Partisan • Patriotic • Internationalist
The recent CPI national school on 21–23 June began with the national chairperson giving a good introduction, which was followed by a brief talk on Irish history, with a different slant on the roles played by the state and its allies the church and its sycophantic followers.
Questions were posed to the audience about how we can change the tide of political discourse and about recent phenomena
The Cuban Revolution did not begin as a socialist revolution; in fact the original Cuban communist party, the PSP (People’s Socialist Party), denounced the attack on the Moncado Barracks in 1953 as a “putsch,” and, while engaging with the rebels during the guerilla campaign, it did not fully align with […]
There I am sitting among my three or four neighbours, and the talk turns to property. Their property. This topic has bothered me for some time, as it brings out the nastiest prejudices in my neighbours: condemning suspected “welfare cheats,” bothersome tenants, and everything else. Now one of these neighbours, […]
Arrival, a recent and popular sci-fi film based on the Ted Chiang novella Story of Your Life, and China Miéville’s perennially popular Embassytown both build on a long tradition of fiction challenging and examining the power of language. These are especially interesting because of their focus on the interaction of […]
In this series on the Capitalist Illusion I have tried to expose as clearly and plainly as possible the exploitative class nature of the capitalist system at the level of both the individual worker and internationally. The next task is to clearly understand how all this is facilitated within borders, […]
The Anthropocene is the term used to describe the geological period in which human activity has been the main determining factor in the Earth System. This influence has been overwhelmingly negative and has led the Earth into its sixth great extinction event. While capitalism will portray this as the fault […]
Communist movement gaining in strength globally In late November the 20th International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties took place in Athens. These meetings have proved very important gatherings, invaluable in pulling together the communist parties around the world after the overthrow of socialist power in the former socialist countries. […]
It was this writer’s privilege and pleasure to attend the 55th congress of the Communist Party of Britain, held in London on 17 and 18 November, as a guest and representative of the Communist Party of Ireland. Well attended by comrades from England, Scotland, and Wales, there were also numerous […]
Empathy is most often discussed in examples of its absence. The idea of a human as unempathetic is the stuff of nightmares, horror films, and late-night true-crime documentaries: the psychopath motivated to kill by an innate evil impulse. Like most dramatic pop psychology, this is an oversimplification. Psychopaths are as […]
Speech at the international communist meeting, Athens, by Eugene McCartan, general secretary, CPI Comrades, Imperialism is mired in an ever-deepening crisis. At the global, regional and national levels the system is now enmeshed, through its contradictions, in several interconnected crises—economic, political, environmental, cultural, and moral. It is the role of […]
When people are discussing happiness, there are few things that come to mind as immediately as freedom and autonomy. As Starbucks said, “happiness is in your choices.” We are told that without freedom we cannot be happy, and that freedom, boiled down to the basics, simply means choice.
In the first week of September the Communist Party of Ireland sent a delegation to the Avante festival in Portugal. The festival is sponsored by Avante! the weekly paper of the Portuguese Communist Party, and is held each year in the first week of September. The PCP takes its international […]
Over the last twenty years the acceleration of the internet and web sites has been critical in the development of thought and ideology in the new wave of Marxists now reaching the age of revolutionary activity and education. Studying theory and discussing it among comrades has never been easier. You […]
Social property will be the main basis for production in Cuba after the adoption next year of a new constitution, and this will continue to be the governing principle of the country’s social and economic life. This was the main message of the Cuban deputy minister of foreign affairs, Ana […]
“At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by a great feeling of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality . . . We must strive every day so that this love of living humanity will be transformed into […]
“The peoples of the world do not want a repetition of the scourge of war.” Psychology has a complicated relationship with the world at large, often seen as something to be a bit wary of. Like nuclear engineering it has the ring of something easily corrupted and dangerous about […]