Detroit WWP hosts Marxist conference

“Marxism: The Science Behind the Struggle” was the theme of a two-day educational conference Aug. 23-24 hosted by Detroit Workers World Party and FIST — Fight Imperialism, Stand Together, a revolutionary youth group. In addition to Detroit and metropolitan Detroit, participants came from the Chicago area, Wisconsin, Ohio and Virginia. Attendees were a multinational group of varying ages, genders and sexual orientations, all involved in many struggles for justice from an anti-capitalist perspective. These struggles, along with a host of contemporary and historical topics, both inside the United States and internationally, were discussed using Marxist methods of historical and dialectical materialism and analyzing the class forces in action.

Much of the discussion centered on the work that Detroit WWP has done in fighting austerity and the forced bankruptcy of the city at the hands of the racist, pro-bank state governor and the emergency manager he appointed to run the city of Detroit.

The era of “dead-end capitalism” with its low wages, vile racism and national oppression was counterposed to prospects for a socialist future where people and the planet, not profits, will be the motor force in society. Shown here are some of the conference attendees at the end of the first day, posed in solidarity with anti-racist activists in Ferguson, Mo.