ILPS Commission 6

The availability of formal education at the basic and higher levels to comparatively larger numbers of people differentiates the modern world of the bourgeoisie and working class from the ancient world of the slave masters and feudal lords. The wider extent of education is made possible by the larger amount of surplus product created by the modern forces of production and is required by the greater need for mass literacy, professional and technical skills to maintain as well as to advance the level of material and cultural development.

The loss or erosion of livelihoods is the most concrete and widespread impact of the current crisis of the world capitalist system on people’s lives, both in the advanced capitalist countries as well as in the underdeveloped countries. Despite recent pronouncements from state officials and the business press that economic recovery is in sight, the global economy continues to tumble with the gross domestic product of the leading capitalist countries still contracting, consumer spending still in decline and unemployment still rising.

Forced displacement of millions and millions of people from their homes and hearths has become a major issue in recent years in the Indian sub-continent. The enormity of the crisis can only be understood when one looks into the centrality of forced displacement as a road map for the so-called development that the subservient ruling classes of the Indian sub-continent have been vigorously promoting for the last decade and a half under the rubric of Liberalisation, Privatisation and Globalisation.

The economic and financial crisis of the US and world capitalist system has worsened to a new and unprecedented level since the Great Depression. This signifies the utter failure of the attempt of the US and other imperialist powers to overcome the problem of stagflation under Keynesianism with the policy shift to neoliberalism. Instead, the latter policy has aggravated and deepened the crisis of overproduction in the real economy and has given free rein to the abuses of finance capitalism.

International League of Peoples' Struggle

On January 28, 2008, a platoon of suspected military and police elements