Silicon Valley is increasingly embracing the narrative that the US is in an existential battle for technological dominance with China. The story is a convenient shield against efforts to rein in the tech industry’s power.

The Politics of Falling in Love
Heteropessimism holds that men and women are incapable of understanding one another, foreclosing the possibility of more equal, fulfilling relations between the genders. But romantic love may offer us a way out of a social order in which everyone loses.

For Socialists, Legislative Hardball Has Limits
It can be tempting for socialists to look to the House Freedom Caucus as a model for how to operate within Congress. But the story of the HFC shows that obstructionism can actually isolate a caucus instead of winning a leading role for it.

Working-Class Voters Are Winnable for the Left. Here’s How.
There’s a big gap between how progressive messaging is received by liberal, college-educated voters and working-class voters with no college degree. But there doesn’t have to be, if the Left appeals to those working-class voters the right way.

If Woke 1 Was Crazy, MAGA Woke Is Absolutely Insane
Much of the Left has been debating “Woke 1” recently. Less discussed has been the Right’s own version of wokeness, characterized by censorship, attacks on free speech, and even jailing and deporting critics.

American Freedom Was Built on Endless Conquest
The Founders made expansion the precondition of American freedom. We must find an alternative.
Jonathan Chait’s Atlantic essay claims the Democratic Socialists of America has betrayed the legacy of its founder, Michael Harrington. It gets DSA’s history, and what the organization is today, wrong.

It’s Prime Time for Socialists. How We Make Our Case Matters.
Democratic socialists have a historic opportunity to make socialism a mass politics that wins over millions. We can’t take full advantage of that opportunity without carefully calibrating our rhetoric and demands.

Liberalism’s Cult of the Individual Has Failed Us
America is suffering from a complete breakdown in social life and shared conception of the common good. Some prominent liberals want to keep it that way.

Canada’s Socialists Are Coming for City Hall
Inspired in part by Zohran Mamdani’s victory in New York City, a new crop of socialist candidates is campaigning for municipal power across Canada.

Utopia Is a Promise Worth Fighting For
Karl Marx mocked utopians for writing recipes for the cookshops of the future. But at their best, utopians emphasize hope without guarantees — a position that carves a middle path between blind optimism and the resigned inertia of “realism.”
Mainstream economics cannot accept the concept of contradiction that is foundational for Karl Marx’s analysis of capitalism. David Harvey explains why we need the Marxist perspective if we want to make sense of capital’s latest mutations in the age of AI.

Immanuel Wallerstein Predicted the Fall of the US Empire
Soon after 9/11, world-systems theorist Immanuel Wallerstein warned that US imperial decline was inevitable. But US leaders didn’t want to hear that their glory days were in the past, and they’ve managed that decline in the worst possible way.

Toward Simp Liberation?
A disturbing New York magazine story on an Andrew Tate devotee’s alleged sex trafficking sheds light on Tate’s entrepreneurial core, red-pill ideology’s brutal gendered hierarchy, and how intrasexual status competition affects male domination.

How China Picks Its Winners and Losers
China’s university entrance exam is one of the most competitive in the world — a reflection of the cutthroat reality of the country’s labor market.

Defending Indians’ Most Basic Rights
India’s civil liberties groups are largely made up of “concerned citizens” rather than the most oppressed groups in society. Their role in defending basic constitutional rights is increasingly under attack from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.