Workers Solidarity Movement

This is the archive page of the 9th Dublin Anarchist bookfair, you will find video and audio from the bookfair below.  For details of the latest bookfair see www.wsm.ie/bookfair

DABF 2014 as at Liberty Hall  Saturday 12th of April   

Between Bookfairs we recommend you join the  Dublin Radical Events from the WSM group so you get invitations as soon as plans are finalised

Before and during the bookfair we encouraged people to tweet to #DABF

The weekend started Friday night with a film screening before the main event in Liberty Hall on Saturday, an afters party / fundraiser in The Flowing Tide Saturday night and then rolling though to Sunday afternoon for a Cycling tour around Dublin. 

Friday 11th in Seomra Spraoi at 7.30 - 'Broken Song' screening
About the film - "GI, Costello and Willa Lee are street poets, hip-hop artists, rappers and song-writers from Dublin’s Northside. Through their words and music they have found a way of expressing themselves and inspiring others to achieve the same." 

The main event of the weekend saw 20-30 organisations with stalls & information stands downstairs in Liberty Hall while upstairs and  in the Flowing Tide three streams of meetings & workshops will run throughout the day. 

The WSM had its Autumn national conference in Dublin on the 23rd November.  National Conference is the ultimate decision making body in the WSM. It happens every six months usually over a day or two. As well as discussing motions time is also spent on discussing the past six months activity and prospects for the next period. Conference also hears reports of activity from all branches, officers and working groups.  This covered areas like the Irish Anarchist Review, WSM Website, Dublin Anarchist Bookfair and our pro-choice and anti racist work.

Earlier this year two Irish anarchists delivered talk at Jura books in Sydney regarding the history of anarchism in Ireland, the politics of the WSM and how it organises. The speakers also referred to its ongoing involvement in campaigns and struggles from shell to sea, anti-war activity and involvement in the CAHWT.

The left is fond of military analogies so I want to open this piece with the observation that poor generals plan for the last war rather than the next one. Those militaries that planned for World War Two by perfecting the trench systems that dominated World War One had their powerful & expensive fortifications quickly overwhelmed in the opening weeks of the war through blitzkrieg. And in turn by 1943 Blizkrieg was defeated though defence in depth at Kursk.

Our members in Cork and Dublin have been active at local, regional and national levels in the Cam- paign Against Home and Water Taxes, helping with stalls, leaf- letting and demos, and arguing for greater grassroots democracy within the campaign. WSM members were also invloved in occupations of council offices and TDs offices in Cork and Dublin as part of the campaign.

Our members in Cork and Dublin have been active in the Campaign Against Household and Water Taxes, at local, regional and national levels, helping with stalls, leafletting and demos, and arguing for greater grassroots democracy within the campaign.

The WSM organised a successful public meeting on Saturday in Na Croisbhealai workers co-op on the topic of anarchists-who we are and what we are up to.  Leading up to the event leaflets and posters were distributed at the annual Mayday march and other meetings in the city. A similar meeting was held recently in Dublin which was attended by 80 plus people and the WSM aims to hold similar meetings across the country so feel free to get in touch.

After some months of preparation the Workers Solidarity Movement is launching our supporter program. We started working on this after debate at our Spring conference around the fact that there are many people who broadly agree with our political positions and the organising we do but for one reason or another are not yet looking to become members. We decided to launch our Supporter program so that such people could have ongoing formal relationship with the WSM that would involve some participation in internal discussion, helping us out financially and working with us in areas of activity they have a particular interest in when they have time. With members we expect a commitment to a minimum level of such activity, but we are not expecting the same from supporters rather we hope they will help us out when they are able.

Early in the morning the crew arrive from the Occupy Cork camp to do their dish washing in the back kitchen of Solidarity Books. At 12 o'clock the days first volunteer arrives to open the bookshop and by lunch time the campers are back for the lunchtime wash up.  By evening the bookshop is closed but will invariably re open by 8 for a meeting or organising group, maybe a movie showing or a talk, the Climate Campers doing their vegan cafe or it could be the Couchsurfers for their meet up, maybe the Campaign Against the HouseHold Tax for an organising meeting or just a crew to paste posters onto corriboard.

Despite the distraction of the presidential election charade, the past couple of months have been busy ones for WSM members as government spending cuts continue to bite.