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What Is Political Will?
Samuel Grove [SG]: For a while now you’ve been working on and defending the old idea of ‘the will of the people’, and you’ve described it in terms of a ‘dialectical voluntarism’; what do you mean by this? Peter Hallward [PH]: I’m not stuck on the terminology, and I’m leery of the way these […]
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Climate Change and Socialism: An interview with John Bellamy Foster
Steve da Silva (SD): Over the last decade you have emerged as a leading thinker in synthesizing radical ecology with the Marxist tradition. From Marx’s Ecology (2000) to The Ecological Rift (2010) and everything in between, you’ve carried out the much needed intellectual work of recovering the overlooked ecological content of Marx’s original thought, presenting […]
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Michael D. Yates Interviewed by Cedric Muhammad (for the Final Call)
The following is an interview of me (MDY) conducted by Cedric Muhammad (CM), who is an aide to the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, the National Representative of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam. An abbreviated version of the interview appears in The Final Call, the Nation of Islam’s newspaper (available at www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/Business_amp_Money_12/article_100637.shtml). […]
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The Complexities of Putting Ideals into Practice: Interview with Margaret Randall
Introduction Margaret Randall is a feminist poet, writer, photographer, and social activist. Born in New York City in 1936 and currently residing in Albuquerque, New Mexico, she has also spent a number of years outside the United States. Randall participated in the 1968 student movement while living in Mexico City, from where she was […]
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An Interview with John Bellamy Foster (for the Sunday Eleftherotypia)
CJP: What began as a financial crisis in 2007 has become one of the biggest unemployment crises in the advanced capitalist world. Could this perhaps mean that the crisis of 2007-08 was not actually caused by finance itself but had its underlying causes in the real economy? JBF: No one doubts that it was […]
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Crises of Capitalism and Social Democracy
John Bellamy Foster is best-known as author of Marx’s Ecology (2000; in which he corrects the popular misapprehension that Marx did not ‘get’ environmental limits), and as editor of Monthly Review (monthlyreview.org), the journal founded by Marxist economist Paul Sweezy in the late 1940s. In his latest book, The Endless Crisis (2012; written with […]
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Interview with Francisco Louçã, Economist and Leading Member of Portugal’s Left Bloc
Francisco Louçã. Photo by Paulete Matos. Francisco Louçã is an economics professor at Lisbon’s Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestão. He is the author of numerous books and essays including Ensaio para uma Revolução [Rehearsal of a Revolution]; As Time Goes By — From the Industrial Revolution to the Information Revolution, with Chris Freeman; Portugal […]
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Interview with Hong Kong Dockworkers Leader
The battle of the Hong Kong dockers, as Union of Hong Kong Dock Workers (UHKDW) Secretary Wong Yu Loy reveals, was important not only because of the rarity of strikes in Hong Kong, or because it was a pitched battle with Hong Kong’s wealthiest corporate magnate, but also because of the way corporate globalization set […]
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The Climate Space and the Future of the Climate Justice Movement: An Interview With Pablo Solon
Pablo Solon is the Executive Director of Focus on the Global South based in Bangkok. He was formerly Bolivia’s Ambassador to the United Nations and Bolivia’s chief negotiator on climate issues as part of the UN COP process. He was also instrumental in organizing the People’s Climate Summit in Cochabamba, Bolivia. He spoke with […]
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What’s Behind the US Escalation Against North Korea?
Aijaz Ahmad: Ever since this young man [Kim Jong-un] became the president, the head of state, of North Korea . . . the West has been testing his will, to see whether he can be stared down. . . . Every year these very provocative war games take place, involving South Korea and the […]
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The Relevance of Marxism Today: An Interview With Michael A. Lebowitz
Do you think Marxism is still relevant today? If so, which parts? I think that Marxism is completely relevant for understanding capitalism now. It’s an error to think that capitalism has changed and that therefore we have to change Marxism. Marx grasped the nature of capitalism; and, although capitalism has changed in some of […]
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Strategizing to Defeat Control Unit Prisons and Solitary Confinement: An Interview with Author/Activist Nancy Kurshan
Author and longtime activist Nancy Kurshan’s new book, entitled Out of Control: A Fifteen Year Battle Against Control Unit Prisons, has just been released by the Freedom Archives. Kurshan’s book documents the work of The Committee to End the Marion Lockdown (CEML), which she co-founded in 1985 as a response to the lockdown at the […]
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Expanding Executive Power for Extrajudicial Executions: An Interview with Marjorie Cohn About DOJ Drone Memo
DB: We continue our discussion of the revelations around a memo coming out of the Justice Department that the administration plans to keep up these assassinations and expand the program. Joining us to take a legal look at this is Marjorie Cohn, Professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law and former President of the […]
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Capitalism, Crises, and a Socialist Alternative: In Conversation With Michael A. Lebowitz
Rebekah Wetmore and Ryan Romard (RW/RR): The crisis of world capitalism starting in 2007 was the most severe crisis of capitalism since the Great Depression and thus far the recovery, both globally and within Canada, has been weak at best. With this mind, to what extent is the current crisis cyclical and in what […]
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Afghan Peace Volunteer Says Drones Bury Beautiful Lives: Raz Mohammad Interviewed by Kathy Kelly
January 10, 2013 Raz Mohammad: Salam ‘aleikum. I am Raz Mohammad. I’m from Maidan Wardak province and I’m Pashtun. Below is a transcript of an interview of Raz Mohammad, an Afghan Peace Volunteer, with questions prepared by Maya Evans of Voices for Creative Non Nonviolence UK. Kathy Kelly: Raz Mohmmad, what do you think […]
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Interview with Gianni Vattimo: “Only Weak Communism Can Save Us”
Is it true that you are communist? What else can one be, the way things are? Communism left 70 million dead. . . That wasn’t communism. What was it, then? Industrialism. Lenin proposed electrification plus soviets, that is to say, popular control . . . but popular control evaporated! And what remained? Industrialism. Stalin imposed […]
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Do We Oppose the Anomalies of Capitalism or Capitalism Itself?
Q. Can you comment on increased public outrage regarding acts of corruption and strivings towards achieving what is considered normal functioning of the capitalist system? A. The question is: Do we oppose the anomalies of capitalism or capitalism itself? Corruption is vastly overrated. Of course, it can reach proportions in which even the normal […]
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Can Syria Avoid the Fate of Libya and Iraq? Interview with Issa Chaer
Dr Issa Chaer is a member of the Syrian Social Club (based in England). Carlos Martinez: Thanks very much for agreeing to be interviewed. You have been very active in spreading information about the Syria conflict. Can you explain why you have chosen to give so much time and energy to this cause? Issa Chaer: […]
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Interview with Eduardo Galeano: “Two Centuries of Workers’ Conquests, Cast Into a Dustbin”
Montevideo From his usual table at Café Brasilero downtown, leaving the cold weather of southern winter outside its large window, Eduardo Galeano insists that “the grandeur of humanity lies in small things, quotidian things, done every day, what’s done by the nameless without knowing that they are doing it.” So, his answers mingle with […]
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Syria’s Ali Haidar: Both Sides Have Extremists
Syrian National Reconciliation Minister Ali Haidar is optimistic, but still thinks that “Syria is on top of a volcano.” Haidar, who is also the President of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP), maintains that he “joined a project and not a ministry,” revealing that contacts with the armed opposition are underway.