Karl Korsch was one of the most brilliant figures of interwar German Marxist culture before it was shattered by the rise of Nazism. His death in 1961 came just before the New Left began to rediscover his contribution to Marxist theory.
The German right made stunning gains in this month's regional elections. The Left must rise to the challenge.
In 1923, with Germany gripped by hyperinflation and far-right insurgents, Social Democrats and Communists formed a joint government in Saxony. It was a pioneering experiment in working-class democracy — before the military overthrew it.
After the Cold War, ideologues declared capitalism victorious. But war and far-right parties have once again returned to the continent. The root of this disorder lies in the neoliberalism of the 1990s and the defeat of the Left.
On April 2, 1922, reformists and revolutionaries from three rival internationals met in Berlin in a bid to agree to a common program. Ending in failure, it was the last time for decades that Communists and Social Democrats would meet as ostensible comrades.
With parliamentary elections looming this fall, the German left party is struggling to present itself as an exciting alternative to the status quo.
The German Greens are on the brink of becoming the country’s second-largest party. But they're no friends of the working class.
The early German socialists fought for the persecuted at home and abroad — convinced that the liberation of workers in Germany was linked to the liberation of oppressed peoples around the globe.
In 2015 the international left invested its hopes in Syriza and its promise of a break with austerity. Today, it must call out the repression of social movements in Greece by Alexis Tsipras’s government.
After splitting from Germany’s Left Party, Sahra Wagenknecht is calling for the state to cut rejected asylum seekers’ benefits. She claims to speak for working-class Germans — but she’s combining anti-migrant lines with classic anti-welfare talking points.
Germany’s former Die Linke parliamentary leader Sahra Wagenknecht has founded a new party. She claims it’s a voice for the ignored middle and working classes — but the party is mainly focused on winning over Germans who’ve turned to the far right.
In Germany, podcaster Ole Nymoen has become public enemy number one for supporters of the government’s rearmament campaign. He spoke to Jacobin about his new book against militarization and on the need for a renewed peace movement.
In an interview with Jacobin, Colombia’s former energy minister outlines left-wing president Gustavo Petro’s plan to make the rich nations that profit from its extractive economy help pay for its green transition.
Chileans have long known about Colonia Dignidad, a German colony in Chile depicted in the Netflix series A Sinister Sect whose settlers committed countless acts of pedophilia, murder, and torture. Less discussed: the Chilean right’s complicity in those crimes.
Throughout the history of the German Democratic Republic, its leaders faced opposition from dissenters who believed that a socialist system needed to have democratic rights. The arguments they made — often at great personal cost — still resonate today.
A public vote on expropriating the big landlords offers Berliners a chance to push down soaring rents.
From the United States to Bangladesh, from Germany to South Africa, Amazon will face coordinated strikes and protests today demanding that the company raises wages above inflation for all its workers and stops its union busting.
The borders of Ukraine are no more arbitrary than those of Poland, Greece, Italy, or Germany.
Ahead of Sunday’s German election, left-wing party Die Linke has enjoyed a surprise resurgence. Longtime leader Gregor Gysi told Jacobin about what’s changed — and how a new generation of activists can take the party forward.
Not only did Bertolt Brecht transform German drama, but his work captured his radical commitment to socialist politics and the emancipation of working people.