One Year Ago

One year ago, I stopped being a full-time activist.

One year ago, exhaustion and anxiety reached saturation point. I couldn't sleep and I couldn't get out of bed.

There were several events which occured in the weeks leading up to this which I've written about here and here, but they weren't the final straw.

The EduFactory conference took place over a long weekend, and I spent my time at the conference involved in a variety of workshops almost exclusively attended by the usual suspects of the Sydney student left. The Alliance didn't have much impact on the discussion which formed a network of student activists, where our criticisms were certainly in the minority. In the end, I realised I'd felt exhausted from day one, underprepared and like we were going through the motions.

Over the course of the last year (and a bit), I've taken time to think about what I need to do to take care of myself mentally and physically, and assess what I want to do with my life.

So, what have I been doing?

I've been writing again, in fits and starts. It still feels like the most useful thing I can do with myself, but it's harder to make space than it was when I was studying it, so I'm working on ways to improve that.

I've been selling Green Left every other week, and occasionally writing an article - there's one which haven't made it up here yet, look forward to that soon.

I've been playing a lot of Eve Online. And other games like Minecraft and Borderlands. But mostly Eve. It's addictive, yo...

I've been enjoying some good football and some great memories. 

I've been listening to a lot of podcasts for the first time since 2006. Politically - Democracy Now, ABC Big Ideas TV, Jadaliyya's Jad for Reel. Otherwise - Soccer Stoppage Time, High Drag Eve Online, Welcome to Nightvale.

And I've been preparing to go travelling again, this time with my partner. More on this as it develops.

Alliance Voices: Thinking About Party Leadership and Functioning in the Socialist Alliance

Alliance Voices: Thinking About Party Leadership and Functioning in the Socialist Alliance


*disclaimer: despite taking leave from organising midway
through last year, I'm still an (inactive) member of the Socialist
Alliance. As always, my opinions on this blog are wholly my own.*

This is a very useful and timely discussion of how a socialist organisation should actually organise, how we address some common problems, etc. However, I think some more elaboration is needed in a few particular areas; in general, some more "derivation from first principles", such as why team leadership building is so important, from where stances on rotating full time organisers, ensuring branch democracy and taking into account different capacity to organise or be involved, etc.



I also think we need to take into account democratic culture a lot more - how it is established and maintained. Rather than a brief note on why establishing cliques along social lines is bad, perhaps it would be better to reflect on what steps need to be taken to ensuring a functioning, healthy democracy in the party, nationally and in branches and local leaderships. This is the best way to combat cliques, in my opinion and experience.



Additionally, I think we need to adopt policy or procedures around bullying to match those on homophobia, sexism, racism, etc. We fight in our workplaces, schools, etc to ensure bullying behaviour is eradicated, yet I have seen no desire to prevent it in the party.

Stand with the Bolivarian revolution

Right now is a critical time in Venezuela. More disinformation is being spread by the opposition and the reactionaries supporting them around the world than anytime before. Social media's opportunities to democratise are being utilised to stifle the revolutionary process which began with the 1989 Caracazo uprising and came to fruition with the 1998 election of leftist president Hugo Chavez. Ever since the death of Chavez attempts to subvert this revolutionary process by the US and the Venezuelan oligarchs have been stepped up; first with the Capriles election campaign last year, and then, when that failed, with the kind of bald-faced crisis manufacturing that has not been seen since the 2002 coup attempt.

Now critical analysis of the reasons why we shouldn't support the reactionary protesters fighting the government is dearly needed - and we all need to step up efforts to counter misinformation being spread by social media. Some great resources:

• Green Left Weekly: Democracy and social justice at stake
• Counterpunch: Venezuela Beyond the Protests
• Venezuela Analysis: News From Venezuela - But Where Is It Coming From? & Constructing "Venezuela" Protests: A Photo Gallery
• Democracy Now: Another Attempt by U.S.-Backed Right-Wing Groups to Oust Elected Government?

Viva Venezuela, Viva Socialismo. 

At Marxism 2013

Watch "Peter Boyle: Long live left unity" on YouTube

So i'm here at Marxism 2013. Sofar the conference is pumping; it's perhaps the largest left conference I've been to (although I did miss the last World at a Crossroads conference, which took place while I was in the middle east. #excitement is the word.

This session i'm in now, the Australian political situation today, has been sofar the best for me. It's packed out the room. Why? It's one of the only sessions raising the question of, not only why we need to fight, but how it is to be done in the concrete here and now.

What are our differences on this question, how do we organise to beat this system? We're not yet having out this question formally, so this session is being framed in the most immediate ways - so the process of hashing out such differences needs to expand from here. But from my experience here and the positive exchanges, it sofar seems there is the good will to do so.

Socialist Alliance 9th Conference

Further end-of-month catch up. Views are my own, etc.

The Socialist Alliance recently held its 9th national conference in Geelong Trades Hall. Geelong is one of the smaller towns and cities where the Alliance has been able to build a branch and other major left forces active today have not, like my home town of Wollongong; this was my first time in Geelong, and I was impressed by the ability of the comrades there to pull of organising such a major and successful decision-making conference. I stayed in Melbourne for most of the month, including the conference, helping with local promo, participating in politics, and organising the Resistance Camp.

Over the [second] two days, delegates discussed international and domestic politics and campaigns, Socialist Alliance's plans for this year's federal election, reflected on the achievements and challenges in building the Socialist Alliance today and the prospects for greater unity of the left in Australia.

Taking place in the context of discussions about prospects for greater unity of the left, the conference adopted proposals to strengthen the Alliance's work in building local and national campaigns and movements, including the labour, environmental and women's movements, and the importance of convincing youth and students of the need to organise for fundamental social change.

Delegates reaffirmed the need to strengthen the Alliance and to seek greater unity in action, while defending the democratic rights of affiliates and tendencies of thought within the party. The conference reaffirmed the decision to participate in the upcoming Marxism conference, and to taking further steps in exploring prospects for unity.

http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/53160

I participated in the pre-conference discussion with a piece about democracy, transitional demands and a mass action perspective for today, based on this earlier post. Many of the issues debated in PCD were discussed at the conference, particularly around the proposed constitutional amendments of Liam Flenady, Ben Peterson and Emma Bacon, which were partially amended on the conference floor and combined with those of Pip Hinman.

Delegates voting in a session at the Socialist Alliance national conference. (Photo: Alex Bainbridge).

I found one of the most interesting aspects of the conference discussing left unity and organising today. Hashim bin Rashid gave a very interesting talk on the process of three Pakistani left parties merging into the Awami workers party, driven by the youth of the three parties who joined after the wave of struggle around lawyers stuff. Hashim got right into the thick of things in Melbourne too - he even wrote an article for Green Left on a local protest commemoration!

Advancing on our own left unity front, the Communist Party of Australia (a former split from the old CP) and Socialist Alternative both participated in the conference with official delegations. I found the input of the Alternative comrades, while held up within the present framework and the tensions that go with it, a good step for building trust. Although a formal uniting of those organisations sends a long way off, i'm confident we can work together in a more constructive way to build a stronger alternative to the pro-capitalist parties this year.

A delegation from the national leadership of the Socialist Alternative and a representative of the Communist Party of Australia also attended the conference, and Mick Armstrong (Socialist Alternative) and Andrew Irving (CPA) both gave presentations on Australian politics today.

In particular, I was enthused by informal discussions about the party, movements and mass action between our activists, in which some comrades raised Camejo and a perspective on mass action which I found, at least on the surface level, to be basically the same as mine. In my PCD piece I raised that this is a point we need to brush up on, since it seems to me the most significant real difference in perspective on how we should organise today amongst the Australian left. Hopefully I am wrong.

What is Ecosocialism?

In Australia's current context of yet another wave of natural disasters, both fire and flood, i'm inspired to refresh myself on the ecosocialist alternative to our climate crisis.

The reigning capitalist system is bringing the planet’s inhabitants a long list of irreparable calamities. Witness: exponential growth of air pollution in big cities and across rural landscapes; fouled drinking water; global warming, with the incipient melting of the polar ice caps and the increase of “natural” extreme weather-related catastrophes; the deterioration of the ozone layer; the increasing destruction of tropical rain forests; the rapid decrease of biodiversity through the extinction of thousands of species; the exhausting of the soil; desertification; the unmanageable accumulation of waste, especially nuclear; the multiplication of nuclear accidents along with the threat of a new—and perhaps more destructive—Chernobyl; food contamination, genetic engineering, “mad cow,” and hormone-injected beef. All the warning signs are red: it is clear that the insatiable quest for profits, the producti- vist and mercantile logic of capitalist/industrial civilization is leading us into an ecological disaster of incalculable proportions. This is not to give in to “catastroph- ism” but to verify that the dynamic of infinite “growth” brought about by capitalist expansion is threatening the natural foundations of human life on the planet.

How should we react to this danger? Socialism and ecology—or at least some of its currents—share objective goals that imply a questioning of this economic automatism, of the reign of quantification, of production as a goal in itself, of the dictatorship of money, of the reduction of the social universe to the calculations of profitability and the needs of capital accumulation. Both socialism and ecology appeal to qualitative values—for the socialists, use-value, the satisfaction of needs, social equality; for the ecologists, protecting nature and ecological balance. Both conceive of the economy as “embedded” in the environment—a social environment or a natural environment.
What then is ecosocialism? It is a current of ecological thought and action that appropriates the fundamental gains of Marxism while shaking off its productivist dross. For ecosocialists, the market’s profit logic, and the logic of bureaucratic authoritarianism within the late departed “actually existing socialism,” are incompatible with the need to safeguard the natural environment. While criticizing the ideology of the dominant sectors of the labor movement, ecosocialists know that the workers and their organizations are an indispensable force for any radical transformation of the system as well as the establishment of a new socialist and ecological society.

www.havenscenter.org/files/Ecosocialism.CNS.final.version.pdf

There is an example of exactly the kind of alternative we need developing already in Australia, an initiative to bring together the demands of labour and ecology:

As employers and governments begin to close the coal industry down, then it is a real issue to where the new jobs will come from. What Earthworker has always argued is that new jobs need to be in manufacturing. Employers and governments are saying that they can’t manufacture any longer in Australia and make a profit, so we are saying that by using a cooperative model we can in fact manufacture in this country.
We actually have a social weight as workers, well beyond the weight that we use to fight the boss for wages, conditions and safety. We actually have a social weight to direct the economy.
\When we looked at the issue of climate, we knew that climate is an environmental crisis but its cause lies in the economy. An economy that is not based on the vested interest of the vast majority but based on the interests of a minority. We’re seeing the narrow interests of investors in the corporations put ahead of the rights of citizens.
We have a massive vested interest in eliminating climate change but how do we do that when the economic levers are in the hands of a minority who are actually causing that climate emergency?
Earthworker is looking to establish the means to allow people to establish the alternative now, not off in the future.

http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/53162

Alliance Voices, Revolution and Transition

In light of recent developments (I'd argue both the the continuing crisis in Europe, the advancing revolutionary situation in the Middle East / North Africa (MENA) region, and the continued development on the Latin American alternative, which are all showing in practice the strengths and limitations of different approaches to the question of revolutionary leadership and unity, as well as the subjective ones of the Socialist Alternative's "turn to unity"), there has been some interesting discussion in the lead-up to the next national conference of the Socialist Alliance. I'm going to look at some particular contributions from Alliance Voices, and some related posts, as part of the process of working on some PCD of my own. There have been other good contributions so far - including this piece from three leaders of Resistance which is well worth reading - that I won't comment on just yet.

Nick Fredman, a member of the Alliance from Melbourne branch, has put forward an amendment to the Towards a Socialist Australia (TASA) document to tighten up some sections - particularly, incorporating an explicit call for "Revolution" in 'How will we get there?'. This is, in part, driven by the call put out by Socialist Alternative for unity amongst "Revolutionaries", counterposing it against unity with the "Reformists", whoever that might mean (during discussion at a recent event in Sydney Josh Lee from Socialist Alternative did say that this didn't mean the Alliance...) - which has triggered seemingly endless back and forth on social media.

Graham Matthews, from Sydney West branch, has responded with an argument that the use of the R word is implicit in the TASA document and our perspectives, isn't necessary, and puts up barriers in actually regrouping working class leadership:

"there is certainly no evidence that an important task facing the (revolutionary) socialist movement in Australia today, is convincing large numbers (or even relatively small numbers) of reformist socialists that socialism can only be won through extra parliamentary struggle and, ultimately, social revolution...

In this context in Australia then, where the level of the crisis is so acute, yet where the forces of working class resistance are so defuse and ideologically confused - why would the (relatively) few organised socialists, want to place an ideological and organisational barrier between themselves and those who are coming into political motion?

Peter Boyle, from Sydney central branch (and national co-convener of the Alliance), has weighed in on this debate and other proposals arguing that making our revolutionary politics explicit in material like TASA isn't a barrier, but it shouldn't be done just to defend the Alliance from accusations of "Reformism". He argues that we should explain revolution in a way which draws on Australia's history and the real context of today:

our guide is not just what we (or others in the left) understand, or want, but also where the consciousness of broader layers moving into struggle against the capitalist system is at... most people come to a stronger realisation of [the] need to organise systematic resistance to the violence of the minority only in the process of struggle.

Peter's piece references and draws on Peter Camejo, whose work I think needs to be included in this discussion, particularly Liberalism, Ultraleftism, Mass Action.

There's another that's come up in discussion - Trotsky's Transitional Program, and whether or not it should have any bearing on this discussion, which I wanted to weigh in on a little bit. Before that, I think it's initially worth noting the following quote from Doug Lorimer in the introduction to the Transitional Program published by Resistance Books:

Under certain circumstances, agitation around any of these different types of demands can serve to mobilise working people in mass anti-capitalist struggles. It is the mobilising potential of any of these types of demands at any particular conjuncture in the class struggle that is of primary interest to revolutionists. It is a basic fact of political life that people who are united with others in struggle are more open to radical ideas and new forms of action than those who are atomised and quiescent.

Omar Hassan from Socialist Alternative, who took up this point of transitional demands in a note on Facebook (apparently in reference to a comment made by an Alliance comrade at a recent event in Melbourne) argued that the Transitional Program is hugely problematic and the divide between our ultimate goal and the struggles of today "cannot be synthesised on paper, they must be embodied in the traditions of a revolutionary party." I find this rather problematic. He is certainly right to say "demands don’t create revolutionary crises, objective circumstances do" - but there is a whole world of advances the working class in Australia could be making short of capitalising on a revolutionary crisis to overthrow capitalist property relations. In the words of Trotsky, "transitional" demands lead to "one final conclusion: the conquest of power by the proletariat" - but there is a whole lot of struggles to be had between now and that final point which can also be considered "transitional", and it's crucial that we make some advances on that front now. Just because Trotsky misread the revolutionary potential of the impending crisis in 1930 doesn't invalidate the concept as a whole.

Many of the examples of transitional demands Trotsky counterpoises to the "minimum" demands of the Stalinists - indexation of wages to inflation, open the corporate books, no secret diplomacy - are struggles that have at specific times or in limited ways, since been won (or forced upon our rulers, in the case of WikiLeaks) - and although this hasn't been a "bridge" to worldwide socialism yet, at times times they have helped to galvanise various other struggles - WikiLeaks played key roles in the change in government in Kenya or the overthrow of Ben Ali in Tunisia, for example.

"We cannot do away with the schism between minimum and maximum program," states Omar - yet the value of the concept of transitional demands is in approaching the fight for minimum demands - ie reforms - in a strategic way which helps to develop the power of the working class and does actually connect our struggles for "minimum" demands today to our broader strategic vision. To strike at the "weakest point of capitalist hegemony" is a good aim, but to me it only seems of use if we're actually using that strike to develop momentum, win recognition, and actually begin to solve the question of leadership by drawing the broadest possible forces into radical struggle in order to further radicalise them.

This is to me an example of a transitional demand - one which may or may not be able to granted under capitalism, but which brings socialist revolution closer. That is our goal as revolutionaries, after all - for our struggles today to be hastening revolutionary overthrow of class society. And history has shown us that victories in certain key social movements has led to a wave of increased class struggle on a whole variety of fronts - from the success of civil rights & indigenous rights movements in the US and Australia helping to catalyse the upsurge of the 60s and 70s, to the overthrow of Ben Ali & Mubarak empowering already rampant trade union struggle, civil rights struggles by minorities, the women's movement or those of the shanty towns.

This isn't a shortcut to revolution; it's a perspective that putting our shoulder to the wheel in struggles today and making them as successful as possible, not only propagandising about the dictatorship of the proletariat from the sidelines, is the best method of convincing people of the need for a revolution and winning them to a revolutionary party.

Omar and I are both active campaigners for Palestine solidarity here in Australia; I think the demands of the BDS movement are a perfect example of transitional demands. The three pillars of the movement - an end to the apartheid wall, the right of return for refugees, and full civil rights for Palestinians inside Israel - are difficult to imagine ever being granted by the present existence of Israel in its current form as an apartheid state and imperialist attack dog for the region, as their implementation would critically undermine the possibility of maintaining that project with a facade of democracy. But this doesn't mean the struggle for those demands is a dead end reform we should stop fighting for - the inability of Israel to grant those reform helps to develop and broaden awareness of the nature of Zionism as a racist ideology underpinning imperialist dominance in the MENA region. And any cave-ins from the Israeli state on these points will curb the power of imperialism in the region, even if only fractionally.

The rallying cries of the Russian revolution - peace, land, bread - were certainly key transitional demands (nobody's maximum program), and those for real democracy, redistribution of wealth and dignity being raised in the MENA region today likewise fit the bill. Tad Tietze, in the discussion following Omar's post, argued that a demand like climate justice is a similar example of such a transitional demand to struggle for today; at one point this was the rallying cry for a movement of thousands, and although the last two years have seen a decline in such activism, I think every new climate disaster reflects the burning vitality of that demand.

How does this all relate to the above discussion about the goals and politics of the Alliance? Omar gives a throwaway comment that "it is also relevant because those seeking to justify the Alliance program seek to hide behind references to their alleged transitionality." This comment (seeming at odds with the above comments that the Alliance isn't reformist) does reflect a certain truth, but I feel it's being expressed as a pre-emptive hostility over a different tactical perspective for Australia today; a different approach to the question that's been raised - what role should the party play in making the revolution? And what does this mean for our activism today? I think this question is shaping the above Alliance Voices debates, as much as Alternative's call for unity.

The certain truth: I do agree with Peter and Nick that we should be including explicit statements that our ultimate goal is working class revolution in the Alliance constitution or our chief propaganda tool, the TASA document - but Graham is right that the key thing to be done today is win more to socialism, not convince other socialists of the correct path, and that requires we throw our energy into the struggles at the grassroots today, particularly aiming for the most transitional demands to strip the emperor's clothes from Rinehart, Palmer and the whole capitalist system and neoliberal offensive, if we want to educate and unite the class-conscious workers into a force which can take advantage of real revolutionaries opportunities.

But the important thing isn't uniting on our "maximum" program - for now, it should be left at the revolutionary overthrow of class society by the masses. In this low ebb of class struggle, it's far more important that we focus our attention on the immediate "minimum" & "transitional" kinds of tasks to regrow a pole of class struggle today. It's heartening to see the Socialist Alternative turn to unity and agree that we should unite on "a socialist program for Australia today"; but is that program to win more ones and twos to Marxism, or is it to build class struggle as a whole and win a whole generation of activists? As a Marxist in the Alliance, my perspective is certainly for the latter.

Update on the Australian left

Against the backdrop of Labor's cave-in to the right on offshore detention of refugees, the whole political establishment using the September 15 #muslimrage protest to whip up Islamaphobia to a level not seen since the Cronulla roots, and the defeat of equal marriage laws for LGBTIQ couples in the Tasmanian and federal, the Australian left has been making some steps forward that
I think it's worth looking at in a little depth.

The mainstream response to the September 15 Muslim rally in Sydney has been predictably depressing. Even supposedly progressive forces like the Greens have wholeheartedly joined the conservatives in condemning the 'bad Muslims' who protested against the film, Innocence of Muslims. Under duress of raids, arrests and threats to increase charges against protesters, Muslim community leaders have likewise joined in the condemnation, rather than highlighting the reasons Australian Muslim youth feel alienated - racism in our society and our participation in wars of occupation against Muslim peoples.

However, there has been a good raft of left responses to the incident and the resulting Islamaphobia. Both Green Left Weekly and Socialist Alternative have run pieces from eyewitnesses highlighting that it was the police, not the protesters, who initiated the violence. This had been substantiated by an SBS report; however, it didn't stop Queensland senator Brett Mason from attempting to pass a motion to condemn Green Left for reporting it. Green Left TV responded with an in-depth report on the issue, featuring researcher Mohammad Tabaa and activist and independant political candidate from a neighbouring electorate to mine, Rebecca Kaye.

A sign-on statement of progressive community leaders and campaigners has started to pick up steam today. However, I've noticed the popularity of the anti-demonstration liberal responses like Peter FitzSimmons's amongst the secular left in the Arab world. We have to understand the context of struggle between revolutionary and counter-revolutionary forces to determine what real gains for democratic struggle and the working class will be won from the Arab Spring; the strategy of both the film-makers and imperialists and the political Islam movements winning elections in the last year is to encourage the revolutionaries to be sidelined by the cultural divide, and we must oppose that however we can wherever we are. For us in Australia, that means standing in solidarity with the Muslim community and doing our best to prevent another Cronulla riot from ever happening.

Looking at the left itself, a little bit of sussurus had been sweeping the internet since Jorge Joquera's announcement that he would be joining Socialist Alternative (btw, get a better search function for that website!). Although he is just one activist, the fact that her is a former leader of the DSP, and active in Cuban solidarity when Socialist Alternative subscribes to the theory of state capitalism, means it's been a significant signal.

In the aftermath, there's been some important steps towards the kind of constructive collaboration Dan Dimaggio talked about that I mentioned in my last post on this topic - the Revolutionary Socialist Party is discussing merging with Socialist Alternative, while the Socialist Alliance and Alternative have also announced the possibility of closer collaboration. These groups have slightly different backgrounds; the RSP split from the DSP, the largest group which initiated the Socialist Alliance, over the question of whether or not the DSP should dissolve into the Alliance after other organised left tendencies pulled out. This eventually happened in 2010 (some figures are sceptical of the reality of this, but my answer is myself and probably half of the other leaders of the Alliance were never in the DSP; I wrote more about this in my earlier posts). The RSP argued that an explicitly Marxist organisation was still necessary, rather than an organisation aimed at forming a broad anti-capitalist pole; this seems a little more in line with the goal of the Alternative project, which likewise prioritises the direct importance of winning revolutionaries to Marxist politics on the level of ideas.

The possibility of these groups coming together in some sort of project or around some points of unity (perhaps Socialist Alternative's Marxism 2013 conference) is at the moment in the air, and a lot of figures on the internet and in the broader campaigning left have been asking me about this in recent weeks, whether we are just being recruited by Socialist Alternative or if there's a deeper regroupment going on here. I can't say how genuine or deep any of these moves will run, but for now I'm somewhat optimistic. I think some of the ideas Derwin/Dimaggio outlined seem more likely to come to fruition for us here - joint events at conferences, joint speakers, cross-publications, etc all seem possible right now. Perhaps a broad "organisational" agreement for these groups is possible somewhere in the future, but there's still competing theories about What Is To Be Done being advanced that seem, to me, to preclude that possibility - For The Moment...

The experience of the recent NSW council elections has also been a step forward for the left. Housing Action, a joint ticket between the Communist Party of Australia, Socialist Alliance & independant left activists, achieved a decent showing, forcing incumbent mayor Clover Moore to respond to the issue of investment in and maintenance of public housing. Although I wasn't directly involved in the ticket's decision making, from all reports the process of sitting down and hashing out what policy all involved could agree upon was the easiest part of the project of all. And out in Auburn, the Battler coalition of progressive candidates has gotten Tony Oldfield of the CPA elected on the back of consistent community campaigning against a radioactive waste dump first brought in by Labor.

Lastly, I recently attended the EduFactory conference at the ANU in Canberra. One participant described it as the largest gathering of the anti capitalist student left she'd seen in around a decade - with all of the 100+ conference participants (who spoke at least) articulating that the neoliberal drive for cuts, rationalisations and restructures on campus must be opposed. Plans have been established to further link up the different campus struggles and potentially launch national campaigns around future attacks on our education.

We live in interesting times...

Tunisia: Ennahda fails to deliver promises of work and freedom

Originally published in Green Left Weekly, Saturday September 1

Almost a year since Tunisia's Constituent Assembly (CA) elections, Islamist party Ennahda, leader of the coalition government, continues to lose the confidence of those who rose up against dictator Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in late 2010.

Anger was prompted by Constitutional Article 27, which was passed by the Committee on Rights and Freedoms on August 1, defining women's rights as "complementary" to those of men, placing women "at the heart of the family and as man's associate".

This enraged feminists democracy activists, who saw the article as trying to undermine the principle of equality for all citizens, enshrined in Article 22. Formal equality for women has been a strong principle in Tunisian society since the days of post-independence ruler Habib Bourguiba.

Activist Wafa Ben Hassine wrote in independent collective blog Nawaat on August 3 that "the gains that women have acquired in Tunisia are admittedly unmatched in the Arab world, and Tunisians are proud of that".

Thousands of people took to the streets of downtown Tunis to protest against the definition of women in Article 27 on August 13. Reuters said protesters chanted "Rise up women for your rights to be enshrined in the constitution".

The question of women's rights, and the relationship between religion and the state in Tunisia, has come into focus since the January 14 downfall of Ben Ali. The dictator used Tunisia's legacy of equality to justify suppression of political Islam movements such as Ennahda, as well as taking part in the “war on terror”.

Hardline Salafists were locked out of taking part in the CA elections, but have polarised national opinion with a campaign of aggression against alcohol vendors. The first Salafist Party, the Reform Front, was granted official recognition in May, reported Tunisia Live. Ennahda leader Rasheed Ghannouchi attended the party's first conference in July.

In mid-June, suspected Salafists destroyed an art exhibition in Tunis they considered offensive to Islam, resulting in riots that left one dead, while in August actor and comedian Lotfi Abdelli's show in Menzel Bourguiba was obstructed by a Salafist sit-in.

Media freedom

Media freedom is another front where confidence in Ennahda had been shaken.

Two hundred journalists rallied on August 22 against the appointment of Lofti Touati to director general of the Dar Assabah state-run newspaper. Associated Press reported the protests were angry at the government for going back on a promise to consult with civil society leaders before making such appointments.

Touati is a former police commissioner. He has come under fire after ordering a piece in Dar Assabah critical of his appointment and accusing him of being "too close to Ennahda" to be replaced with advertisements.

Minister of foreign affairs, Rafik Abdessalem, was reported by TAP state news agency on August 26 as saying that Ennahda's goal was to "clean up" the media and prevent them from "[transforming] themselves into forums of opposition to government action".

Tunisia's president Moncef Marzouki responded at the congress of the centrist Congress Party for the Republic (CPR), one of the parties of the troika government.

He criticised "the appointments of Ennahda supporters in key positions whether they are competent or not”, Jeune Afrique reported on August 25. “Our brothers in Ennahda are working to control the administrative and political state."

Tunisian cyber activists, at the forefront of the uprising against Ben Ali, have lodged a bid with the Interior Ministry to reveal the identity of the figure responsible for administering Tunisia's regime of internet censorship, nicknamed "Ammar404".

Nawaat reported on August 21 that Sofiane Chourabi, one of the initiators of the idea, said: "It seems that this government is working on wiping out and marginalising this issue, so that those who committed violations would not be held accountable."

Food, work and national dignity

On the economic front, Ennahda and the coalition have done little to differentiate from the old regime. Al-Akhbar English reported on August 17 that the minister for investment, Riadh Bettaib, announced the state would take out a further $1 billion in World Bank loans.

And radical labour struggle has continued to grow. The General Union of Tunisisan Workers (UGTT), under radical left leadership since it's constitution in January, has led a wave of strikes in the south and interior aimed at fulfilling the Jasmine revolution's demands of “work, freedom, national dignity”.

City-wide general strikes have swept through Tataouine, Monastir, Kasserine and Kariouan, as well as Sidi Bouzid, the town where fruit vendor Mohamed Bouazizi immolated himself on December 17, 2010, which triggered the Arab uprisings.

Day workers in Sidi Bouzid demonstrated on July 26 over a two month delay in wages, reported Al Akhbar English, attacking the party offices of Ennahda. Ongoing water shortages in the region over the past six months have also raised anger. Sidi Bouzid's governor, Mohamed Najib Masouri, has blamed residents who failed to pay their bills for the shortages.

The December 17 Progressive Forces Front, along with the UGTT and other forces, organised a demonstration on August 9 to take up the demands of securing water supplies and settling workers' wages.

The demonstration also called for the resignation of the governor and the regional commander of the National Guard, and the dissolution of the whole CA for failing to address the issues of Sidi Bouzid and Tunisia's poorer interior regions.

The protest was attacked by police with tear gas and rubber bullets, putting five in hospital. Blogger Lina Ben Mhenni said one young activist of the Tunisian Workers' Party (POT), Saddem Akermi, was hospitalised after he was shot with a rubber bullet.

An Ennahda spokesperson blamed the demonstrations on the party Nidaa Tunis (Call to Tunis), which formed on July 19 and is comprised of ex-regime figures.

He claimed to have "proof that some figures within the region known to be close to Nidaa Tunis sided with criminals, thieves and alcohol vendors to spread anarchy in Sidi Bouzid," reported Leaders.

The December 17 Front and UGTT responded with a general strike on August 14. TAP said thousands marched through the town and rallied outside the local courthouse to demand the release of prisoners from the previous protests.

Crisis of legitimacy

These struggles have shaken the confidence of many Tunisians in the Ennahda-led troika to chart a new path for Tunisia after the ousting of Ben Ali.

An International Crisis Group report published in June dismissed the "spectre of a second insurrection", but identified that continued political turmoil and a failure to address severe economic inequality could "risk snowballing into a legitimacy crisis for the newly elected government".

Nidaa Tunis has been presenting itself as the alternative vision to the troika. The party, led by elder statesman and post-Ben Ali prime minister from February to December last year, Beji Caid Essebsi, has been condemned by troika parties as a renewal of the old regime. CPR secretary general Mohammed Abbou told Tunisian radio that Nidaa Tunis represented "a return to tyranny," reported Tunisie Numerique.

Essebsi responded to the attacks, calling them "free of charge". He publicly supported the demonstrators in Sidi Bouzid, saying "it is inappropriate to describe this way the democrats, activists and human rights components of civil society who took to the streets to protest against repression and to defend their rights."

Given the moves of Ennahda in office, and the emboldened Salafist aggression since the downfall of Ben Ali, Nidaa has taken up space for a secular-based "Doustourian" (constitutional) party with the popular recognition and networks to electorally challenge Ennahda outright, unlike the two secular troika partners, the CPR and social-democrat Ettakatol.

Two representatives of the CPR in the CA, Dhamir Manai and Abdelaziz Kotti, said they had joined Nidaa on August 23, joining members of the 17 different parties formed out of Ben Ali's Constitutional Democratic Rally (RCD).

The left alternative

However, the left has also made steps to challenge both poles of the mainstream political spectrum and follow through on the demands of the Jasmine revolution.

The Tunisian Communist Workers Party (PCOT), which holds three seats in the CA and has some of the best recognition of any of the far-left parties, made the decision to rename itself the Tunisian Workers Party (POT) in July.

Party spokesperson Mohamed Mzam told Tunisia Live on July 11 that the party aimed to "avoid the stereotype most Tunisians think of when hearing the word 'communist'", and that people should instead "focus on what a political party is committed to offer them on political, social and economic levels."

The decision came after a long process of discussion and a general referendum within the party. Discussion had begun immediately after the overthrow of Ben Ali, but was postponed for the CA elections last October. This may have accounted for PCOT's inability to win serious space in the CA.

POT has also participated in the reformation of the national January 14 Front, which was active immediately after the overthrow of Ben Ali to push for further democratisation, but quickly broke apart. Negotiations to re-form the alliance began in July, and on August 13 a first agreement was announced between 12 left parties from a variety of Marxist, Nasserist, Baathist, Green and other backgrounds, alongside independent revolutionaries.

Mohamed Brahmi, of the Nasserist Movement of the People party, said the front was formed "following the example of the December 17 Front set up in Sidi Bouzid".

POT's chairperson Hamma Hammami described the coalition as "a political front and not essentially electoral. It will work for the realisation of the objectives of the revolution."

The reformation of the front is an important step forward for strengthening the democratic struggle. The spectre of a "second insurrection" may well prove a possibility before new elections are due in next year.

Please read Kefteji's posts on the battle for media freedom and the debate over Constitutional Article 27 for more information on those topics. Tunisian Girl has also written an update on the appointment of Lofti Touati to Dar Assabah, including a protest that took place as my original article went to print, and the call for a general stike on September 11 in protest.

Egypt: Brotherhood claim presidential win amid big street protests

This was orginally published in Green Left Weekly here, going to print on June 24 shortly before Morsi's victory was announced. Stay posted for another update on his swearing in, the Brotherhood's withdrawal from Tahrir, and the military's advances.

[Although official results are yet to be announced, it seems] Muhammad Morsi, the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood (MB) candidate, has won the second round of Egypt's presidential elections, held on June 16-17.

However, his opponent, ex-regime candidate Ahmed Shafik, also declared victory on election night, claiming there was no way Morsi had secured the million-vote lead their camp claimed.

Election Contest

In the lead-up to the second round of voting, several prominent left forces, including the Revolutionary Socialists and the April 6 Youth Movement, declared their support for Morsi's campaign.

In a statement on May 28, the Revolutionary Socialists described Shafiq as the "face of the counter-revolution", and without a candidate standing for the Tahrir revolution, called for all supporters of the January 25 revolution to unite behind Morsi.

The statement attributed Shafiq's success to "the smear campaigns, systematic repression and intimidation of the social and popular forces "

An independant election monitor supported by Middle East Voices substantiated Morsi's claim of  leading with around 51.8% of the vote. (the final count was 51.7% Morsi)

Much of the attention from the elections, however, was taken up with the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF)'s maneuvers to limit the power of the winner.

Military Declares Power

After the Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC) ruled on June 14 that the Parliamentary Election Law regulating the 2011 elections was unconstitutional, the SCAF issued a decree dissolving the Islamist-majority parliament on June 17, shortly after the presidential polls had closed.

The day before the ruling, the Justice Ministry had also decreed that military police and intelligence officers could arrest civilians, continuing the legacy of the state of emergency, which legally ended at the start of June.

Al Jazeera English quoted Mohamed Beltagy, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, as describing the decree as a "military coup" which had not been discussed in Parliament.

On June 17, Ahram Online reported Saad El-Katatni, speaker of the Parliament, as having told the SCAF he would continue to convene the body despite its dissolution.

The SCAF has also issued a "supplementary constitutional declaration" seizing many Presidential powers for the council itself.

Armed forces were deployed in great numbers across Egypt ahead of the announcement of official results – originally scheduled for June 21.

Amr Ahmed, from the Egyptian Socialist Party, told Green Left Weekly: "There are four main points to the declaration.

Firstly, that the SCAF are the only ones responsible for everything relating to the military, the appointment of leadership, and [Field Marshall] Tantawi is to hold the power of Commander in Chief and Secretary of Defence

Second, that the SCAF must approve any declaration of a state of war.

Thirdly, the SCAF will hold the authority of Parliament until a new one can be elected.

Fourth, the SCAF will control the body to draft a new constitution within 3 months, to be approved by a referendum after that.

So at present you can see the SCAF will remain in the scene regardless of who is the president.... they will be like a marionette in the hands of the military."

Responses

The US government has signalled concerns with the situation. Hilary Clinton responded to the declarations with a statement on June 14 calling for the military authorities to "fully transfer power to a democratically elected civilian government as planned", reported Ahram Online.

However, the role of the US has been far from helpful to the transition to democratic rule in Egypt. In fact, in March Clinton waived the requirement  for certification of basic human rights conditions in the country before the United States' $1.3 US billion of aid to Egypt could be released, reported the New York Times on March 26.

The Guardian reported that Egypt's benchmark index dropped 1.9% in the early hours of Monday morning, on the back of the expected win of Morsi and the military maneuvers.

Initial protests at the dissolution of parliament drew thousands to the street on June 15. Then on June 18, a joint statement was issued by a variety of left forces to "Announce [the signatories'] complete rejection of the Supplementary Constitutional Declaration."

The statement called for the president-elect to reject the Supplementary Declaration, cancel exceptional measures issued by the SCAF and refuse to take the oath of office before the SCC. (ed: Morsi did take the oath before the SCC, which I write about in my following article)

The statement called for a protest in Tahrir Square on Tuesday June 19; tens of thousands responded, rallying through the night.

The Muslim Brotherhood called for its supporters to join the protests throughout the week, launching its own vigils in public squares throughout the country against the "coup".

Ahmed told Green Left Weekly: "What's happening now has nothing to do with the goals of the revolution or the people, but is part of the ongoing conflict between the SCAF and the Muslim Brotherhood for power and influence in the state."

Where to for the Revolution?

Since the first-round elections, when all candidates reflecting the demands of the revolution were defeated, Egypt's revolutionary camp has been split on how to approach the electoral processes and the political sphere.

One important chapter for breaking people's illusions in the Muslim Brotherhood is the question of sexism and sexual harrassment, which was brought to the fore in December when footage of a female protester being beaten and stripped half-naked in Tahrir by soldiers spread online.

Ahmed said: "On this issue there is no conflict between the SCAF and the MB. The Brotherhood said that it was the fault of the protester for being in Tahrir Square that this happened to her."

"The illusion of fundamental differences between the MB and the SCAF will become more and more apparent over time."

Where to for Tahrir?

The "leaderless" approach of the Tahrir revolutionaries, uniting around basic demands for democratic and economic reforms, has been a factor in the lack of significant wins in the political sphere for the demands of the revolution beyond the winning of electoral process and the trial of Mubarak.

"We have pushed to take some advancements and achievements, but they have all been taken up by the Brotherhood", Ahmed told GLW.

"We need to create a third power, an organisation of the revolution, to represent its agenda & goals, and lead people towards the revolution's milestones."

"The Egyptian Socialist Party is seeking to create this third political force with other figures on the left – such as Sabahy and El Baradei – that can represent the revolution."

Writing on her blog Tahrir & Beyond on June 17, Gigi Ibrahim, a leading member of Egypt's Revolutionary Socialists, declared: "the revolution has no machine, no organised group, no political party sufficient enough to adopt the revolution's goals and capable of fighting the two most organised and biggest threatening machines to the revolution, the NDP (Mubarak's party) and MB, and the SCAF"

Throughout the struggles around the elections, the workers' movement has continued to push for economic & political reforms in workplaces across Egypt.

Public Transport workers in Cairo went on strike for two weeks in March, demanding the removal of corrupt Mubarak-era officials as well as a bonus equal to 100 weeks pay.

On March 27 they went back to work, winning their demands for improved pay and conditions.

The strong showing of Hamdeen Sabahy, who put forward a Nasserist platform of expanding subsidies and state investment, and polled a close third behind Shafik in the first round of the presidential elections, shows that the prospects for building on the demands of workers and democracy activists in the political sphere are good.

The question is – will they find the vehicle to exercise their own power? Or will the mauevering between the SCAF & MB stagnate the January 25 revolution?

Their Leadership and Ours

Along with the previous post, The Tyranny of Coffee, this piece is part of a larger article I submitted to Resistance Pre-Conference Discussion discussing how socialists, particularly youth, should organise in Australia today.


UPDATE: 4000 page views, w00t!

The kind of leaders and the vision of leadership prevalent in society today today are fundamentally deformed by the nature of class society. Under modern global capitalism, leadership – whether in civil society, parliament or industry – is structured hierachically. Leaders, whether formally elected or, like Rinehart,Palmer and Forrest, not at all, are expected to command those below them, and implement their own individual vision of how to carry out decisions that are made, either by them or collectively.

The socialist vision of leaders is something radically different. Socialists understand that, as human beings, we are best equipped to solve our problems collectively, through collaboration and teamwork. Our vision of leadership is collective too; decisions that are made by a group should be carried out by a group, with the different ideas of how to carry things out that all members hold tested out in practice. Our organisers are not "leaders" to instruct members on how to carry out their assignments or tasks they have taken on, or take on responsibility for doing everything themselves, but members of the team, there to ensure decisions made collectively through branches or executives are actually getting carried out in practice, and to help comrades out when they need it.

Failures should not lead to individual shame or demotion, but are also the responsibility of the whole team involved. Going it alone as activists or taking on too much work as individuals rather than as a team, no matter how much easier or more efficient it might seem in the short term, is a quick route to developing bad ideas unchecked, becoming more and more alienated from those we are seeking to lead, and in the long run, burning out and losing faith in people or activism altogether.

Youth are particularly vulnerable to being under-developed as leaders in class society – we are underrepresented in leadership positions both in politics and the economy, under-developed or mis-developed as leaders by civil society programs and official forms of student politics, and super-exploited and in the workplace. Yet since we haven't yet risen to better jobs with better perks, and we haven't yet been as ground down by the capitalist system as the rest of the working class, we are also most open to ideas about changing the society that we live in in a revolutionary way.

Unless we actively take steps to safeguard against it, the dominant consciousness of leadership developed under class society also plays out within activist spaces. This is true for a variety of oppressed groups in society, but particularly so for youth and new members – given the seriousness with which socialists committed to building an organisation take our task of fighting to overthrow the system, it is only natural for older and more experienced comrades to step in when new ones are making mistakes or unsure of what is to be done – and this isn't always a bad thing. But if it happens repeatedly, then it means that we aren't allowing space for young activists to develop as real leaders, with confidence in their own abilities, but who understand they aren't operating alone.

The Tyranny of Coffee

Before I became an activist, coffee was not a usual part of my diet, outside of the occasional late-night writing (or gaming) stint.

The best photo of myself drinking coffee I could find...

But in the last couple of years, as I've become a full-time activist, I've found myself drinking coffee more and more, to the point where now I generally feel like I'm not firing on all cylinders if I haven't had one to start the day. So i thought I'd take a minute, while I'm buzzing on this morning's coffee, to reflect on what that means.

I think coffee is a fine thing, and probably no more hurtful than any other mildly addictive substance (let's not forget the conditions of alienation, increasing automatisation, atomisation, etc for the majority in current first-world capitalist nations, in which material context such things have to be considered). I'm more interested, though, in the role "coffee" has to play in social activity and activism.

I've been to many meetings in my day over a cup of coffee (this way was my first real introduction to regular coffee-drinking). It's a good shot of zest for those early morning picket lines or stalls, long skype meetings, tedious days of email and data entry, etc... And meetings over coffee are a great way to get to know new members of your organisation or campaign group, sketch out ideas, and bond with people (and let's not forget that, as Eddie Izzard pointed out, "coffee" dates can often have a more adult connotation too...)

But if coffee dates are the primary way of getting stuff done in an activist group (even if between meetings), I think there's some issues. It's hard for there to be accountability to an informal gathering in a cafe (or a pub, or wherever). A coffee meeting doesn't have a constitution, and it's open only to those already in the circle. Even with people who are well-intentioned or don't mean to be cliquey or exluding, there are some implicit assumptions in coffee meetings - that people know each other and are friendly, that they have the right to make decisions and act on them, that attempting to involve more people in the process is at odds with formal meetings. Those who work during cafe opening hours are excluded; those who can't afford to drink coffee are excluded.

I'm not saying such meetings should be banned by serious activists, just that any organisation which wants to grow, involve more people and lead them in doing something needs to be open, accountable and easy to get involved in and take on responsibility in; coffee dates, pub lunches and other informal meetings have their place in this, but collective and democratic decision making meetings are essential.

Now, I'm off to put the percolator on...

"An act of political thuggery, not a matter of law and order" - Interview with Austin Mackell

Austin Mackell (of The Moon Under Water) is an Australian journalist based in Cairo who reports on Egyptian politics, the labour movement and life on the street. In February he was arrested in the city of Mahalla el-Kubra while reported on an attempted general strike of workers. I spoke to Austin on the 30th of May; this interview will appear in Green Left Weekly.

What are the latest developments with the Presidential elections – what do the first round results show, and is it clear who will be contesting the second round?

The first round of the elections show that the Muslim Brotherhood and the remnants of the old regime, the felool, are still able to out-compete the revolutionaries in terms of an electoral process.

The winner by a small margin was the Muslim Brotherhood's candidate, Mohamed Morsi, and second was Ahmed Shafik, who was Prime Minister under Mubarak appointed at the very last minute of his regime's life. It looks now like the final race will be between those two candidates, which is a huge disappointment for the revolutionaries.

There was a left-wing secular candidate called Hamdi Sabahi, who was written off by many people as an outside because he didn't have the resources and infrastructure many of the other candidates had – he came in third. Considering that he was also competing for the vote with Abul Fotouh, an Islamist who had split from the Brotherhood towards the moderate side who was also considered a revolutionary candidate – those two between them, if they'd had a combined revolutionary vote they would have had a clear lead.

Of course many of the revolutionaries boycotted the first round. I wonder if they are questioning that seeing how close Sabahi came to winning it.

Secondly, now there's a much stronger call for a boycott as well, since it's the Muslim Brotherhood versus the old regime. There's been some controvery over some revolutionaries saying to back the Muslim brotherhood because at least they aren't from the old dictatorship, while others are saying no, they already have control of the parliament, handing them control of the presidency as well would be handing over too much control at the formative stage. In any case, most revolutionaries, in terms of people who have been active on the streets, are still saying the street is where the battle has to happen for the next few years – that's the position of the April 6 youth movement. That's why they didn't contest the elections, they say that you don't have elections during a revolutionary phase, the revolution has to be more complete.

Who is exactly is Hamdi Sabahi? What does he stand for?

Sabahi is the founder of the Dignity party; he was an MP under President Mubarak, he won a seat in 2005, though he's credited as being one of the few voices of resistance in that parliament asides from the Brotherhood. He really ran as the poor man's candidate. His party is Nasserist; carrying on the spirit of pan-arab socialism would be his root ideology, although it's moderated and the message is much more populist and nasserist than ideological

How widely was the boycott observed?

It's hard to know how widely it was observed; it's clear that the turnout was lower than the parliamentary election, which some revolutionaries have called a victory because it means the population is losing faith in SCAF's electoral process. But you could also make the argument that that was simply the result of the Salafi candidate Abbou Ismael being disqualified ahead of the poll. Because the Salafists didn't have a candidate to vote for – some voted for Abol Fotouh, or for Morsi, but you can imagine a lot of them were a lot less motivated to vote not having a major Salafi candidate on the ballot. This would also explain why there was what's been considered a majority secular vote, if you add up Sabahi, Shafik and Amr Moussa, the former foreign minister, which people have been using to say Egyptians have turned to secular candidates. But you can question that because the Salafis may have been sitting out as well.

That has probably been a bigger boycott (although it may not have been phrased that way) than the active calls for a boycott from Tahrir Square and the revolutionary youth networks around it. However, that being said, now that it's a race between Morsi and Shafik you might see a much bigger boycott in the second round.

What is the situation with Tahrir Square and the revolutionary layer? Is the Square still occupied?

There's basically a constant occupation now in Tahrir Square with people protesting – earlier today they had at least a few hundred there protesting due to allegations of fraud by Shafik. In fact, there's been reports of fraud by both Shafik and Moussa as well as the Brotherhood by April 6 and various news outlets as well. But the general impression is that there was a lot of small irregularities but not necessarily enough to have influenced the vote. It doesn't mean there was a concerted plan to rig the campaigns, but perhaps just the kind of dirty campaigning you see everywhere.

Some people are protesting of that – a lot of them, Sabahi's supporters – but the Square's been pretty much permanently occupied since the clashes of the Occupy Cabinet incident in early December. All throughout 2011 there was an ongoing struggle for physical control of the Square, and now it seems the army and the police have pretty much given up on it. The protesters were allowed to keep the central island with tents, as well as the space in front of the central administrative building the Mogamma.

So the revolutionary youth won that space in those clashes, and actually now we've seen the latest clashes taking place outside the ministry of defence, which occured just before the elections. There were numbers of Salafis demonstrating because their candidate Abbou Ismael had been disqualified, actually on the basis that his mother was an American citizen – which some were disputing, claiming there's a conspiracy against him, etc etc.

Either way his supporters went down to protest the decision at the electoral commission, and they were joined by secular supporters and opponents of the SCAF as well; there were 11 deaths reported there, in the final week before the election. There is still definitely real tension on the streets and the possibility of more of these battles – particularly if Shafik wins, I might add.

I should add that the significance of protest moving to the MOD is that the protesters are moving more into more confrontation – we've got Tahrir now and that's great, now let's move on the next seat of power, seems to be the idea.

Is the Brotherhood taking out the presidential election likely to change the balance of power or weaken SCAF's hold over the country?

That's very difficult to know – it's certainly going to change the balance of power. What the relationship between the brotherhood and the military will be like and how it'll evolve is really difficult to know. People are talking about some kind of deal being made between the Brotherhood and the SCAF – there's probably been all kinds of deals made, but I don't think that there's a marriage between the two about to take place where we see them unite as the stable new elite, although something like that may evolve. Really we're in a period when making predictions is a good way to look stupid; if you look at the polling during the last election votes fluctuated wildly in the days before the elections. Things are really in flux here, there aren't established political forces like we're used to dealing with in Australia. There is the brotherhood and there is the military but there's this huge chaotic force at work in the political sphere as well of the revolution.

How has the labour movement related to the elections?

The one thing that was clear after the parliamentary elections was that until now the labour movement as a whole hadn't emerged on scene as any sort of political force. But with the emergence of Sabahi as such a strong candidate, there's certainly evidence that this is on the cards in the future. This was a suprise to many here, including people like me with an interest in the labour movement, as we didn't see anything like this gaining support in the parliamentary elections – but there's clearly an affinity for labour in Sabahi's platform, in what he's standing for. We don't know how real that would be if he got into power, of course. His candidacy underlines the new dynamics which are starting to emerge – there are the candidates like Moussa and Shafik, whose primary qualifications are having served in the old regime, and whose popularity has its own reasons like name recognition – but if you remove them from the equation you have the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic conservatism on the right and then Arab nationalism on the left, and then you have a candidate like Abol Fotouh in the middle who is some kind of mix of all of those. So this is a political spectrum very similar to ours – although with such population and poverty in Egypt there's a lot more space for leftward movement, which is exciting.

Did any radical left forces make a decent showing in the results?

That depends how you define "radical" – there was Khaled Ali, who was seen as the revolution's candidate. How radical his rhetoric exactly would be I'm not clear on – I haven't seen many of his speeches translated – but my impression is he's been seen as the candidate of the revolutionary youth, so radical in that sence, although certainly not as far to the left as the Revolutionary Socialists, who didn't field a candidate, and who now have gained a lot of ire for their leadership figures suggesting Morsi should be backed to prevent the return of old leadership.

But the candidate on the left of note was Sabahi – and his platform was significantly to the left. The difference between Sabahi and Shafik or Moussa was much bigger than the difference between major left and right candidates in any western elections, so the revolutionary situation has already opened up more democratic space than we already have in the west. His platform was explicitly about wealth redistribution; instead of following the line being tossed around by the IMF for cutting or "targetting" subsidies, he's talking about the need to expand subsidies and providing more services. His success has come as a surprise, and it changes the political landscape. Of course the success of Shafik and Morsi were also suprises and much more unpleasant ones.

What is the latest with your case? Has the regime indicated if they are going to press the charges?

We're still not clear whether we'll be taken to court or not; what we've got are preliminary charges – the Egyptian legal system is modelled on the French, so it doesn't really mirror Australia's. The charges are with the prosecutor's office, who is then meant to decide whether it goes to court or the case is archived. That's been the case for the last 3 months, and there hasn't been any real progress – we've heard of paper moving from one office to another, so we don't know when to expect any resolution.

Are you free to travel and report?

To an extent – my passport was taken when I was arrested, and it's being held along with my laptop and camera and other stuff, so it makes it quite difficult to move around. In the initial period after my arrest I was quite nervous when moving around of being recognised in the street as the spy from TV; I was kicked out my apartment and my neighbourhood has sort-of turned against me after our story was flashed on state TV. It's already been made quite difficult for journalists in general, foreign journalists in particular, by virtue of all of the media about foreign conspirators and such. And if I were in the situation where I had to explain myself to a large group of people why I don't have my passport, what I'm doing, etc etc – it's a situation which might complicate things with the case. But the main thing is that I'm not allowed to leave the country while this is going on – I can't travel home to Australia or anywhere else, which is an inconvenience. But there's a veiled threat in all of this; we're very confident we would win if the case went to court, but however improbable it is, this notion of 5 to 7 years sentence is in the back of your mind; it makes it hard to live a normal life, let alone work or move around.

What do you have to say to Bob Carr and the Australian government?

I wish Bob Carr would take a more active interest in the case. He's been very standoffish and hasn't responded to any of my friends, family or supporters – even through the union, I was only able to get what looked like a form letter our of him saying they can't interfere with the Egyptian legal process. On the other hand, the motion introduced by Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon to the Senate was passed calling on the Australian government to ensure due process was followed. I don't know how much information Bob Carr has about the case; you at Green Left probably are quite aware that what is happening is anything but due process. From the beginning this is an act of political thuggery, not a matter of law an order. The Australian government should have the gonads to speak out on that, as it should have for all of the human rights abuses committed by the Egyptian forces and all of the remnants of the old regime. But there's a silence on that, as there is on so many other issues, because Washington says to be quiet about it, so we do.

My case is nothing compared to what happened to people like David Hicks or Mamdouh Habib. Habib was brought to Egypt – he didn't come here of his own free will but was "rendered" or kidnapped here, and tortured for 6 months. He has alleged the Australian government was complicit in that, and they certainly still haven't cleared their name of that. You can see that today with the case of Julian Assange, or with our case here – the government certainly doesn't hold the rights of it's citizens as its first priority.