Five lessons from 2025
2025 will go down as a turning point in world politics—a year characterised by the ascendancy of the far right, savage attacks on living standards and imperialist brutality from Gaza to Ukraine. But it’s also been a year in which millions have been grasping for ways to resist this state of affairs—from general strikes in Europe to communities facing down immigration agents in US cities, from left electoral challenges to youth revolts in the economically underdeveloped world. There is no shortage of will to fight. What socialists make of this potential will play a role in shaping the future. Here are some lessons from the year.
1. Capitalist politics is showing its true face
The Trump administration in the US has radicalised at breakneck speed, encapsulated by the president’s recent speech to top-ranking generals, pledging to use the military to destroy the left-wing “enemy within”. Trump has built his own Gestapo in the form of an army of deportation agents that now receives more funding than most national militaries.
This is a far-right insurgency not on the fringes of world capitalism, but at its centre. The notion that “capitalism”, “freedom” and “democracy” were essentially synonyms has long been an article of faith in mainstream politics—as former Vice President Kamala Harris expressed in September: “I always believed that if push came to shove, those titans of industry would be guardrails for our democracy”. But Trump came to office with the “titans of industry” sitting in the front row, and no amount of deportations, war crimes and coup threats seems to have dimmed their enthusiasm.
As billionaires cosy up to the far right, traditional conservatives are basking in their glow—from Britain’s Tories, to German Chancellor Frederich Merz, to Emmanuel Macron in France. Vice President J.D. Vance, once lauded as a “never Trump” moderate Republican, embodies this shift.
Politicians of the liberal centre, who have spent the past decade promoting themselves as the only viable barrier against far-right advance, have proved that, when push comes to shove, they crawl and simper before it. This goes beyond the cringing statements of fealty to Trump, as shameful as these are. Centrists and liberals are the prime drivers of a new militarism, fulfilling Trump’s demands for Western countries to build their armed forces. Germany’s Merz, for instance, has been able to rely on support from the Social Democrats and Greens for his plans to raise military spending to 5 percent of GDP. Britain’s Kier Starmer has attempted to roll back disability support payments in the quest to build a “battle ready” military.
This should surprise nobody. The pretence that the “sensible centre” stood for a “rules-based” liberal international order based on human rights was shattered by their wholehearted support for Israel’s war on Gaza. As Israel has spent two years bombing hospitals, massacring hungry children at “aid distribution” points and burying Palestinians in mass graves, the arms from Israel’s Western allies have kept flowing.
All the pro-capitalist political currents have shown themselves to be part of the same sordid game of power politics, in which the lives of the poor count for nothing.
2. The resistance will not go away
2025 wasn’t just a year of right-wing ascendancy. Resistance to the new normal of austerity, authoritarianism and war has rocked every continent.
Some of the sharpest struggles have occurred in the global south, where a wave of struggle over the past few years, dubbed the “Gen Z revolution”, has pitched millions of young people against their governments, from Paraguay to the Philippines. This is a generation for whom capitalism has broken all of its promises—of “development”, jobs and democratic rights.
The movement in Bangladesh last year, which reached revolutionary proportions, contains important lessons. Protesters faced down mass arrests, torture and massacres to topple Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Hasina fled to India and has been sentenced to death in absentia. But Bangladesh’s movement also shows that replacing a leader or political clique at the head of the state will not be enough to address the demands that fuelled such heroic resistance. Hasina’s replacement, Muhammad Yunus, has doubled down on implementing the International Monetary Fund’s austerity directives. A year on from the revolt, two-thirds of young women in Bangladesh are still classified as “NEET”—not in employment, education or training.
The sense of frustrated expectations is also felt in the West. Young people are priced out of their own cities by the real estate market, face mountains of student debt and diminishing prospects of finding a stable, well-paying job. This underlying resentment is constantly looking for new outlets.
The global movement for Palestine has given a generation a unifying banner—a focal point for opposition to a discredited, genocidal political establishment. The urgency of defending Palestine has also acted as a source of courage, helping people across the world sweep away decades of demoralisation and apathy, and reviving traditions of mass protest. In standing up for the brutalised population of Gaza, people are also learning again to stand up for themselves. As one placard wielded by a demonstrator in Rome said: “We wanted to free Palestine, but instead Palestine is freeing us”.
Another expression of the desire for an alternative is the emergence of new left-wing political forces. La France Insoumise (France Unbowed) has consolidated into the largest radical left party in Europe, with 400,000 members. The German Die Linke (The Left) party has grown from 58,000 to 120,000 this year. In Britain, the Greens have turned sharply to the left, increasing their membership by more than 100,000. The Socialist Party in Australia, formed this year, has already attracted more than 5,000 members, making it the largest socialist organisation in the country for generations.
3. The working class has the power to change the world
For decades, it has been fashionable to write off the working class. Liberal academics have argued that workers are too precarious and atomised to act effectively in their own interests. Postcolonial writers claim that Western workers are a privileged layer, beneficiaries of the imperialist exploitation carried out by their rulers. Many question whether the working class meaningfully exists any more—and when workers are noticed, it’s usually to pin blame on them for the latest disaster.
Trump’s 2016 victory was dubbed the “revenge of the white working class” by commentators of conservative and liberal persuasion alike. Both sides agreed that “the white working class” was irredeemably conservative and racist. This was never rooted in genuine analysis, but reflected middle-class prejudices and a desire to legitimise a further shift to the right in mainstream politics.
This rubbish was blown out of the water this year by the incredible actions of workers in solidarity with Palestine. Dock workers were the first to put themselves on the line. In the Greek port city of Piraeus, Marseille in France and Genoa in Italy’s north, they have repeatedly taken industrial action over the last two years to stop the loading of arms onto ships bound for Israel. In September, inspired by the upsurge in Palestine activism and the courage of those on board the Global Sumud Flotilla, dock workers decided to raise the stakes, calling for a general strike if Israel dared intercept the delivery of aid to Gaza.
This culminated in an incredible moment in October: more than 100 cities were seized by mass demonstrations and strikes involving an estimated 2 million people. The promise of left-wing unions and the Palestine movement to “block everything” for Gaza was made good. Society was paralysed, from the ports to the railways to the factories. Schools were blockaded and universities occupied. The attempts by Italy’s fascist Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to demonise, trivialise and repress the movement all fell flat. An authoritarian “security decree” that her government passed earlier this year to criminalise disruptive protests was torn to shreds as hundreds of thousands blocked major intersections and highways.
It’s not the case that workers are always at the forefront of struggles against oppression and injustice. The workers’ movement is misled by politicians and bureaucrats who want to use workers as nothing more than a voting base and discourage any struggle. After decades of defeats and demoralisation, many people have understandably adapted and lowered their horizons on what is possible.
But this can change quickly—once workers’ power catches on, it’s infectious. When workers withdraw their labour, they can halt the flow of profits, stop the flow of arms, end wars and even topple governments. The common interests and experiences of workers in vastly different situations across the globe, and a sense that all face a common enemy, push working-class solidarity back to the fore. As one participant in the Italian general strike for Gaza wrote: “The hand that bombs the Palestinians is the hand that exploits us in our workplaces”.
If a new left is built that can play a role in turning the tide of reaction, it has to restore at its heart the idea that the organised working class is the most powerful potential force for social change on the planet.
4. A radical minority, when organised, can move millions
While the horrific direction of world capitalism has generated many spontaneous movements, resistance has reached its greatest heights where organised groupings of radicals have given a lead and inspired masses of people to join them. The world isn’t going to be changed by sitting around complaining about capitalism with your friends or arguing on the internet. Turning discontent into a political movement requires organisations experienced in arguing, educating and mobilising people.
This was shown clearly in Italy, where the sustained organising and bold action of a left-wing minority galvanised the strikes. They were not the initiative of the liberal parliamentary opposition to Meloni, nor of the largest union federation, the CGIL, which is a conservative and cautious bureaucracy.
First came the actions of militant students, organised by various socialist and communist groups, who blockaded high schools, organised university encampments and bravely stood up to police violence, generating sympathy from the public and statements of solidarity from sections of the union movement.
The baton was then taken by radical unions dominated by the far left, which operate independently of the CGIL. The call of workers in the radical Autonomous Port Workers Collective lit the fuse for the movement. Millions of people fed up with government complicity and looking for a way to offer meaningful support to Gaza took up their call to block everything in successive days of mass strikes.
The left didn’t move millions into action by sucking up to their equivalents of the Labor Party or the ACTU—they planted a flag and challenged the “moderates” to follow. The first day of mass strikes on 22 September was not supported by the CGIL, but was nevertheless a massive success, with half a million taking to the streets. Many CGIL members took the day off work despite their union’s stance. The CGIL then felt it had no choice but to reverse course and endorse a general strike on 3 October or risk discrediting itself completely. The strike was a rare and exceptional day of workers’ unity, with the left and the country’s biggest union federation working together to shut down the country.
In Germany, Die Linke has played an important role organising opposition to the fascist Alternative für Deutschland (Alternative for Germany). As mainstream politicians have moved to normalise the party, Die Linke leader Heidi Reichinnek used her platform in parliament to call for people to take “to the barricades” against the far right.
Socialists in Australia have also played a modest but crucial role in mobilising resistance. The 300,000-strong demonstration in July, which defied the NSW state Labor government to march across the Sydney Harbor bridge, was the initiative of experienced Socialist Alternative members working through the Palestine Action Group. Socialist Alternative campus clubs also organised a national “student referendum” on university ties to weapons manufacturers and Labor’s complicity in Israel’s genocide, which culminated in the biggest wave of mass student meetings since the 1970s.
5. Socialists have an enormous opportunity—and a responsibility
The good news: socialism is becoming more popular. As the Liberal Party-aligned Institute for Public Affairs bemoans, polling conducted in Australia, Canada, the United States and the UK shows that around half of young people see socialism as the ideal economic system.
Politicians who adhere to the socialist label are winning elections from the Irish Republic to New York City. It’s no wonder—the mass cynicism towards politics as usual, the discrediting and fracturing of established parties and political polarisation have created an opening.
But the scale of the crises and injustices of 21st-century capitalism places an enormous responsibility on socialists. It’s not enough to win elections. Socialist leaders and organisations have to be judged on the extent to which they contribute to the organisation, struggle and consciousness of workers. Socialist politics is fundamentally about organising people around a radical world view, based on an understanding of working-class collective power, shared interests and a hostility to capitalist institutions like the state and mainstream political parties.
Unfortunately, the most popular self-described socialists of recent years haven’t done this. US Senator Bernie Sanders raised the hopes of millions by calling for a struggle against the hated Democratic Party establishment, before becoming the left flank of the Biden administration as it armed Israel and broke strikes.
In New York City, mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s “socialism” consists of a series of reforms such as free buses and rent controls, which, while deserving support, have nothing to do with challenging the priorities of capitalism. Worse, his “strategy” for achieving these reforms is to conciliate and collaborate with the Democratic Party establishment and the billionaires who run New York. He has stacked his transition team with Democratic Party bigwigs and Goldman Sachs executives, and disgracefully praised Trump’s supposed commitment to an “affordability agenda”.
This won’t cut it. This type of politics has never won meaningful change for working-class people. In a world defined by widening inequality, climate crisis, authoritarianism and war, it is dishonest to promote Mamdani’s agenda as a “socialist” project.
Rebuilding a real socialist movement to meet this moment means restoring a sense among people that victories won’t be delivered by enlightened progressive politicians, through clever negotiations or accommodation to the institutions of capitalist power. They will come about only by building organisations that encourage the self-organisation of workers, raise political horizons and demand a fight against the rich and powerful.
The discrediting of the capitalist mainstream, the overlapping crises facing the world and a sense of injustice have gripped a generation. This has created new opportunities for the socialist movement. But these can be seized only if there is a break with decades of demoralisation and moderation. The socialist movement must be bold. We have a world to win.
