From Amazon’s monitored warehouse hell to delivery workers being paid per package, exploitative work destroys collaborative relationships young people need — more screen time and 12 new AI ‘friends’ will only make things worse, writes ALAN SIMPSON
The New Popular Front in France and the balance of class forces
Amid an enormously dynamic situation, can Le Pen’s National Rally be stopped in the forthcoming snap election and what role will the new left-wing anti-fascist pact play, asks KEVIN OVENDEN
A protester holds an anti-far right banner during a rally in Paris, June 15, 2024
The Tatar rebel argued that Western workers could be bought off, so instead a ‘colonial international’ must form a dictatorship over Europe and the US, ideas that led to his expulsion from the Bolsheviks and eventual execution, writes EDMUND GRIFFITHS
HEATHER WOOD reports back from another packed annual Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival, where Palestinian flags flew high and solidarity with Birmingham’s striking refuse workers was central
Robinson successfully defended his school from closure, fought for the unification of the teaching unions, mentored future trade union leaders and transformed teaching at the Marx Memorial Library, writes JOHN FOSTER
A judge in a German court ruled that the ban activity imposed on renowned Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah was unlawful, reports LEON WYSTRYCHOWSKI
At the very moment Britain faces poverty, housing and climate crises requiring radical solutions, the liberal press promotes ideologically narrow books while marginalising authors who offer the most accurate understanding of change, writes IAN SINCLAIR
FRANCE is in a deep systemic crisis of the kind that has punctuated its history with violent eruptions. We index them by the years in which they took place from 1789 onwards.
The panicked election for the National Assembly called by President Emmanuel Macron following his party’s humiliation in the European elections, means France in three weeks could have: a fascist prime minister, or a prime minister on a left programme that bosses are screaming is “anti-capitalist,” or no prime minister plus chaos in the government. All with eruptions on the street bigger than those already taking place. Hundreds of thousands protested at the weekend against Marine Le Pen and her far-right National Rally (RN) that topped the European election.
Polling for the legislative election is volatile. The RN is at about 32 per cent. Macron’s liberal-centrist party on 18 per cent. The main opposition to the right is from an alliance of left and centre-left parties, the Popular Front, drawn up last week. It has 28 per cent.
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As Starmer flies to Albania seeking deportation camps while praising Giorgia Meloni, KEVIN OVENDEN warns that without massive campaigns rejecting this new overt government xenophobia, Britain faces a soaring hard right and emboldened fascist thugs on the streets
The shameful passage of the assisted dying Bill where safeguards have been all but jettisoned is symptomatic of a hyper-liberalised society where the cult of individualism reigns supreme, argues KEVIN OVENDEN
The proxy war in Ukraine is heading to a denouement with the US and Russia dividing the spoils while the European powers stand bewildered by events they have been wilfully blind to, says KEVIN OVENDEN
As heavy industry flees and public-sector strikes paralyse the nation, the French leader’s increasingly desperate attempts to rule without a majority reveal the deep crisis at the heart of European liberal democracy, writes KEVIN OVENDEN
