The Jewish Labor Bund, from its beginning, described itself as a Marxist, revolutionary party, wanting thus to place itself in the camp of those opposed to the reformist tendencies in the world socialist movement.
Category: Culture & History
Spotify Itself Is Misinformation
If big-money artists, like Neil Young, are speaking out against Spotify but not mentioning the company’s exploitative practices, then Spotify couldn’t have asked for a better distraction from its wretched business model.
Reply to Eric Blanc’s “Can Leninists Explain the Russian Revolution?: A Reply to Sam Farber”
If the main strategic task for the American Left is to change the existing relation of forces in society, Congress cannot be the main arena of struggle.
Can Leninists Explain the Russian Revolution?
A Reply to Sam Farber
Learning the right lessons from the Russian Revolution is one way socialists today can start to more critically, and more effectively, develop strategies and tactics appropriate to the actual contexts in which we find ourselves.
review
Marx’s Last Years Explored
Karl Marx’s last years, when he famously failed to complete all the volumes of Capital, were for a long time viewed as a period of illness and even senescence, even though he was only 64 years old at his death . . .
review
The Centrality of Dialectics in Marxist Theory and Politics
Kevin B. Anderson’s1 latest offering, Dialectics of Revolution, brings forward diverse perspectives on the concept of dialectics that have been discussed over the past two centuries. Beginning from Hegel, Anderson extends the discussion to Marx and then further on to . . .
review
The Life and Political Contributions of Hubert Harrison
With the completion of his biography of Hubert Harrison, Jeffrey B. Perry has made a monumental contribution to our understanding of one of Black history’s most important yet neglected figures. Hubert Henry Harrison (1883-1927) was the first Black figure in the . . .
Psychoanalysis for Collective Liberation
A Review of Erich Fromm’s Critical Theory
Erich Fromm (1900-1980) was a humanistic psychoanalyst, writer, and activist influenced by the theories of Marx and Freud, though critical of both.
Was there a Revolutionary Social Democracy?
Samuel Farber reviews Eric Blanc’s Revolutionary Social Democracy. Working Class Politics Across the Russian Empire (1882-1917), a book that is likely to become the focus of important debate on the left.
For a 21st Century Bolshevism: Re-Configuring the Relations between the Cadres and the Subject
A 21st century Bolshevism should be much more open to both popular rebellion and cadre opposition to socialist rule than the original Bolsheviks ever were.
An Especially Shameful Episode in Zionist History
We need to know all this history and lots more about Zionist leaders’ dealings with Jew haters so we can immediately confront and neutralize Zionist slander the next time they falsely cry “antisemitism.”
It’s Easier to Imagine a Mark Fisher Meme than the End of Platform Capitalism
A constellation of events has thrown left wing memes into the mainstream, leading to a confirmation of the late Mark Fisher’s thesis that countercultural trends tend to be co-opted by capitalist media.
Beyond Tragedy: Postscript on Kronstadt at 100
To avoid repeating the Kronstadt tragedy, and to build toward principled world revolution, we can commit to organizing transnational solidarity and speaking out against all forms of authoritarian repression.
The Kronstadt Revolt of 1921 as a part of the Great Russian Revolution
The March revolution of 1921, initiated by “Red Kronstadt”, had to complete the cause of the February and October revolutions of 1917. In this context, the Kronstadt revolt of 1921 appears as an integral part of the revolutionary process that took several years.
Kronstadt at 100
On the 100th anniversary of the Kronstadt events, New Politics is hosting a symposium on the historic tragedy, its meaning and significance, and its implications for today’s socialists.
Marx’s Commune
An Appreciation and a Critique
For the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune, an analysis of Marx’s views on the Commune and its historical possibilities.
Satire and Healing
A Conversation with Singer/Songwriter Roy Zimmerman
An interview with the political singer-songwriter whose anti-Trump song got over 100 million views on social media.
American Gothic; or, What Melville Can Teach Us
What Melville crafted might paradoxically be called a gothic humanism. While probing the depths of human depravity with lyricism and wit, Melville’s fiction directly confronted slavery and capitalism.
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