Our historic conception of the Transitional Program and its underlying method is aimed at the construction of a deeply rooted, mass revolutionary socialist working class party with the central objective of leading the proletarian struggle for state power and the construction of a socialist society. The Bureau text is silent on this fundamental question.
Robbie Mahood, 75, a founding member and a leading light in Socialist Action/Ligue pour l’Action socialiste, our sister party in Canada, passed away in Montreal on December 26, 2021.
Robbie Mahood [Presented as on line educational sponsored by Ligue pour l’action socialiste (LAS)/Socialist Action/Canada. Montréal, April 23, 2021. SA/LAS is Socialist Action/USA sister party in the Canadian state] The last few decades have seen a resurgence in anarchist thought and modes of organizing inspired by anarchism. Decisions by consensus, diversity of tactics, affinity groups, … Continue reading Marxism versus Anarchism
By Ann Montague Grace Carlson was the only female member of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) (predecessor organization of Socialist Action) to be convicted and sentenced under the notorious anti-communist Smith Act of 1940. She was sentenced to sixteen months in the Federal Correctional Facility For Women in Alderson, West Virginia. The trial and convictions … Continue reading Grace Carlson: Unsung Hero of the Early Trotskyist Movement
The past several months of highlight the inherent power of coordinated mass action. Those who previously considered themselves non-actors in society came to realize their power.
To celebrate our comrade Cliff Conner's new book "The Tragedy of American Science," out now from Haymarket Books, we re-publish an early excerpt published in Socialist Action in April 2018.
The bi-weekly educational series is a response by the Party to educate and integrate a growing wave of new recruits drawn to the ideas of revolutionary socialism.
By MARTY GOODMAN “The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born; now is the time of monsters.” “I’m a pessimist because of intelligence, but an optimist because of will.” “To tell the truth is revolutionary.” — Antonio Gramsci, Italian communist leader and philosopher (1891-1937). “We must stop this brain working for 20 … Continue reading Philosopher Antonio Gramsci: How revolutionary?
By ROB LYONS From the 6th to the 8th of May, the first International Academic Conference examining the life and ideas of the great Ukrainian revolutionary and leader of the Russian revolution Lev Davidovitch Bronstein, now universally known as Leon Trotsky, was held in Havana, Cuba. The Conference was organized by the Juan Marinelo Cultural … Continue reading Trotsky conference in Cuba: An interview with the organizer
By DAVID RIEHLE Four score and seven years ago … Franklin Roosevelt brought forth in this country a New Deal. Not a Square Deal (Teddy Roosevelt) or a Fair Deal (Truman) but a NEW DEAL. New York Governor Roosevelt was nominated for president at the Democratic Party national convention in Chicago on July 2, 1932. … Continue reading The New Deal: Roosevelt’s answer to ‘radicalism’
By RUWAN MUNASINGHE “The structuring of the LSSP leadership ... showed itself best during the August 1953 Hartal (general strike). The LSSP leadership appeared as a really revolutionary team at the head of insurgent masses, fighting in the streets simultaneously for immediate material gains for the impoverished masses and for the socialist overthrow of the … Continue reading The day Trotskyists shut down a country: 65th anniversary of the Sri Lankan Hartal
By LISA LUINENBURG When I became a mother three and a half years ago, I began to feel my oppression as a woman in capitalist society more acutely. All of the endless demands on my time began to add up—the sleepless nights, the feedings, child care, cooking, housework, errands and laundry around the clock. And … Continue reading Marxism & the social reproduction of labor: Exploring the roots of women’s oppression
By DAVID KIELY Our dear comrade Annette Gagne died in Providence, R.I., on March 14, the 135th anniversary of Karl Marx’s death in 1883. In her last moments, Annette was surrounded by friends and comrades. All were people who, as a close friend of Annette said, “meant the world to her.” Annette’s political legacy as … Continue reading Annette Gagne: Socialist & LGBT activist
By CLIFF CONNER Following World War II, a think tank named the RAND Corporation took the lead in formulating policies guiding military-industrial Big Science. Some of the titles of books and articles about RAND provide a hint of what it represented in the public imagination: “The Think Tank that Controls America,” “America’s University of Imperialism,” … Continue reading The Militarization of American Science
By CHRISTINE MARIE “Social Reproduction Theory: Remapping Class, Recentering Oppression.” Edited by Tithi Bhattacharya; forward by Lise Vogel (London: Pluto Press 2017). Social reproduction feminism is not new. Marxist thinkers began to focus in earnest on the relationship between production and social reproduction in capitalist society nearly 40 years ago, in the context of what … Continue reading Essays on feminism and Marxist theory
By GARY BILLS We are republishing an article that appeared in the print edition of Socialist Action newspaper in May 2007. The article is pertinent to the widespread discussion on gun control today, when some are calling for repeal of the Second Amendment. After a horrific gun crime like the one at Virginia Tech [32 … Continue reading Gun control & workers’ militias: How socialists view the issues
By KAMRAN NAYERI and ALIREZA NASSAB The following paper was prepared for and presented at the III Conferencia Internacional de La Obra de Carlos Marx y Los Desafios del Siglo XXI (The Third Conference on the Work of Karl Marx and the Challenges of the 21st Century) in Havana, Cuba, in May 2006. The conference was organized … Continue reading The rise and fall of the 1979 Iranian Revolution: Its lessons for today
By JEFF MACKLER This is the second part of a series of articles. Part I appeared in the October 2017 issue of Socialist Action. The Russian Revolution of Oct. 25, 1917 (Nov. 7 in the new calendar) remains the seminal event in modern human history, if for no other reason that it marked the first … Continue reading The relevance of the Russian Revolution, Part II
Connecticut: ‘Solution is Socialism’ By KEITH LESLIE — NEW BRITAIN, Conn. — On Nov. 4, Socialist Action Connecticut and the Central Connecticut State University Youth for Socialist Action held their second annual conference, entitled “The Solution is Socialism.” More than 100 workers, students, and activists from as far away as Alabama turned out for a … Continue reading Educational conferences reflect growing interest in socialist ideas
By CHRISTINE MARIE Following is the text of a talk delivered by the author on Nov. 4 at the “The Solution is Socialism” educational conference in Connecticut. The conference was hosted by the Youth for Socialist Action chapter at Central Connecticut State University, where the sessions were held. Usually, when I begin a talk about … Continue reading How capitalism uses gender oppression to rule
By JEFF MACKLER Leon Trotsky, co-leader with Vladimir Lenin of the 1917 October Revolution in Russia, famously argued that the “Russian Question” was key to the standing of every party on earth that claimed allegiance to the heritage of revolutionary socialist politics. To this day, 100 years after Lenin’s Bolshevik Party led the world’s first … Continue reading The relevance of the Russian Revolution today
By JOHN LESLIE On Nov. 3, 1979, members of the Ku Klux Klan and the American Nazi Party (ANP) attacked an anti-Klan march in Greensboro, N.C., that was organized by the Communist Workers Party (CWP). Five members of the CWP were murdered and 10 others were wounded with the collusion of federal and local law … Continue reading Recalling the Greensboro Massacre
By CHRISTINE MARIE and ANN MONTAGUE This is a particularly important moment to be considering the meaning of the Russian Revolution for women, LGBTQI activists, and gender politics. We have seen the protests against the Misogynist in Chief by more than 3 million U.S. women being channeled into clubs to rebuild the Democratic Party in … Continue reading Women & gender politics in the Russian Revolution
By BARRY WEISLEDER “James Connolly and the Reconquest of Ireland,” by Priscilla Metscher. (Minneapolis: MEP Publications, 2002), 243 pages. The aftermath of the 101st anniversary of the Easter Rising is a good time to become (re)acquainted with the views of the great Irish republican socialist, James Connolly. Though many of today’s Irish nationalists and “socialists” pay homage … Continue reading Books: Remembering James Connolly
By DAVID JONES “Trotsky in New York 1917, A Radical on the Eve of Revolution,” by Kenneth D. Ackerman. (Berkeley, Calif., Counterpoint 2016), $30. One hundred years ago, on Jan. 13, 1917, the small Spanish passenger vessel SS (or Vapor Correo) Montserrat (Vapor is Spanish for steamship, Correo for mail) arrived in the harbor of … Continue reading Books: Leon Trotsky’s 1917 stay in New York City
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