The Red Review | Issue #11 (July 2024)
The Red Review | Issue #11 (July 2024)
Editor: Flo Schade
Managing Editor: Yener Kara
Federal Secretary: Barry Weisleder
Queer Liberation through Socialist Revolution!
Warmest solidarity greetings from Socialist Action/ Ligue pour l"Action Socialiste for Pride 2024. We are happy again to congratulate The No Pride in Policing coalition and allies for organizing. Over the past year the continuing growth of the hard right, both internationally and in "Canada" makes the struggle to defend queer and trans rights ever more urgent.
Attacks on trans rights have grown and intensified. Three provinces passed laws which aim to out trans youth and further repress them. After some initial trans rights gains came the ludicrously named Million march, effectively answered by counter protests. Fortunately, the second instalment of the bigots’ march was a bust. But the struggle for trans rights will be a long one.
For the Zionist State, China is a Leading Partner in Trade
by Barry Weisleder
China is #3 in bi-lateral trade with Israel. In terms of import sources of the Zionist state in 2023, China is #1 with a share of 17.7% (14a.7 billion USD). That puts the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) far ahead of the USA, Germany and Turkey in trade with the Zionist Apartheid state. This is according to the World Bank, which has no material interest in lying about this matter.
Since July 2005, unions and civil society organizations in Occupied Palestine, and around the world, have demanded that Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions be applied against Israel. Since October 2023 the world is witnessing an escalated, ongoing genocide by the Zionist colonial-settler state directed at the Palestinian people, over 45,000 of whom have been killed by IDF bombardment and on-the-ground massacres in Gaza and the West Bank. Over the past two months, thousands of students have erected pro-Palestinian encampments on their campuses to demand disclosure and divestment by academic institutions. Tens of thousands of employees at UCLA are engaged in rotating strikes to press for BDS action.
Degrowing China—By Collapse, Redistribution, or Planning?
by Minqi Li, first published in Monthly Review.
In recent years, degrowth theory has gained popularity among a growing number of ecological economists and social activists. Degrowth theorists argue that humanity’s consumption of material resources and impact on environment have overshot the earth’s ecological capacity, and that the restoration of ecological sustainability requires rapid and massive reduction of material and energy throughput in the global economy. Empirical evidence suggests that positive economic growth has been usually associated with rising material consumption and environmental impact. “Absolute decoupling” between economic growth and environmental impact (that is, a situation in which positive economic growth rate happens, together with absolute reduction of resources consumption and environmental impact) has happened only in specific countries during relatively short periods of time, and is unlikely to happen on a global scale at a sufficiently rapid pace. Degrowth theorists are convinced that global ecological sustainability cannot be restored without abandoning the pursuit of infinite economic growth.
The Liberals Have Trampled On Workers’ Strike Rights, Again
by Adam D.K. King; Reprinted from Class Struggle
The federal government is once again trampling on workers’ right to strike.
On May 9, federal Minister of Labour Seamus O’Regan used an obscure section of the Canada Labour Code to pre-empt looming job actions by the Teamsters Canada Rail Conference (TCRC) at Canadian National Railway (CN) and Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC).
It seems recent overtures to organized labour, such as passing anti-scab legislation, haven’t appreciably changed the Liberals’ overall approach to unions and strikes in strategically important industries.
Thousands rally at Queen’s Park to stop privatization of Ontario’s public health care
Barry Weisleder
They came in busses, cars and trains from across southern Ontario to Toronto City Hall on a breezy, but sunny May 30, 2024. In their thousands they marched and gathered in front of the Ontario Legislature. Their mission: to stop privatization of public healthcare.
Labour union contingents, community organizations, seniors’ groups and many others responded to the call of the Ontario Health Coalition. Speakers from the Ontario Federation of Labour and the “loyal opposition”, including the capitalist Liberal and Green parties, and the pro-capitalist New Democrats, decried the agenda that prevails at Queen’s Park.
State and Revolution: An Introduction
By Gary Porter
EVERY STRUGGLE aiming for genuine and fundamental transformation of society must come to terms with the role of the state.
Today, there is still much debate and controversy about how to approach the state, because these questions are intimately related to how society
can be changed: Can the capitalist state be reformed through elections into something that meets the needs of the majority? Is the state as powerful as it once was or do corporations have more power? Can workers take over the capitalist state or do we need a different one? Is a workers' state a necessity to repel counter-revolution?
It goes without saying that revolutionary socialists, reformists and anarchists have different approaches to these questions. But it is important to test these approaches against the actual experience of the working-class movement historically.
The Russian revolutionary V.I. Lenin wrote what became State and Revolution in the critical months immediately preceding the outbreak of the 1917 February Revolution in Russia. The arguments contained in the short book became a practical guide to Russia's working class in the period before and after the seizure of political power in November 1917.
Ukraine Proxy Attacks Russian Nuclear Defence Systems in major US Provocation
Stephen Bryen
Missile attacks on Russian Nuclear Radar Defence Risks nuclear conflict since the core of Russian angst is that Ukraine could become a NATO nuclear missile base
On May 23 drones launched from Ukraine hit a Russian strategic radar station in Armavir, Russia. This is not the first time that nuclear facilities in Russia have been targeted and hit, but it represents a significant escalation that could trigger Russian retaliation on NATO suppliers or even a nuclear response by Russia. The core of Russian angst about Ukraine is that the country would become a NATO base for nuclear missiles. It is certain that such a target could not be hit by Ukraine without US permission, intelligence and technical assistance.
Transit Workers’ Readiness to Strike Won Gains
Written by a TTC worker who is a member of Socialist Action
Amalgamated Transit Union Local 113 members voted on their collective agreement with Toronto Transit Commission management on June 18, 2024. 8,153 of approximately 12,000 employees cast a ballot -- about a thousand less than voted for a strike mandate a month earlier. This time, 6,555 indicated that they favour the deal, with 1,538 against and 60 abstentions.
Negotiated on June 7, the settlement was reached four hours past the strike deadline after a ‘framework’ settlement was reached at around 11:30 p.m. on June 6. It followed a union announcement that there would be a strike action. Contract negotiations started in February 2024. The previously arbitrated terms expired in April. The new deal appears to be an overall improvement over anything ATU-113 has seen in decades, but it contains some concessions.
