FIGHT FOR COMMUNISM!
	International Communist Workers Party
ICWP@Anonymousspeech.com

FRANCE, May 16—Thousands of railway, port and airline workers went on a political strike against Hollande’s new anti-worker labor reform law, joining masses of students in the streets.   Transportation has been snarled across France and even in England.  This shows the huge potential of the mighty industrial working class!  But reform struggles, no matter how large or militant, cannot meet the
masses’ needs for meaningful work and a decent life.  Red Flag readers in France and everywhere must begin to organize political strikes for communism and point to the need for communist revolution

In France, hundreds of thousands of youth and workers have taken to the street to protest against socialist François Hollande’s new Labor law. The law strips away almost all the protections workers currently have against being fired. Not to mention cutting the minimum for overtime from 25% over regular wages to 10%.
The law is so unpopular even in the Socialist Party that Prime Minister Vals invoked a special clause of the constitution that allowed him to pass it without a vote!
Socialism is in the news these days elsewhere too.
In Venezuela socialist Maduro (Chavez’ successor) has declared a state of emergency. The government has run out of money, electricity is on only a couple of days a week, and there is no food in the shops.
In Greece, socialist Alexis Tsipras is shoving another round of disastrous austerity down the throats of Greek workers and youth.
In Brazil, Dilma Rousseff of the socialist (and corrupt) PT party has been purged by a collection of the equally corrupt opposition parties led by her former running-mate.
In South Africa, “revolutionary” socialist Julius Malema threatens to overthrow the “democratic” socialist ANC. And finally, in the USA, Bernie Sanders calls himself a socialist and is running for President.

What is socialism? What is communism? How is it different from socialism? These are questions on the minds of billions of people worldwide.
Communism (as the ICWP sees it) is the complete negation of class society. No more bosses, no more money and wages, no more exploitation. Everyone will work for the common good and be taken care of “according to their needs”. These needs include food, housing and healthcare, and also education, culture and childcare. Racism and sexism will have their roots pulled up and, eventually, will be stamped out completely.
But Hollande, Maduro, Tsipras, Rousseff, Malema, the ANC and Sanders all believe in socialism, not communism. What is the difference?
Socialism retains money, banks, wages and profits, and all the good things of life are still for sale. The difference is that the government is supposedly in the hands of ‘good guys’ who rein in capitalism’s excesses. So (in theory) workers lives will be better.
This theory sounds plausible. But in practice, it has never worked. The bosses are driven to maximize profits and won’t let themselves be restrained.
The socialists initially may introduce reforms – say, universal health care or food subsidies for the poor. But then something happens – the price of exports like oil or minerals collapses (Venezuela, South Africa, Brazil), or the banks lay down the law (Greece), or the bosses need to better compete with their rivals (France). All the good intentions go out the window and the socialists become ‘realists’ who have to make ‘difficult’ if unpopular decisions (like the French labor law, austerity in Greece, or raising tuition fees in South Africa).

Communism has also been tried out, though not to the extent that most people think. For some 70,000 years, humans lived in percales communism, sharing everything without money. In China, during the civil (guerrilla) war, tens of millions in the red base areas lived under the “supply system”, which was basically distribution according to need.
Unfortunately, in both Russia and China, after the civil war was won the communists decided that the masses weren’t ready for communism. So they restored money, markets, wages and profits. They believed they could manage the resulting capitalistic economy. In other words they became socialists! And in the end, failed, like all socialists before and after.

In China in the late 1960’s the masses had had enough of socialism and rose up against it in the ‘cultural’ revolution. They tried, unsuccessfully, to move to communism. The ICWP commitment to communism, and our view of it, grew out of this history.

Only communism can end the horrors of capitalism, also known these days as “socialism.” We need to mobilize millions and millions for a communist revolution. Join the ICWP and help make it a reality!

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