Monthly Review Press

[MR Press blog posts should be listed on this page.]

“Albert Einstein’s ‘Why Socialism?'”

“Albert Einstein’s ‘Why Socialism?'”

The latest: Einstein's perspective links alienation and nuclear annihilation, capitalism to the devastating possibility of omnicide -- the destruction of all human life on earth. As the U.S. approaches its 250th anniversary....
Notice what Kohei Saito is reading?

Notice what Kohei Saito is reading?

In this image, Kohei Saito holds a copy of "Monopoly Capital," by Baran and Sweezy. Saito’s book "Capital in the Anthropocene" (not to be confused with John Bellamy Foster's book by a similar name) has become an unlikely hit among young people and is about to be translated into English...

John Bellamy Foster’s “Breaking the Bonds of Fate”

John Bellamy Foster’s “Breaking the Bonds of Fate”

The latest: The title of John Bellamy Foster’s latest book "derives from Lucretius’s famed De Rerum Natura, usually translated as On the Nature of Things. Lucretius wrote: “Again, if all movement is always interconnected, the new arising from the old in a determinate order – if the atoms never swerve so as to originate some new movement that will break the bonds of fate, the everlasting sequence of cause and effect – what is the source of the free [will] … .” ([On the Nature of Things,] Book II, 251ff) This exact quotation, moreover, was one made by Karl Marx in his Epicurean Notebooks, compiled in preparation for his doctoral thesis: “The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature” of 1841. From this point of departure, Foster initiates the reappraisal of two thousand years of philosophical controversy...."
New! Matthew Stanley’s “The Ragged Edge of Freedom”

New! Matthew Stanley’s “The Ragged Edge of Freedom”

The latest, from Paul Buhle: "Abolitionists and social reformers of all kinds, with a wide Yankee following augmented by many recent German immigrants, sought to take things beyond the uneasy accommodation of white populations to each other across existing political lines. In Wisconsin and in Chicago most notably, these would include “Abe’s Boys” enrolling in the army of the Union. Not so in the Southern Illinois, two hours’ drive from my hometown. The whites who immigrated northward from the near South, largely uneducated and lacking skills, came to be considered almost a species in themselves...."
New! “Requiem for French Theory”

New! “Requiem for French Theory”

The latest: "During the 1960s and 1970s, it was an oft-repeated quip that the European left was long on theory and short on practice, while the North American left was strong on action, but allergic to theory...."
Ian Angus’ “Metabolic Rifts” (Stay tuned for September’s Ecosocialism 2026 gathering!)

Ian Angus’ “Metabolic Rifts” (Stay tuned for September’s Ecosocialism 2026 gathering!)

The latest: "Angus discusses the carbon cycle’s breakdown—which is driving climate change...and he describes how industrial agriculture is pumping nitrogen into Earth’s systems faster than any natural process through fertilizers, disrupting the nitrogen cycle. Angus proposes a radical reduction in the use of nitrogen and chemical fertilizers as a solution to environmental damage, and envisions a time when it will be possible to feed people without them..."
WATCH: Socialist Register 2026

WATCH: Socialist Register 2026

This was the first live launch of the Socialist Register in New York City, with our brand new editor, Arun Kundnani, alongside the (relatively new) coeditor of the Socialist Register, Steve Maher, joined by three contributors to this year’s volume: Ibrahim Shikaki, Costas Lapavitsas, and Paul Heideman. Together they considered these and other questions:
Gabriel Rockhill’s “Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism?”

Gabriel Rockhill’s “Who Paid the Pipers of Western Marxism?”

The latest, in Le Monde: "En 1999, une historienne britannique, Frances Stonor Saunders, a décrit dans Who Paid the Piper? CIAand the Cultural Cold War ( Qui mène la danse ? La CIA et la guerre froide culturelle , Denoël, 2003) comment la CIA infiltrait la culture des années 1950 et 1960 par l’entremise de fondations commeFord ou Rockefeller. Gabriel Rockhill prolonge cette enquête en montrant comment les Etats-Unis ontutilisé ces mêmes canaux pour influencer les théoriciens de gauche – notamment ceux de l’école deFrancfort – afin de rendre leurs idées compatibles avec le capitalisme...."