Author: icsswpadmin

Our program will address current events in Iran and the international reaction to them. US-led forces are exploiting events in Iran to push for violent regime change. Unilateral and illegal economic sanctions imposed by the US are killing Iranians. These sanctions are responsible for much of the Iranian people’s suffering and anger. They have served as a background for the outburst of different protests and are intentionally aimed at destabilizing the Iranian society through instigating a “velvet revolution.” Iran is targeted by the imperialists because of its key role in an emerging multipolar world through strategic alliances with countries and movements such as Syria, Russia, China, and Venezuela, and Hezbollah.

“Every Liberal is a Socialist. Every Socialist is a Communist. Every Communist is Moscow’s Spy.” So went a poster used in an anti-May Day “Loyalty Day” march in the high cold war period after WWII.

But anti-Communism went far beyond traditional conservative and reactionary groups and became the foundation of a “cold war consensus” for U.S. domestic and foreign policy in the post WWII period. In my presentation I will examine the relationship between color racism as the model for anti-radicalism at home and in U.S. imperialism abroad, and the role of the Communist Party USA in its struggle against both.

Norman Markowitz was born in 1943 and grew up in the South Bronx. He attended the then free tuition City College of New York (1962-1966) and the University of Michigan on a “National Defense Act” Fellowship and received his PhD in 1970. He taught history at Northern Illinois University (1969-1971) and at Rutgers University/New Brunswick (1971-present).
He has written numerous articles for various print and internet publications, scholarly journals, encyclopedia, and Marxist and Communist publications and websites on topics which include the history of the Communist movement in the U.S. and its activists, and the role of anti-Communism in U.S. history.
He served on the editorial board of Political Affairs, the theoretical journal of the CPUSA for many years and is currently a member of the International Department of the CPUSA.

A huge, unprecedented strike of academic workers started on November 14th, hitting all ten University of California campuses like a ton of bricks. The 48,000 striking workers perform the majority of the teaching and research at UC, yet the pay and benefits for these workers, members of the United Auto Workers union, is way too low especially for high-cost-of-living areas like Berkeley, California.

The UC Regents, who run the university and represent the most powerful business interests in the state, have so far refused to bargain over wages.

Come to a special session of Sunday Morning at the Marxist Library to hear the latest about this historic academic workers strike.

Speaker: Dave Welsh is a writer, musician, retired letter carrier, Labor Council delegate, and lifelong fighter for people’s power. Whether it was the civil rights movement in Mississippi, support for the Black Panther Party, solidarity with the grassroots movement in Haiti, or breaking the blockade of Cuba at the border with the Pastors for Peace caravans, or holding down Oscar Grant Plaza with Occupy Oakland or the ongoing fight to jail killer cops – he’s been a part of it.

In line with the tradition of Marxism-Leninism, this presentation argues that the elements constitutive of objectively revolutionary conditions are all present in the U.S.; what is missing for a successful revolutionary movement is the subjective factor. The presenter will argue that the purity fetish which predominates the outlook of modern American communism has presented a fundamental fetter for the development of the subjective factor in the American working masses; the development of a consistent dialectical materialist worldview, it will be argued, is the precondition for the advancement of the subjective conditions.

Speaker Bio:

Carlos L. Garrido is a Cuban American PhD student and instructor in philosophy at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale (with an M.A. in philosophy from the same institution). His research focuses include Marxism, Hegel, early 19th century American socialism, and socialism with Chinese characteristics. He is an editor in Midwestern Marx Institute for Marxist Theory and Political Analysis and in the Journal of American Socialist Studies. His popular writings have appeared in dozens of socialist magazines in various languages. As a political analyst with a focus on Latin America (esp. Cuba), he has appeared in dozens of radio and video interviews around the world. He also edited and introduced Marxism and the Dialectical Materialist Worldview: An Anthology of Classical Marxist Texts on Dialectical Materialism (Midwestern Marx Publishing Press, 2022).

 Professor Aleksandr Dugin of Russia has a wide sweep in scholarship, from Philosophy, Sociology to Geopolitics. He is 60 years of age. He has written 60 books. His book ‘The Fourth Political Theory’ has been translated into English by Michael Millerman, a Canadian, with a Ph.D. in Philosophy. Dugin is an idealist conservative philosopher. Liberalism, according to Dugin, is the theory of Capitalism, which has defeated its two challengers in the 20th century: Communism on the Left and Fascism on the Right. These cannot now pose an effective challenge to it. Further, that Liberalism has turned into “Postliberalism” after 1991, and it is totalitarian. So, a fourth political theory is needed to save humanity.  

 Raj Sahai will summarize Dugin’s theory and offer an analysis and offer a Marxist critique. Raj is a Marxist and a long time activist against capitalism and its wars. He is a member of the planning committee of ICSS.