Marxist. Trade Unionist. Socialist-feminist. Author. Poet. Speaker. Tutor. RMT ex-Exec. Workers' Liberty. Autie. Bi. PUFC fan.
A slim (40 ages + cover) book telling the story of the near-revolutionary year of 1919.
Published by Workers’ Liberty to mark the centenary in 2019.
Also posted on the Workers’ Liberty website here. As 1919 began, working-class people in Britain and many other countries looked forward to leaving the Great War behind them and rebuilding their lives. They expected and demanded a better society than … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website here. 1918 had ended with British women voting in a general election for the first time ever. But it was only those aged 30 or over and who met a property qualification who … Read more
This would be the year in which the capitalist state rigorously enforced the role of the police, purging them of rebels, ensuring their loyalty and cutting any link between them and the workers’ movement. The events of 1919 shaped the … Read more
Also published the Workers’ Liberty website here. The stories of 1919 are historic struggles. But mostly, they failed. Even when they succeeded in heading off a particular attack or winning an advance, they did not succeed in remaking society. Imagine … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website here. The British left hailed the Russian revolution in 1917. On 18 January 1919 in London, a mass meeting launched the ‘Hands Off Russia’ campaign to oppose British military intervention in support of … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website here. 11 November 1918 had been merely an armistice. The war would not be officially over until peace terms had been negotiated. The victorious Allied countries began six months of talks in … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website. The ‘Great War’ was finally over. When it had begun in August 1914, the British government predicted that it would be won by Christmas, but it had dragged on for four more years, … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website here. After Britain and its Allies had won the war, proclaiming themselves champions of freedom and democracy, the people of its imperial possessions stepped up their democratic demand for some of that … Read more
While workers were angry and willing to fight, too often their anger was aimed at fellow workers of a different colour rather than at the employers and authorities responsible for their exploitation and poverty. Sometimes this occurred in the absence … Read more
Also published on the Workers’ Liberty website, here. With engineers and others taking on the employers, the time was ripe for the other bastions of industrial power – the rail workers, miners and transport workers – to join the fray. The … Read more
A new short book (40 pages + cover), written by Janine Booth and published by Workers’ Liberty. In 1919, inspired by the Bolshevik revolution in Russia, British workers took more strike action than ever before. But communists in Britain had … Read more