At the University of East Anglia recently Rob Sewell of the Socialist
Appeal gave a talk on the Miners strike in Britain 1984-5. The strike
was a culmination of the inevitable build up of tension between the
ruling and working class. In the post-war period the decline of British
imperialism had occured. The Tories of the 1980s were a rabid reaction
to that phenomenon, determined to destroy the organised labour movement
by taking on its most militant section, the National Union of Miners. Listen here to Part 1 and Part 2.
Read more: The Miners strike
Fred Weston of the International Marxist Tendency, and editor of In
Defence of Marxism, talks on Leon Trotsky's theory of the Permanent
Revolution. This marxist concept constitued the main ideological
opposition to Stalin's theory of 'socialism in one country', which came
to be the dominant outlook of the Soviet bureaucracy, that grew out of
the isolation and degeneration of the young workers state. Part 1 and Part 2.
Read more: The Permanent Revolution
At a meeting in London in November 2007 Linda Clarke of the Socialist Appeal
talks about Marxism in relation to the national Question. Linda talks
about the history and evolution of the nation state, the meaning of
bourgeois nationalism, and deals with the particular circumstances of
the national question in relation to Scotland, Ireland and the position
of the Marxists during the Falklands war. Listen to part1 and part2.
Read more: Marxism and the National Question
Supporters of the Venezuelan revolution held a meeting at Cardiff University (Britain) on November 14, 2007. This
meeting was held in order to explain the significance of events that have taken
place in Venezuela over the last 10 years and to spread the message that is
coming out of Latin America: that there is an alternative to capitalism in the
21st century - socialism. Listen to Fred
Weston's introduction here and summing up here.
Read more: What's all the fuss? Hands off Venezuela at Cardiff University
Mick Brooks of the Socialist Appeal Editorial Board spoke recently
at a meeting organised by Socialist Appeal supporters in London on
Britain and the World Economy, looking in particular at the financial
panic that began in August. Listen to Part 1 and Part 2.
Read more: Britain and the World Economy
Alan Woods talks to the ULU Marxist Society in London on the topic of 'Marxism
and Religion'. Alan explains the materialist conception of the world,
integral to the theory of Marxism, and contrasts it to the idealist
perspective that gives rise to religion. Alan explains the nature of
religion as a means of consoling the oppressed with a life after death,
the tendency of the church to break down along class lines, as well as
the trade union credentials of God. Listen to part 1 and part 2.
Read more: Marxism and Religion
In the first of a series of talks, Alan Woods adresses the Greenwich
branch of the Socialist Appeal on the need for Philosophy, especially
for those who are interested in the perspective of revolution. This
talk begins with the materialist pre-Socratics of Greece, where real
philosophy began, and the father of dialectics - Heraclitus. The
relevance to politics of having a philosophy is to explain the apparent
static reality of things, which is in fact a surface appearance that
conceals maturing contradictions. Part 1.1 and Part 1.2.
Read more: The History of Philosophy
This recording was made at the Socialist Appeal day school in London in July 2007, where comrades gathered to hear Fred Weston, editor of www.marxist.com, talk on the current situation in the Middle East. The
talk covers primarily the situation in Israel and Palestine, the war
last summer between Israel and Lebanon and the situation in Iraq.
Listen to part 1 and part 2.
Read more: The Crisis in the Middle East
Fred Weston, editor of the website In Defence of Marxism,
talks about the current situation in Brazil at the London Aggregate of
the Socialist Appeal at the begining of July 2007. The occupied factories
movement in Brazil is symptomatic of the extreme instability throughout
the Latin American continent, as is the Lula governments attempts to
divide the working class along race lines and its recent attacks on the
CIPLA and Flasko occupied factories. Listen to part 1 and part 2.
Read more: The Situation in Brazil