Remembering My Friend, David Graeber
David Graeber will remain for me a model for how to live to the fullest a scholarly and activist life.
Blog
Under Capitalism, There’s No Such Thing as a “Fair Day’s Wage for a Fair Day’s Work”
We’ve got some bad news for you on Labor Day: your boss is exploiting you. Karl Marx explains how.
Workers at Melbourne’s Toll Warehouse Unite Against COVID-19
When managers at a major retail warehouse in Melbourne concealed information on the spread of COVID-19 among the workforce, casual and permanent workers united to walk off the job. The result was a powerful victory in the fight against unsafe conditions.
Socialists Can Still Change the World for the Better
Because socialists were marginalized for decades, we’ve had to build a new left almost from scratch. It’s understandable to feel demoralized by defeats. But the movement we're building is one that can still win real change.
“Jess La Bombalera” and the Pathologies of Racial Authenticity
Simply put, Jessica Krug was a minstrel act, a racist caricature. But while Krug’s persona was certainly offensive, what’s far more offensive is that there is a demand for this kind of performance in liberal academic circles.
What Martin Luther King Jr Really Thought About Riots
Joe Biden is trying to use Martin Luther King’s legacy to make the case for a law-and-order crackdown on protests. But King drew a distinction between violence against people and violence against property — and he viewed riots as the product of an unjust social order.
Europe’s Coronavirus Recovery Program Will Make It Even More Unequal
The negotiations over a European Union bailout were riven with splits on whether “frugal” Northern states should have to assist their coronavirus-hit Southern partners. But while the eventual €750 billion deal was widely hailed as a victory for European solidarity, its details show that it will aggravate the EU’s inequalities even further.
Melbourne’s Spotless Laundry Workers Went on Strike to Stop COVID-19
At the Spotless Laundry in Melbourne’s southeast, employers demanded that work continue despite escalating numbers of COVID-19 cases. The workers refused to allow the company’s profit to be placed above their safety — and won.
A Jewish Goodbye to David Graeber
David Graeber’s intellectual legacy is enormous and wide-ranging, but his recent writings on antisemitism deeply moved me. He knew that antisemitism was far from dead — and he also knew that only a democratic left could stop it.
Joe Biden Won’t Learn Anything From Ed Markey’s Win
For four decades Sen. Ed Markey was a run-of-the-mill liberal Democrat. But when he found himself threatened by a potentially career-ending defeat, he turned toward young voters and the Left — and it worked. Could Biden do the same? Maybe. But he probably won’t even try.
Oliver Cromwell Cox and the Capitalist Sources of Racism
Radical sociologist Oliver Cromwell Cox argued that racial antagonism was an essential tool for maintaining capitalist power. Cox’s understanding of race and class can help us forge a broad, multiracial movement against oppression today.
The OAS Accusation of Electoral Fraud Against Evo Morales Is Bullshit — And Now We Have the Data to Prove It
The day after the Bolivian election, the Organization of American States suggested the result was fraudulent — then took months to provide any proof. Last month, it finally released its data — and researchers at the Center for Economic and Policy Research found a basic coding error that destroys the OAS’s case against Morales.