SPAIN--Student movement on the rise

From www.ft-ci.org
Spanish state: A student movement on the rise

By Carlos Munis and Susana Penna
Wednesday, November 19, 2008

The academic year in Europe had a hot beginning. Although the plans by the bourgeoisie for privatizing public education had already been in preparation since the 1998 Bologna Declaration, now the crisis of capitalism at an international level is forcing the acceleration and hardening of these measures.

The November 13 strike: One more step against the Bologna Plan and the capitalist crisis

In the Spanish state, the government of Rodríguez Zapatero, in keeping with the rest of the European bourgeoisies, is making a considerable gift of 150 billion euros to the banking interests, with the resulting emptying of the government coffers, that is precipitating, among other things, the reduction of the budget for the universities. University financing is decentralized and belongs to the autonomous communities. [1] Thus, for example, the Madrid community made a 30% cut, or the Valencia community, that cut [the university budget] by 25%, and in both, it will be impossible to guarantee payment of the wages of workers and university teachers, if things do not change. This budget cut is similar to the indebtedness of the autonomous communities to the central government.

The first step in the Spanish state was the October 22 strike against privatization of education. The mobilizations had been growing, and the last one, on November 13, was one of the most massive. 20,000 people came out in Madrid, a somewhat larger number in Barcelona, in a demonstration joined by teachers in secondary education, fighting against a privatizing law pushed by the Govern Catalá, 5,000 in Salamanca, 2,000 in Valencia, and 1,000 in Zaragoza. The mobilizations were not the only demonstrations of the spirit of struggle among the students; departments, like Madrid, Barcelona and Valencia, were also seized, with the possible extension to other cities. These processes could mean the first steps this school year in organizing a vanguard group.

We need a combative, massive, democratic and grass-roots student movement

The struggle has only just begun: it is necessary to turn the assemblies into mass bodies. The student movement must be grass-roots and democratic, with delegates subject to recall. It must take as an example struggles like the one in France against the CPE. [2] We must recover these experiences to strengthen the offensive against the current crisis and all its privatizing plans for public education, which has already been much degraded.

For a worker-student pact, to fight against the capitalist crisis

Capitalists and their governments want to make not just us, but all the workers, and especially immigrants, legal or undocumented, pay for this crisis. Worker-student unity is more needed than ever.

Coordinating and unifying our demands, next to those of the workers, will allow us to be stronger, by taking up again the lessons of May 1968, or that of the Spanish state in 1986-1988, where the workers and students were the leaders. We should support the current struggles of the workers, like that of the Nissan workers in Barcelona, and back them actively, as we are able.

Down with the Bologna Plan!
Not a single Euro for the bankers!
The capitalists must be made to pay for the crisis!
Oppose layoffs and precarious employment!
For a decent job once studies are finished!
For an education that serves the working class!

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[1] "Spain is divided into 17 autonomous communities," Wikipedia.
[2] Contract of first employment.