Manifesto Press authors draw inspiration and insight from humanity’s struggle for a new life in a new world free of exploitation and oppression
A
Bill Alexander worked as an industrial chemist before volunteering to fight in Spain, where he served as Political Commissar of the Anti-Tank Battery and then as Commander of the British Battalion. During the Second World War he was a Captain in the Reconnaissance Corps. After the war, and for many years, he was a leading figure in the International Brigade Association, the predecessor of the International Brigades Memorial Trust. He was also a Trustee and Chair of the Marx Memorial Library. His George Owell and Spain is republished in Two pamphlets from the Spanish Civil War (Manifesto 2019)
international-brigades.org.uk | marx-memorial-library.org.uk
Robin Page Arnot was a founder member of the CPGB, author of innumerable publications including several histories of the British miners' union and of The Impact of the Russian Revolution on Britain (republished by Manifesto in 2017)
B
C
J R Campbell, 1894-1969, (known as Johnny) was a foundation member of the Communist Party and editor of the Daily Worker for several years. His Spain's 'Left' critics is republished in Two pamphlets from the Spanish Civil War (Manifesto 2019).
Bob Cooney (1907-1984) was a prominent anti-fascist and communist in Aberdeen who fought in the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War of 1936-39 and author of Proud Journey (Manifesto 2015).
international-brigades.org.uk
D
Mary Davis FRSA is visiting professor of Labour History at Royal Holloway University of London. Her books include Comrade or Brother? A History of the British Labour Movement 1789-1951 (1993), Sylvia Pankhurst: A Life in Radical Politics (1999), Fashioning a New World: A History of the Woodcraft Folk (2000) and Women and Class (Manifesto with the Communist Party 2020).
Ian Duckett was a teacher and head of an alternative education provision in London. He is currently a consultant and school improvement partner in Norwich, a member of National Executive Committee of Socialist Educational Association and an executive committee member of Norfolk NEU.
socialisteducationalassociation.org
E
John Ellison is a retired local government lawyer and author of Censorship overruled , an alternative history of 1918 (Manifesto 2021) and World War Two A Peoples’ War to be published in Spring 2023 by Manifesto).
F
Jenny Farrell is a lecturer, writer and an associate editor of Culture Matters. culturematters.org.uk
John Foster is Emeritus Professor of Social Sciences, University of Paisley/UWS. His main relevant publications include: Class Struggle and Industrial Revolution (Weidenfeld, 1974) and, with Charles Woolfson, Class Alliances and the Right to Work: The Politics of the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders Work-in (L&W, 1986); Track Record: The Caterpillar Occupation (Verso 1988); and Capital and Labour in Britain’s Offshore Oil Industry (Mansell 1997) and The Councils of Action 1920 and the British Labour Movement’s Defence of Soviet Russia (Manifesto 2017)
G
C Desmond Greaves was editor of the Irish Democrat and author of The Life and Times of James Connolly (Manifesto 2018) and a many other books on Irish national liberation.
connollybooks.org | irishdemocrat.co.uk
H
David Horsley has taught in Lambeth, South London and Ewarton, Jamaica and is a veteran activist in the anti racist and anti imperialist movement. He is author of Billy Strachan - Caribbean Man. Caribbean Labour solidarity
cls-uk.org.uk
I
J
K
Phil Katz is a printer and designer, writer and lifelong activist in the labour movement. He has worked as a union organiser and union communicator and extensively in magazine, newspaper and web design . Phil has worked on projects in Australia, Ireland and South Africa and for the British, Commonwealth and European TUC’s. He gained his MSc at Birkbeck University of London in Industrial Economics and went on to further qualify in Computer Aided Design at the world-renowned Central Saint Martins School of Art. This is his fourth book. He is a proud father of four and passionate supporter of Tottenham Hotspur.
Previous books include:
The Long Weekend - combating unemployment in the inter war years - Hetherington Press
Thinking Hands - the theory of Labour in William Morris - Hetherington Press
The People, Organised - unions on the home front in WW2 - TGWU publications
Freedom From Tyranny - against fascism and historical revisionism - Manifesto Press
Co-authored ‘Unity is Strength’ The official 125th Anniversary of the Greater London Association of Trades Councils and ’Sovereignty for What?’ why getting out of EMU is just the start. (Tribune Publications)
“Yours for the revolution” - the evolution of Tom Mann’s political thought, by Phil Katz
Tom Mann remains Britain’s most accomplished trade unionist but each generation struggles to rediscover him. Mann is one of a small handful of characters in working class history who can rightly be called a ‘Pioneer’. With the current union upsurge his time has come again. No character in labour movement history is more relevant to day’s struggle. Mann’s theory of socialism and class organisation was literally forged in the fiercest and most decisive union struggles extending over a sixty year period - here in Britain and across the globe. This book charts the evolution of his political thought as it passed from religion to Marxism. Yet, little is known of his activity in the last two decades of his life, when he had his greatest impact and most enduring influence. This was recognised throughout continental Europe, China, Australia, the USA, South Africa and the Soviet Union.
“Yours for the revolution” will intrigue the reader and inspire. It covers Mann’s major strikes, organisations, his many friends and comrades and the evolution of his political thought. It makes for vital reading for those asking where next for union struggle and seeking a path to socialism today.
Acquaintances, close friends and allies (who appear in the book) include James Connolly, Mary McArthur, Keir Hardie, Annie Besant, Lenin, Trosky, William Morris, Harry Pollitt, Sen Katayama, Big Bill Haywood, Solomon Lozovsky, President Mikhail Kalinin, Gustav Herve, Ben Tillet, William Z Foster, George Hardy and Willie Gallacher.
John Kotz was a London bus driver, life long anti fascist, Labour leader of Hackney Council and chair of the Britain GDR Society. Vintage Red (Manifesto 2011) is his autobiography
L
Gawain Little is a primary school teacher, a member of the NEU national executive committee, editor of Education for Tomorrow and the editor of Global Education Reform. With Malcolm Richards, Aretha Green and Phil Yeeles he edited Beyond the Blockade, Education in Cuba (Manifesto 2021)
socialisteducationalassociation.org | educationfortomorrow.org.uk
M
Kevin Marsh is a local government officer and activist in the COHSE and UNISON trade and the author (with Rob Griffiths of Granite and Honey, the story of Phil Piratin, communist MP.
Mercia McDermott is a leading authority on Bulgarian history, politics and culture, teaching there for sixteen years, both at the English Language High School in Sofia and at Sofia University, where she lectured on the Bulgarian revolutionary movement against Ottoman rule in Macedonia and Aegean Thrace.
She is author of Lone Red Poppy A biography of Dimiter Blagoev, founder of the first marxist circle in Russia and of the Bulgarian Communist Party (Manifesto 2014) and Once Upon a time in Bulgaria (Manifesto 2016)
From 1958 to 1973, she chaired the Society of Friendship with Bulgaria (now the British Bulgarian Society).
bulgariatours.co.uk
Andrew Murray is a former chair of the Stop the War Coalition and former Chief of Staff at Unite the Union and advisor to Jeremy Corbyn. He is the is the author of several books and numerous pamphlets, including The Communist Party of Great Britain: A Historical Analysis to 1941 (1995),[Flashpoint World War III (1997), Off the Rails (2001), A New Labour Nightmare: Return of the Awkward Squad (2003), Stop the War: The Story of Britain's Biggest Mass Movement (with Lindsey German, 2005), The Imperial controversy Challenging the empire apologists (2009) and The T&G Story (2008),The Fall and Rise of the British Left and Is socialism possible in Britain (2022).
N
O
P
Q
R
Louise Regan was national president of the NUT/NEU. She is currently national officer for membership and equality. She is also joint editor of the SEA bulletin Education Politics. She is a primary teacher.
socialisteducationalassociation.org
C Ritchie is the author of Marx, work and the 21st century (Manifesto 2022) Dr. Ritchie has written two books and many articles and papers on comedy, and is the founding editor of Comedy Studies Journal. (Routledge). He runs AVzounds spoken word/music label, mixing ‘radical speech with lo-life beats.’
Soundcloud | tandfonline.com/loi/rcos20
S
Tom Sibley was for many years head of the MSF (now part of Unite) Research Department. He went on to become London representative of the World Federation of Trade Unions and then to be the secretary of the International Centre for Trade Union Rights. After retirement he was awarded a Ph.D for his dissertation Cold War and Anti-communism and its impact on the trade union movement which in reparation for publciation by Manifesto. He edited Two pamphlets from the Spanish Civil War (Manifesto 2019).
The late Graham Stevenson was a senior official of the Transport and General Workers Union and its successor, Unite the Union, covering the transport industries at a national and international level. He wass a former president of the European Transport Workers Federation. He is the author of Defence or defiance: Derbyshire and the fight for democracy (Manifesto 2014)
facebook.com/DerbyTUC/ | grahamstevenson.me.uk
T
U
V
Andy Vine is a designer.
avine.co.uk
W
Claire Weiss is part biographer and part editor of the authobiography of her mother Rita Weiss. Born to campaign (Manifesto 2021)
X
Y