International Viewpoint

The Alliance for Economic Democracy (AED) is a concerned group of trade unionists, farmers, fishers, students, academics and activists who uphold the value of economic rights and justice in public policymaking. We wish to draw your attention to several key issues regarding the proposed Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact (MCC), which are not adequately represented in public discussion at this time, yet crucial to the wellbeing and security of people in Sri Lanka.

A socialist candidate elected in Seattle against the weight of a $4.1 million campaign by Amazon against progressive and socialist candidates in their “company town”. This report from Socialist Alternative.

In Hong Kong, leftists of all kinds support ongoing protests for democracy and civil liberties. Leftists everywhere else should, too

Several countries in Latin America are currently experiencing very powerful class conflicts and extremely violent repression on the part of reactionary forces and the state. The following is an overview on the situation in various countries and the dynamics of their struggles. Franck Gaudichaud was interviewed by Antoine Pelletier.

“Domestic workers arrive to smoke, ash,” the headline in the Los Angeles Times read on October 29, 2019. Unaware of mandatory evacuations from a fire sweeping through exclusive enclaves near the Getty Museum, domestic workers had trudged up deserted streets and through particle-filled air not wanting to be late to their jobs; losing even one day's pay could make it impossible to afford housing, food, or medicine. They discovered that their employers had fled hours earlier without notifying them or advising them to stay away from the evacuation zone.

France has once again entered a phase of large-scale social confrontation.

The general election in Britain on 12 December will be the most important in 40 years. Back in 1979, Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister, introducing neoliberal policies with a wave of privatisations and the breakup of the welfare state. Despite heroic struggles in the 1980s, especially the year-long miners' strike, the defeats of the labour movement have had an enduring effect. This was most evident with the political change in the Labour Party with Tony Blair becoming leader and then Prime Minister for ten years until 2007.

The 25th Conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP25) is about to start in Madrid. This summit was set to be held in Santiago, but the Chilean president preferred a waiver. COPs often convene 10,000 people: they had to be prevented from witnessing the savage police repression of the uprising against the Piñera government's ultra-liberal policies.

Between 800,000 (according to the police) and 1.5 million protesters (according to the CGT – France's largest trade union federation), the first day of a strike against the government's neoliberal pension “reform” was particularly impressive. In Paris and many regional cities, this was the largest street mobilization we have seen since the massive working-class movement during the winter of 1995, which bodes well for the future. In many cities, police tried, but failed, to disrupt trade union marches: the demonstrators were determined to march, despite police provocations and violence.

A few weeks ago four thirty year olds from Bologna were complaining about the victory of Salvini's hard right Lega (League) in the Umbrian regional elections and the danger of him winning their traditionally left of centre region in the January elections. They then did something that is typical of angry thirty year olds. They went onto social media and cooked up the Sardines idea.

Every year, the commemoration of the massacre of students at the Polytechnic University of Athens, when soldiers of the fascist military junta (1967-73) massacred dozens of students (the exact number is still not established) leads to important mobilizations of student youth, around slogans which are always topical: “education, bread, freedom”. The days leading up to the demonstration on 17 November give rise to rallies, solidarity celebrations, demonstrations of all kinds, in a context of anti-imperialist resistance and the defence of democratic rights.

Across the globe workers, indigenous people and youth are taking to the streets to protest against austerity, corruption, dictatorship and climate extinction – despite the setback of electoral victories by the hard right. How can we understand these movements, and what political obstacles do they face?

Chilean women have hit the headlines recently on social media with their performance denouncing violence against women which has been taken up in countries around the world. But women's protests didn't start in November.

After the death of hundreds of people since the eruption of Iraq's revolution in October, there is no return to the old system.

The balance sheet of the violent crackdown on the Iranian protesters is difficult to establish. Various NGOs, including Amnesty International, advance figures of 100 to 200 deaths, thousands of injuries and more than 5,000 arrests in less than a week. A violence that speaks volumes about the fears of the regime facing a new uprising, almost two years after the winter of 2017-2018, against the cost of living and, more generally, against the regime itself.

The characteristics of the current crisis, as well as the practical and theoretical course of recent years, have allowed a fruitful dialogue between two of the central theoretical currents of the last two centuries, feminism and Marxism. With a past history of marriages and divorces it seems that in recent years we are witnessing their reconciliation. In the past decade, the literature that is indebted to both currents has been rediscovering, as well as overcoming, some of the historical debates that have marked their relationship. Undoubtedly, the mass growth of the feminist movement has contributed to this. And, on the other hand, it not surprising that during recent years there has been a renewal of academic and activist interest in Marxism: university seminars proliferate, the works of classical thinkers have been reissued and so on.

In office since 2006, Evo Morales, Bolivia's first indigenous president, has been overthrown in a coup d'état. Debate on how this happened and what it all means has been proliferating on the international left. Ashley Smith talked with Jeffery R. Webber and Forrest Hylton, two long-time observers of Bolivia, to get a better sense of the issues at stake.

Gilbert Achcar was interviewed for the Marxist Left Review by Darren Roso.

A new contribution to writing the history of the Fourth International was published in November 2019: Memoirs of a critical communist; Towards a history of the Fourth International by Livio Maitan.

This address was given by Franco Turigliatto at the launch of Livio Maitan's book Memoirs of a critical communist: Towards a history of the Fourth International at the Historical Materialism conference in London in November 2019.