International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

Socialist strategy and the party

Gilbert Achcar — 2021-09-02T10:38:37Z

Below is the transcript of a talk titled “Marxism, socialist strategy, and the party” by Gilbert Achcar, which was delivered to the South African initiative, Dialogues for an Anti-capitalist Future. Here, Achcar traces conceptions of the party from Marx to the present and its implications for socialist strategy today. This transcript has been revised, edited and completed by Gilbert Achcar. The original video recording of the talk can be found here.
Thank you for inviting me to address (…)

- Building new parties of the left / New parties of the left, Debate section

The Rise and Fall of Podemos: Reasons for a Farewell

Manuel Garí — 2020-09-16T17:33:02Z

The creation of Podemos in the Spanish state represented a significant attempt to build a mass, anti-neoliberal, and pluralistic party to the left of social liberalism. That experiment, which began very well, ultimately ended very badly. Perhaps for this reason, the title of this article could have been “The Rise and Fall of Podemos… as an Emancipatory Political Project.” The aim of this article is to explain why it was necessary to create Podemos and why it has been necessary to abandon it.

- Building new parties of the left / Spanish state, New parties of the left, Debate section

Anticapitalist strategy and the question of organization

Julia Cámara — 2020-06-12T22:04:34Z

No matter how much time passes, or how often history is declared to have ended, the debate over socialist strategy and organization always returns. This foundational question appeared in embryo at the very start of the workers movement in the nineteenth century and was raised explicitly by Lenin when he described his perspective as “tactics as plan” and when revolutionaries split with social-democracy during World War I.

- Building new parties of the left / Marxism, Spanish state, New parties of the left, Debate section

Parliamentary action and social struggles - The experience of the Portuguese Left Bloc

Françisco Louçã — 2018-09-07T13:20:18Z

The Left Bloc was formed about twenty years ago in Portugal, by the fusion of forces from the anti-capitalist left and the social movement. Today, together with the Communist Party, it is the main formation of the combative left in the country. Based on the Bloc's experience, Francisco LouçÃ£ gives an overview of the still problematic relationship between parliamentary opposition work and investment in social movements and mobilizations.

- Building new parties of the left / Portugal, New parties of the left, Debate section

Reflections on the “party question” (expanded version) – an overview

Pierre Rousset — 2017-05-15T15:39:13Z

On the occasion of the one hundredth anniversary of the Russian Revolution, the Spanish-language Viento Sur journal asked me to write an article on the “party question” (Rousset 2017). This is an expanded version of that piece. This version focuses far more on the present than on the past – and aims to contribute to an international debate, rather than a solely French one.

Corrections and clarifications will probably be added in the future.

- Building new parties of the left / New parties of the left, Debate section

Que podemos? A potential party

Héloïse Nez — 2017-05-07T07:55:23Z

The vitality of Podemos is an exception in Europe. Can the Spanish movement survive its institutionalization? Is its positioning above the right-left cleavage still relevant? To these questions, the militants of the young party offer sometimes contradictory answers.

- Building new parties of the left / Spanish state, New parties of the left, Debate section

Winning Power, Not Just Government

Florian Wilde — 2017-05-06T09:55:21Z

For twenty-five years, European left parties have joined broad coalition governments and come out with nothing to show for it.

- Building new parties of the left / New parties of the left, Debate section

Germany: What we are and why we fight - resolution of the ISO

2017-02-24T13:17:25Z

This resolution was adopted by a very large majority (one vote against, one abstention) by the founding conference of the International Socialist Organisation (ISO), German section of the Fourth International, held on December 3-4, 2016 in Frankfurt.

- Building new parties of the left / Germany, Fourth International, New parties of the left

Die Linke and our activity within it

2016-12-29T07:48:21Z

The emergence of the Die Linke party constituted a substantial change in the political landscape in Germany . To give an order of magnitude, Die Linke has about 80,000 members (compared to 400,000 for the SPD and 60,000 for the Greens). With 8.6 per cent of the vote it currently has 76 members of the Bundestag out of 614. It is a member of the European Left Party and sits in the European Parliament in the Group of the European United Left/Nordic Green Left with 7 MEPs. (7.4 per cent of the vote in the 2014 European elections).

Die Linke is currently participating in three regional governments: in the LÃ¤nder of Brandenburg since November 2014, Thuringia since December 2014, and following the elections of last September and the so-called red-red-green coalition agreement (SPD-Greens-Die Linke) concluded in November, in the Land of Berlin, now for the second time. Despite all this, no one in Germany considers it very likely that this party can be integrated into the national government; journalists and social democrats broadly concur in describing it as "irresponsible and not capable of governing", with within it forces that are considered utopian, leftist and extremist, and that are the object of close supervision by the state security services. [IVP]

- Building new parties of the left / Germany, New parties of the left

What is the Communia Network?

Communia Network — 2016-11-05T18:32:46Z

The Communia Network political project in Italy is very much connected to a profound reflection about the crisis of the class struggle left and also what has been defined, somewhat provocatively, as “the end of the workers' movement”.

- Building new parties of the left / Italy, New parties of the left