Overview of all pages with the authors #Chris Cutrone

The American Revolution and the Left

March 1, 2020 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

Presented at a Platypus Affiliated Society public forum panel discussion with Norman Markowitz (CPUSA) and Bertell Ollman at Columbia University on February 22, 2020. “We should not fear the 20th century, for this worldwide revolution which we see all around us is part of the original American Revolution.” * * “I am delighted to come and visit. Behind the fact of [Fidel] Castro coming to this hotel, [Nikita] Khrushchev coming to Castro, there is another great traveler in the world, and that is the travel of a world revolution, a world in turmoil. [Read More]

Jobs and free stuff

March 1, 2020 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

Chris Cutrone Platypus Review 124 | March 2020 THE CURRENT POLITICAL POLARIZATION in the U.S. is not Democrat vs. Republican or the minorities of race, gender and sexuality against straight white men: It is between the politics of free stuff vs. the politics of jobs — demands for more free stuff vs. demands for more jobs.1 “Democratic socialist” candidate for Democratic Party nomination for President Bernie Sanders has responded to charges that he is actually a communist with the assertion that the U. [Read More]

Why not Trump again?

February 1, 2020 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

Presented with an introduction to Marxism in the Age of Trump (2018)1 and “Why I wish Hillary had won”2 at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, December 4, 2019. Video recording of presentation and audience Q&A discussion available online at: <https://youtu.be/EaOfsnrmSo0>. “Nothing’s ever promised tomorrow today. . . . It hurts but it might be the only way.” Kanye West, “Heard ‘Em Say” (2005) “You can’t always get what you want / But if you try, sometimes you find / You get what you need. [Read More]

Robots and sweatshops

February 1, 2020 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

STARTING WITH THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION, there have been two contrary tendencies in the development of social production: increased automation lowering socially necessary labor-time; and the desperation of people rendered superfluous as workers. For Marxism, this presented a social and political task for the working class to demand higher wages for fewer hours. An alternative to this would be for workers to try to fight against technology — the Luddites. Conversely, the capitalists could invest in machines instead of labor. [Read More]

Redeeming the 20th century

Statism and anarchy today

May 1, 2019 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

Prepared opening remarks presented at the closing plenary of the 11th annual Platypus Affiliated Society international convention, April 6, 2019, at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. A complete audio recording of the event, including response by Richard Rubin and audience Q&A, is available at: https://archive.org/details/Redeeming20thCentury040619 The 20th century A SENIOR TEACHING COLLEAGUE of mine at the University of Chicago revised the college core syllabus, which he said needed to be “brought into the 21^st^ century. [Read More]

The end of the Gilded Age

Discontents of the Second Industrial Revolution today

December 2, 2017 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

THE ACCOUNT OF HISTORY is the theory of the present: How did we get here; and what tasks remain from the past – that however appear to be “new” today? As Adorno put it, “the new is the old in distress.”1 This is true of capitalism and its crisis now. The present crisis is a crisis of the world system of capitalism that emerged in the 20th century, a crisis of the capitalist world created by the Second Industrial Revolution at the end of the 19th century – in fits and starts (such as the two World Wars and the Cold War) but nonetheless consistently and inexorably. [Read More]

Gilded Age History Capitalism Theodor W. Adorno

Marxism in the Age of Trump

July 21, 2017 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

ON APRIL 7, 2017 the Platypus Affiliated Society hosted a discussion at its Ninth Annual International Convention in Chicago on the subject of “Marxism in the Age of Trump.” The event’s speakers were Chris Cutrone, President of the Platypus Affiliated Society and teacher of Critical Theory at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; Catherine Liu, Professor of Film and Media Studies at the University of California, Irvine and author of The American Idyll: Academic Anti-Elitism as Cultural Critique; and Greg Lucero, a founding member of the Revolutionary Students’ Union and a member of the Chicago chapter of the Socialist Party USA. [Read More]

Marxism Donald Trump Populist Party

The crisis of neoliberalism

May 3, 2017 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

On February 18th, 2017, as part of its third European Conference, the Platypus Affiliated Society organized a panel discussion, “The Crisis of Neoliberalism,” at the University of Vienna. The event brought together the following speakers: Chris Cutrone, President of Platypus; John Milios, former chief economic advisor of SYRIZA; Emmanuel Tomaselli, of the International Marxist Tendency; and Boris Kagarlitsky, of the Institute for Globalization Studies and Social Movements in Moscow. What follows is an edited transcript of their discussion. [Read More]

Bernie Sanders Jeremy Corbyn neoliberalism SYRIZA

The politics of Critical Theory

April 2, 2017 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

ON FEBRUARY 17, 2017, as part of its Third European Conference, the Platypus Affiliated Society organized a panel, “The Politics of Critical Theory.” Held at the University of Vienna, the event brought together the following speakers: Chris Cutrone, President of the Platypus Affiliated Society; Martin Suchanek of Workers Power, an international organization fighting to build a Fifth International; and Haziran Zeller of Humboldt University, in Berlin. What follows is an edited transcript of their discussion. [Read More]

Critical Theory Theodor W. Adorno

Why not Trump?

September 6, 2016 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

IF ONE BLOWS ALL THE SMOKE AWAY, one is left with the obvious question: Why not Trump?1 Trump’s claim to the Presidency is two-fold: that he’s a successful billionaire businessman; and that he’s a political outsider. His political opponents must dispute both these claims. But Trump is as much a billionaire and as much a successful businessman and as much a political outsider as anyone else. Trump says he’s fighting against a “rigged system. [Read More]

/2016 American Presidential Election Donald Trump