by Jacobin Editors
In this exective summary, the Jacobin editors attempt to carve out a model candidate and platform for garnering the support of working class voters in America. They base it upon a study conducted in conjunction with YouGov and thr Center for Working Class Politics.
1059 days ago

by Benjamin Fogel
Fogel opens this issue of Jacobin by providing historical and ideological perspectives on crimes, and how that fits into the current anxiety around a "rising crimes rate."
1064 days ago

by Matt Huber

1111 days ago

by Isabella Weber interviewed by Daniel Zamora
Zamora and Weber try to understand why China didn't undergo a similar collapse as the Soviet Union when integrating into global markets just decades ago. Weber believes that Russia's unwavering "shock therapy," where prices were liberalized essentially overnight, was much more dangerous than China's "dual path" approach.
1144 days ago

by Chris Maisano
Maisano reviews Göran Therborn’s new collection of essays, "Inequality and the Labyrinths of Democracy." Maisano focuses on the aspects of the "tertiary" or service sector, saying that working-class politics must change to account for the clear deindustrialization of the workforce.
1144 days ago

by David Broder
Broderick reviews several books and theories that posit the Left has becoming more "educated" and less representative of the traditional working-class. Cultural values, more than economic ones, are what is increasingly binding the Left together in recent years.
1160 days ago

by Debbie Chase
Chase recounts her experience of returning back to a restaurant's kitchen during the COVID-19 pandemic.
1161 days ago

by Freddie Stuart
Stuart writes this article as a first-person autobiography based on interviews with an anonymous Amazon warehouse worker in the Northeastern United States. He sheds light on the hiring process and working conditions of a typical worker, as well as the feelings and struggles that come with the job.
1162 days ago

by Vivek Chibber
Vivek Chibber introduces this issue of Jacobin by saying the following: "the ties between the Left and laboring people have been largely severed, with the Left mainly housed within the professional classes and the working class both atomized and set politically adrift from the socialist tradition." But he gives hope to "Labor's Long March" forwards.
1162 days ago

by Liza Featherstone
Featherstone cites Alexandra Kollantie, a Bolshevik leader and writer, in identifying the proliferation of "elite feminism" in today's culture. Featherstone quotes that "the woman and her male comrade are enslaved by the same social conditions" and concludes for herself that "casting men as an additional class enemy drastically divides and reduces our numbers, and we will never win that way."
1221 days ago

by Doug Henwood
Henwood gives us a history of the American "ruling class" and tries to understand its composition in the current moment. He writes, "I'd say the ruling class consists of a politically engaged capitalist class, operating through lobbying groups, financial support for politicians, think tanks, and publicity, that meshes with a senior political class that directs the machinery of the state."
1221 days ago

by Timothy Earle
Seth Ackerman interviews Timothy Earle, the author of the book "How Chiefs Come to Power: The Political Economy in Prehistory." Earle lays out that a key factor in a "chief" being able to develop control is "circumscription" or "the ability to bind people to a place." He believes that "chiefs" were granted power on behalf of a group, but at some point "seized personal power," which is "how property develops."
1236 days ago

by Nicole Aschoff
Aschoff reviews one of the most famous consulting agencies in the corporate world: McKinsey & Company. She depicts it as a morally dubious company with the only goal of securing its own profits. She brings up some of their most controversial jobs, from recommending that the ICE spend "less money and food, medical care, and supervision for detainees" on the border to save money, to serious conflicts of interests in bankruptcy dealings where its own hedge funds have investments.
1236 days ago

by Ted Jessup
In this personal memoir, an essay form that Jacobin doesn't often publish, Jessup reflects on his upbringing as the son of an important CIA agent. He tries to show the close-knit relationship of WASPs (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants) as the government "elite." From being on friendly terms with Presidents to dating the same people, it's clear that America in the middle of the 20th century did have a ruling class that all went to the same schools and lived in the same neighborhoods. The question is, does that class still exist today?
1236 days ago

by Matt Bruenig
The stimulus payments during the COVID-19 pandemic have certainly sparked controversy in the American public. Some say they are necessary to support workers who lost their jobs, others to stabilize an economy teetering on the edge of depression, while others see them as "handouts" or methods of redistribution that the government should not be controlling. Bruenig discusses the most recent stimulus bill, which although excludes the $15 minimum wage that many were pushing for, does include reforms on tax credits that could significantly reduce poverty rates in the United States in the years to come.
1314 days ago

by Natalie Shure
Even though pubic support for Medicare for All is significant, with "pools showing from around 40 to 69 percent support," translating the popular will to legislation is difficult. It's especially so when facing a nearly $3.5 trillion industry that has a lot of power in politics. Shure argues that "we'll never get Medicare for All by organizing for it alone," and that we must build stronger movements before it could even be a possibility.
1314 days ago

by Alex N. Press
Press suggests that with the new Biden administration, the Left must work to organize a stronger labor movement that had dwindled during Trump's years in office. But he cautions that the Democratic Party is not necessarily a pro-worker party, indicated by its shift towards suburban and wealthier America, and that not pushing for reform now could reduce the numbers of organized labor even further.
1315 days ago

by Leigh Phillips
Phillips attempts to convey why strong government intervention is crucial in the distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine, just as it was in its creation. After diving into the science behind how the mRNA vaccines were created and what it takes to distribute them, he looks at the economic implications of distribution on a global scale.
1321 days ago

by Branko Marcetic
On the cusp of the 2020 elections, there were two stories that caught the public eye. One was an article by the New York Times claiming to have seen Trump's tax returns. The other was an article by the New York Post that claimed Biden met with members of Burisma as Vice President of the United States. Marcetic details how each story was treated differently by social media and how that could spell disaster in the years to come.
1321 days ago

by J.C. Pan
Pan argues that the Alt-Right was "never more than a fringe subculture devoid of real power." Although she says we can't dismiss them completely, the Left must actually take notes on how a "preoccupation with subculture" can actually indicate a the fundamental "marginality" of a movement.
1321 days ago

by Dustin Guastella
Guastella discusses the issue that seems to be dividing the Democratic Party: should they stay moderate or lean on progressive trends? He argues that each side has its pitfalls. Progressives tend to alienate working-class voters through their "woke" rhetoric, while moderates give "a wry smile and a charming affect" that leads nowhere.
1323 days ago

by Matt Karp
Karp suggests that the current state of American politics isn't that much different than another time when economic inequality was at its greatest: the Gilded Age. As power goes into the hands of the few, politics becomes more like mass entertainment or sporting events, and candidates become more import than parties themselves, "class dealignment" reduces the strength of the working-class. Even though there seems to be more turnout and enthusiasm, it revolves around identity politics and does not wield the power necessary for making real change.
1324 days ago

by Ryan Zickgraf
In his review of the video game "Cyberpunk 2077," Zickgraf argues that cyberpunk has been "reduced to a cool retro aesthetic easily appropriated" by new forms of media.
1326 days ago

by Eileen Jones
Jones reviews Bob Dylan's new album, "Rough and Rowdy Ways." She compared the album go an American roadhouse, saying it's socially on the edge of respectability, musically on the edge of good taste, and spiritually on the edge of hell."
1326 days ago

by Paris Marx
Marx reviews the new film "Nomadland." It follows a fictional character, Fern, as her company closes and she hits the road as a nomad, picking up work here and there. Marx argues that its depiction of Amazon as exploiting this class of worker is not strong enough, especially when compared to the nonfiction book it's based on.
1326 days ago

by Nicole Aschoff
After four years of a wild presidency and a global pandemic that has changed most everything about our lives, Biden ran as a candidate who could return us to normalcy. He wants to put foreign policy back at the forefront of the agenda, but Aschoff argues that "global leaders aren't asking the United States to be their champion."
1330 days ago

by Anton Jäger and Arthur Boriello
Some may have hailed Biden's 2020 presidential victory as an end to Trumpism, but Jäger and Boriello think otherwise. They argue that "leaderism" is rampant in Western democracies, from the US to France, and that "incompetency and lying are no impediment to base building or popularity.
1331 days ago

by the Editors
The Jacobina staff researched and compiled documents from the 1990s about Joe Biden published by the Clinton Presidential library. They give insight into Biden and Clinton's relationship on healthcare and what government relationships are like more broadly.
1331 days ago

by Chris Maisano
In his review of two new books, "Break It Up: Secession, Division, and the Secret History of America's Imperfect Union" by Richard Kreitner and "Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How To Restore Our Nation" by David French, Maisano contemplates opposing viewpoints on breaking up or keeping the union. The interesting twist is the argument for rupture comes from the Left, and the argument for union comes from the Right.
1334 days ago

by Daniel Bessner
In his review of Barack Obama' memoir "A Promised Land", Bessner critiques Obama's centrist approach to politics. He focuses on establishment politics and the military.
1334 days ago

by The Center for Working-Class Politics
This article compiles and displays data from the 2020 presidential election indicating that the Democratic Party is slowly moving away from its working-class base. Findings are summarized under three key takeaways: the Biden coalition depended on affluent, white suburban voters, working-class voters shifted to the right across all racial groups, and although turnout was up across the board, it was weakest in working-class black areas.
1337 days ago

by Meagan Day
In South Texas, a number of majority Latino towns have been moving away from the Democratic Party. A large percentage of this change is simply people who didn't vote, even as turnout increased in other parts of the nation. Day believes this boils down to two factors: indifference and defiance. People either don't feel represented any longer or they believe the party is actively working against their interests.
1339 days ago

by Chris Maisano
In 2015, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) was mostly irrelevant, if not simply unknown to Americans. The Bernie Sanders movement brought democratic socialism back into the national spotlight, and has pushed many liberals and progressives to see what true Leftists policies are, and how the population responds meaningful to them. The Left matters again and can be very influential coming out of the pandemic crisis and building a better America in the upcoming years.
1339 days ago

by Jonathan Steele
Although Steele makes it clear that the "United States today isn't on the verge of a Soviet style disintegration," he does attempt to draw parallels between the decline of the Soviet Union and issues that America faces at this moment. The article is more of a quick overview of history taken through a modern lens, but it does provide a cautionary tale for pitfalls we must avoid.
1372 days ago

by Nicole Aschoff
On the Left, there is often a rhetoric of talking about America as if it's falling apart and we are in a tailspin towards destruction. Aschoff argues that we should change this view, American Capitalism is working how it's designed to, and we should frame issues as improvements and changes towards a new age rather than ultimatums on the life and death of our country.
1372 days ago

by Philip Rocco
The COVID-19 pandemic has shook up what many of us had though about Federalism and the powers granted to States. On one hand, a well-executed federal response would have been the most powerful action to fight the spread of the virus. On the other hand, because the federal government was horribly inept, the States had the power and authority to battle the disease. Philip Rocco reviews a new book by Daniel Allen, "The Divided States of America: Why Federalism Doesn't Work" which tackles these difficult questions.
1374 days ago

by Editors
The Obama Administration presented an $8 billion proposal for a high-speed rail system as one of its flagship policies. It was torn apart in Congress and by State governments who wanted to get rid of their railroads. In this article, the Jacobin Editors have reprinted the initial proposal sent to Congress with an introduction and footnotes to help put it all into perspective.
1375 days ago

by Ezra Klein interviewed by Bhaskar Sunkara
Sunkara, the editor of "Jacobin", interviews Klein about her book, "Why We're Polarized", and why the American political system seems to be growing more and more dysfunctional. Klein believes it's because we have shifted from two large parties with diverse, inner coalitions to two parties that are becoming increasingly homogenous. Our institutions were founded on the need for compromise; but politics is becoming more divisive and civic-mindedness less common. How can we fix this?
1404 days ago

by Seth Ackerman
Ackerman suggests the government that much of the populace perceives as being dysfunctional is actually working much more like the founders imagined than we may think. He argues that the aristocratic intentions of James Madison and other Framers of the constitution curbed popular power coming out of the Revolution by founding a bicameral legislature and an executive veto. He suggests that the American experiment may have turned into a recipe for state failure.
1404 days ago