Global Left Midweek — April 29, 2026
- Reasons to Persevere
- War and Peace: Breaking the Rules
- Lessons from Hungary’s Election
- Ukraine Survives
- Africa’s Gen Z Awakening
- What Marxism is For
- Swedish Dockworkers Do Solidarity
- New Mobilisation Wave in Argentina
- Jewish Communists Fought to Halt Nazism
- The Forgotten Ones of the French Left
Andrea Ferrario / Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières (Paris)
One must not lower one’s guard on the resurgences of fascism, the risks of generalised war, and the nuclear danger. But it is equally important not to fall at the same time into the trap of regarding the enemies as invincible: they are nothing of the sort, they too are very afraid, and there are those who can defeat them.
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War and Peace: Breaking the Rules
John Feffer / Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung (Berlin)
Where authoritarian nationalists have overreached in Brazil and in South Korea, they have been rejected by voters and jailed for their transgressions. But the left cannot count on such scenarios to regain power. Nor can it win on the correctness of its programme. Its view of a reformed state and a new internationalism must be compelling as well.
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Lessons from Hungary’s Election
Nandini Naira Archer and Bernadett Sebály / openDemocracy (London)
After a historic electoral defeat for Orbán’s Fidesz party, the mood in Hungary is shifting. But whether this moment marks a clean break, a fragile opening, or something more complicated is still an open question – especially for those who have spent years organising under pressure.
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Oleksandra Matviichuk / Voxeurop (Paris)
Four years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Nobel Peace Prize winner Oleksandra Matviichuk describes how Ukrainians have turned survival into resistance. This includes lecturing in sub-zero temperatures and sowing seeds in frozen soil, thereby defying Putin’s attempts to erase their future.
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Felix Kumah-Abiwu / The Elephant (Nairobi)
Unlike previous generations of activists who relied on formal leadership and structured machinery to challenge power structures, Gen Z operates through decentralized networks – from online hashtag campaigns to flash mobs, to economic boycotts, to street occupations – for political mobilization, from Senegal to Kenya, Burkina Faso to Sudan, and more recently in Madagascar.
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Life Against Capital
Marxism has often been mistaken for a closed doctrine precisely when at its core is a method for tracing how domination of life is organized, how capacities emerge within it, and how those capacities might gather into forces capable of transforming the very conditions that formed them.
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Swedish Dockworkers Do Solidarity
Erik Helgeson / Jacobin (Brooklyn)
In Sweden, workers boycotted Russian ships in response to the invasion of Ukraine, and then did the same for Israel’s arms trade. Their action shows the power of working-class solidarity against militarism.
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New Mobilisation Wave in Argentina
Martín Alvarez / Alternative Viewpoint
Argentina has witnessed massive mobilisations, amid deepening economic crisis, growing social unrest, and the controversial policies of the government of Javier Milei. The strong participation of young activists has been especially notable, reflecting a broader process of politicisation and renewed radical engagement.
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Jewish Communists Fought to Halt Nazism
Zo Haderech / In Defense of Communism (Thessaloniki, Greece)
Many communists expelled from Palestine in the 1920s and 1930s went on to fight heroically against fascism. Leopold Trepper led one of the most important Soviet intelligence networks in Western Europe. Yerachmiel Lukachar died defending Stalingrad. Marcel Langer commanded the 35th Brigade of the Resistance in southern France. Yet in Israel, Zionist historiography has erased them.
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The Forgotten Ones of the French Left
Catherine Tricot / Regards (Paris)
[Electronic translation by Portside. Lire l'original en français ici.]
The left is an ecosystem that goes far beyond the simple structure of a political party. Yet the parties [La France Insoumise, PS, PC, greens] and their elected officials seem to have forgotten this. If this continues, the presidential race is off to a bad start.
The political left is turning inward, focusing on its elected officials. Throughout the left, there is a tendency to reduce politics to public policy, laws, and their implementation. This view leaves it to these elected officials to champion political initiatives, embody them, and defend them. It would also be up to them—our elected officials—to come up with a solution for 2027. Forgive me for doubting that.
Within LFI, it falls to the circle of “senior elected officials”—members of parliament and mayors—to take on the responsibility—if not the burden—of proposing a candidate for 2027 for ratification by at least 150,000 Insoumis members. It is these same members of parliament who, more often than not, have led the municipal campaigns and are put forward in political battles. The central role of the parliamentary group in the life of the La France Insoumise movement, however, contradicts the stated goal of a more democratic republic with broader public participation in the nation’s affairs.
On the other end of the left-wing spectrum, some fifty elected officials—including Raphaël Glucksmann, Yannick Jadot, and Boris Vallaud—declared this weekend that they, for their part, are not giving up. They write [in the manifesto Construire 2027]: “Entire segments of our elites are resigning themselves to the situation and preparing for France’s predicted shift into the Trumpist and Putinist camp. Not us.” How dare you? Don’t they see in this claim to be part of the “right” elite, one of the causes of the left’s political decline? They’ve opened their text to signatures. They’re coming in, but very slowly: just over 5,500 as of Monday. A result that may leave these initiators feeling humbled and anxious.
The left has always been made up of activists, organizations, and unions, as well as intellectuals, publishing houses, and newspapers. But these millions of committed individuals are overlooked in political strategies. The narrowing of leadership circles to focus solely on elected officials and their staff is deeply troubling.
How did we end up with such a withering of the parties, such a withdrawal into themselves? Yet everyone knows the history of the left. They know that the left has never been limited to political parties, much less to elected officials alone. The left has always been made up of activists, associations, and unions, intellectuals, publishing houses, and newspapers. But these millions of committed individuals are overlooked in political strategies. The narrowing of leadership circles around elected officials and their aides is deeply troubling.
This assessment isn't anything new. Everyone knows it.
Everyone experienced the New Popular Front in the summer of 2024—that surge of momentum that achieved what had seemed unattainable. It was indeed the entire left, mobilized in a thousand and one ways, that succeeded in preventing the far right from seizing power. But once the danger was averted, we were no longer asked to do anything. For better or worse, everyone went back to bickering with their neighbors across the aisle in the National Assembly.
Everyone also knows that it was the massive protests against pesticides, against raising the retirement age, and against attacks on civil rights and social history that kept the government in check. These victories aren’t complete, nor are they always spectacular, but they are victories nonetheless. And even though they are members of Parliament, they wouldn’t have achieved this without all of us.
We, the forgotten ones of the political left.