Bücher der Reihe Sison Reader Series

The crisis of the world capitalist system and that of the Philippine ruling system have become worse than in any period after World War II. The US-instigated policies of neoliberal globalization, state terrorism and aggressive war have wrought havoc on the lives of the people and continue to escalate oppression and exploitation. The Filipino people cannot tolerate their suffering and they are fighting back against imperialism and all reaction. 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.

The crisis of the world capitalist system and that of the Philippine ruling system have become worse than in any period after World War II. The US-instigated policies of neoliberal globalization, state terrorism and aggressive war have wrought havoc on the lives of the people and continue to escalate oppression and exploitation. THe Filipino people cannot tolerate their suffering and they are fighting back against imperialism and all reaction. 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.

The growing imperialist turmoil in the world capitalist system makes socialism a clear prospect to the broad masses of the people. This necessitates the study of the historical background and the analysis of the current concrete conditions of the workers' movement in the Philippines and all over the world.Joma's firm wish was always for the proletariat and peoples of the world to dismantle the monopoly capitalist system and replace it with a just, democratic, and peaceful new world in which socialism prevails. About the Author:Jose Maria Sison led the reestablishment of the Communist Party of the Philippines in December 1968 as well as the founding of the New People's Army in March 1969 and the National Democratic Front in April 1973. He was the world's most outstanding theoreticians in Marxism-Leninism-Maoism. While living, he did research and wrote on Philippine and global issues as a public intellectual. About the Series:The International Network of Philippine Studies presents the 14th book of the Sison Reader Series: On the Workers' Movement. To follow shortly are On the Peasant Movement and Agrarian Revolution; On the Youth Movement; Women In Revolution and On the National Minorities and Their Right to Self Determination, Imperialism in the Philippines, Imperialism in Various Global Regions, On Ecology and the Environment, On People's Rights, Justice and Peace, Intensifying Interimperialist Contradictions, and many more books to complete the series.

At the present stage of our national history, the single immediate purpose to which our people are committed is the achievement of national democracy. On this single purpose, all are agreed, irrespective of social classes, unless one belongs to a class aggrandized by the perpetuation of semi-colonial and semi-feudal conditions in our society. Unless one is a landlord or a comprador, one aspires to have his nation free from colonial and imperialist exploitation. Every patriotic Filipino wishes to liquidate imperialism and feudalism simultaneously in order to achieve national democracy. The relation between national democracy and land reform is very clear. We can achieve genuine land reform only if we, as a nation, are free from colonial and imperialist domination. In fighting for national democracy against US imperialism and feudalism today, we need to unite the peasantry - the most numerous class in our society - on the side of all other patriotic classes and we need to unite with the peasantry, as the main force or backbone of our national unity and anti-imperialist struggle.

Jose Maria Sison's writings on the youth movement are a must for a comprehensive understanding and acting on the issue in the context of the Filipino people's struggle for national freedom and democracy. Sison started the resurgence of, and led the development the youth movement in the national democratic revolution to provide the cadres for the people's war.

Women all over the world are driven by their dire situation to unite and fight for their rights. From year to year, as the global crisis worsens, the women's movement has raised its level of resolve and militancy and widened its various arenas of action. Women are fighting not only for their very existence but also for the lives of their children and grandchildren. Outraged, they vigorously expose, condemn and oppose the doublespeak of their own governments, which try to equate neoliberal policies to development. The nationality question can be dealt with only in historical terms. It involves correctly relating the political, socioeconomic and cultural aspects of nationality as well as the whole national formation, its parts and the world. In its origination and development, Philippine or Filipino nationality is first of all a political concept that has arisen and developed from the necessity of uniting and activating the entire people of various social conditions and cultural traits in the anticolonial and then the anti-imperialist struggles for national independence and democracy. To this day, the Marxist-Leninist teachings on the nationality question are our best guide. There is yet no experience more advanced than that of Lenin, Stalin and Mao in successfully dealing with the nationality question in the course of overthrowing the counterrevolutionary state and establishing and building socialism.

Sison Reader Series Book 20, Proletarian Internationalism and International Solidarity consists of Jose Maria Sison's writings (essays, articles, speeches, messages, statements and interviews) on the subject of proletarian internationalism and international anti-imperialist solidarity. It highlights the role of international solidarity and practical cooperation in the advance of national liberation movements and proletarian revolution in countries, to raise the socialist cause around the world. The rest of the book's content consists of messages and statements of proletarian internationalism, and solidarity and support to peoples and organizations in the struggle against imperialism and all reaction. They underscore the role of the proletariat in building revolutionary parties to develop and strengthen the revolution towards socialism among all oppressed nations and peoples.

The chain of armed power in the Philippines leads to US imperialism. With this understanding, the masses have a strategic hatred for US imperialism as the presiding power. They recognize that their domestic exploiters and their armed satellites are subordinated in this hierarchy of power. It is of vital importance that the masses understand how through the control of the Philippine military, the US and other imperialists are able to maintain a stranglehold on Philippine society through puppets and collaborators among the domestic ruling classes of compradors, landlords and bureaucrat capitalists. Thus, the Filipino people and their revolutionary forces are compelled to wage the struggle for national and social liberation.

Sison Reader Series Book 19, Imperialism in Various Global Regions consists of Jose Maria Sison's writings (articles, speeches, statements, interviews and messages) from 1976 to 2022 on the workings of imperialism led by the United States and the resistance of peoples, nations and countries against various forms of impositions by imperialists. It details how imperialist impositions are carried out through the instrumentality of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank (WB), the World Trade Organization (WTO) and other such multilateral and bilateral agreements and how these impositions, agreements and arrangements have reduced underdeveloped countries into mere sources of raw materials and markets of finished products from capitalist countries.

Sison Reader Series Book 21, People's Rights, Justice and Peace clarifies the relationship between the struggle for national sovereignty and civil rights. This involves understanding the structure of political relations and of political power in a given society. We learn that national freedom necessitates recognition and assertion of the fact of classes and organized groups within our society and within which conscious individuals exist and operate. These classes and organized groups mediate or bridge without exception the individual with the nation.