A working-class Christmas 175 years ago
Modern Christmas as we know it, with its trees, dinner menu, cards and time off from work, only dates back to the early days of modern socialism as we know it, writes KEITH FLETT, checking in on Marx, Engels and the Chartists in the 1800s
The welcome news that Cuba has finally been removed from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list is tempered by the fact that Donald Trump, the man who put it there, is returning to the White House, warns NATASHA HICKMAN
Thanks to impressive progress in Britain with wind and solar generation, clean electricity now costs a fraction of the price of gas — yet the current system keeps bills artificially high to protect fossil fuels, writes TOM HARDY
By spreading race-based conspiracy theories, the billionaire tycoon turned right-wing provocateur has been seriously undermining the case against those who really did let victims of the grooming gangs down, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
Many Western countries are grappling with deep political instability. What are the causes of this, and what could be a possible way forward? asks MARC VANDEPITTE
KEITH BENNETT explains why, despite its present meagre economic outcomes, an honest and fruitful partnership with China is worth pursuing
Nick Wright talks to photographer and author JANINA STRUK
IN 2024, the Christmas period is marked by eating and drinking for those who can afford it and a lot of hard work by those who need to earn money for even the most modest celebration.
Looking back 175 years to 1849, when market capitalism was still a relatively new system, we find much the same pattern.
Until the 1871 Bank Holidays Act, there was no official time off at Christmas, hence Scrooge reluctantly allowing his clerk the day off on December 25 in Dickens’s Christmas Carol.
More from this author
Every few years, it seems like the ‘right time’ to build a new left party — but what are the right conditions, asks socialist historian KEITH FLETT, looking back at the last two centuries and the insights of Ralph Miliband and EP Thompson
Forget Farage and the recent daft demands for a new election against Labour: the greatest petition Britain has ever known gathered millions of names demanding the right to vote — and it didn’t work either, writes KEITH FLETT
KEITH FLETT considers how the return of the monarchy after Cromwell offers lessons for a left facing the return of Donald Trump, showing that radical traditions endure despite reactionary victories
KEITH FLETT reflects on the 1964 and 1974 election victories, arguing that despite years in power, Labour failed to fundamentally reshape society in the way Thatcher later would — a pattern Blair and now Starmer would follow
Similar stories
Forget Farage and the recent daft demands for a new election against Labour: the greatest petition Britain has ever known gathered millions of names demanding the right to vote — and it didn’t work either, writes KEITH FLETT
PAUL DONOVAN applauds the dogged determination of the Old Vic to stage Dickens’s classic Christmas moral tale in support of Waterloo food bank
Socialist historian KEITH FLETT looks at the 19th-century roots of the labour movement’s celebratory day
The right-wing press has been dining out on the idea that new graves near Marx’s in Highgate Cemetery being ‘sold for profit’ would be some great rebuke of the great anti-capitalist – KEITH FLETT sets the record straight