January/February 2022

TheSocialist

PaPer of the SocialiSt Party

iSSue 151

January / february 2023

no to far-right racism, housing profiteering & Govt inaction

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2

News & aNalysis

The socialist

2022 in numbers – another year of capitalist chaos $97 billion

homelessness crisis isn’t being dealt with due to government policy of reliance on the private market.

this is the total profits of the world’s largest coal mining companies. in spite of the worsening existential climate crisis, for which these companies are majorly responsible, they managed to triple their profits in 2022. Some did even better: Glencore earned $13.2 billion in the 12 months ending on 30 June, compared with $1.2 billion the year before, china Shenhua made $12.2 billion, compared with $288 million, and bhP brought in $9.5 billion.

46 this is the amount of days women in the eu worked for free due to the persistent gender pay gap. tuesday, 15 november 2022 was the eu unequal Pay Day; from that date to December 31 women worked for free because of the structural discrimination women face across all sectors and countries. the pay gap was slightly less than the previous year, but this was not because of women’s pay rising, but because of unemployment affecting maledominated sectors more.

9.2% ireland's inflation rate from

6,023 the amount of children killed or injured in the united States by gunfire in 2022, the most ever recorded in the 90-year history of a nonprofit that tracks shooting incidents. it was also the second worst year ever recorded for mass shootings (four or more people shot), of which there were 617 incidents through november 2022.

october 2021 to october 2022, a 38-year high. 2022 saw workingclass people thrown into a cost of living crisis – prices of food, fuel, heating and many other essentials soared with minimal action taken by the government in its budget. it even set aside €2 billion for a ‘rainy day fund’, but for working-class people, it is raining cats and dogs!

$270 billion this is the estimated cost of the damage caused by extreme weather events in 2022. the costliest natural disaster in 2022 was hurricane ian in the uS, which caused losses of around $100 billion. the 2022 total was less

than the 2021 estimate of $320 billion, but it’s clear these incredible costs will be a feature every year ahead.

1,739 the number of people killed in

By Peter McGregor

floods that covered one-third of Pakistan. the floods were described as the worst in Pakistan’s history and was caused by an intense Monsoon season coupled with water from melting glaciersboth of which are serious consequences of climate change. the floods were disastrous, causing $10 billion of damage and affecting 30 million people.

1 million the number of working days lost to strike action in the uK in 2022, the most since 2011. in the context of the cost of living crisis, rising inflation, and a fumbling tory government, workers in britain across many different sectors took strike action.

11,542 the number of people accommodated by homeless services in ireland in november, up 26.2% in a year. this is just the tip of the iceberg of the overall crisis, as there are tens of thousands on housing waiting lists and thousands more without secure accommodation. Successive governments have failed to deal with the housing crisis, but it isn’t a question of a lack of resources or funds – the housing and

From ashling to Bruna: action needed to stop rise of violent misogyny by emma Quinn

T

HE KILLING of 28-year-old Bruna Fonseca on New Year’s Day 2023 was a painful and poignant close to what was a horrific year for femicide and gender violence, and sends a stark warning for 2023. Bruna was the first victim of men’s violence against women in 2023. Her murder took place just days before the first anniversary of Ashling Murphy’s murder, the first woman killed in 2022.

Between the killings of Ashling and Bruna, 11 other women were murdered by men in this state. Over Christmas two pregnant women were murdered: Natalie Mc Nally in Northern Ireland and a young Dublin mother, Ailish Walsh, who was killed in London.

A pandemic of violence

Women’s Aid has said statistics confirm that 2022 was “a terrible year for violence against women, both in Ireland and globally”. In Spain, 11 women were killed by their partners or ex-partners in the month of December alone. In this state in the first half of 2022, reported rapes increased by 23%, and at the beginning of December there had been 49,257 domestic abuse reports received

by Gardaí – an increase of 9% over the same period in 2021. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as most go unreported.

Worsened by the Covid pandemic and its wide-ranging impact on women, the “pandemic of gender violence” is still raging and emergency action is overdue. In the aftermath of the killing of Ashling Murphy and the enormous public outcry that followed, the government published “a zero tolerance policy to tackle domestic, sexual and gender-based violence”. A welcome development but also too little, too late and still much too slow.

Misogyny consciously injected

The capitalist system has always relied on and profited from the systematic oppression of women; using backward, stereotypical gender roles, laws, the state, as well as promoting the patriarchal family structure, to ensure women provide essential care work, are low paid, are exploited and objectified for profit by the beauty and sex industries.

But in recent times, lowlife “influencers” like Andrew Tate and figures like Jordan Peterson are part of a conscious ratcheting up of backward, misogynistic ideas. We are in the middle of an organised backlash against the global feminist wave and active movements against oppression that began in the 2010s, from Ni Una Menos to #MeToo and BLM, to the struggles for abortion and LGBTQ+ rights and the many gains that were won globally.

Tens of thousands protested to demand action after the murder of Ashling Murphy in January 2022, but much remains to be done

That backlash includes millions of boys and young men being targeted online via “the manosphere”: an enormous collection of websites, blogs, and forums promoting toxic masculinity, male entitlement, and opposition to gender equality. These anti-feminist figures, and the social media companies they use to effectively promote themselves (benefiting from algorithms that promote controversy, targeting select demographics), are making huge profits

by grooming boys and men to hate women on a massive scale, and the impact of this is immeasurable.

Socialist feminist movements

Misogyny, gender violence, racism are rampant but they are not natural or inevitable. Capitalism has a vested interest in amplifying all divisions, including by promoting toxic masculinity and rigid gender roles.

Evidence shows that the most impor-

tant drivers of social change are strong and active social movements. Building campaigns will literally save lives, push back the alt-right misogynists and challenge backward attitudes generally, and is the most effective way of pressuring the government to act now.

Now more than ever we have to actively build working-class and socialist movements of solidarity that proactively take on backward ideas and the system that fosters them.

health & iNequality

3

The socialist

Record number on hospital trollies: legacy of underfunding and austerity

Oxfam’s ‘Survival of the Richest’ report

by Donal Devlin

2

023 opened with an all-too-familiar story of overcrowding in public hospitals across the state – only, this time, it’s worse. A record 931 and 838 people were lying on trollies, waiting on a hospital bed, on 3 and 4 of January respectively. While these record numbers may ease in the coming weeks they are indicative of a wider crisis in our health service. by laura fitzgerald

Record figures

The government has tried to avoid blame for this crisis, suggesting it is the by-product of the “perfect storm” of rising flu, RSV and Covid cases. However, this problem is ultimately the result of decades of underfunding and austerity that has had a devastating impact on the health service.

In the past ten years, successive governments – including both Labour and the Greens, along with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil – have closed eight A&E units. On top of this, the number of beds in the state has fallen by over a third since 2008 - then, the number of beds stood at 21,789; today, it stands at 14,412. This is despite the fact that the population of the state has risen by 200,000 in the same period. The number of hospital beds is significantly below the EU average – the latter figure is 387 beds per 100,000 people; in Ireland, this figure stands at 269 beds per 100,000.

Staff retention

Another factor driving the crisis in our health service is the question of staff re-

Nurses should be supported in taking industrial action to improve conditions in hospitals

tention. Working in an underfunded service on poor pay and conditions is undoubtedly a difficult and demoralising experience. A recent survey carried out by the INMO found that two-thirds of nurses are considering emigrating and one-third are considering leaving the major cities because of the cost-of-living crisis. A similar situation is being faced by other public sector workers such as teachers, thus putting further pressure on vital services.

We need emergency measures to tackle this crisis.The decision of the INMO to ballot its members to take industrial action on this issue is an important and necessary one. They mobilise

the power of their members and link in with working-class communities that are being hit by perennial crises.

We need:

l Permanently nationalise private hospitals with no compensation, ending the obscene existence of a two-tier health service. l Tax big business and the super-rich's wealth – from 2021 to 2022, Ireland’s nine richest billionaires increased their wealth by €10.8 billion. l Notwithstanding the Irish state’s low tax regime, an additional €7.3 billion came in revenue from corporation tax last year, meaning huge profits are

being made in the Irish economy. l Recruit more healthcare staff on decent wages and conditions, so we can retain them. Build public houses so they have a place to live! l Invest in a one-tier, top-quality, national public health service that is free at the point of use and funded through progressive taxation.

This whole crisis graphically exposes where the priorities of capitalism in our society lie, and it is certainly not with the interests of ordinary, working-class people. We need to break with this system and use the wealth and resources of society for the needs and benefit of all.

Varadkar’s hollow commitments won’t end child poverty by conor burke

U

PON COMMENCING his second spell as Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar highlighted the issue of child poverty as a crisis that his government would supposedly make a priority to deal with over the remainder of its term in office. This pseudocommitment should be treated with the derision that it deserves.

This is a government that is presiding over a devastating housing crisis that is seeing a record number of children living in emergency accommodation. At the time of writing, there are over 3,000 children in emergency accommodation.

They not only grow up in a “home” that is overcrowded, with a poor diet and often lack the necessary educational facilities given that they are often forced to change where they live.

Who is being hit?

In 2022 there were an estimated 1,201,618 children living in Ireland, accounting for 23.6% of the total population. Of these, just under 200,000 were living in a household experiencing poverty. These figures were calculated before the worst impacts of the cost-of-living crisis, therefore we can

One in six children in Ireland live in poverty

assume that the numbers today are even higher. For children living in one parent families, the majority of whom are women, the rate of deprivation is much worse.

Households living below the poverty line are hardest hit by inflation as the cost of basic food staples, raising energy costs, and rising rents are compounded by stagnant or reduced wages and social welfare payments (due to inflation).

Not surprisingly, children living in poverty are much more likely to live in deprivation as adults. It is a vicious cycle caused by the policies of this and successive governments. They have refused to invest the necessary sums in public homes, and public services such as education.

Capitalism is the root cause of this unending cycle of impoverishment. It’s outrageous that we live in a world in which children are condemned from birth to live in poverty. Child poverty should not be an issue today – in a world of so much wealth – and we should not accept it. We need to organise, and build a new working-class movement to eradicate it – along with the rule of Varadkar’s government and the capitalist system they so worship.

The richesT 1% of irish society now owns more than a quarter of the country's wealth or €232 billion, according to a new Oxfam report.

Shockingly, it found that the two richest people here – with €15 billion between them – have 50% more wealth than the poorest half of the population! in total, there are now eight irish billionaires, but 1,435 people in ireland have more than €47 million each, while 20,575 have more than €4.7 million each. Since 2012, the numbers in both those categories have more than doubled. the report makes the point that for every €93 of wealth created in ireland over the past decade, €31 has gone to the richest 1% and less than 50 cent to the bottom 50%! in other words, the richest 1% has gained 70 times more wealth than the bottom 50% in the last ten years. the richest 10% now owns nearly two-thirds of the wealth – a staggering €547 billion combined. at the same time, the poorest 50% of the population owns only 1% of wealth.

No more billionaires Globally, in the last two years the richest 1% of the world's population has gained nearly twice as much wealth as the rest of humanity put together. billionaire fortunes are increasing by $2.7 billion a day. Meanwhile, over 800 million people go to bed hungry every night. oxfam argues for the halving of the wealth and number of billionaires between now and 2030. it calculates that in ireland a wealth tax with graduated rates of 2%, 3% and 5% above a high threshold of €4.7 million would raise €8.2 billion a year. these are welcome proposals, but we need to go much further. billionaires can only exist because billions of workers and poor people are exploited and impoverished to make their billions in wealth. in other words, billionaires are not billionaires despite of the obscene inequality in the world, which is bad enough, but because of the obscene inequality in the world. therefore, we need to fight for a world without billionaires altogether; a socialist world.

4

aNalysis

The socialist

Far-right protests – how can we defeat racist division? nity protest which was joined by hundreds. We need a fightback against the threat of the far right.

But in order to be effective and to win as many as possible away from the orbit of the right, this fightback has to be clearly opposed to the government and capitalist establishment. It has to put forward a real alternative, based on uniting all working-class people in a struggle for a decent life for all.

by conor Payne

P

ROTESTS HAVE been organised in many different parts of the country outside buildings being used to accommodate refugees; including in East Wall, Ballymun, and Drimnagh in Dublin, Fermoy in Cork and in Killarney in Kerry. In some cases, these protests have attracted crowds of hundreds of people.

The refugees in these centres are fleeing the war in Ukraine or other wars, persecution, and devastation.

Large crowds gathered outside these facilities, shouting slogans like ‘Get them out’, is obviously intimidation and must cause real fear and distress to those being targeted.

The protests are being driven by an emboldened far right, who want to use the refugee crisis to push their own noxious agenda of racist division, and turning back the clock on women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and church control.

Stirring up racism

At the same time, the protests have drawn in others who are not part of the far right. There are racist attitudes in society and these are being consciously played upon with pernicious arguments about ‘unvetted males’ arriving in the country. However, there is also a real concern in many communities that it isn’t possible to accommodate the number of refugees who are coming to Ireland or about the impact of a sudden increase in populations in areas that are already suffering from a lack of housing and services.

We should demand:

Hundreds protested in Fermoy, Co. Cork, to oppose the racist fear-mongering of the far right

The government bears responsibility for giving the far right opportunity to take advantage of this situation. There is a crippling housing crisis, with record numbers in emergency accommodation, many living in substandard conditions, rents at an all-time high. Many public services are at breaking point, including GP and health services. Meanwhile, they have failed completely to plan properly for the increased numbers of refugees since the war on Ukraine began, resulting in many who arrive here being housed in completely unsuitable and inhumane conditions.

Refugees not to blame

The different crises in our society are not caused by refugees, and have existed long before the current war in Ukraine began. They are caused by the under-

funding of public services, the refusal over years to build public housing, a system which places the private vested interests of landlords and developers above the needs of working-class people.

There are more than enough resources in this country to ensure homes, services and decent living standards for all.

There are 166,000 vacant and derelict homes in the state and the wealth of Ireland’s billionaires went up by €16 billion during the pandemic alone. Multinational corporations here are making record profits and the government had a €5 billion surplus last year. But this government’s neglect creates a situation in which ordinary working-class people feel forced to compete with each other for access to housing and other necessities.

Protesting refugees will not improve

anything in working-class communities. What’s needed is a united movement of working-class people of all backgrounds to take on the government and their system; and to demand public homes for all, a real public health service and major investment in longneglected communities. The far right forces are completely opposed to this, and by deflecting attention to refugees are in fact protecting the status quo and those in power.

Far right can be pushed back

But they can be pushed back. We shouldn’t believe for a second that there is widespread support for these protests in the communities where they are taking place. In Fermoy, protests against Ukrainian refugees were significantly outnumbered by an anti-racist commu-

l Build public housing on a massive scale. Cut and freeze rents, make the eviction ban permanent. Seize all land and property that is being hoarded for profit and use it for public housing. l Invest in a new national public health service, free at the point of use.

End the two tier health service. l End Direct Provision, defend the right to asylum. All refugees should have the equal right to study and work.

No to deportations. l Organise to take on the far right, and divide and rule politics. Get organised in communities to challenge the myths about refugees and migrants and put forward an alternative based on uniting working-class people. With over 500,000 members, the trade unions could play a key role in mobilising working people against racist division. l Build a struggle against capitalism, which has always promoted racism and division among the working class.

Fight for a democratic socialist society that uses the wealth and resources to fulfil the needs of all, for a world without inequality and oppression.

new taoiseach, same disastrous right-wing policies

by Mick barry tD Lewis carrOLL's Through The Looking-Glass, published in 1871, featured the characters Tweedledum and Tweedledee. according to wikipedia, The Tweedle brothers “agree to have a battle, but never have one... rather, they complement each other's words, which led John Tenniel to portray them as twins in his illustrations for the book." fianna fáil and fine Gael are today the tweedledum and tweedledee of irish politics. as if to prove the point they swapped around the two top jobs in irish politics in December, and the policy of the Government will stay more or less exactly the same.

Protecting the wealthy formed in the Summer of 2020, the fianna fáil / fine Gael / Green Party coalition has consistently and vigorously prioritised the interests of big business, the wealthy and big landlords over the interests of working people and the poor.

the corporate media has tended to praise them for their handling of the crisis that immediately confronted them after taking office – the covid pandemic. but the reality is that thousands died unnecessarily as a result of the premature lifting of a lockdown in the summer of 2020 and again with the premature lifting of another before christmas 2020. in both instances the Government bowed to pressure from business interests and recklessly gambled with the health of the population.

Similarly, the Government has not been anywhere near sufficiently bold with cost of living countermeasures and has stood idly by while capitalist profiteering has gone on left, right and centre. abysmal record on housing nowhere has this Government's failure (or its ties to monied interests) been seen more clearly than in relation to the housing crisis. it has failed to halt the relentless rise in rents, which are up 82% in a decade compared to an eu average of 18%. a record 11,300 plus people includ-

ing 3,000 plus children spent christmas in emergency accommodation, some of them for the second, third or even fourth time.

Varadkar and coveney are pushing for tax breaks for developers as the way to deal with the crisis. it is typical that this Government considers such a market-driven "solution" to tackle a problem caused by the failures of the self-same capitalist market.

Bigger problems to come commentary about the Government now reaching "the half-way stage" belies the fact that this Dáil is closer now to the 60% mark. a General election must take place by March 2025 and local and european elections are due in May 2024. the Government may decide to hang together rather than hang separately and try to keep going to the bitter end. alternatively, jockeying for position between fianna fáil and fine Gael could cause instability as could jockeying for position within fianna fáil after Martin's step down from the taoiseach's position and as the Gen-

FF and FG: political and ideological kindred spirits

eral election draws nearer. irrespective of whether harmony is disrupted in the tweedledum / tweedledee camp, it is a sure thing that the pair of them will be casting a nervous eye on a discontented public. their

capitalist system faces major crises both here in ireland and globally, the necessity of building a socialist alternative to the parties who dutifully serve this order has never been greater.

NoRth

5

The socialist

Tories go on the offensive against working-class people

escalate the action to a 24-hour general strike!

by Sean burns

2

023 LOOKS set to be marked by a renewed upswing in industrial action as more strike ballots are being returned successfully. The National Education Union (NEU) in Britain, as well as Scottish teachers are joining the strike action. Likewise the ongoing struggles in Royal Mail, health, and universities are set to continue.

This is no surprise as the ongoing pressure on workers’ pockets continues to mount.

The fact that inflation looks set to halve by the end of the year will provide little comfort to workers when wages have not met rising inflation. Energy costs increased by 70% last year, while food costs rose by 11.6%. The Tories’ response has been wholly inadequate cost of living payments, while welcome, barely scratch the surface given the depth of the crisis.

They have refused to seriously tackle the rampant profiteering by the likes of big energy companies pulling in over £16 billion in profits last year. Instead, the Tories have laid bare their intentions of going on an offensive against workers, including with legislation that would make strike action ineffective – by introducing minimum service levels and allowing the use of agency staff to break pickets.

be an immensely powerful stand by and for working people. The Tories recognise this fact even if the TUC leadership does not.

Co-ordinate the strikes

It is in this context that the TUC has announced a day of “events” to “protect the right to strike” on 1 February. It is positive that there is some resistance to the Tories’ attempt to introduce this legislation – beyond a lacklustre legal challenge – but what is notably absent is a call to coordinate the strike action.

125,000 Royal Mail and Post Office workers, 50,000 rail workers, 100,000 civil service workers, 30,000 ambulance workers, 100,000 nurses, 70,000 university workers and 60,000 Scottish teachers will have active strike ballots on that day. At the very least the call for those workers to time their action to be on the same day would drastically increase the impact of the action against the Tories, but also crucially assist the individual disputes in securing victories. We are stronger when we strike together.

Attempts to justify this mis-leadership from the TUC have amounted to, in effect, an appeal to the establishment to be reasonable. The Tories have made clear that they are not reasonable nor willing to concede a fair deal to workers.

In a similar vein, the TUC General Secretary has downplayed calls for a general strike. The Financial Times reported him stating, “it would make lit-

The way forward

125,000 Royal Mail and Post Office workers will ballot on 1 February

tle sense to groups as disparate as teachers and physiotherapists who were worried about pay, but hardly inclined to militancy.” Such a view is the opposite of reality!

Workers across the board, in every sector are facing the same issues: pay

not matching inflation, intransigent employers refusing to give an inch, and a hostile Tory government. Moreover, they are more often on strike at the same time. The coming together of these disputes, and others that may arise, in a 24-hour general strike would

The alternative strategy of the TUC General Secretary would appear to be along the lines of ‘wait for Labour’.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions’ strategy is little different in 'wait for Stormont return.'

Trade union activists must come together to discuss how to coordinate strike action and maximise the effectiveness of their actions. This should include pressuring the leaderships of individual unions to co-operate in and across sectors.

Crucially, we must push for a strategy that seriously confronts the Tories and raises demands that will deliver a lasting change for workers, including inflation-linked pay rises and the repeal of anti-union laws.

Adjacent to a serious industrial strategy, a political strategy needs to be developed that forges a new party for working-class people that is based on the struggles of workers, and accountable to them, and crucially, armed with anti-sectarian and socialist politics that can challenge the crisisridden capitalist system and its representatives.

6 special featuRe Collins Dictionary has decided that the word of the year for 2022 is ‘permacrisis,’ because it “sums up just how truly awful 2022 has been for so many people.” This word is a paradox. A crisis usually means a painful but brief moment of tension. But in the age of permacrisis, writes MANUS LENIHAN, we get all the pain and tension with no progress, no recovery, no resolution.

W

E FACE a range of overlapping crises, each one feeding back into the others, such as the cost of living, climate change, war, and pandemics.

Part of the meaning of ‘permacrisis’ is that the problems are so deep-rooted we can’t even understand them, let alone try to solve them. This part is not true. Obviously, we’re not going to get anywhere without the knowledge of healthcare workers or climate scientists, for example. In that sense, the problems are indeed complicated. But the biggest obstacles to fixing ‘permacrisis’ are political, not technical. They are due to the system, due to things we can change, but only if we are willing to challenge the rule of the powerful and wealthy.

So let’s start the year by breaking down permacrisis into its main aspects, the better to understand and the better to fight back.

1. Climate There are various ways to try and deal with ‘permacrisis’ in 2023. For example, it is tempting just to ignore politics and look after your own interests as best you can. The biggest problem with that attitude is that we can’t ignore the environ-

ment, because we live in it. At least, we still do at the time of writing.

Summer 2022 was one of wild heat waves and fires. China saw widespread devastation but even in less hard-hit countries like England, firefighters reported they had never seen anything like it. Then winter saw large parts of the US unexpectedly freeze over, and just a few weeks later hundreds of weather stations across Europe announced that it was the warmest January on record (19 degrees in Poland!). Meanwhile in India temperatures have plummeted.

This is the worst example of permacrisis. In a sane world, it would have been prevented decades ago. But the CEOs, billionaires, and world leaders kept on burning those fossil fuels, and they continued to design cities around the car and the plane, all because it was more profitable than making the transition to cleaner energy and public transport. There were significant changes after millions of school students walked out on climate strikes in 2018 and 2019.

If it were up to workers and consumers, massive progress could have been made.

But it’s not up to us. The real power is in the hands of businesses and the wealthy.

It is cheaper to look after their own PR through greenwashing than to actually change things.

The so Will big banks, industries, and agribusinesses make a transition to sustainable energy in 2023? Unfortunately, not a hope. Will establishment politicians force them to? The most ambitious thing you can expect from the Irish Green Party is that they will find some new way to penalise rural people for driving. But we need truly ambitious and pro-worker measures such as free and expanded public transport, or public ownership of the energy industry.

2. Economics Another way to try and cope with the stress of ‘permacrisis’ is to fixate on some narcissistic rich guy and have faith that he will solve all our problems with some clever invention. But it’s not easy to keep up that blind faith after 2022. Twitter, Tesla, and Meta suffered disasters. NFTs and cryptocurrencies – digital fool’s gold – collapsed.

2022 was the year inflation spiralled out of control, driven by war, supply chain issues, falling productivity, and profiteering. As we paid double at the fuel pump, Shell’s net income rose from $12.8 billion in 2021 to $30.1 billion in 2022. Similarly BP, ExxonMobil, Chevron, Total, etc. Not content with destroying the planet, they are squeezing the last cents out of us.

It’s broadly accepted that we will see a global recession this year. In fact, the ruling class in the United States is flirting with recession so as to drive down wages. Various public figures have said that “there’s going to need to be increases in unemployment to contain inflation”, and described the rise in unemployment as “really terrific”, “the right direction of travel re jobs”, and “the best reason for hope”.

Why are they taking ghoulish delight in the misery of millions? Because the Covid profits surge has run out of steam, and there is a need for some new source of profit. So now big business owners are using inflation as an excuse to drive down wages.

What might a recession in 2023 mean for us? Whenever a recession comes, our jobs, pay, services and benefits are all sacrificed to ‘restore profitability,’ i.e. to maintain the rich in the manner to which they are accustomed. That’s what happened in Ireland after 2007-8, and what have we got to show for it today?

Mass homelessness – 11,542 are now in emergency accommodation – and another recession around the corner.

To sum up, permacrisis in the economic sphere is not all that complicated.

The messiahs of the tech sector mostly turned out to be frauds and idiots. Instead of saving the world with clever inventions, the rich are drinking toasts to unemployment and turning housing into a cash cow, which is why kids have to live in hotel rooms. It’s the simplest way to maintain profits.

3. War

The horror of imperialist war returned to Europe in 2022

Another way some people try to cope with permacrisis is by saying ‘we need to look after our own first.’ But to do that you need to exclude and attack most of the human race, including people who are in the same boat as you (or worse) when it comes to jobs, housing, services, etc. And the super-rich members of ‘your own’ remain in charge, and they only ‘look after’ themselves. So all we can ever achieve through ‘looking after our

capitali of ‘pe

The Covid pandemic is still with us, with China now particularly badly affected following a chan

own’ is to help rich people to stay rich through divide and rule.

Capitalism was supposed to deliver peace and democracy. How many times did we hear that line? But we live in a world that’s growing more divided, violent, and authoritarian. 2022 ended with a bizarre far-right coup plot in Germany and 2023 began with supporters of the far-right Bolsonaro trying to stage a coup in Brazil.

The war in Ukraine, like Covid, came as a shock to most. But it makes a twisted kind of sense in the logic of the new Cold War between the US and China. The United States, the only

country with hundreds of military bases all across the world, is locked in struggle with Chinese imperialism for control of the world’s markets and resources. Likewise, Russian imperialism, which maintains an uneasy but real alliance with China, has sought to aggressively boost its influence and prestige with the brutal invasion of Ukraine. This new Cold War, of course, is a key factor in the economic problems. US politicians claim they are fighting for freedom and democracy; tell that to the Afghans and Iraqis. Russian politicians claim they are fighting for security and the national idea; tell that to the Chechens. That’s their job, as Martin

special featuRe

ocialist

7

Is revolution possible in the 2020s?

ism & the aGe ermacrisis’

nge in government policy

Luther King said: to trick young people into being scarred or killed on ‘dark and bloody battlefields,’ all for corporate profits and imperial prestige.

Will the Ukraine war end in 2023?

Probably not.

Who will win? That one is easier to answer: Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin...

The fight against imperial aggression is not a con. That is why Ukrainian soldiers have fought better than was widely expected: they are not simply fighting for the corporate interests that rule their country like every other country, nor the geopolitical goals of western imperial-

ism. They are defending their national independence, their homes, and their dignity. Imperialism can be defeated not by bending the knee to some other brand of imperialism, but through the resistance of working people, and through cross-border and cross-community solidarity.

and pandemics in the future. Even before Covid we lived in a world in which diseases that previous generations had nearly wiped out were making a comeback.

4. Pandemics

The word ‘permacrisis’ invites pessimism.

We want to live without fear of war or disease, and to hand down a better world to the next generation. This isn’t much to ask, with all the wealth and technology and know-how that exists. And yet with every passing year, it’s more obvious that the powers-that-be can’t deliver on any of it, because all that wealth, tech, and expertise are chasing profits instead of human welfare.

All the aspects of permacrisis feed into each other. The necessity to end each, and all, has to be seen as part of the struggle to get rid of capitalism – the system responsible for all the major crises in the world. Working-class people are the majority in society, and if united and organised we are a powerful force that can both end this system, and prevent a future of ever instensifying permacrisis. That means a struggle for fundamental, socialist change: change that will see the resources of society taken back from the big corporations, banks and the billionaires, and placed into democratic, collective ownership – from which we can plan the economy to meet the needs of all people and the planet.

The deep malaise facing the system points to the urgency of waging this struggle and winning this change. Tinkering simply won’t suffice. If you agree, join us today.

After war, we turn to another biblical horseman: plague.

While Covid thankfully recedes from the headlines in the ‘higher-income’ countries, only one in five are vaccinated in the ‘lower-income’ neo-colonial countries. The failure to vaccinate the people of China will result in disaster now with the collapse of the unsustainable Zero Covid strategy.

Here in Ireland, the hospitals have been overwhelmed by flu and respiratory infections, along with Covid, to the point where the fire service is declaring certain Emergency Departments unsafe.

As we pointed out this time last year, the pandemic was caused by three major factors (and the next pandemic will be caused by the same factors because they haven’t been fixed): (1) the for-profit healthcare industry, which spent billions on marketing instead of research into viruses; (2) the massive encroachment of big business into remote wilderness, shaking loose new pathogens; and (3) the underfunding of health services over decades due to privatisation and austerity.

As long as healthcare is run for profit, and nature is recklessly exploited for profit, and public health systems are neglected, we will see more epidemics

Conclusion

Protesters storm capital in Sri Lanka, 2022

by Keishia taylor receNT years have been marked by a proliferation of what’s been called "doomerism" — the belief that humanity is inevitably destined for misery, destruction, and ultimately extinction. after a cursory examination of the headlines, it is easy to see why. The intractable and all-consuming crises of capitalism are breeding war, pestilence, famine and environmental disasters of biblical proportions, and it is becoming increasingly obvious that fundamental, all-encompassing change is needed if we are to survive. But is this type of change possible? and can it happen before it is too late? who can lead the way? the ruling classes, the business and political establishment, reveal time and again that they are incapable of solving the crises facing working-class people, indeed humanity (including, ultimately, themselves!). the logic of their capitalist system, of competition and expansion, is blocking the global cooperation and planning needed to take on the existential threat of climate change.

So who can take on this threat, and all the other crises we face? thankfully, there is such a social force: the working class – the multiracial, multigendered, and multinational majority in the world. this is the class that makes society run – producing the products, providing the services, maintaining the infrastructure. Without its physical and mental labour the economy grinds to a halt. this gives it incredible potential power. but it’s also the force that has brought about all the major political progress of the last 150 years or so. and don’t just take our word for it, even the Washington Post, a right-wing establishment newspaper, reported on a study of 100 years of protests in 150 countries which found that “protest movements dominated by industrial workers outperform all other protest campaigns in bringing about democracy.” it remains the decisive force for progress today, and likewise the only force capable of averting catastrophe in the years ahead. but there is a real problem of the working class being less organised today, both politically and industrially, and therefore also more atomised. So, can the working class be relied on to act, when it is needed more than ever? these are important questions, which we can’t fully explore in the short article, but the simple answer is: yes!

Uprisings from ‘out of nowhere’ a big reason why the power of the working class is not always obvious to many is that all of the capitalist ideology throughout society tries to hide it,

and present it as, at best, a thing of the past. but unfortunately for them, reality keeps challenging these myths. the pressure mounting on workingclass people in this world of crisis has led to countless explosions of mass movements in recent years, most notably and powerfully in places like iran, Sri lanka, Sudan, Myanmar, ecuador, india, Sudan, hong Kong, and now in mainland china, to name a few. but virtually every country is seeing new sections of working-class and young people getting organised and active in some way. even if only beginning, these can take off quickly in the right circumstances.

Many of the examples above took the ruling classes by complete surprise, as they underestimated the desperation and resentment boiling beneath a seemingly subdued surface. for example, in india, in response to the far right Modi government’s punishing 2020 “farm bills,” tens of millions of farmers, transport workers and others marched on Delhi, held a 24-hour strike – one of the biggest in history – and protested for a year against the new agricultural laws, labour laws, and privatisation resulting in a repeal of the farm bills. in neighbouring Sri lanka last May, provoked by devastating shortages and price hikes – while the corrupt ruling rajapaksa family enjoyed a lavish life – a ‘hartal’ general strike involving over 2,000 unions brought the country to a halt. this quickly escalated to a revolutionary situation in which the masses stormed and occupied the Presidential palace and state buildings, and forced the President and Prime Minister to flee.

The only hope these uprisings may seem distant to some, but ireland is certainly not immune from the effects of capitalist crises, nor the political awakenings experienced by many as a result. indeed, global movements have been reflected here, in the blM protests or climate strikes in recent years. Just as movements in ireland, from lGbtQ and abortion rights, to the victory against water charges – in which working-class and young people led the way – had a small but notable impact abroad. these examples prove the point about the essential role of the working class as the only force for progress today, as well as the only force with the power to challenge the ruling capitalist class, which is leading us to extinction. further, they show that when necessary the working class can and will use its power. this alone is not the solution to our problems, it’s just the start, but it shows that it’s virtually inevitable – as crises intensify – that we will see the proliferation of mass struggles of the working class and youth in the 2020s, and even revolutions.

8

iNteRNatioNal

The socialist

israel / palestine: New hard-right government escalates politics of hate

by James Mccabe

I

N 2021, the New York-based Human Rights Watch released a report titled Threshold Crossed: Israeli Authorities and the Crimes of Apartheid and Persecution. Historically, US-based NGOs have steered wide of exposing the full extent of the day-to-day violence and discrimination meted out against Palestinians by the state of Israel. Long deemed a key ally of US imperialism in the Middle East, the Israeli state receives $3.8 billion in military funding from the US government each year. So, the unambiguous condemnation of Israel in the Human Rights Watch report represented a certain watershed.

Nevertheless, Joe Biden released a statement expressing enthusiasm for working with prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s (a “friend for decades”) new government. This is just the latest example of the hypocrisy of US imperialism’s supposed defence of “democratic values”. Netanyahu’s new government has been described as the most right-wing, ultra-nationalist and outright racist government in the history of the state of Israel.

A cabinet of racist thugs

Many of the new government ministers from far-right parties are nothing more than bigoted thugs. The new finance minister once called for segregating Is-

Benjamin Netanyahu once again leads a dangerous coalition government in Israel

raeli maternity wards between Jews and Palestinians because he said that he didn’t want his wife “to be forced to give birth next to an enemy”.

The new minister for national security, Itamar Ben-Gvir, lives in a settlement in the occupied West Bank. In 2007, he was convicted of incitement to racism and of supporting a terrorist organisation. Although only convicted once, he was indicted over 50 times. For years, Ben-Gvir hung a photo in his living room of Baruch Goldstein, an Israeli-American who in 1994 killed 29 Palestinians at a mosque in Hebron.

This is the man who is now responsible

for border police in the West Bank at a time when violence and the killing of Palestinians have already been surging.

In 2022, one of the deadliest years on record, 220 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces, including 48 children, according to a report by Middle East Eye. Rise in violent repression

Netanyahu has agreed to advance annexation of the West Bank as part of his coalition deal with ultra-nationalist parties. As it stands, there are almost 630,000 Israeli settlers living in the Occupied Territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The settlers have the

right to vote, access to clean water; the right to carry guns; and to travel into Israel on the motorway whenever they want. All these rights are denied to their Palestinian neighbours, who are increasingly having their homes bulldozed to make way for Israeli settlements.

The inevitably brutal actions of this government could spark a new mass movement of resistance by Palestinians.

In May 2021, unprecedented protests erupted in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Israel which forced the Israeli government into a ceasefire after it launched an attack on Gaza. These protests included a strike of 65,000 Palestinian construction workers. The provocations of the far-right could well spark an organised backlash that they aren’t expecting.

Such a movement could be organised democratically from below based on revolutionary committees of struggle, in the occupied territories and within Israel itself. It could make an appeal to the Israeli Jewish working class – 100,000 of whom protested against the new government’s threat to democratic rights on 14 January – to join it in a struggle to end the disastrous rule of capitalism, and the toxic, racist ideology of its ruling class. It could be the beginning of a struggle to end the rule of this oppressive capitalist system throughout the region and open the way for a revolutionary socialist transformation of society.

Brazil: serious threat as Bolsonaro mob attempt coup

by Mark Johnson

J

UST EIGHT days into the term of President Lula, far-right supporters of former president Jair Bolsonaro went on a rampage against the "democratic" institutions of Brazil.

In a shocking aping of the infamous ‘January 6th’ events in Washington DC, when Trump supporters stormed the Capitol Building, the Bolsonaro supporters stormed the parliament, the Supreme Court, and the Presidential Palace causing millions in damages.

Funded and supported by powerful and wealthy

The right-wing mob was funded by millionaire backers and supported and aided by sections of the Brazilian state (like in Washington DC, police fraternised and took selfies with the protesters). The plot was well organised with over 100 free busses bringing thousands of Bolsonaro supporters from all across the county. Hotels were paid for, and meals were provided, along with other free supplies such as camping equipment etc.

Bolsonaro and his sons were conveniently in the USA during the attack but even if not directly involved (which they were), they prepared the ground and advocated for such actions, and need to be held accountable. The work-

Bolsonaro supporters stormed government building in the capital, Brasilia

ers’ movement needs to call for the purging of all reactionary elections from the state and full prosecution of all involved.

An attack such as this was widely predicted. In fact, in August 2022 during the election, a WhatsApp group of Brazilian tycoons was exposed for discussing how a coup would be better for them if Bolsonaro lost, and how they would fund / organise it.

Working class must organise to resist the right

Despite Lula’s strong rhetoric and (limited) actions in the wake of the coup attempt, the working class and oppressed of Brazil can have no faith that his government, which includes three far-right evangelicals, will wage an effective struggle, and must mobilise their own forces to defeat the right.

Much of the left, including sections

in the leadership of PSOL (a significant left party), have unfortunately uncritically fallen behind Lula's government.

While it is correct to mobilise and defeat the right, Lula's government is one of coalition with the traditional rightwing forces who will not be able / willing to deliver in the face of the growing social crisis and thus can create more opportunities for the far right, and coup attempts in future.

Drought in Somalia brings devastation by finn McKenna sOmaLia is currently experiencing its worst drought in four decades. according to Nasa, the horn of africa is suffering its worst drought ever. somalia has a population of 17 million and just under half are suffering food shortages, with 1.5 million children acutely malnourished. internal displacement is an ever-growing feature of the disaster, affecting over 1 million people. climate change effects in 2011, 260,000 Somalis perished due to a drought. a similar hellscape is facing the Somali people today unless essential products such as medicine and food are acquired from outside of Somalia, where the earth is scorched and with it livestock and crops turn to dust. the global c02 output, which the african continent contributes to the least, is resulting in fundamental shifts in wind and rain patterns off the coast of eastern africa. the people there are paying a devastating price for the actions of the major industrial and imperialist states, and their pursuit of profit. the rain season has failed to come to Somalia for four consecutive years. civil war civil war in the past three decades has seen the almost complete disintegration of the Somali state. the military junta under Siad barre, which was uSSr-aligned in the 1980s before turning towards uS imperialism, was ousted by various clan-based rebel militias in the early 1990s. these militias soon thereafter turned the guns on each other. ever since, a protracted civil war has ensued. the contending war-lords (some backed by Western imperialists, others are islamic extremists), are attempting to dominate and control aid as part of their power struggle. world must respond Military intervention by surrounding states or anyone else can bring no solutions to the conflagration experienced by Somalia’s people. nor can any capitalist forces resolve the crisis. the workers’ and trade union movement internationally must respond to this catastrophe and find ways to transport essential food and medical supplies to the horn of africa. and also, crucially, to support a movement of working-class and poor people that breaks with the rule of capitalism and imperialism as the only way out of this horror.

woRkplace

9

The socialist

Victory for migrant fishers’ struggle against exploitative visa

by Michael o’brien

T

HE ANNOUNCEMENT at the beginning of January by the Department of Justice that all NonEuropean migrant fishers enrolled in the now abolished Atypical Work Permit Scheme has been granted a stamp 4 giving them full labour market access is the culmination of a struggle waged by hundreds of predominantly Egyptian, Filipino, Ghanaian and Indonesian fishers and the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF). They have brought to an end a state-sponsored system of racist super-exploitation in the Irish fishing fleet.

An abusive scheme

The ‘Atypical Work Permit Scheme for Non-EEA Fishers’ turned out to be the most disadvantageous work permit scheme for any Non-European workers employed in Ireland. Most Non-European workers in Ireland come under the Critical Skills Permit or General Workers Permit. While socialists have no truck with permit schemes which are discriminatory these two schemes come with superior conditions relative

Years of struggle by hundreds of migrant fishers in the ITF wins victory

to what the fishers have had to endure.

It includes the minimum salary of €30,000 and the right after a fixed period to progress from an exclusive employment relationship with the employer who brings you to Ireland to a visa stamp 4.

Minimum wage paltry increase against the cost of living backdrop

Super-exploitation

In the case of the Atypical Scheme the minimum salary by the time of its recent abolition was €21,000 based on a notional average 39-hour week. Furthermore, the visa had to be renewed

annually and there was no progress as of right to a visa stamp 4 was entertained, totally tying the fisher to the vessel owner indefinitely.

Many vessel owners took full advantage of this and used their double power over the fisher, in terms of both their employment and the legal status, to force a work regime of 20-hour days in the fishing grounds. This meant that the migrant fisher was on half the minimum wage.

A string of successful cases taken by the ITF on behalf of fishers at the WRC to recover unpaid wages and the admission by the Garda of 18 fishers who were enrolled into the atypical scheme into their referral mechanism for human trafficking over the last six years gave only a partial indication of what was happening in the industry.

Most fishers have felt coerced to put up with this exploitation because it was a simple matter for the vessel owner to communicate to the Department of Justice that the employment relationship had ended to render the fisher undocumented.

Lifting the lid

The ITF, whose fisheries campaign in

Ireland was taken over by long-time Socialist Party member Michael O’Brien commissioned research conducted by the Maynooth University Department of Law on the experiences of non-EEA migrant workers in the Irish fishing industry in October 2021.

It was based on in-depth interviews with fishers about their working conditions and it obtained widespread coverage.

This was instrumental in triggering a government review of the scheme.

But also instrumental was an increasing number of migrant fishers sticking their necks out individually and collectively to demand change including holding a protest outside the Dáil last May. Victories can be won

This experience has shown that a combination of a fighting campaigning approach even by the most exploited workers, coupled with a tenacious approach by a trade union organisation results in victories that can be replicated by tens of thousands of migrant workers concentrated in other sectors such as meat processing, agricultural work and elder care.

Dublin 15 parents and teachers organise to tackle teacher shortage

by Kate relihan

by enda Kelly

T

The irish establishment has patted itself on the back for some minimal increases to the minimum wage. Up 7.6% to €11.30, as our now Taoiseach remarked in June: ‘to ensure people have a decent standard of living’. he wanted to ensure that such an increase is ‘viable’ for businesses, which shows where this government's focus is – concern for business interests over workers. a key issue inflation for this year, according to erSi, will remain on a similar path with an increase of 7.1%, meaning the increase implemented amounts to just a paltry 0.5% increase. according to the cSo, enforced deprivation has increased from 13.8% to 17.1% in 2022 due to the cost-of-living crisis. this small increase will not put a dent in this number. nearly 10% of workers in ireland are on minimum wage, so this is a key issue that needs to be addressed. according to the low-pay commission in a report commissioned by Varadkar, a living wage to live in ireland is €13.85, which is actually too low as it focuses on providing a minimum standard of living rather than a comfortable one. the government’s plan to gradually

move towards a living wage in 2026 is way too little, too late; workers are suffering and need a drastic improvement in their living standards. €17 now!

Workers need a minimum wage of €17 an hour to have any sort of decent standard of living and deal with the repercussions of the capitalist cost of living crisis, i.e. to be able to not worry about rising bills due to corporate greed. this will require organised action in workplaces, including preparing for strike action to allow workers to live and thrive.

HE EXODUS of teachers from the profession and the current chronic shortage, especially in Dublin, has created a perfect storm that all teachers saw coming.

This tinderbox bubbling under the surface affects every school in urban areas, particularly Dublin. Sixty-two per cent of unfilled posts on the Supply Panel for primary and a recent TUI survey found that 91% of second level have experienced difficulties hiring qualified teachers in the last six months.

It is near impossible to source substitute teachers, autism classrooms lie empty, and failure to fill maternity posts leaves students lucky to be supervised, let alone taught. On top of this subjects are being shelved left, right and centre, along with the quality of education, as students end up being taught by “out of field” teachers.

Getting organised

Secondary schools are hugely under resourced, particularly in Dublin

This was the backdrop to the formation of Coolmine Community School Parents Action Group. No longer could parents of first/second-year pupils withstand the impact of so many free periods in their children’s second-level education as the school struggled to recruit a Woodwork, Metalwork, or Graphics teacher. Following a discussion with former Socialist Party TD, ASTI member and teacher, Ruth Cop-

pinger the wheels were set in motion.

Two extremely well-attended online meetings were held in November and December 2022 with a keen media interest. The campaign was cited on the Tonight Show and was carried by The Irish Times, RTÉ and all local newspapers. In attendance were all local government Ministers, councillors, General Secretaries of ASTI & TUI unions, education stakeholders and

parents who aired their frustration and deep concern There is a real need for teachers, unions and parents to get organised to demand an end to this crisis. It means demanding decent pay and conditions for younger teachers to tackle the cost of living crisis. It means urgent investment in measures to tackle the housing crisis – slashing rents to affordable levels and building public homes.

10

The socialist

Review: aftersun directed by

Review & theoRy

Socialism 101 series #10

charlotte wells

aren’t the state, the courts and the police politically neutral?

reviewed by harper cleves

(Spoiler warning) FTERSUN, WRITTEN and directed by Charlotte Wells, follows a late 90s summer holiday of a Scottish father-daughter duo Sophie and Callum, played by Franki Corio and Paul Mescal. The film has been lauded by critics, and for good reason. Wells’ feature directorial debut is a quiet masterpiece that explores childhood, ageing, loss and renewal with an aching poignancy that every viewer will find an echo of in their own human relationships.

The clear perspective and careful yet unobtrusive cinematography recounts the mundanity of a summer holiday, while packing each moment with emotion and meaning. The film begins through the lens of a camcorder, and from the first flickering image on screen, a tone is set.

Sophie has the chaotic cinematic eye of a newly minted 11-year old. She zooms in and out. She makes fun of her father’s dancing, likens him to a centenarian despite his being only 30 years old. She turns the camera back to herself to make a silly face. She asks Callum about how he imagined his adult life when he was 11. He pauses. And then, before he can answer, the tape rewinds, a shadow of who we presume to be the adult Sophie sitting on a couch briefly visible in the reflection of the screen; a momentary union of past and present before the scene dissolves into pixelated images of a summer in reverse.

These first two minutes initiate a narrative that is suffused with bittersweet nostalgia. We as an audience will now not experience the holiday alongside 11 year-old Sophie and 30-year old Callum. Instead, we sit alongside adult Sophie on that couch; barely visible, yearning for a childhood long gone; a version of a relationship that exists on camcorder tapes and our memory and nowhere else. The camcorder footage features throughout the film, alongside

A

by eddie Mccabe

interspersed scenes of Callum dancing under flashing flights, seemingly disconnected from narrative. Past, present, and dream seem to overlap; her memories are saturated with both hindsight and invention. Such is the brilliant union between narrative viewpoint and cinematography.

The intimacy of this film is also of course achieved through the undeniable performances of Paul Mescal and Franki Corio. Mescal’s portrayal of an affectionate young father plagued with sadness is quiet. Anyone who has been on a holiday with a loving single father will recognise the sadness that exists even in the fun; the attempt to forge a genuine connection with a child he loves but doesn’t see as much as he would like. He sometimes misses the mark, but his trying means something.

Corio for her part flawlessly portrays an intelligent and observant child; but one that still feels her age. She is gangly and makes faces and gets colourful hair wraps on her holiday. Lying on cheap plastic lounge chairs next to the hotel pool she says to Callum “sometimes at playtime, I look up at the sky... I think about the fact that we can both see the sun, so even though we aren’t actually in the same place... we kind of are in a way, you know?”

Marxist journal of the Socialist Party:

Socialist Alternative no.16

Both actors in concert begin to hint at a more fundamental sadness. In one scene Sophie describes sometimes feeling heavy and low, even after a good day.

She looks to see if her father can relate.

It’s clear through a clenched jaw and an unmet eye that he can. He changes the subject instead.

The holiday and the film end shortly after Callum’s 31st birthday. It’s implied that he takes his own life shortly thereafter. Adult Sophie, newly 31 herself, has a new child. In the end this is a story of the love of an ordinary father, who did his very best, and got a lot wrong. And a daughter who has to figure out how to move forward with the legacy of his pain in her own life. Isn’t this the story we are all figuring out – how to grapple with the best and worst we inherited from those we love as we navigate our own lives?

As Marxists, it is these stories in the lives of ordinary people that are at the beating heart of our struggle for a better existence. A potential future exists in which the Callums of this world meet their grandchildren; in which the Sophies make countless memories with their fathers. That's a world worth fighting for; one in which our talents, and joys can find their fullest expression – and our love also.

S CIALIST Marxist Journal of the Socialist Party Issue 16 Winter 2022 / 2023 €4 / £4

includes articles on: l Global inflation Spiral: a capitalist crisis l Socialists and a Sinn féin Government l Marx, the ‘Metabolic rift’ and capitalism’s assault on nature l interview: Strike Wave in britain and northern ireland l revolutionary uprising in iran: a Programme to Win l china: Xi Jinping Purges ccP’s top ranks l how Mussolini triumphed l reviews of Athena, Nothing Compares, The Janes and Russia: Revolution & Civil War

€4 / £4 Get a copy from any Socialist Party member or order online or subscribe at: socialistparty.ie

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INSIDE

Global Inflation Spiral – a Capitalist Crisis Socialists & a Sinn Féin Government Marx, the ‘Metabolic Rift’ & Capitalism’s Assault

on Nature

we all know of dictatorial regimes in certain parts of the world, or in history, which rule primarily through repression – the combination of violence and the ever-present threat of violence.

This is the most brutal, but most basic way of ensuring the authority of those in power is obeyed, and the inequality in those societies is maintained. as a result, few question the political role of the state, the courts, and the police in these societies.

Of course, this is not the optimal way of ruling for a ruling class, as it requires significant resources and is inherently unstable – existing in constant fear of those millions of working people being repressed.

Far preferable is to rule with the consent of the population, which is usually achieved by the control the ruling class has over the dominant ideas in society, which it maintains through its influence on the mass media, education, politics, religion, and culture. Ideology, not violence, is its most powerful weapon.

Yet, for so-called ‘capitalist democracies’ both are essential. A critical part of capitalist ideology is ideas about crime and punishment, law and order, civic duties and transgressions. All of which take as read that the state is a neutral body that represents and serves the interests of society as a whole. The legal system that the state enshrines is supposedly ‘above politics’, and the police and judges who preside over it operate without political bias.

The falsity of this notion becomes apparent as soon as you think about the way society is divided, particularly the class divide between the exploiting minority of owners, and the exploited majority of workers. Clearly, these classes have different, totally conflicting interests, which can’t both be represented and served by the same state.

So which of these classes does the state actually serve? Well, the most fundamental role of the state throughout history, and in capitalist society today, has been to protect the private property of a privileged minority, i.e. its ownership of

society’s key wealth and resources.

And make no mistake: it is protecting this private property from the rest of society – the majority that produces that wealth but doesn’t get to keep it.

Indeed for tens of thousands of years, early human societies existed without anything resembling a state, because classes didn’t exist, and therefore neither did the need for an institution to protect the privileges of one class from another.

But why doesn’t this majority simply take back its fair share? It’s because of the power of the ideology that convinces them that things are the way they are for a reason, and also that there’s nothing they can do about it.

Powerful as this ideological hold is, however, it’s not all-powerful, and at times of extreme crises and struggle, it can break down. It’s times like these that the reality of the state as, in Engels’ words, “special bodies of armed men” in defence of the ruling class becomes especially evident.

The truth is that the state, the courts, and the police are inherently political. We see this every time the police are used to break up a picket of striking workers, to evict tenants from their homes, or to ‘kettle’ peaceful protesters. Far from neutral, they are firmly on the side of the bosses, landlords, and governments.They are not ‘party political’, and merely implement the laws of the land regardless of which party is in power. But that’s the point: the problem and the politics are deeper, embodied in the laws themselves, which are ultimately laws to protect the rich from the poor.

Most people, most of the time, accept or abide by the laws of the state, and to do otherwise is considered ‘civil disobedience’. But as the historian Howard Zinn wrote: “That is not our problem… Our problem is civil obedience.” If we remember that most of the wars, oppression, and environmental destruction in our world is all perfectly legal, we should also remember that the fight for equality, democracy, and justice is also a fight against unjust laws and the states that uphold them.

fightiNg Racism

11

The socialist

housing crisis & the hateful lies of the far right

by Steph lacey The mOdUs operandi of the far right is to jump on any kind of problem or issue in society and exploit it to push its nefarious agenda. Far right groups tried to utilise the fear and confusion of the covid-19 pandemic to influence people while they were vulnerable. They held antilockdown protests, and while most people who attended these protests weren’t far right and attended them to express, in a misguided way, their frustration at the Government’s failure to get a grip on the pandemic or to protect the living standards of working-class people, the speeches given by far right figures at these protests exposed their real agenda.

These speeches started off talking about lockdowns and vaccines, but quickly developed into vile racism and homophobia. unfortunately, this tactic had an effect in increasing their influence. but as the country started to open up again, this issue was no longer available to them and they moved onto the next big issue in society, the housing crisis. cynically exploiting the crisis the far right in ireland has never done anything to actually fight for affordable housing for ordinary people. and while they are trying to pretend that they now care about housing homeless irish people, their actions, and the deliberate spreading of misinformation and lies directed at refugees and immigrants tell a different story and expose their real agenda. the housing crisis is devastating the lives across the country, particularly the younger generation. to fight back against it, it is vital to know the reality around the cause of it, and who is to blame. there are huge resources in this society and no justifiable reason why

n “we don’t have enough houses.” it’s true that tens of thousands of social and affordable homes must be built by the state to end the housing crisis, which the government refuses to do. it’s also true that there are currently 166,000 vacant houses in ireland. With 11,397 people in emergency accommodation, for every one of them there are 15 vacant homes. the problem isn’t immigrants, the problem is the government’s policy of putting profit for vulture funds and construction companies over the needs of people.

anybody, whether irish or migrant, should be left without a home. the culprits are the landlords, property developers and the government which backs them up at every turn. they and their system of profiteering have created the crisis in housing, which gives rise to the false idea that working-class people must compete against each other for scarce resources. blaming migrants or refugees seeking asylum for the housing crisis deflects blame from the real culprits and so only acts to further prolong the crisis. What is needed is a united struggle of all working-class people, and everyone affected, to fight for homes for all.

So it is important to know what lies are being spread and the reason they’re being spread.

n “why don’t other countries take them?” other countries are taking in far more refugees than ireland, including much poorer countries than ireland. 62% of all international Protection applications were made to just three countries: france, Spain, and Germany. 84% of the world’s refugees are in poorer countries in the Global South.

Far-right lies vs. the truth: n “house the irish, not the world.” this slogan, which the national Party has plastered around some areas with stickers and posters, is one example of its racist nonsense. the implication of the slogan is that the government is currently housing non-irish people, but not irish people. if this was true it would mean that the government has a policy that’s working to house some people. there’s no truth to this. the government’s housing policy is a disaster for everyone. it’s caused by its reliance on profiteers to solve it, and non-irish people are generally worse affected. n “it’s only men coming over.” this bizarre rumour has been spread widely in recent weeks. in fact, 81% of the ukrainian refugees seeking asylum in ireland are women and children.

35% of asylum seekers who come to ireland are women and 25% are children. refugee centres are communal living spaces, with some being segre-

gated for gender privacy or to accommodate families with children. So, seeing a “bus full of men” going into one is to be expected, for this reason. n “They’re taking houses from people on the housing list for years.”

Migrants receive no preferential treatment from the state in housing allocation, if anything it’s the opposite. refugees are provided with emergency accommodation, which may be in a Direct Provision centre, a hostel, a hotel, or a converted warehouse or office building, or – as highlighted recently – tents! in 2022, three of Dublin’s four

councils failed to build any social homes – with a similar picture across the country. this is the real reason people are left waiting years and years on the housing lists. n “They aren’t being vetted.”

What this is supposed to mean exactly is anyone’s guess – nearly all of us are ‘’unvetted’’. When people seek refuge in ireland, they have to notify the international Protection office. their fingerprints and photos are taken and compared with an eu database. only after this process are they finally offered temporary accommodation.

Fight for housing, against racism by blaming refugees and migrants, the far right is diverting from the real problem, which is government policy, and the capitalist market system it is based on. by knowing the facts, it is clear that immigration isn’t to blame. the far right know this as well but are trying to fool people to support their racism.

Protesting outside emergency accommodation centres will not help anybody to be housed, or change the government’s policy on housing, it will only make the people inside live in fear. the scapegoating of migrants is a distraction from and cuts across the only thing which can force real change on housing: a united movement on the streets, in communities and workplaces by working-class people of all backgrounds to take on the government, the developers and the landlord class.

humanitarianism on trial in Greece: Drop all charges against sean Binder!

by Jonathan Diebold

O

N 10 January, the trial of Sean Binder, of Kerry, began on the island of Lesbos, Greece. The charges: people smuggling, membership of a criminal organisation, espionage, and money laundering. The crime? Saving peoples’ lives. Only these people happened to be refugees.

Sean, a certified rescue diver, along with 24 other rescue workers, had spent nearly a year working with the Greek authorities to provide emergency medical assistance at sea and on the shoreline to asylum seekers crossing the Mediterranean, before abruptly being arrested. As Sean wrote: “Imagine you arrive at the scene of a car accident. You see someone lying on the roadside; they clearly need your help. What would you check first, their pulse or their passport? If, like me, you first check their pulse, you have committed the same crime I supposedly have.”

Chill factor

For this, he spent 106 days in prison alongside another rescuer, Sarah Mar-

dini, without even having been convicted of any crime. “Let me tell you, I wouldn’t recommend it. It’s not great,” he recently told a press conference about his stay.

Sean was released, but, while the charges weren’t dropped, no trial was forthcoming. The arrest was made in 2018, so why has the trial only just commenced? “It’s the chill factor itself,” Sean said, “And the limbo dissuades others from participating in necessary and legally required search and rescue.”

The trial has been marred by numerous basic procedural errors by the prosecution, such as failing to translate indictments into English, which has kept the expensive and stress-inducing process on for year after year. Between that, and the incredible charges, they seek to create an example out of him.

Lesbos, once home of the ancient Greek poet Sappho, now stands on the edge of the graveyard of Europe: the Mediterranean sea. This is one of the world’s deadliest migration routes – 40,000 have been recorded dying since the 1990s, with over 3,000 in 2021.

with EU forces such as EU border agency FRONTEX using illegal tactics to push refugees, including children, away.

Racist ideology

This is rooted in the fortress Europe policy of the EU as a whole. While those who reach Europe are allowed to

request asylum, there are no safe, legal routes to do so, forcing people to undertake extremely hazardous journeys,

The same racist ideology of European capitalist society which has killed tens of thousands on the EU’s borders tells us to blame refugees for all our ills.

Meanwhile, the rich are getting richer and wealth disparity is at an all time high. It is not refugees which have caused a housing crisis in Ireland or in Europe, one of the wealthiest societies in the world. It is the fact that this wealth is hoarded by massive companies and the super rich, and things that people need to survive, such as housing, are used as commodities to extract even more wealth from people.

Now more than ever we need to stand in solidarity with refugees and recognise that we have more in common with each other than with the capitalist class, and fight together to demand an end to direct provision, for housing for all, and for a socialist alternative.

TheSocialist Not oNe More!

PaPer of the SocialiSt Party

iSSue 151

January / february 2023

Build socialist feminist struggle to end femicide & gender violence

what the socialist party stands for: “The day has passed for patching up the capitalist system; it must go.” — James Connolly was right. The immense social, political and economic crises that dominate life in the 21st century all testify to this truth, but the climate emergency gives added urgency to its meaning. That’s why the Socialist Party stands for revolutionary socialist change, and why we are organising to bring it about. We support every right and reform that can improve life for working-class people, while fighting for what’s needed. We say: if capitalism can’t afford to provide for our needs then we can’t afford capitalism.

Workplace • All workers need double-digit wage rises.

For a €17 an hour minimum wage.

• End precarity and bogus self-employment. For guaranteed hours with permanent contracts for all workers.

• A four-day work week with no loss of pay.

• Reduce the pension age to 60. A guaranteed decent pension for all.

• No layoffs. Open up the books and take large job shedding companies into public ownership, under democratic workers’ control and management, with compensation paid only on the basis of proven need.

• Repeal the Industrial Relations Act. For the

right to organise and effective action.

• For a fighting trade union movement that organises the unorganised and mobilises the power of its membership. All officials should be elected, subject to recall and live on the wages of the workers they represent.

Housing • Reduce and freeze rents at affordable levels. Ban evictions.

• For a major programme to build public homes. Take the big construction companies into public ownership. Seize vacant properties and unused land being hoarded for profit.

• Provide culturally appropriate accommodation for Travellers.

• Nationalise the banks and repudiate the odious debt. Reduce mortgage payments to affordable levels.

Public services • End church control of schools and hospitals – full separation of church and state.

• For a major public works programme to build public schools, hospitals and childcare facilities.

• For a one-tier, national health service free at the point of use. Bring all private hospitals, nursing homes and pharmaceutical companies into public ownership.

• Free publicly-run childcare scheme for

join The socialisT parTy

every community. Extend fully-paid parental leave to two years and provide high quality early-years education.

• For 24-hour free counselling services and education programmes to begin to tackle the mental health crisis.

• Free education and training for all. Abolish the Leaving Cert system and provide a Third-level place for all who want one, with a living grant for all students. Build affordable, accessible student accommodation.

Environment • For substantial investment in an expanded, reliable and free public transport system.

• End the reliance on fossil fuels — keep them in the ground. For extensive state investment in renewable energy, retrofitting homes and public buildings, and green jobs.

• For a just transition to a zero carbon economy, with no job losses or regressive carbon taxes.

• Take the fossil fuel companies, big agribusinesses and corporations into democratic public ownership to stop the destruction of our planet for profit.

Equal rights for all • Oppose all forms of racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia.

• For LGBTQ-inclusive, consent-based sex education in schools. Fully fund trans healthcare.

• Reduce the voting age to 16.

• Defend the right to asylum. End Direct Provision. Abolish all racist immigration laws.

• Black lives matter! Oppose far-right division.

• Fight to end gender violence, abuse and harassment in all its forms.

• For a socialist feminist movement that unites the whole working class in the struggle against oppression.

For workers’ unity in Ireland • For the unity of the working class, Protestant and Catholic, North and South, in opposition to all forms of sectarianism, paramilitarism and state repression.

• For a socialist Ireland, with no coercion and the rights of minorities guaranteed, as part of a free, equal and voluntary socialist federation of Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales, as part of a socialist Europe.

End the rule of the billionaires • Take the wealth off the 1%. For real progressive taxation on incomes, assets and profits to fund public services.

• Stop tax avoidance and evasion by the wealthy.

• Double corporation tax. End corporate welfare policies.

• No to all forms of privatisation in health, education, transport, housing, energy, sanitation, water and broadband provision.

For socialist change • Capitalism produces inequality, environmental destruction and war. We need an international struggle against this system.

• Solidarity with the struggles of workers and oppressed peoples internationally.

• Oppose all imperialist powers, wars and occupations. No to NATO and EU militarisation. US military out of Shannon.

• No to corporate “free trade” agreements.

No to the bosses’ EU and “Fortress Europe”.

• Build a new mass party that organises workers and young people in struggle against all injustices and for a socialist alternative. For a working-class movement to bring about a left, socialist government that breaks with capitalism.

• Take the key sectors of the economy — the monopolies in banking, industry, services, agriculture and big tech — into public ownership under the democratic control of the working class.

• Replace the capitalist market with a democratic socialist plan of the economy based on the interests of the overwhelming majority of people and the environment.

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