This month marks 40 years since anti-fascists took on the Nazi National Front in multicultural north London. Simon Hester recalls the events running up to the day that became known as the Battle of Wood Green.
On 23 April 1977, St George’s Day, roughly 1,000 supporters of the National Front marched in multicultural Wood Green, north London. Over 2,000 anti-Nazi activists confronted them, in what became known as the Battle of Wood Green.
Nicola Sturgeon has played another blinder and lit a bonfire underneath the cosy Westminster establishment. There will be another independence referendum in Scotland, or at least she will ask that Westminster grants permission for one to take place between the autumn of 2018 and the spring of 2019.
The artist, refugee, political activist and influential creator of “auto-destructive” art, Gustav Metzger, died last month. Noel Halifax recalls his radical contribution to the culture of Britain in the 1960s and 1970s.
Art and artists come in and out of fashion, as does their influence and people’s interpretation of it. In recent years Gustav Metzger, who died in March, has been out of fashion. His heyday was the 1960s and 70s when he was central to the shape and direction of the British art world and ironically created one of the foundations on which the current bloated art scene is based. Ironically, because he was politically opposed to the current art world, hated the art market and all that it stands for.
Part seven of our series on the IWW looks at a victorious strike in Lawrence in 1912 and a defeat in Paterson a year later.
The two most famous strikes led by the Industrial Workers of the World were those in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1912, and in Paterson, New Jersey, in 1913. The first of these battles opened the way for IWW organising in the East while the second seemed to close that door.
In part six of our series on the Wobblies, John Newsinger tells how, at a time when lynchings were common, the IWW fought for unity between black and white workers.
One of the great weaknesses of the US labour movement was the way that many white workers fell for the race card and played into the hands of their employers, both North and South.
The concern of many white workers was to keep black workers off the job rather than to build a united movement to fight the bosses and their political representatives.
They stood by while black workers were oppressed, denied the vote, discriminated against and brutalised on a daily basis. The public torture and lynching of black men and women was almost an everyday affair.
The issue of a second Independence referendum is once again coming to prominence in Scotland.
The UK Tory government’s decision to pursue a “hard Brexit”, remove the UK from the European Single Market and end the free movement of labour puts it strongly in the opposite camp to the Scottish government, which favours both.
David Lammy MP has been a powerful advocate for justice following the Grenfell Tower fire, calling for corporate manslaughter charges to be brought, and he has spoken out regularly against racism. Last month his review of how black people are treated in the criminal justice system grabbed headlines for highlighting discrimination, but does it go far enough? Claire Dissington assesses his proposals.
As someone who works in the criminal justice system, I was excited to see the publication of David Lammy’s report into the treatment of, and outcomes for, Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) individuals within it. It rightly grabbed headlines last month for highlighting the hugely disproportionate number of ethnic minority people in prison.
Donald Trump’s reluctance to denounce neo-Nazis marching on the streets of the US has shocked many people. But there is a long history of US businessmen flirting with fascism, writes John Newsinger.
Donald Trump is by no means the first US businessman to flirt with the far-right and even fascism. In the 1920s and 1930s many American businessmen looked to fascism as a way to protect their interests.
One particular individual stands out though — Henry Ford. Ford is still celebrated as one of the greatest US businessmen, as someone who transformed modern capitalism.
What is less often acknowledged is that he was also a vicious antisemite. Indeed, far from Ford being influenced by the Nazis, it was very much the other way round.
Marx discussed the concepts of productive and unproductive labour in Capital and it has been a source of debate ever since.
There was an interesting letter in last month’s Socialist Review from Ken Muller. In it he questioned the approach taken by my recent book, A Reader’s Guide to Marx’s Capital, to the concept of “productive labour”.
Ken’s argument is that my definition of productive labour — actually Marx’s definition — as labour hired by capital which produces surplus value (the source of profit) is too narrow.
To lead is to foresee, someone once said. This applies to phenomena such as the Football Lads Alliance (FLA), covered in Socialist Review last month. Too many either ignore the FLA or have a complacent attitude to what is a serious matter.
