WHEN CAPITALISM IS IDENTIFIED AS THE PRIMARY ILL facing society, the search for a time for it to be undone, exceeded or simply left behind, is inevitable. The idea of ‘no exit’ evokes a present that is both totalizing and enclosed, a kind of hall of mirrors found in classic horror films. Whichever way you turn, there is continuous multiplication, whether of space, objects or people. Without a potential escape, the critique of capitalism seems an argument without a conclusion.

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ALTERNATIVES TO CAPITALISM, WHICH HAD LONG BEEN DORMANT after the collapse of the Soviet Union, are now everywhere enjoying a resurgence. Extinction rebellions, black blocs and cooperatives everywhere are on the ascent, resisting neoliberal attacks on the poor with as much vigor as they resist those on the environment.

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IN A SERVICE ECONOMY, where most workers are readily replaceable or completely superfluous, the old idea of wage claims arbitrated through the state is an increasingly hopeless proposition. The labor theory of value still holds but wages are artificially propped up, within definite limits,[1] to maintain the consumption of commodities, especially the consumption by the capitalist class of the wealth creating commodity labor-power (we need jobs and any jobs will do).

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Following Hillel Ticktin’s presentation at the Communist Party of Great Britain’s annual Summer University, “Predicting the Collapse of the Soviet Union,” Sophia Freeman interviewed Hillel Ticktin on the phenomena of Stalinism. The interview coincides with the 2019 Platypus Summer Reading group: "Thirty years of 1989: What was Stalinism in Power?", and an article — of the same title— published by Rory Hannigan in PR 119.

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On Wednesday, August 28th, 2019, Efraim Carlebach interviewed John Rees, historian, activist and lead organizer of Counterfire, about his book The Leveller Revolution and the memory of the English revolution today. The questions were prepared with Richard Rubin. What follows is an edited transcript of the interview. During the interview, Boris Johnson announced the prorogation of the British Parliament, provoking comparisons to the English civil war. A postscript on the Brexit political crisis is appended.

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