Marxism brings together activists, radicals, rebels, students, unionists and revolutionaries from across the world for a weekend of debate and discussion of contemporary radical politics, history and theory.

Foundations of Marxism

Spotlight on the Middle East

Racism, sexism and resistance

Revolutionary history

Imperialism, colonialism and resistance

Fighting the far right

Themes

Until 1948, Zionism was a minority current in the Jewish community in general. Hertzl’s proposal in 1896 for a Jewish state in Palestine generated vigorous opposition within Jewish intellectual, social and political movements, most notably the Jewish Labor Bund. American socialists and communists in the interwar years understood that Zionism was right-wing nationalism and opposed it as an attempt to align the Jewish working class with the interests of the Jewish bourgeoisie.  In the years after WW2, anti-zionism and opposition to Israel were crucial to understanding Middle Eastern politics. Today, radical and revolutionary Jews have continued to stand with Palestinians in their resistance to the apartheid Israeli state and its genocidal attacks. Their courage in the face of accusations of antisemitism and threats to jobs and often their person is a testament to the continued strength of this tradition.

The revolutionary tradition of Jewish anti-Zionism

Education under capitalism

The US v China

The 1905 revolution and the birth of the Russian soviets

High school rebellion and struggle

The history of spies in Australia

Socialist Alternative: history and perspectives

The fight for the Amazon

Donald Trump is returning to the White House to oversee US capitalism and empire. Once Trump is inaugurated, the Republicans will hold the presidency, both houses and the majority of the Supreme Court. The party is now united behind his far-right vision. While we cannot be certain what Trump will actually do in office, we do know he will rule for the rich while workers and the oppressed will suffer. This session will discuss what Trump's second term will look like and what it means for US and global politics.

USA after the elections

Bows of burning gold: The revolutionary visions of William Blake

Why are so many teenage boys misogynists?

Class struggle in Argentina

The social construction of the homosexual identity

Why we need a revolution to solve the climate crisis

Explaining transphobia today

The politics of Judith Butler

Despite all the gains made over the last 50 years, women have never been more objectified. Industries that thrive off the requirement that women look attractive to men at all times are thriving. The sex industry is increasingly normalised, and with it, attitudes that normalise the treatment of women as though they exist to serve men. And much of the time, it's women who are profiting from or promoting these soul-destroying practices. This session will look at why this is happening, who is driving it, how they are benefiting and what it is about the capitalist system that means it cannot tolerate genuine equality.

Capitalism and sexual objectification

The strikes that made international working women's day

Abortion fights- from Australia to the US

Despite some progress, women in Australia still get paid less, have worse jobs, retire with less and do more of the unpaid caring work than men. This is not the result of sexist attitudes on the part of men, although many have them. Inequality persists because capitalism is a system based on exploitation. Effective exploitation requires that the lives of the great majority of us are organised to maximise profits for business and industry, not to fulfil our potential or relate to each other as equals. This session will explain the connection between exploitation and oppression, focusing on the situation facing women in Australia today.

The impact of women's changing role in the workplace

Marxism and women's liberation

The XX Factor

Sexism and class in Australia today

The term “united front” was used by the international communist movement in the early 20th century to describe any form of joint action between revolutionaries and non-revolutionaries. But it also referred to a more specific approach to winning over social democratic workers. This session will seek to clarify the united front as a strategy and the ways in which it has been posed in a wide range of contexts and periods.

Revolutionary strategy and the united front

The United Front

While revolutionary socialists might advocate for public control of utilities, nationalisation is

not socialism. Socialism requires workers' control, which can only be the product of workers'

What would be different about a socialist economy?

Workers' control of production

What do we mean by workers' control over production?

General strikes are nearly as old as the workers’ movement. They have featured in virtually every major upsurge of the class struggle in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The stakes are high as they bring the working class into conflict with the capitalist class and the capitalist state. This session will examine how revolutionary Marxists have understood the theory and practice of the general strike—not as a slogan applicable at all times and under all circumstances, but as a specific demand to be raised at particular, concrete points in the struggle.

The General Strike

Wars can take many different forms. Imperialist wars are an inevitable outgrowth of the competition at the heart of the capitalist system. Marxists absolutely oppose such wars. But socialists are not pacifists. We support the right of oppressed nations to fight for their freedom and the right of any future workers' state to defend itself against imperialist invasion. This session will discuss the different types of war and the attitudes socialists take toward them.

Marxism and War

Marxism and war

Generations of socialists have tried to change society through parliament, a strategy known as reformism. Yet, time and again, these reformist socialists have ended up selling out to the capitalists and carrying out anti-working class measures, including supporting imperialist wars. But does that mean it is unprincipled for revolutionary socialists, who prioritise mass working class struggle and deny that parliament can be a forum for far-reaching socialist reforms, to run for parliament under any circumstances? This talk will discuss situations where revolutionaries have used elections and parliamentary positions as a platform to advocate for socialism, to disrupt the consensus-building process of bourgeois elections and to build faith in the working class and the possibility of a world organised for human need.

Revolutionaries and parliamentary elections

How should revolutionaries view parliamentary elections?

Revolutionary parliamentarism?

The Ballot, the Streets-or Both?

What is the socialist approach to parliament?

Mass protests change people. The act of collectively standing together pushes aside the powerlessness we experience in everyday life, builds confidence and generates a sense of strength. This experience lies at the heart of all famous movements against tyranny and oppression, all social action that has won radical reforms or ended wars. Protests are not just some strategy to pressure politicians to grant our demands, even though, at times, they do. They are essential if fundamental social change is to be achieved.

The importance of a mass movement

Militancy in movements

Iran

Oil slicked reaction: The role of the Gulf States in the Middle East

Nasser speaking

Nasser and Arab Nationalism

Mass protests in the Arab Spring

The 2011 uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa started in Tunisia and spread across the region as far east as Bahrain on the Arabian Gulf. They shook and overthrew decades-long repressive monarchies and presidencies and opened up the possibility of social transformation. Yet, within a couple of years, the uprisings had been snuffed out as a result of both repression and their political weaknesses. What lessons can we learn from these uprisings and their defeat? All are welcome to reflect on and analyse these momentous events.

The rise and fall of the Arab spring

Demonstration of oil workers

The Middle East has long been a chessboard on which global and regional powers play out their games of domination, oppression and war. However, there is another tradition, that of resistance to colonialism, oppression, and capitalism by the region's oil workers, who have repeatedly demonstrated their enormous power. This talk goes over the rich history of struggle by oil workers and their fight for social progress and liberation for workers across the region.

A history of oil workers resistance in the Middle East

Depiction of the Lebanese civil war

In the early stages of the Lebanese Civil War of 1975-90, it seemed that revolutionary Lebanese students and workers could link up with fighters of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) to transform Lebanon and provide a launchpad for the liberation of Palestine. But thanks in large part to the brutal military interventions by Syria and Israel, the revolution turned into a terrible civil war that ended in a stalemate and the PLO's exile to Tunisia. What went wrong, and was there an alternative? All are welcome for a discussion.

From revolution to barbarism: Revisiting the Lebanese Civil War

Woodcut by a convict

Resistance by both free and unfree labourers emerged soon after the colony of NSW was established in 1788. Sometimes, this took the form of individuals absconding from their masters; at other times, it involved collective action, including strikes, go-slows, riots and sabotage. Professor Michael Quinlan, author of "The Origins of Worker Mobilisation: Australia 1788-1850" (2017) brings this rich history to light.

Southern Tree of Liberty

The Origins of Worker Mobilisation: Australia 1788-1850

United We Stand: Class Struggle in Colonial Australia

Confronting the lash: Workers' rebellion in the early Australian colony

Police in uniform

Protest repression in Australia today

Striking Ore: The Rise and Fall of Union Power in the Pilbara

Strikers with placards

Australia's support for World War II is often presented as totally ubiquitous amongst the population, as the nation united to support what was supposedly a global war against fascism. However, there are outliers to this - such as the resistance of coal miners who went on strike for months in 1940 over demands for better working conditions and to seize up the Australian war machine.

Coal miners during World War II

The Coalminers of New South Wales: a History of the Union 1860-1960

A History of the Miner's Federation of Australia

Striking against World War Two?: the 1940 coal strike

Newspaper article of the NSW general strike, 1917

In 1917, a general strike that began in New South Wales shook the foundations of Australian capitalism. Workers on the railways, in the coal mines, on the docks and even in cafés took dramatic strike action. Hundreds of thousands of workers were mobilised across the country to protest against the Australian government’s attacks on living standards. This session will examine the dynamics of the general strike, its power and political limitations.

Australia 1917: From world war to class war

The NSW General Strike of 1917

Aboriginal Embassy protests

The Black Power movement of the 60s and 70s marked a radical leap forward in the anti-racist struggle in Australia. Inspired by the movement in the US, Aboriginal activists took up militant tactics to place radical demands against the inherently racist nature of Australian society and institutions. They directly confronted racism with protest, including setting up the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in 1972. This session will be an incredible firsthand account of the movement and draw out the key lessons for activists today.

Black Power in Redfern 1968 - 1972

An eyewitness to Australia's Black Power movement

Elon Musk

Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Andrew Forrest, Gina Rinehart. The world's richest people have tripled their fortunes in the last two decades. Not only are they obscenely wealthy, but they are extremely powerful. This session will discuss who the capitalist class is today, their interests, their divisions, and how they are organised.

The ruling class in Australia

Masters of the world: capitalists today

Recent strike footage

The working class has changed dramatically in the past half-century with a big jump in office workers and many fewer working in factories; many more with university degrees and many fewer leaving school at 16. But what do these changes mean for the power of the working class? Are they still the "gravediggers of capitalism", as Marx and Engels argued, or are they now too weak or too satisfied with their lot to make a difference? This talk explains why the working class still has the power to change society.

Does the Australian working class have the power to change society?

Who makes up the modern working class?

"Save the middle class" placard

The two main classes under capitalism are the capitalists and the working class. However, the middle class—journalists, academics, small-town mayors, businessmen, and, historically, the clergy—also shapes society through its influence on ideology. Their class point of view can influence the working class, especially when the working class is less organised and middle-class aspirations are widespread. They are a key support base for capitalist parties.

The 'New Middle Class' and Socialist Politics

Who's middle class?

Karl Marx's Theory of Revolution, Vol. 2: The Politics of Social Classes chapters 11 and 17

The middle classes and their outsized influence

Whiteness has become the lens through which many understand racial division and oppression. By treating whiteness as a social construct, whiteness theory seeks to examine how racism operates and its root causes. This talk explains why whiteness is a dead-end for anti-racists.

Race and Class

Whiteness

Yanis Varoufakis

Left intellectuals, such as Yanis Varoufakis and Jodi Dean, argue that we have transitioned from a capitalist system to feudal class relations. This session will critique the analysis that we are now living in techno-feudalism, neo-feudalism or post-capitalism and unpack what's wrong with their arguments.

Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism

Communism or Neo-Feudalism?

Brand new, you're retro

Are we living in post capitalism?

Flags from many countries

The United Nations is, in theory, the diplomatic glue holding together a state of world peace. Its role as the maker and enforcer of international law has come into increased relevance in recent years; it has declared Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory illegal, and the state of Israel is being tried in its International Court of Justice for genocide. But does international law even matter? Can it actually be enforced? And if not, what's the point of it?

Does international law matter?

Overlaid colourful faces

When it comes to challenging discrimination, many people, from left-wing radicals, to progressive liberals to ruling class figures, argue for greater representation of oppressed groups in prominent positions in government, business and academia. But can such an approach end oppression? This talk argues that such token measures do nothing except elevate a few well-connected figures and simply reinforce the underlying structures responsible for oppression. It will also argue for a strategy that can liberate all the oppressed rather than just a tiny handful.

The politics of representation

Pictures of heads of state

Given the US domination of the world system, some on the left claim that any nation that opposes the US - such as China, Iran and Russia - should be supported when they clash with Washington.  This approach, known as campism, is often associated with an attempt to paint these nations as socialist or, in some way, progressive. This talk will discuss the historic roots of campism and why anti-imperialist leftists should reject it.

Confronting the Stalinist legacy

Internationalism, Anti-Imperialism, And the Origins of Campism

China and the U.S. Left - A Dialogue Between Critical China Scholars and Spectre

Campism

A crowd of people

Identity politics centres the experience of the oppressed and their leadership in resisting oppressions like racism and sexism. This can seem innocuous and a common sense position for those wanting to challenge oppression, but it is a poor strategy to fight oppression. This session will engage with the practical impact of identity politics in movements today and argue why the fight against oppression needs a different, class-based approach.

The failure of identity politics: A Marxist analysis

Identity politics in movements today

Banner featuring Ho Chi Minh

During the 1960s, radical anti-war protesters would chant, "Ho, Ho, Ho Chi Minh, Ho Chi Minh Is Gonna Win!" For millions around the world, the heroic struggle of the Vietnamese people inspired those who stood against the US war machine. However, much leftist mythology surrounds Ho Chi Minh and the Vietnamese communist movement. While the National Liberation Front achieved a great victory over US aggression, the leaders of the movement were never motivated by a desire to end exploitation and oppression and bring workers to power. Instead, a new bureaucratic state was founded, which would go on to ruthlessly exploit the Vietnamese working class and peasantry and, over the decades, adopt neoliberal economic measures and support US imperialism in the region. This talk will explore the politics of Ho Chi Minh and why the movement he led could not lead to liberation and equality.

Neither Washington, nor Moscow - but Vietnam?, editorial for International Socialism 1968

Vietnam and Cambodia: Winning the war, losing the peace

Red Brotherhood at War: Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos since 1975

Ho Chi Minh: a life

Ho Chi Minh and the politics of the Viet Cong

Picture of Castro

Third-worldist theory argues that the key divide in world capitalism is between the nations of the Global North and the Global South and that the only consistently revolutionary force in the world are anti-imperialist nation-states in the Global South. Third-Worldism has been an influential idea amongst much of the radical left for decades and has revived with Israel's brutal wars in the Middle East. However, Third-Worldism suffers from fundamental problems; it ignores the class divides within both the Global South and North, which are vital for understanding the nature of modern capitalism and the potential for resistance by the global working class of all nations.

A Marxist critique of Third Worldism

Meeting of the Comintern

The Communist International was formed by revolutionaries to support the struggle for socialism across the entire world. In its early years, there were vibrant debates about the relationship between anti-colonialism and revolutionary socialism in various contexts: China, India, Turkey and elsewhere. As the rise of Stalinism radically transformed the Comintern into an instrument of Stalinist foreign policy, these debates were profoundly distorted. This talk will explore the debates over anti-colonial nationalism in both the early years of the Comintern and the later Stalinist period.

National Liberation

Left Transnationalism The Communist International and the National, Colonial, and Racial Questions edited by Oleksa Drachewych and Ian McKay

Travellers of the World Revolution: A Global History of the Communist International

To See the Dawn: Baku, 1920-First Congress of the Peoples of the East.

Alliance of Adversaries: The Congress of the Toilers of the Far East ed. John Sexton.

Debates over third world nationalism in the Comintern

Pro-IRA graffiti

The IRA, Bobby Sands and the hunger strikes, The Wind That Shakes the Barley, James Connolly and the struggle for Irish independence remain reference points for much of the international progressive left. This talk will explore the evolution of Irish republicanism from a movement that radically challenged British rule to one incorporated into mainstream capitalist politics.

From barricades to ballots

Crisis in the North: Twenty years since the Good Friday Agreement

War and Peace in Northern Ireland

A Secret History of the IRA

One Man's Terrorist:A Political History of the IRA

From the Troubles to the Good Friday accords: The history of the IRA

Protestors in Algeria

The struggle for Algerian independence has entered into the pantheon of heroic anti-colonial revolutions lionised by the left, epitomised by the continued popularity of Gillo Pontecorvo's film The Battle of Algiers. Indeed, at the time, it galvanised revolutionary activists who rejected the pro-colonial positions of the traditional parties of the French left and wished to show their solidarity with an epic struggle that foreshadowed the conflict over Vietnam a few years later. However, it is important to look beyond the mythologies of the Algerian struggle to understand why, after independence, the country failed to advance towards justice and equality.

A Savage War of Peace Algeria 1954-1962

European Revolutionaries and Algerian Independence, 1954-1962

Algeria

Wretched of the Earth

The struggle for Algerian independence and the limits of anti-colonialism

Torture of prisoners of war

On 16 September 2001, US President George W Bush declared that America was engaged in a fight against "a new kind of evil" and that he would pursue a "crusade" and "a war on terrorism." The so-called War on Terror would see the US empire and its allies around the world unleash massive levels of violence against the peoples of the Middle East, particularly during the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. At the same time, there was a significant assault upon democratic rights within Western countries and a wave of racist campaigns against Muslims and others from the Middle East, all justified as necessary to defeat this "new kind of evil." And while George Bush might have started the war on terror, it was continued by Obama and supported by many liberal politicians and spokespeople, even those who baulked at backing the invasion of Iraq. Understanding this period is essential for grasping the current chaos in the Middle East and the nature of Western imperialism today.

Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire: 20 years after 9/11

The Clash of Fundamentalisms Crusades, Jihads and Modernity

The Obama Syndrome Surrender at Home, War Abroad

Dirty Wars: the war as a battlefield

Torture, rendition and massacre: The war on terror twenty years on

Guerilla fighters

Trotskyism and the struggle of guerilla fighters are not usually associated with each other. For decades, Trotskyists argued that the road to socialism lay in the power of the working class to overthrow capitalism through mass struggles in the workplace. However, in the aftermath of the Cuban revolution, sections of the Trotskyist movement within the 4th International argued that revolutionaries should embrace the armed struggle, particularly in South America. In Argentina, the Trotskyists formed the People's Revolutionary Army, which launched an armed struggle campaign against the government with disastrous results. This led to an important debate within the Trotskyist movement about the role of armed struggle in the fight for socialism.

Argentina and Bolivia - the Balance Sheet: A polemic with the guerrilla (1969-1972)

Two methods for the Latin American revolution

Resolutions of the Fifth Congress of the Revolutionary Workers Party (Argentina), 1970

Guerrilla warfare: A method

Guerillaism and Trotskyism in the 1960s

Portrait of Rosa Luxemburg

The Polish revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg is often presented as having a more democratic and libertarian appoarch to party building when compared to Marxists like Lenin and Trotsky. While it is true that Luxemburg was critical of various aspects of the Bolsheviks

Chapter 4, Marxism and the Party

Paul Le Blanc, "Luxemburg and Lenin on Organization", in Paul Le Blanc, ed., Rosa Luxemburg, Reflections and Writings

Organizational Problems of Russian Social Demcracy

The Rosa Luxemburg Myth: A Critique of Luxemburg's Politics in Poland (1893-1919)

Rosa Luxemburg: The Biography

Luxemburg: a libertarian alternative to Lenin?

Depiction of Lenin speaking at a meeting

No Marxist is as associated with the idea of a revolutionary party as is Lenin. However, huge amounts of distortion, propaganda and outright lies abound about Lenin's actual views on the revolutionary party, and the real history of how the Bolsheviks operated. Lenin gathered around him a core team of revolutionary activists who would go on to build a mass party of working-class militants dedicated to the overthrow of capitalism. This session will discuss how the Bolsheviks achieved this and how Lenin developed his ideas about the revolutionary party over time. 

This session is part of a book club focusing on Marxism and the Party by John Molyneux". We strongly encourage you to read Molyneux's book for the session and go along to the other sessions on Marx and Luxemburg in the series

Chapter 2 and 3, Marxism and the Party

Lenin and the Revolutionary Party

Lenin's Political Thought (2 Volumes)

Lenin Rediscovered

Lenin and the revolutionary party

A depiction of Marx debating politics

Karl Marx is most famous for being a theorist of capitalist crisis, but he was no armchair intellectual. Throughout his life, Marx strove to build socialist working-class parties. Marx did this in a period when political parties were a new phenomenon and before bureaucratic conservativism and reformism had begun to take their toll. This talk will place Marx's activity and writings on the question of party building in this historical context and assess the strengths and weaknesses of Marx's writings. 

This session is part of a book club focusing on Marxism and the Party by John Molyneux. We strongly encourage attendees to read Molyneux's book and go along to the other sessions on Lenin and Luxemburg in the series

Chapter 1, Marxism and the Party

Marx and Engels: Their Contribution to the Democratic Breakthrough

Critique of the Gotha Programme (1875)

Marx and the working class party