Along the Death Road
After a plant in Israel was closed for allowing grave levels of pollution, it was moved to the occupied West Bank — where it ruins the land, spoils crops, and poisons Palestinian workers today.
Blog
To the Lifehouse
A new book rediscovers lessons from Black Panther survival programmes, solidarity networks of crisis-era Greece and the Occupy Sandy disaster relief efforts — and asks whether impending climate catastrophe means we should stop waiting and start doing.
In With the In Crowd
The Left tends to celebrate the crowd only in limited and conditional ways. A new book by Dan Hancox aims to reclaim the mass gathering for the 2020s.
Communism’s Forgotten Radicals
A new book traces a group of forgotten militants whose disparate lives collided in 1920s Moscow, culminating in a queer love story against the backdrop of the nascent communist state.
Museum Without Objects
The ‘universal museum’ is a product of Enlightenment thinking, with museums such as the Louvre cast in an increasingly ludicrous position as guardians of global heritage. But is there another way?
The Left’s Cafeteria
For decades, The Gay Hussar was the Labour Left’s integral Soho spot for organising, gossip, and goulash, remembers Mark Seddon.
A Gut Radical
From popularising peoples’ history to crusading for ordinary people’s access to good food and wine, Raymond Postgate’s socialism was about the full enrichment of life for all.
The Revolt of the Housewives
In 1795, English women facing starvation organised to seize food supplies and distribute them for an honest price — making the case for a system that placed community need above individual profit.
Feeding the Flames
More than simply keeping picket lines going, providing food to workers in dispute is a form of collectivism that has shaped the trade union movement.
Fries and a Shakedown
After decades of consolidation, just four firms now control at least 97% of a frozen potato market worth over $68 billion — and a new spate of legal cases are accusing them of price-fixing.
Imagining the Progressive Restaurant
In a country where so many people live increasingly lonely, bland, and digitised lives, food institutions can — and should — be bodies that place communal enjoyment before the whims of consumerism.
Socialism at the Milk Bar
The authoritarian socialist regimes of the twentieth century tried to rescue people from ‘kitchen slavery’ through communal eateries. In Poland, they survive and thrive.