I Wor Kuen History of I Wor Kuen Published: In the pamphlet, Statements on the Founding of the League of Revolutionary Struggle (Marxist-Leninist), 1978. Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above. EROL Note: This history was written by IWK as part of the process of merging with the August 29th Movement to create the League of Revolutionary Struggle (Marxist-Leninist). * * * I Wor Kuen (IWK) today is a multinational nationwide Marxist-Leninist organization in the U.S. IWK regularly publishes Getting Together, its political organ, which is distributed across the country. The organization has ties within the national movements, especially the Asian national movements, and in the industrial working class. IWK has also led a number of mass struggles in some of the key cities of the country. Along with other Marxist-Leninist organizations, IWK is moving ahead firmly in the struggle to forge a single, unified communist party. IWK has a relatively long history in the contemporary revolutionary movement. Since the organization’s founding in 1969, IWK has been an integral part of the U.S. revolutionary movement. There have been weaknesses and errors in IWK’s history as well as contributions. Overall, the history of IWK is marked by a steady development in our understanding and application of the science of Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought to the U.S. revolution. This paper’s purpose is to review the history of IWK. We will try to do this by placing IWK’s history in the context of the objective situation at each stage of its history, the state of and struggles in the revolutionary movement, and the struggles that IWK was itself engaged in. The history is broken down into several periods: 1) The formation of IWK 2) The period of 1969-1972 3) The period of 1972-1975 4) The period of 1975-1978 We will try to run down the line and practice of IWK in each period and the key two-line struggles that occurred, as well as indicate the strengths and weaknesses of the organization in its development. Formation of IWK IWK was one of the many revolutionary organizations that arose in the late 1960’s. These organizations were a tremendous step forward for the revolutionary movement, for they were a decisive break from revisionism and Trotskyism. The CPUSA had become revisionist in the 1950’s and had attempted to stifle the mass movement by channeling it into reformism. The Trotskyism of forces such as the Progressive Labor Party, too, sabotaged and attacked the mass movement. There was no genuine communist party to lead the mass movement forward. But oppression breeds resistance, and the masses rose in militant struggle in the 1960’s. In particular, the Black liberation movement rose in an unprecedented storm and shook the capitalist system to its very foundation. The struggle of Black people inspired and set an example for other oppressed peoples, the Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, the Asian nationalities, Native Americans and others. The 1960’s was also marked by a broad anti-war movement against U.S. aggression in Indochina. Hundreds of thousands of people actively took part in this movement. It was from these great movements that IWK developed, in particular, out of the struggles of the Asian nationalities. It was not originally founded as a Marxist-Leninist organization, but like similar organizations from the oppressed nationalities such as the Black Panther Party and the Young Lords Party, IWK consciously saw itself as a revolutionary organization dedicated to uniting with other revolutionary forces in leading the masses to overthrow U.S. imperialism. It drew great inspiration from the Chinese revolution, including the Cultural Revolution, and the national liberation struggles around the world. The organization stood for revolution, armed struggle, the unity of oppressed and exploited peoples, and solidarity with the Chinese, Vietnamese, and other people’s revolutionary struggles. In the absence of a genuine communist party, organizations like IWK played a leading role in reconstructing a revolutionary movement in the U.S. They were the first steps in breaking the chains of revisionism which had bound the working class movement. 1969-late 1971 IWK first formed as a revolutionary collective in New York City in late 1969. During that same year, the Red Guard Party in San Francisco also formed. Later, during the summer of 1971, IWK became a national organization as a product of the merger of these two groups. IWK and the Red Guards played a vanguard role in the Asian national movements during the years between 1969 and 1971. Both organizations recognized that only revolution could solve the contradictions in capitalist society. They set out to build a genuine revolutionary movement in this country, to boldly challenge the oppressing forces, and to show that the everyday oppression and injustices that the masses face come from the system of imperialism. The IWK collective in N.Y. was formed by Asian-American revolutionaries from diverse backgrounds, including students, workers and working class youth. During its first year and a half, IWK waged a number of mass campaigns against poor living conditions in the community as well as struggles against harassment and repression of the masses by the state. The organization also conducted a number of serve the people community programs, and conducted broad political agitation and educational work among the masses. IWK published Getting Together in Chinese and English, and used it to educate and organize, and to put forward the organization’s revolutionary views. IWK took up problems such as the horrible health care facilities in Chinatown as a way of organizing the masses in the community to take up collective political struggle against those conditions. In March 1970, IWK launched an extensive campaign of door-to-door TB testing in Chinatown. The organization realized that Chinatown had the highest TB rate in the country because of the extremely overcrowded, decaying living conditions caused by capitalism and bad health care services. In New York Chinatown, there were no hospital facilities, TB clinics or hospital staff who spoke Chinese. The door-to-door campaign helped arouse the community to fight for better services and to join with Puerto Ricans, Blacks and working class whites in the Lower East Side community of New York to fight for the new Gouverneur Hospital, and to force the city government to provide a TB X-ray and testing center. The struggle around Gouverneur Hospital continues to be a focal point of health struggles to the present day. In 1972, IWK helped wage a mass struggle and held several important demonstrations resulting in the hiring of more Chinese-speaking workers at the new Gouverneur Hospital. Simultaneous to the health campaign, IWK initiated Chinatown’s first draft counseling service. Many young Asians were being drafted to fight against the Indochinese people. In Chinatown, many young men did not want to go, but they had no organization to fight for them and no way to find out about possible draft exemptions. IWK took the service right into the streets of Chinatown to seek out youth facing the draft and convince them to resist the draft. It was an important part of revolutionary work among the youth sector. Another basic serve the people program was the childcare school program, which was a way of organizing Chinese working mothers and taking up their concerns for their children’s education. Besides trying to deal with the critical lack of childcare services, the program was important because it was conducted bilingually, upholding the equality of languages and the importance of teaching Chinese to the children. It was important in developing progressive educational materials which mothers supported. Many progressive community women despised and worried about the education their children received in the Chinese after-school programs which had long been monopolized by the KMT reactionaries. The same attitude of serving the people, of promoting revolution, and of waging mass struggle was the basis for the active and often leading role that IWK played in many community struggles. In early 1970, IWK played a major role in the “We Won’t Move” campaign in New York Chinatown, in which residents and community organizations united to defend housing which the Bell Telephone Co. wanted to tear down to build a telephone switching station. IWK helped to physically move many Chinese families – some recently arrived immigrants – into abandoned apartments on the block, to strengthen the tenants’ forces and show the seriousness of the struggle. The block of housing still stands today because of this mass resistance. In late 1970, IWK waged a militant struggle against the government’s attempts to close down small Chinese grocery stores selling Chinese produce and roasted and preserved meats. The government branded these traditional Chinese foods as “violating health codes.” IWK was approached by Chinese store owners to help fight this government attack because IWK had become known as an organization that stood on the side of the masses. Through taking direct action and confronting the government inspectors right inside the stores, the state’s attempt to wipe out small Chinese-owned grocery stores was halted. The government health ordinances on Chinese produce were changed as a result of this successful struggle. IWK also joined with many youths to directly confront the Chinatown reactionaries in the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association (CCBA), demanding access of city youth to the CCBA gym facilities.