On 4 April 1968, Martin Luther King Jnr. was assassinated: shot in cold blood whilst standing on the balcony of his hotel room in Memphis, Tennessee. 50 years on, speaking at the recent Revolution Festival in London, Fred Weston looks at Martin Luther King's life and ideas, and discusses the way forward today in the fight against racism and for liberation.

Speaking at a 2018 'Marx in a Day' event, celebrating Karl Marx's 200th birthday, Alan Woods (author of 'Reason in Revolt') discusses the philosophy of Marxism - dialectical materialism. 

Jorge Martin, editor of América Socialista and writer for In Defence of Marxism, discusses the results of Sunday's presidential elections in Brazil, where the far-right candidate, Jair Bolsonaro, won with 55 percent of the vote. The blame for this lies at the feet of the Workers' Party (PT), who have been thoroughly discredited through years of carrying out austerity and attacks on the working class whilst in government.

Speaking at the opening rally of the 2018 Revolution Festival, Marie Frederiksen and Rob Sewell discuss their new books about Rosa Luxemburg and the German Revolution.

Many academics and critics of Marxism attempt to portray Karl Marx as nothing but an armchair theoretician. However, Marx spent his whole life devoted to putting his revolutionary ideas into practice. From his collaboration with the Communist League, who commissioned his writing of the Communist Manifesto; to the founding of the First International: Marx (and his lifelong peer, Friedrich Engels) were dedicated to the task of fighting for international socialism.

In this talk from a 2018 'Marx in a Day' event, celebrating Karl Marx's 200th birthday and discussing his key ideas, Rob Sewell (editor of Socialist Appeal) explains the fundamental concepts of Marxist economics.

In this talk from the 2018 IMT World Congress, Alan Woods (editor of In Defence of Marxism) discusses the perspectives for world revolution. Alan emphasises the volatility and turbulence seen on a world scale, with the situation – and consciousness – changing in a matter of days on the basis of events.

Recent events in Catalonia, Scotland, Kurdistan and so on, have brought the question of national self-determination back onto the political agenda. It has become a key element in the development of the class struggle. In this recorded discussion, Fred Weston (from In Defence of Marxism) explains the Marxist approach to the national question.

In this video from Socialist Appeal's "Marx in a Day" event in 2018 (which celebrated Karl Marx's 200th birthday), Josh Holroyd discusses the contribution made by the great revolutionary thinker towards our understanding of history.

In the latest episode of IMTV – the International Marxist Television channel, hosted by our British section, Socialist Appeal– our guests look back over a busy year for student and labour activists on UK campuses. Earlier this year we saw the largest ever strike by academic staff in the University and Colleges Union (UCU), who took action over cuts to pensions.

On 14 June 2017, disaster struck in Britain as the Grenfell tower in west London was engulfed in flames. 72 people died in the fire, according to official reports. But the real number could be even higher. One year on, and the inquiry into the Grenfell fire is underway.

John Wight of Sputnik Newsinterviewed Jorge Martin, secretary of the Hands Off Venezuela campaign, to discuss the significance of President Maduro's re-election, given the crisis afflicting the Bolivarian Revolution and the nefarious influence of western imperialism.

Elias, a leading member of Lucha de Clases, appeared on Out of Left Field Podcast, offering a balance sheet of the Bolivarian Revolution and the crisis faced by Venezuela today. He explained that what has failed in the country is not socialism, but all attempts to regulate capitalism in the interests of the Venezuelan people.

At a recent public meeting at Queen Mary University in London (hosted by the Marxist Student Federation), Hamid Alizadeh of marxist.com provided a history of the Kurdish national liberation struggle, looking at how Kurdish fighters have consistently been used as pawns by the imperialist powers in their belligerent games.

In the third episode of IMTV – the International Marxist Television channel, hosted by the UK section of the IMT, Socialist Appeal – Francesco Merli provides a Marxist analysis of the situation in Israel and Palestine.