Few political questions from the 20th century were so fraught as how to understand the Russian Revolution. Inspiring example of workers throwing off the Tsarist yoke and rattling the foundations of capitalism, or well-spring of tyranny and the antithesis of the benighted values of ‘The West’? Even among its most ardent defenders debates raged about what lessons to draw from the experience of the revolution, and how (or whether) to replicate the organizational model of Lenin and the Bolshevik Party.

Though these very questions animated several generations of activists and organizers on the Left in countries across the globe, how relevant are they for today’s burgeoning socialist movement in a modern democratic state? What lessons can we apply to the current world situation?

Taking as their starting point the ground-breaking contributions of Eric Blanc’s Revolutionary Social Democracy, Blanc and Seattle’s socialist city councilwoman Kshama Sawant will debate exactly what we can learn from the Russian Revolution for our contemporary struggles.

Blanc and Sawant will be joined by Bryan Koulouris of Socialist Alternative, for a debate moderated by Bhaskar Sunkara.

Get a copy of Revolutionary Social Democracy from Haymarket: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1907-revolutionary-social-democracy

***Register through Eventbrite to receive a link to the video conference on the day of the event. This event will also be recorded and live captioning will be provided.***

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Speakers:

Kshama Sawant is a Seattle city councilwoman and member of Socialist Alternative and the Democratic Socialists of America.

Eric Blanc is the author of Revolutionary Social Democracy: Working-Class Politics Across the Russian Empire, 1882-1917, a member of Democratic Socialists of America, and an organizer with the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee.

Bryan Koulouris is the national organizer for Socialist Alternative, and an executive committee member of International Socialist Alternative

Bhaskar Sunkara (moderator) is the founding editor of Jacobin and the author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequality.