by Sean Purdy, For SW February 1994

Corporate capitalists in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada received a
rude awakening on New Year's Day this year.

Mexico's Zapatista National Liberation Army took up arms and
rebelled against centuries of oppression of native peoples and the
brutal agenda of the multinational corporations and their backers
in government.

Those fighting for social justice the world over should celebrate
the blow against the New World Order struck by the Zapatistas. The
fight to turn back the corporate agenda of cutbacks, union
smashing, dispossession of peasant land and persecution of
indigneous peoples has received a tremendous boost of confidence.

Peasant rebellions against national oppression and ruthless
exploitation at the hands of corporations have occurred many times
this century. Cuba and China stand out as prime examples of largely
peasant based liberation movements which rose up against repressive
regimes propped up by imperialist business interests.

But these struggles against exploitation and oppression failed as
a new ruling class arose and put in place policies far removed from
the original aims of the millions of people struggling for
political, social and economic justice.

Socialists unconditionally support peasant and national liberation
movements against oppression but advance an alternative set of
politics in the struggle for people to freely determine their own
futures and build a different society based on human need and not
profit.

In the early years of the century, Leon Trotsky, the Russian
revolutionary, developed his theory of permanent revolution to show
that in order to carry through a successful socialist revolution
the working class would have to be the central force leading the
revolutionary struggle and that the revolution would need to be
spread to other countries. His experience in the Russian Revolution
also convinced him that revolutionaries had to be organized in a
socialist party.

In Russia at the time, despite a growing working class, most people
were peasants who worked the land. Historically, the peasants were,
as Trotsky put it, "completely incapable of playing an independent
role." Since the peasants' economic and social activities were
centred on farming individual plots of land they lacked the social
and political cohesion to form a force capable transforming
society.

Only when led by the working class can the peasantry play a key
role in revolutionary struggles. Under capitalism, profits come
from the labour of the workers. As capitalist enterprises grew
larger and more complex, the process of work was socialized, making
the system dependent on the combined efforts of the working class.
While peasants may rise up and seize their individual patch of land
from landlords, it would make little sense for workers to seize
individual bits of a factory. Unlike peasants, workers are by
necessity forced to organize and act collectively.

The Russian Revolution of 1917 saw the theory of permanent
revolution put in practice. The working class backed the peasants
in their fight against big landlords and were able to struggle
together under the leadership of the workers to overthrow Tsarism
and then capitalism. Unfortunately, the failure of the revolution
to spread to other countries isolated the fledgling socialist
society, leading to its defeat and the rise of a bureacratic ruling
class under Stalin.

Socialism cannot be built in one country. But socialists argue that
a revolution led by the working class in one country can quickly
spill over to other countries. Since capitalism is an international
system, its inevitable crises are felt in all countries.
Revolutions in one country, especially more advanced capitalisms,
can deepen this crisis, providing the conditions for revolution
elsewhere. A revolution in Mexico, for example, would likely have
a devestating economic impact on the whole of Latin America.

The political effect of a revolution can be even more decisive - as
shown by the revolutionary convulsions in Germany, Austria and
Hungary and the general strikes in Winnipeg and Seattle which were
inspired by the Russian Revolution.

The revolution will encourage workers' movements around the world.
It will show that the working class can take power, making the case
for revolution much easier in other countries. Divisions among
workers along artificial lines of gender, sexuality, race and
nation will be overcome as the concrete proof of the solidarity
needed for victory will be clearly demonstrated.

But we can't just wait for the revolution to happen. In order to
boost the confidence of workers to fight back and lead struggles to
victory those fighting for social justice need to be organized.
Armed with the experience and knowledge of class struggle politics
and rooted in the lives and activities of the working class, the
revolutionary party can effectively intervene in the struggles of
the day and lead them to victory.

The Zapatistas have called for an alliance of workers, peasants and
native peoples to fight the corporate aganda of the Canadian, U.S.
and Mexican ruling classes. They have argued that we need to
reorganize society to guarantee real democracy, decent jobs, social
services and living conditions for all.

By building a fighting socialist organization here in Canada and
focusing on the power of the international working class to build
a better society, we can ensure that courageous struggles against
exploitation and oppression like those of the Zapatistas will be
successful.