International Viewpoint, the monthly English-language magazine of the Fourth International, is a window to radical alternatives world-wide, carrying reports, analysis and debates from all corners of the globe. Correspondents in over 50 countries report on popular struggles, and the debates that are shaping the left of tomorrow.
In the aftermath of January 2026’s crackdown, voices within and close to the Islamic Republic renewed calls for Iran to complete a nuclear deterrent, claiming the bomb would have prevented the current existential crisis. Houshang Sepehr, exiled Iranian Marxist and editor of Solidarité Socialiste avec les Travailleurs en Iran, challenges this on structural grounds. Drawing on the cases of India, Pakistan, and North Korea, he argues that nuclear deterrence only functions within security architectures backed by a great power patron --- a guarantee Iran never had. Neither Russia nor China was willing to absorb the risks of a nuclearised Islamic Republic contesting US hegemony. The bomb, he concludes, would have deepened Iran’s isolation rather than protecting it.
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As the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran goes into its third week, the people of the United States are still figuring out what they think about the conflict. Since the war began, most polls show a majority of Americans disapprove of the war, something unseen in modern American history. A majority of Americans approved of World War II, the Korean War, and initially of the Vietnam War. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2000—the American government, anxious for revenge—was backed by huge majorities when it made war on Afghanistan in 2001. When in 2003 the George W. Bush administration wanted to make war on Iraq, it fabricated false evidence that Saddam Hussein had nuclear and biological weapons of mass destruction, and, bamboozled by Bush, nearly three-quarters of the American people supported the war.
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The first round of the French local elections will take place on Sunday 15 March, the second on 22 March. There is a real possibility that the “traditional” right, which is increasingly radicalizing in a far right direction, will win in Paris, under Socialist Party government since 1995, and that the Rassemblement National could win in France’s second, and very multi-racial, city, Marseilles.
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“This landmark ruling highlights the links between institutional politics, militias and economic interests in Rio de Janeiro.”
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The upcoming mass No Kings! demonstrations planned for March 28 and ambitious plans for May Day mobilizations point to the growing convergence of anti-Trump forces. This convergence takes place against the backdrop of Trumps’ destructive assault on democratic rights in the US and the sovereignty of nations abroad, most recently his reckless aerial attack on Iran, and plummeting approval ratings in the polls.
read article...Recent years have seen renewed debate about prostitution in European countries. Both the Swedish and the Dutch models have been in effect for over 10 years and a lot of research has been done on the various implementations. What are the opinions and results?
Underneath many of the debates in the contemporary feminist movement is a hidden discussion about free choice versus structural impact. To put it simplistically, there’s two sides: those who defend women’s freedom of choice, and don’t want (to see) any limitation on this choice, and on the other side those who stress the impact of societal structures and the way those structures can limit and hide our choices.
In the 21st century, women of the working classes — employed in the formal economy, the informal economy, working in the countryside or doing unwaged labor — have entered the global political stage in an astonishing array of movements. Sparked by the capitalist war on the working class, the enclosures sweeping peasants and farmers off the land or devastating their livelihoods upon it, and the consequent crisis and intensification in patriarchal relations, these movements are creatively developing socialist-feminist politics — with much to offer the left as it gropes toward new organizational forms and organizing strategies.
The last years have seen strong mobilizations around the right to abortion in Spain: justice minister Alberto RuÃz Gallardon announced the criminalization of abortion in 2012, now the law has been voted through congress. As 8th March 2014 approaches, protests against the re-insertion of abortion into the domain of criminal law are intensifying in Spain as well as internationally. Based on conversations in March 2014 (with Silvia Gil from Vidas Precarias) and November 2012 (with Marcella Arellano from the Feminisms Commission of Sol, and the feminist researcher Emanuela Borzacchiello), this text gives an overview of some of the social, legal, discursive and political matters at stake in the struggles around abortion in Spain. Republished from LeftEast
The first round of the local elections took place against a backdrop of widespread creeping fascism in France and comes after a brutal offensive by the far right, during which the traditional ‘Republican’ right has decisively broken from much of its historical framework and values.
- read article...The majority of the party votes to maintain its autonomy and a commitment to social change.
- read article...After 59 days of unjust imprisonment, Lyes Touati has finally been acquitted - 59 days of waiting, mobilization, solidarity and determination.
- read article...International Viewpoint is published under the responsibility of the Bureau of the Fourth International. Signed articles do not necessarily reflect editorial policy. Articles can be reprinted with acknowledgement, and a live link if possible.
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