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By Socialist Appeal
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Tuesday, 02 September 2008 |
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Socialist Appeal is pleased to announce
the publication of the first in the new series run of our journal of
Marxist theory, the Marxist International Review. The main part of
the Summer 2008 issue comprises the first two chapters of Alan Woods'
unpublished book on the history of philosophy. Also included is Leon
Trotsky's short but ever relevant article, Against the stream.
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Tuesday, 12 February 2008 |
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An analysis of the growing political and social turbulence in Europe, the United States, Latin America with an emphasis on Venezuela, the Middle East and Asia with particular emphasis on the explosive situation in Pakistan and ends with an appeal to help build the International Marxist Tendency in all countries. At this stage it is a discussion document.
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 06 February 2008 |
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This is the first part of a draft document on World Perspectives as approved at the recent meeting of the leadership of the International Marxist Tendency. At this stage it is a discussion document.
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Friday, 30 March 2007 |
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At the last congress of Rifondazione Comunista (2005) the Italian Marxists of FalceMartello presented their own national document. A comrade sent a letter questioning the kind of transitional demands presented. Here we publish the letter with a reply from the Italian Marxists, an interesting debate on what kind of demands should be raised at each turn of events.
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By Rob Sewell
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Wednesday, 24 January 2007 |
 As
advertised recently, Wellred Books have just republished that classical work of
Engels Dialectics of Nature. Here we publish the Preface to the book, in
which Rob Sewell outlines some of the most advanced discoveries in scientific
study that confirm that dialectics is nothing more than the philosophical
expression of the way nature works. Matter, science and society evolve, in which
revolution is a natural and essential element.
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By Wellred Publications - wellred.marxist.com
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Monday, 08 January 2007 |
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Wellred is proud to announce the republication of the 'Dialectics of Nature'. Ever since Engels' arrival in London in 1870, he was keen to write a comprehensive work on science and dialectical materialism. The notes and studies for such a work make up the present volume, originally published in 1925. It is an essential read for all those who want to develop a deeper understanding of Marxist philosophy. Wellred is offering the book for a special price of £9.99 (list price £14.99).
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By the editorial board of Marxist.com
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Monday, 06 November 2006 |
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The ideas of the International Marxist Tendency are very clear. We stand for the genuine ideas of Marxism and base ourselves on the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky. You may agree or disagree with these ideas. Occasionally however, we encounter opponents who are prepared to go to incredible lengths to distort and falsify what we stand for. Just such a case came up earlier this year when the French language journal, La Vérité, published by the Lambertist group launched a vicious and dishonest attack on our positions. Here we explain what we really stand for. |
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By International Marxist Tendency
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Friday, 29 September 2006 |
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In the final part of the document we look at the
lessons of Haiti and the threats to the Cuban revolution. The only way of
defending it is through an all-Latin American revolution. We also look at
indigenous movements, the effects of the free trade agreements and conclude by
emphasising the new period we have entered. A new revolutionary wave is
spreading across the globe.
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By International Marxist Tendency
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Wednesday, 27 September 2006 |
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Part Four is dedicated to the revolutionary
events taking place in Venezuela, still the key to the Latin American
revolution. A conflict is unfolding within the Bolivarian movement between the
revolutionary wing and the reformist. Unless the revolution is carried through
to the end the forces of reaction can make a comeback. The opportunity is there
to complete the revolution. It must be taken in the coming period.
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By International Marxist Tendency
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Thursday, 21 September 2006 |
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In Part Three we look at how the crisis of
capitalism expresses itself also as a crisis of the ruling class and then we
look at Latin America, the continent where this crisis is most acute with
revolutionary developments erupting in one country after another. Venezuela
will be dealt with in Part Four.
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By International Marxist Tendency
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Tuesday, 19 September 2006 |
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Here we look at the situation in Europe, where a
revival of the class struggle is clearly taking place, the contradictory
process in world relations, the impasse facing the underdeveloped countries,
with a particular emphasis on the situation in occupied Iraq, in Iran and in
Palestine and Israel.
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By International Marxist Tendency
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Friday, 15 September 2006 |
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Without correct perspectives it is impossible to conduct
fruitful revolutionary work. This document makes the case that we have entered
the most turbulent period in world history. One shock after another is shaking
the system to its foundations. The world situation is characterised by extreme
instability, which is a reflection of the impasse of the capitalist system on a
world scale.
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By Ann Robertson in San Francisco
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Monday, 28 August 2006 |
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In a socialist society, workers will be in a position to
decide which kind of investments are required to promote the social well-being
of the majority; for example, quality education, housing, public
transportation, health care, cleaning up the environment, developing solar
energy, organic farming, etc.
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By Ted Grant
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Friday, 18 August 2006 |
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Ted Grant remembers the day the news of Trotsky's murder came over the
radio as he lay in bed in hospital. First published in Militant 17 August 1990
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By Ted Grant
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Friday, 18 August 2006 |
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Sunday August 20th is the 66th anniversary of Trotsky's assassination by a Stalinist agent. On this occasion we republish Ted Grant's text Trotsky's Relevance Today, written in 1990.
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By Ann Robertson in San Francisco
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Wednesday, 09 August 2006 |
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Ann Robertson in this article originally published in 2002
takes up the arguments often used by reactionaries to present a caricature of
what socialism really is. Stalinism is often invoked as if that were genuine
socialism. Ann explains what socialism really is.
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By Ann Robertson
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Tuesday, 13 June 2006 |
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With Marx's and Bakunin's divergent philosophical frameworks at least
partially clarified, it becomes clearer why their political differences
could not be resolved. Their respective political programs were tied to
conflicting philosophical principles so that they were at times being
pulled in diametrically opposed directions.
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By Ann Robertson
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Friday, 09 June 2006 |
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Many superficial explanations have been given
for the conflict between Marx and Bakunin, between Marxism and Anarchism. Some
commentators have resorted to personality flaws to account for the conflict. A
more promising line of explanation of their intractable differences, however,
lies in an investigation into the profoundly divergent philosophical frameworks
that served as the points of departure for their respective political analyses.
As will be shown below, their foundational concepts are so incompatible that
even their points of agreement are rendered more illusory than substantive.
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By Alan Woods
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Tuesday, 07 March 2006 |
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In his concluding remarks Alan Woods stresses that we have entered a new period, one in which the working class is moving in all corners of the globe. After the defeats of the past a new generation of working class fighters is coming onto the scene of history, a generation that has no alternative but to fight. We are faced with a new revolutionary perspective, a new period that will unfold over some time. We must grasp the opportunity to build the forces of revolutionary Marxism in all countries. |
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By Alan Woods
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Thursday, 02 March 2006 |
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Alan Woods continues his analysis of events in the rest of Latin America, in particular, the situation in Mexico where Lopez Obrador is seen as a threat to the interests of US imperialism, Argentina and the victory of Evo Morales in Bolivia and what this means. He also stresses the need to defend the Cuban Revolution, but the only way to do this is by spreading the revolution to the rest of Latin America and beyond and returning to the ideas of Lenin and Trotsky. |
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By Alan Woods
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Friday, 24 February 2006 |
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Here Alan Woods looks at the conflicts between Russia and China on the one side and US imperialism on the other in areas such as Central Asia, the crisis of leadership of the ruling class, the revolutionary wave sweeping across Latin America and the particular role of Chavez who is faced with the stark alternative of either capitulating to the oligarchy and imperialism or continuing along the road he has followed so far and end up putting an end to capitalism. |
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By Alan Woods
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Friday, 17 February 2006 |
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In Part Two of his speech Alan Woods looks at the growing protectionist tendencies, especially in the light of the emergence of China as a major world economic power, the long-term decline of Europe, the disaster of Iraq and the growing turmoil in the Middle East. |
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By Alan Woods
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Thursday, 16 February 2006 |
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In January at a meeting of the International Committee of the International Marxist Tendency Alan Woods gave a lead off on World Perspectives, in which he analysed the unfolding class struggle on an international scale, laying special emphasis on the events taking place in Latin America. After a long period of relative lull in the class struggle workers everywhere have started to move once more. The task is to provide this movement with the necessary revolutionary leadership. The present text – in five parts – is based on Alan Woods’ speech. In Part One of his speech he deals with the method of Marxism, the relationship of the economic cycle to the class struggle and the state of the US economy. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Thursday, 19 January 2006 |
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A new Indian edition of Trotsky’s Revolution Betrayed has just come out, published by Aakar Books and will be available at the Delhi (January 27) and Kolkata (January 25) book fairs. |
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By Rob Sewell
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Friday, 23 December 2005 |
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There are many indicators that show that Venezuela is in the vanguard of the class struggle internationally, one of them is the phenomenon of occupied factories run under workers' control. Throughout history it has always been the case that workers' control has been raised as a demand during periods of intense class struggle, but workers' control under capitalism can either move forward towards the complete expropriation of the capitalists or it slips back and can be reabsorbed into less threatening forms of workers' “participation” and so on.
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By Rob Sewell
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Friday, 09 December 2005 |
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There are many bourgeois historians who believe that history is made by “Great Men and Women”, kings and queens, statesmen and politicians. It is this unscientific approach that Marxism is opposed to. However, Marxists do not deny the role of individuals in history. History is made by people. But we need to uncover the dialectical relationship between the individual (the subjective) and the great forces (objective) that govern the movement of society and see this role in its historical context. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 02 November 2005 |
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Aakar Books in Delhi, India, have recently published a new edition of Fascism - what it is and how to fight it with a new introduction by Anindee Banerjee and Saurobijay Sarkar. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Friday, 30 September 2005 |
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Aakar Books in Delhi, India, have recently
published a new edition of The Permanent Revolution. Here we provide the
details and a picture of the cover.
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By Rob Sewell
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Friday, 16 September 2005 |
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More
than a decade ago, with the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the strategists of
Capital launched an unprecedented ideological offensive against socialism and
Marxism. For them, capitalism had won. But while the forces of socialism were
isolated in this period, the ground was being prepared for a titanic shift to
the left. We are witnessing this now all over the world. |
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By Miriam Martin in Vancouver
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Tuesday, 08 March 2005 |
 Mainstream feminism has attempted to reduce March 8th to a vague and depoliticised celebration of
the female sex as a homogenous group, but to socialists and working
class women the world over, it is a day for mobilizing, a day of class
struggle. It was in fact first launched by Clara Zetkin at the second
International Conference of Women Socialists, held in Copenhagen in
1910, with the aim of mobilizing women for the struggle against
bourgeois domination.
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By Marxist International Review
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Wednesday, 02 March 2005 |
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The
new MIR is now out and contains unpublished material on the history of
the Revolutionary Communist Party. The MIR also contains articles on
the Marxist view of history, Marxists and Religion and Ted Grant’s
article The character of the European Revolution. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Tuesday, 21 December 2004 |
Wellred Publications is publishing this book which contains a detailed
refutation of the charges made against Leon Trotsky at the infamous
Moscow Trials. Not Guilty also contains a new preface by Pierre Broué. Readers of In Defence of Marxism have the opportunity to purchase this book at a pre-publication price of £10 (list price: £14.99).
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 20 October 2004 |
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An article by Israel Shamir, La saga de Woods, appeared on October 15, on the Spanish language web site Rebelión.
Shamir brings out all his Stalinist venom against genuine Marxism –
i.e. Trotskyism – but he also adds some of his own novel ideas. Alan
Woods, basing himself on the classical writings of Marx, Engels and in
particular Lenin, shows how Stalinism and Marxism are opposites. In
Part One he deals mainly with the question of ‘Socialism In One
Country’, stressing that this represented the narrow nationalist
outlook of the bureaucracy and was in total contradiction with the
internationalism of Lenin. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 20 October 2004 |
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In the second part, Alan Woods explains that far from playing a
revolutionary role, the ideas of Stalinism were disastrous for the
world Communist movement. They led to the defeat of the 1926 Chinese
Revolution. Stalinism was also steeped in racism and nationalism, an
example of which was the terrible treatment of the Jews in Russia. The
“two stages” theory led to a series of disasters in the colonial
revolution, and the official Communists in Cuba, instead of backing
Castro actually supported the Batista regime, all in the name of
supporting some imaginary progressive national bourgeoisie. Today,
these same ideas, if followed in Venezuela, risk the derailment of the
revolution. Israel Shamir understands none of this. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 20 October 2004 |
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Shamir claims Stalin was not an anti-Semite, but all historical
evidence proves the opposite. He also reveals a classical Stalinist
approach to the Russia of today. He seems to have no problem with the
return of capitalism to Russia. All he is worried about is the
interference of “foreign” capitalists. If his nationalist approach were
applied to Cuba and Venezuela this would spell disaster for the
revolution in both countries. Alan Woods ends his three part article by
appealing for a return to the traditions of genuine Bolshevism and not
that of the Stalin school of falsification. |
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By Alessandro D'Aloia
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Friday, 15 October 2004 |
 For
a long period in his life Wilhelm Reich considered himself a Marxist.
He applied the scientific method of Marxism to his research into
Psychoanalysis and this led him to break with many of the theories of
Freud. At one stage he came close to Trotsky, but then drifted away.
Under intense persecution he eventually broke with Marxism and even
revised some of his earlier brilliant insights. Alessandro D'Aloia
looks at the rise and fall of Reich.
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By Heiko Khoo
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Friday, 15 October 2004 |
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Whilst one does not find in Noam Chomsky any specific critique of Marx’s writings (he admits he is not a Marx “scholar”), there are a number of inferences that Marxism represents an authoritarian tradition, although this is qualified by regular references to a supposed “left libertarian tradition”. Heiko Khoo looks at some of the ideas of Chomsky, showing how he misrepresents – or doesn’t even understand – genuine Marxism.
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By Heiko Khoo
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Friday, 15 October 2004 |
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Heiko Khoo continues his analysis of Chomsky’s writings on Marxism. Chomsky reveals no real understanding of the Russian Revolution and its later degeneration. For him Lenin and Stalin, in the end, are the same, or at least one prepared the ground for the other. He prefers movements such as that of the Spanish Anarchists, but again he ignores what they actually did in practice.
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Thursday, 23 September 2004 |
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We are proud
to announce the launch of a new Marxist theoretical magazine, the Marxist International Review.
This will appear every two months, contain a full 60 pages of analysis,
and deal with a wide range of subjects. In particular, we will call
upon the rich theoretical material produced by In Defence of Marxism but largely unavailable to those without internet access. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 01 September 2004 |
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Marxist.com recently published an article by Celia Hart in Havana. It has
a very great significance, because the author, who is the daughter of two
well-known leaders of the Cuban Revolution, calls for a discussion about Trotsky’s
role and ideas. It immediately caused a controversy on an international scale.
One of those who attacked Celia was a certain Israel Shamir, who raked up all
the old Stalinist myths about the great role of Stalin. Alan Woods comments. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 01 September 2004 |
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In Part Two of this article we deal with the statements of G. Zyuganov published
in Rebelion under the title Stalin y el Partido Comunista Ruso hoy (Stalin
and the Russian Communist Party today). Zyuganov attempts to revive the
authority of Stalin. Alan Woods sets the record straight. |
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By Alan Woods
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Wednesday, 01 September 2004 |
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In Part Two we concluded with how easily the old Soviet bureaucracy accepted
the passage to capitalism. Comrade Zyuganov sings the praises of the Stalinist
bureaucracy in the economic field. But contrary to what comrade Zyuganov would
like us to believe the Stalinist bureaucracy, and Stalin himself, were actually
preparing the conditions which would eventually lead to the collapse of the
state-owned planned economy. |
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By Alan Woods
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Saturday, 28 August 2004 |
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“What we are discussing here is the world revolution. Globalisation manifests itself now as a global crisis of capitalism. That is the inner meaning of these shocks and crises and wars, which are already beginning to shape the psychology of the new generation of fighters.” Second part of Alan Woods’ speech at the August 2004 international gathering of the international revolutionary Marxist tendency. |
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By Alan Woods
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Friday, 27 August 2004 |
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A speech given by Alan Woods at the August 2004 international gathering of the international revolutionary Marxist tendency, in which he outlines the general lines of development of the crisis of capitalism today and the effects this is having on the class struggle internationally. The capitalists have no solution to the crisis of their system, therefore in the long run revolution is the only way out. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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The present document updates the analysis of the Marxist tendency on the world
situation in the light of the latest developments. Part One deals mainly with
the world economy, with particular attention being paid to the position of the
USA and the growing power of China. Parts Two, Three, Four and Five will deal
with the European Union, world relations, Iraq and the Middle East, the South
Asian subcontinent, Latin America and the effects all this is having on the
consciousness of the masses and the mass organisations of the working class. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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In Part Two we deal with the growing contradictions within the European Union,
products of the crisis of capitalism which is pushing the various member states
in different directions. It also looks into the polarisation between rich and
poor worldwide and how world relations are affected. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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Here we look at the situation as it is developing in Iraq and the
difficulties of US imperialism in holding the country, the Middle East
and the conflicts between US imperialism
and the European Union in this region, the impasse in Afghanistan, the
revolutionary potential
of the Indian proletariat and the developments in Pakistan where the
Marxist tendency has started to develop in a serious manner. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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Latin America is in the vanguard of the process of world revolution. In
Venezuela, where the masses have defeated reaction three times, the
revolution is at a crossroads. The Cuban revolution is threatened and
can only survive by spreading to the rest of Latin America, starting
with Venezuela, but also moving on to countries such as Peru and
Ecuador, and linking up with the Bolivian revolution, also at quite an
advcanced stage. |
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By In Defence of Marxism
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Wednesday, 18 August 2004 |
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In this final part we look at the effects of changes in the economic
environment on the consciousness of the masses and on the mass
organisations of the working class. These effects do not take place
automatically, but only with a delay. Human consciousness tends to lag
behind events. But every day the masses are learning painful lessons,
for the new situation does not allow the ruling class the luxury of
serious reforms and concessions. |
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By Ted Grant
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Wednesday, 14 July 2004 |
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Originally published in 1974 in a period when there was a discussion on the question of workers’ control and what it meant. The right-wing leaders in the British labour movement (and internationally) interpreted it as “workers’ participation”, which meant the workers would be consulted on minor questions, but real control remained in the hands of the bosses. Today, thirty years later, this article maintains all its validity, in explaining the real Marxist approach to this question.
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By Ted Grant
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Wednesday, 07 July 2004 |
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Originally published in 1975, this article was an answer to Chrysler’s
plans to sack thousands of workers in Britain. We are publishing it together
with our article on workers' participation or workers' control as it posed
clearly the demand for nationalisation under workers’ control and management. |
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