Weekly reading group on the history of Marxism and the Left presented by the Platypus Affiliated Society. New participants always welcome, no prior knowledge necessary, come into the syllabus at any point at time.

Meeting weekly Sundays 7-9 pm in SAC 3.116 Balcony Room C, unless otherwise noted!

Find the full syllabus and all readings at the following link: platypus1917.org/2018/11/25/platypus...st-reading-group-winter-spring-2019/

Reading schedule as follows:

Revolutionary leadership | Jan. 27, 2019
• Rosa Luxemburg, “The Crisis of German Social Democracy” Part 1 (1915)
• J. P. Nettl, “The German Social Democratic Party 1890–1914 as a Political Model” (1965)
• Cliff Slaughter, “What is Revolutionary Leadership?” (1960)

Reform or revolution? | Feb. 3, 2019
• Luxemburg, Reform or Revolution? (1900/08)
+ Eugene Debs, "Competition versus Cooperation" (1900)

Mass strike and social democracy | Feb. 24, 2019
• Luxemburg, The Mass Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions (1906)
+ Luxemburg, "Blanquism and Social Democracy" (1906)

Permanent revolution | Mar. 3, 2019
• Leon Trotsky, Results and Prospects (1906)
+ Tariq Ali and Phil Evans, Introducing Trotsky and Marxism / Trotsky for Beginners (1980)

State and revolution | Mar. 10, 2019
• Lenin, The State and Revolution (1917)

Imperialism | Mar. 24, 2019
• Lenin, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916)
+ Lenin, Socialism and War Ch. 1 The principles of socialism and the War of 1914–15 (1915)

Failure of the revolution | Mar. 31, 2019
• Luxemburg, “What does the Spartacus League Want?” (1918)
• Luxemburg, “On the Spartacus Programme” (1918)
+ Luxemburg, "German Bolshevism" (AKA "The Socialisation of Society") (1918)
+ Luxemburg, “The Russian Tragedy” (1918)
+ Luxemburg, “Order Reigns in Berlin” (1919)
+ Eugene Debs, “The Day of the People” (1919)
+ Sebastian Haffner, Failure of a Revolution: Germany 1918–19 (1968)

Retreat after revolution | Apr. 14, 2019
• Lenin, “Left-Wing” Communism: An Infantile Disorder (1920)
+ Lenin, "Notes of a Publicist" (1922)

Dialectic of reification | Apr. 21, 2019
• Lukács, “The Standpoint of the Proletariat” (Part III of “Reification and the Consciousness of the Proletariat,” 1923). Available in three sections from marxists.org: section 1 section 2 section 3
+ Being and becoming (freedom in transformation) / immanent dialectical critique chart of terms
+ Commodity form chart of terms
+ Reification chart of terms

Lessons of October | Apr. 28, 2019
• Trotsky, The Lessons of October (1924) [PDF] • Trotsky, "Stalinism and Bolshevism" (1937)

Trotskyism | May 5, 2019
+ Trotsky, "To build communist parties and an international anew" (1933)
+ Trotsky, "If America should go communist" (1934)
• Trotsky, The Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International (1938)
+ Trotsky, "Trade unions in the epoch of imperialist decay" (1940)
+ Trotsky, Letter to James Cannon (September 12, 1939)

The authoritarian state | May 12, 2019
• Friedrich Pollock, "State Capitalism: Its Possibilities and Limitations" (1941) (note 32 on USSR)
• Max Horkheimer, "The Authoritarian State" (1942)