WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE uk United Kingdom - news journal UPDATE - (en) UK, ACG: New Year's Message from the Anarchist Communist Group: Putting Hope Back on the Agenda (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 Despite the pessimism peddled in the mainstream media,  2024 was a year

of  resistance to the increasing barbarism of capitalism. Yes, we have
the continuing wars in Ukraine  and the Middle East,  both claiming
thousands of victims, 45,000 and rising for Palestinian fatalities. We
have the election of Trump in the USA, and the threat of the far right
in Spain, France, Italy, Germany and here. We have the cyclone that hit
the island of Mayotte, the extreme flooding in Spain, and more recently
in the Midlands and Wales, events triggered by the worsening climate crisis.
All of this indicates that capitalism, which puts greed before general
welfare, generates war after war,  and is responsible for climate
disaster, must go. It must be replaced by a new society based on the
collective ownership of the means of production and distribution, the
land and housing, the end of the class system and the overthrow of the
State. Only this can end war, exploitation, and the destruction of the
planet.

Despite the gloomy scenario that the media pushes, designed to lead to
despair and helplessness, resistance is there and it can be seen in the
events in Bangladesh, in South Korea, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Kenya.
A 24 hour general strike in Greece challenged austerity programmes and
the Greek state's support for NATO, which involved maintaining a frigate
in the Red Sea to protect Israel from the Houthis. Large demonstrations
with the possibility of a general strike are looming in Belgium over
austerity measures and attacks on pensions. Here in the UK, we had huge
numbers turning out on demonstrations against the Israeli attacks on
Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon, and the large numbers who turned out at
short notice to counter far-right mobilisations.

The Tories suffered a severe blow at the last election when they were
booted out. They were replaced by a Labour administration that has
carried on with policies previously applied by the Tories. Labour won
many seats, mainly due to anti-Tory revulsion, but their foundations are
flimsy. Starmer's approval rating is the lowest for any party leader in
the last half century.

This indicates that resistance can win concessions. Anger at the cutting
of winter fuel payments and the maintenance of the two child benefit cap
is the tip of the iceberg. There is a much deeper anger at the social
conditions in this country that could explode at any time in the future.
This should not be diverted by the fake anti-establishment credentials
of Reform UK, a far right formation funded by a gang of billionaires and
millionaires.

Putting Communism Back on the Agenda

The Starmer government has already shown that it means to continue with
the austerity policies of previous Labour and Tory governments.  It has
attacked pensioners and means to continue the dismantling of the NHS. We
must move from an anti-capitalism that is too often reduced to vague
slogans to a strong defence of communism as the only credible
alternative to capitalist globalisation and the wars between major
imperialist powers that threaten us, as in Ukraine and the Middle East.
This communism has nothing to do with Lenin, Stalin and Mao and the
deplorable experience of the Soviet Union and China. It is a free,
stateless, communism that must be re-introduced into the dreams and the
aspirations of the working class.

Anarchist communists must more than ever hold high their social project:
socialisation of the means of production and self-organisation of
society through a system of workplace and neighbourhood councils.

Resistance

Trump will now intensify support for attacks on Palestine and the
Lebanon, and indeed throughout the Middle East. This requires an
international movement against war, with practical support given to war
resisters, conscientious objectors, draft dodgers, and deserters,
whether in Israel or Russia and Ukraine. It requires the development of
an internationalist anti-war position, at the moment voiced by small
numbers of revolutionaries, including the Anarchist Communist Group.
This is vital and we shall continue to defend these positions and
attempt to enlarge their audience.

At home we must encourage opposition to the Labour government and to
capitalism in general. We must get involved in local and national
campaigns around housing, support for strikers, and against attacks on
the environment. Recent events have seen support for the London Renters
Union and for rank and file base unions organising workers who have been
ignored by the mainstream unions, like security guards at London museums
and workers at Harrods. Elsewhere we have seen strikes by workers at
sixth form colleges and the NHS. All of these strikes must be supported.
We must develop local strike support committees and organisation in the
local communities, around evictions, landlords' treatment of renters,
and against the closure of social facilities like libraries, youth and
community centres, creches, and nurseries, etc. by local councils.

In order to resist we must build alternative structures both in the
workplaces and in the neighbourhoods. We must emphasise mutual aid and
direct action, against the manipulations and betrayals by Labour and the
union bureaucrats. That is the only effective opposition.

Resistance is fertile!

https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2025/01/01/new-years-message-from-the-anarchist-communist-group-putting-hope-back-on-the-agenda/
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