Workers Solidarity Movement

I am going to look generally at the issue of woman’s work. Initially a very quick survey of the global position – then some more specific stuff on wage differentials, house work, work conditions, child care in Europe and Ireland with some possible suggestions for some points for our new program maybe to be incorporated into a general section on work.

Would you accept a job without signing a proper legal contract? A job that means working long days for 400 euro a month doing chores like ironing, cooking, laundering, cleaning a 4 bed house and even mean babysitting four children aged between two and seven years old?

In 1941 a bill was brought before the Dail which would make trade unions pay for licences to negotiate on behalf of their members. Without a licence workers and their unions could be sued by employers for loss of profits if they went on strike. This blatant attempt at extorting money from unions was not taken well. The Dublin Trades’ Council, representing 60,000 workers, called the bill ‘a partisan attack on the working classes’. The Irish Women Workers Union urged opposition to the bill and on June 4th 100 shop stewards endorsed their union’s stand.

Edited extracts from the Class, Feminism and Revolution recorded at the 2007 Dublin anarchist bookfair. The meeting was organised by RAG (Revolutionary Anarcha-Feminist Group) and was based around a written text

Red & Black Revolution interviewed Ana Lopez, one of the founders of IUSW who as a sex worker in London when she finished her masters and wanted to start a PhD. "In supporting this kind of initiative of sex workers organizing, you don’t necessarily have to agree with my view that sex work is a legitimate type of work, and that it’s not inherently exploitative"

Short (1.5 min) interview with a WSM member involved in the Dublin based Revolutionary Anarcho-Feminist Group who have just launched a magazine with some photos of the Dublin launch.

Silvia Federici’s “Caliban and the Witch; Women, The Body and Primitive Accumulation” does a fantastic job of taking the feminist analysis of the body and re-conceptualizing it within a class struggle understanding of history. She fills in the blanks that a traditional left analysis has missed, including the concepts of difference, women, race and the body. This work is very important, allowing feminists and socialists alike to realize that identity and class struggle are not polar opposite theoretical understandings

In June, the women members of the WSM hosted a dayschool on Women in Revolutionary Struggle. Following on from this, RAG (Revolutionary Anarcho-Feminist Group) decided to host a women's only day-school on sexual violence. This was held in the in the new Seomra Spraoi space in Dublin.

A 14-page pamhlet, made up of compilation of articles from Workers Solidarity. Compiled and edited in 2001.

Louise Michel was born on 29th May 1830. She was raised by her mother and paternal grandparents. Her love and understanding of everything downtrodden, human and animal alike, developed from her empathy with her childhood world. Her compassion and sensitivity to suffering grew, as she grew. This, along with her instinct to rebel against social inequalities, led her along the revolutionary path.