Like the preceding world youth festivals in Havana in 1997 and Algiers in 2001, this gathering will bring together thousands of students, workers, and other youth from every continent who are looking for ways to fight imperialist oppression and exploitation everywhere, from the Mideast to the Americas.

The fact that this festival takes place in Venezuela, a political flashpoint in the world today, provides a special opportunity. It’s a chance to learn firsthand about the intensifying struggles of workers and farmers in Venezuela for land, jobs, literacy, and improved living conditions in face of efforts by Venezuelan capitalists, backed by Washington, to overthrow the government of President Hugo Chávez and push back the gains and self-confidence that working people have won. It’s a chance to learn about the example of internationalist Cuban volunteers working in Venezuela as teachers and medical workers—a glimpse of what workers and farmers can accomplish when they make a revolution and take state power as they have done in Cuba.

At a recent meeting of the U.S. National Preparatory Committee (NPC), which is organizing the U.S. delegation to the festival, participants heard reports from a dozen newly formed local organizing committees on their initial efforts to build delegations from their areas. Across the country there are opportunities right now to work with others to form local organizing committees in cities where they don’t exist and to expand out from existing coalitions to other campuses and elsewhere in surrounding regions, doing so through the national committee.

Reaching out to involve students, workers, farmers, and other youth, including a united effort to draw in the broadest range of organizations interested in building the festival, will maximize the number of people who can attend the gathering in Caracas.

In a number of cities, local organizing committees are holding meetings, giving presentations to student groups, setting up information tables on campuses, distributing the NPC’s festival brochure and local literature, and organizing other activities to promote participation in the world youth festival. These efforts provide opportunities to explain the class struggle unfolding in Venezuela, report on the internationalist work of Cuban volunteers there, and mobilize defense of Venezuela and Cuba in face of Washington’s confrontational course and military build-up in neighboring Colombia. Some have organized showings and discussions of The Revolution Will Not be Televised, a documentary that shows the mass working-class mobilizations in Caracas that were key in defeating the April 2002 U.S.-backed military coup in Venezuela.

For young workers and students who are potentially attracted to the working-class resistance here and abroad, getting involved in such political work can help draw them closer to an understanding of the class struggle and the need to join a movement to make a revolution of workers and farmers in the United States or wherever we may live.

One of the first questions young people interested in attending the world youth festival in Venezuela will ask is: how can I get there? In each city, collective efforts to plan travel, raise funds to cover costs, and work out other practical arrangements are needed to ensure the largest possible delegation to the international gathering.
 
 
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