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The cliché that ‘a week is a long time in politics’ can sometimes seem
inapplicable to China, with the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP)
vice-like grip on the political life of the country. But the truth is
that such a system is, for all its appearance of serenity, actually more
like a pressure cooker. Dramatic political events and factional turmoil
can spring up as if from nowhere and in these moments the stage-managed
consensus can suddenly unravel.
While hundreds of thousands of civil servants,
teachers and health workers are fighting to defend their pensions, the Tory Lib
Dem Coalition are preparing further attacks on all sections of the working
class people. The March 21st budget was a budget by the rich, for the rich. Pensioners, those on benefits, the
unemployed – all will be hit hard, yet the rich are rewarded with tax handouts.
Four inches of snow had fallen
during the night and temperatures were well below freezing, but with breath
turning white in the icy air the socialists from Peterborough Labour Party were
out campaigning for Socialist Appeal supporter, Ron Graves, who is the
prospective candidate for Stanground Central in the May local government
elections.
On Friday 16th March, several hundred students
marched through Cambridge to demonstrate against the victimisation of a single
student who has been handed the punishment of two-and-a-half years suspension
for his role in a peaceful protest earlier in the academic year. This
outrageous punishment was a clear signal from the University authorities that
students should not step out of line and that protests against education cuts
will not be tolerated. Meanwhile, the 500-strong demonstration sent an equally
clear message that the mass of students will stand by their victimised peers in
solidarity.
Much confusion exists on the left as
to the real nature of the Syrian regime because of what it was in the
past.
It is a year since the Syrian masses
rose up against the Assad regime. Since March 2011, the Syrian people
have faced the open brutality of the state in wave after wave of mass
demonstrations, strikes and civil disobedience. These movements arose in
response to the stifling dictatorship, and against the massive
inequality, unemployment and poverty in Syrian society.
It is the scandal that must not be ignored. For yet another month, UK
unemployement has risen again as we pay for the bosses’ crisis. Another
28,000 have been added to the ranks of the jobless in the three months
from Nov 2011 to January 2012.
On Thursday, 3rd May, Londoners will go to the ballot box to elect our
new Mayor. Despite other candidates standing it is clear that the choice
facing Londoners is simple: Tory or Labour, Boris or Ken. For working
Londoners struggling to make ends meet in the face of Tory cuts the
answer is equally simple: vote for Ken and kick out Boris!
Despite having a constitution that
enshrines equality between the sexes, the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC) is home to some of the most extreme and brutal oppression of
women. This demonstrates in a very vivid manner that women’s oppression
cannot be eliminated simply through legal rights, but requires certain
material conditions, which in turn must be fought for in the shape of a
class struggle.
We begin today the publication of the
IMT’s analysis of the world situation. This is a draft document that is
the basis of discussion within the Tendency and will be voted on with
possible amendments at this year’s world congress of the IMT. Part One
deals with the general crisis of world capitalism, to be followed by an
analysis of specific areas of the world.
At least 800 people participated in the TUC march and lobby of the Lib
Dem conference this morning (Saturday) in Gateshead. Meanwhile inside
the Conference Centre the Lib Dem leadership are coming under pressure
from their own members who are not surprisingly worried that the party
faces electoral disaster.
The times leading up to the Paris Commune were difficult for all
workers, but especially for women. It was typical for a woman to work 13
hours a day, six days a week. Even still, the wages she received for
that work were woefully shy of the cost of living at the time, even if
her wages were added to her husband’s. This contradiction drove many
working women to prostitution