Workers Solidarity Movement

It is a very sincerely held belief by many people, that we are "naturally" greedy, rotten feckers and, in the absence of government, some mad form of capitalism would be inevitable

The dispute at Irish Ferries is about greedy bosses, very greedy bosses who want to replace their staff with modern day galley slaves. Eamonn Rothwell, Managing Director of Irish Ferries, plans to get rid of 543 workers and replace them with migrants on e3.50 per hour. Rothwell earned e687,000 last year. That's e338.00 an hour. But there is no talk about replacing him with a yellow pack boss from Eastern Europe!

The 30th of September (2005) marked a new anniversary of the first coup against Aristide in Haiti. That day, activists in 47 cities around the world, held an international day of solidarity with Haitian people who, once again, are suffering from the effects of a coup and a bloody occupation under the command of the UN. In Dublin, we were visited by a Haitian activist, Obed Alexis, who gave a conference and we participated in the picket organised by the Latin American Solidarity Centre, joining this international protest. We showed Haitian people that they are not on their own and that there are plenty of hands ready to help them in their struggle against the occupation and Latortue's dictatorship.

Over the summer of 2005 the Zapatistas surprised their supporters by suddenly declaring a Red Alert out of the blue. After a couple of days of near panic it emerged that this was just because they were undergoing a consulta (a discussion and referendum) which would decide on a new path for the movement. This new path is to once more turn outwards and to aim to build a new alliance across Mexico and beyond

Anarchists are usually pretty good at listing the things we are against: capitalism, racism, religious sectarianism, authoritarianism and so on. We are usually pretty good at explaining how best to struggle: direct democracy and mass direct action.

Where we often fall down is in explaining what we want at the end of the day, and convincing our listeners that it is a realistic alternative rather than a utopian pipe dream.

The Situationists are mostly known to anarchists as a group that had something to do with the May 1968 Paris Uprising. However, the Situationists played a relatively peripheral role in the disturbances. Although much of the graffiti that appeared around the city (some famous ones included : "Never Work" and "All Power to the Imagination") were taken from Situationist works, the group did not play a major role in initiating the revolt themselves.

On December 14th the three week dispute at Irish Ferries came to an end. SIPTU claimed that the deal protects a "threshold of decency". Irish Ferries had offered redundancy to 543 crew members, who were to be replaced with staff employed on wages of just €3.60 an hour - less than half the national minimum wage.

A look at some of the problems faced and mistakes made in the organisation of the Dublin EU Mayday summit protests in 2004.

The experience of May Day brings up us back to some of the perennial questions thrown up by counter-summits protests: how do we broaden our movement and what role do direct action and confrontational tactics have in that process. These are, of course, the issues that have been mainstay of Red and Black Revolution debates over the past few years but have been usually viewed through the prism of events outside of Ireland. The following article is a personal account of the Dublin Grassroots Network's approach to such issues in relation to May Day and goes on to argue for increased tactical flexibility from anarchists within the anti-capitalist movement.

I joined Sinn Féin in the mid eighties with many others on the back of what we saw as a radical shift to the left and a commitment to build a 32 county Democratic Socialist Republic. I find myself outside that movement now, thoroughly disillusioned with it and its shift to a left nationalist and social democratic electoralist future.