On the Bookshelves: Jasper Bernes, ‘The Future of Revolution’ (Verso, May 2025)
Marx versus Lenin and others on the Decadence of Capitalism
“There was a time when Lenin’s work ‘Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism’ had a very bad press within the communist left, with the exception of the Bordigists. The reason for this is simple: it was the theoretical basis that permitted all ultra-left groups to justify their support for national liberation struggles and to legitimize the pursuit of a syndicalist and parliamentary activity analogous to that of the 19th Century, an activity that seemed all the more up to date as, according to Lenin, “capitalism is growing far more rapidly than before”.
By contrast, the economical theories of Paul Mattick and Rosa Luxemburg where more fashionable because of their more ‘radical’ outlook, postulating an inevitable end for capitalism! These analyses had the advantage of offering a ‘theoretical stage’ to better justify the ‘class positions’ of the communist left: the integration of the trades unions into the state; the henceforth imperialist character of every national liberation struggle; political abstentionism; the development of state capitalism…
By an irony of history – capitalism having survived the worst economic predictions evoked by the groups of the communist left and even having prospered considerably since 1914 – Lenin’s theory has regained colours and has found a second youth.
(…)
The Internationalist Communist Tendency (ICT), one of the major components within the communist left, expresses this ‘return to Lenin’ best. After having strongly interrogated itself about the concept of decadence, this group has reaffirmed it … but has it henceforth inserted in the theoretical corpus developed by Lenin.
However, such a turn-around does not go without posing enormous contradictions and incoherence. To just give one example: how to render the fidelity to the concepts of a Marx speaking of “relations of production” turning from “forms of development of the productive forces” into “their fetters” compatible with a “capitalism growing far more rapidly than before” that Lenin speaks of? We will now discuss these contradictions and the quibbles used to justify or get around them.”
Read C.Mcl.’s Contribution on A ‘Lenin Revival’
Escalation of the War over the Near and Middle East – First Internationalist Statements
As the atrocious massacre and starvation of the inhabitants of what is left of the Gaza Strip, after 19 months of relentless destruction and killing since Hamas’ terrorist assault on Israeli dwellings and kibbutzes of October 7, 2023, and the increasingly brutal repression of the Palestinian population on the West Bank, had come under increasing pressure both ‘domestically’ and internationally – especially following the renewed Israeli blockade since March 19 (1) – the Netanyahu fraction has taken the flight forward into an open and direct military confrontation with its regional arch-enemy, the Islamic Republic of the Ayatollahs.
The Israeli surprise assault on Iran of June 13, prepared long in advance and exerted in tandem with its US American master, opens up the Pandora’s Box of a regional imperialist conflagration with global implications and may therefor pose urgent questions to internationalists. (2)
First and foremost, this new belligerent escalation confronts internationalist minorities with their responsibilities. In the following, we therefor reproduce the first two proletarian internationalist statements that we have been able to find, as contributions to a necessary debate:
1. The statement by the ‘Circolo Internazionalista’ from Italy: The Flames of Imperialism are Increasing, published June 13, 2025;
2. The statement by FD, Battaglia Comunista (affiliated to the Internationalist Communist Tendency) of June 14, 2025: Israel’s Attack on Iran, but not only.
Henry Cinnamon, June 16, 2025.
1 Even seasoned defenders of the State of Israel in the “democratic West”, like for instance the Dutch and German bourgeoisies, saw themselves prompted towards an hypocritical change of tone in face of rising domestic anger against the barbarity exerted in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank that undeniably is on the account of their Israeli “friend”.
2 We have tried to develop one regarding the US-Israeli alliance in our brief editorial of June 15.
Israel’s Attacks on Iran’s Nuclear Facilities, Military Defenses and Key Regime Figures – Is the Tail Wagging the Dog?
Editorial
At the dawn of Friday 13 June 2025 the Israeli army and intelligence have started a massive military assault on Iran’s nuclear facilities, high echelon military commanders of the Iranian regime, and key nuclear scientists.
According to Israeli sources some 200 military airplanes have been used to bomb over 100 targets on Iranian soil. Next to targeting a considerable number of the geographically dispersed sites related to the Iranian nuclear program, among which the Uranium enrichment facility at Natanz, six nuclear scientists and a number of the highest ranking army and Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders have been eliminated, among which key figures to the presumed negotiations with the USA on controlling the country’s nuclear development in order to prevent it from obtaining nuclear weapons’ capabilities.
The War in Ukraine: I.O.D. on the US-Turnaround and Europe’s Difficulties
In the following article, L. Procopio of the ’Istituto Onorato Damen’ develops on the turnabout in US international policies since the start of Trump’s second term, at the hand of the US negotiations with the Kremlin on the war in Ukraine, keeping the notorious ‘European diplomacy’ at bay. Under the pretense of bringing about “piece” and setting an end to this war, the stage is set for still larger imperialist confrontations.
The article is a follow up to The Trump Menace: Proof of Strength or of Great Fragility? (G. Paolucci, March 5, 2025) which we took up recently on this site.
Continue reading “The War in Ukraine: I.O.D. on the US-Turnaround and Europe’s Difficulties”
The Three ‘Historical Missions’ of Capitalism
The following article sets out what Marx conceived as the historical missions of the capitalist mode of production, the “last antagonistic form of the social process of production” in human history – the antagonism emanating “from the individuals’ social conditions of existence” (Preface of Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy, 1859).
It does so by quoting relevant passages from Marx’s maturing analysis of Capitalism, like the ‘Grundrisse’ (1857 – 1858) and ‘Capital’ Volumes I and III (first published 1867 and 1894 respectively), and his letter to Engels of October 8, 1858.
It is only when capitalism has fulfilled these historical tasks that the premisses have been created for its historical demise and surpassing.
The article aims at contributing to a meaningful exchange on the question of the criteria for determining capitalism’s obsolescence as a historical mode production that, among other places, has been attempted at this site with: Has Capitalism entered its Decadence since 1914? and Discussion Contributions on the Question of Capitalism’s Decadence.
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Trump’s 2025 “Shock and Awe” – Repercussions from groups of the Communist Left(s)
First statements by a number of groups of the communist Left apropos of the “shock and awe” policies enacted by the Trump administration since its inauguration on January 20, confronting and pressurizing notably their closest economic “partners” and military “allies”:
Trump’s 2025 “Shock and Awe” – Repercussions from groups of the Communist Left(s)
Contents:
FD (Battaglia Comunista), February 17, 2025.
Munich Security Conference: The Worst is Yet to Come
Giorgio Paolucci (I.O.D.), March 5, 2025.
The Trump Menace: Proof of Strength or of Great Fragility?
I.C.P. (Le Prolétaire), March 9, 2025.
The bourgeois rulers are preparing for war, let’s prepare for class war !
The IGCL , March 10, 2025.
With Trump, it is Time to Choose between “Bread or Guns”
Germany’s Early-Election Campaign: A Dispute over Competence in Racism and Inhumanity
On the same day as the US presidential elections resulted in Trump’s win of a second turn in the White House, the long ailing coalition government of SPD, FDP and the Green party in Germany was finally terminated, giving rise to early parliamentary elections on February 23, and the perspective of a “rightist” turn, notably by strengthening the right-wing extremist AfD at the federal level.
Previously, broad street demonstrations throughout the country against political extremism and racism, in particular against anti-immigration and anti-refugee tendencies “in defence of democracy” had emerged, as a secretive conference on deportation plans of migrants had been publicly revealed – however without preventing significant electoral gains of the AfD in the federal states of Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia last autumn.
So, the stage for the electoral campaign for the Bundestag had already been prepared as the murderous car attack of December 20 on a Christmas market at Magdeburg, committed by a Saudi immigrant (who appeared to have a notorious track record of harassment and intimidation), fanned the flames of racism and xenophobia and gave rise to an instrumentalisation of the political tribunes of German officialdom and its contesters that is beyond the pale.
World domination by 2030: Middle Empire and/or US Empire?
We publish a first article that treats the stakes of the worldwide imperialist rivalries and confrontations, following the re-inauguration of D.J. Trump as president of the USA: “World Domination by 2030: Middle Empire and/or US Empire”, translated from the Pantopolis website.
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An internationalist Articles Selection & Review 