Author: Admin

Whatever the exact course events might take in the weeks and months ahead, the possibility of the development of a new, mass vehicle of independent working-class political representation is now part of the consciousness of all classes in Britain, as the multi-faceted crises of capitalism unfold.

This is the indelible result of the appeal made by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana on July 24 to join in the founding of “a new kind of political party”, based on “a mass redistribution of wealth and power” against the “rigged system”.

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In November 2020 Socialism Today published an article, The Battle for Unite, (Issue No.243) in anticipation of the union’s 2021 general secretary election campaign. We quoted the BBC’s Iain Watson who said, “the result of that contest will determine whether the union works closely with Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership, or is willing to be openly critical”.

The biennial Unite policy conference held this July kicked off a year of leadership elections in Unite. This October will see nominations open for the lay member executive council (EC), with voting starting in January; and later in 2026, members will vote for the general secretary position.

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THEO SHARIEFF gives a round-up of discussions on political representation at this year’s union conferences and the approach of delegates to their union’s relationship with Starmer’s Labour.

The joint announcement in July by Independent Alliance MPs Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana of their intention to establish a new political party in Britain to “take on the rich and powerful” amassed support from over 700,000 in the space of days.

Their announcement came just three days after over 1,000 trade union members met to discuss how the fight for a political voice for the trade union movement could be advanced in light of Labour’s continued attacks on the working class. Initiated by Socialist Party member and former MP Dave Nellist, the meeting was attended and addressed by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana, the first such meeting since Zarah Sultana had made a public statement resigning from the Labour Party.

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CHRISTINE THOMAS argues that the experience of the development of the early Labour Party, in particular its federal structure of representative democracy, is a useful contribution to current discussions on the formation of a new party in Britain.

The announcement by Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana on 24 July that they would be launching a new party, following the decision by delegates at Unite conference to review the union’s relationship with Labour, has placed the question of working-class political representation firmly on the agenda in Britain. In just three days, 500,000 people had added their names to an email list for a new party, while one opinion poll placed a new Corbyn-led party neck and neck with Labour. These developments, at a time when the new party is still only in the concept stage, are a clear indication of the potential that exists for channelling the anger that has exploded against Labour’s pro-austerity, pro-war, pro-big business policies after only one year in office.

Debates are already under way about what kind of new party is needed and how it should be organised. For 30 years the Socialist Party (and its forerunners) has virtually alone argued and campaigned for a new mass workers’ party – with the exception of the brief ‘accident’ of Corbyn becoming leader of the Labour Party from 2015-2019. At that time, had Corbyn taken decisive action to oust the Blairites plotting against him in parliament, local government and the party apparatus, Labour itself potentially could have been transformed into a workers’ party.

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France Insoumise is the main left organisation in France, with 70 MPs and nearly half a million members. LEILA MESSAOUDI of Gauche Révolutionnaire (CWI France) explains its programme, class orientation and method of organisation.

Since Emmanuel Macron came to power as French president in 2017, France Insoumise (FI – France Unbowed) is the only political force resisting the offensive by the capitalist parties and their representatives on a wide scale. It is opposed to racism, to police violence, and to war. This is in a context where the rest of the ‘left’ and the leadership of the trade union movement is holding back, forming a kind of ‘national unity’ in the face of political and economic crises. FI also denounces the ills of this capitalist system, especially the economic and environmental problems.

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Seventy years ago on 26 June 1955 around three thousand people assembled in a field in Kliptown, just outside Johannesburg. They were gathered to debate what the alternative should be to the apartheid system of institutionalised racial segregation, which had been inaugurated following the victory of the National Party in the whites only South African election of 1948.

This was the Congress of the People, organised by the African National Congress (ANC), the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) and others. Delegates had been elected from across the country, travelling by train, bus or on foot to, in the words of the prominent black academic ZK Matthews, ‘draw up a Freedom Charter for the democratic South Africa of the future’.

The following article by WEIZMANN HAMILTON of the Marxist Workers Party, the South African section of the CWI, explains how the working-class masses viewed the aspirations for a new society contained in the Charter: a challenge to capitalism itself, not just its then structural form of apartheid.

But the ambiguity of the Charter’s wording, not accidentally omitting a commitment to socialism, provided sufficient camouflage for the aspirant capitalist interests within the liberation movement to assert their own interpretation. With the consequence that when the racist regime was eventually overthrown a new class apartheid emerged under the ANC’s banner, with South Africa today now the most unequal country in the world.

This article has been abridged from a fuller version, available at https://marxistworkersparty.org.za

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