An important new work of labour history was launched on November 23 at the Melbourne Trades Hall. About 70 people heard author Douglas Jordan and Victoria University historian Phillip Deery mark the publication of Conflict in the Unions: The Communist Party of Australia, Politics and the Trade Union Movement, 1945-60.
History
World War II was fought to resist fascist aggression; the Vietnam War was an imperial war of aggression fought chiefly by France and the US, alongside allies that included Australia. The wars have been well documented, but rarely will you find an account of how they were instrumental in rejuvenating and then expanding the heroin trade.
Tasmanian Aboriginal activist Michael Mansell said he was grateful for the thoughts behind his Australia Day award nomination but that he “would be a hypocrite to accept it”.
Mansell has been outspoken about the offensiveness of Australia’s national day celebrating the invasion and dispossession of Australia’s Aboriginal people. He has participated in Invasion Day rallies held by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre for many years.
Call me old-fashioned, but as far as celebrity outlaws go, I’ll take Ned Kelly over Chopper Read any day.
The rise to fame of recently deceased Mark “Chopper” Read symbolised the emptiness of our celebrity culture. In a world governed by large-scale gangsters in control of big industry and finance, Read was a mere petty psychopath and opportunist who figured out how to turn a buck from the fact that, as he famously noted, “posh people love gangsters”.
Karl Marx: A Nineteenth Century Life
Jonathan Sperber
Liveright Publishing, 2013
In life, Karl Marx lived a tumultuous, revolutionary life. His death, too, has been less than tranquil.
Alive, he was the best hated man in Europe. For the ruling classes and police spies he personified the “spectre” that was haunting the continent, the demonic rise of workers’ revolution.
After his death he was bleached of his humanity, canonised by admirers and slandered by enemies. Both misrepresented him.
Venezuelans rallied to condemn fascism on September 11, marking the 40th anniversary of the United States-backed coup d’etat in Chile that ousted left-wing president Salvador Allende.
The rally began at Plaza Salvador Allende at the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) and marched through the city centre to Llaguno Bridge. On the bridge is a memorial to those killed during the 2002 US-backed coup that temporarily removed former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez from office. Chavez was restored by an uprising by loyal soldiers and the poor.
The Bracegirdle Incident: How an Australian Communist Ignited Ceylon’s Independence Struggle
Alan Fewster
Arcadia/Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2013
173 pages, $39.95 (pb)
In 1937, Ceylon’s British Chief of Police reported that “it is clearly dangerous” to allow the Australian communist Mark Bracegirdle, to remain in the country “stirring up feelings against employers of labour and against the British Government”.
Paul Le Blanc, author of Lenin and the Revolutionary Party, visited Australia in June in a tour hosted by Socialist Alliance. This is his presentation to 150 people at the 'Organising for 21st Century Socialism' seminar in Sydney on June 8, 2013.
On April 2, 1911 women all over Britain were holding all-night parties, staying out at concerts and late-night restaurants, skating at ice rinks until the morning and generally having a very good time.
But this was also a huge act of civil disobedience because the April 2 was Census night and these women staying out all night were refusing to have their details recorded in protest at the government’s refusal to grant votes for women.
As the world economy spirals down into its deepest crisis since the great depression, the writings of Karl Marx have made a return to the top seller lists in bookstores. In his native Germany, the sales of Marx’s works have trebled.
Radical Glebe Walking Tour
Sunday 3 April 11 – 1.30pm
Leading us:
Ian Stephenson, President of the Glebe Society and former Senior Curator with the National Trust (NSW), Director of Historic Places in Canberra and CEO of the National Trust for South Australia
Dorothy Davis: Friends of Glebe and
Emily Bullock: Hands Off Glebe, Action for Public Housing group
Denis Doherty: Hands Off Glebe
Start: Outside the front door of the Chau Chak Wing Museum, Sydney University, Corner of University Avenue and Parramatta Road, Camperdown.
Green Left presents this screening of Women Of Steel, Saturday 15th May 5pm at the Boorloo Activist Centre Perth!
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Radical History Walking Tour & Dinner
Meet us at Geelong Trades Hall at 4pm on Saturday 18th February to take part in a Radical History Walking Tour of union and social justice struggle at a number of different sites in the Geelong CBD.
The walking tour will be followed by dinner back at Geelong Trades Hall and an address from Allan Sargent, lifelong unionist, and author of '100 Years of Struggle: The history of Geelong Trades Hall Council 1909 to 2009'
Venue: Geelong Trades Hall, 127 Myers Street, Geelong
Join historian Dr Deborah Jordan for a Brisbane CBD tour of significant sites in the struggle for women’s suffrage in Queensland.
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