Class
Women Write on the Verge of Historical Change: Last session
Online: Zoom link will be provided to registered participantsDuring this term, the MEP Literature Studies Group will read novels by women writers which explore the intersections of life in their communities, both at home and in the metropoles of Europe, India and the Philippines. These stories will take us to places and introduce us to people facing many of the dilemmas posed during late-stage capitalism, when the looming tipping points begin to collide. Reading and discussing these important writers could very well bring us to a broader sense of time and place. We will discussion Aminatta Forna and Gloria Apostol on December 2, 9, and 16.
Book Special Redux! Marx Dead and Alive: Reading Capital in Precarious Times
Online: Zoom link will be provided to registered participantsThis is for ordering the book only. Andy has an upcoming talk on Sunday, January 23. We are offering this important book for $12.00 inclusive of postage (US and Puerto Rico only), until one week after Andy's presentation on Henri Lefebvre and Louis Althusser.
Old and New Contradictions: Opening Socialist Register 2022 Session—The Crisis of Centrism
The stage is set well for Socialist Register No. 58 in the Preface by Greg Albo and Colin Leys: “current multi-dimensional crisis, the center-right consensus that was struck around the neoliberal policy regime has been steadily splintering, with a phalanx of far right and neo-fascist groups inserting themselves into electoral politics and gaining prominence ‘in the streets’ (not least in motley demonstrations against pandemic measures of any kind, from lockdowns to masking). The observation that capitalism is always characterized by just such economic and political polarizations has preoccupied – even haunted –socialist analysis from its very origins: in Marx’s and Engels’ memorable phrase of revolutionary optimism in The Communist Manifesto, ‘the more or less open civil war, raging within existing society, up to the point where that war breaks out into open revolution, and … lays the foundation for the sway of the proletariat’. In the much picked-over chapter in Marx’s Capital on ‘The General Law of Capitalist Accumulation’, the language is just as vibrant but now stark in its imagery: ‘The greater the social wealth, the functioning capital, the extent and energy of its growth, and therefore also the greater the absolute mass of the proletariat and the productivity of itslabor, the greater is the industrial reserve army…. Accumulation of wealth at one pole is, therefore, at the same time the accumulation of misery, the torment of labor, slavery, ignorance, brutalization at the opposite pole, i.e. on the side of the class that produces its own product as capital.’
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
Karl Marx’s Writings on Alienation: A discussion with Marcello Musto and Michael Hardt
The event marks the publication of “Karl Marx’s on Alienation,” edited by Marcello Musto. This is an essential volume. The introduction written by Marcello provides a guide to the concept of alienation prior to Marx, Marx's essential thought and writings over three periods of his working life. This brief quote from Volume Three of CAPITAL is one of many presented and discussed: “The realm of freedom really begins only where labor determined by necessity and external expediency ends; it lies by its very nature beyond the sphere of material production proper. Just as the savage must wrestle with nature to satisfy his needs, to maintain and reproduce his life, so must civilized man, and he must do so in all forms of society and under all possible modes of production. This realm of natural necessity expands with his development, because his needs do too; but the productive forces to satisfy these expand at the same time. Freedom, in this sphere, can consist only in this, that socialized man, the associated producers, govern the human metabolism with nature in a rational way, bringing it under their collective control instead of being dominated by it as a blind power; accomplishing it with the least expenditure of energy and in conditions most worthy and appropriate for their human nature. But this always remains a realm of necessity. The true realm of freedom, the development of human powers as an end in itself, begins beyond it, though it can only flourish with this realm of necessity as its basis. The reduction of the working day is the basic prerequisite.” —Karl Marx
Come join Michael Hardt and Marcello Musto as they discuss with each other and those present from this essential volume for study—and practice.
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
Marx and Spinoza: Connections and Provocations
Readers of contemporary theory will perhaps not be surprised to see the name Spinoza paired with that of Marx. Ever since Louis Althusser argued that he, and his cowriters of Reading Capital, were Spinozists rather than structuralists, there has been an increased inquiry into the points of connection between Marx and Spinoza. It might even be possible to say that what the Hegel/Marx connection was to a previous generation, animating the writings of Adorno, Sartre, Lukacs, etc. the Marx/Spinoza connection is to a current collection of philosophers ranging from Althusser, and the members of his circle such as Étienne Balibar and Pierre Macherey, to Antonio Negri, Frédéric Lordon, Warren Montag, and Hasana Sharp.
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
Marx’s Grundrisse: Last two weeks until spring term
Online: Zoom link will be provided to registered participants“Forces of production and social relations – two different sides of the development of the social individual – appear to capital as mere means, and are merely means for it to produce on its limited foundation. In fact, however, they are the material conditions to blow this foundation sky-high…” —Karl Marx, The Grundrisse
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
Marx’s Grundrisse: Last two weeks until spring term
Online: Zoom link will be provided to registered participants“Forces of production and social relations – two different sides of the development of the social individual – appear to capital as mere means, and are merely means for it to produce on its limited foundation. In fact, however, they are the material conditions to blow this foundation sky-high…” —Karl Marx, The Grundrisse
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.
The Invention of the White Race
In 1972, after over 30 years of activism in the labor and communist movements, Allen shared the following strategic insight with a new generation of revolutionaries: “The most vulnerable point at which a decisive blow can be struck against bourgeois rule in the United States is white supremacy. White supremacy is both the keystone (in the arch) and the Achilles heel of U.S. bourgeois democracy, the historic form of bourgeois rule in the US. It is a vulnerable point because it is a historically developed and unresolvable internal contradiction of US bourgeois democracy. It is the decisive vulnerable point because – as history has repeatedly proved – the basic class contradictions in bourgeois democracy can never fully mature until and unless the anti-proletarian nature of white supremacy has been completely established in the minds of the proletarian masses.”
Allen spent the next 20 years researching the primary sources and writing his magnum opus.