The left in disarray

There is a quickening of life on the left. But, politically, the left is still very weak and disoriented. This book traces the turns and realignments imprinted on this left over many decades by the ascendancy of Stalinism and by the post-Stalinist global reshufflings after 1989-9. Independent working-class politics needs a sense of its own path and its own compass. The left needs to emerge from defining itself primarily in a negative and reactive way, and rediscover what, positively, the real left must be for. This book is a companion volume to Can Socialism Make Sense?. which makes the case for unabridged socialist and anti-capitalist aims. Introduction Preface Stalinism has not been buried yet The Stalinist roots of the present crisis on the left The Stalinist counter-revolution in socialism and in Marxism The melding of left and right: The Stalinist synthesis The fate of the Bolshevik rearguard The survivors of Atlantis Imperialism and anti-imperialism in the making of the contemporary left Imperialisms and anti-imperialism Bureaucratic Imperialism and the socialist revolution Imperialism and the left: twenty case histories The left in disarray: ten polemics 1. The warmongering anti-war demonstrations 3. Real and invented differences on political Islam 4. What is reactionary anti-imperialism? 5. The Prophet and the demoralised revolutionaries 7. What is left antisemitism? 8. The Balkans, nationalism, and imperialism 9. How to make your anti-imperialism sterile People who shaped the left: five essays The Great Gadsby: The paradoxes of Tony Cliff Ernest Mandel and the historic process Tony Benn and the left Gerry Healy: The revolutionary as gangster Ted Grant and the workers How not to fight the kitsch left: the Euston Manifesto