From Hope to Disillusionment: Bolivia After 20 Years of the MAS

Amidst bitter infighting and economic crisis, Bolivia’s left suffered a major defeat after nearly two decades of groundbreaking governance.

 By Linda Farthing and Benjamin Swift

 [My thanks to the North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA) for this informative contextual analysis of the recent Bolivian electoral process, from which this English version (with photos by Benjamin Swift) is republished. I follow it with reference to two articles I published in happier times, following my brief sojourn in Bolivia in 2013-2014. – Richard Fidler]

A nearly two-decade era of Indigenous-oriented governance and anti-neoliberal politics has come to an end in Bolivia. The Movement towards Socialism (MAS) government, which launched in the early 2000s with great hopes and optimism, is closing with disappointment and economic chaos.

In a reversal as drastic as the MAS’s landslide victory in 2005, three right-wing presidential candidates—from center-right to far-right—won a combined 77 percent of the vote in the August 18 national election. Far from commanding a majority in both the Congress and Senate as it has since 2006, the MAS lost all its seats in the legislature but one.

Rodrigo Paz Pereira of the Christian Democrats, along with his popular vice-presidential candidate Edman Lara, defied opinion polls and stunned observers by surging into the lead. They will advance to a runoff vote against far-right candidate Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga on October 19.

Though Paz presented himself as a populist outsider promoting “capitalism for all,” he is hardly new to politics. He is a sitting senator representing the department of Tarija and the son of Jaime Paz Zamora, a neoliberal president from 1989 to 1993, closely tied to Bolivia’s traditional ruling elite. Yet it was his running mate, Edman Lara, who propelled Paz to first place. Lara, 39, is a former police officer from rural Cochabamba whose denunciations of police corruption have earned him a large and enthusiastic following on TikTok, Bolivia’s most popular social media platform.

Disenchantment with the MAS was palpable after the vote, when hundreds gathered in the streets of La Paz to celebrate Paz and Lara’s unexpected success. Zuleyka Pinto, a pharmaceutical chemist from El Alto who had knocked on doors for their campaign for months, saw their ticket as representing something new. “El MAS nunca más” (“the MAS never again”), the crowd surrounding her chanted on election night. 

“The MAS no longer guaranteed any possibility of surviving economically, so people went to the other side,” says political analyst José de la Fuente, a former employee of the MAS-controlled Cochabamba departmental government. Indigenous and working-class voters “will never choose the neoliberal right,” he explains, “so many of them opted for what they thought was the middle.”

 Exploding Political and Financial Crises

Other voters heeded a call by former President Evo Morales—barred by term limits from running again—to spoil their ballots. Approximately 19 percent of ballots were marked null, nearly six times above average. Yet not all of these votes can be interpreted as support for Morales; voting is mandatory in Bolivia for those under 70, and null and blank ballots have long been used as a form of resistance against traditional party politics. Even so, with the number of null votes a whisker above perennial conservative candidate Samuel Doria Medina, Morales triumphantly declared victory,  asserting on the coca growers’ radio station, “if you add in the blank ballots and the absentee vote, we’re in first place.”

Morales’s maneuvering eliminated any chance for 36-year-old MAS Senate President Andrónico Rodríguez, who ran on an independent left ticket. Once considered Morales’s political heir, Rodríguez garnered only 8.4 percent of the vote. Rodríguez had been the hope of Bolivia’s left for months, but Morales’s fierce antipathy towards him, his perceived indecisiveness in public appearances, and an unpopular vice-presidential pick all combined to sink his campaign.

With President Luis Arce deciding not to run for re-election amid low approval ratings, former Interior Minister Eduardo del Castillo ran as the MAS candidate. In a reflection of Arce and Rodriguez’s unpopularity, he scraped by with only 3.16 percent of the vote, just barely above the 3 percent threshold required to maintain the party’s legal status. 

This fracturing of the left echoed the infighting that has plagued the party since 2020, when Arce—Morales’s longtime finance minister—won a resounding victory with 55 percent of the vote, one year after Morales was ousted in a coup following his unconstitutional bid for a fourth term. Morales always viewed Arce as a placeholder, believing he could run again in 2025, and soon clashed with Arce and his Vice President, David Choquehuanca, as they asserted their independence.

Now facing statutory rape charges, Morales has sought to destroy every Left rival, including his former ministers and social movement allies. Morales even turned on his closest ally: in 2023, when former Vice President Álvaro García Linera proposed mediating the MAS leadership conflict, Morales called him “my newest enemy.”

“I would have been open to supporting the MAS if it had been another person,” says Óscar Paco, a former Morales’s supporter who spoiled his ballot this time, unconvinced by the contenders, including Rodríguez. “Evo already had his moment—he should make space for young people.”

 Beyond the MAS divide, disillusionment stemmed in large measure from Bolivia’s faltering economy. After 2013, falling global commodity prices and dwindling natural gas reserves eroded state revenues. The burden of costly fuel subsidies—which the MAS government failed to curb in 2010 after a near-uprising over proposed price increases that fell most heavily on the poor—has deepened the strain. Meanwhile, the dollar-pegged currency has steadily weakened, with the black-market exchange rate now about twice the official one.

As people struggled to put bread on the table—and with bread size decreasing as prices rose—memories of MAS-era social welfare gains faded from view. 

 The Fall of the MAS

Over two decades in power, the MAS party, which grew out of Bolivia’s powerful social movements, achieved astounding gains for poor people, particularly in its early years. Under Morales, the country’s first Indigenous president, poverty was reduced by half, natural gas contracts were boldly re-negotiated with powerful multinationals, and rural infrastructure expanded dramatically. There was hardly a village or low-income barrio that didn’t boast a new school, road, or health clinic. These advances brought the MAS unprecedented popularity and sustained its electoral dominance for 14 years.

But a steady concentration of power centered on Morales weakened the country’s grassroots movements. Social movement leaders were absorbed into the government,  their loyalty ensured through perks such as union headquarters funded by the state, while critical social movement voices were sidelined. “The MAS became distant from social organizations and from ordinary people,” explains analyst de la Fuente. “It abandoned its agenda and focused only on re-election.”

The MAS’s successes were not only material. For many Bolivians, the most profound transformation was the decline of everyday racism. During the 2019 protests in defense of Morales, a common refrain heard in the streets was, “we don’t want to go back to the racism of the past,” as a street vendor said through tears at a rally in La Paz.

While the government’s investments proved successful at stimulating the economy and lifting about 10 percent of the population into the middle class, they were built on the extraction of the country’s abundant natural resources—the same model in place since the Spanish invasion over 500 years ago. The boom-and-bust cycles that have plagued Bolivia ever since brought the left-wing experiment to its knees. When commodity prices collapsed after 2013, the government’s carefully accumulated reserves, among the highest in Latin America, were drained as it maintained spending to shore up political support. 

Bolivia’s deeply entrenched patterns of extractivist dependence were never shaken. If anything, more advanced technologies and China’s surging demand for natural resources accelerated exploitation, leaving ecological devastation in their wake. By 2024, Bolivia ranked second only to Brazil—a country eight times its size—in tropical primary forest loss, much of it driven by soy expansion and cattle ranching in the eastern lowlands.

Corruption scandals have further eroded trust in MAS governance. One case diverted millions of dollars earmarked for Indigenous development projects; others have tainted Arce’s administration directly. “There’s been so much corruption with Arce’s current government,” says Máxima Laura, a street vendor in traditional Aymara dress and former MAS voter. “His kids have profited,” she adds. Though Laura voted for Paz and Lara, she is skeptical of their promises. “I don’t believe in politicians anymore. They say one thing, but when the time comes, they change their mind.”

 What’s Next for the Bolivian Left?

The rise of Paz and Lara, and Morales’s enduring influence, leave the Bolivian left with few immediate paths forward. Since most political parties in Bolivia revolve around individual leaders, MAS’s failure to renew its leadership does not bode well for the future.

Morales’s top-down governing style still shapes political culture at every level beyond the local. Bolivia’s Indigenous and working-class unions have long relied on charismatic male leaders, corporatist structures, and close ties between leader and base. As president, Morales famously helicoptered into rural communities almost daily, launching public projects and cultivating loyalty.

But the generational terrain has shifted. Most young Bolivians, raised in relative middle-class security thanks to the MAS’s own achievements, never experienced the poverty or struggles that defined their parents’ lives. One consequence of neoliberalism is that for many young people today, the primary focus is on individual rather than collective well-being.

According to Iveth Saravia, who coordinates a children’s foundation in El Alto, “a lot of young people talk about the need for new people, and for them that new person is Tuto.” She sees it as ironic that “Tuto” Quiroga, who served as vice-president under former dictator Hugo Banzer and briefly as president more than two decades ago, is now embraced as fresh leadership. “It’s striking how much historical memory has been lost,” she observes.

This shift also shaped how Morales’s rhetoric was received. His grand narratives of anti-imperial struggle increasingly rang hollow for younger Bolivians, whose priorities centered on more immediate, everyday concerns. The MAS discourse came to have “an ideological overemphasis,” notes de la Fuente. For him, the future of the Bolivian left lies outside the MAS: “Another left has to emerge, one that’s more mature and more savvy.” That includes more seriously addressing environmental issues, a cause the right has skillfully co-opted as the MAS—like every government before it—prioritized economic development over sustainability.

This is Bolivia’s great conundrum: how to improve living standards through value-added industries, rather than perpetuating historic patterns of resource extraction. It is, in many ways, the perennial dilemma of the Global South.

Before formally gaining power, the resurgence of the right is already taking shape through court rulings favoring key figures from the 2019 coup and subsequent massacres. In response to a rare Supreme Court order, a judge annulled charges against former interim president Jeanine Áñez for her role in the Sacaba and Senkata massacres, sending the case back to Congress for approval before it reaches the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, another judge ordered that former Santa Cruz governor Fernando Camacho be moved to house arrest and that Marco Antonio Pumari, another central figure in the coup, be released from preventive detention. “These politicized court decisions will inevitably pave the way for more political violence like the massacres Áñez oversaw,” says Thomas Becker, a human rights lawyer working with the families of 2019 massacre victims.

Yet amid the crisis, one achievement stands out. In the year of Bolivia’s bicentenary of independence from Spain, the only apparent winner in the recent election is electoral democracy itself—no small feat in a nation that has endured more coup d’etats than almost any other. This time around, Arce appears committed to a democratic transition, even at the cost of dismantling his own party and the legacy of the self-styled “government of social movements.”

But this is Bolivia: a country where social movements have repeatedly risen—against colonial powers, military dictatorships, and neoliberal governments alike—to demand a more equitable and inclusive society. It may take time, but there is little doubt they will rise again.

September 3, 2025

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Linda Farthing is a journalist and independent scholar who has co-authored four books on Bolivia. She has written extensively on Latin America, including for the Guardian, the Nation, Al Jazeera, and Ms. Magazine.  

Benjamin Swift is a journalist based in La Paz, Bolivia. His stories focus on climate change, the environment, and LGBTQIA+ themes. Find more of his work at www.bswiftcreative.com

 See also:

How Bolivia is leading the global fight against climate disaster

 Bolivia’s Evo Morales re-elected, but important challenges lie ahead

(Both articles are among those republished on Z Network and first published on my blog.)

 

Ukraine must receive all it needs to win a just peace!

 Introduction

For more than three and a half years Russia has pursued its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It occupies about one-fifth of the country, which it has illegally annexed (including territories it has not yet occupied). And it is relentlessly bombing daily cities and towns in the rest of Ukraine with immense damage to critical infrastructures and civilian residences.

Ukraine’s heroic resistance, at the cost of tens of thousands of lives, has blocked further major advances by Russia on the ground. But Putin shows no signs of retreat from his goal of overthrowing the government in Kyiv and replacing it with a subservient pro-Russian regime.

Trump’s capitulation to Putin at the Alaska summit of the two war criminals has sabotaged the Ukrainian resistance, which has depended heavily on US military supplies. Trump has shifted that responsibility to Ukraine’s west European allies, who must purchase from the US much of the additional military aid they agree to provide to Ukraine. There is now much talk among the Europeans of how they plan to aid Ukraine once the war has ended – a hypothetical in view of Russia’s refusal of a ceasefire and negotiation of a “peace deal” that Ukraine could accept.

Canada’s prime minister Mark Carney, sensing an opportunity in Europe to counter Canada’s loss of trade under Trump’s tariff offensive, has concluded a four-day official visit to Ukraine, Germany and other countries in the region in which he and his ministers promoted Canada as a source of arms, gas, critical minerals and other commodities. Citing the Russian war on Ukraine as the pretext for his projected multi-billion dollar increase in military spending (to 5% of GDP by 2035), Carney said his offer of assistance to Ukraine does not rule out a possible role for Canadian troops to help enforce a peace agreement.

That was enough to trigger a renewed campaign by Montréal-based antiwar blogger Yves Engler, who is currently hoping to mount his own candidacy in the federal NDP’s leadership campaign. Engler, along with his family enterprise the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute, has consistently opposed Ukraine’s self-determination in opposition to Russian aggression, effectively urging its surrender to Putin’s demands. They tend to reduce their portrayal of global imperialism to the US and its military and commercial allies, and have never acknowledged the existence of Russian imperialism -- all in the name of liberal pacifism and diplomacy.

A radically different and progressive approach to the war by the European network in solidarity with Ukraine is expressed in the following statement calling for a vast increase in support for Ukraine, including further armament to be sourced in part by a ban on arming Israel and Saudi Arabia.

The ENSU statement is followed by links to a few articles and interviews with leading protagonists in the solidarity movement in and outside of Ukraine. – RF

 * * *

 Ukraine must receive all it needs to win a just peace!

 Declaration of the European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine

August 26, 2025

 After US president Trump’s “summits” with Putin (August 15) and European leaders (August 18) Ukraine confronts the immediate prospect of an unjust “peace” settlement that rewards the Russian aggressor. If forced on their besieged country, this Trump-Putin “deal” will betray the Ukrainian people’s heroic struggle against Russia’s murderous invasion.

Top-level haggling among the US, Russia and European powers over a possible settlement continues, and may well founder because of stubborn Ukrainian resistance to Trump’s appeasement of Putin.

However, any version of the current “peace” blueprint will grossly violate Ukraine’s democratic and national rights. It will legitimize:

• The violent Russian occupation of a fifth of Ukrainian territory and the swap to Russia of territory and people presently under Ukrainian administration
• The destruction of Ukraine’s towns, schools, hospitals, infrastructure, environment and heritage
• The murder of tens of thousands of Ukrainian citizens and the kidnapping of thousands of Ukrainian children, and
• The genocidal Russification of the occupied territories, and a host of other war crimes.
• It will also place the burden of ending the war not on aggressor Russia but on Ukraine, its victim.

The flurry of diplomatic activity in mid-August did not deter Putin, who is determined to gain as much as possible on the battlefield and in negotiations. Lethal drone and missile attacks have increased on Ukraine’s cities and infrastructure, even as Russian foreign minister Lavrov insists that Russia must have a role in guaranteeing Ukraine’s security (and is supported in this by J. D. Vance).

A “settlement” on these terms will not only be a disaster for Ukraine, but a blow against democratic rights and freedoms everywhere, like colonizer Israel’s genocidal invasion of Gaza.

The European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine (ENSU) therefore calls on supporters of democratic rights to mobilize to help prevent a “peace” deal that can only leave the door open to further Russian aggression. The Ukrainian people must experience a new wave of solidarity like the one that surged after Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion, a wave strong enough to make governments–and politicians facing elections–think long and hard before abandoning Ukraine.

Policy towards Ukraine to date: supporting it just enough to survive

Ukraine’s present dangerous situation is largely the work of Vladimir Putin’s “partner” (his term), Donald Trump. But the hesitations and vacillations of the Biden administration and major European governments and institutions that have most boasted about “standing with Ukraine” also contributed.

Trump has directly sabotaged Ukrainian resistance. US military aid, which was always a useful tool for blackmailing Kyiv, is now far from guaranteed: even when agreed to, Europe will foot the bill. Trump’s Alaskan red‑carpet for war criminal Putin simply accommodated to his aggression: the threat of sanctions was promptly forgotten, “land swaps” (involving hundreds of thousands of human beings) were accepted as part of “a comprehensive peace”, the demand for a ceasefire before negotiations disappeared, the prospect of a return to normal in US-Russia business relations was floated, and any prospect of justice for victims of war crimes just evaporated.

On the European side, the last three years have been marked by the reluctance of the major powers, especially Germany and France, to offend Russia “too much”: Ukraine could have been given longer range missiles, more aircraft and €300 billion in frozen Russian assets. Russia’s “shadow fleet” of rusting oil tankers could have been pursued with much greater vigour.

The overall level of support received by Ukraine after three years has been enough to prevent its defeat but well short of that needed to win the war. The Zelensky government has been left expressing gratitude for what has been given, but also imploring its donors to actually deliver what has been promised and provide what is still lacking.

Time for serious commitment from Europe

Europe’s vacillations must now end in all those areas where its leading powers have so far feared to act. They must first pay attention to Putin when he says what he really thinks: “I’ve said it before, Russians and Ukrainians are one people. In this sense, all of Ukraine is ours. There’s an old rule that wherever a Russian soldier sets foot, that’s ours.” (St Petersburg International Economic Forum, June 20)

They must also stop believing that Trump can be lured over to Ukraine’s side with gross flattery and offers of financial gain. No-one, not even Trump himself, can say what his posture on Ukraine will be tomorrow.

The European Union and the United Kingdom must follow the lead of the Nordic and Baltic countries, whose leaders stated on August 16: “We will continue to arm Ukraine and enhance Europe's defences to deter further Russian aggression. As long as Russia continues its killing we will continue to strengthen sanctions and wider economic measures to put pressure on Russia’s war economy. We stand firm in our unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity.”

Taken seriously–and so Putin understands that Ukrainian resistance really is being boosted–these words can only mean:

• Full and rapid arming of Ukraine, in part sourced from a ban on arming aggressor states like Israel and Saudi Arabia. The quicker and more completely Ukraine can develop its own defence industry and find reliable non-US suppliers of equipment it still cannot manufacture, the better.
• Frozen Russian assets must be immediately transferred to Ukraine and sanctions tightened on Putin’s regime, its supporting oligarchs and European firms directly or indirectly implicated in its war effort.
• The European Union’s timetable for eliminating its dependence on Russian fossil fuels exports must be radically shortened and any firm that provides services to this trade severely sanctioned.
• Prosecution for Russian war crimes must be pursued rigorously.

Solidarity with Ukraine–now more than ever

ENSU holds that the alternative to appeasement of aggression lies in supporting Ukraine’s right to self-determination and self-defence, done in the name of a democratic and united Ukraine free of occupiers.

The defence of Ukraine is also a struggle against authoritarian aggression everywhere. The fate of the peoples of Europe and of the whole world, from Palestine to Ukraine, is at stake. Any position taken by the labour movement and the left that would help Putin (like dropping the call for all Russian forces to leave Ukraine or echoing his demand for a change of regime in Kyiv in the midst of war) would be a stab in the back not only of the Ukrainian people, but of the social and national struggles of all peoples.

Former UK Labour shadow treasurer John McDonnell has explained what is at stake: “This is a critical time in Ukraine’s future. There can be no sell‑out after all the sacrifices made to maintain freedom. It’s time for maximum solidarity.”

No to an imperial peace leading to future wars! Real peace through the defeat of Putin and Trump! Peace through solidarity with Ukraine and among the peoples of Europe and the world!

 Ukraine must receive all it needs to win!

For a full statement of the ENSU position on the Russian invasion of Ukraine and how to counter it see the Brussels Declaration.

See also…

“Anti-militarism without pacifism,” https://labourhub.org.uk/2025/08/15/anti-militarism-without-pacifism/

“Will Russia-Ukraine War End with Diplomacy or on Battlefield? John Mearsheimer vs. Denys Pilash,” https://www.democracynow.org/2025/8/19/russia_ukraine_war

And from Ukrainian socialists, an earlier statement explaining the class issues posed in the war: “For Ukraine without oligarchs and occupiers!,” https://internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article8894

 

Members of The Hague Group declare six ‘concrete’ steps against Israel at Bogotá summit

 Colombia says ‘we will no longer allow international law to be treated as optional’ as nations pledge to prevent arms transfers to Israel for Gaza atrocities

 By Laura Gamba in Bogotá

[Thanks to Middle East Eye for this report, which is followed below by further information and analysis – R.F.]

A coalition of states from around the world gathering in Bogotá on July 16 agreed to implement six measures to stop Israel’s onslaught on Gaza and prevent violations of international law.

The announcement came as part of an “emergency summit” in the Colombian capital, co-hosted by the governments of Colombia and South Africa as co-chairs of The Hague Group, to coordinate diplomatic and legal action to counter what they describe as “a climate of impunity” enabled by Israel and its powerful allies.

The Hague Group is currently a bloc of eight states, launched on 31 January in the eponymous Dutch city, with the stated goal of holding Israel accountable under international law.

The conference brought together more than 30 states, including Algeria; Bolivia; Botswana; Brazil; Chile; China; Cuba; Djibouti; Honduras; Indonesia; Iraq; Ireland; Lebanon; Libya; Malaysia; Mexico; Namibia; Nicaragua; Norway; Oman; Pakistan; Palestine; Portugal; Spain; Qatar; Turkey; Slovenia; Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; Uruguay; and Venezuela.

“We came to Bogotá to make history - and we did,” said Colombian President Gustavo Petro.

“Together, we have begun the work of ending the era of impunity. These measures show that we will no longer allow international law to be treated as optional, or Palestinian life as disposable.”

“In the deliberations at the Bogota conference, all 30 participating states unanimously agreed that the era of impunity must end - and that international law must be enforced without fear or favour through immediate domestic policies and legislation - along with a unified call for an immediate ceasefire,” the Hague Group said in a statement.

To kickstart that process, the group said that 12 states from across the world – Bolivia; Colombia; Cuba; Indonesia; Iraq; Libya; Malaysia; Namibia; Nicaragua; Oman; Saint Vincent and the Grenadines; and South Africa – have committed to implementing the six measures immediately through their domestic legal and administrative systems.

The measures seek to “break the ties of complicity with Israel’s campaign of devastation in Palestine,” the group added.

A date has been set for 20 September 2025, coinciding with the 80^th UN General Assembly, for additional states to join them in adopting the measures, the statement added.

“Consultations with capitals across the world are now ongoing.”

What are the six measures?

The six measures are as follows:

1.      Prevent the provision or transfer of arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel.

2.      Prevent the transit, docking, and servicing of vessels at any port…. in all cases where there is a clear risk of the vessel being used to carry arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel.

3.      Prevent the carriage of arms, munitions, military fuel, related military equipment, and dual-use items to Israel on vessels bearing our flag… and ensure full accountability, including de-flagging, for non-compliance with this prohibition.

4.      Commence an urgent review of all public contracts, to prevent public institutions and funds from supporting Israel’s illegal occupation of the Palestinian Territory and entrenching its unlawful presence.

5.      Comply with obligations to ensure accountability for the most serious crimes under international law, through robust, impartial and independent investigations and prosecutions at national or international levels, to ensure justice for all victims and the prevention of future crimes.

6.      Support universal jurisdiction mandates, as and where applicable in national legal frameworks and judiciaries, to ensure justice for victims of international crimes committed in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

 In her closing speech, Francesca Albanese, UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied Palestinian territory, said: “These aren’t just measures but are lifelines for a people who are under relentless assault and a world that has been paralyzed for too long.”

“These 12 states have taken a momentous step forward,” Albanese added. “The clock is now ticking for states, from Europe to the Arab world and beyond, to join them.”

The conference agreed to set a deadline for states’ final decisions by September 2025, in line with the 12-month timeframe mandated by UN General Assembly Resolution A/RES/ES-10/24, adopted on 18 September 2024.

That resolution called on all states to take effective action on Israel’s violations of international law, including accountability, sanctions, and cessation of support, within one year of adoption.

“What we have achieved here is a collective affirmation that no state is above the law,” said South African Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Ronald Lamola.

“The Hague Group was born to advance international law in an era of impunity. The measures adopted in Bogotá show that we are serious, and that coordinated state action is possible.”

Varsha Gandikota-Nellutla, the executive secretary of The Hague Group, said: “This conference marks a turning point, not just for Palestine, but for the future of the international system.

“For decades, states, particularly in the Global South, have borne the cost of a broken international system. In Bogotá, they came together to reclaim it, not with words, but with actions.”

Israel’s war on Gaza, increasingly condemned by experts and governments as a genocide, has killed more than 58,000 Palestinians and displaced almost the entire population since October 2023.

The onslaught has left the Palestinian enclave barely habitable and around two million on the brink of starvation.

***

The full text of the “Joint Statement on the Conclusion of the Emergency Conference on Palestine” can be accessed here.

In her closing remarks at the Bogotá conference, Francesca Albanese was critical of the Joint Statement’s favourable reference to the conference on “Implementation of the Two-State Solution” to be held at the UN General Assembly from 28-30 July. The “32 years of two-state discourse,” she said, has led to the current genocide. “Palestinian self-determination, reparations and return, are not subjects for negotiation, as the International Court of Justice has declared.”

However, as the above report indicates, Albanese described the conference decisions as “a momentous step forward” and urged other states to follow suit.

Most of the governments that signed the Bogotá statement have already cut diplomatic ties with Israel. Some of the states attending the conference are unlikely to sign the statement; among them is China, Israel’s 2^nd largest trading partner (including Hong Kong).

The Progressive International, initiator of the Hague Group, is a coalition of international left-wing activists and groups mobilized to fight what it calls “the resurgence of authoritarian nationalism worldwide as well as the rise of disaster capitalism.”

In an article announcing the Bogotá conference, Colombia’s President Gustavo Petro warned that failure to implement United Nations resolutions on Israel’s Gaza war risks “stripping the global legal order of its remaining protections for less-privileged nations.”

“In September 2024, when we voted for the United Nations general assembly resolution on Israel’s policies and practices in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, we assumed concrete obligations – investigations, prosecutions, sanctions, asset freezes, and cessation of imports and arms. That resolution set a deadline of 12 months for Israel to ‘bring to an end without delay its unlawful presence’.” One hundred and twenty-four states voted in favour, including Colombia. The clock is now ticking.

“In the meantime, however, far too many states have allowed strategic calculations to override our duty. While we may face threats of retribution when we stand up for international law – as South Africa discovered when the United States retaliated against its case at the international court of justice – the consequences of abdicating our responsibilities will be dire. If we fail to act now, we not only betray the Palestinian people, we become complicit in the atrocities committed by Netanyahu’s government.”

Although the Bogotá conference went largely unreported in mainstream media, the U.S. government was quick to respond, in a statement that reeked of cynical irony:

“The United States strongly opposes efforts by so-called ‘multilateral blocs’ to weaponize international law as a tool to advance radical anti-Western agendas,” a State Department official said. “The so-called Hague Group—whose leading voices are South Africa and Cuba, authoritarian and communist regimes, respectively, with deeply troubling human rights records—seeks to undermine the sovereignty of democratic nations by isolating and attempting to delegitimate Israel, transparently laying the groundwork for targeting the United States, our military, and our allies.”

Those “allies” include Canada, which repeatedly votes “no” at the United Nations on resolutions regarding Palestinian rights. Its complicity with Israel’s aggression was further detailed in a report by Francesca Albanese on “the corporate machinery sustaining Israel’s settler-colonial project of displacement and replacement of the Palestinians in the occupied territory.” Here is a summary of some key findings.

Last November, Albanese was invited to meet with Canadian government officials and parliamentarians, but both events were cancelled a week before her arrival. She nevertheless managed to meet with a wide range of pro-Palestinian activists in Ontario and Quebec. In a hard-hitting interview with The Breach, she explained how Canada is “part of a small group of countries who have ‘continued to allow and nurture the arrogance that is at the origins of Israeli behaviour today’.”

On July 11, NDP Foreign Affairs critic Heather McPherson and NDP House Leader Alexandre Boulerice announced their intention to nominate Francesca Albanese for the next Nobel Peace Prize:

“She has travelled the world to share what she has witnessed on the ground in the occupied Palestinian territories and has urged us to take action in the name of justice and the rule of law. She has shown true courage and conviction in the face of a genocide that world leaders have failed to take concrete action to stop.”

Here is Albanese's speech at the opening session of the conference. Note that she calls for state actions that are far more definitive than those demanded by the Bogotá conference:

"Each state [must] immediately review and suspend all ties with Israel: their military, strategic, political, diplomatic, economic relations — both imports and exports — and make sure that their private sector, insurers, banks, pension funds, universities, and other goods and service providers in the supply chains do the same. Treating the occupation as business as usual translates into supporting or providing aid or assistance to the unlawful presence of Israel in the OPT. These ties must be terminated as a matter of urgency.

"Let’s be clear: I mean cutting ties with Israel as a whole. Cutting ties only with the “components” of it in the OPT is not an option."

A Québécois socialist response to Canada’s federal election

The following article appeared first in the Quebec online weekly Presse-toi à gauche. The English translation is by International Viewpoint, slightly revised and updated by me, which IV published under a literal translation from the PTàG headline: “Lessons from the last federal elections: Towards the renewal of the status quo ante or the desperate search for an agreement with Trumpism.” The authors, André Frappier and Bernard Rioux, are editors of the Quebec publication. Both are members of the left party Québec solidaire, which does not contest federal elections. – Richard Fidler

Although opinion polls in 2024 had predicted a landslide victory for the Conservative Party, the recent federal election gave the Liberal Party of Canada a fourth consecutive mandate. The election campaign was dominated by widespread public apprehension over the trade war and Donald Trump’s threats of annexation of Canada. These fears weighed heavily on voting intentions.

The new government headed by Prime Minister Mark Carney has pledged to defend the Canadian economy against the effects of the trade tariffs imposed on the country, to reaffirm national sovereignty, and even to protect territorial unity. The Canadian bourgeoisie and its federal and provincial governments will be under pressure from a US administration determined to subordinate Canada to its own interests. The trade-union movement, the various social movements, and the political left — at least what remains of it — will have to work to build their unity and to demonstrate strong combativeness and political autonomy vis-à-vis the choices of the governments of the Canadian oligarchy in order to resist the Trumpist project with a view to achieving genuine social emancipation.

Electoral dynamics and party positioning

The Liberal Party of Canada elected 169 members of parliament, with 43.7 percent of the vote. It will have to form a minority government, having fallen short of the 172 seats needed for a majority. The Conservative Party of Canada recorded significant gains, winning 144 seats and a jump in its vote from 33.7 percent in 2021 to over 40 percent in 2025.

The New Democratic Party (NDP) suffered a collapse, its number of MPs dropping from 25 to 7, causing it to lose its status as a recognized party. Much of its traditional electorate, worried about Trump’s threats and eager to prevent a Conservative victory, opted instead to vote for the Liberals.

The Bloc Québécois lost ground, securing 22 seats. The Green Party elected only one member, with just 1.2 percent of the vote. The far-right People’s Party of Canada (PPC) received only 0.7 percent of the vote, six times less than in 2021.

These elections therefore led to a minority government, revealing a polarization of the electorate around the two major neoliberal parties and a marginalization of third parties. The social democratic and ecological left saw its parliamentary representation and popular support reduced to a bare minimum.

The Conservative Party driven by populist demagogy

The Conservative Party has championed an ultraliberal, climate-sceptic, and militaristic agenda: corporate tax cuts, privatization, deregulation of oil and gas exploitation, and attacks on union rights. It has combined this approach with populist demagogy aimed at the working classes, presenting itself as the defender of purchasing power and access to housing.

Through a tour of factories and workplaces, it managed to build significant support for its program, anchoring it to popular anger. A conservative bloc was thus formed, ranging from supporters of fossil fuel capital to certain sectors of the working class.

The trade union movement and progressive social movements clearly perceived this strategy, but they responded not with a united and massive mobilization but with support for the Liberal party and its new leader.

Faced with the Trumpist offensive, the Liberal party is surfing on Canadian nationalism

The new Liberal leadership quickly realized that the Tories’ rise in the polls reflected a significant shift to the right of the electorate. It repositioned itself accordingly.

Taking office as the new Liberal leader (he replaced Justin Trudeau, who resigned in December), Mark Carney abolished the consumer carbon tax, short-circuiting Tory leader Pierre Poilievre’s “Axe the tax” slogan. During the campaign, he promised tax cuts and an end to the further tax on capital gains introduced by Trudeau. He also supported pipeline projects, advocated for increased oil and gas production, promised to boost military spending to 2 percent of GDP, strengthened border surveillance, and restricted immigration.

He thus adopted many elements of the Conservative platform, which the Tories denounced as a plundering of their ideas. Taking advantage of the resurgence of Canadian nationalism sparked by Trump’s comments on the annexation of Canada, Carney touted the purchase of local products, energy independence, and the diversification of export markets.

As Romaric Godin wrote in Mediapart: “Finding new outlets for Canadian businesses is likely to be tricky. […] The US market represented nearly 75.9 percent of Canadian exports and 62.2 percent of imports in 2024.”

The economic diversification project therefore seems unrealistic, especially since Canada has long since abandoned any policy of economic nationalism, as in the orientations of the Watkins report of the 1960s. Every government since Mulroney’s in the 1970s has supported continental integration, embodied by NAFTA and then CUSMA. The Carney government’s objective is thus a return to the status quo ante, in the interests of the Canadian bourgeoisie. But any negotiation with Trump will involve unilateral concessions: expansion of fossil capital, increased military spending, tougher immigration policy, deportations of asylum seekers and border reinforcement.

The government’s embarrassed silence in the face of Trump’s authoritarian excesses shows that it is prepared to compromise with Washington to preserve a facade of Canadian autonomy.

In Quebec: decline of the Bloc Québécois and impasse of the independence movement

The Bloc Québécois suffered a sharp setback. Focusing its campaign on defending a distinct society, it did not challenge federalism or address the issue of Quebec independence. It pledged its support to the Liberal party for the first year and suggested the creation of a border ministry, which angered the leader of the Parti québécois.

The Liberal Party’s victory in Quebec strengthens the legitimacy of Canadian federalism and weakens the PQ’s referendum plan. Collaborating with the Liberal party is tantamount to reinforcing the status quo. To believe otherwise is politically naive.

The foundations of the marginalization of the political and social left

The left has been weakened by the NDP’s prolonged support for the Liberal government, its parliamentary manoeuvring, trade-union apathy and the fragmentation of social movements.

Unions, in Quebec as in Canada, have failed to mobilize their members against conservative policies. As Sid Ryan, former president of the Ontario Federation of Labour, wrote: “The voice of millions of union members was shamefully missing this election.” He attributed this to the NDP’s failure to address workers’ concerns and needs, and to the unions’ lack of political autonomy.

The NDP, becoming a mere parliamentary back-up force, cut itself off from real social struggles. Its strategy based on compromise weakened its credibility. Its electoral decline can also be explained by its inability to defend a programme of radical change in action.

The major unions developed platforms of demands, but limited themselves to asking their members to challenge the candidates. The Liberal party’s shift to the right went unchallenged. The Canadian Labour Congress was quick to express its willingness to collaborate with the Liberal government, confirming the abandonment of any political autonomy.

The feminist movement challenged the parties, of course, but its demands have been marginalized. The mobilization for abortion rights has come up against the rise of a pro-choice right that has received little opposition.

The international solidarity movement campaigned, for example, in defence of the Palestinian people, but without achieving significant traction. Neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives have denounced Israel’s genocidal policies in Gaza.

Social movements remained dispersed, each acting in its own field without building a common front.

Paths to Rebuilding the Left in the Canadian State

These elections took place in a climate of heightened Canadian nationalism. In Quebec, the Bloc adopted a nationalism compatible with federalism. Both forms of nationalism assume that national interests converge with those of capitalists, to the detriment of solidarity between peoples.

The Canadian and Quebec left can rebuild itself only by breaking with these nationalisms. It must bring together the working classes, Indigenous peoples, and subaltern groups in a plurinational liberation project.

This project must be feminist, anti-racist, socialist and decolonial. It implies the rejection of any alliance with the PQ and of any defence of the Canadian state as it is, that is to say, based on the negation of the multinational reality of the territory.

A left of social transformation must link its action to an ecosocialist project, uphold the self-determination of the indigenous and Quebec peoples, and develop solidarity with ecological, feminist and popular movements.

It must work to build a social bloc around climate justice, the fight against patriarchy, reparations for Indigenous peoples, the creation of popular constituent assemblies, the nationalization of resources and the dismantling of the Canadian military-industrial complex.

The results of the last elections show that everything must be rebuilt from a veritable field of ruins. But there are battles that cannot be avoided.

Returning to the road to solidarity and updating our perspectives

Initial thoughts:

Building a pan-Canadian activist network has always been a laborious undertaking. This challenge was described in the article “The Challenge of Fighting Together” by Andrea Levy and André Frappier, published in issue 24 of the Nouveaux Cahiers du Socialisme. This 2020 article described the political situation in the Canadian state and in Quebec and its challenges. Clearly, the arrival of Trump and the rise of fascism on our doorstep have altered the situation. We must now examine how we can and must fight together, and on what basis.

The imperialist character of the Canadian state is still very real, as we stated in 2020:

“The Canadian state was built against the rights of peoples, through the oppression of Indigenous peoples who were dispossessed of their territories and ancestral rights, and through the oppression of the French-Canadian nation. This state then developed into an instrument of industrial corporations and finance capital, increasingly playing an imperialist role internationally as a junior partner of American imperialism.”

 A difficulty arose, on the one hand, in understanding the national liberation struggle: “To think of a uniquely Quebec strategy for changing society is to ignore the power of financial institutions and corporations.... Let us remember the fate that the European Central Bank reserved for Greece (a sovereign state, nonetheless) a few years ago.”

And, on the other hand, we considered the problem of the progressive forces in the Rest of Canada: fragmented and limited to regional perspectives, while identifying with the federal state, as the CLC does.

The rise of the far right and the arrival of Trump have changed this situation. The mantra has become “Save Canada,” with a right-wing stance from the Liberal Party that adopts Poilievre’s policies. Building a pan-Canadian left movement is becoming an unavoidable necessity, but it cannot be achieved without comprehending, in the Rest of Canada as much as in Quebec, a perspective that combines the dynamics of the national liberation struggle in Quebec, the struggle of Indigenous peoples for their ancestral rights, and the fight for an egalitarian society. The unity of the pan-Canadian left cannot exist if it falls into supporting the Canadian ruling class in the hope of blocking Trump.

This lack of perspective has left all the ground open to neoliberalism and the right. It is urgent to reclaim a united, working-class, and popular perspective at the pan-Canadian level. We must dedicate ourselves to it now!

 Tuesday, May 6, 2025

Memory as Warfare: How Putin’s Russia Weaponizes Anti-Fascist Rhetoric to Justify Imperial Aggression

From Kyiv to Brussels: The Great Patriotic War as Putin’s propaganda tool

Russian embassy in Ottawa, May 11, 2025, celebrating Soviet victory in the "Great Patriotic War"

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been cloaked in the language of “denazification” - a rhetorical sleight of hand that warrants critical examination from progressive perspectives. Hanna Perekhoda explains how the Kremlin has systematically distorted the memory of World War II, transforming anti-fascism from a genuine emancipatory struggle into a tool of imperial aggression. By appropriating and manipulating the sacred symbolism of the “Great Patriotic War”, Putin’s regime has constructed a narrative that erases the USSR’s complicity in the war’s outbreak, silences minority experiences, and reframes contemporary geopolitical conflicts as existential battles against an eternal fascist threat. This weaponisation of memory serves not only to justify Russia’s violence against Ukraine but increasingly targets all of Europe. For those committed to authentic international solidarity and anti-imperialism, understanding this cynical manipulation of anti-fascist rhetoric is essential - progressive movements must reclaim the genuine legacy of anti-fascism from those who pervert it to serve imperial ambitions.  -- Adam Novak (Europe Solidaire sans Frontières)

By Hanna Perekhoda

Ukrainian historian, researcher, and activist

Since the Maidan uprising and Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, Kremlin propaganda has consistently portrayed Ukrainian leaders as Nazis or fascists. Russian officials and state media began claiming that the new Ukrainian leadership consists of “neo-Nazis” who allegedly threaten the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine. Russia also accused the Ukrainian authorities of “genocide” of the population of Donbas.

On 24 February 2022, while announcing the full-scale invasion, the “denazification” of Ukraine was presented as the primary goal of the war. On the ground, there is no evidence to support Moscow’s accusations: nobody has ever documented a “genocide” against ethnic Russians or Russian speakers, whether in Ukraine or elsewhere. As for the Ukrainian far-right, its political influence remains minimal: in the 2019 parliamentary elections, the main ultra-nationalist parties, running together on a joint list, received just over 2% of the vote, well below the threshold required to enter Parliament. In short, the image of a “Nazi regime” in Kyiv is based on a glaring mismatch between rhetoric and reality.

However, the goal of this analysis is not to demonstrate that Russian propaganda is, in fact, propaganda. Rather, it is to understand why the Russian authorities repeatedly invoke references to the Second World War—or, in Russian parlance, the “Great Patriotic War”—when speaking about Ukraine. Understanding this memory dynamic is essential to grasp the power of a rhetoric which, despite lacking any factual basis, continues to shape the Russian worldview.

Erasing Soviet complicity in World War II

The Soviet and Russian insistence on using the term “Great Patriotic War” to refer exclusively to the period from 1941 to 1945 serves a specific purpose: to erase the twenty-one months that preceded Nazi Germany’s invasion of the USSR. Between the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 23, 1939, and Operation Barbarossa on June 22, 1941, Moscow and Berlin were de facto allies: they engaged in extensive economic cooperation, diplomatic coordination, jointly invaded and partitioned Poland in September 1939, and the Soviet Union proceeded to annex the Baltic countries and wage war against Finland. By reducing the war to the period 1941–1945, the USSR and Russia were able to deny any responsibility for the outbreak of the Second World War and present themselves solely as the victim of Nazi aggression and the primary liberator of Europe.

The Great Patriotic War—and especially the victory in 1945—became the founding event of Soviet history and the cornerstone of collective memory. Yet this memory, often portrayed as monolithic and universally shared, is anything but uniform. A Ukrainian from the west, who endured two successive occupations between 1939 and 1944, remembers a war very different from that of an eastern Ukrainian, whose experience was shaped primarily by Nazi destruction. The memory of a Russian bears little resemblance to that of a Crimean Tatar, who was deported along with his entire community and denied the right of return for decades. As for Soviet Jews, whose families and communities were annihilated in the Holocaust, they were long forced to remain silent—official narratives left no room for the specificity of their suffering.

While in Western Europe and North America the Holocaust has come to be understood as the ultimate measure of wartime horror, the Soviet myth of war erases this tragedy by subsuming it within the vast death toll of the Soviet people as a whole. Minority memories—of anti-Jewish massacres, ethnic deportations, or the varied experience of occupation—had to be absorbed, silenced, and effaced.

The collective experience of the war and the official discourse surrounding it deeply reshaped the Soviet population’s understanding of “fascism” and “anti-fascism.” Rather than referring to a specific political doctrine of the inter-war period, the term “fascism” had become a catch-all label for the ultimate enemy. Trotsky or the British Conservatives could just as easily be branded as “fascists”, as well as domestic and international opponents after 1945—including even the Chinese Communists. The word “Nazi” itself was rarely used. In everyday life, calling someone a “fascist” served more as the gravest possible insult rather than as a statement of ideological substance.

In the 1960s and 1970s, as faith in communism as a project for the future began to wane, the cult of the 1945 victory gradually became the main pillar of the Soviet regime’s legitimacy. Commemorations became ritualised and came to involve all generations and social groups: children, neatly lined up, marched in front of the Eternal Flame or the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier; brides, veils flowing and bouquets in hand, visited war memorials to lay flowers and pose. In every city—and eventually in every town and village—the state-built memorial complexes whose solemn architecture was intended to inscribe the memory of the Great Patriotic War into the everyday life of its citizens.

The Putin Era: memory as a weapon

Under Vladimir Putin, the cult of the Great Patriotic War has been revived. Following the pro-democracy protests of 2011 and Putin’s bid for a third presidential term in 2012, the regime instituted a deliberate policy of historical narrative construction, aimed at grounding its legitimacy in a vision of the nation as under siege. Faced with widespread protests against growing authoritarianism, the authorities chose to portray Russia as surrounded by enemies—and Putin as the only bulwark capable of defending the homeland. There was no need to invent a new ideology: the already well-established myth of the Great Patriotic War naturally emerged as the regime’s strategic narrative, functioning on every level.

The glorification of the 1945 victory allowed the regime to purge the collective memory of its specifically socialist elements: by retaining only the narrative of national triumph, the Soviet period could be seamlessly integrated into a continuous national history without any revolutionary rupture. At the same time, the rehabilitation of Joseph Stalin as a legitimate victor served to validate autocracy. The mass repressions and genocidal policies that claimed millions of lives were reframed as a tragic but necessary step: they had made the USSR a global superpower, capable of defending civilisation against the “brown plague.”

The Kremlin has multiplied its legal instruments to enforce this narrative. Since 2020, the Russian Constitution mandates “respect for the memory of the defenders of the Fatherland” and prohibits “diminishing the importance of the heroism” of the Soviet people. In April 2021, Putin signed a law increasing penalties for “insults” or “false claims” about the Second World War and its veterans. In December 2019, Putin himself gathered some leaders of post-Soviet states around a pile of archival documents that he said proved historical truths long ignored in the West—selectively quoting them to justify, in retrospect, the USSR’s annexation of Poland and the Baltic states. In this way, Putin has weaponised history, which has become inseparable from national interest. To challenge his interpretation is tantamount to treason.

The national imagination built around the cult of the Great Patriotic War now allows all of Russia’s actions on the international stage to be framed as part of an eternal war against fascism. Within Russian media discourse, it would have been unthinkable to describe the Ukrainian government as a “fascist junta” or a “Nazi clique” outside the narrative framework imposed by the state over the past decade. The 2022 full-scale invasion is thus portrayed merely as a continuation of the Great Patriotic War: a conflict embedded in a cyclical conception of time in which Russia, eternally under threat from a Western enemy, fights for its very survival—on Ukrainian soil.

9, Russians march in the Immortal Regiment carrying portraits of relatives who fought between 1941 and 1945. Increasingly, the faces of those who fought—or died—in the war against Ukraine are added to these ranks, as though both wars were part of a single, endless struggle. Past and present warfare are merged, and the victory of 1945 becomes the lens through which all events—past, present, and future—are interpreted in a continuous historical timeline.

This symbolic fusion also explains the surreal images of Russian occupation forces who, in recent weeks, have placed propaganda banners in destroyed Ukrainian cities. An uninhabitable Bakhmut was transformed into a stage for celebrating the 80^th anniversary of Russia’s victory in the “Great Patriotic War.” The cult of victory is not only a central element of the Putinist imaginary—it functions as an operating system for domestic governance and external aggression.

Expanding the war narrative: from Ukraine to Europe

This mythological framework also shapes Moscow’s foreign policy. It fuels the belief in a moral right to “punish” people accused of collaborating with the enemy; the war narrative becomes a disciplinary tool used against “rebellious” neighbouring countries. A telling example of this is the installation of a giant screen on the Estonian border, broadcasting Victory Day celebrations in a loop—an attempt to remind Estonians, as well as Latvians and Lithuanians, that the Soviet victory represents an unassailable moral superiority. Identifying with the discourse of the Great Patriotic War thus becomes a mark of loyalty and virtue; to reject or question it is to prove one’s treachery, to expose oneself as corrupted by the enemy, and therefore to be branded a fascist. Through this mechanism, the Russian regime does more than control collective memory—it controls the political and social sphere.

In the Russian collective imagination, the word “fascism” has lost all connection with a specific political ideology and now refers only to an abstract, absolute threat: the desire to destroy Russia. It has become synonymous with “enemy” or “Russophobe,” always denoting the Other, never a historically defined movement. This separation between word and meaning allows the regime to simultaneously glorify the antifascist victory and openly promote xenophobic, homophobic, or ultraconservative rhetoric, without any perceived contradiction.

The word “denazification,” used by Vladimir Putin on February 24, 2022, to justify the invasion, initially puzzled many Russians, most of whom were unfamiliar with the term in this context. Shortly afterwards, the state news agency RIA Novosti published an article by Timofey Sergeytsev – What Russia Should Do with Ukraine – aimed at clarifying its meaning: “denazification” was described as a “total cleansing,” targeting not only alleged Nazi leaders but also “the popular masses who are passive Nazis,” deemed guilty of having supported the “Nazi government.” According to Sergeytsev, modern Ukraine hides its Nazism behind aspirations for “independence” and “European development.” To destroy this Nazism, he argues, is to “de-Europeanise” Ukraine. In this logic, denazification becomes synonymous with eliminating all Western influence from Ukraine and dismantling the country’s existence as a nation-state and a distinct society. Incubated on official state platforms, this narrative reveals the true scope of “denazification”: a large-scale project aimed at erasing any trace of Ukrainian singularity, a blueprint for the genocide.

The article recently published on the official website of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), entitled “Eurofascism, Today as 80 Years Ago, Is a Common Enemy of Moscow and Washington,” strikingly illustrates the expansion of the “denazification” discourse far beyond Ukraine. The accompanying image depicts a grotesque hybrid monster: its body is shaped like a black swastika with the EU’s circle of stars in the centre, while its head is a caricature of Ursula von der Leyen. The creature, with its blood-stained claws outstretched, is caught between two bayonets—one American, the other Russian/Soviet. This grotesque image is not merely a provocation: it reflects a narrative deeply entrenched in Russian state propaganda, where “Eurofascism” becomes an operational concept encompassing all European societies.

Such a message, endorsed by the highest levels of the state, might have seemed absurd or even comical just a few years ago—much like the rhetoric around “Ukronazis,” which even Russian opposition figures failed to take seriously, dismissing it as a cynical smokescreen. But the 2022 tipping point revealed these discourses for what they truly are: the ideological foundation of a large-scale invasion, long prepared within the informational sphere. Today, part of European society—especially elements of the pacifist left—is falling into the same trap: underestimating or ignoring the ongoing propaganda dynamic. But the machine is already in motion. The language of fascism is being broadened daily to include new designated enemies, and the ideological war is shifting: it is no longer stopping at Ukraine—it is now targeting all of Europe. In the face of this brutal reconfiguration of the official Russian narrative, complacency or passivity have themselves become forms of strategic blindness.

 See also: Silenced memories: the Holocaust Narrative in the Soviet Union

‘The left should support a just peace for Ukraine, not a Trump-Putin deal to appease the aggressor’: An interview with Ukrainian socialist Denys Pilash

 Ukrainian socialist Denys Pilash, interviewed by Federico Fuentes

March 13, 2025

Denys Pilash is a political scientist, member of the Ukrainian democratic socialist organisation Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement) and editor of the left-wing journal Сommons. In this broad-ranging interview with Federico Fuentes for LINKS International Journal of Socialist Renewal, Pilash discusses the reaction in Ukraine to the recent meeting between United States President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and the implications for Ukraine and the world of the shift in US policy towards Russia. He also outlines the threat posed by the rising global axis of extreme reaction being spearheaded by the US, Israel and Russia, and argues why the left must defend a renewed internationalism that opposes all oppressors.

The interview is followed with a statement by Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement) Ukraine.

 What was the reaction inside Ukraine to the recent meeting between Trump and Zelensky?

The reaction was predictably one of outrage. The consensus is that Trump and [Vice President JD] Vance tried to humiliate not just Zelensky but Ukraine and its people. They showed zero respect for Ukraine and cynically blamed the victim. They proved themselves to be bullies taking the side of another bully waging war on Ukraine. From what I have heard from people, including in the army, they are angry at the current US administration. They feel Ukraine is being blackmailed into a very disadvantageous “deal”, which will hand over our resources in return for nothing: no security guarantees, no gains, nothing. The deal is simply one where Ukraine is made to pay for everything, not the aggressor.

That is the opposite to what our organisation, Social Movement, and the broader Ukrainian left has been campaigning for. We have demanded that Ukraine’s foreign debt be cancelled. We have said Ukraine’s reconstruction should be funded using the wealth Russian and Ukrainian oligarchies looted in the post-Soviet space and now stored in the West and tax havens. Some of these assets have been frozen by European governments and should be used to reconstruct Ukraine. But right now the opposite is occurring.

So, there is a lot of discontent against Trump. Only a very small minority continue holding some delusions about Trump. They believe Zelensky should have been more obedient and nodded along, because supposedly if you appease Trump’s huge ego he will listen to you. But the way many world leaders have tried to make deals with Trump is not just despicable, it has only reinforced Trump, Vance and [Elon] Musk’s belief that they face no strong resistance, domestically or internationally, and can get away with anything.

Perhaps the one optimistic thing to come out of this is that people are losing their illusions, not just in Trump but in his brand of hard-right conservative politics. Prior to Trump taking office, when he was making preposterous claims about ending the war in 24 hours, there was a lot of hope for Trump in Ukraine. Hopes were high that, somehow, Trump’s unpredictability would help change the course of events and that maybe, magically, he could create a favourable end to the war. Now almost everyone hates Trump. And they see a direct link between Trump’s and Putin’s hard right politics. They see Trump and Putin as ultimately the same: they are two rulers of two great powers who want to impose the rule of force on the world, where the strongest dictate the terms.

Various explanations have been given to explain the US’s 180 degree turn in policy towards Ukraine. How do you explain it?

Many explanations have been given, for example that it is part of some profound strategy to tear Russia from China. But it is hard to see any particularly coherent vision when it comes to Trump’s foreign policy. What we can see, however, is a very clear ideological message. Trump, Vance and Musk are essentially saying to the world, and in particular Europe: “We declare war on you.” They are saying: “We want to bring far-right and neo-fascist forces to power everywhere, and we will only work with these fascistic, authoritarian leaders.”

It is quite telling that the only people now greeted and respected by the White House are war criminals wanted by the ICC [International Criminal Court]. Just look at how [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu was greeted when he visited recently. Or how the Trump administration talks about Putin; Trump always avoids blaming Putin for the war or calling him a dictator, preferring instead to talk about his strong leadership. Others they are more than happy to greet are those associated with what we can now call the “Elon salute”: the Alternative for Germany, [Argentine President Javier] Milei, and other parties and political leaders from the far right that promote the values of ultraconservatism, market fundamentalism and neo-fascism.

A new axis is clearly emerging, bringing together Trump, Putin, Netanyahu, the far right in Europe, and various authoritarian regimes from around the world. You could see this in action in the UN General Assembly vote on the draft resolution [condemning Russia’s war] presented by Ukraine and about 50 co-sponsors [on the third anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion]. Those who voted against included Russia, of course, but also the US, Israel, [Viktor] Orban’s Hungary, the military juntas in the coup belt in Western Africa, North Korea, etc. Even Milei’s Argentina, which previously promoted itself as ultra pro-Ukrainian, abstained; Milei could not bring himself to criticise daddy Trump.

When it comes to the US, Russia and Israel, there is a clear aligning of interests with their vision for the world. It is a vision that Putin espoused for a long time, and which he has framed as “multipolarity”. In this vision, Russia, for instance, is free to do what it wants in the post-Soviet space, while the US is free to do what it wants in the Western hemisphere. Of course, the US has enacted imperialist policies in that region for many years. But what we are seeing now — with Trump making expansionist claims over Greenland, Canada, Panama, and pressuring Latin American states, starting with Mexico — is that they are no longer even trying to hide this fact.

In that sense, we have something similar to the imperialism of more than a century ago. Many on the campist left [who see the world as divided into a pro-US imperialism camp and an anti-US imperialism camp] fell into the trap of thinking it would be inherently better to have lots of centres of power throughout the world; that this would somehow automatically be more egalitarian, more democratic. In fact, the opposite has turned out to be true: this brand of “multipolarity” was not about democratising the world, but partitioning it into spheres of influence, where a handful of great powers — and only these great powers — have agency.

Within this scenario, it is true that the only great power Trump sees as real competition is China, so they want Russia on their side. But Trump’s alliance with Putin cannot simply be explained by geopolitics. Resorting to purely geopolitical thinking, while abandoning class analysis, is the Achilles’ heel of much of the contemporary left. Trump and Putin are role models for the global far right. They share a vision for a conservative order that seeks to dismantle the legacy of enlightenment, and they want to replicate this nationalistic, chauvinistic, exclusionary vision across the globe. That is what explains this alliance.

And this alliance has to do with class. The most reactionary sections of the ruling class in the West are grabbing the chance to dismantle the remnants of the welfare state and rollback concessions won by labour and social movements during the 20th century. We see this with the assault being waged in the US by Musk — the world’s wealthiest capitalist — on social security, education, public health, on everything. They want to implement what some call technofeudalism, but what I call ultracapitalism on steroids. Here again Trump and Putin have a shared vision: the billionaire US president is envious of Russia’s oligarchic system, where political leaders allow the ultra-rich to continue looting as long as the oligarchs do not interfere in political decisions. This oligarchic system, based on unchecked supreme power, is something Trump and the far right would like to replicate in the West.

So, all this is part of their shared vision for reshaping the world order into one where smaller nations and their own people are deprived of any agency. They want to impose hardcore authoritarian hierarchies in every country. Their deliberate attempt to humiliate Ukraine was a clear manifestation of how this axis of extreme reaction believes the world should function.

Where does Trump’s proposed deal leave not just Ukraine but the Global South?

The first thing to say regarding the rare earth minerals deal is that we still do not know what exactly is in it. In fact, we do not even know if there is a finalised deal. Second, even if they proceed with the deal, it is currently based on estimates from explorations carried out in Soviet times. So, there is no guarantee Ukraine has enough rare earth minerals to fulfill the supposed US$500 billion deal. What happens if they find out there are not enough minerals or that extraction will be too expensive? The deal seems to imply that Ukraine would have to compensate the US by handing over other resources, and other sectors of its economy, especially infrastructure.

Clearly, this deal is about imposing economic colonialism. It can only entrench Ukraine’s role as a dependent and exploited country, and sets a dangerous precedent for the Global South.

What about the proposed Russia-US peace talks? What is their significance?

On the negotiations between Moscow and Washington to partition Ukraine over the heads of Ukrainians: if this deal goes ahead it should serve as an important lesson to the people of the world, especially in the Global South. The situation is very clear. Ukraine, as a peripheral country, has been treated badly by neighbouring Russian imperialism. On top of that, it is now being sold out by US imperialism. These two imperialisms are colluding on a shady deal at Ukraine’s expense. The scenario could not be clearer. It is as if a very unsubtle Marxist screenwriter wrote the script: you have an administration of billionaires, co-run by a clownish president and the richest person in the world, acting in a brazen and openly imperialist manner, and clearly stating that they are working with Putin’s Russia.

Of course, we on the political left had no illusions in the US. Ukrainians understood, just like the Kurds in Syria, that you need to use any opportunities to obtain the support needed to withstand an aggressor. But we also criticised our ruling class who failed to understand that this was not a dialogue of equals, and that great powers can turn on you at any time if it suits their interests. This new situation, however, leaves no excuses for those who think Putin’s Russia represents some kind of counterbalance to Western and US imperialism. The campist way of thinking believes imperialisms will remain in permanent opposition and that the enemy of my enemy is somehow my friend. This has clearly been shown not to work. Our current situation should also dispel the simplistic argument that this was all just a proxy war. If that is the case, on whose behalf is Ukraine now waging a proxy war? The US is clearly not on Ukraine’s side — it is converging with Russia. So, is Ukraine fighting a proxy war on behalf of Denmark? Latvia?

Unfortunately, we are often ignorant about the situation facing people in different parts of the world. That was why our journal, Commons, launched its project, “Dialogues of the Peripheries”, to help bring together people from Ukraine and Central Eastern Europe, with peoples from Latin America, Africa, Middle East and Asia to share experiences, histories, and legacies of colonialism, neocolonialism and imperialism. Our contexts are different, but the pattern of great powers conquering, colonising and subjugating smaller nations is very similar.

What would Ukrainians like to see come out of any negotiations?

 The first thing to say is that while Russian propaganda is far from masterful, it has managed to create this idea that Ukrainians are the warmongers and that Russia is on the side of peace, despite the fact it unleashed the biggest invasion in Europe since Adolf Hitler. They have managed to monopolise terms such as “negotiations”, “peace talks”, “peace deals”. But if you listen to what Russian officials say — I am referring here to Putin and [Foreign Minister Sergei] Lavrov and not the crazier ones who act like attack dogs for the regime — they have clearly said Russia will not only not hand back the lands it has occupied, but has as a prerequisite for peace talks that Ukraine cede even more territory. This includes ceding the entire oblasts of Kherson and Zaporizhya, including the big city of Zaporizhya, which Russia has never managed to occupy and thus could not hold their sham referendums there to incorporate these territories into their constitution. Yet they say this is part of the “new geopolitical reality” that must be accepted.

The truth is no one in the world wants peace in Ukraine more than Ukrainians. Most people are naturally tired of the war. But that does not mean they want to capitulate to Russia and just hand over our land and people. They understand that if Ukraine is partitioned, the millions who are either in the occupied territories or have had to flee will have nowhere to return. They know that an outcome that hugely rewards the aggressor will only strengthen Putin’s authoritarian regime and mean even more repression, especially in the occupied territories. So, Ukrainians have two things in mind when thinking about any deal: the fate of the people in the occupied territories and how to prevent Russia from restarting the war.

Within this, there are possible areas for agreements. For example, the Ukrainian government has made it clear it will not recognise Russia’s illegal annexations, as this would set a dangerous precedent for Ukraine and the world. But it has said it could be willing to accept a temporary arrangement whereby, following a ceasefire, Ukraine retains at least some of the currently-occupied territories and negotiations are held regarding the fate of the rest.

Another important condition the Ukrainian government has raised is security guarantees. What guarantees will there be to ensure Russia does not use any ceasefire to simply accumulate more resources, human power and shells, and then restart the war? Trump says this will not happen because unlike previous “weak” US presidents, Putin respects him personally because he is “strong”. But Russia never stopped its hybrid war against Ukraine during Trump’s first administration. Trump’s words mean nothing. Increasingly more people (though still a minority) understand there is no prospect of NATO membership — let’s leave aside here all the implications of this and everything we as leftists know that is wrong with NATO. But some sort of security guarantees involving important players are needed to ensure Russia does not invade again.

One criticism often raised is that elections have not been held and therefore Zelensky has no legitimacy or mandate in terms of any possible negotiations. How do you respond to this?

It is funny because you have a guy who tried to overturn an election that he lost and another guy who has been in power for 25 years via completely sham elections, who kills his political opponents, and these two guys meet in Saudi Arabia, which is ruled by an unelected absolute monarchy, in order to criticise Ukraine because it has not held an election in the middle of a war.

The fact is that you cannot have proper elections in a war, because to hold elections you need to guarantee people’s security. And you cannot do this if your country is being constantly bombarded. Another issue is how do you involve the millions of people who have been forced to flee and are now either internally displaced persons or refugees living outside the country. And how do you ensure soldiers on the frontline or the people in the occupied regions can freely vote. All these problems make the practicalities of holding a fair election quite difficult. And that is before we even start talking about Ukraine’s constitution, which prohibits holding elections in times of war or martial law. But if Russia is so eager for Ukraine to have an election, then the best thing they could do is stop shelling Ukrainian cities.

As for the claim that Ukrainian authorities are illegitimate because Zelensky’s term has ended, the answer to that is the same — end the hostilities, then the Ukrainian people can vote for whoever they want in an election. But I would say this: despite the stark decline in his popularity, opinion polls show Zelensky still has more legitimacy in the eyes of Ukrainian people than some other governmental bodies — and is certainly seen by Ukrainians as much more legitimate than Trump and Putin. And if we compare his approval rating to that of any other politician in Ukraine, Zelensky wins hands down. His only real contender appears to be General [Valerii] Zaluzhnyi, who was Ukraine’s military commander and, naturally, is no friend of Russia. So, the implication that people would like to get rid of Zelensky and elect a president who is friendly to Trump and Putin runs contrary to every public survey. In reality, if Ukraine had an election right now, Zelensky would probably win with more ease in such a hastily-organised electoral process. In contrast, those politicians who act as Trump’s proxy, claiming they could negotiate a better deal than Zelensky, have a popularity of 4% or less.

What new challenges and opportunities does the current situation pose for the Ukrainian left?

All of this is a huge challenge, not just for the Ukrainian left but all Ukrainian people. If our future was unclear before, now it is even more precarious. But in terms of the left, the current situation has clearly shown that the emperor has no clothes — all these myths glorifying capitalists and entrepreneurs are being dismantled right in front of peoples’ eyes. The way Trump and Musk talk about Ukraine has alienated anyone who had Illusions in these false idols. The only people still cheering for them are those on the far right who want Trumpian reaction to triumph around the world.

This moment has to be seized to show people that the problem is not just the individuals but the capitalist system that creates such despicable people. We have to explain how the problem is capitalism, which is based on rewarding the owners of capital at the expense of society, and that if we continue down this path, this system will not only destroy Ukraine but the world. It is also an opportunity to provide our alternatives to neoliberal oligarchic capitalism.

This requires effectively campaigning around issues that benefit the Ukrainian working class, who have been made to pay the biggest price for this war. We need to empower workers and put forward proposals for reshaping Ukraine’s economy. Not just for the sake of peoples’ wellbeing but because this is necessary in times of war. If we are going to be able to defend ourselves properly, we need a properly functioning war economy, healthcare system, science and research department, etc — all these things are interconnected and vital if we want to develop the economy. We also need to make sure socially-oriented issues are prioritised in the reconstruction phase, not the interests of private capital. This requires reversing oligarchic privatisations and returning strategic sectors of the economy to public ownership.

It also means continuing to organise together with others on the left — with comrades from the different socialist and anarchist milieus, trade unionists, from progressive social movements — to support those whose lives have been torn apart by the war as well as those involved in the armed resistance, whether in the army or by providing essential services. We have to build upon these ties and structures to bring about political subjects that can pave the way for revolutionary changes.

Of course, this is not just a challenge for the Ukrainian left, but the left everywhere. We face a moment of extreme polarisation in which extremely reactionary forces have achieved a momentum not seen since World War II. We have Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Trump’s plans for Gaza reinforcing each other, and reinforcing reaction around the world. Trump and Putin plan to turn the world into an even worse hell. Unless they come up against some genuine and coordinated resistance, ultraconservative and fascist forces will continue to take power in country after country.

Our class enemies are uniting at a global level. So, we really need to start thinking about how we, as the left, unite internationally. Achieving this will require, among other things, consistent internationalism. That means no longer making excuses for withholding solidarity. We have to stop trying to determine which peoples are somehow more worthy of support than others, or not worthy of support at all because somehow they are oppressed by the wrong oppressor. We need to stand with all oppressed people around the world.

There are genuine progressives who view the new situation regarding Ukraine as positive (at least compared to what preceded it) because they believe it might help bring an end to the slaughter, or out of fear of the war escalating into a nuclear or world war. How would you respond to them?

The truth is that we have experienced enormous solidarity and support from comrades around the world. But we have also seen progressives not just refuse to take sides, but even refuse to listen to us. We understand the sources of this. In many cases it comes from a feeling of powerlessness. This ultimately leads people to resort to the idea that maybe if some other force can, in some way, challenge the existing system (or at least the major imperialism), it might somehow create some room for changes. But such thinking represents a clear break with leftist politics. Ultimately, it has more in common with cynical realpolitik or the “realist” vision of politics. It represents an abandonment of class politics and replaces the fight for an alternative to capitalism with simply rooting for any anti-Western regimes.

You can see how this kind of thinking ends up being very similar to the right-wing conservative mentality. Conservatives blamed the Cuban Revolution for bringing the world to the brink of nuclear conflict during the Cuban missile crisis. Back then, they said “Cuba is so selfish for wanting Soviet missiles that could endanger the US” and blamed “crazy Cubans” for not understanding the gravity of the situation. Today, you hear the same things, that Ukrainians are somehow “warmongers who are gambling with World War III,” only now you hear it not only from the far-right billionaire US president but also from some on the left. The people who really want World War III are the aggressors. It is Putin who is risking World War III and has no regard for human life, not even Russian lives. Yet you still hear people on the left blaming Ukrainians and accusing them of wanting to fight “until the last Ukrainian”.

In terms of avoiding war, the reality is that there is no historic example where rewarding or appeasing an aggressor has worked. But there are many examples of how it paved the road to World War II, such as when the international community essentially did nothing to prevent the fascists winning the Spanish Civil War. Even the Stalinist Soviet Union, which provided aid to the Republic, took Spain’s gold reserves in return — much like Trump wants to do with Ukraine’s rare earth minerals. Similarly, Britain and France simply ditched the Spanish Republicans under the guise of “non-intervention”. They also directly collaborated with Hitler to dismantle Czechoslovakia, arguably the most democratic country in the region, but that too did not stop World War II. The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact [between the Soviet Union and Germany] also did not stop Germany from attacking the Soviet Union in World War II. So, the pattern has been repeated time and time again.

Ultimately, the problem with these progressives is that they have no real alternative to propose. They put forward nice pacifist and, in many cases, idealistic slogans, such as “we need to look outside the box”, “war is never the answer”, and “give diplomacy a chance”. But in the end, the solutions they adhere to is the same realpolitik advocated by great powers: let imperialists negotiate over how they partition smaller countries and divide up the world into spheres of influence. Those espousing such logic really need to place themselves in our boots and consider how this looks from our side. How would you feel if you were being occupied, tortured, murdered, but somehow others saw this as contributing to reshaping the world order for the better? The reality is that our current situation will only help reshape the world for the worse.

Those that cling to this rhetoric will increasingly find themselves aligned with the forces of extreme reaction that are part of the new fascist international being led by the US and Russia (and apparently Israel). Because, ultimately, if you are OK with their plans for Ukraine, you are OK with their plans for the Palestinian people, because you are OK with imperialist powers coming together to unilaterally decide what happens to smaller nations.

How can the international left best help the Ukrainian people, and Ukrainian left in particular, in these turbulent times?

The first thing I would say is that the left must not surrender the struggle in your own countries against your own ruling classes, against your own reactionary forces that are linking up with similar forces globally. To help the Ukrainian people, the first thing to do is continue your own struggles.

The second thing is to stand on an internationalist platform that opposes all aggressors, all oppressors, all imperialists. Today that means finding ways to help the people of Ukraine, rather than supporting the plans of sycophantic dictators and ultracapitalists. Ukraine is an important struggle for the left. Nice slogans, such as “the suffering has to end somehow”, “the war has to end somehow” are not enough to stop the suffering and war. Achieving this requires a just and sustainable peace. But these so-called “peace” negotiations between Putin and Trump are simply about rewarding the aggressor and inviting further aggressions.

So, against the realpolitik we see on the left today, we need a renewed internationalism to confront the Trump administration, which is leading a global far-right assault on what remains of progressive forces and social gains throughout the world. Every time Trump makes a statement demanding entire nations cease to exist and become US states, or threatens to annex parts of other countries, all you get is a very meek response from the international community. They are afraid. But we, as the left, can not be afraid, not even in the face of the worst capitalist nightmare. It is now or never. If we do not act now, there may be no tomorrow. We may instead all find ourselves living under the heel of extremely authoritarian, fascistic regimes seeking to reshape the world to their liking — a nice big playground for the world’s most brutal and richest people.

Denys Pilash

For a Ukraine without oligarchs and occupiers!

March 10, 2025, by Sotsialnyi Rukh (Social Movement) Ukraine (Translation from International Viewpoint)

The predatory policies of the newly elected U.S. president make it impossible to establish a lasting peace for Ukrainians. Ukraine’s refusal to sign the mineral extraction agreement, designed to serve the interests of American capital, demonstrates the country’s determination to avoid colonial dependence. This opens the door to exploring a more equitable model of relations between Ukraine and the states of Europe, Asia, and the rest of the world under the banner of resistance to imperialist domination. However, if the current approach persists, Ukraine risks facing an imminent reduction or even a complete halt of military aid from the United States.

This aid has never been either timely or sufficient. However, its termination would be deeply felt.

If the Ukrainian state is determined to sustain the military effort until the liberation of its territories or the decisive defeat of the aggressor, it must adopt the appropriate methods. In our view, Ukraine’s defence could be strengthened by transitioning to a policy of “war socialism”, which would involve mobilising sufficient capital to serve the state through confiscation and abandoning market-based economic regulation. Such a policy, combined with wealth redistribution, would reduce the burden of war that falls disproportionately on the poorest segments of Ukrainian society.

The European community has already responded to Trump’s statements by expanding defence budgets and increasing military aid to Ukraine. It is worth noting that since the full-scale invasion, the government has taken significant steps to strengthen our own defence capabilities, localise Western production, revive missile programs, and scale up own drone program. However, Ukraine still has substantial potential to mobilise internal resources.

Social Movement (Sotsialnyi Rukh) has long emphasised the necessity of these measures, but now they are critical to Ukraine’s ability to defend itself. The main obstacle to effectively mobilising resources is the neoliberal policy, which prioritises private property above all else, encourages profiteering, and allows wealth to be accumulated by private individuals. As long as Ukrainian cities remain occupied and the Russian aggressor retains offensive capabilities, all sectors of the economy must function in a coordinated manner, maximising their contribution to the defence effort.

Most financial resources should be concentrated in the hands of the state and invested in the defence sector, while private capital must be subject to progressive taxation to replenish the state budget. Strengthening defence is inseparable from large-scale investment in the social sphere: creating jobs (especially in critical infrastructure sectors), improving the care sector to enable more women to enter the workforce, and increasing access to the social services such as healthcare, temporary housing, and rehabilitation. These measures could also help attract citizens back from abroad.

Additionally, it is essential to improve social guarantees for the military service members, especially those defending Ukraine since 2022.

The uniqueness of Ukraine’s situation lies in the fact that the dismantling of oligarchic capitalism has become more possible than ever in the context of full-scale war and is justified by society. Firstly, a significant portion of essential public services, which determine Ukraine’s resilience, are already provided by state-owned enterprises (railways, postal services, healthcare, education, banks). Secondly, numerous enterprises (primarily those connected to Russian oligarchs) have been nationalised, and the share of GDP redistributed through the budget has increased. Thirdly, Ukrainian oligarchs have already lost part of their wealth and levers of control, increasingly submitting to the influence of state power.

Measures that should be taken

• Audit of natural resources and land to determine their owners and the public benefits derived from their use. Transparency in the control of national wealth is not needed for hasty trading of these resources, but to understand the foundation on which the growth of general prosperity is possible. This will motivate the people to fight more effectively for their homeland and its social prospects.
• Establishing state control over enterprises in strategic sectors of the economy and setting up mass production for the needs of those at the front-line. Industry must operate in the interests of defence, not chase after volatile market trends. Returning critical infrastructure objects to state ownership. Access to basic goods should not become a feeding trough for oligarchs or a means of siphoning state benefits into the pockets of monopolists. Keeping DTEK in the hands of Rinat Akhmetov or regional energy companies in the hands of Vadym Novynskyi is an unjustified act of state charity in favour of oligarchs.
• Revising the results of the plundering privatisation. Enterprises bought for a pittance should be returned to the state, or the difference between the purchase price and the actual market value should be compensated. First and foremost, under state control should be enterprises in the mining, machine-building, and chemical industries that are critical for ensuring defence. Enough scraping money from donations – let the oligarchs pay.
• Denouncing any agreements on double taxation avoidance with Cyprus, the Virgin Islands, and other offshore jurisdictions. The added value created using Ukrainian natural resources, infrastructure, and labour should be taxed here and only here.
• Introducing progressive taxation and a luxury tax. The defence of the country relies on the heroism and sacrifices of Ukrainian peasants, workers, and small business. To preserve the country, the wealthiest must sacrifice their fortunes, in proportion to the influence they had before the war – the top tax rate should reach 90% of income. Without fiscal activism, Ukraine will fall into an insurmountable debt trap (by 2025, the external debt may approach 100% of GDP).
• Establishing worker control in enterprises as an effective tool for internal auditing and a form of self-organised society. From the first days of the war to the present, the country has been accompanied by corruption scandals related to the misuse of funds. Continuous control by trade unions and workers’ councils is the key to greater transparency in leadership actions and preventing corruption. It may be possible to bribe individual people, but it is impossible to bribe an entire collective. Granting effective control powers to trade unions will serve as an incentive for the development of a genuine labour movement.
• Abandoning the previous practice of underfunding education and science. The high technological nature of modern warfare makes the role of engineers and skilled workers just as important as that of soldiers. It is only the educational inertia of the previous era, combined with the widespread technical literacy of the Ukrainian population, that has made possible the design, production, and mastery of numerous modern technical tools that give us an advantage on the battlefield. We can no longer rely on the inertia of past eras. Significant investments in education and science were needed yesterday. Without the development of the social sector, Ukraine faces mass emigration and a demographic crisis that will prevent replenishing human losses.
• State monopoly on exports. In 2024, the export of agricultural products reached a record $24.5 billion, although the profits continue to line private pockets.
• Resetting relations with Europe regarding the fate of Russian assets. Cleansing itself of the remnants of oligarchic influence, Ukraine will heal from corruption, making it possible to have a substantive discussion about transferring frozen Russian assets for Ukrainian needs. Currently, approximately $200 billion of the $300 billions of Russian-origin assets are held in European countries.
• Raising the social prestige of the military personnel. The replenishment of the state budget will allow for the payment of fair financial compensation to wounded soldiers who wish to return to service. It is essential to restore the practice of maintaining the average salary for mobilised workers, which will ensure the Armed Forces of Ukraine have the necessary personnel potential.

The implementation of these steps is impossible without a break between the country’s leadership, big business, and its agents of influence. If even some of these measures are implemented, they will increase public trust in the government. True guarantees of Ukraine’s security lie in strengthening internal societal ties. On the other hand, other countries will not help us until we demonstrate our willingness to prioritize defence interests over market interests. And in the 34th year of its independence, Ukraine will have to learn to live without oligarchs and capitalists. While Ukraine still has significant financial, industrial, and human resources, failing to move towards their socialisation would be a major mistake.

Now the Ukrainian government has a unique opportunity to show, in practice, what it is willing to sacrifice – the country or the oligarchs. If we put an end to the neoliberal chaos that deepens the gap between the rich and the poor, we will unite the people and become a unifying force of global stature! If we rebuild the economy on socially oriented principles, we will endure the struggle and lay a solid foundation for reconstruction!

Millions from the oligarchs – for welfare and defence! For Ukraine without oligarchs and occupiers!

Sotsialnyi Rukh