review of a classic: giovanni arrighi’s ‘the long twentieth century’

by Dan Jakopovich

In The Long Twentieth Century: Money, Power, and the Origins of Our Times (1994), Arrighi centres his attention on the examination of systemic capitalist cycles of accumulation: their immanent logic, the interplay between the emerging and old powers (elements of systemic continuity and discontinuity), and the factors of hegemonic consolidation.

the cost of living: it’s time to act

a leaflet by the commune

A mere 22% of a typical household’s monthly income is left after tax and essential bills, down from 28% since 2003. The situation is getting worse.  Costs have gone up across the board:
 
Increase of    10%      for Electricity
Increase of    15%      for Gas  
Increase of    6.6%     for Food                
Increase of    20.2%   for Petrol  
Increase of    6.5%     for Water             
 
The government says wages must be kept down to stop inflation – but it’s not wages that are to blame.  In May, over 90% of workers got wage rises beneath inflation.  In fact the share of the overall economy going to wages has gone down this year, as it has every year since 1995.  Wages are nowhere near enough to meet the rising costs.  To make it worse, unemployment, which has never gone away, is rising fast.

lukacs on terror

We present here to readers of The Commune a little-known article by the leading Marxist philosopher George Lukacs.  Well known for his History and Class Consciousness, it is sometimes forgotten that Lukacs was an active Hungarian communist during the Hungarian Soviet Republic of 1919.  Lukacs fought in the ranks of Hungarian Red Army, but the republic of which he was a leading member was suppressed by foreign intervention. The following article challenges the hypocrisy of Social-Democracy on the question of violence – the term terror having a different meaning from its current use. This first appeared in the Workers’ Dreadnought, a communist paper published by Sylvia Pankhurst, on August 21, 1920.  Chris Ford

lenin the god and lenin the revolutionary

by Sylvia Pankhurst: introduction by Chris Ford

The following article originally appeared in the Workers’ Dreadnought entitled ‘Lenin’, written by pioneer communist Sylvia Pankhurst after Lenin’s death.  Pankhurst was a sympathiser of those opposing the retreat of the Communist International from an organiser of world revolution into defender of Soviet Russia at the hands of growing bureaucracy.  She sought to create in England a Communist Workers’ Party aligned to the short-lived Fourth International founded by the KAPD and others.

coup threat in bolivia

A week ago we carried a report from La Paz on the deepening crisis in Bolivia, where the oligarchy are using fascist shock troops to seize control of public buildings and attack trade unionists and indigenous people in their efforts to take back control of the country. The oligarchy already control half of Bolivia, including most of the east and south, and now they are even more openly mobilising for a coup: yet the Morales government continues to sit on its hands and offer ‘negotiations’ with the oligarchs. The article below is translated from the Spanish from www.econoticiasbolivia.com

rees and german resign from “left alternative” leadership

today’s ‘left alternative’ members’ bulletin announces the resignation of socialist workers’ party leaders john rees and lindsey german from the national committee of  the swp’s post-respect electoral front. no political explanation has been given for this move, although it is clearly part of the swp’s attempt to shift direction after their electoral debacle in may.

convention of the left

next weekend sees the convention of the left, a counter-conference held in manchester at the same time as the labour party conference. the convention will be a site for the left, (and hopefully not just the left groups), to have some open discussions, an all-too-rare occurrence.

hal draper: anatomy of the micro-sect

reproduced with the kind permission of ernest haberkern: available to buy at amazon.com or socialisthistory.org.

There is a terminological problem. “Sect“ is often used as a cuss-word to mean a group one doesn’t like. “Movement” is often used to describe something that does not exist in organized form; as when “the American socialist movement“ is used as an abbreviation for scattered socialist elements that often do not “move” at all. We shall use these terms with more precise meanings.

fascists attempt to split bolivia

evo morales’ plans to rule in concord with bolivia’s oligarchs are unravelling ever further, as the right wing of the ruling class have now effectively split the country in two and the central government has lost authority over five out of nine provinces, now patrolled by fascists. the workers’ movement betrayed by morales has been left with the task of fighting the gangs hired by the landowners to ‘keep order’. from la paz, september 3rd:

The oligarchy plans to consolidate its power in the east and in the valleys, with its fascist bands seizing control of roads and the streets as the Morales Government continues to place its trust in the ballot box.

With sticks and whips in hand and using their fascist bands as a spearhead, the oligarchy – governors, right-wingers and the 100 powerful clans who own the land and big business – are consolidating their power over the east of Bolivia and the valleys.

may 1968 in france: could the working class have taken power?

this video was taken at the cpgb’s annual school, the communist university, which took place from august 9 – 16 2008 in south london. for more info, reports and comments visit www.cpgb.org.uk

last night’s meeting on the upsurge 1968-74

last night (monday 1st september) we held the first session in the ‘uncaptive minds’ educational series on class struggle in the 1970s. 23 people attended.

after a showing of arise ye workers, a film on the 1972 struggle against anti-union laws and the fight to free the pentonville five (which you can download here), the meeting was addressed by former vauxhall car worker george shaw and sheila cohen, author of ramparts of resistance.

revolutionary strategy

david broder reviews revolutionary strategy, a new book by the cpgb’s mike macnair

There is much of value in any serious attempt to talk about the tasks of the left today, and what exactly the purpose of its existence is: Mike Macnair’s new book, which carries the subtitle “Marxism and the challenge of left unity” is certainly this. The left sects are crying out for some ideas and some definition for their project: what we have at the moment is a maelstrom of sectarian and internally undemocratic groups, with philistine hostility towards discussion and utter disdain for ideas other than those quoted from the holy texts of Lenin and Trotsky.

the fundamental principles of communist production and distribution

Today we have added to the site The Fundamental Principles of Communist Production and Distribution, a book produced by the Dutch GIK (Group of International Communists) in 1930, putting forward a vision of communist society totally different from that of the many failed state-socialist experiments. Below we reproduce the foreword written in 1989 by Mike Baker, who translated this important work into English.

crosland’s new social-democratic reformism

The idea of Gordon Brown writing on the future of socialism will come as a surprise to many, but that is precisely what he invites us to discuss in his foreword to a new edition of Anthony Crosland’s The Future of British Socialism.