Geography Archives: Americas

  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 […]

In the many homages to Hugo Chávez in recent weeks, there is an important element that suffers almost complete neglect.  For want of a better term we could call it “Leninism.”  By this, of course, I do not mean the tired, formulaic (and basically anti-Leninist) doctrine that generally bears that name.  It is precisely the […]

The following comments were made by White Earth Chairwoman Erma J. Vizenor during her “State of the Nation Address,” March 7, 2013, in Mahnomen, Minnesota.  They are taken from the Nation’s newspaper, Anishinaabeg Today, March 13, 2013, reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. On Tuesday Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez passed away.  President Chavez was a […]

Days before last month’s climate change demonstration on the doorstep of the White House, two Senate Democrats introduced legislation that they say would put the U.S. on the path to cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent by 2050.

The best friend the Cuban people have had throughout their history died on the afternoon of March 5. A call via satellite communicated the bitter news. The significance of the phrase used was unmistakable. Although we were aware of the critical state of his health, the news hit us hard. I recalled the times he joked with me, saying that when both of us had […]

Hugo Chávez always said that a key book he had read during his prison years was Beyond Capital by his friend István Mészáros.  The book was brought to him by Jorge Giordani, who later became Venezuela’s chief minister in charge of economy under Chávez, the position that Giordani still holds today. The last time I […]

  The President of the World Forum for Alternatives (WFA), Egyptian economist Samir Amin, today paid tribute to the late president of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, whose death he called a “great tragedy.” The neo-Marxist intellectual expressed his sadness for the death of the Venezuelan leader and his solidarity with the Venezuelan people in a communiqué […]

“Check out the latest track from Rebel Diaz, a tribute to the recently-deceased Venezuelan President, Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías, perhaps the most important political leader of our generation. . . .  The intro sample is from legendary Venezuelan musician and activist, Alí Primera.  The words translate as ‘Those who die for life cannot be called […]

With the death of Hugo Chávez, Venezuela and the world have lost a leader whose primary concern was to bring a new system into existence — one he referred to as 21st Century Socialism.  This meant a lot of things to Chávez, including making sure that all people had access to the necessities of life […]

The masses make history, but particular charismatic men and women can play a pivotal role, especially when they believe in the people and mobilize the masses to take action on their own behalf.  Hugo Chávez was one of those rare revolutionary leaders.  He was especially important for Latin America and the Third World for taking […]

Caracas, March 6, 2013 Hugo Chávez, who died yesterday afternoon, was something of an Emersonian hero.  “Speak your latent conviction,” said the sage of Concord, “and it shall be the universal sense.” Chávez said things that other people thought, or at least recognized that they thought after he said them. One could say that he […]

When Hugo Chávez triumphed in the 1998 presidential elections, the neoliberal capitalist model was already foundering.  The choice then was none other than whether to re-establish the neoliberal capitalist model — clearly with some changes including greater concern for social issues, but still motivated by the same logic of profit seeking — or to go […]

  “The Third World Network and Jubilee are partnering today to stand up against vulture fund activity, stand up for Argentina, in this incredibly important court case that has massive repercussions for all countries around the world to be able to protect themselves from this kind of litigation in the courts by holdout vulture funds. […]

New York, N.Y., 2018 — Every year about this time, since way back in 2013, the City of New York has bestowed its prestigious Hashmi Award upon a worthy New York resident who lives openly as an observant Muslim.  The Hashmi recipient — preferably of Asian, Middle Eastern, or African descent — must have paid […]

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 […]

Labor historians Marcus Rediker and Peter Linebaugh have vividly described how sailors and other maritime workers were in the vanguard of the creation of an international working class.  Unlike most people in the early modern period who largely stayed rooted to the soil of their birth or tied closely to their particular artisanal enterprises, Jack […]

The depth and length of the global crisis are now clear to millions.  In the sixth year since it started in late 2007, no end is in sight.  Unemployment rates are now less than halfway back from their recession peak to where they were in 2007.  Over 20 million are without work, millions more limited […]

  February 15, 2003 Sarah, New York: The wind that whips down the avenues is bitterly cold, but that doesn’t stop us from protesting the drive to war in Iraq.  People from all over the city and the Northeast — young and old, hardened activists and first-time protestors — have converged on Manhattan, where the […]

On February 3, 120 socialists took part in a Toronto meeting to celebrate publication of Toward the United Front: Proceedings of the Fourth Congress of the Communist International, 1922, available in paperback from Haymarket Books.  This 1,300-page volume is the seventh book of documents on the world revolutionary movement in Lenin’s time edited by John […]

The most recent victim in Colombia’s conflict, in spite of ongoing conversations between the government and the FARC-EP guerrillas that began last year, seems to be common sense itself.  With the government declining to enter a two-part truce at the conclusion of the insurgency’s unilaterally assumed ceasefire on January 20, the war naturally resumed its […]