People's Democracy

International Seminar Discusses

World Economic Crisis

 Avtar Sadiq

AN international seminar on �The World Crisis and Alternatives� was held at Sao Paulo in Brazil on June 20-21, 2009. It was organised jointly by the Workers Party of Brazil, the Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB),, Perseu Abramo Foundation, Mauricio Grabois Foundation and Corint-Internation Correspondence.

Sitaram Yechury, Polit Bureau member of the CPI (M) and head of the international department of the Party was invited to present a paper on �The Marxist Interpretation of the International Capitalist Crisis� in the seminar. He could not attend the seminar as the Central Committee meeting of the Party to review the results of the recently concluded general elections was held on those dates. The paper prepared by Yechury was instead read out in the seminar by Avtar Sadiq, secretary of the International Workers Association, London, in a  session chaired by Jose Reinaldo, international relations secretary of the Communist Party of Brazil.

Over 300 activists of the five organisers and 38 delegates from communist and workers parties belonging to 22 different countries participated in the seminar.

Sitaram Yechury, congratulating the organisers of this seminar on behalf of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), in his paper has pointed that the present day crisis has once again resoundingly vindicated Karl Marx�s penetrative analysis of capitalism. Quoting from the statistics released by the World Bank, he pointed out that the year 2009 will see the �first decline in world output on record�. He also stated that according to the latest Bank estimates, the global economy will decline this year by close to 3 per cent, a significant revision from a previous estimate of 1.7 per cent, global economy could shrink for the first time since World War II and global trade is expected to fall for the first time in three decades. �The crisis will trap 90 million more people in poverty in 2009, according to Bank research and between 1.4 and 2.8 million more babies may die by 2015, if the crisis persists. The ILO has declared that more than 50 million are going to join the numbers of unemployed�.

CRISIS INHERENT

IN CAPITALISM

He pointed out that �as a creative science, Marxism-Leninism identifies the tendencies and directions of development� and �doing so it provides the possibilities for popular mass intervention in these developments in the pursuit of establishing an exploitation-free society�. Emphasising that capitalism is a system that is based on the exploitation of man by man and nation by nation, he stated that it can never be a crisis-free system as Marx has shown. Stating that this crisis is an inevitable consequence of the path of globalisation that was unfolding in recent decades, he pointed out to Marx�s analysis of capitalism and its tendency for concentration and centralisation of capital and said it is this process of globalisation that imperialism utilises to seek its political objective of economically recolonising the developing countries.

Quoting once again Marx - it is not enough just to interpret the world but the necessity is to change it - he stated that the inevitability of capitalism's collapse is not an automatic process and it needs to be overthrown. Expressing his concern at the growing racial attacks in various parts of the world and the efforts of the right wing forces to utilise the crisis to their advantage, he urged that all efforts must be made to ensure that �ugly, uncivil and anti-democratic expressions like racist abuses are contained on the basis of decisive deterrent action by the authorities�.

He concluded by stating that it is incumbent upon all Marxist-Leninists to make a concrete analysis of the concrete conditions, both internationally and domestically, in each country and on that basis to chart out the course of human liberation. �The only way for humanity's liberation from this exploitation is the establishment of a socialist system�.

Jose Reinaldo delivered the opening speech. He highlighted that two important parties of Brazil and the Latin American Left had joined their efforts for organising the debate. He said from this debate a convergent thought would appear giving clarity to the Left forces as the crisis is serious, extended and deep, requiring clear answers and forceful intervention. This crisis can be faced with the resistance and the fight of the workers across the world.

Emphasising the ideological fight, Jose Reinaldo said this seminar has a great meaning in the context of aggravation of the national and class antagonism, in which, can be observed the historical limits of the capitalism.

CAPITALISM�S END

NOT AUTOMATIC

Professor Emir Sader, prominent Brazilian intellectual spoke on �Crisis and Alternative of the Left.� He said any interpretation of the crisis must take into account the principles of Marxism.  Capitalism does not end with the crisis unless it is overthrown and so is the case with neo-liberalism. The State acts as a doctor  when the capitalism suffers illness, he said.

Jorge Beinstein, economist, said the process of globalisation is very uneven, whether we take investment flows, trade flows, or migrant flows. The global economy is composed of multitude of national and regional economies and has overlapping jurisdictions. It has also implications for security, for governance and for political economy.

This crisis can be viewed from a number of perspectives, as a crisis of banking system, as a crisis of regulations, as a crisis of the  continued hegemony of the United States over the global economy and as a political crisis of the legitimacy of the global order. We see the liberal democracy is also in crisis. But Cuba, in this phase of economic and political crisis, stands firmly to defend its sovereignty and socialist gains, even after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The advocates of capitalism, are blaming the bankers and the governments and they believe the crisis is surmountable and there are those of us who see it as the integral, the final crisis of capitalist system and believe that the non-capitalist way of development is the way forward to socialism. The crisis of capitalism is an integral one, because, it includes not only economic  and financial crisis, but the crisis of food industry, the environmental crisis, the crisis of aggressive imperialist policy  (in Afghanistan and Iraq), the crisis of unbridled consumerism, the crisis of governability. A point arose during the discussion that these crises are fused in one, which means the source of these crises is capitalism and trying to examine them separately is a grave mistake.

A brief glimpse was thrown on the crises of the 20th century, which gave birth to two World Wars and wiped out millions of people from this planet along with destruction and devastation of properties. There was a  major crisis of the international monetary system, which led to the decision to suspend convertibility of the dollar and in effect to break up the Bretton Woods system, which had worked only for about thirteen years. The regime of floating exchange rates took its place.

The oil price shocks triggered a global recession and unemployment rose steeply, but the problem that governments faced was not deflation but accelerating inflation, combined with low or non-existent growth. The US, as the dominant power and leading architect of the post-war financial order, was not displaced or sidelined in the way that Britain was in the 1930s. As we know, it took the lead to reshape the financial and economic order to fit better with its interests. The 1970s and 1980s were a period of restructuring, which laid the foundation for the triumphant reassertion of American interests and American power in the 1990s. The regional economic blocks based on Japan and EU were linked with the US. The EU and Japan were firmly tied into the security alliances with the US, they were economically dependent on the US and there was no significant political will to challenge the US or significant US intention to disengage.

It was emphasised by speakers that while billions of public resources are mobilised in the form of bailout packages to save those responsible for the crisis- the big capitalists and speculators- the workers, small farmers, middle strata and all those who work for a living are suffocating under the weight of monopolies and will experience more exploitation, unemployment, lower wages and pensions, insecurity, hunger and poverty in the prevailing crisis.

Luis Fernandes, academician, said that the beginning of the 21st century is marked by a unilateral expansionist and militaristic foreign policy based on-pre-emptive strikes against sovereign nations, leading to situation of great instability and uncertainty in an unequal world, to maintain the unipolar US supremacy, with the help of EU and Japan and through its institutions- the IMF, World Bank, European Central Bank, NATO, and WTO- to pursue the interests of trans-national corporations, as well as to use the UNO to suit their needs. Bush's doctrine of neo-liberalism and war has plunged US into severe crisis. Obama is currently talking about change because he reflects the reality of trends of changes in the USA, represents the defeat of  Bush's bellicose and genocidal policies. He intends to revive US economy and to resolve the prevailing conflict by advocating diplomacy and dialogue.  But one should not be under any illusion that he can break or transform the grip of US hegemony.

Sergio Riberio, an economist and member of the Portuguese Communist Party explained the impact of the crisis on the EU and its governments. He said that in order to deal with the crisis many governments had provided bailout packages to the banking sector, despite this support, unemployment has reached  up to 18 million, and due to worsening economic conditions, protests and riots have taken place in many EU countries. In the June EU elections, the right reactionary forces have won the majority in most of the countries, and along with this trend the xenophobic, racist and fascist forces have gained significant strength to form their group in the EU parliament to exert their credibility. However, this capitalist crisis is providing fertile ground for the rise of fascist forces in the future.

RENEWED STATE

INTERVENTION

IN CHINA

Vladimir Powar presented a comprehensive picture of the economic and social development in China and criticised those, having ' right', and ' left' orientation, who fail to understand that China has carried forward market reforms over the past three decades according to Chinese characteristics. China is a rising economic power. Since the present Communist Party leadership took power, fresh market -oriented liberalisation has been minor and such policies have been wounded down and supplanted by renewed State intervention. Rapid GDP gains have created jobs at the end of 2008 despite the crisis, the official unemployment rate is less than 4.5 per cent in rural and urban areas.

Chris Mathako, secretary of International relations of the Communist Party of the South Africa made ample expositions on the South African experience of the National Democratic Revolution, (NDR) that completes 15 years of end of the hateful regime of apartheid. He emphasised the importance of the election of Jacob Zuma as  new president of the Republic, in the fourth consecutive victory of the African National Congress (ANC). Under the presidency of Zuma, possibility and expectations of advance and deepening of the National Democratic Revolution are ample, he said. For South Africa, the crisis opens large possibilities of reorientation of macro-economic policies aiming at fighting poverty and extending the revolutionary potentialities.

A number of speakers from Latin American countries raised the point that the regional mechanisms of integration, in the form of ALBA, Mercosur Parliament, the Bank of the South, the South American Defence Council, Telesur network and the Energy Council of South America and Petrocarbe offer resistance to the neo-liberal model of the US and its hegemony.

The president of the PCdoB, Renato Rebelo presented main ideas in the debate of the PCdoB, that would be presented to the 12th Congress to be held in Sao Paulo in November this year. In the battle of ideas, socialist ideas are bound to win.  In a situation as today, we can gain forces and advance the ideological fight and the possibilities for a socialist alternative exist, but it does not mean that the change will be seen immediately. Renato explained that the domestic development project was abandoned by Brazil during 1980-90s marked for neo-liberalism, stagnation and decay for the country. The two elections of president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had modified the political arena, but Brazil has to advance more.

The Workers Party secretary of International Relations, Valter Pomar, made the conclusion on behalf of both parties. He underlined that the seminar has noted that the crisis increases the high social and ambient costs of the capitalism; the outcome of the crisis will be defined by the political struggle inside each country and across the world ; to face long period of instability, we need international alliances and reinforcement of the regional integration; the Latin American developments will continue to be favourable with a high degree of unity between the people; we must combine the fight against the neo-liberalism and the defence of socialism and; our strategy must take into account the strong presence of the Left in the governments of the region. The seminar demonstrated that many reasons exist for an optimist change.