famine in Indonesia on the island of Sumatra, said to have already claimed forty-eight lives, was reported in an Agence France-Presse dispatch of January 24.
The famine victims were among immigrants who had arrived from East Java and Bali, where the price of rice has -80-
ately moved ahead to form its own party. Cooperation between the two wings of the PSP was no longer possible.
How should the Left Socialist party be characterized, and what are its chances of becoming a force in the workers movement?
Like the other Danish workers parties, the LSP lacks a revolutionary program; it has for the moment retained the basic PSP program, which, however, is an honest attempt to apply Marxist methods to Danish realities.
The history of the LSP, however -the way it came into being -- constitutes a basis in experience that can lead to revolutionary conclusions. The party has directly encountered the true nature of the "neocapitalist" economy, the role of the state in relation to the economy, the role of parliament, and that of the Social Democrats and the union bureaucrats.
In the campaign for the January 23 elections, the Left Socialists have stressed the important role of extraparliamentary forces in the fight for socialism. They have also called for solidarity with the national liberation movements in the "third world." There is no doubt that the new program being worked out will base itself on the struggle for anticapitalist structural reforms.
Taught by bitter experience, the LSP has dropped the old forms of leadership. It practices collective leadership, without the office of chairman or other autocratic symbols.
The party begins with an already existing national base. In nearly half of the old PSP local branches the leadership went over to the Left Socialists, followed by half of the PSP town councillors, the whole youth and student organization and, most important, the majority of union leaders formerly in the PSP.
The fact that the Danish left is forced, for the second time in ten years, to build a new party has not diminished the enthusiasm with which, above all, the youth have gone to work.
IN INDONESIA
tripled and signs of desperation among the people are evident. Suicide is said to be mounting among the poor. Many parents no longer able to feed their children are trying to give them away.
The army is reported keeping close watch to prevent the appearance of slogans calling for cheaper rice.