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Richard Seymour’s “Dreaming of Downfall” provides a crucial analysis of the recent wave of racial violence across Britain, exposing the deep-rooted anxieties and deliberate provocations that have led to this disturbing moment in the nation’s history.
The growing concentration of power in the digital realm, exemplified by Elon Musk’s control over X, poses unprecedented risks to both online discourse and real-world stability.
Crisis is the word that keeps coming back to haunt us. Whether it’s the crisis of democracy, the crisis of liberalism, or the overarching notion of a time of crisis, we seem perpetually embroiled in a state of polycrisis.
The assassination attempt on Donald Trump has spotlighted a troubling paradox: why do liberal institutions and figures often defend fascist politicians, even when these politicians espouse values antithetical to liberalism? This article delves into the inherent contradictions within liberalism that lead it to shield authoritarian figures like Trump, arguing that these actions reveal a deeper alignment with capitalist interests and a fear of revolutionary change.
The COVID-19 pandemic has revealed the weaknesses of global health systems under capitalism, showing how profit-driven intensive farming and environmental degradation heighten the risk of future pandemics, such as the persistent threat of H5N1 avian flu.
Marine Le Pen’s rise in French politics, often attributed to immigration and crime, is more accurately understood as a reaction to the economic exploitation and inequality perpetuated by the capitalist system.
The Labour Party’s hasty withdrawal of support for by-election candidate Azhar Ali over benign comments critical of Israel exemplifies a wider pattern of oversensitivity regarding any anti-Zionist perspectives in the post-Corbyn era.
As revelations of systemic misogyny and abuse in prominent UK trade unions expose the corrupt old boys’ networks still clinging to power, sisters betrayed by false promises of reform continue their brave struggle for gender equality from below.
Allegations of Hamas ties among some UNRWA staff spark tensions amid Gaza’s humanitarian crisis and the settler community’s escalating far right rhetoric against Palestinians, written by Simon Pearson.
Decades of incremental climate action have utterly failed to spur the urgent systemic transformation needed to address the worsening climate crisis. Therefore, radical eco-socialist change involving confrontational civil disobedience targeting the continued use of fossil fuels may now be the only morally justifiable pathway left to break the stranglehold of capitalism and give humanity a chance at a livable future.
The following recently published articles criticise the weaponisation of rape allegations to justify a brutal military action against Palestinians in Gaza. The authors contend that propagandistic reporting and double standards reveal deep-rooted racism used to advance the oppression of Gazans.
Simon Pearson analyses the multifaceted documentary Israelism and the difficult questions it raises about ideology, identity, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Simon Pearson argues that Marxists must revive class-based language and analysis of capitalism’s exploitation to connect today’s diverse struggles against inequality and build mass working class power.
The recently published Oxfam report revealing that the world’s five richest men doubled their wealth during the pandemic while billions were made poorer spotlights the obscene inequality generated by global capitalism and highlights the urgent need for systemic change centered on collective ownership and democratic control of workplaces and resources by the working class.
The chaos of the “traditional” Boxing Day hunts has ended, with the saboteurs doing all they could to disrupt the hunts; yet we still saw a fox ripped apart by an out-of-control packs of hounds. It’s now time for the Labour Party to commit to ending the blood sport of the ruling class once and for all.
As 2023 draws to a close, it’s time to reflect on the most compelling and insightful reads of the year. In this roundup, I recommend five books spanning climate disaster, digital privacy, the Trump era’s threat to democracy, Marxist theory, and life under Israeli occupation, describing how each illuminates the complex issues defining this moment.