Michael Lwy - Böcker

The photographs collected in this unique book provide a startling visual documentation of seminal revolutionary events, from the Paris Commune of 1871 through to a series of “Unfinished Revolutions”, from May 1968 in France to the Zapatista uprsing in ther mid-1990s. The immediacy of the images tells the story of these struggles in a way that texts rarely can, with revolutions appearing as complex and messy events driven by the actions of real, breathing humans who make their own history. Commentary on the images is provided by leading historians Gilbert Achcar, Enzo Traverso, Janette Habel, and Pierre Rousset, and Michael Löwy. This edition includes a new afterword by the author.

In celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune, leftist writers Olivier Besancenot and Michael Löwy offer a deeply informed, and eminently enjoyable, imagined history of what might have been if Karl Marx and his eldest daughter, Jenny, had travelled to Paris during the heady weeks of April 1871. In disguise, employing imperfect but serviceable French, Karl and Jenny encounter and debate many important figures of the movement, including Leo Frankel, Eugène Varlin, Charles Longuet, Elisabeth Dmitrieff, and Louise Michel, eventually returning to England with a profoundly changed sense of political possibility.

In celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune, leftist writers Olivier Besancenot and Michael Löwy offer a deeply informed, and eminently enjoyable, imagined history of what might have been if Karl Marx and his eldest daughter, Jenny, had travelled to Paris during the heady weeks of April 1871. In disguise, employing imperfect but serviceable French, Karl and Jenny encounter and debate many important figures of the movement, including Leo Frankel, Eugène Varlin, Charles Longuet, Elisabeth Dmitrieff, and Louise Michel, eventually returning to England with a profoundly changed sense of political possibility.

Renowned Marxist scholar Michael Löwy offers an indispensable assessment of an enduringly fascinating revolutionary.Vibrant, insightful, and wide-ranging, Löwy’s essays illuminate the heroic, tough-minded idealist and martyr, Rosa Luxemburg. Active in the labor and socialist movements of Germany, Poland, and Russia, Luxemburg had international standing as an original and sharp-minded theorist during her life and remains one of the most admired and studied revolutionaries in the Marxist tradition.Löwy follows Luxemburg in blending diverse intellectual disciplines—philosophy, history, political science, sociology, anthropology, and economics—to make sense of global realities in her time and our own. Luxemburg’s creative intellectual endeavors were shaped by her genuine devotion to the free development of all people, and her fierce opposition to all forms of tyranny and authoritarianism. These commitments guided her analyses of exploitation and mass struggle, the dynamics of trade unions and of bureaucracy, the origins and impacts of economic crisis, the nature of war and imperialism, and the interconnections of reform and revolution.In accessible and stimulating prose, Löwy explores Luxemburg’s many political and theoretical contributions, as well as her links to revolutionaries including Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Antonio Gramsci, Georg Lukács, José Carlos Mariátegui, and Leon Trotsky. Through Löwy’s expansive engagement with Luxemburg‘s political trajectory and influence, we are able to see her wrestle with political problems that remain relevant today.

Renowned Marxist scholar Michael Löwy offers an indispensable assessment of an enduringly fascinating revolutionary.Vibrant, insightful, and wide-ranging, Löwy’s essays illuminate the heroic, tough-minded idealist and martyr, Rosa Luxemburg. Active in the labor and socialist movements of Germany, Poland, and Russia, Luxemburg had international standing as an original and sharp-minded theorist during her life and remains one of the most admired and studied revolutionaries in the Marxist tradition.Löwy follows Luxemburg in blending diverse intellectual disciplines—philosophy, history, political science, sociology, anthropology, and economics—to make sense of global realities in her time and our own. Luxemburg’s creative intellectual endeavors were shaped by her genuine devotion to the free development of all people, and her fierce opposition to all forms of tyranny and authoritarianism. These commitments guided her analyses of exploitation and mass struggle, the dynamics of trade unions and of bureaucracy, the origins and impacts of economic crisis, the nature of war and imperialism, and the interconnections of reform and revolution.In accessible and stimulating prose, Löwy explores Luxemburg’s many political and theoretical contributions, as well as her links to revolutionaries including Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, Antonio Gramsci, Georg Lukács, José Carlos Mariátegui, and Leon Trotsky. Through Löwy’s expansive engagement with Luxemburg‘s political trajectory and influence, we are able to see her wrestle with political problems that remain relevant today.

In this new edition of his acclaimed book, Michael Löwy argues that capitalism is killing the planet—and offers a competing vision of radical, ecosocialist transformation.For decades, Löwy has been a leading voice in the fight for ecosocialist transformation. As the climate crisis accelerates, his message has only become more urgent: capitalism is incompatible with a liveable planet.This expanded edition foregrounds Löwy’s canonical essays, while offering plenty of new material, from sharp critiques of environmentalist complicity to deep dives into Marxist texts. The past decade has only continued to expose the limits of “green capitalism,” with cap-and-trade agreements violated, electric cars dependent on energy from coal-burning power plants, and international agreements broken again and again. Real change requires a complete reorganization of our modes of production and consumption—a fundamental shift, rooted in democratic planning, toward a society where both human and planetary needs are valued.In Ecosocialism, Löwy offers an incisive critique of the destructive logic of capitalism, tracing the intimate link between the struggle against the commodification of the world and the defense of the environment. Moving between theory and practice, he looks to activists around the world, especially in Latin America, to push readers to dream bigger about what might become possible. Prescient, shrewd, and deeply hopeful, Ecosocialism is an indispensable introduction for people unsatisfied with mainstream “solutions” to climate change—and will also challenge committed environmentalists to deepen their analysis of the climate crisis.