2006-10-07
Against the G8 summit in 2007 in Heiligendamm!
Call by Anti-G8-Alliance for a revolutionary perspective
In the summer of 2007, the heads of state of Germany, Italy, France, Russia, Great Britain, Japan, Canada and the USA will meet for the so-called G8 summit in Heiligendamm in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in north-east Germany. They will be well protected by police and the military, and they want to demonstrate their unity to the media. They will try to present themselves as the legitimate leadership of the “civilized world” and organize to force through their common interests. Contrary to their actual policy they will again feign commitment against world hunger, disease, poverty and terrorism. Just like at past summits, tens of thousands will protest against the meeting to show the real meaning of the G8.
G8 – peace, freedom and democracy?
The G8 summit will take place in a political situation in which the contradictions are growing in Germany as in the other G8 states. There are increasingly far-reaching attacks on the standard of living of the working class in the form of repressive laws and cuts in wages, in the social systems and in retirement plans. More and more people are forced into unemployment, precarious employment or low-paid jobs. Already millions of people live under the poverty line – even full-time employment no longer guarantees the former standard of living. At the same time privatization leads to a clear deterioration in standards for workers in this sector as well as for the general population, who pay higher prices for fewer services. Steadily rising costs for rent, heating, water and electricity, as well as the discontinuation of many previously guaranteed services in the health care system and in education are the concrete results. Women are especially affected by these cuts, as they are in a worse position in many sectors and the cuts have an especially dramatic effect on them. Because of the legal regulations from the “Hartz” laws, many women get no social support because their life partners’ income is calculated as their own – this is only one of many examples. Also many immigrants, as a part of the lower classes of society, are affected even more drastically by these developments, and as soon as they are no longer useful for the economy, they are threatened by massive state discrimination and deportation. In addition, they are held up as scapegoats for the worsening situation and are exposed to social prejudices, exclusions and attacks. However, in the end, it is characteristic for the current attacks that they no longer affect only the marginalized social groups, but the majority of the population. Consequently more protest and resistance is appearing against these attacks in the form of mass demonstrations and strikes.
The offensive of capital takes place not only on a national level, but affects people in all parts of the world. The imperialist states have always used every means possible to push through their interests worldwide – with wars, economic sanctions or the installation or the logistical and military support of regimes faithful to them. Thus nowadays the G8 states are involved directly in imperialist wars, arm to prepare themselves for the next wars, or take part by supplying arms to conflict regions. A bitter irony is that they are currently fighting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, against brutal regimes they once installed and supported themselves – as long as they profited from them. The victim is, in any case, the majority of the population.
With the help of institutions like the IMF, the World Bank or the WTO, with commercial agreements like GATS and with direct influence on the regimes in different countries, they secure worldwide access to cheap raw materials and manpower for themselves – at the expense of the population in the affected countries. Millions of people are forced into brutal exploitation in sweat shops, from Eastern Europe over Asia to Africa, or the foundations of their survival are destroyed by the robbery of raw materials available there. The dam projects in India, which led to devastating poverty and masses of refugees, or the structural adjustment programs in Argentina, which led to a wave of the impoverishment, are only two of countless examples worldwide which demonstrate the direct results of the policy of the IMF and the World Bank.
The resistance of the affected people – whether against the military attacks, the inhuman conditions of work or the theft of natural resources – is suppressed either directly by the thugs of the big companies or by the regimes which are financed and equipped by the big companies, with their state apparatus: the police, the secret services and the military.
This work of capital or its representatives is an expression of increasing competition between big companies and the countries in which they are based, as well as increasing difficulties in further raising profits. To solve this crisis they attempt to increase exploitation and to lower the expenditures in social areas, to reshape all social relations according to the interests of capital and to secure markets worldwide – as these are divided up, the competition must increase.
The G8 summit was brought to life to defuse the inner-imperialist contradictions – specifically, for example, the customs disputes between the EU and the USA or the currency competition between the euro and the dollar – and to mark out, if necessary, the respective zones of influence. At the same time it serves to standardize strategies for exploitation and decide on measures to prevent uprisings, and to present these in propaganda as “necessary” or even “in the interest everyone”.
Those who don’t fight have already lost!
There are more than enough good reasons to use the opportunity provided by the G8 summit to demonstrate against the policy of the ruling class, whose mightiest political representatives meet there, and to bring protest and resistance against the summit out on the street. The mobilization must be led by those who are affected by social cuts and “Hartz” laws, privatization, wage cuts, lengthening of the working week, racist discrimination or sexist oppression and who have, therefore, an interest in changing things. However it must also be a platform for the advanced and revolutionary movements in all parts of the world to present their struggles in the capitalist metropolises: against capitalist exploitation and impoverishment of big parts of the world population in the affected countries, against the imperialistic plundering of national resources, against expulsion, occupation and war, against the attacks of the oligarchy. Hence, the dialogue with the liberation movements and their long experiences must also serve to develop strategies against the common imperialist enemy. Here the resistance against the capitalist offensive must stand in solidarity to the different progressive and revolutionary movements worldwide to co-ordinate common actions and to develop common perspectives.
From resistance to a perspective!
Protest and resistance cannot only be directed against the symptoms of the policies of the leading capitalist states. If we want to change the situation, we must analyze and understand it.
The foundations of the concrete policies of the G8 states are the foundations of the capitalistic system. These foundations are based on exploitation, competition and ownership of the means of production by a minority which holds power in society. On this basis there can be no real steps towards emancipation, because the rights and needs of people and the preservation of the environment are subordinated to the profit system. All appeals to the profiteers and managers of this system, appeals for a more social version of this system, appeals for at least minimum concessions have proven hopeless – the current worsening of the situation makes them more hopeless than ever.
The current developments also make it clear that the capitalist system with its exploitation and repression always produces the possibility for overcoming it: The inner logic of capitalism and the supposed weakness of the exploited lead to increasing fierceness of the “class struggle from above” in the capitalist metropolises, which means that the question of real alternatives is posed for the people affected.
In this situation it’s obvious that the reformist policies of the social democracy and the trade union leaderships, which aim for a compromise between the classes, lead in this situation to a dead-end, or they position themselves openly on the capitalists’ side and begin to lose their integrative role. Based on this development, the possibility of an actual transformation of social relations towards a liberated society makes itself real. The appearance of new, mass protest movements, strikes and attempts of different forms of organization are the first signs for the fact that the times when there was a consensus in the G8 states and the social contradictions were exported, are coming to an end. Besides the conflict zones in different parts of the world, the revolutionary movements and organizations building on decades of experience, from Nepal via India, Colombia and the Philippines to Mexico, capital finds itself in an objectively precarious situation in the metropolises as well, and the tendency is for this to increase. The pre-emptive internal armament and the ever more brutal methods against social protests, sometimes by attacks in the bourgeois media, sometimes by (supposed) offers of integration, sometimes by crude police actions, already show how this problem is to be solved. However, the results of the relatively small strikes in the car industry, at airports or in the civil service at least give an idea of the power of the class of the wage-earners, and of what the results of even bigger and better-organised workers’ struggles or even a general strike could have. Also the struggles in other parts of the world, like the factory occupations in Argentina, mass protests and riots in France against the attacks on protection against dismissal, the guerrilla struggles and militant and political general strikes in Nepal or the countless other labour struggles show which forms of struggle are possible as an answer to the attacks of capital – and also must be developed here.
But for this it is necessary to bring the isolated protests, resistance and workers’ struggles again onto a political plane: to recognize the capitalist system as a cause of these developments and to strive for its overthrow. The fact that the revolutionary forces are so weak after many mistakes and defeats, especially in Germany, that they currently have almost no political influence to intervene in current developments, presents this necessity all the more urgently.
Together with racist attacks against migrants, “public opinion” is to be mobilized in a social-chauvinistic to pre-emptively split a possible common resistance of all affected persons.
Mobilizations like the one against the G8 summit can be an occasion to unite ourselves, to conduct discussions and gain experience. They can be used to explain criticisms of the dominant social relations and the necessity of a revolutionary transformation of these relations, as well as to bring together existing structures and thus to strengthen them. Decisive is what develops from this. Only by a continuous organizing process of the revolutionary forces on different levels, the development of a fund theory and practice, can capitalism really be overthrown and a liberated social order can be created. The current, temporary protests and movements must be used as an impulse for an engaging organization, to develop from resistance to a broader perspective.
Get involved in the Anti-G8-Alliance for a revolutionary perspective!
We want to use the mobilization against the G8, in a situation of increasing contradictions, to connect the defensive struggle against the current attack at home as well as globally with the fight for a liberated social order. The meaning of the mobilization for us is more than making revolutionary theory and practice visible, but also to organize common engaging structures which will continue beyond the G8 summit.
We assume that the G8 summit offers an important opportunity for the revolutionary, class-struggle-oriented and internationalist left just in the current situation. A successful mobilization could be the starting point for a revolutionary movement and organizing becoming and stronger again in Germany.
In addition it is in our opinion necessary to work on the basis of basic positions and clear demands which are directed against the central points of attack of capital:
• Resistance against the general offensive of capital at home!
• For class struggle in workplaces, schools and universities, against social cuts, longer working hours, wage and pensions cuts!
• Against the Lisbon Agenda, the Bolkestein directive, the further flexibilisation of services and working conditions!
• No imperialist war and occupation! No war against Iran! Immediate withdrawal of the occupying troops from Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine! No to Plan Colombia! No to Plan Patriota!
• Solidarity with all revolutionary and emancipatory forces and their struggle against imperialism.
• Fight against all reactionary and dehumanising positions! Fight against racism, patriarchy, anti-Semitism and Islam-phobia.
• No to IMF, World Bank, WTO and GATS! Cancellation of all debts of the countries of the Tricont held by the imperialist states and their institutions!
• No to the imperialist EU! No European army and battle groups! No to worldwide military interventions or and domestic interventions!
• No racism and national oppression! No to fortress Europe! For open borders! Against all restrictions on entry and residence! Equal rights for all!
• Against the destructive exploitation of nature and the environment!
• Freedom for all political prisoners worldwide! No to the so-called “anti terror laws” and black lists! Resistance is not terrorism!
Starting with these basic positions, ideas and demands we want to build up our alliance, mobilize against the G8 summit and develop a constructive collaboration with all alliances, organizations of the left and rank-and-file groups of the trade unions.
AK Kultur & Klassenkampf Ostalb, Autonome Antifa Lüdenscheid/Gruppe Internationale Solidarität Lüdenscheid, Autonome Kommunisten Berlin, Breites Bündnis für Kolumbien, Gegeninformationsbüro Berlin, Gruppe Arbeitermacht, Gruppe Internationale Solidarität Magdeburg, Initiativ e.V. Duisburg, Kommunistische Jugendgruppe Revolution, Revolutionäre Aktion, Sozialforum Hamburg-Eimsbüttel