Video

It’s the festive season, and the Spectre of Communism podcast welcomed Alan Woods (marxist.com editor-in-chief) onto a special live episode to discuss the origins of Christianity from a Marxist perspective. This is a fascinating story of revolution and counter-revolution in the ancient world. The recording is now available on all platforms!

The International Marxist University 2022 was four days of online discussion dedicated to understanding the fundamental principles of Marxism, hosted by the International Marxist Tendency on 23-26 July. The event was a tremendous success, with over 7,000 registering. If you weren't able to attend, or want to relive your favourite moments, we've included videos of all the sessions below, the videos have been edited to remove the pauses for translation. Edited audio files are also provided.

In the Spanish State, 12 October is celebrated as the ‘National Day of Spain’, commemorating the ‘discovery’ of the Americas by Christopher Columbus in 1492. But what is there to celebrate? The Spanish conquistadors, driven by an appetite for gold, subjected countless people to bloody subjugation, extinguishing entire civilisations in just a few years. This session from our International Marxist University this summer tells the real story of the conquest of the Americas.

Between 24-26 June, 80 comrades from across Britain took part in the Marxist Student Federation’s first ever residential Marxist summer school. The inspiring school, set in the idyllic hills of the Peak District, was themed on the life and ideas of Lenin. Now, all four talks from the school are available online.

In 2001 US President George W Bush sent American troops into Afghanistan, and soon afterwards the Taliban regime fell. This was followed by years of fighting, in which hundreds of thousands of people were killed. After twenty years of fighting, the Taliban are now back in power.

The Supreme Court’s position on Roe v. Wade would ban abortion access for millions of people in the US. In this podcast episode, Laura Brown (editor of Socialist Revolution) and Joel Bergman (editor of Fightback) discuss the reasons and impact of a repeal of Roe v. Wade, and provide a Marxist perspective to fight back against this egregious attack on abortion rights.

The final round of the French presidential elections will be held on Sunday 24 April. The French electorate will be called upon to chose between Emmanuel Macron or Marine Le Pen – two sides of the same pro-boss, viciously anti-worker and reactionary capitalist coin! While the so-called leaders of the French left and trade union bureaucrats have capitulated to bourgeois pressure, calling for workers and youth to form a ‘Republican Front’ behind Macron to beat Le Pen, we say: neither one, nor the other!

Postmodernism is a counter-revolutionary tendency in ‘philosophy’ (if we are to dignify it with the term). While it presents itself as radical, in fact it represents a pessimistic attack on progress, objective truth and science in general – and the revolutionary ideas of Marxism in particular. We have to combat these reactionary ideas, which exert a powerful influence in academia, and even parts of the labour movement.

V. I. Lenin was one of the greatest revolutionaries to have ever lived. His life’s work and his ideas represent a brilliant application of the Marxist method. On the firm foundation of Marxist theory, Lenin built the Bolshevik Party, which in 1917 was able to lead the working class to the seizure of power in Russia – the first time that the working class anywhere had seized power on the scale of an entire nation. In this talk from Revolution Festival 2021, editor of Socialist Appeal, Rob Sewell, discusses his remarkable legacy, which any serious fighter for socialism today must undertake to carefully study.

As capitalism traverses its death agony, the world is experiencing turmoil: from the war in Ukraine, to the unresolved pandemic, to runaway inflation and the threat of a new recession triggered by the war. In the following talk, delivered at the recently held national conference of Socialist Appeal, the British section of the International Marxist Tendency, Fred Weston explains the fundamental driving factors of this crisis, how it is making life unbearable for millions of working people, how it is transforming consciousness, and how it is preparing the ground for an era of revolutionary upheaval.

One of capitalism's oldest myths is that of the efficiency of the so-called 'free-market' and its superiority to a socialist planned economy. Defending economic planning, in this talk from the 2021 Revolution Festival, Adam Booth responds to the libertarian ideas of the Austrian School of economics, whose 'theories' amount to vitriolic support of the unrestricted rule of capital at the expense of the needs of society.

Dialectical materialism is the philosophy of Marxism. It is our method for understanding nature, history and society. This nine-episode podcast series, ‘The ABCs of Marxist philosophy’, will provide listeners with a valuable introduction to the basics of dialectical materialism, explaining all its aspects in a clear and accessible way.

It has now been two weeks since the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Since then, the hypocritical Western imperialists and their lackeys in the media have been pouring forth endless denunciations of Russia's actions.

The Ukraine crisis has confirmed the dictum that "the truth is the first victim of war". In this talk given to British Marxists on Tuesday 1 March, Jorge Martín of the International Marxist Tendency cuts across the lies and war propaganda. He explains the real causes of this war, its background, the imperialist ambitions of both Russia and the West, and the hypocrisy of western imperialism throughout the course of this conflict.

We’re often told that the British monarchy is little more than harmless pompery, the equivalent of a shiny ornament atop the solid Christmas tree of British democracy. It is there to look nice, but does not actually affect how the country is run. And after all, isn’t the Queen a lovely lady who works mightily hard?