In 1934, Sutnar repeated his feat at the 3rd Workers’ Olympiad, collaborating again with the creator of the theme, Karel Loersch, and director Vojta Novák. The script on “liberated labor,” inspired by hopes for a socialist future, was influenced by the Great Depression of the 1930’s. The design is striking—darkly dressed masses of “workers,” masses of “engineers” in white and an iron army of robots reel around the key symbol of mechanized industry: a huge press. When economic depression causes workers to lose their jobs, they turn to the machines attacking them as enemies. The capitalists flee from the factories and the press then addresses the rebelling masses, telling them in a human voice that it is a laborer, just like them. A new era opens, with machines and people joined in labor for the good of the whole society. Ladislav Sutnar, Design in Action

Jacobin's Summer 2015 issue celebrates and commemorates the 150th anniversary of the Union victory and Emancipation with interviews, essays, and more.

“It took several hundred years for feudalism to be finally wiped out and capitalism to emerge as the new dominant mode of production and it will take several hundred years for capitalism to be finally wiped out before socialism becomes the new dominant mode.” —Maurice Bishop

Featuring over 170 pages on what kind of political party we need and why we don't have one yet, this is a hefty one.

Nixon’s real crimes are not the petty ones of bribery and corruption which his fellow capitalists so hypocritically accuse him of. Our movement to dump Nixon must expose his real crimes against the people of Indochina, the Arab peoples and the people of Chile as well as the working and oppressed people here in the U.S. While these are not on Time Magazine’s or Senator Kennedy’s list of Nixon’s crimes, they must be added to our indictment of the Nixon government and the imperialist interests which he represents. —“Dump Nixon! Stop the Fascist Tide!” The Call, Vol. 2, No. 3, December 1973

Bolívar prophesied shrewdly that the United States seemed fated by Providence to plague America with woes in the name of liberty. General Motors or IBM will not step graciously into our shoes and raise the old banners of unity and emancipation which fell in battle; nor can heroes betrayed yesterday be redeemed by the traitors of today. It is a big load of rottenness that has to be sent to the bottom of the sea on the march to Latin America’s reconstruction. The task lies in the hands of the dispossessed, the humiliated, the accursed. The Latin American cause is about all a social cause: the rebirth of Latin America must start with the overthrow of its masters, country by country. We are entering times of rebellion and change. There are those who believe that destiny rests on the knees of the gods; but the truth is that it confronts the conscience of man with a burning challenge. — Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America (1971)

What should we make of the October Revolution and the legacy of state socialism in the 20th century?

PARTY LINES MEAGAN DAY We Won’t Forget the Questions Bernie Asked What will decide the fate of neoliberalism today is not the extent of the economic damage the virus wreaks—it is the extent to which the virus transforms popular expectations. Illustration by Daniel Haskett THE SOAPBOX Letters & Internet Speaks Send us your deepest thoughts—we’ll try to publish them. STRUGGLE SESSION BRIAHNA JOY GRAY, ARI RABIN-HAVT, DAVID SIROTA, AND JEFF WEAVER The Oral History of the Bernie Campaign Four key figures in Bernie Sanders’s quest for the White House on what really happened. MEANS OF DEDUCTION Numbers Don’t Lie VULGAR EMPIRICIST The Social Democracy Index We looked at the best polling from the 2020 primary season. Turns out, you can spot a Bernie Sanders supporter not just by their age, but by their support for social-democratic policies. UNEVEN & COMBINED How We Lost Michigan In 2016, Bernie won a major upset in Michigan, thanks in part to a groundswell of support in the state’s rural areas. In 2020, he lost every county in the state—and the numbers show he lost many of his rural supporters, too. READING MATERIEL Take a Look, It’s in a Book CANON FODDER ANTON JÄGER & DOMINIK LEUSDER The Prophet of Inequality Whatever its shortcomings, Thomas Piketty’s latest book, Capital and Ideology, is a serious attempt to map our social world without resorting to easy abstractions. FIELD NOTES The Enemy Within Leaked messages from Labour Party staff littered with casual racism and sexism show that they worked against Jeremy Corbyn and wanted to keep the Tories in power. CANON FODDER HANNAH PROCTOR Reading Victor Serge from the Depths of Defeat Despite isolation, political defeat, and incalculable grief, the Russian revolutionary Victor Serge persisted in writing in collective rather than personal terms. Bernie Sanders’s Five-Year War FEATURE MATT KARP How he lost and where we go from here. The Two Paths of Democratic Socialism: Coalition and Confrontation FEATURE JARED ABBOTT After Bernie Sanders, democratic socialists in America face a vital strategic dilemma. Do we go the Justice Democrats route of winning gains by being the junior partner in a progressive coalition, or do we take a gamble on more independent class organization and struggle? How the Labour Party Lost the Chance of a Lifetime FEATURE RONAN BURTENSHAW Corbynism had a popular program—but not the popular insurgency it needed to fight for it. Illustration by Harry Haysom CULTURAL CAPITAL Capitalist Realism BASS & SUPERSTRUCTURE ALEX NIVEN Don’t Look Back in Anger Britpop is often dismissed as an embarrassing, retrograde moment in British culture. But at its best, it hinted at what might have happened if the working class had managed to regain its sense of power and pride after the defeats of the 1980s. WAYS OF SEEING PHOEBE BRAITHWAITE Mark Fisher’s Popular Modernism It’s been three years since we lost Mark Fisher, but his vision of a socialist future endures. BEYOND A BOUNDARY DANIEL FINN Where Have All the Political Footballers Gone? “Football gives meaning to life, yes. But life also gives meaning to football.” Illustration by Charlie Le Maignan THE TUMBREL Still Roasting Liberals GIRONDINS DAVID SIROTA Did Americans Want a Political Revolution? Joe Biden told us there was an easy path. Reality will soon catch up to that fantasy. WORST ESTATE DAVID BRODER We Don’t Live in Weimar Germany Liberals say that socialists who don’t support Joe Biden are “like the German Communists who refused to fight Hitler.” The analogy doesn’t hold up—and it’s also historically illiterate. LEFTOVERS The Struggle Continues POPULAR FRONT MARILYN ARWOOD We Knocked on a Million Doors for 45,000 Votes I helped organize Bernie Sanders’s canvassing efforts in Iowa, and I learned that we can knock on as many doors as we want, but to make lasting change, we need to think beyond election day. POPULAR FRONT CEDRIC JOHNSON Let’s Talk About South Carolina Bernie Sanders didn’t lose because of the “black vote,” but winning places like South Carolina is crucial to building a left majority. MEANS & ENDS SETH ACKERMAN The Victory to Come Bernie critics seem to think they dodged a bullet. They haven’t—the bullet is still on its way.

PARTY LINES SETH ACKERMAN Failure Is an Option Haunted by the specter of democracy, the Constitution’s framers blundered into a historic miscalculation. We’re still living with the consequences. THE SOAPBOX Down and Out in Pittsburgh and Las Vegas A slice of life from a country in crisis. STRUGGLE SESSION EZRA KLEIN INTERVIEWED BY BHASKAR SUNKARA Don’t Blame Polarization A discussion on American partisanship, political dysfunction, and why it’s not our passions that are the problem—it’s the Constitution itself. FRIENDS & FOES DANIEL BESSNER The General Who Brought Down the American Empire In 2002, the Pentagon staged a $250 million war game known as the “Millennium Challenge.” It was supposed to be a fixed fight—until a retired Marine lieutenant general, playing the role of a Middle Eastern country, brought the US military to its knees. MEANS OF DEDUCTION Data Collection VULGAR EMPIRICIST America the Laggard By virtually any measure, people in the United States are worse off than those in other rich countries. There’s no disputing the impact of our weak entitlements and paltry labor protections. TRANSITIONS The Great Divergence It used to be better to be a low-wage worker in the United States than in France. That hasn’t been the case for a long while. UNEVEN & COMBINED Mapping the Decline How the neoliberal project’s very own fifty-state strategy left poverty and low wages in its wake. READING MATERIEL Peer Review FIELD NOTES America’s Railroad to Nowhere We know the US rail network is no match for trains in France or Japan. But Barack Obama’s plan for high-speed rail couldn’t even match that of Morocco or Uzbekistan. CANON FODDER PHILIP ROCCO Ending Federalism as We Know It A new book shows how the fragmented American state arrests democracy. What we need is nothing short of a reconstruction. CANON FODDER LUKE SAVAGE A Very British Dystopia A Very British Coup embraced the intrigues of class war, but its sequel falls prey to the mundanities of culture war. Illustration by Joe O’Donnell The New American Exceptionalism FEATURE RICHARD LACHMANN Effective states can enforce discipline on elites. The United States is not one of them. Illustration by Mark Pernice American Capitalism Is Working—That’s the Problem FEATURE NICOLE ASCHOFF The United States is not a failed state—just ask any American capitalist. But we desperately need something better for everyone else. Where’s Our Gorbachev? FEATURE JONATHAN STEELE The United States today isn’t on the verge of a Soviet-style disintegration—but neither is there any force at the top willing and able to reform our political system. Message in a Bottle FEATURE MEAGAN DAY In the United States of 2020, millions are desperate for help, and they’re forced to compete for scraps from Twitter philanthropists. CULTURAL CAPITAL Emergency Eye-Wash Station RED CHANNELS EILEEN JONES John Carpenter, Apocalyptic Filmmaker John Carpenter’s movies provide visions of societies falling apart. No wonder his work is resonating now more than ever. WAYS OF SEEING BEN DAVIS The Collision of Self-Importance and Despair In the United States today, as in 1990s Russia, for a lot of intellectuals, total nihilism seems more plausible than hope for even modest reform. WAYS OF SEEING OWEN HATHERLEY From Your House to Our House America’s experiment with public housing was far less successful than Europe’s—but this hasn’t made it any less influential. THE TUMBREL Lighting the Bunsen Burner Illustration by Daniel Zender GIRONDINS ABI WILKINSON On Being a Mother in America Within ten days of giving birth, a quarter of us are forced to return to work. If liberals truly want to support parents’ choices, they need to back the subsidies and employment legislation that are vital to child-rearing. THERMIDOR BRANKO MARCETIC Stories for the End of the World From the mutant animals of Chernobyl and Marie Antoinette’s perverted orgies, to QAnon and Russiagate, conspiracy theories flourish in times of crisis and collapse of political legitimacy. LEFTOVERS Mouse #4 Has Died POPULAR FRONT PETER FRASE Blue Order In an increasingly unstable country, what if a “deep police state” threatens to undermine our electoral gains? DUSTBIN MATT KARP How Abraham Lincoln Fought the Supreme Court It is not enough to question the decisions, the justices, or even the structure of the current court—we need to challenge, as Abraham Lincoln did, the foundation of its power to determine the law. DUSTBIN AMBER A’LEE FROST Socialists Should Be Republicans The first generation of the GOP tried—and failed—to build a modern republic. Socialists today won’t get very far unless we finish their work. PROLETOCCULT DONALD HUGHES Your Quarterly Horoscope Real left strategy isn’t found in socialist magazines. It’s found in the stars. Illustration by Pete Gamlen MEANS AND ENDS VIVEK CHIBBER Celebrating Ten Years of Jacobin And our decades to come.

Party Lines Chris Maisano A Left That Matters Our still small but growing socialist movement now has a chance to make a real impact. The Soapbox Letters + Internet Speaks Our inbox at letters@jacobinmag.com is open to your effusive praise or ruthless criticism. Friends & Foes Meagan Day The Indifferent and the Defiant Battered by poverty and coronavirus, South Texas should have been deep blue turf for Joe Biden. It wasn’t. But in the Rio Grande Valley, the story is less about growing conservatism than about the rise of nonvoting—and despair. Means of Deduction Amtrak Train to Nowhere Vulgar Empiricist The Center for Working-Class Politics The 2020 Presidential Election and Working-Class Voters Our findings suggest that the 2020 presidential election represented a continued shift in the base of the Democratic Party from one rooted in working-class voters to a coalition that’s highly concentrated in high-income suburbs. Uneven & Combined Trump’s Surprising Working-Class Success In November, the Right continued to lose wealthy suburbs but made inroads in working-class counties. Reading Materiel I Think I Have a Much Higher IQ Than You, I Suspect Canon Fodder Daniel Bessner Don’t Trust the Process From his new memoir, it’s clear that Barack Obama believes process is politics. But no amount of “process” will solve the problems that plague us—for that, we need the political will he could never muster as president. Canon Fodder Chris Maisano Secession Planning A looser union with more room for state and regional autonomy, as two recent books advocate, would cede much of America to the mercies of the Right. Field Notes When Biden Met Hillarycare Records from the Clinton presidential archive give a revealing—and unflattering—look at the triangulating politics of Senator Joe Biden. Trumpism After Trump Feature Arthur Borriello and Anton Jäger Don’t count right-wing populism out. While technocrats have seen their fortunes rise under lockdown, the sense of national decline and disarray that first brought leaders like Donald Trump to power still has a bright future. Where Boomers Party Till They Drop—Dead Feature Arielle Castillo Welcome to The Villages, where not even the coronavirus can keep retirees from their steady diet of sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll, and Donald Trump. Illustration by Hunter French The Biden Doctrine Feature Nicole Aschoff As president, Donald Trump launched broadsides against the liberal international order. Will Joe Biden be able to put America “back at the head of the table” once in office? Illustration by Mark Pernice The Politics of a Second Gilded Age Feature Matt Karp The mass inequality of America’s first Gilded Age thrived on identity-based partisanship, helping extinguish the fires of class rage. In 2021, we’re headed down the same path. Illustration by Rose Wong Cultural Capital Make Sure You Have the Record Player on at Night Red Channels Paris Marx Nomads in Search of a Villain The new film Nomadland is a heartfelt look at the lives of itinerant Americans cast aside by the Great Recession. But it ignores how employers like Amazon are raking in profits off this new class of worker. Illustration by Cat Sims Bass & Superstructure Eileen Jones Bob Dylan’s American Apocalypse Dylan’s latest album, Rough and Rowdy Ways, is a fitting capstone for our end times. Ways of Seeing Ryan Zickgraf Cyberpunk Needs a Reboot Cyberpunk once stood out as a vital genre of anti-capitalist fiction. Today, it’s been reduced to a cool retro aesthetic easily appropriated by the world’s second-richest man to market ugly Blade Runner–inspired trucks to nostalgia-drenched Gen Xers. The Tumbrel Corn Pop’s Straight Razor Girondins Dustin Guastella Everyone Hates the Democrats Progressives and moderates accuse each other of being unable to appeal to working-class voters—and maybe they’re both right. Thermidor J. C. Pan Why the Alt-Right Will Lose Thankfully, almost nobody likes a Nazi, and even fewer still like a Nazi steeped in a creepy online subculture. The Worst Estate Branko Marcetic The Year Twitter Tried to Dictate an Election If you want to see the future, imagine a finger clicking “mute” on anything criticizing an establishment presidential candidate, forever. Illustration by Rose Wong Leftovers God Love Ya Cookshop Leigh Phillips Thank Socialism for the Vaccine. Blame Capitalism for Its Distribution. The jaw-dropping speed of COVID-19 vaccine development is a glorious marvel of science, cooperation, and economic planning. But the lifeboat ethics of vaccine rollout is a horrifying display of the cruelty of capitalism. Popular Front Alex N. Press Building From the Ruins The Left needs a revived labor movement, and a revived labor movement needs the Left. Popular Front Natalie Shure Medicare for All: No Victory in Sight As the Trump era draws to a close and yesteryear’s centrist, Joe Biden, takes office, can the Medicare for All movement build the momentum it needs to win? Proletoccult Your Quarterly Horoscope Looking forward to 2021? Read this horoscope first. Means and Ends Vivek Chibber Leo Panitch (1945–2020) We’ve suffered an irreparable loss with the passing of our friend and comrade Leo Panitch.

He who was previously the money owner now strides in front as capitalist; the possessor of labor power follows as his laborer. The one with an air of importance, smirking, intent on business; the other hesitant, like one who is bringing his own hide to market and has nothing to expect but a hiding. –  Karl Marx, Capital

After the failure of every revolution or counterrevolution, a feverish activity develops among the fugitives, who have escaped to foreign countries. The parties of different shades form groups, accuse each other of having driven the cart into the mud, charge one another with treason and every conceivable sin. At the same time they remain in close touch with the home country, organize, conspire, print leaflets and newspapers, swear that the trouble will start afresh within twenty-four hours, that victory is certain, and distribute the various government offices beforehand on the strength of this anticipation. —  Friedrich Engels, “The Program of the Blanquist Fugitives from the Paris Commune,” 1874

How did we go from Build Back Better to Build Back Never? Featuring a new look and almost 200 pages of content from Jeremy Corbyn, Azmat Khan, Anand Gopal, Owen Hatherley, Christian Lorentzen, Hadas Thier, Alex Press and many others, we know you'll enjoy this issue.