[Importantly in Vietnam, and in Angola, Portugal and…]

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Importantly in Vietnam, and in Angola, Portugal and Greece.

The traditional leaders of the borking class internationally, the leformists and the Stalinists, seek In this situation to do their utmost lo hold back the working class and bppressed masses in their struggle to defend jobs and living standards und throw off the shackles of Imperialist domination.

NO LIMIT .. There is no limit to the betrayals ind defeats into which the Italinists and reformists are prepared to lead the working class, notivated, as they are, by the recessity to defend capitalism in TISIS.

The question of leadership is ¡herefore posed as the number one juestion facing the working class md oppressed masses interrationally.

The crisis of capitalism cannot re resolved in the interests of the vorking class unless the crisis of yorking class leadership is itsell irst resolved.

In this situation the role of vorking class youth assumes onsiderable importance. Whether hey be conscript soldiers in Portugal, guerilla fighters in Limbabwe, school students in loweto or young workers in Madrid md Barcelona, young workers the world over have demonstrated their letermination not to accept the vurden of the capitalist crisis:

It is, of course, no accident that roung workers should figure so prominently in the struggles of the Forking class. Many of the gains fought for and won by the working lass since the Second World War, particularly in such areas as health ind education, full employment ind high wages, have been of particilar benefit to young workers.

Now as the crisis accelerates into dump, all these gains are being riciously attacked. Cuts in public pending are resulting in falling mandards of health and education, zundreds of thousands of schoolcavers face the dole each summer und those lucky enough to find jobs ace government wage-cutting miorced by the trade union sureaucracy.

But the youth have both the inthusiasm and the ability to fight sack.

PAST DEFEATS

Free from the responsibility for he past defeats of the workers movement in the 1930's and for he formation of an opportunist kadership, reared in the boom sonditions of the '50s and '60s, ind determined to head off Aruggles by any sections of the Porking class now that the boom tas collapsed, the way is open for Porting class youth to play a sentral role in the fight for principled leadership.

As Trotsky wrote in the TransThe movement is revitalised by e youth who are free of responTry for the past. The Fourth ternational pays particular attenfon to the young generation of the proletariat. All of its policies strive • inspire the youth with belief in Is own strength and in the future. unly the fresh enthusiasm and #caive spirit of the youth can cantee the preliminary successes • the struggle: only these successes I return the best elements of the continual economic dependence on the family, the dole or a dead end job.

Only by directing young workers into the mass organisations of the working class, by putting demands on the trade unions and fighting for support can the bureaucrats be exposed and an alternative leadership formed.

YOUTH PROGAMME

Youth at Work.

The struggle of young workers must deal with capitalism's flagrant disregard for their physical and cultural development. Only a strong organisation amongst youth in the trade unions can prevent abuses where young people are used as cheap sweated labour.

All barriers which prevent young workers and apprentices from playing a leading role in the organisation of the working class must be removed. This includes the removal of the age bar on young workers taking out a steward's card.

Youth commissions at all levels imposed trades unions must be of the on a bureaucracy who must • be forced to fight for the specific demands of youth.

Factory committees of youth should function with delegates on shop stewards committees.

Similarly, young workers' representatives must be brought on to open committees of the trades councils to fight for the interests of all sections of youth - employed and unemployed.

TRADE UNION CONTROL All control over the use of young • labour must be under the direction of trade union committees to safeguard the health of youth by preventing practices like heavy work, shift work or night work.

Alongside this, we demand compulsory training facilities and opportunities for general study must be raised, the cost of this to be borne by the bosses.

All supervision of training must be under workers control. The struggle to extend training facilities and recruitment into industry directly connects with the issue of unemployment.

Youth have a right to economic independence from the family. We demand that apprentices be paid 75% of the adult rate and that unskilled youth receive the same wages as adult workers doing the same work - the application of the principle of equal pay for equal work - but under workers' control.

This is particularly relevant for girls, as is the struggle for equal training and equal apprenticeship opportunities.

The development of a struggle for control over wages leads on to the fight for a sliding scale of wages pegged to an index of prices worked out by trade union committees to keep wages level with the rate of inflation.

Youth on the Dole.

The main problem facing youth today is unemployment. Over 200,000 school-leavers in the summer of 1976 swelled the dole queues and six months later there were still 140,000 school-leavers without jobs.

With Treasury officials forecasting (in private) a 1977 level of unemployment of 1.8 million, the The struggle for the right to work challenges the very basis -the quest for profit - of capitalism.

The inability of capitalism to plan production to satisty need is manifest in the closure of factories and machinery lying idle while workers are given the sack or suffer wage-cutting and a decline in their living standards.

It is vital that the trade union leaders are forced to throw open the doors of the unions to exploited and unemployed youth. Trade union dues should be reduced for youth. As long as youth remain unorganised theit energy will be sapped and they will be left defenceless against harassment by the state.

Only the unity of the employed and unemployed can oppose the employers' device of snatching jobs through policies of 'natural wastage' and running down the level of recruitment.

Working class youth will only be won to a revolutionary programme if they can see its relevance to their own circumstances.

DEMANDS

But the demands of youth can only be struggled for as part of an overall programme capable of leading workers beyond capitalism. Young workers must develop the demands of youth as part of the banner and programme of the whole working class.

Youth's right to work has to be part of a programme against redundancies. All sackings and redundancy measures must be opposed -instead a policy of work sharing on full pay • - the total number of hours divided equally among the whole work force with no loss of pay - must be implemented.

Where the employer refuses this demand the factory must occupied and a committee elected to open the books and investigate the finances of the firm. Where these committees establish that the firm is bankrupt the Labour government must be forced to nationalise the factory without compensation and under workers' management.

The government must moreover be forced to provide the factory with government contracts in order to keep the workforce employed. Black Youth.

Black youth particularly acute access to a pro NEW JOBS Given the high proportion of youth who are out of work it is not merely the defence of existing jobs but the creation of new ones which is posed: part of this programme must include demands for the maintenance of recruitment and the extension of training by forcing the reopening of shut down factories to be used as training facilities.

Moves to employ youth on subsistence wages in all sorts of 'community work' in order to patch up the crumbling social services, and the more recent job swap scheme must be answered by a campaign for the commencement of large scale public works.

Trade Union committees in each area must draw up plans for useful public works to provide employment at trade union rates. This plan must be under workers' management from top to bottom.

in Britain face problems. Denied ser education Or We I€ December Year.

PERATION print below the main body of the 4th and 5th. The other resolutions VNITE SMA training, they have been forced low paid, unskilled jobs.

As the crisis deepens, more and more black youth are forced onto the dole. In parts of London over 25% of black youth are unemployed.

Neglected by the leaders of the organised labour movement, black youth remain largely unorganised and leaderless, subjected to racialism - which this year resulted in the murder of three Asian youths at the hands of racialists; and police harassment which led to the battles between black youth and police at the Notting Hill Carnival as a direct result of a massive police provocation. FOR I Resolution on Youth Work a from the Conference will berp Frustrated by their inability to defend their standard of living in the face of manoeuvres by the trade union bureaucracy, sections of the working class fell prey throughout the summer to the racialist hysteria whipped up by the capitalist press, a hysteria exploited by fascist and extreme right-wing groups in an attempt to win sections of workers to the idea that the immigrant population is responsible for the crisis.

In this situation large numbers of black youth, both Asian and West Indian, took to the streets in numerous demonstrations and in some areas began to organise the defence of their communities

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éludiants, enseignants, travailleurs, solidaires Youth, students and workers on a joint demonstration through Paris in May June, 1968 opted at the First Annual Conference of the Workers Socialist League on blished in our theoretical supplement Trotskyism. Today starting in the New against racist attack and police harassment.

It is precisely in such a situation where the fascists attack racial minorities today, attempting to split and divide the working class so that they can attack all socialists and trade unionists tomorrow, that the demand for workers' self defence becomes central.

• Black youth have a key role to play in the fight to mobilise the working class in the formation of defence squads against the fascists, While the labour movement itself has a responsibility to come to the defence of any section of the labour movement singled out for attack by the forces of reaction.

:321..

LISM But the fight for workers self defence must go hand in hand with the fight against the anti-working class policies of the Labour government and the collaboration which, by holding back the struggles of the working class leads to the kind of frustration which can result in a surface reaction to the racialist hysteria of the capitalist press.

This means that black youth must be brought into the organised labour movement to take up a fight not only for the organisation of workers' self defence but also to demand that the leaders of the trade unions lead a fight against the Labour government's attacks on the working class.

On the other hand it will only be possible to bring black youth into the labour movement on the basis of a programme which will appeal to these youth because they see in it a way of securing united action to overcome the problems that they face. Such a programme must include:

*The recruitment of black youth alongside white youth, employed and unemployed, into the trade unions.

*The setting by trades councils of youth unemployment sub-committees where black youth can fight alongside white youth around such demands as the drawing up of a plan of useful public works which the government must be forced to finance under trade union control.

*Trade union enquiries to investigate the harassment of black youth by the police and law courts.

*Workers' defence squads, organised by the labour movement to protect the black community from police and fascist harassment.

Despite the political differences existing between Marxists and the various 'Black Groups', the right of black youth to organise in such defended from the harassment and nevertheless attacks of the police and extreme right wing.

When necessary, trade union organised protection of premises and meetings must be fought for.

Youth and Leisure.

With the worsening of the economic crisis, and inflation now once more on the increase, working class youth find themselves more and more limited in the range of leisure activities they can pursue.

The entertainments industry, like all capitalist industry, is run for profit. The inflationary crisis has put many forms of entertainment out of the reach of young workers.

For hundreds of thousands of youth living on large council estates on the outskirts of provincial cities, all that remains by way of leisure activity is the local youth club. The slightest trouble, however, frequently leads to youth being barred from these clubs.

Consequently they are forced out onto the streets where they fall prey to the police patrols. The creativeness of youth is given no chance because the facilities do not exist to develop this.

A programme for youth should include the following demands:

*Nationalisation of the entertainments industry without compensation and under workers' management.

*Youth facilities, including youth clubs, schools and playing fields owned by local authorities must be placed under trade union control and made freely available to all youth.

*Trade union committees must draw up plans for an adequate provision of facilities for all young people which the Labour government must be compelled to finance.

Not only will this result in assisting the physical and cultural development of young workers but it will also provide jobs for the unemployed.

Youth at School and College.

Capitalism denies working class youth access to education and the right to work. As unemployment rises, working class youth are forced to stay 'on at school in increasing numbers.

But with the cut back in state expenditure and an increasing number of school students, conditions and standards of education decline.

While the raising of the school leaving age to 16 should be defended, it-must be turned into a gain for the working : class. The raising of the school leaving age must be linked to the fight to defend and improve the state education system by means of opening the books of the LEAs and of all education supply firms to elected trade union committees, principally the teachers and students unions.

STATE SPENDING

From the information revealed, it is possible to argue for an increased injection of state expenditure.

This will compensate for the cuts already implemented as well as offsetting the effects of inflation by the operation of a sliding scale of public expenditure. Control over state educational expenditure will prepare the path for the future management by the working class of state education.

Defend the raising of the school leaving age to 16 with grants to school students over the age of 15, based on a sliding scale tied to a working class cost of living index and supervised by workers' representatives - not a means test. ' Down with privilege! Abolish private schools and use their facilities within a fully integrated comprehensive state education system under the management of the working class.

Schools must be approached through the National Union of School Students, recognised by the NUS, which all League members and contacts who are eligible must join to campaign to make the union a mass organisation enabling a broader layer of youth to be reached than otherwise possible.

The present Stalinist leadership, which is unable to realise the potential of the union and unable to organise adequately its day to day running, must be challenged. This can only be done by building areas with large memberships and a correct leadership capable of challenging the existing Stalinist leaders.

Students.

The mass of students in colleges and universities (excluding technical colleges) occupy a class position intermediate between the working class and the bourgeoisie.

Though the deep crisis of capitalism lessens their prospects of gaining access to a privileged career this does not necessarily mean that they will be won to the side of the working. class.

The struggles and college occupations which developed in the late 60s marked the high point of any independent activity by students and at the same time demonstrated their illusions in their independence from class society and the limitations of any student movement which is not tied to the working class.

In this period many revisionist groups identified students as a revolutionary force and lent support to the idea of 'student power' in the universities. (The Pabloites, adapting to the student movement, for some time adopted a strategy of fighting for "red bases' in the universities).

Now in the mid-70s, students, like the working class, are confronted by a Labour government intent on introducing enorious cuts public expenditure, including education.

RESTRICTED ACCESS

The fact that capitalism has always restricted the access. of working class youth to education, especially higher and technical education, is nothing new.

The ruling class have always attempted to ensure that culture and science remain their exclusive preserve. economic crisis, by drastic cuts at Now. in the throes of the all levels of the education system, capitalism threatens to further restrict the development of human science and culture and attacks the limited rights to education that have been won by the working class.

Though both the course content and structure of the education system embody the desire of the ruling class to develop a privileged intelligentsia to serve its class interests, we cannot pick and choose which parts of it to defend.

To defend the jobs of all workers in the colleges and preserve what access to education has been won for the working class, we oppose all cuts in higher education.

We call for the financial accounts and details of the planned cuts to be made open to elected committees of education workers and other trade unionists:

We call for students' representatives to be brought on to these committees and for joint studenttrade union action against the cut backs. This must include the mobilisation of the working class around the demand for a sliding scale of public spending.

Alongside this must go the fight for entry to the colleges and universities to be made open to all youth who are willing to study. For an immediate grants increase to give full maintenance and automatic increases to compensate for inflation under the control of trade union committees.

The existing leadership of the National Union of Students have proved themselves incapable of leading such a fight to defend higher education against the attacks of the Callaghan-Healey government.

• NO LEAD With the government announcing more and more drastic cut backs in the number of teachers to be employed, and the teacher training colleges being rationalised to cater for fewer trainee teachers, the NUS have provided no leadership in the fight back against these attacks.

It was the student teachers themselves, faced with the threat of the dole, who this year occupied their colleges in protest against the education cut backs.

The Broad Left leadership of the NUS, elected with the support of Tory votes at the last NUS Conference, moved in, not to support organise and extend the action of the student teachers, but to gain control of the actions so that they could defuse them as quickly as possible.

A fight by students on the above programme for education cannot be separated from the struggle to replace the leadership of the NUS, the fight to expose the bankruptcy of the Broad Left with its policy of talk, demonstrations and no action, and the struggle to build a new, revolutionary leadership. in the student movement, a struggle which can win many of the best students to the WSL.

It is through our understanding that the attacks on the education system cannot be finally defeated without the working class seizing state power, and with a perspective of winning students to the side of the working class that we fight to take a leading role in the struggles to defend higher education against the cuts.

• INTELLECTUALS Though only a minority of students are open to revolutionary politics it can be a valuable gain for the movement to win a section of young intellectuals.

This can only be an overall gain for the WSL, however, if they are fully won to revolutionary Marxism and integrated into the work of the League.

Both because of their • class position and the strength of ruling class ideas in the universities there is a danger of students bringing idealist methods into the League.

Consequently it is essential for students to take up a fight for Marxist theory in conflict with the ruling class ideology in higher education.

On this basis they can also fulfill a vital role in bringing the ideas of revolutionary Marxism to the more class conscious elements in the working class who are attracted towards the revolutionary party.

This development cannot proceed, however, if it is left purely at this level. The separation of theory and practice is an essential part of reactionary and idealist schools of thought.

Only by taking up a struggle in practice to win the working class to the revolutionary programme, by participating in the struggles of their generation, can students be developed and tested as part of a revolutionary leadership.

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The Chinese Revolution and the People's Republic of China help to shape virtually every important political question of our time.

Second only to the October Revolution and the establishment of the Soviet Union, the Third Chinese Revolution's victory in 1949 overshadows the history of the second half of this century.

Livio Maitan, in his revised edition of this important book sets himself the task . of a Marxist analysis of "the society and the politics that emerged from this momentous transformation" , with the central aim of showing how the concentration of political decisions in the hands of a "tiny group of top Party leaders...systematically comes into collision with the underlying momentum of the socialist revolution itself."

SEPARATES

In doing this he separates himself from the two predominant schools of thought and writing on modern China: those "inspired by anti-communism and the Cold War whose aim is to attack and discredit the Chinese revolution"; and writing which "simply echoes with naive enthusiasm the particular official ideology of the moment... often written by those who have spent a month or two travellling in China understandably impressed by what they have seen."

In both cases, Maitan correctly points out, the result is a complete inability to grasp the nature of political struggles in China" (Introduction, pp8-11).

Maitan writes as a political leader of the majority tendency of the 'United Secretariat of the Fourth International'. His book cherefore offers an opportunity to examine one central example of the way in which the general line and framework of political analysis of this section of the world Trotskyist movement attacks the problems presented by the development of Stalinism in China, in this case set out at length rather than attempting to compress the scope and complexity of events into the limits of a journal article or similar.

SOCIALIST PRI Workers on a Chinese Commune . Wednesday 15th December, 1976 Languages Institute in May 1967, in search of documents to establish the complicity of Liu with Suharto, chief butcher of the Indonesian counter-revolution.

The Central Group of the Cultural Revolution', under Mao, and so probably in the person of Chiang Ching intervened immediately, summoning in the army to ensure that the archives were returned to safe, secret storage. And the reason is clear - the documents risked incriminating not only Liu, but the entire hierarchy, up to and including Chou and Mao, in a way which it might not have been easy to contain.

Another, broader, question which gets insufficient emphasis in Maitan's book is the origins of the modern, bureaucratised Chinese state in the areas controlled by the Communist Party and the Army before the liberation of 1949.

95 MILLION He mentions, it is true, the probable estimate that in 1945 the population of the "liberated areas" mainly in the north, centred on Yenan) was around 95 millions (ie larger than any of the states of Western Europe today) - but he nonetheless effectively begins his account from October 1949, when MaoR proclaimed the People's Republic of China.

While this is without question the highest watershed in political terms, it is an artificial date for purposes of understanding the social origins and character of the bureaucratic strata against which the rebels of the Cultural Revolution rebelled.

They were largely formed, and began to gain decisive social weight, in administering the 'quasistate' organisations which ruled very large areas and populations -without expropriating landlords or capitalists - for more than a decade and a half before liberation. And it was this stratum, based on the peasant army which routed Chiang Kai-shek in civil war, which took political power in 1949.

Not grasping this nettle presented by real historical development, Maitan can say little of fundamental importance about the central contradiction of the Third Chinese