Alex Callinicos

Is the City losing its financial domination?

Is world history going into reverse? The great historian Fernand Braudel argued that the modern capitalist world economy always has had a city at its centre, starting in the later Middle Ages with Venice.

Myanmar is fought over by imperialists

The neoliberal imperialists who have returned to office in Washington with Joe Biden are finding the world has become more complicated since they left with Barack Obama four years ago.

Vaccine nationalism will endanger us all

Farcical aspects aside, the row over the European Union’s vaccine supplies reveals the inability of the present system to manage the Covid-19 pandemic.

Emmanuel Macron wages war at home and abroad

French president Emmanuel Macron said last week that France would offer “no repentance or apologies” for the colonisation of Algeria or the eight-year war it waged against Algerian independence, in which perhaps a million people died.

Stock market booms as economy suffers

The most bizarre single feature of capitalism is probably the stock market. It seems to have the ability to defy mere economic reality.

Covid-19 hasn’t stopped capitalism from changing

For many of us—especially those lucky enough not to have caught Covid-19—the past year has been as if our lives have been put on hold.

The political choices behind hard Brexit

Whether or not there is a trade deal between Britain and the European Union, we will experience a hard Brexit, with a fair degree of economic disruption. Such an outcome was not inevitable

What lies behind the divisions over Brexit?

It’s anyone’s guess whether Britain and the European Union (EU) can reach an agreement on their new trading relationship, which is due to start on 1 January.

The pandemic, debt and economic power

The Covid-19 pandemic has caused an enormous jolt to the world economy. We are in the midst of the biggest global slump since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Biden heralds return to US ‘forever wars’

Donald Trump's decision last week to cut back US troops in Afghanistan and Iraq was roundly denounced by what Barack Obama called the “blob”— the mainstream national security establishment, whether Republican or Democratic.

A fine scapegoat for many Tory failures

Dominic Cummings’ stagey departure from 10 Downing St, like a pantomime Demon King, was one of the few happy moments in a terrible year. But what does it really mean?

The left in Britain and the US after two earthquakes

Win or lose, Donald Trump has upended the politics of the United States.

Trump’s Republicans at odds with big business

Amid all the uncertainties of this week’s US presidential election, one thing’s for sure. The Republican Party’s relationship with its social base is cracking apart

Joe Biden can’t contain the deep bitterness that exists in the US

It was one of Bill Clinton’s advisers who coined the slogan, “It’s the Economy Stupid!” But this has been Donald Trump’s recipe for getting re-elected.

Can Johnson survive Covid-19 and Brexit?

Weak and nasty” has been a good description of all Tory governments since the fall of Margaret Thatcher nearly 30 years ago. None fit this description better than Boris Johnson’s administration.

The sickness coming from the White House

There are three things to understand about Donald Trump at present. The first is that he may be incoherent and self-obsessed, but he’s not a fool.

European economies are headed for crash

The political disarray the pandemic is causing in Britain and the United States has made the European Union (EU) look good by comparison.

Covid-19 is creating new political divides

More and more coronavirus is reshaping politics

Trump is escalating an ideological war

It’s always been a mistake to underestimate Donald Trump. This is especially true now, when he’s fighting ferociously to stay in the White House. Not underestimating him means taking him seriously as a political operator, but also as an ideologist.

International law is made for capitalism

International law helps to regulate the relations between capitalist states. It plays an increasingly important role in providing a framework for the activities of transnational corporation