an image of the ‘big society’? a report from woodberry down community library

by ‘Lady Stardust’

The Tories are talking about the Big Society; anti-capitalists are talking about self-organisation and the commons; and the anti-cuts campaigns are demanding the preservation or re-instatement of state run and controlled services. Amongst this finding a radical critique of the state whilst defending those state services; finding a critique of self-exploitation whilst acknowledging the great things communities and small groups are doing to change lives and empower people – is not always easy. To take a concrete example we did a couple of interviews with some people running a community library in Hackney, North London.

The history

Woodberry Down is a huge run-down estate in Hackney with a population of 280,000. It has had a long planned and long delayed regeneration programme, resulting in repairs not done and empty flats; along side a huge building site for a flashy new development of ‘mixed housing’.

revolutionary syndicalism in interwar europe, monday 29th

Following our successful series of talks on political organisation over the summer, where we looked at series of communist political organisations (Kamunist Kranti in India, Potere Operario in Italy and finally at Big Flame in England), The Commune is hosting a series of discussion forums on revolutionary syndicalism.

The second meeting of this series is: Monday, November 29, 7pm: Revolutionary Syndicalism and Anarcho-Syndicalism, the Interwar European Experience. Like the other meetings in the syndicalism series, Monday’s will be held in The Artillery Arms, 102 Bunhill Row, London, EC1Y 8ND.

bristol reading group 28th november: 21st century socialism in latin america?

The next Bristol reading group session is on socialism in Latin America. It will be on Sunday 28th November at Cafe Kino, Ninetree Hill, Stokes Croft, from 6pm.

All welcome. See below for suggested reading. It is not expected that you read all the texts – focus on the country or countries you are most interested in.

rimbaud and the paris commune

Sean Bonney was not impressed by a talk on French poet Arthur Rimbaud and the 1871 revolution in Paris

Last month, the Marx Memorial Library hosted a talk called “Rimbaud and the Paris Commune”, given by the latter-day “decadent” poet Sebastian Hayes. Hayes – whose qualification to talk about the revolutionary aspects of the poetic imagination didn’t amount to much more than having apparently hung out in Paris in 1968 – seemed to know little about Rimbaud, nothing about the Paris Commune and even less about Marx.

The most memorable part of the evening was his suggestion that Marx’s definitive account of the Commune, The Civil War in France was ‘not worth reading’ because it contains ‘too much detail’. It was also surprising to hear his claim that there had been no uprisings in France since 1968: presumably the riots in 2005, or indeed last month’s strikes – still going on while he was speaking – were not ‘poetic’ enough for him.

why are we still protesting this crap?

Bahar Mustafa writes on debates among feminists in Oxford over a lap dancing club

Oxford Brookes University sells itself as a modern, business-orientated institution which boasts a hefty contribution of £1 million every single day of the year to the UK economy.

As impressive as that may be to many people, some friends and I thought it odd that such a reputable institution, with its myriad of student organised societies, should be fiercely lacking in a space where gender inequality is highlighted and challenged. So earlier this year, an enthusiastic group of us of varying backgrounds, genders and sexualities, founded the first Feminist Society at Brookes; aka: OMFG! Organised Multicultural Feminist Group.

a strike made in hollywood

‘Feel-good’ hit movie Made in Dagenham didn’t make Sheila Cohen feel very good…

A film about a strike that really happened, a strike that brought a huge multinational to a standstill, a strike that was waged and led by women… What’s not to like? Only that Made In Dagenham fails to tell the true, and far more significant, story of the 1968 Ford sewing machinists’ strike – a story of class rebellion against exploitation rather than of softly gender-focused togetherness.

For its first half hour, Made In Dagenham looks good. Apart from the stripping-off scenes in the sweaty factory, unanimously repudiated by strike survivors, the film more or less tells it like it was – i.e. that the sewing machinists were involved in a grading dispute. The emphasis is necessary, because, along with almost every account of the dispute over the last 40-odd years, the next two-thirds of the film stubbornly present it as a “strike for equal pay”.

precarious work and solidarity

Tawanda Nyabango reports on discussions among cleaner solidarity activists

At this year’s Anarchist bookfair the Industrial Workers of the World organised a discussion around the issue of solidarity with cleaners. Speakers included a Cleaners Defence Committee regular, a leading organiser in the University College London Living Wage Campaign and a member of The Commune.

The meeting began with the speaker from the Cleaners Defence Committee giving a brief outline of the struggles and solidarity actions that took place earlier on this year. These included the Willis insurance and School of Oriental and African Studies cleaners’ disputes in 2009, and more recently the struggle UBS cleaners and the campaign to reinstate victimised shop steward Alberto Durango. The Cleaners Defence Committee has sought to assist and build links between these disputes.

Council housing, and the changing needs of capitalism.

Barry Biddulph explains the historical restructuring of council housing

The state provision of Council Housing has always been  bureaucratic, and top-down, based on the needs of capital.  The nature and scope of council housing has changed with the changing needs of capitalism.

Its heyday was the long post-war economic boom. Since then the structural crisis of British capitalism has led to social engineering by Conservative and Labour governments making council housing mainly accommodation for those stigmatised as the “undeserving poor.”In other words, working-class people who will not or do not conform to the requirements of the market economy and can function as a reserve army of labour when necessary.

state repression in france’s pensions struggle

Millions in France have marched and struck against a two-year increase in the retirement age. Nicolas Dessaux looks at the repression of the movement.

Since the start of the movement over pensions, the state has reacted in a highly repressive manner. From the fist demonstrations, the slightest stepping-out-of-line, a single bottle thrown, has led to offensives by CRS (riot cops), tear gas, arrests, fast-track trials and sentences.

First, on 23^rd September, workers were arrested in Saint-Nazaire, since when court sentences, dismissals, penalties and threats have rained down on workers who took part in blockade actions. From the start of the movement in the lycées (of high school students), there has been a hail of arrests and punitivemeasures, and many have already been injured.

more work, no pay

editorial of The Commune

On 7th November the ConDem coalition announced its plan to force unemployed people to work a 30-hour week of manual labour to ‘earn’ the £65 Jobseekers’ Allowance.

Tory Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith said the Work Activity scheme will “make work pay”. Quite the opposite. It will make people work for free, slaves to the state.

Government rhetoric claims that people in work are having to support the “work-shy”, and that this tax is unfair. Yet the whole coalition cuts project means that working-class people will get less services for the tax money they have to pay to the state, which is of course as high as ever.

bar humbug: the new shape of work

Pete Wright went through the mill of precarious bar work

How does one go about describing the experience working at the Clapham Grand? Well I suppose it depends on who you ask. If you asked management they would tell it’s like being part of a giant family or a rainbow or something; which is somewhat disturbing when you consider that the floor manager changed a total of four times in the three months I worked there. A model family for the broken society I suppose.

Management would probably cite how everyone knows each other’s names (they don’t) and how they enjoy each other’s company so much they spend a certain premeasured but non-compulsory segment of their free time outside of work together as well. If however you were to ask a worker I’m sure their answer would be pretty short and along the lines of ‘it’s like working at most bars in London’.

what’s wrong with kansas? russia iran disco suck

Sharon Borthwick writes on the meaning of the success of right-wing ‘Tea Party’ candidates in the United States midterm elections

Shocking as it may be, the Tea Party movement has been a great success. This ‘grass roots’ conservative activism is not a new phenomenon and it would be interesting to look at its recent history.

Thomas Frank’s 2003, What’s the Matter with Kansas? proves a useful tool in that regard. Frank himself, grew up in Kansas and was a deeply conservative adolescent who hero-worshipped Ronald Reagan. He learnt from older men an anger that was “endless, implacable, spectacular”.

issue 19 of the commune

The November 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.

Public services cuts

more work no pay – an editorial on new plans to make the unemployed work for free

PFI disasters and council hot air – Dave Spencer on Coventry’s failed incinerator plan

assetco fiddle as london burns – Joe Thorne on developments in the London firefighters’ strike

no cuts, better services – Bob Goupillot on the anti-cuts demos in Edinburgh

cuts in jobs and services at sheffield council – a bulletin produced by The Commune for housing staff

the crumbling walls of council housing – David Huckerby explains the restructuring of council housing

International

what’s wrong with kansas – Sharon Borthwick looks at the USA’s Tea Party right-wing revival

crisis and resistance in spain – Millie Wild reports from Seville on the recent general strike

state repression in france’s pensions struggle – Nicolas Dessaux on state attacks on the social movement to defend pensions

stop the stoning of sakineh – report on the fight for the release of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, an Iranian woman condemned to death by stoning for ‘adultery’

Workplace

bar humbug: the new shape of work – Pete Wright went through the mill of precarious bar work

precarious work and solidarity – Tawanda Nyabango reports on the Cleaners’ Defence Committee

revitalising NSSN – Keir Snow writes on a new syndicalist initiative

Education and students

first issue of The Educator

what resistance to education cuts – Mark Harrison attended the Education Activist Network conference

why are we still protesting this crap? – Bahar Mustafa writes on the Oxford feminist scene’s debates over a lap-dancing club

Reviews

rimbaud and the paris commune – Sean Bonney was not impressed by the Marx Memorial Library’s talk on Arthur Rimbaud

badiou, the helmsman and communism from below – Sharon Borthwick reviews The Communist Hypothesis

permanent revolution in the andes? – David Broder reviews Bolivia’s Radical Tradition

a strike made in hollywood – Sheila Cohen reviews Made in Dagenham

Our network

platform of the commune

upcoming events

pamphlets

monday 15th london forum: revolutionary syndicalism in britain 1910-30

Following our successful series of talks on political organisation over the summer, where we looked at series of communist political organisations (Kamunist Kranti in India, Potere Operaio in Italy and finally at Big Flame in England), The Commune is hosting a series of discussion forums on revolutionary syndicalism.

The first meeting in this series is Monday, November 15th, 7pm: Revolutionary Syndicalism in Britain and the Industrial Syndicalist Education League: 1910-1930. At the Artillery Arms, 102 Bunhill Row, near Old St.