textfiles/politics/SPUNK/sp001364.txt

For Starters

WE ALL MADE a difference.  As the opinion polls 
showed support for divorce slipping some feared that 
this basic civil right would be defeated again.  Then 
Patricia McKenna won her High Court case to stop the 
government funding the 'yes' side.  Meanwhile the 
anti-divorce groups were pulling in big money to fund 
their propaganda.

Instead of fatally damaging the 'yes' side, her case had 
an unforeseen result.  A lot of people who had not 
intended to do anything got worried, and then got 
stuck in.  In the end the good guys won by a whisker.  
But, however small the majority, we did win.  And 
every single person who put leaflets into their 
neighbours' letter boxes, stuck up a few posters, talked 
to their family & friends... everybody who worked for a 
'yes' victory made a difference.  Every vote was needed.  
So, the next time you wonder if there is any point in 
getting involved in campaigns or struggles for change 
think of the divorce referendum.  Every person has a 
contribution to make, and sometimes an extra one or 
two people can, literally, make all the difference.

The fight in our neighbourhoods
WSM members have been involved in the anti-water 
charges campaign since its inception.  We have helped 
organise local meetings, protests at Labour & DL 
conferences, pickets of court cases.  We have worked to 
win trade union support, and assisted in the building a 
movement which, in Dublin alone, now has over 8,500 
paid-up members.  We have written about it in our 
paper and produced a special edition of our Anarchist 
News bulletin.  Why so much effort?

Because it is about working class people saying we 
refuse to continually foot the bill for everything while 
the rich avail of tax amnesties.  Because it is about 
people taking direct action: getting organised and 
refusing to pay the double tax instead of naively relying 
on the empty promises of politicians.  Because it offers 
an opportunity for rebuilding class consciousness and 
confidence.  That's why!  

As councils move to cut-off the water supply of non-
payers the heat will be turned up as the campaign 
protests, obstructs and reconnects.  The state will 
probably take a more aggressive stance than they have 
up to now.  One immediate task is to set up local 
groups and involve more non-payers in them.  Just as 
trusting politicians won't win anything, neither will 
relying on a relatively small number of activists to 
organise events.  

Instead of leaders and followers, we need involvement 
- working class people managing their own struggle.  
We can turn more supporters into activists, build 
strong local groups, and defeat the water tax.  Let's do it. 

Another anarchist magazine

Readers looking for more detailed information and 
ideas than we have space for in this paper should get 
hold of the Workers Solidarity Movement's magazine, 
Red & Black Revolution.  Issue no.2, which appeared 
recently, carries an exclusive interview with Noam 
Chomsky.  Here he gives his views on anarchism and 
Marxism, and the prospects for socialism.  

Other articles look at Sinn Fein's pan-nationalist 
strategy (by Gregor Kerr, a former National Committee 
member of the Irish Anti-Extradition Committee), Irish 
Travellers' struggles for civil rights and ethnic 
recognition (by Travellers' rights activist Patricia 
McCarthy), management attacks and union leaders 
love of partnership (by SIPTU Regional Committee 
member Des Derwin), how single issue campaigns can 
get sucked into the system they were set up to oppose 
(by former unemployed activist Conor McLoughlin), 
what anarchists mean by revolution, the trials and 
tribulations of the modern Russian anarchist 
movement, and a report from the European libertarian 
gathering in Spain last summer.

Copies can be obtained from shops like Bookworm in 
Derry, The Other Place in Cork, Books Upstairs in 
Dublin, or direct from the WSM for #1.50 (#2.00 inc. 
post & packing).

Irish anarchist papers

As well as the WSM's Workers Solidarity, Red & Black 
Revolution and Anarchist News, there are two other 
anarchist papers being produced in Ireland at present.  
These reflect the wider international growth of interest 
in anarchism.

Ainriail
30p+postage from TFC, P.O. Box 102, Galway.

>From Galway, this aggressive little paper is produced by 
The Frontline Collective.  This new anarchist group 
seems to be making an impact around the city.  They 
introduced their first issue last year with "if you're one 
of those people who've swallowed all the crap about 
there being 'no such thing as working class anymore' 
or that 'we live in a classless society' then this is the 
time to stop reading".

Organise! (The Voice of Anarcho-Syndicalism)
60p+postage from Organise!, P.O. Box 505, Belfast BT11 
9EE. 

This Belfast-based anarchist-syndicalist bulletin now 
appears as a magazine.  Vol.2 no.3 includes articles on 
whether there can be a left wing loyalism, the 'peace 
process', water privatisation, the French government's 
nuclear tests, and a review of Ken Loach's film 'Land 
and Freedom'.  The group producing the magazine 
seek to build an alternative to the existing trade 
unions, a revolutionary union like the CNT in Spain.