The Anarchist Federation is now in its 20th year and we are especially pleased to bring you the first of this year's Organise! magazine. Thanks to all those who have read and contributed to the paper, and supported the press fund.
The end of our second decade coincides with a number of other important anniversaries: the General Strike in Britain 1926, the high point of the Spanish Revolution in 1936 and the Hungarian Revolution against the 'Soviet' invasion of 1956. We will keep the full celebrations for next issue with articles on Hungary and the General Strike. For this issue we offer a piece about the legacy of Spain in the 1930s, one of the most important examples of the influence of anarchist ideas and action in living memory. We also provide a host of revolutionary portraits, pamphlet reviews and sadly, further obituaries, of both lesser and more well-known anarchist lives.
But Organise! is not only about the old - in this issue we report and analyse a vibrant community campaign against an oil pipeline in Rossport on the West coast of Ireland, and interview an IWW member about opposition to 'mountain top removal' strip-mining in West Virginia, USA. We also reproduce an interview with the Venezuelan anarchists who are attempting to come to terms with the Chavez 'revolution' which is becoming more and more statist and militaristic by the minute. There too, indigenous communities are coming to further realise the reality of state dependence on the profits of powerful multinational mining companies like Anglo-American (Tarmac in UK). This environmental destruction is being continued and promoted by the leftist Chavista regime just as before under the right-wing. At government level, money always talks, whatever the colour of the flag.
In Britain, as western warmongering continues in the Middle East, our freedom to speak out and act against our increasingly authoritarian state has been weakened by new laws, bans, and the looming threat of a national identity scheme. Anarchists need to do more to help make the ID scheme into Labour's 'Poll Tax', and to this end we provide both analysis and some thoughts for action. Likely imposition of more nuclear power and weapons will require additional efforts by our movement, and this is sure to be a newsworthy issue in the coming year. But as our article on the media and academia will assert, we will have to be careful not to be sucked into struggling through second-hand propaganda and spectacular stunts. As the state gets more oppressive, neither must we forget the prisoners who are fighting the system from within their cages, and we print an impassioned call for more prisoner support.
As we write this editorial, widespread protests and other anti-government activities have continued in France against the 'Anglo-Saxon' (read Thatcherite) austerity measures which are threatening the livelihoods of young workers, now the government has proposed to allow companies to sack you after 2 years for no reason, if you are under 26. The fight is on within Europe to protect past gains, whilst we must ensure solidarity with migrant workers who are being exploited by the current economic system, and highlight the class war over dangerous racist and religious diversions.