John Pilger was a writer, journalist and film maker who pulled no punches. His work was hard hitting and scathing about the rich and powerful, both in Australia and globally. Pilger died in London on 30 December of pulmonary fibrosis, aged 84.
For most people, the word “politics” brings to mind the workings of the state: who will win the next election, what laws politicians are debating, how well or badly the government is delivering public services. The mainstream media and political commentators are also fixated on it. They pay far more attention to the latest opinion polls or a squabble in parliament than they do to working conditions in a factory or the investment decisions made by merchant bankers, which are generally not considered political at all, but simply the natural workings of a market economy.
“We stand today ... before the awful proposition: either the triumph of imperialism and the destruction of all culture, and, as in ancient Rome, depopulation, desolation, degeneration, a vast cemetery; or, the victory of socialism.”
A bombshell report in the West Australian has uncovered details of appalling abuse in Banksia Hill Juvenile Detention Centre in 2022.
Thousands rallied across Aotearoa (New Zealand) in protests called by Te Pāti Māori (The Māori Party) as a new conservative government took office in December. Rally organisers have called the movement “Toitū te Tiriti”, referring to the need to uphold and enhance Te Tiriti o Waitangi (The Treaty of Waitangi) against the new government’s racist attacks. Organisers invited people of all races to participate, and there was a significant minority of non-Māori protesters.
How is the world economy doing as 2023 comes to an end? To answer that, we must remember that the “world” is made up of many parts, and not every major economy is doing as well as others.
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The world is a very volatile place. Two major invasions have occurred out within two years—a reminder of how deadly and destructive global capitalism is.
If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and the Missing Revolution
For more than 100 years, the socialist movement has been divided into revolutionary and non-revolutionary wings.
Mainstream politicians and pundits have long peddled the narrative that young people are politically disengaged, more interested in taking selfies than changing society. But the explosion of youth-led climate protests and Palestine activism indicates there is no shortage of political opinions among young people.
Panama’s President Laurentino Cortizo has announced the closure of an environmentally destructive copper mine after the country’s Supreme Court ruled on 28 November that legislation granting the mine a 20-year concession was unconstitutional. The decision was greeted with jubilation by masses of protesters who had fought for weeks for this result.
It’s more than 50 years since scientists first came to understand that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions from human activities could be drivers of a potentially catastrophic warming of the world’s climate. It’s more than 30 years since the issue gained serious attention and politicians began promising to do something about it.
“The Australian Government continues to work with the United States and other partners in support of the international rules-based order in the Middle East and surrounding region.”
In his 1896 pamphlet The Jewish State, the founder of modern political Zionism Theodor Herzl made the case for a flag. “We have no flag, and we need one”, he wrote. “I would suggest a white flag, with seven golden stars.”
The turbulent political winds of Latin America blew to the far right in Argentina’s November presidential election. Javier Milei, a self-styled “anarcho-capitalist”, won 56 percent of the vote, while his opponent Sergio Massa, economy minister in the Peronist centre-left ruling coalition, secured only 44 percent.
From the outset, the Labor Party has steadfastly defended Israel’s crimes.
Socialist representatives in local government have led a push for councils to take a stand against Israel’s war on Gaza. Opposing them have been Labor Party councillors.
As midnight approached on 20 December, people streamed from their homes into streets across Argentina, banging pots and pans. As small, scattered groups marched, they grew and merged, forming cacerolazo demonstrations in neighbourhood after neighbourhood. (Cacerolazo is derived from “casserole dish”, which middle-class people traditionally bang with spoons in Argentinian protests.) Javier Milei, the newly elected far-right president had appeared on television just minutes before to announce a package of sweeping spending cuts and price increases.