October 2023 (Volume 75, Number 6)
At the center of the United States’s New Cold War MR editors write, is the World Trade Organization, “the crown jewel of the liberal international order.” After China’s admittance into the WTO did not lead to the collapse of socialism in that country, presidents from Obama to Biden have gutted the institution and escalated the tariff war, all in the name of protecting the so-called rules-based international order. | more…
Marxian Ecology, East and West: Joseph Needham and a Non-Eurocentric View of the Origins of China’s Ecological Civilization
Following the work of Sinologist Joseph Needham, this talk by John Bellamy Foster illuminates the conceptual linkages between the ancient Greek and Chinese thought and modern dialectical materialism and ecological civilization. This interweaving of intellectual traditions, he writes, has created a “powerful organic ecological-materialist philosophy.” | more…
China’s Health and Health Care in the “New Era”
This article will be released in full online October 9, 2023.
What is the state of health care in China? Wei Zhang analyzes the deep institutional issues that plague China’s health care system. Despite its timely and effective efforts to mitigate the COVID-19 crisis, the system still faces deep-seated challenges, many of which can be traced directly to the marketization of hospitals and medical care. | more…
Relative Pauperization and Involution in Contemporary China: A Survey of Jingzhou City
This article will be released in full online October 16, 2023.
There is a growing sense in China, Alex Witherspoon, Amir Khan, and Yu Zhou write, that the timeworn methods of social advancement are yielding diminishing returns. Using an original survey of 301 individuals in Jingzhou City, the authors lay bare the roots of this widespread feeling of involution. | more…
Unequal Value Transfer from Mexico to the United States
This article will be released in full online October 23, 2023.
Matteo Crossa reveals the true nature of unequal value transfer from Mexico to the United States. Going beyond a simple tally of wages lost versus remittances, Crossa’s research demonstrates the true magnitude of the value stolen from Mexico, negating the claim that its manufacturing sector is a boon to the Mexican working class. | more…
A Nation of Guns
This article will be released in full online October 30, 2023.
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz reviews Bloodbath Nation, a poignant exploration of the painful, studiously ignored truths about gun culture in the U.S. To grapple with the epidemic of gun violence, she writes, requires confronting deeper truths about white supremacy, settler-colonialism, and the U.S. history of enslavement. | more…
Out of kilter
A new poem by Marge Piercy. | more…
September 2023 (Volume 75, Number 4)
What is the New Washington Consensus? In this month’s Notes from the Editors, MR editors discuss Washington’s fundamental shift in its approach to China, moving from an emphasis on neoliberal globalization toward a new, more aggressive policy pursuing U.S. military and industrial supremacy. | more…
What Every Child Should Know about Marx’s Theory of Value
Michael Lebowitz expounds on the simple truths found in Marx’s theory of value—truths that, nonetheless, have been obscured by decades of incomplete theorizing that has failed to make key distinctions in the relationship between labor, value, and money. | more…
The Double Objective of Democratic Ecosocialism
Humanity in this moment faces two major crises: one ecological, growing more acute with every planetary boundary passed; the other social, leading to deprivation and despair across the globe. An effective ecosocialist approach to these crises, Jason Hickel writes, must aim to resolve both in a single stroke. | more…
Totality: Decades of Debate and the Return of Nature
“How is it,” Helena Sheehan asks, “that classical Marxist authors were able to address such a stunning array of issues”? The answer can be found, she writes, is in the totality of their intellectual efforts: “Marxism is the only intellectual tradition on the scene capable of embracing…what needs to be comprehended to understand and cope with our world.” | more…
Ecological Marxism
In this interview from April 2023, Jia Keqing and John Bellamy Foster discuss the state of ecological Marxism worldwide, the question of anthropocentrism, the theory of metabolic rift, and the environmental proletariat. | more…
Frederick Engels: The First Marxist?
In the history of Marxism since Karl Marx’s death, Frederick Engels has cut a controversial figure across the centuries. Through an examination of their correspondence and collaborations, McFarlane presents Engels as not only a stalwart friend and colleague to Marx, but a fascinating organizer, editor, and strategist in his own right. | more…