Update on the tensions and continued social crisis in Greece
“Greece is going to hell, it is going to hell and I am glad it is so that we can comeback and start things from the beginning” These were the last words of an anarchist comrade in Greece as we spoke about events that have taken place in recent weeks because of the austerity measures introduced by the Government to tackle Greece’s enormous debt.
Read more »
Twenty years ago the very day after the Poll Tax riot erupted in Trafalgar Square prisoners in Manchester’s oldest jail took control of the chapel for the start of what was to become the biggest riot and longest rooftop protest in British penal history and triggered a wave of revolt in over twenty other prisons across the country.
Read more »
New report exposes poor conditions at the Olympics site that led to the first fatality
The death of a worker on the massive Olympics 2012 construction site in East London forms the backbone of a new and damming report by Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) union members, some of whom work on the site, exposing systematic breaches of basic health and safety, putting workers ‘at risk of injury and death’, as well as management cover-ups and deception.
Copies of the Report are available in the Bookshop for free or can be posted if you send in a pre-paid (61p 1st class, 47p 2nd class) SAE.
Read more »
♦ Five years after the initial national Community Action Gathering a second is being organised later this month in Nottingham. Invitations have been sent out to all radical, community-orientated local groups and individuals throughout the country to a gathering at the Sumac Social Centre on Saturday 27th March.
Read more »
Women being held at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre, Bedfordshire are entering their fourth week on hunger strike as concerns grow over their deteriorating health. Around 34 women at the centre have stopped taking in food as a protest over the inhumane and brutalising conditions suffered by those awaiting deportation.
Read more »
Obituary by Milan Rai
John Rety, chessplayer, Freedom editor, novelist, poet, publisher, painter, pacifist and lifelong anarchist and activist, has died at the age of 79. John confessed in a radio interview in 2008 that he became aware of anarchism “quite late, really – I must have been 13 or 14.” This was during the last year of the Second World War, in occupied Budapest, when John’s father was confined to a camp. John himself was a courier for hidden Jewish families scattered around the city, and perhaps also for the anti-fascist resistance. While his parents survived, John’s beloved grandmother was shot dead on the final day of the war, after telling a soldier that he could put his gun down, now that it was all over.
Read more »
It’s been a bleak beginning to the year 2010. Not only has January been the coldest month in over twenty years, right in the middle of a global recession and continuing financial crisis, but we have lost, in quick succession, some of the greatest political minds, radical thinkers and inspired anarchist comrades of our lifetime.
Both Anna Mendelssohn and Jake Prescott died within months of each other, and while both had retired from the political scene, their actions and activities during their time in the Angry Brigade brought a certain dynamism and daring to anarchist politics, not witnessed before or since, and raised the bar in terms of how we confront the state.
Read more »
Freedom takes an occasional look at the goings on within the anarchist movement and here reports back on the recent Anarchist Federation delegates meeting, their future plans and ongoing activities.
The National Delegate Meeting of the Anarchist Federation took place on January 30th/31st in Glasgow, attended by 35 members. This was a sign of the increasing strength and vigour of the Federation. Those present were from: Aberdeen, Brighton/Portsmouth, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Lincoln, London, Manchester, Merseyside, Nottingham, Sheffield and Stirling/Dunblane. Apologies were received from East Kent, Bristol, Hereford and Norwich.
Read more »
Greece is the latest in a line of countries squeezed by the ongoing financial crises continuing to ripple around the world. It is an important case to watch, more so than say Iceland or Ireland, as the situation in Greece is closer to the economic positions of the UK – both have governments who form an important part of economy, and are financially overstretched. This is a case of irresponsible governments, not banks. However, one has to be careful that responses to such crises are not in danger of propping up the underlying capitalism.
Read more »
Crippling energy costs hit the poor and elderly as companies cash in on cold weather
Households across the UK are facing record energy bills this month as a result of the recent freezing weather conditions. After one of the coldest Januarys in over 25 years gas and electricity bills are set to rise from an average £156 to £237 – a massive 52 per cent increase, according to official figures, with many people falling further into debt in order to pay.
The extreme weather during the first month of 2010 saw average temperatures slip below 3c Read more »
The final volume in Dave Douglass’s mining trilogy, Stardust and Coaldust, published to coincide with the 25th anniversary of the end of the miners’ strike. A first-person, insider’s view, of, probably, the last generation of miners and their union…cont
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the Poll Tax riot Freedom Bookshop is offering Danny Burns’ definitive account of the anti-Poll Tax campaign at the special discounted price of £4.95
…cont
Freedom Press is proud to announce the forthcoming publication of the infamous, and incendiary, Tintin ‘graphic novel’.
Originally published in the 1980’s during the dark years of Thatcher’s Britain…cont
List of books available from Freedom’s online shopping cart
Peter Kropotkin, “The Anarchist Formerly Know As Prince”, kindly agreed to contact us from beyond the grave to update his 1902 classic book on the importance of co-operation in evolution.
The definitive book on the hero of the Mexican Revolution.
For the first time in English, Malatesta, in his usual commonsense and matter-of-fact style, sets out and critically analyses the arguments for and against anarchism.