After more than 30 years, the printing presses have finally halted for the left-wing magazine. KATE HUDSON pays tribute to the always thought-provoking publication and explains how the editorial team are inviting feedback and comment on their continued online operations
Trump and his impossible return to the past
In an act of desperation, Trump is trying to stop the clock to revive the ‘golden age’ of imperialism, writes ATILIO A BORON
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Why is the Labour government so addicted to giving government jobs to Tories when it spent so long trying to oust them? In the hope the favour is returned the next time the Tories return to power, writes SOLOMON HUGHES
MARC WADSWORTH reports from the meeting to commemorate the Sharpeville Massacre 65 years ago
Despite the US withdrawal from Ukraine and economic self-harm from sanctions, European centrists maintain their bellicosity to justify military spending and distract from neoliberalism's failures, writes PRABHAT PATNAIK
Netanyahu’s failed attempt to replace Shin Bet’s chief violates longstanding Israeli political taboos, as the apartheid state’s internal power struggle spirals to a new level of crisis while Gaza burns, writes RAMZY BAROUD
Following the historic ban on companies profiting from children’s care, Unison Cymru calls for transparency in implementing the changes and extending the reform to create a truly national, profit-free care service, says MARK TURNER
The left must confront both far-right bigotry and the undeniable problems the exploitation of migrant workers by the ruling class creates — but there are few lessons from the global left on how to strike this balance, laments NICK WRIGHT
THE radical return to protectionism is not only possible but necessary for an empire facing an undeniable decline. It has been denounced by critical analysts but certified by leading intellectuals of the US Establishment, such as Zbigniew Brzezinski in a 2012 text and, subsequently, by several documents of the Rand Corporation.
Decline, or dissolution, if you prefer, came hand in hand with critical domestic factors: the slow growth of the economy, the loss of competitiveness in global markets, and the gigantic indebtedness of the federal government. If in 1980 the US federal government’s debt-to-GDP ratio was 34.54 per cent, today it has reached an astronomical level of 122.55 per cent. To this must be added the intractable balance of the trade deficit, which continues to grow and in 2024 amounted to $131.4 billion, representing roughly 3.5 per cent of the GDP. This is the case because the US consumes more than it produces.
To this constellation of domestic factors of imperial weakening should be added the deterioration of democratic legitimacy. The latter was highlighted by the January 6 2021 assault on the Capitol and by the more recent widespread pardons granted by Trump in favour of some 1,500 attackers who had been convicted by the US judiciary. Instead of bipartisan consensus, today, there is a huge rift undermining the political system, of which Trumpism is but one expression.
