Jonathan Sas has worked in senior policy and political roles in government, think tanks, and the labor movement. He is an honorary witness to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. His writing has appeared in the Toronto Star, National Post, the Tyee, and Maisonneuve.
When two British volunteers died in Ukraine this month, they were duly hailed for selflessly joining its fight against invasion. Yet both men had also faced terrorism charges for supporting the Kurds — showing the double standards of British foreign policy.
European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen’s “State of the Union” address shows she’s concentrating ever more power in her own hands. Not only are far-right parties on the rise across the continent, but the EU’s leading official is pushing their agenda.
Last week, several leading European politicians visited the Italian island of Lampedusa, presented as a symbol of a continent overwhelmed by immigrants. But there is no “migrant crisis” — just a political failure to create safe routes for people on the move.
After autoworkers in Coahuila, Mexico, organized an independent union at a VU Manufacturing facility, the company shuttered the plant and fired all the workers. Now local business elites have imposed a hiring blacklist on all the former VU workers.
After already securing agreements for deep spending cuts earlier this year, House Republicans are poised to force a government shutdown to demand even more austerity. Democrats seem ill-prepared to stand up to the GOP’s hostage-taking.
Brandon Johnson, the labor-backed mayor of Chicago, is poised to deliver his first major victory: scrapping the subminimum wage for tipped workers.
France’s education minister has banned girls in public schools from wearing the abaya, a loose-fitting Islamic dress. Emmanuel Macron’s government is whipping up conflict over identity — but ignoring the real problems that face France’s underfunded classrooms.
Since inflation started rising, British capitalists have been raking in massive profits while workers have suffered a disastrous wage slump. Yet the Bank of England still wants to boost unemployment in case workers develop their fighting strength.
In July, the European Union announced a deal with Tunisia to police migration. The deal allowed the EU to outsource the dirty work of repressing migrants — but it’s done nothing to hide the mounting numbers of desperate people dying in the Mediterranean.
The UAW strike just got bigger. The union announced this afternoon that workers at 38 GM and Stellantis locations would join the walkout — and the pressure tactics are already working, with Ford making significant concessions at the bargaining table.
The story of the African-American working class is the story of democratic struggle: of pairing the fight against racism with the fight against economic exploitation to push the US to become a freer and more just society.
Google is now on trial for illegally building a monopoly over online search — but given the weak state of US antitrust law, the company is likely to emerge unscathed. To check Google’s power, we need to bring it under public, democratic control.
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman was one of the loudest cheerleaders for the war in Iraq. His condemnation of Putin’s “war of choice” in Ukraine — a horrific act of aggression, like Bush’s war — could be a word-for-word rebuke of what he wrote then.
New York City mayor Eric Adams is simultaneously pushing austerity and declaring that migrants will “destroy” the city by straining its public services. These are perilous flames to fan, and the biggest fan belongs to the mayor.
As autoworkers are worked to the bone and face factory closures, dynastic billionaire and Stellantis chairman John Elkann is hanging out on his yacht and attending fancy art galas. No wonder the UAW is on strike.
Irish politics has been shifting toward greater class polarization in recent years, defying academic predictions about the death of class. The modern working class has taken a new shape, but it still has the potential to mobilize for radical change.
The UAW has given the Big Three until noon tomorrow to make progress at the bargaining table or face a strike escalation. One week in, the historic walkout has already left politicians and bosses alike scrambling amid an utterly justified worker action.
Canadian workers are grappling with a cost-of-living crisis and struggling to afford housing and groceries. The Trudeau government’s response? Politely requesting that grocery bosses be nicer.
In Guatemala, the historic victory of Bernardo Arévalo has unleashed the wrath of the country’s conservative elite. The coming months will prove crucial as Arévalo and progressive forces struggle to guarantee a peaceful democratic transition.
Socialist intellectual Georg Lukács was an astute critic of right-wing philosophy and its connections to fascism. For Lukács, philosophers of the Right were united by a reactionary disavowal of reason and justice.