workers, intellectuals and the crisis

We publish below an Open Letter from Labour Scholars on the Economic Crisis from a number of left intellectuals in Canada on the current crisis. It was published by the New Socialist Group.  This document is important in two respects: firstly it provides useful ideas on how comrades in other countries think we can respond to this situation; secondly it also raises the question of the relationship of intellectuals to workers.  These intellectuals are posing their ideas directly to the labour movement and do not see their mental labour as separate from our movement.  This stands in stark contrast to events in the UK,  here we have seen no such documents or statements from the many intellectuals around such bodies as Capital and Class or Historical Materialism.  The Historical Materialism conference and Conference of Socialist Economists bring together many left intellectuals. But there is little relationship to the labour movement or belief that it has any bearing on its perspectives.  These comrades could do well to take a leaf out of the Canadian comrades’ book.

Chris Kane

two announcements

Upcoming meetings

We have finalised the line-up for the last in the series of our ‘uncaptive minds‘ discussion series on the 1970s class struggle. Joe Marino (Bakers’ Union general secretary) and Steve Hedley (LUL regional secretary of the RMT) will be joined by John McDonnell MP and Jeremy Corbyn MP for a discussion on the subject “Then and now: where did it all go?”. The meeting takes place in London on Monday 8th December.

There are two meetings before that, however: the next is on the evening of Monday 10th November, a film showing and talk on the 1971-72 Upper Clydeside occupation. Email uncaptiveminds@gmail.com for more details. This will be followed by a meeting about the Grunwick dispute, taking place on 24th November.

Newspaper

The first issue of our newspaper The Commune will be published in the next ten days. It will feature extensive coverage of the economic crisis; articles about state intervention in the economy; about public sector pay; a piece by Gregor Gall on industrial democracy; Terry Liddle’s take on the life of William Morris; news from the class struggle in Iran; and other news from our movement. Email the above address to indicate your interest, and stay tuned.

To take a look at the pamphlets and leaflets we have already produced, click here.

considerations on self-management – by henri simon

We are pleased to publish this letter we received from Henri Simon, a French activist who has been involved in the Socialisme ou Barbarie group, Informations et liaisons ouvrières/Informations et correspondances ouvrières and Échanges et mouvement. A long-time council communist favouring a self-managed society based on workers’ councils, Henri has written about the impossibility of maintaining self-managed units as islands of communism within capitalist society:

What follows is only a schematic look at my views on self management and not at all a complete and well documented article on the subject of self management. I was for a long time, and still now am interested by all kinds of experiments which could be connected to this idea of self management from the Israeli kibbutz up to the past and recent experience of cooperatives or communes, and have got some material about all that.

demos for reinstatement of sacked colombian cleaners

Reinstate the 5 sacked Colombian cleaners. Papers for All.
Que reintegren a los 5 cleaners colombianos despedidos. Papeles para todos.

Wednesday 29th October
Protest outside the Amey offices in central London.
12.30 – 1.30pm
Meet 12.30pm @ Chancery Lane tube on the Central Line
protest at 5th Floor, 1 Waterhouse Square, London EC1N 2ST

Thursday 30th October
Protest outside the Amey offices in Colindale (supported by Barnet Trades Council)
12.30 – 1.30pm
Meet 12.30pm @ Colindale tube on the Northern Line
protest at 8th Flr, Merit House, Edgware Road,, Colindale, London NW9 5AF

film showing 10th november: the upper clydeside occupation

The next of our ‘uncaptive minds’ discussion forums on 1970s class struggle will feature a film showing about the Upper Clydeside dispute of 1971, where workers staged a fourteen-month-long work-in as a protest against the Tories’ planned shipyard closures.

As well as showing the 1971 Cinema Action film UCS 1 and sections of their 1977 film Class Struggle: Film from the Clyde (total running length: 36 minutes), we will be discussing the lessons of this important dispute in relation to the occupation and work-in tactic, trade union bureaucracy and the role of the Communist Party in the labour movement of the day.

The meeting is being held on Monday 10th November, from 6:30pm. The venue is in central London. Email uncaptiveminds@gmail.com to find out where it is, and to find out more information about our discussions.

If you’d like a Word file with the leaflet for the meeting, click here.

morales tones down constitution to secure his re-election

Bolivia’s President makes a deal with the parliamentary right-wing and seals the ratification of a bill calling a referendum on the new Constitution. The far-right, the fascist governors and the ‘hardest’ oligarchs, who control half the country, are preparing resistance and civil disobedience.

La Paz, October 21st 2008 – translated from Econoticias Bolivia

Early this Tuesday evening president Evo Morales could boast of achieving half of his objectives after the Bolivian Congress voted for the staging of a referendum in three months’ time to ratify his new State Political Constitution, re-formulated at the eleventh hour with right wing MPs, who agreed to make legal the re-election of the president, in exchange for eliminating from the constitution’s text all reforms they considered radical.

andrew fisher speaking about northern rock on bbc

Andrew Fisher from the Left Economics Advisory Panel, who recently spoke at our uncaptive minds forum on nationalisation and workers’ management, speaks on BBC news about Northern Rock, the newly nationalised concern which is nonetheless repossessing three times as many homes as other banks.

27th october meeting on 1972 building workers’ strike

In the aftermath of the 1972 building workers’ strike, police raided homes and took away men who were tried and jailed on “conspiracy” charges.

Among them were Ricky Tomlinson, now a successful actor, and Des Warren, who served his full three years and suffered from Parkinsons Disease as a result of drugs administered in prison. Des died of pneumonia on April 24, 2004, aged 66.

The “Justice for the Shrewsbury Pickets” campaign is for an inquiry into the convictions, with all the official papers to be opened, and a reversal of the so-called guilt.

Chair – Mick Dooley,
Speakers – Ricky Tomlinson, Arthur Scargill, Terry Renshaw

Meeting from 7:30pm, Monday 27th October, at the Welsh Club, 157-163 Grays Inn Road, London WC1 (Russell Square/King’s Cross).

pdf of leaflet for meeting

mészáros, harman and brenner debate credit crunch

This evening the Socialist Workers’ Party’s Chris Harman, Richard Brenner from Workers’ Power and the Hungarian Marxist István Mészáros debated the topic ‘Marx and the credit crunch’ at Conway Hall in central London. Around 190 people attended the meeting.

pics of pro-choice demo

Today’s Feminist Fightback action at the Department of Health, demanding the extension of reproductive rights, in particular allowing Northern Irish women to access abortions, was very well attended (about 35-40 people) and lively. A few pictures forwarded by other comrades are below.

A full report on the action is currently available here.

schroders cleaners’ demo 17th october

From Jake

The Schroders cleaners’ demo time has changed at the last minute to 1pm; the date is still Friday 17th October… here is their leaflet:

Schroders is a global asset management company with £130.2 billion (EUR 164.4 billion / $259.1 billion) under its management as of 30 June 2008. And it is paying its cleaners only £6 an hour.

The cleaners have been trying to get a pay rise for over 12 months. For all this time our management (Lancaster Cleaning Company) have kept promising an increase, and 3 times have stopped the cleaners demonstrating in front of Schroders Headquarters based on these promises.

We had been congratulated for our good job, but congratulations don’t pay our bills.

Now we have been told that not only will we not receive the London living wage, but also will lose our jobs because Schroders want a night shift to replace our 4 hrs part time shift, and to reduce the staff from 30 workers to 9 workers.

We are appealing to all Londoners to help us stop this injustice by supporting our demonstration in front of Schroders Headquarters: 31 Gresham Street, London EC2V 7QA on Friday 17th October 2008 at 1pm.

You can also send your letter of support to our email: schroderscleaners4justice@live.com

We want to thank you in advance for your support.

Sincerely

Cleaners from Schroders

strategy for industrial struggle

We have published a new pamphlet ‘strategy for industrial struggle’, a reprint of a 1971 solidarity pamphlet with a new introductory essay by Chris Kane.

The solidarity pamphlet explores different forms of working-class action (strikes; occupations and sit ins; sabotage; work-to-rules and go-slows; etc.) and looks at how different tactics used relate to rank-and-file involvement and control over struggles. Similarly, Chris’s introduction examines the lessons and relevance of these ideas for today, and stresses the centrality of self-organisation, democracy, and resistance to the conservatism of the trade union bureaucracies when faced with draconian anti-union laws.

The 24-page pamphlet, the third we have produced, costs £1, or you can click here to download it: industrialstrugglepamphlet.pdf

If you would like to be posted a printed copy of the pamphlet, email us at uncaptiveminds@googlemail.com or write to The Commune, 2nd Floor, 145-157 St John Street, London EC1V 4PY

‘march on the city’

by Jack Staunton

A demonstration has been called for 4pm on Friday 10th October at the Bank of England (Threadneedle St, London EC2, Bank tube) with the slogan “We won’t bail out the bankers”.

Chris Bambery writes in Socialist Worker that “we need to take to the streets to demand, “No bail out for the bankers – we will not pay for their crisis!” From small acts of resistance we can craft a political force that can knock back those running this destructive system.”

Of course, working-class action amidst the financial crisis should not be some instrument for building a party, but rather action which actually helps us weather the storm of the economic situation. While demonstrations mocking bankers like Friday’s may seem attractive, the most pressing matter is not to make shallow propaganda arguing ‘look: capitalism is crumbling’ as if power is about to fall into our lap, but rather for the workers’ movement to organise to defend ourselves from the worst concrete effects of the current economic climate (which is not limited to side-effects of the financial slump). Unemployment and underemployment, casual work with no stability (as experienced by many of the UK’s 750,000 call centre workers) and huge increases in utilities bills are all set to become even more aggravated.

We have produced a leaflet ‘the cost of living: it’s time to act’ about reshaping the workers’ movement for modern realities – the text is below.

new section: ‘videos’

We have added a new section to the website – videos– in order to advertise films portraying working-class struggles and other videos which may be of interest to our readers.

Currently the ‘videos’ section features links to three films relevant to our discussion series on class struggle in the 1970s, as well as the press conference held by Iranian socialist student activists on September 29th 2008; footage of the massacre of Bolivian peasants in Pando; and a debate with the Communist Party of Great Britain on the lessons of France’s May-June 1968 general strike.