AlokeKumar

Chris Harman (1942-2009)

Marxist thinker of modern times

Chris Harman, a leader of the Socialist Workers Party died 7th November 2009 in Cairo of a cardiac arrest, where he was speaking at a Congress of Socialist Revolutionaries.

Chris Harman was not only an intellectual, a writer and a theorist of the most extraordinary quality He had something much more. Harman took Marx out of the hands of academics. This explains why attending a public meeting when he was speaking was a great experience. Chris Harman could write so well precisely because he had grasped the full wealth of Marxist ideas. He has produced numerous books, pamphlets and articles on a wide variety of topics: on the state capitalist tyrannies of the former Stalinist regimes in Eastern Europe, how the Russian revolution was lost, the failed German revolutions, the dynamics of modern capitalism, on the 1968 revolts, on political Islam, on Imperialism and many more. His writings comprised a valuable tool for revolutionaries wanting to intervene in the every day political and worker's struggles with clarity of ideas, strategy and tactics.

Harman was a towering figure in Britain and he made an immense theoretical and personal contribution to the Socialist Workers Party He edited the International Socialism journal, and had written an accessible critique of mainstream economic theory, Zombie Capitalism In addition, his historical work, culminating in the magisterial A People's History of the World, provided an invaluable introduction to the topics. Chris inspired our generation to be revolutionaries. His commitment to the building of a revolutionary party internationally was unflinching. He had nothing insular. He had that trait of the real revolutionary that would not allow him or her to be indifferent to people's predicament wherever they may be confronting oppression and injustice. Harman's writings, his efforts and contribution have played a significant part in germinating the seeds of revolutionary Marxist groups and organizations in whatever part of the world. He will remain an inspiration to successive generations of socialists.

Born into a working class family, Harman attended the London School of Economics (LSE) where he joined the International Socialists. He was instrumental in publishing the magazine of the LSE Socialist Society, The Agitator, and was a leading member of the IS by 1968. He was involved in the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign and outraged many leftists when, at a meeting in the Conway Hall, he denounced Ho Chi Minh for murdering the leader of the Vietnamese Trotskyist movement, Ta Thu Thau, in 1945 after crushing the workers' rising of that year in Saigon.

His main role in the IS (from 1978 the Socialist Workers Party (SWP)) was as a theorist and he has produced numerous books and articles on a wide variety of topics. Almost all his writing has appeared in the publications of the IS and SWP or has been published by related publishing houses, such as Bookmarks. He was first editor of Socialist Worker in 1976-77 and returned to the role after a break in 1982, remaining in the post until 2004, when he started editing the SWP's theoretical quarterly International Socialism Journal.

Harman has left behind his wife Talat and children Seth and Sinead.