Germany

"Fighting instead of managing capitalism"

December 2, 2017 | The Platypus Affiliated Society • Other languages: Deutsch

ON MAY 11, 2017, Stefan Hain and Sebastian Vogel of the Platypus Affiliated Society conducted an interview with Sascha Staničić of the Sozialistische Alternative [SAV] and author of Anti-Sarrazin: Argumente Gegen Rassismus, Islamfeindlichkeit und Sozialdarwinismus (2011). What follows is a translation of the edited transcript of their conversation as published in the sixth issue of Die Platypus Review. Stefan Hain and Sebastian Vogel: In its program Die Linke describes itself as a socialist party that wants to achieve “democratic socialism” through projects of gradual reform. [Read More]

Something better than the nation?

Book Review: Rob Ogman, Against the Nation: Anti-National Politics in Germany. Porsgrunn, Norway: New Compass Press, 2013.

July 4, 2014 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

IN THE WAKE of the fall of the Wall and reunification the German left confronted a resurgent nationalism. One section of the Left’s response was an “anti-national” tendency whose answer to questions posed by historical developments challenged received political categories by rejecting not only nationalism but, ultimately, traditional left attitudes towards both the nation-state and “the people.” In Against the Nation, Rob Ogman charts the emergence of this “anti-national” tendency by examining two activist campaigns of the 1990s, “Never Again Germany” and “Something Better than the Nation,” to show how “the encounter with nationalism resulted in a fundamental reorientation of a broad set of political assumptions, and produced a deep restructuring in the content and contours of left politics and practice” (11). [Read More]

Nationalism Nation-state State Germany

Crisis of the eurozone and the Left

Responses to the global economic downturn

July 3, 2012 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

THE FOLLOWING TRANSCRIPT is from an event that took place on April 2, 2012 at the University of Chicago, in conjunction with the 2012 Platypus International Convention, titled “Responses to the Global Economic Downturn.” Members and contacts of the Platypus Affiliated Society in Europe were invited to speak on their experience of leftist responses to the economic downturn. The speakers included Haseeb Ahmed (Netherlands), Valentin Badura (Austria), Cengiz Kulac (Austria), Moritz Roeger (Germany), Jerzy Sobotta (Germany), and Thodoris Velissaris (Greece). [Read More]

Crisis Eurozone Germany Greece Occupy

Responses to the Global Economic Downturn

April 2, 2012 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

A public forum with students, activists and organizers from across the globe held on April 2, 2012. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Transcript in Platypus Review #48 Panelists Haseeb Ahmed (Maastricht) Valentin Badura (Austria) Cengiz Kulac (Austria) Moritz Roeger (Germany) Jerzy Sobotta (Germany) Thodoris Velissaris (Greece) Moderated by Pam C. Nogales C. Description From teach-ins in the UK, occupations in Austria and Germany and protests in the Netherlands and Greece, responses to the economic downturn are international in character. [Read More]

Platypus International Convention 2012 Austria Crisis Europe Germany Global financial crisis Greece International Internationalism Maastricht Netherlands

Antisemitism and the Left

A German-US comparison

November 28, 2011 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Description From accusations directed towards Occupy Wall Street to arson attacks in Brooklyn, antisemitism has reemerged as a concern of the left in recent months. This talk will look at the relationship between the left and antisemitism, giving an overview of different historical forms, analyzing divergent theoretical explanations, and comparing the U.S. and German cases. Special attention will be given to examining the particular relationship of antisemitism to political economy and critiques of capitalism, the political implicationst of viewing antisemitism as a form of prejudice versus an ideology, and left debates around antisemitism and Israel post-9/11. [Read More]

Anti-semitism Antisemitism Germany Israel Zeena Arnold

The Contemporary German and American Lefts

A Transatlantic Dialogue

September 14, 2011 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

On Wednesday September 14, 2011 in New York City, Platypus hosted a dialogue with Sebastian Traenkle, editor of the influential German left journal Phase II. Audio Recording Your browser does not support the audio element Description On Wednesday September 14, 2011 in New York City, Platypus hosted a dialogue with Sebastian Traenkle, editor of the influential German left journal Phase II revolving around what does contemporary landscape of left politics look like in Germany and the United States? [Read More]

Anti-deutch Anti-german Germany Phase ii

German psycho

A reply to the Initiative Sozialistisches Forum

March 1, 2011 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

MOISHE POSTONE ONCE REMARKED about the German left: “No western Left was as philo-Semitic and pro-Zionist prior to 1967. Probably none subsequently identified so strongly with the Palestinian cause. What was termed ‘anti-Zionism’ was in fact so emotionally and psychically charged that it went far beyond the bounds of a political and social critique of Zionism.”1 Postone’s diagnosis, that the Israeli-Arab conflict served as a projection-screen for the psychological needs of the German left, is just as valid for the new political current which, since the outbreak of the Al-Aqsa Intifada in autumn 2000, has come to identify itself completely with the state of Israel. [Read More]

Anti-Deutsche Germany ISF Israel Palestine Ulrike Meinhof Zionism

On nationalism

An anti-fascist intervention

May 9, 2010 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

ULI VOM HAGEN’S RESPONSE1 to my article on the current state of the German Left2 engages in a remarkable apology for its nationalism, which results from its near complete failure to digest the dangerous policies of the German KPD of the 1920s and 30s. With his focus on the events of 1923 and his excitement for “National Bolshevism,” vom Hagen presents a highly symptomatic position informed by a gross conflation of nationalism and romantic-regressive anti-capitalism, which experienced its peak with the rise of European fascism and National Socialism in Germany. [Read More]

Anti-Deutsche Fascism German National Bolshevik Movement Germany Nationalism Social Democratic party of Germany Leon Trotsky Uli vom Hagen

Why is it that nobody understands me, yet everybody likes me?

The ambivalence of the current German student movement

March 15, 2010 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

“DIESER HÖRSAAL IST BESETZT!” (“This lecture hall is occupied!”) In November and December 2009, signs bearing such slogans were found on doors at over 60 German universities. For the second time that year, a broad student movement managed to gain public attention for its demands. Protests at the University of Vienna kicked off what became a Europe-wide solidarity wave. In Germany, the Viennese protest first triggered occupations in Heidelberg, Münster, and Potsdam, after which students at many other institutions also became involved. [Read More]

Bologna Process Capitalism Germany Human rights Max Horkheimer Michael Burawoy Nationalism Occupation Protest Red-baiting Reform Strike Students Student politics Student Left

Rosa Luxemburg's legacy

A reply to Jerzy Sobotta

February 18, 2010 | The Platypus Affiliated Society

THE ASSUMPTION THAT ROSA LUXEMBURG’S CORPSE has significance for the state of the German Left, though perhaps not her body, is tempting. Luxemburg was a Polish socialist involved in a European socialist movement during a time when there was no sovereign Polish state. She was successively a member of the Social Democratic Party of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania, the German Social Democratic Party (SPD), and the Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany. [Read More]

Anti-Deutsche Baader-Meinhof Group Communist Party of Germany Die Linke Fascism German National Bolshevik Movement Germany Henry Ford Jerzy Sobotta Karl Liebknecht Karl Radek Vladimir Lenin Marxism Nationalism Nazism New Economic Policy Proletariat RAF Rosa Luxemburg Schlageter Line Social democratic party Social Democratic party of Germany Spartakusbund Joseph Stalin Leon Trotsky