Radical Wales Launch

Radical Wales will be launched later today. (Monday July 5th) The obvious question that many reader will be asking is What is Radical Wales? Well the answer is simply, Radical Wales is a new blog which has been set up involving the radical left in Wales, anarchists, communists, environmentalists, left republicans and socialists outside of any of the main political parties, in this case in reference to Labour and Plaid Cymru who do have activists who would otherwise fit the definition.

The idea behind Radical Wales which has been building for a few months before the launch is that it can act as a forum for the ideas across the left spectrum in Wales. The blog has existed for sometime but simply acted as a blog aggregator initiated by Tom Fowler. It has now developed into much more. The site now houses a blog aggregator, twitter feed, directory of left organisations and campaigns in Wales, a calendar displaying events of the radical left and most importantly now the blog which as of today will start to publish individual material.

This is what it says on the Radical Wales site

About
Loss of heart and burnout ends many people's contact with radicalism in Wales, as elsewhere. Many of those who don't completely turn their back on politics end up compromising and accepting mainstream 'realities'. This is partly because our respective movements suffer from visibility and image problems: the limited coverage given to protests and campaigns by the mainstream media fails to address the core reasons for discontent, and much of what's left of the radical media suffers from an inward looking culture that only preaches to the choir.

Radical Wales exists as a platform for considered radical political commentary and discussion in Wales. We hope to attract a wide range of submissions from across the spectrum of anarchists, communists, greens, left-republicans and socialists.

Inspired by the long line of rebels and revolutionaries who have stood outside and against the political process of the ruling class in Wales, we'll publish original articles that continue that tradition. Are you interested in writing an article or becoming a regular contributor? Then read our guide to submitting an article and get in touch to discuss your ideas further.

By including contributors from different radical traditions there will doubtless be countless political and tactical disagreements. Many (probably most) of these will never be resolved, but through honest and frank discussion we hope areas of common ground can be found. We're keen to encourage debate, but ask all that everyone makes themselves aware of the comments policy.

As well as a being a platform for original articles, this site aims to be a hub for radical politics and an activist resource. With that in mind we ask for your help updating the calendar, keeping the directory up-to-date, and joining us in sharing ideas and events using social media. Please get in touch about anything we've overlooked or you feel is missing.

We hope you enjoy reading the site, but we can achieve more collectively than we can individually so please do get involved, leave comments, write articles, send in updates and publicise what you like on the internet and beyond.

This gives you a flavour of what to expect from Radical Wales in the future. There is currently an editorial group, but they aim to limit their editorial role to an absolute minimum. The editorial group currently includes me (regular readers of my blog should know my political background. Tom Fowler, who initially created the site to collect together all radical blogs in Wales,. He described himself as a libertarian socialist and has been active within South Wales Anarchists and No Borders as well as various of campaigns since the late 1990s. Adam Johannes, a Marxist currently unaligned with any political party but still active in various campaigns most notably Cardiff Stop the War Coalition. Finally there is Andy Williams, who I must confess to knowing very little about other than he is an academic and an anarchist. This editorial group is not a complete or definitive list it’s just the one we have started with. Other current contributors include anarchists, Marxists and greens.

So keep an eye on developments here, watch out for the articles to come forth in the next few weeks and the launch article later today and get involved. If you are interested in getting involved then what better way to do get in touch with me on my cool new e-mail address glyn@radicalwales.org!


Radicalwales.org