Eyewitnesses to the Russian Revolution Author Event
Haymarket Books and the Washington, D.C. International Socialist Organization present Todd Chretien for a public presentation and discussion on his new book, Eyewitnesses to the Russian Revolution.
For much of the 20th century, millions of workers understood the October Revolution of 1917 as a touchstone in the struggle for trade unions, against oppression and exploitation, against capitalism. Stalinism and McCarthyism both contributed to obliterating this legacy.
So why should people struggling today in the Black Lives Matter movement, for women’s liberation, transgender rights, against climate catastrophe, and for $15 an hour care? While there have been many revolutions and mass struggles against oppression since, the Russian Revolution is the one time that our side has moved from resistance to taking power, from everything the rulers do to us, to the capacity to re-make the world the way we decide.
While not a blue print for the future, the Russian Revolution is an invaluable template of lessons and insight into our own struggle for a socialist future.
Todd Chretien is editor of Eyewitnesses to the Russian Revolution (Haymarket Books, October 2017), and a member of the International Socialist Organization. He is also a frequent contributor to Socialist Worker and the International Socialist Review, and editor of Haymarket Books’ 2014 edition of Lenin’s State and Revolution.