The "manifesto," as it was soon named, became the center of discussion at a West Coast regional conference hosted by the California Young Socialists chapters in San Francisco September 5-6.
It appears in New International, and here, together with the "Aims of the Young Socialists," the opening section of a document entitled the "Young Socialist Organizer," adopted by the second national convention of the Young Socialists in Atlanta, Georgia, March 28-30, 1997.
The California regional conference called the third national convention of the Young Socialists, to be held in Los Angeles, December 4-6, 1998, and placed both documents before the Young Socialists to initiate preconvention discussion in every chapter.
A. What does it mean to be a part of a functioning chapter of the Young Socialists in Los Angeles?
1. Political context provided by Jack Barnes in New International no. 10, "Imperialism's March toward Fascism and War."
a. In recent past, harder for young fighters "to see
how they could link up with a social force, with the working
class and labor movement, that had the power to bring about
change . . . harder yet for them to connect up with a
broader tradition of struggle" in the working class (p.
222). But today there exists an open field where the YS can
function as a revolutionary youth organization.
b. ". . . more young people today . . . are becoming
interested in politics and are willing to fight. They hate
the consequences of capitalism . . . the racism, the police
brutality, the attacks on women's rights, the destruction of
the environment, the unemployment, the wars and threats of
war. . . . Wherever there is resistance to oppression and
exploitation, they want to join the battle" (p. 225).
c. ". . . seek to politically convince every young
rebel we can, before he or she becomes committed to crank
ideas, is pulled toward the radical right, or simply comes
to terms over time with capitalism and sinks back into
workaday life in bourgeois society" (p. 235).
d. ". . . I am raising something different: that we
cannot think about the world clearly today without the
beginnings of motion toward a youth organization. Why is
this so? Because in addition to the working-class
experience, composition, and continuity without which any
communist organization will go off the rails politically,
there are also points in history at which so much is
changing so rapidly that even the best fighters will be
disoriented unless they can break from habits of thought
developed in the past and see the world through the eyes of
a generation just awakening to political life" (p. 236).
e. YS attempting to understand our place within this
context as a real, functioning chapter that is increasing
its level of political activity and recruitment.
B. Increasing political activity of the Los Angeles chapter of Young Socialists
1. Political involvement with youth and students
a. Community, plant-gate, and campus sales teams:
California State University, Los Angeles (CSLA), University
of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), United Airlines, door-to-
door subscription drive campaign for the Militant and
Perspectiva Mundial
b. Hands Off Iraq political work: Occidental College,
UCLA, and picket lines
c. YS Class Series: weekly classes at bookstore and
Occidental
d. Welcome Back from Kosova, Havana, and Cairo
Conference: bringing interested youth to the conference to
discuss talks by party and YS leaders, and involvement and
responsibility, including financial, by YS members
e. Socialist Workers campaign: upcoming campaigning for
SWP candidates, one of whom is a YS member from LA
f. Jobs and the proletarianization of the Young
Socialists
C. Building a stronger YS chapter: Recruitment and contacts
a. How to win youth to a working-class perspective:
"Take advantage of any political opening. . . . Join
demonstrations and other protests that take place; take part
in whatever resistance there is on the job; go onto campus
to meet whoever we can; get socialist literature around as
broadly as possible. . . . To present the socialist
alternative. . . . [And] basing what we do on an objective,
thought-out understanding of politics
b. and a disciplined and sustainable, a proletarian,
approach to organization. [Otherwise] we will end up
frittering away our accomplishments and disorganizing our
work" (p. 228).
1. by taking a more conscious approach at being a part
of building a variety of youth-led actions
2. YS classes/education: Pathfinder arsenals,
Militant, and Perspectiva Mundial
3. Steady, patient political work to win new members
4. Maintaining focus within broader youth and student
coalitions
c. Clarity in defining the Young Socialists
1. YS is not a "turn" organization
2. Fast-track vs. quality political recruitment
d. How does the YS function in relation to the party?
1. Committee work with SWP
2. Different and auxiliary organization
3. Working on Militant articles with comrades
e. Campaign for Socialist Workers Party candidates
"For the young Marx and Engels, joining this
organization of revolutionary-minded workers was a necessary
step in recognizing themselves as actors in history who, in
order to be effective in politics, needed to be part of the
vanguard movement of a class" (p. 231).
AIMS OF THE YOUNG SOCIALISTS
The central aim of the Young Socialists is to participate
in the fight to establish a workers and farmers government
that will abolish capitalism in the United States and join in
the worldwide fight for socialism. The YS strives to win young
fighters to our political perspective, that of revolutionary
socialism. We educate ourselves and other fighters with the
history and lessons of the working class and apply these to
the skirmishes and small-scale struggles that break out today
in preparation for the major class battles ahead of us. Our
political program and activity stem from 150 years of the
modern class struggle and the principles developed by the
revolutionary workers movement.
We also recognize that a youth organization cannot lead workers and their allies in the overthrow of the capitalist class and the conquest of a workers and farmers government. A mass revolutionary party of the Leninist type is needed. Our work is aimed to help facilitate the building of such a party. To that end, we collaborate and have fraternal relations with the Socialist Workers Party, the nucleus of such a party in the United States.
The Young Socialists is organizationally independent and politically subordinate to the Socialist Workers Party. We look to the Socialist Workers Party and its experience and continuity in the class struggle, which can be traced back to Marx and Engels, for political leadership. The Socialist Workers Party, along with the Young Socialists, make up the nucleus of the proletarian vanguard in this country. The SWP and YS have a structured, formal, organizational relationship, conducted through our respective National Committees and their elected executive bodies - the SWP Political Committee and the YS National Executive Committee. On a local level, Young Socialists chapters and branches of the SWP coordinate our work through the elected leadership bodies of the chapters and branches - the executive committees of those organizations.
The way we organize ourselves flows from our political aims. In order to effectively carry out our goals, the YS must be a cohesive and disciplined organization. We have adapted democratic centralism, used by the vanguard party, to the needs of the YS as the method for carrying out our aims.
Democracy is a method of reaching decisions, which requires organized discussion, debate, and a vote.
The positions adopted by majority vote are the positions all YS members carry out in a centralized way. Majority rule is fundamental to the concept of democratic centralism. The minority may maintain its disagreements and raise them at the appropriate time within the organization, but is bound by the majority decision and the YS engages in political activity united and with a common purpose. This maintains both internal democracy and the ability of the organization to act with unity. This is based on fundamental agreement with the political program and principles of the YS, laying the foundation for discipline.
Membership is based on political agreement with the principles of the YS and active participation in the work of the organization. Responsibilities of membership include attending weekly chapter meetings, payment of monthly dues, and carrying out the work of the chapter on a weekly basis.