Communis Press

06/03/2024

«No War but the Class War», Historical Materialism and Institute for the Radical Imagination Conference (May 31 - June 2), just successfully concluded yesterday at Long Island University - Brooklyn, gives now way on the horizon to the next stop in the annual series of HM-sponsored and co-organized conferences around the world: «Class struggle and the construction of alternatives in the era of disaster capitalism» Historical Materialism Barcelona International Conference (3-7 July 2024).

For more information on the conference, available in English, Catalan, and Spanish, please visit https://historicalmaterialismbcn.net/

«No War but the Class War», conferencia auspiciada y co-organizada por Historical Materialism y el Institute for the Radical Imagination Conference (31 de mayo - 2 de junio de 2024), que acaba de concluir en Long Island University - Brooklyn, da paso ahora al próximo alto en la serie anual de conferencias auspicadas y co-organizadas por HM en todo el mundo: «Lucha de clases y construcción de alternativas en la era del capitalismo del desastre», Conferencia internacional de Historical Materialism en Barcelona (3-7 julio de 2024).

Para obtener más información sobre la conferencia, disponible en español, catalán e inglés, visita https://historicalmaterialismbcn.net/es/

05/28/2024

Only three more days to register.

05/27/2024

LENINIST DAYS/JORNADAS LENINISTAS: 100 YEARS WITHOUT LENIN, 100 YEARS WITH HIM.

Acknowledgements

«The fundamental challenge for radical movements today does not consist in the politicization of supposedly merely social demands, or their representation at the political level; our intersectional socio-political movements have already practically demonstrated the extent to which political relations of force already traverse all social instances. It is instead the form and the practice of politicization within movements themselves that will determine their capacity to grow. The concrete critique of representation as a governing logic of political action through experimentation in alternative practices of delegation is today our generation’s first step towards generating a de-subalternizing “politics of another type” capable of inheriting Lenin’s radical proposal.»

Thus concluded his closing address Peter D. Thomas, last Saturday, 25 May, at Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas after four months of sessions that had begun on 27 January with an inaugural address by Paul Le Blanc, and which, before the closing session, had served as a stage for 21 keynotes, 12 panel discussions, and five conversations – including three dedicated to book presentations – by 85 keynote speakers, panelists, chairs, discussants, and simultaneous interpreters, intervening from 43 cities around the world.

Those who wish to do so can translate these figures into proper names and toponyms and titles and streams by visiting the official site of this international series of events, sponsored and organized by Communis, historicalmaterialism.org, ICIC Juan Marinello, Revista Jacobin, and Viento Sur.

On behalf of Communis, I would like to thank in particular the generous, valuable, or otherwise indispensable contribution, among sponsors and organizers and technical, logistical and support staff (in alphabetical order), of Luis Emilio Aybar, Sebastian Budgen, Margarida Coelho de Assis, Andreu Coll, Sergio Dobkevicius, Brais Fernández, Humberto T. Fernández, Daniel García, Alejandro Gumá, Martín Mosquera, Leandro Moura, Florencia Oroz, Pedro Perucca, Luke Stobart, and Ernesto Teuma.

It would be unwarranted not to thank, in particular, among the keynote speakers, panelists, chairs, discussants, and simultaneous interpreters – as well as contributors and supporters whose names do not appear in the official program as direct participants – for the many occasions and the multiple capacities in which they did so, publicly and privately (also in alphabetical order), Kevin B. Anderson, Josep María Antentas, Valerio Arcary, Bruno Bosteels, Sebastian Budgen, Andreu Coll, Jodi Dean, Carlos Delgado, Humberto T. Fernández, Montserrat Galceran, Chris Gilbert, Natasha Gómez Velázquez, Peter Hallward, Alla Ivanchikova, Hjalmar Jorge Joffre–Eichhorn, Tora Lane, Paul Le Blanc, Michael Löwy, Martín Mosquera, Jorge Orovitz Sanmartino, Cira Pascual Marquina, Panagiotis Sotiris, and Ernesto Teuma.

It would be impossible to mention the dozens of frequent and active attendees who engaged in the reflections and collective discussions that invariably followed each individual or group intervention in each of the sessions, and therefore it would be unwarranted to mention only a few.

Even more unwarranted would be not to record the fact that there were many more who contributed to making this series of virtual and in–person events possible over the last four months, whose names and faces we do not know.

There remains, in addition to what can be gathered in names, dates, and figures, what is perhaps the most lasting contribution of Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas – besides its audiovisual and documentary legacy, in whose due dissemination work will continue – and the main reason that would authorize us to say that not only an anniversary was commemorated through them, but also that a continuous and spurring presence among us was celebrated and reactivated, a double objective that was echoed in the official motto of this international series of events, "One hundred years without Lenin, one hundred years with him" – : the intangibles of shared knowledge and renewed comradeship and commitment.

To all those mentioned above, to those who without the slightest intention of detriment we have forgotten to mention, to those who we cannot even mention because we do not know their names, once again, thank you.

Rolando Prats
Communis //

Agradecimientos

«El reto fundamental que tienen por delante los movimientos radicales de hoy en día no consiste en la politización de reivindicaciones que se presume son meramente sociales, ni en su representación a nivel político; nuestros movimientos sociopolíticos interseccionales ya han demostrado en la práctica hasta qué punto las relaciones políticas de fuerza atraviesan todas las instancias sociales. Es más bien la forma y la práctica de la politización dentro de los propios movimientos lo que determinará su capacidad de crecimiento. La crítica concreta de la representación como lógica rectora de la acción política por medio de la experimentación de prácticas alternativas de delegación es hoy el primer paso de nuestra generación hacia la generación de una “política de otro tipo” des-subalternizadora, capaz de heredar la propuesta radical de Lenin.»

Así concluyó Peter D. Thomas, el pasado sábado 25 de mayo, su alocución de clausura de Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas, tras cuatro meses de sesiones que se habían iniciado el 27 de enero con una alocución inaugural a cargo de Paul Le Blanc y que, antes de la sesión de clausura, habían servido de escenario de 21 conferencias, 12 mesas redondas y cinco conversaciones —entre ellas tres dedicadas a presentaciones de libros— a cargo de 85 conferencistas, ponentes, moderadores o intérpretes simultáneos, desde 43 ciudades de todo el mundo.

Quien desee hacerlo, podrá traducir en nombres propios y toponímicos y títulos y líneas temáticas esas cifras visitando el sitio oficial de esta serie internacional de actos, patrocinada y organizada por Communis, historicalmaterialism.com, ICIC Juan Marinello, Revista Jacobin y Viento Sur.

En nombre de Communis, quisiera agradecer en particular la amable, valiosa o de otro modo imprescindible contribución, entre patrocinadores y organizadores y personal técnico, logístico y de apoyo (por orden alfabético), de Luis Emilio Aybar, Sebastian Budgen, Margarida Coelho de Assis, Andreu Coll, Brais Fernández, Humberto T. Fernández, Daniel García, Alejandro Gumá, Martín Mosquera, Leandro Moura, Florencia Oroz, Pedro Perucca, Luke Stobart y Ernesto Teuma.

Sería injusto no agradecer, de manera particular, entre conferencistas, ponentes, moderadores, intérpretes simultáneos —así como colaboradores cuyos nombres no aparecen en el programa oficial como participantes directos— por las múltiples ocasiones y en las múltiples capacidades en que lo hicieron, pública y privadamente (igualmente en orden alfabético), a Kevin B. Anderson, Josep María Antentas, Valerio Arcary, Bruno Bosteels, Sebastian Budgen, Andreu Coll, Jodi Dean, Carlos Delgado, Humberto T. Fernández, Montserrat Galceran, Chris Gilbert, Natasha Gómez Velázquez, Peter Hallward, Alla Ivanchikova, Hjalmar Jorge Joffre-Eichhorn, Tora Lane, Paul Le Blanc, Michael Löwy, Martín Mosquera, Jorge Orovitz Sanmartino, Cira Pascual Marquina, Panagiotis Sotiris y Ernesto Teuma.

Sería imposible mencionar a las decenas de asistentes frecuentes y activos en las reflexiones y los debates colectivos que invariablemente siguieron a cada intervención individual o de grupo en cada una de las sesiones y, por tanto, sería improcedente mencionar sólo a algunos.

Más improcedente aún sería no dejar constancia del hecho de que son muchos más quienes contribuyeron a hacer posible esta serie de encuentros virtuales y presenciales, a lo largo de estos últimos cuatro meses, cuyos nombres o rostros ignoramos.

Queda, además de lo que pueda recogerse en nombres, fechas y cifras, lo que quizás sea la contribución más duradera de Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas —además de su legado audiovisual y documental, en cuya debida divulgación se seguirá trabajando— y la principal razón que nos autorizaría a decir que no sólo se conmemoró a través de ellas un aniversario, sino también que se celebró y reactivó una continua y espoleadora presencia entre nosotros —doble objetivo de que se hizo eco el lema oficial de esta serie internacional de actos: “Cien años sin Lenin, cien años con él”—: los intangibles del saber compartido y la camaradería y el compromiso renovados.

A todos los aquí mencionados, a los que sin la menor intención de menoscabo se nos haya olvidado mencionar, a quienes no podemos ni siquiera mencionar por no conocer sus nombres, una vez más, gracias.

Rolando Prats
Communis

Poster / Cartel © Daniel García/Viento Sur

05/24/2024

LENINIST DAYS/JORNADAS LENINISTAS: THE FINAL SESSION IS HERE.

Let's all join Peter D. Thomas for his Closing Address on «Lenin’s Alternative: A Politics of Another Type», on Saturday 25 May 2024 at 11:00 AM (EST). Chaired by Sebastian Budgen.

To join the session click on the following link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81155049542

«While most theories of dual power from Lenin onwards have posited a clear distinction between constituted state power and the revolutionary forces that aim to launch an assault upon it, Poulantzas’s insistence that contemporary capitalist state power must be seized from ‘within’ seems to leave no possibility for the theorization of genuinely autonomous institutions of a "counterpower" of the subaltern classes and social groups. Can there ever be a politics beyond the state? [...]

«Rather, in a perspective common to Gramsci and Lenin, political power is immanent to the hegemonic projects by means of which social classes or groups constitute themselves as classes in an integral and properly political sense, rather than remaining an incoherent mass of ‘corporative’ interests at the subaltern level of civil society. It is the capacity of such hegemonic projects to transform those experiences of subalternity into institutions of self-organization that allows a class to elaborate its own distinctive forms and practices of politics, within but also potentially beyond the existing state [...]

«As originally elaborated by Lenin, "dual power" was not a matter of the choice of one strategic proposal over another. Nor did it involve a simple rejection of engagement with the existing State apparatus, in favor of a ‘purer’ power located elsewhere. Lenin in fact always argued that engagement with the state, including the mechanisms of parliamentary democracy, could be tactically useful for the revolutionary movement, in particular conjunctures and under certain precise political conditions.»

(Peter D. Thomas, Radical Politics, OUP, 2023)

Attributed Illustrations: Red Lenin / Black Lenin by Andy Warhol (1987).

Poster: Daniel García/Viento Sur.

05/24/2024

CUBA: EN EL PRESENTE VIVIDO REFUNDAR EL PORVENIR

«Cuba es hoy escenario de una disputa sobre el destino de la Revolución. Esa disputa es omnipresente y se plantea en un momento de definiciones fundamentales, en el que todo parece estar en juego y — como es de temer— lo está.

«Esas definiciones emanarán de la respuesta a preguntas que están hoy sobre la mesa y que nos alertan de nuevos problemas sin resolver. De esos problemas, dos son los más urgentes y, por tanto, los decisivos ¿cómo re-pensar el sentido de la justicia y de la igualdad frente a una desigualdad y pobreza cada vez más visibles y agobiantes, y cómo hacer que ese sentido reencarne en formas viables, convincentes, sostenibles? ¿Cómo desatar una participación protagónica y activa del pueblo que lo re-politice por cauces revolucionarios? [...]

«La solución tampoco podrá ser administrativa. La solución no podrá venir sino de la movilización de las masas en torno a nuevas ideas, prácticas y discursos que actualicen la Revolución como presente vivido por el que valga la pena seguir apostando aquí y ahora, pero que también la doten de una perspectiva de futuro que hagan de esa apuesta una elección existencial y no solo una esperanza.

«La clausura de ese futuro viene de la mano de la privatización, cierre que en cierto modo ya se ha iniciado. Por todas partes vemos emerger poderes privados, discrecionales: en el mundo empresarial — tanto privado como estatal—, en las instituciones, en el espacio doméstico; lo vemos en el énfasis de lo privado que cercena cualquier otro tipo de relación, en la tendencia a vivir hacia el interior de las casas y en la proliferación de muros, rejas y separaciones; en el temor a la calle y al encuentro con el otro. Lo vemos en el rechazo de lo común y de todo aquello considerado como estorbo, como traba frente a lo privado, lo individual, lo familiar, lo infrasocial. En la experiencia cubana, como en muchas experiencias de construcción socialista del siglo XX, el Estado era efectivamente la forma principal de comunidad, pero a su alrededor y por debajo crecían múltiples relaciones que alimentaban y fomentaban otra manera de vivir. La presencia del Estado y su vocación de regular, administrar y controlar no dejó de generar un malestar y una rebeldía comprensibles, pero hoy nuestro reto es cómo ampliar las formas de lo común más allá del Estado, cómo llevar adelante «una política de lo común».

«El partido de esa política ha llevado siempre el mismo nombre: comunista [...]

«Es en ese debate programático sobre el socialismo cubano, en la refundación revolucionaria, en la profundización democrática y socialista del proyecto social de la Revolución cubana, que los comunistas y los revolucionarios cubanos demostraremos si somos dignos de ese nombre.»

(Ernesto Teuma, militante comunista y profesor de Teoría Política en la Universidad de las Artes-ISA (La Habana). Miembro del colectivo editorial de La Tizza y del Consejo Editorial de Communis Press).

Publicado simultáneamente hoy en español en La Tizza y Jacobin América Latina y en francés en Contretemps. R***e de critique communiste.)

https://medium.com/la-tiza/la-revoluci%C3%B3n-cubana-frente-a-los-desaf%C3%ADos-de-sus-propias-conquistas-6474187915d8

https://jacobinlat.com/.../la-revolucion-cubana-frente-a.../

https://www.contretemps.eu/revolution-cubaine-tizza.../

Por Ernesto Teuma

05/24/2024

CUBA: REFONDER L'AVENIR DANS LE PRÉSENT VÉCU

"Cuba est aujourd’hui le théâtre d’une querelle sur le sort de la Révolution. Cette querelle est omniprésente et se déroule à un moment de redéfinitions fondamentales, où tout semble être en jeu et – comme on peut le craindre – tel est bien le cas.

"Ces nouvelles définitions émaneront des réponses aux questions qui sont sur la table aujourd’hui et qui nous alertent sur de nouveaux problèmes non résolus. Parmi ces problèmes, deux sont les plus urgents et, par conséquent, les plus décisifs : comment repenser le sens de la justice et de l’égalité face à une inégalité et une pauvreté de plus en plus visibles et accablantes, et comment réincarner ce sens sous des formes viables, convaincantes et durables ; comment libérer la participation active et protagoniste du peuple qui les repolitise par des voies révolutionnaires [...]

"[...] La solution ne peut venir que de la mobilisation des masses autour de nouvelles idées, pratiques et discours qui actualisent la Révolution comme un présent vécu sur lequel il vaut la peine de continuer à parier ici et maintenant, mais qui la dotent aussi d’une perspective d’avenir qui fait de ce pari un choix existentiel et pas seulement un espoir pour l’avenir.

"La fermeture de cet avenir va de pair avec la privatisation, une fermeture qui, d’une certaine manière, a déjà commencé. Partout, nous voyons émerger des pouvoirs privés et discrétionnaires : dans le monde de l’entreprise – privée et publique -, dans les institutions, dans l’espace domestique. Nous le voyons dans l’accent mis sur le privé qui réduit tout autre type de relation, dans la tendance à vivre à l’intérieur et dans la prolifération des murs, des clôtures et des séparations, dans la peur de la rue et de la rencontre avec l’autre. Nous le voyons dans le rejet de tout ce qui est considéré comme une entrave, un obstacle au privé, à l’individu, à la famille, à l’infra-social [...] [A]ujourd’hui, notre défi est de savoir comment élargir les formes du commun au-delà de l’État, comment poursuivre « une politique du commun ».

"Le parti de cette politique a toujours porté le même nom : communiste [...]

"C’est dans ce débat programmatique sur le socialisme cubain, dans la refondation révolutionnaire, dans l’approfondissement démocratique et socialiste du projet social de la révolution cubaine, que les communistes et révolutionnaires cubains pourront se montrer dignes de ce nom."

(Ernesto Teuma, militant communiste et professeur de théorie politique à l’Université des arts-ISA (La Havane). Membre du collectif éditorial de La Tizza et du Conseil Éditorial de Communis Press.)

Publié simultanément aujourd'hui en espagnol dans La Tizza et Jacobin América Latina et en français dans Contretemps. R***e de critique communiste.

https://medium.com/la-tiza/la-revoluci%C3%B3n-cubana-frente-a-los-desaf%C3%ADos-de-sus-propias-conquistas-6474187915d8

https://jacobinlat.com/2024/05/24/la-revolucion-cubana-frente-a-los-desafios-de-sus-propias-conquistas/

https://www.contretemps.eu/revolution-cubaine-tizza-socialisme/

Lire hors-ligne :Dans cet article, Ernesto Teuma, professeur de théorie politique au département de philosophie, d’esthétique et de théorie politique de l’Université des arts-ISA à La Havane, résume les réflexions, […]

05/22/2024

WILL «TRUE» LENIN EVER BE FOUND?

From Lenin's (dissenting) contemporaries to Lenin's (unorthodox) heirs: from Kautsky to Rosa to Gramsci, from Daniel Bensaïd to Perry Anderson.

A last panel discussion at Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas.

Week 17/Session 40/Panel 12:

Thursday 23 May 2024 @ 11:00 AM (EST) — Lenin's (dissenting) contemporaries, Lenin's (unorthodox) heirs: from Kautsky to Luxemburg, from Gramsci to Anderson.

With Michael Löwy on «Convergences and divergences between Rosa Luxemburg and Gramsci»; Massimo Modonesi on «Gramsci: the Lenin criterion»; Josep María Antentas on «Bensaïd's Melancholic Leninism. The wager for revolution»; Santiago Roggerone on «Uncompromising realism and slow impatience: On Perry Anderson’s and Daniel Bensaïd’s peculiar Leninisms»; and Michal Kozlowski on «True Lenin will never be found».

Chaired by Michael Löwy.

In English with simultaneous Spanish interpretation by Andreu Coll Blackwell and Ernesto Teuma.

Venue(s): Barcelona, Buenos Aires, Havana, Mexico City, New York, Paris, Warsaw.

To join the session click on the zoom link

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86416223662

Photos: (CW): Michael Löwy, Massimo Modonesi, Josep María Antentas, Santiago Roggerone, Michal Kozlowski.

05/20/2024

JOIN GIGI ROGGERO AT LENINIST DAYS ON TUESDAY 21 MAY @ 11:00 AM (EST) ON CAPITALIST DEVELOPMENT IN ITS RELATIONSHIP WITH STRUGGLES, SUBJECTIVITY, AND ORGANIZATION

To join the session click on the zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84770719588

Week 17, Session 39, Keynote 21 of Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas

Gigi Roggero speaking from Bologna on «The Matter of Capitalist Development in its Relationship with Struggles, Subjectivity, and Organization», chaired by Rolando Prats. In English with simultaneous interpretation.

Registration remains open for this and the other two remaining sessions of this last week of Leninist Days on the official site of this international series of events.

_____

«The historicist and objectivist Lenin faithful to stages of development that has been handed down to us by Leninism is a complete misrepresentation and must be abandoned. Throughout his life Lenin continuously tried to force, interrupt and overturn the development of capital, or rather to impose revolutionary will within and against history [...] [O]nly the struggle decides destiny. Everything else remains imprisoned in managing the false certainties of the present. We need to choose, we need to make a wager, we need to dare: “Whoever wants to depict some living phenomenon in its development is inevitably and necessarily confronted with the dilemma of either running ahead or lagging behind.” There is no middle way, he argued. That was the case in 1905 and again in February 1917; it is only the “tail-ists” who could think those were bourgeois revolutions and that the proletarians had to wait their turn, had to wait for historical development rather than struggle to hand them socialism and then communism. This is nonsense! We need to be within the revolutionary movement, break its linearity, steer it towards other ends. We need to leap over the stages of development, overthrow the potential of the possible against the misery of the objective. This is the only way to have a revolution against Capital, breaking Marx’s vicious circle.

«The most significant lesson Lenin taught us was that revolutionaries must be prepared for every opportunity, without thinking that they will fall from the sky and transcend the materiality of historical dynamics, organizational continuity, and the patient construction of relations of force. We must methodically create the conditions of possibility to seize the opportunity, to grab the lightning bolt with our bare hands. This is about rethinking the relationship between process and event, or rather duration and leap, in a completely different way: for the simple continuity of the process without the discontinuity of the event leads to objectivism, while the pure discontinuity of the event without the continuity of the process leads to idealism. This is how the Bolshevik leader took the will inherited from the revolutionary populists and stood it on the legs of historical materialism, extracting the historical materialism of Marx from the iron cage of objectivism.»

(Gigi Roggero, «“A Science of Destruction”: An Interview with Gigi Roggero on the Actuality of Operaismo». Gigi Roggero and Davide Gallo Lassere, April 30, 2020, appendix to Roggero’s «L’operaismo politico italiano: Genealogia, storia, metodo», translated into English for Viewpoint Magazine.)

Illustration: Angelo V***a, Untitled (courtesy of Viewpoint Magazine).

05/18/2024

Did you miss today being on a Saturday late morning-early afternoon session at Leninist Days?

You sure did. As did we all.

What you for sure won't want to miss is Peter D. Thomas' Closing Address this coming Saturday 25 May 2024 @ 11:00 AM (EST) on «Lenin's Alternative: A Politics of Another Type», chaired by Sebastian Budgen.

Stay tuned for more details on Leninist Days' Closing Address by Peter D. Thomas, author of the monumental, groundbreaking «The Gramscian Moment» (HMBS 24, Brill, 2009), and more recently of «Radical Politics» (OUP, 2023), as well as on the remaining calendar for this coming week - seventeenth and last - of Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas (27 January - 25 May 2024).

Registration remains open at the official site of Leninist Days/Jornadas leninistas.

05/16/2024

Edwin Morgan's (27 April 1920 – 19 August 2010) poem Manifesto, belonging to his Emergent Poems, as masterfully read today by Heather H. Yeung during the thirty-eighth session of Leninist Days / Jornadas leninistas - a panel discussion on «Insurrection as an Art / The Art of Insurrection» featuring Andrew Cole, Rebecca Comay, Frank Ruda, and Heather, and chaired and discussed by Peter Hallward.

The final line of Morgan's poem, «proletarii vsekh stran[,] soedinyaites», towards which all the other lines march with apparent hesitance, randomness, and yet steadily, firmly, self-constitutively so - «fragments towards their magnet», one could say with José Lezama Lima -, is the transliteration of «Пролетарии всех стран, соединяйтесь!», Russian for «Workers of the world, unite!»

Look closely, rise, stand, prove...

05/15/2024

WELCOME ANDREW COLE, REBECCA COMAY, FRANK RUDA, AND HEATHER H. YEUNG ON «INSURRECCTION AS AN ART / THE ART OF INSURRECTION» TO LENINIST DAYS / JORNADAS LENINISTAS

To join the session on Thursday 16 May 2024 @ 11:00 AM (EST) click on the zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82565146852

Panel # 11, «Insurrection as an Art / The Art of Insurrection», of Leninist Days / Jornadas leninistas features Andrew Cole on «The Poiesis of the Present»; Rebecca Comay on «Slogan Time — Petrograd to Palestine»; Frank Ruda on «De l’audace, de l’audace, et encore de l’audace !»; and Heather H. Yeung on «A Poetological Abacus (Morgan’s Lenin’s Marx)».

Chaired and discussed by Peter Hallward.

In English with simultaneous interpretation.

From Dundee to Toronto, from London to Princeton, from New York to Havana.

Registration for this and upcoming sessions remains open on the official site of Leninist Days.

05/15/2024

WANT TO BE PART OF THE FLAGSHIP COLLECTIVE REFLECTION AND DEBATE ON RADICAL POLITCS TODAY, ON 7-10 NOVEMBER IN LONDON, AT THE TWENTY-FIRST ANNUAL HISTORICAL MATERIALISM CONFERENCE?

The deadline for the submission of abstracts has been extended through 14 June.

For all enquiries, please contact: [email protected]

HM London Conference: An academic event, a social and political gathering, a living militant laboratory in which to think aloud ways to radically transform our current condition. //

¿QUIERES FORMAR PARTE DE LA REFLEXIÓN Y EL DEBATE COLECTIVOS INSIGNIAS SOBRE POLÍTICA RADICAL HOY, DEL 7 AL 10 DE NOVIEMBRE EN LONDRES, EN LA VIGÉSIMO PRIMERA CONFERENCIA ANUAL DE Historicalmaterialism.org?

El plazo de presentación de resúmenes se ha ampliado hasta el 14 de junio.

Para cualquier consulta, ponte en contacto con: [email protected]

Conferencia de HM Londres: un evento académico, un encuentro social y político, un laboratorio militante vivo para pensar en voz alta formas de transformar radicalmente nuestra condición actual.

Countering the Plague: Forces of Reaction and War and How to Fight Them 7-10 November 2024 SOAS, Russell Square, Central London Deadline for abstracts: Friday 17th May 2024 Submit paper or panel proposals here For inquiries contact: [email protected] A wave of reaction and war ....

05/14/2024

INSURRECTION AS AN ART, THE ART OF INSURRECTION

«Marxists are accused of Blanquism for treating insurrection as an art! Can there be a more flagrant perversion of the truth, when not a single Marxist will deny that it was Marx who expressed himself on this score in the most definite, precise and categorical manner, referring to insurrection specifically as an art, saying that it must be treated as an art, that you must win the first success and then proceed from success to success, never ceasing the offensive against the enemy, taking advantage of his confusion, etc., etc.?

«To be successful, insurrection must rely not upon conspiracy and not upon a party, but upon the advanced class. That is the first point. Insurrection must rely upon a revolutionary upsurge of the people. That is the second point. Insurrection must rely upon that turning-point in the history of the growing revolution when the activity of the advanced ranks of the people is at its height, and when the vacillations in the ranks of the enemy and in the ranks of the weak, half-hearted and irresolute friends of the revolution are strongest. That is the third point. And these three conditions for raising the question of insurrection distinguish Marxism from Blanquism.

«Once these conditions exist, however, to refuse to treat insurrection as an art is a betrayal of Marxism and a betrayal of the revolution.»

(V. I. Lenin, «Marxism and Insurrection». A Letter to the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P.(B.), September 13-14, 1917)

On Thursday 16 May 2024 @11:00 AM, join (clockwise) Andrew Cole on «The Poiesis of the Present»; Rebecca Comay on «Slogan Time — Petrograd to Palestine»; Frank Ruda on «De l’audace, de l’audace, et encore de l’audace !»; and Heather H. Yeung on «A Poetological Abacus (Morgan’s Lenin’s Marx)» at Panel # 11, «Insurrection as Art / The Art of Insurrection», of Leninist Days / Jornadas leninistas. Chaired and discussed by Peter Hallward.

From Dundee to Toronto, from London to Princeton, from New York to Havana.

Registration remains open on the official site of Leninist Days.