Lefteast
The article originally appeared in Bulgarian in Dversia.Net and was republished as part of a cooperation between Eastern European leftist media platforms in ELMO (Eastern European Left Media Outlet). There is war once again, and the re-radicalised right in Bulgaria is using the war in Ukraine to establish its final hegemony. While the Russian invasion of […]
The following open letter to the Russian anti-war movement was sent today by over 275 anti-war activists in Israel. The LeftEast collective is glad to amplify this voice, which we hope will help spark a movement by Russian conscripts, reservists, and soldiers to refuse to serve in occupied Ukrainian territories. We take this opportunity reiterate […]
Do not let half-baked political positions substitute an analysis of the situation. The injunction that the main enemy is in your country should not translate into a flawed analysis of the inter-imperialist struggle. At this stage appeals to dismantle NATO or, conversely, accepting anyone there, will not help those who suffer under the bombs in Ukraine, in jails in Russia or Belarus. Sloganeering is harmful as ever. Branding Ukrainians or Russian fascists only makes you part of the problem, not part of the solution. A new autonomous reality emerges around Russia, a reality of destruction and harsh repressions, a reality where a nuclear conflict is not unthinkable anymore. Many of us have missed the tendencies leading to this reality. In the fog of war, we do not see clearly the contours of the new. Neither do, as it seems, the American or European governments.
Based on all this, the ongoing conflict is between
– a richer (and of course very considerably larger) Russia that turns its economic performance into life spans of its population with relatively low efficiency (sort of like a state afflicted with what I would call a quasi-resource-curse), and
– a poorer (and, obviously, less gigantic–although by no means “small”–) Ukraine whose Life Expectancy figures are considerably higher than those of Russia, reflecting a less terrible linkage structure turning the country’s moderate per capita GDP into life spans for its population.
Translated from the Russian original in Moskvichmag.ru. Editorial note: In the absence of meaningful sociological data, it is difficult to know what ordinary Russians think of their country’s war on Ukraine. (In pro-Kremlin media, of course, it is not a war but “a special operation,” “the defense of Donbas,” etc., and the accompanying imagery reflects […]
The members of LeftEast collective are aghast at the violent military aggression that has escalated into war in Ukraine. It threatens to cast our region into bloodshed of a scale that has not been seen in decades. We unequivocally condemn the Kremlin’s criminal invasion and call for the withdrawal of Russian troops back to the […]
It has been two years already since we started living in a deadly pandemic. Тwo years since the labor we do has been claimed essential while our lives remain disposable. […]
The question is how to transform our struggles into a collective transnational power, nurture political communication and create conditions for a common social strike. Inspired by the ongoing struggles, we declare our plan for a feminist reconstruction for 8M and beyond! 8M is an important moment to join forces transnationally on the following terrains of struggle
The U.S. and U.K. officials and media have long been warning against the “imminent” Russian invasion of Ukraine. Whatever the prospects of such an invasion are, it also raises an important question about the character of the Russian political regime and how the invasion may change it.
Throughout the fall of 2021, the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory (IFDT) of the University of Belgrade and the Housing Equality Movement have jointly organized a series of five reading workshops under the title “Housing Issue: the Economy of Housing Inequality”. The aim was to bring together those interested in contemporary housing issues and offer space and opportunity to read and analyze some of the most important texts enlightening the topic from the perspective of political economy. Sara Nikolić from the IFDT and Jovana Timotijević from the Housing Equality Movement, in an interview by Sonja Dragović from LeftEast, who also took part in the workshops, tell us more about this program and about critical engagement with the politics of housing in Serbia and beyond.
“In the Women’s Conference we are trying to get something which is new in the history of the world; we are trying to formulate a body of doctrine with regard to women’s problems seen through the eyes of the women themselves.”
[…]
Significantly, the emphasis on deep differences within Europe as well as the greater visibility of participants from countries not belonging to the Western and Central European (social democratic) core visibly shaped the final stances adopted at the 1931 Conference.