By: Correspondent

The meeting, which brought together some thirty organizations from different countries, was held in Paris from May 16 to 18. The International Socialist League (ISL) and the forces related to the international regroupment of revolutionaries that we promote participated actively, contributing their opinions and proposals.

From Milan to Paris

The call to the Paris Meeting was aimed at “… deepening the debate without hiding disagreements or different assessments of reality, and making available to all comrades a wide range of positions”. In this sense, the Promoting Committee published, as it has done before each meeting, the Internationalist Correspondence Bulletin with all the sent written contributions.

Subsequently, at the Paris headquarters of the NPA-R, the oral exchange of opinions took place, whose agenda focused on the international situation -first and second day-, and the militant experiences in the working class -third day-. The interventions and the responses showed the political agreements and differences in the central topics mentioned below.

The debate revealed the existence of 3 blocs of more or less common opinions. a) The most homogeneous was the one formed by the members of the ISL together with the comrades of the ITO, the L5I, the MAS of Portugal and Socialist Alternative of Australia. b) the one that defended positions similar to Lotta Comunista of Italy and c) another more heterogeneous one with the NPA-R as a reference.

Transformations driven by Donald Trump

On the basis of recognizing that Trump intends to impose changes in the world order, nuances were expressed about the motivations that drive him, the scope and consequences in the U.S. and the world.

We stated that after the fall of the USSR and the Berlin Wall, US imperialism believed that capitalist restoration would allow it to consolidate and extend its rule, but reality did not unfold as thought. Without its counterrevolutionary partner, the Stalinist apparatus, US imperialism had to absorb the onslaught of class struggle on its own. It wasn’t able to semi-colonize China or Russia, which gradually became imperialist powers and began to compete for world hegemony. Although the U.S. maintained its primacy, ir proceeded to weaken. This situation took a leap with the 2008 crisis, while China was transformed into a global power, giving way to a new cold war.

All measures promoted by Trump in his second term are aimed at trying to recover the role that the United States has been losing. Whether he will succeed or not will be defined by class struggle in the U.S. itself and internationally. For now, rather than a new order we are witnessing a great world disorder, the intensification of inter-imperialist tensions and an increasingly uncertain future, where only the socialist revolution can prevent capitalist barbarism from continuing to advance.

Oppressed nationalities and self-determination: Ukraine and Palestine

The divergences of the previous Meeting about the demands of oppressed nationalities and self-determination were repeated, mainly with Lotta Comunista, which considers them “issues of the past”, but also with other organizations that have ambiguous and mistaken positions in the two most important processes taking place in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

The war in Ukraine has a dual character, the right to Ukrainian self-determination and inter-imperialist disputes intervene. Therefore, from the ISL and the Ukrainian Socialist League (USL) we support the resistance of the Ukrainian people against the invasion of Russian imperialism and at the same time we denounce NATO and Western imperialism with a policy independent of Zelenskyy. Currently we reject the negotiations between Trump and Putin behind the backs of the Ukrainian people, because they will bring the plunder of strategic resources, territorial loss and subjugation of the country.

Regarding Gaza, we promote the broadest unity against genocide, ethnic cleansing and the territorial occupation of Zionism against the Palestinian people, regardless of the policy of Hamas, which is separated by great differences. We reject the deception of the utopian policy of two states and we state that the only way out is to defeat the State of Israel and achieve a single, secular, non-racist, democratic and socialist Palestine, which can only be achieved by promoting the Socialist Revolution throughout the Middle East.

New imperialisms: China and Russia

On China and Russia there are still organizations that believe that these countries are workers’ states that must be defended. A true madness that induces to campism and to flag themselves behind the new imperialisms that have arisen. Others, although recognizing the evident capitalist restoration, refuse to define them as imperialist and in this way also end up capitulating to them in their confrontation with the U.S. In the ISL we have no doubt that China has become the main imperialist power disputing the hegemony of the old imperialism, while Russia has also been transformed in the same sense and wants to regain its old zone of influence, the reason for which it has invaded Ukraine.

On concrete experiences

As contributions to the day of exchange of trade union experiences in the workplaces, we presented written presentations from Argentina, Belarus, Ukraine and Kenya, in addition to those sent by the comrades of the PCL. Orally all the comrades who are regrouping intervened in the debate. Alejandro Bodart, referred to the actions of the MST in the FIT-U, which is followed with interest by the vanguard of different latitudes. He spoke at length about its positive aspects but also about its great limitations, as we have just seen in the massive mobilization of March 24 ¹. Our comrades from Lebanon and Pakistan participated virtually, which allowed us to have first hand testimonies on how Zionism is being confronted and the consequences of the conflict between the two nuclear powers of the Indian subcontinent respectively.

Weaknesses, limitations and positive aspects

In the two previous meetings in Milan (2023-2024), political differences were so great that it was clear that no common declarations or campaigns could emerge from them. But they did generate the possibility of getting to know each other and to relate among the organizations that did have important coincidences. This is what happened between the International Socialist League (ISL), the International Trotskyist Opposition (ITO) and the League for the 5th International (L5I) initiating a rapprochement that is in the process of allowing us to unify in the same organization.

The meeting in France showed once again the enormous differences that exist, but at the same time also the great progress in the process of regrouping around the ISL.

The ISL, a dynamic project that is growing stronger

The forces that are already part of the ISL and those that are related were an important actor in the event. Among those present, the written contributions and the videos sent comrades from fifteen countries participated. It was held a week before the entry of the ITO organizations to the ISL was confirmed. It noted the advanced relations with L5I and MAS (Portugal) and the existing political harmony with Socialist Alternative (Australia) and other organizations that follow with interest the potential development of the ISL.

We would also like to thank the hosts of the NPA-R, with whom we have a fraternal relationship of collaboration and exchange.

(1) https://lis-isl.org/en/2025/05/debate-with-the-pts-two-conceptions-on-the-left-in-mileis-era/