frontline issue 4

ISM Holds Successful Conference

On the weekend of 29-30 September the International Socialist Movement held its annual conference in Glasgow. Over a hundred people attended. Many SSP members who are not members of of the ISM were present and took part in the discussions. International visitors attended from socialist organisations in France: Revolutionary Communist League (LCR); the United States: Labour's Militant Voice; Brazil: Movement of the Socialist Left (MES), a left current within the Workers' Party; Argentina: Movement for Socialism (MAS) and Australia: Democratic Socialist Party (DSP).

International organisations and tendencies represented were the United Secretariat of the Fourth International (USFI), International Workers' Unity (UIT) and New Course. From England there were a number of visitors who are active in the Socialist Alliances, including members of the Socialist Solidarity Network and the International Socialist Group.

Luciana Genro, (pictured above) Brazilian Workers' Party MP from Porto Alegre in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, who was present at the conference, subsequently spoke at SSP public meetings in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

The conference started with a discussion, introduced by Alan McCombes, on the international situation following the events of September 11. There followed a wide-ranging discussion on the significance of the events, their likely impact on the class struggle and on the anti-globalisation movement and the need to build an antiwar movement. On the Sunday there was a forum on international regroupment with representatives of the ISM, the USFI and the UIT. Comrades from several countries took part in the subsequent discussion.

In the course of the conference there there were a series of workshops: on the Middle East, on Cuba, on the national question in Scotland, on globalisation and on women's liberation. There was a particularly lively but all too short debate in the workshop on Cuba around the question, 'Is Cuba Socialist?' with Tommy Sheridan and Davie Archibald putting different points of view.

The conference ended with a discussion on the role of the ISM in building the SSP. The tone of the discussion was upbeat, expressing pride in the role the ISM and its members have played in launching and building the SSP and confidence in the future of the party and the role our platform can play in developing Marxist ideas within it.

The documents of the conference will shortly be available on this web site.

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