Marx, like generations of socialists, saw the particularly capitalist character of the New World’s slavery — and the inextricable link between the emancipation of the enslaved and the liberation of the entire working class.
We’ve long known that the US armed forces target poor and working-class students to meet their enlistment goals. But according to a recent report, the military’s JROTC program is also rife with sexual misconduct and outright abuse of young women.
Emma Chambers tried to unionize her Los Angeles Starbucks store. As a result, she was fired and lost stable housing and health care. But she says that if she knew all that going in, she’d still have stood up for herself, her coworkers, and the working class.
Rossana Rossanda represented the very best of the generation drawn to Italian communism in the 1940s. Rossanda insisted on the need for militant working-class politics throughout her life while much of the Italian left lost its political bearings.
The late Michael Brooks championed a vision of international solidarity, grounded in our shared humanity. In doing so, he was reviving a tradition of cosmopolitanism that has long animated socialist and working-class movements at their best.
At a time of historic working-class weakness, it’s tempting to watch the portrayal of Jimmy Hoffa in Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman and long for similar labor leadership today. But while Hoffa negotiated contracts that improved the lives of millions, his corruption and autocratic leadership also paved the way for the Teamsters’ decline.
Unions are absolutely essential for building working-class power. But they’re also often undemocratic. Building a strongly democratic labor movement is a key task for the Left and the labor movement as a whole.
The Chicago Teachers Union has established itself as a union that fights for the entire working class. In striking tomorrow, the union’s strategy is about solidarity — not only within their own union, but with SEIU Local 73, whose members earn poverty wages and are also walking off the job.
In the lead-up to the November election, states like Florida are ramping up voter disenfranchisement. That disenfranchisement didn’t come out of nowhere — it’s the latest in decades of bipartisan disenfranchisement of poor and working-class voters and voters of color.
In Norway's recent election, the Labor and Centre Parties formed a new government — but they need socialist support on crucial bills. The current battle over the budget will decide if the swing to the left at the polls will bring real change for working-class Norwegians.
Claims that the working class no longer exists often suggest it’s been replaced by a “precariat” who don’t get a regular salary. But this precarious condition has been the experience of most workers throughout capitalism’s history — and where we did get stable employment, it was because we organized.
Despite his “working-class Joe” schtick, Joe Biden has often sided with big business over the labor movement. But his changes in the National Labor Relations Board may allow union organizers new opportunities to rebuild labor. It's up to us to take advantage before the window closes.
Otto von Bismarck built the world’s first welfare state, but his intent was to kill the rising workers’ movement. It’s a reminder that socialists don’t just want to use the welfare state to keep starvation at bay — we want to build the foundation for working-class emancipation.
The GOP’s proposed coronavirus relief legislation is grotesque — an insult to the working class and a threat to the lives and livelihoods of millions. The fact that Senate Republicans felt at liberty to propose it is a telltale sign of political rot.
The most effective counter to Donald Trump’s State of the Union lies is an affordability agenda with teeth, writes New York socialist assemblymember Claire Valdez, backed up by an organized working-class majority.
To win on social issues, the Left has to develop the cultural competence to connect progressive goals with working-class priorities. The gay marriage fight offers a formula for appealing to ordinary Americans’ values without giving up on social progress.
Rather than focusing on the actual harms Republicans are inflicting on the American working class, Democrats are using the Signal group chat leak to obsess over violations of norms and protocols. This strategy is doomed to fail.
Briana Boston, a working-class woman fighting a health insurance claims denial, has been arrested for saying “delay, deny, depose” on a phone call to her insurer. The judge has set her bail at $100,000, “considering the status of our country.”
The Olympics are coming to Paris in 2024, with Airbnb as an official sponsor. Communist deputy mayor Ian Brossat told us why development projects for the Games mustn’t be used to drive out working-class residents — and how city hall is fighting to defend social housing.
Ukrainian elites have for decades been divided between Westernized professionals and pro-Russian oligarchs, each with a narrow social base. The missing force has been the working class, unable to develop its own distinct project for the country’s future.