The 2019 Jacobin Mixtape
We covered the good, the bad, and the ugly all year, from Bernie Sanders’s presidential run to the violent coup against Evo Morales in Bolivia. Here are some of the highlights (and lowlights).
19687 Articles by: Alex Press
Graphic Novels Are Comic Books, But Gentrified
In the age of gentrification, a financial logic shapes cultural products just as much as the neighborhoods we live in. The rise of graphic novels is a case of aesthetic gentrification — the transformation of comic books into a glossier product marked by high prices and middle-class values.
The Worst People of 2019
Before 2019 comes to a close, let’s take one last look at the most obnoxious, appalling, and insidious personalities of the past twelve months. These are eight auld acquaintances we’d desperately like to forget — here’s hoping we’ve heard the last of them.
The Decade When Climate Change Became Real
The 2010s were the decade when climate change stopped being an abstraction for millions of people in the rich countries. With extreme weather events presenting a grim picture of the future, suddenly politicians felt pressure to offer solutions — and young people started wondering how it would affect their own lives.
The Gilets Jaunes Have Changed How France Thinks About Strikes
Last winter, yellow-vested protestors blockaded roads and roundabouts across France, building a social revolt outside of classic labor-movement structures. Today, the trade unions are back at the center of the fight against Emmanuel Macron’s pension reforms. Yet the spontaneity and militancy that drove the gilets jaunes are again at the heart of the struggle.
The Labour Left Isn’t Going Anywhere
Labour’s election debacle had multiple causes: a monolithically hostile media, the Brexit imbroglio, and unfocused messaging in the campaign’s final stretch. But for the hundreds of thousands of left-wing dues-payers who have joined the party — now the biggest in Europe — the mood is one of determination, not despair.
In the 2010s, the People Began Saying No to Endless War
The decade began with Bush-era jingoism intact. Then, the unthinkable happened: radical critiques of America’s endless wars and reflexive militarism that were once hopelessly marginal went mainstream.
A Green New Deal Can Win, Even Among Building Trades Unions
In order for the Green New Deal to move forward, organized labor must take it up as a demand. Building trades unions have been written off as hopelessly reactionary on fighting climate change — but they shouldn’t be, as one union electrician explains.
The Right’s Continued Dominance in the Dominican Republic
After two decades of rule by the reactionary Dominican Liberation Party reign, the task of democratizing the Dominican Republic remains a difficult one.
Israel Is Finally Being Investigated for War Crimes
After dragging its feet, the International Criminal Court is finally investigating Israel for committing war crimes against the Palestinians over the last five years. It’s long overdue.
Law, Order, and Repression in Greece
Athens’s Exarcheia neighborhood has long been known as a center of political dissent. But the incoming right-wing government’s attacks on its “lawlessness” are a bid to whip up moral panic — and the pretext for a massive extension of police power.
“At the Heart of Democratic Socialism Is the Ethic of Solidarity”
Nikil Saval is a union campaigner, leftist magazine editor, and a democratic socialist who is running for Pennsylvania State House. In an interview with Jacobin, he talks about his history of working on hotel workers’ boycotts and editing n+1, how the Bernie Sanders campaign inspired him to run for office to advance left politics, and building a Pennsylvania and a world for the many, not the few.
What the New Economic Policy Did — And What It Left Unfinished
The NEP helped the young Soviet Union rebound economically. But its lack of political reform hampered the ability of workers and peasants to resist the onset of Stalinism.
Why We Should Remember William Monroe Trotter
In the early twentieth century, conservative “race leaders” like Booker T. Washington preached self-help and other accommodationist nostrums. William Monroe Trotter was different. A pioneering black editor, he worked closely with African-American workers to advance a liberatory black politics.
Against Recycling
Recycling is part of an insidious sleight of hand that reframed our growing waste problem as one not of corporate excess, but of irresponsible consumer choices and individual lifestyles.
Chile Needs a Political Revolution
After weeks of popular protests, Chilean authorities have promised to rewrite the constitution inherited from the Augusto Pinochet regime. But the millions-strong mobilization behind the protests wants to totally undo the country’s neoliberal order.
A Strong Welfare State Could Be a Blow Against Imperialism
The US military is a human-maiming, planet-destroying machine. We have to begin rolling it back immediately.
Sports Teams Should Be Owned by the Public
Why do we allow billionaires to run beloved sports franchises as dictatorships and blackmail us for tax subsidies? We should put our favorite teams under public ownership.
The Year in Class Struggle
Labor is going into a new decade weaker than it’s been in nearly a century. But the year was a promising one for those looking for sparks from the US working class — and hoping the new decade can stoke those sparks into a flame.
Italian Football, a Mirror of a Society in Crisis
In the 1980s and 1990s, Italy’s Serie A was the world’s leading football league. But as financial interests asset-strip once-great clubs and the terraces become home to harshening racist abuse, Italian football no longer looks like such a “beautiful game.”