In this piece from the CD archive, Ellen reflects on her direct experience of a 1979 strike at York University that marked an “impressive victory” for labour, explaining the nature of universities within a capitalist state. It is striking how many parallels can be drawn with today, but what becomes clear is Ellen’s sharp mind and critical insights into the nature of capitalism and socialist struggle.

We should not confuse respect for the plurality of human experience and social struggles with a complete dissolution of historical causality, where there is nothing but diversity, difference, and contingency, no unifying structures, no logic of process, no capitalism and therefore no negation of it, no universal project of human emancipation.