Just before 2012 closes out, I’m reposting my last Overland blog of the year, which originally appeared here. In some ways it is a summing up of themes we have developed at Left Flank since we started in mid-2010; chiefly in our attempts to present not just a general ideological or theoretical approach to the […]
11 Jun
As background to the recent posts on the situation in Greece, we’re reprinting the translation of an article written by PANOS GARGANAS, editor of the Workers Solidarity newspaper, from his organisation SEK’s Socialism From Below magazine, May-June 2012 issue. This piece was written just after the 6 May elections. Translation is by Costas Todoulos. The original […]
13 May
Read mainstream accounts of the massive electoral realignment in Greece and you notice a strange use of terminology. The pro-austerity parties — especially conservative New Democracy and centre-Left PASOK — are called “pro-bailout” and “moderate”, while the parties that oppose austerity are called “extremist” and “hard-line”. And there’s a tendency to portray the rise of new […]
19 Nov
Comments Off on End times for democracy? How the 1% staged a coup & why worse is yet to come
‘Don’t forget who runs your economy now.’ For the 1 percent who rule society, democracy seems more than ever a hindrance to ensuring that the most calamitous economic crisis since the 1930s is paid for by the 99 percent below them. The most obvious expression of this is the installation of unelected technocrats as prime […]
10 Nov
Comments Off on A Left Flank dispatch from Europe: The ‘descent into chaos’ begins
If the last week’s bizarre political contortions in Greece — first a referendum, then not, then a government of national unity, now more uncertainty — were not enough, the spread of contagion to Italy threatens even greater turmoil. As we arrived in London we were greeted by the Financial Times informing us that Silvio Berlusconi had (finally) […]
14 Aug
Comments Off on ‘Mama said there’ll be days like this’ — The UK riots, the labour movement and the Left
Special guest post by KEVIN OVENDEN* What did people expect? Just over a year ago, during the general election campaign in Britain, I remember George Galloway on the stump warning that the last time the Tories came in to replace an already dead Labour government and pursue full-blooded, class war policies, Britain’s cities went up […]
13 Aug
Comments Off on Intended or not, the consequences of riots are not always negative
Watts Riot of 1965 — how the rioters treated ‘their’ community then This is the original text of an article commissioned by ABC’s The Drum, which was published yesterday and can be found here. The riots in the United Kingdom, mainly involving school age and unemployed youth, have provoked a backlash that seeks to paint them […]
11 Aug
Comments Off on Whoever expects a ‘pure’ revolution will never live to see it: The UK riots in perspective
Mark Duggan, whose killing by police sparked the riots Maybe it’s a sign of the times, but for mine the most depressing thing about the UK riots is how some on the Left feel the need to loudly proclaim their lack of solidarity with some of the poorest and most oppressed people in society, instead resorting […]
07 Aug
Comments Off on US capitalism: ‘Take the money & run,’ or, ‘This sucker could go down, Mark II’
By liz_beths and Dr_Tad It is hard to grasp the epochal significance of ratings agency Standard & Poor’s downgrade of the United States’ credit rating, nothing less than an ideological humiliation of the world’s largest national economy. This after a week dominated by massive falls on stock markets across the globe and the “resolution” of the political […]
22 Jul
Comments Off on Beyond the age of austerity, a new pattern of resistance and revolution emerges
In apparently “normal” times we Marxists are given a hard time, derided for our economic determinism about the crisis-prone nature of capitalism, scoffed at for suggesting that revolutionary movements could possibly occur in modern times, and accused of totalitarian impulses if we suggest that conscious revolutionaries should try to cohere their forces. Often the most […]
30 Dec
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