socialism

The Iron Heel- Jack London

Cover of the Iron Heel

Dystopian sci-fi novel. The character agitates and struggles for a socialist revolution against an oligarchy. Envisages fascism, despite being written many years prior to its advent.

The Iron Heel describes the rise of Socialism in America, and how the wealthy oligarchy react by imposing a Dictatorship that would very closely resemble the Fascist regimes which would arise in Europe after the novel was written.

Mother- Maxim Gorky

Cover of Mother

Novel following the radicalisation of an uneducated young Russian woman, which went on to define the genre of Socialist Realism.

Resignation letter - John Crump

John Crump's resignation letter from the Socialist Party of Great Britain (SPGB) in 1973. Written as he left the UK for Japan, he describes and critiques the two main currents (economic determinists and utopians) that existed in the organisation and its failure to respond to events in society.

What is it that prevents the SPGB functioning as a revolutionary organisation?

Introduction

When we say "class", what are we talking about?

Submitted by Django on Dec 8 2012 11:51

Two parallel definitions of the word are used in political discussion. It's a perennial problem that radicals don't define what they're talking about when discussing class, or worse, making sweeping statements about it.

There were plenty of things wrong with last weekend’s Up the Anti conference.

Lobbying for the limited yet impossible

Submitted by Phil on Aug 27 2012 22:52

From the 9th to the 12th September, Brighton will play host to the 144th TUC Congress. As is the norm lately, this will be preceded by a "lobby" from Socialist Party front the National Shop Stewards Network. These are some brief thoughts provoked by constantly seeing links to the lobby on Facebook, Twitter and elsewhere.

In 2010, the lobby called on the TUC to call a demonstration. In 2011, to name the date of the next co-ordinated strike action in the pensions dispute. However you dressed it up, what it essentially amounted to was anticipating where the plodding, lacklustre trade union "left" would go next and being the first to demand it publicly.

After Six Years of Authoritarian Revolution - Max Nettlau

In this short essay written during the 1920s, Max Nettlau discusses the psychological and political impacts of the success of the Soviet dictatorship and the eclipse of libertarian socialism on the workers of Europe, claims that the “taste for freedom” is “almost dead”, predicts that any European revolution in the circumstances of his time would be an authoritarian revolution, and calls for a worldwide libertarian initiative to “create a new mentality” that should embrace all those “movements that still have a basis in voluntarism, free association, federation, the coexistence of various opinions, free experimentation, abstention from the state, and real internationalism”.

After Six Years of Authoritarian Revolution - Max Nettlau

Chapter 1

Abolish Money!

A work by the father of Japanese anarchism, Shūsui Kōtoku.

When bacteria enter a person’s bloodstream, so that person’s health is gradually undermined.

It is the same with money as with bacteria. Since money has unlimited power in the world, the ways of the world are bound to be increasingly debased. Step by step, morality is bound to be ruined and human nature faced with corruption. In the end, society is driven to destruction.

Socialism and the intelligentsia: The ideas of Jan Machajski in historical retrospect - Paul Flewers

A balanced critique of the anti-Bolshevik socialist Jan Machajski by Paul Flewers, from a Trotskyist influence perspective.

The predominance of intellectuals in the leadership of most if not all left wing organisations, and their presence to some degree or another amongst the rank and file, often give rise to the idea that socialism and/or Marxism represent the interests of intellectuals, that the working class is merely the agency by which the intellectuals are to gain power, and that socialism merely means the rep

The revolutionary workers movement and the agrarian question - Amadeo Bordiga

In this text first published in 1947, Amadeo Bordiga briefly discusses the historical and juridical background of forms of agricultural labor and landed property in the development of these forms from feudalism to capitalism, the political significance of the various strata of the agricultural working classes, and the impact of the proletarian revolution on agriculture (“thanks to one of many dialectical relations that intervene in the succession of social and historical forms, [the revolution of the industrial proletariat] will be able to abolish the principle of land rent much more rapidly and completely than that of the profit of industrial capital”).

The Revolutionary Workers Movement and the Agrarian Question – Amadeo Bordiga1

  • 1. This text on the “agrarian question” reproduced here, was first published in 1947 in our journal, Prometeo (First Series, No. 8); it is a manifestation of our incessant struggle to defend the principles and the classic position of Marxism against all distortions.

Communism has not yet begun - Claude Bitot

First published in 1995 in France: Section One, “The Historical Balance Sheet” includes chapters on: communist movements throughout history; Marx and Engels and communism; “Real” vs. “Formal” domination of capital and the importance of this distinction for understanding the failure of the old workers movements (capitalism was not “obsolete” prior to 1945). Section Two, “Perspectives”, contains an extensive discussion of: the economic roots of capitalism’s current crisis (the “final stage of its cycle”); the communist revolution; and socialism.

Communism Has Not Yet Begun – Claude Bitot

Author’s Preface to the Spanish Edition