WW newspaper to participate in Left Forum

Among the 400 panels scheduled for this year’s Left Forum, being held on the weekend of March 16-18 at Pace University, are three that Workers World newspaper is organizing. These panels will take up the capitalist economic crisis, the threat of imperialist war and the reality of struggling for socialism in the year of the Occupy movement.

The LF has been a center for the struggle of ideas of people within the left movement who at least consider themselves to be socialist at some level. While the forum leans toward representing social democratic voices and academia, it also represents many ideas of leftist organizations. Nearly every political tendency, from those just left of the openly capitalist Democratic Party to the most revolutionary, tries to express its point of view at the LF.

Besides organizing panels, Workers World newspaper will be one of many organizations staffing a literature table at the Book Fair section of the LF. Political activists and thinkers from around the country and the world will be able to get familiar with Workers World newspaper and with books that WW supports.

The theme for this year’s Left Forum is “Occupy the System: Confronting Global Capitalism.” In keeping with this theme, Workers World newspaper has organized three panels. The basic agenda of each will be three presentations of 10 to 15 minutes each, followed by 45 minutes of discussion.

The times and places for these panels will be publicized as they are assigned, or can be looked up at www.leftforum.org.

Capitalist crisis

The panel on the capitalist crisis is called, “Is Capitalism at a Dead End? Socialist Revolutions in a Time of Crisis.”

This panel’s scheduled speakers so far are WW managing editor Monica Moorehead, who is also editor of the book, “Marxism, Reparations and the Black Free­dom Struggle”; Brenda Stokely, a founding member of the Million Worker March Movement and a former president of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees District Council 1707; and Fred Goldstein, author of “Low Wage Capitalism.”

The abstract for this panel points out that “rapid technological advancements in production constantly eliminate jobs, especially skilled jobs; each new investment pushes more workers into the army of the unemployed. Capitalism has become a low-wage social system characterized by persistent, growing, massive unemployment and underemployment.

“The class struggle can retard this process but cannot reverse it. Thus, the system is in a permanent crisis that now affects workers in the advanced imperialist countries. The first responses to this crisis have been the uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East, general strikes and occupations on Europe’s periphery and the Occupy movement in the United States.

The abstract concludes, “The panel will focus on the fightback, the role of the working class, the unions, the community and the students, with special emphasis on how these developments affect the nationally oppressed, including destruction of social services, education and the criminalization of youth of color.”

Anti-imperialist struggle

Another WW-organized panel is “Confronting Global Capitalism’s Attempt to Recolonize Africa and Asia.” Speakers are Abayomi Azikiwe, editor, Pan African News Wire; Joyce Chediac, editor of the book, “Gaza, Symbol of Resistance”; and Workers World editor in chief Deirdre Griswold.

This panel will discuss Washington’s attempt to set up Africom [the so-called “U.S. Africa Command”]; U.S./NATO aggression against Libya; intervention in Sudan, Somalia, Ivory Coast and threats against Zimbabwe; the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan; war threats against Syria and Iran; and the role of the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa.

In addition, it will take up the continued U.S. threats against North Korea and the surrounding of China; the character of the states and peoples targeted by imperialism; and the “necessity of progressives in the U.S. to protest and obstruct all imperialist intervention against these peoples and nations.”

Socialism and struggle

The third WW panel is “Socialism in the United States: Is It Possible?” Three young Marxists from a new generation of revolutionary activists will present the following points: “Who are the 1%? Who are the 99%? That is, what is the relationship between the categories of the Occupy Wall Street movement and the class struggle”; and “We don’t need the 1%. The attempts to build socialism point the way to the future, while the capitalist crisis is heading toward chaos. It is necessary to stand strong against racism, imperialism and all oppression as part of fighting the 1%.”

The presenters are LeiLani Dowell, a managing editor of WW newspaper; Caleb Maupin, a co-author of “What Is Marxism All About?” and Occupy Wall Street activist; and Larry Hales, who has been an organizer with New Yorkers Against Budget Cuts and Defend Education and with the Bail Out the People Movement.