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To open the new academic year, the University of London Union Marxist Society is hosting a debate between Alan Woods – editor of www.marxist.com and author of “Bolshevism: the Road to Revolution” – and Orlando Figes – Professor of History at Birkbeck University and author of “A People’s Tragedy” – on the true nature of the Russian Revolution. Come along on Thursday 10th October to hear both sides in what promises to be a fantastic discussion.
For a number of years now, Socialist Appeal supporters have helped to set up and build Marxist societies in universities across the country, in order to provide a forum for discussing Marxist ideas and organising interventions in the movement and the fight back. After a number of successful years of building the forces of Marxism in the student movement, the initiative has now been taken to launch the Marxist Student Federation.
At the International Marxist Tendency winter school 2013, hosted in London by the UCLU Marxist Society with a theme of “130 years since the death of Marx: the life and ideas of Karl Marx”, Rob Sewell – editor of Socialist Appeal – gave a tour of London from the viewpoint of Marx’s life, highlighting the places where this great philosopher, economist, and political theorist, lived, worked, and socialised.
The recent speech by shadow Education Minister, Stephen Twigg, should ring alarm bells for anyone expecting any significant change from the current state of affairs in the event of Labour winning the next election. John Pickard of the NUT argues that the Labour leaders must make a radical break with the Coalition’s education policies.
In a year’s time, on 18th September 2014, Scotland will go to the polls over a key constitutional change – over whether to support an independent Scotland or not. This will be a vital issue, the outcome of which will have profound consequences for the fight for socialism in Scotland and the rest of Britain.
Thanks to an online petition of more than 9,000 signatures and the threat of a mass demonstration, management at Birmingham Metropolitan College, were forced to change a policy that, if it had been implemented, would have discriminated against a section of the student population on the basis of their religious identity. Darrall Cozens from West Midlands UCU looks at the wider issues involved of how education institutions are run.
Can capitalism be made “responsible”? What’s wrong with capitalism and the idea of making profits if we can convince the capitalists to then put their money to good use? We publish here an article by Mark Rahman from Socialist Appeal, USA, who looks at the question of philanthropy and highlights the contradictions and limitations of any reliance on the generosity of the capitalists.
Despite some jostling for position between the Fine Gael back-benchers and Labour TD’s, Michael Noonan’s forthcoming Budget is set to add yet more pressure and hardship on hard pressed families across the state. We publish here an article from Fightback, the Marxist tendency in Ireland, on the latest austerity budget and the crisis-ridden Irish economy.
The Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove, and his mandarins at the Department for Education (DfE) have taken every opportunity to denigrate the performance of school teachers, whilst simultaneously seeking to reduce pensions, pay and terms and conditions of service. Siôn Reynolds, local secretary of Portsmouth NASUWT (personal capacity) looks at the attacks on teachers by the coalition government and explains the reasons for the latest action by the teaching unions.
The spontaneous uprising of the Syrian masses, inspired by events in Tunisia and Egypt, has degenerated into a sectarian bloodbath. Deprived of a revolutionary leadership, the hopeful beginnings have been transformed into a tragedy. On the other hand, US imperialism’s hypocritical and bellicose zig-zags are a complete and utter farce, and graphically illustrate the limits of US power.
Who was behind Pinochet’s coup? What interests was he defending? What were the policies of the Allende government and why was he unable to prevent the coup?
On Saturday 7th September the English Defence League (EDL), a far-right racist organisation, had planned to march through Tower Hamlets in London. Such a march, had it gone ahead, would have been sensationally provocative. But faced with the prospect of thousands of anti-fascist workers and youth confronting the EDL, the police stepped in and banned the EDL from entering Tower Hamlets. Ben Gliniecki and Niklas Svensson, present at the anti-fascist demo, report.