Arkivet – Nummervisning

Fra International Socialism Journal nr. 150

Forfatter: Titel

Nr.

Side

Udgivet

Om

Contents (ISJ 150, Spring 2016)

150

1

apr 16

Migrants versus borders

Contributors (ISJ 150, Spring 2016)

150

2

apr 16

Alex Callinicos: Analysis: Intimations of mortality

150

3

apr 16

The year 2016 started pretty badly for global capitalism. In the first couple of weeks of January global share prices fell sharply—at one point they were 20 percent below the high they reached last year. Subsequently markets regained a degree of stability (for reasons to which we will return). But by early March the average decline in equity price indices in 2016 was over 6 percent, implying a loss in companies’ capitalisation of over $6 trillion, 8.5 percent of global GDP.

Megan Trudell: Analysis: Sanders, Trump and the US working class

150

17

apr 16

“The best president in the history of the world—somebody courageous, smart, bold—that person will not be able to address the major crises that we face unless there is a mass political movement, unless there’s a political revolution in this country”. So Bernie Sanders told his audience at a meeting in New Hampshire in June 2015.

Nicholas De Genova: The “crisis” of the European border regime: Towards a Marxist theory of borders

150

31

apr 16

Ever since Marx and Engels proclaimed in The Communist Manifesto that the workers have no country, it has been an elementary and defining premise of Marxist politics that we are internationalists. There has never been a more clear proof that Stalinism involved a radical betrayal of Marxism, furthermore, than the devious and self-serving proposition that it was possible to build “socialism in one country”.

Kate Davison: Atheism, secularism and religious freedom: Debates within the German left

150

55

apr 16

Debates in Germany in recent years around the wearing of the hijab, Islamic religious instruction in schools, circumcision and claims of a “Salafist” threat continue to demonstrate the importance for Marxists to be clear on the question of religious freedom. Under the cover of defending “Western” culture—always “defined” as “Christian-Jewish” or Christianity-based—these controversial discussions have created an atmosphere of hostility and suspicion, offering renewed opportunities for racists and reactionaries.

Shaun Doherty: “All changed, changed utterly”: The historical significance of the Irish Revolution

150

83

apr 16

The problem with political anniversaries is that they often focus on specific dates in the past without any recognition that they are part of a longer process. Easter Monday 1916 is an iconic date in Irish history that all and sundry seek to appropriate, but it can only be understood by what preceded and followed it. This may seem like stating the obvious to readers of a Marxist journal, but in the light of all the false narratives that have been peddled since, it is an important starting point for a credible evaluation of its historical significance.

Andy Brown: Reassessing Podemos

150

97

apr 16

The emergence of new left wing political parties in Europe in response to the crisis and government austerity policies has been discussed already in the pages of this journal. Specifically we have looked at the nature of the Podemos project in the Spanish state and the question of how the left should relate to it. It is now useful to revisit the analysis in the light of events in 2015 in the Spanish state in order better to understand the viability of Podemos in its own terms and the relationship between it, the left and the working class.

Gareth Jenkins: Shakespeare belongs to us

150

121

apr 16

We don’t know a great deal about William Shakespeare’s life. The records are scant and, in the absence of personal testimony, we know nothing of his intimate feelings or thoughts.

Sarah Bates: Marxism and Women: At the forefront of revolution

150

133

apr 16

A review of Judith Orr, Marxism and Women’s Liberation (Bookmarks, 2015), £9.99

The gains won by the women’s liberation movement during the 1960s and 1970s, such as the right to divorce and increased reproductive rights, are real material gains. Women are told that in Britain we have never had it so good. And on the surface that can appear to be true. But, as Judith Orr points out in Marxism and Women’s Liberation, “much has changed for women, but too much has not”. While “women have never had more freedom in their personal lives” women’s oppression still pervades society, and some aspects of sexism have got worse during the last decade.

Geoff Brown: Pakistan: failing state or neoliberalism in crisis?

150

143

apr 16

See also timeline of key events related to this article.

The popular image of Pakistan is of a failing state with nuclear weapons. Neither the government nor the army can prevent the Taliban’s terrorist outrages, not least because they cannot do without the proxy forces they use against Afghanistan and India, forces often indistinguishable from the Taliban in their methods. What follows seeks to show the falsity of this pathologising, Islamophobic mythology that pays little attention to Pakistan’s place in the global division of labour.

Geoff Brown: Pakistan: Timeline of key events

150

158

apr 16

Related to: Pakistan: failing state or neoliberalism in crisis?

Simon Boxley: The meaning of the school testing obsession

150

173

apr 16

Across the world, the culture of testing and monitoring the performance of children in school at every level is becoming ubiquitous and deeply entrenched. Pasi Sahlberg has famously identified such standardised testing as the third pillar of the Global Education Reform Movement (GERM) that has infected so many school systems. This article focuses on the new frontiers for the calculation of human productivity in its earliest forms, in early years education in Britain; but the general points are applicable across continents and educational age-phases. It will be argued that the English baseline test is just one example of the policing of capital’s interests in our classrooms, but a particularly pernicious one for the way it reaches deep into the experience of the youngest children.

Paul Le Blanc: Letter: John Rose’s review of Leon Trotsky

150

183

apr 16

Dear friends, I very much appreciate John Rose’s thoughtful review of my book Leon Trotsky (Half socialist? Leon Trotsky and the Soviet Union, in International Socialism 149) including his positive comments and the gratifying endorsement: “Buy this book!”
Yet his review is far from uncritical, and I would like to address a couple of issues touching on the nature (including limitations) of writing a succinct biography, and also to offer a crucial political clarification.

Ian Birchall: Feedback: Some questions about the lost German Revolution

150

185

apr 16

It is not surprising that Tony Phillips has made a vigorous defence of the ­“classic” Socialist Workers Party position on the 1918-1923 situation in Germany. The argument is central to the SWP’s historical analysis. In order to argue that Leninism did not inevitably lead to Stalinism, it is necessary to show that there was an alternative.

John Rose: Feedback: Revolutionary workers’ movements and parliaments in Germany 1918-23: A reply to Tony Phillips

150

191

apr 16

Tony Phillips provided a rather misleading account of my Marxism 2014 talk on Workers’ and Soldiers’ Councils in the German Revolution in the last issue of International Socialism. Nevertheless Tony does point to an unresolved argument about workers’ councils and factory councils at different stages of the German Revolution, and their relationship to parliament.

Joseph Choonara: Feedback: PostCapitalism: A reply to Pete Green

150

203

apr 16

It is always a pleasure to see Pete Green’s name listed in the contents of International Socialism. I personally learnt a lot about Karl Marx’s theory of value from reading Pete’s early contributions to this journal and what he has to say is always illuminating, even if the thrust of his recent piece was to critique my review of Paul Mason’s Postcapitalism.

Ben Selwyn: Book Review: Emerging workers’ movements

150

209

apr 16

A review of Immanuel Ness, Southern Insurgency: The Coming of the Global Working Class (Pluto Press, 2016), £15
Since the 1980s the institutionalisation of global neoliberalism has been pursued based on a range of ideological claims which have been advanced (or at least accepted) across the political spectrum. These claims include the arguments that the working class is increasingly a thing of the past, both structurally (as industry gives way to services and information) and politically (as traditional left parties embrace varieties of neoliberalism); that globalisation is reducing world poverty and that as a result the global middle class is expanding rapidly; and, seemingly logically, that radical politics are a thing of the past.

Sarah Ensor: Book Review: Two books that swim against the tide

150

212

apr 16

A review of Alistair Couper, Hance D Smith and Bruno Ciceri, Fishers and Plunderers: Theft, Slavery and Violence at Sea (Pluto Press, 2015), £19.99 and Stefano B Longo, Rebecca Clausen and Brett Clark, The Tragedy of the Commodity: Oceans, Fisheries and Aquaculture (Rutgers University Press, 2015), £26.95
Human activity has pushed the world’s oceans into crisis from overfishing, pollution and warming water linked to climate change—and if nothing is done about it the results will be catastrophic for marine systems and the billions of humans who rely on them.

Rhys Williams: Book Review: In the belly of the beast

150

218

apr 16

A review of Christian Høgsbjerg, C L R James in Imperial Britain (Duke University Press, 2014), £16.99
In these days of intense state and media racism, any book that offers a deeper understanding of the role of anti-racist and black liberation struggles is invaluable. Høgsbjerg’s book provides a thorough and engrossing account of such struggles in the colonial world and in the belly of the imperial beast—where C L R James lived from 1932 to 1938.

Andy Wynne: Book Review: Questioning failed growth in Africa

150

220

apr 16

A review of Morten Jerven, Africa: Why Economists Get It Wrong (Zed Books, 2015), £14.99
Africa: Why Economists Get It Wrong ­provides a critical review of the recent economic history of Africa. Morton Jerven argues that, for most of the past two decades, mainstream economists have been faced with trying to explain the chronic failure of economic growth in Africa. In contrast, during the 1950s, the 1960s and even into the 1970s, many African economies actually grew rapidly, but this development was subsequently overshadowed by the economic problems of the 1980s and 1990s.

Alex Callinicos + Camilla Royle: Pick of the quarter: This quarter’s selection

150

223

apr 16

Jacobin – New Left Review

Day school: Marxism and Nature

150

apr 16

A one-day conference hosted by International Socialism
Saturday 15 October 2016
10.30am- 5pm
Student Central, Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HY