miners.
The importance of the international solidarity work lies more in the internationalism it brought to life among millions of trade unionists and socialists across the world - a practical experience that can be used again.
Jonathan Saunders argues that this intemationalism could have been developed much further if it was not for the NUM leadership restricting the fight to defend NUM jobs. His argument is that if NUM's fight had been against all job losses - in British industries as well as abroad -then it would have been more likely to get real practical solidarity work from other workers: such as respecting picket lines and sympathy strikes. And he goes a step further: it was the sectoral struggle of the NUM that 'unfortunately led directly to the isolation and defeat of March 1985.
There is no doubt that the NUM strike would have been
MARCH AGAINST strengthened if other workers in Britain and abroad had taken industrial action against austerity policies and job losses.
But Jonathan's own description of the response from the foreign workers (and my own experience inside the Danish trade union movement) indicate that these workers gave unconditional support to the British miners because they understood that this was a major test of strength in the class struggle. I doubt very much if these foreign workers solidarity would have been qualitatively different if NUM's official demand had been against all job losses; it might make a difference for British workers. In neither case can one explain the defeat of March 1985 as a consequence of the strike defending only NUM jobs.
In the last chapter of the book Jonathan Saunders looks at the legacy of the miners' strike. Politically this is the weakest chapter of the book. He criticies Scargill for supporting the Labour Party: "The NUM was the first union to weigh in with a big contribution (£400,000) towards Labour's election expenses. Scargill, who made the announcement, was apparently willing to swallow much of Kinnock's 'new realism':
First of all it is ultra-left not to ask people to vote Labour (un-
Andrew Wiard/Report less you present a better altema- - INTERNATIONALE F tive). But secondly Saunders is wrong in sug gesting that PIT Scargill sup COSURES ports new realism. Scargill has made mis- takes, but he is still a class stug gle fighter. His election cam- paign for NUM's presidency was just one proof of that. Saunders gives credit to the various left or- ganisations that have been in- volved in the international solidarity work but in his last chapter makes sweeping generalisations about the British left without any nuances. His central thesis is that 'In- stead of trying to persuade miners to transcend the limits of activity being organised by the NUM leadership, they (i.e. the British Left) restricted themsel ves to attacking the Kinnockites and the Willises for failing to back the strike. ... In political terms their (i.e. the left's) inter vention was more or less ir- relevant. The problem with the miners' strike was not the NUM leader- ship restricting the activity of the rank and file members but the lack of industrial action from other British workers in support of the miners. That is why it was necessary to put pressure on the Kinnockites and the Willises to organise industrial support for the miners. A few hundred revolutionary miners could not have organised it. Despite these political weak- nesses, the book is worth read- ing by any militant trade unionist. It is also worth noting that Canary Press has published many other excellent books on the miners' strike. Paqe 29
American car workers queue for jobs Grabbing hold of the boss Roger and Me Film directed by Michael Moore. Review by Piers Mostyn. As a one and a half hour documentary on the impact of mass unemployment on a midWest American motor town, at first sight Roger and Me' would not be the average lefty's first choice for a Saturday night out at the movies. Hardly the escapism you're looking for to get away from rows at anti-Poll Tax meetings or the grind of the GMC.
Not so. That a such a film fills cinemas in London's West End and is being well received, speaks for itself.
It's good entertainment that manages to be political at the same time as very funny. Like Atomic Cafe, without the cartoons, it takes a chunk of the great American dream and satirises it ruthlessly by exposing the reality undemeath. Warts and all.
Director and main star Michael Moore goes back to his home town of Flint to find that 30,000 jobs are being shed by General Motors because cheaper labour is available elsewhere.
Moore juxtaposes the naive idealism of the town's golden age - when auto production by GM was everything the community stood for - to the rapid collapse of the myth. Archive footage of streets thronging with annual pageants and parades is set against miles of derelict houses and wrecked cars. In the midst of Page 30
REVIEWS all this Moore pursues GM Managing Director, 'Roger" Smith, asking him to come to Flint and meet the victims of his chase for profits.
Much of the film takes the form of a spoof on the Roger Cook brand of TV investigative journalism. But it also follows Flint's hapless inhabitants as they are evicted for non-payment of rent or try to make ends meet -often with absurd results.
That Moore makes such a depressing subject so funny is partly because he raises laughs at their expense. The redundant workers are presented very much as victims. The only portrayal of any resistance to this onslaught is some anger shown by GM workers when the closures are announced and by one in particular who castigates the union bureaucracy for its refusal to fight.
But Moore is also portraying the bizarre nature of provincial USA where there a low premium on trade unionism and a high premium on kitsch.
There are attempts to generate hope through a series of wacky official job-creation enterprises. The only one that makes any sense is the big new prison, built to cope with the surge in crime stemming, from the town's economic devastation.
As an attack on the ethos and policies of capitalism run riot, the film is a timely reminder - given events in Eastern Europe and the crisis of Thatcherism in this country - that it wasn't only Stalinism that was discredited in the 1980s.