Remembering the Paris Commune
On the 150th anniversary of the instigation of the Paris Commune, rs21’s Art Group presents a video project to commemorate the world’s first working-class revolutionary government.
The Paris Commune: Order Reigns in Paris
A new translation of an article from Le Cri du peuple, the leading newspaper of the Paris Commune
The Paris Commune: the Cry of the People
Over the coming three months rs21 will use articles from the Commune’s leading newspaper, Le Cri du Peuple to draw out the history of the Paris Commune.
Unearthing hidden histories: an interview with Ian Birchall
An interview with socialist historian Ian Birchall. Ian’s work has has involved researching and reevaluating lesser-known revolutionaries and activists from the Global South.
Revolutionary reflections | The Anti-Poll Tax Federation: ‘Mob rules’
Debates about the use of confrontational collective action in the Anti-Poll Tax Movement remain relevant for struggles today.
Revolutionary reflections | The moral economy of the anti-poll tax movement
The anti-poll tax movement took on and defeated a Tory government at the height of its powers. Andrew Stone explores the ways that protestors developed political justifications for resistance.
Audio: Neil Davidson on 1968
Join comrades and friends in an online event to remember Neil Davidson (1957-2020). Here we remember him with a talk he gave on the revolutionary upheavals of 1968.
Review: Martin Monath, A Jewish Resistance Fighter among Nazi soldiers
Merilyn Moos reviews a fascinating and little-known history of Trotskyist organising during World War Two.
The villains of Parliament Square
A who’s-who of the murderous colonialists set in stone in Parliament Square Gardens.
Winston Churchill: the man, the myth, the murderer
Churchill is central to the Tory myth of national unit. But the historical record is clear: he was a virulent racist, a diehard colonialist, and responsible for the deaths of millions.
Review: Anti-Nazi Germans
As Boris Johnson and others attempt to invoke the ‘spirit of the Blitz’ in response to COVID-19, Ian Birchall celebrates a recent publication that disrupts the national myths of WWII.
The Scottish general strike of 1820
Pete Cannell recounts the first general strike in the history of capitalism.
revolutionary reflections | The Anti-Poll Tax Federation: Organisation and spontaneity
The anti-poll tax movement was arguably the most successful social movement in Great Britain since the 1970s. In advance of the 30th anniversary of the poll tax riot (31 March 1990), Andrew Stone explores how political organisations and grassroots initiative interacted.
Mods and Rockers: the 1960s youth cult
Following his earlier A brief history of the Teddy Boys, Mitch Mitchell recalls the rivalries, real and manufactured, between the Mods and Rockers.
The Politics of Monsters
Caliban’s Revolt celebrates the capacity of the monster to terrorise the powers that be.
Review: A Jewish Communist in Weimar Germany
Merilyn Moos reviews a new biography of Werner Scholem, an uncompromising revolutionary to the end.
‘Dear Sisters of the Earth’: Peterloo bicentenary
Women were a particular target of the violence at Peterloo on 16 August 1819. We publish an extract from an address by the Manchester Female Reform Society delivered shortly before the massacre.
Review: The Order of the Day
The unfolding catastrophe of the 1930s is illuminated in new ways in a disconcerting new book by Éric Vuillard, writes Brian Parkin.
Homelessness: Rachmanism returns
As homelessness figures have risen yet again, Mitch Mitchell looks at the history of housing in the UK the post-war period.
Beyond 4 June
Last week we published reflections on the 30th anniversary of China’s ‘May of the Masses’. Here Charlie Hore reflects on the massacre of 4 June and its aftermath.
Hope and tragedy in April 1919
The Limerick Soviet (13 – 27 April 1919) was one manifestation of a wave of revolutionary crises that confronted British imperialism in the aftermath of WWI.
Bloody Sunday prosecution: no justice, no peace
Not just one soldier, but the entire British state must be held to justice for its murderous record in the North of Ireland
The Communist Women’s Movement
As we mark International Women’s Day (8 March), Estelle Cooch talks Darya Dyakonova and Mike Taber about the history of the Communist Women’s Movement (1920-22).
A brief history of the Teddy Boys
The post war youth subculture that became the subject of a moral panic.
How we beat them last time
How can anti-fascists find a cultural politics to fit the current moment? David Renton speaks to Colin Revolting about Rock Against Racism, the Anti Nazi League and his new book, Never Again.
Favourites of 2018: rs21 reviewers recommend…
Our reviewers recommend the music, films, books, exhibitions and TV they discovered in 2018.
A homosexual Christmas in 1905 Berlin
Colin Wilson presents an account of a “uranian” Christmas, written by a leading campaigner over a hundred years ago.
Pétain, Franco and chemical warfare in the Rif
While Macron has been trying to rehabilitate Pétain as a WWI hero, the latter’s role in a war against Africa’s first anti-colonial state is less well known.
Obituary: Jean Dorothy Parkin, 1921-2018
Brian Parkin looks back at the life of his mother, Jean Dorothy Parkin, who passed away on 14th November.