What Revolutionary Socialism Means to Me
The revolutionary socialist vision is a vital one. Today’s rising socialist movement shouldn’t discard it.
Search Result(s) for: “Kautsky”
Ulyanovsk
A review of Lars Lih's Lenin
The Rise and Fall of the Second International
On July 14, 1889, the Second International was born to unite the workers of the world. What happened to that dream?
Marxism and the Agrarian Question
The leading thinkers of Marxism stressed how important it was to govern in partnership with the peasantry. When communist states imposed collectivization by force, the results were disastrous.
Revolutions Look Different According to Authoritarian or Democratic Conditions
The Russian Revolution led to revolutionary upheaval in countries far beyond Russia. Looking at Russia’s imperial borderlands like Finland suggests that socialist struggle can look wildly different in autocratic versus parliamentary conditions.
Booze and Socialism
German socialists knew the craze for schnapps was a plague on working-class life. They fought it by building their organizations around beer.
Jean Jaurès, an Iconic Leader of International Socialism
One of France’s leading socialists, Jean Jaurès was assassinated just days before the outbreak of World War I. An impassioned defender of working-class internationalism, his murder signaled Europe’s descent into war.
Classical Marxism: An Intellectual History
The Invention of Marxism is a rich group biography of the founding generation of socialists, who introduced millions to Karl Marx’s ideas. Even where it falls short, its details still charm and provoke interest.
We’re Still Learning From Rosa Luxemburg
More than a century after her murder, there’s still so much to discover in Rosa Luxemburg’s work as more of her writings become available in English. Brazilian writer Michael Löwy is one of the best guides we have.
The Socialist Who Helped Bring Marx to America
The early-20th-century socialist and New York mayoral candidate Morris Hillquit saw liberalism and democracy as providing a foundation for a transition to socialism. Alongside Eugene Debs, he helped to forge a distinct American socialist tradition.
The Real Vladimir Lenin
Ninety-nine years after the Russian Revolution, let’s free Lenin from distortions of all types.
Storming the World’s Bastilles
On Bastille Day 1889, militants from around the world met in Paris to declare an international union of socialist parties. The Second International promised to spread the spirit of the revolution across borders, only itself to fall victim to nationalist passions.
The Social Forces Behind the MAGA Coalition
The glue that holds Donald Trump’s coalition together is not ideological coherence but a volatile compound of empire, spectacle, and grievance. Understanding these tensions helps explain both MAGA’s successes and its weaknesses.
Reformism Yesterday and Social Democracy Today
We shouldn't try to resurrect the social-democratic politics of the past. What we need is a socialist movement that pairs radical demands with mass, militant action.
Henriette Roland Holst Was a Poet and a Revolutionary
Dutch poet Henriette Roland Holst was twice nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature — but also made her name theorizing the mass strike. Her life shows how a generation of militants linked revolution in the arts to the fight for a socialist future.
From February to October
In the standard account, February was the good revolution and October was the extremist one. But events in Russia were far more complex than that.
Marxism Is the Product of a Struggle for Political Freedom
It’s important to place the leading figures of Marxism in the context that shaped them. That context has to include the repressive state structures and extreme inequalities of Europe in the early 20th century, which made revolution seem inevitable.
The Revolutionary Roots of Social Democracy
Why was the revolutionary road out of capitalism abandoned for an evolutionary one? Vivek Chibber explores how socialist parties moved from revolution to reform, but why real progress will always mean a conflict with capital.
David Riazanov, a Revolutionary Scholar of Marxism
David Riazanov was a brilliant scholar who pioneered the study of Marxism while playing an active part in Russia’s revolutionary movement. But Ryazanov and the Marx-Engels Institute he founded both fell victim to Stalin’s purges in the 1930s.
Revolutionary Socialists in the Democratic-Socialist Moment
Right now, democratic socialism is on the rise in American society. Revolutionary socialists who have kept the torch of socialism burning during the lean years will now have to merge with democratic-socialist demands of the current moment.