In Firebrand’s second visit to the Socialism Conference in Chicago, we took part in discussions throughout the weekend, intervening with Marxist perspectives in a “big tent” event now largely defined by reformism. The Gaza genocide rightly dominated discourse. We spoke to affirm the importance of class independence, class analysis, genuine anti-imperialism, and revolutionary organization.
National Bolshevism originated during a brief, disastrous moment in the 1920s when the German Communist Party attempted to appeal to working-class Nazi supporters with nationalist or even anti-semitic rhetoric. As Marxist historian Doug Enaa Greene shows, this shameful chapter still resonates today. Marxists should never be tempted to set aside our internationalism or anti-oppression principles in hopes of reaching the most backward workers.
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.
What will it take to liberate Palestine? It starts, of course, with the heroism and sumud (steadfastness) of Palestinians we’ve witnessed over the past 75 years. That’s why Firebrand supports Palestinian resistance in all its forms. But international action is also...
Karl Kautsky’s grandson John told a very revealing anecdote about attitudes towards his grandfather in the 1960s. He recalled a historian named Georges Haupt, who had many discussions among students about the history of the Second International. During those talks,...
In Marxist theory, primitive accumulation is, as Marx defined it in Capital Volume I, “the historical process of divorcing the producer from the means of production.” Occurring at different times in different regions around the world, primitive accumulation is the...
Earlier this month, I attended Socialist Alternative’s Socialism conference in Sydney. For readers outside Australia, I’m referring to the Australian Trotskyist organization (which was a cousin of sorts to the ISO in the US before the latter disbanded), and not the...
Continued from Part One After my first experiences with the International Socialist Organization (ISO), what convinced me to join was the sincere belief that my views and actions mattered. After meeting up with some comrades from the organization in early 2011, we...
Introduction “Trotsky considers the opportunist current and its leaders somewhat as victims of circumstances… There is no doubt that opportunism, like all else in the world has its objective causes in external conditions. But in politics more than anywhere else, to...
What kind of party do we need? Or what kind of party should revolutionary socialists be focused on building? I want to propose some answers to the organizational questions we’re facing. But more than that, I want to invite those who are asking the same questions to...
A specter is haunting communism: the specter of “socialism” Reformists and Stalinists, social democrats and communists alike have invented “socialism” as a replacement for Karl Marx’s revolutionary communism. They try to divert the left-wing movement from its goal of...
On May 2, 2022, a draft opinion of the United States Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health decision was “accidentally” leaked. As it stands, the decision — concerning a Mississippi law seeking to ban abortions past the 15th week of pregnancy — would...
The authentic Marxist tradition has always stressed that democracy is fundamental to socialism. Marx defined socialism as the “self-emancipation of the working class.” In the Communist Manifesto, he and Engels said that the first step on the road to socialism and then...