Northern Day School (Leeds)

 'Capitalism in the Real World'  

 11th June

CROSSING BORDERS

Nations, Migrations and Exploitations

Speakers: Brian Gardner, Paddy Shannon and Paul Bennett

Brian Gardner - Scotland appears increasingly eager for independence.  In the UK, few feel any real identity with their country and enthusiasm for a united Europe is dwindling.  Is nationalism really on the increase? And if so why?  Should we be concerned? Or should we welcome this development, as an attempt to fightback against the global market and the faceless corporate world. 

Paddy Shannon - Greece has closed its Turkish border and now passed a law allowing itself to deport refugees back to Turkey. Austria is tightening border controls at the Brenner Pass to stop migrants getting in from Italy. The Eurozone's free-to-travel Schengen Agreement is in tatters as Euro attitudes harden in the face of the million people per year fleeing poverty, war and medieval religious fanatics. What can western governments do about any of this? And what do socialists have to say? What would our solution look like? 

Paul Bennett - We will approach exploitation by considering the notion of class. Is it still just a case of manual vs non-manual workers? Or is class structure far more complex, as some recent researchers have claimed, with no fewer than seven classes identified? We will argue that the basic division in society remains that between a small number of capitalists and the overwhelming majority of the population; that this division inevitably involves exploitation; and that this can only be resolved by the establishment of a classless Socialist world. 

Free admission, Discussion periods