IV370 - September 2005

Stalin Perez Borges, trade union leader and long-standing Trotskyist militant, is at the heart of the revolutionary process in Venezuela. He is one of the four "national coordinators" of the new - and today majority - trade union confederation, the UNT. He is also a member of the "initiating committee" of a new party that is being formed, the Party of Revolution and Socialism.

The contribution given by Pierre Rousset, long-time Fourth International leader and veteran of the 1960s French JCR, at the “Capability Building Seminar” for Filipino Progressive Groups: “Toward a Democratic, Pluralist and Humane Framework and Strategy for Social Change”, Silang, Cavite, Philippines, May 26-28, 2005.

A supporter of the socialist organisation Solidarity and member of the Green Party living in New Orleans reports on the catastrophe which has struck the historic city, impacting disproportionately on the poor and Black people there.

The leftwing coalition Encuentro Progresista - Frente Amplio - Nueva Mayoria triumphed at the Uruguayan elections of October 31, 2004, with Tabaré Vázquez of the Socialist Party being elected president in the first round with 51% of the vote (see IV 363, January 2005). The new president assumed office in March 2005 - Ernesto Herrera examines the record so far of his “progresista” government.

The result of the referendum on the European Constitution held in Luxembourg on July 10th confirms the unprecedented crisis of legitimacy of the European Union. Despite an all-out propaganda campaign in favour of the Constitution,
Luxembourg, which the international press describes as the "spoilt child" of Europe, was the scene, while the campaign lasted, of an unprecedented challenge to neo-liberal Europe.

Government employees, migrants... Whole sections of South Korean society do not enjoy basic rights at work, such as the right to organise, to strike and to collective bargaining. At the moment when the government is implementing neo-liberal policies, militant trade unions are being hit by repression.

The drama of the split in the US AFL-CIO union federation has focussed attention on the depth of the crisis of U.S. unions.

The purpose of the noisy ceremonies of the anniversary of the birth of Solidarnosç is to hide its real nature - a workers’ revolution conducted in the name of authentically socialist values.

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