Category: Monthly Review Press /

“A powerful package of ideas in highly readable form” — Paul Buhle reviews The Russians Are Coming, Again

February 20, 2024

These days we see a seemingly odd project taking place in the realms of American liberalism: ferocious insistence that the truly outrageous Donald J. Trump is at his worst when….making peace with our enemies! Has he been brainwashed by Russian and/or North Korean agents, perhaps? Or is this all, perhaps, a crude plan to place Trump Steaks in Trump hotels in heretofore unbidden locations? What kind of madness would lessen the threat of American nukes that keeps us all as safe as we may reasonably hope to be?...

Why and How the First Socialist State Evolved: Science & Society on Reconstructing Lenin

February 20, 2024

Since the collapse of Eastern European “socialism” and the Soviet Union, the prospect to transcend capitalism has been lost in obscurity. ¶ However, what happened once can happen again, and “since the ‘end of history’ did not occur in 1989, one need not be a prophet to foresee that the need for the revolutionary salvation of the world will arise again” ...

Tumultuous Rapids: Countercurrents.org reviews Samir Amin’s Russia and the Long Transition from Capitalism to Socialism

February 20, 2024

History…is not a peacefully flowing river, but made up of different moments, separated by tumultuous rapids’ (134). When the USSR broke apart in 1991, an unprecedented ideological campaign was launched, propagating the idea that Soviet collapse implied the collapse of the socialist project as a whole. The ‘end of history’ was said to be at hand. ¶ Amin’s critical reading of Russian history de-bunks this myth, with the compact prose and theoretical precision that is characteristic of Amin’s many writings...

Backstage at the Trump Show: Mumia Abu-Jamal on Neo-Fascism in the White House

February 20, 2024

Prison Radio, an independent, multi-media production studio devoted to challenging mass incarceration, regularly presents the work of imprisoned journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal. Here, in a recent broadcast, entitled “The Trump Show” (produced by Noelle Hanrahan), Mumia dismisses whimsical media condescension about Donald Trump and his vast, “sub-intellectual” support base. Trump’s so-called populism “ain’t a joke,” says Mumia; it deserves too be seen according to John Bellamy Foster‘s analysis in Trump in the White House: as neo-fascism.

Chicago, April 27-29: Rosa Luxemburg, Engaging the Left; Impacting the World

February 20, 2024

April 27-28, 9AM-8PM | April 29, 9AM-1PM
UE Hall, 37 S Ashland Ave., Chicago, IL 60607
Free and Open to the Public
Speakers include: Michael Löwy (France), Helen Boak (England), Radhika Desai (Canada), Pablo Slavin (Argentina), Drucilla Cornell (USA), Zhang Meng (China), Sobhanlal Datta Gupta (India), Ottokar Luban (Germany), Ankica Čakardič (Croatia), and many others

Barbaric Production: Gerald Horne Discusses Slavery, Capitalism, and White Supremacy on This is Hell!

February 20, 2024

Historian Gerald Horne, author, most recently, of The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism: The Roots of Slavery, White Supremacy, and Capitalism in Seventeenth-Century North America and the Caribbean, talks to Chuck Mertz about his book — and our history — on This is Hell!, which broadcasts every Saturday, 9AM-1PM (CDT) on WNUR 89.3FM Chicago and podcasts to the world shortly after.

Culture as Politics reviewed by Helena Sheehan in Marx & Philosophy

February 20, 2024

Christopher Caudwell was a brief and breathtakingly brilliant presence in the world. Born Christopher St John Sprigg in London in 1907, he published prolifically and died fighting in the Spanish civil war in 1937, before he even reached the age of 30….

Gerald Horne speaks at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s 14th Annual African American History Month Lecture

February 20, 2024

On February 21, radical historian Gerald Horne, author, most recently, of The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism: The Roots of Slavery, White Supremacy, and Capitalism in Seventeenth-Century North America and the Caribbean was the featured speaker at The University of North Carolina’s (Chapel Hill) 14th African American History Month Lecture. As he is introduced by history professor Genna Rae McNeil, the video segment below begins Gerald Horne’s lecture...

“Freedom” and “Liberty” Were Only for Whites in Settler Colonialism: Truthout’s Mark Karlin interviews Gerald Horne

February 20, 2024

Mark Karlin: How did you settle on the title The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism for your book?
Gerald Horne: In my opinion, discussing profound change in the US without a popularizing of the concept of “settler colonialism” would be akin to seeking change in pre-1994 South Africa without underscoring “apartheid.” By adding “apocalypse,” I wanted to at once contrast this account with past accounts, which have tended to stress the “benefits” of settler colonialism, which obviously elides and obscures (if not justifies) genocide and dispossession targeting the Indigenous population of North America and mass enslavement of Africans....

Chicago, April 17: Howard Waitzkin on Health Care Under the Knife via FRESH Ayers

February 20, 2024

If you’re in Chicago Thursday, May 17, you’re invited to FRESH Ayers, a discussion series on various books, conducted by Bill Ayers, social justice activist, author, and teacher, Distinguished Professor of Education (retired) at the University of Illinois at Chicago. This event features MRP author Howard Waitzkin, who’ll talk with Bill about his latest book, Health Care Under the Knife: Moving Beyond the Capitalism for Our Health.