Lefteast
LeftEast reprints this piece from the Turkish gender, art, and politics platform 5Harfliler.com. In one of the first days of the ongoing invasion of Russia in Ukraine, the Russian troops burnt down the historical museum in Ivankiv, a town near Kyiv. The museum holdings included a collection of early-medieval archeological artifacts, rare Polissia (North Ukrainian […]
Russia’s political capitalists waged war in order to survive as a class, to continue accumulating wealth through the exploitation of the state – says Volodymyr Ishchenko, a research associate at the Institute of East European Studies, Freie Universität Berlin. – However, this war, depending on what happens on the battlefield, may equally bring about a fall or a radical transformation of the whole post-Soviet order. Interview by Małgorzata Kulbaczewska-Figat.
Tens of thousands of workers are currently employed in factories in the Baia Mare area. Most factories are greenfield projects, while old industrial sites in Baia Mare have been abandoned. Most employees working in furniture, mattresses, clothing and footwear producing factories receive a minimum wage for full-time work. The young and “disciplined” employees manage to supplement their minimum wage by working overtime or doing additional shifts, depending on the employer’s needs. Some resort to seasonal work abroad in order to ensure their families’ survival. The factories in question are a precarious link within the capitalist circuit, operating as outsourced factories for large Western companies – the largest by production volume and number of employees being Ikea. The experience of managers and workers in these factories shows how factories and employees alike are in an extremely vulnerable and volatile position. Their bargaining power is minimal, while constant concessions are essential for survival.
Note from LeftEast editors: The following piece was first published on the Global Social Change Blog. We reprint it with permission. Below please find an incriminated paragraph from Orbán’s rambling, recent speech, given before a couple hundred, predominantly middle-“class”, middle-aged fans at an open-air right-wing political festival in northern Romania. The speech has been widely […]
Note from LeftEast editors: This article by Svetlana Subašić was originally published on July 26, 2022 by Mašina. We publish its translation by Anastazija Govedarica Antanasijević as part of a cooperation among Eastern European leftist media platforms in ELMO (Eastern European Left Media Outlet). For more additional on the Waterfront project in Belgrade, listen to this podcast. […]
Note from LeftEast editors: In marking the Roma Holocaust Memorial Day in Europe on August 2, we reprint this article on anti-Roma racism in Europe and the struggles for the collective unification and liberation of Roma. The article first appeared on Roarmag.Org, and is shared here with permission. We also link a recent podcast with […]
Note from LeftEast editors. This article was originally published in Czech language on June 2, 2022, on Alarm. We publish it as part of a cooperation among Eastern European leftist media platforms in ELMO (Eastern European Left Media Outlet). Interview with political economist, expert on China and author of the award-winning book about debates in 1980s when the […]
Note from LeftEast editors. This article was originally published on June 2, 2022, on Alarm.cz . We publish it as part of a cooperation among Eastern European leftist media platforms in ELMO (Eastern European Left Media Outlet). We talked with Albanian writer and academic Lea Ypi about her award-winning memoir, where she describes growing up in one of […]
Editorial note: This article was originally published on the American University of Beirut Critical Development blog, in English and in Arabic. On March 28, 2022, foreign ministers from Israel, the US, Egypt, Bahrain, Morocco, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) met in Sde Boker – a place chosen for its symbolic value as the final […]
Editorial note: This text is a contribution to the Berliner Gazette’s “After Extractivism” text series, and was originally published in English on Mediapart; the German version is available on Berliner Gazette. You can find more contents on the English-language “After Extractivism” website. Have a look here: https://after-extractivism.berlinergazette.de In April 2022, the Bulgarian Ministry of Environment and Water […]