The Left is dead! Long live the Left!

Vicissitudes of historical consciousness and possibilities for emancipatory social politics today

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society  • Other languages: Ελληνικά

The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living. —Karl Marx, The 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon (1852) The theorist who intervenes in practical controversies nowadays discovers on a regular basis and to his shame that whatever ideas he might contribute were expressed long ago – and usually better the first time around. —Theodor W. Adorno, “Sexual Taboos and the Law Today” (1963) [Read More]
19th Century  /20th Century  capitalism  consciousness  counterrevolution  crisis  Vladimir Lenin  Critical Theory  defeat  depoliticization  emancipation  György Lukács  Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel  History  History of the Left  humanity  ideology  Imperialism  Industrial Revolution  Iraq  Karl Korsch  liberalism  Marxism  Karl Marx  Moishe Postone  Negative Dialectics  New Left  Friedrich Nietzsche  opportunism  Philosophy  Political economy  Politics postmodernism  Revolution  Robert Pippin  Rosa Luxemburg  Social Democracy  Social Democratic Party of Germany  SPD  Socialism  society  Stalinism  Theodor W. Adorno  utopianism  Walter Benjamin  war 

Taking issue with identity

The politics of anti-gentrification

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

The perception of gentrification in Chicago mirrors would-be progressive groups’ social imaginations and the heterogeneity of their goals. Gentrification is the reconstitution of a neighborhood which occurs when lower-income areas with lower land value are re-developed with higher-value housing into a decidedly wealthier neighborhood. During this process the class-composition and character of the neighborhood is changed; those already living in the neighborhood cannot sustain the rise in property taxes and must move elsewhere. [Read More]
Anti-gentrification  Artists  Capitalism  Chicago  Class  Community  Emancipation  Gentrification  Housing  Identity  Income  Movements  Neighborhood  Political  Politics  Poverty  Progressive  Race  Reform  Social  Socioeconomic  Urban renewal  Value 

Review: "The Common Sense"

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

MY FIRST IMPRESSION UPON ENTERING Haseeb Ahmed’s installation, “The Common Sense,” which opened at Around the Coyote Gallery on September 5th was one of open space. It was an openness that contrasted sharply with the hundreds of paintings, photographs, sculptures that cluttered the rest of the many other galleries that opened that Night in Wicker Park’s FlatIron Building. Such a contrast pointed out the fact that, more a piece of interior architecture than a collection of installed objects, the central element to be experienced in Ahmed’s installation was space itself. [Read More]
Aesthetics  Architecture  Art  Critical theory  Exhibition  Installation  Islam  Marxism  Muslim  Religion  Sculpture  Society 

Review: "La Commune"

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

IN 1871 THE PARIS COMMUNE, a revolutionary body formed during the deep unrest following France’s defeat in the Franco-Prussian war, rose against the post-war provisional government of Adolphe Thiers and briefly held power in France. Two months after it took power, the Commune was brutally suppressed by the French army. In his film “La Commune,” released in 2002, director Peter Watkins orchestrated and documented a theatrical re-enactment of the Commune. At nearly six hours, the film explores the events of the Commune as well as its relevance for the present, and in so doing it is compelled to negotiate the myriad ways in which history bears on the present. [Read More]
1871  Film  France  Franco-Prussian war  History  La Commune  Organization  Paris  Peter Watkins  Politics  Re-enactment 

Remember our real Iranian friends

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

DURING HIS VISIT TO NEW YORK this week to address the UN General Assembly, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is scheduled to go to Columbia University to address faculty members and also to meet with a group of American religious leaders. His arrival was preceded by weeks of commotion and dispute: should Ahmadinejad have been allowed to visit ground zero? Should Columbia have agreed to host him? Should he even have been granted a visa to enter at all? [Read More]
1977  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad  Bush administration  Columbia University  Democracy  Government  Human rights  Iran  Jürgen Habermas  Jean-Paul Sartre  Leonid Brezhnev  Michel Foucault  Nationalism  Noam Chomsky  Slavoj Žižek  The Left  Women's rights 

Process point

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

STUMBLING INTO THE WARS RESISTERS OFFICE, I found Josh Russell and Madeline Gardner wearing headsets and pacing. It was a week before the convention and they were having yet another discussion as to whether or not the planning committee had the authority to decide whether or not they had the right to make any decisions. In the words of Lisa Fithian, we were processing ourselves to death. The new Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) seem to take their namesake seriously. [Read More]
Activism  Ideology  Marisa Holmes  Micheal Albert  New SDS  Organization  Participatory democracy  Sectarianism  Structure  Students 

A Prelude to the History of the Left

 November 1, 2007  |  The Platypus Affiliated Society

THE PLATYPUS HISTORIANS GROUP is a collective of members of Platypus who are researchers into the history of the Left. We will be publishing this series on the History of the Left under this collective authorship to indicate the collaborative nature of our research and the questions it raises. Each article under this byline will be written by one or several members of this collective, but with contributions and review by as many others of this group as possible and appropriate to the topics essayed. [Read More]
1789  1917  1960s  1968  Capitalism  Defeat  Enlightenment  History of the Left  Humanity  Marxism  Movements  Ronald Reagan  Sectarianism  Socialism  Stalinism  The Platypus Historians Group  Trotskyism