Artwork by Susan Point.
Socialist Studies 2019 – Circuits of Capital, Circles of Solidarity
4-7 June, Vancouver
Society for Socialist Studies Congress 2019, June 4-7, on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Musqueam people at the University of British Columbia.
The circuits of financialised capitalism birthed by neoliberal capitalism have brought us to today’s historical moment of radical domestic and international inequality and with the existential threat of global warming. Much of the world is experiencing war and ongoing conflict, including genocide and apartheid, as new powers challenge the historic dominance of the West. Unnatural disasters threaten human and other life on planet Earth. A very small proportion of humanity holds most of the wealth and the world’s resources while others live in misery. There are new, bold expressions of old hatreds.
Socialisms in all their variety matter today because they seek justice and peace for humanity, which is only possible through sustainable relationships with the natural world of which we are all a part. These struggles demand critical analyses of the unequal and ecologically destructive world we have inherited, as well as practices that prefigure a more just world to come in new circles of solidarity.
For more than 50 years, the Society for Socialist Studies has endeavored to open and maintain spaces for socialist and allied critical analyses and reflection, among both scholars and activists. In so doing, the Society draws on the strengths, however constrained and challenged, of both historical and contemporary struggles against capitalism and injustice around the globe. Despite often violent, sometimes murderous repression, socialist and allied movements mobilize in sometimes extraordinary, sometimes everyday struggles. Together, working people, Indigenous peoples, racialized persons, those with disabilities, the poor, sexual and gender minorities struggle for sustainable relations with the natural world, for social(ist) justice, and for peace, for each and all.
Given the magnitude of the challenges, socialism is strongest as a richly diverse tradition of critique and struggle, open to critical engagement with a wide range of liberatory theorizing and praxis, both historical and contemporary. These include but are not limited to:
- socialist feminisms
- critical race feminisms
- ecological socialisms
- gay, lesbian and queer socialisms
- socialisms from the global South
- “crip” or disability socialisms
- anarchist socialisms
- critical Indigenous theorizing and resurgence.
Such analyses, which in recent decades have targeted liberal capitalisms, must now also confront alliances of wealth with popular hatreds. Everyday struggles face new/old challenges, as they seek to carve out spaces where more equitable and ecological relationships may be nurtured.
From June 4-7, 2019, the Society of Socialist Studies meets on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Musqueam people at the University of British Columbia. We invite papers, theoretical, empirical and/or praxis-oriented, that critically analyze the world-as-it-is and engage with struggles that prefigure a more just, equitable and sustainable world-that-may-be.
Queries: rosa1919@uvic.ca
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Our final programme is now available. Access the short version here. For conference abstracts, please also see our detailed programme.