International solidarity and BDS – overcoming oppression in PalestineSPSC Aberdeen members Tommy Campbell and Kate Ramsden recently took part in a Morning Star webinar with a focus on international solidarity and the BDS movement. The webinar, which took place on 12th January 2021, was part of the Our Class, Our Culture series and was entitled “How international solidarity and boycott can overcome oppression.” Tommy gave a fascinating account of the history of the boycott movement, whilst Kate focused on the current Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) Campaign in solidarity with the people of Palestine. David Drever also spoke at the event remembering the experiences of his father, George Drever, who, in an ultimate act of solidarity, fought in the Spanish Civil War against fascism. Click on this link to see the recording of the event in full. Tommy took us back to 1791, one of the earliest known acts of boycott, when the UK Parliament refused to support a bill to end slavery. The Abolitionists gained support from over 400,000 people to stop buying "slave" sugar from the West Indies. This resulted in a drop in sales of over 33%. Tommy said: “The organised actions of the Abolitionists brought together people in a common cause to exercise their collective power upon Parliament, especially given that most people then did not have a vote. This power to act outside of Parliament united men, women and children and set the tone for future extra parliamentary action, mobilising people for other causes outwith the end to slavery.” Tommy then explored the mass petitioning campaign in 1834-36 to secure a pardon for the Tolpuddle Martyrs, the six innocent farmworkers sentenced to seven years penal servitude for organising themselves into a farmworkers’ union. He explained how the movement then snowballed: “The collective action by consumers in the late 18th Century was followed up by British Cotton Mill workers and their trade unions who supported the campaign to end cotton picking slavery in USA. “These examples of industrial and farmworker solidarity gave rise to local community solidarity in Ireland when the Irish National Land League campaigned against unfair rents and evictions of poor tenant farmers, targeting the Landlord Lord Erne and his land agent Captain Charles Boycott. “The local community ostracised Lord Erne and Captain Boycott, where no shops would serve them, postal workers refused to deliver letters to them, blacksmiths refused their custom and farm workers refused to work the harvest.” Tommy pointed out that the success of that campaign brought the word “boycott” into the universal vocabulary of the trade unions and people's movements. He added that these lessons of international solidarity and boycott campaigns have been carried forward into the 20th and 21st Century, in particular the international campaign against Apartheid in South Africa, solidarity with the people of Chile during the Military Dictatorship and now with the international BDS campaign against the Israeli apartheid government. Kate then spoke about the BDS campaign’s origins and the reasons behind it. She described the day to day oppression and terrorism suffered by the people of Palestine, including by children, and the importance of the international community acting to end this.
|
