Solidarity 042, 3 December 2003

Marx for which times?

I offer a different assessment of Daniel Bensaid's Marx for our times to the one given by Alan Johnson in Solidarity 3/40 . Marx for our times * is one of a number of books which Bensaid has published since 1990 to rethink Marxism in the light of the disconcerting events of 1989. Until then, Bensaid's current, the USFI, and many others had located their politics within a view of history as proceeding on two levels. The "underlying" history of the second half of the 20th century was relentless advance by the "world revolution" through more and more victories "against imperialism". It was both...

Al Richardson: An "unorthodox orthodox" Trotskyist

Bruce Robinson assesses the life and work of Al Richardson, historian of Trotskyism and editor of the journal Revolutionary History, who died unexpectedly in his sleep on 22 November, aged 61. I first met Al in 1968 when he was an activist in the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign and a member of the International Marxist Group (the then British representative of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International). One thing from that time that sticks in my memory was his organisation of the "Karl Marx Memorial Pub Crawl" as a fund-raiser for the VSC. This involved a dwindling bunch of hardened...

R-E-S-P-E-C-T, what the hell does it spell to you?

First the good news: the left is getting together in large numbers early next year. There will be a "Left Unity Convention", probably on 25 January, and a "Convention of the Trade Union Left", definitely on 7 February. Now the bad news: the way these events are being set up. A private conclave at George Galloway's house in London on Sunday 30 November apparently set the 25 January date; chose a name - "RESPECT Unity Coalition" - for a grouping to contest the June 2004 euro-elections with Galloway as figurehead and lead candidate; and drafted a political platform. According to best reports, the...

Real Celeb: Ethical Dreads

Mark Sandell honours Benjamin Zephaniah Christmas is coming so it is appropriate that Her Majesty the Queen will be dishing out feudal baubles in the honors list. Of course most of these gongs go to the ageing segment of the British ruling class for services to... the rich and powerful. Some gongs are kept aside for populist gestures towards the great unwashed. A handful go to sporting heroes (D Beckham) and other celebrities - "thank you kindly ma'am" - a few to do gooders from ordinary backgrounds - "it's such an honour". It's enough to make you want to vomit, but this year the whole vile...

Julius Jacobson (1922-2003)

Barry Finger concludes his appreciation of the life and work of Julius Jacobson, who died last March. Julius was the founder and editor of the American socialist journal, New Politics. One of the most agonising essays Julie was called upon to write was "The Two Deaths of Max Shachtman" in the Winter 1973 issue of New Politics. Shachtman had earned the admiration of a generation of radicals of previous decades by his political courage in engaging and opposing and - in Julie's estimation - besting Trotsky, whom he "loved, respected and feared", and for his intellectual and political...

The Myth of JFK

By Joe Carter The fortieth anniversary of the assassination of John F Kennedy, who was killed on 22 November 1963, has produced the usual flood of eulogies. The reality was very different. Kennedy's actions in office were those of a pro-business government, with an imperial foreign policy which continued the work of the previous Republican administration. William Blum, author of Killing Hope, a book about US intervention since 1945, has documented the activities of the US military and the CIA, including incidents while Kennedy was president (January 1961 to November 1963). During his election...

FBU ranks must organise

FBU ranks must organise By Nick Holden Fire Brigades Union members have voted to accept the staging of the second phase of their pay rise, with a three to one majority. The ballot had a 56% turn-out, low by the FBU's standards, and was a major reversal since twelve months ago, when there was a nine to one majority for strike action to win a £30,000 salary for all fire fighters. The latest vote not only settles the pay campaign for £25,000 at the end of two years, but also accepts a number of cuts and attacks on working conditions dressed up by management - and sometimes the FBU negotiators -...

The labour movement can beat top-up fees

By Alan Clarke, NUS Executive, personal capacity With more than a third of Labour MPs now supporting an anti-top up fees motion in the House of Commons, the Government's plans for student funding are looking increasingly shaky. With public, labour movement and even Labour Party opinion overwhelmingly hostile to introducing a free market in higher education, there is every chance that the Blairites will finally be defeated on a major issue of government policy. However the rebels are not quite what they seem. To start with, the motion they are backing (proposed by Charles Clarke's fellow...

New Labour tells asylum seekers: We will starve you, lock you up and then tak

By Rosalind Robson The government is in trouble. It is failing in every department. New Labour appears untrustworthy and ineffective. They need to do something to outflank a resurgent Tory Party. They want to answer their critics at the Daily Mail. What do they do? They plan to take the children of destitute and vulnerable people into care! Under new asylum legislation children of those asylum seekers, whose application for asylum has been turned down, could be taken into care if their parents refuse to "voluntarily" leave the country. David Blunkett, forced to defend himself, in the wake of...

Master and Commander

Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin novels, said Christopher Hitchens, are set where two worlds meet. The first is the large and political world of "the long struggle between imperial and Georgian Britain and Jacobin and Bonapartist France". This "astonishing global tumult" stretched across the late 18th and early 19th centuries and might be thought of as the real First World War. The second was the small human world of the "decks, holds and cabins of a seagoing fighting machine". Peter Weir's film Master and Commander (based on the first and tenth of O'Brien's novels) offers only a blurry view...

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