The Commune sowed the first seeds for a genuine liberation of women, created factory jobs for their financial independence, industrial vocational schools for girls, a divorce law; legitimate and illegitimate children were treated equally. It passed a decree for the equal rights of women. The independent women's organization “Union des Femmes“ was a member of the International. Until today, the Paris Commune is groundbreaking for the following great socialist revolutions and the struggle for the liberation of women.

 

In this capitalist system female workers are doubly oppressed and doubly exploited because they are workers and because they are the ones responsible for housework, the care of children, partner and relatives – for what is summed up as unpaid “housework”. In fact, this all is not the private affair of women! These are tasks of society as a whole! They have to be solved and organized accordingly. The Paris Commune was a guiding light for this, too. In this system, in contrast, their bodies become commodities such as through exploitation for sexual reasons and human trafficking. Every day in the world women are being raped, mutilated, in the streets, in their houses they are abused and murdered just because they are women. To put it short, this system is based on family and social relations patriarchal in nature which have their origin in private ownership. Especially anti-women policies are practiced by the Islamist reaction.

The ICOR promotes the struggle for the liberation of women in connection with the struggle for national liberation, proletarian revolution, genuine democracy and socialism, in the imperialist countries as well as in those countries dependent on imperialism. It promotes the role of women in political movements and revolutionary parties! It therefore invites international women's organizations to participate in building the international anti-imperialist united front against fascism and war.

 

Imperialism reveals its true face in the corona pandemic in interaction with the world economic and financial crisis. Profit economy is incompatible with sustainable health protection for the masses of people. On the background of the unpredictably spreading corona crisis, millions of people starving, non-functioning health-care systems, massive job destruction and rampant poverty, an accelerated tendency to a general societal crisis of the imperialist world system is unfolding with mass movements, strikes and protests in which women are playing an important role. Those forces are growing and strengthening who continue the path begun with the Paris Commune and emulate the courageous fighting women. 

 

All the more, it is now the time to make the Paris Commune and its lessons known and to anchor them among the masses of women. Whether in India, where nine general strikes took place within one year, the latest with a participation of 250 million; where peasants coming from the entire country rebel without fear of death against the laws of the fascist Modi government; and where women working in the healthcare sector, in childcare and as cooks join in. The women peasants, too, struggle against their lack of rights because they can till the soil, but not own it. As in Bangladesh, where female garment workers have been struggling for months for outstanding wages and against dismissals. Or in South Africa, where 59 % of the youth are unemployed and a general strike against corruption, the shifting of the crisis burdens onto the backs of the workers and against gender-specific violence received widespread support from the masses. In France, where mass struggles oppose President Macron as he advances the fascistization of the state apparatus and shows himself incapable of fighting against the corona pandemic – and where revolutionary women are preparing for the celebrations for the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune. Or in countries like Peru, Ecuador, Brazil - where those dying from corona are sometimes not even being buried, and women are taking over social provision and mutual help as best they can and are part of the struggles against the government.

 

It is of strategic significance that the international militant women's movement becomes an ally of the world proletariat and that women in the revolutionary parties take up their role with self-confidence. All of the contradictions of the imperialist-capitalist system are being aggravated through the international economic and social crisis, intensified by the Covid-19 pandemic. The contradiction between the internationalized productive forces and the capitalist production relations cries for a solution. What began with the Paris Commune, was continued by the Socialist October Revolution and the socialist revolution in China of Mao Zedong in the struggle against backward feudal oppression, was tested and realized in the former socialist countries – all of this is on the agenda of world history today - the liberation of women in  liberated, democratic and socialist countries.

 

Let us struggle across country borders and together, women and men, in ICOR and the United Front – for the liberation of women, freedom, democracy and socialism!

 

Signatories (as of 23 February 2021, further signatories possible):

1. UPC-Manidem   Union des Populations du Cameroun - Manifeste National pour l’Instauration de la Démocratie (Union of Populations of Cameroon - National Manifesto for the Establishment of Democracy)

2. CPK   Communist Party of Kenya

3. MMLPL   Moroccan Marxist-Leninist Proletarian Line

4. CPSA (ML)   Communist Party of South Africa (Marxist-Leninist)

5. PPDS   Parti Patriotique Démocratique Socialiste (Patriotic Democratic Socialist Party), Tunisia

6. MLOA   Marxist-Leninist Organization of Afghanistan

7. CPB   Communist Party of Bangladesh

8. CPI (ML) Red Star   Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Star

9. Ranjbaran   Hezb-e Ranjbaran-e Iran (Proletarian Party of Iran)

10. NCP (Mashal)   Nepal Communist Party (Mashal)

11. PPRF   Patriotic Peoples Republican Front of Nepal

12. NDMLP   New-Democratic Marxist-Leninist Party, Sri Lanka

13. CPA/ML   Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist)

14. БКП   Българска Комунистическа Партия (Bulgarian Communist Party)

15. БРП(к)   Българска Работническа Партия (комунисти) (Bulgarian Workers Party (Communist))

16. PR-ByH   Partija Rada - ByH (Party of Labor - Bosnia and Herzegovina)

17. MLPD   Marxistisch-Leninistische Partei Deutschlands (Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany)

18. UCLyon   Unité Communiste Lyon (Communist United Lyon), France

19. UPML   Union Prolétarienne Marxiste-Léniniste (Marxist-Leninist Proletarian Union), France

20. KOL   Kommunistische Organisation Luxemburg (Communist Organization of Luxemburg)

21. RM   Rode Morgen (Red Dawn), Netherlands

22. UMLP   União Marxista-Leninista Portuguesa (Portuguese Marxist-Leninist Union)

23. MLGS   Marxistisch-Leninistische Gruppe Schweiz (Marxist-Leninist Group of Switzerland)

24. VZDOR   VZDOR - strana práce (Resistance - labour party), Slovakia

25. TKP-ML   Türkiye Komünist Partisi – Marksist-Leninist (Communist Party of Turkey – Marxist-Leninist)

26. MLKP   Marksist Leninist Komünist Parti Türkiye / Kürdistan (Marxist Leninist Communist Party Turkey / Kurdistan)

27. KSRD   Koordinazionnyj Sowjet Rabotschewo Dvizhenija (Coordination Council of the Workers Class Movement), Ukraine

28. UoC   Union of Cypriots, Cyprus

29. PCC-M   Partido Comunista de Colombia – Maoista (Communist Party of Colombia - Maoist)

30. PCP (independiente)   Partido Comunista Paraguayo (independiente) (Paraguayan  Communist Party (independent))

31. BDP   Bloque Democratico Popular (Popular Democratic Bloc), Peru

32. PC (ML)   Partido Comunista (Marxista Leninista) (Communist Party (Marxist-Leninist)), Dominican Republic

33. PCR-U   Partido Comunista Revolucionario del Uruguay (Revolutionary Communist Party of Uruguay)