for workers' power from below
Sheila Cohen looks at the Great Unrest and the meaning for syndicalism today
It seems unlikely that the centenary of the 1910-14 Great Unrest will gain much attention in the media – if, indeed, it gets a mention at all. But, for supporters of workers’ revolutionary self-activity, this is an anniversary to remember. Continue reading “a syndicalism for the 21st century?”
In August we staged a series of forums on what we can learn from past communist organisations. Martine Bourne reports on the discussion about Italian group Potere Operaio.
Potere Operaio (Workers Power) were the focus of the second meeting of the series organised by the London group on communist organisation and class struggle. Potere Operaio emerged in 1967 as a grouping operating independently of the trade union movement. They stood as a faction within the Communist Party-led CGIL trade union during internal elections at the Petrolchimico company based in the industrial zone of Venice, Porto Marghera. From here they built themselves into a national organisation which at their high point had 10,000 activists, but by 1973 had split. Continue reading “potere operaio: the last firebrands”
The September issue of The Commune is now available. Click the image below to see PDF or use the list of individual articles as they are posted online.
Contact us at uncaptiveminds@gmail.com if you would like to buy a printed copy (£1 + 50p postage) or set up a subscription. (£12 a year UK/£16 EU/£20 international.
News
spectre of communism haunts china’s rulers – Adam Ford on the recent strike wave
solidarity with the miners’ strike in ukraine – by Chris Kane
Life at work
‘the security is to keep us in!’ – Sharon Borthwick reviews Rivethead, a ‘book of tales from the assembly line’
Strategies for fighting the cuts
building a movement against cuts – by Steve Ryan
proposed principles for anti-cuts movements – a motion by Dave Spencer to The Commune’s upcoming conference
Events
the commune around britain – details of local groups and forums
women at the cutting edge – Feminist Fightback meeting on the crisis, 30th October
Our network, the left and theory
Adam Ford reports on recent upheavals in China
With the US empire in terminal decline, the Chinese economy has become essential to the globally integrated capitalist economy. China is now the world’s second largest economy, having officially overtaken its neighbour Japan, with a gross domestic product of over a trillion US dollars in the second quarter of 2010. It has long enjoyed gargantuan economic growth, and even weathered the storm of the global economic crisis up to this point.
But its status as “sweatshop of the world” now seems extremely vulnerable to both internal and external shocks, and a period of huge social upheaval is on the horizon. Continue reading “a spectre of communism haunts china’s rulers…”
Eleanor Davies, a member of Permanent Revolution, proposes joint forums and a culture of openness
Permanent Revolution members attended The Commune’s recent summer school and found it to be a day of open discussion with many committed activists. One of the things that stuck out most was the number of people who wanted to talk about taking the day forward in terms of working together with a common goal of rebuilding the movement.
The plenary session was opened by Chris Ford of The Commune who made the point that, as we approach a period where the working class will come under the savage attack of the Con-Dem government, the left is marginalised to the point where we have very little influence in any sphere of society. The idea of ‘communist regroupment’ was posed and met with favourable if cautious response. Continue reading “for creative and critical thinking on the left”
Gregor Gall, professor of Industrial Relations at the University of Hertfordshire, explores the difficulties of forming alliances and coalitions to fight the cuts.
In previous articles for The Commune, I laid out the arguments for, and problems and challenges contained therein, in constructing civil alliances between the providers (via unions) and users of the services in order to oppose cuts in and privatisation of public services. Continue reading “a coalition of cuts, a coalition of resistance”
Adam Ford writes on the recent inquiry into the police killing of Ian Tomlinson, which resulted in a whitewash of those involved.
For the ruling class, the embarrassment caused by the transparent cover-up of Ian Tomlinson’s police killing was a necessary evil. The alternative was far worse – a very public examination of policing tactics at a time of drastic cutbacks. Continue reading “ruling class embarrassed by ian tomlinson charade”
Richard Price reports on last month’s English Defence League and Islamist provocations in Tower Hamlets and the left’s response. See here for an interview with a Bengali secular activist on the same theme.
In mid-May an event was announced for June 20th at the Troxy Ballroom in Limehouse, Tower Hamlets, organised by the UK-IC (UK –Islamic Conference) (1) . The list of speakers was impressive and global including the likes of the Malaysian Sheikh Hussein Lee. And bigots to a man: and, of course, they are all men. All of them having been quoted as spouting filth supporting violence and rape against women in marriage, killing gays and violent anti-Jewish racism (2).
Sadly, instead of an immediate reaction of east London progressives to oppose this meeting, the EDL (English Defence League) (3) jumped up and said they would march against the meeting. The EDL are an odd crew, a few right wing libertarians ideologically against Islamic conservatism, a few neo-Nazis trying to ferment race riots, but what appears to be a majority who are ‘British loyalists’ i.e. working class conservatives, who support the notion of a ‘Great Britain’ and will fight for that, who, while ignoring the massive loss of power neo-liberalism has wrought on us, are panicked by the almost irrelevant threat of Islamism in the UK. On the one hand it says it is simply against Islamism and the threat to British liberalism brought by that but its attacks on Islamism end up looking pretty much like scapegoating all Muslims, deeply dangerous in a period when we need to be united against the state as it attacks. Continue reading “the day the EDL didn’t show up”
by Mark Harrison
In November 2009, the management of Manchester Metropolitan University announced plans to shed 127 members of ‘support staff’ from their workforce; this follows a period of manifest ‘natural wastage’, which has left the library devoid of staff. Amongst students, those of the flagship art department will be hardest hit. Artists have complained that their courses will become ‘unviable’ with the loss of technicians and studio time.
The UNISON branch secretary made a firm verbal attack against management, highlighting the Vice Chancellor John Brooks’ £250,000 annual salary and the 7% increase in his pay packet as well as the development of new sites by the university, a £1.3 million budget surplus for the year 2009-10 and the fact that the cuts were announced before Alistair Darling’s 2010 budget. The union called for a vote of no-confidence in the VC whilst condemning a growth in the number of highly paid managers and “years of mismanagement”. Continue reading “‘unviable’ courses thanks to MMU cuts”
A report on the recent cuts by an hourly-paid ESOL teacher
Cuts and Compulsory Redundancies
Earlier this year 68 members of staff at Hackney Community College were issued with notification of possible redundancy. After two successful, solid strike days, negotiation and many voluntary redundancies there are now only a handful of people facing compulsory redundancy. Continue reading “hackney community college needs a community fightback”
by Dave Spencer
When we are talking about building communism from below, we need to know our starting point – the state and the consciousness of the working class.
One of the greatest influences on the theory of this matter and on the consequent policies and actions of local government and of workers in the voluntary or “Third” sector is Robert Putnam’s book Bowling Alone (2000). In it Putnam introduces the term “social capital”. By this he means any type of social or community engagement whatsoever – formal, informal, to do with friends, work, the family, hobbies, faith, politics, sport, the community. In other words social capital refers to how society works at grass roots, street and community level.
Angela Gorrie reports on Dundee
While traditional manufacturing industries are declining in Dundee, it’s beginning to seem like workers’ struggles are on the rise.
It’s saying something when a city which once boasted to be the home of ‘Jute, Jam and Journalism’ now lists Tesco as its largest single employer. Of the 29 companies who employ more than 300 people, few can claim to be involved in any kind of manufacture. While Michelin still remains, the likes of Timex have been replaced by companies specialising in biotechnology and computer games and the city council never tire of talking up their so called ‘Cultural Quarter’. Continue reading “‘the resurgence of unions in the strangest of places’…”
by Sheila Cohen
Bryan Pearce’s 1959 article ‘Some Past Rank and File Movements'[1] is an intriguing piece, not only because of its date during a period of relative quiescence in the labour movement but also because it puts its finger on almost every issue that currently confronts today’s perhaps even more quiescent – or at least less powerful – working class.
Paradoxically, the piece begins with two de rigeur quotes from Leon Trotsky which in turn muddy two of the central points Pearce’s account later indicates. This is largely because of the conflation which Trotsky, like so many other writers, makes between trade unionism in its aspect as organiser of class resistance and as bureaucratic institution through – again like almost every other writer in the field – referring to both aspects under the same rubric. Thus: “The trade unions of our time can either serve as secondary instruments of imperialist capitalism for the subordinating and disciplining of workers… or, on the contrary, the trade unions can become the instruments of the revolutionary movement of the proletariat…” Continue reading “‘some past rank and file movements’… and the future?”
As UK troops pulled out from the Sangin area of Helmand in early July, commanders hailed the successes of their mission in Afghanistan.
Yet at the same time the US-backed president Hamid Karzai has sought reconciliation with the Taliban, demonstrating the sham of ‘democracy’ brought by imperialist troops. The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan reports.
By inviting the Taliban, the leaders of the Islamic Party and other “Jihadi leaders” to be part of a “Consultative Peace Jirga,” Hamid Karzai is committing yet another crime against the Afghan people.
He has installed former Soviet puppets and Northern Alliance warlords in key posts of his government. He even went as far as assigning the two most notorious warlords, Karim Khalili and Qasim Fahim, as his vice presidents. Continue reading “an olive branch to the taliban?”
