Articles

U.S. Imperialism Resurgent

U.S. Imperialism Resurgent

by Costas Lapavitsas

July 1, 2026

It is quite evident, Costas Lapavitsas begins, that the world is currently ensnared in geopolitical turmoil, perhaps for over a decade. In this article, Lapavitsas provides insight into the inseparable and interlocking mechanisms of dollar dominance and imperialism backed by the escalatory militarism of the second Trump administration. As Lapavitsas notes: "The dollar and the F-35—monetary coercion and military power—are two moments of a single structure of domination."
Monetary Policy and Capitalism

Monetary Policy and Capitalism

by Jan Toporowski

July 1, 2026

Jan Toporowski explains our contemporary age of "monetary policy dominance": the era in which the setting of short-term interest rates by the central banks is seen as the key instrument for regulating economic activity. This, however, does not reflect an ironclad law of the business cycle but, rather, a set of assumptions that underscores the dependence of capitalism on the accumulation of capital itself. This in turn obscures deeper truths about the effectiveness of monetary policy on the daily lives of the working class.
Why Can China Resist Financialization?

Why Can China Resist Financialization?

by Xiaolu Kuang, Fusheng Xie and Zhi Li

July 1, 2026

Over the last half-century, the "financial explosion"—manifest in the unrestrained expansion of financialization and its tools and institutions—has fundamentally reshaped the global economy, impacting countries throughout the Global North and South. China, however, has proven to be a distinctive case. Xiaolu Kuang, Zhi Li, and Fusheng Xie probe the question of how and why China has managed to maintain its emphasis on production above finance, and the development all above the accumulation of capital.
Imperialism in a Full World: Neomercantilism and the Return of the Zero-Sum Game

Imperialism in a Full World: Neomercantilism and the Return of the Zero-Sum Game

by Alberto Garzón

July 1, 2026

Since the wane of mercantilism in Europe, conceptions of wealth, trade, and productivity have also changed: from one of a zero-sum game reliant only on the productivity of land, to one of the potential for positive-sum wealth created by industry, and, now, to the zero-sum neomercantilism necessitated in a world of resource depletion, where the earth is pushed to its biophysical limits. But the response to this crisis does not have to be further fortification—it could also be a world that organizes itself within the metabolic limitations of nature.
Value Chains in the Digital Age: Labor Exploitation and Systemic Ecocide

Value Chains in the Digital Age: Labor Exploitation and Systemic Ecocide

by Benjamin Selwyn

July 1, 2026

In order to comprehend the environmental crisis that goes hand-in-hand with the "Structural Crisis of Capital," we must also understand the nature of global value chains and how they contribute to environmental degradation and worker exploitation on a global level. Benjamin Selwyn elucidates how global value chains and digitalization sit within a "conjoined dynamic of labor-exploitative accumulation and ecological expropriation."
Tech Billionaires, the AI Threat, and Resistance

Tech Billionaires, the AI Threat, and Resistance

by Martin Hart-Landsberg

July 1, 2026

Martin Hart-Landsberg gives an in-depth account of the oligarchs of Silicon Valley and their embrace of transhumanist ideologies that celebrate individualism and technological advancement above all else. However, he asserts, all is not lost, as growing dissatisfaction with capitalism "is slowly but steadily helping to grow a movement of resistance"—a resistance that must recognize that it is not just tech billionaires but capitalism itself threatening humanity's chance at a better future.
Capitalism and Cognition: The Fate of Science in a System in Decline

Capitalism and Cognition: The Fate of Science in a System in Decline

by Helena Sheehan

July 1, 2026

The world is being roiled by a crisis of meaning, leading to a pervasive sense of despair and stagnation. Helena Sheehan gives an account of the present-day epistemological nihilism resulting from the corrosion of "the foundations of knowledge production"—that is to say, the devaluing of rigorous scientific inquiry and the rise of irrationalism. Marxism provides us with both an understanding of how this crisis of cognition relates to the "Structural Crisis of Capitalism," as well as the socialist opposition that seeks to resolve its manifold contradictions.
June 2026 (Volume 78, Number 2)

June 2026 (Volume 78, Number 2)

by The Editors

June 1, 2026

June's "Notes from the Editors" revisits the fundamental concept of monopoly capitalism as expounded by Paul A. Baran and Paul M. Sweezy in their pathbreaking Monopoly Capital. The recent resurgence of the debate around Baran and Sweezy's work, the editors write, misses not only the enduring relevance of their analysis in an era of megacorporations and hyperscalers, but the revolutionary understanding of the economic system that arises from such an analysis.
The Destruction of Reason and the Rise of Ecofascism in the United States

The Destruction of Reason and the Rise of Ecofascism in the United States

by Brett Clark and John Bellamy Foster

June 1, 2026

MR associate editor Brett Clark and editor John Bellamy Foster explore "the death drive of late imperialism" and its manifestations in an ecological crisis that is not parallel to, but inseparable from, increasingly open ecofascism in the United States. Drawing from Luckács's Destruction of Reason and István Mészáros's work on imperialism, Clark and Foster present a materialist analysis that illuminates the cult of unreason so pervasive under capitalism and imperialism while pointing to a path forward that is grounded in the historical-materialist Marxist tradition.
The Thermodynamics of Capital: Artificial Intelligence, Energy Crisis, and Ecological Crisis

The Thermodynamics of Capital: Artificial Intelligence, Energy Crisis, and Ecological Crisis

by Te Li

June 1, 2026

Te Li unravels the myth of digital dematerialization so heavily promulgated by Silicon Valley and other AI boosters, which presents the technology as a phenomenon that has escaped the material realm and thus, entropy itself. In fact, Li shows that the material and energetic requirements of AI places it squarely in the physical realm, then situates the technology within the context of the metabolic rift under capitalism.

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