Review | Smoke and Ashes
Opium was central to British rule in India, British exploitation of China and the rise of capitalism in the US.
Review | Hard Graft
Kika Hendry reviews the Wellcome Collection’s exhibition Hard Graft, which explores the relationship between work and health tracing through histories of exploitation, oppression and resistance.
Review | Reasons to Rebel
A review of Sheila Rowbotham’s latest book which recounts her experiences as a socialist feminist activist in the 1980s.
How should socialists think about political tradition?
“Our task isn’t to guard a faith, a static tradition.”
Remembering the Portuguese Revolution
Marxist historian Raquel Varela remembers the Portuguese revolution of April 25 1974 and its aftermath
1974 – an end and a beginning
Willie Black looks back at 1974. A pivotal year both in Britain and across the world – high points of workers’ struggles, but also the beginning of five decades of neo-liberalism
Video | Abolition Revolution
Why do we have a police force in the first place? How does policing uphold racism, capitalism and colonialism?
Militarism and anti-militarism
In the midst of an arms industry boom, we need to link anti-imperialism to anti-militarism.
Here We Go! Forty years on from the outbreak of the Great Strike
Forty years ago today British miners began industrial action in what became the longest and most bitter strike of the twentieth century. Here Brian Parkin, a former Research Officer for the National Union of Mineworkers, gives a brief introduction to this pivotal strike.
An introduction to Lenin and Leninism
We are marking the hundredth anniversary of Lenin’s death by reprinting an essay by American socialist historian Paul Le Blanc, in which he explains the different components of what has come to be called ‘Leninism’.
Review | Ben Lewis, ‘Karl Kautsky on Democracy and Republicanism’
Is it time to re-evaluate renegade Kautsky? Andreas Chari reviews a new collection.
The origins of Zionism
In part one of our series on the roots of Israeli terror rs21 member Neil Rogall, looks at the origins of Zionism.
A small earthquake in Chile, 1970-73
Mike Gonzalez writes about the 1973 coup in Chile and the lessons it offers for the struggle for socialism today.
Interview | Toussaint Louverture: The Story of the Only Successful Slave Revolt in History
Matthew Cookson interviews the authors of a new graphic novel on the Haitian Revolution.
Review | Making the Revolution Global
The history of black anticolonial radicals in Britain is central to the history of the left.
The IS History Project
A new oral history project aims to record the memories of socialist activists from the 1960s and early 1970s. Project members Sue Sparks and Hazel Croft explain its aims and its relevance for activists today in an interview with rs21 members.
Rosa Luxemburg on May Day and working class struggles
On International Workers’ Day, or May Day, rs21 presents two classic texts by the revolutionary socialist Rosa Luxemburg on the history and significance of the day. What Are the Origins of May Day? (1894) The happy idea of using a proletarian holiday celebration as a means to attain the eight-hour day was first born in […]
Review | A Revolutionary for Our Time: the Walter Rodney Story
Rachel Iboraii reviews Leo Zeilig book on Walter Rodney, finding a compelling account of the life of the great Marxist and pan-Africanist.
London in revolt – revisiting the English Civil War
Andrew Stone looks at a new history of the origins of the English Civil Wars, finding an engaging account of the class character of the process which ultimately saw Charles I executed. London may not have the same revolutionary reputation of Paris or St Petersburg, but in this new account of the outbreak of the […]
The union of women and the Paris Commune
An account of the Women’s union of the Paris Commune, extracted from Mark Winter’s forthcoming book ‘Turbulent Women’
Review | Let the record show
‘Let The Record Show’ is a pathbreaking history of ACT UP founded to fight the AIDS/HIV crisis in New York in the late 1980s.
Review | Working for the War Effort
Merilyn Moos reviews a recent work on German-speaking refugees and their role in British wartime propaganda.
The Paris Commune: Rent Strike!
rs21 members present three new translations from Le Cri du peuple (The Cry of the People), the leading newspaper of the Paris Commune.
Revolutionary Reflections | Antisemitism and the Russian Revolution
A new book by Brendan McGeever casts new light on the role of antisemitism in the 1917 Russian Revolution and illuminates the struggle against the rise of antisemitism today.
The Good Lord Bird: John Brown’s militant abolitionism
Bill Crane looks at the life of militant US abolitionist John Brown and his portrayal in a recent TV adaptation of James McBride’s novel The Good Lord Bird.
Remembering the Paris Commune
On the 150th anniversary of the instigation of the Paris Commune, rs21’s Art Group presents a video project to commemorate the world’s first working-class revolutionary government.
The Paris Commune: Order Reigns in Paris
A new translation of an article from Le Cri du peuple, the leading newspaper of the Paris Commune
The Paris Commune: the Cry of the People
Over the coming three months rs21 will use articles from the Commune’s leading newspaper, Le Cri du Peuple to draw out the history of the Paris Commune.
Unearthing hidden histories: an interview with Ian Birchall
An interview with socialist historian Ian Birchall. Ian’s work has has involved researching and reevaluating lesser-known revolutionaries and activists from the Global South.