Portside

1. Change Requires Deep Organizing
2. Syria, Kurds and Turkey
3. Pink Tide Governments and Trump
4. Inside the Protests in Seoul
5. How Social Reproduction Shapes Women’s Union Militancy
6. China and Myanmar: Which Side Are You On
7. Germany’s Decolonial Climate Movement
8. Military Refusal in Israel
9. Sahel: Two Views
10. Ukraine: Does the Struggle Continue?

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Change Requires Deep Organizing

Kriangsak Teerakowitkajorn / Asian Labour Review (Hong Kong)

Change requires deep organising rather than relying solely on mutual aid or awareness campaigns. Protests and campaigns raise visibility but rarely result in lasting change. Organised groups are shifting toward building associational power by uniting and sharing experiences, fostering a worker-led movement that emphasises internal capacity-building for long-term struggles.

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Syria, Kurds and Turkey

 • The Future of Syria   Israel Dutra and Joseph Daher / Links (Sydney)

 • Will Kurds Survive?   Matt Broomfield / Jacobin (Brooklyn)

 • The Week That Toppled Assad   Sarah Glynn / Medyanews (Campobasso, Italy)

 • Call for Defense of Rojava     35 parties and organizations / ANF English (Amsterdam)

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Pink Tide Governments and Trump

Ociel Alí López / NACLA Report (New York)

Despite having so many progressive governments in office, Latin America does not have the same degree of cohesion as it had in the previous decade, when there were fewer leftist leaders in power but with greater shared political force. The enthusiasm generated by the first cycle of leftist governments is no longer the same. There is a lack of consistency as they face the complex situations to come.

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Inside the Protests in Seoul

Kwan Wei Kevin Tan and Andrew Minjun Park / Business Insider (New York)

The president had crossed the line when he got the military involved. What he had done posed a risk to democracy. I took the subway to the National Assembly. Many of the people who were already there seemed to be party members or unionists. The unionists were wearing uniforms and waving their unions' flags. At around 12:30 a.m., families and students were arriving in larger numbers. 

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How Social Reproduction Shapes Women’s Union Militancy

Mariela Cambiasso / Global Labour Column (Johannesburg)

The new women’s movement intersects with women’s union activism in the industrial sector. Demanding conditions for union activism clearly contribute to women’s low participation rates. By treating these barriers as simply individual challenges to overcome, we fail to acknowledge systemic inequalities that limit union participation.

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China and Myanmar: Which Side Are You On

Than N Oo / Asia Times (Hong Kong)

Historically, China has hedged its influence in Myanmar by simultaneously supporting the Myanmar military and various ethnic resistance organizations (EROs) along its border. The turning point came during Operation 1027, where the military lost significant territory in northern Shan state to the EROs. China adjusted its approach and began openly supporting the military regime.

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Germany’s Decolonial Climate Movement

Ilham Rawoot / Waging Nonviolence (Brooklyn)

Tatu Hey, a member of Climate Justice Berlin, an intersectional climate and environmental justice collective founded in Berlin, says that climate justice is inherently decolonial. Climate justice is seen through the lens of people in the Global South fighting colonial struggles, be this in the form of extractivism, continuation of colonial gender dynamics, land struggles or educational struggles.

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Military Refusal in Israel

Oren Ziv / +972 (Tel Aviv)

+972 met with Elam and Behar Tsalik two days before their incarceration to talk about what led them to publicly refuse military service, the reactions from those around them, and their preparations for spending time in prison.

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Sahel: Two Views

 • Alliance for Sovereignty   Vijay Prashad / The Wire (New Delhi)

 • Alliance of Juntas   Bouba Jalloh / Deutsche Welle (Berlin)

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Ukraine: Does the Struggle Continue?

Sacha Ismail / South London socialist

Weariness is not the same as willingness to surrender. To state what should be obvious but the anti-Ukraine left has such trouble with, all or virtually all Ukrainians want and always have wanted the war to end as soon as possible – in a general sense. There is an overwhelming – rational – scepticism about what will result from negotiations without a significant military shift in favour of Ukraine.