Workers Solidarity Movement

Over the last few months changes made by Facebook have greatly reduced the effectiveness of Events and Pages because it has become much less likely that someone following a page will see posts made by that page. According to Facebook on average only 12% of followers will see a given post. In 2011 Facebook did the same to events, multiple changes in the way events work saw response rates to event invitations decline from around 80% of those invited responding to this figure often being less than 20%.

Czech anarchist, Anti-Racist and Squatter Jakub Polak passed away after a long term illness last week on Tuesday 25th September. Jakub Polák was born in Czechoslovakia in 1952. He became a political dissident as a teenager during the Prague Spring (1968). Because of his political activity Jakub wasn’t allowed to study in university. This made him even more involved in the various underground and dissident movement activities.

The rain is pouring, Summer's over and the Eurozone crisis is back from his hols. Timed nicely to coincide with the brutal Spanish riot police attack on the indignados protest outside the Madrid parliament, yesterday's statement by the remaining triple-AAA rated "Nordic Front" of Germany, Finland and the Netherlands, has put the cat back amongst the pigeons.

On Wednesday last, 19th September, the United Left Alliance held a press conference at which it announced “plans to launch a public campaign of resistance to property tax and austerity”.  For those of us who have been working alongside ULA members for over 12 months now to build the broad-based Campaign Against Household & Water Taxes (CAHWT), this announcement came as something of a surprise. CAHWT already is a ‘public campaign of resistance to property tax’ so why do the ULA (who are part of CAHWT) feel the need to ‘launch’ something that already exists?

The new republican newssheet ‘The Proclamation’ produced by the Sean MacDiarmada Ardoyne branch of the republican umbrella group '1916 societies' exposes much of the contradictions implicit in the politics of the republican movement today. In the front page article it asks the question 'Where is Our Leisure Centre?'  The article goes on to contrast facilities in the working class catholic & protestant areas of Belfast.

Marian Price has been detained without trial in inhumane conditions since May 2011.  Despite the fact that the charges against her – encouraging support for a paramilitary organisation – have been dismissed and her release ordered by the courts, she continues to be held on the direction of the North’s secretary of state, Owen Patterson. 58-year-old Price spent a year in solitary confinement in Maghaberry (an all-male prison) and Hydebank prisons.  During this time she was locked in her cell for 21 hours a day while kept under constant camera surveillance.  The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture has said that spending anything more than 15 days in solitary confinement amounts to torture.

Loyalist rioting this week in North Belfast is a reminder that beneath the shiny new ‘normalised’ Northern Ireland is a political process that reaps what it sows.  While our local politicians continue to promote and sell the North to greedy developers, investors and tourism the reality is the majority of us, the working class have been left behind by a so-called settlement in which we are left to rot to be discarded and disposed when necessary. As increasing poverty, sectarianism, lower wages, mass unemployment, lack of affordable and social housing; including the introduction of water charges back on the agenda being as raw as ever the need to build a political alternative to the politics of green and orange is as urgent and relevant as ever.

‘We have taken a good path. As we see it, the formation of social study circles and the establishment of libertarian schools are solid, protective bulwarks in our race toward emancipation.  They are the groundwork of the great revolution.’ - La Protesta Humana, January 7th, 1900

As someone who moved from Irish republican socialism to anarchism, Kevin Bean offers a convincing and fascinating insight into the journey and demise of radical republicanism in Ireland. It demolishes the ‘sell-out’ narrative promoted by some quarters of disaffected republicanism by diligently exploring the rapid transformation of the Provisional movement from a counter-insurgency to an active partner in governing the state it now eagerly upholds.

The Amber Women’s Refuge in Kilkenny was set up to support women facing domestic violence.  Although the Centre has never been as busy it is now facing massive cuts.  The workers at the Centre are fighting to save the service.  Earlier this week the workers, members of SIPTU, placed a daily two-hour picket at the Centre to highlight the situation they are facing.  They are looking for support.  Following the intervention of the Labour Relations Court, talks have taken place between the workers and management.  Although daily pickets have been suspended pending the outcome of these talks, the fight for the Centre is still very much on.  In this interview Claire O’Neill talks about what has happened and the background to the dispute.