There was little cause for optimism in Canada in July 1933. Thirty percent of the labour force was out of work. One-fifth of the population was on government relief. And severe drought had turned huge swathes of Prairie farmland into dust. But amid the deprivation and misery of the Great Depression, a new socialist party … Continue reading The Regina Manifesto at 90: lessons for the Canadian left →

Surveillance, censorship and deplatforming may be hallmarks of the digital age, but they existed long before the advent of Facebook and Twitter. Consider the case of the young Bob Dylan, scheduled to appear on the Ed Sullivan Show on May 12, 1963. Told he couldn’t play Talkin’ John Birch Paranoid Blues, a satirical indictment of … Continue reading Musical scares →

Forty years after the Communist Manifesto eviscerated capitalism and predicted its demise, a relatively unknown American writer shot to fame with a fascinating blueprint for its replacement. Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward 2000 – 1887 was a literary, cultural, and political sensation. First published in 1888, it was an international hit and only the second U.S. novel to sell a … Continue reading Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy: Is this 1888 vision of a year 2000 utopia still relevant? →

Wherever they go on the campaign trail, federal political leaders are asked about the Afghanistan crisis and Canada’s failure to evacuate all those who risked their lives to support our soldiers, diplomats, and aid workers. But reporters seem unwilling to press the party bosses on the broader implications of Canada’s military and moral defeat in … Continue reading To avoid another Afghanistan, Canada must leave NATO →

The Labour Party’s dismal performance in the 2019 UK general election has generally been attributed to its incoherent Brexit policy and the shortcomings—real or perceived—of its former leader, Jeremy Corbyn. But according to trade unionist and party activist Paul Embery, Labour’s worst electoral showing since 1935 also stemmed from the decades-long alienation of its traditional … Continue reading Does the left really hate the working class? →