Statement on the 20th Anniversary of
the International Conference of Marxist-Leninist Parties and Organizations
In the 21st century the world
continues to be divided. The contradiction between Labor and Capital in all
spheres is the division that reflects the antagonism between labor and the
increasing socialization of production on the one hand, and the capitalist
character of appropriation that is increasingly concentrated in a handful of
people on the other hand.
Scientific and industrial forces
have emerged that were unimaginable fifty years ago; production has been
mechanized to an extraordinary degree, technology, communications and computers
have spread widely for social and individual use. However, everything carries
its opposite with it, the despair caused by capitalism has reached very serious
levels; the signs of decay have evolved parallel to the accumulation at a level
that exceeds the final periods of the Byzantine Empire.
In 2008, the global crisis of
capitalism, which many countries are still suffering from, is trying to make
the broad masses of the exploited pay for the crisis, the masses who have
experienced that capitalism is the social organization characterized by
"poverty within wealth." To make the popular strata pay for the
crisis further aggravates the disastrous consequences of capitalism: the
mechanization of the labor process, the increase of exploitation, including the
decrease in real wages, the explosion of poverty and famine, injustice and
inequality, begging, drugs, prostitution, etc.
It is impossible to accept, bear or
ignore this division of the world and the growing discontent and exasperation
that leads the exploited masses in various countries to rebel. This situation
is evident in Greece, Portugal, Spain, Tunisia, Egypt, Turkey, Brazil, etc.
The antagonism between capital and
labor is not the only reason for the division of the world. There is the
contradiction between a minority of rich capitalist countries and imperialist
States, and the backward peoples and countries, oppressed and exploited
politically, economically and financially, which are the majority. The big
imperialist States, which have created international organizations such as the
European Union, the Free Trade Agreements, NATO and the United Nations, touted
as the "international community," plunder the natural resources of
the oppressed peoples and do not tolerate the possibility of their
self-determination. This is the case of Africa which they are exhausting, or
the Amazon which they are destroying, or the occupation of Afghanistan, Iraq,
Libya, Syria. etc.
Another field of conflict and
contradictions is the confrontation between the international monopolies and
imperialist countries among themselves, which is expressed mainly in the
formation and reformation of economic and military blocs, in the establishment
of military bases on the five continents. In the dispute over who will dominate
and plunder certain regions, the imperialist countries clash with each other
harshly. To gain control of these regions, they incited national quarrels to
obtain the support of the oppressed peoples. These internal struggles that are
provoked and lead to military conflicts as has been seen in Ukraine and Syria,
show that the imperialist confrontations are being aggravated.
In the 1990s the capitalists and
their lackeys proclaimed "the end of history," "the eternity of
capitalism" and a "new world order"; they proclaimed a peaceful,
prosperous society, without crises, built on a "self-regenerated
capitalism," based on a "capitalist globalization" that would be
built "superseding classes and the class struggle." However it is not
prosperity but misery that is being aggravated. Instead of peace there is war
and coups, the loss of credibility of the dictatorships that we have experienced
in the past decades.
No, capitalism cannot propose to the
workers who subsist on their labor power in the factories and offices; to the
unemployed and the poor of the cities and the countryside, neither a job nor a
decent wage, neither peace nor prosperity nor security in the future. To obtain
all these it is necessary to encourage the workers and other working people to
revolt and overthrow the power of capital.
From the struggle of the slaves
against the slave masters, in all societies that have been the scene of class
struggle, the struggle has been resolved by the seizure of power by one class
of oppressors over another. Capitalism has developed the forces of production
to such a degree that it cannot maintain itself without cutting or changing property
relations. Moreover, capitalism continually develops the working class,
increasingly socializing it. Thus it has created the social conditions in which
the power of an exploited class can replace that of the exploiting class. This
historical and social evolution determines the historic mission of the working
class, the seizure of power to create a transitional period towards socialism
with the aim of expropriating the expropriators, abolishing classes and
relations of class exploitation.
The
working class demonstrated against capitalist tyranny for the first time in the
19th century with the rebellions that took place throughout the European
continent, and the seizure of power in France in the Paris Commune for a short
period in 1871. Then there was the overthrow of the power of the capitalist
class in Russia with the Great October Revolution of 1917, when it organized as
the ruling class to build the Soviet Union and took giant steps for half a
century toward the abolition of the exploitation of man by man.
We, the Marxist-Leninist parties and
organizations of the world, united in the International Conference (ICMLPO), on
the occasion of the 20th anniversary of our Organization, call on the working
class of the world, the oppressed peoples, the youth of all countries to unite
against the international bourgeoisie and imperialism, and so to strengthen the
struggle for liberation.
The world, divided between
exploiters and exploited, between imperialist masters and oppressed peoples, is
moving towards a new period of rebellions and revolutions.
Capitalism has nothing to offer the
exploited masses; it has matured conditions more than in any other period of
history, the prelude to socialism. Speaking of maturity, we must use that term
both quantitatively and qualitatively for the working class and other working
people, which are further consolidating their positions in order to strengthen
their organizations in all countries if they draw upon their own experiences of
both trade-union and political struggle, especially of the massive struggles in
many countries.
Even if the revolutions have been
manipulated in countries such as Tunisia and Egypt, the future belongs to the
working class and other working people of the world who are accumulating rich
experiences in order to continue advancing.
The experiences of the revolutionary
waves and of the national and social struggles of all countries of the world
show that we can move forward to victory, and now with more strength and force.
Our struggles for national and social liberation will take particular forms and
will follow different roads depending upon the country; they will have an
internationalist character by their content, being components of a single
process of the world proletarian revolution.
All this demands from us the
responsibility to consolidate and strengthen our unity and organization both
nationally and internationally.
Socialism
will win!
Long live
internationalism!
Workers
and oppressed peoples of the world, unite!
INTERNATIONAL
CONFERENCE OF MARXIST-LENINIST PARTIES AND ORGANIZATIONS
May 1, 2014