BY JOSHUA CARROLL
This column is written and edited by the Young Socialists (YS), an international organization of young workers, students, and other youth fighting for socialism. For more information about the YS write to: Young Socialists, 1573 N. Milwaukee, P.O. Box #478, Chicago, Ill. 60622. Tel: (773) 772-0551. Compuserve: 105162,605

CHICAGO-"The example set by the 185,000 workers on strike against United Parcel Service poses the most serious threat to the ruling class today," said Jack Willey in the opening report to a meeting of the Young Socialists (YS) National Committee held here August 16 - 17. Willey is the organizer of the YS National Executive Committee (NEC).

The Teamsters strike against the nation's largest delivery service was at the center of discussion at the two- day meeting. YS leaders discussed the next steps the revolutionary youth organization can take to respond to workers struggles and use its campaigns to attract, recruit, and integrate young fighters into its ranks.

A representative of the Socialist Workers Party Political Committee and a delegation from the Young Socialists in Canada also attended the meeting.

YS National Committee members discussed the volatility of the stock market and the rapid pace at which it has been rising during the current economic upturn, what spokespeople for the ruling class refer to as the "Wall Street miracle." In his report to the meeting, Willey pointed to the debate in the ruling class, reflected in the big-business press, over whether the recent boom in the stock market can be sustained.

One part of the ruling class argues that this "boom" is not sustainable. Another school of bourgeois economists advances the view that new economic laws of motion have come into play, that the normal ups and down in the business cycle don't apply anymore, and that the U.S. economy is locked into a pattern of steady growth and rise in productivity.

"The capitalist class has factored into their investments the patterns of the last two decades, that workers' wages will continue to go down and labor productivity will continue rising," Willey said. "Productivity, however, is stagnating. And there is another thing that threatens all this: the class struggle. The Wall Street `miracle' only works if workers continue to accept take-back contracts, two-tier wages, and less pensions. A victory by the Teamsters against UPS, for example, would go in the opposite direction of what the rulers want and need. It would represent a big setback for them." The day after the NC meeting ended, UPS and the Teamsters reached a tentative settlement favorable to strikers.

Willey noted some of the recent developments in the labor movement such as the six local strikes that UAW workers have waged against General Motors since the beginning of this year. The pattern has been that GM has settled quickly in each case and was not prepared to provoke any long walkouts, unlike what the auto giant did a year ago during the 17-day-long strike by auto parts workers in Dayton, Ohio. Willey also pointed to the recent United Farm Workers' organizing drives in California and Washington state.

Lessons of Detroit labor march
At the meeting there was discussion on the 25,000-strong demonstration in Detroit on June 21 in solidarity with workers locked out by the Detroit News and Free Press. A few days before the march workers received news of a ruling by the National Labor Relations Board ordering the newspapers to immediately reinstate the more than 1,000 union members who have been on strike since 1995. The ruling had an impact on the demonstration, turning it into a victory rally for workers in the six striking unions.

During the NC meeting, participants received news of a ruling by a federal judge denying the request of the NLRB. "This shows that workers have drawn a line and are resisting, but are not on the offensive yet," said Willey in his summary report to the meeting. "The bosses will continue to try to drive wages and working conditions down. In fact, as workers fight back, polarization will grow as the employers and the government try to run union organizers off the fields and plants, sponsor pro-company rallies that involve some workers - like the one growers recently organized in Watsonville, California - and defeat union organizing drives. This makes it all the more important, and slightly easier, to convince young fighters to join a revolutionary youth organization that's proletarian in character."

The YS didn't respond to the June 21 mobilization in Detroit adequately, said YS NEC member Verónica Poses in a tasks and perspectives report to the meeting. Only a handful of Young Socialists attended the march. The National Committee pledged to never repeat this again.

"It should be second nature for us to respond when workers are fighting," Póses said. "Many YS members were recruited through going to picket lines of workers in struggle and seeing the potential that the working class has when it organizes itself to fight back."

World youth festival
YS leaders also evaluated the work of the organization leading up to, and during the 14th World Festival of Youth and Students, held in Cuba July 28 - August 5.

"The Young Socialists came out of the festival stronger, more confident, and more competent in functioning on an international level at events of this type, dominated by forces that look politically to the old Moscow Stalinist bureaucracy and others who put forward that the solution to the problems of the world is to reform capitalism," said Willey in his report. "YS members sought out revolutionary- minded youth attending the gathering, collaborated with other organizations like the Movement of Landless Rural Workers from Brazil and the Union of Young Communists from Cuba in common campaigns, took part in debates raising communist politics, and sold hundreds of Pathfinder books and pamphlets. As a result of this work, and the preparation in the United States before the festival, two young people asked to join the YS during the festival." A number of other festival delegates requested to join the YS after returning to the United States from Cuba.

Strengthening the YS nationally
The YS National Committee discussed the recent moves made by the SWP and the Young Socialists leaderships to strengthen the communist movement in the coal field regions of Alabama and Western Pennsylvania. A few weeks before the National Committee (NC) meeting, YS NC member Diana Newberry transferred from Morgantown, West Virginia, to Pittsburgh. Meg Novak, another YS NC member, moved from Chicago to Birmingham. YS member Paul Coltrin from the Houston chapter will also be moving to Pittsburgh to help build a YS chapter there.

"It's important that the Young Socialists have strong units of our movement in the coal mining regions to be able to relate to workers in the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) and be ready for when a new generation gets hired in the mines," said Poses in her report. "UMWA members have a long history of struggle and the coal industry is fundamental to the U.S. economy."

Meg Novak talked about her experiences selling the Militant to mineworkers in the Birmingham area. "We sold six papers at a portal sale and we've run into UMWA members at the Teamsters picket lines at UPS," she said during the discussion. Novak also noted that coal miners in Kentucky recently voted for UMWA representation (see box on back page).

National Committee members voted to continue on this course and transfer another member of the Young Socialists to Pittsburgh and another person to Los Angeles. "A move to Los Angeles should be combined with getting SWP and YS members into garment factories organized by the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE) in that city," Poses stated. "Los Angeles has one of the largest concentrations of garment workers in the United States, a very important component of the working class."

Fall propaganda campaigns
Campaigning to widely distribute socialist literature will be at the center of YS activity over the fall. Participants voted to join with Socialist Workers Party members and supporters in getting subscriptions to the Militant, and its Spanish-language sister monthly Perspectiva Mundial, into the hands of as many fighters as possible.

The current campaign to get the newly released Pathfinder book Pombo: A Man of Che's `Guerrilla' along with The Changing Face of US Politics: Working Class Politics and the Trade Unions into the hands of workers and youth will help prepare for the subscription drive in the fall and draw workers and young people closer to the communist movement, Póses said.

As a way of helping chapters carry this out, YS leaders will be available to tour in cities across the country and speak at college and high school campuses, at meetings of youth interested in the YS, and at Militant Labor Forums.

YS National Committee members reaffirmed the decision made by the Young Socialists convention in April to have its members volunteer at the print shop where Pathfinder books and the Militant are printed. José Aravena, a YS member from Newark who volunteers in the print shop, talked about the impact the UPS strike has had on sales of Pathfinder books. "We've had increased orders for the Teamster series by Farrell Dobbs and we'll have to reprint them soon," he said.

The National Committee also elected a new National Executive Committee that will guide the work of the organization for the coming months.  
 
 
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