Imperialism

Ana Cristina Carvalhaes — The multiplication of wars and the aggravation of tensions between states and intra-states are only one of the signs of the new historical period of convergence of crises, opened with the crash of 2008.

Au Loong-Yu discusses China’s global status and its implications for peace and solidarity activism.

Leftists in Ukraine are insisting on the urgent need to build solidarity without exception among oppressed peoples.

Simon Pirani — Israel’s murderous onslaught on civilians is something that Israel’s war on the Palestinians and Russia’s war on Ukraine have in common. This is what empires do in the 21st century: the western empire that supports Israel and the weaker Russian empire.

Fourth International — The wars we are facing are linked to the global crisis of capitalism and the resulting headlong rush into conflict between rival imperialist powers.

Claudio Katz talks about the need to avoid looking at imperialism in purely economic terms, the rise of what he terms an “imperial system” and the complexities of anti-imperialism in the 21st century.

William I. Robinson discusses the rise of transnational class exploitation and how contradictions between a globally integrated economy and a nation-state-based system help explain rising US-China tensions.

Sarah Glynn — Turkey, Iran, and President Assad’s government are in competition for control over the land of Syria, but there is one thing they all agree on: control should not be in the hands of the people who live there, especially if they are Kurds with dangerous ideas about radical democracy.

Renfrey Clarke — Few questions of international politics have seen the Western left as sharply divided as the war in Ukraine. But there is no good reason why Marxists, with the writings of Vladimir Lenin at their disposal, should lack clarity on how to analyse the war.

Murray Smith — Throughout history, solidarity has helped achieve the only possible acceptable peace — one guaranteeing defeat of the aggressor and the victim to live free of the threat of renewed assault. That must be the goal of the European Left in relation to Ukraine.