Upsurge of workers’ struggles in 2015 in Mexico, from field workers in San Quintin, Baja California to maquiladora workers in Ciudad Juarez along with ongoing opposition to government educational “reforms” by teachers in the autonomous union CNTE, demonstrate workers’ resistance to the plans of capital and its state. How can organizations of activist-thinkers meet what workers have achieved in our own organizational response?
Mexico
World in View: Pope Francis in Mexico: pity and contradiction
The Pope has a partial, limited critique of certain transgressions of industrial capitalism. In some areas of human rights, the Pope and the Catholic Church as an institution is not only silent, but in opposition.
Women battle war, terrorism and anti-abortion fanatics
March 8, 2016Foregrounding the new formal solidarity between Trust Black Women with Black Lives Matter, we explore the thought and actions of women worldwide, including the struggle for reproductive justice in the U.S.; women fighting war and terrorism in places like South Sudan and Syria, the successful fight of domestic workers to organize, and the need to make the revolutionary content of such actions explicit.
Risking jobs for union and respect
January 25, 2016Workers in four maquiladoras in Ciudad Juarez began organizing to form an independent union and for higher wages, better working conditions and against sexual harassment.
Letter from Mexico: Ayotzinapa’s new point of departure?
December 15, 2015Universality of the movement for Ayotzinapa’s disappeared students
World in View: Mexico’s ‘La Migra’
December 10, 2015Mexico takes millions of dollars from the U.S. to stop Central American immigrants from crossing Mexico’s southern border. Gangs prey on those who make it into Mexico.
Handicap This! September-October 2015
September 6, 2015A roundup of the situation of people with disabilities and how they are fighting for their rights including in Mexico, a prison in Carlisle, Penn., outrage against the shackling of two young students with disabilities in Covington, KY, the banning of a child with cerebral palsy and autism in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia, and disabled people in Iraq who face neglect and isolation.
Letter from Mexico: CNTE teachers’ goal: autonomous learning
August 31, 2015The National Coordination of Education Workers (CNTE) has been struggling for autonomy, new labor relationships and a non-capitalist educational model. In September 2013, tens of thousands of people—teachers outside the CNTE, students, parents and activists—demonstrated throughout Mexico to show their rejection of the government’s privatizing educational reforms.
Readers’ Views, July-August 2015
July 4, 2015Black lives as Subject; Russia in crisis; Nothing about us without us; Homelessness in L.A.; Central Canada Alliance; Perspectives and philosophy; Elderly to the streets?; Women and Yemen half-peace; Labor and climate justice; Dialectic and women’s liberation; Voices from behind the bars
Letter from Mexico: The Zapatistas and Critical Thought
An appreciative and critical look at the Zapatistas’ seminar held in Chiapas, Mexico, May 3-9 on “Critical Thought in Face of the Hydra of Capitalism,” by a participant.
Marxist-Humanist organization and philosophy
May 6, 2015Spelling out the philosophical breakthrough on Hegel’s Absolutes as the total uprooting of the old and the creation of new human relations, in concrete relationship to struggles for freedom in practice and in theory, is at the heart of projecting Marxist-Humanism, and therefore of its organizational life.
Readers’ Views, May-June 2015
May 3, 2015Letters and comments sent in by readers or taken down, to and about the articles in News & Letters or current events.
Seeking justice for 43 in Ayotzinapa
May 1, 2015“Caravana 43” includes some of the parents of 43 students who were “disappeared” in September from the Normal Rural School Raúl Isidro Burgos in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, Mexico, and are touring the U.S. Here are in-person reports from their trips to Berkeley, Calif., and Detroit, Mich.
Reader’s Views, March-April 2015, Part 2
March 8, 2015The thoughts of News & Letters readers on: MARXIST-HUMANIST PHILOSOPHY IN THE WHIRLWIND OF EVENTS; SAVING THE PLANET; and VOICES FROM BEHIND THE BARS.
From Turkey to USA, women as force & reason fight inhumanity
March 5, 2015Another savage sexual assault and murder—this time in Turkey—brought forth thousands of demonstrators, mostly women, throughout the country and beyond. Özgecan Aslan was a student taking a bus home. Worldwide, women are not only railing against sexism and challenging men to change what is often deadly behavior and when not deadly, deeply oppressive; they are as well explicitly extending their critique to the state itself.
Los Zapatistas y los padres y estudiantes de Ayotzinapa: Una unión decisiva
February 16, 2015Carta Politico-Filosofica, Num. 3 praxisamericalatina@gmail.com
Un nuevo momento en la dialéctica de la lucha
LOS ZAPATISTAS Y LOS PADRES Y ESTUDIANTES DE AYOTZINAPA: UNA UNIÓN DECISIVA
Eugene Gogol
Desde [=>]
Aceptando el desafío de este nuevo momento en México: De la represión a la resistencia a la rebelión
Carta Politico-Filosofica, Num. 2 praxisamericalatina@gmail.com
¿Que hacer? Una dialetica de la organizacion y la filosofia
ACEPTANDO EL DESAFÍO DE ESTE NUEVO MOMENTO EN MÉXICO:
DE LA REPRESIÓN A LA [=>]
World in View: Zapatistas and the Ayotzinapa rebellion
January 31, 2015More than three months after the forced disappearance of their 43 sons—students of the Normal Rural School Raúl Isidro Burgos in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero—their fathers and mothers continue their protests. In mid-November the parents arrived in Chiapas to share their pain and outrage with the Zapatista Indigenous communities.
Readers’ Views, January-February 2015, Part 1
January 30, 2015From Ferguson to Staten Island; Revolutionary Rojava; Youth Protest; Violence Against Women; Detroit Solidarity; Paris March; Recalling Mary Jo
Mexico: Students win at IPN
November 25, 2014A general strike by students at the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN) reveals a longing for universality, for going deeper and lower within society.
Mexico at a new moment of revolt
November 21, 2014Mexico City—Massive protests have swept across Mexico in response to the brutal state-instigated attack against students from the Escuela Normal Rural Raúl Isidro Burgos in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero. On Sept. 26 six people had been murdered outright, and 43 students were “disappeared” and likely assassinated, incinerated and buried in clandestine graves. October and November have been months of rage, led by hundreds of thousands of students….
Praxis en America Latina noviembre-diciembre 2014 edición
November 19, 2014La nueva edicion de Praxis en America Latina. Esperamos sus comentarios. Por favor, reenvíenla a sus redes y contactos.
Los normalistas de Ayotzinapa: Asesinato y criminalización de la juventud en México
November 7, 2014A la barbarie del Estado mexicano, sus adherentes y secuaces, nosotros le oponemos la necesidad de construir un nuevo humanismo, la unidad de teoría y práctica —en suma: la revolución en permanencia.
‘Trail for Humanity’ links immigration, environment, prisons
August 31, 2014Spurred by racist responses to busloads of immigrant children from Central America, a 300-mile march from Merced, Calif., to the Mexican border was organized.
Nueva edicion de Praxis en America Latina, 8-9/2014
August 28, 2014Por favor, comparta con sus amigos y redes.
revista Praxis en América Latina – teoría/practica
www.praxisenamericalatina.org
No. 12, agosto-septiembre 2014
Los números anteriores: # 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11,
Desde México
Por un socialismo de autogestión común a todos los anti-capitalistas
Panorama del movimiento estudiantil en Xalapa
“¿Por qué ya no luchamos?, ¿por qué no defendemos”: la lucha del pueblo de San Bartolo Ameyalco por el agua
Prólogo a la [=>]
Praxis en América Latina No. 11
June 30, 2014Praxis en América Latina: nuevo número.
revista Praxis en América Latina – teoría/practica
No. 11 mayo 2014
http://www.praxisenamericalatina.org/indice-5-14.html
Sección especial: Escuelita Zapatista
‘Humane immigration reform now!’
March 24, 2014400 immigrant workers from Mexico and Central America and their U.S. supporters marched through downtown Los Angeles for “comprehensive and humane immigration reform now!”
Woman as Reason: Language and death in Juárez
February 12, 2014The way we construct experience with language has effects on its transmission and on the configuration of subjectivity, not only in aesthetics and ethics, but also in understanding politics. That is the case in the crimes committed against women in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua and other states in Mexico.
January-February 2014 News & Letters online
February 4, 2014The January-February issue of News & Letters is online. Rampant U.S. surveillance slouches toward totalitarianism; Tahrir three years later; Charles Denby, worker-editor; Syrian revolution ‘brought us together’; Communization theory’s missing link: dialectical mediation; what happens after; Language and death in Juárez; Let RNs give care; …
‘Legalize my parents!’
December 3, 2013Demonstrators representing “Millions of Voices for Immigration Reform” marched through downtown Los Angeles demanding immediate immigration reform and a path to citizenship.
Latin America in continuous struggle
November 22, 2013Resistance by Indigenous groups in Colombia; Indigenous Guatemalans resist Canadian mining company; teachers in Mexico protest “educational reform” law
Latin America in view, September-October 2013
September 23, 2013Latin America in View, Sept.-Oct. 2013: Ecuador oil drilling; Brazil rapes; Mexico Escuelita Zapatista.
Chicagoans rally: Forward on Climate
March 22, 2013From the March-April 2013 issue of News & Letters:
Chicago–“Hey! Obama! We don’t want your climate drama!” we chanted at the Forward on Climate rally here on Feb. 17. There were at least 20 rallies that day, with 40,000 people in Washington, D.C. Most of the 400 here were college students brought out by Chicago [=>]
New publications of Marxist classics
March 8, 2013A new South Asian edition of Marxism and Freedom, from 1776 until Today by Raya Dunayevskaya has been published in India.
South Asian readers can order it from Aakar Books, http://aakarbooks. com/, 28-E, Pocket-IV, Mayur Vihar Phase-I, Delhi-110 091, India. Phone: 91-11-2279-5505. Telefax: 91-11-2279- 5641. Email:aakarbooks@gmail.com.
Franklin Dmitryev
Chicago
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In Mexico, there has come to light a [=>]
New Publication: Raya Dunayevskaya’s “Trilogy of Revolution” in Spanish
March 2, 2013Una Trilogía de Revolución
Marxismo y Libertad: Desde 1776 hasta nuestros días
Filosofía y Revolución: De Hegel a Sartre y de Marx a Mao
Rosa Luxemburgo, la liberación femenina y la filosofía marxista de la revolución
Epílogos especiales para la edición en español:
• “América Latina y el marxismo de Raya Dunayevskaya”
• “El significado del [=>]
Zapatistas’ new era
February 13, 2013World in View
Dec. 21, 2012, was a special date in the Mayan calendar—the end of an era and the beginning of a new historic cycle. For the Zapatistas of Chiapas in southern Mexico, it signaled a new moment of the movement. Some 40,000 Zapatistas from the autonomous Indigenous communities in resistance marched through the five [=>]
Mexico: ‘Yo soy #132’
July 23, 2012World in View
Mexico: ‘Yo soy #132’
Mexico City—Into this dismal Presidential electoral season has come a breath of fresh air: a student movement by the name of “I am #132.” It arose in mid-May and spread like wildfire in universities throughout the country, with thousands and then tens of thousands of secondary and university students joining [=>]
Queer Notes, September-October 2011
September 27, 2011by Suzanne Rose
While returning from a bar last month in Yaounde, the capital of Cameroon, three men were detained by the police because they thought two of them looked feminine. The three were jailed for a week and two were tortured and abused by the police. One man was released, but the other two were [=>]
Stop Colombian FTA
August 10, 2011Chicago–On June 10, several dozen activists from FSPA Justice & Peace Coordinating Committee, 8th Day Center for Justice, News and Letters Committees and others marched to Obama’s campaign headquarters here to forcefully remind the President of the promise he made as a candidate in 2008 to “oppose the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement (FTA)” while trade [=>]
World in View: Mexico protests inhuman drug wars
May 24, 2011by Gerry Emmett
On April 6, from Mexico City’s main square, the Zócalo, to dozens of other cities throughout the country, thousands marched against the violence of Mexico’s drug wars. In Mexico City alone, 15,000 marched chanting, “Not one more!” and “No more blood!”
The demonstrations were sparked by an open letter by journalist and poet Javier [=>]
World in View: Murder in Juárez
April 18, 2011by Gerry Emmett
Violence attributed to rival drug cartels has again fallen heavily on the border areas around Ciudad Juárez, Mexico. In one weekend in February, 53 people died in the city of only 1.5 million. Since 2008, over 7,600 have died, with 3,112 murdered last year alone. Beyond the cartels, there is suspicion that businesses [=>]
Solidarity with Mexican miners
March 31, 2011Chicago–Black, Latino and Anglo workers here showed solidarity with workers in Mexico on Feb. 19, the fifth anniversary of the Pasta de Conchos mine disaster in Mexico. Over 100 people came out, mostly steelworkers, joined by Jobs with Justice, Arise Chicago Worker Center, and News and Letters.
In recent years the National Union of Mine, Metal, [=>]
Ciudad Juárez activists speak out
March 12, 2011San Francisco, Cal.—The Mexico-U.S. Solidarity Network (mexicosolidarity.org) sponsored a tour for Ciudad Juárez activists Verónica Leyva and Felix Pérez. Below we print excerpts of their talk given in San Francisco in November.
Verónica Leyva: To speak of Ciudad Juárez is to speak about extreme negative impacts of capitalism: the effects of globalization, the precarious situation of [=>]
Mexico: Betrayal in electrical workers union
February 27, 2011Mexico City–In October 2009, Mexican President Felipe Calderón ordered the destruction of the publicly owned City Light and Power Company, and with it the destruction of the union. The union members, men and women, were informed only by watching television, where we heard that troops would stealthily be occupying our workplaces.
I had been working with [=>]
World food crisis, still
January 26, 2011The world food crisis, which was hot in 2008 and then subsided temporarily, is getting worse again. It was one of the factors in Tunisia’s revolution, along with recent revolts in Algeria. The piece below, published in the June-July 2008 issue of News & Letters, is still quite germane.
World food crisis stirs revolt
by Franklin Dmitryev
In [=>]
Recollections of Leon Trotsky on the 70th anniversary of his assassination
August 20, 2010Image via Wikipedia
Tomorrow will be the 70th anniversary of the assassination of Leon Trotsky, one of the most important leaders of the Russian Revolution, by an agent of Stalin. For this occasion, News & Letters reprinted Raya Dunayevskaya’s “Some Memories of Trotsky,” written in 1965, in the July-August 2010 issue.
The signature from the [=>]