The fight for workers'

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SOCIALIST ACTION SEPTEMBER 1989 15 three years from the U.S. government as shock treatment for the Polish economy.

But George Bush dashed these hopes on his recent trip through Eastern Europe. While expressing support for the changes in Poland, he offered a measly $325 million in new loans and promised to ask Congress for a $100 million fund "to capitalize and invigorate the Polish private sector."

Secretary of State James Baker explained the meager proposal: "In the 1970s, we and our allies and the Polish people made a mistake. We shovelled a lot of money into this country with no requirement for economic reform."

The British business weekly magazine The Economist further explained the go-slow approach of the imperialists in a recent editorial. While stating that the West must not block Poland and Hungary's access to the capitalist world, the editorial states:

"Should the West send money to help the reformers? Not for now. The pressure of the external debt is one of the principal factors that has impelled Poland and Hungary to search for freer markets. ...

"It would be foolish for the Western governments to loosen the pressure as long as the If the new government is unable to contain and co-opt the working class, the entire framework set at the "round-table agreements" could be shattered.

On Aug. 25, shortly after the official press agency reported that thousands of railworkers in Lodz had gone on strike for higher pay and that a national rail strike was planned, Prime Minister Mazowiecki issued an urgent appeal to George Bush to accelerate economic aid.

(Walesa denounced the strikers as "provocateurs" and called on workers to "display resolve in stopping the increasingly dangerous strike in the region.")

Deep opposition to Walesa Walesa's cooperation with the Stalinist regime and his enthusiastic endorsement of pro-capitalist market reforms have already met with strong opposition within the ranks-and even among prominent leaders of Solidarity.

And as Solidarity is compelled to administer the IMF-imposed austerity program-the very same program that sparked the creation of the massive trade union in the first place back in 1980—these divisions are bound to deepen.

National Solidarity leaders Andrzej Gwiazda congress of Solidarity.

Pro-socialist opposition

The most consistent oppositionists within Solidarity are organized in the Polish Socialist Party-Democratic Revolution (PPS-RD). These socialists are opposed to Stalinism and capitalism, and call for the overthrow of the bureaucracy and its replacement by a "system of workers' self-management."

Josez Pinior, the main leader of the PPS-RD, explained the party's views:

"We in the PPS-RD are building a new socialist alternative in Poland. We are elaborating a political program not just for Poland We aspire to be an internationalist party—in the good sense of the term. We are not a nationalist party; we seek a new alternative for the workers in the East and in the West.

"Our alternative to the bureaucratic system is a system of workers' self-management. Our first priority is workers' democracy.

"As for our views on the West, on the capitalist system, we were the first organized tendency to insist in its written political program that capitalism is bad, and to severely criticize the capitalist countries.

"Ours is the party of the young generation SOCIALIST ACTION Salianoi mith an introduction ano eitch by Car firamore Poland: Solidarnosc and the Fight for Workers' Democracy To order, write to: 3435 Army, Rm.

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