Workers Solidarity Movement

ANARCHISTS ARE NOT against democracy. We are in favour of the idea but we sure as hell disagree with the way it's currently practised. Fine cases in point were the local elections. These were the first local elections in the 26 counties for eight years. Indeed the government decided it might just as well be the wisest thing for all concerned to offer the sitting incumbents up to £20,000 to feck off and retire rather than having to put us all though the process of reminding us how great they were. Thankfully many of them did.

PART 1 - Last year WSM members participated in a number of pickets, organised by the Anti-Racism Campaign, on the constituency clinic of Dublin Fianna Fail TD Ivor Callely. This was in response to comments made by Callely when he criticised the numbers of asylum seekers coming to Ireland. At the time we said that his comments would lead to an increase in racism, and would provide people who have an openly racist agenda with a cover for their activities.

BORD FAILTE, the Irish tourist board, sells an image of Ireland as being a very friendly place to visit, a place where you are guaranteed a huge "Cead Mile Failte" (a hundred thousand welcomes). Tell that to the group of nine Polish tourists whose friendly welcome in mid-June consisted of spending a night in Mountjoy prison before being dispatched back to Poland unceremoniously because "they didn't have enough money". Or to the Japanese academic who wanted to come to Ireland for the Bloomsday celebrations, also in mid-June, but was refused permission to land in the State.

ON APRIL 25TH 1974 a radical faction within the Portuguese Armed Forces, the MFA, revolted against the government. Until that day Portugal had been under a fascist dictatorship for over half a century. Whether the MFA was left or right wing inclined was unclear at the time. The military revolt created a space where people could effect change in their lives and the opportunity was grasped eagerly.Left-wing activists began returning from exile, and new political parties sprouted up. The parties all used the situation to gain political power in the government. Ordinary folk, in contrast, used the situation to improve social conditions in their communities and workplaces through new autonomous organisations. It was here that the true revolution was fought and is of most interest to anarchists.

OVER THE SUMMER there were developments in the long struggle over women's rights to control their own bodies. Most of them have not been good. In the North a group known as Precious Life succeeded, following a campaign of intimidation, in closing down the Ulster Pregnancy Advisory Association. The association had been in existence for 20 years. They took the decision to close their doors following picketing of the homes of their councillors, who were all volunteers. Their head office was broken into and a fire was started.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees is spending about 11 cents a day per refugee in Africa. Some refugee camps hold as many as 500,000 people and have just one doctor for every 100,000. Up to 6,000 people there die each day from cholera and other public health diseases.1

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In the ten years from 1987 to 1997 (the first decade of 'social partnership') the share of 26 county earnings going to wages, pensions and social welfare declined by 10%; from 69% to 59%. The share going to profits, rents and dividends rose by 10%; from 31% to 41%.2

Irish syndicalism - WE HAVE LEARNED with regret that the Irish section of the International Workers Association, Organise!, has decided to dissolve itself. Although we had political differences with this anarcho-syndicalist group - in particular with their approach of trying to build new revolutionary unions - we welcomed their existence as offering another option to those interested in anarchism in Ireland.

LAST SUMMER, the Irish News ran an article titled 'SDLP slams Britains record in East Timor'. (August 6th). SDLP assembly member Carmel Hanna rightly criticised the British government for continuing arms sales to Indonesia. She even went so far as to describe Britain's role in relation to East Timor as "sordid" because of this.

Quite right, but...

The issues of the Irish anarchist paper Workers Solidarity published in 1999.  These are issues 56 to 58 and were the last in the A3 8 page format.

The Sunday Tribune of 7th March 1999 reproduced a photograph taken in the grounds of Dublin Castle in June 1990. Beaming at the camera, without an apparent care in the world, are the then 12 Prime ministers of the European Union, along with their foreign ministers. They had indeed plenty of reason to feel satisfaction with their weekend's work in Dublin - their idea of closer European political union was being discussed and we were all about to be embarked on the road to European Monetary Union and the wonders of the Euro.