Category Archives: Leftism

Marxist scholar David Harvey has a new book out, The Enigma of Capital, and this means he’s been on the road giving talks to promote it.  One such lecture was at Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, Manufactures and Commerce in London this past April.  You can watch/listen to the talk here.

However, if you want the short version, I suggest watching RSA’s beautiful animation of it below.  It does a good job of adding some visual content to Harvey’s explanation of the crisis of capitalism.

h/t Gopal Balakrishnan

The Tower: A Songspiel is a new agitprop production from the fine people at Chto Delat.  The film is the final part of a trilogy that includes Perestroika Songspiel: Victory over the Coup (2008) and Partisan Songspiel: A Belgrade Story (2009).  The theme of this installment:

Filmed in April 2010, The Tower: A Songspiel is based on real documents of Russian social and political life and on an analysis of the conflict that has developed around the planned Okhta Center development in Petersburg, where the Gazprom corporation intends to house the headquarters of its locally-based subsidiaries in a 403-meter-high skyscraper designed by the UK-based architectural firm RMJM. The proposed skyscraper has provoked one of the fiercest confrontations UNESCO World Heritage Site, Gazprom has so far managed to secure all the necessary permissions and has practically ..read more

Two things hit me as I emerged from the Oktyabrskaya metro station on Saturday morning to check out the KPRF May Day march.  First was that God himself must have been smiling down on the KPRFers.  After several days of on and off rain, his holiness decided to part the clouds, let the sun shine through, and let Russian commies do their thing without the hindrance of rainfall.  The second thing that hit me was that unlike most, or should I say every political rally I’ve been to, the Communists began marching on time.  Who would have ever guessed Communists to be prompt.  And they say Leninist discipline is dead.  As soon as I pushed through the heavy glass metro doors, I had to quicken my step to catch up with the dancing red flags on the move.

Luckily, ..read more

Roses, tulips, and other colorful flowers extend from the hands of Russian women like prostheses.  One day a year they replace the broom, the pot, and the child.  The flowers, like the wedding bands on women’s fingers, are a symbol of property.  Almost every woman strolling through the metro or down Moscow’s avenues has one hand around a man’s arm while the other clutches a bouquet. Thus, the object on their left hand says, “I’m taken” while the man on their right says, “by him.”

What an ironic scene International Women’s Day has become in Russia.  What was once a day calling for a “struggle against patriarchy,” has in many ways become patriarchy’s reinforcement. Nothing says this more than the popular gifts bestowed on this day of “struggle.” According to the Russian polling service VTsIOM, flowers are the most popular gift ..read more

As many know, talk of modernization is once again all the rage in Russia.  But what is it and to what end?  Is it merely another example of “eternal Russian question” of historical backwardness?  Is Medvedev’s overtures merely a replay of every Tsar and Commissar before him?  Or does Russia’s current backwardness have more immediate roots in the liberal capitalism of the post-Soviet era?  Can “modernization” really be achieved with a Russian Silicon Valley, fiber optic lines, nanotechnology, the political decentralization of the political system, and the increased privatization of its economy as many partisans across Russia’s liberal political spectrum advocate?  Is innovation enough, especially in a globalized economy that is predicated on increasing redundancy of labor, de-industrialization, and financial casino capitalism?

Some of these questions are posed in “ Their Modernization and Ours” by the editors of ..read more

In Russia, you can’t hold a public gathering or protest without a permit.  Okay, a lot of places have similar laws.  I can understand this even if I don’t agree with it.  But according to Vremya Novosti, the local court in Tver district in Moscow set a “precedent which threatens to turn into new accusations that the Russian government is violating civil freedoms.”  Not only is holding non-permitted gatherings consider illegal, now it’s also verboten for journalists to cover them.  “According to the [court's] ruling, journalists, who enter unsanctioned protests or marches to make their reports are equated with the participants in these protests and violators of the law.”  Nice.

The case involves Andrei Stenin, a photo correspondent for RIA Novosti, who was charged with participating in an “unsanctioned protest” in December in front of the Presidential Administration building.  If by “participating,” you mean entering the crowd to cover it, then ..read more