Very interesting reading indeed.
Case in point is that, as opposed to being signs of economic windfall to be
celebrated by Africans as some would advocate, the upsurge in the number of
foreign owned financial institutions/Banks on the African continent is one of
the major indications of the quest for new hunting ground for expansion of
the same predatory financial activities/practices by those always seeking to
have more at the expense of others. It sets the stage for a frightening trend
towards an even deeper economic stranglehold on, and marginalization of
Africans on African soil. This, coupled with the auctioning off of almost every
piece of land to the highest foreign bidders by corrupt governments more
interested in lining their own pockets while insisting they love Africa,
Africans will soon enough become homeless outsiders in our own countries.
Thanks for the forward.
Jabou
In a message dated 1/11/2008 6:42:55 A.M. Central Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
I wonder what Mr. Walter Williams, erudite professor or Economics at George
Mason University, will say about this write-up were he to read it. I will be
forwarding it to one of his former pupils, who swears by every common-sense
utterance of Mr. Williams. I like Mr. Williams and enjoy his writings
greatly.
Soffie
________________________________
From: [log in to unmask]
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Fye samateh
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 7:22 AM
To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list; [log in to unmask]
Subject: [>-<] Notes on the political and economic crisis of the world
capitalist system and the perspective and tasks of the Socialist Equality Party
Notes on the political and economic crisis of the world capitalist system
and the perspective and tasks of the Socialist Equality Party
By David North
11 January 2008
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The following report was given by David North, national secretary of the
SEP, at a national aggregate meeting held January 5-6 in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
1. 2008 will be characterized by a significant intensification of the
economic and political crisis of the world capitalist system. The turbulence in
world financial markets is the expression of not merely a conjunctural downturn,
but rather a profound systemic disorder which is already destabilizing
international politics. As always, the weakest links in the chain of imperialist
geo-politics are the first to break. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto in
Pakistan, the eruptions of civil wars in the Congo and Kenya, and the renewed
tension in the Balkans over Kosovo are indicative of the increasingly
explosive state of world politics.
2. Sixteen years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, an event which
supposedly signaled the definitive and irreversible triumph of global
capitalism, the world economy is in shambles. The bursting of the housing market
bubble in the United States, which had been fueled by uncontrolled speculative
investments in sub-prime mortgages, has resulted in global losses of hundreds
of billions of dollars for international banks and other financial
institutions. The murky alphabet soup of financial instruments-i.e., SIVs (structured
investment vehicles), CDOs (collateralized debt obligations), etc.-had been
devised to "securitize" sub-prime mortgages, conceal their dubious character,
and spread risk among a large number of institutions. The result is an
international financial crisis which, in the words of one analyst, has called into
question the viability and legitimacy of the Anglo-American system of
capitalism. The Financial Times writes that "faith in 21st century financial
innovation has since evaporated. The events of last year showed with brutal clarity
that risk dispersal does not always prevent financial shocks, but may fuel
contagion instead..." (January 2, 2008)
3. That the present economic situation is extremely serious is no longer a
matter for debate among informed bourgeois analysts. The most astute and
honest among them acknowledge that there is still insufficient data about the
extent of financial losses and their impact upon broader sectors of the American
and world economy to make firm predictions about the consequences of the
still unfolding crisis. The "credit crunch" which developed in the summer of 2007
remains a major threat to the functioning of the world capitalist economy.
With the realization that billions of dollars in assets must be written off as
unrecoverable losses, the mutual confidence of financial institutions in
each other's solvency has been gravely undermined. Moreover, it is widely
assumed that the same sort of lending practices that created the housing bubble
were applied in other sectors of the US economy. There is growing fear that a US
recession may expose the recklessness in corporate lending. But in this
tense situation, initial hopes that the impact of the collapse in housing prices
on the broader American economy will be contained are rapidly dissipating.
"America has entered 2008," writes the Financial Times, "in greater danger of
recession than at any stage since the collapse of the internet bubble in
2000-01, as the world's largest economy struggles to maintain growth in the face
of the credit squeeze, a housing slide and high oil prices." (January 2, 2008)
4. Another major economic study concludes: "So far as the credit crunch
goes, there seems to be widespread agreement that, taking everything together,
the present crisis is already more serious than any other that has occurred
before in modern times. Major banks and their financial institutions are still,
almost daily, revealing huge losses as a result of imprudent lending. House
prices are falling. And there is a general sense that some further
deterioration is in prospect, particularly as many more sub-prime borrowers [and some
others who obtained (misnamed) 'interest only' loans or loans with enticing
'teaser' rates of interest] are going to come under increased pressure as the
initial rates they have paid get raised over the coming year." [ Strategic
Analysis, November 2007, Levy Institute of Bard College, p. 9]
5. A crisis of the US economy has direct and immediate global implications.
The International Monetary Fund warns that "risks to domestic demand in
western Europe and Japan have now shifted to the downside" as a result of the
"contagion" emanating from the United States. ( World Economic Outlook, October
2007, p. 11) Also, the IMF anticipates that "continuing turbulence in global
financial markets could disrupt financial flows to emerging markets and
trigger problems in domestic markets... [G]rowth [in Asia and Latin America] would
be vulnerable to spillover effects from slower aggregate demand growth in the
advanced economies..." [ibid., p. 19]
6. Within the United States, the crisis in the housing industry is, first
and foremost, a social disaster for millions of working- and middle-class
families. It is expected that at least one million families will lose their homes
due to foreclosures during the next two years. Millions more who are not
immediately threatened with foreclosure are being seriously affected by the
crisis. In many parts of the country housing prices are expected to fall by 25
percent or more. Declines of this magnitude must have a devastating impact on
the personal finances of working class families. It is well known that home
equity loans have played a crucial role in supplementing the wages or salaries
of working- and middle-class families. These loans have been used to finance
education for children, pay medical bills and meet other pressing needs. This
source of additional income will no longer be available for millions of
people.
7. Thus, the collapse of housing prices deprives the broad mass of working
Americans of one of the principal means by which they have sought to
counteract the financial burdens created by three-and-a-half decades of wage
stagnation. The income of a male worker in his 30s is now 12 percent below that of a
worker the same age in 1978. As former Labor Secretary Robert Reich has noted,
the "coping mechanisms" that have been employed to deal with wage deflation
have been the massive movement of women into the work force (from 38 percent
in 1970 to 70 percent today), and the addition of two weeks to the annual
work load. Americans work 350 hours longer per year than the average European.
By the turn of the 21st century, when workers reached the physical limit of
their ability to make money by working, they began to depend more and more on
borrowing, using their homes as collateral. As this means of bridging the
ever-wider chasm between income and needs disappears, millions are faced with the
specter of falling into the financial abyss. Already, during the first half
of 2007, personal bankruptcies in the United States increased by 48 percent.
The extent to which workers are stretched financially to the limit is exposed
by the fact that 27 million workers will have to borrow money this winter
simply to pay their heating bills. But the use of credit cards is becoming just
as problematic as home equity loans. As all the traditional and
individualistic means for coping with prevailing economic realities recede, the working
class is forced to turn to the only means by which it can defend itself-that
of collective and conscious social and political struggle against the
capitalist system.
8. The revolutionary character and consequences of the struggle of the
working class are determined above all by the objective nature of the crisis of
the global capitalist system. As stated previously, the expanding crisis is of
a systemic character. For the third time in a decade, the world economy has
been shaken by the collapse of a bubble that had been created by massive
financial speculation. The East Asian financial crisis, which erupted in the
summer of 1997, engulfed the economies of Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, South
Korea, the Philippines and Singapore, and came close to triggering an
international financial meltdown. This was prevented by massive counter-measures by the
International Monetary Fund, which funded country-wide bailouts to the tune
of billions of dollars to prevent a series of cataclysmic national defaults.
The vulnerability of the US equity markets to the Asian crisis was reflected
in the upheavals on Wall Street. On just one day, October 27, 1997, the Dow
Jones average fell 554 points ( 7.2 percent) in response to turmoil on Asian
currency markets. Subsequent efforts to stabilize Wall Street, particularly
with low interest rates, further inflated the investment bubble that had begun
to develop in the mid-1990s. By 2000, the unsustainable character of the "
dot.com <http://dot.com/> " craze, characterized by "irrational exuberance,"
had become all too clear. The bubble burst, and the subsequent crash led to the
first recession in a decade. Again, the response of the Federal Reserve was
to lower interest rates to their lowest levels in decades and flood the
economy with liquidity. The means employed to contain the bursting of the dot.com
<http://dot.com/> bubble set the stage for the frenzied speculation in the
US housing market. The highly speculative character of the housing market was
widely recognized, but financial policy makers believed that its continued
growth, however dubious in nature, was required in order to prevent a relapse
into recession. As noted by the Levy Economics Institute, "The rise in
personal expenditure, on which continuous growth of the US economy largely depended
after 2001, was directly and indirectly caused by the hysterical boom in the
housing market." [Strategic Analysis, November 2007 , p. 7]
9. The persistent tendency toward the creation of speculative bubbles arises
out of deep-rooted contradictions in the development of the world capitalist
system, especially bound up with the historical decline in the global
position of American capitalism. The long-term decline in the profitability of
US-based industry has propelled the drive by American financial institutions for
alternative sources of high returns on investment. The mode of existence of
the American ruling elite has been characterized for the last 30 years by the
ever-wider separation of the process of wealth accumulation from the
processes of industrial production. The latter is of interest to the ruling elite
only where the availability of cheap labor provides the possibility of realizing
a rate of profit large enough to satisfy its demand for ultra-high levels of
personal enrichment.
10. The parasitic character of the American ruling elite is inextricably
bound up with the extreme intensification of militarism. In the final analysis,
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan-while exploiting the events of 9/11 as a
pretext-grew out of the drive by the American ruling class to maintain the
hegemonic global position of the United States. The doctrine of preventive war,
unveiled by the Bush administration in 2002, remains in place. The
geo-political and economic challenges posed by existent or emerging rivals are to be
counteracted through the exercise of military power. The setbacks suffered in
Iraq, far from diminishing the aggressive impulses of US imperialism, have
created new imperatives for the deployment of US power. The threats against Iran
have escalated in response to the fragility of the American position in Iraq.
11. As for the war in Iraq, the slight abatement of violence in Iraq does
not mean that Bush's "surge" has been successful, let alone that the war is
drawing to a close. To a certain extent, the temporary decline in violence
reflects the degree to which "ethnic cleansing" of neighborhoods-the product of
the US invasion-has been carried out. There is also the effect of the massive
loss of life that has already been suffered in Iraq. But the outcome of the US
invasion has been a tremendous intensification of the social and political
contradictions within the country and region. The escalating conflict between
Turkey and Iraqi Kurds threatens to break out at any time into full-scale
war. At any rate, there exists-apart from the development of a powerful anti-war
movement of the American and international working class-no prospect for the
withdrawal of US troops in the foreseeable future. As writer Nir Rosen
observed in a recent article in the journal Current History, "The US surge is
merely a way to kick the problem of Iraq down to the next administration, but the
truth is that American soldiers will never leave Iraq. The large bases in
Anbar province, such as Al Assad and Taqadum, are built to last-'an enduring
presence,' as one Marine officer told me. Located in the remote desert,
virtually impregnable and only occasionally targeted by mortars, these bases will
remain for decades." [December 2007, p. 413]
12. During the five years since the invasion of Iraq, the strategic position
of the United States has deteriorated. Particularly in Central Asia, whose
domination is considered by Washington to be essential to the project of
global hegemony, the United States is confronted with a more challenging
environment. The revival of Russian influence in the region and the continuing
economic expansion of China and India are seen as a potential constraint on the
imperial ambitions of the United States.
13. For the strategists of American imperialism, the issue of China looms
ever larger. The unabated growth of China's economic strength-which must assume
an ever more overt military form-is widely seen as incompatible with the
global interests of the United States. The recent formation of the new American
military center for Africa-AFRICOM-is a direct response to steadily expanding
Chinese influence on that continent. But the conflict between China and the
United States for influence in East Asia is fraught with even greater and
more immediate tension. As foreign policy expert Christopher Layne has written:
"If the United States tries to maintain its current dominance in East Asia,
Sino-American conflict is virtually certain, because US grand strategy has
incorporated the logic of anticipatory violence as an instrument for maintaining
American primacy. For a declining hegemon, 'strangling the baby in the crib'
by attacking a rising challenger preventively-that is, while the hegemon
still holds the upper hand militarily-has always been a tempting strategic
option." [ Current History, January 2008, pp. 16-17]
14. The drive toward war arises inexorably out of the global geo-political
interests and ambitions of the American bourgeoisie. It is also a product of
the increasingly malignant state of social relations within the United States.
The staggering growth in the levels of economic inequality over the past
three decades signifies the build-up of extreme social tensions beneath the
surface of official political life and outside the channels of media-sanctioned
public discourse. Imperialist militarism is among the most important political
instruments employed by the ruling elites to prevent social tensions from
assuming the form of domestic class conflict.
15. Recent studies by Edward N. Wolff of the Levy Economics Institute of
Bard College document the extreme levels of social inequality in the United
States. The statistics relating to the allocation of wealth and income reveal the
extraordinary degree of social stratification. The top 1.0 percent of the
population holds 34.3 percent of the net worth of households in the USA. The
next 4.0 percent holds 24.6 percent, and the next 5.0 percent holds 12.3
percent. All in all, the richest 10 percent of the population holds just about 71
percent of the national household wealth. The next 10 percent holds just 13.4
percent of the wealth. The bottom 80 percent of American households accounts
for just 15.3 percent of wealth. Those who fall in the third quintile own
just 3.8 percent of the wealth. The bottom 40 percent of households possesses
just 0.2 percent of wealth!
16. When non-home wealth is considered, the stratification is even greater.
The top 1.0 percent of households owns 42.2 percent of non-home wealth. The
top 10 percent owns just under 80 percent of non-home wealth. The bottom 80
percent owns 7.5 percent of non-home wealth. The poorest 40 percent report a
-1.1 percent of non-home wealth.
17. Measuring income, the top 1.0 percent receives 20 percent of the total.
The top 10 percent receives 45 percent of total income. The bottom 80 percent
receives 41.4 percent. The poorest 40 percent accounts for just 10.1 percent
of income.
18. Another extremely interesting set of statistics relates to the financial
condition of households falling within the middle three quintiles (80-60,
60-40, 40-20). Their homes account for 66.1 percent of their personal wealth.
Liquid assets account for only 8.5 percent of their wealth. Investment
instruments (stocks, securities, trusts, etc.) account for only 4.2 percent. These
figures make all too clear the extent to which the financial position of the
middle three quintiles depends upon home valuation and the general condition
of the housing market.
19. This fact makes all the more significant the sharp rise in the
indebtedness of these sections of the working class and middle class. In 1983, the
debt to equity ratio of these sections was 37.4 percent. By 2004, it had risen
to 61.6 percent. In 1983, the debt to income ratio was 66.9 percent. In 2004,
it had risen to 141.2 percent! In 1983, the mortgage debt on the homes of
these three quintiles was 28.8 percent of house value. By 2004, the debt level
had risen to 47.6 percent.
20. One last set of statistics: In 2004, according to Wolff, "the richest 1
percent of households held about half of all outstanding stock, financial
securities, trust equity, and business equity. The top 10 percent of families as
a group accounted for about 80 to 85 percent of stock shares, bonds, trusts,
business equity, and non-home real estate. Moreover, despite the fact that
49 percent of households owned stock shares either directly or indirectly
through mutual funds, trusts or various pension accounts, the richest 10 percent
of households accounted for 79 percent of the total value of these stocks,
only slightly less than its 85 percent of directly owned stocks and mutual
funds." ["Rising Trends in Household Wealth in the United States: Rising Debt and
the Middle-Class Squeeze," June 2007, p. 25]
21. What are the political implications of these statistics? The extreme
stratification of American society over the last three decades is rapidly
approaching the point of open and violent class conflict. The sclerotic American
political system, administered by two political parties that serve as
instruments for the implementation of the interests of the ruling plutocracy, is
organically incapable of responding in any sort of credible, let alone
progressive, manner to the demands of the people for significant social change. In the
final analysis, the demand for social change, even of a reformist character,
runs up against the unyielding determination of the ruling elite to defend its
wealth and social privileges.
22. The stolen election of 2000-as the SEP and the World Socialist Web Site
warned at the time-represented a historical milestone in the degeneration of
American democracy. The willingness of the Democratic Party to accept the
theft of the election demonstrated that no substantial section of the American
capitalist class retained a compelling interest in the defense of the
traditional institutions of bourgeois democracy. All that has occurred since the
election has substantiated that judgment. The wholesale violations of democratic
and constitutional principles carried out under the cover of the post-9/11
"war on terror"-in which both the Democrats and Republicans are
complicit-represent ever more brazen preparations for dictatorial forms of class rule. These
are not aberrations, but arise out of a deepening social polarization that
is ultimately incompatible with the maintenance of the traditional forms of
American democracy. It should be taken as a warning that the procedure of
"enhanced interrogation"-i.e., torture-is an English translation of a procedure
that Hitler's Gestapo called "versch酺fte Verhemung."
23. Regardless of who is ultimately nominated by the bourgeois parties and
elected president, the logic of social and political developments is leading
inexorably toward an intensification of class conflict. Moreover, the
protracted deterioration in the social position and living standards of the working
class, its ever-decreasing share of the wealth of society, and the unrelenting
intensification of its exploitation by those who own and control the means
of production have laid the foundations for a profound change in the political
orientation and allegiances of the working class. Those who fail to see or
who even deny that the profound changes in economic life over the past 30
years have left deep marks in the social consciousness of the American working
class expose not only their demoralized skepticism, but also their ignorance of
history. Indeed, the absence of open social and class conflict during the
past quarter century stands in sharp contradiction to the general pattern of
American history. But this prolonged period of social quiescence, rooted in a
complex and exceptional interaction of national and, above all, international
economic and political processes, is now drawing to a close. The central task
of the Socialist Equality Party in 2008 is to prepare in all aspects of its
work-theoretical, political and organizational-to meet the challenges posed
by the eruption of class conflict.
24. A critical element of this preparation is the review of the lessons of
past periods of revolutionary upheaval. This year marks the fortieth
anniversary of 1968, a year that was characterized by explosive struggles
internationally and in the United States. The events of that year set into motion a
protracted period of international revolutionary struggle and intense class
conflict within the United States. Significantly, the political eruptions of 1968
were first anticipated and then developed against the backdrop of increased
strains in the world economy. The devaluation of the British pound in November
1967, followed by the March 1968 instability in the European gold market,
presaged the 1971 breakdown of the Bretton Woods system upon which the
post-World War II reconstruction of international capitalism and the dominant role of
the United States was based.
25. Let us briefly review the main events of that year: In late January, the
government of North Vietnam launched its historic "Tet Offensive," which
utterly discredited the claims of the Johnson administration and the Pentagon
that the United States was winning the war. Secretary of Defense Robert
McNamara resigned and a ferocious internal struggle erupted within the
administration over its Vietnam policy. Also in January, the arch-Stalinist Antonin
Novotny was replaced as premier of Czechoslovakia by Alexander Dubcek, setting in
motion what was to become known as the "Prague Spring." In February, Lyndon
Johnson narrowly defeated Sen. Eugene McCarthy in the New Hampshire primary,
an outcome that was interpreted as a major political defeat for the incumbent
president. In March, Sen. Robert Kennedy announced that he would challenge
Johnson for the nomination. Two weeks later, Johnson announced both his
willingness to enter into peace talks with North Vietnam and his decision not to
seek renomination. On April 4, Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis
and riots erupted in cities throughout the United States. In May, the violent
suppression of student protests at Paris' Sorbonne University led to a general
strike of the French working class that paralyzed the DeGaulle government
and brought the country to the very brink of social revolution. On June 5, Sen.
Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles. In August, the Democratic
convention in Chicago was besieged by anti-war protests, which Mayor Richard
Daley sought to suppress with police violence. During the same week, Soviet
tanks entered Czechoslovakia and restored hard-line Stalinist control. In
November, Richard Nixon was elected president.
26. The events of 1968 marked only the beginning of a massive upsurge of
global class struggle, which persisted for nearly a decade. On every continent
mass struggle was the rule, not the exception. The most significant feature of
that period was the parallel development of revolutionary movements in both
the less developed and advanced capitalist countries. Pre-revolutionary or
revolutionary conditions arose in Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Italy, France,
Britain, Portugal, Greece, and Spain. Within the United States, the dominant f
orce in social struggles during that period was not the students, but the
working class. With the exception of 1973 and 1976, the number of workers
involved in major strikes never fell below one million between the years 1967 and
1979. In 1970 and 1971, the number of workers involved in strikes was 2.4
million and 2.5 million respectively. In Britain, the strike of coal miners in
1973-74 forced the resignation of the Conservative government of Edward Heath.
27. What then accounted for the survival of the capitalist system during
this period of tumultuous social struggles? On the political front, the
principal reason for the survival of capitalism is to be found in the
counter-revolutionary policies of the Stalinist and social democratic governments, parties
and trade union bureaucracies, which did everything in their power to sabotage
the revolutionary struggles of the working class. Moreover, the Pabloite
parties and organizations, which had in the 1950s and early 1960s broken with
the Fourth International, played a destructive role in covering up for the
political treachery of the Stalinists and social democrats and channeling mass
struggles into politically impotent protests. In this project, the Pabloites
worked arm-in-arm with the organizations of the so-called New Left, whose
defining characteristics were disdain for the working class, indifference toward
the lessons of history, hostility toward Marxist theory, and bitter hatred of
Trotskyism.
28. The political treachery of these forces was abetted by substantial
objective factors, of which the most significant was the still-dominant world
position of American capitalism. The dollar functioned as the linchpin of the
world capitalist economy, convertible into gold at the rate of $35 per ounce.
But politically and economically, the world of 2008 is vastly different than
that which existed 40 years ago. The world's principal creditor has become its
most indebted nation. The US dollar, whose value on international markets is
only a fraction of what it was during the era of Bretton Woods, has lost
virtually all credibility as a world reserve currency. Its displacement by the
euro or a "basket" of international currencies, a development which is all but
inevitable, will only confirm what is already apparent-that the era of the
global dominance of American capitalism has come to an end. Moreover, the
extraordinary technological changes that underlie the processes known as
"globalization" are profoundly revolutionary in their implications. The last three
decades have witnessed an immense world-wide expansion in the forces of the
international working class. Its social power and potential ability to
reorganize the world economy along socialist lines-that is, for the consciously
directed purpose of ending poverty and exploitation and serving the needs of
humanity-is greater than in any previous period of history.
29. The Socialist Equality Party, in political solidarity with the
International Committee of the Fourth International, anticipates with confidence the
resurgence of working class struggles. We are convinced that the objective
crisis of the capitalist system will provide the impulse for the upsurge of the
American and international working class. But the coming upsurge will not
automatically solve the problems of developing socialist consciousness.
30. As the initial struggles of the working class in recent months
demonstrate, there remains an enormous gulf between the objectively revolutionary
implications of the crisis and the present level of political consciousness.
Objective conditions will propel the working class into struggle and create the
conditions for an immense leap in consciousness. But it would be a mistake to
underestimate the degree of struggle that must be conducted by the party to
raise the political consciousness of the working class and overcome the
reactionary influence of the bureaucracies, which, while weakened, remain a
dangerous and critical prop of capitalist rule. Nor can we ignore the role played by
myriad "radical" petty-bourgeois tendencies, which persistently seek to
disorient the working class and maintain its subordination to "progressive"
sections of the bourgeoisie. The influence of all these different political
agencies of the ruling class can be overcome only by fighting for the assimilation
of the strategic experiences of past revolutionary struggles and for an
understanding of the implications of the developing crisis of world capitalism.
31. During 2008, the Socialist Equality Party will undertake a
politically-ambitious campaign to expand its influence within the working class and among
youth. This campaign will include:
(a) The participation of the SEP in the 2008 elections with its own
candidates in as many states as possible. The purpose of this campaign will be to
develop the political consciousness of the working class and its understanding
of the program of international socialism, to hasten its political break with
the parties of the capitalist class, to fight against poverty, exploitation
and all forms of social inequality, to build opposition to American militarism
and imperialism, and to recruit new forces into the Socialist Equality
Party.
(b) The development, in conjunction with our political co-thinkers in the
International Committee, of the World Socialist Web Site. This will include a
major redesign of the web site to improve readability and make the most
effective use possible of modern web technologies. The WSWS will also introduce
editorial changes that will strengthen its political, cultural and theoretical
content. The goal of all these changes is to expand the readership and
political influence of the web site as an instrument of socialist thought and
action.
(c) The International Students for Social Equality (ISSE), the student youth
movement affiliated with the SEP, will expand its work on campuses
throughout the United States. Combined with the efforts of our political co-thinkers
in the International Committee, we will strive to develop the ISSE as a
genuinely international movement fighting for the political unity and solidarity of
youth and workers throughout the world.
32. We appeal to all SEP members to fight on the basis of the perspective
outlined in this report for the expansion of the work of the party in 2008. At
the same time, the entire SEP membership calls upon the readers and
supporters of the World Socialist Web Site to recognize the urgency of the political
and economic crisis of American and world capitalism and join with us in the
fight for socialism.
Join the fight for socialism! Click here <http:
//www2.wsws.org/phpform/use/isse/form1.html> to contact the SEP and ISSE.
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