Britain's ruling class want the Tories back
Since Tony Blair's enforced departure in June 2007 as leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister, Britain's ruling class have been seriously trying to win back parliamentary and legislative power for its number one party, the Conservatives.
JAMES THOMSON analyses what lies behind the latest attempt to remove Gordon Brown as Prime Minister and force a General Election.
Son of a Conservative Party organiser in the north east of England, Tony Blair was the safest pair of "Labour" hands Britain's ruling class has ever had. From the ruling class' standpoint Labour without Blair is less predictable and malleable and a bit more prone to trade unionist, working class, Keynesian and liberal economic influences. With big changes at home and abroad about to happen better to have at the helm the leader of your own party. In any event, Blair's and Brown's New Labour job is done. They delivered an even more docile and compliant Labour and trade union movement than existed two decades ago and it's a very good time for them to go and let the number one party of capitalism takeover again.
Ramsay MacDonald and Gordon Brown
Plus ca change, plus c'est meme chose
In June 1933, two heads of state, eight prime ministers, 20 foreign ministers and 80 finance ministers, representing 66 countries, met in London with the UK prime minister Ramsay MacDonald as chair to try to revive the world economy, then in the fourth year of the Great Depression.
Dr. PAUL SUTTON examines the current world capitalist economic crisis and reviews the recent G20 Summit in London.
The conference was beset with difficulties and within a month had collapsed with the withdrawal of the US to pursue its own programme, the New Deal, under its newly elected president Franklin Roosevelt. The effect was immediate. Countries went their own way in protecting trade and national currencies. Unemploy-ment continued to rise as the Depression deepened. The US turned its back on Europe and Hitler, recently elected as chancellor, re-occupied the Rhineland as the first international act of a resurgent Germany. The rest, as they say, is history.
Cuba at 50: a luta continua
The Cuban revolution has defied the enormous odds stacked against it and this year celebrates the 50th anniversary of the overthrow of the US-backed Batista regime.
HELEN CHRISTOPHER reflects on 50 years of socialism in Cuba and argues that it is deeply rooted in the Cuban people's struggles against slavery, colonialism, imperialism and dictatorship.
Its importance is at least as great now as when it triumphed, and to appreciate the immensity of its achievement it is worth reflecting on what it has had to endure and overcome.
The Cuban revolution has survived:
Invasion sponsored by the United States of America and ignominiously defeated at the Bay of Pigs.
Hundreds of terrorist attacks against the Cuban people and assassination attempts on the life of Fidel Castro emanating from the US.
The illegal US blockade which is nearly as old as the revolution itself and which has enacted sanctions against third countries and agencies for trading with Cuba.
Victory for ANC, but challenges ahead
The South African election on 22 April overwhelmingly returned an African National Congress (ANC) government with 65.9% of the votes cast on a 77% turnout.
ALEX DAVIDSON reports on the election and the challenges that lie ahead for the people of South Africa and the ANC government led by their new President, Jacob Zuma.
Jacob Zuma was inaugurated as President on 9 May and his Cabinet was announced the following day. The election result showed that ANC is still dominant. Neither the Democratic Alliance (DA) with 16.6% of the vote nor the Congress of the People (COPE) with 7.4% came anywhere near challenging ANC except in the Western Cape. The DA won control of the Western Cape. This Province has always been a problem for ANC. In elections since 1994 one of its weakest performances was in the Western Cape. This is largely due to the ethnic nature of the province inherited from the colonial and apartheid past. The province has a very high 'coloured' population and a relatively large 'white' population. In addition, ANC has had internal problems in its provincial structure.
14 nations intervened to destroy at birth the first-ever socialist state
The revolution in Russia on November 7, 1917, was followed by a ferocious attack, spearheaded by the British, on the young socialist state.
GINA NICHOLSON looks back to 1917 when the Imperialist powers waged war in their bid to destroy at birth the world's first-ever socialist state.
This attack took two main forms: assistance to counter-revolutionary forces within the country, and outright invasions without any declaration of war. On December 21 1917, six weeks after the Russian revolution and while the war with Germany still raged, the British War Cabinet issued a memorandum which, while asserting its support for self-determination of countries, nevertheless agreed to suggest that Britain and France should share in giving financial support to 'anti-German' forces which, in fact, happened to be counter-revolutionary Cossacks and the like who happened to be thousands of miles away from any German army presence.
"Hands Off Russia" Jolly George campaign
1920 London dockers' strike: International working class solidarity in action We reprint Chapter VII from HARRY POLLITT's autobiography, Serving My Time, an apprenticeship to politics. In this he deals with the "Hands Off Russia" campaign and the successful Jolly George London dockers' strike of 1920 in which he played a leading role. Pollitt became General Secretary of the Communist Party in 1924.
The news of the revolutionary overthrow of Tsarism by the workers and peasants of Russia in 1917 evoked a tremendous response among the whole working class of this country, and an equally terrific hostility from the ruling class.
Never was such a stream of filthy propaganda poured out against any Government as was poured out by the gentlemen of Britain against the first Workers' Republic in the history of the world. Against the might and influence of the capitalist Press and the Government’s statesmen, our resources for conducting propaganda for solidarity with the Russian Revolution seemed very limited, but the sympathy with workers' Russia grew. Various working-class organisations took part, and in the summer of 1919, when the "Hands Off Russia" movement was formed, a great deal of work had already been done.
1939 Soviet-German non-aggression pact
On 23 August 1939 the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany.
PAT TURNBULL investigates the major factors in the lead-up to WWII that forced the USSR into signing the pact with fascist Germany.
Why did the Soviet Union, the first state in human history to represent the real interests of the people, make a non-aggression pact with the most vicious representatives of monopoly capitalism? The Soviet leaders based this decision on experience and on an accurate analysis of the actions and motives of those in power in the capitalist countries since the October Revolution. On the night of October 25 - 26 1917 (November 7 - 8 in the current calendar) workers, soldiers and sailors led by the Bolshevik Party stormed and occupied the Winter Palace in Petrograd and arrested the members of the Provisional Government who were hiding in one of its suites. Three hours later the Second All-Russia Congress of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies proclaimed Russia a Soviet Socialist Republic. The people, led by the working class, had taken over state power. The people's uprising had won with very little bloodshed.
Has the leopard really changed its spots?
Pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) has recently announced that it is to slash the price of drugs to the poorest countries (to 25% or less of UK and US prices), return some (20%) of its profits to be used for health spending in those countries, and share information about patent-protected potential drugs for "Third World" diseases.
LESLIE MASTERS argues that while GSK's announcement has been welcomed, the real reasons for it lie in economics not philanthropy.
New GSK CEO Andrew Witty argued that drug companies had an obligation to help the poor get treatment.This announcement has been broadly welcomed by medical charities operating in the Third World, and by liberal commentators, who regard it as a "sea change" in the attitude of at least one drug company. But has the leopard really changed its spots? And, if it has, is it really for the philanthropic reasons advanced by GSK? The real reasons for GSK's apparent change of heart have to be sought in economics, not philanthropy.
Darwin's magnum opus: The Origin of Species
S. Wordfish reflects on Darwin's groundbreaking achievement of establishing evolution by natural selection.
Charles Darwin, the great English naturalist, was born 200 years ago, on 12 February 1809. Fifty years later, on 24 November 1859, he published his groundbreaking book, The Origin of Species. 2009 is therefore a double anniversary for the man who established evolution by natural selection as a unifying principle in the development of life on Earth. Darwin's great insight was that since some individuals of a given species reproduce themselves more successfully than others, so the frequency of any reproducible characteristic that improves their chances of doing so increases in successive generations. The world is awash with information about Darwin's life and work. Some of it is specialised and technical, but there are also engaging biographies and convenient summaries of his scientific insights. This article reflects on Darwin's achievement in three sections, starting with the longest, about connections between discoveries in the natural world and politics, economics and everyday life; then the shortest, about what Marx and Engels made of Darwin's ideas and how these were expressed; and lastly some observations about neo-Darwinism and its alternatives, which impact on practical politics today.
Hung, drawn and quartered
Ken Gill, Communist and trade union leader, died in May 2009, very shortly after his book, "Hung, drawn and quartered: the caricatures of Ken Gill", was launched, in his presence, at an event in the TUC building.
GEORGE HEARTFIELD reviews the book:
There are some 80 drawings, most of which are accompanied by text about the individual caricatured. The subjects range from Tony Benn to Margaret Thatcher and include Nelson Mandela and Leonid Brezhnev. In his Introduction to the book, Rodney Bickerstaffe writes, "Ken's supreme gift is to draw a cartoon which invariably pleases the 'target' and amuses everyone else. In these images, old friends are returned to us, past times brought to mind, the famous gently mocked - and the pompous deflated".
