For Wallis, who sees capitalism in strictly Manichean terms, as an absolute evil, it’s revolution or nothing. Reforms are of no avail, will never ever go far enough, and he completely rejects social democracy for having nothing of a lasting nature to commend itself, writing acerbically that the “alternative [to not opposing capitalism totally] is to reinforce the basic assumptions of anticommunism, which, in their social democratic variant, call for the decomposition of any coherent vision of social transformation and its replacement by a hodgepodge of socialist proposals grafted onto a presumably indestructible capitalist framework”
[. . .]
On October 14, 2025, Platypus Affiliated Society member Jonny Black interviewed Humphrey McQueen, an Australian historian and writer whose work was shaped by his participation in the New Left. He has had a lasting influence on debates about nationalism, labor history, and the fate of radical politics in Australia. He is the author of A New Britannia: An Argument Concerning the Social Origins of Australian Radicalism and Nationalism (1970) Gallipoli to Petrov: Arguing with Australian HistoryWe Built This Country: Builders’ Labourers and Their Unions, 1770 to the Futureem> (2011) and more. An edited transcript follows.
[. . .]
THERE HAVE BEEN DOZENS of excellent and insightful reviews of One Battle After Another, Paul Thomas Anderson’s magnificent project in response to this political and cultural moment. As a Weather Underground veteran, I suppose if I could add anything useful it would be to provide perspective on the history of extra-legal, anti-capitalist resistance groups
[. . .]
On March 30, 2023, at its 15th annual International Convention in Chicago, the Platypus Affiliated Society hosted a panel discussion on Second International Marxism in America. The panel was made up of Platypus members who addressed the origins and crisis of the Socialist Party of America (SPA): Spencer A. Leonard (prehistory and origin of the First International), Pamela C. Nogales C. (First International and prehistory of the Second International in America), Ed Remus (crisis of the Debsian-era SPA), and Chris Cutrone (legacy of the SPA). Platypus member D. M. Faes moderated the panel. An edited transcript follows.
[. . .]
THE GLOBAL POLITICAL CLIMATE of the 2020s is marked by the apparent resurgence of far-Right populism, particularly in the United States with the consolidation of the MAGA movement under Donald Trump. Yet beneath the surface, there are signs of a renewed interest in leftist traditions. Marxism, Leninism, and Trotskyism — ideologies long pronounced “dead” after 1989 — are finding new resonance among young people, especially as systemic crises of capitalism deepen and political polarization accelerates.
[. . .]
