We review a recent book published in French, which while offering important scientific insights into the origins of the Covid pandemic, proves to be powerless when it comes to grasping the problem at its roots in the capitalist mode of production.

The Ukraine crisis, with the US proclaiming a Russian invasion at any moment and Russian forces remaining massed on Ukraine's borders, shows the dangerous and unpredictable nature of the current period. The motivations of the imperialist powers are diverse and complex and linked to the irrationality of capitalism's decomposition. It clearly demonstrates the growth in militarisation and capitalist barbarity.

On the weekend of March 5/6 2022, the ICC will be organising online public meetings around the theme: Faced with deepening capitalist barbarism and the return of workers’ struggles, what is the role of revolutionaries? The meetings will be held on the morning of Saturday 5th March, to make it easier for comrades in Asia to take part, and the early evening of Sunday the 6th, so that comrades in the US can attend. For further details, write to us at [email protected]

The social unrest in Kazakhstan began with important workers’ struggles against price rises, but the latter were quickly engulfed in a 'popular' protest manipulated by rival bourgeois gangs.

After a serious setback in the struggle during the first year of the Covid pandemic, workers in Europe, the US and elsewhere are beginning to react to the attacks on wages and working conditions. While the pandemic is peaking at new heights with the appearance of the Omicron variant, workers are facing even more severe attacks on their living standards through rising inflation and increasing energy costs.

The furore about Boris Johnson’s premiership is being used both to hide the deeper divisions within the ruling class, and to spread the idea that we should demand a cleaner and more democratic version of capitalist exploitation.

In all countries, in all sectors, the working class is facing an unbearable degradation of its living and working conditions. All governments, whether of the right or the left, traditional or populist, are imposing one attack after the other as the world economic crisis goes from bad to worse. How are we to face up to the attacks of the ruling class...?