Branch Meeting: What's Next in Puerto Rico, Sunday, Sept. 12 3 PM
Sunday, September 12
3 PM
Borough of Manhattan Community College
199 Chambers St.
Room S370
To download this page as a letter-sized PDF leaflet, click here.
Free childcare available on request. If you have any questions or need to request childcare (by 9/5), feel free to email nyc@solidarity-us.org
Join New York Solidarity on September 12 for a special branch meeting on the political situation in Puerto Rico, looking back in particular on the historic 2010 strike at the University of Puerto Rico.
Lasting for over two months, the strike eventually spread across the entire UPR system, ending with an accord that blocked privatization and tuition and fees hikes in June. But the University has already moved on rolling back crucial agreements and so a new moment of struggle is opening once again, demanding our understanding and solidarity.
As we engage in fights against the cuts to the public sector and build towards the October 7 actions and beyond, there are important lessons to be drawn from the UPR strike as to how a democratic and militant student movement was built from the campus outward to the communities.
We will also hear about the ongoing struggles of the teachers’ union against the state—in the wake of the August 26 work stoppage in which 30,000 people participated—and continued attacks by the SEIU. And upcoming fights in the private sector promise to test the militant independent trade unions.
Come discuss how we can effectively build real support for workers and students from Puerto Rico in New York. Featuring a guest speaker from the Movimiento Socialista de Trabajadores (MST, Socialist Workers’ Movement, www.bandera.org).
Sept. Study Group: Worker Radicalism and Struggle in the US before WWI (RESCHEDULED)
In the United States today, most socialists are isolated from the working class. And most stewards and militants have no connection to socialist ideas and organization.
What can change that? We’ll look at successful examples where hundreds of thousands of militants became socialists, from Turin to Johannesburg to Seoul.
We’ll explore how working class consciousness develops, the role of socialist organization, and what we can do today to bring about the fusion of socialist organization and working class struggle.
Next meeting: Worker Radicalism and Struggle in the US before WWI
NOTE NEW TIME: Saturday, September 25, NOON, email nyc@solidarity-us.org for the location.
Readings:
David Montgomery, The Fall of the House of Labor: The Workplace, The State, and American Labor Activism, 1865-1925: Introduction, Chapters 1-4.
Used copies available at:
More on the Study Group
Click here for a more in-depth take on the study group and what we'd like to accomplish.
Click here for the presentation that kicked off our introductory session.
Full outline with projected readings coming soon! For more information and to join the low-traffic New York Solidarity list for related announcements, email nyc@solidarity-us.org!
