Canada: Marxist School 2025 – studying the pillars of communism to prepare for turbulent times

The fifteenth edition of the Marxist Winter School took place in the midst of a storm. A record snowstorm rocked Montreal on the weekend of February 14 to 16 delaying the arrival of many of the 600 or so participants. But this storm was nothing compared to the chaos currently gripping global capitalism. It was to help us navigate through these tumultuous events that we held this School under the theme of “The Pillars of Communism”.

[Originally published at marxist.ca]

Our times are marked by tectonic shifts in international relations, as Jorge Martin of the International Secretariat of the Revolutionary Communist International explained in the Saturday morning plenary. The relative decline of the American empire and the rise of rival imperialist powers, especially China and Russia, are causing shocks and explosions.

Trump’s arrival as President of the United States is massively accelerating these developments. The entire political order that has prevailed since the Second World War is crumbling. Even an alliance as solid as that between Canada and the United States has collapsed in the space of a few days.

As Joel Bergman of the Communist Revolution editorial board explained, the Canadian ruling class has embarked on a campaign to rally the working class behind it in its trade war. But American and Canadian workers have nothing to gain by rallying behind the flag. The bosses will pass on the bill for the trade war to their own workers—they are our real enemies.

In this context, the internationalist character of the Marxist School was particularly important. The 600 participants came not only from English Canada and Quebec, but also from Mexico, Puerto Rico, Switzerland and the U.K. Above all, a strong delegation of 70 American comrades was also present, in a powerful demonstration of the internationalism that lies at the heart of communism.

The entire liberal-reformist left cries out in horror at what they call a turn to the right under Trump, as if the liberal establishment he’s replacing were the least bit left-wing. While they are in the grip of panic and demoralization, communists are the only optimists—we understand that the popularity of right-wing populists only reflects a rejection of the rotten policies of liberalism. Like the liberals, the MAGA right will be incapable of solving any of the workers’ problems, and they too will be promptly rejected.

This confidence in the possibilities for communism translated into an impressive fund-raising effort on Saturday evening: in a session lead by comrade Marco La Grotta, comrades raised $25,000, bringing our annual fund-raising campaign to $195,000 – exceeding our winter goal by $20,000!

As history moves forward at breakneck speed, Marxist theory acts as a compass in the storm. Presentations on fundamental aspects of Marxist theory and the history of communism—the materialist conception of history, the causes of the U.S.S.R.’s Stalinist degeneration, the struggle against oppression, the history of the Third International, Marx’s economic theory, the Marxist approach to morality and the Marxist theory of the state, and the important Friday evening plenary on “The History of Communism in Palestine”—served to equip comrades with the theory they need to understand the world. Only by mastering these theoretical tools will communists be able to intervene effectively in the movements and struggles that will inevitably arise.

And there was a real thirst for ideas among all participants, who wanted to arm themselves with the tools to understand the pivotal times in which we live. Between sessions and on the evenings of Saturday and Sunday, the discussions continued unabated. The book stalls were swamped from all sides by people eager to delve deeper into the subject discussed at the previous session. Almost 1,000 books and booklets were sold.

The weekend was an indisputable denial of the prejudice that workers are not interested in theory. This was particularly clear during the last discussion of the weekend, which focused on the philosophical roots of Marxism. Participants were hanging on every word during the introduction given by Josh Holroyd, from the RCI International Center, entitled “How Marx became a Marxist”. He explained that Marxism was born of a philosophical struggle to understand the world. Marxism is not an abstruse, dusty armchair philosophy, but a profoundly revolutionary theory, which explains that everything is in constant motion, and that everything is doomed to die—capitalism included.

As Josh explained, if theory without action is sterile, action without theory to guide it leads nowhere. In Marx’s timeless words to Weitling, “Ignorance never helped anyone!” Comrades came away from this session determined to enter this struggle for knowledge, like Marx before them.

But Marx and Engels weren’t just philosophers, they were revolutionary activists who took part in the important struggles of their time. It’s not for nothing that the ultimate conclusion of Marxist philosophy, expressed in the eleventh of Marx’s Theses on Feuerbach, is that “philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways, the point, however, is to change it.”

In these stormy times, the struggle to understand the world acquires crucial importance. If we are to put an end to the rotting capitalist system, whose agony is causing the current upheavals, we absolutely must combine theory and action. The Revolutionary Communist Party represents the synthesis of theory and action necessary to transform the world.