Campaigning work of Austrian section of REVOLUTION, April - May 2008

On Mayday there are several demonstrations in Vienna. The first one is organised by the social democratic Party (SPOE) in the morning. The SPOE is part of the government and the leading bureaucrats represent in the first place the interests of the bourgeoisie. Hence the turnout to the SPOE-demonstration was not as expected as many workers feel betrayed by “their party”. Mayday therefore was not a success for the SPOE-bureacracy and their concept of having a demonstration just based on tradition while making policy against the interests of the workers. We always stressed that it’s not only about tradition but that Mayday always was a day where the working class was fighting for concrete demands to improve their situation.

Therefore we organised an Mayday-Demonstration together with 20 other organisations – many of them migrant organisations that took place after the social democratic one. Students, pupils, workers and families (from Turkey, Columbia, the Philippines and Latin America) marched together singing “Hoch die Internationale Solidarität” and carrying red flags. International solidarity and the unity of the working class – independent of their national background – is especially important as we can see a rise of racism and also fascist structures are growing in Austria.

After the demonstration we had a festival where speeches were held, different food from different regions was offered and where we had a chance to sell our newspaper and put forward a revolutionary approach in several discussions.