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You are here: The Platypus Affiliated Society/Archive for category 2016
Given the disintegration of traditional social democratic parties, 2015 saw the rise of novel political formations such as Syriza and Podemos. 2016 has seen the rise of the Corbyn leadership of the Labour Party and the mass support for Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Party. This panel seeks to address the project of social democracy today, both in light of these new political formations and the long history of social democratic politics on the left.

Workshop on the Bernie Sanders Campaign, with Bernard Sampson (CPUSA) and Jason Schulman (DSA), held on Saturday April 2, 2016, at the Platypus International Convention 2016.

Workshop with Jack Ross, (author of The Socialist Party of America: A Complete History), held on Saturday 2nd April 2016, at the Platypus International Convention.

On June 8, the London chapter of the Platypus Affiliated Society hosted a panel on the topic“Left Exit or No Brexit?” at the London School of Economics. The panel brought together Neil Davenport , Mike Macnair, and Gerry Downing , and was moderated by Ninad Pandit of the Platypus Affiliated Society.

Meeting Mondays, 6pm

Goldsmiths College, Richard Hoggart Building, Room 257

• required / + recommended reading


Marx readings pp. from Robert C. Tucker, ed., Marx-Engels Reader (Norton 2nd ed., 1978)


Recommended background readings

+ Edmund Wilson, To the Finland Station: A Study in the Writing and Acting of History (1940), Part II. Ch. 12–16 (from "Marx and Engels go back to writing history" to "Karl Marx dies at his desk")
+ James Joll, The Second International 1889–1914 (1966)


Week 1: 20th June

+ Karl Korsch, "The Marxism of the First International" (1924)
• Karl Marx, Inaugural address to the First International (1864), pp. 512–519
• Ferdinand Lassalle, Open letter to the German workers’ movement (1863)
• Mikhail Bakunin, A Critique of the German Social-Democratic Program (1870)
• Bakunin, Marxism, Freedom and the State (1872)


Week 2: 27th June

+ Korsch, Introduction to Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme (1922)
• Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme, pp. 525–541
• Marx, Programme of the Parti Ouvrier (1880)
• Karl Kautsky, The Class Struggle (1892)


Week 3: 4th July

• Kautsky,The Social Revolution (1902)


Week 4: 11th July

• Peter Kropotkin, The Conquest of Bread, especially Chapters 3, 11 and 12 (1906)
• Kropotkin, Anarchist Communism (1909)


Week 5: 18th July

• Kautsky, The Road to Power (1909)