Jeremy Corbyn can’t state the obvious on Gibraltar because he has gone along with Brexit.
At the end of March it became known that Spanish diplomats had succeeded in inserting a clause into the provisional treaty governing the transition after Britain leaves the EU in March 2019. The clause states that those transitional arrangements will only apply to Gibraltar if Spain agrees.The British Government which desperately needs a transitional agreement to prevent a cliff edge departure from the EU can neither veto nor opt-out; they just have take what they are given - or walk away with nothing.
Now whether the tax-haven Gibraltar is ruled by Britain or Spain doesn’t interest me, nor does the loss of international power by the British state. But there is a point here. The Brexiteers who are all British nationalists of one sort or another, claimed that EU departure was about ‘taking back control.’ Yet the reality, as highlighted by the Gibraltar issue, shows the exact opposite: a massive loss of ability for the British state to wield influence and control.
And, had Jeremy Corbyn continued to oppose Brexit after the referendum - of course mainly for reasons nothing to do with Gibraltar - he could have pressed home the point that power and influence are seeping away from Britain, and the Brexiteers’ triumphalism of a powerful, proud and independent nation is a mere delusion. But with Corbyn de facto co-sponsoring Brexit with the Tories, and inevitably falling into step with with the nationalist discourse that accompanies it, the Labour leader is hamstrung and can’t make the point.
4 April 2017
1 April 2017
Corbyn should realise that Brexit will screw working people
Jeremy Corbyn is wrong to support and downplay Brexit. He should oppose processes which attack working people.
March 29th 2017 saw the British Government finally triggering Article 50 to start the two year process of leaving the European Union. In the House of Common, Jeremy Corbyn hardly made headlines when he repeated his Brexit mantra “Brexit is the will of the people,” and no to Britain becoming a low tax, low regulation economy.
Quite clearly Corbyn doesn’t feel strongly about Brexit. He probably thinks it is an issue which will just fade away. Or he might even harbour illusions of it granting his vainly hoped-for majority Labour government, elected in 2020, extra powers. In the meantime, however, he wants to concentrate on economic issues and leave talking about Brexit to others.
But what Corbyn fails to understand is the link between Brexit and the increased exploitation of working people. Brexit is already causing capital flight, for instance the news the following day that Lloyds and J. P. Morgan were moving some of their operations outside the UK. And on top of that, much more capital simply won’t flow into Britain in the first place. Trade barriers increase costs. So put simply the Tories, to maintain profit levels, will need to increase exploitation through a further cutting of wages, taxes,employment rights and benefits.
It won’t be long before the economic price of Brexit becomes obvious. And Corbyn will pay heavily for his foolishness in co-sponsoring Brexit with the May Government.
March 29th 2017 saw the British Government finally triggering Article 50 to start the two year process of leaving the European Union. In the House of Common, Jeremy Corbyn hardly made headlines when he repeated his Brexit mantra “Brexit is the will of the people,” and no to Britain becoming a low tax, low regulation economy.
Quite clearly Corbyn doesn’t feel strongly about Brexit. He probably thinks it is an issue which will just fade away. Or he might even harbour illusions of it granting his vainly hoped-for majority Labour government, elected in 2020, extra powers. In the meantime, however, he wants to concentrate on economic issues and leave talking about Brexit to others.
But what Corbyn fails to understand is the link between Brexit and the increased exploitation of working people. Brexit is already causing capital flight, for instance the news the following day that Lloyds and J. P. Morgan were moving some of their operations outside the UK. And on top of that, much more capital simply won’t flow into Britain in the first place. Trade barriers increase costs. So put simply the Tories, to maintain profit levels, will need to increase exploitation through a further cutting of wages, taxes,employment rights and benefits.
It won’t be long before the economic price of Brexit becomes obvious. And Corbyn will pay heavily for his foolishness in co-sponsoring Brexit with the May Government.
15 March 2017
Divorcing the Scottish Labour Party
The Labour Party in Scotland should become a wholly independent organisation.
Jeremy Corbyn’s position on the question of a second Scottish independence referendum is utterly muddled, though it is unclear whether he is at fault or the mainstream media. But cutting through the confusion, his opinion seems to be this: Scotland should be allowed to have a referendum if it wants one, but it should not want one. In short, Corbyn has hitched himself to Unionism, and believes that, despite the Scottish rejection of Brexit in the April 2016 referendum, Scotland, as part of the UK, should be taken out of the EU against its will.
In taking that line Corbyn has fallen into step with the fiercely Unionist Scottish Labour Party leadership, the body which has sunk Labour in the last decade from Scotland’s dominant force into a measly third-placed party. Scottish Labour leader, Kezia Dugdale, is strongly anti-Corbyn, as is Ian Murray, Scotland’s sole Labour MP. They won't help Corbyn to achieve anything.
Of course, it’s not up to Corbyn to tell Scotland that the country should be independent, any more than it is up to him to say that it should not be. That issue is for Scotland alone to decide. But Corbyn could, and should, disassociate himself from the Scottish Labour Party, and declare that Scottish Labour ought to be a wholly independent organisation. But sadly I don’t think Corbyn will take that step.
Jeremy Corbyn’s position on the question of a second Scottish independence referendum is utterly muddled, though it is unclear whether he is at fault or the mainstream media. But cutting through the confusion, his opinion seems to be this: Scotland should be allowed to have a referendum if it wants one, but it should not want one. In short, Corbyn has hitched himself to Unionism, and believes that, despite the Scottish rejection of Brexit in the April 2016 referendum, Scotland, as part of the UK, should be taken out of the EU against its will.
In taking that line Corbyn has fallen into step with the fiercely Unionist Scottish Labour Party leadership, the body which has sunk Labour in the last decade from Scotland’s dominant force into a measly third-placed party. Scottish Labour leader, Kezia Dugdale, is strongly anti-Corbyn, as is Ian Murray, Scotland’s sole Labour MP. They won't help Corbyn to achieve anything.
Of course, it’s not up to Corbyn to tell Scotland that the country should be independent, any more than it is up to him to say that it should not be. That issue is for Scotland alone to decide. But Corbyn could, and should, disassociate himself from the Scottish Labour Party, and declare that Scottish Labour ought to be a wholly independent organisation. But sadly I don’t think Corbyn will take that step.
12 March 2017
Brexit: Corbyn Screwed Up
Jeremy Corbyn steered Labour into unconditionally supporting Brexit. In so doing he stained progressive politics and sunk the Left.
When Jeremy Corbyn was elected to the Labour leadership in 2015, my hopes were rekindled that for the first time in decades a progressive force had emerged in British politics. But Corbyn’s decision to whip the PLP into voting unconditionally for the May Government’s hard Brexit finally dashed any such optimism. There are some mistakes in politics which are survivable, and some which are not. Corbyn’s Brexit stance, I believe, falls into the latter category.
Let us add up the damage.
1. Corbyn aligned Labour alongside the xenophobia which is the cause and effect of Brexit. Many right-wing Labour MPs are seemingly happy to accommodate themselves to the wave of anti-liberal, foreigner-hating nationalism now sweeping England, but the tragedy for the progressive left is that Corbyn joined them. His commitment to Freedom of Movement is dead, even if he continues to plead the case of the three million or so non-British EU nationals resident in the UK.
2. Seventy percent of Labour voters, and an even larger majority of Labour members, voted for Remain. The vast bulk of the young left that joined to support Corbyn’s leadership campaigns saw Britain’s future in the EU. Many will now be seeking new political homes, or abandoning politics altogether. The future for the left in the party without them is bleak.
3. Corbyn threw away the chance of building any kind of progressive alliance with other centre and left-leaning parties: the Liberal Democrats, SNP and the Greens. A key element of any working arrangement would have been opposing Brexit and the consequences of Brexit. The official Labour position, namely, that it will win the 2020 General Election single handed is highly improbable.
4. Brexit will impede trade and drive away investment. And, as the economic negatives become apparent, Labour will lack any credibility in blaming Theresa May’s hard Brexit on the Tories. Corbyn led Labour through the Tory lobbies and thus willed the consequences.
Following the House of Commons vote to endorse a hard Brexit backed by Corbyn, the Labour leader tweeted,"Real fight starts now. Over next two years Labour will use every opportunity to ensure Brexit protects jobs, living standards & the economy." This must rank among the most pathetic utterances in modern political history, as he vouched to fight the consequences of his own actions. Corbyn hopelessly mis-analysed the situation, lost friends without finding new ones, damaged the left, and stained Labour as a progressive movement.
It is hard not to agree with Martin Kettle writing in The Guardian (02-March-2017), "There is nothing socialist about this, nothing social democratic, nothing liberal, nothing progressive, nothing moral, nothing with any optimism or imagination.”
When Jeremy Corbyn was elected to the Labour leadership in 2015, my hopes were rekindled that for the first time in decades a progressive force had emerged in British politics. But Corbyn’s decision to whip the PLP into voting unconditionally for the May Government’s hard Brexit finally dashed any such optimism. There are some mistakes in politics which are survivable, and some which are not. Corbyn’s Brexit stance, I believe, falls into the latter category.
Let us add up the damage.
1. Corbyn aligned Labour alongside the xenophobia which is the cause and effect of Brexit. Many right-wing Labour MPs are seemingly happy to accommodate themselves to the wave of anti-liberal, foreigner-hating nationalism now sweeping England, but the tragedy for the progressive left is that Corbyn joined them. His commitment to Freedom of Movement is dead, even if he continues to plead the case of the three million or so non-British EU nationals resident in the UK.
2. Seventy percent of Labour voters, and an even larger majority of Labour members, voted for Remain. The vast bulk of the young left that joined to support Corbyn’s leadership campaigns saw Britain’s future in the EU. Many will now be seeking new political homes, or abandoning politics altogether. The future for the left in the party without them is bleak.
3. Corbyn threw away the chance of building any kind of progressive alliance with other centre and left-leaning parties: the Liberal Democrats, SNP and the Greens. A key element of any working arrangement would have been opposing Brexit and the consequences of Brexit. The official Labour position, namely, that it will win the 2020 General Election single handed is highly improbable.
4. Brexit will impede trade and drive away investment. And, as the economic negatives become apparent, Labour will lack any credibility in blaming Theresa May’s hard Brexit on the Tories. Corbyn led Labour through the Tory lobbies and thus willed the consequences.
Following the House of Commons vote to endorse a hard Brexit backed by Corbyn, the Labour leader tweeted,"Real fight starts now. Over next two years Labour will use every opportunity to ensure Brexit protects jobs, living standards & the economy." This must rank among the most pathetic utterances in modern political history, as he vouched to fight the consequences of his own actions. Corbyn hopelessly mis-analysed the situation, lost friends without finding new ones, damaged the left, and stained Labour as a progressive movement.
It is hard not to agree with Martin Kettle writing in The Guardian (02-March-2017), "There is nothing socialist about this, nothing social democratic, nothing liberal, nothing progressive, nothing moral, nothing with any optimism or imagination.”
7 March 2017
Socialism and nationalism are not compatible
You can be a nationalist or a socialist, but you can’t be both.
A nationalist is someone who prioritises allegiance to a national group ahead of other political considerations. Thus those Labour politicians who talk about 'the will of the British people' as a trump card in politics are nationalists – just like the fascists who shout out "Britain First." Of course, there are many different varieties of nationalists. Politicians and parties combine their nationalism with other political objectives; and some varieties are far less odorous than others. Yet whatever the type, there are two reasons why socialists do not embrace nationalism.
First, the nationalist, by virtue of making the national group the most important factor of identification, creates a dichotomy between those who are members of the defined national group and those who are not. People are divided, favoured and discriminated against by characteristics that they cannot, or at least cannot easily, change. Socialists, in contrast, are universalists, whose politics embrace people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity. Nationalism and socialism cannot be combined because one negates the other.
Second, the nationalists’ construction of the concept of a nation is a historical undertaking, which involves looking backwards to find historical customs, myths, language usage, etc. which supposedly bind the people of the nation. By looking backwards, nationalism tends to be conservative and finds its ideals in the past. Socialists, in contrast, believe in freeing people from historical oppressions and see the ideal world as something to be created by human beings in the future. And that future is based on what is progressive from a combination of all human history, not that of one nation.
Internationalism is not the opposite of nationalism. Internationalism involves the recognition of different nationalisms and works for them to coexist on a friendly and cooperative basis. The opposite of nationalism is anationalism (or cosmopolitanism), which seeks the unity of people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity.
One thing should be made clear. Someone who calls for autonomy or independence for a territory, is not for that reason alone, a nationalist. For instance, the demand for an independent Scotland can be less nationalistic than those wielding the unionist rhetoric of the 'integrity of the British nation.'
In England Brexit has fuelled nationalism, and socialists need to confront it.
A nationalist is someone who prioritises allegiance to a national group ahead of other political considerations. Thus those Labour politicians who talk about 'the will of the British people' as a trump card in politics are nationalists – just like the fascists who shout out "Britain First." Of course, there are many different varieties of nationalists. Politicians and parties combine their nationalism with other political objectives; and some varieties are far less odorous than others. Yet whatever the type, there are two reasons why socialists do not embrace nationalism.
First, the nationalist, by virtue of making the national group the most important factor of identification, creates a dichotomy between those who are members of the defined national group and those who are not. People are divided, favoured and discriminated against by characteristics that they cannot, or at least cannot easily, change. Socialists, in contrast, are universalists, whose politics embrace people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity. Nationalism and socialism cannot be combined because one negates the other.
Second, the nationalists’ construction of the concept of a nation is a historical undertaking, which involves looking backwards to find historical customs, myths, language usage, etc. which supposedly bind the people of the nation. By looking backwards, nationalism tends to be conservative and finds its ideals in the past. Socialists, in contrast, believe in freeing people from historical oppressions and see the ideal world as something to be created by human beings in the future. And that future is based on what is progressive from a combination of all human history, not that of one nation.
Internationalism is not the opposite of nationalism. Internationalism involves the recognition of different nationalisms and works for them to coexist on a friendly and cooperative basis. The opposite of nationalism is anationalism (or cosmopolitanism), which seeks the unity of people irrespective of nationality or ethnicity.
One thing should be made clear. Someone who calls for autonomy or independence for a territory, is not for that reason alone, a nationalist. For instance, the demand for an independent Scotland can be less nationalistic than those wielding the unionist rhetoric of the 'integrity of the British nation.'
In England Brexit has fuelled nationalism, and socialists need to confront it.
1 March 2017
Saturday by Ian McEwan
Musings by a well-off 'Blairite' on the eve of the invasion of Iraq in 2003
The book, all set on one Saturday in the lead up to the Iraq war, is an internal portrait on one man. Henry is a typical Blair bourgeois middle-Englander in every sense, who is married with children in their early twenties. McEwan carefully constructs through Henry's internal musings the background and influences of one man and by extension the whole era of Blair's Britain.
This excellent book has a side plot of a psychopath who breaks into Henry's family life and humiliates him and his family. Though extremely well described and written I felt that this typical McEwan theme could have been dispensed with.
McEWAN Ian, Saturday, Vintage 2005
The book, all set on one Saturday in the lead up to the Iraq war, is an internal portrait on one man. Henry is a typical Blair bourgeois middle-Englander in every sense, who is married with children in their early twenties. McEwan carefully constructs through Henry's internal musings the background and influences of one man and by extension the whole era of Blair's Britain.
This excellent book has a side plot of a psychopath who breaks into Henry's family life and humiliates him and his family. Though extremely well described and written I felt that this typical McEwan theme could have been dispensed with.
McEWAN Ian, Saturday, Vintage 2005
7 February 2017
Brexit: a sense of foreboding
Britain voted for Brexit in June 2016: eight months later we are still in the phoney war.
As a kid my grandmother and I often took the 113 bus home. I loved travelling on the upper deck of the red London bus. As we turned into Edgwarebury Lane, Granny and I had to prepare to get off, and she warned me, “Don’t stand up before we’ve turned the corner. You’ll fall.” Doubting the wisdom of Granny’s words, I stood up without holding on saying, “See, I didn’t fall.” “Yes,” said Granny, “but we haven’t turned the corner yet.”
Something like that is very much how I feel today about Brexit, the almost mindless amputation of the UK from the EU and the EFTA single market. Britain is going to a very lonely place, and while it is true that very little has happened in the phoney war so far - except for a rise in fear and a drop in the value of sterling - the gathering dark clouds are ominous.
Business will gravitate out of the UK to EU countries simply because it makes more sense to have easy access to hundreds of millions of workers and consumers than to sixty-five millions. The UK will respond by becoming an economic dependent on the US and accelerating towards a low-regulation, low-wage economy.
Who loses? Higher unemployment, lower pay, worse working conditions and poorer social provision will affect all working people. But non-British EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries will face the brunt. At worst it means expulsion, creating the worst ethnic cleansing in Europe, Yugoslavia aside, since World War Two. At best four million people will experience discrimination and insecurity in their adopted homelands.
If the future beholds a toxic mix of ascendant xenophobic nationalism and economic dislocation, we have much to fear. Reassuring White Papers and statements by Tory ministers tell us what government wants and what they hope will happen. They might tell us, “Get over it,” but it hasn’t happened yet, and the pain is likely to be bigger and more long-lasting than we think.
As a kid my grandmother and I often took the 113 bus home. I loved travelling on the upper deck of the red London bus. As we turned into Edgwarebury Lane, Granny and I had to prepare to get off, and she warned me, “Don’t stand up before we’ve turned the corner. You’ll fall.” Doubting the wisdom of Granny’s words, I stood up without holding on saying, “See, I didn’t fall.” “Yes,” said Granny, “but we haven’t turned the corner yet.”
Something like that is very much how I feel today about Brexit, the almost mindless amputation of the UK from the EU and the EFTA single market. Britain is going to a very lonely place, and while it is true that very little has happened in the phoney war so far - except for a rise in fear and a drop in the value of sterling - the gathering dark clouds are ominous.
Business will gravitate out of the UK to EU countries simply because it makes more sense to have easy access to hundreds of millions of workers and consumers than to sixty-five millions. The UK will respond by becoming an economic dependent on the US and accelerating towards a low-regulation, low-wage economy.
Who loses? Higher unemployment, lower pay, worse working conditions and poorer social provision will affect all working people. But non-British EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in other EU countries will face the brunt. At worst it means expulsion, creating the worst ethnic cleansing in Europe, Yugoslavia aside, since World War Two. At best four million people will experience discrimination and insecurity in their adopted homelands.
If the future beholds a toxic mix of ascendant xenophobic nationalism and economic dislocation, we have much to fear. Reassuring White Papers and statements by Tory ministers tell us what government wants and what they hope will happen. They might tell us, “Get over it,” but it hasn’t happened yet, and the pain is likely to be bigger and more long-lasting than we think.
1 February 2017
Charlie Kunz: a personal reflection
Charlie Kunz (1896-1958) was the greatest popular piano medley player of all time.
A taste for Charlie Kunz was one of the few things that my father (born 1908) and my maternal grandmother (born 1904) shared. And though as a child I professed to prefer pop music, I always hung around on the stairs to listen to Charlie’s medleys when they were played on the gramophone in the sitting-room.
Before the Second World War Kunz featured in several ball-room bands, but it was in the more egalitarian atmosphere of post-war Britain that Kunz rose to superstar status, apparently, being the first music performer to need police protection to keep him unmolested from his fans.
Anyone interested in hearing Kunz today only has to go to You Tube to get the flavour, but I will describe how his music seems to me. His piano playing has a light up-beat bounce and flow which is entirely distinctive to him; attempts to reproduce it have failed miserably.
Piano and light music, taken mostly from popular songs, musicals and operetta, acquired status for me in my childhood, precisely because such music was held up to be something meaningful by my parents and grandmother. In their view (or at least for my mother and grandmother), the music of Charlie Kunz represented the “old world” - an indeterminate past which ran from the the 1930s through war-time Britain before collapsing at the end of the 1950s. That world was held up in contrast to the “nowadays” of the 1970s when loud disrespectful drugged-up pop stars held sway.
Though I became attached to some 1970s pop music in my teenage years, and then became a follower of the pop charts, I never rejected the senior members of my family’s predilection for Kunz and his medleys. Too much of his influence was embedded in my life.
In the 1970s an odd feature of our family was that we did not have a television set. However, once a month there was a showing of old silent films in a scout hut at the other end of the town. My father, mother, sister and I walked there on winter evenings to meet up with the other ten to fifteen regulars to see the old films projected onto a screen. There was a small charge but money was also raised by a sales table and a raffle, which inevitably the same people always won.
The late middle-aged bachelor, Laurie, who organised the event with his spinster sister, also had an interest in Kunz, so invariably we would watch the old reels of film with a tape-recorder playing his medleys. Though Laurie possessed several cassettes, we tended to hear the same Kunz medleys over and over again. I began to anticipate the tunes.
In 1975 in the latter weeks of August my parents booked a week in a guest house in Bognor Regis, a seaside town on the southern English coast. My mother’s intention was that the whole family should spend the day together, almost irrespective of the weather, huddled up on the beach near a wave-breaker. As a thirteen-year-old boy I was keen to wander off and explore. One port of call in the later afternoon was the park where an organ player gave a rendition of Gershwin and other popular songs - not Kunz, but very much the same thing.
At university and in early adult life Charlie Kunz disappeared from my life. I never went out myself to purchase Kunz, but I did once in the 1980s pick up a second-hand cassette, which is still with me today. Then, with the advent of the net, I was able to re-discover him with a few clicks and could bring back the music of my childhood.
The ready availability of music on You Tube and elsewhere on the net has enabled me not just to re-acquaint myself with Kunz, but to hear him against the background of his contemporaries in Britain, the US and Germany. Though I am largely ignorant of music, the ability to follow links on You Tube has enriched my understanding and enjoyment of Kunz.
In 2009 my younger sister, aged forty-three, died of breast cancer. Some months before her death, I put together some scanned old photos of our family and set it to the music of Charlie Kunz. She could cope with the pictures and enjoyed them, but the Kunz’s music was too overwhelming for her. I switched it off.
I do not think Kunz is outdated in the way that Winifred Atwell’s or Mrs Mills’ honky-tonk knees-up piano certainly is; those popular pianists are firmly tied to an era of post-war Britain. Kunz’ music, by contrast, has a certain timeless gentle sophistication which will keep it going.
Historio de la Esperanto-Movado by Nikola Aleksiev
A Bulgarian Esperantist, Nikola Aleksiev, then in his eighties, expressed his ambitious hopes for the language.
This is a remarkable little book written man an elderly man (born 1909) in a distant corner of Europe. Aleksiev was Bulgaria’s leading Esperantist during the socialist years, and before that a left-wing activist in inter-war Bulgaria. After the change in regime in 1989 his mind remained sharp, and his ability to grasp the realities of US domination in his country is clearly illustrated.
The book begins with a historical overview of the Esperanto movement first internationally, and then in his home country of Bulgaria. The book concludes with two essays; first an analysis of language imperialism (particularly English) in Bulgaria, and second a critique of Mark Fettes essay ‘The future of the European Babylon.’ Aleksiev takes issue with Fettes claim that a generation would be required to introduce Esperanto as a lingua franca in Europe, arguing instead that, if the political will were there, teaching Esperanto in schools across Europe could be accomplished within a few years.
Throughout the book is written in clear, easy-to-understand Esperanto, and demonstrates the potential power of the international language.
ALEKSIEV,Nikola Historio de la Esperanto Movoado Pres-Esperanto, Sofia 1992
Pri Nikola Aleksiev el Vikipedio: Nikola Aleksiev, naskiĝis la 29-an de junio 1909; mortis la 19-an de julio 2002, estis bulgara esperantisto kaj honora membro de UEA kaj MEM. Li estis la unua eksterlandano, kiu ricevis honoran membrecon de ĈEA.
Li estis filo de malriĉa ŝuista familio, li estis kunfondinto kaj sekretario Bulgara Laborista Esperanto-Asocio (fondita en 1930).
Kiel ĵurnalisto kunorganizanta strikojn li pasigis 7 jarojn en karceroj de la faŝisma Bulgario. Post la dua mondmilito li ĉefredaktoris la centran organon de bulgaraj sindikatoj Trud (1946-1952) kaj estis membro de Tutmonda Packonsilantaro.
Li apartenis al plej aktivaj esperantistoj en Bulgario. Li estis la prezidanto de la Loka Kongresa Komitato de la 48-a Universala Kongreso de Esperanto en 1963. De 1964 ĝis 1976 Nikola Aleksiev estis prezidanto de Bulgara Esperanto-Asocio. Li dediĉis multajn fortojn al la komunisma Mondpaca Esperantista Movado (MEM), kies prezidanto li estis. Lingvan majstrecon li pruvis en siaj tradukoj (ekz. Apostolo de Libereco pri bulgara nacia heroo Vasil Levski, Mia vivo de Trifon Ĥristovski k.a.)
This is a remarkable little book written man an elderly man (born 1909) in a distant corner of Europe. Aleksiev was Bulgaria’s leading Esperantist during the socialist years, and before that a left-wing activist in inter-war Bulgaria. After the change in regime in 1989 his mind remained sharp, and his ability to grasp the realities of US domination in his country is clearly illustrated.
The book begins with a historical overview of the Esperanto movement first internationally, and then in his home country of Bulgaria. The book concludes with two essays; first an analysis of language imperialism (particularly English) in Bulgaria, and second a critique of Mark Fettes essay ‘The future of the European Babylon.’ Aleksiev takes issue with Fettes claim that a generation would be required to introduce Esperanto as a lingua franca in Europe, arguing instead that, if the political will were there, teaching Esperanto in schools across Europe could be accomplished within a few years.
Throughout the book is written in clear, easy-to-understand Esperanto, and demonstrates the potential power of the international language.
ALEKSIEV,Nikola Historio de la Esperanto Movoado Pres-Esperanto, Sofia 1992
Pri Nikola Aleksiev el Vikipedio: Nikola Aleksiev, naskiĝis la 29-an de junio 1909; mortis la 19-an de julio 2002, estis bulgara esperantisto kaj honora membro de UEA kaj MEM. Li estis la unua eksterlandano, kiu ricevis honoran membrecon de ĈEA.
Li estis filo de malriĉa ŝuista familio, li estis kunfondinto kaj sekretario Bulgara Laborista Esperanto-Asocio (fondita en 1930).
Kiel ĵurnalisto kunorganizanta strikojn li pasigis 7 jarojn en karceroj de la faŝisma Bulgario. Post la dua mondmilito li ĉefredaktoris la centran organon de bulgaraj sindikatoj Trud (1946-1952) kaj estis membro de Tutmonda Packonsilantaro.
Li apartenis al plej aktivaj esperantistoj en Bulgario. Li estis la prezidanto de la Loka Kongresa Komitato de la 48-a Universala Kongreso de Esperanto en 1963. De 1964 ĝis 1976 Nikola Aleksiev estis prezidanto de Bulgara Esperanto-Asocio. Li dediĉis multajn fortojn al la komunisma Mondpaca Esperantista Movado (MEM), kies prezidanto li estis. Lingvan majstrecon li pruvis en siaj tradukoj (ekz. Apostolo de Libereco pri bulgara nacia heroo Vasil Levski, Mia vivo de Trifon Ĥristovski k.a.)
29 January 2017
Brexit: victory for the British far right
Brexit and right-wing xenophobic nationalism are symbiotically related. Each is the result and cause of the other.
The decision by the May government to plough on with its preparations for a hard Brexit is certainly injurious to business, but it is even more harmful to the interests of ordinary working people. Let’s list the damage:
In the first instance Brexit propaganda targeted East European EU citizens in the UK, but behind that veneer lay racist antipathy to anyone not white British. Thus the defining moment in Ukip's campaign was Nigel Farage standing in front of a poster showing long queues of Syrian refugees in Slovenia - an issue nothing to do with Britain’s EU membership. But that did not matter a jot to Farage; the poster was promoting racist fear of ‘the other’, and the message hit home in its intended constituency.
The causes of the current explosion of right-wing populism are various, but one idea needs to be knocked on the head. It is false to claim the existence of high numbers of non-British EU citizens in a locality caused a high Leave vote. It did not. Those areas with the highest number of non-British EU citizens, such as London, Manchester or Bristol, voted Remain. Ukip propaganda was most successful wherever multicultural communities were lacking, not where they existed.
Right-wing populism is the diametric opposite of everything socialists stand for. The Labour Party is not properly the party of British working people; it is the party of workers in Britain, irrespective of race, ethnic background or nationality. Socialists support multicultural and cosmopolitan communities across the UK, and defend the free movement of EU citizens as a basic acquired right. There is no such thing as a Left-wing Brexit because the political reality is that Brexit is a tool of the right to restrict individual freedoms and social solidarity in favour of authoritarian nationalism, xenophobia and ethnic chauvinism.
Labour has responded badly to the referendum result. While the result does give Prime Minister May a mandate to pursue Brexit, it does not bind the Labour Party to anything. If a majority in a referendum had voted for capital punishment, would Labour then support it? Of course not. Labour policy is made by its members, not by national referenda.
Sadly, Labour has backed the triggering Article 50, mostly in a misguided attempt of stave off Ukip’s advance in northern seats. Yet, the more right-wing populism is accommodated, the more acceptable and stronger it becomes. The more Labour capitulates to Ukip’s agenda, the more it betrays the young, and the multicultural and progressive communities in the metropolitan centres across England.
On Labour’s right-wing, politicians have been quick to accommodate themselves to the xenophobic upsurge. Rachel Reeves among others has sung the praise of immigration controls on EU citizens. Andy Burnham, Labour’s candidate for mayor of Manchester, has chided Labour for prioritising access to the internal market over ending free movement. But the left, too, has not disentangled itself entirely from the right-wing populist offensive. John MacDonald has foolishly spoken of Brexit as an “enormous opportunity.” Well it is, but only for the enemies of the left. Jeremy Corbyn, for his part, while courageously defending free movement, has sometimes given the impression that Brexit is a low priority issue.
Labour should echo the Liberal Democrats, Greens and SNP in opposing Brexit. Insofar as Brexit is unstoppable, we should strive to remain in the European Economic Area (the so-called Norway solution), and with that retain free movement. And, if Britain does in the end leave the EU, which seems likely, we should work with the left across Europe for Britain to rejoin.
The decision by the May government to plough on with its preparations for a hard Brexit is certainly injurious to business, but it is even more harmful to the interests of ordinary working people. Let’s list the damage:
- Economic pain: sterling down, lower investment and the prospect of tariffs
- Workers rights: a bonfire of EU-created employment rights can be expected..
- Mass insecurity: for millions of EU residents in the UK and reciprocally for UK citizens in other EU states;
- Locked in: British citizens will have no right to live and work in mainland Europe.
- Scotland: to be taken out of the EU against its will.
- Northern Ireland: the re-imposition of a ‘hard’ border will threaten the peace process;
- Racism and xenophobia: stimulated and legitimised in Britain.
- European Identity: undermined and fractured.
- Pan-European socialism: a united fightback across the continent undermined.
In the first instance Brexit propaganda targeted East European EU citizens in the UK, but behind that veneer lay racist antipathy to anyone not white British. Thus the defining moment in Ukip's campaign was Nigel Farage standing in front of a poster showing long queues of Syrian refugees in Slovenia - an issue nothing to do with Britain’s EU membership. But that did not matter a jot to Farage; the poster was promoting racist fear of ‘the other’, and the message hit home in its intended constituency.
The causes of the current explosion of right-wing populism are various, but one idea needs to be knocked on the head. It is false to claim the existence of high numbers of non-British EU citizens in a locality caused a high Leave vote. It did not. Those areas with the highest number of non-British EU citizens, such as London, Manchester or Bristol, voted Remain. Ukip propaganda was most successful wherever multicultural communities were lacking, not where they existed.
Right-wing populism is the diametric opposite of everything socialists stand for. The Labour Party is not properly the party of British working people; it is the party of workers in Britain, irrespective of race, ethnic background or nationality. Socialists support multicultural and cosmopolitan communities across the UK, and defend the free movement of EU citizens as a basic acquired right. There is no such thing as a Left-wing Brexit because the political reality is that Brexit is a tool of the right to restrict individual freedoms and social solidarity in favour of authoritarian nationalism, xenophobia and ethnic chauvinism.
Labour has responded badly to the referendum result. While the result does give Prime Minister May a mandate to pursue Brexit, it does not bind the Labour Party to anything. If a majority in a referendum had voted for capital punishment, would Labour then support it? Of course not. Labour policy is made by its members, not by national referenda.
Sadly, Labour has backed the triggering Article 50, mostly in a misguided attempt of stave off Ukip’s advance in northern seats. Yet, the more right-wing populism is accommodated, the more acceptable and stronger it becomes. The more Labour capitulates to Ukip’s agenda, the more it betrays the young, and the multicultural and progressive communities in the metropolitan centres across England.
On Labour’s right-wing, politicians have been quick to accommodate themselves to the xenophobic upsurge. Rachel Reeves among others has sung the praise of immigration controls on EU citizens. Andy Burnham, Labour’s candidate for mayor of Manchester, has chided Labour for prioritising access to the internal market over ending free movement. But the left, too, has not disentangled itself entirely from the right-wing populist offensive. John MacDonald has foolishly spoken of Brexit as an “enormous opportunity.” Well it is, but only for the enemies of the left. Jeremy Corbyn, for his part, while courageously defending free movement, has sometimes given the impression that Brexit is a low priority issue.
Labour should echo the Liberal Democrats, Greens and SNP in opposing Brexit. Insofar as Brexit is unstoppable, we should strive to remain in the European Economic Area (the so-called Norway solution), and with that retain free movement. And, if Britain does in the end leave the EU, which seems likely, we should work with the left across Europe for Britain to rejoin.
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