Workers Solidarity Movement

This is the archive page of the 9th Dublin Anarchist bookfair, you will find video and audio from the bookfair below.  For details of the latest bookfair see www.wsm.ie/bookfair

DABF 2014 as at Liberty Hall  Saturday 12th of April   

Between Bookfairs we recommend you join the  Dublin Radical Events from the WSM group so you get invitations as soon as plans are finalised

Before and during the bookfair we encouraged people to tweet to #DABF

The weekend started Friday night with a film screening before the main event in Liberty Hall on Saturday, an afters party / fundraiser in The Flowing Tide Saturday night and then rolling though to Sunday afternoon for a Cycling tour around Dublin. 

Friday 11th in Seomra Spraoi at 7.30 - 'Broken Song' screening
About the film - "GI, Costello and Willa Lee are street poets, hip-hop artists, rappers and song-writers from Dublin’s Northside. Through their words and music they have found a way of expressing themselves and inspiring others to achieve the same." 

The main event of the weekend saw 20-30 organisations with stalls & information stands downstairs in Liberty Hall while upstairs and  in the Flowing Tide three streams of meetings & workshops will run throughout the day. 

11.00-12.15

Anarchism, Punk, Cultures of Resistance & that ‘lifestyle’ V ‘social anarchism' debate -  Theater
The talk will examine the supposed gulf between ‘lifestyle’ and ‘social’ anarchisms, with a particular focus on DIY punk’s contested siting within this false dichotomy. It will consider several strands of punk engaged with anarchism – especially contemporary manifestations. - More details at the Facebook event

Defeating Fracking - setting limits to growth? - Listen to the Audio
Climate change has reached a point where scientists are now saying that direct actions against resource extraction is the only strategy likely to prevent ecological collapse and ensure our environment’s survival. This panel considers what needs to be done and who is going to do it. There will be speakers from the anti-Fracking movement and the Workers Solidarity Movement’s Paul Bowman will look at alternatives to the politics of "jobs and growth", including those of "degrowth" and other anti-productivist movements. More details & RSVP at the Facebook event

12.30 -13.45

A year of class war - the British Miners Strike of 1984 - Watch the video or listen to the audio
Dave Douglass will talk about his experiences of 1984 - the year the British mines almost defeated Thatcher. "That fight in 84-85 involved the whole community, it was not only about unions. It was partly about unions but it was about an industry, it was about a way of life. The miners were almost an ethnicity, with father to son for hundreds and hundreds of years in the same miner family. And we had a very strong revolutionary and radical tradition. So, all of the politics of power, fuel power was about political power and not just about energy. It was about more than that. It was about "Who rules ?""
RSVP and get more details at the Facebook event for this meeting

My Life in Activism : Women speak - Red Room - Listen to Audio
We host a panel of women activists who inform us about how they became involved in the movement, what drew them into this life of campaigning for social justice, rights and attempting to change the world in which we live.  They inform us of how they remain motivated, inspired and sustained in active political life.  More details & RSVP at the Facebook event

Radical Cooperatives: homes without landlords, workers without bosses - Listen to Audio
Do you want to work without bosses? Do you want to live without landlords? Come to this panel to find out how! Speakers: - ‘Radical Routes’ is a United Kingdom-based co-operative federation that provides support to housing and worker co-operatives as well as social centres in the form of mutual aid.  More details & RSVP at the Facebook event

14.00-15.45

Priceless land: Resisting Displacement in Colombia - Listen to the audio
Two female community activists from Colombia share with us their stories of resistance, and lessons on uniting against injustice. Women play a central role in these communities and, in spite of discrimination as both peasants and women, are emerging as important social leaders for this pivotal time. RSVP and get more details at the Facebook event

Dublin Housing Action: Past, present & future - Red room
Over the years, Dublin’s working class has organised to fight landlords, developers and politicians in search of decent housing and well-being for all. This panel will consider how some of these earlier campaigns and direct actions can inform today’s struggles.  RSVP and get more details at the Facebook event

Can we eliminate the reproduction of oppression in our movements? - Flowing Tide Pub
We have all grown up in a society where we are shaped by what bell hooks terms ‘white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.’ For the most part the left sees its role as fighting against all these aspects of society but from observation its quickly apparent that the left reproduces these oppressions within its ranks. How and why does this happen and is there anything that can be done about this? RSVP and get more details at the Facebook event

16.00 - 17.30

Care & Social Reproduction - Selma James - Watch the Video or listen to the audio of this session
The hardship of the current economic crisis has impacted unevenly across genders. This panel discusses the intersection of austerity, care-work and women’s reproductive rights.  Selma James and Conor McCabe will be presenting with Conor focusing on what this has meant in Ireland in particular. RSVP & get more details at the Facebook event

A Media panel on Manufacturing Consent - Listen to audio
Just how good are the mass media at keeping the rabble in line? This panel explores the media’s complicity with the rich and powerful and what we can do about it. RSVP & get more details at the Facebook event.

Ten Minute Campaign Talks - Listen to the audio
A space at which people involved in a variety of struggles can explain them and seek your solidarity.  Will include Rodger Yates from Vegan Ireland, Stop NATO, Cymru and the International Organisation for a Participatory Society (IOPS). RSVP & get more details at the Facebook event

18.00 - Liberty Hall closes move to Flowing Tide

A Dublin Solidarity Network - What are the possibilities? - Flowing Tide pub
In recent years a form of organising around economic issues based on picking small but winnable fights, has had a certain success in a number of places around the world. From the US's Seattle Solidarity Network, to Spain's Mortgage Holders Platform, a number of models exist. This talk is to introduce the work and methods of these groups and ask the open question of whether we could build something similar in Dublin. RSVP & invite your friends on the Facebook event

19.30 - Selma James on Sex Work - Listen to the audio

A late addition to the Dublin Anarchist Bookfair line-up in both senses of the word as this meeting will take place upstairs in the Flowing Tide at 19.30 Selma James is going to lead off a discussion on sex work 

Saturday night  
Post Bookfair Party with Dr Groove & guest DJ's in The Flowing Tide

After the long day that will be the Anarchist Bookfair we will be winding down and hopefully raising some fund to covers costs at the post-Bookfair party in the Flowing Tide, doors opening at 8pm.

Dr Groove will take to the decks to give us some red bearded fury (TM police court report of 2004 Mayday) along with a line up of his carefully selected guest DJ's.

It's always a blast, you may even find yourself trying to borrow a tractor on Bull island at dawn (true story).  RSVP & promote the hell out of this on Facebook.

Sunday 13th 2pm - Cycling Tour: Dublin Housing Action, Past & Present - starts at Mountjoy Square park
We will be visiting some of the many sites of housing actions. From the activities of the Dublin Housing Action Committee in the 1960's & the Dublin Squatters’ Association of the 1970s, through the traveller community's protests in the 1990's, right up until the 2000's anti-Globalisation protests, finishing with the current occupations by squatters in the city with many other interesting stories of social struggle in between. RSVP to the tour and get more details at the Facebook event

Please lend a hand with promotion by signing up for the DABF Thunderclap campaign below. Providing we hit 100 people by midday on the 9th there will be a mass similtanous tweet / update to about 90,000 people letting them know the bookfair is on that weekend.  If we don't reach 100 nothing happens.  You can +1 us getting there by going to the link below and simply clicking on a button for Twitter, Facebook or Tumblr that will include you as one of those broadcasting on the 9th.

Find out about the latest bookfair at www.wsm.ie/bookfair