Imperialism

Capitalist Globalisation and Imperialism

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The Workers Solidarity Movement position paper on Capitalist Globalisation and Imperialism, as ammended at July 2004 National Conference. This sits under the State and Democracy position paper.

The partition of Ireland

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WSM position paper on the partition of Ireland. Last debated and updated at the April 2009 conference. It sits under the State and Democracy position paper.

The Partition of Ireland

        A Workers Solidarity Movement Position Paper

 


Direct Action against the Iraq war in Ireland

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Across the globe millions of people mobilised against the war in Iraq. On February 15th 100,000 people marched through the streets of Dublin in the biggest political protest in Southern Ireland for over 20 years. Around 15,000 demonstrated in Belfast on the same day.

The turnout on these demonstrations showed that the battle for public opinion had been won. Massive numbers of people opposed Bush and Blair's drive to war and the Irish government's role in it. But they seem to have had very little effect on the war. The governments concerned simply ignored them. In every country the anti-war movement was thus faced with the question of what to do next. After February 15th we should have expected to see the various movements internationally working on ways to stop the war despite the fact that their respective governments were ignoring them.

What is Imperialism?

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Imperialism is one of those words that often seems to be little more than an effective way of making people stop listening to you. However, despite the frequency with which it is thrown around by left wing groups, with little or no explanation of the ideas behind it, it does have real meaning and is something that we can all recognise in the world around us - especially in this age of US wars against third world regimes.

Revolutionary Anarchism & the Anti-Globalization Movement

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Riot police battling youth. Armed forces locking down a major American city. Tens of thousands under anti-capitalist banners. Western youth and workers physically battling the WTO and imperialism. These potent images of the 'battle of Seattle', November 30, 1999, were seared into the minds of militants the world over, inspiring millions upon millions fighting against the class war from above that some call 'globalization'. Followed by further mass protests in Washington and Davos, and two massive international coordinated actions on May 1, 2000 and September 26, 2000, Seattle marked, by any measure, an important turning point for the global working class and peasantry.

Hobson's choice : The "Good Friday Agreement" and the Irish Left

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Until the Real IRA blasted the heart out of Omagh and its people, the Northern "peace process" appeared to be close to achieving the impossible. Loyalists and Republicans alike signing up to the "Good Friday Agreement", its acceptance by large majorities on both sides of the border, Gerry Adams and Ian Paisley sitting down in the same room as part of the new Assembly - it seemed as if what had appeared for decades to be impossible had been overtaken by the realpolitik of the pragmatic. All sides in the "conflict" - we were led to believe - were looking to a new beginning. Countless column inches in the popular press had been written eulogising the "statesmanship" of David Trimble and Seamus Mallon, the "peacemaking skills" of Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern and the "pragmatism" of Gerry Adams and David Ervine.

The consequences of the fall of the Berlin wall & Eastern European dictatorships

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WHAT WAS ANYONE to make of the fact that students began hanging pears from apple trees on the morning of December 20th 1990 at Bucharest University? For, early that same morning, workers were bussed from all over Romania to attend a 'spontaneous' demonstration in front of Party buildings in support of the dictator, Nicolai Ceausescu. The students at Bucharest University, aware of the real mood in the country, were satirising a famous speech made by Ceausescu to the effect that Stalinist party policy in Romania would only change when 'pears began to grow from apple trees' - the students proved to be singularly accurate with their timing.

Sinn Fein and the 'Peace Process'

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The 'Irish peace process' is now well into its second year. It has brought respectability for Sinn Féin but little of consequence for the Irish working class - North or South. Gregor Kerr a member of the National Committee of the Irish Anti Extradition Committee in the late 1980s, looks at events leading up to the cease-fire and Sinn Féin's pan-nationalist strategy.

Since the ending of the 'Cold War', many national liberation struggles throughout the world have been 'settled'. In places as far apart as South Africa, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Palestine these national liberation struggles were led by groupings which were often seen as having left leanings. However in all of these cases the 'settlement' was far from socialist. The current 'Irish peace process' is following exactly the same lines and has nothing to offer the Irish working class North or South

Dublin protests against Trump visit

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Donald Trump's visit to Ireland is defined, as you might expect, by cynicism. He seems to be here mostly in order to promote his hotel in Doonbeg. This is the hotel that rather famously, despite him being a major climate change denier, perhaps the leading climate change denier, that he has applied for planning permission to build a seawall to protect the hotel against rising sea levels!

Brexit & a border poll - an anarchist view on the possibilities and consequences

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“Every exclusively political revolution that is in defence of national independence or for internal change... [and] that does not aim at the immediate and real political and economic emancipation of people, will be a false revolution. Its objectives will be unattainable and its consequences reactionary.” Michael Bakunin.

With less the two months until the Brexit deadline, the North of Ireland remains on edge as the British PM announces plans to deploy police reinforcements to six counties echoing past images for many of aggressive border checkpoints and control stoking up conflict.
In the the midst of this Brexit spectacle the real war continues to ravage the streets, housing estates and workplaces across the North in the form of a brutal austerity agenda of class warfare in cuts to public services and social welfare under the Stormont Fresh Start Agreement resulting in misery and deprivation for the many while the wealthy few have never had it so good on a local and global level. According to a recent report released by Oxfam in January this year ‘Billionaire fortunes increased by 12 percent last year – or $2.5 billion a day - while the 3.8 billion people who make up the poorest half of humanity saw their wealth decline by 11 percent’ (1)

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