Monthly Review Press

U.S. Must Take Responsibility for Asylum Seekers & the History That Drives Them: David L. Wilson, via Truthout

February 20, 2024

A large segment of the US public was horrified in May and June when they saw the Trump administration snatching toddlers away from Central American mothers who arrived at the US border seeking asylum. Many would still be appalled if they knew that the White House is seeking to continue the practice in a different form. Most undoubtedly feel genuine sympathy for young people trying to escape violent gangs or abusive partners. Still, a lot of these same sympathetic Americans don’t actually want the asylum seekers to come here….

“The Logic of Human Survival”: Against the Current reviews A Redder Shade of Green

February 20, 2024

‘Anthropocene’ refers to a new geological period, where the activities of human beings have become the dominant factor shaping the planet’s changing geology, biology and climate, including effects on humanity. Angus, and increasingly geologists, are focusing on the period beginning around 1950, when humanity’s impact, which had been developing gradually, underwent a ‘great acceleration’ — a dialectical transformation of quantity into quality….

“Understanding the political economy of what we eat”: Communist Review on A Foodie’s Guide to Capitalism

February 20, 2024

Too often, food and agriculture have been left out of left-wing political discourse, as if peripheral to the class struggle. But actually, they are crucial. Family and peasant farmers need to be able to feed themselves and their families, while workers need nutritious diets too. However, capitalism needs a supply of landless labourers who have nothing to sell but their labour power ...

India’s independent weekly, Frontier, reviews Michael Yates’s Can the Working Class Change the World?

February 20, 2024

This is the first of eight parts of Farooque Chowdhury’s review of this book for Frontier: An independent weekly since 1968. Look for the rest of the review, in compiled form, coming soon to MR Online...

“So many reasons to fight”: ISR on Kohei Saito’s Karl Marx’s Ecosocialism

February 20, 2024

"Ecosocialism needs Marx," Kohei Saito once wrote. In Karl Marx’s Ecosocialism, Saito shows why…. This work and Saito’s familiarity with a range of international debates regarding Marxist theory and practice make possible his beautiful analysis of Marx’s ecosocialism, an analysis that should inform our struggle for revolutionary socioecological change….

Yellow Journalism and the New Cold War: Jeremy Kuzmarov via Counterpunch

February 20, 2024

Like Saddam Hussein a decade and a half ago, Russia and its President Vladimir Putin have been repeatedly vilified in the Western media over the last five years, helping to mobilize popular support for the reemergence of a new Cold War...

Marx & Philosophy on Michael Lebowitz’s The Socialist Imperative: From Gotha to Now

February 20, 2024

During the past two decades, economist Michael A. Lebowitz has written a number of books, proposing to build socialism as a practical alternative. Lebowitz’s new book, The Socialist Imperative from Gotha to Now, is a continued project about proposing the building of socialism in the 21st century…. Lebowitz’s book attempts to establish a theoretical vision of socialism and the lessons from the experience of ‘real socialism’...

Science & Society reviews Ian Angus’s A Redder Shade of Green

February 20, 2024

A Redder Shade of Green is a very welcome compilation of posts from Ian Angus’ website “Climate and Capitalism,” some original, others updated and revised. Ian Angus is a Canadian ecosocialist activist and scholar. This book follows two other earlier ones, the excellent critique of populationism/neoMalthusianism (with Simon Butler), Too Many People (Haymarket, 2011), and Facing the Anthropocene (Monthly Review Press, 2016), a splendid introduction to this subject....

Jeremy Kuzmarov talks to Paul DeRienzo on TrumpWatch

February 20, 2024

Jeremy Kuzmarov, author, with John Marciano, of The Russians Are Coming, Again: The First Cold War as Tragedy, the Second as Farce, talks with Paul DeRienzo about the little-remembered history of Russia-United States relations.

Black Agenda Report interviews Marciano and Kuzmarov about their book, The Russians Are Coming, Again

February 20, 2024

Jeremy Kuzmarov and John Marciano: Our book provides a historical perspective on contemporary affairs by showing how the Russo-phobia that has been prevalent in our political discourse over the last four to five years has deep and long historical roots, and has often been used by government leaders to turn public attention away from domestic inequalities...”