Introduction from the Editors

This issue of Socialist Viewpoint has a lengthy analysis by Lynn Henderson that puts the Trump presidency in the context of the collapse of the capitalist system. Marx predicted this and it’s been going on for a long time, but it seems to be speeding up of late. We are seeing capitalism in its dying days—which of course, doesn’t mean we’re home free. It’s a choice—socialism or barbarism—and at this point, we seem to be well on the way to barbarism, and large sections of the world proletariat are already living in conditions of barbarism. Understanding this seems basic to what needs to be done, specifically, a thorough break with the two-party duopoly; the formation of independent working class organizations that are thoroughly anti-capitalist; thoroughly democratic; thoroughly based on the working class (employed and unemployed); to chart an independent course for socialism. That’s a very general idea, but it is a logical alternative to the reformists who look for support and aid within the Democratic Party, or the Green Party. Neither of these will do. Neither represents the working class. We must have organized, independent, mass action in the streets and in the political arena.

This issue also features several articles about the Women’s March and its meaning for a growing movement of resistance to President Trump and the capitalist political and economic agenda. Significantly, several prisoners welcomed the Women’s March, showing that unified mass defiance of oppression is welcomed by the most oppressed, who understand that an injury to one, is an injury to all and the converse, resistance from one segment of the oppressed is in the interests of all the oppressed.