Subjects Archives: Ideology

Jailed communist Mikhail Kononovich thanked supporters who have protested in solidarity with Ukrainian political prisoners as the trial of him and his brother Alexander resumed on Monday.

Despite the persistent hegemony of capitalism and its ruling neoliberal ideology, various forms of resistance, social struggle, and proposals for an emancipated future continue to emerge.

Two hundred years ago, on July 8, 1822, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley drowned. He was less than a month short of thirty.

Global politics seems to be moving in two opposite directions. On the one hand, the U.S. and its closest allies are stepping up their efforts to consolidate and expand U.S. hegemony. On the other hand, the countries of the developing world, the socialist countries and the formerly-colonised countries are increasingly united in their efforts to promote multipolarity, multilateralism, sovereign development, and democracy in international relations.

Who, or what, is the “middle class”? Most people identify themselves as middle class, but what does that mean, and what difference does it make?

If you ask most teenagers in the United States or Europe what they like to do, they’ll probably tell you they enjoy playing video games like “Call of Duty,” where they pretend to be at war. For them, war is a game. An entertaining way to spend their time after school or on weekends.

Marxist, Nationalist, Feminist – these are the words that describe not only the political convictions but also the artwork of Frida Kahlo. Although born as Magdalena Carmen Frida Kahlo y Calderón outside of Mexico City in 1907, Kahlo eventually shortened her name and frequently told people that she was born in 1910. This was the year that widespread political unrest finally culminated in the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution.

In June, a federal appeals court upheld an Arkansas law barring state contractors from boycotting Israel, sparking concerns over First Amendment rights in the United States.

The drastic reduction in infant mortality rates is yet another testimony to the Cuban Revolution’s attention to the health of the country’s population.

As Lenin prepared to understand the First Great Slaughter of the twentieth century, he spent from September to December 1914 absorbing Hegel’s The Science of Logic (1813). Humphrey McQueen begins a six-part exploration of why Lenin thought he had to do so. This first installment, Dialectical Reasoning: ‘The Science of Interconnectedness’ shows why Hegel is still not ‘a dead dog.’

Frankfurt School critical theory has been—along with French theory—one of the hottest commodities of the global theory industry. Together, they serve as the common source for so many of the trend-setting forms of theoretical critique that currently dominate the academic market in the capitalist world, from postcolonial and decolonial theory to queer theory, Afro-pessimism and beyond.

The fantasy novelist and left activist on why Marx’s ‘Communist Manifesto’ speaks to the crisis-ridden politics of the present.

I have two favorite sayings. One draws on the dialogue in Shakespeare’s Henry the VI part 2 when Jack Cade envisions that the effect of his plot will be that “all the realm shall be in common.” To this, comrade Dick responds, “the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”

Five o’clock in the morning is a “preferred time” for Peter Schumann to make comics, he said. Ideas can come from just about anywhere: the weather in the Northeast Kingdom, where he lives, or a piece in the Monthly Review, a long-running socialist publication. “I go by what’s happening in the world,” he said.

Virtually all socialists today are descendants of the Second International of 1889 to 1914. Yet its legacy remains sharply disputed. Some associate this International with its betrayal of socialist principles at the start of World War I, and think there is little reason to study it any further. Others see the prewar Second International as a model to be re-created. Both assessments are mistaken.

With just over 98 percent of the precincts counted, the triumph of Gustavo Petro, candidate of the Historic Pact, in the second round of the Colombian presidential elections was confirmed.

Julian Assange, Alina Lipp and Anne-laure Bonnel are three journalists who are paying a high price for telling the truth in the West: attempts to suffocate them financially, followed by censorship, threats of imprisonment or imprisonment altogether, and even physical and psychological torture in the case of Assange.

Last week (June 8-10) there were two summits in Los Angeles, California: the Summit of the Americas hosted by the U.S. State Department and the Peoples Summit hosted by U.S. and international activist organizations. The two summits were held in the same city at the same time but could not be otherwise more different. ​

The tradition of concise introductions to Marxist theory is a long one, stretching back perhaps to Engels’s Anti-Dühring. Alienation, Spectacle and Revolution enters stridently into this tradition with an acerbic, tremendously illuminating, and urgent style.

We need degrowth in industries ranging from armaments and advertising to fast fashion and fossil fuels, together with a dramatic reduction in consumption of the richest 1% who are responsible for 15% of emissions.