BRETIGNY-SUR-ORGE, France — The depth of the world capitalist crisis, the imperialist rulers’ drive toward more wars and the need to build revolutionary working-class parties were at the heart of discussions at the Pathfinder stand at this year’s Fete de l’Humanite here, Sept. 12-14. The festival, organized by the French Communist Party, is attended by tens of thousands.
Volunteers from France, and from the Communist Leagues in Canada and the U.K. staffed the booth. It featured books by leaders of the Socialist Workers Party and other revolutionaries, from V.I. Lenin and Leon Trotsky, who led the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, to Fidel Castro and Che Guevara in Cuba, and Thomas Sankara, who led the 1983-87 revolution in Burkina Faso. A total of 120 books and 10 subscriptions to the Militant were sold, the highest number in over a decade.
The festival was held as political turmoil in France is deepening. The government of Prime Minister Francois Bayrou lost a no-confidence vote Sept. 8 after failing to pass a plan to offload more of the capitalist rulers’ crisis onto workers’ backs, including by scrapping two national public holidays.
Julien Michaudon, a worker from Montauban, bought Nouvelle Internationale no. 3, with its lead article “The Second Assassination of Maurice Bishop” by Socialist Workers Party leader Steve Clark. The book describes the accomplishments of the 1979-83 Grenada Revolution led by Bishop, and its overthrow by a Stalinist faction.
“I am pessimistic real change can happen,” Michaudon told volunteer Claude Bleton, pointing to the weight of the capitalist media.
Rival ruling classes are “marching to another world war and dragging us with them,” Bleton said. That’s why the Communist Leagues in Australia, Canada, and the U.K. and the Socialist Workers Party in the U.S. are campaigning with these books, and urging workers to join them in building proletarian parties that can overturn capitalism.
Bleton pointed Michaudon to The Turn to Industry: Forging a Proletarian Party by SWP National Secretary Jack Barnes. The book describes the working-class program, composition and course of parties that are needed to lead workers to fight for political power. Michaudon got a copy of the book.
“What’s happening in Ukraine is terrible, but Macron is using the ‘Russian menace’ to rearm,” Christophe Farinet told this worker-correspondent. “The thought that France is on a war path, with all that is already going on in the world today, is scary. Meanwhile, the government is cutting back on social services.”
Farinet is a member of the waste, sewer and sanitation section of the General Confederation of Labour union in Paris. He was interested in learning about the strike of refuse workers in Birmingham in the U.K.
“The government and Labour-run council in Birmingham side with the bosses. They’re trying to break the strike,” I said. I pointed to the importance of winning solidarity for the strikers and described the work of the Communist League to build a revolutionary working-class party in the U.K. Farinet signed up for an introductory subscription to the Militant.
A number of discussions took place at the Pathfinder booth over Israel’s war to destroy Hamas and prevent it from carrying out another Holocaust.
French President Emmanuel Macron had joined Hamas supporters and other capitalist governments by recognizing a Palestinian state at the United Nations, seeking to put pressure on Israel to end its war. We explained that this could only mean a state led by Hamas.
Volunteers at the booth sold six copies of the French edition of The Fight Against Jew-Hatred and Pogroms in the Imperialist Epoch: Stakes for the International Working Class. Dozens of the June 25 SWP National Committee statement “Defend Israel’s battle to prevent another Holocaust! US troops, bases and warships out of the Mideast!” were distributed.