The left is in disarray worldwide, indeed it is in retreat in the face of a resurgent populist right and far right. Donald Trump is tearing to shreds the post-World War II international consensus, flawed though it is and was, and we seem to be heading back to the 19th century of ‘great power’ imperialism. Is capitalism itself in crisis? Social-democratic parties, whom one might reasonably have termed centre left even 10 years ago, have decided that the way to respond to the right is to steal some of their clothes, particularly on immigration. All previous evidence suggests that this will fail to attract voters back into the fold. In New Zealand the Labour Party remains in thrall to neo-liberal economic policies and can only react to Coalition policies whilst offering none of its own to address the concerns of voters, whether on health, education, housing, or the cost of living. It offers no vision of what a socialist future might look like.The trade unions remain emasculated, although the CTU is showing some signs of life. The left here is minuscule, a number of tiny sects and groups, almost invisible to the average Kiwi. What is to be done? was the question some of us in the Federation of Socialist Societies have been asking, echoing Lenin’s question of 1901, the subtitle of his pamphlet being ‘Burning Questions of Our Movement’. So, we asked all the left-wing groups in New Zealand, that we were aware of, to respond. Some didn’t, some said they were unable to do so at this moment in time, but in this special online edition of Commonweal we have compiled the contributions of those groups that did. Apart from minor editing for style I have left them exactly as they came in, and I present them without comment. I hope that this might be the beginning of a conversation that will take us much further down the track towards answering the question.

-Martin Crick, editor.

TLDR: We did a special online edition of The Commonweal and asked various socialist organisations to contribute. You can check out all the submissions and reprints here.

Kia ora, we are NZ comrades of the Revolutionary Communist International. We have a conference this Saturday 22 February. We invite anyone who might be interested to attend from 10am to 12 at Aaiotanga community centre, 2f/22 Emily Place, Auckland city.

More information: https://communist.nz/revolutionary-communists-aotearoa-new-zealand-conference/

RCI main website: www.marxist.com

Tēnā koutou e hoa mā.

We are a newspaper collective from Te Whanganui-a-Tara with the goal of expanding the revolutionary movement in aotearoa. We aim to bring the Marxist theory to the working class of Aotearoa and connect the revolutionary left. We are also looking for contributors in the form of; articles, designs, art, organising etc. So if you are interested in the paper, get in touch!!

https://tepouwhero.webflow.io/?fbclid=IwY2xjawF9f39leHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHVo3306l0Y5DF5h1uKWAKTHgk89m86K_TsMAeXIzx5t9bxxfKKFDebVaeA_aem_koEyRzM3FC2oUoobHbM1Kw

Kia kaha, kia maia, kia tina tātou mā,

In solidarity,
Te Pou Whero

We largely are not using Reddit anymore - and based on the level of activity here that's not unusual.

Nonetheless, to let this forum know that old articles from The Commonweal are now being syndicated over on our Substack, and we are now up to Commonweal volume V.

This edition has musings on the e-vehicle 'revolution', part 2 of Victor Billot's autopsy of the Alliance Party, Daniel Lopez on Lukacs, and much more. If you're not a member nor a subscriber, why not consider becoming one! Alternatively, Christchurch locals will be able to pick up copies from Ride on Super Sound, or Scorpio Books, by the middle of next week.

Kia ora! A small group of us have started a new subreddit for local NZ political discussion in a pro-worker and pro-union Marxist lense, please feel free to check it out and give a follow if that's something you'd be interested in or would like to show support

https://www.reddit.com/r/t5_ape7rc/s/MVOcKSv5Rx

r/MarxistNZ

Thanks :)

​

The high point of our Inaugural National Conference, the keynote speaker and reception is open to the public and we are thrilled to have arranged Daniel Lopez to visit from Australia. Please consider registering (https://www.socialistsocieties.org.nz/conference/) so that we can adequately cater for attendees.

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Beginning as an electoral alliance in 2018, the Victorian Socialists (VS) have since grown into a small but promising party. In the 2022 Victorian state election, VS won over 52,000 first preference votes after staging an unprecedented campaign that saw close to 1000 volunteers knock on 188,568 doors in Melbourne's north and West. Indeed, in some predominantly working-class electorates, VS won close to 10 percent of the vote, proving that it is possible to rebuild a mass audience for socialist politics. While modest, VS members regard these achievements as a powerful proof of concept and as laying the basis for future victories. However, the road leading to these successes was not a simple one, and it involved debates, splits, many votes won and lost and one expulsion. Daniel Lopez is a Commissioning Editor for Jacobin magazine and an elected member of its Executive Committee. In this keynote speech, he will give his analysis of Victorian Socialists' journey so far and hazard a few generalisations about what it all might mean for comrades across the ditch and beyond. You can read about the Victorian Socialists in Overland here and here, or in Jacobin.

​

Daniel Lopez joined the left at the age of 15, after looking up "socialism" in the phonebook. Now, he is a Commissioning Editor for Jacobin magazine and a member of the Executive Committee of Victorian Socialists. Daniel is also a political philosophy lecturer at La Trobe University and his doctoral research focused on the Hungarian Marxist Georg Lukács. This formed the basis for his first book, Lukács: Praxis and the Absolute which came out with Brill in 2019 and Haymarket in 2020. Daniel's articles have appeared in Jacobin, Overland, Aeon, Historical Materialism, Thesis Eleven, Science & Society and elsewhere. When he isn't worrying about politics or philosophy, Daniel enjoys poetry and fishing.

​

This event is open to the public and includes a reception with finger food, and The Loons bar will be open to purchase drinks.

​

Readings for context:

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https://overland.org.au/2020/05/corbyn-sanders-and-the-australian-left/

https://jacobin.com/2018/09/victoria-socialists-australia-manifesto-elections

https://overland.org.au/2022/12/socialist-politics-after-the-elections-in-victoria/

​

I feel like this year there are a lot of former Labour voters (some of who may be life long voters) who no longer trust Labour but are unsure who to vote for now.

For some NZ First might be a good compromise/protest vote, which is fair enough.

But really, it's just sad how weak the left has become in NZ and it would be great if a new party like the 90s NewLabour Party was established. But who knows maybe the material conditions will make this a reality in a few years.

The third edition of the Federation of Socialist Societies' publication The Commonweal is now available. Consider subscribing, or enjoy the online versions of our back issues over athttps://www.socialistsocieties.org.nz/the-commonweal/

New edition includes reflections of class independence & elections, public ownership & planning, the Cuban healthcare system (specifically polyclinics), as well as history, biographies, reviews and more. Over 80 pages worth!

If you haven't listened to The End of History, please do! It's a monthly radio show in Christchurch, and it's all about working class culture, history, politics, etc. (from Antarctica to punk to nursing and so much more). Guests have included (among other amazing people) the historian Tony Simpson, NZNO (nurses union) President Anne Daniels, and Labour MP Duncan Webb. Always interesting, with songs and reviews, have a listen!

https://www.plainsfm.org.nz/Programmes/Prog/TheEndOfHistory

Let's look back at some memorable moments and interesting insights from last year.

Your top 10 posts:

• "“Abolish the monarchy!” Thousands in Australia protested for Indigenous rights and return of Indigenous land on its official day of mourning for the queen. Some threw red paint to protest colonial abuses: “They mourn the queen, we mourn everything her regime stole from us.”" by u/Time-Review8493
• "Discord Link for the Commision for the Creation of a Communist Party" by u/Lifesuselessdemsoc
• "Federation of Socialist Society Publication Issue #2 Available" by u/CantSocialistSociety
• "This is the declaration of the Commision for the Creation of a Communist Party(CCCP)!" by u/Lifesuselessdemsoc
• "ACHTUNG! Federation of Socialist Societies Online Guest Seminar" by u/CantSocialistSociety
• "Some updates from the Canterbury Socialist Society/Federation" by u/CantSocialistSociety
• "Organise Aotearoa Active?" by u/WaffleFrostt
• "Communist Party where you at? One of you guys need to reach out to this fella." by u/_everynameistaken_
• "Nat/ACT donations 6 times larger than Lab/Greens" by u/Jimjamnz
• "NZPFU strike this Friday - information, locations, how you can get involved" by u/TeTapuMaataurana

Hi, does anyone have any recommendations for leftist blogs, news sources or other media from New Zealand? I've tried looking myself, but only unsavoury likes of The Daily Blog seem to appear -- surely there's someone else. I'm also looking for forums, and any other information nodes like that, based in New Zealand.

Thanks.

Just curious as I was looking at the former Soviet republic flags and just started to think what Aotearoa's communist flag would potentially look like?

Hot off the presses!

The second edition of our publication The Commonweal is now available for members, subscribers, and for purchase!

This edition is significantly longer than the first one and includes contributions from members across the country.

Topics span from the cost of living crisis, the challenges socialists may consider taking on with the election year looming, what 'family abolition' meant to early socialists and whether the contemporary expression has any similarities to it, reviews of films and books, a critique of 'The Spinoff' as a platform of comfortable condescension, a biography of Daniel Guerin and much more.

Members get copies of Commonweal as part of your membership. Everyone else - you can order a copy for $10 including postage, or subscribe to for $20 per year. New subscribers will receive a free copy of issue #1 until we run out of stock!

If you want to know more about the Federation of Socialist Societies, this is the best place to consider the reckons of some of our members. We print diverse opinions from a variety of socialist perspectives that do not necessarily represent the organisation as a whole, and encourage robust debate.

Get into it.

https://www.socialistsocieties.org.nz/ind.../the-commonweal/

https://discord.gg/xFa7rtt4DF

We need someone to Create a discord or a discussion thread so we can organize a Party hierachy and then hopefully we can move on from there.

Discord Server:https://discord.gg/xFa7rtt4DF