1970s
The working class in Iran: some background - class struggles from 1979-1989 - Mostafa Saber
Some excerpts from A Brief Look at the Situation of the Working Class in Iran, a short description of workers' history and conditions - and their struggles during and following the 1979 Revolution.
Of particular interest is the observation that "in practice the [workers'] councils, due to their complete accordance with workers' direct and immediate exercise of power, won an indisputable victory vis-a-vis the unions. The few attempts at creating unions remained irrelevant to the real workers' movement."
Poznan 1956 and Radom 1976
A background report for Radio Free Europe written in 1981, detailing the workers uprisings in Poznan '56 and Radom '76.
BOX-FOLDER-REPORT: 46-4-214
TITLE: Polish Workers Commemorate their Past Struggles
BY: J. B. de Weydenthal
DATE: 1981-7-7
COUNTRY: Poland
ORIGINAL SUBJECT: RAD Background Report/192
--- Begin ---
RFE-RL
RADIO FREE EUROPE Research
RAD Background Report/192 (Poland)" 7 July 1981
Ending a war: Inventing a movement: Mayday 1971
After SDS committed political suicide, and after the Jackson and Kent State shootings, one of the largest mass direct actions in US history took place under the slogan "If the Government won't stop the war, we'll stop the Government."
Ending a war: Inventing a movement: Mayday 1971
Kauffman, L A
Strange Defeat: The Chilean Revolution, 1973 - Pointblank!
An article by Situationist group Pointblank! written in October 1973 about the coup in Chile which deposed elected left-wing leader Salvador Allende.
Instead of blaming the right and the CIA for the coup like most commentators on the left, Pointblank! point out the role that Allende and the parties of the left played in demobilising the powerful working class, undermining their strength and eventually signing their own death warrants by refusing to arm them
Like a Summer with a Thousand Julys …and Other Seasons…
An overview of the early 1980s strikes and riots in the UK.
This text has been reproduced without most of the original pictures and their captions due to space. Some captions which were thought to be useful additions to the main text have been included in boxes.
Like a Summer with a Thousand Julys …and Other Seasons…
INFANT SORROW
A disgrace before God: Striking black sanitation workers vs. black officialdom in 1977 Atlanta
This article is a case study of the betrayal of the African American working class by the Black political class brought to power by the Civil Rights and Black Power movements of the 1960's.
"A disgrace before God"
Ireland, nationalism and imperialism, the myths exploded, 1972-1992 - Subversion
Written before the Good Friday Agreement at a time when the 'armed struggle' was still part of daily life in Northern Ireland this article, though inevitably somewhat dated, this remains a cogent analysis of the recent history of Ireland.
TWENTY YEARS ON A KNIFE EDGE
'... the fate of the province [Northern Ireland] is still, as it has been for so long, poised on a knife- edge between a slow climb back to some form of ordered existence, or a swift plunge into unimaginable anarchy and civil war.'
1977: The great Northampton General Hospital lie in
A short history of a successful example of creative direct action against healthcare rationing in a British hospital.
30 years ago: Rita Ward and the Great Northampton Hospital ‘lie-in”
We hear a lot these days about the ‘creeping privatisation’ of the NHS. We have a Labour government committed to turning our free National Health Service into just another business along the lines of the American model, which sees poor people refused medical treatment because they can’t afford it.
An Introduction to The Angry Brigade - Jean Weir
An article about controversial UK urban guerrilla group, the Angry Brigade looking particularly at anarchist criticism of them at the time. While we disagree with much of the article we reproduce here for reference.
The eight libertarian militants on trial in the Old Bailey in 1972 who were chosen by the British State to be the `conspirators' of the Angry Brigade, found themselves facing not only the class enemy with all its instruments of repression, but also the obtusity and incomprehension -- when not condemnation -- of the organised left.
Lip and the self-managed counter-revolution, 1973 – Negation
A critical article about workers' struggles at the Lip watch factory in France, where workers began self-managing the firm..
LIP AND THE SELF-MANAGED COUNTER-REVOLUTION
from Negation, No. 3 1973
Table of Contents
• Publication Notes
• Négation Introduction
• I. The Workers' Movement and its Decline
• 1. The Expropriation of the Expropriators
• 2. Dead Labor
• 3. Variable Capital and the Unions
• a. The CGT and Devalorization
