Past Events

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An opportunity to catch up on what we've been up to

28 November 2024

Gawain Little, general secretary of the GFTU, chairs a discussion on the new challenges facing Britain’s trade union movement with Fran Heathcote (general secretary PCS), Alex Gordon (RMT President) and Sarah Woolley (general secretary BFAWU). This includes the challenges of maintaining and enhancing members' pay, terms, conditions and legal rights and freedoms under the current government and more strategic issue of how collectively to create a movement in communities and workplaces that can combat the arguments of the far right and redevelop wider class solidarity.

23 November 2024

Special lecture from Ofer Cassif, member of the Israeli Knesset for the Hadash party. This onsite and online lecture is free-of-charge, but please register in advance using the link below. Dr. Ofer Cassif is a member of the Knesset, representing the Democratic Front for Peace and Equality (Hadash) in parliament since 2019. A scholar in the field political science, he obtained his PhD from the LSE on research project involving Marxist approach to nationalism. MK Cassif has been a loud and clear voice against the genocide in Gaza and war crimes of Israel, advocating for Palestinians rights, freedom and sovereignty from the heart of the Israeli political system. He suffered ever growing persecution and repercussions, including an attempt to impeach him for supporting South Africa’s ICJ case and multiplies bans on parliamentary activities. He supports a just peace based on immediate end of the occupation, following the traditions of the Communist Party of Israel, which he is a lifelong member of. He joined its ranks as a young adult after refusing to serve in the occupied Palestinians lands during the first intifada, and consequently facing military imprisonments.

17 November 2024

This lecture in partnership with the Working Class Movement Library will be delivered by Professor Marj Mayo will explore Engels as Educator Engels has been valued in so many ways, as a theoretician in his own right as well as having been Marx’s co-author and editor. His contributions to political education have been far less recognised. This lecture will argue that Engels does indeed have much contribute here too, though, making Marx’s writings accessible and relevant for wider audiences. ‘Socialism: Utopian and Scientific is a classic example’. But this isn’t all. Engels’ writings have also been trail blazing in terms of developing Marxist understandings of language, cultures and changing consciousness, understandings which have underpinned subsequent understandings of the development of class consciousness

14 November 2024

Printworkers as pioneers

A panel jointly organised by the Marx Memorial Library & Workers' School and Unite GPMITC Sector in celebration of the MML's Printworkers' Collection.The inaugural annual lecture in celebration of our Printworkers' Collection, in partnership with Unite GPMITC Sector. MML is currently carrying out a two-year project to catalogue and make available this incredible collection of material documenting the history of printworkers' struggle and union organising. With archive material donated by Unite and the personal papers of activists in printworking, this collection provides a history of nearly 200 years of workers organising in the print, paper and publishing industry, in addition to some key disputes.This panel will examine printworkers as pioneers in the development of collective rights and bargaining, and the importance of ensuring that heritage is preserved for future generations. Ann Field will look at the history of printworkers organising and highlight key moments in the fight for collective agreements to improve pay and conditions by them. Matt Dunne will introduce the printworkers collections and discuss the importance of maintaining that history so that crucial stories of labour movement history are not lost or forgotten. Matt Whaley will finish by looking at current organising and bargaining in the growing IT and digital technology companies within the sector today.Speakers:Matt Whaley is a Unite regional officer with responsibilities for the GPM&IT Sector.Ann Field was a national officer of Unite/GPMU and represented print and publishing workers from 1974 until 2009. She is joint creator of the Wapping exhibition and archive at MML. Matt Dunne is the archivist at MML and is carrying out a two-year cataloguing project on the library’s Printworkers' Collection. Chaired by Tony Burke, former assistant general secretary of Unite and former deputy general secretary of GPMU, and currently co-chair of the Campaign for Trade Union Freedom.
 

30 October 2024

A panel reflecting on the legacy of the 1974 Health & Safety Act.  This Act was passed by the Labour government of Harold Wilson. It reflected the demands of the trade union movement at the height of its power in the aftermath of the defeat of Edward Heath.  For the first time it gave trade unionists the right to demand the cessation of work in face of workplace hazards and directly involved trade union representatives in the safety monitoring of workplaces.  The years immediately following saw a significant improvement in workplace safety.  However, the past period has seen a drastic erosion of Health and Safety funding and personnel, a major decline in trade union density, especially in the most dangerous industries, and a crisis in enforcement.  Janet Newsham of Hazards and Geoff Fletcher, Emeritus Professor Middlesex University, will discuss what needs to be done to reverse the decline.

 

 
17 October 2024

 

The meeting brings together officers from three peace movements to discuss how to combat the pro-war narrative currently dominating British politics. It does so in the spirit of Professor J D Bernal, a founding member of the World Peace Council, whose relevant papers are housed in the library. Liz Payne will represent the British Peace Assembly e affiliate of the WPC that today unites peace organisations across the global south, the Americas and much of Europe. Kate Hudson is general secretary of the Campaign against Nuclear Disarmament, Britain’s main campaigning body against nuclear weapons. Andrew Murray is a Deputy President of Stop the War, currently campaigning against Israeli aggression in the Middle East. The meeting will be chaired by Meirian Jump, MML Director, who will also outline the scope of the library’s peace collections.

 

10 October 2024

 

With Professor Roger Seifert and Angela Grant (President of the DWP Section at the Public and Commercial Services Union). Chaired by MML Archivist Matt Dunne.

Roger Seifert will discuss how unemployment is entirely created by those in positions of power within the political economy of the state. It is not an act of God. It is not an inevitable outcome of the workings of economics, nor indeed the result of bad luck and whimsical elements of the human condition. It is the deliberate consequence of specific policies, and as such can be remedied and eliminated. The unemployed themselves are usually blamed for being unemployed by the very people who pursued the economic programmes that ended in such waste. The organised fight back, lead by the NUWM, combined a stinging rebuke for those that allowed unemployment to ravage the nation; a set of practical policies to end unemployment; and suggestions for the mitigation of the misery endured in the here and now by the unemployed and their families. In so doing the movement united a wide range of groups in a common cause, and breathed solidarity into the labour movement otherwise prone to division and fragmentation. This contribution will analyse the causes and consequences of unemployment, and how only through class struggle can it be eradicated.

Angela Grant will cover the conditions our unemployed workers are experiencing today and the failings of successive governments to provide any real security.  PCS demand a fit for purpose and fully funded social security service that provides support at the time of need, and allows unemployed workers and our elderly, sick and disabled citizens to live with independence and dignity.

Angela Grant, Public and Commercial Services Union.
Angela has worked for DWP since 2006, was elected member of the union's Group Executive since 2014 and is currently DWP Group President.  She sits on the union's National Executive and National Black Members' Committees. She is an Equality Advocate, campaigning for womens' and disability rights, and with a determined endeavour to win for our class a fair and just social security service, to aid all in need.

 

26 September 2024

With Professor Costas Lapavitsas, chaired by Professor Mary Davis

 

Costas Lapavitsas, professor of  economics at London's School of Oriental and Africa Studies, examines the rise of the far right in Italy, France and Germany. He does so in the context of a failing neo-liberal capitalism and the institutional crisis of its political guardian, the European Union.   Professor Lapavitsas was elected to the Greek parliament as a member of Syriza in 2015 and subsequently moved to Popular Unity.  His latest book is The State of Capitalism: Economy, Society and Hegemony

 

18 September 2024

Marxist economist Michael Roberts discusses the latest developments in the world economy - in particular the forecast that the major economies are stuck in a stagnation that the IMF has called the 'tepid twenties'. Chaired by Alex Gordon.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

15 June 2024

 

Perfidious Albion: Britain & the Spanish Civil War: The book’s title reflects the first of its three central themes – the damaging hypocrisy of British foreign policy towards the Spanish Republic, a policy founded in the class prejudices of Conservative decisionmakers rather than British strategic interests.  The second contrasts that negativity with the selfless humanitarian efforts of many doctors and nurses from Britain, Ireland and Commonwealth countries. The third examines the political influences on major writers on the Spanish Civil War.

Born in Liverpool in 1946, Paul Preston is Professor of International History at the LSE.  He has devoted most of his career to teaching, researching and writing about 20th century European history.  He is best known for his books on the Spanish Civil War and Franco. 
 
Drawing substantially on new material, the ten biographies in Forged in Spain tell the stories of a handful of extraordinary men and women, explaining why they went to Spain, what happened to them there and the lasting, often dramatic impact the war had on their lives. While they survived the war, all were forever changed by their experiences. All of them were, in their different ways, forged in Spain.

Formerly Chair of the International Brigade Memorial Trust, Richard Baxell is a historian who has written extensively on the British volunteers and the Spanish Civil War. His Unlikely Warriors was short-listed for the 2013 political history book of the year.
 

6 June 2024

 

Energy policy is promoted by government and by Labour since its scrapping of its £28bn ‘green pledge’ as a choice between economic ‘growth’ (and jobs) and the environment.  The reality is that energy companies now rake in eye-watering profits while millions struggle to heat their homes or pay their bills in the ongoing cost of living crisis.  

Simon Coop is national officer for energy and utilities at Unite the union whose meticulous and detailed report ‘Unplugging energy profiteers’ makes an unanswerable case for public ownership of energy distribution networks, domestic power suppliers and the North Sea’s reserves of oil and gas, to bring an end to flagrant profiteering.  Simon will introduce the report, outline the policy options available and discuss how campaigns like Unite’s ‘Take the Power Back’ can put energy policy centre-stage.

Sean O'Neill is Secretary of the GMB's Glasgow Education branch.  Within his local Wyndford Residents Union -he campaigned to protect the community's pioneering heat and power system and the architecturally famous Wyndford Tower blocks.  Sean will examine the challenges and potential of local campaigning involving community organisations, stressing that ultimately only public ownership at national level can resolve the problem. 

The Unite report can be downloaded from or read online at www.unitetheunion.org/unpluggingenergyprofiteers 

 

15 May 2024

 

A panel discussion on why and how archivists & historians preserve the heritage of the Miners' Strike for the labour movement, accompanied by a display

Join us for the second part of our commemoration of the 40th anniversary of the Miners’ Strike!

This panel discussion will hear from archivists and historians on the importance in preserving the heritage of the Miners’ Strike for future generations of the Labour movement. Hear panellists discuss their role in maintaining stories of the Strike that would otherwise be hidden and what we can learn from them, how archivists have preserved records during and since the Strike, and the ongoing work to look after labour movement archives today.

There will also be a chance to see a display of some of the amazing material from the Miners' Strike held in our collections.

 

  • Liz Wood, Project Archivist at the Modern Records Centre

Liz Wood has worked as an archivist at the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick, since 2006. She is currently cataloguing the archives of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) as part of 'Mining the Past', a three year grant-funded project (2023/6).

  • Keith Gildart, Professor of labour and social history, ex-miner

Keith Gildart is a Professor of Labour and Social History. After working as an underground coal miner for seven years he studied at the universities of Manchester and York. Keith is an expert in the historiography of the Strike and was instrumental in saving the NUM archive.

  • Matt Dunne, Archivist & Volunteer Coordinator at the Marx Memorial Library

Matt Dunne works with the archival collections at the Marx Memorial Library and is carrying out a 2 year cataloguing project on the library’s Printworkers Collection. He will discuss how the library reacted to the strike at the time, and some of the links of solidarity from the Miners’ Strike shown in our collections.

Discussion chaired by Meirian Jump, Director of the Marx Memorial Library

9 May 2024

A panel discussion exploring the role of the law, the state and communities in the 1984-5 Miners' Strike

  • Lord John Hendy KC on the role of the law and the state. 
  • Heather Wood on Women Against Pit Closures
  • Ann Field in the Chair

 

Lord John Hendy KC spent most of his years in practice at the Bar representing workers and trade unions. During the miners' strike of 1984-5, he appeared for the NUM and its Area unions in practically all of the civil litigation against the unions including the the injunctions, sequestration and receivership. It took over a year after the strike before the sequestrators and receivers were finally removed. He was Standing Counsel to the NUM (and 7 other UK unions) for many years. He is now a member of the House of Lords, appointed by Jeremy Corbyn, and an honorary professor in the Faculty of Law of University College, London. He is chair of the Institute of Employment Rights, president of the International Centre for Trade Union Rights and a vice-president of the Campaign for Trade Union Freedom.   

Heather Wood trained as a nurse and later entered the probation service. In 1983 she was was chair of Easington Constituency Labour Party when they formed Save Easington Area Mines, a group which she also chaired. In 1984-5 Heather set up 14 support groups in Easington District and a number beyond.

Ann Field was a national officer of Unite/GPMU and represented print and publishing workers from 1974 until 2009. She is joint creator of the Wapping exhibition and archive at MML. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

27 April 2024

MML 1933-2033: Looking Forward to Our Centenary • Katie McAndrews, Historic Building Consultant, Hutton & Rostron • Ruth Hayes, Councillor for Clerkenwell Ward and Marx Memorial Library trustee • Fran Heathcote, General Secretary of the Public and Commercial Services • Meirian Jump, Director of the Marx Memorial Library

 

Read about our centenary plans reported in the Morning Star here.

10 April 2024

Albano Nunes - former International Secretary of the Portuguese Communist Party & Participant in the Portuguese Revolution of 1974

Albano Nunes, currently member of the Central Control Commission of the Portuguese Communist Party, was an active participant in the revolution.  The Revolution overthrew the fascist regime in power since 1926 and marked the culmination of two generations of illegal struggle by trade unionists, by agricultural workers in Portugal’s south, by those struggling for liberation in Portugal’s colonies and by clandestine organisation in Portugal’s conscript army.  The PCP helped coordinate these struggles. The resulting mass movement of the Portuguese people brought a socialist constitution pledging public ownership, the nationalisation of the big monopolies, cooperative ownership of the big landed estates in the south. The revolutionary government backed and assisted the process of full colonial liberation by the movements in  Portugal’s ex-colonies.

 

 

14 March 2024

The Labour Manifesto of 1974 firmly places on the agenda the challenge to the distribution of power and wealth in this country that has reverberated through every political struggle since. Its ambition was the foundation stone for the left to build upon, becoming an inspiration for the radical 2017 and 2019 Labour manifestos.

6 March 2024

Professor Mary Davis

This year marks the centenary of the first Labour Government. It was a minority government and lasted just nine months. Was it the product of a cunning Tory/Liberal plot or a wise decision by Labour to prove that it was ‘fit to govern’?

22 February 2024

Andrew Feinstein, writer, campaigner, ex-ANC MP and author of 'The Shadow World: Inside the Global Arms Trade' Andrew Feinstein was born in South Africa, worked with the ANC under Apartheid and was subsequently elected an ANC MP (later resigning in protest at a government arms deal). He has since lived in Britain. In 2011 Penguin published his Shadow World: Inside the Global Arms Trade described by the Washington Post as ‘possibly the most comprehensively complete account ever written’

8 February 2024

Professor David Lane and discussants Andrew Murray and Radhika Desai; 

The twentieth century was an era of socialist revolutionary transformations and significant social-democratic reforms. By the twenty-first century, these socialist inspired movements have largely disappeared, their ideology had been disavowed, and their institutions dismantled. In the first part of the book, David Lane explains which social forces drove them and why, initially, they were successful. He considers how they were consequently reversed in the context of global neoliberal capitalism which became a dominant ideology driven by political and economic elites with significant social support and political legitimacy.

Underlying these developments, he describes the changing economic and social structure of capitalism and the geo-political consequences of globalisation.  He defines the key areas in which neoliberal capitalism can be faulted. In the second part of the book, he considers current social and political movements and points to alternative forms of capitalism, notably state capitalist formations, as well as its replacement.  Here he summarises the merits and limitations of proposed social-democratic reforms, or reversals of globalisation, proposals for self-sustaining autonomous communities, the limits of ecological reforms, and ideas about a globalised form of socialism.

Finally, he outlines his own proposals to move to economic and political coordination predicated on combining market socialism and statist forms of planning.

 

20 January 2024

Commemorating the the centenary of Lenin's death 1924-2024

This symposium will open with a panel on Lenin in London, followed by an opportunity to visit our 'Lenin Room' in person, or virtually if attending online.

The afternoon will include three sessions on Lenin's intellectual and political legacy including an exploration of Lenin on imperialism and the labour aristocracy, and his thinking on the state and revolution.

Speakers include

  • Bob Henderson (author of the Spark that Lit the Revolution: Lenin in London)
  • Professor Mary Davis 
  • Jonathan White (author of Making our History: A Users Guide to Historical Materialism)
  • Vijay Prashad (Indian historian & journalist, author of forty books)

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