Online Townhall: The Current Working Class Fight in Argentina

The international economic crisis has hit Argentina with a vengeance, with inflation expected to hit 100% for 2022. Powerful mobilizations of unemployed and underemployed workers have broken out. After a 5-month strike, the Single Union of Argentine Tire Workers (SUTNA) forced the tire companies to give a massive wage increase to make up for inflation, and to tie wages to future increases in inflation. The number of strikes has risen, along with the activism and blockades of the “Piqueteros”, the unemployed workers’ movement. What is the way for the workers to fight back in the face of this crisis? What role do socialists play in these movements?

Guillermo Kane is a long-time activist of the Partido Obrero (Worker’s Party) and an elected deputy from the Workers’ Left Front – Unity (FIT-U), in the provincial Buenos Aires regional parliament. He participated as an organizer of the unemployed, community cafeterias, and in the National Strike Assemblies of La Matanza district in 2001, and the National Assembly of Workers in 2002 and 2005 from the National Piquetero Bloc. He is currently an adjunct professor at the University of Buenos Aires.