Review by Alex Miller
Gregor Gall, The Political Economy of Scotland: Red Scotland? Radical Scotland? University of Wales Press, 2005.
This is not the time for the empty conceits of vainglorious demagogues, but the occasion for well-grounded marxians smartly able to seize the upsurging opportunities to rouse and lead our class to victory. English labour is bound to respond to our call if we in Scotland strike out boldly for political conquest.—John MacLean, 19201
By Alex Callinicos
Alex Callinicos is a leader of the Socialist Workers Party in Britain. His most recent book is Against the Third Way: an anti-capitalist critique.
Previous issues of Links have frequently discussed internationalism and internationals, or the question of how socialists should collaborate on an international scale. This issue is devoted to the closely related matter of left regroupment, or how socialists can collaborate at the national level. It discusses the challenges of left regroupment through concrete experiences in Australia, England, Scotland, France and Brazil.
In Australia in 2002, the Socialist Alliance, grouping nearly all the far-left organisations, was able to overcome difficult electoral registration requirements in several states and attract as new members a significant number of activists who were not members of any of the component groups. In September, the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP), the largest member organisation of the Alliance, proposed to spur the process of left regroupment by becoming an internal tendency within the Alliance and carrying out all its public political activity through the Socialist Alliance.
By Tommy Sheridan
Tommy Sheridan was the first member of the SSP elected to the Scottish Parliament, in 1999.
The election of six socialist MSPs represents both a massive advance for and a huge challenge to the socialist movement in Scotland.
Undoubtedly the ability of the SSP to link its socialist activity within the Scottish parliament to its socialist program outside parliament has played a major role in promoting the party in relation to anti-poverty, pro-trade union, pro-peace and anti-war campaigns.
The way the party was able to take the abolition of poundings and warrant sales campaign out into the communities and bring pressure to bear back inside the parliament was a model for uniting parliamentary and extra-parliamentary activity. A similar and even broader exercise was conducted in relation to the free school meals campaign. Even though the end result was unsuccessful, the party still managed to pressure thirty-five MSPs to vote for a significant anti-poverty and pro-health measure.
By Allan McCombes
Alan McCombes is a member of SSP National Executive and was the coordinator for the party's 2003 election campaign. He is a member of the Editorial Board of Links.
For the complacent ruling establishment, the spectacular rise of a new left opposition in Holyrood came like a snowstorm in the Sahara.
Right up until literally the midnight hour, the SSP, the Greens and the independents had been ignored, or at best patronised, by the mainstream media.
Nothing prepared the political commentators for the shock of witnessing the big four parties lose one and a quarter million votes across the two ballots; or for the lurch to the left across Scotland and the election of seventeen radical anti-establishment MSPs.
The centre right continues to rule Scotland through the Lib-Lab coalition. But the political centre of gravity in Scotland has shifted decisively to the left.
There is now a clear red gulf separating Holyrood from Westminster. Scotland has become the political Achilles heel of the UK capitalist state.