items for the debate of up to 1200 words in length. Any opinions printed in the debate are those of the authors only and do not necessarily represent the views of SR. Tami Peterson G uest speaker Jose Sagaz of the Solidarity Campaign made one of the most telling statements of the evenlng the London Socialist Resistance meeting on February 22.
A discussion took place, not oniy on current events ln Venezuela and Bolivia, but why such struggles are happening at this particular time in this particular place.
lose stressed that revolutionaries in Britain and elsewhere may have a thing or two to learn from our fellow revolutionaries in Latin America, regardless of how much we know about Lenin and the Bolshevik Party.
He related how after the anti-war demo, "people were telling me 'We had 2 million people on the streets!' and I said 'Yes... and what then? Did you call a general strike? Did you march to Number 10 to demand Blair step down?'"
Obviously, the way Latin American politics is different from how we in Europe or the US experience political activism today.
After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989, one needs only to look at the most exciting political events of the next decade to see that the idea of building "revolutionary party" as a means to take power was simply not on the aceaa even mooueo mere wa still widespread anger at the oyoLCl.
In the US and Europe, this manifested itself in the form of the anti-capitalist movements, where hundreds of thousands of quite politicised, mostly young people took to the streets and created a movement whose echo persists in today's discussions around neo-liberalism.
In Latin America the inspiring struggle of the EZLN (Zapatistas) Chiapas, a largely indigenous movelcll. purposefully rejected the party structure but instead used a mainstay of Lalu amenca revo udon• ary politics, the guerilla struggle. However, guerilla warfare is largely off their agenda as well.
In its place, we see the masses using the tools of elections and street protests to place in power leaders such as Chavez or Morales whom they hope will nationalize natural resources and begin using movements that no party suuclute exists
Besides being condescending to those involved in those movements and even if one beneves inis lo bellruc, lu would seem that the left's inability to think outside of the idea of a "party" as being necessary for progressive transformation may have cut us off from looking at what these movements have to teach us.
If we fail to analyze events as they occur and try to fit the square pegs of actual events into the round holes of our notions of what should be happening we would be pushed further down the road of sectarian irrelevance.
Are these movements doomed to failure because they are not following a predetermined model?
One need only look at Latin America's history to see that in every place (waere struggle has occurred and in every place where the masses were victorious, this did not
behest of a occur al mne Bolshevik-style party.
If anything, it was largely the guerilla movements that filled the role of overthrowing the state. Sometimes they triumphed, as in Cuba. and sometimes they failed, as in Bolivia in the 1960s.
While it is too early to tell, the masses in Bolivia and Venezuela, in particular, may be willing to take these small tary failing to crush the social movement. that brought much of the countrv to a grinding halt last summer.
We cannot assume that the Morales government will go the same way as Allende's in Chile in 1973.
Further, to give credit where credit is due, activists in Latin America have continually tried to look to new ways to change their conditions and their governments. We in Europe and in North America have done nothing of the sort since the 1960s.
In this sort of situation, if Chavez or Morales refuses to do what those who put them in power want, I am very confident that those very same people will remove them, by force if necessary.
Could we say the samne thing about Bush or Blair? Hardly. That in and of itself should tell us something about the importance of what 1s occurring
Indeed, just because what has happened Latin America is a step forward does not mean that it will not be defeated and end up being "Iwo steps back", but many are ready to damn the foetus while still in the womb instead of supporting the ongoing and inspiring struggles of those in Latin America as they fight for a way forward in a world where struggle of this sort remains only too scarce.
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The recent elections in Nepal attracted attention because of the high level of nonparticipation. LIAM MAC UAID looks at the background and explains why Nepal's Maoists offer only a dead end. NEPAL is living through the hardly surprising.
The country was in a state of emergency from 2001 until 2005. Prior to that it had had a dozen governments in as many years. King Gyanendra ordered the army to crush the Maoists.
The army took this as permission to indulge in mass murder supported by police and paramilitaries. Nepal now has the highest number of unexplained disappearances in the world. More than 1,200 people have been taken by the army. Few soldiers have been political sympathy or by fear. Many the CPN-M's demands on women's rights, abolition of the caste system, healthcare and sanitation reflect the desires of the most oppressed people in Nepal.
It seems apparent that the Nepalese state is not capable of defeating the CPN-M. The army does not seem to understand that winning the support of the peasantry won't happen by killing and terrorising them.
It has not managed to inflict any significant defeats