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Tony Cliff: A Marxist for His Time
Tony Cliff was a Palestinian Jew who became a revolutionary socialist in his teens. He came to Britain in the 1940s and built the anti-Stalinist left, pulling together the group that was to become the Socialist Workers Party. He died in 2000 aged 82 and thousands attended his funeral procession through Golders Green. This lovingly crafted book is the culmination of years of work, drawing on interviews with over 100 people who knew Cliff and painstaking research in archives around the country. It is a majestic example of political biography at its best.
664 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
January 2, 2022
The definitive account of the life of Tony Cliff, from a sympathetic though usually sufficiently critical perspective.
The detailed account of Cliff’s early political evolution from socialist-Zionist to revolutionary Marxist is especially interesting, as is the beginnings and ideological evolution of the International Socialists before renaming themselves the Socialist Workers Party in late 1970s Britain.
Author Ian Birchall does an excellent job at establishing the historical and political context that shaped Cliff’s life, times, and the currents and debates which were formative in the emergence of his own views.
The detailed account of Cliff’s early political evolution from socialist-Zionist to revolutionary Marxist is especially interesting, as is the beginnings and ideological evolution of the International Socialists before renaming themselves the Socialist Workers Party in late 1970s Britain.
Author Ian Birchall does an excellent job at establishing the historical and political context that shaped Cliff’s life, times, and the currents and debates which were formative in the emergence of his own views.
June 26, 2025
An in-depth account of Cliff but falls short in many ways.
It’s absences are often striking - from 1936-39 Palestine, Flame before its dissolution, several of the factional battles that occurred in the early 70s - however more generally, whilst occasionally noting how Cliff’s intervention led to changes in the organisation (particularly in the period of 68-79) the book skirts away from explaining these generally (and hence risking any critique of the way they reoccur today or in 2011). As a result the book describes an eclectic but lively org at the end of the 60s and a far different beast built very much around one man by the start of the 80s, yet is surprisingly surface about this process and his role in it.
Whilst oral testimonies are good, at a certain point in most chapters, Birchall uses these to list how Cliff inspired or related to a few pages worth of members - in a way that quickly falls quite dry and feels like something of a ‘pat on the head’ to fellow members.
Perhaps we could cut out the 20-40 pages of such practices and insert some of the missing substance?
It’s absences are often striking - from 1936-39 Palestine, Flame before its dissolution, several of the factional battles that occurred in the early 70s - however more generally, whilst occasionally noting how Cliff’s intervention led to changes in the organisation (particularly in the period of 68-79) the book skirts away from explaining these generally (and hence risking any critique of the way they reoccur today or in 2011). As a result the book describes an eclectic but lively org at the end of the 60s and a far different beast built very much around one man by the start of the 80s, yet is surprisingly surface about this process and his role in it.
Whilst oral testimonies are good, at a certain point in most chapters, Birchall uses these to list how Cliff inspired or related to a few pages worth of members - in a way that quickly falls quite dry and feels like something of a ‘pat on the head’ to fellow members.
Perhaps we could cut out the 20-40 pages of such practices and insert some of the missing substance?
November 25, 2012
this book was actually better than i expected. there are things i didn't agree with cliff on but i thought this was a solid book about someone who dedicated their life to revolutionary politics. and despite some errors cliff did fight for a genuine bottom-up socialism. and i fully respect that.
August 17, 2022
Detailed and epic account of one of the longest living of the dynamic revolutionaries out there. Birchall balances honest evaluation and criticism of Cliff with admiration for his project and dogged efforts in building for it. Indispensable reading for revolutionaries working to build in times of low levels of class struggle.
January 4, 2012
I reviewed it here: http://thatfaintlight.wordpress.com/2...
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews