Blogs

There is an ever-growing stream of media commentary on the Grenfell fire, increasing daily as the public enquiry unfolds. There are some elements in the media with the goal of obscuring or excusing the plain facts as part of a pre-emptive defence manoeuvre to protect those most implicated in what caused the fire and the 72 deaths. That they feel the need to use such distortions to defend the Grenfell landlords and those who ordered and oversaw the Grenfell refurbishment that fitted the lethal cladding only increases the suggestion of a general doubt on all sides about their innocence.

An Italian comrade takes a sardonic look at the latest abasement of so-called “academic Marxists” at the feet of the new imperialist order à la chinois.

On 5 January demonstrators wearing yellow vests assembled in London to demand a ‘hard’ Brexit that will fulfil their nationalist fantasies. In reality that will not happen because it runs so sharply against the interests of the ruling class both in Britain and elsewhere in the European Union.

It was the tripling of bread prices which sparked off the current revolt in Sudan. People first took to the streets in the town of Atbara in north eastern Sudan on 19 December 2018, but they did not restrict their demands to bread even though some had not managed to find any in four days. They had had enough of the brutal military dictatorship of Omar Hassan al-Bashir which has ruled the country since 1989. The protestors not only demanded “freedom, peace, and justice” but also echoed the slogan of the 2011 Arab Spring that “the people want the fall of the regime.” As a symbol of their wider political demands, the ruling party headquarters in Atbara was burned to the ground.

A Libertarian Communist analysis of the Great Leap Forward under Mao Tse-Tung and the Chinese Communists which aims to show that the Great Leap Forward was a capitalist project rather than a socialist, or communist one.

A critical review Peter Gelderloos' How Nonviolence Protects the State, a much-read but rarely analysed book.

If you’ve ever expressed a political view to the left of Tony Blair, chances are you’ve been met with a response along the lines of: ‘Haven’t you ever read any Orwell?’ The irony of this statement is usually in how little Orwell that person has actually read.

Everyone's fav suburban dads of anti-capitalism are back and in our latest podcast we try to get a handle on what happened in 2018 and where we are going in 2019 - from The Word From Struggle Street blog

Comrades,

2019 will be a good one! The political honchos from left to right are in chaos, the crisis is sharpening. What we need are independent working class initiatives that combine self-defense against bosses and their lackeys with a vision of social emancipation. There ain't no shortcuts!

To see the new phase of the crisis, which began with the bursting of the speculative bubble in 2008, as just a repeat of the same decades-long pattern of boom and bust, is a mistake. It is a gross misunderstanding of the impasse that capitalism has come to today.

The proletarians in the Middle East have not yet realized it, but the struggle to defend their living situation and against the imperialist war is developing towards a revolution in which the overthrow of the Shah regime was only child's play.

A friend works as a maintenance engineer at Heathrow airport. You can read about working conditions and organising efforts below - a shorter version will be distributed to Heathrow workers in WorkersWildWest no.9. If you want to get involved in our modest organising efforts in and around Heathrow, drop us a line:
angryworkersworld@gmail.com

Pantomimes usually start in December and end early in the New Year. The Brexit version at the Westminster Palais looks set for an extended run.

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As 2018 draws to a close, a twofold picture emerges. On one side, the accelerating capitalist crisis. Escalating global turmoil and imperialist manoeuvres bring untold misery to Yemen, Syria and the Ukraine. The ruling class, struggling to find a solution to the economic crisis, causes political chaos and confusion in Britain and the United States. On the other side – new mass struggles of the working class in Iran, Iraq, China, Nicaragua, Jordan and France. This happened before.

The article which follows is a translation of a contribution from a close sympathiser of the ICT in France.