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An Analysis of the 2019 Oakland Teachers’ Strike
The recent seven-day strike by the Oakland Education Association (OEA) was eerily similar in key ways to its 26-day strike in 1996. What happened in both cases was that union members and community allies won on the picket lines and in the streets but got a draw, at best, at the bargaining table.
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Does Iran’s economic fate depend on a lifeline from China?
China has increased its oil purchases from Saudi Arabia by 43 percent in April. There is every indication that China will continue to increase its buys from the kingdom during the course of this year—to substitute for Iranian oil and, perhaps, for U.S. oil.
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India, ideology and the New York Times
Liberals of all stripes ought to, in the years to come, pay careful attention to the way language is deployed in public discourse, to recognize shibboleths and call them out. Neoliberal reforms were smuggled in via this route, and if the exit-polls are to be believed, fascism will be next.
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“There is no alternative” to managing the economy and the climate
The United States is the country most easily positioned to address climate change but it has done likely the least out of any rich country. China, a country significantly less wealthy than the United States, has likely done the most. In fact, a recent study provides some evidence that China’s carbon dioxide emissions peaked in 2013 and are declining in large part due to changes in China’s industrial structure, which includes pilot programs for pricing carbon, among many other things.
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A Climate Emergency Manifesto to avert climate catastrophe
The panic button needs to be hit to declare climate emergency. We need serious action now; there is no more time to waste.
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On Eric Hobsbawm and other matters
The failures of Richard Evans the biographer reveals the greatness of Eric Hobsbawm the historian.
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Dossier 16: Resource sovereignty—the Agenda for Africa’s exit from the state of plunder
In this interview Gyekye Tanoh, head of the Political Economy Unit at the Third World Network-Africa based in Accra (Ghana), elaborates upon the themes of corporate plunder, resource nationalism and people-centered forms of resource management in Africa.
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A first-hand account from Caracas from the day of the coup through May Day
Today there was a farcical attempt to take a military airport that fizzled. It turned into a dozen or so guys throwing stones and being ignored. The Guardian is shamelessly running video of something that happened weeks ago as though it were today. We were there and it was all normal.
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Tricontinental Briefing No 1: Canadian mining companies
Introduction Of the world’s mining companies, 60% are headquartered in Canada. In February 2019, 216 companies were listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) and 961 companies were listed on the TSX-Venture Exchange (TSXV). Mining accounts for 53% of the composite index. This kind of industry dominance suggests that investors trust the stability of the […]
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Climate science deniers resort to attacking Greta because they’ve lost the argument
We can start with the Grande Dame of anti-environmentalism: Koch-sponsored Brendan O’Neill, who Debrorah Orr reminds us “has already devoted a thousand or so of his rancid words to ‘The cult of Greta Thunberg’”.
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U.S. imperialist domination in Latin America and Europe
The history of empires amply demonstrates that in their phase of decline they become more violent and bloodthirsty, and that their leaders tend to be coarser and more brutal. Not only their leaders, as Donald Trump clearly demonstrates. Also its environment of advisors reflects similar devolution, becoming something similar to what Harold Laski, referring to the leaders of European fascism, called “outlaw elites”.
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‘Crustacean Jung v Cocaine Hegel’: Zizek-Peterson debate blowout sparks meme war
In the wake of Saturday’s debate between intellectual superstars Slavoj Zizek and Jordan Peterson, an onslaught of mockery has appeared online satirizing the clash between the highly-memeable thinkers.
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Workers of the World unite (at last)
Once seen as the vanguard of a new social order, the contemporary labor movement has been written off by many progressive activists and scholars as a relic of the past. They should not be so hasty. Rather than spelling the beginning of the end for organized labor, globalization has brought new opportunities for reinvention, and a sea change in both trade unions and the wider labor movement.
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Defending Venezuela: Two Approaches
The law of diminishing returns does not have to operate in the field of international solidarity.
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The mountain of corporate debt will be the seed of the next financial crisis
What have they done with the money? Have they invested in research and development, in production, in the ecological transition, in creating descent jobs, warding off climate change? Not at all!
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Dossier 15: The art of the revolution will be internationalist
We need all of the cultural workers today—from graphic designers to cartoonists, programmers to poets, psychologists to meme-makers—to seize what we know in order to dream and to construct a world that is not only possible, but necessary.
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Unequal scenes
Inequalities in our social fabric are oftentimes hidden, and hard to see from ground level. Visual barriers, including the structures themselves, prevent us from seeing the incredible contrasts that exist side by side in our cities.
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A new unionism for the twenty-first century
As we contemplate the ongoing decline of British trade unions, and as Americans consider their next move after the Supreme Court’s Janus vs AFSME decision, the the Independent Workers of Great Britain (IWGB) and United Voices of the World (UVW) point towards an alternative way of organising, fighting—and winning.
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Russiagate implodes, pleasing Trump but leaving the left in the cold
With Mueller’s “no collusion” verdict, Donald Trump can claim to have been vindicated in the Russiagate saga, but there will be no respite for the real left—not to be confused with the phony “resistance” that has run on Kremlin-hate (and Syria hate and Venezuela hate) for the past two years.
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Venezuela in the Crisis
The solution of the Venezuelan “crisis” lies in good faith negotiations between the government and the opposition, an end to the economic war, and the lifting of sanctions.