When “Mary Poppins” was made into a movie in 1964, Mr. Banks’ advice to his son was sound. The banks were then paying more than 5% interest on deposits, enough to double young Michael’s investment every 14 years.... [read more]

From the moment the news came out that on Sunday March 4th in Salisbury, one of England’s revered cathedral cities, a Russian spy and his daughter had been poisoned by some form of ‘nerve agent’ my reaction was ‘Oh dear’. ... [read more]

The LPJ's India correspondent, Colin Todhunter, describes how India's true wealth creators are increasingly sidelined as temples to global capitalism spring up across the country... [read more]

As India and Pakistan engage in sabre rattling troops have been moving towards their forward deployments, Assed Baig asks: What about the victims of this age-old rivalry?... [read more]

The euphoria of Labour’s renewed vision engaged many who had despaired of the failure of centrality and compromise... [read more]

With each day that passes the conflict and animosity between the conservative reactionary forces and the global movement for progressive change becomes more acute, uglier and increasingly dangerous... [read more]

Allegations of a cover-up at Scotland Yard show that the British are as prone to malfeasance as any other nation, writes George Monbiot.... [read more]

Thomas Riggins continues to guide us through chapter 5 of Lenin's State and Revolution... [read more]

New Zealand has decided to change its flag. This was only briefly mentioned in the media here. But it is a significant example for us... [read more]

Mohammad Yahiya shares his personal experience of state terrorism and torture in this article... [read more]

W Stephen Gilbert delivers an up-to-date, state and fate of the retail trade in Britain, it is partly warmingly, personal and anecdotal, and partly a critical overview: part one... [read more]

Uri Avnery casts a close eye on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu\'s threat of an attack against Iran... [read more]

Science and humanities students view each other with incomprehension: blame our dumb, narrow schooling, says George Monbiot.... [read more]

The recent intervention by David Miliband and the resulting manoeuvrings reveals much about the febrile state within the Labour Party. Beyond the Blairite-Brownite soap opera, which goes on even after one of the protagonists leaves the stage - rather like Ernie Wise continuing to define himself after poor Eric passed away - this is an existential crisis for Labour.... [read more]

Matt Genner considers Naomi Klein's comments at this year's Hay Festival.... [read more]

Helene Hanff is well remembered for 84 Charing Cross Road, a record of her long correspondence with a London bookseller. ... [read more]

The U.S. federal debt has more than doubled since the 2008 financial crisis, shooting up from $9.4 trillion in mid-2008 to over $22 trillion in April 2019... [read more]

In a culture of bland conformity it is stimulating to find a challenge. It surely demands a response. To dismiss it out of hand would be to show no respect.... [read more]

Honduras is in crisis. The national election took place on Sunday 26 November. Results posted that night showed the challenger Salvador Nasralla with a 5% lead with 57% of the votes tallied... [read more]

The atrocity goes on. Two million human beings suffer inhuman treatment. And the world? Alas. the world is busy. It has no eyes for Gaza. Better not to think about that awful place... [read more]

Theresa May’s moral failings are evident. They are certain to lead to political failure that may take some time to become evident.... [read more]

When everybody on both sides was exhausted, the war ended with a set of armistices, which defined the recognized borders of Israel... [read more]

2017 is going to see many revised versions of the October Revolution. Some prejudices need to be countermanded even before they are uttered. Lenin’s reputation is overshadowed by, and confused with, Stalin’s.... [read more]

Writing is the hand that feeds society’s conscience and consciousness. Writing examines life, the essential process of civilized awareness, the fuel of serious social discourse... [read more]

A poem by Simon Cockle... [read more]

People wonder why Netanyahu denounces Abbas as an "inciter", while not mentioning Hamas. To solve this mystery, one must understand the Israeli Right does not fear war, but is afraid of international pressure – and therefore the "moderate" Abbas is more dangerous than the "terrorist" Hamas.... [read more]

The gravity of feeling was embedded in his face and voice as he spoke of his fears for the future of the party he once led... [read more]

Discontent among the uninformed tends toward unreasoned emotion. The educated dissentient is able and willing to identify the nature of a problem and articulate an indictment of the problem’s source.... [read more]

As the future of public service broadcasting is uncertain, it is timely now to again ask a familiar question and to broaden the debate beyond the confines of sectional interest... [read more]

This week, President Rivlin published a peace plan. That is not a usual act by a president, whose office is mainly ceremonial.... [read more]

For months now, Israel has been in the throes of a mini-intifada... [read more]

Optimistic? Today? When the Israeli peace camp is in deep despair? When home-grown fascism is raising its head and the government is leading us towards national suicide?... [read more]

David Rhani describes his latest trip to Iran... [read more]

The release of the film ‘Carol’, based on Patricia Highsmith’s 1952 novel, ‘The Price of Salt’, gives us an opportunity to enter into the subversive world of one of the 20th century’s greatest popular writers... [read more]

Forty five years ago Gamal Abd-al-Nasser died at the early age of 52. It continues to have a huge influence on the present, and probably will on the future... [read more]

The roots of the current Syrian refugee crisis lie in the adoption of regime change as a key plank of US and NATO foreign policy... [read more]

In 2009, the three leading ministers – Netanyahu, Barak and Lieberman – decided that the time had come to attack Iran... [read more]

What follows is a report from a resident of Aleppo whose identity is not revealed for reasons of security... [read more]

The larger social architecture defined by the academic, political and corporate ties of the gun lobby helps explain how we could systematically take the fight to the NRA... [read more]

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During the last 27 years, Conservative and Coalition Governments have passed legislation aimed at reducing the voting rights of people not likely to be supportive of the Conservative Party... [read more]

Binyamin Netanyahu seems to be detested now by everyone... [read more]

Kate Zagoskina explains the origins of democracy and it various manifestations throughout history... [read more]

I fear the outcome of the general election; I fear the deals made by politicians desperate to stay in power, deals that will further harm the disadvantaged poor... [read more]

The borders of the Ukraine today are very different than they were before WWII... [read more]

John Malcolm Fraser, prime minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983, passed away on 20 March 2015... [read more]

People are suffering from a deficiency which is as unbalancing as a hormone or vitamin deficiency. What we are severely lacking in is democracy... [read more]

In April 1961, Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space, when Vostok 1 made a successful orbit of the Earth. ... [read more]

When I was 15 years old and a member of the Irgun underground (by today's criteria, an honest-to-goodness terrorist organization), we sang "(In the past) we had the heroes / Bar Kochba and the Maccabees / Now we have the new ones / The national youth…"... [read more]

Me-first acquisitiveness is now pervasive throughout the upper strata of society... [read more]

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When the Orwellianly name “Middle East Peace Envoy” Tony Blair was named “Philanthropist of the Year” by GQ Magazine in September for “his tireless charitable work” there was widespread disbelief... [read more]

Lately, the words "Crusaders" and "Zionists" have been appearing more and more often as twins... [read more]

Thomas Riggins reviews the first part of Chapter V of Lenin's State and Revolution (1917)... [read more]

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Part 1 of Thomas Riggins's analysis of Thomas Piketty's book - Introduction to Capital in the Twenty-First Century... [read more]

Thomas Riggins talks us though the rest of Chapter 4 of Lenin's book Materialism and Empirio-Criticism ... [read more]

The British government’s policy to rid England’s cattle of bovine TB by culling badgers is unravelling writes Lesley Docksey... [read more]

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The first in a series of articles by Thomas Riggins analysing Lenin's famous work The State and Revolution: The Marxist theory of the State and the tasks of the Proletariat in the Revolution... [read more]

Rightwing politicians and their press use talk of patriotism to disguise where their true loyalty lies: the wealthy elite, writes George Monbiot.... [read more]

The 10-year-old Londoners I took to Wales were proof that a week in the countryside is worth three months in a classroom, writes George Monbiot.... [read more]

Three years ago few predicted that a revolution, a coup and an emergent civil war would soon explode in a country considered a prime tourist hot spot and ruled by the same autocrat for nearly 30 years ... [read more]

There is no secret in saying that the National Curriculum was not introduced to promote co-operation or individual ingenuity. Elijah Pryor advocates a different model for learning... [read more]

Dr Faysal Mikdadi explains how education is the key to Palestinian liberation and democracy... [read more]

David Benbow critiques the BBC's ‘Masters of Money’ episode, aired last year, that focused on the economic theories of Karl Marx... [read more]

The Spending Review by George Osborne contained no surprises. But suppose Mr Osborne really understood economics and actually wanted to improve the British economy. George Tait Edwards provides a constructive speech for a competent chancellor... [read more]

The choice on the one hand is for people to be a resource for a rich economy. The choice on the other is for a rich economy to be a resource for society. Alfie Stirling explains... [read more]

Thomas Riggins states that the majority of Americans support more gun controls to reduce and prevent the epidemic of violence in the US ... [read more]

In chapter seven of "'Left-Wing' Communism: an Infantile Disorder" Lenin addresses himself to the ultra-left claim that socialists should no longer work with or be members of bourgeois parliaments. Thomas Riggins explains.... [read more]

Ramzy Baroud writes, in life, some phenomena cannot be explained by ordinary logic or technical language, let alone official discourses. How did Gaza manage to fight back with such ferocity and undying vigour in quelling the latest Israeli war despite years of a bloody siege and one-sided war in 2008-9?... [read more]

In his latest article analysing “Left-Wing” Communism: an Infantile Disorder, Thomas Riggins looks at Lenin's views on what sort of relations a Marxist party should have with the trade union movement... [read more]

In 1920, Lenin produced an analysis of the political conditions in Germany after the failure of the Communist uprising in 1918. The Communists had split into two rival factions. The issues facing the German Marxists were somewhat analogous to those facing Marxist movements today, writes Thomas Riggins.... [read more]

Thomas Riggins gives an analysis of Chapter Four of Lenin's 'Left Wing' Communism: an Infantile Disorder and describes the Bolsheviks' struggle against both 'opportunism' and 'petty-bourgeois revolulutionism'... [read more]

The eulogies in the media for the late Marxist historian, Eric Hobsbawm, praise his historical insight yet express bemusement at his adherence to the Communist cause. Why is there a lack of understanding as to why so many of his generation remained loyal to the cause of their youth? John Green explains.... [read more]

We publish a poem by Usiemure Christopher.... [read more]

Naturally there have been many glowing tributes to Eric Hobsbawm following his death at the age of 95, but there have also been some extremely ungenerous slights and grotesque attacks on his integrity as an individual and as an historian, writes David Morgan... [read more]

Since the Second World War, US foreign policy has been largely predicated on military adventures, by severely punishing enemies and controlling ‘friends’. Diplomacy was often the icing on the cake of war, writes Ramzy Baroud.... [read more]

The mainstream corporate media has been fooling the public for decades. It fails to shine a light on important decisions that are made behind closed doors by unaccountable corporate players, senior politicians and unelected bureaucrats, writes Colin Todhunter.... [read more]

LPJ's arts correspondent and resident philosopher, Stephen Gilbert, comments that an emphasis on celebrity is the prevailing television flavour of the age, infecting every genre of programming, whether appropriate or not... [read more]

By common consent (at least among those like me who lived through it), the ‘golden age’ of broadcasting – at the BBC especially – was that which spanned the 1960s, writes W Stephen Gilbert.... [read more]

The Kindle - an infinity of reading or a bibliophile's nightmare? Stephen Gilbert shares his thoughts on the matter.... [read more]

Here’s why the government’s proposals on executive pay won’t work – and why we need a maximum wage, says George Monbiot.... [read more]

W Stephen Gilbert delivers an up-to-date, state and fate of the retail trade in Britain, it is partly personal and anecdotal, and partly a critical overview: part three.... [read more]

David Eade contrasts the Occupy movement in the UK with the 15-M movement in Spain... [read more]

Uri Avnery shows how Hamas' decision to make peace with Israel scuppers plans for war... [read more]

If the evidence of the successes of recent events is anything to go by, interest in the socialist approach to history is on the increase, which is probably no surprise given the turbulent and uncertain times in which we currently live, says David Morgan.... [read more]

At a time when the poorest are being hit hardest, W Stephen Gilbert comments on the obsence bonuses enjoyed by those at the top echelons of the financial sector and puts paid to the reasons most commonly used to justify such unfair practice.... [read more]

Sarah Carlson looks at the growing social protest movement in Israel and discusses the need for the Israeli working class to combat not only the economic policies of their government but also its colonialist policies.... [read more]

Madeleine Louise Fry reflects on the Anglo-centric nature of history teaching in the UK's schools.... [read more]

From JA Hobson's re-published classic to Doug Stokes and Sam Rafael's lucid contemporary critique, understanding imperialism is key to achieving a fairer and more sustainable world, writes Nathaniel Mehr.... [read more]

Iqbal Tamimi reflects on a gross incident of on-air sexist bullying on the UK Arabic TV channel, Alhiwar.... [read more]

The tensions on the Korean border are unlikely to die down so long as the US maintains its intransigent stance towards North Korea, says Kevin Gray.... [read more]

Political resistance is not simply gratuitous violence - is a collective response to oppression, writes Ramzy Baroud.... [read more]

Daniel Serge dispels a few myths about the recent unrest in Greece. ... [read more]

The idea that Iran would risk certain annihilation by attacking Israel is ludicrous, writes Uri Avnery.... [read more]

Samuele Mazzolini reflects on an election that has consolidated the dominance of Silvo Berlusconi's centre-right bloc, and the continuing malaise of the Italian left.... [read more]

The government's plan to impose a 'licencing' system on the teaching profession is bureaucratic and unworkable, says Christine Blower.... [read more]

Ramzy Baroud condemns the scapegoating of Muslims by European politicians who are unwilling to address their countries' most pressing social problems.... [read more]

Nathaniel Mehr reviews Judith Butler's thought-provoking examination of the ways in which identity and culture are manipulated in the interests of imperialism.... [read more]

While Obama proclaims the 21st century, the government of Israel is returning to the 19th, writes Uri Avnery.... [read more]

Uri Avnery assesses a critical moment in Israeli domestic politics.... [read more]

Christopher Vasey examines the potential ramifications of the recent Israeli election results.... [read more]

Michael Albert is a prominent activist and economist and a co-founder of Z Magazine. Adam Gill spoke to him about the Venezuelan government's radical "Consejos Comunales" initiative, aimed at deepening participatory democracy.... [read more]

Samuele Mazzolini on the outrageous new direction taken by the EU on immigration.... [read more]

Samuele Mazzolini calls on both sides in the FARC-Uribe stand-off to make concessions in the name of democracy.... [read more]

London Progressive Journal's Haseeb Khokhar spoke to prominent climate change campaigner George Monbiot.... [read more]

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