Direct Action #46 Spring 2009

Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 contents

Direct Action is published by the Solidarity Federation, British sec- tion of the International Workers Inside this issue: Association (IWA). DA is edited and laid out by the DA Collective, and printed by 4: Beyond the Usual Union Structures Clydeside Press. 6: PFI: The Economics of the Madhouse Views stated in these pages are not necessarily those of the Direct 8: The Dead End of Nationalisation - how state owner- Action Collective or the Solidarity ship does not, never has, and never will serve our class Federation. We do not publish contributors’ 11: Breeding like Rats - the professional middle classes names. Please contact us if you under new labour want to know more. 12: The Crisis Factory - the roots of the global ecological Subscriptions crisis (for 4 issues ) 14: A Killer at Work / Have your Say - single status / Supporters – £10 g20 / sapphire Basic – £5 (Europe – £10; 16: 1976 and all that rest of the world – £15) 18: Looking back at the 1984-5 Miners’ Strike cheques payable to “Direct Action” – return to: 21: If Voting could Change the System... - the liber- DA, PO Box 29, S.W.D.O., tarian case for direct democracy Manchester, M15 5HW. 24: The Union or the Party To contribute 27: International - argentina / spain / germany / guadeloupe If you would like to help out or contribute articles or photos, work 28: Reviews - flat earth news / the dirty thirty / liberal fas is entirely voluntary. cism / the matthew herbert big band / the common place We welcome articles of between 31: Anarchism and Crime 250 and 1,500 words on industrial, social/community and international 35: Contacts Directory issues; on working class history; and on anarchist/anarcho- syndicalist theory and history. Articles may be sent as hard copy, on a disk or by email, and can only be returned if accompanied Aims of the Solidarity Federation by a request (and SAE if appropri- ate). he Solidarity Federation is an organi- which arise from our oppression. We recog- sation of workers which seeks to nise that not all oppression is economic, but Tdestroy capitalism and the state. can be based on gender, race, sexuality, or Contact us Capitalism because it exploits, oppresses anything our rulers find useful. Unless we DA Collective, PO Box 29, South and kills people, and wrecks the environ- organise in this way, politicians – some West PDO, Manchester, M15 5HW ment for profit worldwide. The state claiming to be revolutionary – will be able to 07 984 675 281 because it can only maintain hierarchy and exploit us for their own ends. privelege for the classes who control it and [email protected] their servants; it cannot be used to fight the The Solidarity Federation consists of locals oppression and exploitation that are the which support the formation of future revo- Bulk Orders consequences of hierarchy and source of lutionary unions and are centres for working privilege. In their place we want a society class struggle on a local level. Our activities AK Distribution, PO Box 12766, Edinburgh, EH8 9YE, Scotland based on workers’ self-management, soli- are based on direct action – action by work- darity, mutual aid and libertarian commu- ers ourselves, not through intermediaries 0131 555 5165 nism. like politicians or union officials – our deci- [email protected] sions are made through participation of the That society can only be achieved by work- membership. We welcome all working peo- www.akuk.com ing class organisation based on the same ple who agree with our aims and principles, or direct from the DA Collective principles – revolutionary unions. These are and who will spread propaganda for social not Trades Unions only concerned with revolution and revolutionary unions. We ‘bread and butter’ issues like pay and con- recognise that the class struggle is world- ISSN 0261-8753 ditions. Revolutionary unions are means for wide, and are affiliated to the International working people to organise and fight all the Workers Association, whose Principles of issues – both in the workplace and outside – Revolutionary Unionism we share. 2 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 editorial The Green Shoots of Class Consciousness?

LL PREDICTIONS ing the first signs of this. While More recently, there’s been a num- point to how the bosses and the state expect us sim- ber of workplace occupations, current crisis ply to roll over and meekly accept attempts by workers to press for their decrees without so much as a improved redundancy terms or to Awill hit Britain murmur of protest, some workers prevent job losses and closures. much harder than Brown have been showing us there is Workers at Prisme Packaging in and Darling care to another way. Dundee and at Waterford Crystal in admit. Understandably, Ireland are notable examples of working people are angry Back in February the Lindsey oil this. As we go to press (mid-April) at the loss of security, refinery workers kick started a the Visteon (aka Ford) car parts wave of unofficial strike action in plants in Belfast and Enfield are livelihoods and, for some, the energy industry as a response also under occupation by workers even their homes. Beyond to the deployment of foreign work- responding to Visteon’s attempts to doubt, however, is the fact ers. At the time, those bastions of rob them of unpaid wages and that this cost will rise conservatism, the right (and not so proper pension contributions. even further in the years right) wing press welcomed the to come as the state tries walk outs, opportunistically …class consciousness overemphasising the “British jobs to force us to pay for the for British workers” undercurrent Lindsey, Prisme, Waterford and billions it has borrowed to launch yet more attacks on Visteon are all signs that workers and is still doling out to migrant workers. In reality, the can and will resist the bosses’ the rich and powerful. Lindsey strike committee’s efforts to trample over us; that, in demands were noth- doing so, they can and will ignore In what will ing of the sort, and the anti-strike laws and go beyond amount to a are best summed up trade union structures that time gigantic wealth by one committee and again have only acted as a transfer, the member thus: “Our brake to frustrate workers’ militan- state bails out action is rightly cy. For workers to successfully the bosses with aimed against com- resist the coming attacks as the one hand, pany bosses who state seeks to cover its borrowings while with the attempt to play off such actions are not only inspira- other it calcu- one nationality of tional, they are also necessary. In lates how best the face of a totally discredited and it might claw anti-working class Labour Party, this back in the this crisis presents us the perfect future. One thing is certain; no gov- opportunity to begin to reverse the ernment, whether Tory or Labour, rolling back of class consciousness will inflict undue pain on the so witnessed during much of the last called “wealth producers”, the capi- century. talist class. So the tax rises, cats in wages, attacks on services and ben- efits and the rest will fall dispropor- tionately on us, the working class.

green shoots… worker against the other…” Unless, that is, the British working Attempts to whip up nationalist class can once more forge itself fervour and play the race card into a force capable of resisting the have always been suited the boss- bosses’ and the state’s attacks. es and the state, intent on divid- Encouragingly, we may be witness- ing and ruling us. occupation at Visteon, Enfield 3 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 Spring 2009 Beyond the Usual Union Structures

ORKERS AT METRONET, THE FORMER LONDON attempt to break the union, but a 48 made sure that Metronet and LUL agency workers crossed picket Underground (LUL) engineering contractor, hour strike, coordinated via the knew what they were doing, as it lines. Another factor was their abil- have developed their Strike Committee as a Shop Stewards Network to coin- put pressure on them to back down. ity to have big mass meetings, as Wform of rank and file organisation that rep- cide with planned bus workers’ the workforce is dispersed and has resents an interesting step beyond the confines of the strikes, forced management to Widening involvement maintains to come back to the depot. The RMT usual trade union structures. Now that the track con- cave in; rank and file control and provides also has a “short structure” where tract is back in house, they are rolling this organising an anchor for the Negotiating there are not too many layers o a new dispute is brewing after Team, who could easily become iso- between the rank and file and the model out across the whole of the underground to LUL announced 1,000 job cuts, lated and open to the suggestions of national leadership, which makes it become the London Underground Strike Committee. threatening the “jobs for life deal” management and full timers at easier to pressurise the leadership. Here we look at the background of struggle against and seeking compulsory redun- ACAS. The Strike Committee had The small number of full timers which the strike committee has been built up, and the dancies and a five year pay even considered giving also worked in the reps’ favour. bottom up tactics that have been vital to its successes. formed the Strike Committee to cut; with the Metronet organ- the Negotia-ting Team widen rank and file involvement – ising model now becoming a mandate that would This organising model shows the Historically, the RMT’s strength on During this period, the RMT leader- 25 to 30 delegates came from all the London Regional Trans- be flexible but with a possibilities for building a culture the underground had been among ship was overstretched and couldn’t parts of the workforce, a Litera- port Strike Com-mittee, the bottom line beyond of resistance in any workplace, if train drivers and station staff. attend all of the many meetings, ture Group produced leaflets and successful methods used in which they would be effective reps, and affinity among Engineering workers had been the which consequently were conduct- information, and the Negotiating the past mean that acti-vists trusted not concede. If them, are built up and spread out. poor relations, and the union had ed by the workplace reps, displac- Team had to report to the Strike are confident they will win. the Negotiating Team A resolution is to be put to the relied on drivers to win disputes. ing full timers and taking control of Committee to avoid isolation at were in a position RMT’s AGM to formalise the posi- the union on the underground. It is ACAS; they won a settlement where they had to tion of Strike Committees in the In 1998 the Public Private Partner- from this, and through a series of which stopped the reorganisation; break the mandate to union’s structure. Although it ship (PPP) for the Tube was an- disputes, that the strike committee make progress, they includes a few sops to the nounced, with the RMT and other model of rank and file organisation o when Metronet went into adminis- would have to meet Executive, it would also make them unions opposing it and organising a on the underground has been devel- tration the union had its most with the Strike Committee first. accountable and force them to con- series of one day strikes. This built oped. The years between the start of successful strike, with great soli- The Strike Committee is also able sult Strike Committees before doing up resistance, delayed the PPP until the PPP in 2003 up to the present darity from other workers; they to monitor and challenge actions by any deal with bosses. 2003 and won a series of conces- have seen the following disputes: not only stopped all lines main- full time officials and, cru- sions including no compulsory tained by Metronet but, through cially, does not call off any redundancies. In addition, all staff o in the first pay round of the PPP control of certain infrastructure, strike before a firm deal is Cardiff Anarchist reductions were classified as mat- the union struck to win a good they also stopped the Jubilee and on the table. ters for negotiation, not simply con- pay deal, raising the profile of the Piccadilly Lines, maintained by sultation, making them harder to engineering branches and giving Tubelines; a key factor in the vic- The tactics used by the Metronet Some factors in their suc- Bookfair 2009 implement and easier to organise their members confidence; tory was that the strike was kept Strike Committee are crucial fac- cess are unique. They had against. This agreement, dubbed going during negotiations; tors in its successes. Their organis- built up a culture of resist- Saturday 23rd May the “jobs for life deal” by the Daily o 2005: when Metronet tried to cut ing model is built from the bottom ance from fighting the Telegraph, had been won through jobs, simply to increase profits, o the fifth dispute, when the con- up – the reps meet with the rank PPP; they had the “jobs for 10am – 6pm balloting for strike action to take the RMT used the “jobs for life tract went back in house, aimed to and file members; the reps then life deal”; they also had a place during General Election deal” to grind them down, holding win equality of pension and trav- meet with the Strike Committee; critical mass of good reps Cathays Community week, demonstrating that well a solid strike with solidarity from el rights for workers who started and the Negotiating Team takes its – whereas TubeLines had timed industrial action, or the train drivers and station staff; during the PPP and who hadn’t lead from the Strike Committee. a shortage of reps and Centre threat of it, is more effective. The transferred from LUL; however, They use the ACAS guidelines on workers have suffered in 36 Cathays Terrace fight also turned the RMT member- o also in 2005, Metronet tried to out- RMT leaders were keener on get- consultation to organise workplace comparison despite simi- ship into fighters, and they adopted source train maintenance; reps ting the contract back in house meetings to speak with the mem- lar conditions. Solidarity Cardiff, CF24 4HX a “Trojan horse” strategy of fight- were worried about “ballot than on workers’ pay and condi- bership. After talks at ACAS, the was also built up with the ing the PPP from within. fatigue” among members, so they tions and, as the dispute held up Strike Committee meets and coordi- many subcontractors and free admission this objective, they hastily agreed nates the activities of the reps agency workers on the We aim to keep DA at £1.50, to keep a deal over the workers’ heads while the Literature Group con- track, over health & safety stalls, workshops, speakers, e and had to be challenged over it; t the basic sub rate at £5 and wish to stantly puts out information to the issues, for instance. This food, crèche, a programme a membership. When still under paid off when the RMT of DVDs and entertainment n thank donors and supporters for o last year saw the attempted vic- Metronet they also involved other fought against the PPP – o helping to make the magazine good timisation of safety rep, Andy grades, like drivers and station even though ten RMT further info: d value for money Littlechild; the sacking would staff, in the Strike Committee. members scabbed on the [email protected] have been the first of many in an When it suited them, they also first strike, none of the 200 4 5 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 Spring 2009 PFI: the Economics of the Madhouse

projects surveyed pay and condi- market orthodoxy grips the Labour aspect left then will be the principle UBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS (PPP) IS AN UMBREL- quality to be far worse than pub- la term for a range of initiatives involving the licly financed schools. The best tions were far worse than for the Party, it seems they are about to that public sector provision is free examples of innovation came from already poorly paid workers in the announce that state funds will be at the point of delivery. But there private sector in operating public services. The traditional schools and the cost of state sector. used to prop up PFI. must be doubt as to how long this PPrivate Finance Initiative (PFI) is the most fre- services like cleaning and caretak- will last. The very act of privatisa- quently used. The key difference between PFI and con- ing was higher in PFI schools. The To meet the rising cost of PFI This will bring us, in a somewhat tion pushes up the cost of public ventional ways of providing public services is that the report also criticised poor design in schemes local authorities have been bizarre circle, to a situation where sector provision, putting ever more asset is not in public ownership. Instead, the public PFI schools, such as small class- forced as divert money from other the government funds companies to strain on public finances. service provider makes an annual payment, like a room sizes and poor acoustics. A social provision. In many cases Eventually a time report by the Audit Office in they can’t even pay for staff to will come when it is mortgage, to the private company which provides the work in the PFI funded building. A argued that we can building and associated services. Whilst PFI projects Scotland was equally damning. It found that PFI schools were com- British Medical Journal investiga- no longer afford the are structured in different ways, there are usually four pleted no quicker than state funded tion found that due to lack of public sector. No key elements – design, finance, build and operate. schools, that the cost of building resources there has been a 20% cut doubt it will start and running PFI schools was much in staff in PFI hospitals, badly with people having The government uses PFI because stream, its “wonders” have been higher, and that over a 25 year peri- impacting on the services to contribute a costs are spread typically over 25 challenged by an increasing num- od local councils would be paying provided. small amount. This years; because, it argues, the pri- ber of highly critical reports. In up to five times more than the origi- will be a first step vate sector would be much cheaper recent years this has reached the nal investment by the private com- You might think that as the prob- in a process leading and more effective in building and point where even the government’s panies involved. lems pile up the government would to full privatisation running public sector projects; and own auditors have been slamming seek to save face and revert to state of public services, because it was calculated that the the performance of PFI. soaring profits funded public provision. But no, the only adding to the public would care little about who opposite is happening and Labour economic and social actually provides public services, Criticisms of PFI are many, rang- That PFI is far more expensive than seems ever more determined to inequalities we just as long as they remained free ing from cost to quality. For exam- traditional state funded projects make PFI work. already have. and available to everyone. ple, an Audit Commission report should be no shock; after all the into PFI funded schools found their state can always borrow money to However, they now face a threat to build public projects. These compa- It is quite remarkable how Labour Though the Tories first finance projects more cheaply than the whole scheme. PFI has been nies then charge the state highly has been able to move ever closer to brought in PFI, Labour the private sector. Another reason based on cheap loans but the era of inflated prices, with part of the private sector provision of public has embraced it with a why PFI is more expensive is the- cheap money has ended with the price returning to the government services in a way that Thatcher real passion. PFI is now huge profits made by PFI compa- credit crunch and companies are to pay the original loan. This is not could never have. They have been one of the main ways to nies. The 20% annual profit rate for finding it almost impossible to bor- only the economics of the mad able to disguise their free market build and run public companies involved in the PFI fund- row the huge amounts needed for house; it is yet another example of polices in the language of fairness sector projects, funding ed London underground improve- PFI projects. This is putting at risk the state taking all the risk while and equality to deflect public oppo- everything from schools ments is typical. Another thing all of the government’s public sec- capitalists make all the profit. sition. This has been achieved only and hospitals to roads pushing up the cost, and the profit tor programmes, like the proposed due to the cowardice of the trade and the underground. margin, is the clever little insur- £40 billion school building pro- There’s worse to come. Labour’s unions. Had the unions organised Totally hooked on free ance trick. All the risk in PFI proj- gramme and the multi-billion free market indoctrination is such action against privatisation it could market principles, the ects comes in the first few years; pound waste processing and recy- that it now appears about to renege have been a focal point for much government has once the building is completed at cling facilities, which must be in on its promise that PFI schemes wider action by the whole popula- increasingly forced cost and on time, there’s very little place by 2013 to meet EU targets. will return to the public sector. The tion. Instead they restricted them- various departments risk. PFI companies can then rene- government has made it known selves to token action while contin- and local authorities to gotiate loans, allowing profits to no longer viable that some primary care trusts will uing to bankroll Labour’s extreme use PFI. soar, in some cases by 80%. Another remain in private hands after the free market views. As such, how the factor driving up costs is the use of The simple answer would be to repayment period. This totally unions are currently structured In PFI’s early years gov- advisers and consultants. The first announce that, due to the credit undermines their argument that means they are part of the problem ernment could silence 15 NHS trust hospitals spent £45 crunch, PFI is no longer viable and PFI is not just a more complex rather than part of the solution. critics by pointing to million on advisers, a full 4% of the planned public projects are to be method of privatisation. shiny new hospitals and capital value of each hospital. state funded. This would allow the That is not to say that union mem- schools as evidence of government to argue that, not only Should this policy extend to all PFI bers and activists are part of the success. But as time has PFI companies have also boosted is it guaranteeing public services, projects it brings us closer to a problem, rather that active trade passed, and as more and profits by driving down wages and but it’s also providing a much need- point where the vast majority of unionists must look beyond the cur- more PFI funded proj- working conditions. A Unison ed boost to an ailing economy. But, the public sector will be privately rent union structures to better ects have come on report found that in 80% of PFI in a sign of just how much free owned and run. The only social organise class struggle. 6 7 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 Spring 2009 The Dead End of Nationalisation how state ownership of industry does not, never has, and never will serve working class interests Redundancies, unemployment, OR OVER A CENTURY NOW ALL SORTS OF SOCIAL brought the Bank of England, coal wage cuts, cuts in public services democrats, Stalinists and Trotskyists have mining, steel, electricity, gas, tele- and home repossessions are all on phones and inland transport under the rise. Benefits are also being tar- espoused the view that the state can be used to state direction. It also developed the bring about a communist society through geted with the unemployed, single F “cradle to grave” welfare state. mothers and recipients of incapaci- reforms and/or seizing the state on behalf of the work- ty benefit, among others, in the fir- ers. This has often been dubbed by libertarian commu- However, in the past 30 years, ing line. At JCB workers voted for a nationalisation was thought to have £50 a week pay cut to avoid redun- nists as “state socialism”. One of the staple demands dropped off the mainstream politi- of this statist strategy is the nationalisation of banks dancies only for the company to cal agenda. The rise of neo-liberal- make workers redundant anyway. and other industries, bringing them under the direc- ism, the fall of the Soviet Union With repossessions hitting record tion of the state. This is usually disguised in leftist and the Labour Party’s dropping of levels the government has even had its commitment to state ownership terms like “public” or “social” ownership, offering the to ask banks to go easy on mort- before its 1997 landslide, were, for gage defaulters. So, yet again, we illusion of a “worker’s state”. many, the final nails in the coffin. see attacks on working people as a small minority of fat cats get bil- However, state ownership of indus- as early as 1840, for the government the current crisis lions in state aid. try is in no way a communist meas- to regulate and supervise them, the UK economy’s reliance on bank- great that defender of the individu- ure – by communism we mean a simply to protect the public. To many people’s surprise though, ing and “mortgage derivatives”. So alistic free market, “presided over society free of state direction and nationalisation has made a come- communist critiques when the housing bubble burst the greatest swing towards protec- based on direct democracy, common In Russia, after the revolution of back. Facing the worst downturn credit dried up, banks teetered on tionism since the 1930s”. In essence, So, with all this state intervention, ownership and production for need, 1917, the Bolshevik regime used since the Great Depression of the the verge of collapse and the econo- American workers bore the brunt why are we no closer to a glorious not want. Nationalisation takes state ownership to develop Russian 1930s, the near collapse of the bank- my went into recession. of “free market discipline” whilst socialist future? Why are we actual- control out of the workers’ hands industry defending it as socialist by ing sector has forced the state to the rich benefited from the actions ly seeing peoples’ lives devastated and into those of the state, which saying that fully fledged capitalism once again openly intervene in the This was most spectacular in the of the state. Laissez faire principles by homelessness and unemploy- bolsters the rule of class over class. was required for socialism to be economy. With workers’ militancy case of Northern Rock with the didn’t apply to the working class in ment? Simply put, nationalisation In the Soviet Union, as in the West, achieved. In post-war Europe at a low ebb, leading to a low wage first run on a bank in over a centu- that they had no freedom in oppos- is not, and cannot be, a tool for there was still a small boss class nationalisation was used to restruc- economy, the growth in credit pro- ry and its eventual nationalisation. ing their exploitation. In Britain, achieving a communist society. who gained profit from the labour ture devastated economies. Attlee’s vided the money to keep consumers Since then, the state has also res- after 17 years of Thatcherite eco- Nationalisation by state socialist of the mass of the population. Labour government, elected in 1945, spending. This was coupled with cued Bradford & Bingley and the nomic gospel, public spending was regimes has never eliminated capi- Royal Bank of Scotland, while the still the same, 42.25% of GDP, as it talism. In the Soviet bloc there were Nationalisation is not only the pre- Anglo-Irish Bank was bailed out by had been when she took over. superficial differences with the serve of the left. Other “state capi- the Irish government. The car Meanwhile sustained attacks on the West. Most capital was owned by talist” ideologies exist which use industry has also been hit with working class continued which saw the state; there was no free >>> nationalisation as a tactic. These renewed calls from some on the left the breaking of include those on the right (such as for its nationalisation. militancy and the Nazis) and so-called “democrat- chronic levels of ic” governments (such as However, governments do not poverty. Unsur- Roosevelt’s with the “New Deal” nationalise industries because min- prisingly, and the Labour party prior to 1997). isters heed the calls of small leftist finance and groups. They do so because of a industry did Often, nationalisation has been a need to prevent a banking collapse very well for tactic for large scale industrial and its inevitable consequences – themselves. restructuring. It was used in 19th economic disaster, falling profits century Europe to develop infra- and the danger of social unrest. In this recession structure. A classic example is the conditions for railways, built at a time when it This use of state intervention by ordinary work- was believed that market forces so-called free marketeers like ing people are would reward the good and useful Brown and Bush isn’t new. Accord- coming under and eliminate the bad or socially 1930s: public works under Roosevelt’s New Deal ing to one expert, Ronald Reagan, further attack. happy state controlled workers useless. However, it was necessary, 9 8 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 market in labour; the poor had the We would thank anyone to point out to us what function, if any, “right to work”. Fundamentally the state can have in an economic organisation, where private though, the conditions of life for the working class were the same as property has been abolished and in which parasitism and special in the West. Capitalism still existed, privilege have no place. The suppression of the state cannot be a because workers sold their labour languid affair; it must be the task of the revolution to finish with power and consequently were dis- the state. Either the revolution gives social wealth to the produc- possessed of the means to freely ers in which case the producers organise themselves for due col- create the conditions of life. As in the West, there was a ruling class lective distribution and the state has nothing to do; or the revolu- which lived off the surplus pro- tion does not give social wealth to the producers, in which case duced by the workers – this class the revolution has been a lie and the state would continue. consisted of a central Party elite which owned the state. Diego Abad de Santillan

has historically been a way to tics which are anarcho-syndicalist save capitalism and libertarian communist in from itself as it nature such as collective action, expands and direct democracy, mass assemblies dominates. After and for links to be made between a decade of the workers despite artificial divisions Labour Party of workplace, union, sector, claiming there temp/permanent status, nationality was no alterna- and so on. tive to the free market, an alter- A libertarian communist economy, native was soon a system without the state and found once the without the free market, where capitalism sys- everyone has equal rights to have tem faced the their needs met, has always been threat of col- the aim of anarcho-syndicalists. lapse. Workers’ self-management will amount to little in a world of inequality with decisions being dic- Peter Kropotkin argued that: libertarian communism tated by the market. However, we Everywhere the State has been, and While libertarian communist and have also been careful to always still is, the main pillar and the cre- anarchist arguments against state point out that any communist sys- ator, direct and indirect, of intervention seem to be vindicated tem will be nightmarish unless the Capitalism and its powers over the by the credit crunch, how can we people support it and are involved masses. Nowhere, since States have respond to the crisis? We, as work- in running it. Thus we argue for grown up, have the masses had the ers, have to widen and deepen our the socialisation of the economy, freedom of resisting the oppression struggles and not hark back to not its nationalisation. by capitalists. . . The state has archaic, out-dated solutions like always interfered in the economic nationalisation which should be left From each according to their ability, life in favour of the capitalist in the history books. Instead, when to each according to their need. exploiter. It has always granted him struggles arise we have to push tac protection in robbery, given aid and support for further enrichment. And it could not be otherwise. To do so The spirit of anarcho-syndicalism...is characterised by independ- was one of the functions – the chief ence of action around a basic set of core principles; centred on mission – of the State. freedom and solidarity. Anarcho-syndicalism has grown and So when left wing groups today call for the nationalisation of the banks developed through people taking action, having experiences, and and other industries (as the learning from them...the idea is to contribute to new and more Socialist Party of England and effective action, from which we can collectively bring about a bet- Wales and their local councillors ter society more quickly. That is the spirit of anarcho-syndicalism. do) they are not arguing for social- SelfEd Collective ism. After all, state intervention 10 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Winter 2009 Breeding like Rats the professional middle classes under new labour

FTER THE SUPER RICH, the latest pronouncements. But the public sector workforce, com- it’s the professional keep up you must, because failure pared with the reactionary private Amiddle classes who’ve to use the latest correct form of sector where it is only 8%. done best from the Brown/ words can lead to trouble. Blair years. This army of Of course it’s not been possible to public sector managers, The bane of the middle manager is completely get rid of the lower consultants, advisors, hold- the manual worker, a group of peo- orders. But middle management ers of quango posts and ple who just don’t want to be team have been able to draft in some of various other hangers on players. In team meetings they their professional friends who’ve have bred like rats under rarely say anything constructive set up little companies that run New Labour. They even have and show no enthusiasm for the lat- courses on such things as team a kind of ideology to unite est initiative aimed at delivering a motivation and health and safety. them – an abhorrence of all better service. When given their For a few thousand pounds a time -isms. These very very nice brightly coloured uniforms, to these people are drafted in to train people have a hatred of any- encourage a sense of team working workers how best to go about their thing sexist, racist or homo- and to present a positive image to jobs safely with wonderful smiles phobic. Their ideology has customer, they wear them reluc- permanently fixed on their faces. even been codified in the tantly and only occasionally wash form of political correct- them. In fact, washing doesn’t seem However, professional middle class ness through which they a high priority for them in general. tolerance doesn’t extend to the impose their (in)tolerance home where, in order to dedicate on the rest of us. themselves to their jobs, they employ a small army of domestic Take the smoking ban. It’s clear the servants. Here they’re happy to lower orders don’t realise smoking employ working class people to do is bad for them. The answer – make the cleaning, tidy the garden, do smokers social outcasts by banning odd jobs and so on; here their com- them from public places until they mitment to equality is geared to learn the error of their ways. The ensuring their employees are paid same applies to those nasty racist, the lowest rate possible. In this sexist hoodies who’re a blot on the endeavour, single parents claiming landscape of liberal Britain. The dole, or illegal immigrants scared answer – ban the horrors, without of being deported, have been found trial, from where they live and dis- to make for the cheapest and most tribute photos so everyone can hard working employee. identify them. But there’s a worry that’s spoiling The stronghold of the liberal mid- this liberal utopia created under dle class is the public sector. This New Labour – a growing realisation army of middle managers spend that Labour may be kicked out at their whole lives rushing round, the next election. But then again, clutching mobile phones and It’s for these reasons, and the suspi- that nice Mr Cameron does seem to attending meetings. No one really cion they all vote BNP, that the pro- be one of us. His commitment to knows what they actually do but fessional middle management have the equality agenda does seem real. when they occasionally stop to talk tried to ethnically cleanse manual And there’s the added bonus that he down to you, they always make it workers from the state sector. might cut taxes. After all, with the clear just how busy they are and Through privatisation and competi- credit crunch, professional middle how hard life is being a manager. tive tendering, directly employed class parents are struggling to pay Their mantra is that the public sec- manual workers are now increas- the kids’ school fees. Perhaps it’s tor must deliver an ever improving ingly a thing of the past. In their time to send back the Labour mem- service to the customer. Or is it place it has been possible to recruit bership card and see if the Tory service users? Then again, it might more and more professionals who commitment to keeping Britain as be client – it’s so hard keep up with now make up a whopping 29% of unequal as Labour is really true. 11 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 environ-mental Spring 2009 environ-mental The Crisis Factory the roots of the global ecological crisis transport. The long term effects of ROM REYKJAVIK TO RIO, FROM WOOLIES TO Furthermore, this drive to expand global warming, predicted by the Whittards, the fall out from the economic can only be fed by using up ever more resources to produce ever Inter-governmental Panel on downturn reverberates like a Mexican wave more commodities to generate ever Climate Change to take effect by Faround virtually every inhabited corner of more profits. Where there is eco- 2050, are likely to result in: the globe. But this crisis, just as surely as it began, nomic growth, there is also mass o displacement of populations will eventually peter out – but not before wreaking consumption. But our capacity to from island, coastline and river consume, like the capacity of the delta areas misery and destitution upon millions. Alongside this natural world to fuel the commodi- o more frequent and more severe ty market, is to any rational mind, latest recession is the environmental crisis, with far weather related natural disas- finite. more irretrievable consequences, and a severity we ters are now only just waking up to. wiped out o desertification, famine and increasing food shortages The crisis of overproduction that Over 100 years ago Karl Marx fore- also the phenomenon we now call These factors will, in turn, con- told, how the inbuilt tendency of “globalisation”. More contempo- leads to recession occurs when the market becomes oversaturated with tribute to more widespread human industrial capitalism to expand rary analysts, such as Murray suffering (especially in poorer parts would give rise to not only continu- Bookchin and the social ecology unsellable commodities. In this sense, the current downturn is no of the world), greater social insta- al cycles of boom and slump, but movement of the late 1960s and 70s, bility and higher levels of enforced different from those of the past. responsible and sustainable use of a proposed new treaty will succeed later warned of migration. Ongoing resource wars The most robust businesses, the natural resources. Profit margins where others have clearly failed. the profound and increasingly repressive popula- transnational corporations, are deter oil corporations from invest- ecological crisis tion control measures also seem nevertheless sufficiently well ing heavily in renewable energy What the politicians and corpora- that we now likely. face. resourced to weather the storm as sources. tions (whose interests the politi- others inevitably go under. Once cians support) will never admit to The globalisa- unproductive capacity has been capitalism in action The 1997 Kyoto Protocol committed us, is glaringly simple. Capitalism, tion of the mar- (painfully) wiped out, the economy governments to reducing the whether of the free market or state ket economy in will eventually pick up, and the Yet global warming and output of greenhouse run variety, will always trigger the last 30 or so market monopolising transnation- the general degrada- gases. But last year, ecological and economic crises years has been als will emerge even stronger than tion and depletion before the climate because, in the final analysis, the closely paral- before. of the world’s convention in overriding priorities of economic leled by the ecosystems – Bali, U.N. fig- growth and profit accumulation unprecedented The same cannot be said, however, the scale of ures reveal- come first. rise of mega-cor- for the natural world. which has ed an 11% porations like only been increase in Like the moribund dinosaurs of the Exxon-Mobil, ICI In the last 30 years, one third of the touched emissions old left, our morally and ideologi- and Coca Cola planet’s natural resources have upon here – world- cally bankrupt leaders scrabble that have suc- been used up. To quote the New is no ran- wide. around for false solutions in the cessfully extend- Economics Foundation: dom occur- Ahead of wake of their failing system. It is ed their influ- For everyone on earth to live at the rence or the No- neither alarmist nor inaccurate to ence around the current rate of consumption, we aberration. It vember cli- suggest that we are living on bor- world. Like all would need more than double the bio is capitalism mate sum- rowed time. For us, the immediacy capitalist busi- capacity actually available – the in action. The mit in Copen- of the need to dismantle the corpo- nesses, they are equivalent of 2.1 planet Earths – to overriding need hagen, there’s rate and state hegemony and shape motivated by 2 sustain us. If everyone consumed at for economic little to suggest a new libertarian (eco)socialist key imperatives the U.S. rate, we would need nearly growth flies com- that this trend has order, quite simply, cannot be – the need to five. pletely in the face of been reversed, or that understated. make profit and the need to Also of growing concern is the omi- increase market nous spectre of global warming, An Overseas Development Institute report indicates that the global economic crisis could share and caused by overreliance on fossil cost up to 90 million lives, increase in the number of those going hungry to nearly a billion. expand. fuels by capitalist industry and 12 13 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 environ-mental / letters

Want to comment on anything A Killer at Work you’ve read in DA? hough asbestos in now banned more likely to get lung cancer than Want to bring anything to DA in Britain, many buildings we miners or quarry workers suffering readers’ attention? Tlive and work in today predate from silicosis. the ban. For example, about 90% of Just email us at: schools still contain asbestos. As a Mesothelioma was a rare cancer of [email protected] result, thousands of people are the lung until, in the 1950s and ’60s, dying, and will continue to die, from increasing numbers of cases were or write to us at: asbestos related diseases which very reported, nearly all connected with PO Box 29, S.W. DO, often are not manifest until many asbestos. What was even more years, even decades, after exposure. alarming was that many of the vic- Manchester, tims of Mesothelioma had contract- M15 5HW. Asbestos is a fibrous substance ed it from either living near a mine found in seams between layers of of factory, or from dust shaken off a rock. The fibres are strong, flexible, relative’s work clothes. Mesothe- April Fools and will not burn below 1000 ºC. lioma is today the biggest industrial There are different types but these killer in this country. Dear comrades, days 95% of all asbestos mined is nd white asbestos, or Chrysotile. Conservative estimates for the num- On April 2 , the multinational G20 ber of British people who will die of circus descended on London. The G20 When processed it is broken down asbestos related diseases, based on is composed of Finance Ministers into tiny fibres, which are so strong World Health Organisation figures, from the world’s foremost advanced and pliable they can be spun and are 50,000 for lung cancer and 12,000 and emerging economies, and repre- woven. There is practically no limit for Mesothelioma. sentatives from the IMF, European to how small these fibres can get. Union and World Bank. The stated When asbestos is used, even if only If workers discover asbestos contam- purpose of the summit was “to seek handled, it gives off dust, some of it inating their workplace, they should solutions to the global financial crisis”. invisible. These invisible fibres can act immediately; under health and Abolishing capitalism, however, did- enter the lungs and are responsible safety legislation, we have the right n’t feature highly on the agenda. for asbestos related diseases. to refuse to work in hazardous condi- Instead discussion centred on meas- tions. So, workers should walk ures aimed at restoring confidence in Asbestosis is the most virulent form straight off the job, demanding the the battered financial markets and of pneumoconiosis and, unlike sili- boss to bring in qualified people to further attempts at “restabilising” the cosis, continues to worsen, even if seal off the hazardous area and to fragile world economy. the victim has ceased working with remove all asbestos. In the last 20 years or so, global capi- asbestos. In 1947 the Chief Medical talism has predicated growing social Inspector of Factories reported that Further info: inequality, war and pillaging of the asbestos victims were ten times www.hazards.org/asbestos/ environment. The impact of this has been especially acute outside of the Subscribe to richest 20 nations. Just 4.3% of the recent Wall Street bail out could have ended world hunger (source: Dissent  supporting sub (enclose £10)  G20), but making poverty history is basic sub (enclose £5) never the priority of the ruling elite.  rush me free information about DA and SolFed Our futures, and those of millions like us are gambled away daily on the  Europe (enclose £10) world stock markets. When the banks  rest of the world (enclose £15) collapsed they were bailed out by our money, while their overseers like Name...... RBS’s Fred the Shred were pensioned off to the tune of millions. We, on the Address...... other hand, get saddled with job loss- ...... es and home repossessions. If the G20 leaders had the power to ...... solve the turmoil we wouldn’t be in it. cheques, etc. payable to: Capitalism is not in crisis, capitalism ‘Direct Action’ is crisis. return to: DA, PO Box 29, South West DO, Manchester, M15 5HW Solidarity, A.D. 14 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 letters Single Status Have Dear DA, As if the credit crunch wasn’t bad your enough, many of us employed in local authorities are now also reeling from the Say effects of “Single Status” implementation. The 1997 Single Status agreement between employers and public service unions called for a pay and grading review of all local government posts. Many were conned into believing it would give a fair- Police are the Rapist’s er pay structure within and across local councils. Indeed, at the time, the union Best Friend bosses told us that “many will gain and nobody will lose”. Dear DA, should be doing, the Met and the So what really happened? Most of the Home Office have other priori- reviews are now complete, and the out- If Sapphire had been created to ties. Investigating rape is low- comes simply beggar belief. In my local protect the rapist, John priority, low-resourced police authority, the senior managers all got Worboys, they couldn’t have work. Every day rape survivors handsome pay rises, thank you very done a better job. comment on how terrorism, sur- much! At the other end of the scale, some veillance of protests, property workers gained while others lost. Sig-nifi- For 30 years WAR has been crime and arresting sex workers cantly, many of the lowest paid, predicted doing all it can publicly and pri- take precedence over the safety to benefit from Single Status, endured vately for the police to take rape of women and girls. seriously, and for 30 years all we losses. Many others will now get inferior have seen is a series of public “Public information campaigns” enhancements. The amount of pay lost in relations exercises while rape by the Met, the GLA, and the the review runs literally into thousands continues to be depri- Home Office, advis- for some. It has not been unheard of for oritised and one case ing women to avoid some to lose up to 20% of their salary. The after another is sabo- unlicensed mini- stress caused and the detrimental effects taged by the police. cabs and watch our on morale are well documented (see drinks, distract labourunion digest.org.uk). We are constantly from the real dan- The new pay structure won’t be intro- told that rape cases ger resulting from duced for 1 to 2 years (some consolation!). are particularly diffi- incompetence, prej- The whole fiasco has seen furious back cult to prove. The udice and laziness peddling by the unions, embarrassed at truth is that the by the criminal jus- reneging on earlier claims. Sporadic police are the rapists’ tice authorities. strike action broke out in Glasgow and best friend, and this other places. However, again the unions’ case proves it. What all these No doubt we will be told again response nationally has been piecemeal, women suffered is a result of a that the black cab driver case is disjointed and lacking any real convic- comprehensive refusal by an isolated incident and offered tion. London Sapphire to act on rape more technical fixes. But the allegations: a refusal to gather only way we will see real The long term squeeze on local govern- and keep evidence, search prem- change, as opposed to cover up, ment funding has resulted in this “rob ises, and interview witnesses, is for those responsible for this Peter to pay Paul” pay review. Despite all and a readiness to dismiss the disaster at the highest levels to the talk of “pay harmonisation”, there is word of any young woman who be sacked – just as they would be nothing harmonious about this whole has been drinking or drugged in other jobs where dereliction sorry affair. Yet again workers will pick and even children, a habit of of duty leads to innocent lives up the tab in the form of pay cuts and ris- delaying arrests for days, weeks, being wrecked. This time heads ing council taxes for government policy or months while rapists contin- must roll. and a failing economy. ue to assault more and more That the union hierarchies have again girls and women. Women Against Rape colluded with this should act as further 020 7482 2496 vindication of those like SolFed who While the public make protec- advocate direct action and workers’ con- [email protected] tion from violent crime their top trol. priority for what the police Yours, Dave. 15 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 Spring 2009 1976 and All That

ICKED THE TITLE FROM AN OLD FINANCIAL TIMES with no “work ethic” and no education “system” for turning out and government borrowing was right, based on profit and greed. article about the economy in the early 90s and respect, being paid “fortunes” on kids who couldn’t read and write. “crowding out” the “dynamic pri- People “got into property” for profit whether we were in for a repeat of the crisis of the dole to shag, smoke dope, get These ideas showed the growing vate sector”, where all the profits spawning whole TV channels dedi- 1976. Memories of 1976 include the hot sum- pissed and have a laugh. influence of what was to be known were made and all the real wages cated to buying and selling “proper- N as the “New Right”. They weren’t were paid. Others ar-gued that the ties” that were once called houses. mer, Man City’s last silverware, and early punk rock Blame was all around, but the rich really new though; they just latched welfare state stopped us doing songs about anti-christs, anarchists and being “pretty and powerful could pay academics on to the ideas of Smith, Ricardo things for ourselves; yet others that Anti-union laws, spineless union vacant”. However, for the wealthy and powerful – and to feed the press. So the likes of and Malthus from the 1700s, kept it hadn’t worked anyway, that the leaders and mass redundancies all those of us who want to destroy wealth and power – Bacon and Eltis argued the problem alive in books and in academics’ middle class had claimed it all. but killed off militancy. Tax cuts for 1976 was a catalyst for change and these changes are was “too few producers” because of heads. the rich, benefit cuts and falling still going on over three decades later, in a crises that’s the size of the ‘public sector’. So, successive governments set out wages for the poor all meant more at least as severs as we had back then. The state protecting private proper- to get rid of it. Callaghan first, then money lining the pockets of the The “public sector”, anything paid ty and defending the “realm” is Thatcher with a vengeance. She pri- scum at the top. Control of the for by taxes, includes bombs, the good, but taxing upstanding rich vatised everything she could and school curriculum, an end to free Jim Callaghan’s Labour govern- football hooligans and kids coming army, navy and air force, the law, people is bad – prevents the “trickle what she couldn’t privatise, private teeth, no more council houses, no ment had to beg the IMF for a bail out of school thick and with dirty police, government, bureaucrats down effect”. Giving money to char- sector business techniques (like more this and no more that; make out. They were in that much debt finger nails; about nobody doffing and the dosh doled out to the horde ity is good but the state taking the local management of schools, per- everything hard to claim and get nobody would lend them any more. their caps any more, the riff raff of royal parasites. But it wasn’t money and giving it to the poor is formance indicators, and so on) those public sector workers under Nor did lenders like our “stagfla- going off to Spain, and there being this “public sector” that got the bad – makes them lazy and depend- were brought in. Managers became the thumb; more casual labour, tion” (high unemployment and too many blame. It was the “cradle to grave” ent; they have too many kids and the new darlings and have been paid agency working, short term con- high inflation at the same foreign- welfare state with free schooling, need “the whip of hunger” to make fantastic wages and bonuses. tracts and super-exploited imported time). To the rest of the ers about free teeth and free death. It was also them work. Education in labour…. And so it’s contin- world Britannia was the place. nationalised industries, ones run the hands of “pinko” ued. knackered after years by the government – some, like teachers is bad – might of “ruling the Above all, transport, gas and electricity, in the encourage kids to think, The problem is, capitalism is waves”, battering the they moaned name of efficiency; some, like car when what they need is unstable, always moving from colonies and robbing about the firms, because the cost of them “facts” and the “work boom to slump. Now the them blind. So they unions hav- going under was politically high; ethic”. Free health is no experiment that brought fan- turned their backs ing “too and some, like bomb factories and good either. How can tastic wealth for the greedy on the 15% interest much aerospace, because the power “experts” know each rich has been found out. The rate on British gov- power”. The freaks want to have their own. individual’s wants and very policies brought in in ernment bonds. As a country was Running these industries gave our needs? Only the free mar- response to the “big state” result, the pound a right mess leaders another excuse to wear ket knows that. All the idea being blamed for the was worthless. according to hard hats and swan around facto- welfare state has done is 1970s crisis have themselves the daily fas- ries watching other people work. give cushy jobs to loads now been found wanting. The pig rich cist, drip of know-it-alls and give moaned about feeding us Lefties loved it. Tony Benn called it them power over the This time governments every- dwindling with classist “socialism”; others called it “pro- humble Daily Mail reader. Another wheeze was to “liberalise where are bailing out banks, not the returns on and racist gress”, the state working “on our financial services”. Banks, building other way round, spending our their “un- shite. They did- behalf”. Some saw it as control and The nationalised industries had societies and other money making money like confetti, with borrowing earned income’, n’t blame the a way to keep us fit for exploitation. done the same, giving jobs to mili- schemes the pig rich use to get even going through the roof. And who is their investments and thievery and The right agreed with Benn and tants like “Red Robbo” who were richer, were left to control them- it that’s going to end up paying for stash in the bank; decadence of hated it, and 1976 gave them their “holding the country to ransom”. selves, to do what they wanted. it all? One thing’s for certain, it about the spiralling money mad mega- chance to stop it. From then on What, with all those “loony left” Again, it was the notion that when won’t be the rich and powerful. But prices of luxury items lomaniacs. Oh no! “progress” went into reverse. councils too, taxpayers’ money the rich get richer it “trickles perhaps this time round people and posh food; about The “British dis- going down the pan had to stop. down”. So, they gave mortgages to won’t fall for it all again; perhaps the new taxes that ease” was our fault, what Among other things, Callaghan anyone – £100 down and move right this time they’ll realise the whole they had to employ withworkerss on demos and kiboshed Keynesianism – the idea According to Bacon and Eltis, 60% in; 100% mortgages to people in the system is run by a gang of thieves; someone to dodge; wildcat strikes all the time that governments spend their way of the economy was in the non-pro- “Anglo-Saxon flexible labour mar- perhaps this time they’ll get organ- about punk rockers, and the bone idle unemployed out of trouble – and rubbished the ductive public sector. High taxes ket”. The market decided what was ised and begin to fight back.

Primark’s use of a Manchester sweatshop paying way below the minimum wage is The Healthcare Commission reported at the end of March that the pursuit of (market followed by TUC findings that over 1.5 million workers are being cheated out of the driven) targets to the detriment of patient care may have caused the deaths of 400 people minimum wage – hairdressing, hotel and bar staff are among the most likely to be affected. between 2005 and 2008. 16 17 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 our history Looking back at the 1984-5 Miners’ Strike

N MARCH 1984, TWENTY FIVE YEARS AGO, THE NATIONAL had higher pay. Nottinghamshire in miners stated that certain forces were Coal Board announced it intended to close 20 pits particular was told that their pits much worse than others. Undoubtedly were safe from the programme of clo- it was deliberate policy to use police with the loss of 20,000 jobs. Cortonwood in South sures with no local connection or sympathy IYorkshire was earmarked as the first to close, “immi- for the miners. In particular the nently”, in the words of the NCB chairman, Ian to ballot or not to ballot Metropolitan Police were renowned MacGregor. The miners at Cortonwood immediately came for their arrogance and brutality. Central to the arguments amongst out on strike and by March 12th the National Union of striking miners was whether there scab union Mineworkers had made the strike national. This was to should have been a national ballot. become the bitterest industrial dispute in most of our life- Dave Douglass, who at the time was a The state also used devious methods – times and marked a major defeat for the working class. delegate from Hatfield Main colliery infiltrating the unions, intelligence in South Yorkshire, argues that the reports from the EEPTU (electricians national ballot would probably have union) and conniving with the Notts The background to the strike lies in The miners’ action at Cortonwood been won. However, he also believes NUM officials to create a breakaway the early ’70s, when the miners fought quickly spread across the coalfields, that the leading role played by the scab union, later to become the Union Ted Heath’s Conservative govern- with Yorkshire, Kent, Scotland, South rank and file miners meant that it of Democratic Mineworkers. ment and its neo-liberal economic Wales and the North East all being wasn’t going to happen. The militants policies. Famously, Heath called an solid. Lancashire and North were afraid the union was going to Because the strike was declared ille- election over “who ran the country” Derbyshire had about two thirds out, sell them out, and could see the strike gal by the courts, miners and their while the miners were on strike, and but the rest of the East Midlands had had already stopped most production. families were not entitled to benefits lost. The right wing of the a very poor turnout. Their pits were They were also well aware that a suc- the hardened scabs in Nottingham- and the NUM’s funds were sequester- Conservatives began planning its more modern and the miners there cessful ballot would not have stopped shire. In Douglass’ words they ed. The media played its role too. All revenge almost immediately, …instructed their delegates at pit the main papers were resolutely with the Ridley Report of 1974 after pit to vote against a national against the miners, and the BBC edit- laying out detailed plans of ballot and to continue the strike to ed footage of heavily armed police how a future Conservative gov- victory. It was an entirely under- attacking unarmed miners to make it ernment would provoke and standable reaction, but in retrospect look like the miners started it. win a conflict with the unions, a mistaken one... and the miners in particular. Solidarity from other workers was in There had been a close call The main flashpoint between scabs many senses magnificent. It kept the when a strike nearly happened and strikers was Nottinghamshire, miners going without any other in 1981, but the government where scabs were just over the income for twelve months, and >>> backed down. It later emerged county border from the striking this was because they didn’t militants in South Yorkshire. The have all the elements of the other notorious flashpoint was the Ridley Plan in place by then. Orgreave Coking Works, the scene of were turned into a mass pickets which were attacked by virtual police state anti-union police. These are the well known as miners were clashes, but there were many more, prevented from The government brought in Ian particularly as militant miners were travelling and any- MacGregor as head of the NCB. using informal groups known as “hit one who looked He had previously been in squads” for lightning actions under like a miner or charge of British Steel where the noses of the police. supporter was he successfully closed plants stopped on the and made redundancies. Not only did the miners have to con- roads. The police MacGregor was viciously anti- tend with scabs and management, acted with impuni- union and was greeted with though. As the full force of the state ty on the picket hostility by Arthur Scargill and Cortonwood Colliery was mobilised along the lines of the lines, and anecdotal the NUM leadership. Ridley Plan, parts of the country reports from the 18 19 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 our history donations came from all over the knew who their enemies were. the work, but because they under- world. Those deceived by the media, the stood what would happen to their government or their own self-inter- communities if the pits closed. solidarity action est have nearly all fared as badly as the strikers. The areas which The strike also raised questions of Unfortunately, the sort of solidarity scabbed had their pits open for where solidarity came from and which might have made a differ- longer, but eventually they were how different struggles were ence was in short supply. There was still closed and their communities linked. The role of women in sup- some blacking of coal by rail work- destroyed. There are now only porting the men, particularly that ers, seafarers and dockers, and about six thousand coal miners in of Women Against Pit Closures, there were rumblings in the power the UK – twenty five years ago went some way to counteract chau- stations, but none of these were there were two hundred thousand. vinist attitudes of many miners. sustained. Most important was the In 1994, British Coal was privatised The active support of black and gay National Association of Colliery and only fifteen pits remained – a groups also challenged prejudice. Overmen, Deputies and Shotfirers vindication of the warnings by (NACODS), the For anarchists, the union for strike showed us supervisory that our ideas were grades in the relevant. Those so- pits. NACODS called anarchists members were who were really going home on individualist liber- full pay if they als found them- met a “diffi- selves adrift, but for cult” picket SF’s predecessor, line. In August, the Direct Action the NCB Movement, the lines rewrote these drawn by the strike guidelines and were clear. Militant they would workers used direct have to go into action in a hard work in the fought, serious reinforced class struggle. buses used for scabs. NACODS held a ballot over Scargill and the NUM militants of However, the question was also this and got an 82% yes vote and what lay behind the closure pro- posed of whether the DAM was an were on the verge of striking in gramme. Only four deep pits and anarcho-syndicalist organisation or September 1984. Even MacGregor, five open cast mines remain open. an organisation of anarcho-syndi- in his biography, says that if they calists. While DAM had some sup- had come out a compromise to end aftermath port among the more direct action the miners’ strike would have been oriented miners, none of them forced on the government. However, Former mining areas are pockets of joined. Dave Douglass later joined the government had an informant poverty and disadvantage. There Class War, which was popular with in NACODS; their demands were were very few other jobs available the strikers for its no nonsense quickly met, avoiding the strike. for redundant miners in the coal- tabloid style. This is a question fields and unemployment reached DAM continued to grapple with and Electricity companies kept the 50% in some areas. Suicides were was one of the main drivers for its power going over the winter of higher, particularly around the transformation into the Solidarity 1984-5 and the strike began to fade. time of the strike. Economic stag- Federation, which was designed as The media became obsessed with nation has been followed by an an organisation that would be easi- the numbers of miners who were influx of drugs and the despair that er for militant workers to join. back at work, even though the gov- goes along with them. Some pit vil- ernment later admitted that the fig- lages have high numbers of empty Dave Douglass ures had been inflated. On 3rd or abandoned homes as residents March 1985, miners marched back have migrated elsewhere for A Year of Our Lives – 20 years to work behind their banners. work. As Dave Douglass writes, since the Great Coal Strike “visit the former pit communities http://libcom.org/library/20- The miners’ strike was a time when today and you will still see the years-since-the-great-coal-strike- class conflict in Britain was open results of that defeat”. The miners of-1984-1985-dave-douglass and not one sided. The strikers weren’t striking because they liked 20 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 ideas for change If Voting could Change the System... the libertarian case for direct democracy

NE OF THE DEFINING TENETS SETTING LIBERTARIAN socialism apart from authoritarian political Politics is the art of traditions of both left and right, is an governing mankind by Ounshirking commitment to the principles of deceiving them. direct democracy. This is the means advocated by anarchists for exercising and enabling genuinely par- Benjamin Disraeli ticipative decision making in all domains of human life. Rejecting hierarchical organisation, we argue sion from political, cultural and that both parliamentary “democracy” and totalitari- economic decision making. Thus, conceding some semblance of anism have the same intensions – to maintain the dis- democracy, while still maintaining tinction between leaders and led, rulers and ruled. their privilege and wealth, became Both, in the final analysis, are designed to ensure a major priority for the ruling our passive acceptance of a system that oppresses us. classes in the late 19th century.

The idea of direct democracy is not During the early days of industrial manufacturing consent a new one. It surfaced during the capitalism, ideas of direct action Paris Commune (1871), the early and direct democracy posed a very From the onset of the industrial part of the Russian Revolution real threat to the established order revolution, against the background (1917-21), and was implemented on a in strongly advocating the masses’ of a growing urban working class, large scale during the Spanish participation in rather than exclu- dealing with “the problem of Revolution (1936-9). Direct democracy” was an urgent matter democracy is a method used for the rich and powerful. The by workers, radicals and arrival of universal suffrage saw a protest movements alike, shift from a political order where often arising spontaneously the masses were denied any say, to during periods of struggle. one where they were nominally Employed with a federal and included – a state of affairs that horizontal organisational continues essentially to this day. structure, direct democracy Our compliance with a social order ensures that decision mak- based on profit, power and exploita- ing power flows not from the tion is now routinely achieved by top down, but from the cir- “manufactured consent”. cumference to the centre. This type of organisation In contemporary society, the infor- “from the bottom up”, mation we receive, and the media enables authentic democracy that conveys it, is controlled by a and collective decision mak- select few. In 2004, the media critic ing, maximises accountabil- Ben Bagdikian pointed out how the ity and eschews the ability of entire US media was then owned by any would be leaders, no more than five companies. The bureaucrats or party hacks information presented is con- to sell us out or otherwise strained by economic dictats and usurp control. priorities to coincide with >>> 21 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 ideas for change corporate and state interests. Far costs. Even reforms like the welfare Chile (1973). It remains to be seen if from an informed choice, the elec- state were only conceded because the South American regimes of torates of supposedly “free and they met the demands of industry Chavez in Venezuela and Morales democratic” nations face a constant for a healthy productive workforce. in Bolivia can survive long enough barrage of disinformation and The few elected “socialist” govern- to implement their social democrat- media distortion – not only at elec- ments that veered from a pro-busi- ic reforms, but already US imperial- tion time, but all year round. Noam ness mandate, have been invariably ist and domestic business interests Chomsky and Edward Herman’s weakened by financial sanctions have conspired to destabilise both. Manufacturing Consent and Paul like “capital flight”. This is the Davies’ Flat Earth News (see deliberate removal of From Iran to Central review, p29) chronicle the mecha- financial and capital America, the CIA has a nisms for misinforming and manip- investment – as long and distin- ulating the electorate. The net happened in guished history of result is all too predictable: France after initiating covert ...corporate lobbies and other elites the 1981 regime change determine political agendas and Socialist conducted in ensure that elections choose between Party vic- the name of candidates who differ primarily in tory. As “preserving how best to maintain elite preroga- intended, democracy”, tives and advantages. Most of the this “mod- a common population doesn’t even participate erated” euphemism in electoral charades, and among erstwhile for the fur- those who do, most have no other progressive thering of US option than to repeatedly favour a and popular imperialist lesser evil. policies. interests. This phenomenonis Michael Albert, Realizing Hope Other subtle chronicled at length financial and mar- by Noam Chomsky, ...they’d make it illegal ket constraints have John Pilger and others and also succeeded against non- offers further proof, if it were The emergence of the parliamen- compliant governments. After the needed, that powerful elites and tary socialist movement in the 1994 election of the ANC in South market forces ultimately determine early 1900s gradually dissuaded Africa, the Financial Times cited political outcomes. large sections of the working class the “disciplinary effect” of the from taking independent action. devaluation of the rand. This led to the rich get richer This curtailed more substantive the adoption of free market reforms forms of democracy in favour of that quashed the expectations of Globally, “democracy” and fascism one which served the rich and pow- the dispossessed in the aftermath of have overseen market forces, covert erful. The Labour Party may have apartheid. Further-more, it has agendas and the conscious exclu- been, in Kier Hardie’s words, “born been well documented how develop- sion of the majority from anything from the bowels of the trade ment loans from the World Bank other than token involvement in unions“, but nevertheless proved and International Monetary Fund political processes with one irre- invaluable in channelling the more have been issued to governments sistible outcome – the rich get rich- progressive working class demands only on the condition that market er and the poor get poorer. up a safe, controlled blind alley. The liberalisation and austerity meas- integration of the unions into the ures were put in place. In May 2006, the UN produced a list state structures also helpted diffuse of the ten most under-reported sto- militancy. The unions’ hierarchical, destabilisation ries on the planet. Of these, a 2002 bureaucratic structures not only World Bank report highlighted a wrestled power from the rank and On other (rare) occasions where a global surge in poverty since the file, but also promoted sectional party has been elected with the 1980s, to the extent that 80% of the rather than class interests. This express intention of fulfilling a world’s population were below the model of state managed mitigation popular mandate, the threat of a poverty line. Meanwhile, 1% of the of conflict was thereafter highly military coup has been exerted to world’s population enjoyed an effective in preserving power rela- prevent an unwelcome outcome for annual income equivalent to the tions and class privileges. the ruling class. A planned coup in poorest 57%. A surge in inequality Britain against Harold Wilson’s in developed nations had also gone Internationally, Labour govern- government in the 1970s failed to largely unreported. These trends, ments have consistently attacked materialise, but elsewhere, success- plus recurring economic slumps, workers’ interests and steadfastly ful coups took place in Haiti (1991), resource wars and a growing eco- upheld market priorities at all Algeria (1992), Nigeria (1993) and logical crisis have stimulated 22 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 ideas for change renewed interest in revolutionary At this point it may be useful to communities have very little real socialist and anarchist ideas. explain further why direct democ- say in decisions regarding their Significantly, however, only anar- racy is so distinctly socialist and workplaces, communities and glob- chism explicitly advocates direct libertarian, especially when com- al politics. Under direct democracy, democracy – for very good reasons. bined with constructive direct we exercise real involvement, real action - autonomous of the state, ownership, and real control over all capital and hierarchy. aspects of our lives . change the world... Firstly, direct democracy is about ...without taking power Anarchists, in rejecting both fas- originating ideas as much as cism and the smokescreen of par- approving them (as is the case By practising direct democracy, liamentary democracy, have also under the elective dictatorship of direct action and horizontal organi- consistently renounced authoritari- parliamentary democracy with its sation here and now, we begin to an “socialism”. Instead, as Bakunin preordained party mandates). This not only extend political conscious- argued, is based on the simple idea that ness and confidence, but also create …future social organisation must be people, acting consciously in their a new society within the shell of made solely from the bottom own interests, should be architects the old. The democratic collectives upwards, by the free association or of their own destiny. built by the workers of Spain (1936- federation of workers, firstly in their 7), galvanised by the anarcho-syndi- unions, then in their communes, Secondly, direct democracy rests on calist CNT, provide probably the regions, nations and finally in the delegation not representation. best example of this being put into great federation, international and Crucially, delegates are only elected practice. This experience led to the universal. to implement decisions and, unlike wholesale transformation of not representatives, can be immediate- only economic, but also wider Lenin, Trotsky and Marx’s belief ly recalled and dismissed if they do social relationships (an experience that the state could be a tool of lib- not carry out a mandate allotted to perhaps most famously eulogised in eration has been found severely them. Further, delegates do not George Orwell’s Homage to Cata- wanting every time it has crys- enjoy privileges, permanence or lonia). Popular rule in this case was talised in power. The state, as we any other conditions that set them shown to be practical, possible and have seen, is the means by which apart from those who elect them. effective on a large scale. However, the management of peo- as with all other examples of direct ple’s affairs is taken democracy in practice, the failure from them into the to establish libertarian socialism hands of a few. The on a more permanent basis owed degeneration of “social- much to the cynical interventions ist” regimes time and of power crazed authoritarians of again into despotic both left and right. This proves but state-capitalist oli- one thing – without organisation, garchies is the we are nothing. inevitable failing of a centralist ideology that Whether we have parliamentary equates “dictatorship of “democracy” or dictatorship, the the proletariat” with seemingly insurmountable prob- “dictatorship of the lems facing the planet and its peo- party”. We now witness ples will not be solved by a few at the plainly absurd situa- the top issuing decrees, manipulat- tion of a multitude of ing public opinion or pursuing leftist parties claiming their own selfish agendas. On the themselves to be the one contrary, the roots of the social ills true workers’ vanguard. we see all around us today are the Spouting slightly differ- direct result of our deliberate dis- ent variations of the empowerment and exclusion from same failed dogma, decision making processes. It is these clowns all follow a only by exercising real (direct) distinctly authoritarian democracy with the long term aim path which, in practice, the Stasi, a manifestation of the dictatorship of achieving a libertarian socialist has always compro- of the proletariat in East Germany society that we have any hope of mised its revolutionary retrieving this precarious situation. aspirations, actively crushing gen- Thirdly, direct democracy relates to uinely liberatory workers’ move- all spheres of our lives; economic, It is time to change the world – ments in the process. cultural and political. Workers and without taking power. 23 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 ideas for change Spring 2009 ideas for change The Union or the Party?

NARCHO-SYNDICALISM HAS ALWAYS BEEN A THEORY the true soli darity that comes from obscure questions of philosophy. Anarcho-syndicalist ideas spread at idea of the revolutionary union is of change derived from the practice of the direct economic interest. Their aim The very reason for its existence is the beginning of the 20th Century to link the present with the future. is to gain power by appealing to the to fight the bosses, to defend the working class. It started as a movement, and revolutionary unions were lowest common denomina tor of interests of the working class and established in Europe and South social revolution Aexpressing itself through action, and any the- agreement. to push those interests forward America as well as having an influ- orists that emerged were militant workers who wrote until the system of exploitation is ence in the Industrial Workers of Direct action – strikes and other for workers, not for social philosophers. They dealt Whatever the method of change, be abolished. Just as the parliament is the World (IWW) in the United methods of struggle – encourage with issues of the moment, not with meta physical it by par liamentary means or the natural expression of the States. One major difference solidarity. Every strike, successful niceties that so impress intellectuals and academics. through the “dictatorship of the reformist, so the union is the natu- between anarcho-syndicalism and or not, increases hostility between As such, their writings are not to be found in academ- proletariat”, it results in substitut- ral form of organisa tion of the rev- the “industrial unionism” of the the classes and stimulates further ing one set of rulers for another. olutionary working class. IWW is that anarcho-syndicalist conflict. The aim of direct action is ic books but in pamphlets, newspapers and leaflets. Freedom and equality cannot be unions are federated together; they to win concessions from the bosses Nevertheless anarcho-syndicalists have always had an decreed from above but only Although the first fully fledged syn- do not form “One Big Union”. in the short term, but in the long overall, coherent view of ends and means. achieved by action from below. dicalist union emerged in France Unfortunately, in Britain, the birth- term, to give workers the confi- with the formation of the place of many of these ideas, the dence and ability to make wider class struggle across class lines, it draws upon revolutionary union Confédération Générale du Travail nearest an anarcho-syndicalist demands leading eventually to people from differing social back- (CGT) in 1895 the ideas that were to union came to being established social revolution. It is defensive and The root of anarcho-syndicalism grounds and econo mic interests. It Anarcho-syndicalists recognise the form the basis of anarcho- offensive, lies in the class struggle. There are attracts armchair socialists and need for the working class to organ- syndicalism had first destructive and exploiters and exploited, oppressors intellectuals who often have an ise to bring about a fundamental appeared in Britain in the constructive. and oppressed, capital and labour – abstract interest in change and so change in society and in place of 1830s and were pivotal in Every strike is only the complete overthrow of the can often ultimately betray the the political party anarcho-syndi- the formation of the Grand a step on the existing social, economic and politi- working class. calists put the revolutionary union National Consolidated road to the final cal order, along with the abolition – the autonomous organisation of Trade Union (GNCTU). The conflict – the of the state and hierarchical forms Socialist parties are dominated by the working class. It unites the aim of the Grand National social general of organisation, can change this. intellectuals and professional politi- workers, not on the basis of some was the complete replace- strike, the This can only be done when the will c ians. Their basis is ideological, ideology or sentiment, but in their ment of capitalism and the beginning of of the workers to achieve it exceeds depen dent on temporary and super- very quality as workers. Although system of competition with the transforma- the will of capital ism and the state ficial agree ments on matters of phi- the revolutionary union is a politi- a co-operative system based tion to a free to prevent it. Victory will be by our losophy. The party, unlike the class, cal as well as an economic organi- on workers’ control. Here society. While own efforts. It was once said that is an artificial organisation. It lacks sation, it is not concerned with we see further key ele- the class strug- while others ments emerging of early gle is waged, played at class anarcho-syndicalist ideas. the future is war like a child In particular, that of one being created. with a toy sword, organisation uniting all The union only the syndical- workers with the aim of becomes the ists have con- direct workers’ control of cell for the new structed from it industry – an organisation society. the appropriate based on the ideas of soli- and logical theory darity and mutual aid. was the Building Workers The revolutionary union is seen as of action. Industrial Union in 1914. This was a permanent organisation of work- social general strike soon crushed under wartime emer- ers that gives a basis for working This shows itself gency regulations with the support class resistance while the intensity in the rejection The GNCTU and the CGT also of the TUC. of the class struggle ebbs and flows. by syndicalists of rejected parliamentarianism and In times of low class struggle the political parties; the artificial separation of the eco- In 1922 the International Workers’ revolutionary union would be even those who nomic struggle from the political Association (IWA) was established mainly a defensive tool while still claim to represent struggle. Both saw political change linking all the revolutionary unions advocating different forms of the working class coming through the actions of the together in one federation and the organisation and fundamental because, by their working class organised at the ‘Principles of revolutionary union- change. As the struggle intensifies very nature, they point of production. Both saw the ism’ were adopted. Each union fed- it would become more aggressive deny the class method of change to be strike erated in the IWA adapted the basic and challenge the capitalist system struggle. Party action culminating in the Social principles to the particular situa- and the state. This is what distin- CGT speakers at a strike meeting in 1909 membership cuts General Strike. tion they found themselves in. The guishes anarcho-syndicalism >>> 24 25 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 ideas for change from other forms of workplace organisation that see temporary organisations springing up in times of struggle only to fade away.

Such organisations have their place and often emerge spontaneously at certain times but they can so easily be used by various political factions they have been purely economic graphical links between different for their own ends. Their political organisations that have taken the industries and international links aims may be deliberately obscured view that political allegiances can be used to resist coercion no to gain support but in an anarcho- should be left out of the union. In matter what guise it takes. syndicalist union the political and reality what has happened is that economic aims are plain and explic- various political groups have tried means and ends it. to exert influence over these unions in various ways including joining Today in Britain there are no func- The combining of the political and en masse and taking positions of tioning revolutionary unions. The economic struggle in one organisa- influence within them. This leads Solidarity Federation (SF) is not a tion is unique to anarcho-syndical- to decision making being taken union but an organisation of anar- ism. Other political groups adopt a away from the ordinary members cho-syndicalists who promote the dual approach that sees political and left to a self-appointed political idea of revolutionary unionism. To elites trying to guide the economic elite. do this it is organised, as any struggle in a particu- future union would be, on lar direction. Up to local and industrial lines recently the Labour that are federated togeth- Party has been the er in a national organisa- main political outlet tion. A member of SF for the reformist TUC would be a member of unions. Other groups both a local and of an have been trying to industrial grouping. Even challenge this in given SF’s small size this recent years but with structure is important little success as yet. since, for anarcho-syndi- The various parties of calists, the means and the the left will set up ends should be as compat- groups within the ible as possible. In this unions to attempt to way we do not lose sight gain influence and get of the final goal. The their members elected structure of the into positions of Solidarity Federation mir- power. These “front” rors how a future union groups will recruit would be structured with from the wider union no two-tier membership membership but will system so loved by other remain under the con- political groups. trol of a particular political grouping. Of course the revolutionary union Anarcho-syndicalist theory and is not only concerned with econom- prac tice presents a fully har- self-appointed elite ic issues. As a political organisa- monised pro gramme of action. The tion it fights all forms of oppres- strike, the natural form of conflict, Other revolutionary unions have sion, tyranny and domination. Its is also the form of revolution. The been established over the years but federated structure means that geo- time that workers could hope to achieve anything purely by insur- rection is long past. The revolution- ary union gives workers a school in which to practice forms of libertar- ian organising that reflects how a free society would function, with the ends and means well-matched to create the future society in the shell of the old. 26 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 international

Argentina Spain Factory Occupation CNT Takes on Robber Boss n February 3rd the workers, joining the pick- ollowing the current solution. workers at the San et line, collecting money fashion, José Velas- OAndres dough for the strike fund, initiat- Fco, boss at magazine Given this failure to nego- maker, Disco de Oro, ing an international soli- publisher, Onis Comunica- tiate, the Union of Graphic occupied their workplace. darity campaign, spread- ción, is using the economic Arts, Communication and The bosses had brought ing information about the crisis as an excuse to rob Events, affiliate of the the factory to bankruptcy struggle among the popu- workers. The company is CNT (Spanish IWA sec- by using it to back up var- lation at large, and organ- chaotically managed, so tion), energetically rejects ious financial and com- ising, alongside the Disco much so that suspension Velasco’s posture and has mercial machinations. In de Oro workers, a solidar- therefore declared addition to these debts ity festival. Featuring an industrial dis- and the factory’s utility music, drama and films, pute. The union’s debts, workers had gone the festival also heard activities focus on without pay as well as messages of solidarity all of Velasco’s social and medical insur- from IWA sections in business interests ance contributions for France and Spain, as well and, as an act of five months. To prevent as from Greek militants. solidarity, are ask- the owners selling off ing for the mes- machinery, the workers There was no real help sage: decided to occupy the from bureaucrats nor of wage payments is a spe- Onis Comunicación no plant to save it. politicians. The official cialism for Velasco and his paga a sus trabajadores. trade union tried to rec- associates. Indeed Onis Solución ya. Disco de Oro has restart- oncile the workers with was set up to take over (Onis Comunicación isn’t ed production and now the bosses, while Trot titles from another of paying its workers. We operates on an anti- parties loudly declared their publishing ventures demand a solution now.) authoritarian basis, with- solidarity but fought to which had hit similar out bureaucrats and boss- control the workers problems, with similar to be sent to the following: es, as a workers’ coopera- assembly. attempts to cheat workers Onis Comunicación – tive. All decisions are out of their pay. [email protected] taken in a general Zebra Producciones, Madrid assembly of workers. Velasco and co. are hoping zebra@zebraproducciones. the state will save them com From the outset, com- money, by paying Onis Zebra Producciones Gijón: rades in FORA (Argen- workers (part of) what [email protected] tine IWA section, in they’re owed from the San Martín have sup- Salary Guarantee Fund. Further info (in Spanish): ported the occupying They’ve certainly shown no desire to negotiate a www.cnt.es/graficas Germany Alternative Cinema Sacks Activist n March 11th, Benoit Robin, a paid holidays or other benefits. By campaign has continued, using a projectionist at the supposed- similar workers elsewhere get thirty Billy Bragg event, and a season of Oly leftist and alternative days paid leave. Babylon cannot be films on the Spanish Revolution to Babylon Cinema in Berlin, and a said to be in a poor financial health; highlight the workers demands. member of FAU (German IWA sec- as an art cinema, it gets a large gov- tion), was sacked. The FAU section at ernment subsidy, almost 500,000 The Babylon workers have a blog: Babylon, formed in January, has euros a year. http://prekba.blogsport.de been organising for improved pay and there is an online petition at: and conditions. Wages at Babylon In February, as part of their cam- are 5.50 to 6 euros an hour, with 6.40 paign, the Babylon workers organ- http://prekba.blogsport.de/solidarit for projectionists, ised a protest during aets-erklaerung. compared with the Berlin film festival. 8.50 euros an Robin was prevented Please send protest messages to: hour in other cin- from speaking at the Neue Babylon Berlin GmbH emas. Many of protest, and one month [email protected] the workers are later, was fired because [email protected] casual, with no of his role in organis- Tel.: 0049 (0)30-24 727 804 contracts, and no ing the campaign. The Fax: 0049 (0)30-24 727 800 27 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 international / reviews Guadeloupe Flat Earth News Nick Davies – Vintage Books 2008 – Revolt in the Caribbean 432 pages – £8.99 – ISBN: 978-0099512684 n January 20th a natural path: to kill he cover notes of journalistic milieu – general strike was Guadeloupeans...every time Flat Earth News colonised as it is by com- Odeclared on the there have been demonstra- Toffer a fairly concise mercial and power inter- Caribbean island of tions in Guadeloupe to synopsis of the contents: ests – routinely ingests and Guadeloupe over rising demand pay rises, the reproduces prepackaged living costs, ending in response of the state has An award winning reporter exposes falsehood, distor- disinformation designed to early March and achieving been repression. satisfy its paymasters. an agreed $250 wage rise tion and propaganda in the Matters turned deadly as global media. Echoing similar conclu- for all workers. Forty union activist, Jacques sions to Herman and seven trade unions, associ- Bino, was killed in cross- Chomsky’s Manufacturing ations and political parties For anyone yet to be con- fire between youths on vinced that the “popular” Consent, Flat Earth News is under the umbrella organ- barricades and the police. littered with examples of isation LKP (Committee media is anything other More recently the strike than unbiased, impartial, how a socially constructed against Extreme Exploita- has spread with reports of “reality” is used to achieve tion – Lyiannaj Kont and representative of the riots on the French island truth, this is the book for mass acquiescence with Pwofitasyion in Guadelou- of Martinique, 100 miles war, corruption and other pean Creole French) you. Lifting the lid on the south of Guadeloupe, as murky world of contempo- acts of villainy by the rich brought all economic well as on Réunion, a and powerful. It forms activity to a standstill. rary journalism, insider, French territory in the Nick Davies, another vital, essential and Indian Ocean. reveals an indus- telling reminder Although Guadeloupe is to look beyond officially part of the try dominated by Talks between bosses and PR, lobbying, mis- the façade of French Republic, the tradi- the union initially agreed media distortion tional labour organisa- truths and power- a wage rise but the strike ful interests. in order to seek tions in metropolitan continued in protest out something France isolated and against the spiralling vaguely resem- ignored the struggle and He painstakingly prices on the island which chronicles how the bling the truth. media coverage was rare are much higher than in and superficial. the French mainland. The islands rely almost exclu- The response of the Paris The Dirty Thirty sively on imports sold in David Bell – Five Leaves Press 2009 – government was hostile, French owned supermar- sending in the gendarmes kets. A packet of rice or 108 pages – £7.99 – ISBN: 978-1905512676 and the notoriously brutal pasta, for instance, costs wenty five years on regime hell bent on remov- CRS riot police. Memories 90% more than in the from the epic 1984-5 ing all obstacles in its path are still fresh in Guade- metropole. Petrol too is far Tminers’ strike, David – one being the National loupe of the 100 workers more expensive than in Bell’s The Dirty Thirty pays Union of Mineworkers. As shot dead by the CRS dur- France. Bosses at first homage to the 30 or so a powerful testament to the ing a demonstration in refused to return to the Leicestershire miners who power of mutual aid, the 1967. The leader of the negotiation table, citing an went on strike from a coal- book describes the emerg- LKP, Elie Domota, stated: atmosphere of physical field where the remaining ing support networks dur- Today, given the number of intimidation created by 2,000 failed to do so. ing the dispute. The closing gendarmes who have the LKP, but had to give in section also high- arrived in Guadeloupe after 44 days of solid Illustrated lights “where they armed to the teeth, the action by Guadeloupean with period are now” and con- French state has chosen its workers. photos and firms how the thir- ephemera, ty’s tireless cam- this inspira- paigning came to tional account acquire them hero draws on the status among the experiences of 170,000 strikers all involved, across the country. examining their motivations and offer- This book is a story of how ing insight into their tenac- the courage, humour and ity in the face of adversity. unbreakable spirit of the The Dirty Thirty is a deeply miners, their families and poignant tale of the human the support groups shone impact wreaked by a through against all odds. 28 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 reviews Liberal Fascism The Secret History of the Left from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning Jonah Goldberg – Penguin 2009 – 496 pages – £9.99 – ISBN: 978-0141039503

RECENT PROPOSAL BY lows that American fascism is one can mean different things, but the student body at without need of concentration there was potential for progress ALondon University to camps, but one deeply imbued with from the beginning and it is purely campaign against the BNP American liberal culture and insti- ideological of Goldberg to dismiss was unceremoniously reject- tutions. So, essentially, American it. Among other things, the ending ed by the Tory Party’s youth fascism is a friendly-esque totalitar- of slavery in Europe was a blow wing unless, they stated, the ianism which utilises a plural and delivered by the French Revolution, BNP was identified as a left pragmatic discourse while bullying not to mention the ending of wing party. It would seem on the populace into all manner of monarchic absolutism. The fascist nasty things. From this we should project during the last century was this occasion leftwing fas- gather that Goldberg doesn’t have a movement that sought to defend cism is exclusively the enemy the KKK, the various Aryan outfits, capital and drew elements from a for these young Tories. But the American Nazi Party or any number of strata. Its absorption of there is nothing new about actual nazi group in his sights; no, “socialists” like Mussolini was pos- this muddled thinking or its he’s taking time to smear the liber- sible because of the political bank- intended implications. To al left, not without reason, but he’s ruptcy of the Social Democratic this vein, we can safely say missed the wood for the trees. movements that had been haemor- Liberal Fascism belongs. It is rhaging members and moving fur- an essential crash course in ther and further away from any historical revisionism for meaningful working class radical- the American free market ism. Socialism or barbarism as right. proximity with the truth, it would seem. Luigi Fabbri described the rise of Italian fascism as a “preventive The political insight of these fascist counter-revolution” to the 1920s thugs was one of rabid anti-intel- worker occupations in Italy. For lectualism, not that of a cohort of leftist thinkers as Goldberg would Goldberg, fascism is defined as: have us believe. What’s more, the …a religion of the state. It assumes political model of the German Nazi the organic unity of the body politic Party and the Italian Black Shirts and longs for a national leader was always one of “Bismarckian” attuned to the will of the people. It is reformism – i.e. giving reforms to totalitarian in that it views every- minimise working class militancy – thing as political and holds that any and corporatism – i.e. the incorpo- action by the state is justified to On the surface this sounds ridicu- ration of economic, industrial, achieve the common good. lous, but Goldberg fleshes this out agrarian, social, cultural and/or There is nothing wrong with saying using a myriad of selective sources. professional bodies into the state. statism is about bad politics but He tries to argue that the French something else is clearly going on Revolution and Rousseau were well- The far right have tried to continu- here. (A better definition of fascism springs for both liberalism and the ally undercut the radical left in can be gleaned from the work of emerging fascist movement, that terms of radical sounding reforms Umberto Eco, for those interested.) fascism is a left wing movement, but their interests are firmly wed- We are told that the reason for vari- that progressives were key support- ded to protecting capital. You only ants between different national fas- ers of fascism – syndicalists, à la have to look up some of the mone- cisms is because “fascisms differ Georges Sorel, are also roped into tary handouts the BNP receives to from each other because they grow the smear – and that a number of get your head around this. out of different soil”. Thus begins past US administrations and pres- the clear fudging of what Goldberg ent policies are indeed fascist. It’s telling that, in weaving this his- defines as the makeup of fascism. tory together, Goldberg has little German fascism (Nazism) is a prod- What starts out as political history room to mention the right’s, or uct of the social, political and cul- increasingly looks like a very per- indeed capital’s, involvement in any tural roots of Germany, similarly sonalised diatribe. Take the French of this; but evidently that would be for Spain, Italy etc., and so it fol- Revolution; at different points it another book entirely. 29 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 reviews There’s me and there’s you CD by the Matthew Herbert Big Band – Accidental Records 2008

REALLY LIKE THIS ALBUM; the music has a modern Ibig band sound with heart and the lyrics say something (although what is not necessarily always apparent to this reviewer). Beside the classic big band swing, there are samples, a So I was ready to give a glowing strong hint of the classical review, given the excellent music current political and economic musicals as well as more with its heart and head seemingly structures, too much of a problem modern takes on these – functioning well together. But, as a for a reviewer in DA. there are similarities with review copy, it was unfortunately Barry Adamson (a favourite accompanied by some marketing However, in other places the con- in this house) as well as bumf or press release which really tent is pretty conceited and really some of Björk’s work. stuck in the throat. It explains the does seem from another world. The themes as being about power and idea that the album “redefines the Having listened a few times without its abuses, tackling the Iraq war, role of music in politics and fuels reading the sleeve or the bumf, it is torture, Guantánamo, Palestine, political debate in a way unique to good that the medium used for the AIDS, climate change, the monar- the usual outlets of journalism, message holds its own. If you’re chy and religion (pretty ambitious print or film” would make sense if writing a political essay, it helps if in 12 tracks). Nor is the implication it were true. For a start, popular the writing is good; if you’re pre- that “music” (not musicians, inter- artists frequently invoke politics, senting politics via music it really estingly) is apolitical or, more like- admittedly often in trite and ill helps if the music is good – and this ly, directly explicitly and implicitly judged ways, but not always. Also, I CD manages that with spades. supportive of the rampages of the can think of numerous examples of active and overtly political musi- cians working in the margins as The Common Place – CD, various artists well as a few fairly successful acts who’ve taken overt, progressive pol- – www.thecommonplace.org.uk 2008 itics into the mass market. Did the person who came up with: 23 track benefit for the writing the appeal has been consid- Leeds autonomous, radical ered but the result is not yet out. This album is one of courage and Asocial centre space. This The centre remains open, without conviction. It will directly politicise a genuinely high quality compilation the income that the licence would largely inert audience includes tracks from a similar allow it to have to support its other actually believe it at the time? If so, number of bands who have played activities. Any cash this CD makes how? If I were to play this to my at The Common Place. The centre will go towards supporting the cen- self-proclaimed politically uninter- is run as a DIY non-profit venue for tre. Go to: ested work mates, would the pas- local bands as well as hosting local www.thecommonplace.org.uk sion of the creators flow through community groups for free. Last them? The lyrics do not seem clear for more information on the centre. year the centre lost is performance enough to effect any such clear and alcohol licence. At the time of Damascus-type conversion. The music is largely by artists I’m not familiar with, with the obvious So, this is a great album of music, and obligatory inclusion on a com- and the fact it has an agenda is to pilation such as this of be welcomed. But if you decide to Chumbawamba. There is a range of check it out – and by all means you styles like electro, hip hop, indie, should – if you end up with the punk, dance and folk and numer- press release, just bung it in the ous mishmashes of some or all of recycling and listen unhindered. the above. As with any such broad ranging compilation there are www.accidentalrecords.com bound to be personal favourites. www.myspace.com/matthewherbert 30 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 a closer look Anarchism and

NARCHISTS ARE REPEATEDLY ACCUSED BY their detractors of being idealist, Crime utopian and impractical. One matter, on which the libertarian perspective is often A material conditions which enable seen as particularly weak, is the thorny topic of crime to flourish. As Keynes put it: crime. It would be fair to say that the “all coppers are “Capitalism is the absurd belief bastards”-type polemics trotted out with tiresome reg- that the wickedest of men, for the ularity do little to convince the potential convert that wickedest of motives will somehow revolutionaries have anything of substance to offer as work for the benefit of all”. It is a an alternative to the crime ridden status quo. system where the good guy comes Moreover, this continued failure to adequately last and the scum rises to the top. The have nots are forever goaded to address lay people’s basic questions with satisfactory play catch up with the haves, and answers surely goes a long way in explaining why the haves are forever encouraged to contemporary anarchism has failed to gain a firm accumulate more – and flaunt their foothold in the collective psyche of the population. ill gotten gains with aplomb. Here we offer one contribution towards addressing Capitalism means that for every this perennial shortcoming. winner, there are literally dozens of losers. Lack of opportunity denies many people legitimate access to crime, profit and power spending millions on arms, destroy- prosperity and breeds resentment ing nature, polluting the environ- and crime. Much antisocial behav- Opponents of capitalism and the ment, dominating other nations, iour is the direct result of this state point to the fact that the exist- enslaving the poor and depriving insidious dog-eat-dog mental- >>> ing law making and law enforce- many of access to the basic means ment infrastructure acts primarily of life. Further, in protecting the for the rich and powerful. In effect, profits of big business, govern- the wealthy elite, who live in untold ments regularly commit mass luxury from the proceeds of proper- murder by sending young men ty and labour time stolen from the and women to war, and by bomb- masses, are just thieves on a grand ing, interning and otherwise ter- scale. Their institutionalised theft, rorising innocent civilians. however, is perfectly legal. Take the recent cases of the big 6 energy Capitalism is antisocial. It pro- companies that hauled in record duces both the motivation and profits by introducing unprecedent- ed price hikes that consigned thou- sands to fuel poverty; or the City speculators who made millions by gambling on the misery wreaked by the economic downturn.

Capitalism is organised gangster- ism. Driven by the need to expand and chase profit, transnational cor- porations and governments collabo- rate to pursue their interests by

31 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 a closer look ity, a mindset that is unani- mously encouraged by the ideological apparatus of the ruling class – the media, the education system and the advertising industry.

Research conducted into the psychological profile of prison populations in the UK and the US in the last decade has uncovered stag- geringly high levels of men- tal illness, personality disor- der and/or drug or alcohol addiction. Further studies have conclusively demon- strated a high correlation between poverty and mental illness. Social inequality, alienation, manufactured greed and aggressive indi- vidualism thus lie at the root of much of what we now know as crime and anti- WpN/UPPA/Photoshot social behaviour. Other prevalent crimes are linked violations steadily decline. Crimes leading to a climate of paranoia to sexism, racism and repressive of the powerful, like insider deal- that actively escalates social prob- morality, anachronisms that have ing, tax evasion, embezzlement, lems. They also act as a means of been unscrupulously handed down fraud, labour violations, price fix- injecting political agendas into the from bygone eras, and that contin- ing, money laundering, corporate public domain, and are invariably ue to be stubbornly upheld by many bullying, unsolicited pollution, accompanied by calls for more of society’s key institutions. The bribery and political corruption are aggressive policing and tougher criminal justice system is a prime all part and parcel of capitalism‘s sentencing. One classic example is exemplar of this; it focuses heavily modus operandi. But more often the failed “war on drugs”. Since its on administering punishments than not, they go undetected and initiation by US Senators in 1924, based on primitive justice, rather unpunished. based on decidedly dodgy advice, than employing more therapeutic the relentless pursuit of drug pro- methods which might begin to The right wing press thrives on hibition policies by governments question the very social origins of generating moral panics by greatly worldwide has given rise to the criminal behaviour. exaggerating the threat to society very problems they claim to want to posed by minority groups and solve – a lucrative black market and moral panic working class youth. Moral panics a trail of diseased addicts, com- are self-perpetuating campaigns of pelled to steal to feed their habits. The tendency of the capitalist misinformation (See www.flatearthnews.net – media and state to exclu- reviewed on page 28). sively target working So long as every institution of class deviance is pur- As the prisons overflow, the crimi- posely designed to divert today, economic, political, social, nal “justice” system, based as it is attention away from the and moral conspires to misdirect on largely false premises, naturally transgressions of the human energy into wrong channels; fails…miserably! Acting as a crimi- rich and powerful. The so long as most people are out of nal conveyor belt, it efficiently government spends thou- churns out a steady stream of hard- sands on combating bene- place doing things they hate to do, ened serial offenders. fit fraud, yet virtually living a life they loathe to live, crime ignores tax evasion will be inevitable, and all the laws policing which, in financial terms, and statutes can only increase, but costs vastly more. As Many working class communities workplace related deaths never do away with crime. have little faith in the police, a force continue to rise, prosecu- Emma Goldman that appears powerless (and apa- tions for health and safety thetic) in the face of rising crime 32 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 a closer look and anti-social activity. in the 1970s, may represent Nevertheless, most of what we Institutions like the only the tip of the ice- know as “crime” is definitively police force rely heavi- berg. linked to social conditions. What ly on obedience, evidence do we have for this? Well, orthodoxy and To an extent, it crime levels vary massively from discipline. may be argued place to place, from country to They engen- the police offi- country. Generally, where there’s der roles cers are also tolerance, minimal economic that erode victims of inequality and a strong sense of individual class society. community, crime is virtually non- freedom They are existent. Thus, if we reconstruct and humani- required to society in such a way as to rectify ty. This is work long today’s iniquitous social conditions because when hours, and are and to foster a new social order of the going gets tough, brutalised by their participation, mutual aid, liberty, the ruling elite needs constant exposure to equality and justice, then crime them to do as they’re traumatic events and the will largely disappear. told, knuckle down unpleasant symptoms of a and keep the rest of us in line. terminally dysfunctional libertarian justice When striking workers and popular society. Some anarchists, in venting protest threaten, the strong arm of their spleen at the police, tend to So how, you might ask, would an the state – the army and police – convey a rather rose tinted view of anarchist society deal with crime preserves ruling class hegemony at criminals as if most are just frus- and antisocial behaviour? all costs. “I’m only doing my job”, trated Robin Hoods, misguidedly they say, but if they didn’t exist, the seeking to redress society’s injus- The first consideration here is that giant disparities of wealth and tices. This view bears little resem- even in a society that has resolved other obtrusive social injustices we blance to reality. Burglary and mug- the contradictions of class and the see all around us today would sim- ging rates are far higher in poor anomalies of moral repressiveness, ply not be tolerated. areas than in better off ones, and a small amount of crime would still the actions of some criminals, who occur. This may be caused by One recurrent symptom of power is knowingly target the old, the infirm endogenous pathological disorders abuse. Some months ago, CCTV or the weak, make even the most or there may be crimes of passion footage of 4 policemen apprehend- hard nosed capitalist look positive- that, although relatively uncom- ing a suspect was shown on TV. It ly human. Portraying rapists, mur- mon, would still persist. Further, it emerged that the suspect was actu- derers and child abusers as victims, must be recognised that humans, ally an innocent bystander who as some sections of the left do, is even under the most congenial happened to be in the vicinity at also, frankly, ridiculous. social conditions, are imperfect and the time a disturbance had subject to occasional erring. been reported. During the Personal freedom must always be incident, the officers wres- balanced against the freedom of tled the man to the floor, others and sometimes mistakes, kicked and punched him wilful or otherwise, will be made. and smashed his head into So yes, even in a socialist utopia, the ground. He was later some degree of policing will be charged with assaulting appropriate. Further, there may be them. Although this was social problems other than crime portrayed as an isolated that may call upon specialist polic- incident, such occurrences ing skills, such as unresolved per- will come as little surprise sonal disputes, vehicle collisions or to many who have been on floods and other natural disasters. the wrong end of a force However, the policing role would that is largely a law unto not be exclusive to a single profes- itself. The inquest into the sion but would be carried out only police murder of Charles as part of a balanced job complex. de Menezes was com- pounded by a litany of lies The idea that a libertarian society by the guilty officers. This, would be a complete free for all along with other famous with no formalised legal, ethical or miscarriages of justice, moral framework is also unrealis- such as that perpetrated tic. All anthropological studies of against the Birmingham 6 functioning “anarchic >>> 33 Direct Action www.direct-action.org.uk Spring 2009 a closer look polities” reveal established justice example, in no circumstances in petty and fraudu- systems of “laws” and sanctions. In would a situation arise of an lent civil claims. the future, these frameworks would alleged wrong doer being “roughed “No win, no fee” not be manipulated and imposed by up” behind closed doors. legal firms – or an unaccountable elite to serve “ambulance their own narrow interests, but A libertarian justice system would chasers” – have a would be formulated and agreed do all in its power to offer represen- vested interest in upon by collective discussion, nego- tation and advocacy to alleged encouraging this. A tiation and decision making in the transgressors at all stages, and in sane society would dis- best interests of the community as case of conviction, to ensure any pense with such trivia. a whole. For instance, it may well sanctions imposed are collectively be decided that victimless “crimes” agreed, proportional and humane. Digressing slightly, a would not be punished and infor- Incarceration of any case from some years mal sanctions would be adequate in kind would not be con- ago may explain how the case of most petty, minor and sidered, except an anarchist society isolated offences.

A limited system of com- munity courts, advocacy and legal representation will also be needed. Just as policing requires skills in forensics, questioning and evidence gathering, court adjudicators and advocates would need some expertise in implementing legal frameworks to ensure equi- would deal with a problem like a ty and consistency. These functions as a very last resort in the case of a car accident. In some particularly would all be discharged in a way pathological psychopath/murderer, poor weather conditions, a car driv- that strictly limits any temporary for example. Imprisonment is en by a visitor to remotest York- powers afforded to (instantly revo- opposed both on practical grounds shire skidded off the road, over- cable) individuals, and to empower (it does not work) and because it is turning and concussing the driver. the wider community, rather than morally repugnant. In many cases, The local community, on hearing of professional bodies or institutions. therapeutic rehabilitation will be this minor calamity, responded by All those tasked with roles in pre- deemed appropriate in the best quickly attending the scene. Acting serving a desirable social justice interests both of the individual in unison, and with minimum fuss, system would be closely monitored, concerned and of wider society. they called an ambulance, alerted fully accountable and subject to the driver’s relatives and arranged rotation. All procedures employed Anarchism emphasises individual repair and storage of the damaged must be completely open and trans- responsibility. If we are all involved vehicle until the owner had recu- parent. For in making “laws” perated. All this was done with no then we’ll all feel police involvement and little or no Like aboriginal justice, anarchists contend duty bound to cost to the driver; other than a uphold them. resounding message of thanks and that offenders should not be punished, Individuals will an expectation that the favour but justice achieved by the teaching and be encouraged to would be reciprocated in the event healing of all involved. Public condemna- be fully account- that the roles be reversed. tion of the wrong doing would be a key able for their own actions and When a child goes missing, commu- aspect of this process, but the wrong doer be expected to nities rally round to help with the would remain part of the community and act sociably, search. When a ship is in danger, so see the effects of their actions on oth- demonstrating volunteers staff the lifeboats. This ers in terms of the grief and pain caused. mutual respect represents anarchism in action. for others. The Problems and difficulties we face It would be likely that the wrong doers litigious culture are best solved when we all pull would be expected to try to make amends of today allows together, reinforcing our common for their act by community service or by excessive humanity and shared commitment helping victims and their families. amounts of to mutual aid, cooperation and time, energy community spirit. In the society of Anarchistfaqs, section 1.5.8 and resources tomorrow, these will be our greatest to be invested weapons against crime. 34 Direct Action www.solfed.org.uk Spring 2009 contacts

SolFed-IWA contacts

National contact point: PO Box 29, South West DO, International Workers’ Association: IWA-AIT Secretariat, Manchester, M15 5HW; 07 984 675 281; Poštanski Pretinac 6, 11077 Beograd, Serbia; +38 (0)1 63 [email protected]; www.solfed.org.uk. 26 37 75; [email protected]; www.iwa-ait.org.

|locals Michael Avenue, Northampton, NN1 4JQ; northamptonsf@ solfed.org.uk. Brighton: c/o SF National contact point; North & East London: PO Box 1681, London, N8 7LE; [email protected]. [email protected]. Edinburgh: c/o 17 West Montgomery Place, Edinburgh, Preston: PO Box 469, Preston, PR1 8XF; 07 707 256 682; EH7 5HA; 07 896 621 313; [email protected]. [email protected]. Liverpool: c/o News From Nowhere, 96 Bold Street, South London: PO Box 17773, London, SE8 4WX; Liverpool, L1 4HY; [email protected]. 07 956 446 162; [email protected]; Manchester: PO Box 29, South West DO, Manchester, M15 southlondonsf.org.uk. 5HW; 07 984 675 281; [email protected]; South West: c/o SF National contact point; mail list: [email protected]. [email protected]. Northampton: c/o The Blackcurrent Centre, 24 St West Yorkshire: PO Box 75, Hebden Bridge, HX7 8WB; [email protected]. |other local contacts Milton Keynes: c/o Northampton SolFed Bolton: c/o Manchester SolFed Scarborough: c/o West Yorkshire SolFed Coventry & West Midlands: c/o Northampton SolFed Sheffield: c/o West Yorkshire SolFed Ipswich: c/o N&E London SolFed South Hertfordshire: PO Box 493, St Albans, AL1 5TW |other contacts & information ‘A History of Anarcho-Syndicalism’: 24 pamphlets Catalyst (freesheet): c/o South London SolFed; downloadable free from www.selfed.org.uk. [email protected]. SolFed Industrial Strategy / The Stuff Your Boss Does Education Workers’ Network: c/o News From Nowhere, Not Want You To Know: leaflets available online at 96 Bold Street, Liverpool, L1 4HY; [email protected]; www.solfed.org.uk; bundles from the SolFed national con- www.ewn.org.uk; email list: [email protected]. tact point for free/donation. Health & Care Workers Initiative: c/o Northampton Manchester SolFed Public Meetings: 7.30pm every 2nd SolFed. Tuesday of the month, Town Hall Tavern, Tib Lane, off Kowtowtonone: freesheet from West Yorkshire SolFed. Cross Street, Manchester. Western Approaches: freesheet from South West SolFed. May 12th / June 9th / July 14th - topics to be arranged SelfEd: c/o Preston SolFed; [email protected]; for further info: 07 984 675 281; www.selfed.org.uk. [email protected].

|friends & neighbours London Coalition Against Poverty: 07 932 241 737; [email protected]; 56a Infoshop: Bookshop, records, library, archive, [email protected]. social/meeting space; 56a Crampton St, London, SE17 National Shop Stewards Network: 3AE; open Thur 2-8, Fri 3-7, Sat 2-6. http://www.shopstewards.net/. AK Press: Anarchist publisher/distributor; PO Box 12766, Organise!: Working Class Resistance freesheet/info; PO Edinburgh, EH8 9YE; 0131 555 265; Box 505, Belfast, BT12 6BQ. [email protected]; www.akuk.com. Radical Healthcare Workers: Freedom: Anarchist fortnightly; 84b Whitechapel High St, http://radicalhealthcareworkers.wordpress.com/. London, E1 7QX; www.freedompress.org.uk. Resistance: Anarchist Federation freesheet; c/o 84b Kate Sharpley Library: full catalogue - BM Hurricane, Whitechapel High St, London, E1 7QX; www.afed.org.uk. London, WC1N 3XX; www.katesharpleylibrary.net. ToxCat: Exposing polluters, pollution and cover-ups; £2 www.libcom.org: online news and resources from PO Box 29, Ellesmere Port, CH66 3TX.

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