Claire Fisher reports on a disturbing outbreak of thuggery at Marxism 2010 - and Zuri Zurowski continues the story. I’m writing as a member of the SWP. Attending Marxism has always been enjoyable for me - the opportunity to listen to debates within a left forum can be inspiring and help foster the belief that we ...
How far does John Molyneux’s critique of SWP bureaucratic centralism go? Ben Lewis reports. “We don’t usually do this”, said leading Socialist Workers Party member John Molyneux in his opening on ‘Democracy and the revolutionary party’ at this year’s Marxism. Indeed, when comrade Molyneux spoke rather candidly of a “recent period in the SWP where it ...
A festival of sporting genius, or an incitement to chauvinism? James Turley looks at the contradictions of the football extravaganza. The world’s eyes are on South Africa - and not because of Aids epidemics or the legacy of apartheid. The French nation is locked in mutual recrimination, the English narrowly avoiding the same fate by hanging ...
Liam Conway reviews The Trial of Bukharin, by George Katkov. Nikolai Bukahrin remains one of the Soviet Union’s most intriguing figures over 70 years after his demise. An exceptionally gifted writer and intellect Bukharin’s life was both eventful and tragic at the same time. From his youthful days as a leading member of the left-wing ...
The industrial unrest at the Morning Star, involving the Communist Party of Britain and National Union of Journalists, cannot be put down to unreasonable workers, argues James Turley. Readers of the Morning Star, by and large, are well acquainted with trade union issues and the occasional dispute - the paper being, after all, the trade union ...
Ben Lewis reports on the campaign to free all political prisoners in Iran. Jafar Panahi, the Iranian film maker recently released after three months in Iran’s notorious Evin prison, protests that at the moment he has little hope of making another film - all he can do is produce one in his head. However, he adds ...
Another split on the left leads to questions being raised about what passes for ‘democratic centralism’. James Turley looks at the travails of the IMT. The decay of the International Marxist Tendency continues apace. A relatively successful Trotskyist organisation, with roots in the British Militant Tendency and (mostly tiny) sections in a large number of countries, ...
After the brutal massacre carried out by Israeli special forces killing over 10 aid workers there has been a demonstration called by Manchester Stop the War and the Manchester Palestine Solidarity Campaign: Sunday 13th June Assemble: 2.00pm All Saints Park, Oxford Road, Manchester March and rally with speakers including: *Babu Adam Zanghar (Freedom Flotilla, Bolton) *Paveen Yaqub (Freedom Flotilla, Huddersfield) *Rae Street ...
Amidst talk of a ‘new Yorkshire Ripper’ James Turley calls for a principled approach to sex work. On October 30 1975, Wilma McCann was brutally murdered in Leeds. The killer was Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper - but it took an enormous police operation six years, during which 12 more women were murdered and many more ...
Sheffield Palestine Solidarity Campaign held a demonstration on June 2 in the city centre, in response to the recent Israeli attack on the flotilla of ships trying to break the siege of Gaza and deliver aid. It was well attended with about 200 people turning out to hear a selection of speakers from Sheffield PSC, ...
Laurie Smith sees the question of unity being further depoliticised. The May 22 Right to Work campaign meeting at Friends Meeting House in central London was a big success organisationally. Over 600 attended. They were, however, in the main, members of the Socialist Workers Party, although ex-SWPers Chris Nineham and Lindsey German, who are now part ...
Over 800 people gathered outside the BBC in Manchester in what was an angry and determined protest. Everyone gathered was outraged by the massacre committed by the Israeli military against aid workers bound for Gaza aboard a humanitarian flotilla organised by activists, MEP's, trade unionists and journalists from across the world. Protesters marched through the city ...
Ben Lewis is astounded by the PCS call for the state and employers to be granted more power over the workforce in the name of anti-fascism. It was certainly encouraging to hear the militant pledges made at last week’s Public and Commercial Services union conference to rally members in defence of public services against the coalition ...