Description
Resistance is a history of the Democratic Socialist Party and the youth organisation Resistance in the tumultuous period from 1965 to 1972, when first Resistance and then the DSP developed out of the youth radicalisation and the fight against the Vietnam War. John Percy was a founder and longtime central leader of the DSP. His history is openly partisan — it’s on the side of those who struggled for a better world then, and who still think it was the right thing to do.
While not attempting to provide a full political history of those years, Resistance recounts the main events, as they provided the framework for the development for the DSP and Resistance. But its central concern is the arduous and complicated process of constructing a viable revolutionary socialist organisation capable of playing a vanguard role in the struggle for a socialist society.
The history of political organisations is necessarily a history of the debates and struggles through which they developed. The DSP and Resistance had a rich history and the author succeeds in bringing it vividly to life. Based on the direct knowledge of a central participant, John Percy’s account is also based on extensive research and features an extensive index.
While it will have a special appeal for those involved in socialist politics, it will also have a broader usefulness and appeal for those interested in left history. The youth radicalisation of the 1960s and the movement against the Vietnam War had an especially important social and political impact then and for generations to follow and this is an important account of that period.