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Tom Bramble (born 27 September 1960) is a socialist activist, author and retired academic based in Queensland, Australia. He taught Industrial Relations at the University of Queensland for many years and has authored numerous books and articles on the Australian labour movement. He is a member of Socialist Alternative.
Bramble has been politically active since the late 1970s, initially in Britain and, from the mid-1980s, in Australia. He was a trade unionist throughout his working life and was made a Life Member of the National Tertiary Education Union on his retirement. He is a member of the National Executive of the Trotskyist organisation, Socialist Alternative (SA) and is a regular contributor to SA's publications, including Red Flag and the Marxist Left Review.
Bramble taught Industrial Relations at the University of Queensland from 1993 until his retirement in 2015. He holds a PhD from La Trobe University in the same field, a Master of Commerce (Hons) from the University of New South Wales, and won the University medal in Economics from the University of Cambridge when he graduated with his BA (Honours) in 1982.
In 2021, Bramble co-authored (with Mick Armstrong) the book The Fight for Workers' Power: Revolution and Counter-Revolution in the 20th Century. This is published by Interventions (Melbourne). Donny Gluckstein, Lecturer in History at Edinburgh College, said of the book: "This work combines a remarkable number of features. It is vast in scope but judiciously focusses on key moments of workers’ struggle between 1917 and 1956. Full of fascinating information and detail, it is never a detached academic history but is a guide to activists today, both in terms of theory and practice. By focussing on workers self-activity in combination with Marxist theory the authors steer clear of the traps of Stalinism and reformism, remaining true to the essence of revolutionary socialism. In the midst of all that they still manage to present debates around important political questions. This book should be of interest to readers worldwide, though the three chapters on Australia will give it special value there."
In 2015, Socialist Alternative published Bramble's book Introducing Marxism: A theory of social change which provides an introduction to the basics of Marxist politics for those new to the area. In the years following its publication, with several thousand copies sold, Introducing Marxism had become the best-selling book on Marxism published in Australia for several decades. In 2024, Red Flag Books published a second edition, titled Introducing Marxism: A theory of revolutionary change.
In 2010 Cambridge University Press published Bramble's book (with Rick Kuhn) Labor's Conflict: Big Business, Workers and the Politics of Class which traced the history of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) from its formation through to the Gillard Government from a Marxist perspective. Australian National University academic Norman Abjorensen described it as "A veritable tour de force. Not since Vere Gordon Childe's How Labour Governs, published nearly 90 years ago, has the ALP been subjected to such a searching analysis". [1]
In 2008 Bramble authored the book also published by Cambridge University Press: Trade Unionism in Australia: A History from Flood to Ebb Tide, a controversial Marxist analysis of the Australian labour movement, attacking the trade union bureaucracy and the ALP. John Pilger said of the book: "Bramble has written an important and fluent reminder that nothing is gained without a fight. An essential read." [2]
In 2003 Bramble co-edited the book published by Ashgate Publishing: Rethinking the Labour Movement in the 'New South Africa' with Franco Barchiesi from the University of Bologna, which analysed the South African labour movement's reaction to the African National Congress post-apartheid. Patrick Bond of the University of the Witwatersrand said of the work: "Bramble and Barchiesi have gathered the toughest contemporary critiques and auto-critiques of the South African labour movement... in a manner that no scholar or activist interested in post-apartheid political economy dare ignore." Ben Fine of the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies called it "the single most important contribution to an understanding of the trajectory of the South African labour movement."
Bramble also edited the memoirs of Jock Barnes, the New Zealand trade unionist [3] and has published many articles on the union movements in Australia, New Zealand and South Korea and global political economy.
The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also commonly known as the Labor Party or simply Labor, is the major centre-left political party in Australia and one of two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. The party has been in government since being elected at the 2022 federal election, and with political branches in each state and territory, they currently form government in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Victoria, Western Australia, the Australian Capital Territory, and the Northern Territory. As of 2023, Tasmania is the only state or territory where Labor forms the opposition. It is the oldest continuous political party in Australian history, being established on 8 May 1901 at Parliament House, Melbourne, the meeting place of the first federal Parliament.
A trade union or labor union, often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages and benefits, improving working conditions, improving safety standards, establishing complaint procedures, developing rules governing status of employees and protecting and increasing the bargaining power of workers.
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy as a whole or certain social hierarchies. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in society whom its adherents perceive as disadvantaged relative to others as well as a belief that there are unjustified inequalities that need to be reduced or abolished through radical means that change the nature of the society they are implemented in. According to emeritus professor of economics Barry Clark, supporters of left-wing politics "claim that human development flourishes when individuals engage in cooperative, mutually respectful relations that can thrive only when excessive differences in status, power, and wealth are eliminated."
The Communist Party of Australia (CPA), known as the Australian Communist Party (ACP) from 1944 to 1951, was an Australian communist party founded in 1920. The party existed until roughly 1991, with its membership and influence having been in a steady decline since its peak in 1945. Like most communist parties in the West, the party was heavily involved in the labour movement and the trade unions. Its membership, popularity and influence grew significantly during most of the interwar period before reaching its climax in 1945, where the party achieved a membership of slightly above 22,000 members. Although the party did not achieve a federal MP, Fred Paterson was elected to the Parliament of Queensland at the 1944 state election. He won re-election in 1947 before the seat was abolished. The party also held office in over a dozen local government areas across New South Wales and Queensland.
Alexander Theodore Callinicos is a Rhodesian-born British political theorist and activist. An adherent of Trotskyism, he is a member of the Central Committee of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and serves as its International Secretary. Between 2009 and 2020 he was the editor of International Socialism, the SWP's theoretical journal, and has published a number of books.
The Socialist Party of Canada (SPC) was a political party that existed from 1904 to 1925, led by E. T. Kingsley. It published the newspaper, Western Clarion.
Labor history is a sub-discipline of social history which specializes on the history of the working classes and the labor movement. Labor historians may concern themselves with issues of gender, race, ethnicity, and other factors besides class but chiefly focus on urban or industrial societies which distinguishes it from rural history.
Socialist Alternative is a Trotskyist organisation in Australia. As a revolutionary socialist group, it describes itself as aiming to organise collective struggles against oppression and inequality while promoting the need for a revolutionary movement that could one day overthrow capitalism. Its members have organised numerous campaigns and protests around LGBT rights, climate change, racism, refugee rights and more. The organisation also intervenes in the trade union and student union movements. It has branches and student clubs in most major Australian cities and publishes the fortnightly newspaper Red Flag.
The Australian labour movement began in the early 19th century and since the late 19th century has included industrial and political wings. Trade unions in Australia may be organised on the basis of craft unionism, general unionism, or industrial unionism. Almost all unions in Australia are affiliated with the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), many of which have undergone a significant process of amalgamations, especially in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The leadership and membership of unions hold and have at other times held a wide range of political views, including socialist, democratic and right-wing views.
John Smith "Jock" Garden was an Australian clergyman, trade unionist and politician. He was one of the founders of the Communist Party of Australia.
The Australian Fabians is an Australian independent left-leaning think tank that was established in 1947. The organisations said aims are to “contribute to progressive political thinking” as well as “progressive political culture.”
Community unionism, also known as reciprocal unionism, refers to the formation of alliances between unions and non-labour groups in order to achieve common goals. These unions seek to organize the employed, unemployed, and underemployed. They press for change in the workplace and beyond, organizing around issues such as welfare reform, health care, jobs, housing, and immigration. Individual issues at work are seen as being a part of broader societal problems which they seek to address. Unlike trade unions, community union membership is not based on the workplace- it is based on common identities and issues. Alliances forged between unions and other groups may have a primary identity based on affiliations of religion, ethnic group, gender, disability, environmentalism, neighborhood residence, or sexuality.
Autonomism, also known as Autonomist Marxism, is an anti-capitalist social movement and Marxist-based theoretical current that first emerged in Italy in the 1960s from workerism. Later, post-Marxist and anarchist tendencies became significant after influence from the Situationists, the failure of Italian far-left movements in the 1970s, and the emergence of a number of important theorists including Antonio Negri, who had contributed to the 1969 founding of Potere Operaio as well as Mario Tronti, Paolo Virno and Franco "Bifo" Berardi.
Solidarity is a Trotskyist organisation in Australia. The group is a member of the International Socialist Tendency and has branches in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Canberra, Adelaide and Perth. The organisation was formed in 2008 from a merger between groups emerging from the International Socialist tradition: the International Socialist Organisation, Socialist Action Group and Solidarity.
Rick Kuhn is an Australian Marxian economist, political analyst and reader at the Australian National University in Canberra. He is best known for his biographical study on Henryk Grossman, for which he won the Deutscher Memorial Prize in 2007. Chris Harman of the British Socialist Workers Party and editor of International Socialism described the biography as "a valuable addition to our theoretical armour." Kuhn is of Jewish origin and is a member of Jews Against Oppression and Occupation. He was the convenor of ACTNOW, the umbrella anti-war organisation in Canberra, formed in response to the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq. He is also a long-term member of the Trotskyist organisation Socialist Alternative and was a founding editor of the online journal Marxist Interventions. Kuhn has published articles in Socialist Alternative, International Socialist Review, Socialist Worker, New Matilda, Monthly Review, ZNet, The Canberra Times and various academic journals and edited collections.
This is a bibliography of selected publications on the history of Australia.
Socialism in Australia dates back at least as far as the late-19th century. Notions of socialism in Australia have taken many different forms including utopian nationalism in the style of Edward Bellamy, the democratic socialist reformist electoral project of the early Australian Labor Party (ALP), and the revolutionary Marxism of parties such as the Communist Party of Australia.
Daniel De Leon, alternatively spelt Daniel de León, was a Curaçaoan-American socialist newspaper editor, politician, Marxist theoretician, and trade union organizer. He is regarded as the forefather of the idea of revolutionary industrial unionism and was the leading figure in the Socialist Labor Party of America from 1890 until the time of his death. De Leon was a co-founder of the Industrial Workers of the World and much of his ideas and philosophy contributed to the creations of Socialist Labor parties across the world, including: Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the Socialist Trade and Labor Alliance.
The Food Preservers' Union of Australia (FPUA) was an Australian trade union which existed between 1898 and 1992. It represented a broad range of production workers in the food processing industry, including many female members.
Elizabeth Teresa Humphrys is an Australian political economist, policy analyst and author at the University of Technology Sydney. Humphrys is most notable for her research on the Australian Labor Party, the Hawke government and trade unions in the implementation of neoliberalism in Australia. Humphrys has also published and spoken on anti-politics, and the impacts of climate change for workers
