Marxists’ Internet Archive

Paul Foot

1937 – 2004

“Only the working masses can change society; but they will not do that spontaneously, on their own. They can rock capitalism back onto its heels but they will only knock it out if they have the organisation, the socialist party, which can show the was to a new, socialist order of society. Such a party does not just emerge. It can only be built out of the day-to-day struggles of working people.” – Why you should be a socialist, 1977

Biography

Despite coming from a ruling-class background, Paul Foot broke politically with his class and became a revolutionary socialist while working as a young journalist on the Daily Record in Glasgow. He became one of the finest investigative journalists of his generation and was responsible for exposing corruption in high places and the blatant injustice of the British legal system.

He was a great populariser of the socialist message both in print and in person at innumerable meetings up and down Britain. He also published a number of important political studies (e.g. on Harold Wilson and Enoch Powell) as well introducing a new generation to the revolutionary message of radical poets such as Percy Shelley and William Blake.

In 2000 he received the Journalist of the Decade award in recognition of his principled struggle against injustice. This archive attempts to provide a glimpse of all aspects of his political work.

Works:

Autumn 1965	Immigration and the British Labour Movement
Spring 1966	The Devlin Report
Summer 1968	Harold Wilson and the Labour Left
27 September 1968	Wilson: the man who murdered reformism
April/May 1970	Law and Order
July 1970	If only Harold had got the date right
21 August 1971	Army reign of terror (with Jimmy Grealy, Chris Harman & Brian Trench)
July 1972	The Old Firm (book review)
1973	Workers Against Racism
15 September 1973	How the TUC killed workers’ paper
February 1974	Portrait of an Appalling Man (book review)
13 April 1974	Clay Cross double-crossed
June 1975	Shelley: The trumpet of a prophecy (extended book review)
1976	Stop the Cuts (pamphlet)
1977	Why you should be a socialist (book)
25 June 1977	How much longer must these people be hounded and humiliated? (with Lionel Starling)
April 1978	For law, read class (book review)
June 1979	Blair – our brother, our friend (obituary)
2 February 1980	The Rotherham lads are here!
March 1980	The Labour Left’s Brightest Star
May 1981	Shirley, Shirley, quite contrary, how will your garden grow?
June 1981	“This bright day of Summer”: The Peasants’ Revolt of 1381
March 1982	Three letters to a Bennite (pamphlet)
July 1983	A socialist bookshelf
January 1984	Orwell and the proles
May 1984	United in battle for the class
1985	Remembering the miners’ strike
February 1985	Late Developer (book review)
February 1985	Thatcher – class warrior
May 1985	May Days and heydays
January 1986	‘An Agitator of the Worst Type’: A portrait of miners’ leader A.J. Cook (pamphlet)
15 February 1986	No sects please
17 May 1986	101 years of not thinking (obituary)
December 1986	Off the Christmas tree (book review)
December 1986	Powell’s poison platform
March 1987	Without a paddle (extended book review)
May 1987	Confessions and repressions
June 1987	Voting for our class
October 1987	Victor Gollancz – From Marx to muddle (book review)
January 1988	Battle for the NUM
January 1988	Ruth First
January 1988	T. Cliff and Zionism
February 1988	Poor on pioneers (letter) (with Margaret Renn)
April 1988	Harry McShane (obituary)
July 1988	Dividing Ireland
September 1988	The great times they could have had (book review)
7 January 1989	Reaching across the centuries
March 1989	Can Labour win?
June 1989	Learning from experience?
July 1989	No challenge, no change
July 1989	The question lingers on
15 July 1989	Icon, icon in the wall ...
22 July 1989	The great society
November 1989	Dead ringer (film review)
11 November 1989	Glamorising an atrocity
January 1990	Tribunes and the people (extended theatre review)
March 1990	Marx’s real tradition
July 1990	The Case for Socialism (book)
21 July 1990	Why the world is eating less
November 1990	All fall down
17 November 1990	Oil’s not well in East Timor
February 1991	Press Censorship: The media massage
Spring 1991	An open letter to New Left Review (with Alex Callinicos, Mike Gonzalez, Chris Harman & John Molyneux)
April 1991	Birmingham Six: Injustice seen to be done
1 June 1991	Revolutionary necrophilia
July 1991	Man’s unconquerable mind
July 1991	Toussaint L’Ouverture: The Haitian Slave Revolt of 1791 (lecture)
November 1991	Will Labour make a difference?
14 December 1991	They all knew he was a crook
February 1992	Saints and devils (book review)
May 1992	Why Labour lost
27 June 1992	At last – Crows peck the eagles
July 1992	Poetry of protest
11 July 1992	‘Positive’ surrender
October 1992	Press: Private parts
November 1992	Birth of our power
7 November 1992	Hungry for power?
12 December 1992	Inspiring memory
23 January 1993	Morse code
February 1993	Stop press
13 February 1993	Bribery and corruption
10 April 1993	‘We need socialist newspapers like never before’
May 1993	Vision of a new world (extended book review)
1 May 1993	A hero of Labour
June 1993	Seize the time
3 July 1993	Ambushing the news
September 1993	Introduction to In the Heat of the Struggle
9 September 1993	How history comes alive
December 1993	Christmas Crackers (book review)
May 1994	Silencing the Nazi threat
June 1994	Ship without a keel
18 June 1994	Can Labour bring jobs?
30 July 1994	Tony Blurs the past
10 September 1994	Ever since Malthus
October 1994	Ten things everyone should know about the Labour Party
16 October 1994	Defiant laughter
November 1994	Parliamentary privilege
May 1995	Arms dealing: Will they get off Scott free?
Summer 1995	When will the Blair bubble burst?
June 1995	Pipe dreams (obituary)
July 1995	The government that devoured itself
15 July 1995	A question of principle
29 July 1995	Rogues and ‘scroungers’
12 August 1995	Capitalism is stripped bare
19 August 1995	What Have They Got To Hide? Tories, arms and the Scott report
26 August 1995	The dream of Tony Blair
October 1995	State of terror
7 October 1995	Moonshot moonshine
November 1995	Treated for health or for wealth?
December 1995	Judges’ ruling
16 December 1995	Marx alive in Clerkenwell
February 1996	Waste disposal
March 1996	Armed and dangerous
June 1996	A Passionate Prophet of Liberation (extended book review)
29 June 1996	Plague of the market
July 1996	In the colonial style (book review)
13 July 1996	Strikes from a sunlounger
October 1996	New Statesman, Decline and Fall
7 November 1996	‘Argies’ with British guns
30 November 1996	Red verse in Horsham
December 1996	Corruption: Members declare an unhealthy interest
January 1997	Ireland: Majority rule
April 1997	Socialism and democracy
5 April 1997	Offensive to the bullies
May 1997	It’s been a long time coming
July 1997	Jonathan Aitken: Weaving a tangled web
12 July 1997	Judges rule against a free press
September 1997	The triple whammy (book review)
January 1998	Labour: Millionaires’ welfare
February 1998	The Lessing legend (book review)
March 1998	Beyond the Powell (obituary)
July 1998	‘A groundswell of anger and dismay’
December 1998	No time to make up
January 1999	House of cards
February 1999	London, 27 February 1900
2000	Introduction to Tony Cliff, A World to Win
JanUary 2000	Democracy and socialism: Century of the great hope
11 April 2000	Tony Cliff (obituary)
May 2000	Tribune of the People (interview)
October 2000	Big Business and Government: Tony Blair’s well oiled machine
November 2000	Labour’s Crisis: Ghost of a chance
2001	Why You Should Vote Socialist (pamphlet)
January 2001	Ireland: Come all you young rebels (preview)
20 January 2001	Ross Pritchard – dedicated socialist (obituary)
February 2001	Passports and Politics: A beautiful symmetry
March 2001	Haunted by the Future (theatre review)
June 2001	Election: Is this what democracy looks like?
November 2001	Stop the war: The Truth Machine
November 2001	I urge you to join the socialists
December 2001	Lewis Grassic Gibbon: Poet of the Granite City
January 2002	Workers’ movement: The party’s just begun
19 January 2002	TUC’s own official part of plots against left leaders
March 2002	Corruption: Dirty Business
March 2002	Doing the Deed of Death (theatre review)
May 2002	The Budget: Not very taxing on the bosses
June 2002	Red Barbara’s Rocky Road (obituary)
July 2002	Slaughterhouse Six (theatre review)
14 September 2002	Shaking up New Labour (interview)
28 September 2002	Duncan Hallas: We owe him a huge debt (obituary)
23 November 2002	‘Seeds of new society are sown in battle with the old’
December 2002	Stocking Thriller (book review)
15 February 2003	Real democracy
April 2003	Born Unfree and Unequal
June 2003	Corruption: Who Said Crime Doesn’t Pay?
July 2003	Orwell Centenary: The Cold War Controversy
26 July 2003	‘We need to concentrate on the big deception’
25 October 2003	Libel Fund: ‘Please contribute to Bookmarks appeal’
November 2003	Democracy: A grand delusion
December 2003	Left Alternative: Beyond the Crossroads
2004	How capitalism corrupts Labour politicians (extract from The Vote)
24 January 2004	Toussaint L’Ouverture and the great Haitian slave revolt
February 2004	Karl Marx: The Best Hated Man
April 2004	Mordechai Vanunu: Israel’s Whistle Test
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