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Balfour at 100: A legacy of racism and propaganda
The coming months mark the centennial of Palestine’s forcible incorporation into the British Empire. In November 1917, British foreign secretary Lord Arthur Balfour declared his government’s support for “the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”; in December, Jerusalem fell to British troops.
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The Popular Front Novel
I became interested in literary relationships with communism and anti-fascism when I was an undergraduate student. I was curious about how modernist writing, often thought to have peaked by the mid-1920s, was transformed by the rise of fascism and the coming of the Second World War.
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Stuart Hall’s deconstruction of fate
The island of Barbuda is currently devoid of human life, a bleak reality that is both unfathomable in its scope and seemingly inevitable under the conditions of racialized capitalism. The severity of Hurricane Irma’s impact was undoubtedly worsened by the gross consumption of natural resources, particularly by nations that historically benefitted from colonialism and the construction of empire.
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Work, capital and the ‘administration of punishment’
Criminal justice and welfare policies routinely produce a distinct labour force in Britain, disposable by design. This article examines recent policy developments driving these labour forms, and explores their implications for the meaning of work.
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Racial inequality is hollowing out America’s middle class
America’s middle class is under assault.
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A question of class: A new class politics, a connective antagonism
Inequality is rising, social divisions are becoming more entrenched, social guarantees once taken for granted have yielded to a generalized culture of insecurity and a common fear of decline.
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The struggle for a decent life
The typical working-class family would need an additional $91K+ per year in New York City just to break even on a reasonable standard of living.
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The alt-right and the 1%
When President Donald Trump let loose at his Tuesday press conference, equating anti-racism protesters with neo-Nazis, it was a big hit with the men who’d taken part in the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville.
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Time for the “International Left” to take a stand on Venezuela
The possibility of an open civil war in Venezuela is not shocking. People are tensing up with the International left being reluctant to show solidarity with the Maduro government and the Bolivarian socialist movement. The need to examine what “neutrality” or, allowing the opposition to come to power via an illegal and violent transition, would mean.
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IWW Miners of Jerome & Bisbee loaded into cattle cars and deported from state of Arizona
In 1912, more than 1000 working class men, mostly members of the Metal Mine Workers Industrial Union of the Industrial Workers of the World, being loaded into cattle cars in Bisbee, Arizona, July 12th, for the purpose of being deported from the state of Arizona.
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Toilet tales
Kakkoos (Latrine) is a Tamil documentary that is a powerful indictment of society’s apathy towards the thousands who are tasked with cleaning public toilets and sewers. The filmmaker Divya Bharathi talks about why she made a documentary and what is the task at hand, post its tremendous success.
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The shifting politics of inequality and the class ceiling
Britain’s class landscape has changed: it is more polarised at the extremes and messier in the middle. The distinction between middle and working class is less clear-cut. The elite is able to set political agendas and entrench their own privilege. The left needs a clear narrative showing how privilege leads to gross unfairness—and effective policies […]
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When you reject class-based politics
If you reject from the outset the idea of uniting a majority based on shared economic interests, then pretty much all you’ve got left is the “thoughtful and humane co-optation” of racism and xenophobia.
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The U.S. is where the rich are the richest
In the U.S., where wealth is most highly concentrated, almost a quarter of income goes to the rich. So it should come as no surprise that a big chunk of the world’s richest call America home. Two out of five millionaires and billionaires live there, and their ranks are growing fast.
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Improving our quality of life will require rebuilding union strength
Unions provide workers with voice and the means to use their collective strength to gain job security and say over key aspects of their conditions of employment, including scheduling and safety. These gains are significant in our “employment at will” economy.
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The general election in Great Britain
When it came to the general election in Britain, everything was settled in advance. The Conservative Party led by Theresa May was supposed to prevail. The Labour Party, victim of its own confusion, its refusal to support the will of millions of members and voters who wanted to put an end to the straitjacket of the European Union, was supposed to be trounced.
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Labour’s manifesto is a shift to the left: it’s no time for compromises with the right
It must be part of a bold and insurgent campaign based on resistance to racism, austerity and war that focusses on mass rallies and mobilisations. Giving in to the right can only make it weaker.
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The Graveyard of Progressive Social Movements
When first encountering the “Impeach Bush” movement in 2007 I responded, almost flippantly, “why not impeach the system that gave us Bush?” Otherwise, I said, “we risk having someone in the White House who’ll make us long for Bush.” If prescient, my response was admittedly formulaic and evidentially deficient.
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The Promises and Limitations of Radical Local Politics
Read Michael D Yates’s informative interview with labor journalist Steve Early and Mike Parker, leader of the Richmond Progressive Alliance. The conversation focuses on both the benefits and limitations of engaging in radical politics at the local level.
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Just Wait Until I Get Tenure
The first thing to understand about colleges and universities is that they are workplaces. And like all workplaces in capitalist societies, they are organized as hierarchies, with power radiating downward.… Those at the top have as their central objective control over the enterprise, so that their power can be maintained, that revenues from tuition, grants, money from various levels of government, and the like keep flowing in, that the prestige of the college or university grows. And, of great importance, that those below them do not and cannot make trouble by challenging their authority.