How Socialists Won Our Democratic Rights
The myth of modern democracy is that it was handed down from on-high. In fact, the ruling class resisted extending the franchise at every turn – and it was socialists who fought them for the right to vote.
4300 Articles by:
Raven Hart
Raven Hart is co-founder of the Bristol Cooperative Alliance, an organisation that aims to promote a decentralised economy that empowers local communities and facilitates democratic self-determination.
The Covid Crisis Could Produce a Rail Revolution
With air travel decimated by the pandemic, countries across Europe are investing in high-speed rail networks – now is the time for Britain to invest, and ensure its regions aren’t left behind once again.
How Socialists Invented the Summer Holiday
In 1930s France, the labour movement made summer holidays a priority — and forced bosses to pay workers for time at the beach.
Remembering John Weeks
Late last month, pioneering socialist economist John Weeks passed away. Ann Pettifor remembers her colleague and friend – and his contributions to left-wing politics.
Clapping Was Not Enough – It’s Time to Give NHS Workers a Pay Rise
Today, across Britain, the same NHS workers that the government called ‘heroes’ during this pandemic had to protest for decent wages and working conditions. The time for clapping is over – they deserve a pay rise.
How the Black Death Changed the World
In just a few years, the Black Death wiped out more than one third of Europe’s population. The world it left behind offered new possibilities for peasants and workers to resist their masters.
Rock in Opposition
A new book on the experimental group Henry Cow concentrates on their attempts to combine socialist politics and avant-garde music.
How the Southbank Centre Betrayed Arts Workers
London’s Southbank Centre is a product of municipal socialism – but today it represents a corporate attitude to the arts, with plans to layoff nearly 400 workers while managers earn six-figure sums.
How Communities Can Organise to Save our Towns
Across Britain, high streets are dying as decades of decline are accelerated by Covid-19 – it’s time to organise not only to save town centres but to transform them into genuine public spaces.
Remembering Michael Manley
On Jamaican Independence Day, we remember the country’s firebrand socialist leader Michael Manley – and his struggle in the 1970s to improve the lives of workers and the poor.
BT’s Attack on Key Workers
BT workers kept Britain connected during Covid-19 – but instead of a reward from the company they now face forced redundancies and cuts to terms and conditions.
Privatised Test and Trace Is a Tory Mess
Instead of investing in public test and trace, the Tory government handed the system over to outsourcing giant Serco and a call centre company. Inevitably, it has failed to deliver.
Hiroshima at 75
The United States dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima 75 years ago today. It remains an act of barbarism unparalleled in the history of war – and its use was never a necessity.
How Market Ideology Destroyed Resilience in our NHS
Corporate management tactics – and the mantra to ‘do more with less’ – claimed to be cutting waste from the NHS, but what they actually cut was resilience and its ability to deal with crises like Covid-19.
Friedrich Engels and the Irish Lever
Friedrich Engels was born 200 years ago today. We remember his engagement with the Irish question – and why he came to believe that, for workers in England to gain their freedom, “the lever must be applied in Ireland.”
Universal Basic Services: A New Model of Collectivism
The labour movement should respond to this economic crisis with a bold vision of a society where everyone is guaranteed the basics in life – and collective interests are more important than private profits.
Roger McKenzie: ‘If We’re Not Organised, We Can’t Win’
Unison general secretary candidate Roger McKenzie on his plans to revive organising in the union, grow its activist base, transform the social care sector – and defend Labour’s pro-worker policies.
Eat Out to Help Rishi
The ‘Eat Out to Help Out’ campaign won’t save jobs, but it will hand over millions of pounds in subsidies to major corporations – and set the ball rolling on Rishi Sunak’s leadership campaign.
How the Government Abandoned the Self-Employed
After years of allowing self-employment to replace secure and well-paid work, the government promptly abandoned the self-employed during this crisis – for the millions left behind, it’s time to organise for better.
Failing Class
In today’s Scottish Highers, working-class young people found their results disproportionately downgraded because of their schools’ history – locking in the educational inequality that plagues the system.