[The following editorial was printed in the July 17, 1981, issue of Rouge, the weekly newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR) of France. The LCR is the French section of the Fourth International. The translation is by Intercontinental Press.]
Many things have changed on the political level since [François Mitterrand's election as president| May 10. But the foundations of capitalist society remain in place. The adversary of the workers after May 10 is the same as it was before: the employers, the capitalist class. A working-class united front is needed against them, as it was needed before May 10 to throw out [former president] Giscard.
How do we build it? Around what objectives? Through answering these questions, the LCR will make its contribution to change.
Although no one can today predict the pace and time frame, one thing is certain: the workers will mobilize against the bourgeoisie's resistance. Already the bourgeoisie is transferring its capital abroad, is continuing to lay off, is blocking new hiring, is attempting to escape nationalizations, however limited, is using pressure from "abroad," is threatening to re-ignite the "war over schooling" [i.e., over government intervention in religious schools].
In their struggle the workers will turn to the government, to push it forward. They will help the government in their own way, and will demand that it support them.
We will do this with the workers, without illusions but also without reservations. We will support any measure that goes in the direction of a break with the bourgeoisie. But we will also express our disagreement with any policy of class collaboration.
We know that the Socialist Party and Communist Party do not have the political will to really fight the capitalist class. That is why we march separately from them. But our activity aims to have the workers movement strike together, to have the SP and CP in the government play their full part in this battle.
That is also how we acted before May 10, when for long months we fought to get the SP and CP to join forces against Giscard and commit themselves to governing together. To that end we won't be hair-splitters. We will be the ones who want to move forward and propose the means to do so.
Today France is at a turning point. Sooner or later the capitalists will shift from a policy of pressuring the government to one of open resistance and sabotage, and then to the offensive. The employers will square off, ranging their power—the power of private ownership of the means of production-against the government's power.
To defend themselves the workers will inevitably make inroads into capitalist property.
The government will then be faced with a choice. It can either aid the mobilization of the workers or press for conciliation. At times of decision, one pays a heavy price for hesitation. for temporizing, for slowness to act.
That is why the activity of tens of thousands of militants is so important now: the activity of union members fighting against divisions in the movement and opposing the watering down of demands; the activity of those members of the Communist Party fighting against the party's change from struggle without unity to unity without struggle: the activity of Socialists who are against the party's policy of friendly overtures toward the Radicals la small capitalist party| and the bosses, and oppose the attempt to breathe new life into the antidemocratic institutions of the Fifth Republic: and finally, the activity of those who were disoriented by some far-left adventures.
If all these people act in a scattered manner. the adversary will be left with a free hand. However, acting in an organized fashion, they would constitute a real driving force.
The LCR's objective is to establish a revolutionary organization that is strong enough to attract the left currents that will develop inside the traditional organizations, in this way laying the groundwork for building a powerful revolutionary party.
Without trying to ignore the considerable political obstacles standing in the way of common activity, the LCR will continue to address itself to Lutte Ouvrière [Workers Struggle] and the OCI [Internationalist Communist Organization] in hopes that the main organizations in France that call themselves Trotskyist do not approach the new situation in a scattered manner.