Workers World at the Left Forum

Among the 1,000 speakers ready to present their ideas at the 2013 Left Forum at Pace University in downtown Manhattan this June 7-9 are a dozen participating in panels organized by Workers World newspaper. The theme of this year’s Forum is “Mobilizing for Economic/Ecological Transformation.” The times and rooms for these WW panels are listed below.

Nearly every political tendency left of the openly capitalist Democratic Party participates in the Forum, along with publishers and research groups, defense committees for political prisoners and most organized forces that might be called progressive.

The weight of opinion expressed at the Left Forum reflects social democratic voices, academia and the arts. At the closing plenary session, Sunday, June 9 at 6 p.m., the speakers will be Marxist environmentalist John Bellamy Foster, Bolivian Vice President Álvaro García Linera, professor Catherine Mulder (chair) and political scientist Tadzio Müller from the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, which is close to the party in Germany known as die Linke, the Left.

The Left Forum also presents a venue for ideas of organizations that identify as the Leninist left, such as Workers World Party.

Workers World newspaper, which reflects a revolutionary communist point of view, has pulled together speakers for three panels, which we list here in the order they appear on the Left Forum agenda.

Session 1. “People’s Power Assembly and other mass resistance to ‘austerity.’” Room E303, Saturday, June 8, 10 a.m. – 11:50 a.m. Larry Hales, chair, Peoples Power Assembly; Betsey Piette, Workers World newspaper, Pennsylvania anti-fracking; Abayomi Azikiwe, Pan African News Wire, Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions and Utility Shut-offs; Teresa Gutierrez, May 1 Coalition for Worker and Immigrant Rights; Larry Holmes, Peoples Power Assembly.

Attempts at mass organizing to resist the unrelenting attack on the U.S. working class in the areas of the environment, the struggle for immigrant rights and housing rights, and against police brutality, include the People’s Power Assembly, which was a key organizer of the May 11-12 March for Jobs and Justice from Baltimore to Washington, D.C. How organizations of the working class independent of the Republican and Democratic Parties are needed to mobilize effective resistance.

Session 1. “The Fighting Youth Movement & the Ideology of Marxism-Leninism.” Room W601, Saturday, June 8, 10 a.m. – 11:50 a.m. LeiLani Dowell, WW managing editor, chair; Caleb Maupin of Red Youth; Thea Connelly of Montclair State University Students for a Democratic Society; Scott Williams of Workers World Party Marxist School of Theory and Practice. Ideology must go together with action.

Young activists explain how the ideology of Marxism-Leninism helps them evaluate what to do to take action regarding anti-war and anti-imperialist events, to fight racism and police brutality, to defend the environment and to participate on the side of the workers and oppressed peoples in the class struggle.

Session 7. “The People’s Republic of China and U.S. imperialism’s “pivot” to Asia.” Room W609, Sunday, June 9, 3 p.m. – 4:50 p.m. WW managing editor Monica Moorehead, editor of “Marxism, Reparations & the Black Freedom Struggle,” on the U.S. role in the Philippines, chairing; WW editor in chief Deirdre Griswold on Korea; WW’s contributing editor Fred Goldstein, author of “Low Wage Capitalism,” on the internal struggle in China; Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of Pan African News Wire on competition of U.S. and China in Africa.

China’s revolution was one of the greatest in the history of humanity. Now, 64 years after the victory of the Chinese Communist Party and 37 years after the death of Mao Zedong, is China headed toward capitalism? What role does Chinese trade and banking play in Africa and Latin America? Does the U.S. “pivot” to Asia increase the danger of war?

Some other panels of interest are listed below:

Session 2. “The War on Africa.” Room W619, Saturday, June 8, 12 noon – 1:40 p.m., organized by the United National Anti-war Coalition. The panel will include African-American anti-war leaders, Margaret Kimberly, Abayomi Azikiwe, and Ana Edwards, who recently returned from Mali, as well at Patrick Bond.

Session 5. “Aggression by another name — How the U.S. wages war on Syria.” Room W504, Sunday, June 9, 10 a.m. – 11:50 a.m. chaired by WBAI producer Dr. Barbara Nimri Aziz; with WW contributing editor Joyce Chediac; International Action Center co-coordinator Sara Flounders; Ghias Moussa, M.D. and member of Syrian American Forum, N.J.

Session 6. “Imperialism Today: What it is and why we must fight it.” Room W616, Sunday, June 9, 12 noon – 1:50 p.m., organized by the International League for People’s Struggle. Chair Gary Labao and speakers Abayomi Azikiwe, Jackelyn Mariano and Bill Dores.

Some others include Session 6. “Public Resource Theft: Lessons of New Orleans Public Housing for NYC.” Room E325, Sunday, June 9, 12 noon – 1:50 p.m. And Session 7. ”Dialectical Materialism vs. The New Physics.” Room W520, Sunday, June 9, 3 p.m. – 4:50 p.m.

Something like 350 panels have been organized. The schedule for all panels and full meetings is available at leftforum.org.

Workers World newspaper will also have a table at the Forum and some of its contributors will be available near the table for discussions on the day they are scheduled to speak.