Last year on May 12 over 1,500 people marched in Santa Barbara to demand a "living wage" and "economic justice." This year thousands more will join this rapidly growing campaign. Similar to the widely publicized rally and sit-in for a "living wage" for Harvard University employees, organizers for the People's March consciously refused to the idea of a "living wage" in an international perspective, thereby confusing the class demands of the imperialist-country proletariat and the international proletariat, the detriment of the latter.

At the same time, the march's organizers consciously decided not to include a discussion of Third World workers' economic struggles, instead raising vague slogans like "stand up for a fair economy where you live." The People's March's website demonstrates just how easily such slogans are stolen by privileged classes. One of the reasons given to march was that median family income in Santa Barbara has dropped from $54,000 in 1990 to "only" $49,000. Evidently, income in Santa Barbara has not kept up with the rest of California, which has increased from $48,000 in 1990 to $51,000.

Unfortunately, the organizing materials for the People's March do not acknowledge that u.$. residents benefit from the exploitation of workers in oppressed nations. Indeed, they did not even discuss the possibility that $16-an-hour wages (about $34,000 per year) were only possible because the imperialists pay workers in the Third World on average 48¢. According to recent Bureau of Labor statistics (published in January 1998), average hourly wages for apparel workers in the Third World are nothing short of appalling: 4 cents in Burma, 23 cents in China, 30 cents in Haiti, 10 cents in Indonesia, 24 cents in Romania, etc.

RAIL supports a campaign for an international minimum, living wage. We simply cannot allow imperialist-country middle classes' backwards ideas about "economic justice" -- which amount to redistributing stolen booty more "fairly" -- to take precedence over the struggle against imperialist exploitation worldwide.

There are many reasons people take up slogans about "struggling where you live" to the detriment of internationalism. Some are class-conscious. They've chosen the imperialist country middle-classes over the international proletariat. Others are hampered by populism or vulgar democracy. Perhaps they feel that by definition a majority in every community is exploited and oppressed. Perhaps they think they have to appeal to a local majority out of principle or pragmatism.

For internationalists working in imperialist countries, such ideas are a drawback. We could win a lot of votes right by promising cheaper gas for Amerika's SUVs, but we know that this is not the right thing to do. Aside from encouraging continued environmental destruction, it would preserve the imbalance in global resource control.

Part of being an anti-imperialist "behind enemy lines" in the "belly of the beast" is having the courage and stamina to go against the tide. Globally, we have a majority. Locally, we do not. But there is much we can do here so long as we do not forget who our friends and enemies are. RAIL can only hope that the People's March organizers will return to the issues of the international proletariat and organize from the bottom up.