{jathumbnail off}The recent upsurge in movement building is something to be celebrated, in that it both reflects and answers the demand for new forms of social and political involvement from the people. It is a difficult and often chaotic process, writes Niall Crowley, which needs to try and answer questions like: How to challenge dominant ideas and entrenched mindsets? How to build effective forms of organisation on what is currently emerging? What effective strategies for change can be developed on actions currently being taken?

{jathumbnail off}Yes, Morgan Kelly is right: Ireland has to ditch this bailout. But no, that doesn’t mean we have to deliver a ‘lethal injection’ to the economy by immediately balancing the books. The ECB isn’t the only bank in town, writes former commercial banker John Clark - Ireland simply needs to look to examples, and perhaps lenders, beyond the European centre.

As part of the May Day International initiative, all of this week's CrisisJam articles are also being published on a special subsite hosted by newleftproject.org (see here), along with contributions from the Greek Left Review, ZNet (USA) and the New Left Project itself.

There is an overwhelming democratic case for a referendum on the EU/IMF ‘bailout’ which commits Ireland to swingeing austerity and the gutting of public services for years, if not decades to come. Voters in February’s general election thought that by voting in Fine Gael and Labour they were effectively saying ‘no’ to the terms of that bailout, but within three weeks the new government had capitulated on promises made during the election campaign, and committed themselves to exactly the strategy pursued by the former ruling coalition of Fianna Fáil and the Greens.

The time of the respectable dissenter - clad in an office suit, with a seat at the table and a place in line for funding – is past, writes Laurence Cox. The bodies involved in ‘social partnership’ are now too depending on funding and policy access, and their bases too disillusioned, to be effective vehicles for change. What is needed in Ireland are effective organisers, movements for change whose primary concern is finding issues around which ordinary people can organise.

Discontent and discord are the main features of NATO's intervention in Libya. By Seosamh Ó Riain.

The trolls - most of us will have encountered them at one time or another. In a comment section, on a message board or Facebook page there is always someone ready to unleash a torrent of abuse, and more often than not the most vicious language is reserved for those who least deserve it. Angela Nagle looks at the phenomenon of trolling, the cultural politics behind it, and asks is it a necessary evil?

Wednesday’s Irish Times tells us that Fine Gael and Labour have started their policy u-turns with gusto, and not a little pathetically either. By Jason O’Mahony.

As Ireland becomes a more unequal society, the already huge pressures on social workers are going to worsen and the societal problems they deal with at work will deepen. While the state writes off billions to provide a safety net for the private sector, these public sector workers are being forced to pay to be legally scrutinised, writes Angela Nagle, right at the time when we need them most.