Socialist Resistance

An archive of socialistresistance.org, 2002–2022

Addressing the work' means imagine and organisations capable of articulating overarching demands and

Socialist Resistance no24  |  page 21

This is scanned newsprint, not web text. The original PDFs carried no text layer at all, so every word here was read off the page by OCR. Expect dropped opening letters, run-together words and wrong characters. There was no contents page to cut the paper up by, so the articles were found from the size of their headlines: a headline may carry its kicker, and where an article ran beside a boxed panel a few lines of the neighbour can appear. The scanned issue is the authority; this text is here so the words can be found at all.

and economic importance. Neoliberal reforms have changed the world of work but they have not shrunk it. Neoliberalism has rather fragthe Water struggles. repression and dismissal. More politicised trade union and social mobilisation centres have to be constructed, which can provide mobilisations beyond one single or group of workplaces.

This is just one side of the coin; in many places in the "third world, where huge factories of the transnational corporations have been constructed (Philippines, Indonesia, Vietnam), the 'old' union form is exactly what is needed.

But in most of those places the huge new factories in the "special economic zones' are literally a relatively small island in a sea of informal, unemployed or underemployed workers, who themselves need to be linked to broader mobilisation structures.

Addressing the 'new world of work' to actually attempt to conquer power.

This of course cannot be done by a local or regional body such the Coordinadora.

It a Coordinadora-type organisation existed OLL national basis, that would in itself pose the question of social transition.

Finally, the question of political parties. It is a vital question from the viewpoint of overall strategy.

In a country like Bolivia, the term 'revolutionary' in their name is nearly obligatory for corrupt, right wing and pro-neoliberal parties (2).

Mass popular disillusionment with all kinds of political professionals - including revolutionary and marxist ones - is not surprising; Oscar Olivera talks of the distance between the masses and discourse professionals.

A body that is capable of inserting this complex picture into an historical discourse -in other words being the historic memory of the class'.

And linking the day-to-day struggles with the question of government and power.

Any membership structure that attempts these tasks will become political party, whether it calls itself a 'movement', a 'front' or anything else.

Read /Cochabamba! It is a window on the liberatory potential, and the strategic challenges, of our times. 1 David Harvey, The New Imperialism, Oxford University Press 2003. P1371 2 For example the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR) and the MNR (National