Transformative Strategies

Yearbook

    Klasse, Partei und die Herausforderung der Transformation des Staates
  • Für alle Parteien, die einen grundlegenden gesellschaftlichen Wandel anstrebten – sei es in Form einer gewaltsamen Revolution, sei es in Form von schrittweisen Reformen –, stand noch im Jahr 1917 fest, dass dies die Konsequenz hatte, den Kapitalismus zu überwinden. Bereits ein halbes Jahrhundert...
    The Consequences of Climate Change for Left Strategy – A Roundtable
  • In periods of crisis socio-ecological questions are repeatedly pushed to the margins. Apart from the Greens, left parties have difficulty in creating systematic connections between economic, social, and ecological questions and in formulating political projects – reason enough for the editors of...
    Ways Out of Secular Stagnation?
  • In its Fall 2016 prognosis for the capitalist economy, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has notably scaled back its growth prediction for the USA. Sluggish investments – possibly also due to insecurity over the country’s future political leadership – have slowed growth by 1.6% for the coming...
    Time of Alternatives: The Left 100 Years After the October Revolution
  • The undermining of commodity production began one hundred years ago with a qualitative leap in the manipulation of market and consumption by corporations. No anti-cartel legislation can touch the market power of the largest capitals. Today the market does not primarily stimulate effectiveness but...
    Twofold Transformation: Strategic Challenges for the Left
  • The origins of transformation: The Great French Revolution and the Declaration of Human and Civil Rights All of us, whether we are we are politically on the left or the right, act in the light cast by the Great French Revolution of 1789. All concepts we employ the world over, including those of...
    An Alternative European Industrial Policy?
  • The need for an ‘industrial renaissance’ seems now to be the object of a fairly broad consensus. Although for a long time industry was considered part of an outdated heritage, industrial jobs are now seen as a crucial factor conditioning the number of jobs, skilled and less skilled, in the service...
    Euro-Exit to the Left?
  • It is a well-known fact that the German right is divided over its attitude to the Euro. In the parliamentary elections of September 2013, a party of so-called ‘Euro-sceptics’ almost reached the 5 % threshold for entering parliament.
    An Industrial Policy for Europe
  • A new departure for industrial policy in Europe is needed for five major reasons. The first is rooted in macroeconomics; exiting the current depression requires a substantial increase in demand, which could come from a Europe-wide public investment plan.
    What SYRIZA Will Propose to Europe
  • Europe is presently threatened by a dangerous social and political time bomb rooted deep in its foundations – a time bomb which we can and must defuse.
    Some Strategic Reflections on How to Change Europe
  • The May 2014 European elections require us to state publicly and clearly how we would like the European Union to change. Euro-scepticism and declining popular support for the EU may have antagonistic political consequences: A simple rejection of the EU without offering political alternatives has the risk of leaving the field open to the extreme right, which is exploiting the wave of discontent and is today running before the wind.
    Left Actors and the European Social Model
  • In June, the European Commission opened the pilot phase of the upcoming European Political Foundations by issuing a public call for projects which have to be submitted to the Commission by September. Responding to the call of the E.C., Transform! and the European Left Party (EL) will submit a...
    A Social Europe or No Europe
  • ”The ‘European social model‘ is still in its infancy. The European left could make this its hallmark, its joint project if only it has the will.“ (Michael Krätke) 1. Two main propositions are presented here. First: A modern left has a great political opportunity – but only if it meets a number of...
    What are we Arguing?
  • The purpose of left politics is to encourage and convince people to work together in solidarity for their interests and for those of the underprivileged. Left politics tries democratically to reduce and solve political, social, ecological and global problems and improve citizens’ living conditions,...
    Solidarity Within the European Left
  • Paris in autumn 2007: The global economic and financial crisis continues to advance. The members of the Left Group of the European Parliament (GUE/NGL), in Paris for study days on the occasion of French EU-Presidency, are tensely listening to the scenarios one of Sarkozy’s advisors is laying out.
    Europe: Existential Danger – New Political Challenges
  • In Europe we are at a new stage of class confrontation. Despite the systemic crisis not only of finance but of the whole of the mode of accumulation and reproduction of “financial market capitalism”, this system has been able to maintain itself.
    France: The Left Front – The Challenge of a True Popular Dynamism
  • As everyone knows, in the 2005 referendum the French people rejected the European Constitutional Treaty. What had enabled this success was that, for the first time, forces opposed to neoliberalism worked together and created a really dynamic popular debate and exchange of ideas, a deep-rooted...
    The Crisis of Europe: Elements of a Political Strategy
  • At the time of this writing, Europe is becoming increasingly unstable and no one can predict the scenario of the coming weeks. It is safe to predict that we are heading for a series of tragedies. The great crisis that we are experiencing is the result of nearly forty years of neoliberal offensives...
    Right-Wing Populism in Europe
  • In many discussions the increase of extreme right-wing and right-wing populist parties in a growing number of European countries is regarded as if it were only a matter of parallel individual national phenomena. But there is also a European dimension that is unfortunately rarely considered, one that...
    The European Union and the Dilemmas of the Radical Left
  • “... the task  arises is not merely to criticize the policy of the ruling classes [...] from the standpoint of the existing society itself, but also to contrast existing society as its every move with the socialist ideal of society [...]” - Rosa Luxemburg, Social Democracy and Parliamentarism (1904)...
    Against the “Pact for the Euro” - Interview with Pierre Laurent
  • Europe is particularly shaken by the crisis. Faced with the explosion of public debt, the response adopted is not to remedy the causes of the crisis but to subject the populations to a super-austerity cure. A new European measure is attempting to “homogenise” the different national policies and the...
    Challenges for Dilma Rousseff and the Role of the Left in Brazil
  • Any analysis of the political situation in Brazil cannot ignore the significance of the victory of the forces of the left and of progressives when Dilma Rousseff was elected to the presidency of the Republic in October 2010. It was an important victory because, for the first time, a woman is...
    The US and the European Social Forum: Strategic Challenges for the WSF
  • No World Social Forum will be held in 2010. Instead, about 40 events are taking place all over the world in order to broaden the alterglobalist movement, to reflect on the crisis – whether it is called economic and social or “civilisational” – and in order to prepare for the WSF in February 2011 in...
    Employment in the Centre
  • Interview with Miguel Portas, Portuguese Member of the European Parliament, Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc), regarding the Pervenche Berès report on the financial, economic and social crisis. What does the GUE/NGL Group think of the Pervenche Berès report on the financial, economic and social...
    A Dearth of Organisational Wisdom Leaves Us Political Orphans
  • The renaissance of Marxism will occur on the soil of “the globally networked brave new world of transnational high-tech capitalism”, and “as analysis, critique, alternative praxis and resistance, … Marxism as a movement will reinvent itself. What we can do, and therefore must do, is to place on the...
    Regional Integration as an Alternative Strategy?
  • The Social Forum on Regional Integration From July 21 to 24 a social forum on regional integration took place at Asunción, the capital of Paraguay. It addressed the possibilities of struggling against the free trade policies imposed on Latin American, African and South Asian countries by the...

Focus

    Unconditional Basic Income. To Each According to Her or His Basic Needs
  • Basic income is not just one financial measure among many but a social, economic and civic financial amount which has a far-reaching multiplier effect in many areas of life. Basic income is a profound civilizational change on par with the introduction of universal suffrage or universal health care. Read an analysis of its key aspects.
    TWT 2019: The Left in the UK Aims for Transformation!
  • Supported by transform! europe once again, the fourth edition of The World Transformed (TWT), the most well-known and well-attended left-wing political festival in the UK, raised some very important questions for the left, acting as an example in terms of the methods applied. A report by Haris Golemis and Angelina Giannopoulou.
    "The Laugh of the Medusa: The Left in Europe"
  • High quality debates among people from different starting points aiming to find a common ground for a Europe of the people. A seminar that tried not to give definitive answers, but to pose at least the right questions.
    Democratizing the Police in Europe
  • The discussion paper “Democratizing the Police in Europe” – with a particular emphasis on Greece –, has been comissioned in the frame of the transform! Left Strategy project in cooperation with Nicos Poulantzas Institute and Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. It deals with the varieties of police organizational models, the relations of police and democracy in times of crisis, and explores possible left responses in the organizing of police. Download the publication here for free.
    Euro-Exit to the Left?
  • It is a well-known fact that the German right is divided over its attitude to the Euro. In the parliamentary elections of September 2013, a party of so-called ‘Euro-sceptics’ almost reached the 5 % threshold for entering parliament.

Blog

    The Case for a National Development Bank: The Main Issues
  • The role of National Development Banks (NDBs) has been rising worldwide since the financial crisis, the global supply chain crisis, and among growing geo-political tensions. Unlike EU member states, NDBs in the European Union aren't subjected to Maastricht austerity criteria and may thus offer a major tool for the transformational policies we need.
    Who Votes for the Left and Why? In Search of Our Identity
  • Check out our new eDossier with selected contributions from last year's annual Strategy Seminar organised by transform! europe and the Rosa-Luxemburg-Foundation, which took place in Paris in November 2022 and focused on the sociology of the left vote and various conglomerates of the radical left.
    After Neoliberalism… What?
  • Neoliberalism is dying, with the radical left and the far-right as only contenders to bring about another system, says Alternative Nobel Prize winner, sociology professor Walden Bello at the recent climate conference on the context of climate emergency and the crisis of neoliberalism.
    'The Art of Changing Capitalism' – A Transformational Polemic
  • When the left thinks about alternatives they usually envision struggles. Already Marx and Engels understood the history of all societies up to then as 'the history of class struggles'. Wolfgang Kessler, chief editor for more than twenty years of the Publik-Forum – a left-oriented Catholic journal – shows that these struggles also require an art.
    Unconditional Basic Income as an Emancipatory Path Out of Capitalism
  • Unconditional Basic Income, formerly derided as a utopia, is increasingly stimulating public interest as a necessary alternative. For some it is a cure-all, for others the last outgrowth of neoliberalism, for increasingly more people it appears to be a milestone on the pathway out of capitalist wage-labour society and towards a solidary society.
    Why it’s Worth Fighting for the Collective Movement
  • A new attempt from the left to challenge the neo-liberal ‘more-of-the-same’ status quo has emerged from the socio-political Left – the collective #aufstehen movement. There are many very valid reasons to stay away from it. Consider the words of poet Erich Fried: “Because I do not wish/ to get my...
    Join the Change Finance coalition! With actions on the 15th September
  • On September 15th, it will be 10 years since the financial crash when US investment bank Lehman Brothers collapsed - a moment in a chain of events that threatened to destroy our economies and create social chaos. Since global leaders failed to break the status quo, we are now at risk of a more dangerous collapse. See our vision for a change!
    Appropriating Europe as a Common
  • The political crisis, which, 60 years after the signing of the Treaty of Rome, haunts Europe, is heavy and resists any easy interpretation.- Speech at the event ‘A Europe for the People and by the People’ at the Rome University during the mobilisations on occasion of the Rome Treaty celebrations.
    Ecosocialism, Climate Change and Left Politics
  • Climate change is the most serious and acute threat currently faced by humanity. What is the left approach to the issue? Different aspects of ecosocialism were discussed in the international seminar “The Climate Change and Left Politics”, hold in Helsinki on 24 October. The seminar also functioned as a publication event of the book “The Politics of Ecosocialism – Transforming welfare”.
    Promoting the social commons
  • Sustaining the planet, preparing the future, building another world … this daunting task for current generations is also a promising manifestation of care for the future of humankind and of nature.
    Coping with the Challenge Posed by the Crisis
  • I will try to tackle the issue of the need for an enhanced cooperation between social movements and political actors for a progressive way out of the crisis in Europe, starting from the national level. This choice is based on the belief, which was cemented by the developments in Greece during the...
    Social-ecological Reconstruction as a Challenge for Left/Socialist Politics
  • We are concerned with societal changes which improve people’s conditions of life. “People’s conditions of life” always involve the integrity of people, their individual freedom and possible influence on social developments, their social relations and social security and their natural environment....

Publication

    The European Left in the 20s. Is there a strategy?
  • This eDossier provides the contributions of the speakers and the participants of the latest Strategic Seminar. Hosted by transform! europe together with the Rosa-Luxemburg-Foundation, the annual event aims to serve as a space of timely debates for the left in Europe. In Addition, find here the sessions' recordings.
    Democratizing the Police in Europe
  • The discussion paper “Democratizing the Police in Europe” – with a particular emphasis on Greece –, has been comissioned in the frame of the transform! Left Strategy project in cooperation with Nicos Poulantzas Institute and Rosa Luxemburg Foundation. It deals with the varieties of police organizational models, the relations of police and democracy in times of crisis, and explores possible left responses in the organizing of police. Download the publication here for free.
    Left Industrial Policy / Productive Transformation For Europe
  • This is the first report of the new project dedicated to a Left Industrial Policy / Productive Transformation for Europe. It aims at presenting the preliminary results of the work undertaken by a Transform! interdisciplinary Working Group composed of economists, trade unionists and historians – as well as its cooperation with relevant actors of the political Left towards a progressive EU-wide industrial and investment policy contributing to the social, ecological and democratic transformation of Europe.
    From Industrial Policy to a European Productive Reconstruction
  • The discussion of a productive reconstruction of Europe’s economy goes beyond the development of a European industrial policy. It embraces also the relationship with the environmental challenge and the re-invention of democratic forms of workers’ participation in the development of their craft and companies. At any rate it is substantial for finding an exit of the lingering crisis of European integration.

Calendar

    2023 Global Climate Jobs
  • As one of the supporters, transform! europe invites you to join the 2023 Global Climate Jobs Conference in Amsterdam from 6 to 8 October, when climate, social and labour movements and activists will come together to organise and build social power for radically progressive policies that stop climate change!
    5th International Ecosocialist Encounters
  • This conference will tackle fundamental questions of how, by whom, and to what end ecosocialist initiatives positions can and should be buttressed to be able to stand a chance in the face of today's historical tasks. Join us!

Webinars

    How Are the Modes of Politicisation Structured?
  • The collective "L'Exigence démocratique" invites you to a webinar with Giuseppe Cugnata on Wednesday 22nd March. The aim of this event is to examine how politicisation of the Left is structured by certain social characteristics.