ALB
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Couldn't find the reference in the article to "free access". Pity because that's what he did stand for. I notice that it also fails to mention Kropotkin's support for the First World Slaughter. And I thought the IWW was more influenced by anarcho-syndicalism rather than anarcho-communism (which, in the anarchist tradition, have seen themselves as rivals). Enough pedanticism as he was basically a good guy who influenced William Morris and demolished the idea of "labour-time vouchers" (in, in fact, chapter 13 of The Conquest of Bread).Review of a book about his Mutual Aid and TH Huxley here:http://www.worldsocialism.org/spgb/socialist-standard/2010s/2011/no-1279-march-2011/book-reviews-crude-world-mutual-aid-introduction-an
The KKE is urging abstention in the referendum or rather voting neither yes nor no but saying workers should put their proposals in the ballot box:http://inter.kke.gr/en/articles/The-referendum-on-the-5th-of-July-and-the-stance-of-the-KKE/
Quote:The people, through their activity and their choice in the referendum, must respond to the deception of the false question posed by the government and reject the proposal of the EU-IMF-ECB and also the proposal of the SYRIZA-ANEL government. Both contain barbaric anti-people measures, which will be added to the memoranda and application laws of the previous ND-PASOK governments. Both serve the interests of capital and capitalist profits.The KKE stresses that the people must not choose between Scylla and Charybdis, but must express, with all means available and in every way, their opposition to the EU and its permanent memoranda in the referendum. They must “cancel out” this dilemma by casting the proposal of the KKE as their vote into the ballot box.This could affect the outcome as the KKE got 5.5% of the votes, and 15 seats, in the general election earlier this year.
I agree it's basically a good leaflet but it will need a bit of editing. For instance, the first paragraph opens:
Quote:The problem is not Austerity … it's POVERTY.but then goes on to talk about "Soup Kitchens" and "Food Banks" but these are signs of destitution rather than what we usually mean by the word "poverty", non-ownership, i.e exclusion from ownership, of the means of production. Leaving it as it is would give the impression that we want to do something only for "the poor". In any event, most workers do not have to resort to food banks and don't regard themselves as poor in that sense (and in fact aren't).There are various ways this could be edited, eg. The Problem is not Austerity … it's That We Have to Work for Wages ( a bit unwieldy) or The Problem is not Austerity … it's the Wages System" (shorter, but less immediately understable by non-socialists). Since the leaflet uses "it's Wage-Slavety" later, perhaps it should be The Prolem is Not Austerity … it's Employment. And then go on to say something like:
Quote:As long as we work for wages what we get to meet our needs is rationed while the rich get richer. We can't hope to end this and inequality , etcalanjjohnstone wrote:There was the Iceland optionAlmost forgot about that. There's a sort of precedent in that they held a referendum that rejected an international debt deal. The economy seems to be doing ok now, i.e growing, but I don't think they avoided austerity, did they?
alanjjohnstone wrote:SNP's Nicola Sturgeon on Greece.She's got another admirer. Today the Times interviewed Pablo Iglesias, the leader of Podemos in Spain which is organising rallies in support of the Greek government.:
Quote:During the interview with The Times in Catalonia, Mr Iglesias expressed his support for Sinn Fein and the Scottish National party. "For me the fundamental element has to do with the defense of social rights, as with Sinn Fein, defending the rights of the working class," he said. "I admire the story of the Labour Party and the unions in Britain but I am not optimistic. What happened in the last British elections was not the victory of the Tories but the failure of Labour."If Scotland has been an independent country in 2008 she would have had a chance to put her money where her mouth is. An independent Scottish government would have been unable to bail out the two big failed banks in Scotland (RBS and HBOS) and would, like Ireland, have had to rely on loans from the EU to do this. Which would have come with strings attached. She could have organised a referendum to reject them ….
We know that most of the money the Greek government owes is owed to German and other European banks, but is what that Guardian economics correspondent, Philip Inman, says below correct? It sounds odd:
Guardian wrote:Unlike most of Europe, which ran up large budget deficits to protect pensioners and welfare recipients,Is that what really happened in Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain, even in Germany and France or Britain. That's not my recollection. I wonder what his source is.
Given him his due. He's more honest than Scargill. Like Scargill he's probably leading his followers to a magnificant defeat but unlike Scargill who voted no to going back knowing that a majority of the NUM NEC would vote yes he's showing that his call for a no vote is not just a pose.Interesting passage in an article in today's Times by their (Tory) leader writer Oliver Kamm:
Quote:So, if you discount the fantasy of a revolutionary uprising that will sweep away the capitalist order and establish a socialist utopia, this is what you're left with. Greece's banking sector will collapse and its economy will need to generate surpluses year after year while in deep recession. And the euro would probably still be the national currency.I didn't know this before but apparently a country can use the euro as its currency without being a member of the eurozone or even of the EU: two other European countries, Montenegro and Kosovo, do. Neither has their own currency.To answer my own question, since a Socialist can't vote YES and a NO vote would make no difference, in fact would probably make things worse, then what Socialists should be doing in the referendum is writing on their ballot paper something like "I want a revolutionary uprising that will sweep away the capitalist order and establish a socialist utopia" (ok, not quite as "democratic revolution" would be better than "revolutionary uprising").In any event, what is happening in Greece will provide some relevant lessons as to whether or not it is possible to say "No to Austerity" under capitalism and the consequences if you try to (a lesson which the left here won't learn of course). Quite literally, the choice is Socialism or Austerity?
I don't see the point of this cartoon or, rather, I do and it's wrong as it's suggesting that there is an alternative to austerity under capitalism in a slump whereas there isn't as events in Greece are about to confirm. TINA is wrong as there is an alternative in socialism but TINAUC is true — there is no alternative under capitalism.
It looks as if Syriza has chosen to go down fighting. Good on them in a sense I suppose but they won't win. Whatever happens the outcome is going to be continued austerity. I doubt if they will survive long as the government either. To get their referendum proposal through they had to rely on the Greek equivalents of UKIP and the BNP. Ominous as to which way the Greek people, who are not socialist but nationalist minded, might jump?The other thing is that the currency cranks who claim that banks don't have to rely on deposits and loans from other banks to function are not saying anything. If they were right the Greek banks wouldn't need to worry — they could just use their supposed power to "create money out of thin air". Another nail in the cranks' coffin.
According to this, the question will be:
Quote:According to the cabinet proposal, voters will be asked to respond to the following question:“Greek people are hereby asked to decide whether they accept a draft agreement document submitted by the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, at the Eurogroup meeting held on June 25.”Those citizens who reject the institutions’ proposal will vote, “Not Approved / NO”, while those citizens who accept the institutions’ proposal will vote, “Approved / YES”, according to the cabinet proposal.It seems that, according to another report, I guessed wrong about the attitude of the KKE.
Quote:Greek lawmakers on Sunday authorised prime minister Alexis Tsipras’ proposed 5 July bailout referendum, setting Greece on course for a plebiscite that has enraged international creditors and increased Greece’s chances of exiting the eurozone.The government easily passed the 151-vote threshold needed to authorise the referendum, with deputies from the far-right Golden Dawn voting with the government and pro-European opposition parties New Democracy, Pasok and To Potami and the KKE Communist party voting against.Apparently they want a YES/NO referendum on whether to withdraw from the EU instead. Here's a typical anti-Syriza article from their website. It's what we used to say about the Labour Party ("used to say" because it's not even that now).
alanjjohnstone wrote:An article that is so pro-Syriza, you'd think it was the Morning Star.Actually the Morning Star has not been particulary pro-Syriza. In fact it supports more the position of the Greek Communist Party (KKE) which is hostile to the Syriza government and wants Greece to withdraw not only from the euro but, like the CPB here, also from the whole EU. Here's a typical example from last week:http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-a04d-Greece-Athens-backs-harsh-steps-to-win-bailout#.VY7hpVKebTQI imagine, though, that the KKE will support a No vote in the referendum. And us if we were there or socialists who are?
SocialistPunk wrote:Never mind "this could have a reformist….interpretation", I read it and instantly saw old school Labour Party oozing from it.I agree with your conclusion about what the order of priorities of a socialist party should be, but this passage is far too flattering to Old Labour. I don't think they ever came anywhere near advocating what Haywood and Bohn did. I would say rather that their views expressed those of Old Leftwing Social-Democracy (from which, incidentally, our Party emerged) which still justified a socialist party having a "minimum" programme of reforms under capitalism as well as a "maximum" programme of socialism which eventually disappeared more and more into the background, turning the party into a completely reformist one.
Got to be honest. Continuing my researches I've found a reference to the brown dog affair in a non-anti-vivisection source. There's a mention in the autobiography of the pioneer British Trotskyist Harry Wicks Keeping My Head who was born and bread in Battersea:
Quote:Most of the Labour women I've mentioned had been involved in or near struggles over vivisection and vaccination. In their image, these two often blurred. Before the First World War, Battersea Council had become famous for erecting a statue of a little brown dog which had been vivisected at a London hospital. A mob of medical students had come down and destroyed it. Battersea became the site of the Anti-Vivisection Hospital (which guaranteed to dissect no live animals). Those Labour women were important among the friends of that hospital. My mother was at least aware of all this. By chance, though, my direct experience of the Anti-Vivi was to be confined to paying two shillings in 1932 for having as many teeth extracted as could be while the gas lasted!Battersea had also seen terrific opposition to compulsory vaccination. In or near the labour movement, it was a regular thing to refuse to have your children vaccinated. Certainly, when my sister was born in 1915, my mother, who was not the meeting-going type (she had left that to my father), decided to pay a solicitor the seven shillings and six pence he demanded for getting an exemption form signed. I remember how distraught she was over how to get the money together, what with my father in the army. But pay she did. After 1919, of course, when the Labour Party became able to nominate some JPs, a signature on the certificate became a costfree formality. Not that Battersea was in the least unusual in this, in the late 1920s, I knew a man from Aberdare in South Wales, a miner, who dumbfounded our hosts by refusing vaccination. This was at the International Lenin School, I'm racing ahead again.I'd have been dumbfounded too. Why would members of the Labour Movement be opposed to vaccination? Just because it was compulsory?Incidentally, I think Wicks got some of the facts wrong. I don't think it was the Council that erected the statue nor did the medical students actually destroy it (in the end I think it was taken down by the Council)?
Belated publication of contributions by the candidates in Oxford West & Abingdon in Oxfordshire Voice, quarterly publication of the Oxfordfordshire Council for the Preservation of Rural England here:http://www.cpreoxon.org.uk/resources/item/2453-voice-spring-2015?highlight=WyJ2b2ljZSJd Mike's contribution is on page 9.
