ALB
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alanjjohnstone wrote:The rule doesn't cover additional titles on the facia by saying these are forbidden so "SPGB" can be added and used, IMHO
That would be undemocratic and go against the whole spirit of the 1988 resolution one of whose aims was to try to introduce some comsistency into what we call ourselves. To promote one instead of randomly using three (The Socialist Party of Great Britain, SPGB, The Socialist Party). To use two different versions on the front of our office would be silly anyway and, don't forget, that SPGB is the preferred name of our opponents as a way of avoiding calling us "The Socialist Party" which we are in this country.In a subsequent Party Poll in 1991 that
Quote:members and branches be required to abide strictly by the terms of the 1988 Conference resolutionwas carried and that
Quote:members and branches revert to the previous practice of using the full or shortened version of the Party's name at their own discretion.was rejected. For defying it in this sort of way most of the members of two branches were expelled by another Party Poll. So, beware of re-igniting the Party name controversy. After all, we are only talking about our image in one street in south London. Nobody in most of London, let alone rest of the country, is affected. It's not that important and not worth falling out over. Let sleeping dogs lie.
Whatever their merits these new designs are out of order as they contravene a 1988 Conference Resolution on the matter:
Quote:This Conference resolves that the Party's full name 'The Socialist Party of Great Britain', be used in the following cases:(a) Legal documents, Forms A to G, membership cards.(b) The World Socialist Movement listing box, The World Socialist Movement publications box, the 'Address of the Party box on the inside page of the Socialist Standard giving details of EC Meetings, etc.'The Socialist Party' to be used in the following cases:(1) On the covers of the Socialist Standard, pamphlets and leaflets.(2) Generally in the texts of articles and pamphlets.(3) On all occasions where the address of Head Office is given, e.g. headed notepaper, adverts for socialist material, etc., except in (b) above.(4) All advertising and publicity material, posters, media adverts, etc.(5) In the titles of meetings and debates, and as the organiser of them.(6) Generally by speakers at indoor and outdoor meetings.(7) Manifestoes, election addresses, etc.(
On the Head Office shop front fascia.It is why the present fascia says "THE SOCIALIST PARTY" and has done since then.
ALB wrote:If I was a LU member I know who I'd expel first and which group to proscribe first: Jack Conrad and the "CPGB". His brazen declaration that he won't accept the constitution's requirement that faction meetings have to be open to all LU members can be found 6minutes 50 seconds into the video clip Handala links to.It appears that they are going to appear to conform to the ban on factional meetings not open to all LU members, according to a recent circular:
Quote:Comrades will be aware that we judged the founding conference of Left Unity as a partial success in that some anti-democratic proposals were pushed back and as a consequence – we wrote with tongue in cheek – LU was now a “safe space for left ideas”. (See our critique of the ludicrous ‘safe spaces’ proposals of a group of LU comrades from last September). The LU policy conference is happening this spring and the CPGB is looking to step up its work with other comrades in the Communist Platform to make an impact on the debates.We plan to organise the first meeting of the platform either in late January or early February (see above for Xmas disruption moans …). We are proposing to comrades that this meeting:1. Is advertised openly – including on the LU site – but it is made clear that participation is on the basis of acceptance of the text of the initial Communist Platform that went to the founding conference. We don’t want to be diverted on the day by silly arguments with people who have turned up precisely because they don’t agree with our general approach. (This may actually run counter to some of the policy agreed at the founding conference – so be it, frankly).2. Takes amendments to the existing platform – or comprehensive alternatives – from platform comrades.3. Elects a five person provisional steering committee at the meeting – comrades should be able to suggest people before or on the day, we think.Advertising their faction meeting must be a new experience for them which their infiltrators into the Labour Party, SWP, SPEW, etc don't have to go through.
I texted John to let him know about this and he says he'll resume letter-writing when his present problems are over. This confirms the impact of letters to the press in the North East. For instance:http://www.sunderlandecho.com/opinion/columnists/tuesday-january-9-2007-1-1128859http://www.shieldsgazette.com/opinion/your-letters/what-s-the-difference-1-1255064http://www.shieldsgazette.com/opinion/your-letters/rottenness-of-capitalism-1-1298259
Never heard of him either but from the voting record you give I guessed he was a member of the Pope's Brass Band.
Yes, there is a whole school of leftwing economic writers who argue that it is possible to explain how capitalism works without having recourse to the concept of "value". This is because they see "value" as "socially necessary labour time" and nothing more and so don't see it as a social relationship. (Others make the same mistake and end up arguing that value will continue to exist in socialism).But the social relationship that value represents is capitalism. Capitalist production is value-production, commodity production (the same thing), i.e the production of use-values for sale on a market by separate producers whose production is regulated by the market.I don't think this is a difficult concept to understand. Where you have private ownership (= ownership by sections of society, whether individuals, corporations, states or co-operatives) of means of production then what links these "private" producers is the market and articles are produced as commodities, as value.Where you have the common ownership by society as a whole of the means of production then there is production directly for use and distribution. There is no commodity-production, no value-production, no value, no money.Why is this so difficult a concept to grasp? Maybe it's the unusual language (value, commodity) but surely everybody can immediately understand the idea of a society without money (even if they don't think it could work)? I know that talking of "the abolition of money" gets us stick as "utopian", so some others prefer to talk of "the abolition of value" (which means the same) but at the risk of not being understood.Here's a group of activists making heavy weather of this simple idea:http://rosswolfe.wordpress.com/2013/04/15/marx-and-wertkritik/
Quote:Heinrich Scrotwengler von GrossteschattenburgThis guy can't be real. Even his pseudonym doesn't conform to German spelling conventions. Sounds like the name of a Troll. Don't they come from near that part of the world?I agree of course that since's he's mentioned socialism, marxism, etc this gives us an opening to give our views on these.
You've forgotten the Euroelections and the London borough elections in May. And there's also the Scottish referendum in September.
There are two ISN's. The Independent Socialist Network (Potts) and the International Socialist Network (ex-SWPers). I think the libcom thread is about the second lot.
I haven't followed David Harvey's apparently very popular lectures on Marx's Capital but I have read a couple of his books and some of his articles. In one of them (an introduction to a new edition of the Communist Manifesto, I think) he suggests that at one time Russia wasn't capitalist (even if it wasn't socialist either).I can't see how anybody who denies that post-1917 Russia has always been capitalist can claim to understand Marx's concept of "value" since the production and exchange of commodities never ceased to exist in Russia.Marx saw "value" as emerging wherever there were separate(d) producers producing for the market. Under these conditions products assumed the form of commodites having a "value" which was a reflection of them being produced by separate producers who exchanged them with each other. So "value" is an expression of this particular social relation between producersI'm not sure why Harvey thought that at one time Russia's wasn't capitalist. Either because he thinkst that "value" didn't exist there or because he thinks that "value" could exist in a non-capitalist context. Both of which are mistaken and would show that he hadn't understood Marx's concept of "value".
He's done it again. Playing to the gallery, that is. This time over the First World Slaughter in an article in yesterday's Daily Telegraph headed "Germany started the Great War, but the Left can't bear to say so". In it he supports Education Secretary Gove's view that it is "unpatriotic" not to take this position and criticises Labour MP and historian Tristram Hunt for taking a more nuanced view. However, he scores an own goal when he writes:
Quote:The driving force behind the carnage was the desire of the German regime to express Germany’s destiny as a great European power, and to acquire the prestige and international clout that went with having an empire.Yes, but German capitalism had to appear as the aggressor because the world was already carved up and dominated by British and French capitalism with their empires and the "clout" this gave them and so could not expand without coming up against them. Being in this position, Britain and France were satisfied with the status quo and so could cast Germany as the aggressor. So Boris is here in effect conceding that the "Great War" was an inter-imperialist conflict or rather a conflict between a would-be imperialist power and two established ones. Nothing justifying the shredding of single drop of working class blood.In other words, Capitalism caused the Great War but the Jingoists can't bear to say so.
alanjjohnstone wrote:But it is nice that the Greens refer to some history recalling th 1906 election.Yes, but typically inaccurately. Nearly all the 29 Labour MPs elected in the 1906 General Election were elected as a result of an electoral deal with the Liberals, not in opposition to them as Sinclair suggests.At that time some constituencies elected 2 MPs. The deal was that, in some seats, there would be one Liberal and one Labour candidate whose supporters would cast their second vote for the other party. The Labour MPs, elected with Liberal support, then formed themselves into the Parliamentary "Labour Party" and generally supported the Liberal government. To get any more representation in parliament the Greens would have to do a deal with Labour or the LibDems (as they probably already have done at local level).Interesting article, but I think many "leftwingers" have already been voting Green in elections. At least that's what we discovered in the London Assembly and local council elections we've contested. For instance, prominent SWPer Paul Holborrow admitted voting Green (rather than Socialist) in Lambeth & Southwark in the 2012 GLA election (but would we have wanted his vote anyway?). The person who chaired a TUSC election meeting in Merton & Wandsworth where we also had a candidate told us he was doing the same.I hadn't realised that Russel Brand had modified the rigid anti-vote stance he took in the interview with Paxman:
Quote:Writing in the Guardian, Russell Brand urged people not to vote: "The only reason to vote is if the vote represents power or change. I don't think it does." However, he ended the article arguing "I believe in change… A system that serves the planet and the people. I'd vote for that."[emphasis added]Not that the Green Party stands for that. They stand for an impossible small-scale capitalism.
Surely you were not expecting Robert Peston to explain value within capitalism, were you?Anyway, as value is an expression of a social relationship (between people organised in separate units producing goods and services for sale) once this social relationship is ended (through the establishment of the common ownership and democratic control of the means of production by society as a whole) value disappears. Simple. Anybody can understand that, can't they?
edmundpotts wrote:Hello all,I'm a member of the steering committee of the Socialist Platform within Left Unity. I noticed the letters written into the CPGB's Weekly Worker by Adam Buick and Alan Johnstone, which seem to express interest in a discussion about similarities between our projects. I'd be more than happy for either Adam or Alan [or any other SPGB member] to email me as the point of contact for such discussions. My address is edmundpotts gmail comFor the record, here's Edmund Potts observations on the founding conference of "Left Unity" and how he sees the future of those who initiated the "Socialist Platform".http://www.independentsocialistnetwork.org/?p=2644
Is this the sort of thing people here have in mind:http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/aug/31/ask-grown-up-pocket-moneyOr they could get together to establish free access and so the need for money and bringing about the end of value (real revolutionary socialism).
