Shaping the future from the past

by Ben Soton 

What is history for – Essays in honour of Professor John Foster: Manifesto Press, 2024, 98pp; Pbk: rrp £10.00

Someone of a more pedantic temperament might have asked the question, what is grammar for? as the publishers omitted to include a question mark in the title. But spending too much time on detail can detract from what is actually a serious question. Whether we like it or not we are all shaped by history; that of ourselves, our families, whole nations and humanity as a whole. Marxists, however, have always viewed history through the prism of class struggle.
The Manifesto Press publication is a series of essays paying tribute to John Foster.  Foster was for many years the International Secretary of the Communist Party of Britain as well as Emeritus Professor of Social Sciences at the University of the West of Scotland.  Most noted for work is Class Struggle in the Industrial Revolution (1974) as well as various articles the national question, labour history and urban development.  
The pamphlet consists of eleven essays on a range of subjects.  In the first essay Mary Davis essentially writes a tribute to Foster. She discusses how in the late 1970s and early 1980s a number of academics attempted to water down Marxism into a purely analytical tool rather than a guide to action; examples of whom included Foucault, Wright and Cohen.
Well worth reading is Hyper Imperialism Today by VJ Prashad; who both defends Lenin’s thesis of imperialism as the highest state of capitalism whilst espousing the new theory of Hyper Imperialism. He claims there is a hyper-imperialist bloc of states led by the USA, which include the European Union, Japan as well as outlying countries such as Australia.  Prashad claims that for the first time since the development of capitalism this bloc is being challenged by a group of rivals from the Global South. These states may not be entirely anti-capitalist but they are, to a greater extent, anti-Atlanticist. The only way the Hyper-Imperialist bloc can respond is through military aggression; evidence is increased military spending in the United States and Europe.  
Another article of interest is James Crossley’s essay, Religion and English Radical History which looks at the role played by religion in the Peasants Revolt of 1381.  Meanwhile Jonathan White writes about more recent events such as the strike wave of 2022 -23 and David Horsley discusses the role of Black communists in Britain. Some are written in a highly academic style whilst others are more accessible.  
The final article by Gavin Brewis, Intergenerational psychosocial trauma: violence, social murder and the ‘space between’, was one of the articles I really struggled to unpick.  The article is more of a discussion about negative language toward marginalised groups; such as “chavs” and for those north of the border “neds”.  In recent years right-wing governments have attempted to create a hostile environment towards certain groups; witness migrants and the disabled.  When considering the Starmer Government’s cuts to disabled benefits I am reminded of a quote from the late Eric Trevett, the former General Secretary of the New Communist Party: “you don’t need gas chambers to carry out genocide”.