The Platypus Affiliated Society organizes reading groups, public fora, research and journalism focused on problems and tasks inherited from the “Old” (1920s-30s), “New” (1960s-70s) and post-political (1980s-90s) Left for the possibilities of emancipatory politics today.

Platypus at UC San Diego

The Left is Dead! Long Live the Left! Come join our discussions on the history of the Left, current events and politics, and the possibilities of emanipatory politics today. Every week, we host a reading group working through the crucial texts in the history of Marxism Wednesdays, 6PM @ Groundwork Books.



Primary Reading Group

Wednesdays 6PM @ Groundwork Books, syllabus

Sep 25 Radical bourgeois philosophy IV. The Third Estate
Oct 2 Radical bourgeois philosophy V. Bourgeois society
Oct 9 Radical bourgeois philosophy VI. Freedom in history
Oct 16 What is the Left? I. Captial in history
Oct 23 What is the Left? II. Utopia and critique
Oct 30 What is Marxism? I. Socialism
Nov 6 What is Marxism? II. Revolution in 1848
Nov 13 What is Marxism? III. Bonapartism
Nov 20 What is Marxism? IV. Critique of political economy
Break Supplementary readings
Jan 11 What is Marxism? V. Reification
Jan 17 What is Marxism? VI. Class consciousness
Jan 24 What is Marxism? VII. Ends of philosophy
Jan 30 Revolutionary Leadership
Feb 6 Reform or Revolution?
Feb 13 Lenin and the Vanguard Party
Feb 20 What is to be Done?
Feb 27 Mass strike and social democracy
Mar 6 Permanent revolution
Mar 13 State and revolution
Apr 2 Imperialism
Apr 9 Failure of the revolution
Apr 16 Retreat after revolution
Apr 23 Dialectic of reification
Apr 30 Lessons of October
May 7 Trotskyism
May 14 The authoritarian state
May 21 On the concept of history
May 28 Reflections on Marxism
Jun 4 Theory and practice


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