Date:         Wed, 14 Jun 2000 10:24:47 -0400
Subject:      Call  for  Responses (fwd)
To: LABOR-L-AT-YORKU.CA


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 13 Jun 2000 21:00:08 -0700
From: CyberBrook <Brook-AT-california.com>
Subject: Call  for  Responses

For Socialist Review's upcoming Special Section on Anti-Capitalism, we are
assembling a Roundtable discussion [on the topics listed below]. Please
send in five copies of your responses and commentaries of approximately
500-2000 words (along with a 1-2 line bio), as well as other visual forms
of creative, radical expression, by 1 September 2000 to the address below.
We look forward to your active participation.

{Please distribute this Call for Responses to other people and lists that
might be interested. Apologies for cross-posting.}


The recent rise in resistance against economic globalization and the
police state exemplified in the US by the actions against the WTO, the IMF
and the World Bank, the rise in anti-sweatshop activism, and anti-prison
organizing has raised excitement about the possibility for fighting
capitalism. At Socialist Review, we want to seize this opportunity to ask
activists and academics, Marxists and postmoderns (yes, we acknowledge
that these categories are not mutually exclusive) to tell us what kinds of
theorizing and politics are relevant to their practice. More specifically,
we want to know what resistance and struggle in the present period looks
like. The following questions are offered to spark some critical
discussion about these critical issues.

1. Is "capitalism" an important category in your politics? If so, what
exactly do you mean by "anti-capitalism"? What is the relationship between
capitalism as a mode of production and capitalism as a discursive
category? Is it just one category among others---such as race, sexuality,
gender, coloniality—or does it have a special centrality in your thinking
and practice?

2. Are the categories of "Marxism", or "postmodernism" useful in your
political and intellectual work? If so, what kind of Marxism or
postmodernism? If not, what other schools of thought are helpful to you?

3. How important is having an alternative to capitalism, e.g., socialism,
for you? If so, what would you call it? How would you define and describe
it? 4. How is fighting against "capitalism" connected---or
disconnected---from struggles against racism, sexism, homophobia, and
other systems of oppression?

5. Does it make sense to envision revolution with a capital "R" as a
necessary condition for a just society? Or is radical democracy a better
and more useful concept?

6. What connections, if any, do you see between anti-sweatshop and
anti-globalism organizing and an anti-capitalist agenda? Does it matter if
activists talk about capitalism?

7. How important---and helpful---is it to argue for the connections
between the prison-industrial complex and capitalism when organizing youth
of color against criminalization of young people?


Socialist Review
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Socialist Review is a forum in which radical politics, cultural dissent,
political economy, and socialist critique are developed, debated, and
creatively contested. Drawing on a varied and inclusive body of radical
perspectives, SR works to promote and critically engage the activist left
in its diverse manifestations.

Socialist Review is published on behalf of the Center for Social Research
and Education, an anti-profit 501(c)(3) organization. Donations are
greatly needed, greatly appreciated, and tax deductible. Subscribing is a
political act. Please also encourage your libraries to subscribe. The SR
Collective is always accepting submissions for publishing consideration.
We welcome your active participation with SR in any form.




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