Protests erupted across Turkey on Saturday 20 March after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan issued a decree withdrawing Turkey from the Istanbul convention, an international treaty to prevent and combat violence against women. The withdrawal has sparked anger, thousands have taken to the streets at protests throughout the country. 

A failed attempt to unionise Amazon workers in Bessemer, Alabama is a lesson in the need for a bold and effective strategy by the US labour leaders. Even a goliath like Amazon is no match for the power of the working class when effectively organised. The battle goes on!

Over the weekend of 9-11 April 2021, Der Funke, the German section of the International Marxist Tendency (IMT), held its national congress. We intently discussed the perspectives for the class struggle, and the tasks facing our revolutionary organisation. Although circumstances meant the congress had to take place online, the mood was militant and enthusiastic.

Marxists are often accused of ‘Eurocentrism’ and ‘class reductionism’ (particularly in academic circles) when we argue for the struggle of workers of all races and nations against capitalism. It is said our emphasis on international working-class solidarity ignores the experience of people from the former colonial world, who must ‘decolonise’ their minds of Western-imposed ideas (Marxism included), and fight their own battles for liberation. But what is the best way forward for oppressed peoples throughout the world? Hamid Alizadeh, a leading activist of the International Marxist Tendency, tackled these questions at our ...

For several weeks now, Turkey has been making international headlines for various reasons. Not the least of these were the back-to-back sackings of the governor of the Central Bank, Naci Ağbal, on 19 March, followed by his deputy. Erdoğan’s move was followed by a sharp 15% one-day collapse in the value of the lira. Mainstream, bourgeois economists were aghast at what they regarded as insane, erratic behaviour from Erdoğan. But there is method in the madness. Above all, Erdoğan is terrified of a social explosion.

The second round of Ecuador’s presidential election has produced a victory for the right-wing candidate, the banker Lasso, and a defeat for the left-wing candidate, Andrés Arauz. It is important to try to understand the reasons why this happened, and the perspectives for the workers’ movement in the Andean country.

Hans-Gerd Öfinger, one of the International Marxist Tendency’s leading members in the German-speaking world, tragically passed away in March of complications resulting from COVID-19.

We will hold an online memorial meeting for comrade Hans-Gerd, celebrating his contribution to the development of our organisation, and the class struggle at large.

On Sunday 11 April, the first round of the presidential elections in Peru produced a major surprise: the victory, against all the odds, of Pedro Castillo, the leader of the 2017 teachers' strike. In the second round, he will face the reactionary, right-wing candidate of Fuerza Popular, Keiko Fujimori, in a clear expression of enormous political polarisation in a country ravaged by the economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last Saturday, hundreds of activists from across the world met online for the philosophy day school – hosted by Socialist Appeal, the Marxist tendency in Britain – to discuss the revolutionary ideas of Marxism: the only ideas that can help us to understand the world – in order to change it.

There is a debate in the US left about building a mass workers' party. Some argue for the so-called dirty break, in which left-wingers within the Democrats split off at some point in the future. Others argue that socialist candidates should remain with the Democrats and establish a surrogate "party within a party". Our US comrades argue that the party of Wall Street is a dead end. Only a mass, independent political party of labour presents any road forward for the working class.

The ongoing elections in five Indian states, with a total population of close to 250 million, provide a snapshot of the situation facing the working class across India. A common feature is the weakness of the left and its insistence on forming alliances with various bourgeois parties. The Indian working class is thus denied an independent voice. The various Communist parties should break with their ideas of class collaboration and build a united front of the Indian workers.

The electoral campaign for the second round of the presidential elections in Ecuador on Sunday, 11 April has come to an end. The second round pits the banker Guillermo Lasso, the candidate of the capitalist oligarchy, against the candidate of the left-wing UNES, Andrés Arauz, who represents correísmo and who came first in the first round on 7 February. So far, the polls do not suggest a clear winner. 

Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth II, has died. Unsurprisingly, the establishment has taken the opportunity to lavish praise upon this infamous bigot, and to promote patriotic flag-waving. We say: Abolish the Monarchy! Topple this rotten reactionary relic!

Over the past week, the North of Ireland has seen its worst rioting in years, ostensibly over the Northern Ireland Protocol signed by the Westminster government with the EU. The threat of loyalist violence has been in the air for months as tensions have ratcheted up since the Protocol came into effect in January.

As we reported previously, one of our leading German members, Hans-Gerd Öfinger, recently tragically passed away. We publish here two reminiscences by comrades close to Hans-Gerd, who over the course of many years experienced first-hand his invaluable role in building the forces of Marxism in the German-speaking world. They share their memories of Hans-Gerd’s life and works, which remain an inspiration to his comrades in the battles to come.