Socialist Appeal

Theory

Socialist Appeal number 180 now out

By Socialist Appeal

Tuesday, 01 December 2009

Socialist Appeal issue number 180 (December 2009) is now out and ready to order.

Click here to order your copy or click on the heading to read more.

Bye, Bye, Dubai?

By Mick Brooks
Tuesday, 01 December 2009
The world of international finance has been shaken by the default in Dubai. Shares have taken a tumble all over the world. Commentators have suggested that this could be the cause of the recession moving into a double dip, of a further downturn in the world economy. Mick Brooks looks at the unfolding crisis in the, until last week, 'money no object' world of Dubai.

Monopoly Capitalism

By Will Roche
Monday, 30 November 2009
There has been no levelling off of the global economy, as economists predicted. Although industrialisation has expanded to lesser-developed countries, it has generally been along lines determined by global corporations based in advanced capitalist countries. From colonialism, we have moved into the age of multinational corporate domination. Will Roche looks at the rise of monopoly capitalism.

Capitalism, Carbon Trading and Copenhagen

By Adam Booth
Sunday, 29 November 2009
From 7^th to 18^th December 2009, delegates from 192 countries will be gathering in Copenhagen, Denmark, in order to create a new, “legally-binding”, global treaty on climate change. The UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen (known as COP15) marks the culmination of two-years of negotiation to try and generate a replacement for the Kyoto protocol, which is due to expire in 2012.

Editorial:British Economy - why is it last out of recession?

By Socialist Appeal
Sunday, 29 November 2009
Stock exchanges and commodity prices are on their way up. The world economy is showing faltering signs of recovery. There’s no doubt that it’ll be a long haul. Millions of people all over the world have had their lives devastated by the economic tsunami. It will take years to clean up all the mess. But one major national economy after another has announced that the recession is officially over – France, Germany, Japan and even the USA. All except Britain. Why is British capitalism still stubbornly stuck in the mire?

Ireland’s public sector strike day: Crocodile tears won’t stem the tide

By Séamus Loughlin

Friday, 27 November 2009

Well over 250,000 Irish workers in the public sector were on strike on the 24th of this month. There would have been many more, but the unions guaranteed emergency cover including flood relief in the west, the midlands and the Shannon area and in Cork City. It’s a feature of every major strike, not just here, but throughout the world, that the well fed representatives of the bourgeois and particularly the mean spirited and greedy petty bourgeois attempt to criticise and attack the worker's movement. These fine gentlemen and ladies are always the first to reach for the box of tissues as they weep crocodile tears about the poor and the vulnerable who they claim (wringing their hands in woe) are being let down by the strikers. The fact that the government have been slashing and burning public services for the last year and attacking the vulnerable seems conveniently to have been forgotten.

Order your Xmas books now!

By Steve Jones (www.wellred.marxist.com)
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
As we approach the festive season, now is the time to order your Xmas reading material. Don't be stuck having to watch 'The Sound Of Music' or 'The Great Escape' yet again when you can be arming yourself with the ideas of socialism! We have lots of new (and not so new) items in stock....

First Extraordinary Congress of the PSUV - Chavez calls for the Fifth International

By Alan Woods
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
At the opening session of the PSUV congress Chavez made a very radical left-wing speech, calling for the setting up of a new international, explaining that it was necessary to destroy the bourgeois state and replace it with a revolutionary state, but also referring to the bureaucracy within the Bolivarian movement itself. It was clearly a speech that reflects the enormous pressure from the masses below who are getting tired of talk about socialism, while real progress towards genuine change appears to be frustratingly slow. Alan Woods reports on the start of the PSUV congress in Venezuela.

‘Transitional Communities’ - a dead end for the environment

By Andy Fenwick
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
At a recent meeting of a local Labour Party Branch in Worcester, a slick high tech presentation was given by a group called Transition Worcester, who said they had the answer to the environmental crisis. It is to turn the clock back 200 years to a mythical age where all trade was local and people enjoyed the benefit of locally grown meat, fruit & veg. Within this presentation were ideas such as we should no longer trade with developing countries and we should therefore export our unemployment to the third world.

Refuse workers win partial victory

By Luke Wilson
Wednesday, 25 November 2009
Striking refuse workers in Leeds have voted to return to work after nearly three months on the picket line. The all-out industrial action, which ran from September 7^th to November 25^th, was in response to savage pay-cuts that would have slashed individual wages by thousands of pounds per year. Workers attending a mass meeting at the suitably flamboyant Jongleurs Comedy Club voted by nearly four to one to return to work, endorsing a deal which benefitted many workers but raised concerns for some.

2009 Xmas Fighting Fund Appeal

By Steve Jones
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
2009 has been a momentous year for Socialist Appeal. The move from a magazine to a full colour tabloid format was without a doubt the biggest step we have taken since we started publishing in 1992. Through the years we have made a number of advances but this was the one which carried the most risks since it was dependant on us firstly raising the funds to go ahead and then increasing the sales to make it worthwhile and cost effective. The prize was being able to reach more people with a higher quality paper that still had the highest quality content within it. But we need your support...

UAL Marxists: Education Cuts - the socialist alternative

By UAL Marxist Society
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
The situation at the University of Arts London is part of the bigger picture of course cuts, redundancies and deficits across the whole of the public sector in Britain. Why should students and staff pay for the economic crisis with their jobs and education? UAL Marxists have organised a meeting for Tuesday 24th (6pm at the student hub, 65 Davies Street) to discuss the course cuts and redundancies that are taking place in UAL. A serious situation is emerging, which ultimately could affect all the students and staff at the university. Your education, your job, the quality of your work, all are under threat.

All out on the 24/11: Defend every job and fight every cut

By Fightback (Ireland)
Tuesday, 24 November 2009
Ireland: Thousands of Nurses, teachers, civil servants, local government workers and other hard pressed public sector workers will no doubt shed a tear today after hearing how disappointed Mr Cowen is that they are going to be on strike. For sure the Taoiseach wasn’t just disappointed according to RTÉ he was indeed “deeply disappointed.”

Ireland: SIPTU joins the fray

By Fightback (Ireland)
Monday, 23 November 2009
Ireland might be out of the World Cup, but the Irish working class is at the forefront of the struggle against the bosses crisis. It’ll take much more than a dodgy hand ball to take the heat out of this situation. Earlier today yet another major union voted massively to join the public sector strikes on November 24^th. SIPTU’s 70,000 members voted by 85% in favour of participating in what is becoming more or less a de facto Public Sector General Strike.

Alan Woods: “We must carry out a revolution within the revolution”

By Últimas Noticias, Caracas
Wednesday, 18 November 2009
We reproduce here a translation of an interview with Alan Woods published in a daily newspaper in Venezuela during his current visit to the country