International Communist Current

The withdrawal of the US from Afghanistan and the fall of Kabul to the Taliban showed the decline of the world's only remaining superpower. British imperialism had been a part of the occupation since the invasion of 2001. The failure of the US was shared by the UK, which has been further reduced in its status among the second and third-rate powers.

C.L.R. James in 1938

In part two of this series on the proletarian struggle against racism in the U.S., we examined the positions in the Socialist Labour Party (SLP) and in the Socialist Party of America (SPA) at the end of capitalism’s ascendant phase. In the third part of the series, we look at how revolutionaries in the US analysed the problem in the period of capitalist decadence opened up by the First World War.

While the Covid-19 crisis has persisted for almost two years with its heavy health, social, political and economic impact on most of the world's states, this has in no way moderated their imperialist appetites. The rise in tensions has been particularly marked in recent months by a clear exacerbation of the opposition between the USA and China, highlighted most recently by the so-called “Aukus” agreement between the US, Britain and Australia, and explicitly aimed at China.

In the preceding parts of this series we have highlighted the opportunist weaknesses which were at the base of the constitution of the Communist International (CI), both on the programmatic and on the organisational levels. This part will tackle the final period of the CI as an organisation of the working class.

To mark the 20th ‘anniversary’ of the September 11 attacks in New York, we draw our readers’ attention to our lead article from International Review 107, “New York and the world over: Capitalism sows death”. The article denounces the massacre of thousands of civilians, the majority of them proletarians, as an act of imperialist war, but at the same time exposes the hypocritical tears shed by the ruling class. As the article says, “The attack on New York was not an ‘attack on civilisation’, it was itself the expression of bourgeois ‘civilisation’”.

The first of two articles analysing the fact that USA’s rise to world dominance also coincides with the course of a world system in decline. In particular, it became a global superpower through imperialist war becoming the “way of life” of decadent capitalism.

We've commemorated this year as the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune. We must also celebrate the book of Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex. The first edition of this book appeared in London on February 23, 1871, a few days before the working population of Paris transported to the heights of Montmartre, Buttes-Chartre and Belleville the cannons that Adolphe Thiers wanted to confiscate from them.

This article is a response to two letters published recently on the phenomenon of "uberisation” Are “uberised” employees part of the working class? It endeavours to place the issues in a historical framework by drawing on the foundations of marxism and the experience of the workers' movement.

We reply to a reader’s question: “How can the ICC maintain that capitalism is a decadent system since 1914 when there has been such enormous growth in the capitalist system since then?”

Mass cremations of Covid victims in India

Uber Eats workers on strike

We are publishing below two letters from ICC sympathisers aimed at continuing the reflection that arose in a meeting in France on 15 May 2020 on the subject of the nature and composition of the working class. During this discussion some participants questioned what affect “uberisation” of work had on the composition of the working class. In other words, do the “uberised” employees belong to the working class? We welcome the comrades’ efforts of reflection and their willingness to express their concerns. The letters from the comrades make two contributions to this debate which will be continued at other ICC meetings.

Poster of May 68 against state repression

In recent months there have been criticisms and misinterpretations of our positions regarding the state measures in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Some have even concluded that the ICC in fact supports these measures. The ICC supports any proletarian struggle against the attacks by the state, but it doesn’t support demands to put an end to the anti-Covid state measures. Such demands have no other perspective than reinforcing illusions in bourgeois rule, whether democratic or openly despotic and only raise obstructions against the development of the class consciousness and the combativity.

Soup kitchen queue, Glasgow, winter 2020/21

From health to housing, education to income, the working class has been hardest hit over the past 12 plague months. The economic crisis and social deprivations, accelerated by Covid-19, have roots deep in the decadence and decomposition of capitalism. However sections of the proletariat in GB, under the most difficult conditions, have nonetheless attempted a defence of basic class interests.

Turkish military incursion into northern Syria, October 2019

Turkey’s ambitions to assert itself as a regional power in the Middle East is a clear illustration of the growing tendency towards every man for himself at the imperialist level; and it is above all the working class of Turkey and beyond which is paying the price in increased exploitation and bloody wars. 

Colored National Labor Union Convention, 1869

The campaign around “Black Lives Matter” (BLM) has led many people to look for references in the history of the struggle against the oppression of and violence against black people. Among the most well-known black activist are Marcus Garvey, Malcom X, and Martin Luther King. But communists do not base their political orientation on activists fighting for equal rights within capitalism. 

In the first part of this series we sketched out the first steps of the workers’ movement in dealing with the aftermath of a 350 years history of the enslavement. In this part we will examine how the socialist parties at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century took up the political defence of black workers. Although African Americans were only one of the many “nationalities”, they were subjected to a special regime, where the culture of slavery persisted. Therefore the struggle for the abolition of the system of two classes of workers, the division between white and black workers, was an important point.

Recent protests by students in France and the UK show that the struggle of proletarians around basic class interests has not been entirely buried by a whole series of marches and protests around the themes of "democracy" and "the rights of the individual" faced with the lockdown.