Category Archives: Politics

“In the struggle, of which we have noted only a few phrases, this mass becomes united, and constitutes itself as a class for itself. The interests it defends become class interests. But the struggle of class against class is a political struggle.” — Karl Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy

Review and Analysis: Patterns of Betrayal

Posted on 19/08/2013 by Gavin Mendel-Gleason

In 1992, the Workers’ Party published a pamphlet: “Patterns of Betrayal: the flight from Socialism”. The pamphlet details the events leading up to the split in the Workers’ Party, including several primary source documents. The contemporary Left in Ireland is … Continue reading →

Posted in Proletarian politics | 2 Comments

The European Monetary Union and the Left

Posted on 17/08/2013 by Gavin Mendel-Gleason

Recently a 45 page report written by Heiner Flassbeck and Costas Lapavitsas was issued by Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, “The systemic crisis of the euro – true causes and effective therapies”. They later popularised their report in a Guardian article. The … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Proletarian politics | Comments Off

Why I am no longer an anarchist

Posted on 03/08/2013 by Gavin Mendel-Gleason

What follows is an outline of my personal process of ideological formation. The process of changing ones world view is in my experience a gradual one. All world views will have places in which they do not match up quite … Continue reading →

Posted in Critique of the Left, Politics, Proletarian politics | 2 Comments

On the Issue of Political Extradition & the United States: Saints & Sinners

Posted on 30/07/2013 by Jerome Nikolai Warren

If justice is transitive, it applies to all alike, and we should critically engage the grave double standard the United States applies to extradition requests it issues, while requests submitted to it for criminals, terrorists and stooges of corrupt regimes … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics | Tagged Edward Snowden, extradition, NSA whistleblower | Comments Off

Provisional thoughts on Egypt

Posted on 28/07/2013 by Maximilien Robespierre

Between January and October 1850, Karl Marx wrote a series of four articles on the revolutionary situation in France for the Neue Rheinische Zeitung, which were collected and published with the dreadfully uninspiring title Class Struggles in France: 1848-1850. Decades later, … Continue reading →

Posted in Bourgeois politics, Politics, Proletarian politics | Comments Off

Review – Bourdieu’s Secret Admirer in the Caucasus: A World-System Biography – Georgi M. Derluguian

Posted on 20/07/2013 by yeksmesh

The title of this book by itself could already warrant a read, yet there is much more to find in this book, its interesting title aside. The work mainly deals with the question of the Soviet Union and particularly its … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural analysis, Geopolitics, History | Comments Off

European Left Summer University

Posted on 16/07/2013 by Gavin Mendel-Gleason

The European Left Summer University was held between July 3rd and 6th. Organised by Bloco de Esquerda of Portugal, the University was a three-day series of lectures and seminars on the key issues facing the European Left, the party of … Continue reading →

Posted in Proletarian politics | 1 Comment

The ties that bind: historical memory and present struggle

Posted on 16/07/2013 by James O'Brien

After having received 12 years of schooling in Ireland, I think it’s not too outlandish to say that history is a means to the formation of national identity, one which inculcates in the population a more or less patriotic conception … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Proletarian politics | Comments Off

The roads to power: capitalist democracy and socialist strategy

Posted on 01/07/2013 by Daniel Finn

This article comes from an abortive book project that I was working on about five years ago. The questions that it raises about political strategy for the radical left now appear far more pressing than they did when I wrote … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Proletarian politics | 1 Comment

Interview With Rob Dietz of CASSE, co-author of “Enough is Enough”

Posted on 10/06/2013 by Jerome Nikolai Warren

Rob Dietz recently published the book Enough is Enough with co-author Dan O’Neill. The gist of the book is that the growth-oriented consumer culture in places like the United States and Europe, where, even in the recent crisis, people are … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Politics | Tagged Dan O'Neill, Enough is Enough, Rob Dietz, steady state economy | Comments Off

“I Had Weird Educational Experiences”: Interview With Noam Chomsky

Posted on 21/05/2013 by Jerome Nikolai Warren

Spirit: Alot of theorists, I think of EJ Hobsbawm in particular, in the book On History, separate the concept of “biography” from that of “history”. You’ve been more concerned, it is apparent, in your career, with the latter rather than … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural analysis, Culture, Philosophy, Politics | Comments Off

The Philosophy of Science

Posted on 18/04/2013 by Gavin Mendel-Gleason

As we saw in Part I, scientific progress is used by the capitalist class as a tool for the expulsion of labour from the workforce by way of technological improvements, which enables them to increase profits. This fact was immortalised … Continue reading →

Posted in Philosophy, Proletarian politics, Sci-tech | Comments Off

Revolution: towards a new approach

Posted on 15/04/2013 by yeksmesh

The first article I wrote on this Spirit of Contradiction was one on revolution, and more specifically a critique of the radical leftist approach to revolution. In this article I wish to return to this subject and repeat some of … Continue reading →

Posted in Critique of the Left | Comments Off

A Call for a Leftist Front a la Mont Pèlerin

Posted on 10/04/2013 by Jerome Nikolai Warren

Friedrich Hayek ends his famous essay The Intellectuals and Socialism with the question of whether the intellectual revival of liberalism occurring in some places in the post-WWII world (notably in Germany and the Anglophone countries) was “in time”. It … Continue reading →

Posted in Critique of the Left, Economics, Meta, Philosophy | Tagged Left strategies, Mont Pelerin for the Left | Comments Off