Speaker Index

Tom Sullivan

Ugo Palheta is a sociologist, co-editor of the journal Contretemps and a member of the New Anticapitalist Party. He has published La possibilité du fascisme, a study of the conditions of possibility for fascism in France and the need to fight it.

Ugo Palheta

Phil Butland is a British socialist who has been living in Germany for 27 years. He is a member of die LINKE (the Left Party) and marx21 and is the speaker of the Berlin LINKE Internationals group, which tries to organise non-Germans in Berlin. He is also the commissioning editor for www.theleftberlin.com.

Phil Butland

Abdul Nouri was born in Ghazni, Afghanistan. In 2002 he fled to Pakistan after the American invasion of Afghanistan. He came to Australia as a refugee in 2010. Currently he volunteers at the Migrant Workers Centre. He is also the Victorian state representative of Nasle Baba Foundation.

Abdul Nouri

Betelhem Tibebu Zeleke is a refugee from Ethiopia. She came to Australia by boat in 2013. She was detained in refugee prisons on Nauru and Brisbane for more than 4 years. Betelhem is currently on a temporary visa facing uncertain future in Australia.

Betelhem Tibebu Zeleke

Shovan Bhattarai

Declan Kerr

Tim Arnot is a longstanding socialist and unionist, recently involved in fighting for covid-safety at work. 

Tim Arnot

Liam Parry

Oula Shihan

Sam Watson

Anna Redshaw

Ti Parker is the Environment Officer for the University of Queensland Union and a socialist student activist. 

Ti Parker

Tristan Dutchin is an Amazon worker and Amazon Labor Union organiser in New York. Tristan sees the recent ALU win as a step towards rebuilding a strong labour movement, not just at Amazon and not just in the US, but for all the workers of the world.

Tristan Dutchin

Bashana Abeywardane has been working as a journalist since 1992 and currently lives in exile. He is the coordinator of exiled rights group Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka (JDS).

Bashana Abeywardane

Viraj Dissanayake

Roxanne Kelly

Ella Marchionda

Dean Maloney

Sebastian Evans

Emma Black

Cat Rose

Cathy Lewis

Matthias Radja

Ruby Healer

Xavier Dupe

Laura Riccardi

Tanya McConvell

Monica Sestito

Steph Price

Emma Dook

Emma Dynes

Colleen Bolger

Ryan Laws

Cecilia Judge

Luka Kiernan

Julien Macandili

Elyssia Bugg

Briana Symonds-Manne

Janey Stone has been a lifelong socialist and activist since her days at Melbourne Uni in the 1960s. She was a founding member in 1972 of Socialist Workers Action Group which became the International Socialists and is a predecessor group of Socialist Alternative. She has been active around the Vietnam War, Women's Liberation, health and medical politics, trade unionism and Jewish anti-Zionism. She has published many newspaper and journal articles and given many talks on these topics and others such as radical Jewish history and resistance to the Nazis. In recent years, Janey's focus has been on cultural issues and she leads multi-media performances on political topics at the annual Marxism conference. Janey was the founding force behind the establishment of left-wing publisher Interventions in 2015 and edited Tom O'Lincoln's political memoirs The Highway is for Gamblers (Interventions 2017).

Janey Stone

Naomi Farmer

Gregor Benton is emeritus professor of Chinese history at Cardiff University. He has published many books on China and other subjects. His principal research areas are modern Chinese history, dissent under communism, and Chinese diaspora. His 

Mountain Fires: The Red Army's Three-Year War in South China, 1934–1938

 won several awards, including the Association of Asian Studies’ prize for the Best Book on Modern China. His translation of Mei Zhi’s 

Gregor Benton

Robert Narai is a longstanding socialist activist and writer. Along with involvement in a variety of campaigns, Robert has written widely for Red Flag and the Marxist Left Review. His recent writing, featuring exhaustive interviews with those involved, has focused on the revolution in Myanmar, and includes the long form article '“Until the end of the world”: Myanmar’s unfinished revolution'.

Robert Narai

Thanush Selvarasa is a refugee who fled Sri Lanka and was imprisoned under the Australian government’s barbaric detention regime for 8 years. In 2020 he was brought to the Australian mainland for medical treatment, and was detained in Melbourne. In February of 2021, he was granted freedom thanks to a tireless campaign led by refugees and refugee activists. Thanush is a member of socialist group Podhuvudamai Iyakkam and continues to fight for the freedom of his friends in detention.

Thanush Selvarasa

Jess Lenehan is a longstanding socialist and ant-fascist activist in Melbourne. She has played a prominent role in the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism, along with may other campaigns. She has frequently written for Red Flag newspaper, including on the topic of the contemporary far right.

Jess Lenehan

Chris di Pasquale is a socialist activist and the former LGBTI Officer for the National Union of Students. He has been involved in the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism and the Yes Campaign for Marriage Equality, and has written on contemporary politics and social justice issues for Red Flag newspaper.

Chris di Pasquale

Omar Hassan is a socialist activist and the editor of the Marxist Left Review. He has played a prominent role in a wide variety of left-wing campaigns, including the movement against the far right, for refugee rights and the environment. He has written widely on the dynamics of global capitalism, including his latest editorial 'Morbid Symptoms'.

Omar Hassan 

Jordan is a longstanding socialist activist currently based in Sydney. He has written a number of articles for 

on understanding colonialism and the oppression of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people Australia. His forthcoming book is entitled 

Jordan Humphreys

Sadia Schneider is a socialist activist and contributor to Red Flag and the Marxist Left Review. She has written and researched widely on Marxist theory and history and her writings include 'Marx and the State: The Politics of Philosophy'.

Sadia Schneider

Ryan Stanton 

Ben Hillier is the editor of Red Flag newspaper. He is the author of 'Losing Santhia: Life and loss in the struggle for Tamil Eelam' and 'The Art of Rebellion: Dispatches from Hong Kong'. 

Ben Hillier

Liz Ross is a long term socialist who has written widely on Australian politics and the Australian labour movement. Her works include 'Revolution is for us: The Left and Gay Liberation in Australia', 'Dare to struggle, dare to win! Builders Labourers fight deregistration, 1981–94' and 'How capitalism is costing us the earth'.

Liz Ross

Chloe Rafferty

Kim Bullimore

Katie has been a delegate for the library at the University of Melbourne for the National Tertiary Education Union for just over a decade. She has been involved in numerous campaigns to save jobs, around Enterprise Bargaining and to defend working conditions. She is also an historian and archivist, undertaking a phd on women in the Australian metal trades. She has written several articles for the Marxist Left Review.

Katie Wood

Liam Ward is a Melbourne-based revolutionary socialist, a lecturer and fim-maker. Most recently he has been a founding member and key activist in 'NTEU Fightback', a rank-and-file centre that waged an electrifying opposition to the national union's agenda of pay cuts, concessions and capitulations amid the deep crisis in the higher education sector.

Liam Ward

James Plested

Jamiel Deeb

Mick Armstrong

Luca Tavan

Priya De

Kath Larkin is a socialist and trade union activist, who is the Victorian Socialists candidate for the seat of Cooper. Kath has a long history of organising for workers' rights in the Railway Industry and was the first female delegate in the RTBU. She has also researched and written on Australian labour history.

Kath Larkin

Rebecca Barrigos is a lifelong socialist activist who has helped build up socialist politics in both Melbourne and Brisbane. She has played a key role in Palestine solidarity campaigning in Brisbane and has written in-depth historical articles on issues around Higher Education in Australia, Aboriginal dispossession and the political economy of Queensland for the 

Rebecca Barrigos

Louise O’Shea

Sagar Sanyal

Darren Roso

Duncan Hart

Ella Gutteridge

Kim Stern

Sarah Garnham

April Holcombe is a long-standing activist in Sydney and currently the co-convenor of Community Action for Rainbow Rights. She recently published the following extended article on Marxism, gender oppression and trans liberation: https://marxistleftreview.org/articles/the-freedom-to-be-marxism-gender-oppression-and-the-struggle-for-trans-liberation/

April Holcombe

Corey is a member of Socialist Alternative's National Executive, and an editor of the newspaper Red Flag. 

Corey Oakley

Lavanya Thavaraja is a Melbourne-based refugee activist and unionist. She is part of the Tamil Refugee Council, an organisation which advocates for Tamil refugees like herself who have fled genocide at the hands of the Sri Lankan government and now face persecution in Australia.

Lavanya Thavaraja

Nahui is a Mexican-Australian socialist. She has been part of the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (CARF) since 2015 and is currently involved in the campaign to free the Medevac refugees in Melbourne.

Nahui Jimenez

Jerome Small is Socialist Alternative's industrial organiser. He has been a socialist and union activist in the telecommunications, clothing, clerical and construction industries for over 30 years, as well as playing a prominent role in climate, refugee and anti-uranium campaigns.

Jerome Small

Aran Mylvaganam is a long-time refugee activist and founder of the Tamil Refugee Council which has led the ongoing campaign to bring the Tamil refugee family of Priya, Nades and their two children home to Biloela. He is a trade unionist and is running in the upcoming federal election as the Senate candidate of the Victorian Socialists.

Aran Mylvaganam

Gary Foley is a legendary Aboriginal activist, writer, actor, teacher, storyteller and historian. Foley describes his politicisation after arriving in Redfern in 1967 at the age of seventeen: "Getting bashed by the NSW coppers, and reading the biography of Malcolm X; that transformed my thinking". Foley was soon involved in setting up the Aboriginal Legal Service and the Sydney chapter of the Black Power Movement. In 1972, he was one of the founders of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra.

Foley has been a regular speaker at Marxism conferences over the years, schooling and entertaining hundreds with his lively stories and research into Aboriginal history. 

Dr. Gary Foley

Anneke is the convenor of Uni Students for Climate Justice which organised protests of tens of thousands in response to the 2019-2020 Summer bushfires. She’s also a long term member of Socialist Alternative and student organiser for the group. 

Anneke Demanuele

Panos Petrou is a leading member of Internationalist Workers Left (DEA, by its initials in Greek), a revolutionary socialist organization in Greece.

Panos Petrou

Tom Bramble is a long-term socialist activist, author and retired academic based in Queensland, Australia. He taught Industrial Relations at the University of Queensland for many years and has authored numerous books and articles on the Australian labour movement. His most recent book, with Mick Armstrong, is 'Fighting for Worker's Power: Revolution and Counter-revolution, 1917-1956'.

Tom Bramble

Roz Ward has gained national attention as the founder of the Safe Schools program, an anti-bullying program designed for children and youth. Her dedication to fighting for LGBTI rights has remained throughout relentless attacks on her and the Safe Schools program from conservative personalities and media, and she even faced a  controversial dismissal from her position at La Trobe University in Melbourne. She was only reinstated after a successful public campaign. Roz was of course part of leading the marriage equality campaign, and has said “I will never give up fighting for a more free and joyful world”. She is one of the hosts of the Redflag Radio podcast. 

Roz Ward

Jorge Jorquera is a recently elected Victorian Socialist member of the Maribyrnong City Council. He has been active in socialist politics for many years in Australia and is also a member of Socialist Alternative. Jorge will be speaking at the session "Trabajadores al poder" Chile '73: perspectives on revolutionary strategy and tactics.

Jorge Jorquera

Sandra Bloodworth is a labour historian and socialist activist, based in Melbourne, Australia. She has been involved in radical politics since the 1970s, where she has played roles in the women's, Aboriginal, anti-uranium mining and trade union movements. She is a member of the National Executive of Socialist Alternative and has written on the Russian Revolution, the global financial crisis, women's struggles, working class resistance in the Middle East and Australian imperialism. 

Featured Speakers