by Shimshon Bichler and Jonathan Nitzan 1. The Triangle of Conflict Analyses of modern Middle East conflicts vary greatly. They range from sweeping regional histories to narratives of individual disputes. They draw on various analytical frameworks and reflect different … Continue reading The weapondollar-petrodollar coalition: still about oil?
by Henry A. Giroux If you want a picture of the future imagine a boot stomping on a human face forever. — George Orwell The larger reasons behind Eric Garner’s execution seem to be missed by most commentators. The issue … Continue reading Taking notes 42: state terrorism and racist violence in the age of disposability
by Jeff Noonan Despite six years of global economic crisis and austerity, and despite much talk, even amongst liberal economists, of the threats growing inequality poses to democratic forms of capitalism, there has been little effective political mobilization in favour … Continue reading Preservative struggles in the age of austerity
by Ismael Hossein-zadeh There is now a widespread consensus that mainstream/neoclassical economists failed miserably to either predict the coming of the 2008 financial implosion, or provide a reasonable explanation when it actually arrived. Not surprisingly, many critics have argued that … Continue reading Taking notes 41: Ideological foundations of neoclassical economics: class interests as “economic theory”
by Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler Economic, financial and social commentators from all directions and of various persuasions are obsessed with the prospect of recovery. The world remains mired in a deep, prolonged crisis, and the key question seems to … Continue reading Can capitalists afford recovery? Three views on economic policy in times of crisis
by Henry A. Giroux Across the globe, a new historical conjuncture is emerging in which the attacks on higher education as a democratic institution and on dissident public voices in general – whether journalists, whistleblowers or academics – are intensifying … Continue reading Higher education and the new brutalism
by Chris Cutrone Lenin stated, infamously perhaps, that Marxists aimed to overcome capitalism “on the basis of capitalism itself.” This was in the context of horrors of not only industrial exploitation but also and especially of war: WWI. Lenin was … Continue reading When was the crisis of capitalism? The legacy of the 1960s New Left
by Roland Boer Communism has ‘failed’, or so the common observation goes. More often, one hears the opinion that the Soviet Union ‘failed’, or that the communist countries of Eastern Europe did so as well. But what does ‘failure’ mean … Continue reading The ‘Failure’ of Communism: a ‘Fall’ narrative
Central to George Orwell’s nightmarish vision of a totalitarian society was a government so powerful that it not only dominated all of the major institutions in a society, but it also was quite adept at making invisible its inner workings of power. This is what some have called a shadow government, deep state, dual state or corporate state.[1] In the deep state, politics becomes the domain of the ultra-wealthy, the powerful few who run powerful financial services, Continue reading Beyond Orwellian nightmares and neoliberal authoritarianism
by John Reed I. What is Bolshevism? Bolshevism is the Social Revolution to which Socialists have looked forward for more than half a century. It is the inevitable struggle which must accompany the transition of society from Capitalism to Socialism. … Continue reading Aspects of the Russian revolution
Philosophers for Change 