The upcoming US presidential election is once again provoking arguments from liberals about the “lesser evil” amid widespread concern about the reactionary right. Revolutionary socialists never support capitalist parties or their candidates — our class enemies — and we reject lesser-evilism as a justification for doing so, even when the “lesser” evil isn’t complicit in genocide. Here, we outline the history of this fundamental Marxist principle.

The current civil war in Sudan, with rival factions backed by foreign imperialist powers, has resulted in a terrible humanitarian crisis. The social and economic causes of the war are storied and complex — but are also the result of Western imperialism and the neoliberal capitalist order leaving an African nation with desperately limited resources, crippling austerity, and ethnic division.

The movement for Palestine is unprecedented in its radicalization of wide layers of society. But there are many demoralizing factors, from unending news of the genocide to vicious state repression. How do we make the movement stronger? The solution is democracy: building engaged membership in democratic organizations, training them as organizers themselves, and making them active participants in the struggle.