Internationalist Workers' Left (Greece) - Foundation and Early Activity

Foundation and Early Activity

The Internationalist Workers' Left was founded on 3 March 2001, after having split from the Socialist Workers' Party (SEK) - the Greek section of the International Socialist Tendency - earlier that year. At the time, SEK announced that "A small group had departed" from the party. The DEA, however, reported that the majority of Athenian members had joined the opposition. According to the DEA, the split was the result of differences in the direction of the party, including the concept of a propagandist "fortress party" as well as the role and tactics of revolutionary organizations in the Anti-globalization movement. The DEA refers to the principles of International Socialists and the Organization Socialist Revolution (OSE), the predecessor of the SEK.

During the organization's founding conference, the Socialistis Erghatis, a group from Thessaloniki that had left the OSE during the early 1990s, joined the DEA. A group around the politically-left magazine Manifesto also joined during the founding conference, only to leave with the founding of Kokkino three years later.

Resulting from the split was a lack of credibility within the Greek Left. One example was the lack of collaboration with the Youth of Synaspismós during the 2000 Anti-globalization demonstrations in Prague, causing a lack of credibility towards SEK by the members of Synaspismós.

From its foundation, the DEA engaged in the organization of various political movements, beginning with the international demonstration against the G8 summit at Genoa in 2001. The DEA's initiative, called the Greek Committee for the International Demonstration of Genoa, went on to be endorsed by other groups of the Left in Greece, such as the Youth of Synaspismós, Xekinima and A/synechia (later the Communist Organization of Greece), as well as other members of the Space for Dialogue for the Unity and Common Action of the Left. This initiative later took the form of the International Action initiative, which went on to organize the Greek movement participation in the first European Social Forum (ESF) held in Florence, Italy, in 2002.