Marxism and Politics Summer Series: Guest Lecture by Rene Rojas

Join PHL DSA for the kick-off of our Marxism and Politics Summer Lecture Series. Throughout June, July, and August, we are bringing political analysts and writers to Philadelphia to give seminars on their recent essays with us. First, we will have a session where we read a contemporary political article or essay and discuss it, getting a sense of its arguments and themes, as well as questions that it raises or problems with the argument. Then, we will host the writer, who will deliver a brief lecture and then lead a seminar where we can go more in depth on the argument, and pose questions that came up in the previous session.

For our inaugural lecture, we have Rene Rojas, a sociologist and political scientist at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. His research is on neoliberal development and politics in Latin America, where he spent years as an activist. Rojas will be delivering a lecture the rise and fall of Latin America's Pink Tide movement. Considered the most promising development for the global left in decades, the Pink Tide is now in retreat. To understand its decline, Rojas compares its rise and achievements to the rise of the region’s classical left, which emerged following the Cuban Revolution. His thesis is that whereas the classical left’s accomplishments were rooted in the structural leverage of industrial labor, the Pink Tide has been based on movements of informal workers and precarious communities.

The Marxism and Politics Reading Group will be meeting the week beforehand (on Monday, June 17th at 7 PM in Chapterhouse Cafe) to discuss his essay on Latin America's Pink Tide.