The closing speech of Giorgos Marinos, member of the PB of the CC of the KKE, at the European Communist Meeting

“We thank the communist parties that took part in the meeting, which was organized by the KKE, and the comrades who contributed to the discussion and shared their experience from the development of the class struggle in their countries against the offensive of capital and the political forces that serve its interests. We know that the problems are complex, that there are different approaches on very serious issues of strategic importance,that the communist movement in Europe and more generally has serious difficulties but we will insist. The formation of a revolutionary strategy and the corresponding tactics is a difficult but inevitable issue.

It is the irreplaceable tool that will create a solid basis for the ideological-political and mass struggle and will contribute to the concentration and preparation of the working class and popular forces in the conflict with capital, its parties and imperialist unions for the overthrow of the capitalist barbarity.

This is the cause of the communists. It is the cause of the communist parties which oppose the opportunist corrosion and defend the class struggle till the end, of the parties which struggle for the socialist perspective. This serves the interests of the working class, the popular forces. The regime of the exploitation of man by man breeds and intensifies social problems. The people’s needs cannot be satisfied on this terrain.

The experience of the parties that struggle in the EU member-states as well in the states which do not belong to the predatory alliance which was discussed here leads to one conclusion: capital is waging a serious unified offensive the aim of which is to reduce the price of the labour power, to make the working class cheaper, to increase the profits of the monopolies, to transfer the burden of the crisis onto the peoples.

The forces that manage capitalism and its crisis are consistently serving this very goal, irrespective of the form of management which is being followed, namely the restrictive policy, which deepens recession of the capitalist economy, or the expansive policy that inflates the deficits and the debt.

In both cases it is the people who pay for the consequences through the reduction of salaries and pensions, high unemployment rates, the abolition of labour and social security rights, the commercialization of social services, the privatizations, the harsh tax measures.

We often hear that the deterioration of the situation of the working class, the farmers, the urban middle strata, the undermining of the future of the youth are due to “unrestrained” capitalism, neo-liberalism, casino capitalism. This is what the European Left Party claims and likewise SYRIZA in Greece as well as other forces that wish to manage the system.

This requires attention. It is an organized, planned effort to mislead the people. These characterizations seek to conceal the essence i.e. that what is responsible for unemployment, poverty, people’s problems in general, the crises and the imperialist wars is the capitalist mode of production and not merely a form of its management, that is to say the system which lives and breathes from the exploitation of the working class, from the extraction of surplus value, the quest for profit, the competition for the expansion into new markets; the system which is based on the power of the monopolies and the capitalist ownership of the means of production.

The real cause of the crisis

The same holds true for the crisis. The bourgeois staff and all the opportunist formations, above all the European Left Party, are talking about a “financial crisis”, a “debt crisis” and insist on this despite the fact that the reality, the depth and the duration of the capitalist crisis have refuted them. Furthermore, they have also been refuted by the developments in Greece, Portugal, Italy, Spain as well as in other states and the EU as a whole.

They insist although the facts stress that it is a crisis of the capitalist mode of production, a crisis of capital over-accumulation that expresses the sharpening of the main contradiction of the system. They insist because they want to conceal that capitalism’s disease is incurable. The crisis, and generally the crises show that the system has declined, that its historical limits have been surpassed.

They insist in order to foster among the people the illusion that it is possible to follow a policy in favour of the workers with the power, the economic instruments and the wealth being in the hands of capital. It is a well-laid trap which we must expose, fight against and we must explain the truth to the peoples in an open and decisive way.

Even in the instance when the capitalist motor restarts, the growth will be marked by the most savage exploitation, which will take place on the ruins of the workers’ and people’s rights, the capitalist competition will intensify, the system will become more aggressive, its possibilities for concessions will be subsequently reduced even further.

The preconditions for a new crisis will be created in the conditions of the capitalist growth.

Thus, the struggle of the communists acquires great and crucial importance as they have the historical task of strengthening the struggle for the overthrow of the rotten system, so that the working class and the people take the power into their own hands and construct the new society, socialism which is more timely and necessary than before. This workers’ and people’s power expresses the interests of the many.

The means of production, the wealth will be under the ownership of those who produce it, who create it, the economy will be organized according to the satisfaction of the people’s needs, it will develop in a planned way and will be able to ensure the right to work for all as well as free social services.

This path of development will negate the causes of the capitalist crises. The workers’ people’s power will proceed to the disengagement from the imperialist unions, NATO and the EU, that is to say from the NATO of wars, interventions and threats against the peoples and the EU of the 30 million unemployed and the 127 million people who live below the poverty line, the EU which was built in order to serve the interests of capital, the multinational companies at the expense of people and will become more reactionary.

Regarding the issue of “occupation” and “colonies”

The EU is not a supranational organization, but it is an inter-state imperialist union. That is to say a union of capitalist states, in which the bourgeois class and its parties unite their forces against the peoples.

The bourgeois state remains the basis of the monopolies. The bourgeois state as an apparatus for the oppression of the working class by the bourgeoisie does not disappear inside the imperialist union, but it adjusts its functions. We see this every day. The conflict of interests, the competition for new markets and for more profits remains, the inter-imperialist contradictions are sharpening.

Unequal relations are manifested among the capitalist states inside the inter-state union, and inside the imperialist system more generally, due to the differences that exist in their historical starting points, their development potential, their geographical advantages, their economic and military-political strength.

This is the basic element which reflects the reality and answers to the mistaken analyses regarding “occupation”, “colonies”, “Centre-Periphery” or “North-South”.

The bourgeois class is hostile to the peoples, irrespective of its geographical position, irrespective of the position of the capitalist state in the imperialist system. For example, in Germany and in Ireland, in France and in Greece.

The concession of sovereign rights made by the bourgeois class inside an imperialist organization like the EU or NATO is something which is carried out consciously and with the unified class interests against the people as its criterion, for the perpetuation of the capitalist system, for the more effective functioning of the imperialist unions.

We assess that these very issues which determine the strategy of the CPs must be further discussed in the course of our struggle. Likewise the following issue must be further discussed:

Imperialism is not merely an aggressive foreign policy, but the final, highest stage of capitalism in which the monopolies are dominant in every sector.

That is to say that imperialism is a system in which the capitalist states participate, according to their economic, military and political strength. Greece has an intermediate position in this system and it plays its own part in the fulfilment of the imperialist plans. It deployed, for example, military forces and military bases for the NATO imperialist wars against Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. If the Greek military base at Suda in Crete had not been used, there would have been serious difficulties for the military operations.

The problems caused by the assimilation in the imperialist organizations can be eradicated if their causes are eradicated, if the capitalist organization of the economy and society is overthrown, if the problems of power and the ownership of the means of production are resolved.

The importance of the struggle at a national level

It has been proved, both theoretically and practically, that the law of uneven development is an absolute law in capitalism. Uneven economic development creates different conditions for the development of the class struggle, unevenness will also be manifested in the ripening of the pre-conditions for the socialist revolution.

The objective developments, a deep economic and political crisis, an imperialist war can provoke a revolutionary situation, and pose the question of the system’s overthrow. It would be better for this to take place not in one country on its own but in a group of countries, this will help us wage the struggle from better positions.

But at the time when history will knock on the door of the one or the other country, we cannot say that we will wait for the overthrow in the European continent as a whole. This position underestimates the class struggle at a national level and has a very negative impact on the preparation of the communist parties, the working class and the peoples for the tough class confrontations.

Of course, we need to intensify the efforts for European and international coordination of the struggle, but what is the basic issue is that the communist parties and working class must be strong, well prepared in order to wage the struggle to resolve the contradiction capital-labour. We can, for example, strengthen the international coordinated struggle and take steps in the regroupment of the labour movement at a national level and on this basis we must lend impetus to the activity of the WFTU. It is an important goal, we have decided on it at the international meetings of the Communist Parties and we must make some progress on this.

From this standpoint, we would like to salute the decision of the trade unions of South Africa, the trade unions of COSATU, which at their recent congress decided to join the WFTU.

On the alliance policy of the Communist Parties

The KKE is struggling on a daily basis for goals of struggle which correspond to the people’s interests. It struggles for the increase in the taxation of capital, at the same time it is struggling for the increase of salaries and pensions, for free social services, for the reduction in the taxation of families from the popular strata.

The combining of the goals of struggle is necessary, but what is central is the direction in which this struggle is incorporated. What is central is that the struggle for one or the other problem is incorporated into the efforts for the improvement of the organization of the working class, the change of the correlation of forces, it must be incorporated in the struggle for the overthrow of the system, for the abolition of the regime of the exploitation of man by man.

The violation of this line of struggle, the substitution of strategy by current initiatives regarding one or the other problem leads the communist parties onto pathways for the management of the system.

Even if the goal for the increase in the taxation of capital is achieved, it does not negate the basic tendency of capital which is connected to the political line of the bourgeois state for the reinforcement of business activity, for the strengthening of the competitiveness of capital, the funding of businesses from the state budget.

The struggle for socialism cannot simply be a statement, a proclamation. It is the basic direction which determines the daily activity of the communists in every field. In this direction the class struggle can be strengthened and the communists should play the leading role in order to create strong bases in the factories, in the workplaces, to strengthen the class unity of the working class, to defeat the forces of class collaboration in the trade union movement, to defeat opportunism and every management policy.

The social alliance of the working class with the small and medium farmers and the urban petty bourgeois strata must proceed, with the participation of the youth and women, the families from the popular strata, for it to become a real force for the overthrow of the system.

The alliance policy of the communists is determined by the goal of overthrowing the exploitative regime and not maintaining it. Every political force is judged not by the label it gives itself but by its stance vis-à-vis the exploitation of labour by capital, its stance vis-à-vis the imperialist unions.

The example of SYRIZA in Greece, the Left Bloc in Portugal, Die Linke in Germany and other such formations is characteristic. It must be made clear that the political forces which defend capitalism and the European Union cannot become consistent forces of resistance and defence of the people’s interests, allies of the communists, however many left labels they use.

The party of the “Democratic Left” in Greece received a part of the popular vote in the elections and today- as the governmental left- is cooperating with the liberal party of ND and the social-democratic PASOK, it is governing and participating in the imposition of harsh anti-people measures.

We must build robust revolutionary parties

We have the historical duty to fight against and overcome our weaknesses and to contribute to the creation of revolutionary parties, with solid foundations, strong bonds with the working class, youth and popular strata in a daily conflict with capitalist barbarity, capital and its parties; in a conflict with the fascist monstrosities that trade upon and exploit the people’s anxieties, as the Nazi party of “Golden Dawn” is doing in Greece.

We warmly salute the struggles of the workers and unemployed in Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, we will better organize our forces against employer and state repression, which exposes the class anti-people character of bourgeois parliamentary democracy, and we will strengthen class solidarity.

We condemn the imperialist intervention in Syria, the threats against Iran, and this must be expressed in a concrete way in every country.”