https://znetwork.org/category/topic/vision-strategy/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Tue, 28 Apr 2026 14:52:35 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/category/topic/vision-strategy/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-third-party-thats-pushing-the-democrats-left/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-third-party-thats-pushing-the-democrats-left/#respond Tue, 28 Apr 2026 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297459 Most Americans, even many Republican voters, disapprove of the war in Iran and remain unhappy about the high cost of everything from gas to groceries, which is only getting worse as the conflict continues. So it’s not surprising that President Donald Trump’s overall approval rating hit record lows  this week. That’s great news for Democrats ahead of this fall’s midterm [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-third-party-thats-pushing-the-democrats-left/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/quelling-the-polycrisis-video-part-3/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/quelling-the-polycrisis-video-part-3/#respond Tue, 28 Apr 2026 14:52:24 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1297461 Whatever happened to the “polycrisis”? A couple of years ago it was the buzzword of the world, describing a concatenation of interacting crises that aggravated each other and made solutions appear impossible. In the year since the inauguration of Donald Trump his words and actions have so dominated world events that discussion of the polycrisis [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/quelling-the-polycrisis-video-part-3/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/as-trump-strangles-cuba-how-to-support-the-cuban-working-class/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/as-trump-strangles-cuba-how-to-support-the-cuban-working-class/#respond Mon, 27 Apr 2026 16:50:37 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1297387 The United States is strangling Cuba.  Since February, President Trump has blocked all oil heading to the island, and threatened to impose tariffs on countries that attempt to circumvent the embargo. The move comes in the context of Trump’s attacks on Venezuela and takeover of the country’s energy sector — Venezuela was Cuba’s main oil supplier, shipping [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/as-trump-strangles-cuba-how-to-support-the-cuban-working-class/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-all-about-the-leaders-manufacturing-wins-in-the-uaw/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-all-about-the-leaders-manufacturing-wins-in-the-uaw/#respond Mon, 27 Apr 2026 16:27:33 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297403 The United Auto Workers’ (UAW) recent organizing breakthroughs in auto manufacturing in the South, major nationwide strikes, and decisive contract successes raise questions about what lessons we can and can’t draw from the last few years’ record of wins and losses. Following the March 2023 change in union leadership, in which reform candidate Shawn Fain [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-all-about-the-leaders-manufacturing-wins-in-the-uaw/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/fighting-for-a-wage-rise-is-also-an-act-of-resistance-against-imperial-tutelage-interview-with-venezuelan-retired-oil-workers-leader-denis-ospino/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/fighting-for-a-wage-rise-is-also-an-act-of-resistance-against-imperial-tutelage-interview-with-venezuelan-retired-oil-workers-leader-denis-ospino/#respond Mon, 27 Apr 2026 14:15:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297421 Retired oil worker Denis Ospino was a prominent part of the revolutionary resistance against the 2002–03 management lockout at Venezuela’s state oil company, PDVSA. She was crucial to restoring and stabilising oil production, playing an active role in protecting the Western Oil Production Directorate headquarters, and as part of the civilian and reserve unit defending [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/fighting-for-a-wage-rise-is-also-an-act-of-resistance-against-imperial-tutelage-interview-with-venezuelan-retired-oil-workers-leader-denis-ospino/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/revisiting-permanent-revolution-in-a-time-of-permanent-crisis/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/revisiting-permanent-revolution-in-a-time-of-permanent-crisis/#comments Sun, 26 Apr 2026 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297350 The 2026 escalation of conflict and atrocity crimes in the Gulf is not simply another geopolitical crisis. It is becoming a systemic global shock, exposing the fragility of an economic order built around energy dependence, concentrated chokepoints, extended supply chains and uneven vulnerability. It is also forcing millions of people into forms of precarity that, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/revisiting-permanent-revolution-in-a-time-of-permanent-crisis/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/socialism-without-illusions/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/socialism-without-illusions/#respond Sun, 26 Apr 2026 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297366 Among leftists, the question of why one continues to use the word “socialism” can for most seem almost unnecessary—until one notices how unstable the term has become even within our own ranks. We invoke it constantly, but often as shorthand for very different and sometimes incompatible political projects. For some it means Scandinavian social democracy [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/socialism-without-illusions/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/progressive-ngos-will-enable-trump-a-warning-and-a-way-out/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/progressive-ngos-will-enable-trump-a-warning-and-a-way-out/#respond Sat, 25 Apr 2026 15:58:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297322 For over forty years, I have worked inside what critics call the “NGO-industrial complex.” In 1982, as a Vietnam combat veteran, I quit teaching organizational psychology at MIT’s Sloan School of Management to work full-time for peace and justice. Since then, I have helped lead and build social change efforts across the country. That experience [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/progressive-ngos-will-enable-trump-a-warning-and-a-way-out/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/as-may-day-approaches-what-about-the-working-class-or-21st-century-common-sense-part-9-of-10/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/as-may-day-approaches-what-about-the-working-class-or-21st-century-common-sense-part-9-of-10/#comments Sat, 25 Apr 2026 15:58:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297324 For many socialists and revolutionaries for a long time, the “working class” has been seen as THE revolutionary group. Karl Marx in the 1840s was among the first to identify the working class as a key sector, particularly the industrial working class which was growing in numbers in the mid-1800s as the industrial revolution advanced [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/as-may-day-approaches-what-about-the-working-class-or-21st-century-common-sense-part-9-of-10/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-tragedies-three-alternatives/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-tragedies-three-alternatives/#comments Sat, 25 Apr 2026 15:57:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297320 Recently, three events unfolded in the state of California: a foreclosure that led to the shooting death of a sheriff and the shooter; a Molotov cocktail was thrown at Sam Altman’s house; and a disgruntled worker torched a Kimberly-Clark warehouse. In each case, a clear alternative existed if only people were organized. Instead, individuals took [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-tragedies-three-alternatives/feed/ 2 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decent-societies-must-recognize-the-value-of-care-work/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decent-societies-must-recognize-the-value-of-care-work/#respond Sat, 25 Apr 2026 15:53:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297331 Capitalism only cares about profits, so it is not surprising that care work is undervalued in capitalist societies. Yet care work is one of the fastest-growing sectors of the US economy,  while “adults spend, on average, about as much time in unpaid work as they do on paid work,” as  renowned socialist and feminist economist [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decent-societies-must-recognize-the-value-of-care-work/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/yanis-varoufakis-ama/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/yanis-varoufakis-ama/#respond Fri, 24 Apr 2026 15:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1297286 Your chance to put Yanis Varoufakis on the spot. Politics, economics, philosophy — or something completely unexpected. Nothing is off the table. Join us live as Yanis answers questions submitted by you. Hosted by Mehran Khalili.]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/yanis-varoufakis-ama/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/keith-kelleher-on-organizing-workers/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/keith-kelleher-on-organizing-workers/#respond Thu, 23 Apr 2026 15:57:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1297242 This week on Talk World Radio, we’re talking about community and workplace organizing. Our guest Keith Kelleher was the founder of United Labor Unions (ULU) Local 880 (1983-5), then Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 880 (1985-2008) and then president (2008-2017) of SEIU Healthcare Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, and Kansas (HCIIMK). Once the smallest local union, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/keith-kelleher-on-organizing-workers/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-opposite-of-corporate-power-is-people-power/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-opposite-of-corporate-power-is-people-power/#respond Thu, 23 Apr 2026 15:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297243 This interview has been edited for length and clarity. OPENING SOLANA RICE Hello and welcome. I’m Solana Rice, co-founder and co-executive director of Liberation in a Generation, a national movement support organization that builds the power of people of color to transform the economy, who controls it, how it works, and most importantly, for whom.  [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-opposite-of-corporate-power-is-people-power/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-rhode-islands-labor-movement-made-its-weight-felt-in-politics/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-rhode-islands-labor-movement-made-its-weight-felt-in-politics/#respond Wed, 22 Apr 2026 17:49:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297223 Over the last decade Rhode Island has been a hotbed of progressive, pro-worker legislation. But it wasn’t always this way. It took years of proactive organizing by the labor movement on legislative and electoral campaigns. This “blue” New England state was led by Republican Governor Donald Carcieri from 2003 to 2011. During his term he [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-rhode-islands-labor-movement-made-its-weight-felt-in-politics/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/open-a-community-center-reject-digital-culture/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/open-a-community-center-reject-digital-culture/#respond Tue, 21 Apr 2026 17:01:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297176 In 2016, my best friend, Sergio, and I opened P.A.R.C. (Politics, Art, Roots, Culture), a community and cultural center located in the deindustrialized landscape of Michigan City, Indiana. Like so many towns and cities throughout the Rust Belt, Michigan City was once a vibrant manufacturing hub, where people worked for the railroad companies, steel mills, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/open-a-community-center-reject-digital-culture/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dockworkers-against-russias-and-israels-wars/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dockworkers-against-russias-and-israels-wars/#respond Mon, 20 Apr 2026 18:37:39 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297160 Ahead of May Day 2022, two months after Russia’s full-scale attack on Ukraine, Ukrainian trade unionists called for solidarity with the invaded country. Artem Tidva, a Ukrainian left-winger and labor activist, addressed international unions calling for actions to help stop the Russian war machine. In Sweden, such action was already underway. In March 2022, Swedish [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/dockworkers-against-russias-and-israels-wars/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/la-socialists-debates-reflect-the-lefts-growing-strength/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/la-socialists-debates-reflect-the-lefts-growing-strength/#respond Mon, 20 Apr 2026 17:48:15 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297139 On a late March afternoon, beneath the vaulted, medieval-revival ceiling of Immanuel Presbyterian Church, more than four hundred members of the Los Angeles chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) gathered in the lingering heat of a citywide heat wave. The air inside the sanctuary was thick and stubborn as members fanned themselves with [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/la-socialists-debates-reflect-the-lefts-growing-strength/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vijay-prashads-iran/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vijay-prashads-iran/#comments Mon, 20 Apr 2026 17:37:42 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297117 In January 2026, as protests swept Iran and the Islamic Republic responded with mass killings, the international left faced a choice about whose voices to amplify and whose to render invisible. The choice it made is the subject of this essay. On April 10, 2026, a Holocaust denier, a white nationalist theorist, the founder of [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/vijay-prashads-iran/feed/ 5 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-the-good-of-all-the-poor-come-first/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-the-good-of-all-the-poor-come-first/#comments Mon, 20 Apr 2026 17:09:18 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297090 Introduction by Bruce Hobson, co-founder of the Mexico Solidarity Project and Liberation Road member On Saturday, April 18, Claudia Sheinbaum gave a statement at the Encuentro Internacional Progresista in Barcelona in which she offered Mexico’s stance on the world’s peoples’ struggle for peace and democracy. The statement immediately began to have a profound impact globally. For me [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/for-the-good-of-all-the-poor-come-first/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-is-to-be-done-feminism-against-reaction/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-is-to-be-done-feminism-against-reaction/#respond Sun, 19 Apr 2026 13:20:55 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297058 “The structure imposes its constraints on both terms of the relationship of domination, and consequently on the dominators themselves, who can benefit from it while remaining, in Marx’s words, ‘dominated by their domination’.” — Pierre Bourdieu, Masculine Domination. The recent advance of feminism is one of the most significant political and social developments for left-wing projects [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-is-to-be-done-feminism-against-reaction/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-no-kings-protests-escalating-costs-of-authoritarian-takeover/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-no-kings-protests-escalating-costs-of-authoritarian-takeover/#respond Sat, 18 Apr 2026 16:39:37 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1297029 ]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-no-kings-protests-escalating-costs-of-authoritarian-takeover/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decarbonizing-housing-means-fighting-landlords/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decarbonizing-housing-means-fighting-landlords/#respond Fri, 17 Apr 2026 18:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296993 Decarbonization is necessary to preserve life as we know it on the planet. But many would have you believe that we can achieve a rapid and equitable transition to clean energy while also preserving the economy as we know it. The case of building decarbonization shows that a much deeper change is needed. Buildings currently [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/decarbonizing-housing-means-fighting-landlords/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-flint-sit-down-strikers-built-their-confidence/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-flint-sit-down-strikers-built-their-confidence/#respond Fri, 17 Apr 2026 13:39:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296981 On February 11, 1937 — forty-four days after their occupations of the Fisher Body No. 1 and No. 2 plants began in Flint, Michigan — General Motors (GM) workers won a landmark agreement. The one-page document included commitments to union recognition and collective bargaining over wages, seniority, work-life balance, and other working conditions, and a prohibition on [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/how-flint-sit-down-strikers-built-their-confidence/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-bus-is-coming-trans-people-coalition-solidarity-and-the-authoritarian-wedge-strategy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-bus-is-coming-trans-people-coalition-solidarity-and-the-authoritarian-wedge-strategy/#respond Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:59:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296933 There is a conversation happening in LGBTQ spaces right now that mostly isn’t happening out loud. It surfaces in strategy sessions and donor meetings and organizational board rooms, in the careful language of political consultants and the nervous calculations of advocacy leaders who are watching polling numbers and thinking about what is winnable and what [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-bus-is-coming-trans-people-coalition-solidarity-and-the-authoritarian-wedge-strategy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/two-visions/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/two-visions/#comments Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:57:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296949 On Sunday there was a big union rally in Manhattan. Zohran Mamdani spoke, and Bernie Sanders spoke, and they were both very good, but in reality, the headliners were there in order to fill up the place so that everyone could listen to the workers speak. In the heart of the event, about a dozen [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/two-visions/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/spiritual-revolution-despair-and-the-climate-endgame/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/spiritual-revolution-despair-and-the-climate-endgame/#comments Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:56:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1296942 Recorded live at Housman’s Bookshop, London, this is Roger Hallam at his most unfiltered – tearing apart 30 years of climate communication and making the case for something harder to name and more urgent than conventional activism. Having written his latest book during a prison sentence, Hallam argues that what the climate crisis demands is [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/spiritual-revolution-despair-and-the-climate-endgame/feed/ 2 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/how-we-got-here/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/how-we-got-here/#respond Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1296939 What went wrong over the last decade — and what can we learn from it? In this panel from DiEM25’s Resistance Is Existence event in London, Yanis Varoufakis, Brian Eno, and Laura Pidcock — moderated by Erik Edman — reflect on ten years of political struggle, defeat, and missed opportunities. From economic crisis and war [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/how-we-got-here/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-the-frontlines/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-the-frontlines/#respond Thu, 16 Apr 2026 15:48:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296935 I was standing near the Taftan border crossing three weeks ago, watching the dust kick up in a way that felt aggressive. It wasn’t just the wind; it was the smell. Since the strikes on the refineries across the border, the air in western Pakistan has turned into a metallic, suffocating haze. A local farmer, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/beyond-the-frontlines/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/8-lessons-from-3-tesla-unions-in-3-countries/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/8-lessons-from-3-tesla-unions-in-3-countries/#respond Wed, 15 Apr 2026 18:54:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1296900 In 2023, mechanical engineers – members of the Swedish Industrifacket Metall (IFM) union – dared to walk out of a Tesla repair shop. This set in motion what was to become one of the country’s most significant industrial disputes in recent history. Yet, the number of workers on strike remained rather small – just 45 [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/8-lessons-from-3-tesla-unions-in-3-countries/feed/ 0