Deprived of the right Having read Neil Davidson’s article in your Autumn 2004 issue, it appears to me that he has three strongly held beliefs: 1.Other historians are deliberate falsifiers or charlatans 2.Those who believe other historians are dupes 3.Imperialism is progressive For eight hundred years now England has been invading other countries from Ireland…
Discovering the Scottish Revolution 1692 – 1746: A critique
Gordan Morgan is a national office bearer of the Scottish Socialist Party. He also belongs to the International Socialist Group, a section of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International. Here he takes issue, both with Neil Davidson’s Discovering the Scottish Revolution and Allan Armstrong’s earlier Emancipation and Liberation review. My thanks to Allan Armstrong…
Highlandism and the Politics of Geography
Alistair Livingston is a historian living in Galloway. He contributed to BBC Radio Scotland’s acclaimed series – The Lowland Clearances. Here he comments on Allan Armstrong’s Beyond Broadswords and Bayonets Having lived for 10 years in Hackney, east London (population 200,000) and then returning to Castle Douglas, south-west Scotland (population 3800), the contrast between these…
Pariahs
Being cast as lower caste makes you an outcast makes you the one to blame The one to vilify the one to dominate the one to terrify and to humiliate But like new strains of flu or less useful poison immunities can form and a boldness surge forth With memories of old fresh as the…
Holy Cross – the hidden story
Holy Cross – the hidden story has one overwhelming strength. Written by a journalist, it is made up of close-grained and exhaustive interviews of many of the leading participants, providing in meticulous detail a blow-by blow account of a truly extraordinary and horrific episode. Yet the book’s greatest strength is also its greatest weakness. Rather…
Lilya 4-Ever: Tolerating What?
Lilya 4-Ever, Lukas Moodysson, Denmark/Sweden, 2002, 109 minutes 700,000 women, according to UN figures, are currently ‘trafficked’ around the world, forced into sexual slavery and prostitution. In the ongoing ‘Tolerance Zones’ debate, both within and outwith the SSP, these figures and terms are bandied about to such an extent that it’s sometimes hard to grasp…
Religion – a means to divide the working class
Alan Graham considers the need for a secular education system. In 2004, the SSP membership voted for a motion titled Secular Scotland. This motion included the points: The SSP is a secular party and stands for a secular Scotland. That religion is a private, not a state matter. It ended with, The fruits of this…
Open Letter from the Socialist Alliance Democratic Platform (SADP)
Build a Democratic Socialist Alliance Towards a Mass Workers’ Party Conference March 12th 2005, United Services Club, Gough Street, Birmingham Dear Comrades, At the time of writing, the Socialist Alliance NEC, under the direction of the SWP leadership, have promised to organise an AGM of the Socialist Alliance on February 5th 2005. We encourage all…
Galloway, The SWP And Socialist Unity
Allan Armstrong analyses recent attacks on the SSP and points the way to an ‘internationalism from below’ perspective Galloway resorts to the gutter press George Galloway’s recent attack upon the SSP has raised the issue of socialist unity in these islands in a stark manner. Galloway’s suggestion that he could stand, on a joint ticket…
For an Anti-Imperialist Front
This article first appeared in Scottish Workers Republic (paper of the Scottish Republican Socialist Movement) Winter 2004 edition Is the Independence Convention (IC) a positive step forwards towards an independent socialist Scotland? It is argued that what’s needed is the coming together of the various pro-independence forces to face down the pro-Unionist media and state.…