The International Youth and Students for Social Equality (IYSSE) in Sri Lanka is holding a public Zoom meeting on Wednesday, July 8, at 7:00 p.m. titled: “The Threat of World War, Imperialism and the Illusion of a Multipolar World Order.”
We are holding this important meeting at a time when imperialism is dragging humanity towards the greatest catastrophe in its history.
The NATO-led war against Russia in Ukraine, the US war on Iran, and Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, backed by the US, are all part of an unfolding global war. The fragile ceasefire brokered by the Trump administration with Tehran is only a temporary pause.
US imperialism is seeking to re-assert its lost global hegemony by securing control over the oil-rich Middle East and ultimately targeting Russia and China—which the US regards as its chief rival. Other imperialist powers are backing these wars while simultaneously pursuing their own military plans to secure their strategic interests.
Amid these critical developments, various postmodernist academics and pseudo-left groups in Sri Lanka, like their counterparts internationally, are engaged in a political campaign to derail workers, students and youth by concealing the growing threat of imperialist war. Sumith Chaaminda, a senior lecturer at the University of Colombo, is promoting the myth that the emergence of a “multipolar world” lessens the danger of war. Chaaminda and his associates argue that the rise of new “power centres,” such as Russia, China and the BRICS bloc, can establish a new global equilibrium and stability.
Not a single academic has condemned the criminal imperialist assault on Iran or Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the slaughter of tens of thousands of people.
Pseudo-left groups such as the Frontline Socialist Party and the Socialist People’s Forum, which is affiliated to Pabloite United Secretariat, are likewise preaching that the world is moving toward a multipolar order. They call on the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna/National People’s Power (JVP/NPP) government to pursue a “non-aligned” foreign policy to defend Sri Lanka’s national interests.
The essence of these arguments, promoted by affluent middle-class layers, is that workers, youth and the oppressed can secure their future within the framework of the crisis-ridden global capitalist order. They seek to lull the masses and keep them politically disarmed in the face of the immense danger of a catastrophic global conflagration.
In reality, the JVP/NPP government is integrating itself into the US war preparations against China in the Indo-Pacific region and has refused to condemn the war on Iran. At the same time, the government is imposing the brutal austerity dictates of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on workers and the rural poor.
War is not the result of diplomatic failures but a catastrophic expression of the historic crisis of capitalism. The irreconcilable contradiction between the capitalist nation-state system and the globalized economy makes war inevitable. Capitalism cannot evolve into a peaceful or democratic multipolar order. In the 20th century, imperialism plunged humanity into two world wars, sacrificing millions of lives and destroying immense productive forces.
As the ruling class imposes the costs of war and the worsening economic crisis on working people, using increasingly authoritarian methods, mass struggles are emerging as workers fight to defend their social and democratic rights. The working class, armed with a socialist and internationalist program, is the only revolutionary force capable of halting imperialism’s plunge toward nuclear war.
The IYSSE meeting will discuss the roots of the present crisis, the reactionary theories advanced by academics and pseudo-left tendencies. Speakers will explain the revolutionary program of the Trotskyist movement for building an international working-class movement against war, and the tasks facing youth and students as part of this struggle.
We invite you to join this meeting and participate in this important discussion.
Date: Wednesday, July 8.
Time: 7:00 p.m.