What does this mean? Briefly stated, Anarcho-Syndicalism is a working-class political ideology that opposes all forms of exploitation and domination. We think that all people are fundamentally equal, and should have the freedom to live their lives as they see fit, as long as they do not harm the freedom of other people. We oppose capitalism because it is a vicious profit system that is based on the exploitation of the workers and the poor to the benefit of a small class of bosses and top government figures. We do not think that the government (courts, army, bureaucracy) is there to look after everyone, instead its role is to keep the ruling class in power. Racism and other forms of special oppression are primarily the product of capitalism and the State. In South Africa, racism was created to "justify", strengthen and deepen the exploitation of the Black working class in the mines, farms and factories.

This unjust social system, which impoverishes and oppresses the majority of the world's population, must be resisted and defeated. It cannot be reformed away. As long as this system exists, there will be poverty, repression and racism. The only people who can fight and overthrow capitalism, the State and all forms of oppression, are the working and poor people. Only these people- the working class and working peasants-can manage the job because only they have no vested interest in the system, because they have power in their ability to organise (particularly in the workplace), and because they produce all the wealth of the world. Only a productive class can make a free, anti-authoritarian society because only such a class is not based on exploitation.

In place of capitalism we want a free socialistic economic system in which the workers and peasants directly control the land and factories, and use these resources to produce for the benefit of all. In place of the State, we want to manage our own affairs through grassroots workplace and community councils, united at the local, regional, national and international levels. We call this system "anarchism" or "stateless socialism" or "libertarian socialism".

We do not think that the State can be made to help ordinary people. The only language the bosses understand is the language of mass struggle from below. This is the only way to win any gains in the here and now, and definitely the only way to smash the system in the long run. Relying on the State to make the revolution is a recipe for disaster, in every country where a "revolutionary government" got into power the result was a social system at least as oppressive as the one that got overthrown. Russia was not socialist, it was a one-party State in which a Communist Party-bureaucratic elite ran a "State-capitalist" system.

Instead of using the State, we believe that the struggle and the revolution must come about through mass democratic movements of the workers and the poor. In particular, we emphasise the revolutionary potential of trade unions. The trade unions can organise the workers to fight the bosses in the here and now, we all know that. The unions can also provide the vehicle for the workers to take-over, and directly manage, the factories, mines, farms and offices. The role of an organisation such as the Workers Solidarity Federation is not to make the revolution "for" the masses. It is to help to organise and educate the masses to march to freedom in their own name. We are opposed to all forms of oppression and support all everyday struggles to improve the conditions under which we live. We promote the self-activity and revolutionary awareness of the masses.

This set of ideas is not something invented by a few philosophers. Instead, Anarcho-syndicalism was created by the working class itself in the course of its struggles. It first emerged in the 1870s in the First International Workers Association, an international federation of trade unions and workers societies. Since then, it has had an magnificent, proud fighting history as a mass movement of the working and poor people in all continents of the world. Our movement has historically attracted millions of workers and peasants because it serves their needs, not the needs of power-seekers and exploiters.

In the rest of this pamphlet, we will explain why we see things like this. We will discuss how we see current situation in the world today, issues like unemployment, poverty and repression. Where do these things come from and what can be done to stop them? We also look at issues like trade unions and the fight for democracy. Are these delivering all that we hope? What can be done about the situation? What should we be fighting for? Finally, we also outline some of the history of the Anarcho-Syndicalist movement. Can workers run society? Where are the achievements of the Anarcho-Syndicalist movement? What are our failures? What are we doing these days?

Can the masses actually run society? No! say the presses of the bosses and exploiters. It will be "chaos". Are Anarcho-Syndicalists advocates of "chaos"? Yes, thunder the politicians who live off the sweat of the masses. Without the State, there would be "chaos". The myth is created that we believe in violence for the sake of it. We say that these "esteemed" and learned gentlemen are liars. We say that the masses are better able to decide their own fate than all the bosses and rulers.

Did you ever wonder about society today? Did you ever come to the conclusion that perhaps we are already living in chaos? At the moment thousands of construction workers are unemployed yet millions of homeless people need housing to live in. The price of basic foods are incredibly high yet every year the commercial farmers restrict production just to keep prices and profits high. Thousands of people are dying of starvation around the world yet millions of rands are spent every day on nuclear arms which have the potential for wiping us and the world out.

You might ask why is this so? We say that there are two big reasons - PROFIT AND POWER!

We live in a capitalist society. By capitalism we mean a system in which different firms compete with each other in the market to make profits.

Under capitalism the means of production- the land, factories, mines, offices and so on- are owned and controlled by a small section of society: senior managers, bosses, employers, and top government officials. These people- the ruling class- live off the profits and dividends they make through their business activities and top government posts.

Most people can only make a living by working for a wage or by earning growing cash crops to sell. Those who are dependent on the earning of a wage are the working class (blue collar workers, white collar workers, workers in the service sector, farmworkers, the poor, the unemployed, the marginalised youth, rank-and-file soldiers). Those who make a living through farming with family labour, and who don't employ others, are called the working peasantry. Systems like plantation slavery were also part of capitalism because were organised around making profit for a few rich men.

In capitalism there is also a middle-class made up of professionals, middle level management and small capitalists.

We are opposed to the capitalist system. Capitalism is based on exploitation. Because the bosses own the factories, banks, mines, etc. the workers have to sell their labour to the boss for a wage. The boss is interested in squeezing as much work out of the worker for as little wages as possible so that he/she can maintain high profits. Thus the more wages workers get the less profits the bosses make.

As a rule, workers never get the full value of their labour back in wages. The same goes for the working peasants. The lower prices the bosses and state marketing boards can pay the peasant for the crops, the more profits they make. The ruling class live off these profits- and use them to get richer by setting up more and bigger firms. Practically all productive work is done by the workers and working peasants (the only exception to this general rule are some sections of the middle class who do useful productive work (e.g. doctors, teachers). The ruling class is parasitic and lives off the working and poor people.

Clearly, the interests of the ruling class, on the one hand, and the working class and working peasantry, on the other, are in total opposition to each other: capitalism systematically produces, and is based on, inequalities in wealth, power and opportunity. It is almost impossible for an ordinary person to make enough money to set up in business. Instead, the rich get richer at the expense of the poor: in 1960 the richest 20% of the world's population got 70% of the world's income- by the 1990s, the elite 20% got a massive 85% of the world's income (United Nations Human Development Report, 1996).

Capitalism is also an authoritarian and undemocratic system. At the workplace level, capitalist enterprises are run by unelected managers and owners who make all key decisions on the basis of profit. The vast majority of people in a workplace -the workers- have no real say at all. At the societal level, class inequality systematically excludes most people from active and equal involvement in political activity e.g. lack of time, education. This same class inequality also exists at the level of the government (see below).

Capitalism puts profit before human needs. Production under capitalism is not based on the needs of ordinary people. Production is for profit. Therefore although there is enough food in the world to feed everyone, people starve because profits come first. Food is not given out on the basis of hunger, but on the basis of ready cash. The bosses would rather let food rot than give it away for free.

This is why capitalism is also an inefficient and wasteful economic system: there is no planning beforehand to make sure that enough goods are made to meet needs- instead, the bosses have the goods made, and then try to sell them. If not enough people have money to buy the goods, they are just thrown away. There is no match between what is actually needed and what is actually produced. Poverty, bad working conditions etc. all take a back seat to the goal of making money. Instead of values like mutual aid, and solidarity, capitalism promotes ruling class values like greed, aggression, and a hunger for power.

Finally, as we show later, capitalism is also a primary cause of racism and other forms of oppression. Racism was developed to justify slavery, colonialism and apartheid-capitalism (see below).

Capitalist must be fought and ultimately overthrown. The only people can successfully accomplish these tasks are the masses of the people- the workers, the poor, and the working peasants. Because the workers produce all wealth, they have a powerful weapon in their hands: their ability to hit the bosses to disrupt the profit system through workplace action like strikes, go-slows, occupations etc. This ability to hit the bosses where it hurts most- in the pocket- is the most powerful weapon in the hands of ordinary people. Workers resistance is aided by the concentration of workers in large factories which makes it easier to develop the resistance organisations that we call the trade unions. But this does not mean that only workers can fight back- working class neighbourhoods and schools also bring people together in large numbers in a way that facilitates action. And peasants have proved themselves again and again as capable of massive fightbacks against the exploiters. Overall, then, we believe that class struggle is the most effective way for ordinary people to fight back.

The ruling class will never get rid of capitalism. They will fight to defend capitalism because they benefit from it. Even the middle class is generally too privileged to support radical change. So there is little point in trying to involve the rich and powerful in a movement against capitalism. They live in different conditions to ordinary people, and have different interests. The ruling class can only be kept in a coalition with ordinary people if that coalition does not do anything too "threatening" (like opposing capitalism). Only productive classes like the workers and peasants can build a free, non-authoritarian society because only these classes do not exploit- they do not live off other people's backs.

Class struggle is also the way to defeat forms of oppression like racism. Because these forms of oppression are rooted in capitalism and the State, they can only be defeated by an anti-capitalist struggle. Such a struggle can only be made by the workers, the poor and the working peasants. Rich blacks may not like racism but they do like capitalism and so they will, when push comes to shove, defend the profit system against the Black working class. Their privileged class position shields them from the worst effects of racism. They can go to fancy schools and live in the suburbs- we can't.

The fight against racism and other oppressions is not something separate to the class struggle: these are working class issues. We say this for the following reasons. Firstly, these oppressions are rooted in capitalism and the State, and can therefore only be finally defeated by a class struggle and a revolution by the workers and the poor. Secondly, the majority of people who are affected by these forms of oppression are obviously working and poor people. In fact, working and poor people suffer far more from the effects of these forms of oppression because they are not shielded by their class status. Thirdly, a united struggle by the working class, working peasants and the poor can only take place if people are mobilised around all of the issues that affect them. This includes racism, rents, low wages etc. in other words, the working and poor people can only be united and mobilised on the basis of opposing all oppression and all exploitation, on the basis of a programme that addresses all of the ordinary people's concerns: this programme is Anarcho-syndicalism.

We believe that capitalism and all forms of oppression can only be ended for once and for all when the workers, the poor and the working peasants overthrow the ruling class and create a democratic stateless socialistic society based on grassroots democracy. That is to say, an Anarcho-Syndicalist society. In the course of this social revolution, the middle class will probably also split, with part of it siding with the bosses and part of it siding with the revolutionary masses.

This revolution cannot come through, and must not preserve, the State.

For the needs of the workers, the poor and the working peasantry to be fully met we must get rid of the bosses and rulers, that is, the ruling class. But this is no easy task. The bosses are organised. They have the mainstream newspapers, TV, and magazines on their side.

They also have the State (army, police, government departments, Parliament) and the forces of repression that go with it. We only have to look at the struggles and repression of the 1980s in South Africa to see how the forces of the state can be used against the working class and poor .

The state (i.e. governments, armies, courts, police, etc.) is a direct result of the fact that we live in a class society. A society where only 5% of the people own 85% of the wealth, 120,000 capitalist farmers own almost all land in the historically "White areas", and 5 big companies control 80% of all shares on the Stock Exchange (South African figures ca. 1994) .

The state is there to protect the interests of this minority, the ruling class, if not by persuasion then by force. Laws are made not to protect us but to protect those who own the property and have the power.

The State is built in a way that allows the minority to rule the minority: it is a very centralised, bureaucratic, hierarchical(top-down) structure of rule over a territory that concentrates power in the hands of the few at the top. There is absolutely no way that ordinary people can participate in the running of this apparatus. These features -authoritarianism, violence, centralisation, bureaucracy, hierarchy, territory, class rule- are the defining characteristics of all States, including the so-called socialist states such as Russia/the Soviet Union (see below for more on Russia).

The State pretends to be a neutral governing body, ruling in the interests of all. The reality is very different. When workers go on strike they are met by police dogs and rubber bullets, as well as media hostility and the threat of dismissal. But the bosses who exploit workers and throw people out of work or off the land and into more misery never face punishment. Who has eve heard of the bosses being assaulted and arrested by the police during a strike?! No. The bosses are called "investors" and treated to all sorts of perks and government support.

If you think that the State is there to protect you, think about the fact that most tax in South Africa is collected from ordinary people through VAT, rents and rates. The companies pay under 25% of all tax (SA figures, ca. 1994).

Anarcho-Syndicalism -workers freedom- cannot come through Parliament. If we look at a country like Chile we can see why. In 1973 the people elected a moderate socialist government led by President Allende. This democratically elected government was toppled by a CIA backed military coup. Repression followed in which the workers movement was smashed and thousands of militants lost their lives.

This happened for two reasons. The Chilean socialists did not understand that real power is not in the Parliament but in the boardrooms of the multinationals, the State bureaucracy, and the military. The choices that the government makes are not determined by the voters but in the end by the needs and demands of the riling class. For example, we never voted for privatisation but it is happening anyway. This is because it is in the interests of, and is demanded by, the bosses and rulers.

This point is not understood by the so-called socialist parties who run in elections (these are often called "Social-Democrats"). In the 1980's in France, Spain and Greece 'socialist' governments are pushed working class peoples living standards down because international banks wanted loans repaid and multinational corporations wanted to maintain profits.

The second reason is that the Chileans did not smash the state but tried to capture it peacefully. We must understand that the army and police are against us. They are there to protect the wealth of the ruling class. To make a revolution it will be necessary to use violence, not because we believe in violence for the sake of it, but because we recognise that the ruling class will not give up its wealth without a fight. There must be democratic workers militia under the control of democratic workers organisations like the trade unions, to defend the revolution against the ruling class when it happens. Allende refused to arm the workers and so made the job of the military much easier.

So clearly, we should boycott elections and rely on mass action to win changes and to build real democratic stateless socialism (Anarcho-Syndicalism). We should not work inside the political parties. Working within the parties is futile because these parties cannot change society. Also, it is dangerous because it promotes illusions in the State and politicians. Real socialism (anarcho-syndicalism)does not come through electing socialists to Parliament but through the direct action of the workers, working peasants and the poor taking control of the factories and land. The State is a hierarchical, bureaucratic pillar of ruling class power and must be destroyed. For us, a genuine, stateless socialist society in which workers and peasants actually run things for their own benefit, can only come from below, not from the top.

We are led to believe that the State is run in our interests. Don't we have elections to ensure that any government not behaving itself can be brought to task?

People often say that if we really want to change things we should run in elections. Take a good look at this idea and it becomes clear that it cannot be done if we are to remain true to our Anarcho-Syndicalism.

Electioneering inevitably leads to revolutionaries forsaking their revolutionary principles.

Look at the so-called Labour Party in Britain. First of all they do not go to the people with a clear socialist message. They go for whatever is popular and will ensure that they get elected. This becomes more important to them than educating people about the meaning of socialism. It also means that they look on the mass of voters as mere spectators. People are seen as voters, not as people who can be actually involved in politics and bringing socialism about.

We do not accept that we should hand over the running of our lives to 400 or so people who are not accountable between elections and can basically do whatever they like. To 400 people who enjoy, and are corrupted by, all the benefits of luxurious Parliamentary lifestyles, the gravy train. In fact, we would say that these politicians are part of the ruling class because they live of the workers, and because they defend and manage capitalism and the State.

Parliamentary democracy is about putting numbers on a piece of paper every five years. We are given a choice all right but between parties who all agree with the system of a tiny minority ruling the country.

This is not to say that there is no difference between life under a dictatorship and life under a capitalist Parliament. Of course there is. At least under the Parliament people have a few political rights, whilst they have none under a dictator or one-party State. These include freedom of speech and association, limited rights to protests and some protection from racist and sexist practices. Therefore, we Anarcho-Syndicalists support all struggles for increased political freedom. We recognise that the holding of the 1994 democratic elections in South Africa was a massive advance for the struggle because it is better to live in under a parliament than a racist regime. (Having said this, however, we still recognise that Parliament is undemocratic and dominated by the ruling class- the generals, rich men and bosses, state managers and professional politicians).

But the important thing to note is that these rights do not come through the "kind" hand of the ruling class. Instead they are forced on the State by mass struggle by the oppressed classes, and must be defended and advanced in the same way. It is mass action which drives all progressive change in society. It was struggle that broke the pass laws. It was struggle that broke the ban on African trade unions. It was struggle that led to the replacement of the racist Apartheid dictatorship by a capitalist Parliament.

Although we are revolutionaries, we do not think that we should around for the revolution to sort everything out. The revolution is essential, but it is also important that we resist the ruling class and fight oppression in the here and now. Winning small gains through struggle is important because it can bring economic and political improvements for the working masses, because it gives the masses confidence in their ability to fight back and win, and because it helps lay the basis for the revolution. It prepares people for the revolution by organising them on the ground in opposition to the system, and by opening them up to revolutionary ideas. It is thus important that we get involved in all everyday struggles whilst linking these demands to the ultimate goal of a worker-peasant revolution.

From the moment we are born we are taught that we must give up control of our lives to those supposedly more capable of running things - that we must put our faith and loyalty in government and bosses to organise our lives. In school, in the newspapers and on television the working class, the poor and the working peasants are portrayed as sheep who need to be led and governed over. Even in the unions, the important organisations of the working class, workers are discouraged from taking any initiative by themselves. Instead they are treated by the union bureaucracy supposedly on the workers' behalf.

However, the class system constantly forces the different classes into conflict. The capitalists in their mad rush for profits are forced to keep workers' pay and conditions at the lowest possible level. In times of recession (economic decline) competition between capitalists increases, and if profits are to be maintained capitalists demand that workers must accept cuts in their pay and conditions.

An example of this ruling class response to the recession created by its insane system is for the government to apply austerity and economic liberalisation programmes that cut social services, remove subsidies on basic goods like bread, retrench workers, privatise industries and undermine workers rights. The bosses and rulers call this creating an "investor friendly climate" and a "competitive economy" . We call it an attack on the working class and poor. Examples are the ESAPs (Economic Structural Adjustment Programmes) in sub-Saharan Africa, and the proposed government plan in South Africa : the "Growth, Employment and Redistribution" strategy in South Africa.

It is when workers, the poor and the working peasants are forced into conflict with their enemies -the bosses and rulers- that they realise their own strength. When workers go on strike they find that they are not powerless. Without labour all production grinds to a halt. The bosses simply cannot run the factories by themselves. Workers who go on strike begin to rely on their own collective strength, they realise that if they are going to win they must stick together. They become more aware of what they can achieve and they become open to more ideas, new ideas.

This was seen in the 1984/5 British miners strike. Before the strike most miners believed womens' role was in the home minding the children. But as the strike began, women took the initiative and set up support groups to aid the strike. Women actively took part in picketing as well as fund-raising. Faced with this many miners changed their sexist ideas. Their ideas about the police and the courts also changed. In conflict, they realised the main purpose of the police and courts was to protect the bosses and smash the strike.

This is not to say that workers going on strike set out with Anarcho-Syndicalist/ Socialist goals in mind. However when workers win on `bread and butter' issues, their confidence increases and so does their faith in their own ability to organise themselves. That is one of the reasons for Anarcho- Syndicalists being involved in organising and supporting strikes - to build the links between workers' day-to-day struggles and our aim of a truly equal society.

Central to our politics is the belief that ordinary people must make the revolution. Every member of the working class and working peasantry has a role to play. Only by this participation can we ensure that Anarcho-Syndicalism is made real. We believe in a revolution that comes from the bottom up and is based on democratic factory and community organisations. Freedom cannot be given, it has to be taken.

This is where we disagree with what is called the Marxist "revolutionary left". While they say that they agree with all this they still hold to a belief that a vanguard left-wing party is necessary to make the revolution for the people.

Most of them base their ideas on the famous Communist Lenin who believed that workers were only capable of achieving what he called "trade union consciousness" [2]. That is to say, the workers are only to focus on "bread and butter" issues, not develop their own revolutionary politics in the course of struggles with the bosses. According to him, this meant that socialism could only come from outside the class struggle, from the middle class intellectuals. What was needed was a centralised and hierarchical (top-down control structure) "vanguard party" of "professional revolutionaries" to make the revolution for the (ignorant) masses. Thus, the Bolsheviks (Russian Communist Party) understood the term "dictatorship of the proletariat" to mean not the direct rule of the whole working class, but the rule of the Party on behalf of the working class.

It is true that Lenin did not believe in a coup, he believed the masses had to be mobilised, but this mobilisation's function was only to help the party get into power to actually make the revolution. As Trotsky, another famous Marxist/Communist put it "Without a guiding organisation the energy of the masses will dissipate like steam in a piston box. But nevertheless what moves things is not the piston or the box, but the steam" [3]. Absent from this view is the idea that the working class is anything more than mindless material driving the "real" makers of history, the vanguard Communist Party, who would give the instructions. Our point is precisely that the Bolsheviks did not believe it possible for the working class to plan and co-ordinate production, in short to break down this distinction between steam and piston. We reject as fundamentally dishonest the view put out by some modern Marxists that Lenin, Trotsky and other leaders of the Communist (Bolshevik) Party that seized power in the Russian Revolution were champions of workers self-management and workers democracy. Marxism is an essentially authoritarian ideology.

Lenin and Trotsky were dead clear that they saw socialism as something to be forcefully imposed from above by a one-party State under the control of so-called "professional revolutionaries" like themselves. For them socialism had nothing to do with workers taking charge of society. Lenin saw socialism as a centralised, State-run economy, very similar to the war-time economies established in Europe during World War 1: thus, in 1918 Lenin advised his supporters to "study the State-capitalism of the Germans, to adopt it with all possible strength, not to spare dictatorial methods to hasten its adoption" [4].

In 1921, for example, Lenin sneered at calls for a congress of workers, united in their trade unions, to plan the economy from below in the following terms [5]:

"A producers' Congress! What precisely does that mean? It is difficult to find words to describe this folly. I keep asking myself, can they be joking? Can one really take these people seriously? While production is always necessary, democracy is not. Democracy of production generates a series of radically false ideas".

Similarly, Trotsky denounced those who were critical of the Communist Party's practice of suppressing free political activity on the grounds that such critics [6]

"have come out with dangerous slogans. They have made a fetish of democratic principles. They have placed the workers right to elect representatives above the Party. As if the Party were not entitled to assert its dictatorship even if that dictatorship temporarily clashed with the passing moods of the workers democracy!"

The result of this undemocratic thinking is to be clearly seen in the Eastern Europe and Soviet Union. What existed in Russia has nothing to do with real socialism. Power rested in the hands of a tiny Communist Party elite. The state was the boss and the workers were still exploited through the wage system and told what to do. Workers did not control their workplaces. All power was held by the party bureaucracy. As early as 1918, Anarcho-Syndicalists realised that the system being established in Russia was not socialist: it was State-capitalism.

As Anarcho-Syndicalists we reject this fake "socialism". We are not definitely not Marxists. We think that a genuine socialist society must be democratic and egalitarian. It must be run by the working class and working peasants, and not by some government or party.

It is no wonder these countries have collapsed and these governments have fallen! The tiny elite was unable to run the economy properly or meet people's basic needs, and its oppression was such ordinary people fought back and overthrew the Marxist governments through mass action. But full freedom has not been achieved in these countries even today. A new ruling class of politicians, capitalists and the old party elite is in power. A workers revolution will be necessary to bring in true freedom. We will look at Russia below in some more detail. For now, it is just important to note that the collapse of the Soviet bloc has created a gigantic crisis in the Marxist movements, with most organisations losing many members or collapsing, whilst those that survive generally lack any clear way forward or hope for the future.

So we say it is up to ordinary people. Some ask is this possible? Would it not be chaotic? Of course not. At the moment capitalism would collapse without the support of the working class and working peasantry. We make everything, we produce all the wealth. It is possible to organise production so that the needs of all are met. It is also possible to create structures that allow everyone to participate in making the decisions that affect them. The basis for the new society will be laid in the present by the spread of our revolutionary ideas, and by the development of workers and peasants organisations such as the trade unions.

As already stated society would be based on democratic and grassroots factory and community organisations. These would federate with each other so that decisions could be made covering large areas. Delegates could be sent from each area and workplace. They would be recallable, i.e. if those who voted them in are not happy with their behaviour they can immediately replace them with someone else. These structures would also be in charge of the internally democratic workers militia that will be needed to defend the revolution against the bosses and rulers. With the new technology such as the Internet it will be much easier to involve lots of people in making quick decisions. There would be no state or capitalist system but instead a stateless socialist (Anarcho-Syndicalist) society.

Within this society there would be genuine individual freedom. Individuals would have to contribute to society but would be free to the extent that they do not interfere with the freedom of others. There would be full freedom of speech, movement and association. We do not advocate the suppression of people who disagree with us! Religion would not be persecuted. Fundamentally we believe that people are good and if they won freedom would not easily give it up or destroy it.

So where do Anarcho-Syndicalists fit into all this? We don't set ourselves up as "the leaders who know it all". We believe that our ideas are good and are worth trying out. We believe it is necessary for those agreeing with them to organise together in an organisation like the Workers Solidarity Federation so that our ideas will spread and be understood by a lot more people. To us it is important that those revolutionaries active in different areas are brought together so that experiences can be shared and learned from. We believe that in day-today struggles or in campaigns it is important that the message is driven home that only a revolution made by the working class and working peasantry can give us ordinary, oppressed and exploited people the freedom to run society so that all our needs are met. We see our role as encouraging the initiative of working people and arguing for structures which allow people to take part in local or workplace activities. We do not aim to take power and make the revolution from above.

We do not believe that the revolution is around the corner. We believe that making it is a slow process during which there may be huge jumps forward. Overall though it is a slow process of spreading ideas and building peoples confidence to bring about change. We accept that winning reforms and short term demands are all part of this process. We also accept the need to work alongside other progressive organisations forces in immediate struggles so long as co-operation does not compromise our right to argue for our politics.