French workers really know how to protest. In response to a proposal to increase the age of retirement, tens of thousands of workers and young people are on strike and on the streets. Garbage workers, transport workers, teachers and others have moved into struggle against the Macron government and its anti worker agenda. Come along to this inspiring session to hear from the frontlines. We will be zooming in a revolutionary activist from the streets of 

Paris and be hearing from Chris Di Pasquale - author of '

Back to the barricades: French workers revolt

A vicious right wing coalition is in power in Israel, including fascists. The racist Zionist Settler movement has enacted pogroms against Palestinian villages. A mass movement, including sections of the Israeli state, is on the Israeli streets almost daily and is threatening social chaos. In Palestine, new resistance groups are emerging while old ones are being challenged. How should socialists understand all this? This session will start to answer some of these questions. Come along to hear from 

 Founder of Jews against Oppression and Occupation 

The Story of Palestine: Empire, Repression and Resistance. 

Pogroms and protest: A socialist analysis of Palestine and Israel today

Three years before the 1917 revolution, the last Russian Tsar wrote of cinema: “Only an abnormal person could place this farcical business on a par with art. It is complete rubbish, and no importance whatsoever should be attributed to such idiocy." But for the Bolsheviks, this relatively new medium was a vital means of spreading revolutionary politics. Before the revolution, the cinemas themselves were a place for agitation and leafletting, while after the revolution the Bolsheviks actively fostered a path-forging and experimental approach to film-making. 

By 1919 the Petrograd Soviet was producing a weekly documentary series, 'Kino Pravda. The echoes of these revolutionary experiments can be seen in films to this day. As Lenin said at the time: "of all the arts, for us the cinema is the most important". In this special presentation, RMIT University lecturer and award-winning film-maker Liam Ward presents an eye-opening account of how the greatest revolution in history shook the film industry, and how film-making came to occupy a special place in the arsenal of revolutionary propaganda.

AGITKI: a journey through Russian revolutionary cinema

More than two years into the Biden Presidency, US politics continues to be defined by polarisation and crisis. Workers are being squeezed by a rising cost of living while corporate profits are soaring. 

The reactionary far right, far from being marginalised by Trump's election defeat, continue to organise. Last year, they scored a massive victory by successfully overturning Roe v Wade, as part of a decades-long crusade to roll back rights won by women and other oppressed groups.  

Biden has seized on the opportunity created by Putin's criminal invasion of Ukraine to restore the image of US imperialism that was tarnished under Trump. Posturing as a defender of democracy and international law, Biden has accelerated the drive to prepare for a potential conflict with the US's number one economic and military rival- China. 

US Socialist brian bean will be at Marxism in person to speak at this session. He will talk about the situation in America and the need to rebuild the socialist left. 

Biden’s State of the Union Turns from Neoliberalism to New Deal Liberalism

Biden's plan to rebuild the US empire

Breaking the Strategic Impasse

The USA today

Book Launch - Years of Rage: Social Conflicts in the Fraser Era

Join us on the Friday evening of the Marxism Festival, for this fun and inspiring tour of the radical history of Sydney Uni.

For more info about the Marxism Festival visit:

https://www.marxismconference.org/program?city=sydney

Sydney uni, long a bastion of elite conservatism, has also frequently been a base of radical activism from students and staff, from the harbouring of Vietnam draft resisters, to the Freedom Rides for Aboriginal rights, to countless protests, strikes and student occupations over the decades. Come along to hear some stories of rebellion.

Our tour will be led by the one and only Diane Fieldes, participant in the anti-Vietnam War movement, Mardi Gras 78er, and revolutionary socialist ever since.

The tour will commence at around 7pm from the Holme Building Courtyard, where our post-conference dinner and drinks will be happening. We will return around 7.45, in time for last drinks.

All tickets to the Marxism Festival include access to this radical walking tour.

Radical History Walking Tour of Sydney Uni

For many decades continental Europe had a large and vibrant radical left albeit one shaped by a variety of leftist traditions. The fall of the Soviet Union and the victory of neoliberalism reshaped this left and opened up a new era of challenges and opportunities. This session will explore the trajectories of various currents on the European left: Eurocommunism, social democracy, anarchism and Trotskyism in the decades since 1989. It will be introduced by Panos Petrou of the International Workers' Left in Greece

After the wall fell: debates on the European left since 1989

PLEASE NOTE: The opening night event will be taking place at the Trades and Labour Council Building, at 16 Peel St, South Brisbane. The rest of the conference is taking place at UQ, St Lucia. 

Brisbane has a long history of radicalism and trade union activism. From the general strike in 1912 to the students protests in the 70's, Brisbane has been a hotbed of left wing activity.

Our opening night event will feature a panel on this topic, followed by informal discussion. Marxism ’22 is the largest gathering of left-wing people in Brisbane and presents a unique opportunity to connect with local activists.

All tickets to the conference include entry to the opening night event.

Opening Night Panel: Radical Brisbane

Sydney Park Pavilion, Euston Rd, Alexandria

https://g.page/sydney-park-pavilion?share

We are excited to announce that in addition to the two days of talks and discussions from 15-16 April at the Marxism Festival, we are now adding an opening night extravaganza!

The night will feature lots of time to meet and greet other conference goers and organisers, with a bar and plentiful buffet of finger food, open from 5.30pm.

From 6.30pm we will hear from some of our most powerful conference speakers, about resisting the endless capitalist atrocities that confront us today, from imperialist war, to climate crises, to an economy that only serves the rich, and beyond. Along with the horror, they will speak about the hope of resistance and the fight for a better world, and what we can look forward to in that vein from the rest of the Marxism Festival.

It will be a great way to kick off what is sure to be a fantastic weekend for the rest of the Festival.

All tickets to the Marxism Festival will also grant access to the opening night.

For details of the Marxism Festival, including how to get your tickets, visit our website here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/481416066927397

April Holcombe: Convener of Community Action for Rainbow Rights, which recently celebrated a victory over Scott Morrison's and Mark Latham's religious discrimination bills. April is a revolutionary, an anti-capitalist, and the bane of every bigot in Australia. She will be speaking later in the conference on "Understanding Chinese capitalism today".

Chloe Rafferty: one of Sydney's leading climate activists and socialists, who organised and spoke at the immense "Sack Scomo" climate rallies, during Australia's bushfire crisis. Chloe will be speaking at the conference on "The war in Ukraine and its meaning for world imperialism".

Following speeches, there will be plenty of time to mingle and enjoy the bar and food.

Our venue will be the beautiful Sydney Park Pavilion, which is close to St Peters station, or via buses 308, 348, 370, 422, and has a carpark.

https://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/hireable-indoor-spaces/sydney-park-pavilion

Opening Night: Resisting a system of endless war and crisis

The tensions between the US and China have been steadily escalating under the Trump and Biden administrations. Nowhere is this more evident than in the field of microchips, where the US has been making it increasingly difficult for China to acquire cutting edge equipment and knowhow. This matters because chips are vital to nearly every sector of the economy, from AI and telecommunications through to the military-industrial complex. At the same time, China is the biggest customer for the major US chip firms. This talk will explore the implications of these various conflicts and contradictions for the future of the world system.

The new frontier for global imperialism: Review of 'Chip War' by Chris Miller

Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology

Chip wars: the cutting edge of imperialism

Wrap up the Conference with some drinks, dinner and speeches.

Closing Panel: Resisting Barbarism, Fighting for Socialism

This all-in closing panel is an absolute must for conference participants. Some of our most powerful speakers will seek to draw together all the different threads of discussion and make the case for a socialist alternative to this monstrous capitalist system.

As Karl Marx said, "the point is to change it!"

Closing Panel: Building the left in a world in crisis

Australian unions are at a low ebb. Despite surging inflation and continued attacks on workers, there is no sign here of the uptick in organising and strikes seen in some other countries. But despite many years of our unions largely refusing to fight, it’s very possible for militants to make an impact. This session features Socialist Alternative industrial organiser Jerome Small on the reasons for the long downturn in strikes – plus an inspiring panel of workers in health, transport, manufacturing and early childhood education sectors who have organised for industrial action in their workplaces.

Rank and file organising in Australian unions today

The Black power movement in Australia was a watershed movement in the struggle for Aboriginal rights.  

The late 1960s was a time of immense social ferment both in Australia and internationally. Following the 1967 referendum, a generation of younger, more militant activists argued against moderate reforms and symbolism. They argued for fundamental and revolutionary change. Inspired by struggles globally and by the work of older radicals like Bruce McGuinness and Bob Maza, the Black power movement was established in Redfern, as well as Fitzroy and South Brisbane, and then in other cities and towns around Australia. 

In the words of Gary Foley: “It was a really exciting time because, in addition to the winds of change running through colonised countries and de-colonisation beginning to happen, it also coincided with what some people call ‘the world youth rebellion’ or ‘revolution’. It was an era of protest.” Two of the most important organisations established were the Aboriginal Legal Service of New South Wales in 1970 and then the Aboriginal Medical Service. The activists involved with Black power stood for self determination, land rights and insisted on making no compromises with the oppressors. They linked up with radicals from the anti Vietnam war movement and the left wing of the trade union movement. 

In 1972, Redfern activists including Foley established the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra. This protest is still the longest running protest in Australian history, and one that encapsulates the radical politics of the Aboriginal left at the time. Foley has been involved in many struggles since and continues his uncompromising fight against Australian capitalism and Aboriginal oppression. The history and politics of this movement provide crucial lessons for Indigenous and non-Indigenous radicals today.

Black power in Redfern 1968-1972

Lessons from the Black Power Movement with Dr Gary Foley

Tsarist rule in nineteenth century Russia consisted of brutal oppression and political repression. Attempts at liberalisation were farcical and the society was extremely backwards in comparison to most European countries. In this context emerged a layer of student revolutionaries drawn mainly from the nobility. They wanted a fundamental overturning of Russia's political and economic structures. Throughout the period from 1860-1880 they dedicated themselves to this task with tremendous bravery, creativity, integrity and daring.  They began with propaganda work among the peasants, trying to stir them into action but, the failure of this strategy and the experience of extreme repression, led them to terrorism. The populism and terrorism of this time were ultimately hopeless, and were superseded by Marxism and working class organising in the following decades. However, this movement helped to build a revolutionary tradition in Russia. This talk will look at the strengths and weaknesses of this early revolutionary movement, and discuss the impact it had on the Bolsheviks and the two workers’ revolutions that swept Russia in the first decades of the twentieth century.

Apostles into terrorists : women and the revolutionary movement in the Russia of Alexander II

Building the Party Chapter 1: Lenin becomes a Marxist 

From apostles to terrorists: the early revolutionary movement in Russia

Gender roles are deeply ingrained in both our sense of self and how we see others. They are also a product of oppression and a means to perpetuate it. Marxists both support people's right to express their gender however they like and fight for a world free from gender roles and women's oppression.

The freedom to be: Marxism, gender oppression and the struggle for trans liberation

The failure of identity politics: A Marxist analysis

Against Transphobia and Misogyny: a Marxist critique of gender

China's rise as an economic and increasingly assertive imperialist power is a key development which has reshaped the world. This session will discuss this, but also explore the internal dynamics of Chinese capitalism. China is, after all, a class divided country like every other, with a myriad of contradictions, class struggle and other forms of popular resistance.

China under Xi Jinping

China's Century?

China's Growth Pains

China's Rise as a World Power

Understanding Chinese capitalism today

Socialists in Australia are part of a movement which involves people from around the world. In this panel we will draw on the lessons of those struggling in circumstances very different to our own. The capitalist system is experiencing a series of deeply-rooted crises: a global offensive against working class living standards, a mounting climate catastrophe, a pandemic which is still claiming countless lives. But this crisis is breeding new waves of resistance- movements to expand democratic rights, to take on oppressive governments and defend working class living standards against continued assault have erupted across the globe, from as far-flung places as Iran, Peru, France and the UK. 

We are proud to announce brian bean as a featured guest speaking on this panel. brian is a revolutionary socialist based in Chicago and a contributor to the book Palestine: A Socialist Introduction. brian will be speaking about the growing imperial tensions between the United States and China and the way they are reshaping global politics, alongside socialist activists and writers from Australia who will draw lessons from the frontlines of resistance to capitalism. 

Panel: The International Struggle for Socialism

The question of how Marxists should relate to broad left parties – parties that organise reformists and revolutionaries and numerous shades in between – has been a longstanding debate on the international left. Some socialists argued that broad left parties offered the way forward for challenging capitalism; that it was no longer necessary to build clear cut revolutionary parties. Indeed that it was sectarian to do so.

Great hopes were invested in parties like Podemos in Spain and Syriza in Greece. But those hopes have been shattered in an utterly demoralising way.

Podemos moved sharply to the right and formed a coalition government with the mainstream Spanish social democratic party. Syriza in government totally betrayed its working class supporters and imposed harsh austerity measures to meet the demands of the European bankers.

Based on this experience what should then be the revolutionary approach to broad left parties? The issue remains very much a live one in countries like France and Brazil.

Should revolutionaries, as some argue, never attempt to intervene in such parties even if they obtain a mass following? Or is there an alternative approach that avoids on the one hand a capitulation to reformism and on the other sectarian abstention?

Broad parties and revolutionary independence: summing up the debates

There are endless academic theories that attempt to explain the relatively long period of Great Power peace around the world (ignoring the horrors inflicted by major military powers on smaller nations). Some argue that the guarantee of Mutually Assured Destruction means that it’s inconceivable that nuclear-armed countries would ever go to war. Others present ‘democratic peace theory’, that no two democracies have ever been to war because of liberal governance structures. The exponents of globalisation argue that economic interconnectedness means that financial ruin awaits any state that breaks the so-called long peace. None of this is right.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine gave a sharp reminder that capitalism is a system of inevitable war. At the same time, China and the US, and with it Australia, continue to gear up and swerve closer and closer to conflict.

The Marxist theory of Imperialism, developed by revolutionary socialists before and during the First World War explains why horrific war is inevitable under capitalism. Imperialist brutality is not just caused by some rogue politicians or diplomatic breakdowns, but is baked into capitalism’s DNA.

Bukharin's theory of Imperialism

Analysing Imperialism

Imperialism and the world economy

Can capitalism exist without war

Protests exploded across Iran last September after 22-year-old Kurdish woman, Gina Mahsa Amini, was murdered by the state’s ‘morality police’. What began as a funeral turned into a riot as hundreds of people poured onto the streets of Saqqez, Kurdistan demanding an end to mandatory hijab laws and justice for Mahsa.

Protests spread like wildfire across Iran. In more than 200 cities and all 31 provinces, students, workers', the young and the old, took to the streets chanting “we are all Mahsa” and “death to the dictator!”. Students led occupations across hundreds of university campuses and videos of women burning their hijabs went viral on social media. Oil workers', teachers, transport workers' and more have gone on strike in solidarity with the movement.

The ongoing “women, life, freedom” rebellion marks the deepest struggle against the Iranian state since the 1979 Revolution. Four months on, the protracted struggle continues, and central questions remain – how do we understand the “women, life, freedom” rebellion in Iran? what are the key political debates? and how can the movement go forward from here? 

‘Women, life, freedom’, the struggle in Iran continues

Three months of rebellion in Iran

When Iran is free

‘We are all Mahsa’: riots shake Iran

Interview: Iran’s rising for dignity and freedom

"Women, life, freedom": Rebellion in Iran

Anarchist ideas are attractive to many on the left, and are often seen as an alternative to the supposed ‘authoritarian’ politics of Marxism. However, throughout history anarchism has failed to adequately understand the nature of the capitalist system and how to overthrow it. This session will provide a critique of anarchist politics, and explain why a politics based on opposing vague concepts like ‘authority’, and supporting individual liberty will never be able to guide a successful fight against capitalism and liberate workers and the oppressed.

Anarchism: a Marxist critique

Marxism and Anarchism

Counterpower, participatory democracy, revolutionary defence: debating Black Flame, revolutionary anarchism and historical Marxism

Anarchism, syndicalism and strategy: a reply to Lucien van der Walt

A Marxist Critique of Anarchism

This session will tackle the long-running debate between Marxists and anarchists. Which approach can actually overthrow capitalism and create a classless society?

While anarchism has a radical gloss, and can understandably attract people who rightly reject the horrors of Stalinism, we will argue that it has no strategy to actually win the class struggle, and boils down to a more radical form of liberalism. A victorious workers' revolution is the only way to actually smash the state and bring about a classless society, but in practice anarchists have always opposed this strategy.

Marxism vs the state

Can we change the world without taking power?

Nestor Makhno: the failure of anarchism

Marxism vs anarchism

More than a century after the fact, the truth of the Russian revolution is hotly debated. Conservative critics dismiss it as the work of a conspiratorial clique to obtain power, or claim that it is a lesson in the futility of trying to abolish capitalism. 

This session will tell the true story of the Russian Revolution. The outbreak of revolution throughout Russia in February 1917 brought millions of people who previously had little say over politics right to the centre of political life.Through strikes, demonstrations and mass action, workers first overthrew Russia’s monarchy. Then, nine months later, they overthrew its capitalist class, replacing it with a radical workers' democracy. 

Come along to this session to discuss the lessons that socialists can draw from one of the most important workers' struggles in history. 

Russia 1917 A radical workers’ democracy comes to life

What workers won in the Russian Revolution

Russia 1917: when the people rose

The Russian Revolution: The real story

 establishment University reflected in its array of elite colleges – Ormond, Trinity, Queens and co – and the naming of so many of the buildings that dominate the campus after rich and powerful capitalists – the Baillieu library, the Sidney Myer Asia Centre, the 

Centre, Wilson Hall, Ian Potter Art Museum plus of course the Redmond Barry building, named after the judge that hanged Ned Kelly.

But as Mick Armstrong will reveal on this history tour there is also a subversive story of conflict and protest to be told about Melbourne Uni. That story begins right back in the university’s starting days in 1856, when stonemasons building the law quadrangle struck and marched to the city winning the eight hour working day – a world first.

It includes riotous mass student assemblies and innumerable invasions, occupations and blockades of the admin building. Draft resisters hiding out in Union House and defying police raids. Protests that disrupted exams in Wilson Hall. Cafeteria workers striking in support of a victimised gay student. And darker stories of fascist mobilisations during the Great Depression.

Plus a few secret stories that will only be revealed if you come on the tour.

Radical History Tour of Melbourne Uni

Friederich Engels was a revolutionary socialist until his death in 1895. His political legacy is however contested. 

Since the death of Engels, the revisionist right-wing of German Social Democracy falsified his political views to blunt their revolutionary character. The extent of the falsification was demonstrated when David Riazanov, who was then collecting Marx and Engels complete works after the Russian Revolution, discovered the original version of Engels Political Testament. Engels in fact tried, in the aftermath of Marxs death, to pave the way forward for a revolutionary tactic in the context of the growth of mass Social Democratic parties at a moment in history, the first time in history, when Marxism became a guiding thread of working-class politics.

Anti-Dühring

Engels on Historical Materialism

David Riazanov: biography of Marx and Engels, pp. 152- 169

Introduction to The Class Struggles In France

Engels after Marx: a revolutionary intervention into Social Democracy

The "bourgeois revolutions" which laid the basis for capitalism were varied and contested historical events. Lenin often drew lessons rom the French Revolution. So we will examine the social and political processes involved in those upheavals and consider how much, if at all, they provide a guide to what will be involved in overthrowing capitalism.

The Great French Revolution

The World Turned Upside Down

The Dutch Revolt: a socialist analysis

 Part 4, Chapter 2, “Renaissance and Reformation” and chapter 3, “The birth pangs of a new order”

If the French Revolution didn't bring us Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, how do we know a workers' revolution will?

The English Revolution and the transition from feudalism to capitalism

The Dynamics of Revolution

The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte

A Marxist view of bourgeois revolutions: from peasant wars in Germany 1552-5 to Russia 1917

Fighting racism and every form of oppression is integeral to socialist politics. But how racism is to be fought and whether it can be eliminated depends on what you think its source is. The concept of 'whiteness' presents white people or white culture as creating the racist society we live in. Marxists instead argue that it's capitalist society that creates racism. This session will explore these two different theories of racism, their strategies for fighting it and investigate what will be needed to win liberation and a world without oppression.

Who's to blame for racism in Australia?

A Marxist critique of the theory of 'white privilege'

Racism: is whiteness the problem?

The formation and growth of revolutionary organisations has always been a process involving all sorts of splits, fusions and experimentation. Comrades in Spain were part of one of the more interesting recent projects on this score, helping to establish, popularise and build Podemos while maintaining their existence as a revolutionary tendency within it. Having left Podemos as it has shifted further and further to the right, a representative of Anticapitalistas will be presenting a summary of their experience and its lessons.

Anticapitalistas leave Podemos - Interview with Raúl Camargo

Strategies for party building: the experiences of Anticapitalistas within Podemos

Throughout the early 1980s the Stalinist wall around Eastern Europe and Soviet Union was cracking. Strikes and revolts that hit at the ruling elite, the wave from below was crushing the state capitalist countries. Russia, which, under the new leadership of Mikhail Gorbachev, was attempting to hold onto its superpower status by restructuring its economy and society through Perestroika (economic reform) and Glasnost (opening up).

All these radical events were hotly debated, both east and west, left and right, some claiming the revival of stalinised communism, others the end of state capitalism, yet others the triumph of capitalism, or even Francis Fukuyama declaring “the end of history”.

In the debates that swirled around the left during the decade, the International Socialist Tendency welcomed the end of Stalinism, backing the working class revolts throughout the Eastern Bloc. The talk is about these issues, with some observations from a visit to Russia and Poland in September 1989.

The decline of the western communist parties

The myth of market socialism

Glasnost – before the storm

Introduction to Boris Kagarlitsky

The storm breaks: the crisis in the Eastern Bloc

From Trotsky to state capitalism. Review of Ernest Mandel’s  Beyond Perestroika

Farewell Perestroika

Prospects for the Seventies The Stalinist States

Russia in Crisis? 

Poland: Crisis of State Capitalism. Part I

Poland: Crisis of State Capitalism Part II

Glasnost, Perestroika and State Capitalism in crisis: Observations of the last years of the USSR

A large part of Pakistan is under water. The devastation is immense. This session discuss the nature of the climate crisis and why and how the global south is suffering in the way they are. We will also hear from socialist environmentalists in the frontlines of events in the global South as well as Australian activists.

Between the Devil and the Green New Deal

Migration in an era of climate catastrophe

The climate crisis in the global south

The workers' revolution that took place in Spain in 1936 successfully confronted an attempted fascist coup by the military, and began a social transformation on a scale unseen outside of the Russian Revolution of 1917. This talk will discuss the revolutionary potential of this little known period and lessons for today's radicals. 

The Spanish civil war: anarchism put to the test [book chapter]

Revolution and Counter Revolution in Spain [book]

Homage to Catalonia

Fighting fascism and capitalism: the workers revolution in Spain, 1936

"It was the first time that I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle. Practically every building of any size had been seized by the workers and was draped with red flags or with the red and black flag of the Anarchists; every wall was scrawled with the hammer and sickle and with the initials of the revolutionary parties..." The Spanish revolution brought the working class to power and pitted them against an insurgent fascist movement. It raised, and answered, crucial questions about how to fight fascism, and what the practical divergences are between Anarchism, Stalinism, and revolutionary socialism.

Contrary to popular mythology, the Bolsheviks – and Lenin in particular – took electoral and parliamentary work very seriously as part of their revolutionary strategy.  In this session, Jerome Small takes a critical look at some recent discussions of this legacy.

Lenin scholar August Nimtz has recovered much of the history of the Bolsheviks’ “revolutionary parliamentarism”. Sean Mitchell has critically discussed Nimtz’s work, viewing the Bolsheviks’ electoral and parliamentary work as part of their strategy of establishing working class hegemony in Russia’s democratic movement. The memoir of Bolshevik Duma deputy Alex Badayev emphasises the important role that party-building played in this work.

The Ballot, the Streets – or Both? From Marx and Engels to Lenin and the October Revolution

Lenin, Elections, and Socialist Hegemony

The Bolsheviks in the Tsarist Duma

Bolsheviks, elections and party building

Italy's 'Hot Autumn' of 1969 triggered a decade-long battle between the working and ruling classes. It saw migrant, unorganised workers and women take the lead in challenging the old order. The Hot Autumn was the biggest, most prolonged strike wave in history, which developed into a struggle for a better society. It also saw the emergence of a large far left. This talk will explore the relationship between revolutionary students and workers and draw out some more general lessons.

States of Emergency [book]

Chapter 10 Chapter 9, "The Era of Collective Action"

“What do we want? Everything!”

The ’Hot Autumn‘ of 1969: when Italy erupted

Fiat Has Branded Me: A Hot Autumn Timeline for Nanni Balestrini’s We Want Everything

Students and revolution: the Italian Hot Autumn

published in 1923, is primarily seen as one of the great works of Marxist philosophy. But Lukács was also a commissar in the failed Hungarian Soviet Republic of 1919 and a political leader in the exiled Hungarian Communist Party in Vienna throughout the 1920s. Along with labour leader Jenö Landler, Lukács led a faction opposing an ultra-left sectarian orientation represented by Béla Kun (at that time also associated with Comintern chairman Zinoviev, later aligning himself with Stalin). This session will explore 

 and his work in the 1920s through the lens of this factional struggle and the degeneration of the Comintern, examining it as an attempt to reconstruct the theory and practice of Lenin and the Bolsheviks, understand the leading role the working class must play in the struggle for democracy in Hungary, and rebuild the Hungarian Communist Party along these lines.

The Legacy of Lukács

The Spider and The Fly: The Leninist Philosophy of Georg Lukács

The Revolutionary Marxism of Lukács’s Blum Theses

“Preface”, “What Is Orthodox Marxism?”, “Class Consciousness”, “Illegality and Legality”, “Critical Observations on Rosa Luxemburg’s Critique of the Russian Revolution” and “Towards a Methodology of the Problem of Organisation” in Georg Lukács’s 

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