No War but Class War - September 2010

This month ends with a 24 hour general strike in Spain, and other protests and actions across Europe in solidarity.

This is a strike about which the CNT are, reasonably, sceptical. They note that although "we have more than enough reasons to strike," it can be said that "a one-day strike (or rather, a workday of symbolic unemployment) is too little too late." An act of wrangling by bureaucrats keen for a seat at the top table.

But rather than heckling at the sidelines, they are responding with action;

Therefore we are calling for participation in a strike, a real strike, not so that they will call on us to negotiate a reform and some cuts to which we are radically opposed, but to throw the reform and the cuts out altogether. But above all, to take the first step in the reconstruction of a class-conscious unionism, one that will defend the interests of everyone who's been suffering from the downpour of the last two years while the state unionists have participated in the spectacle of giving out subsidies and cutting rights. And we are going to do this while following the principles we've always had, without accepting state subsidies or delegating our power to others.

We will call for the strike, we will form pickets and we will protest. Direct action will be our identifying mark on September 29th. We will do this to try to demolish the labor reform that cheapens firings, facilitates layoffs, favors pulling away from labor agreements (including salary tables), and grants full powers to the union bureaucrats in the critical sectors to negotiate with the employers to the detriment of the workers' assemblies...

Worker, unemployed, student... it's past time to reclaim what is ours, because if we don't they will continue to strip our rights. If you're fed up with seeing how the state unions boss us around, and you want to take part in the construction of revolutionary unionism, a unionism that doesn't sell itself to our enemy in exchange for a plate of state subsidies, come to the branches of the CNT or contact our workplace branch in your company.

Starting on September 29th and even before, we'll see you in the street, against the abuses of the employers, the politicians, the bankers, and the pickpocketing so-called "unions", because the struggle doesn't stop here.

As I write, the strike continues and reports have not yet come in. However, it is clear that the course taken by the CNT is the one that anarchists and radical workers need to take.

We should not merely be hecklers on the sidelines, deriding "reformism." Alongside a solid analysis of the flaws of the mainstream union movement, we need to provide an alternative and make the case for it directly to the working class. And the best way to do that is by acting.

At the very beginning of the month, we saw what results such action can achieve. In Warsaw, tenants are celebrating a successful campaign to prevent the sell-off of publicly owned housing.

In the first round of protests, the campaign managed to prevent the sell off of one building under claim, which ,means that all buildings in the same property will remain municipal housing. And the struggle continues, with a rent strike called for October 1st by the anarcho-syndicalist ZSP.

This demonstrates the efficacy of grassroots organisation and direct action. But it also shows that cuts and privatisation can be resisted communally as well as in the workplace.

In Minneapolis, workers at the fast food chain Jimmy John's have formed an IWW-affiliated union, presented demands for better wages and more control over scheduling, and held large pickets. Following the precedent set by the Starbucks union, this clearly shows the efficacy of the libertarian organising model over traditional unions in mobilising casualised workers.

In a similar vein, the Seattle Solidarity Network have helped a woman hounded out of her job by racism to win her dispute with Lorig Associates. Despite heavy-handed union busting tactics, a determined 18 months campaign saw the company drop their lawsuits and pay out $22,000 compensation.

In France, the government's proposal to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62 was met with street protests and a national strike against the measures. This was not a one-off, with two more such events later on in the month. It follows an earlier action in May.

This is in stark contrast to Britain, where such measures were met with little to no reaction. Which is part of a broader inaction against government class warfare, the occasional march notwithstanding.

In Ankara, contractors in one of the biggest university hospitals in Ankara have gone on wildcat strike over wages. They did not receive their pay for August and only got half for September. The workers have vowed to continue their strike until they will receive their wages.

In Poland, LibCom reports on a similar dispute;

A group of hospital cleaners from the Specialized Hospital in Dabrowa Gornicza had a meeting with their new bosses at the Municipal Office in the presence of members of the City Council. The workers are trying to get the city involved in the fate of the hospital staff since it is a public hospital. Still the President of the City claims they are "not a party" in the conflict.

The problem is that the hospital outsourced their work six years ago. The workers became employees of a private firm called Aspen. In the last public tender, a firm called Naprzod won and will now be their employer.

37 cleaners have refused the conditions of the new contract. They are asking for permanent contracts with a minimum guaranteed salary. In other words, they are also concerned that the company can cut their working hours.

Naprzod wants to give the women 3 year contracts. Those trying to convince the workers to accept this point out that Naprzod's contract with the hospital, which they won in a public tender, is only three years long.

The struggle then is in fact against the outsourcing and the way people are hired in public health care. In recent years, the majority of health care workers have lost their labour relationship with their hospital as part of reforms connected to the commercialization of health care in Poland.

The cleaners had no luck talking to their new employer or the city so they decided to occupy the office. The security guards then locked the door of the top-floor conference room where they were meeting. In this way, they tried to get them out, by among other things, cutting their access to toilets. But the women were able to get onto the roof, from where their protest became visible. They spent the night on the roof and say they are waiting for the President of the City to speak with them. 

Migrant workers in Greece have responded to police violence and harassment by striking. As the culmination of a long campaign of racism and terror, police inspired their employers to evict them. The strikers demands are human housing, decent wages, and legal status / asylum for migrants and refugees.

We should hope that they get solidarity from native Greek workers and follow the same example here. Class solidarity - not nationalism - is the only sensible solution to capitalist abuses.

Still in Greece, "struggle season" has once more begun anew;

The massiveness of what in the last decades has become a 'traditional' and usually lukewarm protest march, accompanying the Greek PM's economic plenary speech in the Salonica Expo was not matched by any considerable pulse on the part of the protesters. Surrounded by thousands of riot policemen, who did not hesitate to apply the Socialist Party's new repressive method, i.e. preemptive detainment of some 35 "anarchist-looking" folk before the start of the march, the protest was more massive than the last years but equally numb and silent. Held in one of the most conservative cities of Greece where the extreme religious element mingles with a long-standing antisemitic nationalism it is no wonder that the man arrested after throwing a shoe at the PM wailed about some "United Patriotic Front". The two marches (one by the GSEE and the other by the grassroots unions) numbered up to 30,000 people under rain.

Nevertheless, the marches during the Expo always mark the beginning of the so-called 'struggle season', which even the most conservative estimates expect to be angry and unpredictable. Even the right-wing daily Kathimerini figured a Friday front-page predicting that numbness will soon lead to rage and perhaps bloodshed. The prospects of a social explosion have risen considerably in the last weeks after the government has proved insensitive enough to introduce a new heating fuel tax that will double the price of heating petrol, amounting to an extra lost salary p.a. Statistics have shown the GDP to have plunged by almost 3,5% in the last 6 months, while unemployment up from 8 to 12% with modest expectations of it to rise to 20% by December. At the same time 20-25% of high-street shops remain shut due to the recession, while 3/4 of the stock-market registered companies have recorded losses. The picture becomes really absurd if one adds to it the fact that the Athens Mayor has announced a budget of 4,000 Euros per uniform, in order to dress his municipal policemen, while the government announcing a multi-million emergency budget for upgrading the police forces. With nearly 90% of the population declaring in various polls that it is against the government and its handling of the economy, the recent reshuffling of the government cabinet has done little to appease the wide spectrum of discontent.

As a nightmare coming back alive, fuel carrying truck drivers have decided to end their peace with the government and resume striking from Monday. News agencies report that on that day the drivers plan a huge motorised march to the capital where they will give the keys to their vehicles to the Transport Ministry refusing to serve under the civil conscription orders that linger over their heads since late July. 

But, with protests and strikes flaring up all over the world in reponse to what is quite clearly a global consensus of austerity, the dilemma is how to turn a "season" into a tidal wave.

Too often, a "winter of discontent" will peter out after much bluff and bluster. The ruling class remain unharmed, as does the social order that perpetuates them. Whilst the masses are in a worse off position than before having been demobilised by their "leaders."

That pattern needs to be challenged. As the CNT are, we need to push for resistance led from below by the rank-and-file. We need to argue and agitate for effective direct action over collaboration.

In individual struggles, the anarcho-syndicalist model has claimed impressive victories. But across the broader movement, we remain a minority. If we are able to put across our perspective through growing and effective organisation, that may not remain the case for too long.

No War but Class War - August 2010

Easily the most high-profile struggle this month has been that of public sector workers in South Africa. They walked out over pay, the latest in a long-run of disputes in the country, and have promised that the strike will be indefinite until demands are met.

I commented that this tactic should serve as a lesson for British workers, hamstrung by stringent laws and bureaucrats all-too-willing to follow them.

However, Adam Ford notes that the South Africans have bureaucrat issues of their own;

For the moment, the Congress of South African Trade Unions leaders are talking tough, but behind the scenes they will be working with the government. Since the ANC came to power under Nelson Mandela in the 1990s, COSATU have been an enthusiastic partner in forcing through privatizations, spending and wage cuts. 

The question is, with President Jacob Zuma ordering ministers to negotiate an end to the strike, how this will affect the chances for significant victories in the strike.

In Britain, there have been a number of ongoing disputes, though these have been rather more low-key than the South African strike. Part of the reason for this is the ruling class desire to play down industrial unrest, with the cuts still to come. But the unions also seem unwilling to publicise workers' struggles.

Unite, in particular, made a point of claiming that there would be no industrial unrest in response to austerity measures because "we don't have the volatile nature of the French or the Greeks."

This should be seen in the context of the union's recent sell-out of BAA workers;

Last week the Unite union agreed a below inflation pay deal with management of BAA, which owns six British Airports including Heathrow and London Stansted. Under the deal 8,400 employees, including security, firefighting and ground handling staff, will receive a 2 percent pay rise, a one-off bonus payment and other bonus payments linked to a productivity increase. The 2 percent deal is a de facto pay cut as inflation now stands at 5 percent.

Unite claimed the deal was a victory, which it now “expected to set the standard for future industry pay deals”.

Mocking Unite’s rhetoric, the Daily Telegraph wrote, “BAA settles airport pay dispute on worse terms than BA”. The Telegraph noted that the pay deal is lower than that which is mooted to have been offered by British Airways (BA) to its cabin crew staff in their ongoing dispute. That deal is now being put to a ballot.

The stitch-up of the BAA workers came only a week after Unite, the GMB union and BA management agreed that 3,000 BA ground crew workers will face pay cuts and up to 500 “voluntary” job losses. ‘Some 200 workers have already been forced to leave. A pay freeze until October 2010 has been implemented and flexibility arrangements will be introduced. This is also being put to a ballot, with the unions recommending acceptance.

After being forced into militancy during the British Airways dispute by the rank-and-file of the BA Stewards and Stewardesses Association (BASSA), Unite are now trying to calm any tendency towards militancy. They want negotiations with management to be on their terms, not those of the workers.

LibCom, ever a useful resource for this kind of information, offers a round-up of other struggles across Britain;

Bin workers strike at West Lothian council

Refuse workers at West Lothian Council have taken strike action over a pay cut being imposed as part of the downgrading of their jobs.

All refuse workers face a job downgrade which will amount to a cut of at least £2,800 a year. The first 24-hour strike took place on Friday the 27th of August, and was sanctioned by the GMB union.

The action, which involved 93 workers, follows the council implementing what it says are its legal obligations to equalise pay for similar skill levels in order to close the pay gap between men and women in the public sector – traditionally 'female' jobs have historically been less well paid than 'male' jobs of a similar skill level. Strikes have followed similar moves at other councils around the UK, as councils attempt to 'solve' the problem of low pay for female workers being cutting the pay for traditionally 'male' jobs, rather than raising those of 'female' jobs.

Bus strikes in Liverpool

Bus workers have begun a four-day strike in Liverpool over pay.

Workers at Stagecoach Liverpool have been offered a 2% pay offer by management, which represents a real-terms pay cut when inflation is running at 4.5%. The action, backed by the Unite union, involves hundreds of staff and stands to hit one in five buses in the Liverpool area. The strike began on Friday, and is running until Tuesday.

London Underground Strikes Announced

200 Alstom-Metro maintenance workers on the London underground have voted for strike action over a management pay offer.

According to the RMT union, which organised the strike ballot, the offer on the table is significantly lower than comparable pay offers for other parts of the London Underground workforce. The first strike will take place on the 5th of September, with further 24-hour strikes to follow in October and November.

The announcement follows an overwhelming strike vote from RMT and TSSA union members over plans to close ticket offices around the capital with the loss of around 800 jobs. 10,000 workers including drivers and station staff stand to take part in the strike action. The first of four one-day strikes is due to start on September the 6th. An indefinite overtime ban will also apply as part of the action.

Southampton Librarians Strike

Library workers in Southampton struck for two days on the 12th and 16th of August in protest against the council's scrapping of two libraries and the replacement of staff with unpaid volunteers.

The strikes follow earlier action in June, after the council announced the closure of Millbrook and Thornhill libraries last year. Millbrook library remains one of the last remaining public services in that area of the city.

The attacks on public services and public sector workers under Southampton's Tory council are a foretaste of what is looming on a national scale, with the “big society” of volunteers being the pretext for job cuts and rolling back vital services.

London hospital drivers and firefighters balloted

The Fire Brigades Union has launched a ballot of its members in London after management scuppered negotiations and moved to cancel existing contracts and impose new ones on staff, which would involve different shift times and working hours. Ballot papers are due to be issued at the end of the month, with action possible from September onwards.

Meanwhile, members of the GMB union employed by the London Ambulance Service are being balloted at the time of writing over the privatisation of key services. The staff are employed to transport patients across the capital to sites and take them to and from hospital. The South London Healthcare NHS Trust has put the service out to tender.

The contract covers London Ambulance employees in Greenwich, Barnhurst and Bromley, who transport patients to Kings College, Lewisham, Royal Marsden and Guys & St Thomas hospitals, and has been awarded to Savoy Ventures Ltd. At a meeting where Savoy representatives were invited to discuss the takeover with GMB members, they made clear their intention to ignore Transfer of undertakings (TUPE) legislation, flouting employment law, cutting the outer-london weighting allowance and threatening “downward harmonisation” from current pay levels to those of Savoy's lowest-paid workers. Such flouting of the law would be in keeping with the transfer of the contract, as public procurement laws stating that contracts should not be awarded to companies whose directors preciously oversaw insolvent companies were ignored. Robert Lawrence Adams, who runs Savoy, was previously involved in companies still owing money to HM Revenue and Customs. 

Earlier this month, migrant workers at a factory in Malaysia rioted after their employer delayed sending an injured worker to the hospital, resulting in his death.

The fighting, which included rubbish and stones being thrown at riot police, took seven hours to contain. Following the riot, management agreed to meet with a representative of the workers, who are demanding an increase in pay and the presence of a mini-clinic on site to prevent further such fatalities.

These demands have been met. LibCom reports that "management agreed to pay compensation of 10,000 Ringgit to the dead worker's family; increase the minimum monthly salary from 428 to 546 Ringgit; [and] provide an ambulance service for emergency cases and on time treatment at a clinic on the factory premises."

However, the broader picture in the country is no cause for celebration;

This case of exploitation of migrant workers is only the tip of the iceberg in Malaysia. Most of the more than 3 million migrant workers (almost 10% of the Malaysian population) earn very low wages, work long hours and live and work in appalling conditions. According to the Nepalese embassy, during 2009 a total of 183 Nepalese workers in Malaysia lost their lives, and another 81 workers in the first six months of this year, mainly through illness and suicides. There are also many cases of deaths due to industrial accidents involving migrant workers.

In the meantime, the employers are using low wage migrant workers as a ‘threat' to discourage local workers from demanding high wages. The weak trade unions, with a right-wing reactionary and bureaucratic leadership, are not capable of playing a role in leading common struggles between local and migrant workers. At the same time, almost 90 percent of workers are not unionized, and the government's pro-employer labour and trade union law further undermines the rights of workers.

Although local workers are given a slightly better deal in wages, when compared to the high inflation rate their salary is not sufficient to manage their living expenses. Many are doing two jobs to meet their needs, and many even end up in the hands of loan sharks when they see no other way out. Even a recent government survey of about 1.3 million workers has shown that almost 34 per cent of them earned less than 700 Ringgit a month - below the poverty line of 720 Ringgit per month.

This highlights how international capital can use migrants against natives in order to drive down wages and undermine working conditions.

Unity as a class is the only way to combat this. But, as the example of Malaysia's trade union leadership demonstrates, it must be done through workers' self-organisation, by-passing the weak and crippling bureaucracy of traditional trade union structures.

In America, there have been a number of significant struggles which highlight the growing class consiousness and militancy of workers in the US.

Baristas of the IWW's starbucks union shut down a store in Omaha in protest at cutbacks imposed on the staff by management. As one Barista said, "Starbucks rewards workers with a poverty wage while they give their Wall Street pals dividends."

This latest action is part of an ongoing campaign against union busting and attacks on the workers by Starbucks.

In the words of one shift supervisor, "since the recession began, Starbucks executives have ruthlessly gutted our standard of living. They doubled the cost of our health insurance, reduced staffing levels, cut our hours, all while demanding more work from us. Starbucks is now more than profitable again. It's time for management to give back what they took from us."

A similar struggle sprung up almost spontaneously at a hotelin California, where non-unionised workers started a wildcat strike in response to labour law violations and unacceptable working conditions.

California state law requires one unpaid 30-minute lunch break and two paid 10-minute breaks for every eight-hour shift. It also requires one hour’s wages be paid to compensate for any missed break. But workers at the Embassy Suites in Irvine, California were being denied both breaks and pay.

The management were fully aware of the situation, and had even threatened workers with disciplinary action for attempts to assert their rights. But, at 4am on August 9th, the workers "lost our fear."

About a third of the staff formed a picket line, and through conversation with other workers as they arrived during the day, convinced more and more to either join the picket line or head home. They returned to work the next day knowing that their employer would continue to try and subvert their rights, but unwilling to simply take it any longer.

One temp housekeeper, threatened with the sack for refusing to cross the picket line, saw their fellow housekeepers refuse to start their shifts in solidarity, and was able to keep her job. The workers have seen first-hand the gains of militancy and solidarity, but their struggle for real concessions continues.

The New York Taxi Workers Alliance (NYTWA) has responded to the anti-Muslim hysteria surrounding the building of the so-called "ground zero mosque" after member Ahmed Sharif was attacked in his cab.

The NYTWA has been organising for 12 years to battle the low pay, long hours, and minimal legal protections afforded drivers. Now, according to Labor Notes, they are using that experience to build strength in numbers against potential hate crimes.

An in-depth analysis of the group's broader organising efforts can be found here.

China has also been experiencing increasing waves of unrest, stemming from a variety of competing factors which have made the country's state-capitalist economy increasingly volatile.

As the Solidarity Federation report in the latest edition of their free newspaper Catalyst (PDF);

Rapid industrialisation over the past few decades has created massive internal migration from the countryside to the cities on an unprecedented scale, dwarfing Britain’s industrial revolution two centuries ago. Now, this new urban working class has begun to flex its muscles, disrupting production in order to assert their demands.

The high-profile suicides at Foxconn, who make iPhones for Apple, were merely the tip of the iceberg. There, angry workers rioted over sweatshop conditions, chanting “capitalists kill people” and brandishing pictures of the CEO of Foxconn, Terry Gou. The company quickly offered improved wages and conditions in an attempt to quell the storm. However these headline-grabbing measures were quickly eaten up by reductions in overtime and speed-ups on production lines.

Elsewhere, 1,000 workers at the Denso car parts plant in the southern province of Guangdong won a two-day strike over poor breakfasts. China’s factories are vast – some the size of whole cities. Some employ tens of thousands of workers at a single site. Coupled with long working hours, this means workers often don’t leave work to eat meals, and the quality of those meals has proved a flashpoint. Workers ignored the pleas of the official union to return to work, and forced company bosses to improve meal provision.

For nearly three decades, corporations have increasingly relocated manufacturing to China to take advantage of a vast supply of cheap labour and lax regulation. The consequences of that lax regulation have also provoked social conflicts. 1,000 villagers in Jingxi county, Guangxi province, near the border with Vietnam recently protested against pollution from an aluminium plant owned by one of the country’s largest aluminium producers. Villagers blocked the gates to the plant and damaged production facilities, and one local government official was taken to hospital after being hit by stones.

In the past two months workers have walked out at three Honda plants, a Toyota supplier, a Hyundai factory in Beijing, a rubber products manufacturer in Shanghai and a Carlsberg brewery. Recently, workers at Japanese electronics firm Tianjin Mitsumi crippled output with a sit-in, complaining they were being asked to work extra hours for no extra pay.

The rising assertiveness of Chinese workers is causing some corporate investors to look elsewhere. However, industrial unrest is a pattern repeated across the region. In Cambodia, workers staged a three-day strike in July in a dispute over the minimum wage, while in Vietnam thousands of workers at a shoe factory staged a strike demanding higher salaries. While wages in Vietnam and Cambodia are still a fraction of those won by Chinese workers, increasing militancy is rapidly closing the gap.

Across the world, the class war continues to heat up as workers realise just how much solidarity and a militant resolve can win them.

Even more hearteningly, the number of instances of workers rejecting the betrayals of union bureaucrats is growing. The recent expulsion of UAW officials from a meeting of workers in dispute with the General Motors in Indianapolis is just one example.

Of course, ramping up the fightback risks more ferocious attacks from the bosses. But in the climate of austerity it seems a risk that many workers are willing to take.

We need to hope that, as the lessons spread and the working class become better equipped to defend themselves, the ruling class finally learn a lesson. Namely, that the threat of mutually assured destruction will not make us accept our lot in life.

We built this world. We created their wealth. And we are not afraid of ruins.

No War but Class War - July 2010

As people around the world watched and celebrated the World Cup in South Africa, he host nation saw a wave of workers' struggles.

This included wildcat bus workers' strikes, postal strikes, walkouts by construction workers, a miners' strike, and the high-profile strike by match stewards during the world cup.

Now, the country's public sector has gone on strike. 9,000 civil servants have walked out, and business leaders are worried that this "jeopardise the country's ability to generate a positive impression of SA as a desirable country with which to trade and in which to invest." Unions are demanding "an 8,6% pay rise (backdated to April 1), a R1000 housing allowance and the equalisation of medical aid subsidies."

Elsewhere in Africa, Rwandan construction workers have downed tools over the non-payment of wages, and Kenyan agricultural workers walked off a farm over pay and conditions.

In the United States, Labor Notes reports that "from California to Maine, double-digit deficits have left civil servants with a giant bull’s-eye on their backs, as politicians across the spectrum have pushed furloughs, layoffs, wage cuts, and farther-reaching measures like pension modifications as the main way to close yawning budget gaps."

What the response from the public sector unions will be is as yet unclear. However, they coulod do worse than follow the lead from other mobilisations around the US.

In response to the Hyatt corporation seeking wage freezes and increases to healthcare premiums, service industry workers have coordinated civil disobedience across the country. Fifteen cities saw action, and hundreds of protesters were arrested. As food server Andy Lopez said, "management needs to see we aren’t going away."

Meanwhile, in the cleanup effort in the Gulf of Mexico, BP is showing the same disregard for workers' safety that caused the Deepwater disaster in the first place;

Today, 27,000 workers in the BP-run Gulf cleanup effort may still be in danger. Some are falling sick, and the long-term effects of chemical exposure for workers and residents are yet unknown.

Workers lack power on the job to demand better safety enforcement. They fear company retaliation if they speak out and are wary of government regulators who have kept BP in the driver’s seat.

BP has said it will provide workers with respirators and proper training if necessary, but the company has yet to deem the situation a health risk for workers. The Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN) provided respirators to some workers directly, but BP forbade them to use them.

One rationale behind banning respirators is that they could increase the likelihood of heat-related illnesses, but Kindra Arnsen, an outspoken wife of a sick fisherman turned cleanup worker, points out that many workers are fishermen accustomed to the Gulf heat who can work safely given enough hydration and time for breaks.

Workers who question the safety of their assignments, choose to wear their own safety equipment, or speak out about the risks are threatened with losing their jobs, according to Arnsen and LEAN’s executive director Marylee Orr.

Arnsen has also spoken out in fear for her community of Venice, Louisiana. She describes illnesses and rashes her young children and husband have suffered since the explosion and cleanup and says there are days when officials tell residents to stay indoors.

Competing against the PR power of BP, and a mass media unconcerned with such issues, this threatens to be a long uphill struggle. Those involved need the solidariy of fellow workers every step of the way.

In China, the convergence of workers and environmental disputes continues;

More than 1,000 people threw rocks at police and blocked roads in southern China in protest at pollution from a plant owned by one of the country's largest private aluminium producers, state media said on Thursday.

The Chinese government has become increasingly worried about rising public anger at environmental problems, especially pollution.

The official China Daily said that in the latest incident, more than 1,000 villagers in Jingxi county, in Guangxi near the border with Vietnam, took to the streets on Tuesday to protest against the Shandong Xinfa Aluminum and Power Group plant.

"Almost all the residents in Lingwan village were involved in blocking the road to Jingxi county on Tuesday afternoon, and some villagers threw stones at police who had been sent by the Jingxi government," it cited a government statement as saying.

"One official hit by stones was sent to the hospital, but no other injuries were reported," the newspaper added.

Residents also blocked the gates to the plant and damaged some production facilities before dispersing.

"Villagers have been very unhappy for a long time about the pollution caused by the plant," it quoted local government official Qin Weifeng as saying.

The newspaper said the Xinfa is one of the three largest producers in Jingxi, in an area known for production of bauxite and alumina, the raw material for aluminium. China's rapid growth has caused many environmental problems, and prompted growing concern among citizens about health problems caused by pollution.

In Greece, a nationwide strike by truck drivers is "threatening fuel, food and medical shortages across the country."

Prime Minister George Papandreou issued a civil conscription using emergency legislation for only the fourth time since the end of military rule, but they have defied the order.

According to the truck drivers themselves, "we continue. Let them take us to prison. We have nothing to more to lose. If the government thinks that after two days of strike it can move to such measures instead choosing dialogue, it carries all responsibility."

This is the attitude that workers around the world need to take as we are faced with near-universal attacks to save capitalism. They only call it class war when we fight back, but we need to do just that.

No War but Class War - June 2010

Whilst everyone has been focused on pay freezes, job losses, and service cuts, the elephant in the room for workers of late has been Health and Safety.

David Cameron has appointed Lord Young to undertake a "Whitehall-wide review" of Health and Safety laws. The obvious intent behind rhetoric about "red tape" being to water down the enforcement of said legislation.

To see the effects of this, we need only look to America, where the lack of a last-ditch safety valve, despite warnings from workers, led to 15 deaths and the worst environmental disaster in US history.

But, as Labor Notes reports, this is overlies a far quieter but equally disturbing story;

In the same week as the human-created disaster in the Massey mine in West Virginia, local media outlets around the country carried dozens of stories with headlines like “Man Killed in Trench Collapse” or “Fall from Roof Fatal.”

The toll of these routine incidents—14 deaths a day from injuries alone—is obscured because most occur one death at a time.

Month after month, year after year, workers die in trench collapses and falls from roofs. OSHA cites the employer, slaps it with a modest fine (a median penalty of only $3,675 per death in 2007), and points out that simple methods exist to prevent such tragic loss of life. Yet some employers continue to ignore the hazards and workers continue to lose their lives due to this criminal neglect.

Like the high-profile workplace disasters, the vast majority of deaths on the job are entirely preventable. The problem is not a technical one of chemical concentrations, safe machinery, and ventilation, but a political one—simply put, our national system for enforcing health and safety regulations in the workplace is broken.

This is what we can expect in the UK if Cameron and Lord Young get their way. But, as of yet, there has been no significant response from the TUC unions. And a few quotes in the media will not effect any change at all.

Still in Britain, the British Airways dispute rolls on. BA have put forward another offer to cabin crew staff, and Unite are delaying a strike vote to allow members to vote on it. Despite Tony Woodley saying that he will not recommend the deal, because it doesn't reinstate member travel perks, this seems to be the best way of resolving the dispute without mutually assurred destruction.

Between Willie Walsh's aggressive union-busting tactics and Unite's earlier dithering over strike action, the workers have been led to a point where no outright victory is possible. Of course, if they opt to strike again they should have the solidarity of their fellow workers, but it seems the best BA cabin crews can hope for is to not lose outright.

The "Belgrade Six," Serbian anarcho-syndicalists arrested on trumped up charges of "international terrorism," have been formally acquitted. After the earlier victory for the German FAU-B, who have reclaimed the right from the courts to call themselves and act as a trade union, this is a positive development for the radical workers' movement.

Anarcho-syndicalists in the ZSP, the FAU-B's sister-organisation in Poland, are engaged in a struggle for Chinese immigrant workers stranded in Warsaw without money or a travel permit. Lawyers for their employers involved are trying to dissuade action and avoid responsibility.

In Spain, the CNT have called to make a coming general strike indefinite, arguing that single-day actions will not disrupt the bosses enough to deter them.

Evidence of this can be seen in Greece, where even rioting and violence has failed to make the actions more effective. Instead of short and dramatic show pieces, there needs to be a more concerted attack on the capitalist system and in favour of workers' control. An indefinite strike would be an integral part of that, and it would seem that some in France feel as the CNT does in Spain.

However, the ZSP have vowed that they "will not be confused by legalistic bullshit" and "will continue to demand help for these victims of exploitation from the entities involved."

In South Africa, the World Cup has become the story, eclipsing everything else. In response not only to this but also evictions, detentions, and a crackdown on dissidents, the Western Cape Anti-Eviction Campaign have launched the Poor Peoples' World Cup.

At the main World Cup, stewards went on strike over a pay dispute. This was met with police violence, with at least one woman hurt and two strikers arrested.

"The sale of rice on the Cuban black market has reached more than three times the price of this product in agricultural markets," according to reports, and the scarcity has led to desperation amongst the country's poor workers. Dockers have refused to allow a ship taking rice to Haiti to leave, defying the army in order to claim a victory for popular militancy.

Another blockade occurred at about the same time in San Francisco.

800 activists blocked the Oakland docks from the early hours of the morning in opposition to an Israeli ship after the attack on the Gaza flotilla. In soldarity, dock workers cited health and safety concerns and refused to cross the picket.

Speaking of pickets, Labor Notes asks the question "How Do We Win Strikes Again?" Noting that "unions avoid strikes because they fear they can’t win them," they get Peter Olney of the Longshore and Warehouse Union, who have just won a 15-week lockout, to explain how to "break this mold;"

You have to set the strike up very carefully. You can’t get suckered out in a pure economic strike. You have to find a way to be out on an unfair labor practice strike so you have more flexibility in returning to work, and returning without permanent replacements. That’s basic rule No. 1. But so many unions walk off the cliff and do what the company wants—I’ve done it myself.

A lot of it is preparation and training. There’s a lot of discussion of heroic actions around not handling struck work or blockading trucks. The tactical part of the struggle is important, but the bottom line is you have to take care of the members. When that breaks down it causes tremendous demoralization.

You must be prepared with a strike fund or food-and-money-raising operation to take care of the workers, who are immediately destitute. People drift away and pay for the strike by crossing the picket line. Feeding the members is part and parcel of winning. It’s a lost art.

As general strikes and unrest at austerit measures continues to spread, this would be a lesson worth learning for worker organisation the world over. The class war is intensifying and disputes continue to heat up.

It would be good if we could win them.

No War but Class War - May 2010

Like the month before, this month began with riots in Greece. And, once again, the event brought with it the tragedy of lost human lives.

Following May Day clashes, there was a 48-hour general strike. All, of course, provoked by the IMF-mandated austerity measures that look set to cripple the country's working class in order to shore up its rulers. It was during the second half of that strike that three bank workers suffocated  in Marfin Bank.

The media followed PM George Papandreou's line that this was a "murderous act" by anarchists. But Occupied London relayed a statement by another worker from the same bank indicating that the deaths were clearly catalysed by gross negligence and dangerous practices on behalf of their employer, whilst the riots were sparked by disturbingly commonplace police brutality. Members of the anarchist squat of Skaramanga and Patision concurred, saying that "the real murderer, the real instigator of today’s tragic death of 3 people is “mister” Vgenopoulos, who used the usual employers’ blackmailing (the threat of sacking) and forced his employees to work in the branches of his bank during a day of strike."

Nonetheless, the police retaliation against anarchists was brutal, and the approval of the IMF measures only exacerbated the situation there. The struggle faced by workers in Greece looks to be a long one. But the question remains as to whether it can go beyond clashes on the street towards workers' takeover and significant change.

In Britain, the May 6th General Election led to the formation of a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government. The result was not the outright Tory majority that many working class people had feared, but nonetheless it wasn't a good sign. The policies outlined in the coalition agreement included some positive measures on civil liberties, but also the expected attacks on social welfare and favouring of the rich. Then came the announcement of £6.25 billion worth of cuts, and the unmistakable news that the class war would continue under the new government.

How this will play out remains to be seen, as this month we saw workers still fighting the class attacks by the previous government.

PCS won a High Court victory in its dispute over the Civil Service Compensation Scheme. The Government cannot force through changes without the negotiated consent of the union, and so for the time being the payouts members would receive if made redundant are safe.

However, we can be sure that what is negotiated will be a step down from the current scheme, thus still making it cheaper than it would have been to cull jobs. Union members will have to watch how this plays out very carefully. The rank and file must be ready to resist if Mark Serwotka or his fellow bureaucrats take the well-worn road to member sell-outs by full time union officers.

BT workers have joined the ranks of those standing up to the inherent unfairness of the capitalist system. They have voted in favour of strike action to secure a 5% rather than 2% pay rise - as I explained recently, not an unreasonable demand given the chief executive's £1.2m bonus, or the overall 9.8% rise in the cost of living after last year's pay freeze.

British Airways cabin crew are presently in the midst of what has become a 15-day strike. After BA won an injunction to block the strike, an appeal from Unite in the midst of protests by workers' groups saw this latest anti-worker verdict by the court overturned.

The problem that the strikers face, though, is that chief executive Willie Wash has turned this into a zero sum game. By pushing on with strike- and union-busting measures to the detriment of negotiations, he has reduced the union to two choices: total capitulation or all-out war. The former would have rendered all previous fightback efforts void and cemented management dominance over the workers. The latter may well be the path to mutually assured destruction.

It is hard to see what third way there might be as this latest round of strike action drags on. What is clear is Walsh's goal. As former Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern said of Walsh's tenure at Aer Lingus, we are seeing "a time when management wanted to steal the assets for themselves through a management buy out, shafting staff interests." The BA staff deserve our solidarity as they fight against a repeat performance.

In the United States, workers secured two considerable victories this month. The first, in Oakland, came as a teachers' strike shut down the district for the day and forced officials to back down on plans to impose harsh new terms and conditions. The second came from hospital workers in Philadelphia. They beat back concessions demanded by their employer on union rights, wages, and working conditions after a month-long strike.

These victories are tempered by the tragedy that occurred off the southern coast of the United States. As the media report on BP's failing efforts to contain the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, we should remember that this accident claimed eleven workers' lives and may have been entirely preventable.

This is not the first time BP has had a catastrophic breakdown at one of its facilities. The company has a history of unsafe work conditions and environmental problems, largely due to cost cutting measures a congressional committee once described as “draconian.”

As The Trial by Fire note;

It should come as no surprise that the company bankrolling this disaster, BP spent $3,650,000 in lobbying expenses in 2006 alone, no doubt to influence regulations. The company is one of the largest oil corporations in the world.

According to Beyond Petroleum (formerly British Petroleum, or BP), the rig was drilling 18,000 feet down to get to pockets of gas and oil under pressure when it caught fire.

The rig reportedly lacked a last-ditch safety valve, an “acoustic switch,” that could have potentially averted the massive oil spill. Such safety mechanisms are common in many oil rich countries around the world, but are not mandated in the U.S. because of their high cost.

A History of Neglect:

In 2006, BP pleaded guilty to felony charges after an explosion at their facility in Texas City, Texas, killed 15 workers and injured 170 others.

Carolyn Merritt, chairman of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, told reporters while investigating the Texas explosion that:

“[These] things do not have to happen. They are preventable. They are predictable, and people do not have to die because they’re earning a living,”

She was right. Investigators at the sight found problems everywhere:

“There were three key pieces of instrumentation that were actually supposed to be repaired that were not repaired. And the management knew this… They authorized the startup [of the machinery which exploded] knowing that these three pieces of equipment were not properly working.”

Despite Bp’s own rules to the contrary, they had parked trailers full of workers in an open area right next to the broken machinery. At the mandatory safety meeting that morning, management didn’t once mention the dangerous procedure that would soon be taking place.

One worker, scared for his safety, wrote his supervisor: “the equipment is in dangerous condition and this is not taken seriously.” Another wrote “this place is set up for a catastrophic failure.”

But management in London didn’t listen, and the company flourished as a result. BP made a profit of $19 billion that year.

Nearly a year afterwards, the company again faced controversy when it was discovered that one of their pipelines had leaked nearly 4,800 barrels of oil into the Alaskan wilderness. The leak was caused by the company’s refusal to check its expansive pipelines in Prudhoe Bay.

In a leaked memo, inspection and quality-assurance specialist Bill Herasymiuk warned BP’s corrosion, inspection, and chemical team warned of an impending “catastrophe” if practices in the company were not changed.

Sure enough, four years after it was instructed to inspect it, BP found that a six-mile length of pipeline was corroded.

Worker unrest looks set to roll over to Spain and Portugal next. Both have announced significant wage and welfare cuts at a time of record unemployment. Greece is not the only example for workers there to follow, with General Strikes hitting both Yemen and Iran this month.

In Yemen, the protest stems not just from rampant inflation and a devalued currency, pushing workers further into poverty, but also government oppression. The immediate response, as reported by al-Jazeera, was more violence. Clashes erupted "when security forces tried to force shopowners to open the doors of their stores" and it was claimed that "armed men had opened fire on police." The complex situation is a combination of political troubles ongoing since 1994 and more generalised worker unrest as destitution increases.


The Iranian general strike stems from the regime's treatment of dissidents. According to the New York Times, "Iranian Kurds staged one of their largest strikes in recent years, closing shops and bazaars in nearly all Sunni Kurdish cities and towns in western Iran to protest the executions of five people, including four Kurdish activists, on Sunday." This is the biggest act of rebellion since the unrest around the presidential elections.

In South Africa, too, the poor and marginalised are fighting against brutal state repression. Police in Johannesburg have "attacked the Landless People’s Movement (LPM) in the shacks in Protea South." According to the LPM statement, "They went around disconnecting us from electricity and beating those who had been connected to electricity. They tried to burn down Maureen Mnisi’s shack and two people were shot. One died on the scene. Today the police attacked the LPM in eTwatwa, Ekurhuleni. At least three people were shot with live ammunition. One person has died and another is currently being operated on in hospital."

The violence is particularly worrying in the context of the upcoming FIFA World Cup in the country. The Olympic games in China saw a massive crackdown on dissidents, and there is a strong likelihood that South Africa will witness something similar.

As Chris Rodrigues noted in the Guardian, "We should be outraged that a country with such a brutal history of forced removals has, in order to create the right brand attributes, evicted the urban poor and rounded up the homeless. Dumped into so-called "temporary relocation areas" and "transit camps" (during the preliminary draw street children were even held in Westville prison) these disowned South Africans make a mockery of the struggle against apartheid."

The LPM share that sentiment. "We are very worried about the World Cup. Billions are wasted on the World Cup, billions that should have gone to meet the most urgent need of the poor. The government tells us that we must ‘feel it’ but in Protea South we don’t even have electricity. Some of us are in hiding from the police. People have been shot and two people have died in recent days."

This, not an entirely imaginary ban on England flags and shirts, is the real injustice of the coming World Cup. It is also a poignant illustration of how the class struggle is global and why international solidarity is vital.

No War but Class War - April 2010

In Greece, this month began with tragedy. A bomb exploded outside a building in the Patissia area, killing and Afghan boy of fifteen and seriously injuring his mother and ten year old sister.

The media was quick to put the blame on "leftist militants" and "far-left or anarchist groups." According to the BBC, "bomb attacks earlier this month targeted the home of a Pakistani community leader and the office of a far-right anti-immigration group." This is the only mention that Greece's neo-Nazis get, despite paramilitary group Golden Dawn being one of the primary anti-anarchist combatants (often with at least tacit support from the state) in the country. Earlier on in the troubles, they threw grenades at a migrant shelter, and have been using the unrest as an excuse to target non-white communities.

In relation to this incident, according to regular LibCom contributor Taxikipali;

The responsibility for the attack has been claimed via a communique by a neonazi group "Revolutionary National-Socialist Front". In it the fascists unfold their racist discourse and promise more bombs in "places crowded by immigrants", pledging its solidarity to Combat 18 prisoners in Britain. The police has expressed caution in accepting the communique as genuine. An earlier phone call to the press taking responsibility under the name "Guerrilla group Lambros Foundas" has been brushed away as a farce by the authorities.

This set the tone for another turbulent month, as Prime Minister George Papandreou formally approved a €30bn bailout package from EU and IMF financiers. The response from workers was not a positive one. According to al-Jazeera, "about 2,500 people marched in the capital on Friday" 23rd April, and "labour unions are planning protests against the government's economic austerity measures next week, as part of ongoing demonstrations since the measures were announced."

Before this, the country saw the detention of anarchists on charges of domestic terrorism, and university buildings occupied in response. The arrest of boys with firecrackers was amongst the disproportionate response of police, looking to crush all dissent underfoot. But, as the growing movement of discontent demonstrates, the Greek public will not be cowed by state repression.

In the United States, airport workers in Austin, Texas held a protest at the Department of Health. According to Labor Notes, "on March 25, a delegation of 30 workers organized by their rank-and-file contract committee had presented a petition to managers demanding a stop to unilateral work rule changes. In response, a manager asked airport police to arrest the whole delegation. ... Several days later, four workers were served with termination notices for "insubordination" and "engaging in a protest"—although the National Labor Relations Act protects "concerted activity" by workers acting for their collective betterment."

This is just the latest grievance in a company which maintains "70 days a year when workers aren't allowed to call in sick without a doctor's note," and where "workers report seeing rodents and insects in the company's kitchens."

Like Britain, the US is facing heavy cutback and privatisation, particularly in schooling. As such, actions of resistance become increasingly vital in a country viewed by workers abroad as a place where the class war is already lost. But there are efforts to reverse that trend. Labor Notes has been at the forefront of this with its "troublemaker schools." As a recent editorial says;

Unionists cannot afford to be purists. Whether it’s a one-day strike or a publicity campaign, any method of fighting back and extracting gains is important and necessary in this era. In discussing the need to change the rules, the danger is promoting defeatism, which is the opposite of what the labor movement needs.

There is no instant answer. But after decades of declining membership, we must begin a discussion of the fundamentals of union power. When the labor movement rises up again as a powerful force in the United States, it won’t be as a result of legislation or of cutting deals with employers. It will be because workers have taken back their most powerful weapons—solidarity and halting production.

Acts of resistance continue to flare up sporadically in China.

In Beijing, "hundreds of laid-off former bank employees have attended a rally in Beijing demanding better benefits." Despite police violence, they chanted “President Hu [Jintao], we want food,” “Premier Wen [Jiabao], we want jobs,” “We have to support our parents, we have to raise our children,” and “We gave the banks our early life, but the banks destroyed our later life.” However, this looks set to be a long struggle as "many petitioners have spent years pursuing complaints against local officials over disputes including the loss of homes and farmland, unpaid wages and pensions, or alleged mistreatment by the authorities."

In Sichuan, violence erupted at the Pubugou dam as police tried to evict people in order to allow the demolition of homes. Some people threatened to blow themselves up, whilst many others engaged in a desperate standoff against the police until the people were eventually moved on.

Unfortunately, neither case resulted in anything approaching a victory. However, according to LibCom, "as public and private developers—using corrupt means, and the absence of property rights and the rule of law—eject people from their homes," China is seeing an increasing number of acts of resistance. There has to be a tipping point, when they become outright rebellion against the tyranny that dominates the country.

There are many other places across the world where the struggle continues, often unheard even by alternative media. It is important that, as Workers' Memorial Day draws to a close, we remember how vital it is to continue building those networks of solidarity. Working class people continue to day, not just at the hands of a brutal police or military force, but on the job in utterly unsafe conditions so that the bosses can add a few extra pennies to their obscene profits.

It will be more intense over the coming months, as the ruling class try to claw back their profits and erase the damage done to them by the recession at our expense. But make no mistake, we will be fighting a class war as long as the exploitation of labour by capital persists. It is no less vital when we are petitioning in the workplace to improve health and safety than when we are on the streets holding the picket lines together.

No War but Class War - March 2010

This month, Britain has seenwhat right-wing commentators have been quick to dub a "Spring of Discontent." Three big unions, namely PCS, Unite, and the RMT, have called strike actions which have drawn heavy fire for their immediate impact upon services and the public.

PCS took part in a two-day strike at the start of the month, followed by a third day to coincide with the delivery of the Budget in Parliament. Despite condemnations from ministers and senior civil servants (who may look more kindly as their own pay gets affected), and propaganda in the media, there was strong support for the action from the general public. Families of civil servants have now started a petition to get the Prime Minister to respond to the action and call a halt to disputed changes in the Civil Service Compensation Scheme.

Unite members in British Airways cabin crews yesterday began their second round of strike action, after their first three days took place from the 20th to the 22nd. The dispute centres around attempts by BA to impose crippling changes to the terms and conditions of staff and, essentially, create a two-tier workforce. Even more so than the civil service dispute, the cabin crew action has come under intense propaganda fire from the media. The Daily Mail has been particularly vocal in this, the latest point being the ridiculous attempts to associate the strike with allegations that Unite official Derek Simpson visited a "seedy go-go bar" in Thailand. Unfortunately, in the anti-union media world, ad hominem attacks work.

Members of the RMT are planning to strike on the 6th to 9th April, over London Underground's cost-cutting plans which would see 800 staff lose their jobs. The union gave the employer a deadline to withdraw the job cuts, before ballotting members on striking. The ballot passed overwhelmingly, and the walkout would effectively see the rail network shut down as a result. However, the "rail strike chaos" (another propaganda play from the media) may be averted now that talks have resumed.

In all three of these cases, the dispute has still yet to be resolved. Workers are fighting to save their jobs in a post-recession environment which allows employers to eradicate people's livelihoods in order to save themselves. The unions are fighting back, but this remains limited to within specific industries and sectors, and from a reformist and concilliatory perspective. What is lacking is the will to link up these disputes and publicly state that this broad attack on workers is nothing less than class war.

When that link is made, we can see a marked difference in the fightback. In Greece, strikes and industrial disputes have become part of the ongoing and explosive struggle there. In the past month, the country has seen the amplification of a genuine Spring of Discontent;

Lawyers have called a 3-day long strike and doctors continue withdrawing their labour against the austerity measures, train workers halt their locomotives, while four different labour marches are to be performed within the day by judicial officers, firemen and pensioners in Athens, along with a central public sector march in the afternoon.

Just a few days before the long holiday season of the greek easter, which is the government's main hope for easing tension, a new wave of strikes and protest marches against the austerity measures is hitting the country.

Lawyers have declared a three day strike against the austerity measures for the 23, 24 and 26 of March (the 25th is a national holiday). Meawhile, doctors are continuing to withdraw their labour from the country's public hospitals in demand of the immediate payment of all their owed salaries. Athens doctors will be seeing the Minister of Health today, although their Salonica colleagues refused to see the Minister for negotiations a few days ago. Yesterday doctors across the country performed a coordinated 6 hour stoppage and a demo outside the Ministry of Health in Athens. It must be noted that talks between National Electricity (DEH) workers and the Minister of Labour are in progress. The DEH union has declared that if the talks fail it will move to rolling 48h strikes that will plunge the country in darkness.

At the same time, train and suburban train workers are performing a 4 hour stoppage today against the measures, during the noon peak-time that will see all trains come to a standstill. Judicial officers continue their daily 2-h work stoppage campaign against the measures, which has brought chaos to the greek courts. The judicial officers will gather today at 10:00 at the Eirinodikio Courts and march to the Parliament. Meanwhile, firemen have called a demo at Omonoia for 11:00 intending to march against the measures to the Ministry of Finance. A little later pensioners have called a march against the measures to the Ministry of National Economy. They will be joined by National Telecommunications, National Railway and National Post workers also protesting against pension cuts. Later in the day, at 18:00, ADEDY, the public sector umbrella union, has called a central protest march against the measures from Propylaea to the Parliament. At the same time, anarchists are calling for an anti-racist demo at Amerikis square, an hang out area of African immigrants coveted by neon-nazi groups.

The continuous protest marches are expected to keep the centre of Athens off limits for cars throughout the day. The government is meanwhile launching a mixed campaign of rumors and declarations against these very rumors concerning the country seeking IMF help, or going bust, or changing back to its old national currency. This strategy of confusion is supplanted by newspaper talk of secret printing of old currency notes in the Treasury vaults, and about the 25th of March being a "critical day" for the currency. At the same time the government is trying to let some steam out of radical protester's anger, by promising an immediate reversal of the anti-hood law and an immediate ban on CCTV in public spaces.

Alongside this, Athens has once again been transformed into an urban warfare zone;

An urban guerrilla offensive seems to be underway in Athens with two major bomb attacks within the last 48 hours, one against the headquarters of the neo-nazi party Golden Dawn, and one against the Police Directorship for Immigrants.

In less than 48 hours two major bombs have hit Athens, marking what seems to be an urban guerrilla spring offensive in the greek capital.

The first bomb exploded a little after 8:00 a.m. on Friday 19 March at the headquarters of Chrisi Avgi (Golden Dawn) the neo-nazi party of greece, an organisation responsible for countless murder attempts, arson attacks and pogroms against immigrants, leftists and anarchists. The group is led by Mr Mihaloliakos a convicted bomber who founded the Golden Dawn in the early 1980s under the direct orders of the imprisoned head of the colonels junta, Georgios Papadopoulos. The daily Eleftherotypia has published documents of Mr Mihaloliakos salary details in the service of EYP, the greek secret services. The bomb that hit the offices on Sokratous street had been pre-announced to the daily Eleftherotypia, giving 20 minutes to evacuate the building and the near by hotel. The bomb, which has been estimated by the police as "very strong" but with a slow diffusion as to minimise the blast wave that could damage near-by buildings, has demolished the officers, creating a crater through the concrete floor and leaving none but cement columns standing. To this moment no urban guerrilla group has claimed responsibility for the attack which the anti-terrorist bureau has coined "a classic divergence tactic" in relation to the investigations on Lambros Foundas, the 35 year old anarchist shot dead during a gun battle with the police earlier this week. The man is proclaimed by the anti-terrorist bureau as "a key member of one of the big new generation terrorist groups" of greece. Anarchist have launched an extended campaign in honour of Lambros Foundas with thousands of posters and a one thousand strong protest march to the spot of his assassination being realised today noon.

The second bomb exploded at 15:58 p.m on Saturday 20 March at the Police Directorship for Immigrants (Allodapon) at Petrou Ralli avenue, Athens. Allodapon is the notorious camp-like place where all immigrants have to stand in line for endless hours waiting for papers applications while cops brutalise them indiscriminately. There have been many deaths of immigrants as a result of police brutality, as well as protest marches and clashes with the police as a result (all covered in earlier postings in libcom). The explosion was pre-announced to the daily Elefterotypia with a phone-call that allowed 20 minutes to evacuate the buildings and close of the streets. The bomb, which is claimed by the police to be "strong" has damaged part of the premises, while its blast wave has also damaged shops across the avenue, with no human injuries due to the evacuation. Both this and the bomb in Sokratous street were time-bombs.

The bomb attacks come after more than a month of a lull by urban guerrilla groups which has launched a winter offensive during December and January. It must be noticed that the small bomb that hit the house of the vice-president of the Pakistani community yesterday is widely considered to be related to the Pakistani secret services (due to the fact that it has been proceeded by the assassination of an embassy official of Pakistan) and not to domestic armed struggle.

The question now must be whether Greeks can take the armed struggle and the atmosphere of general strike and push forward towards some kind of victory for the working class.

In America, the big moment in this month's struggle was March 4th, when California's educational system was hit by walkouts, student strikes, and marches. As Labor Notes tells us, the action occured "against crippling state budget cuts—$17 billion in two years to California’s education fund." "Rallies in each city [in the state] numbered in the thousands—a gathering sponsored by the San Francisco Labor Council drew 20,000 people to the Civic Center. Hundreds of marchers took their protests onto the freeways, stopping traffic for nearly an hour in Oakland. UC Davis students marched through two police lines before baton-swinging cops turned them away at an on-ramp."

The IWW has a report on the day's action, but for a fuller analysis we must return, once again, to LibCom;

In response to the state government's attempt to use the crisis as en excuse for rolling back public services -including tuition increases of 32% at the UC system- students and workers struck and occupied across the state of California, as did their counterparts at colleges in New York and 30 other states, defying efforts to corral the movement into after-work rallies or "dialogues" at the Capitol.

One of the most striking facts about the breadth of the action on March 4 was the popularity of radical action in areas with very little history of struggle. Students across the UC system were consciously referring to their activity as a strike and attempting to shut down their campuses, not just at the "activist" campuses of Berkeley, LA, and Santa Cruz, but also at San Diego, Irvine and Riverside (all in the heart of suburban Southern California), Santa Barbara (notorious as a party school) and Davis (the agricultural campus, located in "The Tomato Capitol of the World").

According to Occupy California (occupyca.wordpress.com), each of these campuses saw at least several hundred students attempting to shut down the functioning of the university and, in many cases, to spread the disruption off campus. At Santa Cruz pre-dawn picket lines closed the entrances to the campus and were held even against violent attempts by drivers to break through, including one attempt by the driver of a Prius that broke a picket's leg. Many campus workers, instead of getting angry at another "student protest", respected the strike by joining the picket lines or by defying supervisors (and police escorts) and claiming that they couldn't get through the picket lines. In Oakland, around 1000 students from Berkeley joined students and teachers from public schools, community colleges, and CSUs for a mid-day rally at City Hall. The marchers managed to get onto Interstate 880, a freeway going through the most working-class sections of Oakland, where 150 were arrested. At Irvine and Davis hundreds of students shut down their campuses and then moved to shut down surrounding traffic - in Davis the marchers then moved to occupy Interstate 80 (the main artery to nearby Sacramento), but after overcoming several lines of police using batons and shooting pepper balls, were eventually prevented. Similar strike attempts occurred at other UC campuses, as well as many campuses of the California State University.

There were simultaneous actions at universities in 31 other states, including at several branches of the CUNY and SUNY systems in New York. Take The City reports an occupation at SUNY Purchase, as well as demonstrations and walk-outs at Brooklyn College, CUNY Hunter, and the CUNY Graduate Center.

The movement is spreading and echoing quicker than anyone expected. Capital demands its pound of flesh and, in so doing, creates its own gravediggers. The students are not relying on any existing organizations for leadership but are spontaneously creating General Assemblies to strategize. By consciously referring to the movement as a strike and by attempting to spread off campus students are showing an implicit consciousness that this is not simply about 'defending education', but is about refusing to pay for the crisis created by the contradictions of capitalism. In order to move forward, the strike movement is going to have to spread - students will have to make links with workers, such as the 15,000 municipal workers who are receiving pink slips in San Francisco today, and they will have to encourage the workers to form general assemblies or general strike committees, instead of relying on the established unions that will divide the workers and prevent a general strike.

South African shack-dwelling movement Abahlali baseMjondolo have emerged stronger after the repression they faced last September, and occupied downtown Durban during yesterday's public holiday in honour of human rights. South Africa has quietened down since the mass rebellions of last year, with the ANC government needing to keep order ahead of the 2010 World Cup, but the resentment of the oppressed is still there, brewing beneath the surface.We can only hope South African activists are able to build a movement to raise awareness around this global event, perhaps with more success than was achieved during the Beijing olympics.