Features

Thu 18 Apr, 15:21

Manifestations de masse dans le sud et le centre de l’Irak 11:26 Thu 26 Jul by Zaher Baher 0 comments

Ce qui suit est un récit de la situation actuelle dans le sud et dans le centre de l’Irak. Cela fait plus d’une semaine [Note du Traducteur : plus de deux semaines à l’heure de la traduction] que des manifestations et des protestations de masse se tiennent contre le gouvernement central et les autorités locales, mais également contre les compagnies pétrolières. Cet article tente d’expliquer brièvement la situation. A lire aussi : Des nouvelles des manifestations à Bagdad et dans le sud de l’Irak : ça continue!

A spectre is haunting us: it’s the past weighing like a nightmare on the present Jul 26 by Shawn Hattingh 0 comments

The context we now exist in is one that is defined by glaring contradictions everywhere, its fractured, changing, unstable and confrontational. It is a time of despair, but also pockets of hope. On the one hand, a spectre is haunting us, but it is not the one that Marx spoke of. Rather an authoritarian and extreme right wing form of capitalism, last seen on extensive scale in the 1930s, is rearing its hideous ghost-like head. This right wing extremism has become an ‘acceptable’ form of politics amongst some people in the context of the unresolved capitalist crisis. It is the ‘solution’ amongst sections of ruling classes in many countries to a crisis that is not going away. As part of this, many states are passing laws attacking basic rights that oppressed classes have won through decades and even centuries of struggle (including in South Africa); states are beginning to bare their teeth more often rather than being in a position to rule by consent; toxic nationalisms based on exclusionary racial, ethnic and religious identities (including within sections of the population in South Africa) have once again become acceptable and even embraced by sections of the population (giving rise to the likes of Trump, Le Pen and Duterte and xenophobia and other ills in South Africa); and bigotry and hate are back. Yet there is also hope. In many parts of the world, sections of the working class have fought back. This has seen movements of protests in some parts, attempts to revive unions in others and in some cases the re-emergence of left political parties and projects. But it is also a restructured working class, a working class that is fundamentally different from even the 1970s. New or different forms of organising happen next to the old. It is thus also a working class in which the past weighs like a nightmare on the present in organisational terms; experimenting with the new and different ways of organising, but also falling back into the old.