A Rebel’s Guide to Eleanor Marx, by Siobhan Brown
Reviewed by Gowan James Ditchburn
“Eleanor Marx saw an alternative: a class that organised across borders, just as the rich do. She was a champion of the oppressed who linked the everyday struggles to a big vision. Our task remains the same.” These are the concluding lines of Siobhan Brown’s short book on Eleanor Marx, and for those of us that fight for a better world they hold true, our task remains the same.
Brown makes it clear that the focus of this book is not the personal life of Eleanor Marx, the focus of so many biographies which overlook the importance of her legacy. This book shines a spotlight on Eleanor’s work at the centre of a powerful trade union movement and her struggle for the rights of the oppressed. This it does amazingly well. Despite the fact the book is only 55 pages long and can fit in your pocket, Brown is able to examine the political context as well as the actions of Eleanor herself. This all important context is key to understanding the contributions of Eleanor Marx to the various struggles examined in the book and for understanding her legacy. [Read more…]
“A dramatic upsurge in working class struggle, surpassing in magnitude the rise of the Red Feds from 1908 to 1913 and the 1951 Waterfront Lockout, took place in New Zealand from the Arbitration Court’s nil general wage order in June 1968 to the union movement’s defeat of the Muldoon Government’s attempted wage freeze in 1976.
This year marks the centenary of the 1912 Waihi miners’ strike, one of the most important – and violently contested – strikes in New Zealand history. Frederick Evans was matyred; political ideas and organisational questions clarified; and the role and force of the state made clear. The strike 
