A very incomplete review of the radical press After an irregular publication over the past year or so, Links: international journal of socialist renewal, has been relaunched on a three-times-a-year schedule, writes Alan Myers. Issue number 9 leads with the mass struggle in Indonesia, a particularly timely choice given the turmoil created by the unfolding economic crisis there. In an interview, Marlin, a leader of the People's Democratic Party (PRD), ranges over many aspects of the struggle against the Suharto dictatorship, and discusses the relationships and interactions between the different class forces and their political organisations. Marlin's explanations will be a very useful tool for anyone wanting to understand political events as they unfold in Indonesia in the coming months. Contributions from Portugal and India take up different aspects of capital's internationalisation. The international theses of the main resolution for the Portuguese Communist Party's most recent congress emphasise the continuing imperialist drive to dominate the world and to prescribe a sort of universal neo-liberalism to guarantee and increase its profit. From India, Dipankar Bhattacharya, a leader of the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) discusses economic nationalism and the Indian left, demonstrating at the same time the continuing relevance of the Communist Manifesto to questions of revolutionary strategy. An interview with Peter Taffe, national secretary of the Socialist Party in Britain, discusses Labour and its leader Tony Blair. In view of the complete marginalisation of the left within the Labour Party, British socialists confront the challenge of finding ways to construct a viable socialist alternative to Labour. Taffe discusses both the lessons which the Socialist Party has drawn from its own experiences inside and outside the Labour Party, and such efforts as Arthur Scargill's Socialist Labour Party. Cuban economist Carlos Tablada discusses the different ways in which the government has sought to organise the economy as circumstances have changed in Cuba and internationally. Renfrey Clarke explains Why Russia needs another revolution. Links contributing editor James Petras provides a solid and polemical Marxist critique of post-Marxism, especially as it shows itself in the activities of many nongovernment organisations in Latin America. Also in a polemical vein is a debate between Irwin Silber, author of Socialism: What Went Wrong?, and Phil Hearse, who critically reviewed Silber's book in Links #8. The debate here focuses on such questions as the accuracy of Lenin's views of revolutionary possibilities after 1914 and the capacity of international capitalism to continue developing society's productive forces. [AM] <links@peg.apc.org> Convergencia socialista #3 Contents include evaluations of the new PRD administration of Mexico city, an analysis of repression of alledged members of the EPR in Oaxaca by Salome Ureña, and open letters to EZLN Subcomandante Marcos from Rossana Rossanda, Guillermo Almeyra and Daniel Bensaid. Subscription outside Mexico costs US$20. Contact: Convergencia Socialista, Xola 181, Colonia Alamos, Mexico, D.F. 03640, Mexico. Tel 590 07 08, Email: <csapn@laneta.apc.org> Convergencia Socialista is published six times a year, under the editoral control of Hector Diaz Polanco and Edgard Sanchez Ramirez, leader of the PRT. 36 International Viewpoint #297
Historical Materialism#1 Includes: Ellen Meiksins Wood: 'The non-history of capitalism' • Colin Barker: 'Some reflections on two books by Ellen Wood' • Esther Leslie: 'On making-up and breakingup: woman and ware, craving and corpse in Walter Benjamin's Arcades Project' • John Weeks: *The law of value and the analysis of underdevelopment • Tony Smith: *The neoclassical and Marxian theories of technology: a comparison and critical assessment • Michael A Lebowitz: 'The silences of Capital' • John Holloway: 'A note on alienation' • Peter Burnham: 'Globalisation: states, markets and class relations' • Fred Moseley: The rate of profit and economic stagnation in the United States economy • plus Matthew Beaumont on Ernst Bloch • Peter Linebaugh on Robin Blackburn • Benno Teschke on Guy Bois Forthcoming issues will include articles by Geoffrey de Ste Croix on Democracy and Ancient Greece, Roy Bhaskar on Critical Realism and Dialectics, Nigel Harris on the State, Chris Arthur on the New Dialectics, Andrew Chitty on Interconstitutivity, Recht and Social Relations, Les Levidow on Biotechnology, Simon Clarke on Lenin, and John Roberts on Adorno. Subscription for issues 1 and 2: Britain £10, Europe £13/US$20, World (airmail) £16/US$25. Cheques, Eurocheques or bank drafts should be in GBP, payable to "Historical Materialism." and drawn in pounds sterling. Contact:Historical Materialism, London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London, WC2A 2AE, Britain. Email: <hm@lse.ac.uk> Zed Books is offering a special price on Rosemary Sayigh's Too Many Enemies: The Palestinian Experience in Lebanon, 1994. Originally priced at £16.95, it will be available for £12, including packaging and posting, until the end of March 1998. Too Many Enemies is the story of Shateela camp told by its inhabitants during and after the Battles of the Camps*, 1985-7: stories of national struggle, cultural resistance, and daily life, Shateela's history is a microcosm of the history of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon, and is set here in an analytic framework of Lebanese and regional history. Illustrated by Carole Vann's photos, its maps, glossaries and a comprehensive bibliography are designed as aid to teachers, students and lay readers. Zed Books, 7 Cynthia Street, London N1 9JF, Britain Fax:+44.171.8333960. <sohawon@zedbooks.demon.co.uk> Undercurrent #5 The latest issue of this alternative sociology magazine includes Floyd Rudmin's study of the history of warplanning against Canada by the American military: *Questions of U.S Hostility Toward Canada: A Cognitive History of Blind-Eye Perception". Rudmin's object is not so much this collection of war plans, exercises, and spying in itself (although those are represented in impressive detail), but rather the cognitive avoidance of such facts by the press, the public, and scholars. darkwing.uoregon.edu/~heroux/home.html <heroux@darkwing.uoregon.edu>
La Gauche
The Québec group Gauche socialiste have renewed publication of their monthly La Gauche. Weekly updates and editorials are published at one of the Canadian state's best radical sites. Issue#2 discusses social and economic policy in Québec, the greenhouse effect, and the challenge facing nationalist movement. Subscription: Canada C$15, US$15/75FF abroad. C.P. 52131, succ. St-Fidele, Québec, QC G1L 5A4, Canada. <maison 1 @total.net> www.total.net/~maison1/
Net
Working
Stop Labour Links!
Internet writer Eric Lee has written a provocative article attacking "the proliferation of "labour links" lists on hundreds of trade union websites around the world - and calling for an international campaign to stamp them out!"
www.solinet.org/LEE/labour04.html Jerusalem on the Net
The Alternative Information Centre is supporting a new discussion list, which hopes to be "a new space for Palestinians, Israelis and the international community to exchange ideas and information about the political situation in the city"
aicmail@trendline.co.il PKK Programme
English and German translations of the 1995 political programme of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) are now available. The original version of this text (PKK Progaram ve Tuzugu), which was adopted in January 1995 after the PKK's 5th Party Congress, revised the PKK's original platform, drafted in November 1978 when the party was founded.
English: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats/
German: www.xs4all.nl/~stk/pro.html International Viewpoint
Over 1,000 people visited our website in October. Visitors came from 43 countries, including, for the first time, Mozambique. Most visitors came from Sweden, USA, Norway, Japan, Britain, Denmark, Germany & Canada
The even popularity of the various parts of the website, including the links, archive, address and Networking pages suggests that a large number of comrades are using the site as a tool, rather than just consulting the latest articles from the magazine. The more the merrier
French and Portuguese supporters of the Fourth International have finally unveiled their websites. Rouge is at www.lcr-rouge.org/
Combate can be consulted at www.terravista.pt/IlhadoMel/1917/ Inprekorr Online
Our German-language sister magazine is now available on the Internet, with a selection of articles, and a growing links section.
www.comlink.apc.org/inprekorr