Spread the movement everywhere!

1. For the past month and a half, the state has been ordering its robocops to beat us with batons, to tear-gas us and fire tear gas canisters at us in the hope of making us give up. Eyes gouged out, hands torn off, jaws smashed in. The media, acting on orders, show endless loops of burning bins and smashed shop windows to discredit us. Prefects are banning demonstrations. Parliament is passing laws criminalising gatherings. Police stations are holding people in custody; courts are sending them straight to prison. Is that still not enough? So the state is relying on far-right militias to attack demonstrators with the blessing of the CRS. This terror is by no means unique to France. In Italy, on 17 and 18 October, several hundred people were injured. On 24 October, 500 soldiers were deployed in Milan. In Germany, the Bundeswehr (German army) was called in to the Mitte district of Berlin. In Belgium, a curfew was imposed and gatherings of more than three people were banned on the streets of Liège. But nothing works: the harder they hit us, the more of us there are, the more united and in solidarity we are!

2. Repression is international because our movement is international! All over the world, particularly amongst working-class youth, the same anger, the same fighting spirit and the same growing awareness are evident. In Germany, a mobilisation against the return of compulsory military service and colossal military spending, at the expense of healthcare, education and social services. In Italy, slogans such as ‘let’s do as they do in France’ against militarisation and austerity. In Greece, condemnation of the same shortages in education and the same housing problems. In Athens, placards expressing the same hopes: “The world is ours”. In Spain and Portugal, massive rallies in the squares against rising house prices. In Austria, a protest against the cost of higher education. Such a level of militancy and consciousness, on an international scale, is unprecedented since May ’68. The global social climate is changing.

3. The question facing the working class today is: how can we expand the movement? One thing is certain: we cannot rely on the trade unions. Since the movement began on 17 September, they have been doing everything in their power to ensure that nothing changes in the workplace. Over a month ago, they had scheduled this day of action for 5 November, after the school holidays, hoping that by then the movement would have run out of steam. Today, compelled by the scale of the struggle, the CGT is calling for a general strike on television programmes, but is doing absolutely nothing within companies to mobilise workers. As for 5 November: a day of trade union action means workers marching one behind the other, separated and herded together under the banner of their company, their sector, their union. This is the opposite of unity. So what is to be done? The school pupils and students involved in the struggle are showing the way for the entire working class by being able to bring about sovereign, self-organised general assemblies open to all (students, school pupils and workers). These general assemblies remain the true lifeblood of the movement, the place where the aims and means of the struggle are collectively debated. General assemblies that operate on the basis of mandates, capable of defining common and open slogans, such as the ‘struggle against precariousness’. General assemblies capable of deciding on collective actions to expand the movement to the entire working class: by distributing leaflets, organising joint general assemblies, and sending delegations to campaign in railway stations, to meet workers, to visit the sites where they gather, and to try to convince them to join the struggle.

4. This international movement signifies the working class’s refusal to see humanity sink ever deeper into war and misery. “Capitalism = No future” is emblazoned on some placards. But this movement is also practical proof that the seeds of a force capable of fighting for a different society already exist: the working class. These general assemblies reject the logic of profit, competition, exploitation and militarism. They know how to avoid the trap of fruitless confrontation with the police and of blind violence. And they all champion solidarity – between sectors, between generations, and with undocumented migrants, those denied university places, the unemployed and the homeless. To put it plainly: albeit still in their infancy, these general assemblies reveal the possibility of a different global society. A society in which these kinds of assemblies, linked together on an international scale, become permanent forums for debate and decision-making. We can see that a different way of organising ourselves socially is possible. Of course, this is a very long road ahead, involving several decades of struggle, a path that will be marked by a few victories and many defeats. But the global working class has just taken a few steps along it. To poke fun at Mr Macron, we might say: “We are En Marche!”

The future belongs to the class struggle!

Workers of all countries, unite!

 

International Communist Current

2 November 2026