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L'Arroseur Arrose(E)

Dews is concerned, for example, to argue that derrida is 'determined to prevent any contamination between the empirical and the transcendental' (18): this very peculiar idea, which dews supports in a lengthy summary of derrida's 'critique' of merleauponty (this 'critique' occupies about three pages of derrida's first book, the introduction to husserl's origin of geometry, and consists in no more than a correction of merleau-ponty's misreading of certain aspects of husserl's thought) is evidently linked to the claim that derrida, unlike most posthegelian philosophers, 'continues to evade the exposure of thought to the contingency of interpretation, and the revisability of empirical knowledge' (37), whereas for dews, following adorno and habermas, 'philosophical concepts must be challenged and transformed in a confrontation with the results of concrete investigations, whether these take the form of empirical science or some other form' (36). This wonderfully aberrant section moves through the following points: 1) a repetition of the now traditional misreading of the end of 'structure, sign and play', which assumes derrida is simply urging on us a 'nietzschean' dionysianism; 2) a recognition that 'from the early 1970s onwards, derrida makes more persistent - and undoubtedly sincere - attempts to link the rational activity of deconstruction [which is not in fact essentially a theoretical activity] up with more directly political engagements and practices' (34—5); 3) an example of the beginner's error of conflating 'text' in derrida's sense with 'discourse', and the concomitant complaint that derrida's description of institutions as involving 'forces' and 'antagonism' implies a 'politically necessary recognition of a non-textual reality' (35) (this naturally taken as contradicting derrida's best-known dictum about 'nothing outside the text' it might just be worth suggesting, as a corrective, a quick look at 'force and signification' and 'differance', though any other text will do); 4) the following attempt at a refutation: 'given that institutions are traversed by relations of force, it is difficult to see how deconstruction could be applied to them [to correct the error involved in this notion of 'application' it might just be worth reading 'letter to a japanese friend', though any other text will do].

Festivals Of The Oppressed

In his remarkable book theatre of the oppressed, the latin american theatre-maker augusto boal contrasts three dramaturgies: the aristotelian model in which the spectator passively delegates power to the dramatic character, so that the latter may act and think for him; the brechtian theatre of the enlightened vanguard, in which the spectator does not delegate his or her power to think, but still gives up the right to act; and boal's own 'poetics of the oppressed', in which the spectator no longer delegates either power to the character, but exercises them both. But against barker's call for the reassertion of the tragic principle in theatre - a form which he acknowledges is and will remain a minority, indeed elitist interest - a popular playwright like john mcgrath would reassert the old '60s principle of theatre based round the real and palpable solidarities of class.2 mcgrath is a highly committed playmaker who has made considerable personal sacrifices in career terms in order to pursue the creation of a mass, popular audience for socialist theatre.

Commitment in art criticism

This stagnation is the direct result of a failure to understand the most elementary facts concerning the nature of experimentation, the treatment of art as a commodity, a gross over-simplification of the nature 50  commitment in art criticism and uses of popular opinion. nothing has been of greater service to the retreat into ambiguity, non-commitment and fear than the relative stagnation of art in marxist countries, the mechanical nature of later marxist criticism and, in certain cases, the perversion of marxist cultural ideology, the basic premises of which seem to me more valid than ever.

Tom Mann 1890-92

The first entry in the minutes is a resolution to form a labour union in the colne valley "on the lines of the bradford labour union", the second concerns election of officers and committee, the third runs: "resolved that the secretary write mr. tom mann of london inviting him to be candidate on behalf of the labour union for a parliamentary seat at the next election". the dock strike gave a national reputation to john burns, ben tillett, and tom mann who became president of the dockers' union and in 1891 was appointed one of seven trade union members on the royal commission of labour - a body presided over by the duke of devonshire which sat for two years and took up much of his time.

Nihilism's Organization Man

a boy named sal paradise, adrift in 1947, falls in with this mixed-up crew who have come back from the war, taken a good look around, seen what's coming and firmly declared, ohne mich, man, ohne mich. now, led by a transcendant barbarian named dean moriarty, who is quite as lost but the most nearly a social outcast (which they are not), they hurl themselves from one town to another for the grandeur that can never be theirs, jumping all over the joint, looking, shouting (no slogans), pounding with their automotive fists at the borders of that great literary whore-mother, america, in a dreary, never-ending pursuit of no-down-payment salvation. Savaged, he is, by historic irony: 60 blasting jazz i speak of "he" and i mean, above all, the negro jazz musician, faithful archivist and blasting forerunner, the traditional keeper of the covenant and bearer of low and high tidings, the ravening genius who drew from himself and his people their experience and the way they think and talk about it: he codified it and modified it with the proper caricature of the white man's diffidence and, when the time was ripe, lay back to receive disciples.

The Poverty of the Poverty of Historicism

one thing that they do have in common, and this is perhaps the basis of professor popper's argument, is that all the incorrigibles at least, are the habitual whipping boys of a certain negative liberalism, which passionately rejects any form of humanism unless it be the abstract laissez-faire defence of formal freedom, as both metaphysical universities & left review 4 summer 1958 (here untenable intellectually) and implicitly totalitarian (here untenable morally). This "argument from the concentration camp" has almost come to replace traditional forms of argument in certain circles in this country whenever ethics or political philosophy are on the agenda, and professor popper cannot resist indulging in it from time to time in the "poverty of historicism."

THE ANATOMY OF MAU MAU

During the mass turning towards mau mau which took place in 1952-3, when mau mau represented the only possible form of self-defence, many elements were swept into the movement, and the diversity of local sections became 23  mau mau mau mau marked. But just as it was wrong to follow; moscow and ignore all the evidence of mau mau atrocities and of mau mau oaths, and to describe complex colonial situations in the crudest of black/white terms, so the policy of blind defence of mau mau led to a playing-down of the new constitutional developments as if they were imperialist manoeuvring of minimal importance.

Spain: a Miners' Notebook

These fears, in any case, increase the responsibility of the left-wing socialists - now is the time for them to increase their militancy as well. freshly cooked open daily and freshly carved joints at the lantern cafe 129 the h i g h for breakfasts coffee luncheons teas snacks & dinners s p a i n : a miners’ notebook b. morris h. dilkes s. l. magness we reprint, here, extracts from the notes of three english miners who were in spain at the time of the recent strike in the asturias, and who, in addition to commenting on the lives of their spanish counterparts, dwell on various other aspects of the falangist regime. If the labour parties are able to combine an effective parliamentary struggle with a wider debate throughout italian society, the present political situation could not only contribute to a heightening of consciousness and militancy of the masses, but would also forge a new basis of unity with catholic workers, and create a new impetus capable of pushing the nation as a whole towards adopting a more far-reaching programme than that assigned to the present government.

No Sense Of Mission

This exercise has already produced papers and pamphlets by david blunkett and bernard crick (the labour party's aims and values: an unofficial statement), by tony benn (an agenda for labour and the aims and objectives of the labour party) and by neil kinnock and roy hattersley (a statement of democratic socialist aims and values).1 none of these would have been written but for the disasters which have hit the labour party and labour movement over the past 10 years. If labour's rethinking does not include or hint at a diagnosis of what went wrong with britain (and therefore what needs to be put right), 'what we need are statements not primarily aimed at inner-party debate, but directly at all who are concerned about britain's future' we leave the field open for the thatcherite diagnosis which lies behind, and gives force to, the thatcherite project of forcing britain into total privatisation by total state power.

Warhol—Image And Substance

Some have seen his art as a critique of society - by taking the most familiar images of us society, they argue that he is making us aware of how empty us society is; by focusing on blatantly commercial images, he tells us that we live in a crass commercial society; by the repetition of images he highlights the banality of the cul39 ture. this means that warhol's versions reproduce very well and so they are part of a never ending circuit - a postcard of his campbell's tomato soup tin is a reproduction of an image that is itself a hand reproduction of an image that has itself been reproduced on a mass scale.

Causes without a rebel

socialist feminist dissidents are often accused of being anti-working class when all we have done is rediscover that the priorities of poor women, working women waged and unwaged, have been ill-served by the labour movement, alias men's movement. Middle class labour professionals spurn feminism as a middle class preoc- cupation, ambitious white men scorn black competitors for being ambitious, and political parties feel safe from the poor because the poor aren't in parties.

NO PASARAN!; FREEDOM SONGS

The irish in spain had songs of their own struggles: off to dublin in the green was an ira remake of a british army recruiting song; connolly's rebel song was written by james connolly, a socialist executed by the british after the 1916 rising in dublin. the british, normally so reticent linguistically, enthusiastically learned songs in spanish like si me quieres escribir ('if you want to write to me'), el quinto regimiento (described by hugh thomas as 'one of the great revolutionary songs of all time') and los cuatro generates (an expression of defiance towards the four insurgent generals, franco, mola, varela and queipo de llano) and the sprightly viva la

Goodbye to the GLC

That's a albeit with much struggle - came to inform other areas, including internal staffing policies (the atmosphere at counthe politicians learnt from ty hall was genuinely multiracial in a red bologna quite new way); the introduction of contract compliance (for the first time in powerful potion, especially in london britain, and evidence of the glc's where civil society is highly developed, a progressive eclecticism, the idea being dense and rich undergrowth of activities imported from the us), or arts policy (the glc's cultural repertoire stretching from and organisations. meanwhile, in opposition, the left in the glc labour group dug itself deep into the london labour party, and found a new generation of candidates to stand in the 1981 election.

Sweets from a Stranger

Feminism appropria­ tes marxist theory, both to use it and criticise it in its opposition to patriarchal capitalism, sexism and men’s subor­ dination of women, and to women’s way of being women. orthodox leninism, or rather the canonised leninism most crudely expressed by trotskyist groups, may have incorporated the idea of the structural or organisational autonomy of groups outside the vanguard party, but that theory of the party fails to assimilate political autonomy.

Feminists in the Factory

The group tried to deal with this problem in different ways (a) trying to organise women ‘outside’ the union, e.g. calling the saturday meetings (b) putting out informa­ tion which would help women to know what was going on in different sections of the factory etc — crucial to trying to deal with the union (c) trying to influence the women shop stewards e.g. through setting up the equal pay day school. October issue includes articles on babysitting, birmingham women’s centre, rule of the women in greece, reports on self help in turin, women and council housing in glasgow as well as fashion in the 19c, book, film and theatre reviews.

Strike: Whittington Hospital 1973

rr: i heard from one woman working as a domestic at the royal free that she’d been to quite a few big, militant union meetings with a lot of women at them, but she felt that the women were very loath to take decision making positions, and she felt that male shop stewards had some­ thing to do with this - that they were kind of protective, that they didn’t believe that the women could really do anything. b: when we asked them to join in their own branch meet­ ings, we’ve got to explain to them what it entails because half of them don’t understand what the union’s about, and have never been involved in the union, not until they came out on strike, just paid their union money.

Hopes, Dreams & Dirty Nappies

People are for just £2 (£1.50 unwaged), you can take part in one of the social events in the socialist calendar.at merlin's cave, margery st, london wcl,on friday 14 december &t just send in the form below live music • late bar • food wild dancing • guest stars name _______ ______ address _ a seasonal spectacular for writers and readers alike-^ bring along a gift for marxism today's grand christmas appeal for the miners 11 i enclose £2 (waged) £1.50 (unwaged) - cheques payable to "marxism today*. ann j lane in her introduction to herland says, 'because women are nurturers of the young and bearers of the cultural values of love and co-operation, and because women have been excluded from the sources of power, they are in an ideal position to create an alternative social vision'.

THE FRENCH FAR RIGHT

In now constitute a serious handicap for the last ten years has made a name for itself on what was considered the 'red belt' around rpr and the udf who contributed so the fringe of constitutional politics by paris the front has built on its initial directly to their electoral success - the virulent and sometimes physical attacks on successes in the municipal elections last anti-jewish and anti-arab diatribes of the immigrant workers, and by fanatical anti- year, with 15.98% in seine saint denis, front leaders may scare centrist opinion communism (the front national was 14.62% in val de marne and 14.14% in away from the right. The radicalisation of the been successful in working class areas 37.5% to 20.7% and the communists from traditional right wing parliamentary par- where the percentage of immigrant work16.17% to 11.20%.

France's Resurgent Right

the restructuring of the french right the rise of the right, a trend which was whatever criteria are used — illustrated the ideological and organisa- already clear after only six months of left election or bye-election results, opinion tional rapprochement between the two tradi- government has been accompanied by polls, manifestations of popular support, tional currents of the parliamentary right, changes in the political and ideological militancy etc — the left experiment in the rassemblement pour la republique balance of forces within the right. The logistic help from the ultra-right political groups cannot be underestimated: during the medical students' strike in may-june the youth organisations of the the parti des forces nouvelles (pfn), the croupe union defense (gud) was extremely active in 'stewarding' demonstrations and sit-ins; the front national joined forces with right wing police unions in the demonstrations of june 23 against the justice minister r badinter (the right and extreme-right have been waging a smear campaign against badinter since he came into office, because of his key role in prison reform, the abolition of the death penalty, and his progressive views on delinquency, law and order etc).

Britain and Western Europe

Uk visible trade by region, 1913-80 region2 percentage shares1 1913 '29 '38 '48 '58 '65 '73 79 '80 29.8 27.9 21.1 15.6 19.8 25.0 32.8 42.4 41.2 7.3 7.9 8.8 10.4 10.3 13.9 17.6 16.6 16.1 eec other western europe europe usa 13.3 11.8 11.8 9.1 9.1 6.6 6.6 9.0 9.0 11.1 11.1 11.1 11.1 9.9 9.9 10.5 10.5 usa 13.3 japan 1.4 1.2 1.2 0.7 0.7 0.2 0.2 0.7 0.7 1.2 1.2 2.5 2.5 2.3 2.3 2.3 2.3 japan 1.4 white dominions 5.9 5.8 white dominions 13.8 13.8 16.1 16.1 23.0 23.0 24.5 24.5 21.121.1 18.3 18.3 10.9 10.9 5.9 5.8 oil exporters 3.4 3.7 3.7 7.17.110.0 10.07.6 7.6 7.9 9.2 oil exporters(opec) (opec) 2.4 2.4 3.4 7.9 7.9 7.9 9.2 newly industrializing 3.9 3.8 3.8 4.0 4.0 newly industrializing 3.5 3.5 3.0 3.0 2.7 2.7 3.5 3.5 2.8 2.8 3.0 3.0 3.9 countries countries other 20.7 24.2 22.7 16.2 16.2 9.8 9.8 8.4 8.4 8.1 8.1 other lessless 20.7 24.2 23.8 23.8 29.629.622.7 developed countries developed countries socialist countries 7.8 4.8 7.0 2.7 3.2 3.6 3.5 3.0 2.7 socialist countries 7.8 4.8 7.0 2.7 3.2 3.6 3.5 3.0 2.7 'average of region's share in uk exports and uk imports. Uk balance of trade in manufactures in 1980, by region, £ million region eec japan rest of the world total uk exports* 13,759 482 22,748 36,989 uk imports1 15,478 1,671 16,055 33,204 balance2 -1,719 -1,189 +6,693 + 3,785 source: uk overseas trade statistics 'exports are measured 'f.o.b' and imports 'c.l.f ^because of the way imports and exports are measured, the regional balances overestimate britain's deficit with japan and the eec and underestimate her surplus with the rest of the world.

To Stanworth and beyond

Whilst some ef!ers apparently expressed the 'need for more allies, especially coming from groups with similar objectives', there is clearly a suspicion of mainstream politics on the part of some of the most committed d1y activists, which extends to organisations which it seems barmy not to see other than as absolutely necessary allies.3 p art of this suspicion of people who are not, now, doing exactly what the most radical diy activists are currently involved in mirrors a lack selfconsciousness about the roots and background of their own politics. ncreasing numbers of articles in the left and liberal press - from red pepper and new times to new statesman and society and the guardian - were pointing to and amplifying the voices of the varied new protest movements: campaigners against the criminal justice act; animal rights activists at shoreham and coventry; environmental activists from road alert and earth first!.

A Letter from America

An application of its method would start from the facts the facts of america's economy, the facts of american democratic tradition, the facts of american productive development in the epoch of imperialism and of a new technological revolution with the splitting of the atom, the facts of how american labour exercised political pressure through the old corrupt capitalist parties, the facts of a higher standard of living than that of workers anywhere, facts which contradicted notions of increasing poverty, facts of the welfare state attained under the roosevelt new deal, the paradoxical facts of continuing monopoly control and the increasing influence of organized labour, the facts of a rising tide in the struggle for negro integration and lots more. One motivating reason for this " era of  88 the new reasoner unusually progressive politics," says david a. shannon, in his history of the socialist party, sponsored by the fund for the republic, was the influence of the socialist party.

War and Atrocity in Vietnam

one can safely predict that before long “malaysia” would be dead and buried, but it seems a pity that the british labour party should have unwittingly given its support to this toryinitiated plan and thus forfeited a large reservoir of mutual support which progressive movements throughout the world share, of the total votes at the last general elections; in singapore the barisan sosialis (35 per cent) and the united people’s party jointly polled 43 per cent of the votes on an anti-malaysia platform, as compared with 47 per cent by the governing party; in sarawak, the sarawak united people’s party commands over 40 per cent of the eleciorate; and these opposition parties have formed some sort of a united front to continue their opposition to “malaysia”. In short, a 5 per cent loan yields nearly 1.25 per cent extra to a company registered in “malaysia” or, in other words, for £250 of undistributed profits before tax a company in britain would get 5 per cent butits 82 spring 1964 g ; ] 2 snasciena the overwhelming dominance of western armed forces in that region, through bi-lateral agreements with local reactionaries and through s.e.a.t.o., constitute a threat to the asian peoples to work out for themselves without external interference their own forms of government and economic systems; it is against the united nations charter in that it makes that organisation condone a military alliance of one part of the world against another: it is a threat to peace because its real purpose is to provoke and maintain “limited” wars in that region based on the neo-colonial strategy of america’s defence peri-  abdul rahim karim subsidiary in “malaysia” would get 1.12 per cent.

One Day a short story

tion with prices determined by an inexorable interplay of producer costs and consumer demand is further undermined by the fact that unrestricted laissez-faire very rapidly throws up a great mountain of monopolistic, monopsonistic and other restrictive practices which prevent any equality between the marginal cost of the workers’ and producers’ effort and the marginal value to the consumer of the end product; and such an equality is fundamental to the way in which the price mechanism under laissez-faire is alleged to ensure a socially just use of resources. t h e n eed fo r d e m o c r a tic s o c ia lism in the search for socialism this, then, that i have described, is the variety of socialist political philosophy which alone seems to me to commend itself on the grounds of the fundamental moral imperatives of happiness and freedom which, unlike socialism in all its complexity, can and do seem intuitively, as well as rationally, acceptable and essential to anyone of a recognisably left wing general psychological disposition.

NATO, The Bomb and Socialism

As, for example, that between lord russell, the sage of c.n.d., and the russell who in the late 1940's could advocate crude atomic blackmail to force soviet totalitarianism to heel; or between the priestley who contributed to collier's magazine's notorious cold-war issue with prophecies of a russia devastated and poisoned by american bombardment, and the priestley of doomsday for dyson and anti-nuclear sanity; or between george kennan, advocate of "disengagement" in the reith lectures of 1957, and the nato strategist of "containment", "mr. x", of ten years earlier; or between "the labour left's honeymoon with american foreign policy" of 194850 (documented in leon d. epstein's britain—uneasy ally, whence the above phrase originates), and the paper that leads the anti-h bomb campaign of recent times. When the requirements of cold war strategy and of french colonialism conflicted in the withdrawal of nato-assigned divisions for the algerian war, the north atlantic council ambiguously expressed "the hope of an early and lasting settlement", and "noted the determination of the french government to restore, as soon as possible, its full contribution towards the common defence of europe" (nato letter, april 1st, 1956).