FOCUS
Conflict in the southern Sudan • The housing benefit bungle • Back to jail

FEATURES

Lebanon: the Middle East battleground •
Roger Owen
The Lebanon has been torn apart by internal and external strife. But now the situation has been internationalised in a quite new way.

Nineteen Eighty-Four in 1984 •
Raymond Williams
1984 has finally arrived. How has the novel stood the test of time?

The Culture Gap
Stuart Hall
Postwar Britain has witnessed enormous cultural changes. But the Left has remained at best indifferent, at worst hostile.

1997
David Edgar
Imagine Thatcherism triumphs at the next election—and again and again.
Just what will Britain be like on the eve of the twenty-first century?

The Age of Unemployment
A roundtable discussion
Unemployment is the issue which most concerns the British people. But not much is happening.

CHANNEL FIVE
Interview with Melvyn Bragg
The Genius of Venice — Tony del Renzio
Spotlight: The Unhipness of Eolk — Karl Dallas

REVIEWS

John Cox — Soviet Policy under Brezhnev and Andropov: The Making of the Second Cold War: Cold War or Detente?

Nick Kimberley — The Sound of the City: Sound Effects

VIEWPOINT
Bert Munro and Des Walshe, and Anna Coote discuss 'Labour's Lost
Millions'.

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
Sinclair — a chip off the old block? • Pension funds • Your shekel or your wallet

FEATURES
Caught in the Gender Trap
Jean Gardiner
One of the great social changes of the postwar period has been the transformation in the position of women. It is also one which the labour movement has failed to keep abreast with.

The New (Liberal) Left
Interview with
Michael Meadowcroft
British politics ain't what it once was. Party labels are no longer quite so self-defining. The emergence of a Left in the Liberal Party is a case in point.

Britain's Misspent Youth
Dan Finn
Once the MSC was about job-creation. Now it — and the YTS — are much more about cultural conditioning.

Yugoslavia: An Experiment in Crisis
Martin Myant
The Yugoslavs have developed a very individual style of socialism.
But they now face major economic problems, and their democratic processes are being severely criticised
.
The Unions: Is there life after Warrington?
John Mcllroy and John Lloyd
There's no doubt about it. The NGA dispute at Warrington was one of the most important in recent years. But what conclusions should we draw?

CHANNEL FIVE
Panto Panto — Richard Dyer
Cinema from Three Continents — Roy Armes
Brookside — Christine Geraughty
Spotlight: The Trouble with Poetry — Michele Roberts

REVIEWS
Andrew Gamble— The Thatcher government: Thatcher and friends
Fred Halliday — Class Struggle is the Name of the Game

VIEWPOINT
Dave Cook and Roger Poole discuss 'Labour's Lost Millions'.

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
Divorce — keeping it in the family • Andropov's 455 days • Training for jobs • Italian unions

FEATURES
Storming the Town Halls: a Rate-Cap Revolution
John Stewart
The Conservative government, in its efforts to reduce local authorityexpenditure, is now challenging the very principle of local government.

The Egyptian Enigma
Chris Mowles
Egypt is beginning to stir again. But it is more likely to be a mild version of Sadat than a return to Nasser.

How the Other Half Lives
Beatrix Campbell
Labour's crisis isn't mainly about policies, it's about its relationship with the people.

Crossed Lines: Communists in Search of an Identity
Jon Bloomfield
The Communist Party may be small, but its present disputes affect the whole of the Left.

The Bleak Country
Frank Gaffikin and Andrew Nickson
The jobs crisis in the West Midlands is a product of global restructuring as much as the domestic recession.

CHANNEL FIVE
Barry Manilow: opium of die missus — Barney Hoskyns
Photography's changing face —
Allan Harkness
Gay Switchboard 10 years on —
Jeffrey Weeks
Musicals now —
Stephanie McKnight
Spotlight: China Watching —
Brian Hipkin

REVIEWS
Gregor McLennan — Class Power and State Power
John Peck — What is Proportional Representation?

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
New Ireland Forum • CPSU and Spanish communists • Racism and employment

FEATURES
To Buy or Not to Buy: is that the question?
David Griffiths and Chris Holmes
The Left has lost out badly on housing. It's time for a rethink.

Taking Liberties- Interview w i th Larry Gostin
Thatcherism Mark II is engendering a growing concern with civil liberties. But how do you defend civil liberties — and which ones?

Mapping out the Unions
Doreen Massey and Nicholas Miles
Once union membership was concentrated in a few areas. Now it is more and more widely dispersed. With far-reaching implications.

Full Employment: Slogan or Strategy?
John Grahl
Unemployment is widely perceived to be Britain's most important problem. But the Left has so far lost the ideological argument. Perhaps it's time to look again at what we are actually offering.

Class Conundrum
Gregor McLennan
Working class has never automatically meant Labour, let alone socialist.

CHANNEL FIVE
Modern Dance — Chris Savage-King
2-Way Communication — Joel Cayford
The Pre-Raphaelites — Deborah Cherry
Architects in Crisis — Martin Pawley

REVIEWS
George Matthews — 1939: The Communist Party and the War
Judy Kimble — Sex and Destiny: the politics of human fertility

VIEWPOINT
Ann Pettifor — Women and the Labour Party
Ron Bellamy — Trends in the Communist Party

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
House of Lords • Video Nasties • South American Slump • Hungarian Reforms

FEATURES
This Lady's Not for Turning: Thatcherism
Mark III
Andrew Gamble
After the election, it began to look as if Thatcherism might have lost its way. Now it doesn't. But what will happen is an open question.

The Unbridgeable Gulf
Patrick Cockburn
The Iran-Iraq war is three and a half years old. Once it seemed that Iran might win, now it looks like continuing stalemate.

Overstating the State
Geoff Hodgson
The dominant socialist tradition in Britain is based on a highly centralised idea of socialism. It won't work — and we won't get there. We need a more decentralised concept.

Males, Morals and Majorities
Interview with Gloria Steinem
Women have made enormous gains in the US over the last two decades, but they are now under assault.

Fuelling Britain: the Future of Coal
Graham Gudgin
The present dispute is not about a handful of uneconomic jobs, it's about the whole future of the coal industry.

CHANNEL FIVE
English Romanesque Art 1066-1200 — Rodney Hilton
Liverpool's Garden Festival — Bob Dent
Fanzines — Paul Mathur
French Crime Movies — David Nicholls

REVIEWS
Sara Lefanu — Feminist Publishing
Hannah Kanter — Female Desire/Desire
Urvashi Butalia —Javady Alley / Woman at Point Zero/ The Republic of Cousins

VIEWPOINT
Dave Richards — Communists in search of an identity
Nigel Stanley — Communist Party — where next?
Tess Woodcraft — How the other half lives
Adam Sharpies— Unemployment: Slogan or Strategy

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
Boycott by any other name • Science parks • Laurels and hardy poets • The Dutch decision

FEATURES
The Changing Face of Royalty •
Rosalind Brunt
While so much in British society has been subject to question in the last decade, the Royal Family seems to have emerged unscathed. If anything its popularity has grown. Why is it so popular?

Berlinguer: Architect of Eurocommunism •
Donald Sassoon
Over one million people attended his funeral. In retrospect, he looks like one of the great figures of postwar Europe.

Sheffield: Steelyard Blues
Dave Child and Mick Paddon
Sheffield has been Labour's greatest English stronghold, a city dominated by engineering and steel. Suddenly the latter is no more; the occupational structure has been transformed. Where will it lead?

The Greening of Britain
Malcolm MacEwen
Socialists have traditionally emphasised growth. Now it must be tempered by conservation.

Coalfield Women at the Face
a roundtable discussion
A unique feature of the miners strike has been the involvement of women in the coalfield.

CHANNEL FIVE
Spreading the Arts — Interview with Joan Bakewell
Computer Games - Tom Conlon
The Royal Shakespeare Company—Paul Allen

REVIEWS
Gareth Stedman Jones—Towards 2000/Wigan Pier Revisited

Anthony Barnett — Ernest Bevin Foreign Secretary/Labour in Power 1945-51 /The Labour Governments 1945-51

VIEWPOINT
Hugo Young — Thatcherism Mark III
John Ross — Thatcherism Mark III
Tricia Davies — Crossed Lines
David Blunkett — How the Other Half Lives

LETTERS

UPDATE

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contents
ads & classified

FOCUS
Labour's black sections • Social security- reviews and reforms • Poles
together • Ethical medics

FEATURES
Strike to the finish-A roundtable discussion
The miners' strike is right at the centre of the political stage. Its outcome will determine much. But already this is a strike which will go down in the history books.

A Tale of Two Germanies • Jonathan Steele
Suddenly, relations between the two Germanies has become an issue of some controversy.

Breaking School Rules • Brian Simon
The Tories have failed to halt the spread of comprehensivisation. They are now seeking a major extension of centralised control over education. That's partly what lies behind the new exam reforms.

Dust to Dust-the World's Expanding Deserts
Adam Markham
Reports of drought and famine in Africa have become commonplace on our television screens. Yet something can be done about it.

Star Spangled Economies
Lars Osberg
Over the last decade, the US has created many more jobs than West Europe. This is one of the reasons why the 'American model' has become fashionable amongst economic commentators. But this is only half the
picture.

CHANNEL FIVE
Computing the Future — Interview with Richard Sharpe
Street Dancing — Chris Savage-King

REVIEWS
Law and Order — Brenda Kirsch
Hidden from History — Alok Ray

VIEWPOINT
Tom Baistow — Mirror's Image Fades
Steve Munby — Municipal Militancy

LETTERS

UPDATE

FOCUS
The bullet bites back • No strike, no say • The Vatican and Liberation Theology • Health care Reaganomics

FEATURES
An Unhappy Marriage? The Labour-Union Link -
Peter Hain
There was talk of going for contracting-in. Instead the Tories have plumped for something far more ambitious — severing the links between individual unions and the Labour Party. There is an awful lot at stake here.

Reagan's American Dream
David Plotke
It looks like Reagan again. But why has he been so successful? From a European vantage point, it doesn't seem so obvious.

Refurnishing the Corridors of Power
Richard Norton-Taylor
All is not well in Whitehall. The Tisdall and Ponting cases are expressions of a deeper unease. It's about Thatcherism's attempt to reshape the civil service.

The State — Socialism's Old Caretaker
Stuart Hall
Not so long ago, the Left was unambiguously/or state intervention, at
least in a lot of areas. Now it's not so sure. It needs to sort out where it stands. Because this is one of the issues on which Thatcherism has been so effective.

Britain's Drug Problem
Bent Gordon
Drug-taking is on the increase. But is it as bad as some claim, and what do the new Tory proposals amount to?

CHANNEL 5
Breaking New Style — Interview with Jeff Banks
Beware Working Woman — Janice Winship

REVIEWS
Mozambique: Ideals and Reality — Paul Fauvet
Hegemony in Dispute— Roger Simon

VIEWPOINT
Following last month's interview with Neil Kinnock, Peter Kellner, Gordon McLennan, Joan Maynard and Robin Cook discuss Kinnock's first year.

LETTERS

UPDATE

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FOCUS
Britain and Ethiopia • Trouble at the Board • Mondale raygunned •
Information technology industry breaks ranks

FEATURES
Hopes, Dreams and Dirty Nappies
Sheila Rowbotham
The Left doesn't believe in Utopias. It should. They give us hope and imagination.

Let a Thousand Enterprises Bloom
JohnGittings
China has gone in for a dose of decentralisation and the market.

Labour and the People Ken Livingstone and
Beatrix Campbell
One of the few left stars that has been burning brightly is the GLC. What wider lessons does it offer?

Bump Starting Britain John Grahl
The old Keynesian model is dead - The radical Right are in trouble. But what does the Left offer the future?

What Britain Thinks Gregor McLennan
Public opinion remains as contradictory and ambiguous as ever.

CHANNEL 5
Ways of Witnessing — Interview with John Berger
Following the Fight to the Finish — Paul Marshall

REVIEWS
It's nearly 1985, and time to look back on 1984. This is our round up:
1984: A Year of New Alliances?—Anne Phillips
Who's Afraid of Tariq Ali—Peter Riddell
Rigging Miracles — Joanna Goulding
Are You Wearing the Right Aftershave? — Carol Sarler
Pop's Young Fogeys — Marek Kohn
Video Viewpoint— Dave Rushton

VIEWPOINT
Keith Hill — Unions Labour: the nitty gritties
Ken Coates — Ballot Boycott

LETTERS

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