Caterpillar to move headquarters from Peoria to Chicago

Alexander Fangmann & Owen Green 

After more than 90 years in Peoria, Illinois, Caterpillar Inc. announced January 31 it would be moving its corporate headquarters—including top executives and several hundred support staff—to the Chicago area. The decision is ostensibly being made in order to locate executives and top managers closer to the region’s top transit hub. Ultimately, it will have a devastating impact on Peoria and the surrounding area, which has seen its higher-paying manufacturing jobs disappear in recent years.

The news came as a shock to many in the area, as Caterpillar (CAT) is closely identified with Peoria, and the company had repeatedly stated its commitment to remaining in the city. As recently as February 2015, the company had announced plans to develop a large new world headquarters campus, consolidating 3,200 downtown Peoria employees into a single location.

Just seven months later, CAT announced it would be postponing those plans indefinitely, citing poor market conditions. This coincided with the announcement that Caterpillar would be eliminating up to 10,000 positions by 2018. In fact, this was a significant underestimate of layoffs, as 16,000 Caterpillar employees have lost their jobs since that announcement. Globally, CAT has shed more than 20,000 workers since 2012.

Revenue at CAT has fallen 44 percent from its high of $66 billion in 2012, largely due to low demand for its construction and mining equipment caused by the ongoing global economic crisis and the resulting collapse in commodity prices. Through this period, CAT has seen its revenues decline monthly for over four straight years for the first time in its history.

Although CAT’s sales outside of the US have made up a majority of its revenue since 1970, around the time that Peoria’s population peaked, that proportion has continued to grow in recent years, making it more important for the company to have more direct links to the global economy.

CEO Jim Umpleby told the Peoria Journal Star, “About two-thirds of our business over the last five years has come from outside the United States. We see a lot of growth coming in the international markets, and we believe that speed and agility for our senior leadership team to be able to travel around the globe is very important.”

No doubt a factor in the move is a desire among CAT’s top executives and managers to be closer to Chicago’s cultural and material amenities. Indeed, under the administrations of mayors Richard M. Daley and Rahm Emanuel, Chicago has become a veritable playground for the wealthy as well as a nexus for national politics.

Although there have been no reports about Chicago offering Caterpillar any tax benefits for moving, it is entirely possible that Emanuel has cut some deal with the company to provide it with Tax Increment Financing (TIF) money. Large corporations are routinely provided tax breaks or even direct assistance via this enormous shadow budget, which siphons property tax money from schools and libraries.

While being a major provider of jobs in the area, Caterpillar has long been known for its ruthless attitude toward its workers. Throughout the 1990s, Caterpillar workers waged a series of militant struggles against the company, including a six-month strike in 1991-1992 and a 17-month strike between 1994 and 1995.

Those militant struggles were undermined by the United Auto Workers union (UAW) and resulted in utter defeat for workers. UAW leadership gave in to essentially every demand the company made, including tiered wages, rolling layoffs, and the use of temporary and part-time workers—pioneering developments that would ultimately be expanded to workers at Deere & Company and the Big Three automakers.

Although Caterpillar has claimed that only about 300 people will ultimately be relocated from Peoria to Chicago, it is likely that with the move of the company’s headquarters there will be less incentive to expand operations in Peoria, and less reticence to imposing layoffs and moving or merging business units to other areas.

This will continue to contribute to the protracted economic decline of Peoria and the region. The central Illinois city has a population of 116,000 with a median household income of $45,552, compared to Illinois’ median income of $57,574, while its poverty rate is an astonishing 22.4 percent, nearly 9 percentage points higher than the state as a whole. Peoria’s official unemployment rate lies at 6.6 percent, nearly a percentage point higher than the state average.

A WSWS supporter had the chance to talk to a few local businesses about their reactions to the announcement and what they thought it meant for the area. The one sentiment that was shared was one of disgust and betrayal, feeling that the company has been lying to the city and its residents about its plans.

In spite of this sense of betrayal, one business owner was not surprised by the news. She said Caterpillar had several buildings in the area, and individual floors on many more and, slowly but surely, they’ve been moving workers out of the area. Another worker said a friend of hers had repeatedly assured her Peoria had nothing to worry about, that Caterpillar headquarters would not be leaving the area.

In line with the demands imposed by globalized production, companies like Caterpillar are more than willing to pick up shop and move their operations to take advantage of lower labor or better communication and transportation links, regardless of the consequences to workers at “home.” Consequently, workers will find no success in pleading with Caterpillar to “do the right thing” and stay for the good of Peoria. The only solution is to put an end to the capitalist profit-system, which pits nation states and even workers within the same country against each other in a race to the bottom.

Sri Lankan president insists on retaining emergency powers

Vijith Samarasinghe

Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena has blocked a move to require a two-thirds parliamentary vote, rather than the current simple majority, to approve a presidential declaration of emergency. He ordered the removal of a clause to that effect in the proposed National Action Plan for Protection and Promotion of Human Rights (NHRAP).

The president’s insistence on having an unrestrained prerogative to impose police-state provisions underscores the anti-democratic nature of the government and its readiness to use draconian measures against political opponents, workers and the poor.

The new NHRAP clause was proposed by a ministerial committee, for submission to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC), which is scheduled to discuss the Sri Lankan human rights situation next month.

A previous NHRAP document, submitted to the UNHRC by former president Mahinda Rajapakse’s government, expired at the end of 2016. Rajapakse’s administration presented that document to UNHRC in 2011 in response to a resolution sponsored by the US that called for an investigation of war crimes committed during the final military offensive against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009.

Washington used this resolution, not to support the democratic rights of the Sri Lankan population, but to pressure Rajapakse to distance himself from China, which the US regards as a strategic rival. When pressure failed, the US helped orchestrate the ouster of Rajapakse via the 2015 presidential election, which installed Sirisena as president.

Sirisena ordered the blocking of the NHRAP clause in a cabinet meeting late last month. Mahinda Samarasinghe, a cabinet minister from Sirisena’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP), quoted the president as saying: “The parliament should retain the right to impose Emergency Regulations with a simple majority … to subject it to a two-thirds majority in parliament could cause unnecessary problems.”

The cabinet decided to remove the clause, Samarasinghe said, with the full agreement of Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and all the ministers of the SLFP-United National Party (UNP) unity government.

Draconian emergency regulations enacted under the Public Security Act have been used by successive governments to suppress class struggles and terrorise the masses since the early 1970s and throughout the communal war against the LTTE. These laws give wide powers to the military and police on the pretexts of protecting “the interests of the public,” “preservation of public order” and “maintenance of supplies or services essential to the life of the community.”

Rajapakse allowed emergency powers to lapse in 2011, facing international criticisms and domestic opposition. However, he incorporated many emergency regulations into the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA). Emergency measures can still be declared by the president. If the emergency goes beyond 14 days it has to be approved by parliament and then extended every month with parliament’s approval.

The NHRAP is not a legally-binding document, even if accepted by the cabinet and approved by the UNHRC. Nevertheless, Sirisena’s directive is highly significant.

The government is facing an acute economic crisis and a rising tide of struggles by workers, students and the rural poor. It has already unleashed the military, police and court orders to suppress protests violently. The government is well aware that explosive social and class struggles are on the agenda as it implements International Monetary Fund (IMF) austerity demands by slashing living conditions, limiting welfare programs and jobs.

That is why the Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government is not prepared to tolerate any limit on the use of repressive powers. Emergency regulations can be used to ban political parties and their activities, and suspend limited democratic rights.

The government is now seeking a pretext to invoke emergency powers. Prime Minister Wickremesinghe presented a note to the cabinet in late January, titled “Formal Declaration of Emergency in view of the impending severe drought.” Currently the country is facing a severe drought, affecting hundreds of thousands of families.

Earlier, Sirisena declared the government would use the armed forces for the relief work. Wickremesinghe reiterated this in his cabinet paper and said an emergency promulgation would facilitate the deployment of security forces. Last weekend, the disaster management ministry secretary, S.S. Miyanwala, told the Sunday Times that a decision on an emergency declaration would be taken in the coming week.

Sri Lankan governments have utilised such scenarios in the past to impose emergency powers and then use the laws to crack down on workers and the poor. In 2005, former president Chandrika Kumaratunga declared an emergency, which only lapsed three years later, in the name of facilitating relief work after the December 2004 Asian tsunami disaster. Rajapakse’s government used emergency powers in the ensuing years to resume the war against the LTTE and suppress working class struggles.

Last month’s cabinet meeting also moved unanimously to remove two further NHRAP clauses on “non-discrimination” and “economic and social rights.” According to Minister Samarasinghe, “some members of the cabinet felt that the non-discriminatory clause could be exploited” to decriminalise homosexuality, which remains an offence under Penal Code sections 365 and 365A.

Further uproar about decriminalising homosexuality reportedly flared in the cabinet regarding a condition proposed by the European Union to “ensure non-discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation,” as part of reinstating GSP+ (General Scheme of Preferences) trade concessions. The government rejected this condition, with some ministers calling it a “surreptitious attempt to recognise homosexuality.”

The pseudo-left groups and NGOs promoted the election of Sirisena in office as the democratic alternative to the Rajapakse government’s dictatorial methods of rule. These claims have been thoroughly exposed. The retention of full emergency declaration powers must be a warning to youth and workers: the crisis-ridden Sirisena-Wickremesinghe government is preparing to unleash ruthless attacks on their democratic and social rights.

Social Democrat Steinmeier is elected president of Germany

Johannes Stern

Frank-Walter Steinmeier (Social Democratic Party, SPD) was elected as the new president of Germany by the Federal Assembly on Sunday. After stepping down as foreign minister in the coalition government headed by Chancellor Angela Merkel (Christian Democratic Union, CDU), Steinmeier will succeed the retiring head of state, Joachim Gauck, in Bellevue Castle.

The election result shows that, despite the large majority achieved by Steinmeier and the many statements congratulating him, the German party system is breaking down under conditions of growing international political and economic instability.

In the first ballot, Steinmeier was elected with 75 percent of the vote, but he received only 931 of the 1,239 valid votes, many fewer than expected. If all the electors of the five parties that officially support Steinmeier—the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the Christian Social Union (CSU), the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Free Democratic Party (FDP) and the Green Party—had voted for him, he would have received 1,106 votes.

Christoph Butterwegge, a poverty researcher who stood in the election as the Left Party candidate, received more votes than expected. He received a total of 128 votes even though the Left Party only has 95 electors. The candidate of the right-wing extremist Alternative for Germany (AfD), Albrecht Glaser, received 42 votes, at least seven of which came from representatives of other parties. In addition, 103 members of the Federal Assembly abstained.

The election of Steinmeier marks a political turning point. At no time since the end of the Second World War has a president held such a prominent and key position in the state apparatus prior to taking office. The conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung wrote: “Steinmeier stands for the political class of this country. One of his predecessors, Horst Köhler, who was an outsider, failed because he didn’t know anyone in Berlin politics. Steinmeier knows everyone.”

More than any other politician of the past 20 years, the SPD politician personifies the rightward shift in German politics. As head of the chancellor’s office under Merkel’s predecessor, Gerhard Schröder (SPD), Steinmeier played a significant role in working out the infamous Agenda 2010 and the Hartz laws, which drove millions into bitter poverty. Between 2005 and 2009, and then again between 2013 and 2017, he served as foreign minister of the grand coalition under Merkel. In this role, he prepared the way for the shift in German politics to a more aggressive foreign policy.

Exactly three years ago, at the Munich Security Conference, Steinmeier, Gauck and Defence Minister von der Leyen (Christian Democratic Union, CDU) announced the return of German militarism. Germany must “be prepared to intervene earlier, more decisively and substantially in foreign and security policy,” said Steinmeier. He pursued this program by supporting the right-wing putsch in Ukraine, the build-up of NATO against Russia, and the military deployments in Mali, Syria and Iraq.

At the same time, the foreign ministry led a so-called review process of German foreign policy under his direction, in order to combat the continual resistance to war and militarism. It published a strategy paper, which advocated the militarization of Europe under German dominance. In countless speeches and articles, Steinmeier himself has repeatedly referred to “Germany’s new global role.”

In his short address after the election, Steinmeier made it clear that he would pursue this project further as president. He said that in stormy times, when the world appears to have gone “off the rails,” everything depends on the “cement that holds society together.” Germany is starting to be seen “by many people all over the world as an anchor of hope,” he claimed. “If the foundation topples somewhere else, then we must stand even more firmly on this foundation … Let’s be bold. Then I will not be anxious about the future,” he told the members of the Federal Assembly.

Steinmeier left no room for doubt that by being “bold” he meant the continued pursuit of war, which will inevitably go along with massive attacks on the working class within the country.

“When Johannes Rau stood here, unified Germany saw itself confronted with difficult foreign policy decisions in the Balkans, with new responsibilities in the world, which have grown even greater today and which we have accepted,” he said. Today is once again “a difficult time—but ladies and gentlemen, this time is ours! We bear responsibility. And if we want to make others bold, then we need to be bold ourselves!”

The presidency, which has had a primarily representative function after the experiences of the Weimar Republic, will have to be transformed once again into a political planning and power centre in order to implement these new great power fantasies.

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported that Steinmeier will bring “a complete team of his own into Bellevue Castle, with whom he has worked for a long time and to whom he is bound by friendship.” This team includes Secretary of State Stephan Steinlein, and previous head of planning in the SPD faction, Oliver Schmolke, as well as “the 30-year-old speech writer Wolfgang Silberman, a graduate of Oxford and Harvard, and Thomas Bagger, the previous head of planning in the foreign office.”

Conservative Fillon campaign faces collapse in French presidential elections

Alex Lantier 

The campaign of François Fillon, the right wing Les Républicains’ (LR) candidate, is on the verge of collapse, as national financial prosecutors (PNF) prepare initial recommendations in the case of the fictitious employment of his wife Penelope in no-show jobs at the National Assembly.

As popular anger builds over extensively documented allegations that she received about €900,000 for doing virtually no work, the possibility of a collapse of the campaign of one of France’s two traditional parties of government is very real. Fillon’s response—a press conference in which he defended paying his wife six figures for work that only he could judge—only served to further infuriate voters.

On Friday, an Odoxa poll found that 70 percent of the population wants Fillon to withdraw, and 79 percent were unconvinced by his press conference. Fillon’s support is collapsing even in his own constituency, moreover: among LR voters, these figures were 53 and 61 percent, respectively. Three-quarters of the population, and 53 percent of LR voters, said they viewed him negatively.

Local LR politicians are reportedly refusing to meet Fillon at campaign rallies or organize his meetings across France, and his campaign staff is reportedly in deep crisis. While Le Monde wrote that, “The political entourage of the candidate [Fillon] is paralyzed and no longer seeks out the media in order to give his positions on current events,” journalist Olivier Mazerolle said that Fillon and his supporters were now “at a loss,” faced with the crisis.

This situation confronts LR, and indeed the entire ruling class, with a quandary. Ex-President Nicolas Sarkozy is under indictment over his 2012 campaign finances, and former Prime Minister Alain Juppé, who was convicted on corruption charges in 2004, refuses to run after his surprise defeat in the LR primaries last year. Fillon, who ran against his LR rivals pledging to step down if he were taken to court, now faces a real prospect of legal action. It is unclear whom LR would run as a candidate, however, were Fillon to step down.

The collapse of Fillon’s candidacy—as President François Hollande languishes at 4 percent approval ratings, and PS officials split their support between PS candidate Benoît Hamon and former investment banker and PS Economy Minister Emmanuel Macron—is part of an international crisis of bourgeois rule.

The discrediting of the PS-LR duopoly, which has ruled France ever since the general strike of May-June 1968, comes amid the election of Donald Trump in the United States, and the discrediting of the European Union (EU) by the Greek debt crisis and Brexit. As Trump’s election showed, long-established certainties of bourgeois politics are vanishing into thin air, as election results repeatedly shock pollsters.

Last year, LR was widely supposed to be the odds-on winner in 2017, given overwhelming hostility to the austerity and war agenda of Hollande’s Socialist Party (PS) and the still massive unpopularity of Marine Le Pen’s neo-fascist National Front (FN). Barely two weeks after the satirical Canard Enchaîné weekly first broke the Penelope Fillon scandal, however, it now appears that Fillon will not survive to the second round of the elections in May.

What emerges from the crisis of Fillon’s campaign, however, is above all the bankruptcy of France’s political establishment. Despite the discrediting of the main right-wing candidate, who called for deep right-wing shock therapy with the cutting of 500,000 public sector jobs and the axing of public health spending, what is emerging is not a field of candidates more favorable to the working class.

Amid spreading protests against Trump in the United States and Europe, what is emerging is a deep, international crisis of bourgeois rule with revolutionary implications.

Fillon voters are expected to react to a withdrawal of their candidate by splitting their votes between the FN and candidates backed by the PS, and either would produce a deepening of the hated austerity, wars and police-state policies carried out both PS and LR. None of the parties—whether the PS, LR, or the FN—would have political legitimacy to continue with this reactionary agenda, however. All would face explosive social opposition.

Despite mounting press speculation about the impact of a collapse of Fillon’s campaign, it remains highly unclear where discontented Fillon voters would go, should he actually withdraw.

The most obvious PS-linked beneficiary, Macron, is widely seen as a weak candidate. He is only 39, has never been elected to public office before, and is leading in the polls due to favorable media coverage of his pro-business, pro-EU and pro-NATO program, which he is still yet to release. He is a former investment banker, advisor to the unpopular Hollande government, and author of an unpopular deregulation bill, the Responsibility Pact, imposed by the PS in 2015.

One sign of the uncertainty over Macron is that Le Monde speculated whether right winger François Bayrou—one of the few not to join LR’s predecessor, the Union for a Popular Majority, founded in 2002 to gather together the right behind Jacques Chirac—might suddenly run. It wrote, “something is still pushing François Bayrou to try his luck in the presidential election. Fillon could be taken to court, the Macron ‘bubble’ could burst. The left is still in ruins. It’s now or never, he thinks.”

With Macron stagnating or even falling in polls, at around 21 percent, it appears that Le Pen, the front-runner in the election, is currently the main beneficiary of Fillon’s collapse. There are now reports that after the first round of the presidential elections, she could pick up as much as 10 percent of the vote—though this still places her at only 36 percent and a loss in the final round.

In a worried article titled “The French election is now Marine Le Pen vs a collapsing French establishment,” Britain’s right-wing the Spectator wrote, “Brexit and Trump have created a sense that the unthinkable is possible, which could further weaken the taboo against voting for her. … [F]ew now rule out a Le Pen victory completely, and if Macron’s campaign runs into serious trouble, all bets are off. Every new scandal or terrorist incident plays into her hands.”

Le Pen is however saddled with her endorsement of Trump, who is deeply unpopular in France, and the continued opposition of two-thirds of the population to the FN, as the heir of 20th century fascism. Surveying in its same article the potential consequences of a victory of Le Pen—who has at various points pledged to try to exit the European Union and the euro currency—the Spectator gloomily foresaw the eruption of an enormous political crisis in France and across Europe.

“If she did become president,” it wrote, “France would face a genuine crisis, the worst for half a century. There would certainly be strikes and violent demonstrations by those who would see themselves as defending the republic against fascism. How she could form a viable government or win a majority in parliament is unclear. We would see a conflict between the Fifth Republic’s powerful president and its parliament under a constitutional system that one liberal critic has called dangerous even in the hands of a saint. The consequences for the euro, the EU, western security and Britain’s relations with one of its closest allies would be dire.”

In face of US threats, Mexican president calls for “national unity”

Clodomiro Puentes

Last week, Enrique Peña Nieto issued a call for “national unity” during a brief televised address. It was clearly a bid to redirect social anger from the crisis-ridden PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) government and deflect it onto to the Trump administration, which is reviled in Mexico in roughly equal measure.

Referring obliquely to the telephone exchange in which Trump thuggishly threatened to send troops into Mexico, Peña Nieto recounted that, “Although we haven’t reached agreement on any issue, this conversation opened a space for the Mexican government and the US government to continue a dialogue.”

He said these “issues” included “national sovereignty,” “respect of our dignity and independence” and “cooperation between two countries that are neighbors, friends and allies in trade,” all of which euphemistically point to the Trump administration’s intention to renegotiate harsher terms for Mexico’s subordination to US imperialism.

Unmentioned in the address was the PRI’s inability and unwillingness to do anything other than accede on every point of substance relating to Trump’s proposed border wall, plans to carry out the deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants, the potential scrapping of NAFTA and a more bellicose footing throughout the Americas on the pretext of “national security,” all of which are of a piece with Washington’s “America-first” strategy.

The Mexican president promised to provide over one billion pesos in additional funding to the country’s consulates in the United States in an effort to appear invested in the defense of immigrants of Mexican origin against predatory US immigration policies. The Mexican Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (SRE) issued a statement last Friday urging Mexican nationals living in the US to “take precautions and stay in contact with their nearest consulate to obtain the necessary help,” citing the recent deportation of Guadalupe García de Rayos, a Mexican-born mother of two in Arizona, whose deportation was “not deemed a priority” for ICE officials under the Obama administration.

“The case of Mrs. Garcia de Rayos illustrates the new reality that the Mexican community in US territory is living before the severest application of migratory control measures,” the SRE explained. The SRE’s recommendation and Peña Nieto’s measly influx of funds to Mexican consulates is a fraud, given the PRI government’s broad cooperation with the Obama administration’s 3 million deportations, and the Peña Nieto administration’s own heavy-handed policing of its southern border with Central America. The Trump administration’s policies represent not a break, but a continuity and escalation of those pursued by his predecessor in the White House.

The PRI government invocation of nationalism is utterly cynical. It has followed Washington’s dictates slavishly in terms of the raft of the counter-reforms dubbed the “Pact for Mexico,” in large part engineered by Washington, including a privatization of the country’s energy sector that was essentially cooked up by the State Department during Hillary Clinton’s tenure.

The Mexican ruling elite finds itself in a weak position, caught between the intransigence of the Trump administration, on the one hand, and mounting social anger from its own population, on the other.

Peña’s nationalist appeal rings false to the broad mass of the Mexican public, which has correctly taken his address for what it is: a desperate effort to shore up public support for a despised and discredited political establishment that extends beyond Peña himself and the PRI government.

The popular reaction to Peña’s appeals stands in stark contrast to that of Mexico’s ruling circles, which have rallied around the slogan of “national unity,” while disagreeing over who will be its standard bearer.

None other than Carlos Slim, the fourth-wealthiest person in the world, insists on lining up firmly behind the Peña Nieto administration. “We have to support him. The whole country must do it before a special threat in relation to the US that we have not seen.” He made his remarks days before the centenary of the 1917 Constitution, demagogically invoking the historical memory of US intervention in the Mexican Revolution. This nationalist bluster gives way to negotiating trade relations with the Trump administration from its present position of weakness, with Slim concluding that, “the best border wall is investment, economic activity and employment opportunities in Mexico.”

Expressing the most minor tactical differences with Slim, Miguel Angel Mancera, the PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution) mayor of Mexico City, stated, “It is the national unity of Mexicans, not [national unity] with the government.” He continued, “The president has a vote of confidence from a lot of people because he’s the one who has to represent the country in a negotiation with Trump. But he has a mandate not to give in, to go in with force and dignity. If the president were to err, then a very unfavorable wave would sweep in. My proposal is not to give Mexico bad news. There shouldn’t be another increase in the price of gasoline, for example.”

The social basis for the embattled president’s “vote of confidence,” comes from within the Mexican bourgeoisie itself, while the references to the possibility of an “unfavorable wave” unless there are some paltry concessions in areas such as the implementation of the gasolinazo point to a deep nervousness within Mexican ruling circles.

On this point, it is unlikely that Peña’s recent announcement postponing the next round of fuel price hikes by one week will do anything to steer the Mexican political establishment out of the adverse currents that so trouble Mancera.

The invocation of “national unity” flies in the face of the deep social chasm that exists in Mexico. According to a recent Oxfam report, the country’s four wealthiest billionaires control as much wealth as the poorest half of the population. What’s more, the study points out that the top 10 percent as a whole accounts for 67 percent of Mexico’s national wealth.

“There can be no social cohesion with these levels of concentration of wealth globally and nationally,” noted the director of Oxfam Mexico, Ricardo Fuentes Nieva.

Nevertheless, the Mexican pseudo-left, whose outlook has its material basis in the “next 9 percent,” also seeks to shackle the Mexican working class to a regime of inequality on the basis of “national unity.”

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (popularly known as AMLO), head of Morena (Movement of National Regeneration) and the current favorite in the 2018 presidential elections, is in fact the initiator of the call for “national unity.” His recent statement, “Political Accord of Unity for the Prosperity of the People and the Rebirth of Mexico,” repeats his ongoing targeting of “the mafia in power,” while avoiding any mention of Mexico’s relationship to US imperialism—indeed, he has gone on record as stating that Obama, the president known as the deporter-in-chief, was “a good, but not exceptional president.”

AMLO’s lenient attitude to the architects of the miserable conditions facing the Mexican working class extends to the “mafia in power” so often called out in his stump speeches. Last year he stated, “we do not consider the members of the group in power, in spite of the great harm that they have caused to the people and the country, to have any ill intention, and we assure them, before their possible defeat in 2018, that there will be no reprisals or persecutions of anyone.”

His frequently invoked promise to combat corruption and “establish an authentic democracy” is contradicted by his unwillingness to hold any of the political establishment legally accountable for mass killings, disappearances and wholesale corruption. Beginning its existence as a split from the PRD, Morena as a political party has its social base not in the working class, but in the more privileged layers of the upper middle class, with links to academics, professionals and trade union bureaucrats.

The pseudo-left organization Izquierda Socialista (Socialist Left) falsifies the historical origins and social base of Morena, falsely portraying it as a workers’ party burdened by an opportunist leadership: “We make a call to the base of Morena … to recuperate control of the party … to demand respect for party democracy, to prevent Morena ending up becoming another version of the PRD and the rest of the parties of the regime.”

It is an absurdity to speak of Morena, founded by Lopez Obrador, a bourgeois politician, in terms of “recuperating” control over the party by the working class. It only exposes Socialist Left’s own orientation, which is not to the Mexican working class, but to Morena’s social base in the upper middle class.

For its part, the Movement of Socialist Workers (MTS), the Mexican section of the Morenoite FT-CI, counterposes to Izquierda Socialista’s outright tailing behind Morena little else than a nationalist course independent of Morena: “For the socialists of the MTS, the working population must reject unity with our executioners ... The unity that socialists propose is … [a] unity to achieve national independence.”

Characteristically for the MTS, the rest of the world—particularly in terms of the international working class—is wholly absent from its strategy. The glaring indifference to international questions of both the MTS and Socialist Left is not merely a question of “mistaken” positions, but a political strategy that is rooted in the strivings of the upper middle class to maintain its privileged position within the capitalist system.

The interests of the Mexican working class cannot be defended on the basis of a strategy of “national unity” that presupposes a community of interest between workers and figures like Carlos Slim. Mexican workers are economically linked and united in a production process that stretches across national boundaries to the rest of the international working class, and in particular the working class of the United States. To effectively defend their social interests, this economic unity brought about by capitalist globalization must be shaped into a political unity on the basis of an internationalist and socialist program.

Trump and Trudeau reaffirm “indispensable” Canada-US alliance

Roger Jordan 

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau travelled to Washington yesterday for his first face-to-face discussions with US President Donald Trump. At their conclusion, Trudeau and Trump vowed to enhance the longstanding military-security and economic partnership between the Canadian and US ruling elites, by intensifying their joint war preparations and by integrating Canada into an aggressive US-led North American trade bloc.

The joint statement that Trudeau and Trump issued at the end of three hours of meetings and a working lunch declared, “no two countries share deeper or broader relations.” It then went on to outline plans for closer collaboration, including in “growing our economies,” “energy security” and “border security.” In its most significant section, the statement stressed the joint military operations of Canada and the US. It declared the two countries “indispensable allies in the defense of North America and other parts of the world, through NATO” and—in a reference to Canada’s role in the US war in the Middle East and support for the US military build-up against China in the Asia Pacific—“other multilateral efforts.”

The statement pledged that Ottawa and Washington “will work to modernize and broaden our NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] Partnership.” It also praised Canada’s plans to buy new fighter jets and its leading role in the US-led campaign of NATO aggression against Russia. Canada is leading one of four “forward deployed” NATO battalions on Russia’s borders in the Baltic States and Poland.

At their joint press conference, both Trump and Trudeau emphasized that the Canada-US partnership was forged in war, with Trudeau making specific reference to the two imperialist world wars of the last century, the Korean War and the Afghan War.

“American and Canadian troops,” declared Trump, “have gone to battle together, fought wars together and forged the special bonds that come when two nations have shed their blood together.”

The militarist tone reached a highpoint, when Trump, after sharply denouncing North Korea for its missile launch over the weekend, declared, “We have problems just about everywhere around the globe.”

Trudeau, who with the support of the trade unions won election little more than a year ago by appealing to popular anger with Stephen Harper’s hard-right Conservative government, was at pains to praise Trump and demonstrate his government’s eagerness to work in close collaboration with the most right-wing administration in American history—an administration that in the name of “America First” intends to wage trade war and massively expand US imperialist violence.

The prominence given NORAD in the joint statement is especially ominous.

The Globe and Mail reported on Monday that it is highly likely that Canada will soon fulfill a longstanding Pentagon demand and join the US ballistic missile defense shield. Its name notwithstanding, the shield’s ultimate goal is to make it possible for Washington to wage a “winnable” nuclear war with Russia, China, or any other geopolitical rival. Canada’s participation in the shield would be through NORAD, which was already expanded in 2006 to include a maritime surveillance function.

An unnamed senior government official told the Globe, “NORAD is the only joint-command relationship in the world. And we have to modernize it and whether that is missile [defence] or whether it is cybersecurity, it is an opportunity to begin to try to draw them out in terms of their thinking [on reforming NORAD] before we finalize our defence policy review.”

The strengthened Canada-US military partnership will be underpinned by a more vigorous assertion of the two imperialist powers’ economic interests through an aggressive North American trade bloc, whether under the banner of the current North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) or a new alliance.

In his opening remarks to Monday’s press conference, Trump called for Canada and the US to “join forces in matters of international commerce,” and “co-ordinate closely…to protect jobs in our hemisphere and keep wealth on our continent, and to keep everyone safe.”

When Trudeau, in answer to a question about NAFTA, spoke of the importance of Canada-US trade to both countries’ economies, Trump emphatically added, “I agree with you 100 percent.”

Later, in answer to a Canadian reporter’s question, Trump said that the changes the US will be seeking from Canada in the renegotiation of NAFTA will be “tweaks,” while emphasizing this will not be true of Mexico. Drawing a sharp contrast between US trade relations with Canada and Mexico, Trump declared, “On the southern [border], for many, many years, the transaction was not fair to the United States. It was an extremely unfair transaction,” then added, “Our relationship with Canada is outstanding.”

The prospect of reopening NAFTA has for months caused great trepidation within Canada’s business elite and political establishment. Weeks ago, the Trudeau government made clear that it is more than ready to throw Mexico to the wolves if this is the price that must be paid for maintaining Canada’s privileged access to the US market.

In the lead-up to Trudeau’s White House visit, the Canadian media and political establishment overwhelmingly endorsed his policy of bending over backwards to seek an accommodation with Trump.

Underscoring the broad support within the ruling elite for close cooperation with Trump, Conservative Party leader Rona Ambrose sent a letter to Trudeau in which she proposed a “bipartisan” effort to find common ground with the new president. Former Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney has for weeks been working informally on behalf of the Trudeau government, using his friendship with Trump and several of his billionaire cabinet ministers to make the case that the Canada-US alliance is a major asset for Washington and Wall Street on the world stage.

Trudeau has further demonstrated his commitment to align Canada with the most right-wing administration in US history in comments he made to European leaders, many of whom have advocated a more assertive European foreign policy, so as to act more independently of, and even directly confront, Washington. In conversations with British Prime Minister Theresa May and French President Francois Hollande last week, Trudeau, reports the Canadian Press, stressed that Ottawa is “mindful that it is at the start of a four-year relationship with the new president,” and needs, given the interdependence of the Canada-US economies, to “engage constructively with Trump.”

Despite this, the media has sought to portray Trudeau as having sharp ideological differences with the US President and made much of a hypocritical, ostensibly “pro-refugee” tweet Canada’s prime minister issued the day Trump’s illegal and discriminatory travel ban on people from seven predominantly Muslim counties came into force. The Washington Post hailed Trudeau as “a leader of the liberal global resistance to President Trump.”

Yesterday, the media was playing up a new bilateral initiative, suggested by Canada, one that aptly sums up the “progressive” character of his Liberal government: the establishment of a “Canada-United States Council for Advancement of Women Entrepreneurs and Business Leaders.” The Council was kicked off at a meeting attended by Trump, Trudeau, Ivanka Trump, and other female executives, including General Motors CEO Mary Barra, and Linda Hasenfratz, the CEO and principal shareholder of the Canadian-based auto parts transnational Linamar.

At Monday’s press conference, Trudeau, while looking visibly uncomfortable, studiously avoided criticizing any of Trump’s reactionary anti-immigrant measures, even after the US president ranted on about them at length. Even when specifically asked, Canada’s prime minister did not refer directly to the travel ban targeting immigrants, refugees, and travellers from seven majority-Muslim countries. Instead, he emphasized Canada’s commitment to “secure borders,” which the joint statement described as a “top priority.”

All that being said, relations between Canada and the US are fraught with tension and potential conflicts. The Trudeau government, for example, has identified expanding trade ties with China as key to its “growth” strategy; yet the Trump administration has made clear it considers China a “currency manipulator” and the principal threat to US global dominance.

The determination of Trudeau and the Canadian ruling class to partner with Trump will incite mass popular opposition. Tradition has it that a US President’s first foreign visit is to Ottawa, but Trudeau chose to travel to Washington for fear that the mass protests that would have greeted Trump on his arrival in Canada would have marred their first meeting.

Trudeau’s evident nervousness during the press conference as Trump vehemently defended his brutal anti-immigrant measures reflects the Liberal Prime Minister’s awareness that such an open association with a right-wing demagogue and authoritarian will impact on his own standing and fuel popular opposition to his government’s right-wing agenda of austerity at home and increased military interventions in partnership with the US around the globe.

Migration Media Award for Journalists in the MENA Region

Application Deadline: 31st March 2017

Offered annually?  Yes

Eligible Countries: All

About the Award: The “Migration Media Award” is an award for journalists covering migration in the Mediterranean region. Journalists or media houses from either an EU country or an EU South Partner Country (SPC) are eligible to participate by submitting together a/ an already published journalistic work that covers a migration-related topic in or around the Mediterranean, either as an entire region or in one or several Mediterranean countries b/ a pitch/synopsis for a second original production to be financed under the award scheme.

Works may be presented by a Media organisation but the prize will be awarded to the journalist that created the work, the Media organisation receiving the money and the future work that would be supported by the award would need to be done by the awarded journalist.

Type: Contest

Eligibility: The following criteria will be considered for shortlisting and selecting of award winners:

1. The entry must have been published between 1 April 2016 and 31 March 2017.
2. The content of the entry must be related to migration in the Euro-Mediterranean region; the Migration Media Award is limited to the Mediterranean region in terms of its regional scope.
3. The entry must either have been published in English, French or Arabic. Submission of published work in other languages requires the production to be accompanied by a translation into English, French or Arabic.
4. Each entry must be accompanied with a 300 word synopsis detailing the pitch for further production to be financed should it win the award.
5. The entry must be accompanied by a form which, among others, guarantees the implementing partners of the award shared copyright with partners and ultimately, with the European Union, and the permission to republish a winning entry entirely and in multiple languages.
6. Each entry must be accompanied by a brief description of circa 300 words detailing the reason/newsworthiness of the angle chosen and any difficulties encountered during the published production.

Selection Criteria: The evaluation of all eligible entries will take place in three languages – English, French and Arabic – and in four categories – TV, radio, print, online.

Number of Awardees: As a result of the categories, there will be 3 x 4 = 12 winners. Since a first, second and third prize are foreseen in each language and category, there will be 12 x 3 = 36 winners, generating a total of 36 winning stories.

Value of Contest: They will receive an EU-funded contract (EUR500 to EUR7,000) to produce original reporting on a migration topic in the Euro-Mediterranean region.

How to Apply: 

Visit Contest Webpage for details

Award Provider: Open Media Hub

University of Manchester Fully-funded Online Masters Scholarships for African Countries 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 17th March 2017.

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania.

To be taken at (country): Online

Eligible Field of Study: Public Health

About the Award: Online learning gives you the flexibility to combine study with work, family and other commitments. We encourage women to apply. Check the online Master of Public Health (in link below) course pages to make sure you understand what the course involves and read the course description carefully.

Type: Masters

Eligibility: Manchester master’s scholarships are aimed at talented applicants, especially from disadvantaged backgrounds, who would not otherwise have the opportunity to study for a UK qualification. To apply for a scholarship, you must:

• have at least two years’ relevant post-graduation work experience (this does not include unpaid internships or voluntary work);
• hold a first or upper second class (or the equivalent) undergraduate degree;
• be a resident citizen of Rwanda and have not previously studied outside Africa;
• be committed to returning home and able to demonstrate the potential to make a positive impact on the future of your home country;
• have a clear idea how studying in Manchester will benefit both your career and the wider community.

Please note that a Certificate of Proficiency from a local university cannot be considered as evidence of your level of English language proficiency.

IELTS and TOEFL test results are only valid for two years. Your English language test report must be valid on the start date of the course.

Also You will require regular access to a modern personal computer (Windows or Mac) with a stable internet connection. You should be confident in using the internet for web browsing and sending emails and also using word processing software, such as Microsoft Word.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: Scholarships cover all tuition fees, course materials and examinations.

How to Apply: You don’t need to have an offer of admission to apply for the scholarship. Please do not apply for master’s admission separately; if your scholarship application is successful then an academic offer will be made.

Apply now

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: University of Manchester

International Scholarships for Taught Masters Students at University of Kent, UK 2017/2018

Application Deadline: 31 May 2017 

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Nationals of any country

To be taken at (country): The University of Kent, UK

Eligible Field of Study: courses offered by the university

About Scholarship: The University has a long tradition of welcoming international students from around the world and is pleased to be able to offer a number of scholarships for entry at taught master’s level.  The scholarships are worth £5000 towards the cost of tuition fees and are offered to nationals of any country paying overseas fees.

Type: Taught Masters degree

Eligibility Criteria: In order to be eligible for consideration for a scholarship, all of the conditions 1 to 3 below must have been satisfied:

• an application must have been made for a taught degree course at the University of Kent (any location of study is permissible)
• the applicant must have received an unconditional offer of a place on such a degree course.
• the University must have received confirmation of the applicant’s acceptance of the unconditional offer.

Selection Criteria: Scholarships will be awarded based on the information provided on your application to the University of Kent, together with the clear thinking and motivation shown in the submitted essay.

Number of Scholarships: not specified

Value of Scholarship: The scholarships are worth £5000 towards the cost of tuition fees

Duration of Scholarship: for the period of study

How to Apply: Applications for the International Scholarship must be made via your applicant portal.  Once logged in, click on My Scholarships and Bursaries. You will then see a list of scholarships that you may be eligible to apply for.  You will be able to apply for the International Scholarship once you have received an offer.  Click on Apply and follow the steps to submit your application.

As part of your application you will need to upload an essay, which should be submitted as either a Word or PDF document. For this essay, please write no more than 750 words on a topic about which you are passionate and which is relevant to your selected degree programme.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Scholarship Provider: The University of Kent, UK

Important Notes: The University of Kent reserves the right not to allocate the awards if the selection panel identifies no suitable candidates. The International Scholarship is subject to full terms and conditions which will be provided to successful candidates at the point of award.

If you have any questions regarding the International Scholarships, then please contact international[at]kent.ac.uk.

SwissRe International ReSource Award in Water Management 2018 for Developing Countries

Application Deadline: 22nd March 2017

Eligible Countries: Developing Countries

About the Award: The Award recognises new approaches for resolving existing issues related to sustainable water management. The prize builds on more than ten years of experience in bestowing the recognised ReSource Award for sustainable watershed management. Every year, an international jury awards USD 150 000 to new social entrepreneurial initiatives driving sustainable water management practices. The award is one concrete initiative of how the Swiss Re Foundation contributes to the advancement of water resilience in low, lower-middle and upper–middle-income countries.

The ReSource Award acknowledges social entrepreneurial initiatives aimed at prototyping or scaling up new approaches for resolving existing social and/or ecological issues related to sustainable water management practices. Examples include access to, use and supply of water, sanitation and hygiene in low, lower-middle and upper–middle-income countries as classified by the World Bank.

Type: Entrepreneurship, Contest

Eligibility: Applicants with the skills, resources and commitment to launch and manage a social entrepreneurial initiative related to sustainable water management practices are invited to apply for the ReSource Award. Currently, only proposals are being considered that are designed to be implemented in low, lower-middle and upper-middle-income countries as classified by the World Bank in terms of per-capita GDP. Originators (for example, a team or organisation) may not submit more than one proposal a year. The ReSource Award intends to partner up directly with social purpose organisations with existing or planned revenue generating activities. Accordingly, intermediary institutions that support social entrepreneurs are not supported under the Award.

Proposal Eligibility: The short and full proposals submitted will be assessed with regard to the following areas:

• Social and ecological challenge: The proposal demonstrates a profound and authentic understanding of the social and ecological problem to be addressed.
• Impact: The expected social, ecological and economic impact is clearly defined and in line with the scope of the ReSource Award.
• Approach: The proposal outlines a compelling social entrepreneurial approach to address the defined challenge. The defined goal and expected impact can realistically be achieved with the approach presented.
• Financials: There is a financially viable business plan in place based on clear and logical assumptions.
• Competencies: A qualified team with appropriate skills and track record is in place.
• Risk management: All relevant risk drivers and related prevention and risk mitigation measures are defined.

Number of Awardees: three finalists (USD 20 000 + coaching each)and a winner will be selected.

Value of Scholarship: The prize combines financial and non-financial contributions (coaching/expert advice). Half of the total contribution equivalent to USD 150 000 will be allocated to three finalists (USD 20 000 + coaching each) from whom the winner will be selected. The award winning organization will be supported (USD 75 000 + coaching) during the following three years in further developing, prototyping or scaling up its social entrepreneurial initiative.

How to Apply: Applicants are asked to provide information on their social entrepreneurial initiative by completing the online questionnaire on our website. The application process is divided into four steps. Details on each step and on the criteria applied are available here. Offline applications are accepted in exceptional cases only upon prior inquiry with the Secretary of ReSource Award.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: SwissRe

Important Notes: The winner of the ReSource Award 2017 will be announced on 3 March 2017. Listed below are the date for the ReSource Award 2018.