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Revision as of 00:07, 22 September 2009
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Red Action" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (November 2007) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Red Action is a small leftist group. The organization was formed following the expulsion of several activists from the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) in 1981 for their involvement in what was called squadism, a term that refers to violent actions against far right racist groups. The expelled activists regrouped around a paper named Red Action. They earned notoriety for their tactics of violently confronting racist and fascist opponents on the streets, and for their support of Anti-Fascist Action. Red Action had close links with the Irish Republican movement (this being one of the sources of their original discontent with the SWP).
Red Action has become more interested in the electoral process, and the group joined the Red Front in 1987 and the Socialist Alliance in England and Wales in 1999. Red Action members left this organisation, along with the Socialist Party of England and Wales, citing the domination of the SWP over the organisation. Some Red Action members went on to found the Independent Working Class Association.
In January 1993, a package containing 1lb of Semtex plastic explosive ripped the front off of the store Harrods in an incident known as the Harrods bombing. Planted on behalf of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA), Jan Taylor and Patrick Hayes received 30-year prison sentences in the attack. Hayes was a member of Red Action, and less than two years earlier he had liaised with police as chief steward for an AFA march through East London protesting against John Tyndall's BNP.
A number of republicans and socialists in Ireland have convened under the Red Action banner, campaigning on various issues, as well as producing documents on the history of radical politics in Ireland. However the organisation is largely defunct since 1996. Some former activists in Dublin went on to found Working Class Action.
Footnotes
- 1985-2001: Anti-Fascist Action (AFA) | libcom.org
- Red Action 2000 - Shaping The Future
- Against the Red Flag : Socialism and Irish Nationalism (1830 - 1913) by Mags Glennon (Red Action)
- Working Class Action
Bibliography
- Mickolus, Edward (1997). Terrorism, 1992-1995: a chronology of events and a selectively annotated bibliography. Greenwood Press. ISBN 0313304688.
- Geraghty, Tony (2000). The Irish War: the hidden conflict between the IRA and British Intelligence. JHU Press. ISBN 0801864569.
External links
- Homepage
- Charge of the New Red Brigade article from the Independent