Library

Four ways to forgiveness - Ursula Le Guin

At the far end of our universe, on the twin planets of Werel and Yeowe, all humankind is divided into "assets" and "owners," tradition and liberation are at war, and freedom takes many forms. Here is a society as complex and troubled as any on our world, peopled with unforgettable characters struggling to become fully human. For the disgraced revolutionary Abberkam, the callow "space brat" Solly, the haughty soldier Teyeo, and the Ekumen historian and Hainish exile Havzhiva, freedom and duty both begin in the heart, and success as well as failure has its costs.

In this stunning collection of four intimately interconnected novellas, Ursula K. Le Guin returns to the great themes that have made her one of America's most honored and respected authors.

Bakunin, Marx and the State

The following has been taken from the Commune website and was the introduction to a joint meeting they did with the Communist Workers Organisation (CWO/ICT) at the Sheffield Anarchist Bookfair. Audio of the meeting can be found here.

The Commune introduction to a meeting on Anarchism, Marxism and the State, at the Sheffield Anarchist Bookfair 11th May 2013, by Barry Biddulph.

Building the One Big Union: the organizing campaign

An article by Alex Erickson on IWW organizing campaigns on how they are what will build the IWW.

In “Building the One Big Union: A Strategy for a Strategy,” I laid out a roadmap for building a union of 10,000 Wobblies- 100 branches of 100 members. We have several branches of 100 members currently, so it should be possible to reverse-engineer and replicate these successes in all of our local groups.

The struggle continues at Chicago-Lake Liquors - John O'Reilly

A reportback of a IWW picket in Minneapolis of Chicago-Lake Liquors, which fired 5 organizers in April 2013. More information can be found here.

Over a month after the retaliatory firings of five works shocked South Minneapolis, a noted progressive community within the Twin Cities, workers at Chicago-Lake Liquors continue their fight for justice at work by taking it right to their bosses.

Rethinking class: from recomposition to counterpower - Paul Bowman

In this article Paul Bowman draws a line between revolutionary class analysis and universalist utopianism and goes on to explore the history of different ideas of class and the elusive revolutionary subject. After exploring the intersecting lines of class and identity, he poses the challenge that we as libertarian communists face as we strive to create “cultural and organisational forms of class power [that] do not unconsciously recreate the... hierarchies of identity and exclusion” that are the hallmark of the present society.

Against universalism, against utopianism

The term class divides people into two camps. One which seems to uphold its validity with an almost cult-like intensity, and a much larger camp that is at best undecided, but mostly turned off entirely by it – and especially so by the apparently religious fervour of the small minority in the first camp.

Left dead-end street vs. destructive critique: China's counterinsurgency policies and how to respond

Gongchao on the attempts of the Chinese state to handle growing unrest and struggle.

In spring 2010, workers at a Honda plant in the industrial city of Foshan, Guangdong went on strike. They overcame the split between permanent employees and technical student interns and brought Honda's entire production in China to a halt. The transnational company was forced to increase workers' wages by more than 30 percent.

Prologue

Foreword

Romanian working class: sitting ducks in open fire of capitalism

An anarchist analysis of the working class in Romania.

There are about 5 million employees in Romania, currently. Some other 3 million people (a quarter of the local work force) work in other countries from the European Union, mostly Spain and Italy. The official unemployed people are said to represent 6.7%, but this is not accurate.

On working class fiction

Detail from the cover of Robert Tressell's The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

In this essay from 2011, novelist DD Johnston presents a communist analysis of the definition and purpose of working class fiction.

Last week, for the second time in my life, I found myself agreeing with Margaret Thatcher. The first time was many years ago, in the mid-1980s, when Thatcher was briefly my hero. I was a timid child, who suffered from a speech impediment, and it had never occurred to me that free school milk was in any way optional.