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.

first ‘uncaptive minds’ forum tonight at 6:30pm

a reminder of the first in our series of discussions on working-class struggle in the 1970s, taking place from 6:30pm this evening (monday 1st september)

the subject of the meeting will be the upsurge 1968-74, with guest speakers sheila cohen, author of ramparts of resistance, and george shaw, a former vauxhall car worker and former member of solidarity.

we will also be showing a short film about the era, arise ye workers

the venue is in central london – contact uncaptiveminds@googlemail.com or 07595 245494 for details

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.

cob announces 45 day truce with bolivian government

la paz, august 13 – translated from the spanish from www.econoticiasbolivia.com

This Tuesday evening the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB) announced a 45 day truce in its struggle to win a new welfare system for pensions, but warned that it would begin mobilisations again if the Evo Morales Government did not keep his end of the bargain.

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.

more new content in ‘ideas’

today we have added to the ‘ideas‘ section of the website…

the solidarity group’s pamphlet on the 1871 paris commune. this compares trotsky and tales’ insistence that the communards failed because of their lack of a party unfavourably to karl marx’s civil war in france, which makes no such argument; and furthermore celebrates this great display of working class insurgency from below.

we also feature an article by david broder on the organisation of education under capitalism and the alienation of students, and an essay by chris ford on the relevance of the theory of state capitalism in today’s globalised capitalist economy.

the website is now accessible at www.thecommune.co.uk as well as the wordpress address.

leaflet for uncaptive minds series on class struggle in the 1970s

click here for a pdf of the leaflet for the forthcoming uncaptive minds series on class struggle in the 1970s.

the first session, from 6:30pm on monday september 1st, will be on the upsurge 1968-74, with sheila cohen, author of ramparts of resistance and george shaw, a former vauxhall car worker and former member of solidarity.

new content in ‘ideas’

we have added more content to the ‘ideas‘ section of the commune.

first off is a piece on self-management in the struggle for socialism by michel raptis – also known as michel pablo and at one time a leading member of the trotskyist international secretariat of the fourth international – who in the late 1960s and early 1970s turned his focus towards workers’ self-management.

tamás krausz describes the struggle for workers’ self-management in action with his article on the workers’ councils in hungary in 1956, where workers mounted a revolution against the stalinist bureaucracy and tried to take power, only to be crushed by russian tanks.

then we reproduce kevin anderson’s essay on lenin’s engagement with hegelian philosophy during world war one, and his little-read hegel notebooks.

and in state capitalism or bureaucratic collectivism? chris ford introduces the debate in the united states workers’ party over the class character of the soviet union, and we republish speeches by raya dunayevskaya and max shachtman.

czechoslovakia ’68: what ‘socialism’? what ‘human face’?

The Prague Spring of 1968 and the subsequent Russian invasion naturally enough provoked comments and analyses from both left and right. That an event of great significance had taken place was not in question. But people differed in their views as to what exactly was important about what had happened.

czechoslovakia ’68: the workers’ councils

by petr cerny

before the invasion the workers were suspicious of the imposed workers’ councils. after the invasion they became symbolic of the advances made. the question of the councils also became mixed up with the defence of the leadership and its policies. at the same time, some workers began to realise that the councils could be changed from what officialdom wanted them to be into something more approaching organs of workers’ power. at this time there were 46 councils functioning. another 140 were in their preparatory stages. however, all of this was unfortunately clouded by the question of defending the dubcek leadership.

new content on the commune

we have launched this website to spread the ideas of workers’ self-management and communism from below, as well as publicising our activities and forthcoming magazine.

the site is new but already features a set of theoretical and historical pieces (see ‘ideas‘), a draft where we stand statement (see ‘about us’) and will soon feature some news pieces.