Thousands of Labour members and supporters are likely to be denied a vote in the current leadership election as a result of a new wave of suspensions and expulsions by the Party bureaucracy. Despite such manoeuvres and machinations, however, the latest polling figures indicate that Corbyn is set to gain an even bigger democratic mandate by achieving another landslide victory.
For the first time, Turkey has launched a direct military intervention in Syria, sending tanks and warplanes across the border in a coordinated campaign with Syrian opposition fighters and targeting positions held by ISIS. The failed coup attempt against Erdogan in July has acted to change Turkey’s foreign policy in the region, shifting the geo-political landscape and altering the dynamics between Turkey, the USA, and Russia.
The backlash against the racist and draconian ban of the “burkini” has resulted, today, in France’s highest court declaring the burkini ban to be illegal. Such bans and attacks on democratic rights are an attempt by the ruling class to distract from the current government’s programme of austerity and cut across the rising class struggle in France. Fight racism! Fight all oppression! Fight capitalism!
Strike action by workers of the delivery firm Deliveroo has been successful in making the bosses reverse a decision that would have seen the couriers’ pay and conditions stripped back. In the process, a valuable lesson has been learnt for workers in precarious employment everywhere about how to fight back.
British politics this week was rocked by a clash between Jeremy Corbyn and the multi-millionaire ‘entrepreneur’, Richard Branson. Branson’s attacks on the Labour leader mark yet another desperate attempt by the Establishment to smear and slander Corbyn. But, as with all these other attempts, Corbyn’s opponents have only served to highlight their own privileges and hypocrisy.
With Jeremy Corbyn on course to win another landslide victory in the contest for the Labour leadership, the Party Establishment are preparing the ground for a split. Rob Sewell, editor of Socialist Appeal, looks back at the Labour split of 1931 to analyse the important lessons of Labour’s history for today’s tumultuous events.
The new and completed edition of Stalin, the critical biography Trotsky was working on at the time of his death, was officially launched last Saturday at the Museo Casa de León Trotsky (Leon Trotsky House Museum) in Mexico City by the IMT with presentations by Esteban Volkov, Trotsky’s grandson, and Alan Woods, the editor of the new edition of the book.
Central to the current crisis in Greece is the question of debt – particularly the national debt. Reducing public debt has became the main aim of (and reason for) the seemingly permanent austerity forced on the Greek working class. Fred Weston continues his series on the deep crisis of Greek capitalism by exploring the origins of the high debt levels in Greece.
Ballots go out today for the latest Labour leadership election. Despite the best efforts of the Blairites and the Establishment, Jeremy Corbyn is on course to comfortably win the contest – possibly by an even larger margin than last year. This would mark a major blow against Labour’s right-wing MPs. Vote for Corbyn! Fight for socialism!
A number of political donations to a new, shadowy organisation, “Labour Tomorrow”, have recently come to light after being declared to the electoral commission. This organisation, established by prominent Blairites such as Lord Blunkett and Baroness Dean, is another attempt by the right wing to counter the influence of Momentum and of Corbyn’s supporters on the left of the party, and is being touted as the potential organising centre of a split in coming months.
This weekend marks the 76 anniversary of the death of Leon Trotsky, who was brutally attacked by a Stalinist agent on 20th August 1940. To celebrate the life of the heroic Russian revolutionary, the launch of his great unfinished work Stalin will be launched in Mexico tomorrow by Alan Woods and Trotsky’s grandson, Esteban Volkov.
In the second part of his series looking at the role of money within capitalist society, Adam Booth explores the questions of value, alienation, and profit in order to develop a more in-depth understanding about the nature of money.