South Wales Miners Federation

Syndicalism in south Wales: The origins of The Miners’ Next Step

Members of the South Wales Miners Federation

This article was written in 1987 to mark the 75th anniversary of the publication of The Miners’ Next Step.

Three quarters of a century ago the celebrated syndicalist manifesto The Miners’ Next Step was published. Written by a group of young socialists from the Rhondda, nearly all of whom were themselves working miners, the pamphlet occupies a prominent place in the revolutionary traditions of the British labour movement.

Armed But Not In The Old Way

Tonypandy after the riot

Arguments for Welsh Syndicalism - Past and Future. an introduction from 1999

It has become fashionable for ‘socialist’ and social-democratic elites, representatives and thinkers to deride emphatically egalitarian positions as ‘old’ and outmoded.

1910: Cambrian Combine miners strike and Tonypandy riot

Tonypandy miners.

A short history of a strike by miners in South Wales in 1910 which led to a series of confrontations between workers and police, culminating in what became popularly known as the Tonypandy Riot.

The strike marked one of the few occasions in British history that troops have been deployed against striking workers.

1912: The Miners' Next Step

Miners in 1912

A document produced in 1912 by the South Wales Miners Federation, which was one of the high points of syndicalist organising in the UK.

Being a suggested scheme for the Reorganisation of the Federation.
Issued by the Unofficial Reform Committee, Tonypandy, 1912