More than 1,100 tickets were sold to this year’s Marxism 2014 conference, held over the Easter weekend in Melbourne. Opening night was the most successful in the history of the conference. The University of Melbourne’s Union House Theatre was full to capacity with at least 455 people coming for a discussion on the theme of “disaster capitalism”.

Heroic Indigenous fighter Lex Wotton broke his silence over the murder of Mulrunji Doomadgee and Wotton’s subsequent imprisonment for participating in protests against the Palm Island police. He was received with thunderous applause and a standing ovation.

Gilbert Achcar, renowned author of The people want! A radical exploration of the Arab Spring, spoke about the contemporary capitalist crisis: “The only real alternative is and remains between barbarism, as the inevitable consequence of this kind of capitalism, or socialism.”

Participants also heard from workers fresh from impressive victories. “PALEA’s win is a win for all workers”, said Alnem Pretencio of the Philippine Airlines Employees Association. PALEA won an epic two-year battle against Philippine Airlines over outsourcing. Pretencio also conveyed PALEA’s solidarity with QANTAS workers.

In Victoria, after a six-week lockout, workers at Super A-Mart also have won their first EBA. “When Tony Abbott’s government is trying to run an agenda of slave wages and encourage companies to pay workers less, I think our story proves that if workers stay together and stay strong and ... are not willing to back down ... and if unions are willing to come together and help each other out ... we will always win”, said Super A-Mart worker and NUW delegate, Chad Wyatt.

On Friday, legendary activist Gary Foley had a message for all the young revolutionaries in an audience that had again filled Union House Theatre: “Don’t make the same mistake that my generation did ... We changed the world alright, we changed it dramatically, but we took our eye off the ball and the bastards came along behind us and changed it back! So don’t let them change it back”, he said.

On Saturday, celebrated US hip-hop artist Boots Riley began his session “Race and politics in the US” with a radical song – “I got love for the underdog”. He spoke about his experience organising the Occupy Oakland general strike in 2011 and the urgency of a class analysis for the left today.

Another highlight of the conference was the session on women and the criminal injustice system. Panellist Vickie Roach, an inspiring activist for Indigenous, women’s and prisoners’ rights, said, “The entire system is rotten to the core, from the top down and it all needs to come down and I’m not just talking about the prison system: the entire rotten capitalist system needs to come down.”

Socialist Alternative and Red Flag would like to send a big thank you to everyone who participated in the conference and made Marxism 2014 the vibrant and inspiring event it was.

[Marxism 2015 will be held over the Easter weekend 2-5 April.]