13.08.2015

Youth and students conference

Callum Williamson reports on the progress of the Left Unity Youth and Student Caucus

The Left Unity youth and students section is holding its first event since its founding meeting in March. The August 29 Red Futures conference will be a day of radical ideas with an ambitious programme of eight sessions, grappling with issues that confront the socialist movement today. Participants will have a choice of two sessions at each of the four time slots during the day. There will be plenty of time for discussion at every session.

The first pair of parallel sessions are on migrant solidarity and free movement; and on organising young workers (the difficulties facing young workers and how they can be overcome). Left Unity has taken a consistent, principled stance in advocating open borders, but, with even much of the left arguing that some controls are necessary, discussing why and how we do this remains important.

Next will come sessions dealing with the aftermath of the Arab Spring and the effects of marketisation reforms on the political culture in education. Yassamine Mather of the Communist Platform will be speaking on the regional fallout of the Arab Spring. Four years on since the revolutions in the Middle East it is obviously necessary to re-assess the legacy of those events in relation to the balance of forces and the position of the working class in the region.

‘Marketisation and political culture in education’ will hopefully be a useful session for youth and student members of Left Unity. Asking how decades of reforms aimed at creating a ‘market’ in higher education have affected the position of students and what consequences the changes have had for the student movement is a must for the left.

The massive support and impressive momentum of the Jeremy Corbyn Labour leadership bid makes the session, ‘Is the Labour Party dead?’, particularly timely. For Left Unity as a party, and the British left in general, the question of how to relate to Labour clearly remains a vital one. The Communist Platform’s Jack Conrad will be speaking in what is likely to be a contentious session.

Running alongside this session will be ‘Class and sex work’, a discussion on the nature of such work, the struggles of workers in the industry and the appropriate position of the left.

Finally, ‘Where now for the European left?’ will address the situation of European socialism, particularly in light of events in Greece, and feature discussion of the way forward for our movement and its immediate tasks.

At the same time we will have a session asking ‘What would a socialist society look like?’, allowing us to imagine how a post-capitalist society could be run differently. Obviously there is no perfect blueprint for the future, but such exercises have the ability to inspire and are needed to combat the pervasive idea that there is no alternative to the rule of capital.

The event will hopefully provide an opportunity for comrades inside and outside Left Unity to discuss some crucial questions and explore their differences in a friendly atmosphere. We hope to see you there!

Red Futures

Saturday August 29, 9.30am to 4.45pm: A day of debate and discussion, Birkbeck College, University of London, Malet Street, London WC1. £5 waged, £3 unwaged/students.