A-Infos (en) Report on Bradford MayDay '98

[Andrew Flood <andrewflood@geocities.com>]

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Report on Bradford MayDay '98
written for A-Infos by Andrew Flood
5/May/98

The May Day weekend saw hundreds of anarchists from
all over Britain (and beyond) travel to the small town
of Bradford in Yorkshire, Northern England.  A local
anarchist social centre, the 1in12 Club had organised
(for the second year running) a weekend of activities
under the title of 'Reclaim Mayday'.

Alongside and as part of the weekends events a
conference 'MayDay '98' had been called by a number of
groups and individuals including those members of
Class War who had decided to wind up the organisation.
They had published a final issue of Class War
explaining why they took this decision which may be
found at
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/last_cw.html

Events organised by the 1in12 Club included a May Day
march and rally in the centre of Bradford which
included live music.  A play about the life of Durruti
ran throughout the weekend as did a number of punk and
folk gigs at the club itself  On the Saturday night
'Fundamental' played a major gig at the nearby
college, also as part of the weekend.  The 1in12 Club
which is located in a four story mill in Bradford City
Centre was packed day and night.

Apart from the social events political meeting were
happening in the evening and the MayDay98 conference
during the day.  Some 250 people paid registration
into the conference and spent the morning and
afternoons discussing the future of the revolutionary
movement in groups of twenty or so.  The aim of these
discussions was not to debate out position papers and
reach conclusions but rather to provide a space for
people to exchange opinions and experiences.

The final afternoon of the conference saw a report
back from each of these groups.  From this it became
apparent that these sessions had been very successful,
more so then many had anticipated and almost every
groups said a similar event should be organised in the
near future.  It was felt that although the
differences remained that had existed before the
conference the format of the meetings had broken down
many barriers and allowed an honest and sincere
exchange between groups and people that previously had
problems talking to each other.

Immediately after this session there were some 10
focus groups where people who wanted to organise
practical future activity went to.  I however had to
return home before hearing of the outcome of any of
these.

Form a personal point of view it was clear that the
conference had given a number of quite demoralised
older activists a considerable uplift.  The British
anarchist movement despite the fact that there are
many very committed, and experienced activists with
good community and work place contacts is very un-
organised and prone to sectarianism.  There is little
doubt that the conference will have helped to tackle
the psychology of this sectarianism.  Those groups who
choose to boycott it lost a great opportunity to learn
how to relate to people with whom they disagree on
relativly minor issues.

However it still leaves out-standing the central
question of anarchist organisation.  This is not a
failing of the event as it was never designed to
answer this question (and indeed emphasised in advance
this was not what it was about).  Nevertheless it
needs to be said that it is the responsibility of
those who attended to initiate organisation(s) that
are capable of arguing for anarchism and helping the
wider class to organise in a libertarian fashion.
This perhaps is the next step

see
http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/inter/mayday98.html
for the call to the conference.

---
About the author: I am an anarchist from Ireland who
travelled to Bradford for the weekend.  I'm fairly
familiar with the British anarchist movement from
attending conferences and events there over the last
decade.  I also attended the first and second
intercontinental encounters in Chiapas and Spain.
Although I am a member of the Workers Solidarity
Movement this is purely a personal account of the
weekend.

--
----************************************-----
About me: http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/andrew.html

Anarchism-> http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/inter.html
Irish struggles -> http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/revolt.html
Publications -> http://flag.blackened.net/revolt/wsmpub.html



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