Dundee Marxists

06/02/2021

Boris Johnson’s recent visit to Scotland was supposed to demonstrate the strength of the United Kingdom and the benefits of “mutual cooperation” between its constituent nations. Few people were convinced, however, of the sincerity of the messenger, or the point of the message pitched by Britain’s ‘Minister for the Union’.

The transparently political nature of the Prime Minister’s sortie to Scotland during the middle of a nationwide lockdown was not lost on anyone.

The Conservatives are running out of ways to politically combat Scottish nationalism. Clearly, the British establishment are unsure of what they can do, if anything, to preserve the Union.

Read more at:

https://www.socialist.net/boris-not-welcome-pm-s-trip-to-scotland-provokes-anger.htm

03/02/2021

From the In Defence of Marxism website:

What is clear is that Myanmar will have no smooth, managed transition to bourgeois democracy. Its future is one of mass struggle and turbulence. The masses of Myanmar must look only to themselves and to the ideas of socialism for a real way out of the crisis.

The traditional left in Myanmar, due to the heavy hangover of Stalinism, is bogged down in the idea that there exists some kind of progressive wing of the ruling class of Myanmar, and that the role of the mass movement is to defend that wing against the more openly reactionary wing. This idea holds back the left in Myanmar from presenting a genuine independent voice, a true voice of the workers and peasants. What is required is an independent mass party of the working people.

The Marxists oppose the military coup, and they defend all democratic rights, but they also explain that in the long run such rights can be easily destroyed, as the present ongoing coup clearly demonstrates. The only way of guaranteeing a real end to the threat of continued military rule is to do away with the system that breeds it, the rule of the privileged elite, the rule of the capitalists and landlords, and replace it with a system where the workers decide. That is something that is worth fighting for in Myanmar.

Read the full article at: https://www.marxist.com/myanmar-coup-2021.htm

25/01/2021

Throughout history, revolutionaries have produced newspapers, pamphlets and magazines to put forward world changing ideas! We cannot trust our enemies, the capitalist class, to allow revolutionary ideas to be discussed in their media. Ideas are distorted, slandered and outright ignored in the hands of our class enemies. 

We cannot allow this to happen. We must fight back against these lies about socialism and communism with a revolutionary press. A press of our own where we can publish the truth.

This is why we produce the Revolution Paper, to spread ideas that can help to overthrow the capitalist order and bring about a new world. The new Revolution has important articles that affect both students and the working class. 

In the paper we discuss the political turbulence of the year past, in ‘2020: A Year In Review’. Also present is an article discussing the Conservative callousness towards school students and teachers, and looking at the union fightback from the National Education Union. Moreover, there are articles on LGBT liberation and how we fight for it, as well as our demands to the University bosses in the current rent strike wave.

Read more inside the Revolution and fight to change the world with the Marxist Student Federation.

23/01/2021

Strike Wave Brewing in UCU - Coordinated Action Needed!

Storm clouds are gathering as attacks on workers in the Universities and Colleges Union (UCU) escalate. The rumbling thunderclaps of class struggle remain isolated and localised for now. But these portend a general period of tumult, tempest, and lightning strikes.

Industrial action looks set to convulse campuses across the country. This is in response to employers’ attempts to force university staff to return to face-to-face teaching. Furthermore, management are seeking to institute a new wave of cuts.

Jo Grady’s support for strike ballots to resist an unsafe, premature return to on-campus teaching is therefore a welcome and necessary step.

What is now needed is to connect local struggles with a coordinated national campaign. This should be focused on giving staff control over any future decisions about face-to-face teaching; resisting escalating attacks (e.g. redundancies); and connecting the UCU’s struggles with the student rent strike campaigns and the NEU’s battle for safe schools.

With public sector workers across the board also facing job cuts, attacks on conditions, and a freeze on pay, unions in the education sector should be organising with a view to the calling of a one-day general strike across the public sector.

Read more at: https://www.socialist.net/strike-wave-brewing-in-ucu-coordinated-action-needed.htm

12/01/2021

Ofgem has predicted that energy companies will try and claw back lost profits by hiking up prices for millions of people.

This begs the question: If companies like British Gas – the UK’s biggest provider – can neither pay their workers a decent wage, nor provide affordable energy, then what are they good for?

These energy monopolies should be nationalised immediately – under workers’ control, and without compensation.

Socialist Appeal says:

No to pay cuts for British Gas workers!

Open up the books for British Gas and Centrica!

Forward to a rolling strike to make the bosses back down!

For solidarity across the labour movement, in support of striking workers!

Nationalise British Gas under workers’ control! Nationalise the Big Six energy companies as part of a socialist planned economy!

Read more at https://www.socialist.net/british-gas-support-striking-workers-and-fight-for-nationalisation.htm

08/01/2021

Trump's 'Insurrection' and the Chaos of U.S. Bourgeois Democracy

2021 has kicked off with a bang. If anyone had any remaining doubts, yesterday's events exposed the depth of the crisis of US capitalism—and it is only the beginning. Even in the turbulent years before and after the US Civil War, we have never seen the US Capitol building breached by protesters—and encouraged by the sitting president!

In the midst of a pandemic and economic slump, we cannot lose sight of labor's immense potential power. The working class is the overwhelming majority of the country, and without it, nothing is produced or transported. Not only is the working class capable of bringing the capitalist economy to a halt, but it is also the only social force that can defeat Trumpism and fundamentally transform society.

Labor should be mobilized to fight for a program of bold social demands, including a guaranteed $1,000-per-week minimum wage, an end to evictions, and a cap on rent of no more than 10% of income. Given the depth of the crisis, these demands would electrify millions and gain a massive echo if pushed seriously by millions of unionized workers. This would also undermine Trump's cynical efforts to pose as a “friend of the working class.”

A mass movement fighting for these demands would cut across the reactionary partisan polarization and unite the workers on a class basis. This cannot happen without leadership. The current union leaders put forward no such perspective, despite the mood of discontent and growing class-consciousness among the young generation of workers. Marxists must work with those currently engaged in building opposition networks in the unions, leavening the workers' struggles with revolutionary Marxist ideas.

Read more at: https://www.socialist.net/usa-trump-s-insurrection-and-the-chaos-of-us-bourgeois-democracy.htm

19/12/2020

Britain: Tories Continue Saudi Arms Spaces While Yemen Bleeds

As Lenin said, war is terrible – terribly profitable for the capitalists. Marxists must fight against the Tories’ war profiteering and imperialist ambitions and the flag-waving capitulation of Starmer, for genuine anti-imperialism in the Labour party and movement at large. Ultimately, can only be achieved by breaking entirely with capitalism and imperialism, which is a natural part of capitalism, and fighting for a society based on human need and welfare, not warfare.

Read more from this article at https://www.marxist.com/tories-saudi-arms-sales.htm

12/12/2020

The farmers’ movement is a ray of hope in the suffocated Indian political landscape. We welcome the upcoming days of action announced by the farmers’ leaders for 12 and 14 December. These will have a significant impact, as long as they can gather the mass support of workers and wider society. With every passing hour, the BJP and state media are spreading hatred against farmers, trying to poison the mass consciousness. They are branding them anti-patriotic agents, funded by the Pakistani and Chinese states; Khalistan nationalists; infiltrated by Muslim jihadists, etc. Furthermore, unless the movement pushes forward towards smashing the state and the entire capitalist system, it will lose people's support, inviting state aggression in the most brutal form. Farmers and their organisations have to actively reach out to major workers’ organisations and their rank-and-file members, making efforts to organise an indefinite general strike until their demands are met.

No to the anti-farmer and anti-worker bills!

All farmers' loans should be waived!

Provide land, housing and social security to landless peasants and workers!

Expropriate the monopolies!

For an indefinite general strike!

Overthrow the Modi regime!

Long live worker and farmer unity!

For a socialist revolution!

Read more at: https://www.marxist.com/india-countrywide-lockdown.htm

10/12/2020

Rotten Freeport Bid

Since September, discussions between Forth Ports, owner of the Port of Dundee, and Dundee City Council have progressed plans to establish a ‘freeport’ in the City. 

Companies operating in this freeport could defer the payment of tax until their products are moved elsewhere, or avoid tax altogether if they bring in goods to manufacture in the port before exporting them again. This would allegedly motivate businesses to develop industry in the area, since companies will prefer to avoid taxes cutting into their profit margin, and produce on site.

Read more at http://www.revolution.scot/2020/12/08/dundee-city-council-backs-rotten-freeport-bid/

04/12/2020

The illegal and inhumane detention of comrade Amar Fayaz, who was abducted by the Pakistani state, has been going on for over 2 weeks now. We call for workers and students from around the world to show their solidarity with the comrades of the Progressive Youth Alliance and demand the release of Amar Fayaz. Please sign this petition and write to your local Pakistani embassy

WE STAND AGAINST THE REPRESSION OF WORKERS EVERYWHERE

RELEASE AMAR FAYAZ!

Immediate release of Amar Fayaz