The ranks of the Labour Party and trade unions have been
denied the right to vote on who they think the next leader of the party should
be. This has been achieved by convincing a handful of Labour MPs not to
nominate John McDonnell. But this is not the end of the story. Now is the time
to redouble efforts to build up the left of the Labour Party in the coming
period.
While the
Blairites are licking their wounds after last week's elections results, the
results of the Scottish Socialist Party and Solidarity in Scotland and the
Socialist Party in England should leave no doubt in anyone's mind that
sectarian politics is a dead end.
Last week’s elections confirmed the
damage that Blairism has done to the Labour Party. Far from being the man who
“wins elections” as the Blairites boasted in the past, Blair has become a
liability. After ten years he has thrown away the 1997 victory. Now is the time
to draw lessons from this whole experience and fight to change the leadership
of the Labour Party.
Strikes and protests erupt on women's day in Petrograd and develop into a mass movement involving hundreds of thousands of workers; within 5 days the workers win over the army and bring down the hated and seemingly omnipotent Tsarist Monarchy.
Following the First All-Russian Congress of Soviets, the reformist leaders called a demonstration to show the strength of "democracy". 400,000 people attended, the vast majority carried banners with Bolshevik slogans.
Spontaneous, armed demonstrations against the Provisional Government erupt in Petrograd. The workers and soldiers are suppressed by force, introducing a period of reaction and making the peaceful development of the revolution impossible.
Following the July days, the Bolsheviks were driven underground and the forces of reaction were emboldened. This process culminated in the reactionary forces coalescing around General Kornilov, who attempt to march on Petrograd and crush the revolutionary movement in its entirety.
The Provisional Government is overthrown. State power passes to the Soviets on the morningm of 26th October, after the Bolsheviks’ Military Revolutionary Committee seize the city and the cabinet surrenders.
The February Revolution saw a mass strike develop from below at a furious pace which posed the question of state power within a week of its inception. Workers in Petrograd took to the streets against intolerable bread shortages, the slaughter…
This reading guide contains some of Lenin’s most important writings and speeches made in the April period, accompanied by works which provide further details of events at that stage of the Revolution.
This reading guide informs the May-June period of the Revolution with analysis, accounts of those who were involved and important speeches and writings of the time.
This selection of texts covers the background, events and consequences of the July Days. Next, we will turn our attention to one of those consequences – the Kornilov putsch in late August.
Kornilov’s failed coup brought the direct action of the masses into play again, and proved to them once and for all that they were the only force in society capable of transforming their own living conditions. For the first time,…
The following series of articles provides in-depth analyses and first-hand accounts of the events immediately preceding, during and after the greatest event in human history: the October Revolution, in addition to reflections on its aftermath.