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Showing posts with label austerity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label austerity. Show all posts
Tuesday, 28 February 2017
Betraying Europe and the danger of collapsing integration.
Thursday, 9 February 2017
Training for Exploitation? Politicising Employability & Reclaiming Education.
Employability is a powerful and increasingly dominant word within
the universities. Nottingham University is proud to be “ranked in the world top 100 Universities for employability”. This
is because students are now the main funder of universities. And
employability provides the answer to why the £9.250 tuition fees per year are
worth it – even if one needs to in-debt oneself for this investment.
Consequently, employability services
are not only spreading like wildfire but also academic staff is increasingly
pressurised to demonstrate in what ways their course facilitates students'
employability. For these employability educators the Precarious Workers
Brigade just published a book
called “Training for Exploitation? Politicising
Employability and Reclaiming Education” (a free pdf is available online). The book offers a
“critical resource pack to assist teachers and students in deconstructing dominant narratives around work, employability
and careers, and explores alternative ways of engaging with work and the
economy”. In this guest post Vera
Weghmann introduces the book by explaining what employability is and why it
needs to be politicised.
Thursday, 5 January 2017
The Class Sentiment of the Precariat: Reflections on social movements in Portugal 2011-2013.
In 2011, analysing new and ever more widely spread practices of informal
work Guy Standing made his important intervention announcing the emergence of
the precariat as a new class-in-the-making (see The Precariat – a new class agent for transformation?). In this guest post, Florian Butollo critically engages with Standing’s claim through an examination of
social movements in Portugal between 2011 and 2013. He demonstrates that
provided we have a broader and more political understanding of class, these
movements can still be understood in class terms, providing us with a better
way of thinking about the possibilities of collective resistance against
exploitation.
Sunday, 21 August 2016
Fighting for the heart and soul of Labour!
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Photo by Jason |
Friday, 24 June 2016
Brexit and the rise of the nationalist right: Where next for the British left?
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Photo by Rareclass |
My brother in
law cannot get a job in the warehouses, because these agencies favour Polish
immigrants.
All our
companies are owned by foreigners, German electricity company, French in the
water industry. I’d nationalise the whole lot’ (Local Resident in Beeston,
Nottingham/UK; 24 June 2016).
As
the Brexit vote sinks in, the first nationalist and xenophobic statements can
be heard on the streets. In this blog post, I am analysing the wider causes
underlying the Brexit vote and reflect on the struggles ahead. I will argue that
there have been two campaigns against increasing austerity and the destruction brought
about by global capitalist restructuring, the progressive left campaign around
the election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party in the summer of
2015 and the predominantly right-wing Brexit campaign. Last night, the latter
won a significant victory, when 51.9 per cent of the people voting endorsed to
leave the EU against 48.1 per cent, who had voted to remain in the EU.
Tuesday, 24 May 2016
What position for the labour movement on the EU referendum?
On
Thursday, 23 June, a referendum will be held to decide whether Britain should leave or remain in the European Union. When Jacques Delors, then EU
Commission President, announced his vision of a social dimension for European
integration in the late 1980s, in the UK he won large parts of the British
trade unions over into a pro-EU position. Against the background of neo-liberal
restructuring by consecutive Conservative governments, social regulation at the
European level offered advances, which would have been impossible in a purely
domestic context. Is this situation still the case today?
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Photo by Descrier |
In
this post, I will first assess the current state of affairs for social
policies in the EU. Then I will focus on the dangers of nationalism and
xenophobic reactions to migration, implied in a no-vote, before concluding in
the third section that the focus of the debate should be redirected on what kind
of EU we want, rather than the issue of further or less integration.
Sunday, 8 May 2016
Mobilising through Solidarity: the social clinic in Drama and the refugee crisis.
While the Syriza government had to submit to the dictate of the European Union in July 2015, the concrete resistance against austerity has continued unabated on the ground in Greece. In this blog post I will discuss the experiences of the social clinic Solidarity Community Clinic – Pharmacy of Drama (KIFA) in Drama and its recent efforts at helping refugees living in a camp close to town. I will draw on experiences and discussions with activists from a recent visit to this city in Northern Greece.
Thursday, 24 March 2016
In or Out? The UK and EU membership: Asking the wrong questions.
The
British public is gripped by the campaigns around the EU referendum and the
question of whether to stay in the EU or leave European integration behind. In
this blog post, I will argue from a left perspective that this debate asks the
wrong questions. EU membership is made into a big issue, while the real
problems in British society are not addressed.
Friday, 26 February 2016
The Corbyn Factor: What does it mean in practice?
When discussing the revitalisation of the Labour Party, many people
refer to the Corbyn Factor. And indeed, the rise of the left-wing, rebellious
back bencher Jeremy Corbyn to become the leader of the Labour Party, elected by
a clear majority of party members and sympathisers only a few months after the
party’s defeat in general elections in May 2015, has been an astonishing
development (see Corbyn’s
Campaign). In this blog post I will assess the dynamics of this development
in practice by comparing two local Labour Party meetings in the area of
Nottingham, one in Beeston North in September 2014 and one in West Bridgford in
February 2016.
Thursday, 28 January 2016
Corbyn’s Campaign: The story of a remarkable summer.
Only a few months after the Labour Party’s
defeat in national elections in May 2015, the socialist, left-wing Jeremy
Corbyn was elected as the party’s new leader carried by a wave of enthusiasm in-
and outside the party. The book Corbyn’s
Campaign (Spokesman, 2016) provides interesting insights in crucial
aspects of this campaign and reflects on the possibilities for a socialist
renewal in Britain today. In this blog post, I will report on the book launch
with three of the authors, Tom Unterrainer, Adele Williams and Tony Simpson,
which took place at the Five Leaves
Bookshop in Nottingham on 27 January 2016.
Wednesday, 20 January 2016
Fighting for Public Water in Europe: The ECI Water is a Human Right.
Jan Willem Goudriaan, General Secretary
of the European Federation of Public Service
Unions (EPSU), has written regular updates (see 1,
2
and 3)
on where the European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) Right2Water fits in the broader
struggles of the European Water Movement and how it links with the struggle for
Another Europe. In this latest guest post, he gives an update following the European Parliament vote on the ECI report.
Monday, 21 December 2015
After the election of Jeremy Corbyn – Where next for the Labour Party?
The
election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the Labour Party so shortly after the
defeat in the general elections of May 2015 came for many as a surprise. The
electoral campaign had not been too far to the left, as Blairites tried to
claim immediately after the elections. Party members' and supporters' verdict was
that it had not been left and anti-austerity enough. In this post, I will
reflect on the chances of Jeremy Corbyn and his Shadow Chancellor John
McDonnell of bringing about significant change in Britain.
Monday, 5 October 2015
Working for an Alternative Economic Policy in Europe: the EuroMemo Group meeting in Roskilde.
Further
austerity imposed, democracy attacked – the third bailout of Greece in July
2015 has demonstrated the brutal face of neo-liberalism in Europe. Refugees in
need at the doors of Europe and the governments of the European Union (EU)
member states are squabbling over the allocation of small numbers of refugees
across the EU, numbers which the comparatively wealthy EU should easily be able
to accommodate. These events provided the dramatic background to this year’s EuroMemo
Group’s
conference Addressing Europe’s Multiple Crises: An agenda for
economic transformation, solidarity and democracy, held at
Roskilde University/Denmark, 24 to 26 September. In this blog post, I will make
some personal observations.
Monday, 31 August 2015
Labour and Transnational Action in Times of Crisis
From
August 2013 to June 2014, the trasnational labour project group came together
in Oslo to work on the project Globalization
and the possibility of transnational actors: the case of trade unions. One of the key publications resulting from
the project, the edited volume Labour and Transnational Action in Times of Crisis, has just been
published by Rowman & Littlefield International. In this post, I want to
draw out briefly the two main common themes underlying the various
contributions as well as highlight a number of key findings.
Friday, 17 July 2015
Greece, the Eurozone crisis and the end of European solidarity?
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Image by Wikimedia Commons |
There is no sign
of European solidarity in this deal. It is a punishment handed down to Greece
for daring to say no to austerity. The EU was established on the principles of
cooperation and mutual support – and many are now wondering what has happened
to those aspirations. But solidarity fell by the wayside some time ago in
Europe. This is just the most recent example of how European integration today
is about profit maximisation for capital – not about cooperation between
European people.
Friday, 5 June 2015
The Future of the Left – Where next for Britain’s labour movement?
‘The
Conservatives are not invincible – splits over the forthcoming EU referendum
and their small majority in parliament are only two signs of their weakness.
Together, the Left can stem the tide of austerity’, these were the words of the
TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady. In front of a full lecture theatre with
300 people, she delivered the first Ken
Coates memorial lecture, organised by the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation and
co-hosted by the Centre
for the Study of Social and Global Justice (CSSGJ) and the local University and College Union (UCU) association.
In this post, I will draw out some of her key points.
Friday, 15 May 2015
Austerity and Resistance – Greece in the Eurozone crisis.
Concerns over Greece’s ability to pay back its debt continue
unabated, with another crisis meeting of Eurozone finance ministers having taken
place in Brussels on Monday, 11 May. While the media focuses on Greece’s
ability to meet the conditions by the European Union, in this post Jamie Jordan and I have
another look at some of the key underlying dynamics of the crisis.
Monday, 2 February 2015
The Great Pension Robbery – UCU unravelling!
Only three years after closing the final salary pension scheme of USS for new members of staff in pre-1992 Higher Education (HE) institutions in the UK, the employers returned to the table with new demands. This time they asked for cuts to staff members’ pensions of around 27 per cent. Initially, the University and College Union (UCU) responded forcefully and carried out a ballot for industrial action: 78% of union members who participated voted for strike action and 87% voted for action short of a strike. The turnout of 45% was the highest in a national higher education ballot since UCU was formed in 2006. And yet, in January 2015 UCU settled for a negotiated deal, which was only marginally better for members than the initial proposals by the employers. Instead of 27 per cent of cuts, many members will now face cuts of somewhere between 20 and 24 per cent. How could this happen? In this blog post, I will provide a critical assessment of this struggle, drawing also on my own experience as a member of the Higher Education Committee (HEC), where the crucial decisions were taken within UCU.
Friday, 23 January 2015
Greece at the ballot box – How should the European left show solidarity?
On Sunday, 25 January the Greek people
are voting for a new parliament. According to opinion polls, this time the left
party Syriza may win the elections (BBC, 22 January 2015).
In view of the heavy pressure put on Greece by financial markets, the European
Commission as well as European Central Bank, people of the European left are
calling for solidarity. Support is needed especially should Syriza form the
next government and demand from the European Union (EU) a re-negotiation of the
terms of its bailout package. In this blog post, I will reflect on what form
these solidarity actions may take.
Monday, 15 December 2014
Belgium’s “hot autumn”: opportunities and challenges.
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