The federal budget for the fiscal year 1980 proposes a socially regressive shift in national priorities. It uses fiscal policy to engender higher levels of unemployment. It shifts the burden of fighting inflation to those least able to bear it, …
A qualified victory in Southeast Asia was recently claimed by C. L. Sulzberger of the New York Times (January 29, 1967). The containment of China—assertedly the basic objective of U.S. policies in Southeast Asia, reaffirmed as such by Secretary of …
None of the basic issues in economic policy have been resolved in the years during which the Democrats have governed; wage and price norms, the distribution of the tax burden, the level and direction of public expenditures, all remain controversial. …
The Goldwater nomination marks a new departure in American politics. For the first time, a Presidential candidate lends focus to the conservative and reactionary forces in both parties. Goldwater is basically the candidate of the well-connected bureaucrat of the Mitchell …
I take issue with Lewis Coser on the following major grounds: 1) He discusses the political evolution of the developing countries in isolation from their ties, past and present, with the West. Yet, their prospects cannot be assayed without examining …
The 1960-61 recession has displayed two contradictory characteristics: it has been the mildest postwar recession when measured in terms of the cutbacks in output, capital investments and inventories, but the worst in terms of unemployment and business failures. The paradox …
One fourth of the American people is poor or lives at the margin of poverty. The poverty from which they suffer is not a “case” problem, amenable to solution by social work, nor does it occur merely in “pockets” which …
Michael Walzer has written a suggestive essay on American education [DISSENT, Spring and Summer 1959]. Yet, with all the thoughtfulness and knowledge he displays, I do not think that he has posed the key problems of American education. Walzer commits …
The economic upswing of the past ten to twelve years has come to an end. Full employment, prevalent for most of this period, is now in jeopardy. Though enjoined by law to maintain full employment, the government has deliberately abetted …
What attitude should democratic Socialists, who reject Communism and abhor the abuses of which Communist Governments have been guilty, take up towards Communist Parties and towards individual Communists in the light of recent developments in the Soviet Union and in …
As this is being written, Bonn’s parliament is voting for German rearmament. This caps the policy of “restoration” pursued during recent years by the U.S. in Western Europe; at the same time it introduces additional elements of rigidity not merely …
Russia: Methods of Analysis In his article (DISSENT, Summer 1954) Mr. Deutscher asks whether a higher level of civilization corresponds to a higher level of economic development and whether a mass increase in literacy induces progress toward democracy. To such …
For the past eighty years the basic economic cause of agrarian movements in the U. S., as well as of government efforts to subsidize agriculture, has been the difference between prices received and prices paid by the farmer. None of …
The June uprising in East Germany was not merely an incident in the resistance that has become part of daily life in the satellite areas; for this time the whole character of the resistance was suddenly, dramatically lifted to a new stage.
Socialist thought provides us with an imaginative and moral horizon.
For insights and analysis from the longest-running democratic socialist magazine in the United States, sign up for our newsletter:
