We can see where the areas of fightback are today: the small strikes, the hospitals, for safety during the pandemic in schools, and the Teamsters’ opposition.
Movements
Chicago strikers fight for their patients
The largest strike taking place in this country today is the combined nurses and campus workers strike at the University of Illinois at Chicago. It represents one of the most important examples of united working class action in the time of Trump and COVID. What’s involved here? On Saturday, September […]
Colombia: a nationwide uprising against police brutality
Colombia is engulfed in a nationwide uprising against police violence and government assassination of social movement leaders. The uprising erupted after September 9 when police detained and murdered lawyer Javier Ordoñez by repeated Taser shocks to his head. Police claimed they had to subdue Ordoñez after they were called to […]
Supreme Court’s Abortion decision: a small victory amid a string of defeats
A movement is needed more than ever to defend a woman’s right to choose The United States Supreme Court, in another sharply divided abortion rights decision, struck down a Louisiana statute that would have required doctors performing abortions in that state to have admitting privileges at local hospitals. The requirement […]
Fighting for reproductive rights in the age of Trump
The Black Lives Matter movement has shaken US society to its core in 2020—and accomplished more in a matter of weeks of struggle than decades of waiting for Democrats to take action. The US Supreme Court is now preparing to rule on the most draconian anti-abortion legislation since the 1973 […]
Without struggle, there is no progress
On May 25, George Floyd was murdered by Derek Chauvin of the Minneapolis Police Department. Like so many times before, at least since the attack on Rodney King in 1992, the police were caught on camera. What’s different now is that George Floyd’s murder has sparked a rebellion larger, broader, […]
The Language of the unheard
“Can you hear us now?” Those were the words spray painted on the boarded-up windows of Minneapolis’ East Lake Clinic—near the 3rd Precinct police station that protesters burned down on the night of May 28th. The whole world has now watched four Minneapolis cops murder George Floyd. Yet it took […]
“The Negro struggle has a vitality and a validity of its own”: C. L. R. James on Black Liberation in the United States
The uprising that spread across the United States in the wake of the Minneapolis police murder of George Floyd on Memorial Day was a powerful reminder of the central role that racism has always played in U.S. history. But was also a reminder of another key point that the Trinidadian-born […]
Socialist tasks during the pandemic
Many excellent articles have appeared analyzing the COVID 19 pandemic from a socialist and Marxist perspective. In this piece, we will look at just one question: what should socialists do during the pandemic? The main components of the answer are supporting essential workers fighting for safety protections, defending workers demanding […]
Workers’ actions at the start of the pandemic
The COVID19 pandemic and resulting shelter in place orders have obviously led to a tidal wave of suffering and hardship throughout the working class. However, in a number of cases, workers have used traditional labor forms of struggle to push back against this situation. These activities have tended to fall […]
The state of the class struggle in the U.S.
When socialists look at the situation in a country, one of the first questions we ask is what is the balance of class forces? Where does the struggle between the employers and the working class stand? This article will attempt to answer that question. Unemployment The October unemployment figure was […]
Black feminism and intersectionality
“Although we are in essential agreement with Marx’s theory as it applied to the very specific economic relationships he analyzed, we know that his analysis must be extended further in order for us to understand our specific economic situation as Black women.” —the Combahee River Collective Statement, 1977 1 “The […]
