heterosexual and homosexual relationships.
* The right of lesbian and gay men to caucus in working class organisations.
Sexual rights and sexual freedom for young people
We live in a society that criminalises and bans countless forms of sexual expression, including consenting sex between young people. Banning consensual sex does not protect young people from abuse. A world that denies the sexuality of young people is a world which denies the existence of sexual abuse and makes the victims feel to blame, rather than teaching young people in advance about problems they may face and to speak out about it.
REVOLUTION fights for:
* No laws against consenting sex - no criminalisation of ‘underage’ lovers.
* Strict laws against rape and domestic violence.
* Improve sex education.
* Free access to decent housing for young people, democratically run and con trolled by the youth themselves.
For our right to party
Socialising is more important for youth than any other group in society. -It’s is a necessary part of our development. Yet under capitalism youth cultures are both repressed and exploited. Hip hop artists, punk and even mainstream musicians like Brittany Spears are attacked by the right-wing as immoral, while at the same time as corporations try to profit from the new market by ripping youth culture off and selling it back to us at expensive prices. We believe that to build a revolutionary youth movement it is essential to identify and relate to popular youth cultures.
The War on Drugs is a scam!
Many youth cultures include illegal drug taking. We believe that it is the right of the individual to choose whether or not to take drugs, and it is undemocratic for the state to arrest or imprison people for doing so. We neither encourage nor discourage illegal drug use for recreation- but we believe that activists should be clear-headed at all political events and meetings. We will need clear brains to break our chains!
The 'War on Drugs' was the focus of the right-wingers before the 'War on Terror'. It is used to justify military aid to right-wing regimes around the world - for example Plan Colombia. In reality the war is not on drugs, but on the people who are fighting to end their poverty. Drugs are used by the police in North America and Europe to harass black and immigrant communities. It is a hypocritical scam by the bosses class who protect their own alcohol and tobacco companies interests and multi-million dollar profits - even though these 'legal' drugs kill millions each year.
REVOLUTION demands:
* The legalisation of all drugs under a state monopoly. This would finish off the organised drug gangs and ensure a quality, safe product.
* A legal drugs industry under the control of the workers and users in the health industry in order to prevent the multinationals and- other drug gangs - from cashing in.
* Nationalise all the breweries and tobacco companies without compensation and place under workers control.
* For a massive campaign for accurate information and education on the real risks of all drug use, initiated by the labour movement, particularly teachers and health workers unions
* Full funding for drugs helplines and local drug rehabilitation centres; free drug testing kits and needles on demand; these centres will be organised and staffed by youth and accountable experts, and free from anti-drugs morals.
* Drug users and non-users to be treated equally; all public areas should have designated drug-free zone including no smoking.
* No to age restrictions on drinking and smoking -- we have the right to do what we please with our bodies.
* Organise self-defence groups on the estates and street against violence and extortion from drugs gangs. These groups should be under the democratic control of elected representatives of workers and residents.
Down with the Culture of Boredom!
Youth are always blamed for anti-social crime such as vandalism. However youth centres and services are being cut all the time by governments. Prices for films, clubs, pubs, museums, concerts, sport facilities and events are beyond our reach. Parks and public spaces are shrinking in our cities as they are bought up and developed, leaving us nowhere to go but to hang out on the streets where the police stop and harass us.
REVOLUTION fights for:
* Our right to skateboard, play music, and hang out in public spaces; we fight against the laws that city authorities and governments pass to ban us. For graffiti zones where we can write and paint what we want.
* An end to the culture of boredom - abolish entrance fees to recreational facilities and events, and fund them by taxing the rich.
* Scrap all laws restricting free parties and other events organised for fun not profit.
REVOLUTION believes that it is the alienation suffered by the majority in society that drives addiction and anti-social behaviour. In addition, millions use drugs to escape the social constraints of our societies and express our true selves. In a socialist society, alienation will not exist because people will control their destiny and society, not the other way around. We will be free to express ourselves in any way we want. In this environment, it is unlikely that people will feel the need for dysfunctional drug use or behaviour on a large-scale, - and there will be other ways to resolve these problems than by resorting to the police.
Media and communitcations
Seventy per cent of the world's population have not made their first phone call.
REVOLUTION believes this is wrong and fights for free communication for all.
Media
Corporate ownership of the media leads to a number of things:
* Conflicts of interests between accurate reporting and the businesses that own/control/ subsidise the media.
* An unrepresentative press: the views expressed are of the middle class jour nalists and not of ordinary people.
* Reactionary sexist/racist/homophobic coverage: it is there to divert the pub lic's attention away from the real issues of class and hierarchy.
REVOLUTION struggles for workers control of the media and communication sector.
To achieve this we call for:
* An end to all censorship, capitalist copyright laws and capitalist advertising.
* For media workers to take direct action to stop the printing, broadcast or pro duction of materials that are racist, sexist, homophobic and anti-working class, which are ultimately aimed at dividing the working class.
TV
Television is the most popular form of media and should therefore be controlled by the majority and not a handful of corporations and propagandists. We call for:
* TV to be free to watch for whoever wants to watch it, no subscriptions, no license fees, no pay per view.
* Nationalisation of television channels under the control of the workers and viewers, not to act as propaganda for the state but to allow TV to be reclaimed by ordinary people. Programmes to be made by the public and for the public.
* Time to be allocated for public broadcasting, to be financed by the state by taxing the rich and big business. Not to be politically censored and to be open to all to participate in.
Radio
Radio is everywhere: in the car, in the shops, and at home. It is therefore a very powerful tool that is used by business and government to divert and control people. From music that is played to the companies who run the stations, it is all designed to politically numb the public. We call for:
* Open the AM-waves under democratic control to enable the public to put across their views regardless of their class and social background. Public funding should be invested and supported in order to give people the means with which to broadcast.
* Investment in local music acts. Music is a key form of expression and should not be dominated by complacent melodies about consumption and fake rebellion. The state should invest in different music types.
The Internet
The internet should provide the opportunity for millions of people to be able to freely access information and communicate with each other. Unfortunately this, like many other technologies, has fallen into the hands of the money hungry tycoons and is used to fuel consumerism. Information that people access is often restricted and monitored by the state and other agencies. We call for:
* Nationalisation of Internet Service Providers under workers control to ensure that people can access information freely and not be threatened with moni toring to aid business or so called 'security measures'.
* We encourage projects such as indymedia which allow the public to distrib ute and discuss their own news and ideas.
* Free internet access for all.
The Printed Press
Everyday we see newspapers filled with reactionary hysteria and adverts - the two things are connected. We call for:
* Newspapers to be publicly funded and democratically controlled to ensure that they do not have to rely on advertising to support themselves and so what they report is not subject to the advertising company's scrutiny ensuring unbiased reporting.
Revolution against refomrism
Social Democrats, Socialist Parties, Labour Parties, official and former Communist parties and other such organisations have tremendous influence in the working class worldwide. They are reformist organisations - they use their base in the workers’ movement to hold back the workers’ struggle. They try to form governments that act within the capitalist system.
Some right wing reformists, such as Blair in Britain and Schroeder in Germany, use these parties as a stepping stone to power and then act directly for the capitalists, not even bothering to conceal their pro-establishment politics. Other, left wing, reformists – like Allende in Chile in the early 1970s – try to use a parliamentary majority to bring in socialism gradually.
The right wing reformists are deliberate agents of the capitalists. They must be driven out of the working class movement.
The left-wing reformists often try to present themselves as radical. But at the crucial moment they will leave the workers defenceless – like in Chile in 1973 when the military overthrew Allende’s Socialist government and the workers were not armed and ready to defend themselves, resulting in years of repression and tens of thousands of killings.
REVOLUTION supports united action by all working class organisations against the capitalists. We defend reformist organisations when they come under attack from the state. We try to break away from the reformist leaders the millions of workers around the world who still look to them for leadership. We do this by demanding that the reformists act in the interests of the workers and break with the capitalists, and by building up a separate revolutionary movement to challenge the reformists’ fatal influence.
Revolution against stalinism
REVOLUTION wants to overthrow capitalism. But that is not the end of the struggle. We want to be free - we want to build a classless society without privilege and oppression.
The Russian revolution of 1917 was the greatest victory the working class has yet had. The working class overthrew capitalism and put power into the hands of its own democratic councils of delegates - the soviets.
But the revolution degenerated - it went backwards and finally collapsed altogether. We must learn the lessons of this to avoid it next time.
REVOLUTION declares its complete hostility to the Stalinist bureaucracy that took power in the Soviet Union and that ruled in every 'socialist' state built on the Stalinist model - including China, Eastern Europe, Cuba, North Korea and Vietnam.
* Down with privilege. All officials in a working class state to earn no more than the average income of those they represent.
* Down with bureaucracy. Rotation of all official bureaucratic posts.
* For real workers' council power. Genuine democratic workers' councils must have the power, with recallable delegates regularly elected from the work place and local areas with no privileges.
* Put all economic planning and all state-owned enterprises under the control of the working class themselves, not just under direction from bureaucrats at the centre.
* For international struggle for socialism in every country as the only way to abolish capitalism worldwide.
The Stalinists stole from the working class, gave themselves big homes, cars and special shops and refused to allow themselves to be controlled by the working class. They reintroduced oppressive laws against women, lesbians and gays and minority nationalities. They smashed all independent organisations of the working class.
In Stalinist states today, like Cuba and North Korea, REVOLUTION demands:
* Full rights for workers to organise unions and their own parties.
* Free speech.
* The right to vote.
* Equality for women.
* End all laws against homosexuality.
* For the right for all nations to determine their own future, including the right to separate from a Stalinist state if they so wish.
The Stalinist state apparatus blocked the road to socialism. To re-open the road and enable the workers themselves to exercise power, the Stalinist secret police, police, bureaucracy and standing armies must be smashed:
* For working class revolution to smash the Stalinist state apparatus and give all power to workers' councils.
The Stalinist states were not socialist. But nor were they capitalist. They were workers' states in which the bureaucrats blocked the transition to a classless socialist society and moved ever backwards to capitalism. They are finishing the job today in their attempts to restore capitalist exploitation.
REVOLUTION will defend everything in Stalinist states that exists as a result of the positive gains of the Russian Revolution.
* No to the restoration of the capitalist market system.
* End the imperialist blockade of Cuba.
* Defend Cuba and North Korea against all attempts to restore the capitalist system, whether by invasion from without by imperialist states, or by market 'reforms' by the Stalinist leaders from within. To stop the final restoration of capitalism, fight for workers' revolution and an end to Stalinist rule.
Anacrhism
In recent struggles against capitalism, anarchist groupings have taken a prominent role. Many anarchists share REVOLUTION’s desire to smash the capitalist state and create a free world without class division, property and repression. We will work together with anarchists wherever we have shared goals.
Anarchists and socialists differ in the following ways:
Anarchists reject the need for a state of any type. REVOLUTION shares the goal of a society without a state power directed against the people. But we see the need for the working class to form a revolutionary republic of our own. This must be based on democratic workers’ councils to transfer property and power from the capitalists to society as a whole - and to stop the capitalists getting it back. Anarchists reject the idea that this workers' state will be a temporary, transitional phase to a classless, stateless society.
Anarchists reject the need for a political party, which they say will result in a new elite leadership in society. REVOLUTION wants to build an international political party of a new type, with the fullest internal democracy to prevent it becoming bureaucratic. This party needs to bring together the part of the working class that supports revolutionary ideas, campaign to increase support for a revolution within the working class, and help organise the struggle for socialism. Without this we will not be able to defeat the influence of reformism worldwide.
Anarchism fails to understand the role of a revolutionary party. When a revolutionary party is described as a vanguard this means providing revolutionary leadership to the working class, not imposing the will of a small elite on the majority. Indeed a revolutionary party can only succeed with the support of the masses.
Some anarchist groups overemphasise the tactic of direct action by small and often disorganised groups of people – and neglect or reject mass action and work within the unions and mass organisations of the working class, thereby leaving the reformist leaders unchallenged.
Consistent anarchists reject fighting for reforms such as taxing the rich, nationalising industries, defending democratic rights or supporting national liberation struggles, such as the Intifada in Palestine. This is because they believe it strengthens the legitimacy of the state. But this takes no account of the practical everyday needs of working people and again removes anarchists from mass working class struggle.
In opposition to the workers' state, some anarchists hold up the idea of federalism. But federalism is a weak and problem-riddled idea. With no agreement by separate collectives to follow decisions, a minority can effectively hold the majority to ransom. This would be disastrous not only in a counter revolutionary situation, but also in the effective organisation of the production of goods. Federalism is a utopian solution to the very real problem of how we organise from the smallest action committee to society as a whole.
REVOLUTION recognises the political limitations of anarchism. Their refusal to take state power, as shown concretely in the Spanish Revolution, ensures the defeat of the proletariat. The power vacuum that opens during the revolutionary period will be filled by reformists and reactionaries – if the revolutionaries don't take power.
Revolutionary youth movement and the revolutionary international
REVOLUTION wants to build an international revolutionary youth movement.
This must have complete organisational and political independence, deciding on its own activity and policies.
The movement should be open to all young people who want to fight capitalism.
REVOLUTION will determine its policies through democratic national meetings of members in individual countries, and by holding international delegate meetings as regularly as possible.
REVOLUTION accepts that the youth alone do not have the power to overthrow the capitalist system. For this the working class is essential. For this reason, we support efforts to build new mass working class parties that fight openly for a programme of revolution and socialism.
These parties must avoid at all costs becoming instruments for a new privileged elite, like the reformist and Stalinist parties. For this reason they must have the fullest internal democracy. All members must vote on and decide policy. Criticism and internal opposition must be rights of the members. There must be a right to organise within the party to change its views and decisions. Otherwise democracy is meaningless.
But the revolutionary movement should not be a talking shop. Once a decision is made by democratic vote, members of the party should carry it out. Otherwise nothing effective will ever be achieved.
Nor can the new party be a national party. There is no national road to socialism. The whole idea of building ‘socialism in one country’ is reactionary. A successful revolution in one country would have to spread quickly to others. If not, it would either be defeated by an imperialist attack, or would corrode from within like the USSR under Stalin.
For this reason, we propose the creation of a new workers’ international on a revolutionary programme. Such an organisation could unite the revolutionary part of the working class, build up its strength and impact in struggle, and pave the way for great revolutionary victories in the struggle against global capitalism. This will be the fifth time in history that revolutionary socialists are building this weapon to fight against the capitalist system. The first four internationals brought important political and organisational achievements, but in the end they failed to lead the working class and the youth to victory. The crisis of capitalism and the war offensive of the imperialist ruling class does not leave us time. We need a mass international fighting for socialism as soon as possible. The time has come to start building for the fifth international.
Therefore we fight together with the League for the Fifth International (LFI) and all others that share our goals for the creation of the revolutionary fifth international.
The road to revolution
Time and again, resistance to capitalism has burst through the obstacles placed in its path and broken out into revolution.
Revolutions happen when the rulers of society cannot find a way forward and when the mass of the people cannot go on living in the old way. Revolutionary situations see millions take to the streets, stop work and bring down the governments of the capitalists by direct action.
But not all revolutions end in success for the working class and the poor. A revolution can overthrow a government but leave the capitalist system intact. In the last century, most revolutions ended in this way, giving the capitalists time to regroup and recover control.
The most successful revolution was in Russia in 1917. That was because the workers and peasants did not stop at half measures. Democratic councils of workers, soldiers and peasants were formed and took the power. A militia of workers took the place of the capitalist police. Although the revolution failed to spread and was overthrown by Stalinism, its early years were days of hope for all humanity.
REVOLUTION fights to bring alternative centres of power into existence as the embryos of a future socialist republic. In every strike, mass movement and action of the workers, we fight for democratic councils of delegates from the workers and the poor. These workers’ councils must become the ruling power in society.
REVOLUTION as a group does not employ the tactic of small groups engaging in property destruction. Instead we support mass self-defence to resist police attack and shut down summits of the major capitalist institutions.
In every confrontation with the capitalists’ police and military, we fight for organised self-defence of the masses. These initiatives can form the embryos of workers’ defence squads or militia to stop police repression and murder, overthrow the state and stop the capitalists regaining power through a military coup.
In this way, REVOLUTION campaigns everywhere to build up an alternative power to that of the capitalists, linking the struggles of today to the revolution of the future.
For 300 years, capitalism has ruined the lives of untold millions. It has threatened nuclear holocaust and environmental meltdown. It has brought humanity the concentration camp, genocide, aerial bombing and ethnic cleansing. It is reducing the fruits of human culture to dollars, cents and tawdry trash.
Generation upon generation has resisted it, fought it, sacrificed safety, security and life itself to stop it wrecking their lives. They have not yet succeeded, but they did not fail. The struggle is not over. From their sacrifices we draw inspiration, we learn priceless lessons and we muster the courage we will need to finish the job.
As capitalism goes global, so does the revolution. Young workers, students, unemployed, of the world – unite! We have a future to reclaim, a world to free from fear and a new life to build for all humanity.
ONE SOLUTION: REVOLUTION!