THE other trade union international of importance today is the Red International of Labor Unions. This international unites the revolutionary trade unionists of the world and has as its basis the 6,500,000 trade unionists of Soviet Russia, and adherents in every country in the world. The R. I. L. U. grew out of the revolutionary period of the victory of the Russian workers and the revolutionary upheavals in Europe following the world war.
The R. I. L. U. differs on every question from the Amsterdam International. The R. I. L. U. policy is based upon the class struggle, while the I. F. T. U. practices class co-operation. The R. I. L. U. fights the capitalists, while Amsterdam is a weapon in their hands against the workers. The R. I. L. U. initiated the movement for international trade union unity and leads the movement for it, while Amsterdam splits the trade unions and fights against the unity of the workers’ forces. The R. I. L. U. stands for the dictatorship of the working class, while Amsterdam is one of the greatest props of the capitalist dictatorship. The R. I. L. U. stands for the socialization of production while Amsterdam aids capitalism to maintain private property by reducing the workers’ standard of living and suppressing the workers.
The R. I. L. U. was started in 1920 by the establishment of an international propaganda committee at a conference of representatives of the Russian unions and representatives from minorities in the British, French and Spanish unions, known as the International Council of Trade and Industrial Unions. The imperialist war and the Russian revolution created revolutionary elements among the trade unionists of all countries. To unite these elements and combat the capitalist influence of Amsterdam over the other trade unionists is the function of the R. I. L. U. But the R. I. L. U. does not issue the slogan of “Destroy the conservative unions.” On the contrary, the R. I. L. U. issues the slogan: “Work within the conservative unions to win the trade unionists for the revolutionary struggle against capitalism.”
The R. I. L. U. was founded in July, 1921, when a definite constitution was decided on as well as a program and the tactical line to be pursued.
The R. I. L. U. views the post-war economic crisis as the inevitable development of the contradictions inherent in capitalism. This crisis shows that the economic basis of capitalism has been cracked and makes the recovery of capitalism and further organic development impossible, i.e., capitalism has entered upon its period of dissolution. In this period the class antagonisms will increase, class conflicts will increase in size and bitterness and history will place on the order of the day the question of the workers seizing power and socializing the productive machinery as the only solution of the economic crisis.
In such a period the duty of the revolutionary trade unionists is the mobilization of the workers for the destruction of capitalism. The capitalists seek to solve the crisis by reducing the workers’ standard of living to the lowest minimum, by placing the whole burden of the solution of the crisis on the backs of the workers. The workers are faced with the choice of submitting to a coolie standard of living or overthrowing capitalism and organizing production on a socialist basis. The R. I. L. U. chooses the latter and issues the slogan: “Mobilize the trade unionists to resist the reduction of their standard of living, the struggle for the socialization of the means of production, and the establishment of the rule of the workers and farmers.”
The fundamental economic crisis renders impossible any victory for the workers upon the old craft union and nationalist basis. The trustification of capital has overcome the national boundaries and takes on international scope. This removes the basis for the narrow craft form of organization and makes necessary industrial unionism based on factory and shop committees and international co-ordination of all struggles of the workers if they are to be successful.
The wage cuts and chronic unemployment forced on the workers by the capitalists during this period places before the workers the question of workers’ control of industry as the only effective means of fighting these effects of the economic crisis. The only organs adapted to lead the struggles for control of industry is the factory and shop committees. These factory committees are the mass organs of struggle capable of mobilizing all workers irrespective of trade union membership in the struggle against the bosses.
The decline of capitalism makes impossible any permanent betterment of the workers’ living conditions. Gains in wages can at best only maintain the present standard of living-a higher standard of living is impossible for the workers under capitalism. Only when the capitalists have been defeated and workers’ rule has socialized industry will it be possible for the workers to realize a higher standard of living.
Recognizing the lack of unity among the workers, split up into competing unions the R. I. L. U. issues the slogan of a united front for the defense of the elemenary needs of the working class. In the struggle for the achievement of this united front of the working class forces the actual process of mobilizing the workers against capitalism is being carried on. The central slogan for the achievement of the united front is: “International trade union unity.”
The development of capitalist industry in the colonies is producing a growing industrial working class which is an ally of the workers of the more developed capitalist countries. This industrial working class of the colonies is not bound by traditions of craft prejudices as are the workers of Europe and America. Thus they are more fitted for revolutionary forms of organization and struggle against their oppressors both native and foreign as has been shown in the Hongkong seamen’s strike of 1922 and the great textile strikes in Shanghai and Bombay this year. This new force must be linked up with the trade union movement of the developed capitalist countries. The R. I. L. U. does not base itself exclusively upon the European workers as does the Amsterdam International but becomes international in the most complete sense by linking up the trade unions of the colonial countries with those of Europe and America.
The clear revolutionary program and tactical line of the R. I. L. U. has met with the bitterest opposition of the leaders of Amsterdam. The exposure of their treachery by the R. I. L. U. has driven them to the length of splitting the unions and individual and mass expulsions of the adherents of the R. I. L. U. Unable to hide their treachery the Amsterdam leaders have resolved to smash the trade unions rather than allow them to become organs of struggle against the capitalists in the defense of the interests of the working class.
Amsterdam is responsible for there being two trade union federations in France today. The R. I. L. U. in 1921 offered as a basis of negotiations to preserve unity of the French movement the liquidation of the revolutionary fractions inside the unions. Amsterdam refused this and precipitated the split. Repeated offers by the left wing federation (United General Federation of Labor) to heal the split have been refused by the Amsterdam leaders of the reactionary General Federation of Labor.
On the shoulders of the Amsterdam leaders rests the present division of the trade union movement. They know that their masters—the capitalists—fear a united trade union movement as this would render the workers capable of fighting against the misery and degradation capitalist rule forces upon them and finally topple capitalism into ruins as the first step toward the establishment of a workers’ republic.
Next: Chapter III. The British Workers and International Trade Union Unity