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What's new at Links: Lars T. Lih on Lenin, Tamils, consumerism, Haiti, S.Africa, Stephen Hawkings, Malaysia, curruption, Cuba, India, Arabic * * * *For more reliable delivery of new content, please subscribe free to Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 * You can also follow Links on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LinksSocialism or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10865397643 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to li...@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in Links. * * * Tamil refugee: `Why I fled to Australia <http://links.org.au/node/1973> By *Sue Bolton*, Melbourne This year is the 15th anniversary of the Nargar Kovil school massacre in Tamil Eelam, the Tamil area of Sri Lanka. On September 22, 1995, the Sri Lankan Air Force (SLAF) bombed Nargar Kovil Maha Vidyalayam schoolyard, which was crammed with 750 children on their lunch break. Reports of the number of children killed vary from 26 to 70. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1973> `Productivism' or liberation? Socialists debate consumerism <http://links.org.au/node/1972> By *Ben Courtice*, Melbourne November 2, 2010 -- In a recent seminar on trade unions and the climate movement, I observed a surprising disagreement between some of the socialists present. It was started by a comment from Melbourne University academic (and Socialist Alliance activist) Hans Baer, who suggested that the "treadmill of production and consumption" had to be challenged, that we need to challenge consumerism and the alienation of work that makes people buy things to feel better. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1972> Peter Hallward: Haiti 2010 -- Exploiting disaster <http://links.org.au/node/1971> With Peter Hallward's permission, /Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal/ is making available the Afterword to the 2010 paperback edition of Hallward's /Damming the Flood: Haiti and the Politics of Containment/ (Verso, 2010), published in November. * Read more or download <http://links.org.au/node/1971> Lars T. Lih: 'We must dream!' Echoes of `What Is to Be Done?' in Lenin's later career <http://links.org.au/node/1980> [Talk given at the US International Socialist Organization's /Socialism 2010/ conference, Chicago, June 2010. Posted at /Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal/ with Lars Lih's permission. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1980> South Africa: ANC leaders attack COSATU <http://links.org.au/node/1979> By *John Haylett * November 5, 2010 -- Relations between the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and sections of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) plumbed new depths this week following a union-initiated Civil Society conference. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1979> Stephen Hawking's `The Grand Design': `Ousting God from science' <http://links.org.au/node/1978> Review by *Christos Kefalis* Stephen Hawking has frequently been called the most eminent natural scientist of our age. Justifiably so, since the renovation of all natural science by someone stuck in a wheelchair, his brain being the only remaining functional part of his body, is something we do not see every day. Besides showing the limitless horizons of the human mind, Hawking offers precious proof of the strength of the will and of the creative potential of humanity, which will fully blossom only in a different society, free from exploitation, vulgarity and the mean motives borne of the pursuit of profit. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1978> Malaysia: The minimum wage farce <http://links.org.au/node/1977> By *Rani Rasiah* November 2, 2010 -- On 1 May 1996, Jawatankuasa Sokongan Masyarakat Ladang (JSML), the plantation workers' coalition of Jeringan Rakyat Tertindas (JERIT, the Oppressed People's Network), launched the campaign for a minimum monthly wage for estate workers. It called for a total revamp of the highly exploitative colonial wage system which assigned estate workers a daily wage that was subject to market price, weather conditions and crop yield, all factors beyond the control of the worker. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1977> Australia: Corruption tactics --- outrage management in a local government scandal <http://links.org.au/node/1976> By *Brian Martin* November 5, 2010 --- A mobilised citizenry is a threat to corrupt operations. Therefore, those involved in behaviours potentially labelled as corrupt have an interest in minimising public outrage. Five ways of doing this are to hide the activity, denigrate opponents, reinterpret actions as legitimate, use official channels to give an appearance of justice, and intimidate or bribe people involved. A local government scandal in Wollongong, Australia, illustrates all these tactics, with public hearings and media coverage providing volumes of revealing information. The implication of this analysis is that anti-corruption efforts should emphasise ways of increasing public outrage. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1976> Cuban Communist Oscar Martinez: `Our economic reforms are based on socialist principles' <http://links.org.au/node/1975> *[For more analysis and discussion on the economic changes in Cuba, click **HERE.] * <http://links.org.au/taxonomy/term/31> November 3, 2010 -- A South African Communist Party (SACP) delegation recently visited Cuba*. Yunus Carrim*, editor of the SACP's monthly journal, /Umsebenzi/, interviewed *Oscar Martinez*, the deputy head of the International Relations Department of the Communist Party of Cuba. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1975> India: Protest Barack Obama's visit -- `US hands off India, hands off Asia!' <http://links.org.au/node/1974> Statement by *All India Left Coordination* November 2010 -- US President Barack Obama's forthcoming visit to India this November [6-9] will inaugurate a new chapter in the "strategic partnership" between US imperialism and India's ruling class. As people of India, let us examine the interests that the US president represents and the implications of his visit for India. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1974> The Flame, October-November 2010 -- Green Left Weekly's Arabic-language supplement <http://links.org.au/node/1970> November 2, 2010 -- With the help of Socialist Alliance members in the growing Sudanese community in Australia, /Green Left Weekly/ -- Australia's leading socialist newspaper -- publishes a regular Arabic language supplement, The /Flame/. * Read more <http://links.org.au/node/1970> * * * Links seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Follow Links on Twitter at http://twitter.com/LinksSocialism or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10865397643 ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
