The Essential Guide to Jacobin
Jacobin has been putting out socialist content at a rapid clip since 2010. Here’s a handy guide to some of the most important works from our archive, from our humble beginnings to the present day.
20400 Article(s) by: Ryan Switzer
Ryan Switzer is a PhD candidate in sociology at Stockholm University. He researches right-wing politics in welfare states.
How Europe Made Indebted African States Into Its Border Police
Since 2015, the EU has increasingly demanded that African states repress migration on its behalf. It secures their compliance through economic coercion — exploiting debt relations which have in recent times sharply turned in favor of rich EU countries.
Unearthing the Often Overlooked Religious Foundations of European Socialism
The diverse mosaic of European socialism engaged both reformists and revolutionaries, often driven by not just intellect but also profound religious conviction. Together, these elements shaped the democratic socialist tradition.
C. L. R. James Showed Us How to Write About the Social History of Sports
Beyond a Boundary turned 60 this year. The classic book by C. L. R. James used cricket as a window into the history of the West Indies as its people liberated themselves from British colonial rule, defying racism to find their place in the world as equals.
Bayard Rustin Showed the Promise and Pitfalls of Coalition Politics
At the height of a calamitous war presided over by a Democratic president, the brilliant socialist organizer Bayard Rustin tried to forge a mass coalition to deliver progressive change. His failure to do so in the 1960s tells us much about building one today.
Gaza After the Deluge
Even before Hamas’s attack on October 7, the Israeli state knew it couldn’t subject Gaza to an unlivable siege forever. Now Israel’s rage has turned huge swathes of the densely populated territory into a howling wasteland.
The Reactionary Jargon of Decoloniality
Cloaked in an impenetrable jargon, “decoloniality” dehistoricizes and culturalizes colonialism. It’s a political and intellectual dead end for socialists.
A Transformative Left Needs to Speak for People Outside the Palaces of Government
Left-wing forces in Spain, France, Germany and Greece all recently suffered damaging splits. They each stumbled over a common problem: how to influence institutions while focusing on priorities ignored by the dominant media-political class.
From Chile to Grenada, Socialism Is What Capitalists Are Really Afraid Of
The history of socialist politics in the Global South shows that all capitalists want a government that will govern unapologetically in their interests — and would prefer the intervention of foreign powers than democracy and socialism at home.
During the 2023 Writers Strike, This Book Helped Me Understand the Depravities of Hollywood
As I covered the Hollywood strike this year, perhaps the best guide was a 1941 novel by a former Communist Party member about the dog-eat-dog scumbaggery of movie executives and the lying and artless bragging that Hollywood runs on.
Israeli Draft Resister Tal Mitnick Is a Hero
Eighteen-year-old Israeli Tal Mitnick has just been sent to prison for refusing to enlist in the army and participate in what he calls a “war of revenge” in Gaza. He’s a hero.
How Giorgia Meloni Made the Far Right Mainstream
Recently genealogists discovered that Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, is a distant relative of Antonio Gramsci. Though they share little else, Meloni has engaged in a campaign for control over cultural institutions that Gramsci would understand well.
Arno Mayer Has Died. He Leaves Us an Unorthodox Marxism.
Historian Arno Mayer, who died this month at age 97, infused his work with a Marxism animated by attention to ideology, passion, and the open-endedness of history.
Javier Milei’s Shock Therapy Would Be a Disaster for Working-Class Argentinians
Argentina’s new president, Javier Milei, has issued a decree with over 350 reforms tearing up labor rights and privatizing industries. The “shock therapy” plan marks a dangerous expansion of the president’s powers — but it also faces fierce opposition.
Health Workers in the UK Shut Down the Headquarters of a Gaza War Profiteer
Last week, hundreds of health workers shut down the London HQ of Palantir to protest a tech company profiting off of Israel’s bloody war on Gaza.
How the 1619 Project Distorted History
The New York Times’s 1619 Project claimed to reveal the unknown history of slavery and racism in the United States. It ended up helping to distort the real history of slavery — and the heroic struggle against it — for a generation.
Federalism Has Been a Disaster for the Working Class
American federalism is often touted as a source of local democratic engagement, political innovation, and responsive public policy. But in practice, the American states have served not as “laboratories of democracy” but as laboratories of autocracy and inequality.
Clarence Thomas Is Committing Tax Fraud
For years, conservative billionaires have treated Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas to opulent vacations and trips on their private jets. If these were anything other than disinterested gifts, then they’re taxable — and Thomas owes the IRS a huge bill.
How Young Karl Marx Got Radicalized
Karl Marx started out in a liberal milieu where the primary concern was abolishing religious authoritarianism. In time, he came to believe that abolishing capitalism was necessary for true freedom — and that only the working class could do it.
Nationalize Greyhound
A publicly owned intercity bus service with dedicated highway lanes could do for travelers what the US Postal Service does for letters and packages: let them criss-cross the country cheaply and quickly at their own convenience.