Book notes reports that, in 1995 alone, more than 800 Kenyans died in prison, while the use of torture has become "routine" in police investigations. *
Appeals, beginning "Dear Sir," should be sent to
Dai COBAS al sindicato (From COBAS to the union)
The Swedish Aliens Board, Box 45102, 104 30 Stockholm, by Gigi Malabara, Data News, 1995
Sweden. tel. +46.8.301539
The "Base Committee" (COBAS) was formed at the Alfa Romeo
Please send copies to plant in Arese (near Milan) in March 1990. COBAS demanded that
Okoth Osewe Defence Campaign, c/o Arne Johansson, the enterprise committee be elected directly by the work force,
Oslogaten 11, 164 31 Kista, Sweden. fax +46.8.605 9402 rather than nominated from above' by the heads of Italy's main
1. Tommy Lindqvist, "Ouko man still fighting", New African, November 1995, trade union federations. In June 1990 elections finally took place, p.25 and COBAS candidates managed to break the monopoly of the
2. Kenya: Torture compounded by denial of medical treatment, Amnesty main trade unions.
International, December 1995.
In this book, Gigi Malabara, a worker at Alfa Romeo, and one of the leaders of the factory's COBAS movement synthesises the history
Mandel in Mozambique of the movement, its main debates, successes and failures. His perspective is all the more interesting since Malabara is also
We have recently received an obituary for our leading secretary of the Rifondazione Comunista group at Alfa Romeo, and collaborator Ernest Mandel, which was published in a regular collaborator of the revolutionary Marxist monthly
Mozambique's independent weekly Savana on 21 July
Bandiera Rossa.
1995. Emest is presented as "one of the principle Marxist
Malabara argues that "it was the awareness, on the basis of day-tothinkers of our times... one of the animators of the debates day experience, that we were facing a change of epoch, and the around the student revolts of May 1968, and a member of awareness of the necessity to resist the attempts of FIAT the Fourth International, founded by Trotsky in 1938."
management to completely sweep away the company's working
Savana also reports that "Mandel's fundamental work, O class avant-garde, which the trade union federations had failed to
Tratado de Economia Marxista (Marxist Political Economy)
tame, which pushed the trade union opposition at Alfa Romeo to was forbidden at the Faculty of Economy of the University create COBAS in Spring 1990. The force, made up of shop during the first years after independence, after the school stewards and workers, organised itself above all in order to was captured by an academic faction with pro-soviet demand the election of the enterprise committee, which, for years, sympathies."
had been filled, by nomination from above, with the representatives of the trade union confederations. We needed an organisation which could organise the conflict with FIAT, and defend the future
Remember this?
*The name chosen was a reference to the only precedent we knew:
the mass movement among teachers in 1986-87. That movement was the high-point of a process of re-conquest of their political and
• Russian left demonstrates collective bargaining autonomy by that category of workers.
"The form we chose was that of a movement struggling for class against Chechnya war objectives, and worker self-organisation. It based itself on
• International Women's Day numerous experiences of the Italian working class, including the election of workplace representatives by the entire work force. We
1995 in Algeria also re-launched the debate on trade union unity, a debate which had been blocked and side-tracked ever since the 1970s. This
• Salvador's FSLN becomes a project did not imply any 'adaptation' to a logic of defending the single party particular interests of a workplace or industrial group, but building
• Indian feminists debate the one wing of a new, reconstructed, class struggle trade unionism.
"In the public sector, critical sectors of the trade union movement
UN Conference on Women demanded the right to participate in negotiations through the
• "Land and Freedom" debate selection of representatives of all those who did not feel themselves to be represented by the CGIL, CIS and UIL. Others dashed on Spanish left ahead with political plans, claiming that the trade unions were "out
•1 million African Americans of date". But in the workplaces, the idea that we needed to rebuild an unitary, democratically elected representation of the workers to march in Washington DC take part in the negotiations gained strength. People wanted to avoid the increasingly clear tendency for certain organisations to lobby for separate negotiation."
Just some of the articles we published in 1995. Documents worth
In 1992 COBAS was a major force behind the creation of the all-
Italian Self-Managed Workers' Union (SLAI-COBAS). In Alfa reading again if you don't want to
Romeo elections for trade union representatives in May 1994, loose your bearings in 1996.
COBAS won 44% of votes, compared to 43% for CGIL, 7% for
The bound collection of
CIS and 6% for UIL.
International Viewpoint costs only
E5/$ US 10 per year (1982-1995),
Dai COBAS al sindicato is published by Data News, the publishing house close to the plus 20% postage charge for orders
Rifondazione Comunista Party, and carries a foreword by Rifondazione leader Fausto of less than 5 volumes. Order now!
Bertinotti.
International Viewpoint n° 274 35
Ernest Mandel
Study Centre in Amsterdam
This Centre has been created by
Ernest's colleagues at the International Institute for Research and
Education in Amsterdam.
Ernest helped create the institute in 1982. Since then, hundreds of militants from all parts of the world have taken part in seminars, courses and conferences. All this was supported with a programme of publications in English, French and
Castillian, and an unique library -
25,000 books and pamphlets, in a wide range of languages
The Centre is an example of the kind of internationalism in which
Ernest Mandel believed. Directed by the needs of its students. Enriching all those who participated in its activities.
Ernest himself was a regular participant in these events. He gave dozens of presentations, and participated in hundreds of debates.
Much of this material is available for consultation and study on paper or audio tape.
But Ernest also came to learn. To meet with new militants from
Eastern Europe, North Africa and
South America, and test his ideas against their experience
The new Ernest Mandel Study
Centre will continue Ernest's favourite activities. It will bring third world militants, socialists and feminists, to Amsterdam to discuss economics, politics, and building the revolutionary alternative. It will facilitate the translation of important texts into the languages tomorrow's revolutionaries will speak. And it will
Send donations to "'IRE: Mandel Study Centre", place Ernest's invaluable stock of account 630-0113884-65, at Caisse Privée articles, speeches and books at the
Banque, Brussels, Belgium. For more information of disposition these new write to the IRE: PO Box 53290, 1007 RG generations of militants.
Amsterdam, Netherlands. Fax +31 20/673 2106
The Centre is just beginning. We
E-mail <[email protected]> need funds to start these activities.
A regular newsletter will be sent to all those who want to support us, so that you know how your money is being spent.
36 International Viewpoint February 1996