Socialist Renewal

Spokesman Books | Socialist Renewal

The Socialist Renewal Series

Socialist Renewal grew out of the discussions around Labour's abandonment of Clause Four, in 1995. A general invitation was issued to socialist authors to write for us. A dozen pamphlets and half a dozen books followed.

Currently Socialist Renewal is in its 11th Series and is still going strong.

The Socialist Renewal series also has a website dedicated to its publications and provides a space in which to leave comments - www.socialistrenewal.net/


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Socialist Renewal 11th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>How to Select or Reselect your MP</span>How to Select or Reselect your MP
2016 Remix
By David Osland

'You may very well be entirely satisfied with your Labour MP, should you be lucky enough to have one. And that's exactly how it should be. Work hard to ensure that she or he is returned to parliament at the next general election, hopefully with an increased majority. Britain needs a radical Labour government that will transform the country permanently for the better.

But if you are reading this, chances are either you are not entirely happy with your Westminster representative's performance, or you know or suspect that your Constituency Labour Party will need to choose a new candidate next time round, for any one of a range of reasons …

Labour Party members do have the right - under the existing rules, as they stand - to seek to put a new candidate in place, through the designedly opaque and little-understood mechanism known as the Trigger Ballot.


Price: £4.00

16 pages
ISBN: 978 0 85124 8615


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Safe at work?</span>Safe at work?
Ramazzini versus the attack on health and safety

By Dave Putson
With an introduction by Mark Serwotka

'This is an important time to write the history of health and safety in the UK, given the near derision that the term now evokes in the media and from the Government. What Dave Putson demonstrates in writing this book is that health and safety, far from being the product of a more litigious society or the political agenda of overbearing bureaucrats, is rooted in human need, protecting people.

This book describes how, over the last 300 years, an evolving body of surveys, research, legal challenges and often tragic experiences led to an emergence of, at first, quite limited protections. Some of these histories will be familiar to the reader, like the match girls and 'phossy jaw', but others, like the seminal legal case of Priestley vs Fowler, are not. What the varied and fascinating histories indicate is that health and safety evolved to improve not only the workplace, but also our homes, our communities, our roads, our waterways, and public and environmental health ...

Today, there are desperate attempts to reverse those gains. Our Prime Minister echoes the worst of the 19th century's irresponsible industrialists when he says health and safety is an 'albatross around the neck of British businesses'. The burden to take reasonable and practical steps to ensure workers can come home at night is what Cameron objects to when he says he wants to "kill off the health and safety culture for good". Despite this supposedly rampant culture, the HSE records that around 175 people died in 2011/12 from injuries sustained at work while, according to the Hazards campaign, up to 50,000 die each year from work-related illnesses, including 6,000 from occupational cancers.

Workers only got these rights and protections because they organised and fought for them. It is a depressing but familiar tale of history that, today, we need to fight those same battles again. I hope you enjoy reading this detailed, fascinating and engaging history as much as I did. But most importantly, I hope it inspires you to think and to act.'

Mark Serwotka, General Secretary of the Public and Commercial Services Union, from his introduction

Dave Putson is a trade union health and safety representative in the London Courts.

Reviews
WEA London Region Newsletter - Issue 4

A review by the Bookmarks Socialist Bookshop

ASLEF Journal - June 2013

'Seeing the increasing attacks on health and safety and "red tape" by this Tory led government and the support from the right wing media, I would like to recommend a book recently published by Spokesman titled Safe at work? written by Dave Putson who is a union health and safety representative in the London Courts.This details theuphill struggle over the last 300 hundred years for safer practices in the workplace. I believe this is essential reading for all health and safety representatives and indeed anyone interested in their own and other peoples well being. We should all be aware that health and safety regulations and so called "red tape" were hard won rights and should not be surrendered.'
Mr J. Randall, Bexley, Kent (UNITE member, who sent this letter to his union journal)

'I'm enjoying this book so much. I suggest you make sure it's on the stall at the Tolpuddle Rally 21st July. Salam, Shalom, Peace.'
Rev. Hazel Barkham


Price: £15.00

184 pages
ISBN: 978 0 85124 8226


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Mutation of Privatisation</span>The Mutation of Privatisation
A critical assessment of new community
and individual rights

By Dexter Whitfield

New community rights to bid, buy, build, challenge and provide are enshrined in legislation and Coalition policy. The government is also extending existing individual rights to buy and to personal budgets. Considerable sums of public money are required to implement these policies and provide technical and legal support to voluntary and community organisations to exercise these rights.

This paper examines the objectives and scope of the new community rights and proposes a typology of public sector reform rights. It highlights the fundamental conflicts between 'rights', 'choice' and 'contract' cultures and localism. It assesses the conflicts and contradictions between community and commissioning, participation and empowerment, and the impact on democratic accountability, public finance, employment, equalities, the changing role of the state and community, voluntary and non-profit organisations.



Price: £8.95

32 pages | A4 pamphlet
ISBN: 978 0 85124 8172


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Socialist Renewal 10th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Unarmed Victory</span>Unarmed Victory
The Cuban Missile Crisis Fifty Years On
By Bertrand Russell

The Cuban missile crisis of October 1962, more than any previous crisis, made the ordinary citizen suddenly aware of the ever-present danger of nuclear annihilation, and no sooner had the fright passed than it was renewed on the borders of India and China. Bertrand Russell shared these feelings, both the fright and the anger, but decided he must go on to turn concern into action. This book tells what he did in those frightening weeks, why he did it, and of the curious reception his activities had.

He asked Khrushchev not to challenge the US blockade of Cuba and Khrushchev acted as Russell had suggested that he should. This was exactly the action that the West had hoped for, but most people in the West still blamed Russell as too pro-communist because it was not by force that the result had been achieved. The same occurred in the Sino-Indian crisis. So the book contains a message of hope. Two precedents have been set for dignified and voluntary compromise in order to avoid nuclear war, and moreover the suggestions of a respected individual outside the battle were heeded. If we want a parallel we must look back to the thirteenth century, when Frederic II was quarrelling with the Pope and was ex-communicated. While ex-communicated he went on a crusade, but instead of fighting the Saracens, he negotiated with them. He secured far more than more warlike crusaders had ever been able to obtain, but he remained in bad odour with the Pope because it was wicked to negotiate with the Saracens. The analogy is very close.

Reviews
David Sinclair - Tribune, May 2012


Price: £8.95

156 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 8028


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Let's Build the Houses - Quick!</span>Let's Build the Houses - Quick!
By Cathy Davis & Alan Wigfield

Some 4.5 million people are waiting for good quality, permanent council and association homes. In response to equally devastating shortages in 1945, Attlee's newly elected Labour Government prioritised council house-building, built to a high standard. We draw inspiration from this experience, and argue that a future government needs to emulate this achievement, prioritise high standard housing and 'build the houses - quick!'

Reviews:
Dr Sarah Payne - Taylor and Francis Housing Studies 2012

Eileen Short in Socialist Review, April 2012


Price: £6.00

62 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 8080
10th Series Number 56


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>In Place of Austerity</span>In Place of Austerity
Reconstructing the economy,
state and public services

By Dexter Whitfield

In Place of Austerity uncovers the realities of commissioning, localism, 'big society' empowerment fraud, and the systematic undermining of public services and the welfare state. It perceptively exposes the scale of disempowerment, dispossession and disinvestment, and analyses the dominant rationale, which continues to underpin the financialisation and personalisation of public services, accelerating marketisation and privatisation on an unprecedented scale.

This is a vitally important book for trade unions as well as for civil and community organisations. It provides a critical understanding of the issues and will aid their intervention in transformation and procurement of public services by forging strong alliances, taking industrial and community action, and advancing alternative policies.

In Place of Austerity sets out a framework for policies that reconstruct the economy, invest in local economies, create jobs and rebuild public infrastructure. In doing so, it charts a new role for the state and offers a radical new public service management strategy. It is an equally important resource for all public sector employees. Incisive, timely and detailed, it is original in its research and analysis.

A paper by Dexter:
A paper written for Studies in Social Services, Li Bing, Vice Professor, Department of Sociology, Beijing Administrative College, China. Social services are at the forefront of the continued neoliberal transformation of public services and the welfare state in the UK. The paper applies the In Place of Austerity framework to examine the changes in social services. Paper in English and Chinese.

Reviews:
Bryan Evans in Work Organisation, Labour and Globalisation Volume 7, Number 1, Summer 2013

Colin Burgess in Campaign for Labour Party Democracy

Dave Putson, TUSC (Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition)

An article by New Left Project on G4S makes positive reference to In Place of Austerity, August 2012

William Podmore - Amazon

Andy Morton for Chartist, March/April 2012

Clive Singer for Open Democracy, Jan 2012

Nick Grant for Socialist Review, Jan 2012

A short review from IIndependent Action


Price: £18.00

264 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 085124 7939


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Socialist Renewal 9th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Bad News</span>Bad News
The Wapping Dispute
by John Lang & Graham Dodkins
Foreword by Tony Benn

In January 1986, some 5,500 workers employed by four of Britain's national newspapers were sacked. The Sun, News of the World, The Times and The Sunday Times were all owned by Rupert Murdoch's News International Limited, and the bitter industrial dispute that followed was to last 13 months.

Although generally referred to as a print workers' dispute, many of those sacked were not printers at all, but managers, clerks, secretaries, librarians, copy typists and messengers who were members of the Society of Graphical and Allied Trades (SOGAT).

In the year following the dispute the authors of this book, themselves previously librarians at The Times and The Sunday Times and active participants in the strike, interviewed many of the clerical workers involved in an effort to document their experiences. Having spent more than a year recording these testimonies and transcribing the tapes onto the backs of discarded fast-food delivery menus using a portable typewriter (money was tight and paper expensive), the project was reluctantly abandoned, the victim of an acute need to earn a living.

The manuscript gathered dust in a loft until, in 2009 (with the 25th anniversary of the dispute fast approaching) unemployment, ironically, provided an opportunity to finish the job. Bad News tells the story of an ordinary group of people thrown into extraordinary circumstances, and how those circumstances affected their lives.

"What comes out in this book is the courage and determination of those who fought for their jobs and their rights against a government that was bitterly hostile to both. This is a book that should be very widely read." Tony Benn, Foreword

Reviews:
Richard Sharpe - Review 31
James Grayson - Chartist, September/October 2011
Sue Sparks - Socialist Review, July/August 2011
Robert Giddings - Tribune, Sunday, June 19th, 2011
Brendan Perring and Ben Welch - Print Monthly, June 2011

Price: £15.00

172 pages | Illustrated
ISBN: 978 0 85124 7960


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The £10bn Sale of Share in PPP Companies</span>The £10bn Sale of Share in PPP Companies
New source of profits for builders and banks
By Dexter Whitfield

This Research Report is part of a wider study of the sale of Public Private Partnership (PPP) equity and the growth of a secondary market focused in the UK, but also including other EU countries, US, Canada, Latin America, Australia and other countries with significant numbers of PPP projects. It follows on from Professor Whitfield's previous study, Global Auction of Public Assets: Public sector alternatives to the infrastructure market and Public Private Partnerships.

BBC File on 4 at 8.00pm 14/6/2011 and Sunday 19 June at 5.00pm, features ESSU research. Listen again via BBC iPlayer.

Price: £8.95

24 pages | A4 pamphlet
ISBN: 978 08 5124 7915


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Nuclear New Build?</span>Nuclear New Build?
A review of the issues
By Christopher Gifford

'This paper attempts to describe the present state of affairs, in particular the issues facing the new Coalition Government. In February 2007, the then government was described in judicial review as having behaved 'unlawfully' in consulting on energy policy with information 'wholly insufficient for the public to make an intelligent response'. Since then, thousands of pages have been published in further consultations and some in response to freedom of information requests, and it has become clear that much detail remains to be provided on matters that may not be decided until licences to build and operate nuclear stations are granted, if at all. The material is usually technical, but there are ethical issues which demand political decisions after the involvement of an informed public. Meaningful information has been slow to emerge, and it is not surprising that, so far, few members of the public have become involved.'

Christopher Gifford


Price: £6.00

56 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7878
Series number: 54


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Nuclear New Build? - ePUB</span>Nuclear New Build? - ePUB
A review of the issues
By Christopher Gifford

This is the ePUB version of Nuclear New Build?, which can be downloaded onto your PC, Sony eReader, iPad and iPhone.

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Price: £4.99

ISBN: 978 0 85124 7984
ePUB format


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Inside the Left</span>Inside the Left
By Fenner Brockway

"Fenner Brockway lived a long life and it was certainly packed with colourful action. Here we are reproducing the first volume of his autobiography, which was written on the eve of the Second World War. Never afraid to court controversy, this book celebrated the Socialist movement's opposition to the First World War, and the activities of an anti-war movement which continued after that conflict.

A pupil of Keir Hardie and Bernard Shaw, the young Brockway found his natural home in the Independent Labour Party, which developed his talents as an editor and public agitator. He became acquainted with many of the key personalities of international socialism, and with all the leading figures on the British Left, including H. G. Wells, Bertrand Russell and the political spokesmen of the growing Labour movement.

This book contains Brockway's detailed account of the efforts of the British Left to find some kind of political unity during the years of the Labour Party's split, when Ramsay MacDonald formed a National Government. The ILP left the Labour Party, and entered into a variety of negotiations with the Communists and others to attempt to crystallise a Socialist opposition."

Ken Coates
Foreword to the new edition

Reviews:
Morning Star, 22nd March 2010 - John Green

Book of the Month: Fenner Brockway's Inside the Left - by John Green in London Progressive Journal


Price: £18.00

352 pages | Indexed
ISBN: 978 085124 7748
Socialist Classic


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Socialist Renewal 8th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Housing: Did it have to be like this?</span>Housing: Did it have to be like this?
A socialist critique of New Labour's performance
By Cathy Davis & Alan Wigfield

'This pamphlet will identify the best of what was achieved by Labour governments in the past, by Labour ministers struggling against considerable opposition to achieve progressive legislation and large building programmes. This will be compared with what New Labour, with a massive electoral majority, has achieved in relation to council housebuilding and maintenance, anti-social behaviour and creating mixed communities. What have been the effects of the twin restrictions on local authorities - in relation to new building and funding to achieve the Decent Homes Standard? Should council or housing association landlords have substantial powers over tenants' personal behaviour, and has New Labour emphasis on dealing with anti-social behaviour changed the way that social housing is regarded?'

Dr Cathy Davis, University of Salford
Alan Wigfield, Sheffield Hallam University, Chair, Sheffield City Council Housing Committee 1986-92


Reviews:
Joe Crawford (2011): Housing: Did it Have to be Like This? A Socialist Critique of New Labour's Performance, Housing Studies, 26:5, 793-794

Ian Cole (2011): Housing: Did it Have to Be Like This?, Housing Studies, 26:5, 795-796


Price: £6.00

33 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7823
8th Series Number 3 (No. 53)


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Housing: Did it have to be like this? - ePUB</span>Housing: Did it have to be like this? - ePUB
A socialist critique of New Labour's performance
By Cathy Davis & Alan Wigfield

This is the ePUB version of Housing: Did it have to be like this?, which can be downloaded onto your PC, Sony eReader, iPad and iPhone.

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ISBN: 978 0 85124 7823
8th Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Global Auction of Public Assets:</span>Global Auction of Public Assets:
Public sector alternatives to the infrastructure market and Public Private Partnerships
By Dexter Whitfield

Public infrastructure in the 21st century is confronted with new challenges - adapting to climate change, meeting the economic, energy, water, transportation and social infrastructure needs of megacities in Asia, megaregions in North America and European city regions.

Public infrastructure provides basic human needs - homes, water, energy for light, heat and cooking; the transport of people, raw materials and goods by road, rail, sea and air; hospitals, schools, sports and cultural facilities; communications networks; facilities for the criminal justice system; and civic and governmental buildings for democratic governance, social and political activity.

Public infrastructure supports economic growth, increases productivity, generates employment, creates opportunities for the production and supply chains in construction and services, and improves community well-being.

Wider adoption of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) and growth of the global infrastructure market, financed by investment funds and pension funds, could fuel a new era of public asset sales. Already, the refinancing and the sale of equity in PPP projects has led to the buying and selling of public hospitals, schools, prisons and roads, furthering exploitation and profiteering.

PPPs are promoted by the World Bank, IMF, development banks and via bilateral agreements in developing countries and the industrialised north. This is the first critical analysis which explores PPP programmes in the UK, France, Ireland, Germany, the US, Canada, Russia, Australia, China, India, Brazil and South Africa.

Yet over US$500bn of PPP projects have failed, have little democratic control or transparency, are costly, lack innovation and are approved on narrow value for money or fraudulent public sector comparators. PPPs are ultimately publicly financed, either directly by government or indirectly through user charges, fares and tolls.

The Guardianpublic article, 17th Jan 2011, on PPP equity sales.

Profiteering from public private partnerships
Dexter Whitfield, Guardian, 10 December 2009

Reviews:
Capital & Class 35.3 (2011) - Hugo Radice, University of Leeds, UK

International Journal of Governmental Financial Management Vol. X No. 2, 2010 - Stewart Smyth, Queen's University Managment School, Belfast

Privatising the Public Sector: Two books expose the defects of Public-Private Partnerships - Keith Reynolds, The CCPA Monitor, October 2010

New book challenges privatization claims - in CUPE, March 31st 2010

Selling off the family silver - Duncan Bowie, Chartist, March/April 2010

Public cost and private benefit - Michael Barratt Brown in Red Pepper, Feb 2010

Socialist Review - Nick Grant, January 2010

Truthout - Friday 15 January 2010, Op-Ed

Price: £18.00

380 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 7731


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Global Auction of Public Assets - ePUB</span>Global Auction of Public Assets - ePUB
Public sector alternatives to the infrastructure market and Public Private Partnerships
By Dexter Whitfield

This is the ePUB version of Global Auction of Public Assets, which can be downloaded onto your PC, Sony eReader, iPad and iPhone.

Once bought please SAVE THE FILE and add it to your eReader as required.

Price: £11.99

ISBN: 978 0 85124 7847
ePUB format


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Miracle of Fleet Street</span>The Miracle of Fleet Street
The Story of the Daily Herald
By George Lansbury

'The Daily Herald is now dimly remembered as a forerunner to the disgraceful Sun. But it is not widely known that it began life as a daily strike bulletin when the London print unions struck for a forty-eight hour working week. This blossomed out to cover general news items and even sport, and spread its reach from London to some provincial cities. It died after the strike, but had already whetted the appetite of trade union activists for a move to relaunch it. It set off on an eventful life with a capital of £300 as a co-operative Labour daily, staunchly "unofficial" and rebellious, a veritable hell raiser ...

The demise of the Herald, and the rise of the Sun, are sad stories of the afterlife. But this book contains the account of George Lansbury, the Herald's consistent sponsor and campaigner. It was published in 1925 and has a racy account of the early struggles which established the paper ... It should reappear on the bookshelves in its own right because its author was not only a notable contender for all the good causes that distinguished the Labour Movement in the early days of the Twentieth Century, but also a most generous and decent man, well worth remembering in his own words for what were, in large measures, his own deeds.'

Ken Coates from his Foreword to the new edition

Cover 'Fantasy (Labour Leaders at their Devotions)'
by Will Dyson, Daily Herald, 3 December 1913.

A further 19 illustrations by Will Dyson can be found in
The Miracle of Fleet Street.

Reviews
Bill Hagerty - British Journalism Review
Geoffrey Goodman in Tribune
Nathaniel Mehr in the Morning Star


Price: £15.00

168 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 7663
Socialist Classic


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Socialist Renewal 7th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Labour's Forgotten Statement</span>Labour's Forgotten Statement
on Banking and Finance
Introduced by J. E. Mortimer

"In the discussion within the labour movement and the press about the current failings of the financial system, the 'credit crunch' and the consequential rise in unemployment little, if any, attention has been given to a statement entitled 'Banking and Finance', prepared by the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party and then presented to and accepted by the 1976 annual conference of the Party.

The report saw the operation of Britain's financial system within the wider context of the problems of the economy. How right they were! At the heart of these problems was the need to increase industrial investment. This need, said the Labour Party report, was 'too important to be left to businessmen and financiers alone'. The report called for a doubling of the rate of manufacturing investment over the next decade. Manufacturing, it said, had 'grown anaemic and needed a major transformation' ... Unfortunately, the Labour Party's 1976 statement on 'Banking and Finance' was not adopted as a guide by New Labour when it was elected with an overwhelming majority in 1997. There is a lesson in this experience."

Jim Mortimer from his Introduction

Price: £3.00

28 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7700
7th Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Left Parties Everywhere</span>Left Parties Everywhere
By Oskar Lafontaine

2009 will be a year of slump and war. Large parts of the population of Europe feels themselves to be unrepresented as these dire developments unfold. There is clearly a vacuum in official politics, which has proved itself incapable of defending peace, jobs and democracy. But alternatives are beginning to emerge.

From its exciting beginnings in Germany, the movement to create Left Parties … has been steadily advancing. Die Linke, the German Left Party, is led by Oskar Lafontaine, the SDP's candidate for Federal Chancellor in 1990, and Lothar Bisky, former Chairman of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS).

Left Parties are now appearing all over the place. These developments will give especial importance to the European Elections which are to be held in June 2009.
Ken Coates from his Introduction

For the full text of this pamphlet click here.

Price: £2.00

28 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7549
7th Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Shape of Things to Come</span>The Shape of Things to Come
The EU Future Group
By Tony Bunyan of Statewatch

The Shape of Things to Come examines the European Union's plans for justice and home affairs, and warns that the Union is embarked on several highly controversial paths. These include: using the 'digital tsunami' to create a surveillance society for law enforcement purposes by gathering personal details on the everyday lives of everyone living in the European Union; allowing law enforcement and security agencies, in collaboration with multinational companies, to determine new technologies to be introduced - including recording details of all phone and mobile phone calls and internet usage; removing 'obstacles' (judicial authorisation) to the exchange of intelligence between all European Union agencies; and the outrageous idea that a Euro-Atlantic area of co-operation with the United States should be set up to decide on policies fundamentally affecting the rights and liberties of the people of Europe.

Also questioned is the undemocratic decision-making procedure under which 27 EU governments will agree the 'Stockholm Programme' that will set in stone the measures to be introduced. The book ends with a warning that, unless we have an open and meaningful debate now, we never will, because it will already be too late.


Price: £5.99

80 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 085124 7601


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Making of the Labour Movement</span>The Making of the Labour Movement
The Formation of the Transport and General Workers' Union 1870-1922
by Ken Coates and Topham

This authoritative and comprehensive history does more than tell a story. It shows how trade unions created permanent organisation, based on "recognition" as a key concept. Those who had formerly been locked out from society now recognised their own strength in association, and saw that strength reflected in the eyes of their bosses.

Price: £15.00

909 pages | Indexed
ISBN: 978 0 85124 5652
Paperback


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Socialist Renewal 6th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>One Big Union</span>One Big Union
Reviewing the History of a Big Idea
by Ron Todd and Others

The two lectures published here celebrate the publication of the history of the Transport & General Workers’ Union. They show how the dream of its founders was the creation of ‘One Big Union’. With the formation of UNITE the Union, the realisation of that dream is brought that much closer. UNITE brings together people working in diverse occupations and locations, as did the founders of the T&G themselves all those years ago. In this booklet, Ken Coates and Tony Topham tell some of that story. For their full account, it is necessary as the reviewers urge, to read The Making of the Labour Movement.


Price: £6.00

67 pages
ISBN: 978 0 85124 752 6


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Brown Studies</span>Brown Studies
Spokesman 97
Edited by Ken Coates


Ken Coates - Editorial
Kurt Vonnegut - My Last Word
Ralph Steadman - My Friend Vonnegut
John Berger- Erasing the Past
Gabriel Kolko - Breaking Storm?
Paul Rogers - Brown's Direction?
Gordon Brown - Planned Economy
Jim Mortimer - Prospects for Labour
Joe Marino - New Beginnings?
Jean Jaurès - Socialist Aim
Leon Trotsky - Jaurès
Kevin Cahill - Blackwater
Alex Salmond MSP - Scotland against Nukes
David Webb - Star Wars

Dossier
Reviews

Price: £5.00

88 pages | A5 size
ISBN: 978 0 85124 750 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Studies in Socialism</span>Studies in Socialism
By Jean Jaurès
Introduced by J. E. Mortimer, Leon Trotsky
& R. Ramsay MacDonald


'Studies in Socialism was first published by the Independent Labour Party (ILP) in 1906. It consists of a number of essays, most of them centred on the method of transition from capitalism to socialism in the economically advance countries.

The special point of these essays is that they reaffirm very vigorously the essential features of the analysis of capitalism made by Marx and Engels. They also illustrate the influence on Jaurès of the traditions of the French Revolution. Nevertheless, the essays challenge the interpretation sometimes made by Marxists about the method of transition from capitalism to socialism. The essays affirm strongly the case for democratic endeavour by socialists seeking to change society.'

Jim Mortimer, Foreword to 2007 Edition


Price: £15.00

210 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 7496


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The War on Freedom and Democracy</span>The War on Freedom and Democracy
Essays on Civil Liberties in Europe
Edited by Tony Bunyan

The 'war on terror' has continued with no end in sight in the years since the attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001. It permeates the institutions of the body politic in Europe, sacrificing liberty and freedoms in the name of a constructed 'politics of fear' and demands for security.

We have learnt that the greatest threat to 'our way of life' and democracy comes not from terrorism but from our governments' reactions to it. The emergency measures that at first were presented as 'expectional' are now the norm.

These essays were prepared for the launch of the European Civil Liberties Network

Contributors: Tony Bunyan, Heiner Busch, Deirdre Curtin, Liz Fekete, Balthasar Glatti, Ben Hayes, Paddy Hillyard, Gus Hosein, Gergana Jouleva, Alexander Kashumov, Virginia Mantouvalou, Thomas Mathiesen, Steve Peers, Max Rowlands, Phil Scraton, A. Sivanandan, Lorenzo Trucco and Aidan White.


Price: £10.99

176 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 723 6


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Socialist Renewal 5th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Lost Stolen or Strayed?</span>Lost Stolen or Strayed?
Gordon Brown as Socialist Pretender
Arguments from The Red Paper recalled by Socialist Renewal and updated by Michael Meacher

In 1975 Gordon Brown edited and published The Red Paper on Scotland - The Socialist Challenge. This was at one time required reading among the Scottish Left. Today, Gordon Brown might usefully be reminded of his youthful thoughts as his position since then has changed considerably.

Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7281
5th Series Number 5


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Nuclear Reactors: Do we need more?</span>Nuclear Reactors: Do we need more?
By Christopher Gifford

A case for ‘fast track’ building of new nuclear reactors to counter global warming, to increase security of electricity supply or to plug the gap envisaged by the closure of existing power stations has not been made. Nuclear stations could not be appraised, licensed and built in time.

Energy from renewable sources has the greatest potential for reducing C02 emmisions but infrastructure changes, notably in the grid and in load management, will be needed. When adopted, we will have a cleaner, healthier planet, and a sustainable way of life.

Price: £2.00

33 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7267
5th Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>New Labour's Attack on Public Services</span>New Labour's Attack on Public Services
Modernisation by Marketisation? How the commissioning, choice, competition and
contestability agenda threatens public services
and the welfare state.

By Dexter Whitfield

New Labour is creating markets in public services on an unprecedented scale. Privatisation inevitably follows marketisation, eroding democratic accountability and embedding business interests. Alternative policies and strategies must build on the support for democratic governance, social justice and the welfare state. As this timely book makes clear, action by alliances of trade unions, community organisations and civil society organisations is urgently required.

Read reviews by:
Mike Tolochko
Patrick Ainley
Labour Research
Keith Popple
Paul Walker

Price: £11.99

176 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7151
5th Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Dodgiest Dossier</span>The Dodgiest Dossier
This publication brings together for the first time all the leaked memoranda about the British Government's decision to go to war on Iraq, plus the Attorney General's legal advice.

You can read the full text of the revealing memorandum about preparations for war on Iraq, dating from July 2002, (which) was leaked to the press in the days before the 2005 General Election.

Price: £4.00

80 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7120
5th Series Number 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Readings and Witnesses for Workers' Control</span>Readings and Witnesses for Workers' Control
Edited by Ken Coates and Tony Topham

This book of Readings and Witnesses for Workers' Control seeks to show the rich history of the trade union movement to win a voice in the government of industry for the people who do the work in it.

Price: £9.99

504 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 6994
5th Series Number 1


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Socialist Renewal 4th Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Fraud at the Elections</span>Fraud at the Elections
The full final and definitive Judgment of Election Commissioner Richard Mawrey QC handed down on Monday 4th April 2005 in the matters of Local Government elections for the Bordesley Green and Aston Wards of the Birmingham City Council both held on 10th June 2004.

Price: £5.00

138 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 708 3
4th Series Number 7


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Countering Civil Rights</span>Countering Civil Rights
by Tony Bunyan

In this pamphlet Tony Bunyan, editor of Statewatch, scrutinises the emerging counter-terrorism regime of the G8 countries and the European Union.

Price: £2.00

33 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7113
4th Series Number 6


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Not Fit to be Prime Minister?</span>Not Fit to be Prime Minister?
That Interview and a Commentary by Ken Coates

In September 2007, John Humphrys interviewed Prime Minister Blair at length about his decision to go to war on Iraq. In his inimitable way, the Today presenter said:

'If your judgement is wrong on this - let me put this very bluntly, you wouldn’t be fit to be Prime Minister ...'

Ken Coates provides a commentary on the facts that underlie this memorable exchange

Price: £2.00

16 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 7090
4th Series Number 5


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Arms for Oil</span>Arms for Oil
By Michael Barratt Brown

It is a fact, an unfortunate fact, that economic relations between the West and the Arab and other Islamic countries could for many years be described accurately in just three words “Oil for Arms” or alternatively “Arms for Oil"

Price: £5.00

62 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6987
4th Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Social Europe We Need</span>The Social Europe We Need
By Robin Blackburn, André Brie MEP,
Ken Coates, Christina Beatty
and Stephen Fothergill.

Robin Blackburn is an editor of New Left Review and teaches in the Sociology Department at the University of Essex.

André Brie MEP is a well-known member of the European Parliament who represents the Party of Democratic Socialism in Germany.

Ken Coates was for ten years a Member of the European Parliament and a Special Professor at the University of Nottingham.

Christina Beatty & Stephen Fothergill are colleagues at the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research, Sheffield Hallam University.

Read a review by Tony Phillips


Price: £9.99

138 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 7038
4th Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Trial of Slobodan Milosevic</span>The Trial of Slobodan Milosevic
By Michael Barratt Brown, Edward S. Herman & David Peterson

What is happening in the court-house in The Hague, to which Slobodan Milosevic has been brought, intermittently, since 2002? What purpose does the International Criminal tribunal for Former Yugoslavia serve?

Price: £5.00

80 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 6932
4th Series Number 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Together for a Different Europe</span>Together for a Different Europe
Manifesto of the European Left

Together for a Different Europe, the first in the fourth series of Socialist Renewal, includes the draft Manifesto of the European Left. It proposes "a broad social and political alliance" to promote significant changes of policy in the societies which compromise the enlarged European Union.

Price: £2.00

9 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6901
4th Series Number 1


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Socialist Renewal 3rd Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Redistribution</span>Redistribution
A Silent Counter Revolution
By Michael Barratt Brown

In this discussion on the shifting balance between the power of capital and labour in Britain, Michael Barratt Brown charts the redistribution of wealth from the poor to the rich under New Labour.

Price: £2.00

17 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6833
3rd Series Number 8


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Workers' Control</span>Workers' Control
by Ken Coates

Trade Unionists in Britain pursued their hope of a more fulfilling life in the secure knowledge that if they joined together, a better world was indeed possible. Now, a new generation of trade unionists, internationally, may in turn draw inspiration from the ideas and experiences of those who came together in pursuit of industrial democracy and workers' control.

'This book is a significant contribution to the ongoing discussion around issues of workers' control...'

Jeremy Dear National Union of Journalists, Andy Gilchrist Fire Brigades Union, Billy Hayes Communication Workers Union, Joe Marino Bakers, Food & Allied Workers' union, Mick Rix ASLEF, Mark Serwotka Public & Commercial Services Union, Tony Woodley Transport & General Workers' Union.

Read a review by Jim Mortimer


Price: £7.99

190 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 6826
Socialist Renewal 3:7


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Tony Blair</span>Tony Blair
The Old New Goes to War
By Ken Coates

In this pamphlet Ken Coates examines some of the disconcerting features of British Parliamentary debate on the war against Iraq, and the state of the Labour Party. How did we arrive at such an impasse?

Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6796
3rd Series Number 6


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Power and Ownership</span>Power and Ownership
By The Swedish Left Party
With an introduction by Michael Barratt Brown

Questions of ownership have long concerned socialists. The Swedish Left Party, which receives some 10 per cent of the popular vote in their country, put the question of Power and Ownership at the centre of its contribution to the European Social Forum in Florence.

This pamphlet looks at forms of public ownership - national state, regional and local government and non-governmental, workers' and consumers co-operatives - to show how democratic control could be enhanced and inequalities reduced.


Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6741
3rd Series Number 5


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>New Labour's US-Style Executive Mayors</span>New Labour's US-Style Executive Mayors
The Private Contractors Panecea
By Peter Latham

US-style executive mayors with cabinets - the optimum internal management arrangement for privatised local state services - are central to New Labour's local governance project.

Price: £2.00

48 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6765
3rd Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Railtracks in the Sky</span>Railtracks in the Sky
'New' Labour, Air Traffic Deregulation and the Competitive Market
Peter Reed

As one of the original Labour modernisers, Peter Reed concludes that 'New' Labour's policies are unrealistic, unworkable and based on no more than ancient dogmas. He shows that alternative policies are perfectly feasible. An international managed regime for air transport could be made to work, starting at European Union level.

Railtracks in the Sky aims to stimulate constructive debate on these themes. Agree with it or not, this is a highly informative, thought provoking and politically constructive book.

Read review a by: Stephen Gruneberg

Price: £9.99

132 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6710
3rd Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Physician, Heal Thyself</span>Physician, Heal Thyself
The NHS Needs a Voice of its Own
By Duncan Smith

How to 'modernise' or reform the National Health Service? This pamphlet suggests that instead of imposing on the Service new ideas from the top down, what is needed is a means by which the wisdom and dedication of the staff, which is displayed in the wards and the surgeries, should be used to carry out the necessary changes.

Price: £2.00

40 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6673
3rd Series Number 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Opening and Innovation</span>Opening and Innovation
Changing Ourselves to Transform Society
Partito Rifondazione Comunista

This pamphlet affords a unique insight into the thinking of the Refounded Communists in Italy. It is an important resource for all those who are struggling to transform political structures, to confront the disaster of the Third Way, and the globalisation of capitalism.


Price: £2.00

16 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6680
3rd Series | Number 1


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Socialist Renewal 2nd Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Third Way or Feeding the Fat Cats</span>Third Way or Feeding the Fat Cats
By Michael Barratt Brown

In this pamphlet Michael Barratt Brown critically examines Prof. Anthony Giddens's Fabian Pamphlet 'Where Now for New Labour?' Giddens's stated aim is to defend New Labour, and the Third Way, against its critics, with a wholesale onslaught on 'old Labour'. Barratt Brown looks in detail at what Giddens means by 'old Labour', and exposes these 'myths of the left'. He then assesses New Labour's embrace of the private sector in providing public services and the role of business in government. "In regard to the major aim of reducing inequalities in Britain, Giddens is entirely complacent about New Labour ... " writes Barratt Brown, who cites the relevant statistics on widening income gaps between rich and poor.

Price: £2.00

16 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6642
2nd Series Number 10


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Flame, Not the Ashes</span>The Flame, Not the Ashes
By Lionel Jospin

"To be faithful to a tradition means to be faithful to its flame and not its ashes." Jean Jaurès

This is the text of a speech given by the French Prime Minister, Lionel Jospin, on European Union Reform on 28th May 2001. He talks of the 'European art de vivre, a specific way of doing things, of defending freedoms, of fighting inequality...' In this speech he provides us with some clear policy prescriptions; for a European response to globalisation, for worker's rights, and for defending public services against privatisiation.


Price: £2.00

20 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6611
2nd Series Number 9


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Straw Wars</span>Straw Wars
Full Spectrum Sychophancy
Jack Straw's Briefing with a response by Ken Coates

Straw Wars includes the verbatim texts of the statements by the Foreign Secretary, with point-by-point rebuttals. It also includes the full text of the United States Space Command's Vision for 2020. This deadly serious document speaks very candidly about what is behind the impending repudiation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, and the wholesale violation of the Outer Space Treaty. The salient points of these Treaties are also reproduced.

Price: £3.00

56 pages | ISBN: 978 081524 6598
2nd Series Number 8


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Public Services or Private Profit?</span>Public Services or Private Profit?
By Dexter Whitfield

New Labour's objectives for public services and the welfare state are cloaked in the rhetoric of the Third Way. Some of the objectives are hidden behind public statements proclaiming 'what matters is what works', and agreeable but vague statements about 'modernisation' and 'renewal'. Dexter Whitfield analyses how the Blair Project promotes private finance and the marketisation of public services, and exposes how the Third Way masks its continuance of Thatcherism.


Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6536
2nd Series Number 7


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Captive Local State</span>The Captive Local State
Local Democracy Under Siege
By Peter Latham

Peter Latham, Secretary of the Labour Campaign for Open Local Government, analyses the relationship between class, power, and the local state.



Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6512
2nd Series Number 6


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Safety First?: Did the Health and Safety</span>Safety First?: Did the Health and Safety
Commission do its Job?
Christopher Gifford

This pamphlet is about how opportunities to protect people from abuse were taken or missed in the 25 year history of the Health & Safety Commission.

Christopher Gifford, a retired HM Inspector of Mines and Quarries, and consultant engineer, examines some of the successes and failures of the last 25 years of health and safety regulation.


Price: £2.00

32 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6529
2nd Series Number 5


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Third Way ... To Where?</span>Third Way ... To Where?
By Michael Barratt Brown

When the third way was invented, not the least of its attractions to its promoters was that if offered a convenient bridge to enable President Clinton to take a position on the same platform as European Socialist Prime Ministers, without undergoing an inconvenient 'conversion' to some form of social democracy. The Third Way was a perfect foil for such an impostor. It afforded a media-friendly cover for the extension of neo-liberal politics of deregulation, the untrammelling of market forces, privatisation and the roll-back of welfare.

'The ideas associated with the Third Way are still the wave of the future for progressive politics' says Tony Blair. Ken Coates and Michael Barratt Brown examine what this 'wave of the future' has brought us, and where it may yet wash us up.

Price: £2.00

20 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6505
2nd Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Towards a More Equal Society</span>Towards a More Equal Society
By David Donnison

After years under a Tory regime which did its best to banish poverty from public discussion, and treated unemployment as a 'price well worth paying', poverty and full employment are back on the political agenda.

Donnison examines why some countries moved to the right in the 1980's and 90's. During this time class conflict did not go away, but merely changed its character. The author shows how this conflict affected its losers, caught in the rising tide of poverty. He then looks at the action required to combat this inequality in the coming century.

Price: £2.00

22 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6468
2nd Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Captive Party</span>The Captive Party
How Labour was taken over by Capital
Michael Barratt Brown

The Mandelson resignation revealed some of the close personal connections of the man himself and other Ministers with wealthy businessmen and women. In this little book Michael Barratt Brown reveals, with much detailed evidence, that this is but a tip of the iceberg. Beneath the surface there is a massive bonding between New Labour and Big Business, British and American.

Price: £5.00

70 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6451
2nd Series Number 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Welfare Reform</span>Welfare Reform
Means-tested versus Universal Benefits
By John Grieve Smith

John Grieve Smith is a Fellow of Robinson College, Cambridge

Despite the wide ranging series of changes in social security that the Government have introduced, the area of so-called 'Welfare Reform' is one in which New Labour polices are to a large extent still dominated by the Thatcherite consensus.

Price: £2.00

24 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6437
2nd Series Number 1


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Socialist Renewal 1st Series

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Crisis East and West</span>Crisis East and West
Must it be Global Barbarism?
By Peter Gowan

Price: £2.00

20 pages | ISBN: 978 085124 6093
1st Series Number 12


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Where Blair is Wrong</span>Where Blair is Wrong
By Michael Barratt Brown

Price: £2.00

20 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 6086
1st Series Number 11


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Feminism after Post-feminism</span>Feminism after Post-feminism
By Liz Davies

Price: £2.00

40 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 6031
1st Series Number 10


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Europe and NATO Expansion</span>Europe and NATO Expansion
By Frank Blackaby

Price: £2.00

12 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5997
1st Series Number 9


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>New Labour as Past History</span>New Labour as Past History
By Royden J. Harrison

Price: £2.00

28 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5966
1st Series Number 8


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Rights of the Unemployed</span>The Rights of the Unemployed
A Socialist Approach
By Anne Grey

Price: £2.00

40 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5959
1st Series Number 7


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>May Day</span>May Day
by European Labour Forum

The streets were ablaze with colour as banners were raised on high, swaying above the heads of the marchers, the tramp and shuffle of feet, animated chatter and the rasp of brass bands filled the air. It seemed that the whole of organised labour in London was on the move, countless thousands treading the cobbles beneath the rain-threatening spring sky.

Price: £2.00

32 pages | Pamphlet
ISBN: 978 0 85124 5935
Socialist Renewal 1:6


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Yugoslav Tragedy</span>The Yugoslav Tragedy
Lessons for Socialists
By Michael Barratt Brown

Price: £6.99

82 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5881
1st Series Number 5


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Democracy versus Capitalism</span>Democracy versus Capitalism
A response to Will Hutton with some old questions for New Labour
By Michael Barratt Brown with Hugo Radice

Price: £4.99

48 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5874
1st Series Number 4


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>New Labour's Aims and Values</span>New Labour's Aims and Values
A Study in Ambiguity
By Ken Coates

Price: £2.00

16 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5850
1st Series Number 3


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>New Directions for Pensions</span>New Directions for Pensions
How to Revitalise National Insurance
By Peter Townsend and Alan Walker

Price: £4.00

48 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5867
1st Series Number 2


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<span style='font-size: 14px;'>Is Socialism Inseparable from Common Ownership?</span>Is Socialism Inseparable from Common Ownership?
By G. A. Cohen

Price: £2.00

8 pages | ISBN: 978 0 85124 5843
1st Series Number 1


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Socialist Renewal

<span style='font-size: 14px;'>The Social Costs of Business Enterprise</span>The Social Costs of Business Enterprise
By K W Kapp
Edited by Michael Barratt Brown

Social Costs is an environmental classic. The main purpose of this book is to present a detailed study of how private enterprise, under conditions of unregulated competition, tends to impose social costs which are not accounted for in entrepreneurial outlays. Instead these costs are shifted to and borne by third persons and the community as a whole. Thus, this book deals at the same time with a specific technical economic question and with broad issues of social philosophy and economic knowledge.

Further information on K. William Kapp.

Price: £25.00

348 pages | Paperback
ISBN: 978 0 85124 637 6


Quantity:  

Spokesman Books | Socialist Renewal