Part four of The ILP: Past & Present featuring the ILP in the 1930s, its role in the Spanish Civil War, and its attitude to the Second World War. It also covers the post-war decline of the ILP as a political force before its re-constitution as Independent Labour Publications in 1975.

This is the latest extract from a 1993 pamphlet written by BARRY WINTER which we are planning to re-write. We are putting the text online in six stages, supplemented by a series of ‘side stories’, and invite you to comment on the contents.

On Saturday 16 July, the 75th anniversary of the first involvement of anti-fascist volunteers from north west England in the Spanish Civil War was commemorated at Manchester Town Hall. CHRIS HALL was there.
Over 100 people, including many young Spaniards, were present to hear about the contribution of the north west in the fight against fascism [...]

The 75th anniversary of the Spanish Civil war will be commemorated at Manchester Town Hall on Saturday 16 July with a celebration of the contribution made by volunteers from the north west of England.
Organised by the International Brigade Memorial Trust, the event will mark the role of the north west volunteers in the Sculpture Hall [...]

JAMES BRYAN asks why it took so long for the Socialist International to expel Mubarak’s party.
When faced with adversity we often find out who our real friends are. Despite being deserted by his own people, Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak can for now put his trust in the police and the top-tier of the military. In [...]

Roma Marquez Santo, the POUM veteran who unveiled a plaque to the ILP’s Spanish Civil War volunteers in Salford in May 2009, died in Barcelona on Wednesday 29 December 2010. CHRIS HALL recalls his life and the events that shaped it.

Roma Marquez Santo born in Barcelona on 6 November 1916 into a political [...]

Roma Marquez Santo, the POUM veteran who unveiled a plaque to the ILP’s Spanish Civil War volunteers in Salford in May 2009, died in Barcelona on Wednesday 29 December.
HARRY OWEN pays tribute to the man who fought fascism in Spain in the 1930s yet could still hold audiences charmed and spellbound with tales of his experiences [...]

Three months in Spain
The British Battalion at Madrigueras and Jarama
Saturday 7 August, 2pm
People’s History Museum
Left Bank
Spinningfields
Manchester M3 3ER

FREE ENTRY
Historian Dr. Richard Baxell lectures on the day-to-day experiences of the British and Irish volunteers in The Spanish Civil War, during the early part of 1937.
The lecture will include audio and video clips from some of the [...]

Iraq could work if the steady success of its Kurdistan Region is supported and spreads throughout the country. GARY KENT reports from a fact-finding mission
The Kurdistan region of Iraq enjoyed a head start over the rest of the country. Its 1991 uprising ousted Saddam’s genocidal forces which had murdered nearly 200,000 Kurds at Halabja and [...]

Across the continent, the left’s response to the recent economic crisis has been poor, verging on non-existent, just when the situation demanded a credible alternative to the dominant political and economic orthodoxy.
That’s the starting point for a Europe-wide online debate on the future of social democracy hosted by the Soundings and Social Europe websites.
“European social [...]

Will Brown looks at the foreign policy agenda facing the Obama administration.
The vitriolic healthcare debate in the US and ongoing economic problems may dominate President Obama’s current agenda but the first nine months of this administration have also put into sharp focus an exceptionally difficult range of US foreign policy problems.
The inauguration of Barack Obama [...]