100 years ago today, the British general strike began. To commemorate this milestone in the labour movement, the British Revolutionary Communist Party's general secretary, Ben Gliniecki, has written a book aimed at drawing out the hard-won lessons of this titanic class battle for communists today.

“Sweden has done more for the German war effort than is generally recognised. Above all, it has in some respects given us substantial support in the war against the Soviet Union – it is true that it protects its neutrality, but much to our advantage.” – Diary entry, Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Germany’s Minister of Propaganda, 28 January 1942.

Just five months ago, Bulgaria was in the grip of one of the biggest protest movements in its history. Based on wide social layers – in particular the youth – and borrowing many of the slogans from the ‘Gen Z’ revolutions, this movement forced the hated government to resign, triggering the eighth parliamentary election in the last five years. Whilst the ruling class is desperately seeking stability, the workers and youth of Bulgaria are striving for change.

Subcategories

Balkans

From the very beginning of the crisis in the Balkans back in 1992 In Defence of Marxism has maintained a firm internationalist approach.

The different imperialist powers and the local former Stalinist bureacrats used the poison of nationalism to gain power and spheres of influence. Their manouevres had nothing to do with the rights of the people's of the Balkans but with naked self interest.

We have insisted that the poison of nationalism (be it Albanian, Serbian, Bosnia, Croatian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Greek, Turkish, or whatever) offers nothing to the peoples of the Balkans but a future of fratricidal war, ethnic cleansing, economic ruin, poverty and despair.

The entirely artificial frontiers that divide the living body of the Balkans have long since ceased to play any progressive role, if they ever did. Reactionary nationalism divides brother from brother, and sister from sister, creating ethnic hatreds and never-ending strife.

We think that only a policy of internationalism and class solidarity between the workers in the different countries in the Balkans would provide a lasting solution to this conflict. Only a Socialist Federation of the Balkans could actually guarantee full democratic rights for all national groups.

Many will say that this is an utopian policy and demand a more "practical" solution. But since the start of the conflict back in 1992 the "practical" policies have solved nothing and in fact have increased the amount of combustible material in the area. Maybe it is time that a genuine socialist internationalist approach is adopted.

Here we offer a collection of our material relating to this question. We think that these texts should be studied by all labour movement activists in the region and worldwide and we hope they will help open a fruitful discussion.

Estonia