Paul Blackledge and Neil Davidson (eds) Alasdair MacIntyre’s Engagement with Marxism: Selected Writings 1953–74 (Brill, 2008), £101.57 “The man who solved the Irish Question” was how Alasdair MacIntyre described James Connolly in an article in an early issue of New… Continue Reading
Marcello Musto (ed), Karl Marx’s Grundrisse: Foundations of the Critique of Political Economy 150 Years Later (Routledge, 2008), £65 The current global financial meltdown highlights the need to both grasp and apply Karl Marx’s analysis of the crisis-prone and exploitative… Continue Reading
Robert McChesney, The Political Economy of Media: Enduring Issues, Emerging Dilemmas (Monthly Review, 2008), £25 The US media reform movement seemingly burst out of nowhere in response to the Federal Communication Commission’s attempt to relax media ownership rules in 2003.… Continue Reading
Ralph Darlington, Syndicalism and the Transition to Communism (Ashgate, 2008), £60 According to the syndicalist Tom Mann, “The object of the unions is to wage the class war and take every opportunity of scoring against the enemy.” One cannot imagine… Continue Reading
John McIlroy, Nina Fishman and Alan Campbell (eds), The Post-War Compromise: British Trade Unions and Industrial Politics 1945-64 and The High Tide of British Trade Unionism: Trade Unions and Industrial Politics 1964–79 (Merlin, 2007), £18.95 each These two volumes bring… Continue Reading
Chris Nineham’s article on “Benjamin’s Emergency Marxism” was less concerned with assessing the work under review, Esther Leslie’s book Walter Benjamin, than with assessing the work of her subject, Benjamin himself.1 My purpose here is not to re-review the book,… Continue Reading
Alex Callinicos takes the debate on the future of the radical left several steps forward with his article in the previous issue of International Socialism. This is very important. It is crucial to restate the need and the possibility of… Continue Reading
Alex Callinicos’s article1 in the most recent issue of International Socialism shows well the changes that have taken place in the radical left in recent months. The characteristics of the situation, and in particular the deepening of the crisis of… Continue Reading
For the best part of 50 years it has been common to ask whether “classical” music is dead/dying.1 More than classical theatre, literature or art, classical music seems more and more to be the preserve of a tiny elite. Are… Continue Reading
Leon Trotsky’s life and work were intrinsically intertwined with the rise and fall of the Russian Revolution. It is his heroic role as both its sword, during the October insurrection and civil war, and then his tragically doomed attempt to… Continue Reading