Difference between revisions of "LM network"

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The '''[[LM group]]''' is a loosely constituted political grouping sharing a common, anti-environmentalist, apparently [[libertarianism|libertarian]] ideology. It is populated by individuals associated with the [[Revolutionary Communist Party]], its organ [[Living Marxism]] and a number of  [[Front groups]] and platforms spawned by the group.
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{{Powerbase:LM network: Resources}}
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The [[LM network]] or LM group is a superficially loose and informal network of individuals and organisations sharing a libertarian and anti-environmentalist ideology. Its constituent organisations are led and largely composed of people associated with the defunct [[Revolutionary Communist Tendency]]/[[Revolutionary Communist Party]] (RCP) and its principal publication [[Living Marxism]]. The network has no public presence or acknowledged existence. The strongest link is between the largest and longest established entities, [[Spiked]] and the [[Institute of Ideas]], both established in 2000 by close associates and for many years operating from the same address, Signet House 49-51 Farringdon Road EC1M 3JB, previously the offices of [[Living Marxism]] <ref>”[http://www.locallife.co.uk/islington/business-consultants.asp?pageno=3 LM Magazine]” Local Life website accessed 7th June 2010</ref>. Thus [[Patrick Hayes]] affirms in his twitter profile "I work for spiked www.spiked-online.com and the Institute of Ideas www.instituteofideas.com...". <ref>[http://twitter.com/#!/P_Hayes P Hayes] Twitter website acc 29 Oct 2011</ref> Associated entities typically have overlapping personnel, similar themes, views and techniques, and promote one another.  The network's funds and staff numbers are relatively limited as is its influence.  Perhaps of most concern are those LM associates who have obtained influential positions with other organisations and the network’s extensive youth oriented programmes.
  
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'The GM debate is the terrain upon which society's relationship to science and human endeavour is currently being worked out.' So wrote [[Tony Gilland]] in an [http://web.archive.org/web/20000618115855/www.informinc.co.uk/LM/LM119/LM119_GMO_Gilland.html article called Seeds of the Future] in the UK magazine LM, formerly Living Marxism - the monthly review of the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP).  
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The rationale for profiling the LM network on Powerbase is not any one of its main characteristics but rather their combination;  these being: advocating policies which benefit corporate interests, as set out by the [[Institute of Ideas]], corporate funding, a significant focus on influencing youth; the number of organisations it operates; and a lack of transparency about its origins, methods, scope and purpose. This profile is necessarily extensive and detailed because of the network's disparate nature and the lack of formal public links between its entities.  
  
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The RCP has spawned a network of political extremists who eulogise technologies like genetic engineering and reproductive cloning and are extremely hostile to their critics, who they brand as Nazis. What is particularly disturbing is that it is a network which engages in infiltration of media organisations and science-related lobby groups in order to promote its agenda.  
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[[Image:Living Marxism No 1.jpg|thumb|right|200px|The first edition of [[Living Marxism]], November 1988, edited by [[Mick Hume]].]]
  
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It is represented, often in very senior positions, in a series of organisations which lobby on issues related to biotechnology, eg the [[Science Media Centre]] (director: [[Fiona Fox]]), [[Sense About Science]] (director: [[Tracey Brown]]; her assistant: [[Ellen Raphael]]), [[Genetic Interest Group]] (policy director: [[John Gillott]]), [[Progress Educational Trust]] (director: [[Juliet Tizzard]]), and the [[Scientific Alliance]] (advisor: [[Bill Durodie]]). Both [[Tracey Brown]] and [[Bill Durodie]] were also brought in in an advisory capacity in relation to the strands of the UK government's official GM Public Debate.
 
  
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==History==
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[[Image:Lm.gif|thumb|right|300px|The logo of [[LM Magazine]] after it changed its name from [[Living Marxism]] at issue 97 in February 1997.<ref>'[http://web.archive.org/web/19980218145236/www.informinc.co.uk/LM/LM97/index.html Welcome to the new-look LM]', ''[[LM]]'', February 1997, retrieved from the Internet Archive of 18 February 1998, accessed 27 October 2010</ref>]]
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::'''1970s''' - Trotskyist faction ejected from International Socialists, further splinters into the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP)
 
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::'''late-80s''' - RCP establishes Living Marxism  
 
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::'''early-90s''' -  RCP begins infiltration of academic and media circles
 
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::'''mid-90s''' - Living Marxism title changed to LM  
 
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::'''2000''' - LM forced to close after it loses libel case
 
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::'''2000''' - LM's ex-editor launches Spiked website
 
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::'''2000''' - LM's co-publisher, Claire Fox, launches Institute of Ideas
 
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::'''2001''' - Long-time LM contributor, and Claire Fox's sister, becomes Director of the Science Media Centre
 
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::'''2002''' - LM/Spiked/Institute of Ideas contributor becomes Director of Sense About Science
 
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==The Background==
 
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The Revolutionary Communist Party was born out of Trotskyist faction-fighting in Britain in the 1970s. Supporters stood in the 1987 general election campaign as the Red Front, boldly proclaiming that the RCP was about to 'replace' the Labour Party, but the candidates all lost their deposits. Around this time the RCP launched its monthly review Living Marxism.
 
  
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In the early 90s the RCP underwent a drastic ideological transformation. Its leaders turned their back on seeking mass working class action. The real contradiction in society now lay, they seemed to argue, between those who believed in the increased human domination of nature and those who did not. They declared a 'total war of ideas' on the enemies of human progress.
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==Methods==
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The Institute of Ideas’ Director [[Claire Fox]] concedes, ‘Certainly, there is a network of like-minded people. Some people do come from an RCP background, because we have a long intellectual history together, and we do work together sometimes…’<ref>Chris Bunting, [http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storycode=193769 What's a nice Trot doing in a place like this?], Times Higher Education, 28 Jan 2005, acc 21 May 2010</ref> Former editor of LM and Spiked and continuing Spiked contributor [[Mick Hume]] confirms, ‘The network of people I live and work with contain lots of people who were members of the RCP.’<ref>Andy Beckett, [http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/1999/may/15/weekend7.weekend2 Licence to rile], The Guardian, 15 May 1999, acc 21 May 2010</ref> while Spiked and Institute of Ideas contributor [[Dolan Cummings]] explains ‘I never left the RCP: the organisation folded in the mid-Nineties, but few of us actually 'recanted' our ideas. Instead we resolved to support one another more informally as we pursued our political tradition as individuals, or launched new projects with more general aims that have also engaged people from different traditions, or none. These include Spiked and the Institute of Ideas... ‘<ref>Dolan Cummings, [http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/printable/3954/ In defence of ‘radicalisation’: Critiques of Hizb ut-Tahrir focus less on its dodgy politics than on its intellectualism. But what’s wrong with a devotion to the debate of ideas?], Spiked, 12 Oct 2007, acc 21 May 2010</ref>
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[[Image:LM-logo-200.gif|thumb|left|300px|[[Living Marxism]] logo circa January 1997 from their website www.junius.co.uk]]
  
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One of the group's then supporters explains their thinking, 'In England, it is as if the Tories lost their nerve, lost faith in their own project. They could no longer unabashedly support roadbuilding for example. Where is this 14 lane M25 they at one time promised us? ...The trouble is that nowadays if you say: Build roads, use genetically modified crop strains, dump the oil platforms in the North Sea, experiment into xenotransplantation and human cloning, there is an anti-progress alliance from left to right on all this. In fact if you say these things, people can't really tell if you are right or left or just out of it!' ([http://groups.google.com/group/alt.politics.socialism.trotsky/msg/87f16e1f922e6e2e?oe=UTF-8&output=gplain LM and Russia])   
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In his statement announcing the closure of LM magazine in spring 2000, LM editor Mick Hume promised that “The LM-initiated Institute of Ideas, a series of events planned to take place from June to July, will go ahead in partnership with major institutions in London, including the British Library, the Royal Institution, the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Society of Arts, Tate Modern, and the Union Chapel Project. A new company, the [[Academy of Ideas]], has been set up by Claire Fox to coordinate these events.”
  
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In reality, the RCP's new vision, which sought to champion 'progress' by opposing all restrictions on science, technology (especially biotechnology) and business, bore startling resemblances to that of the libertarian Right.  
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He also stated that “As for the post-LM future of magazine publishing, watch this space”.  Mick Hume was the first editor of Spiked, launched shortly afterwards.  
  
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An obvious similarity lay in the RCP's strong antipathy towards the environmental movement. It was as if environmentalists had now replaced the old 'class enemy' for the RCP. The concerns  environmentalists raised about the abuse of science, technology and corporate power were 'scaremongering', the RCP now  argued, which undermined 'progress' and the emergence of a 'confident individualism' unafraid of risk and experimentation.
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Many of the organisational and campaigning approaches used by those in the network are characteristic of those used by the RCP, including: the creation of a range of organisations without apparent formal links; the launching of multiple campaigns; the use of extensive and extended debate; the adoption of contrarian and controversial positions; the use of martial terminology; and the early adoption of leading edge communication techniques.
  
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Post-modernism and the New Left were also viewed as enemies of 'science', 'progress' and 'the Enlightenment', all of which the RCP defended in a curiously uncritical fashion. Other inhibitants to progress were 'victim culture' and the 'culture of safety' which gave rise to 'risk-aversion' and 'moral panics'. One should pay the least regard, the RCP now argued, to the views of victims or their relatives, whether one was dealing with gun crime, road accidents, Bhopal, BSE, AIDS or whatever, as it only encouraged a culture of fear and caution and so inhibited freedom and progress.  
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A defining characteristic of the network’s entities are their positioning and presentation as catalysts for debate or irreverent challenging of established orthodoxy. In practice, this enables the promotion of the views of the network and its sponsors on almost any topic, under the guise of free enquiry.  Their principal underlying themes of economic development and freedom from regulation benefit corporate interests while the larger and more established organisations explicitly seek sponsorship, either directly or via PR companies or free enterprise think tanks.  Several of the entities target young people, while others are sector or issue led. The network's entities are increasingly seeking partners overseas.  
  
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''''Invasion of the body snatchers''''
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Individual ex-RCP members with links to the network have assumed influential positions elsewhere, particularly in the media and sciences.  Members of the network write regularly for mainstream news publications, particularly the Independent, which publishes an occasional series of Battle of Ideas thought pieces, Prospect and Huffington Post (UK) and appear on topical radio programmes, notably the [[Moral Maze]].
  
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While intellectually the RCP was now singing from the same hymn sheet as elements on the far Right, tactically it drew from elements on the far Left. One tactic practiced by some Trotskyists is 'entryism'. Traditionally this has involved infiltrating a trade union or a political party in order to try and exert a disproportionate influence over its direction. To forward its new war of ideas, the RCP initiated a new style of entryism. Suddenly its members were sharp suited and organising seminars.  
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However, higher education is the most common occupational sector of associated personnel.  Many have past or current links with the adjacent Universities of Kent, Canterbury Christ Church, Sussex and East London. Their influence on the latter is particularly evident in UEL units [[London East Research Institute]] and [[Rising East]]. Details of some of those associated with the LM network are available via LM network at the bottom of this page.
  
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'Its call in the early 1990s to "return to the suburbs" saw it embark on a project of infiltrating academic and media circles in a style reminiscent of Invasion of the body snatchers,' commented a rival Marxist publication, [http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/230/rcpdesign.html The Weekly Worker]. 'To give praise where it is due, our upwardly mobile executive "Marxists" have managed to worm their way into the appropriate dinner parties, seminars, and conferences.' 
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An example of how the network operates was when LM associates [[James Heartfield]] and [[James Woudhuysen]] set up a building industry consultancy [[Audacity]] <ref>"[http://www.audacity.org/people.htm People]" Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref> and sought funding from building companies <ref>"[http://www.audacity.org/sponsors.htm We need your support]", Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref>.  The consultancy then published Heartfield’s book ‘Let’s Build’ calling for government support for the building industry <ref>"[http://www.audacity.org/buy.htm Buy]" Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref>.  Heartfield’s book was then promoted across part of the rest of the network: [[Birmingham Salon]] <ref>"[http://www.birminghamsalon.org/ Let’s Build event 8th June 2010]", Birmingham Salon website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref>, [[Spiked]] <ref>"[http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/boxarticle/3395/ We need more houses, not divisive housing policies]" Spiked website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref> and [[WORLDbytes]]. <ref>"[http://www.worldbytes.org/shownpreviously.html Programme 7 Audacity Director Ian Abley on planning laws]" WORLDbytes website, accessed 5 June 2010</ref>
  
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As part of this process, Living Marxism changed its name in the mid-1990s to LM, while the Party itself was formally liquidated. [http://www.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,3604,184070,00.html One member complained], 'In recent times, people like myself have had to stand back and watch as the organisation, its discussions and activities, have been closed down and party leaders have switched from calling themselves die-hard communists to espousing the virtues of the free market. While [[Mick Hume]], [[Claire Fox]] and others at the top were building up a coterie of followers in the academic and media world, we were being told: "Our aim is social revolution." Yet within a short time the party was declared finished and anyone who expressed any vaguely leftwing sympathies were ridiculed as being old-fashioned "liberals", "Trotskyists" and sometimes even both.'
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[[File:Internet freedom.png|thumb|left|300px|[[Internet Freedom]], a project of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Libero.png|thumb|right|300px|[[Libero]], a project of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Transport Research.png|thumb|left|300px|[[Transport Research Group]], a project of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[Image:IoI small.jpg|thumb|right|200px|The Institute of Ideas: an [[LM]] project. Image from the LM website @ www.informinc.co.uk circa 2000 promoting the first Institute of Ideas event in June/July 2000<ref>Retrieved from the Internet Archive the [http://web.archive.org/web/20000207200115/http://www.informinc.co.uk/ LM] website of 7 February 2000</ref>]]
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[[File:IoI.png|thumb|left|200px|[[Institute of Ideas]], at the core of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Battle of Ideas logo.gif|thumb|right|200px|[[Battle of Ideas]], a project of the [[Institute of Ideas]], part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Academylogo.gif|thumb|left|300px|[[The Academy]], a project of the Institute of Ideas, a core element of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Battleofideasbanner.jpg|thumb|right|600px|[[Battle of Ideas]] banner noting the funding of the [[LM network]] by pharma giant [[Pfizer]], [[BT]] and [[Rupert Murdoch]]'s newspaper ''[[The Times]]''.]]
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[[File:Culture Wars.jpg|thumb|left|300px|[[Culture Wars]], a project of the Institute of Ideas, a core element of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Debating Matters.gif|thumb|right|300px|[[Debating Matters]] a project of the [[Institute of Ideas]] a core element of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:GU Logo Animated Text.gif|thumb|left|400px|[[Global Uncertainties Schools Network]] a project of [[Debating Matters]] which is in turn part of the [[Institute of Ideas]] a core element of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Belfast Salon.png|thumb|right|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Birmingham Salon.png|thumb|left|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Brighton Salon.png|thumb|right|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:East Midlands Salon.png|thumb|left|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Huddersfield Salon.png|thumb|right|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Leeds Salon.png|thumb|left|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Manchester Salon.png|thumb|right|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:NY Salon.png|thumb|left|200px|[[Salons]], projects of the [[LM network]]]]
  
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But the core of the party had not been liquidated. The new glossier looking LM was still the vehicle of those who had been the party's leadership. The editor, as of Living Marxism, was the head of the RCP, [[Mick Hume]]. LM's star columnist was the RCP's chief theoretician, the sociologist Frank Furedi (aka [[Frank Richards]], aka [[Linda Ryan]]). LM's regular contributors continued to be made up by other leading lights of the RCP. And they and their closest supporters continued to meet to discuss tactics and ideology. The difference was that such meetings were now by invitation only. 
 
  
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'''Against Nature - the war zone'''
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[[File:AFAF LOGO small.jpg|thumb|right|200px|[[Academics for Academic Freedom]] and [[LM network]] associate.]]
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[[File:SAFAF.jpg|thumb|right|300px|[[Student Academics for Academic Freedom]] the student equivalent of [[Academics for Academic Freedom]] a project of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Manifesto club logo.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Manifesto Club]] part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Maverick club logo.gif|thumb|left|300px|Logo of the [[Maverick Club]], circa 2000, a part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Spiked logo.gif|thumb|right|200px| Logo of [[Spiked]], a core element of the [[LM network]], circa 2011.]]
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[[File:YJA new banner.gif|thumb|left|600px|[[Young Journalists Academy]] is a project of [[Journalism Education Limited]] launched by [[Spiked]] a core part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Novo logo.png|thumb|right|300px|[[Novo Argumente]] the German magazine affiliated with the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Hands_off_the_human_footprint.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Hands Off The Human Footprint]] a [[Spiked]] campaign, part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Modern movement demo.jpg|thumb|right|400px|The one and only [[Modern Movement]] demo - a counter to the protests against the third Heathrow runway in February 2009.]]
  
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In the late 1990's LM's 'most spectacular coup', according to The Weekly Worker, 'was the three hours of prime-time television, in the form of Channel Four's anti-green Against Nature. Frank Furedi was the star of the show.' Against Nature targeted environmentalists, presenting them as 'the new enemy of science' and comparable to the Nazis. They were responsible, the programmes argued, for the deprivation and death of millions in the Third World. (Crimes against Nature, The Revolution Has Been Televised)   
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[[File:Audacity logo.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Audacity]], an [[LM network]] project]]
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[[File:Logo BigPotatoes.gif|thumb|left|200px|[[Big Potatoes]] part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Engaging Cogs logo.gif|thumb|right|400px|[[Engaging Cogs]], an [[LM network]] project]]
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[[File:Future cities.gif|thumb|left|400px|[[Future Cities Project]], associated with the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Global futures logo.gif|thumb|right|600px|[[Global Futures]], an [[LM network]] venture]]
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[[File:Mantownhuman logo.jpg|thumb|left|300px|[[ManTownHuman]] a project of the [[LM network]]]]
  
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Channel Four had to broadcast a prime-time apology after Against Nature drew the wrath of the Independent Television Commission which ruled, 'Comparison of the unedited and edited transcripts confirmed that the editing of the interviews with [the environmentalists who contributed] had indeed distorted or misrepresented their known views. It was also found that the production company had misled them... as to the format, subject matter and purpose of these programs.' (See CHANNEL 4 SAVAGED BY TELEVISION WATCHDOG )     
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[[File:CPCS-150x100.jpg|thumb|right|200px|[[Centre for Parenting Culture Studies]], associated with the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Generation Youth Issues logo.gif|thumb|left|300px|[[Generation Youth Issues]], a project of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Parentswithattitude.jpg|thumb|right|600px|[[Parents With Attitude]], associated with the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Pro choice forum.gif|thumb|left|200px|[[Pro-Choice Forum]], part of the [[LM network]]]]
  
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Against Nature provided a platform not only for LM columnists like Furedi, John Gillott (aka John Gibson) and Juliet Tizzard, all of whom were billed by the programme makers as independent experts, but for a whole string of contributors from the far Right. Extreme advocates of free-market capitalism were also increasingly to be found expounding their views in the pages of LM. The magazine published pieces, for instance, by the Executive Vice President of the Centre for the Defense of Free Enterprise, Ron Arnold. Arnold's mission was their mission, 'This is a war zone. Our goal is to destroy, to eradicate the environmental movement'. (Far Left or Far Right? Living Marxism's interesting allegiances)     
 
  
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According to Frank Furedi, such alliances are all part of LM's regrouping of 'all those who believe human beings should play for high stakes' (LM 100). LM loyalist Adam Hibbert admits that working with the far Right, 'might appear duplicitous and fraught with the danger of assimilation', but asserts that as long as the activist is alert to these dangers, 'much more progress is possible: and that is our overriding duty, if we're serious.' (Re: For Hibbert: LM and Russia)
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[[File:Worldwrite_logo.gif|thumb|right|200px|[[Worldwrite]], part of the [[LM network]]]]
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[[File:Worldbytes.jpg|thumb|left|300px|[[Worldbytes]] part of [[WORLDWrite]], a project of the [[LM network]]]]
  
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[[File:Easynet logo.jpeg|thumb|right|200px|[[Easynet]], started by [[LM network]] associate [[Keith Teare]]]]
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[[File:200px-Cyberia Internet Cafe.gif|thumb|left|400px|[[Cyberia]] a business set up by [[LM network]] associate [[Keith Teare]]]]
  
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Against Nature's director Martin Durkin and his production team went on to make an almost equally controversial TV programme about GM for Channel Four, in which GM proponents like CS Prakash played a starring role. (see Getting your science from charlatans) 
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[[File:ELSS Logo.png|thumb|right|300px|The logo of the [[East London Science School]] the first venture of the [[LM network]] into running an educational establishment]]
  
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Rewriting history in favour of the murderers
 
  
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Controversy and notoriety had always been a hallmark of the RCP in their ideological jockeying with other factions on the far Left. They defended the right of racists publicly to deny the Holocaust, opposed sanctions against the aparthied regime in South Africa and sought to disrupt an anti-Nazi march in London. They even opposed trade union campaigns for better wages and against public-spending cuts. (The rebels who changed their tune to be pundits) Their unequivocal espousal of the republican cause in Northern Ireland was such that their continuing support for violence led them to eventually outflank even the IRA itself, whom they bitterly criticised along with the rest of the republican leadeship for engaging in the peace process (see Fiona Fox).  
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==Funding==
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None of the organisations associated with the LM network provides a breakdown of funders and how much they have provided. We do know, however, that they are funded by corporations that fund think tanks dedicated to promoting their interests in the political and media spheres.  For example, the pharmaceutical company [[Pfizer]] has funded [[Spiked]], the [[Institute of Ideas]]' [[Battle of Ideas]] in 2005 and 2006, the [[Debating Matters]] programme and two organisations with which the LM network has connections, the [[Science Media Centre]] and [[Sense About Science]]. Both of the latter are engaged in managing debate about scientific issues.  
  
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Their libertarian stance gave the group still more scope for controversialism. They opposed legal restraints on almost anything - from guns to child pornography to late abortion. They appeard to revel in setting their face against almost every public concern or scruple, particularly where it showed signs of giving rise to any kind of social constraint, legal restriction or other form of intervention. (Life after Living Marxism: Banning the bans) 
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As well as funding the LM network, Pfizer funds free market think tanks such as the US-based [[Competitive Enterprise Institute]] and [[Cato Institute]], the Netherlands-based [[Edmund Burke Foundation]], the Brussels based [[Centre for the New Europe]] (which also does work on climate funded by [[Exxon]]), the UK’s [[Social Market Foundation]] and the [[American Council on Science and Health]], a deceptive front group. <ref>"[http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/340/apr07_2/c1819  American Council on Science and Health]", BMJ website, accessed 3 May 2010</ref>  Pfizer is a member of one of the most important global corporate lobby groups, the International Chamber of Commerce. <ref>"[http://www.iccwbo.org/id19696/index.html Links to ICC member companies]", International Chamber of Commerce website, accessed 3 May 2010</ref>  What’s in it for Pfizer?  One clue is in the topics covered by the Debating Matters schools debating competition which include such subjects of interest to the pharmaceutical industry as: the value or otherwise of complementary medicine, NHS rationing of expensive drugs, clinical trials in developing countries, fertility treatments, genetic screening, anti-aging treatments, genetic engineering and animal experimentation.  
  
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They downplayed concern over AIDS as a heterosexual disease or as a problem in Africa. They also engaged in a lengthy campaign of denial of the Rwandan genocide. This led to LM being accused of rewriting 'history in favour of the murderers'. (Genocide? What genocide?; see also Fiona Fox) 
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BT is another major sponsor of the LM network. BT sponsored the Battle of Ideas in 2006, 2007 and 2008.  In addition, then BT subsidiary O2 sponsored five Spiked Debates during 2005, 2006 and 2007<ref>"[http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/onlinedebates/ Online debates]", Spiked website, accessed 7 June 2010</ref> while another was sponsored by Orange.  The Mobile Operators Association is also on record as having funded Spiked. In return, BT/ O2 and other operators had the opportunity via Spiked to challenge public concerns about the perceived effects on health, child protection and the environment of mobile phones.
  
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But what really threw the group into the spotlight and led to the demise of LM, was their downplaying of Serb nationalist atrocities. Throughout the 1990s LM had published a string of articles in this vein, mostly by its columnist Joan Phillips (aka Joan Hoey). Then in 1997 LM published 'The picture that fooled the world', an article by Thomas Deichmann who edited Novo magazine  - LM's sister publication in Germany.  
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Other corporations and corporate lobby groups that have funded the LM network are [[Cadbury Schweppes]], [[IBM]], [[Novartis]], [[Orange]], [[O2]], The [[Mobile Operators Association]] and the [[Society of the Chemical Industry]]. <ref>"[http://www.spiked-online.com/pdf/BrandManagersPack.pdf Spiked Brand Managers’ Pack]", Spiked website, accessed 8 May 2010</ref> These sources of funding are typical of lobbying or PR firms.  Unsurprisingly, some of the biggest lobby firms also fund the network. [[Hill and Knowlton]] is one of the most controversial lobbying and PR firms in the world, having famously been behind the deception on the incubator baby story in Kuwait in 1990/91. It also worked for a long list of controversial corporations, including some from the oil, tobacco, pharma, fast food, and GM industry. It worked too for repressive regimes, including Egypt, Haiti, Indonesia, Morocco, Turkey – and China after the Tiananmen square massacre. Along with PR firm [[Luther Pendragon]] (which has worked for the Hinduja brothers, Macdonalds, Pepsi, the GM industry and others), Hill and Knowlton has put up cash for LM network events.  
  
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Deichmann's article argued that the journalists working for TV news broadcaster ITN had deliberately misrepresented an image that came to symbolise the horror of the Bosnian war, an image that was supposed to show emaciated moslem prisoners in a Serbian prison camp, Trnopolje. Deichmann's article claimed the moslems in the picture had, in fact, come to a place of refuge and that they were being protected, not mistreated, by the Serbs. (Deichmann's claims are painstakingly revealed as fabrications, distortions, and lies in an article by David Campbell, Professor of International Politics at the University of Newcastle, Atrocity, Memory and Photography, Journal of Human Rights, March & June 2002) 
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The LM network has also worked with other free market think tanks such as the [[International Policy Network]] (which took money from Exxon for climate change ’outreach’) and the [[Social Issues Research Centre]] (which takes money from the food, alcohol and tech industry and downplays the risks from their products). <ref>"[http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/340/mar03_3/c484 The Social Issues Research Centre]", BMJ website, accessed 3 May 2010</ref>
  
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LM was forced into closure after losing a libel case brought by the ITN journalists it had accused of fabricating evidence. It emerged during the trial that contrary to the claims in LM, 'Trnopolje was a camp where Muslims were undoubtedly imprisoned, and that many were beaten, tortured, raped and killed by their Serb guards.' (High stakes in battle over Serbian guilt)
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==Comment by George Monbiot==
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The following is an excerpt from an interview by Lobbywatch with [[George Monbiot]] about the LM network:<ref>Lobbywatch, [http://www.gmwatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3876:interview-with-monbiot-on-the-lm-group Interview with George Monbiot about the LM group], 11 April 2007, archived on GMWatch website, accessed 21 May 2010</ref>
  
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But in the run up to the case the LM-ers successfully capitalised on the poor regard in which Britain's libel laws are widely held, by promoting themselves as the victims of ITN's 'deplorable attack on press freedom'. A highly successful three-day conference was held called 'Free Speech Wars'.
+
:Lobbywatch: Do you actually think there is a network of people concertedly working together as this LM group?
  
−
The Guardian journalist Ed Vulliamy, who filed the first reports on the Trnopolje camp, was unsparing of those who offered LM their support. 'Those who helped LM cannot fail to recognise that by doing so they also stirred the poison LM had dropped into the well of history, playing their own role in denying a genocide...' Vulliamy claimed there was evidence of collusion on LM's part with Serb military intelligence and worse, concluding, 'Shame, then, on those fools, supporters of the pogrom, cynics and dilettantes who supported them, gave them credence and endorsed their vile enterprise.' (Poison in the well of history)     
+
:George Monbiot:  That is a good question and I think it could be answered in several different ways.  There is a group of people who have more or less stuck together for a long time. To what extent they consciously organise under a single name or under a single banner, I don’t know - you would have to ask them.  But that they have pursued a very consistent agenda for quite a long time and the fact that they have moved first of all into one industry, television, and then into another, science communication, more or less as a body, suggests to me that there is a coordinated programme of action.  
  
−
Whatever LM's ultimate mix of motives, there was a clear ideological line running through the group's antics over Rwanda and Bosnia. While LM raised no objection to Western economic and corporate domination of other countries, which it seemed to regard as a necessary corollary of 'progress', it was totally opposed to armed intervention. This led in turn to a concern about the way in which conflicts were reported. The portrayal of the Tutsis and the Bosnian moslems as victims of horrific atrocities could fuel demands for greater intervention not only in those conflicts but elsewhere. Those behind LM and the RCP therefore fought to undermine such perceptions. The ways in which they did so are revealing.   
+
:Lobbywatch: We all have networks of people that we interact with. What makes this so different?  Why do you find it so worrying?
  
−
Martin Cohen, the Editor of the journal of the Philosophical Society, The Philosopher, reports how at a talk he gave at Leeds University in the early months of the Bosnian war, the RCP sought to stifle debate and bury criticism of the Serbs 'in a cynically calculated bombardment of misinformation and propaganda.' For the RCP, he writes, ' "truth" was a bourgeois notion, political power was the higher cause.' (Living Marxism and the Serbs)     
+
:George Monbiot:  There are two reasons why I find it worrying.  The first is that the agenda they pursue appears not to be pursued overtly.  For example, when they ran the magazine Living Marxism it was very far from a Marxism journal - it was just about as far from a Marxist journal as you could possibly get.  And it seemed to me that the title was a direct and deliberate attempt to distract attention from the fact that this was a far right wing libertarian publication which was using the terms of the left to make it look as if the positions it was taking were new and unusual ones.  Whereas in actual fact they were very well trodden ones, but well trodden by people like the [[Libertarian Alliance]] who in theory were at the other end of the political spectrum.
  
−
Life after Living Marxism         
+
In another part of the interview, Monbiot talks about the LM network's lack of transparency and their fondness for ostensibly objective debates:
  
−
The 'battle of ideas' over Bosnia was one that had largely been fought by the time of the LM libel trial in 2000. Undaunted by the legal and financial setback of the verdict, LM's co-publisher Claire Fox launched the Institute of Ideas (IoI) on the very day that LM folded in the face of massive damages. Shortly afterwards, Mick Hume, LM's ex-editor and by then a Times-columnist, launched the website of a new online magazine, Spiked . Spiked's managing editor was Helene Guldberg, LM's ex-publisher.  
+
:Lobbywatch: Could you give more examples really of how you see them as not being as transparent as they might be? ...
  
−
The Institute of Ideas regularly organises seminars and conferences, as to a lesser extent does Spiked , drawing in well-known figures to events carefully designed to promote the LM agenda. As a Guardian article notes, 'From the platforms and the floor, the LM line is assiduously promoted by the magazine's supporters and contributors - often without clear attribution of their affiliations.' (Life after Living Marxism ) 
+
:George Monbiot: The idea of them sitting behind what appears to be a front? Well another example is the way in which you have got this great proliferation of organisations which all do the same thing and have the same people in it, but run under a host of different names.  And perhaps, even more importantly, the way in which they stage debates which claim to be objective and even-handed debates but are totally controlled and managed.  And this is what the Institute of Ideas specialises in.  Where it will…it is very clever, it knows how to get famous names… because it will write to Melvyn Bragg or someone and say, ‘Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ are coming to speak at this conference we are having in six months time - would you like to join them?’ and they say, ‘Oh yes’.  And then they’ll write to Fay Weldon and say ‘Melvyn Bragg, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ are coming’.  Etc. And then they’ll say ‘Unfortunately, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ can’t come, but anyway we have got Melvyn Bragg and Faye Weldon’.  And that is how they operate.  So they get all these names together and everyone thinks ‘Oh look…look at all these big names doing this debate, it has got to be a really good debate’.  And then they will stuff the panels with these network people. And then you’ll suddenly say ‘Well no, hang on, wait a minute - there’s [[Tony Gilland]], and there’s [[Juliet Tizzard]], and there’s [[Fiona Fox]] - what are they doing on the panel?’
  
−
An incestous and self-perpetuating world of undisclosed affiliations
 
  
−
Thomas Deichmann , the editor of LM's sister publication Novo, provides a telling example of the group's resilience and ability to not only make clever use of 'platforms' of their own creation but to re-present members of their own network in different guises according to the current need of the war of ideas. 
+
==Organisations==
 +
===Precursors===
 +
*[[Revolutionary Communist Tendency]] (1977-1981) | [[National Organisation of Revolutionary Communist Students]] 1979 | [[Revolutionary Communist Party]] (1981-1996)| [[The Red Front]] (1987) |  [[Workers Against Racism]] (1978-?) | [[Smash the Prevention of Terrorism Act Campaign]] (1977-early 1980s) | [[Irish Freedom Movement]] (early 1980s to 1993) | ''[[Confrontation]]'', theoretical journal (1986-89) | [[The next step]], review/newspaper (1979-1994) | ''[[Living Marxism]]'' (1988-2000) | [[Ad-hoc Hands Off the Middle East Committee]], 1990 |
 +
===Companies===
 +
The LM network has operated via a series of companies.  At first these were publishing companies, but from the mid 1990s as they branched out into the science communication world and the internet these became for profit companies which often employed significant numbers of LM network associates as well as being used to cross-subsidise other LM network entities.  Companies include (in date order):
 +
*[[Junius Publications]] (1977-2000) | [[Informinc (LM) Limited]] (1997-2004) | [[JP Graphics Limited]] (1997-2003) | [[Cyberia]] | [[Easynet]] | [[CScape]] | [[Inset Press Limited]] | [[Academy of Ideas]] | [[Cybercafe Limited]] | [[Delta Bravo Limited]] |
  
−
According to German journalist Paul Stoop of the Berlin Tagesspiegel, nobody had ever heard of the editor of Novo before Deichmann reinvented himself as a fully-fledged Bosnia expert (The Guardian, 12 March 1997). In that guise Deichmann wrote material for Novo and LM, as well as for the RCP front group, the London International Research Exchange. Quite apart from the libel article, his pieces included a sympathetic interview with Radovan Karadzic, after the Bosnian Serb leader had been charged with genocide and crimes against humanity. Deichmann also put in an appearance as the final defence witness at the trial of the Serbian war criminal Dusko Tadic. (Poison in the well of history)    
+
===Defunct associated entities (with years of activity)===
 +
* [[Africa Direct]] 1995-1997
 +
* [[Campaign Against Militarism]] 1993-1998
 +
* [[Channel Cyberia]] 1996-1999
 +
* [[Chew On It Productions]] 2000 (inc. 2006) (dormant)
 +
* [[Culture Wars]] 1999-2013
 +
* [[Engaging Cogs]] 2006-2007
 +
* [[Families for Freedom]] 1996-1999
 +
* [[Feminists for Justice]] 1998-2000
 +
* [[Freedom & Law]] Active 1997
 +
* [[Genderwatch]] 1996-1999
 +
* [[Global Futures]] launched 2002 (dormant)
 +
* [[Inter-Generation]] launched 2009 {dormant}
 +
* [[Internet Freedom]] 1998-2006
 +
* [[Libero]] 1997-2000
 +
* [[Litigious Society]] launched 1999 by [[Global Futures]]
 +
* [[London International Research Exchange]] 1994-1998
 +
* [[Maverick Club]] 1998-2002
 +
* [[ME-WE]] 2003-2005
 +
* [[Modern Movement]] active 2009
 +
* [[Parents Against the Charter]] active 1991
 +
* [[The Progress Club]] 2001 (dormant)
 +
* [[Transport Research Group]] 2000-2008
 +
* [[Trasna An Domhain Go Leir]] 1999-2003
 +
* [[Workers Against Racism]] 1980-1994
  
−
But as the battle of ideas over Bosnia receded, Deichmann was reinvented once again. In April 2003 he was one of the speakers at a Genes and Society 'festival' in London organised by the the Institute of Ideas . Here he was billed not as an expert on Bosnia but as an expert commentator on GM crops and the Third World.   
+
===Active associated entities (with year of launch)===
 +
* [[Academics for Academic Freedom]] 2007 together with [[Student Academics For Academic Freedom]] 2007 - Unqualified free speech
 +
* [[Audacity]] 2000 - Construction
 +
* [[Big Potatoes]] 2010 - Innovation
 +
* [[Centre for Parenting Culture Studies]] 2007 - Academic network
 +
* [[East London Science School]] 2013 - School
 +
* [[Fans For Freedom]] 2012 - Anti-regulation
 +
* [[Freedom in a Puritan Age]] 2009 - online magazine (loose association)
 +
* [[Future Cities Project]] 2006 (together with [[Bookshop Barnies]] 2005 and [[ManTownHuman]] 2008) - Planning/ architecture
 +
* [[Generation Youth Issues]] 2007 - Children and young people's peer relations
 +
* [[Hands Off The Human Footprint!]] 2009 - 2010 (inactive) anti-environmentalist
 +
* [[Institute of Ideas]] 2000 (together with [[Battle of Ideas]] 2005, [[Debating Matters]] 2003 and [[Global Uncertainties Schools Network]] 2010) - Debating fora
 +
* [[Manifesto Club]] 2006 - Anti-regulation
 +
* [[Novo Argumente]] 1992 - German online magazine (sister organisation)
 +
* [[Parents With Attitude]] 2002 - Debating website
 +
* [[Pro-Choice Forum]] 1997 - Abortion studies
 +
* [[Salons]] (Regional) 2005 - Debating fora
 +
* [[Spiked]] 2000 (together with [[Young Journalists Academy]] 2006 and [[free speech NOW!]] 2014) - online magazine
 +
* [[Take a Liberty (Scotland)]] 2010 - Anti-regulation
 +
* [[WORLDwrite]] 1991 (together with [[WORLDbytes]] 2008) - Current affairs/ media training
  
−
Deichmann has also contributed articles to Novo and Spiked on Percy Schmeisser, the Canadian famer who has been in a long-running legal battle with Monsanto over patent issues in relation to GM crops. In his Spiked piece the man who once chided the Western media over their misreporting of Serbian atrocities, now chides them over their inaccurate reporting of the GM debate.                                                 
 
  
−
Completing his transformation from an expert exposer of 'myths' about Serb atrocities into an expert apologist for biotechnology, Deichmann has co-authored a book Das Populäre Lexikon der Gentechnik: Ãœberraschende Fakten von Allergie über Killerkartoffel bis Zelltherapie (The Popular Lexicon of Genetic Engineering: Surprising Facts from Allergy and Killer Potatoes to Cell Therapy) .  
+
The LM network appears to have some influence with the [[Genetic Interest Group]], the [[Progress Educational Trust]], the [[Science Media Centre]] and [[Sense About Science]].  It also has links with [[The Free Society]] which uses as columnists LM associates [[Suzy Dean]], [[Claire Fox]] and [[Dennis Hayes]], carries articles by LM associates [[Dolan Cummings]], [[Shirley Dent]] and [[Tim Black]] and maintains front page links with LM entities the Future Cities Project, Institute of Ideas and Spiked <ref>"[http://www.thefreesociety.org/ Think Tanks/ Media]", The Free Society website, accessed 31 May 2010</ref>. The Free Society has as its policy director ex Tory MSP and hard right ex Chairman of the now disbanded [[Federation of Conservative Students]], [[Brian Monteith]].  The other principal organisations involved in the Society are the tobacco industry lobbyists [[FOREST]] and the right wing think tank the [[Adam Smith Institute]].  The Free Society was a partner of the 2008 Battle of Ideas.
  
−
The platforms that have made this reinvention possible - Novo, Spiked and IoI - are all part of the same network. However, when the Spiked presented him at their 'festival' as, 'Thomas Deichmann editor, Novo magazine and co-author of The Popular Lexicon of Gene Technology', there was nothing to indicate that Novo is a sister publication of LM or that Deichmann's book  was published by Novo's publishing house.  
+
Information on these or other past or present LM/ RCP initiatives gratefully received.
  
−
This incestous and self-perpetuating world of undisclosed affiliations almost exactly replicates what Brad K. Blitz found in his study of revisionism and denial in relation to the Bosnian conflict. Blitz, who considered the role of Deichmann and fellow Living Marxism contributor Joan Phillips in the reporting of the conflict, noted how 'marginalized ideologies' are advanced through the 'incestuous nature' of what he calls 'the publication drive'. The players are not, Blitz writes, 'advancing knowledge but are rather recycling the founding ideas of certain ideological arguments that mesh with their own political agendas. Phillips' outrageous comments (many of which came straight out of the government-controlled Belgrade media) are re-packaged... [in an article] in Foreign Policy... [which] is then cited by... Diechmann who also makes reference to Phillips' 20 Things You Know About the Serbs That Aren't True . Diechmann is Phillips' colleague who then promotes the work of another author... [who] himself cites... Phillips and again repeats the same accusations.'   
+
==Notes==
−
 
+
<references/>
−
Defending Monsanto in the Wall Street Journal
+
[[Category:GM]][[Category:Pro-GM Lobbyists]][[Category:GM Lobby Groups]][[Category:Biotechnology]][[Category:Corporate Science]][[Category:LM network]]
−
 
 
−
However self-perpetuating and self-promoting the LM world may be, it is one that has been far from unchanging in the three decades since the birth of the RCP. The once fervent Trotskyist, Frank Furedi, who has been called the 'Father of the modern RCP', has in recent years been found defending Monsanto in the columns of the Wall Street Journal and pamphlet writing for the Centre for Policy Studies , a think tank founded by Margaret Thatcher and Keith Joseph. His CPS pamphlet was advertised alongside those of Lord Archer and Lord Saatchi. 
 
−
 
 
−
Furedi is even said to have tried to hock his services to the supermarket chains and the Food and Drink Federation as someone who could help them put consumers' minds at rest on food safety issues.  He also penned a reassuring report on risk for Lloyds of London which Lloyds say 'has the potential to be invaluable to our business'. A decade earlier Living Marxism had dismissed Lloyds as 'a benevolent fund for the rich' (LM 43). 
 
−
 
 
−
This corporate-alignment is also to be found at  Spiked and still more at the IoI where events are put on, for example, in 'association with Pfizer', the giant pharmaceutical company that aggressively promotes biotech, and with 'thanks' to CropLife International (a 'global federation' led by BASF, Bayer, Dow, DuPont, Monsanto and Syngenta). In a Times' interview  the IoI's director is drawn on another sponsor, Novartis. Asked who they are, she responds, 'Pharmaceuticals, I think. I don’t know who they are.'
 
−
 
 
−
Some of Furedi's followers appear to believe that he is just biting back the revolutionary critique in order to realign and mobilise forces who can, despite themselves, further the interests of the revolution. How those who choose to make use of the services provided by Furedi and his followers view the relationship is another matter. Like Lloyds, presumably, they see something of value for their businesses.
 
−
 
 
−
Monopolistic hidden agendas
 
−
 
 
−
Many of 'Furedi's children' have emerged from his base at the University of Kent Canterbury. Amongst these are Tracey Brown and Ellen Raphael, both of whom have gone on to work for PR company Regester Larkin . Regester Larkin help many of the major oil, pharmaceutical and biotech corporations manage their reputations in the face of what they term 'anti-technology activists' and 'risk averse' consumers. Regester Larkin's PR terminology is that honed by Furedi and LM.   
 
−
 
 
−
Keith Teare is another of Furedi's 'offspring'. Teare has written of his time at the University of Kent, 'I got a double first on an essay I wrote for Frank Furedi, who became a kind of mentor. We still keep in touch.' This seriously understates the relationship. Teare, under the name Keith Tompson, became a leading member of the RCP and in the 1980s headed the RCP front organisation Workers Against Racism.   
 
−
 
 
−
In the mid-90s, with the RCP heading more and more in its new pro-technology, pro-enterprise direction, Teare helped set up a series of internet business ventures, including Cyberia, Easynet, and Cscape. These were mostly headed by and employed other RCP-ers. Teare then went on to become a Silicon Valley tycoon, enjoying a roller coaster romp through the boom years of the new economy bubble.
 
−
 
 
−
During the Microsoft anti-trust trial Teare made a spirited defence of Microsoft and the American way of life - a line that was also peddled in LM. That, however, was before Microsoft pulled the plug on Teare's company, plunging it into liquidation. Since then some have accused Teare of playing the victim. His views on Microsoft certainly appear to have changed radically:
 
−
 
 
−
'We believe that Microsoft's investments should be seen for their positive impact not as a sign of monopolistic hidden agendas.'  Keith Teare,  June 7 2000
 
−
 
 
−
'Microsoft killed a whole market. It is a poor business decision made by souless people who clearly have the arrogance that comes from absolute power.' Keith Teare, June 4 2002
 
−
 
 
−
In Teare's extraordinary journey there seems to be a kind of metaphor for what happened to the RCP.
 
−
 
 
−
==LM group==
 
−
A
 
−
* [[Ian Abley]]
 
−
* [[Kate Abley]]
 
−
* [[Africa Direct]]
 
−
* [[Against Nature]]
 
−
* [[Duleep Allirajah]]
 
−
* [[Audacity.org]]
 
−
B
 
−
* [[Graham Barnfield]]
 
−
* [[Daniel Ben-Ami]]
 
−
* [[Mark Birbeck]]
 
−
* [[Carlton Brick]]
 
−
* [[Jennie Bristow]]
 
−
* [[Tracey Brown]]
 
−
C
 
−
* [[Campaign Against Militarism]]
 
−
* [[Campaign for Internet Freedom]]
 
−
* [[Aidan Campbell]]
 
−
* [[Channel Cyberia]]
 
−
* [[Barrie Collins]]
 
−
* [[John Conroy]]
 
−
D
 
−
* [[Steve Daley]]
 
−
* [[Thomas Deichmann]]
 
−
* [[Ceri Dingle]]
 
−
* [[Bill Durodié]]
 
−
F
 
−
* [[Families for Freedom]]
 
−
* [[Feminists for Justice]]
 
−
* [[Michael Fitzpatrick]]
 
−
* [[Fiona Foster]]
 
−
* [[Claire Fox]]
 
−
* [[Fiona Fox]]
 
−
* [[Freedom & Law]]
 
−
* [[Ann Furedi]]
 
−
* [[Frank Furedi]]
 
−
G
 
−
* [[Genetic Interest Group]]
 
−
* [[Tony Gilland]]
 
−
* [[John Gillott]]
 
−
* [[Global Futures]]
 
−
* [[Helene Guldberg]]
 
−
H
 
−
* [[James Heartfield]]
 
−
* [[Mick Hume]]
 
−
* [[Jonathan Hunt]]
 
−
I
 
−
* [[Institute of Ideas]]
 
−
* [[Irish Freedom Movement]]
 
−
J
 
−
* [[Tiffany Jenkins]]
 
−
K
 
−
* [[Eve Kaye]]
 
−
* [[Rob Killick]]
 
−
L
 
−
* [[Ellie Lee]]
 
−
* [[Kirk Leech]]
 
−
* [[Libero!]]
 
−
* [[Living Marxism]]
 
−
* [[Daniel Lloyd]]
 
−
* [[London International Research Exchange]]
 
−
* [[Rob Lyons]]
 
−
M
 
−
* [[ME-WE]]
 
−
* [[Kenan Malik]]
 
−
* [[Toby Marshall]]
 
−
* [[Julian Morris]]
 
−
* [[Phil Mullan]]
 
−
N
 
−
* [[Novo]]
 
−
P
 
−
* [[Reshmi Parag]]
 
−
* [[Parents Against the Charter]]
 
−
* [[John Pender]]
 
−
* [[Joan Phillips]]
 
−
R
 
−
* [[Ellen Raphael]]
 
−
* [[Revolutionary Communist Party]]
 
−
* [[Mark Ryan]]
 
−
S
 
−
* [[Peter Sammonds]]
 
−
* [[Science Media Centre]]
 
−
* [[Helen Searls]]
 
−
* [[Sense About Science]]
 
−
* [[Spiked Online]]
 
−
* [[Sandy Starr]]
 
−
T
 
−
* [[Keith Teare]]
 
−
* [[Juliet Tizzard]]
 
−
* [[Transport Research Group]]
 
−
* [[Trasna An Domhain Go Leir]]
 
−
W
 
−
* [[WORLDwrite]]
 
−
* [[David Webb]]
 
−
* [[Austin Williams]]
 
−
* [[Workers Against Racism]]
 
−
* [[James Woudhuysen]]
 
−
 
 
−
==Authors==
 
−
 
 
−
This section is the collective product of
 
−
*[[Jonathan Matthews]]
 
−
*[[David Miller]]
 
−
*[[Andy Rowell]]
 

Latest revision as of 21:27, 25 October 2014

LM network resources

The LM network or LM group is a superficially loose and informal network of individuals and organisations sharing a libertarian and anti-environmentalist ideology. Its constituent organisations are led and largely composed of people associated with the defunct Revolutionary Communist Tendency/Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) and its principal publication Living Marxism. The network has no public presence or acknowledged existence. The strongest link is between the largest and longest established entities, Spiked and the Institute of Ideas, both established in 2000 by close associates and for many years operating from the same address, Signet House 49-51 Farringdon Road EC1M 3JB, previously the offices of Living Marxism [1]. Thus Patrick Hayes affirms in his twitter profile "I work for spiked www.spiked-online.com and the Institute of Ideas www.instituteofideas.com...". [2] Associated entities typically have overlapping personnel, similar themes, views and techniques, and promote one another. The network's funds and staff numbers are relatively limited as is its influence. Perhaps of most concern are those LM associates who have obtained influential positions with other organisations and the network’s extensive youth oriented programmes.

The rationale for profiling the LM network on Powerbase is not any one of its main characteristics but rather their combination; these being: advocating policies which benefit corporate interests, as set out by the Institute of Ideas, corporate funding, a significant focus on influencing youth; the number of organisations it operates; and a lack of transparency about its origins, methods, scope and purpose. This profile is necessarily extensive and detailed because of the network's disparate nature and the lack of formal public links between its entities.

The first edition of Living Marxism, November 1988, edited by Mick Hume.


The logo of LM Magazine after it changed its name from Living Marxism at issue 97 in February 1997.[3]

Methods

The Institute of Ideas’ Director Claire Fox concedes, ‘Certainly, there is a network of like-minded people. Some people do come from an RCP background, because we have a long intellectual history together, and we do work together sometimes…’[4] Former editor of LM and Spiked and continuing Spiked contributor Mick Hume confirms, ‘The network of people I live and work with contain lots of people who were members of the RCP.’[5] while Spiked and Institute of Ideas contributor Dolan Cummings explains ‘I never left the RCP: the organisation folded in the mid-Nineties, but few of us actually 'recanted' our ideas. Instead we resolved to support one another more informally as we pursued our political tradition as individuals, or launched new projects with more general aims that have also engaged people from different traditions, or none. These include Spiked and the Institute of Ideas... ‘[6]

Living Marxism logo circa January 1997 from their website www.junius.co.uk

In his statement announcing the closure of LM magazine in spring 2000, LM editor Mick Hume promised that “The LM-initiated Institute of Ideas, a series of events planned to take place from June to July, will go ahead in partnership with major institutions in London, including the British Library, the Royal Institution, the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Society of Arts, Tate Modern, and the Union Chapel Project. A new company, the Academy of Ideas, has been set up by Claire Fox to coordinate these events.”

He also stated that “As for the post-LM future of magazine publishing, watch this space”. Mick Hume was the first editor of Spiked, launched shortly afterwards.

Many of the organisational and campaigning approaches used by those in the network are characteristic of those used by the RCP, including: the creation of a range of organisations without apparent formal links; the launching of multiple campaigns; the use of extensive and extended debate; the adoption of contrarian and controversial positions; the use of martial terminology; and the early adoption of leading edge communication techniques.

A defining characteristic of the network’s entities are their positioning and presentation as catalysts for debate or irreverent challenging of established orthodoxy. In practice, this enables the promotion of the views of the network and its sponsors on almost any topic, under the guise of free enquiry. Their principal underlying themes of economic development and freedom from regulation benefit corporate interests while the larger and more established organisations explicitly seek sponsorship, either directly or via PR companies or free enterprise think tanks. Several of the entities target young people, while others are sector or issue led. The network's entities are increasingly seeking partners overseas.

Individual ex-RCP members with links to the network have assumed influential positions elsewhere, particularly in the media and sciences. Members of the network write regularly for mainstream news publications, particularly the Independent, which publishes an occasional series of Battle of Ideas thought pieces, Prospect and Huffington Post (UK) and appear on topical radio programmes, notably the Moral Maze.

However, higher education is the most common occupational sector of associated personnel. Many have past or current links with the adjacent Universities of Kent, Canterbury Christ Church, Sussex and East London. Their influence on the latter is particularly evident in UEL units London East Research Institute and Rising East. Details of some of those associated with the LM network are available via LM network at the bottom of this page.

An example of how the network operates was when LM associates James Heartfield and James Woudhuysen set up a building industry consultancy Audacity [7] and sought funding from building companies [8]. The consultancy then published Heartfield’s book ‘Let’s Build’ calling for government support for the building industry [9]. Heartfield’s book was then promoted across part of the rest of the network: Birmingham Salon [10], Spiked [11] and WORLDbytes. [12]

Internet Freedom, a project of the LM network
Libero, a project of the LM network
Transport Research Group, a project of the LM network
The Institute of Ideas: an LM project. Image from the LM website @ www.informinc.co.uk circa 2000 promoting the first Institute of Ideas event in June/July 2000[13]
Institute of Ideas, at the core of the LM network
Battle of Ideas, a project of the Institute of Ideas, part of the LM network
The Academy, a project of the Institute of Ideas, a core element of the LM network
Battle of Ideas banner noting the funding of the LM network by pharma giant Pfizer, BT and Rupert Murdoch's newspaper The Times.
Culture Wars, a project of the Institute of Ideas, a core element of the LM network
Debating Matters a project of the Institute of Ideas a core element of the LM network
Global Uncertainties Schools Network a project of Debating Matters which is in turn part of the Institute of Ideas a core element of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network
Salons, projects of the LM network


Academics for Academic Freedom and LM network associate.
Student Academics for Academic Freedom the student equivalent of Academics for Academic Freedom a project of the LM network
Manifesto Club part of the LM network
Logo of the Maverick Club, circa 2000, a part of the LM network
Logo of Spiked, a core element of the LM network, circa 2011.
Young Journalists Academy is a project of Journalism Education Limited launched by Spiked a core part of the LM network
Novo Argumente the German magazine affiliated with the LM network
Hands Off The Human Footprint a Spiked campaign, part of the LM network
The one and only Modern Movement demo - a counter to the protests against the third Heathrow runway in February 2009.
Audacity, an LM network project
Big Potatoes part of the LM network
Engaging Cogs, an LM network project
Future Cities Project, associated with the LM network
Global Futures, an LM network venture
ManTownHuman a project of the LM network
Centre for Parenting Culture Studies, associated with the LM network
Generation Youth Issues, a project of the LM network
Parents With Attitude, associated with the LM network
Pro-Choice Forum, part of the LM network


Worldwrite, part of the LM network
Worldbytes part of WORLDWrite, a project of the LM network
Easynet, started by LM network associate Keith Teare
Cyberia a business set up by LM network associate Keith Teare
The logo of the East London Science School the first venture of the LM network into running an educational establishment


Funding

None of the organisations associated with the LM network provides a breakdown of funders and how much they have provided. We do know, however, that they are funded by corporations that fund think tanks dedicated to promoting their interests in the political and media spheres. For example, the pharmaceutical company Pfizer has funded Spiked, the Institute of Ideas' Battle of Ideas in 2005 and 2006, the Debating Matters programme and two organisations with which the LM network has connections, the Science Media Centre and Sense About Science. Both of the latter are engaged in managing debate about scientific issues.

As well as funding the LM network, Pfizer funds free market think tanks such as the US-based Competitive Enterprise Institute and Cato Institute, the Netherlands-based Edmund Burke Foundation, the Brussels based Centre for the New Europe (which also does work on climate funded by Exxon), the UK’s Social Market Foundation and the American Council on Science and Health, a deceptive front group. [14] Pfizer is a member of one of the most important global corporate lobby groups, the International Chamber of Commerce. [15] What’s in it for Pfizer? One clue is in the topics covered by the Debating Matters schools debating competition which include such subjects of interest to the pharmaceutical industry as: the value or otherwise of complementary medicine, NHS rationing of expensive drugs, clinical trials in developing countries, fertility treatments, genetic screening, anti-aging treatments, genetic engineering and animal experimentation.

BT is another major sponsor of the LM network. BT sponsored the Battle of Ideas in 2006, 2007 and 2008. In addition, then BT subsidiary O2 sponsored five Spiked Debates during 2005, 2006 and 2007[16] while another was sponsored by Orange. The Mobile Operators Association is also on record as having funded Spiked. In return, BT/ O2 and other operators had the opportunity via Spiked to challenge public concerns about the perceived effects on health, child protection and the environment of mobile phones.

Other corporations and corporate lobby groups that have funded the LM network are Cadbury Schweppes, IBM, Novartis, Orange, O2, The Mobile Operators Association and the Society of the Chemical Industry. [17] These sources of funding are typical of lobbying or PR firms. Unsurprisingly, some of the biggest lobby firms also fund the network. Hill and Knowlton is one of the most controversial lobbying and PR firms in the world, having famously been behind the deception on the incubator baby story in Kuwait in 1990/91. It also worked for a long list of controversial corporations, including some from the oil, tobacco, pharma, fast food, and GM industry. It worked too for repressive regimes, including Egypt, Haiti, Indonesia, Morocco, Turkey – and China after the Tiananmen square massacre. Along with PR firm Luther Pendragon (which has worked for the Hinduja brothers, Macdonalds, Pepsi, the GM industry and others), Hill and Knowlton has put up cash for LM network events.

The LM network has also worked with other free market think tanks such as the International Policy Network (which took money from Exxon for climate change ’outreach’) and the Social Issues Research Centre (which takes money from the food, alcohol and tech industry and downplays the risks from their products). [18]

Comment by George Monbiot

The following is an excerpt from an interview by Lobbywatch with George Monbiot about the LM network:[19]

Lobbywatch: Do you actually think there is a network of people concertedly working together as this LM group?
George Monbiot: That is a good question and I think it could be answered in several different ways. There is a group of people who have more or less stuck together for a long time. To what extent they consciously organise under a single name or under a single banner, I don’t know - you would have to ask them. But that they have pursued a very consistent agenda for quite a long time and the fact that they have moved first of all into one industry, television, and then into another, science communication, more or less as a body, suggests to me that there is a coordinated programme of action.
Lobbywatch: We all have networks of people that we interact with. What makes this so different? Why do you find it so worrying?
George Monbiot: There are two reasons why I find it worrying. The first is that the agenda they pursue appears not to be pursued overtly. For example, when they ran the magazine Living Marxism it was very far from a Marxism journal - it was just about as far from a Marxist journal as you could possibly get. And it seemed to me that the title was a direct and deliberate attempt to distract attention from the fact that this was a far right wing libertarian publication which was using the terms of the left to make it look as if the positions it was taking were new and unusual ones. Whereas in actual fact they were very well trodden ones, but well trodden by people like the Libertarian Alliance who in theory were at the other end of the political spectrum.

In another part of the interview, Monbiot talks about the LM network's lack of transparency and their fondness for ostensibly objective debates:

Lobbywatch: Could you give more examples really of how you see them as not being as transparent as they might be? ...
George Monbiot: The idea of them sitting behind what appears to be a front? Well another example is the way in which you have got this great proliferation of organisations which all do the same thing and have the same people in it, but run under a host of different names. And perhaps, even more importantly, the way in which they stage debates which claim to be objective and even-handed debates but are totally controlled and managed. And this is what the Institute of Ideas specialises in. Where it will…it is very clever, it knows how to get famous names… because it will write to Melvyn Bragg or someone and say, ‘Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ are coming to speak at this conference we are having in six months time - would you like to join them?’ and they say, ‘Oh yes’. And then they’ll write to Fay Weldon and say ‘Melvyn Bragg, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ are coming’. Etc. And then they’ll say ‘Unfortunately, Mahatma Ghandi, Nelson Mandela and Jesus Christ can’t come, but anyway we have got Melvyn Bragg and Faye Weldon’. And that is how they operate. So they get all these names together and everyone thinks ‘Oh look…look at all these big names doing this debate, it has got to be a really good debate’. And then they will stuff the panels with these network people. And then you’ll suddenly say ‘Well no, hang on, wait a minute - there’s Tony Gilland, and there’s Juliet Tizzard, and there’s Fiona Fox - what are they doing on the panel?’


Organisations

Precursors

Companies

The LM network has operated via a series of companies. At first these were publishing companies, but from the mid 1990s as they branched out into the science communication world and the internet these became for profit companies which often employed significant numbers of LM network associates as well as being used to cross-subsidise other LM network entities. Companies include (in date order):

Defunct associated entities (with years of activity)

Active associated entities (with year of launch)


The LM network appears to have some influence with the Genetic Interest Group, the Progress Educational Trust, the Science Media Centre and Sense About Science. It also has links with The Free Society which uses as columnists LM associates Suzy Dean, Claire Fox and Dennis Hayes, carries articles by LM associates Dolan Cummings, Shirley Dent and Tim Black and maintains front page links with LM entities the Future Cities Project, Institute of Ideas and Spiked [20]. The Free Society has as its policy director ex Tory MSP and hard right ex Chairman of the now disbanded Federation of Conservative Students, Brian Monteith. The other principal organisations involved in the Society are the tobacco industry lobbyists FOREST and the right wing think tank the Adam Smith Institute. The Free Society was a partner of the 2008 Battle of Ideas.

Information on these or other past or present LM/ RCP initiatives gratefully received.

Notes

  1. ↑ ”LM Magazine” Local Life website accessed 7th June 2010
  2. ↑ P Hayes Twitter website acc 29 Oct 2011
  3. ↑ 'Welcome to the new-look LM', LM, February 1997, retrieved from the Internet Archive of 18 February 1998, accessed 27 October 2010
  4. ↑ Chris Bunting, What's a nice Trot doing in a place like this?, Times Higher Education, 28 Jan 2005, acc 21 May 2010
  5. ↑ Andy Beckett, Licence to rile, The Guardian, 15 May 1999, acc 21 May 2010
  6. ↑ Dolan Cummings, In defence of ‘radicalisation’: Critiques of Hizb ut-Tahrir focus less on its dodgy politics than on its intellectualism. But what’s wrong with a devotion to the debate of ideas?, Spiked, 12 Oct 2007, acc 21 May 2010
  7. ↑ "People" Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010
  8. ↑ "We need your support", Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010
  9. ↑ "Buy" Audacity website, accessed 5 June 2010
  10. ↑ "Let’s Build event 8th June 2010", Birmingham Salon website, accessed 5 June 2010
  11. ↑ "We need more houses, not divisive housing policies" Spiked website, accessed 5 June 2010
  12. ↑ "Programme 7 Audacity Director Ian Abley on planning laws" WORLDbytes website, accessed 5 June 2010
  13. ↑ Retrieved from the Internet Archive the LM website of 7 February 2000
  14. ↑ "American Council on Science and Health", BMJ website, accessed 3 May 2010
  15. ↑ "Links to ICC member companies", International Chamber of Commerce website, accessed 3 May 2010
  16. ↑ "Online debates", Spiked website, accessed 7 June 2010
  17. ↑ "Spiked Brand Managers’ Pack", Spiked website, accessed 8 May 2010
  18. ↑ "The Social Issues Research Centre", BMJ website, accessed 3 May 2010
  19. ↑ Lobbywatch, Interview with George Monbiot about the LM group, 11 April 2007, archived on GMWatch website, accessed 21 May 2010
  20. ↑ "Think Tanks/ Media", The Free Society website, accessed 31 May 2010
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