Yi San is a freelance writer based in New York.
The crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic is an opportunity for us to think again about Marx’s idea of human freedom. As David Harvey writes in Jacobin, emergency steps to get through the crisis also show us how we could build a different society that’s not beholden to capital.
Jordan Peterson is one of the most famous public intellectuals in the world. But his pronouncements in favor of capitalism and hierarchy collapse at the slightest bit of scrutiny.
In a capitalist society, state managers rely on business confidence to generate the economic growth on which they depend, so capitalists don’t have to mobilize politically to block radical reform. It requires exceptional circumstances to loosen these constraints.
Since last year, the UK has seen sustained and powerful industrial action across its higher-education sector, with the latest strike wave only interrupted by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. With the crisis sure to be exploited by the Tory government, universities and colleges are more under threat than ever, and union strength has never been more vital.
British socialists may be reeling from December’s election defeat, but the injustices that fueled their movement are still as glaring as ever. Sooner or later, the forces inspired by Jeremy Corbyn will regroup and resume the struggle, under the leadership of a new generation.
In May 1970, 4 million students went on strike across the country, shutting down classes at hundreds of colleges, universities, and high schools and demanding an end to the Vietnam War. Fifty years later, their rebellion remains an inspiration, as radical student politics is back on the agenda.
The anti-lockdown protests may currently represent a Trumpian minority — but that could easily change if the choice becomes going hungry or going back to work. We need a real alternative that refuses to accept the false trade-off between economic security and public health.
Gary Shteyngart’s novel Super Sad True Love Story was published a decade ago, and it offers a portrait of a near-future, dystopian United States that might suddenly be upon us. It’s perfect reading for the pandemic lockdown.
Progressive economist Joseph Stiglitz means well, but the dream of a “progressive capitalism” will remain just a dream, its horizons always strictly limited by capitalist private ownership.
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought a change of priorities, as states buy up masks and ventilators regardless of the cost. Basing economic decisions on human need, not our ability to pay, imposes a principle of equality — allowing us collectively to decide what kinds of production we really need.
The G20 has announced it will allow 76 poor countries additional time to pay back their loans. But it’s not an act of benevolence — it’s a desperate maneuver to maintain the global debt peonage that undergirds neoliberal capitalism.
The COVID-19 pandemic will transform our world. Massive state intervention is essential to head off an unprecedented slump. We must come out of this crisis with a better society.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has apologized to Italy for the EU’s underwhelming response to coronavirus. But faced with economic meltdown, battle lines are hardening between the German-led bloc and the states of the Southern periphery — and the splits are about to become even more irreconcilable.
Democratic Party liberals got what they wanted in a Joe Biden nomination for president — and yet they’ve never been more contemptuous of Bernie Sanders supporters.
Poor and blockaded Cuba not only has better health indicators than the United States, but its international medical efforts save thousands of lives a year. We should be applauding the Cuban health system — and learning from it.
With Joe Biden releasing racist anti-China ads and Donald Trump trafficking in his usual toxic xenophobia, it’s becoming clear liberals and conservatives alike are trying to stoke a New Cold War with China. Democratic socialists must stand against it.
Mexican elites have done everything in their power to discredit and undercut President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador since he first took power. In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, they’re ramping up their attacks.
After he left Siberia in 1900, Lenin would spend much of the next decade in London. He didn’t much like the food — but his time in the émigré milieu would help make him the revolutionary he was.
Small business owners, who feature prominently in the anti-shutdown protests, occupy a unique place in capitalism’s class hierarchy — although many share the same kinds of struggles experienced by wage workers, as a class, they’re often drawn to the far right.
Even as Iran’s coronavirus death toll nears 5,000, US sanctions continue to bear down on the country’s health care system.