Feature: Interest in Marx surges as British search for alternative

by Xinhua writers Jin Jing, Zhang Dailei

LONDON, May 2 (Xinhua) -- Alex Gordon was glowing with pride as he showed visitors a huge portrait of Karl Marx, Lenin's office during exile and precious collections, including the New York Tribune articles that Marx wrote to supplement his income and the full run of the Daily Worker and Morning Star.

The 51-year-old chair of the Marx Memorial Library could barely hide his excitement -- the two-story whitish building located in the heart of London has in recent years witnessed an increasing number of visitors and memberships, especially of young people.

"We have increasing applications from school students to borrow books for research due to a lack of academic courses in British schools about Marxism," Gordon told Xinhua.

Wearing a plain dark striped shirt and sporting a short haircut, Gordon's profession is actually being a train conductor. He drives high-speed passenger trains from London to cities in the west of England and Wales such as Oxford, Bristol and Cardiff. As former chairman of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, Gordon has been an active trade union organizer among railway workers for 25 years.

"Since the global financial crisis of 2007, it became clear to me and to many trade unionists that an understanding of Marxist political economy is essential in order to develop a clearer picture of the crisis of Western capitalism," he said. "For this reason I returned to reading Marx's Capital, which I had read 30 years previously as a student."

However, Gordon felt that it was not enough to read and learn from Marx and Lenin and more action needed to be taken. Five years ago, Gordon joined the Communist Party of Britain.

"The philosophers have only interpreted the world, as Marx wrote, the point however is to change it," he said.

Apparently, Gordon felt his role in the Marx Memorial Library could in a way help change the world. In 2012, Gordon was elected chair of the library board and since then he has worked at the library for up to three days each week as a volunteer.

Established in 1933 on the 50th anniversary of the death of Marx, the Marx Memorial Library has been the intellectual home of generations of scholars interested in studying Marxism, trade unionism, and the working class movement.

With its vast collections of books, posters, photos and pamphlets from across Britain, the library's collection even outdoes that of the British Library, offering a unique place for members and visitors to fill "the vacuum of knowledge," Gordon said.

The library, also called the Marx Memorial Library and Workers' School, holds regular lectures and classes to explain the capital crisis, the Labor movement and Marxist ideas.

The lectures offered by the library have proved popular, with people sometimes even queuing up in the streets, said Mary Davis, a board member of the library.

"People want an explanation for the capital crisis," said Davis, also a visiting professor of labor history from Royal Holloway, University of London. "People, and especially young people, are looking to Marx."

The ruling Conservative Party led by British Prime Minster Theresa May unexpectedly lost its majority in the 2017 general election due to its cuts in health, education, welfare and local government. Meanwhile, the main opposition Labor Party, pledging "For the many, not the few," seems to have gained wider popularity. In its 2017 Labor manifesto, the party offered a wide-ranging socialist program, including increasing taxes on the wealthy and nationalizing the railways, postal services and utilities.

"That showed up that there was a possibility of an alternative," said Davis. "People begin to think that's a real choice and something which is new and developing."

To cater to the rising demand from visitors and thousands of its members, the library is planning a major expansion to allow more teaching space.

More importantly, the library is looking into digital technology, including audio and video technologies, to adapt to the need of young people. Major documents are also being digitalized to make them more accessible through the Internet.

"For us, the task for the next few years is to ensure the ideas which this building was established to defend are available using digital technology, to an entire new generation that are used to using smart phones and computers rather than simply leafing through dusty books," said Gordon.

Meanwhile, the library is also seeking more engagement with China, the world's second-largest economy, to explore the development of Marxist theories, said Gordon.

The Chinese are among the largest foreign visiting groups to the library, he said, adding that professors from the Chinese Academy of Sciences are coming to visit on the 200th anniversary of Marx's birth on May 5.

Gordon also highlighted the special link between the library and China, while holding a bilingual honorary doctorate degree certificate of Kangda University Yen-an signed by Mao Zedong, who was chairman of the educational committee during the anti-Japanese war, to leading British Communist writer James Klugmann, one of the founders of the library.

"One of the things that we are very determined to do is to have a better dialogue with Chinese Marxists," he said. Enditem