Archives

From the PMR Archives: September 2019

From the Editor

Capitalism’s ‘gift’: climate change

The serious catastrophe looming for the ecosystem and indeed life itself on Earth due to climate change and its effects has finally gripped the imagination of millions throughout the world, especially the youth..

A Primer on Lebanon: History, Palestine and Resistance to Israeli Violence

Lara Deeb, Maya Mikdashi, Tsolin Nalbantian, Nadya Sbaiti

Israeli attacks have killed thousands, wounded thousands more and displaced over one million people in Lebanon..

Return of the National Question – II

Classical Marxism and the National Question

Chris Harman

Marx and Engels were part of the revolutionary movement of the 1840s. They began their political life on its extreme liberal democratic wing, but came to realise very quickly that human emancipation could only be achieved by a movement that went further and looked to working class revolution..

The Pakistani Revolution – VII

The Role of the National Awami Party, the 1965 General Elections and the War with India

W B Bland

The Role of the National Awami Party

The revival of the National Awami Party (NAP) and the release from prison in November 1962 of its leader Maulana Bhashani, provided the military dictatorship with a political arm, the objective function of which was to mobilise ‘left’ support for it..

Imperialism Old and New

Hamza Alavi

“Imperialism is the eve of the socialist revolution,” wrote Lenin whilst revolutionary hearts were still warm with the apocalyptic vision of the social transformation that was about to take place following the disintegration of moribund capitalism..

Punjabis: Living down a ‘vulgar, abhorrent’ language

Dr Abbas Zaidi

Millions of Punjabis in Pakistan and the diaspora have been engaged in linguistic witch-hunting of their own language. It happened a long time before terms like “identity politics”, “linguistic identity”, “language and religion” and “bloodthirsty mullahs” were in vogue..

Socrates’ views regarding the business world

Professor Maqsudul Hasan Nuri

1. Introduction

Socrates’ teachings as a philosopher are often cited in the fields of law, education, ethics and philosophy. Quite controversial in his lifetime, Socrates did not claim himself as a teacher or anything to do with matters of business..

The return of the National Question

Chris Harman

Introduction

It has become almost an orthodoxy to say that the great divide in the world today is between nationalisms..

How to understand the change of government in Syria

Vijay Prashad

One of the most stunning events of the past few months has been the fall of Damascus. This fall had initially been expected over a decade ago, when rebel armies funded by Qatar, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and the US crowded around the edges of Syria and threatened then …

The Last Days of Mankind

Pankaj Mishra

“In the beginning was the press and then the world appeared,” Karl Kraus wrote in 1921. The biblical allusion was no rhetorical flourish..