Stop Racism and Fascism Network

Stop Racism and Fascism network

The Stop Racism and Fascism (SRF) is a new network of groups, local campaigns and activists in Nottingham, Cardiff, London, Manchester, Derby, Sheffield, Liverpool, Lincoln and across the country uniting working class communities against the growth of the BNP and the rise of groups like the EDL.

Why do we need working-class anti-fascist campaigns?

Racism and fascism attempts to divide workers as well as being a physical threat to any minority, anti-racist or oppressed grouping. Our campaigns oppose all forms of oppression: racist, religious, sexist and homophobic. For us the principles of liberation are not divisible and we welcome all those who fight for them to join with us.
But the fertile soil, in which the BNP and EDL grows, are years of declining standards of living and of government policies that neglect working communities around Britain: years that have created a real sense of anger and frustration. Anger that turns to racism weakens us; the lack of jobs, houses and services has helped fascists’ attempts to divide us.
As the coalition government prepares huge cuts, we can fight each other over fewer and fewer resources, or we can unite to say that no section of the working class should pay for the crisis caused by the bankers and bosses!
Our alternative is for working communities to unite – black and white, British-born and migrant, all religions and none – and fight back for jobs, homes and services for all.

Those who want to fight racism and fascism effectively cannot be neutral either on the fight for equality or the fight of workers for decent pay, the right to work and the right to decent housing.

Drive the racists and fascists off our streets!

The fascists of the BNP and violent racists of the EDL should not be allowed to march through our streets sowing fear and division and intimidating minorities, anti-racists and trade unionists. The BNP’s limited electoral defeat does not mean the far-right street mobilisations will end; on the contrary, it may boost them.
We cannot rely on the police, who more often than not will defend the fascists against us, or call for state bans, which will be used against anti-racists and the left. We need to revive the tradition of trade unionists and working-class communities taking to the streets in our thousands whenever the racists dare to show their face.
Whilst the racists and fascists in the EDL continue to organise successful national mobilisations then we must meet them with national mobilisations of our own. But alongside such mobilisations we need solidly base campaigns in local workplaces and communities. A primary criteria of measuring success for national actions is how local campaigns are strengthened.

Why we need a new national network
We need a broad federal network of local groups with a democratic structure that allows us to fight together and yet maintain our strength as campaigns grounded locally in working communities across the country.

As a broad democratic network we can create a new forum for debate on the left and in the unions on how to combat the far right; debate that is currently stifled. Through democratic debate, we are best assured of carrying out effective actions, refining our tactics and developing convincing anti-fascist arguments and literature.
Measured against these aims the two long-standing national and centrally controlled anti-fascist campaigns, Unite Against Fascism (UAF) and Hope Not Hate (HnH), are not up to the job. We aim to revitalise the movement; bringing activists from UAF and HnH into the debate and lead to greater unity on the left. But our network will not pull its punches in saying and doing what is necessary to take on and defeat the fascists.

Get involved!
We call on local anti-fascist campaigns, including UAF and HnH groups, which share our objectives to support our network as well as individuals looking to build such campaigns in their own areas.

We call on individual anti-racist activists to help us build the network.
We will seek and need to build the broadest possible support in the trade union movement. But our measure of success in getting support is not the size of the cheque received but the number of workers who are mobilised in anti-racist and anti-fascist campaigning.

We will seek to work with women’s, black, LGBT, migrants’ and other organisations of the oppressed. For us the principles of liberation are not divisible.

Get your organisation to affiliate, send a representative to our steering committee: drive the racists and fascists out of our communities!

The network now known as the Stop Racism and Fascism network was set up at a conference in Nottingham on March 27. It has brought together anti-racist and anti-fascist campaigns in Nottingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Lincoln, Derby,  and South London who are frustrated at the lack of effectiveness and democratic discussions within existing anti-fascist networks. See those resolutions from the March 27 conference by clicking this link.