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SEXUAL VIOLENCE

in the weeks following the death of jacqueline hill, the 13th 'ripper murder', many women campaigned to link together three separate phenomena: the 'extraordinary' violence of the ripper crimes; the normal pattern of domestic violence; and the depiction of violence against women in the cinema in particular. They did share one thing with most violent attacks on women — the murders challenged men's historic role of 'protecting women' and terrorised women who, by walking alone, ventured outside men's protection.

Edward Bond

It was a form of repression because it tried to stabilise a class society, but it was also true, rational art because that society was for its time progressive.  marxism today human beings have to be able to say in their art, in their stories, in drama and whatever, what their life is about and what the value of good is, in their life. i would like to be able to create individuals on the stage — i am talking about the problem not of creating evil, which is different, but of creating goodness if you like—to be able to present people in such a way that you can understand their social relationship and be able to read the rest of their society in them, to understand them as living processes.

Coast to Coast

I do not want to give an illusion of immense numbers participating or joining, however; as francis deutsch remarked in a letter to the new statesman: 'there is a very real difference in scale between london and the provinces: during the coast-to-coast march we drew at indoor meetings an audience of between 120 and 150 people and this was acknowledged as very successful; one town informing us that we had a greater number of people than they had at their may day rally, although both events were organised by the constituency labour party. As francis jude remarks:  130 the new reasoner 'i think it is true to say that we were bound together by the fact that we all see the objectives of the campaign for nuclear disarmament merely as embracing useful first steps to something else: to total disarmament and non-violence; to world government; to uplifting underdeveloped areas; as an essential to socialism; or as implicit in christianity ...' we have to show that moral opposition is not 'idealistic', 'starry-eyed', 'impractical', that it will not rescue us from h-bombs to land us in slave camps, but that unilateral disarmament is the only hard-headed practical course.

Beyond the Congress

Moreover, the relatively “flexible” attitude adopted over the last few years by the leadership of the soviet union and strengthened considerably by the speeches of mr. khruschev and mr. mikoyan to the xxiind congress is one which arises from the genuine belief that the communist countries can compete favourably with the west and, in time, prove its economic and social superiority without recourse to war. o utput of engineering and metal-working industries (thou­ 115 334-375 9.8-11 34 sand million roubles) m ineral fertilisers, in conven­ 77 125-135 9-9.7 13.9 tional units (million tons) synthetic tars and plastics 5,300 332 19,000-21,000 57-63 (thousand tons) artificial and synthetic fibres 1,350 211 3,100-3,300 14.7-15.6 (thousand tons) 122 45.5 233-235 5.1-5.2 cem ent (million tons) textiles (thousand million 13.6 6.6 20-22 3-3.3 square metres) 825 419 2.1-2.4 900-1,000 leather footwear (million pairs) domestic, household and other m anufactured goods (thousand 18 58-60 9.8-10.1 million roubles) keynsian weapons, the british and u.s. economies can achieve growth rates of only 2—3% per annum.

The Second Sex

It is not her concern: ‘to proclaim eternal verities, but rather to describe the common basis that underlies every individual feminine existence.’ by browning in the lines :- in establishing this common basis we must start from the fact of woman as an existent and disregard all: ‘vague notions of superiority and inferiority' which are irrelevant to the status of free beings in a free society. De beauvoir argues, it is of supreme importance to the rest of a woman’s life: its context can give rise to permanent associations, whether of joy, fear, disgust, or pain.

The Swimming Pool

He questions petrov's two companions as to the greatest misfortune which can be brought upon man; 119  t h e s w i m m i n g p o o l t h e man in straw hat: greatest misfortune? a fence comes down which divides the pool leaving petrov, ivan ivanovich, the secretary and the man in the staw hat on one side and the man in the cap and everyone else on the other side.

HUNGARY IN RETROSPECT

to read these six books and pamphlets(1) is to find yet more proof in abundance of what the hungarian revolt really was, who (1) the counter-revolutionary forces in the october events in hungary 11, ([budapest:] information bureau of the council of ministers of the hungarian people's republic. The hungarian section, 246 pages long, gives pretty well every document of importance relating to hungarian politics last year, beginning with the resolution on the lessons of the twentieth congress adopted by the central committee of the hungarian working people's party on march 12th-13th, 1956, and ending with "pravda's" attack on tito on november 23rd.

Events are Happening

A new form of instant theatre; a sort of 3-d collage using sound, music, smells, words, paint, more words and people, people, people; a semi-improvized artform which is sort of visual jazz variations on a pre-arranged theme like the ‘head arrangements’ of standard jazz practice; an attempt to return to the dynamic, shared experience of primitive ritual dances to exorcise the 20th century blues, figures of fun, and death capering once more outside the inyard.; a chance for the practicioners of the ‘lonely arts’painting and poetry to use the ‘teamwork’ methods of the new art-forms-jazz and the cinema; above all a chance to use the new myths imagery and techniques of the popular mass communication arts to work directly on an audience, however small. our most recent event was called ‘the machine’ in which sounds light empire builders policemen housewives music your genial compere gorman prawn more music politicians the queen as a gunslinger admen priests arnold waistcoat poet of the people etc. etc. pour out of a huge ‘machine’ in the middle of the audience.

After the Masses

Second, as part of a process of critical review, the canon of high modernism has been brought to book for its 'eurocentrism', its 'masculinist' stress on transgression and transformation, its downgrading of everything that doesn't fall within its definition of what's important, ie, women's art, domestic culture and reproduction, black and third world art, 'bourgeois' and 'socialist' realism, peasant and working-class white, 'mass' culture, middlebrow and high culture, non-metropolitan culture etc. far from being 'progressive', it's condemned for its patriarchal values, its aggressive change-the-world heroism, its colonialist plundering of 'primitive' third world art. One of the things ignored in the more 'fatal' versions of new times is the binding power of the new transnational media systems: the power they have to move people not just to buy into networks that offer forms of community and alliance which can transcend the confines of class, race, gender, regional and national culture.

A Bitter Harvest

apologists for the ethiopian government point to the fact that while ethiopia has attracted very considerable amounts of emergency aid, for geo-political reasons it receives amongst the least development aid of any country on a per capita basis. but the right - whether in the form of conservative mps julian amery and john biggs davidson of the socalled horn of africa council, or the editorial writers of the murdoch press - are now arguing increasingly vehemently an alternative thesis about where responsibility really lies, namely with the ethiopian government or, as the sunday times puts it, the 2 'gang of bloodstained, ideologically-obsessed zealots who should be accused before the court of world opinion of a charge of criminal negligence bordering on genocide.'

After The Apocalypse

One thing is clear, however, which is that the leadership's lack of experience in peacetime administration cannot be blamed, for between 1955, when the french finally left the north, and 1964-5, when heavy us bombing started, the old democratic republic of (north) vietnam (drv) experienced a decade of peace during which every effort was made to implement socialist development based upon the (pregorbachev) soviet model. Ho chi minh city's trading companies were closed down; state factories which had been busy finding ways of doing independent deals found themselves under pressure from their ministries to supply higher volumes of goods at low prices; peasants found themselves forced to sell to the state through the preserved system of cooperatives, rather than free to sell surplus on the free market as earlier legislation had promised.

The Victorian Visionary

From nowhere (1890) is again a dream; the these concerns made morris a kind of narrator finds himself in a future cultural materialist, seeing culture and communist society.4 aesthetic experience as linked to social morris's originality as a marxist rests on relations, long before he, or anyone else in the encounter in his mind between literary and aesthetic concerns, and criticisms of i wish thank colin mercer, john oakley and roger simon for helpful comments on morris in general, victorian society expressed through them, and the works of marx. morris uses these forms in an attempt to address what he always sees as the crucial issue of the connection between the imagined vision of a better society and immediate struggles: 'free as thou wouldst have them, when thine hope rises the highest, and thou art thinking not of the king's uncles and poll-groat bailiffs, and the villeinage of essex, but of the end of all, when men shall have the fruits of the earth and the fruits of their toil thereon, without money and without price', the narrator (a modern socialist) addresses john ball.13 both the political essays and the two short novels are written from an experience of frustration, hope deferred and bafflement at the difficulty of establishing such connections.

HIP LITTLE ENGLANDERS

Socialism was both part of what was seen as the working-class tradition, and the force behind the anti-racist politics that turned out to be the main political issue in boy george of culture club  38 november 1983 marxism today pop at the time. you don't have to be an especially vulgar jonathan king is a happy man today, marxist to find the lack of nationalistic because british groups are once again sentiment in british pop a little surprising.

Impasse in Namibia

keenly aware that, just as the soweto media blackout or not, the people of uprisings followed independence in britain are being called to make a stark mozambique and angola, and similar choice — if we don't act now to support events followed zimbabwe's independence, swapo, the anc and the oppressed south africa's military withdrawal from people of southern africa, 'the south namibia would boost the liberation africa factor' will make the 'falklands struggle in south africaitself. brian wood impasse in namibia only a few weeks ago over 130 governments gathered together in paris to condemn british and other western power collusion with pretoria's intensifying military occupation of namibia; following that, no less than 30 foreign ministers flew to new york to call a halt to the british and western power diplomacy over namibia which, they argued, has become during the past four years a cynical attempt to use the united nations machinery to guarentee south africa's regional 'security' interests.

Santa in Crisis

when the laughter had died down, sir robin said, wearing his intensive look, 'would you care to say why, santa?' 'well, it's obvious that...' santa began. 'what's your reply to that, santa?' 'it's a load of bollocks,' santa said.

The Transition to The Transition

However much it may be argued that state intervention has a positive bias against  42 the new reasoner labour's claims in the long run, and often in the short run, it still remains true that the state is often compelled to see industrial strife from a point of view a good deal broader than the point of view of the individual employer and may press for solutions to any given industrial dispute which, while not wholly meeting the claims of labour, yet do not give a total victory to employers either. as to the studies in evasion which the labour party has been issuing from time to time under the name of policy pamphlets, they fully illustrate how far the party has now moved from the aim it first proclaimed in 1918, and which it has never officially repudiated, of establishing a socialist society 'upon the basis of the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and exchange, and the best obtainable system of popular administration and control of each industry or service'. nor do the pronouncements of the parliamentary leaders suggest an unambiguous will to contribute in practice to the termination of the international civil war which defines such a large part of the reality of our times.

After the Landslide 1

had goldwater campaigned on some of the positions he has taken in both the senate and in his publications, he would only have increased his isolation and the size of his defeat, for he has never been able to translate his ideal of an open, competitive, individualist society, and his objections to bureaucracy, welfare, increased federal intervention into every sphere of individual and corporate activity, and the consequent coalition so inclusive, unified, and effective that narrowing of it may continue to dominate american politics years after goldwater has retired to his depart- into any programme orpolicy relevant to contemporary america. But far more than a sympathy vote, the assassination caused a collective internal shudder, and silent, inarticulate repudiation of the right-wing which buttressed all the talk about extremism, and defeated not only goldwater but most of the conservative and right-wing supported local candidates.

After the Landslide 2

three—the republican party which started as a northern party on the eve of the civil war, if it destroys itself in internecine war and is replaced by a new second party, ironically will be left to die in the deep south. The democratic party is—as is the republican party—a peace movement and the civil rights groups work10 campaign by his constant reference to “unity” and his desire “to be president of all the people.”

Notes from New York

2 * 2 last year, as everyone knows, was a bad time for america, it started with the murder of the children in birmingham, was followed by the assassination of the president, murder of oswald, chaos and death in mississippi, violence in new york, and it was also the year that newspapers here felt called upon to remind this city of eight million that if thirty-five people see a woman being murdered they should not turn away, in that short space of time between kennedy’s death and now, america has dizzily embraced another ideal of the future, and we are now going to the polls with a choice, as the jokesters put it, between a crook and a madman. Barbara probst solomon holes from new york the editors have asked me to append a glossary to mrs. solomon’s piece for the benefit of british readers, but i don’t think it needs one, except to explain that the new york review of booksis a literary bi-monthly (i think) newspaper edited and largely written by young men and women.

The Left in Germany

The left in germany to english participants the chief value of the postaldermaston seminar in oxford, attended by members of the german socialist student association, from berlin, and of various english university labour clubs, was the insight it afforded into the current position of the german left. The younger generation of left-wing thinkers, as wolfgang hohmann stressed, is engaged in a desperate struggle to retain its political organisation, and in a campaign among german students to improve the poor financial position of the west german student body (maximum grants are about £130 per annum).

A use for documentary

Universities & left review winter 1958 issue 3 a use for documentary karel reisz if you think of documentary films as the occasional travelogue you have to sit through at your local before the main film comes on, or as the film about how sulphuric acid is manufactured which is probably useful to science teachers; if in fact you don't know much about them, and care less, it is largely because the people who make them don't care either. From the 'film-makers point of view this is particularly disturbing because the film represents the almost complete abdication of the creator of the film, the director.

New Directions in Music

Whether the avant-garde turned to this as a last resort when everything else that they could think up had been exhausted, or that a feeling for true musical expression prompted some of the composers to turn away from their previous ideas, or that composers from countries until very recently outside the avant-garde world have introduced a more traditional approach to music; whichever it was, avant-garde music today has a definite future for the first time for fifteen years. The influence of composers outside the central tradition of avant-garde music in europe; electronic music, especially in combination with instruments; its influence on vocal and instrumental music; and controlled indeterminacy.

Another Forward March Halted

28% of tory voters said they usually voted for their party, or against another party (ie, labour); but 37% of labour voters cast their ballot for analogous reasons.4 take away the outer circle of tory voters and tacit thatcher-tolerators, and what we are left with are hard-core supporters of this government. '2 maybe another 10 years, maybe another generation before british business 'has recovered fully from its condition in the 1970s' thinks the economist which, after 10 years of 'mrs thatcher banging the drum for business', concludes that the british still don't seem to love it, and until they do 'there is a limit to british capacity to have an "economic renaissance'".

The Party Is Over

those parts of the radical trade who, like pluto, tried to use their 1970s success to continue to operate across the range could not compete. because it had been relative¬ ly easy to sell radical books in the 1970s with little com¬ mercial competition, they had not developed the hard business skills to survive. the parts of the 1970s' radical book trade that have survived are those which chose to specialise in par¬ ticular topics and make one part of the radical book mar¬ ket their own, publishers like the feminist presses, comedia, gay men's press (gmp), zed (on the third world);

Learning, Sexism and Femininity

though some women will argue in mixed schools the differential changes from being rigid to becoming more subtle, the potential is there to undermine the polarity which at present exists between boys schools, at one pole with an overtly authoritarian and rigid atmosphere, and at the other pole the docility and compliance intrinsic to that of girls. They try to divide teachers unions along sex lines, work to preserve headships and administrative posts for men, and blatantly stating that the training of women is wastage they are the one section of teachers openly in favour of discrimination against women.