History and Traditions

  • The limits of consensus

    For a movement or struggle, hoping for general agreement after a thorough discussion is very different from requiring it.

  • Why we say no to war and hate

    On the 10th anniversary of the war in Afghanistan, SocialistWorker.org reprints the voices that stood up to the war drive.

  • Marxism's environmental legacy

    Marxist thought possesses an environmental core that envisions human beings living in a society in harmony with nature.

  • The socialists before Marx

    Visions of socialism and ideas about how to achieve it are as old as class society--but Marxists have very distinctive answers.

  • Will there always be wars?

    If war is a product of human culture and history, rather than the result of some immutable nature, then it can be changed or done away with.

  • More dangerous than a thousand rioters

    During her remarkable life, labor radical Lucy Parsons led workers and the oppressed in struggle and wrote widely on vital questions for the left.

  • Don't buy "Buy American"

    During the economic crisis of the 1980s, Corporate America sounded the call for protectionist policies and import controls.

  • Why we need socialist theory

    What Marx called the "ruling ideas of society" are widely disseminated in order to obscure the real workings of the system.

  • Rebellion at Attica

    September 9 marks the 40th anniversary of the most important prison uprising in U.S. history--the rebellion at Attica in upstate New York.

  • Labor and Black Power

    The strike wave of the late 1960s coincided with the most militant phase of the Black Power revolt.

  • A wake-up call for business

    In 1997, the Teamsters strike at UPS galvanized widespread support and set a fighting example for workers everywhere.

  • The workers' rebellion of the 1960s

    The 1960s movements against the war and for Black Power led to the radicalization of a significant layer of industrial workers.

  • The myth of the quiet 1950s

    Rank-and-file pressure produced numerous surprises for labor bosses as well as corporate heads during the 1950s.

  • No justice! No peace!

    In May 1992, a rebellion rocked Los Angeles and the whole country after the acquittal of four cops who beat Rodney King.

  • The Spanish Civil War

    Seventy-five years ago, the workers of Spain led a heroic fight against fascism--and their rebellion gave the world a glimpse of workers' power.

  • The Pueblo revolt of 1680

    More than 400 years ago, the Pueblo nations of the Southwest expelled their colonizers and returned to self-rule.

  • Labor and the Cold War

    The post-Second World War purges of communists and other militants had a long-lasting effect on the U.S. labor movement.

  • Revolution in 1930s Spain

    Seventy-five years ago, Spain's future hung in the balance--between the rising forces of fascism and the potential of a working-class revolution.

  • The labor wars after the war

    Even as union leaders hoped for "labor peace" after the Second World War, rank-and-file workers led a wave of strikes.

  • Anger erupts in Benton Harbor

    In June 2003, poverty-stricken Benton Harbor, Mich., erupted in rioting after the death of an African American man following a high-speed police chase.

  • Women's liberation and socialism

    A united working-class struggle that upends the current system of exploitation and oppression can bring about true liberation.

  • Free speech in the shadow of war

    Seventy years ago, the federal government's began an assault on the SWP and a Teamsters local under the Smith Act.

  • Who will make socialism?

    For the Marxist tradition, socialism and democracy are inseparable parts of the struggle of workers "reaching out for freedom with their own hands."

  • A new movement for civil rights

    In February 2004, a new LGBT civil rights movement took to the streets in a struggle to win the right of same-sex marriage.

  • The miners at war in Kentucky

    During their bitter 1977 strike, miners at Stearns Mining Company in Kearns, Ky., faced intimidation and violence from company thugs.