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2026 Conference Agenda
2026 AGM Draft Agenda
Minutes – 2025 GAMM
Constitution and Bylaws – 2025 GAMM
2026 President’s Report
2026 Membership Secretary Report
2026 Treasurer’s Report
L’Université de Saint-Boniface, Winnipeg
June 4-6, 2026
Challenges to collective life cast a looming shadow: high unemployment, the rising cost of living, and state authorities pushing or intensifying a socio-economic status quo that for decades has left millions of people behind. International affairs are marked by genocidal annihilation while on-going wars increase tensions among major powers and exacerbate ecological destruction. A persistent gendered wage gap and declining rates of women in decision-making roles have stalled progress toward equity. State policies that exploit migrant workers, or that overturn decades of practices designed to improve equality of outcomes, undermine attempts to build equal communities. Politics appear mired in reaction, punishment, and outright fascist tendencies. All these factors combine to perpetuate capitalist societies that squeeze workers more than ever and drive wedges among us all.
At the very same time, bursts of resistance are pushing back against it all. Indigenous peoples around the world have taken action to press demands for consultation, reconciliation, decolonization, and self-determination. Unions have stood fast and reminded both employers and the state of workers’ power. Rent strikes have successfully pushed back against greed and squalor. Nationwide protests in some countries have condemned gender violence and grabbed the attention of state authorities. Demonstrators have organized and chased anti-immigration groups out of public spaces. Protests and demonstrations have loudly proclaimed that the current world order is not good enough—and it will not be tolerated. Activists determined to interrupt the shipment of machines that rain death and chaos down on people around the globe have blockaded ports and factories. And legislators, running on explicitly socialist platforms, have been elected to political office, and are disrupting existing parties.
Socialism today is presented with multiple challenges—and opportunities. This year’s conference confronts several questions: how can socialism help chart a path toward liberation? What could socialism look like today? What lessons do historical movements offer to socialists who are guided by a rejection of present conditions, and yet optimistic that a better world is not only possible, but absolutely necessary? Such questions imply additional conversations about what–if any–overarching strategies could guide socialist liberation, as well as which tactics would be most effective from moment to moment. How can we recognize and expand upon moments of collective optimism, and contribute toward the will for a better future? With all of this in mind, this year’s conference calls for panels and papers that make arguments for a better tomorrow.
The Society’s 2026 Conference invites bold, unflinching observations about how to motivate socialist theory and practice today. Set in Winnipeg, on the lands of the Red River Rebellion and the Winnipeg General Strike, we share ground with movements that have provided a rich inheritance of historical and contemporary economic and political contestation—and attempts to construct alternatives. Indigenous resistances; the labour movement; prairie populism, socialism and co-operativism; the resistance of immigrant communities; internationalism; and electoral victories all can, and have, provided inspiration to socialists for decades. How can socialists take action now?
This year’s Conference will also feature a symposium, China in the World Today. The People’s Republic of China has become a major economic and geopolitical force in the world. Its leadership on ecological issues, in forming an economic bloc to counter the U.S. empire, and its advocacy of socialism with Chinese characteristics demands a careful, Marxist response from the Canadian left. Unfortunately, the left has been remiss in coming to terms with China and its rise, largely ceding the field to (neo)liberal and conservative perspectives. As hostilities toward China intensify, these sessions will add much-needed discussion on the left, and a unique space to develop and shape dialogue. A symposium on China offers vital connections to expert knowledge and a rare opportunity to both develop a knowledge base on Canada-China relations and raise questions that are central to the contemporary political economy.
The Society welcomes proposals for sessions and papers that address, but are not limited to:
• Learning from the past and socialist innovation
• The return of the strike and militant labour action
• Challenges within electoralist strategy
• Strategic socialism
• Gender and socialism
• From the municipal to the international
• How deeply are socialist political parties and social movements reaching people?
• The existence of, and potential for, solidarities across movements
• Co-operativism
• The potential for socialist optimism
• Reclaiming the word Socialism
• Racial capitalism and socialist alternatives
• Socialism, anti-imperialism, and decolonization
• The role of the state
• Actually-existing socialism
• Eco-socialism
• Socialist ideology and writing
• Labour and social movement archives
• Historical socialist texts
• Worker resistance to capitalism
Please submit a session proposal (detailing a theme, papers, and presenters) or a paper proposal by February 16, 2026, using this form.
Questions may be directed to 2026sssconference@gmail.com
Please note that this year’s Society for Socialist Studies conference will be a standalone conference, not as part of the Congress for the Social Sciences and Humanities.
L’Université de Saint-Boniface is located on Treaty One Territory and the National Homeland of the Red River Métis, in Wiiniibak, Manido Abi. We acknowledge these are the ancestral lands of the Anishinaabeg, Anisininew, Ininiwak/Nehethowuk, Oceti Sakowin/Dakota Oyate, and Michif (Métis) Peoples. This territory is also a place of significance for the Denesuline and the Inuit. The water in Winnipeg is sourced from Shoal Lake 40 First Nation, in western Ontario.