In 1939, James P. Cannon, the historic leader of American Trotskyism, remarked: “Who touches the Russian question, touches a revolution. Therefore, be serious about it. Don't play with it” (The Struggle for a Proletarian Party). Revolutionaries today must approach the “Chinese question” in the same way. The “market reforms” of...
The Birth of the Zionist State
Part 1: Jewish Colonization in Palestine While the “Yom Kippur” war of 1973 is the direct result of the defeat of the Arab states by Israel in the 1967 war, it is more fundamentally the product of the conflict between Zionism and Arab nationalism which has torn apart Palestine since...
Inching towards WWIII
In January, the influential French academic Emmanuel Todd told Le Figaro newspaper that the “Third World War has begun.” The historian and anthropologist argued that the conflict in Ukraine, “moving from a limited territorial war to a global economic confrontation between the whole of the West on the one hand and Russia...
The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International
The Objective Prerequisites for a Socialist Revolution The world political situation as a whole is chiefly characterized by a historical crisis of the leadership of the proletariat. The economic prerequisite for the proletarian revolution has already in general achieved the highest point of fruition that can be reached under capitalism....
3. The “Third Period”
Stalin's consistent rightist course during 1926-27 led him to capitulate to the kulaks (rich peasants) at home, to the trade-union bureaucrats during the British general strike, to Chiang Kai-shek in China. He backed up this policy by a bloc in the Politburo with Bukharin, who had called on the peasants...
2. Socialism in One Country
The story of the origins of the Stalinist doctrine of "socialism in one country" is one of the usurpation of power by a bureaucratic stratum at the head of the first workers state in history. This privileged caste consolidated itself in the Soviet state apparatus which was formed as a...
1. The Permanent Revolution
In their tireless efforts to betray the struggles of the workers and peasants, the Stalinists must continue to maintain a pretense of revolutionism. Yet their doctrines stand counterposed to the line of Marxism. This presents them with a dilemma, which they can only resolve by resorting to systematic lies about...
The Revolution Overthrown
“The October revolution has been betrayed by the ruling stratum, but not yet overthrown.” —Leon Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed, 1937 “The aborted Moscow coup of 19-21 August was so ill-conceived and executed that it almost didn’t happen. Yet it will be remembered as one of the decisive events in the history...
South African Menshevism
In every capitalist society on the planet the Moscow-loyal Communist parties parrot the same line: ‘‘now is not the time for socialism, first we need unity with the progressive capitalists.’’ South Africa is no exception. This class-collaborationist theory of a ‘‘two-stage’’ road to socialism is borrowed directly from the arsenal...
Provoking China
The South China Sea is the site of myriad irredentist territorial claims by China, Vietnam, Taiwan, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, over islands, oil and gas resources, and fishing and maritime boundaries. Recent weeks have seen a series of bellicose provocations by US imperialism in the region – part...