Monopoly Music
Today’s ruling class treats all culture as either commodity or plaything. We should not accept either definition.
Search Result(s) for: “working class”
The Ramones Spoke for Capitalism’s Leftovers
The Ramones’ legendary self-titled debut celebrates its 50th anniversary this month. More than the blueprint for later political punk, the record spoke for those the system had already forgotten.
Steven Rose Brought His Science and Socialism Together
Steven Rose, who died last month, was a major figure in the field of neuroscience and a brilliant scientific popularizer. Rose was also a committed socialist who challenged the misuse of science to legitimate racism, sexism, and class inequality.
Trump’s Protectionism Protects the 1 Percent
Donald Trump’s tariffs amount to a stealth tax on the middle and working classes, wrapped in the language of sovereignty. In practice, it’s upward redistribution and corporate price-gouging, fueling inequality that corrodes stability and erodes democracy.
The ANC’s Double Bind
After losing its parliamentary majority for the first time, South Africa’s African National Congress is scrambling to form a coalition government. Its options are bleak.
Spain’s Far-Right Vox Party Is Inciting Racist Violence
Spain’s Vox party typically masks its racism in more palatable rhetoric. But this summer, leading Vox MPs helped incite violence against residents of Maghrebi origin in the Murcia region in Spain.
New Poll: Democratic Socialism Is Now Mainstream
A national poll from Jacobin, DSA Fund, and Data for Progress finds broad support for democratic socialist leaders and left-wing policies.
Syria’s Future After the Massacre in Sweida
Syria’s new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, has been feted by establishment media as an ex-radical gone moderate. Yet massacres of civilians by government forces disturb the rosy picture of a return to peace.
It’s Time for Emmanuel Macron’s Administration to End
Every few months, French president Emmanuel Macron appoints a new government, without his prime ministers ever winning a real base of support. The fundamental problem is the president himself and a dogmatic austerity agenda, which most French people reject.
What We Can Learn From Nordic Socialism
A new book by Danish MP Pelle Dragsted argues that socialists can start building economic democracy even before capitalism is fully overcome.
Performative Politics Is a Dead End
Canada’s New Democratic Party once rallied workers around a bold social democratic vision. The leadership contest now unfolding shows a center left so busy virtue signaling it forgets how to build power.
The Tough Task of Forging a Labor-Climate Alliance
Winning a just transition will require environmental activists to forge ties with labor unions around shared interests. That’s no easy task — but across the US, we’re seeing promising beginnings of a labor-climate alliance.
You Aren’t Allowed in These Billionaire Towns
Welcome to the fully privatized city, where the ultrarich can do as they please — no whining from the rabble permitted.
What Liberals Don’t Get About the Liberal Order’s Crisis
Liberals often explain today’s disorder as the work of authoritarians or populist agitators. What they miss is that the postwar consensus depended on conservatives, whose defection has left it in crisis.
What Is Tim Dillon Doing?
The Tim Dillon Show is disorienting and disturbing. It also has a massive audience, to whom it reflects back the disorientation and disturbance of contemporary society in pseudo-personalized form.
The Red Scare Is American Past and Present
If we want to understand how we arrived in this authoritarian moment in 2025, we need to understand one of the central pathways that brought us here: McCarthyism.
France Is in the Streets and Deep in Political Crisis
President Emmanuel Macron last week appointed France’s fifth prime minister since the start of 2024. This Thursday’s mass strike suggests that his gambit has done little to settle the country’s political crisis.
Kamala Harris Thinks Trump Is a “Communist.” That’s Insane.
Centrist Democrats like Kamala Harris and Gavin Newsom seem to think the best way to disparage Donald Trump is to highlight his departures from free-market orthodoxy. Good luck with that.
California’s Academic Strike for Free Speech and Palestine
The recent violence against Palestine encampments across the University of California system has led to an unprecedented labor response: a strike by UAW Local 4811 over alleged violation of rights to free speech and peaceful protest.
New York City’s Forgotten Public Bank Plan
In 1975, Wall Street declared war on New York, sending the city into a fiscal crisis. A forgotten public banking proposal in the state assembly could have stopped it — and put both the city and the country on the path to socialized finance.