Manufacturing Intellect, 1976
Bryan Magee—world-renowned author
and professor—and Sir Isaiah Berlin, Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and
biographer of Karl Marx, answer fundamental questions such as "What is
philosophy?" "Why does it matter?" and "Why should anybody
be interested in it today?"
By Kamran Nayeri, September 4, 2026
 |
Anthropogenic crisis of the Colorado River
The anthropocentric industrial capitalist civilization has created existential crises: catastrophic global warming and catastrophic climate change, the Sixth Extinction, recurrent pandemics, and the nuclear holocaust.
In this essay, I will show how beavers, as social mammals
that alter the environment to suit their lives, enhance or improve ecosystems.
To support this claim, I will examine the anthropogenic crisis of the Colorado
River. The Colorado River, which is five million years old, has been running
with less and less water over the last few decades. Originating in the Rocky
Mountains of Colorado, the river is an important water source for seven U.S.
states and two Mexican states before it eventually pours into the Gulf of
California in Mexico.
Below are the major interventions in the Colorado River and
how the crisis developed.
·
1922: The Colorado River Agreement is signed,
which sets the amount of water taken from the river for the neighboring states:
Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming. Under a
1944 treaty between the United States and Mexico, the United States pledged
that 1,837 million acre-feet of water from the Colorado River would be Mexico's
share.
·
1930s:
Major dam construction projects, including the Hoover Dam, were completed,
which significantly altered river flow and water distribution.
·
2000s:
Prolonged drought due to global warming and climate change led to a drop in
water levels in Lake Mead and Lake Powell, both created after the river dams
were built. Currently, Lake Mead is at 28.5% capacity, and Lake Powell is at
26.2% capacity.
·
2012:
The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation reported that the Colorado River is running
short of water.
·
2021:
The U.S. government declared water shortages for the first time, prompting
forced water cuts in Arizona and Nevada.
·
2023:
Heavy rainfall is forecast, providing temporary relief, but experts warn that
several more rainy years are needed for the water shortage crisis to fully
recover.
·
2026:
Water scarcity continues, as the ongoing negotiations between states to share
water and protect it in the current dire situation continue. Phoenix, a city of
1.6 million people built in the heart of the Arizona desert, is on a short list
of cities that may be deprived of Colorado River water.
The anthropogenic crisis of the oceans
Of course, the crises caused by anthropocentric industrial
capitalist civilization threaten life on the planet everywhere. Take, for example, the oceans' crisis. Human
activities have now altered 66% of the marine environment. 35.5% of
assessed marine fish stocks are overfished. Eleven million tons of
plastic enter the oceans each year, almost one million tons per
month. Industrial fishing,
greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels, industrial agro-runoff carrying
fertilizer, organic matter containing phosphorus and nitrogen, plastics,
transportation, coastal development, mining, and chemical pollution all
interact and cause cumulative population and ecological losses. One particularly
striking historical indicator is the decline of global fisheries: the
proportion of fish stocks considered biologically sustainable has fallen from
90% in 1974 to about 64.5% in 2021.
Compare this behavior of humans, who consider themselves god’s
greatest creation, with the life of beavers in relation to the rest of nature.
Who are the Beavers?
North American beavers have a stout body, a yellow-brown to
almost black coat, and a wide, smooth, scaly tail. They have curtained hind
legs and forefinger paws. The beaver’s stout body allows it to retain heat.
North American beavers are the largest rodents in North
America and the second largest in the world (South American capybaras are the
heaviest). They weigh between 16 and 30 kilograms, and the heaviest beaver on
record weighed 50 kilograms. They are 1 to 1.2 meters long and 0.3 to 0.5
meters high. The shape of the beaver's tail varies, but it is generally about 5
centimeters thick at the base and narrows to about 0.6 centimeters at the tip.
Beavers have long, orange front teeth. These teeth grow
continuously throughout their life and wear down with daily use. These teeth
sharpen on their own and can cut off a part of a tree the size of a person's
finger with a bite. If the front teeth are too long, they can prevent the beaver's
mouth from closing, which can lead to starvation and death. Beavers' front
teeth look dark orange due to the large amount of iron in the enamel, which is
the hard outer layer of teeth. Iron strengthens tooth enamel and helps prevent
teeth from breaking or cracking when a beaver chews.
Beavers move regularly between aquatic and terrestrial
environments. Their small, agile front legs are well adapted for working on
land. They walk on five toes, grasp wood with their front paws, and their claws are suitable for digging. The
hind legs are larger, with fur that is suitable for swimming, and are fur-free
except for the dorsal surface.
The hind legs also have a finger to clean, the second toe on
the inside, with a unique double nail. Beavers are very meticulous groomers.
They use the sorting finger as a comb to prevent their soft, thin fur from knotting
and to maintain its waterproof, insulating properties. These flexible toes also
kill thorns and parasites.
On land, the beaver moves very slowly, making it vulnerable to
predators. But in the water, the beaver swims up to 10 kilometers per hour. Its
large lungs allow it to stay underwater for up to 15 minutes while swimming
more than half a kilometer.
Their whiskers help to distinguish objects around the beaver's
face and head, which are especially useful in narrow passages and dark waters.
The blue dog's eyes have a thin, transparent membrane called the nictitating
membrane, which covers the eyeball
underwater. Beavers' vision is only good at close range. His outer ears are small, round, and have valves
that close when immersed, and the beaver has a developed sense of hearing.
The shape of the tail is an individual and family feature,
ranging from short and wide to long and slender. It is almost hairless and is
covered with black scales. There is a clear border between fur and scales. The tail acts as a rudder in swimming,
supports balance when working on the ground, and warns of danger by frequently
crossing the water's surface when it hits the water. Beavers also store fat in
their tail and eat more fat in the fall so that they can survive on the fat
stored in their tail if food is not available in the winter. The vertebrae on
the back of the beaver extend to the tail and almost to the end.
Beavers are found throughout North America except for the
deserts of California and Nevada, and parts of Utah and Arizona. They live in
nearby ponds, lakes, rivers, swamps, streams, and wetlands.
Beavers are one of the few animals that change their habitat
as needed; they build wooden dams woven with reeds, branches, and saplings,
then cover them with mud. These dams reduce
river erosion by creating ponds where water flows slowly. These ponds support a
wide range of small aquatic organisms and provide water and food for much
larger animals. By building these dams, beavers create new habitats that
support a diverse ecosystem.
Beavers also build dome-shaped huts known as lodges, which are 2
meters or more high and can reach 12 meters in width. A cabin can have one or
more underwater entrances, and Beavers live in a lodge above the waterline. These
lodges are often built off the coast, forming islands. The lodge chamber may be 1.2 meters wide and
0.6 meters high, with walls about one-third of a meter thick that are insulated and ventilated by a small hole
in the ceiling called a "chimney." They usually cover the floor with
wood chips to absorb excess moisture and provide a suitable substrate. Beavers
spend the summer and autumn building dams and collecting and storing food for
the winter.
North American beavers typically live 10 to 12 years. The
oldest recorded beaver has lived to be 30 years.
Beavers communicate with each other by wagging their tails
on the surface of the water.
Beavers scent-mark the boundaries of their enclosures by
spreading castoreum secreted from their anus. This pungent, concentrated liquid
is produced for olfactory marking and leaves a lasting odor. This fat sac is
also secreted to keep the beaver's fur dry. The oil varies slightly between the
sexes and is used in reproductive communication.
Inside the lodge, beavers use a variety of sounds (although
their voice boxes are rudimentary) and body postures to communicate with family
members. At the Smithsonian National Zoo, beavers can be heard barking when they are
upset
Beavers are herbivores that eat leaves, woody stems, and
aquatic plants. Their main building materials are also their favorite foods:
spruce, willow, birch, and maple.
In cold climates, beavers spend the winter in the cabin of
their hut, feeding on the branches they store on the muddy bottom of the pond.
The water acts like a refrigerator, keeping the stems cool and maintaining their
nutritional value. Beavers hold their food with their front paws and eat like
corn on the cob.
Beavers are mainly nocturnal. However, in areas where ponds
freeze during the winter season, beavers may stay in their habitats or under
the ice and feed on their fat reserves.
In the residence and underwater, light radiation remains
constant and low for 24 hours, so sunrise and sunset are not visible. In the
absence of "solar signs," the beaver's activity is not in sync with
the solar day. The circadian rhythm, or regular cycle of the day, is disrupted,
and the beaver's "days" become longer, ranging in length from 26 to
29 hours. At the zoo, the beaver wakes up around 4 p.m.
Social structure
Beavers form strong family bonds. They are social animals,
and each group includes a couple, this year's young, and offspring from the
previous year. There may be one or more new adults who are 2 years old or older
from previous breeding seasons. These new adults usually do not reproduce.
In the winter, these family groups live together in their
hut and share a food pantry. Their family life is very stable and is based on a
hierarchy with one-year-old and newborn children following their parents.
Physical violence is rare, and sounds, gestures, and postures are used inside
the lodge to express their place in the group hierarchy.
It is generally believed that beavers mate for a lifetime. They breed in the winter, from January to late
February, and females give birth in the spring.
The babies are born weighing about half a kilogram; their
eyes open, and their bodies are completely covered in fur. They go into the
water inside their residence within half an hour after birth. Within a week, they
become skilled swimmers.
Babies usually suckle and suckle with their mother for the
first few weeks, and their weight increases
significantly. Females have four nipples and sometimes sit upright to breastfeed
the offspring. Evidence suggests the nipples are divided equally among the
babies, which may explain the high survival rate. All babies are breastfed for
about six weeks, and then the whole family brings them solid food.
On land, mothers often carry the cubs on their broad tails,
sometimes even walking upright and holding them in their paws. In the water,
the cubs may rest on the mother's back. The cubs help maintain the lodge and
raise the next generation.
The role of beavers in the ecosystem
Beavers are one of the most powerful freshwater
ecosystem-shaping agents in North America and Europe. By building dams, digging
canals, and cutting down trees, they turn streams into meandering wetlands that
store water, filter pollutants, protect wildlife, and even prevent wildfire
from spreading.
Before European colonization, an estimated 60 to 400 million
beavers lived in North American waterways (Young, November 2025). Intensive fur
trapping by European American mountain men and settlers in the 19th century
drastically reduced the beaver population in the Colorado River basin, driven
by the high demand for fur in the global fur trade (Young, December 2025).
Hunters in the 1820s and 1830s targeted tributary streams such as the Little
Colorado River and exploited abundant beaver colonies to produce waterproof
fur that fueled hat production in Europe and the eastern United States. This
commercial exploitation, which culminated in the mid-19th century, pushed many
of the Southwest's watersheds to the brink of extinction, as populations could
not recover from incessant harvesting. Habitat changes intensified trapping
pressure, as expanding agriculture, mining, and settlement in the arid
Southwest disrupted marginal ecosystems essential to beaver survival. Land-use
changes, including river canalization, clearing vegetation for agriculture and
resource extraction, habitat fragmentation, and the decline of food sources
such as willow and aspen, exacerbated the effects of over-trapping. This
combined influx caused widespread wetland loss and destroyed river areas,
turning vibrant water systems into dug canals and dry floodplains that lasted
into the 20th century. Without beavers engineering ponds and slowing water flow, soil erosion intensified, biodiversity declined sharply, and the basin's water-holding capacity shrank, leaving a legacy of ecological
simplification.
Today, only 9 to 12
million beavers remain, representing an 80 to 98 percent decline from their
historical populations. This decline has had a chain effect on ecosystems
across the continent.
How beavers shape waterways
Beavers are often called "ecosystem engineers"
because they physically regenerate the environments in which they live. A
family of beavers can dam a stream, flood a canyon, and create a whole new
wetland that didn't exist before. These dams slow water flow, spread it across
the plain, and raise surrounding groundwater levels. At the source of the
streams to which the beavers have been transported, about 243 cubic meters of
water were stored in the first year due to the construction of dams 100 meters
from the river. This is enough to visibly
change the hydrology of a small valley.
But what is happening underground is less visible. Beavers' dams
direct water deep into the soil and regenerate groundwater. In a scientific
study, the displaced beavers raised groundwater levels by up to one-third of a
cubic meter and stored almost 2.4 times the groundwater of each dam. This is
especially important in arid regions that rely on groundwater from wells because it maintains vegetation in the
summer and prevents rivers from drying out. Dams also lower river temperatures,
which helps cold-water fish species and slows evaporation in the warmer months.
Water treatment
Beavers’ ponds act like slow treatment systems for polluted
water. When a stream accumulates behind a dam, sediments settle, and calm,
low-oxygen conditions at the bottom of the pond create natural chemical
processes that break down excess organic matter. This is especially valuable in
agricultural areas where runoff carries nitrate and phosphate from fertilizers.
Research on beaver ponds in agricultural watersheds shows
they can remove 5% to 45% of the nitrate load, depending on the season and pond
conditions. In a study comparing upstream and downstream water quality in the beaver
enclosure, nitrate concentrations decreased by 43% and phosphate concentrations
by 51%. In the summer, when biological activity peaked, these reductions were
even greater: 47% for nitrate and 61% for phosphate. Even in winter, ponds
removed 37% nitrate and 38% phosphate. Compared with a nearby agricultural
stream without a water dog, reductions were dramatic: 64% less nitrate and 86%
less phosphate.
This treatment capacity is essentially free while municipalities
spend millions of dollars to treat built wetlands.
Enhancing ecosystem diversity
Beavers create wetlands for far more species than streams
and forests that are replaced. Open beaver ponds combine muddy edges, standing
dead trees, and dense growth, forming a series of microhabitats that attract
everything from insects to large mammals
(Larsen et al., 2021; Wu et al., 2019).
Recent comparisons between beaver-built wetlands and
man-made ponds found that beaver ponds attracted more than twice as many
floating flies and 45% more butterflies than nearby artificial ponds. On a
typical night, beaver ponds hosted an average of 5 species of bats versus 4
species in other parts of the same river, showing a 22% increase in diversity.
These differences likely stem from the structural complexity of beaver
wetlands. The combination of standing dead wood, live shrubs, aquatic plants,
and varied water depths creates feeding and nesting opportunities that a simple
pond cannot match.
Beaver ponds also provide vital habitat for amphibians,
waterfowl, and songbirds. Flooded trees create nesting holes for woodpeckers
and owls. The warm, calm shallow waters are ideal for frogs and salamanders to
mate. The lush vegetation on the edges of the ponds also attracts deer,
reindeer, and other herbivores to drink and feed.
A complicated relationship with salmon
The relationship between beavers and fish is one of the more
complex parts of their ecological story. In many environments, beaver ponds
increase fish populations. The slow, deep water provides shelter from
predators, and the organic matter that accumulates in the ponds feeds the
insect larvae that the young fish eat. Studies have documented higher fish
densities, faster growth rates, and better survival of juvenile salmon in beaver-pond
habitats than in open streams.
But this relationship is not always positive. In large river
floodplains with extensive tributary channels, beavers' dams can fragment
habitat by blocking fish passage between the ponds and the main river. Research
on two rivers in Alaska showed this clearly. In one river where beavers built
many dams in tributary channels, juvenile salmon density in beaver-created
ponds was 3 to 12 times lower than in habitats connected to the spring stream
and the main channel. The researchers estimated that without dams, the
floodplain of that river could raise nearly three times as much salmon and
produce almost twice as much fish biomass.
Context matters. In small, degraded streams with limited
habitat complexity, beaver activity usually helps fish by deepening ponds,
cooling the water, and adding structure. In floodplains that are already well
connected, a large number of dams can fragment the system and reduce total fish
production. This is why fisheries managers sometimes evaluate waterfowl and
salmon interactions on a river-to-river basis and do not enforce general rules.
Fire resistance
In the western United States, which is prone to wildfires, beavers
have been known to be unexpected agents
of preventing wildfires. By raising groundwater levels, moistening soil in floodplains,
and preserving green vegetation in dry summers, beaver dams create bands of
moisture in arid landscapes (Murray, 2025;
Studies of wildfires in the western United States showed
that in the Rocky Mountains region, Beaver Ponds reduced
the intensity of burning in areas around floodplains of large fires. The mechanism is simple: moist soil and lush vegetation, such as dry grass and dead shrubs, don't burn. Beaver wetlands
essentially create fire barriers along river paths.
This effect has practical implications for the community.
Networks of moist, fire-resistant habitats created by beavers can slow the
spread of flames and give firefighters more time to arrive. Some fire
prevention managers in the western U.S. are now considering relocating the beavers
or constructing similar dams (man-made
structures that resemble water dog dams) as a low-cost strategy to increase
fire resistance in landscapes.
Why beaver population decline matters
The loss of 80 to 98 percent of North America's beaver population
means the disappearance of millions of dams, ponds, and small wetlands that had shaped the continent's hydrology for
thousands of years. Streams that once ran through vast, humid floodplains.
Wetlands dried up. Groundwater levels dropped.
The ecological transformations that beavers offered for free, from water
storage to nutrient treatment and habitat creation, disappeared along with
them.
Restoring the beaver population won't solve all of the
watershed's problems, but evidence suggests that even a small number of beavers
can tangibly improve water storage, water quality, biodiversity, and fire
resistance within a year of human-assisted reintroduction
Human-assisted restoration efforts in the Colorado River
basin include relocation programs that relocate beavers from areas that
generate conflict or have been relocated to areas that are less occupied and
suitable for regeneration (Sadiq, 2025). These initiatives aim to leverage beavers'
natural dam-building to improve riparian habitats, conserve water in
drought-prone areas, and support ecosystem recovery throughout the arid
watershed. A notable example is the 2019 transfer project led by Utah State
University researchers, which relocated beavers to tributaries such as the
Price River to restore degraded waterways by promoting wetland formation and
sediment absorption. In Colorado, the Colorado Parks and Wildlife
Administration has pursued strategies to strengthen populations in strategic
areas, moving from lethal control to relocation where possible to maximize
habitat benefits. These programs often involve collaboration between state
wildlife agencies such as Colorado Parks and Wildlife and conservation
organizations such as the Colorado Beaver Working Group, which coordinates
efforts to expand the Blue Dog's presence in the basin's historically
appropriate but currently uninhabited areas. By targeting places where blue dog
engineering can improve water infiltration and biodiversity, these restorations
complement broader restoration goals amid ongoing water scarcity.
Conclusion
The key difference between human activity in human-centered industrial capitalist civilization and beaver activity is that while human activities tend to destroy ecosystems, the beaver community builds its environment in ways that enhance ecosystems and biodiversity. Both behaviors are the result of species evolution. For 2.5 million years, the genus Homo, our ancestors, interacted with the rest of nature largely like hunter-gatherers. Even our species, Homo sapiens, which appeared about 300,000 years ago, behaved similarly because we were also hunter-gatherers who saw ourselves as inseparable from nature and lived by a culture of ecocentrism. However, with the advent of agriculture in the Holocene, groups of early farmers emerged and began to domesticate plants and animals to create an artificial ecosystem called the farm. This required a radical cultural shift from ecocentrism to anthropocentrism. The farm required farmers to dominate and control plants and animals for their benefit, and it also saw wild nature as a threat that had to be cleaned up when needed. Mother Nature became a source of wealth that could be exploited whenever it wanted. The Beavers Society teaches us that it is possible and better to return to ecocentrism and love of nature and culture versus having a culture.
References:
Clements, Charlie D. and Dan N. Harmon. “Beavers
and Riparian Habitats.” The Progressive Rancher. March 8, 2023.
Ebbs, Stephenie. “How Beavers Could Help the
Colorado River Survive Future Droughts.” ABC News. April 20, 2023.
Larsen, Annegret, Joshua
R. Larsen, Stuart N. Lane. “Dam Builders and Their Works:
Beaver Influences on the Structure and Function of River Corridor Hydrology,
Geomorphology, Biogeochemistry and Ecosystems.” Earth-Science Reviews. July 2021.
Murray, James. “How Did the Loss of Beavers Affect
the Environment?”
The Institute for Environmental Research and Education. August 27, 2025.
Pobis, Madison. “How
Reintroducing Beavers Can Build Watershed Resilience.” Woods Institute of
Environment, Stanford University.
Sadiq, Muhammad. “The
Story of a Town Saved by Beavers.” Animals Around the Globe. April 16,
2025.
Singhai, Swasti. “As the Second-Largest Reservoir
in the Nation Drops, So Does Tourism.” USA Today. August 31, 2026.
Wan, Luwen. “How Reintroducing Beavers Can Enhance
Ecological Health.”
Stanford Report. August 11, 2025.
Wu, Haipeng, Jin Chen, Jijun Xu, Guangming Zeng, Lianhai
Sang, Qiang Liu, Zhengjie Yin, Juan Dai,
Dacong Yin, Jie Liang, and Shujing Ye. “Effects of Dam Construction on
Biodiversity: A Review.”
ScienceDirect. June 2019.
Young, Laura. “Was There a Prehistoric Beaver?” The Institute for
Environmental Research and Education. November 8, 2025.
___________. “Why did the beaver population
decrease?” The
Institute for Environmental Research and Education. December 6, 2025.
By Leon Trotsky (taken from Marxist.org)
Though expelled from the USSR, Trotsky and the Left Opposition still considered themselves a faction of the Communist International. Until Hitler came to power, they tried to influence the Comintern and the German reds, to return them to the Leninist precepts of internationalism and internal democracy.
They did not (yet) support the rise of a Fourth International. It was these events in Germany, and the failure of the German Communist Party and the Communist International that lead to Trotsky’s call for a new, “Fourth” Communist International. We include one 1940 article on the nature of Fascism that Trotsky was working on the time he was murdered by a Stalinist agent. The rest of this collection deals specifically with the rise of the Nazis in the early 1930s.
In the following collection of Trotsky’s letters and articles, he is specifically addressing the German Communist Party, which he considered the only realistic organization to stop fascism. His goal was for them to break with Comintern policy, not the Comintern itself. These series of articles and essays, however, show Trotsky’s method in his ultimate break with the Comintern.
We’ve also include a chronology of events beginning with the rise of the workers movement at the end of World War I and statistics on the various elections that the Communist Party participated in.
This page was originally compiled by the Zodiac. The page has been reformatted to conform with the Trotsky Internet Archive. Several additional articles, previously un-transcribed have been contributed by the TIA’s director and other TIA volunteers.
1918: German revolution dies, due in large part to the Social Democratic Party (SPD). The SPD belongs to the old Second International. Before the war, it had never held power, only opposition. Class cooperationists, the SPD supported the war. In working to prevent a successful Red revolution, the SPD allies with capitalists and the army, even cooperating with right-wing “Freikorps”, thereby helping train early cadres of the future National Socialist Party (Nazis).
Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht are both executed by the state. Russian Bolsheviks had counted on a successful German revolution for the survival of their own revolution.
1919: German monarchy folds, the Weimar Republic is born. The Weimar constitution is a standard “social democrat"-style arrangement: workers are granted several “social safety net” programs, while the capitalists (and army) retain with full powers, which they more or less “promise” to never abuse. The first Weimar cabinet is headed by the SPD, and their Chancellor Philipp Scheidemann, in coalition with two capitalist parties, the Catholic Center Party and the German Democratic Party. (NOTE: In the 1919 Reichstag elections, 45 percent of voters support parties which label themselves Marxist.)
1921: All revolutionary opportunity has passed. The Third International (Communist International, or Comintern) initiates a “united front” strategy as a way of strengthening Communist parties in nations where Social Democrats dominated—rather like Germany.
1922: German government is crippled by, and unable to meet, war reparations specified by the Treaty of Versailles.
1923 January: French government sends troops to occupy the Ruhr. Inflation soars, the working class launches massive strikes, the middle class has savings wiped out. It’s an extreme crisis and the government is helpless. KPD membership swells and new ultra-right movements (like the Nazis) grow. But KPD leadership, guided by the Comintern, misses the opportunity. By 1924, events stabilize (with some American aid).
1924 May: Reichstag elections see “Marxist” parties drop to to 33 per cent of the electorate; Nazi strength declines even more drastically.
1924 December: Another round of Reichstag elections sees SPD support grow and KPD drop.
1925: Presidential election. Monarchist general Hindenburg elected president in runoff election against Wilhelm Marx, member of the Catholic Center Party—the latter being supported by the SPD and the liberal capitalist parties—and Ernst Thaelmann of the KPD.
1925-29: Weimar Republic’s stable period. SPD remains Germany’s largest party with powerful support from the working class. No realistic plan for a German social revolution can be constructed without intelligent consideration of the SPD.
Meanwhile, in the USSR, the “Left Opposition” is defeated by Stalinists. In 1927, Trotsky is expelled from the Soviet Communist Party. In 1928, he’s deported to Siberia. In 1929, he’s exiled to Turkey. Stalinists purge more than just Left Opposition. By 1930, the Communist International and affiliated parties are merely bureaucratic extensions of Soviet foreign policy. The leaders of the KPD are appointees of the Kremlin.
1928 May: Reichstag elections return the SPD to cabinet with Chancellor Hermann MÃœller. KPD get a third of the SPD’s vote (Nazis get less than a tenth). This SPD leadership is further right than before and opts for something called the Great Coalition—including the People’s Party—and holds power for about two years.
Meanwhile, the Comintern adopts the ultra-left doctrine of the Third Period and something called social fascism. The doctrine says the collapse of the world’s capitalist nations is supposedly following a handy pattern:
The Comintern concludes it’s time to end Second Period collaboration with Social Democrats (and their powerful working class base). In the case of Germany, it means these SPD workers are really just “social fascists,” a sort of left wing of fascism.
1929 Fall: The Great Depression, death knell of Weimar. German unemployment hits 3 million. The already fragile German economy collapses. The populace is radicalized. KPD membership grows, despite alienation from SPD-led unions. The fascists likewise grow, now even attracting financial support from big capitalists. And the storm troops (Sturm-Abteilung or SA) hits 100,000 by year’s end.
1930 March: the SPD Müller cabinet resigns. Never again will Weimar see a majority government. President Hindenburg appoints Heinrich Brüning of the Center Party as Chancellor. Bruening tries to establish a more right wing government but fails to get sufficient support in the Reichstag.
Brüning cites Paragraph 48 of the Weimar Constitution and claims to now rule by “emergency decree.” The Social Democrats helped construct that paragraph, never imagining they’d be the target of it.
1930 July: Brüning’s emergency decrees on budget are overruled by SPD, KPD, and Nazi deputies. Hindenburg dissolves the Reichstag and calls for new elections.
1930 September 14: Election day. SPD votes tumble by 6 percent, while the KPD rises by 40 percent. However, their combined vote falls from 40.4 per cent of electorate to 37.6. The real change is the Nazi vote—up 700 per cent. The Nazis go from ninth to second-largest party. Meanwhile, the Comintern-led KPD dubs this a victory for the Communists and “the beginning of the end” for the Nazis. The Comintern concurs.
Trotsky’s opinion was slightly different. To paraphrase him, the KPD is like a singer who sings wedding songs at funerals, and funeral songs at weddings ... and is soundly thrashed at each occasion.
1930 October 18: Shaken by the Nazi electoral triumph, the SPD decides to back Brüning’s government. With SPD support, Brüning remains Chancellor another 26 months. It is an unpopular rule that only benefits the Nazis. Big business support of Hitler continually increases. The SA is emboldened in attacks on working-class radicals.
Stymied by the SPD-Brüning block, the Nazis focus on gaining control of Prussia’s Landtag (state legislature). Prussia is the largest state in Germany, with over two-thirds of the population. It’s a Social Democratic stronghold. The Nazis, right-wing Nationalists and the Stahlhelm (a counter-revolutionary veterans’ organization), invoke a clause in the Weimar Constitution to launch a referendum to oust the Prussian SPD-coalition government. KPD opposes the referendum.
1931: Over 4 million unemployed.
1931 July 21: KPD leaders present ultimatum to sPD coalition leaders in Prussia: make a united front with us or we’ll back the Nazis. SPD leaders reject it. The KPD backs the Nazis, despite the fact it might put the Nazis in power—though now the KPD calls it the “Red referendum”. Nazis and German Communists campaign together to remove Prussia’s SPD-led government.
1931 August 9: Prussian Referendum fails. SPD stays in control.
1931 September: SPD leaders expel Reichstag deputies Max Seydewitz and Kurt Rosenfeld for open opposition to SPD support of Brüning regime. The expelled deputies favor a united front against fascists.
1931 October: More SPD expulsions/resignations. SPD splits. Left Social Democrats unite with SPD youth, pacifists, and some of the Brandlerite Communist Party Opposition (KPO) to form the Socialist Workers Party (SAP). Six SAP leaders are deputies in the Reichstag.
Trotsky takes a positive attitude toward new group, hoping that its members will overcome SPD centrism. But SAP is a confused body with no real impact on working-class politics. (In July 1932 elections, SAP gets merely 72,630 votes and lose all six Reichstag seats. In the November 1932 election, their vote drops further still. SPD rank and file can not be dislodged from their party that easily. So rather than destroy the SPD in this time of crisis, one should work to save it.)
1931 December: SPD leaders create the Iron Front for Resistance Against Fascism. The organization seeks to engage the old Reichsbanner, the SPD youth, and labor and liberal groups. SPD rallies to the Iron Front, holds mass demonstrations, fights fascists in the streets, and arms selves. This is more than the SPD leaders wanted. But SPD workers don’t care and grow increasingly revolutionary. Meanwhile, the KPD has no ideological concept of a united front—hell, they just supported the Nazis in the “Red referendum.”
1932: Economic crisis deepens. Unemployed: 5 mil. “Social Democratic” state further dismantled.
1932 March 13: Presidential election. Three main candidates: Hindenburg, Hitler, and Thälmann. But the Nationalists also push Stahlhelm leader Theodor Düsterberg—who merely steals votes from Hitler. Last Presidential election, the SPD opposed Hindenburg. Now they support him over Hitler. The Iron Front becomes an electoral machine for the monarchist militarist.
1932 April 10: Run-off Presidential election held since no clear majority was established. Düsterberg withdraws so Nationalists can campaign for Hitler. Hindenburg wins, but Nazi vote has doubled in 17 months. Nonetheless, the SPD hails Hindenburg’s election as a triumph over fascism.
1932 April 14: Brüning has Hindenburg sign a decree outlawing Nazi SA and SS. Brüning thinks this curbs Hitler’s growth. Instead, it will prove to be Brüning’s fall.
1932 May 31: Hindenburg demands Chancellor Brüning resign. Hindenburg picks Franz von Papen of the Centre pary as new Chancellor. The Center party expels von Papen. He is basically Hindenburg’s puppet, without any support in the Reichstag.
1932 June 4: Papen dissolves the Reichstag and calls for new elections.
1932 June 15: Papen rescinds the ban on Nazi private armies. Wave of violence results. Hundreds dead/wounded. Papen bans political parades in fortnight before July 31 elections.
1932 July 17: Nazis march, under police escort, through working class Hamburg. Result: 19 dead, 285 wounded.
1932 July 20: Citing the Hamburg battle, Papen claims the Prussian government can’t maintain “law and order.” He deposes the Social Democrats and appoints himself Reich Commissioner for Prussia.
The SPD once swore to defend the republic against any coup d’etat, from the right or the left. German workers wait for a call to action. The SPD promise to appeal Papen’s coup to the courts. Nothing else happens.
The KPD calls for a general strike. Of course, the KPD’s great “Red referendum” is used to ridicule it.
1932 July 31: Reichstag elections. Nazis are now Germany’s largest party.
1932 September 12: New Reichstag convenes. Papen thinks he can manipulate the Nazis, but they realize they don’t need him. Nazis support the Reichstag vote to censure the Hindenburg-imposed Papen regime (vote of 513 to 32). The Reichstag is dissolved and new elections called for November 6.
1932 November 6: Reichstag election. Nazi faithful have begun to tire of Hitler’s political maneuvers to gain power carefully. Morale drops. In the election, Nazis lose two million votes. Critically: total Nazi vote is now less than the combined SPD-KPD vote. But this is lost on the Comintern and KPD. This would turn out to be the last “free” election of Weimar Germany—and the Nazis failed to get their majority.
1932 November 17: Papen and cabinet resign.
1932 December 2: Hindenburg appoints “social general” Schleicher Chancellor. Schleicher tries split left (trade-union bureaucrats break with the SPD) and right (dissident “left Nazis” under Gregor Strasser break with Hitler).
1933 January 30: Hindenburg appoints Hitler as Chancellor. Papen is Vice-Chancellor. Hitler agrees to take only three of 11 cabinet posts. Trotsky expects worker parties will resist Hitler and mobilize. SPD leaders say “Hitler’s appointment” is constitutional and forbid worker actions that might upset the Nazis. The KPD, on the other hand, is still denouncing the SPD.
1933 March 5: Hitler gets Hindenburg to dissolve parliament. In the run-up to new election, KPD meetings are banned. KDP press are shut down. Nazis finally take control of Prussia and its nationwide police force and flooded it with storm troopers. The terror begins.
1933 February 27: Nazis start fire in the Reichstag and blame it on Communists.
1933 February 28: President Hindenburg suspends Constitutional guarantees of freedom of expression, press, assembly, association. Thousands of KPD and SPD officials are arrested. Only the Nazis and Nationalists are permitted to campaign in the last week before the election.
1933 March 5: Reichstag elections. Even with all this “constitutional” oppression, the Nazis still couldn’t get a majority. But it was still game over. KPD calls for national strikes.
1933 March 23: Citing the Constitution, Hitler asks new Reichstag to grant him dictatorial power. This requires a two-thirds Reichstag vote. As KPD deputies are jailed or leaving the country, Hitler’s demand is granted (441 to 84). Liberal and conservative parties vote for it. Only the remaing Social Democrats vote against it.
1933 April 1: Stalinists Comintern deludes itself about an expected proletarian revolution soon to follow Hitler’s victory. While it dreams, the KPD is annihilated.
1933 May 1: May Day. The remaining SPD is a different beast than Frederick Engels had known. This creature supports Hitler’s various labor “reorganizations” and encourages workers to march in the Nazi “National Day of Labor” parade May 1.
1933 May 2: Nazis take over the trade-union movement and send labor leaders to concentration camps.
By Kamran Nayeri, August 30, 2026
 |
On August 20, The Guardian
published an Open
Letter, “To Iran’s political prisoners, trapped ‘between two blades of a
scissors’”, by 23 prominent leftists mostly from the United States and Western
Europe: “We write to you from a place of deep solidarity, our hearts heavy with
the knowledge of the struggle you face within Iran’s prisons: the torture, the
systematic neglect, the enforced silence, and the brutal reality of sham trials
and executions.”
The authors go further:
“And we stand
in solidarity with you, as you are at the intersection of two sources of
oppression.
“On one side,
you face the Islamic Republic that, from its inception, enforced absolute
social and political control based on an exclusionary ideology. It is a system
that claims to counter imperial power while using its very logic of domination
and systems of carcerality, torture and execution.
“On the other
side, you face the aggression and violence of the very imperialist and Zionist
forces the Islamic Republic purports to stand against.” (my emphases).
The Open Letter has ignited a much-needed
public discussion.
This essay contributes to this
discussion by examining aspects of the twin problems of how to defend Iran
against imperialist and Zionist aggression while fighting for the release of
political prisoners in Iran.
As an Iranian American socialist
since 1971 who participated in organized Iranian socialist movement (1975-1982)
and organized socialist movements in the U.S. since 1982, I have firsthand
experience in defense of Iranian political prisoners as well as participating
as a leader of the Iranian Trotskyist movement and a co-founder of the Workers
Unity Party in the Iranian revolution (1979-82) with the goal of helping the
Iranian working people to form their own government based on their own
grassroots organizations, in particular the workers and peasants shora
(council) movements.
To proceed, I'll cite some notable
earlier contributions focusing on the “scissors” analogy that frames the Open
Letter.
Vijay Prashad, the executive
director of the Tricontinental Institute for Social Research, in “Against
the False Symmetry of the Scissors: An Open Letter While Iran Resists an
Illegal War of Aggression,” criticizes the “scissors” analogy:
“The central
image, two blades of a scissors, is evocative but erroneous. It suggests that
one of the blades is the Islamic Republic and the other blade is the United
States and Israel, with the Iranian people being cut by the two of them. The
error of the scissors is not merely that its blades are unequal. It is that the
image makes the aggressor and the attacked appear as parallel sources of the
same danger, stripping away the history and hierarchy that connect them. US
imperialism is not simply one oppression alongside another. It is the force
that has encircled Iran, devastated the region, armed Israel, imposed sanctions
upon an entire population, and now brought war to Iranian territory. Your
letter places the aggression and its target in the same moral frame.” (emphasis
added)
Thus, the political framework Prashad
uses is what was called Third Worldism in the 1960s and later “anti-imperialism,”
which frames the main problem Iranian working people face as imperialism rather
than the clerical capitalist Islamic Republic. Indeed, he considers the Islamic
Republic regime (which he identifies with Iran as the country) to be an
anti-imperialist force facing off against United States imperialism and Israeli
Zionism. Thus, he praises the Islamic Republic policy of forming what they call
the Axis of
Resistance.
Farah Mokhtareizadeh, in “Who
Names the World? Anti-Imperialism and Iran's Political Prisoners,” correctly
points out:
“Prashad’s
argument becomes more difficult when he moves from geopolitical asymmetry to
political timing. There is a time to make demands and a time to act in
solidarity, he suggests, implying that certain demands upon the Iranian state
should recede while imperial war continues. The difficulty is that prisoners
live both dangers in the same present tense. An execution sentence does not
pause for war, and a prison door does not unlock because the state holding the
key confronts a greater external power. The question becomes not whether
Iranian repression exists but whether Iranians must postpone naming or
resisting that repression until some safer political moment arrives.”
She notes that the scissors analogy
was used by Keyvan Mohtadi, a labor activist and former political prisoner, on
June 24, 2025, the day after Israeli bombing of Evin Prison, about the political
prisoners held inside, including his wife, the labor organizer Anisha
Asadollahi.
Thus, Mokhtareizadeh shows how opposition
to imperialist and Zionist war and freedom of political prisoners are
intertwined and reinforcing.
The false scissors analogy
At the same time, Mokhtareizadeh’s
example shows that the scissors analogy betrays political confusion among a considerable section
of the left regarding Iran since the 1979 revolution that overthrew the
U.S.-installed dictatorship of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. There can be no doubt that the clerical
capitalist Islamic Republic and imperialism oppress the Iranian working people.
However, were they not oppressed by Mohammad Reza Shah’s dictatorial regime and
imperialism before the 1979 Iranian revolution?
Of course they were, as the 1979 revolution was anti-dictatorial and
anti-imperialist. The scissors analogy refers to the fact that the 1979
revolution overthrew the U.S.-installed regime of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and
because of the weakness of the working class and socialist movements, put the
power in the hands of ayatollah Khomeini, who proceeded to create the Islamic
Republic, which is independent of imperialism, by crushing grassroots movements
of the working people unleashed by that revolution.
The 1979 Iranian revolution
threatened the dominance of imperialism, Zionism, and reactionary Arab regimes
in the Middle East. Contrary to the dominant view propagated by both the
Islamic Republic and imperialism, the 1979 revolution was not an Islamic
Revolution. It was an anti-dictatorial, anti-imperialist, national democratic
revolution aspiring to democracy, freedom, and social justice.
However, the Iranian people who
lived under dictatorship had no chance to discuss what kind of society,
economy, or state they wished to create after they overthrew the Pahlavi
dynasty. The labor movement, especially
oil workers, played a significant role in the revolution, but it was
politically unprepared to lead the revolution. The left was largely influenced
by Stalinism, the ideology that envisioned a national democratic movement led
by an anti-imperialist leader. The Tudeh Party held the totalitarian Soviet
Union as the Actually Existing Socialism, and pro-China Stalinists (Maoists)
held a similar view of the revolution. What is more, Stalinism of the Iranian
socialist currents trained them as an undemocratic force. Here is an example: right
after the victorious insurrection of February 9-12, two groups of Iranian
Trotskyists merged in the Socialist Workers Party. They planned to hold their first public
meeting at Tehran Polytechnic (now Amir Kabir University) in central Tehran. A
group of Maoists, Communist Union اتØادیه کمونیست ها), physically attacked and disrupted the
meeting. The reason was Stalinism. Both Moscow and Beijing continued Stalin’s
campaign against Trotsky and Trotskyism until the Soviet Union collapsed and
China became the world's leading capitalist power! Meanwhile, Iranian labor and
socialist movements never made defending democratic and political rights their
central concern. Thus, when Khomeini declared mandatory Islamic dress for women
who were government employees, the protest in Tehran included a rally in front
of Tehran University and a march to Azadi Square, which was attacked by
semi-fascist Islamic gangs and drew only 20,000 mostly younger women (at the
time, Tehran had 3 million people). The labor movement and many leftist groups
did not mobilize to participate in or defend it.
Political Islam and the Axis of
Resistance
Thus, the power people took by
months of mass struggle and three days of armed insurrection across the country
was handed over to Ayatollah Khomeini, who began to institutionalize the
theocratic capitalist Islamic Republic. In the early 1970s, while in exile in
Iraq, Khomeini wrote a pamphlet titled Velayat-e Faghih (the rule of
Islamic Jurists). He argued that Muslims everywhere are ruled by non-Muslims
and demanded the formation of an Islamic government ruled by Islamic Jurists. The
1979 revolution gave Khomeini that opportunity to establish it in Iran, which
he was able to do by deceit and by bloody repression.
Of course, consolidating the
Islamic Republic required destroying grassroots movements of working people,
including the workers’ shora (council) movement resulting from the 1979 revolution,
suppression of oppressed nationalities, systematic oppression of women, as well
as any independent political party. Thus, the 1979 Iranian revolution was
destroyed through bloody repression by the clerical capitalist Islamic
Republic, not by imperialism! (Nayeri, 2025, Chapter One, Chapter Two, pp.
51-56).
However, Khomeini’s vision required
expanding the Islamic Republic's power among Shiites in the Middle East. This
led to the formation of the Axis of Resistance. This created a new form of
confrontation with imperialism and Zionism over their domination of the Middle
East and their decades-long struggle to overthrow the Islamic Republic. Prashad
mistakes this trajectory for anti-imperialism and anti-Zionism.
Rejecting Dependency School politics
By now it must be clear that how to
stop imperialist and Zionist attacks on Iran and at the same time fight for Iranian
people’s political rights, especially through building a movement to free all
political prisoners, requires theoretical certifications. The “anti-imperialist”
framework reflects the dominance of Dependency School (DS) in the 1950s and
1960s, which waned in the 1970s.
In the post-World War II period,
anticolonial revolution swept much of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. It
raised questions about their development. The Dependency School (DS) refers to
a group of different theories that shared the idea that the backwardness of the
periphery of world capitalism was due to imperialism. Thus, those who
subscribed to DS theories framed their political theories on
“anti-imperialism.” At the same time, Latin American nationalist economists
formulated the initial DS theories (Nayeri, 2023B, Chapter 3), two prominent
socialist dependency theories emerged: Paul Baran's Political Economy of
Growth (1957; for a critique see Nayeri, 2023B, Chapter pp. 82-118) and Arghiri
Emmanuel’s Unequal Exchange: A Study of the Imperialism of Trade
(1972, for a critique see Nayeri 2023B, Chapter 4).
However, DS theories did not jive
with Marx's historical materialism, which focuses on modes of production and
relations of production to understand society and history. Instead, both Baran
and Emanuel focus on imperialism as an external force and the sphere of
circulation to explain the periphery's economic backwardness.
By the late 1970s, the DS school began
to decline as countries in the periphery of capitalism industrialized,
beginning with South Korea and, by the new century, China, which is now
outcompeting the United States as the leading world capitalist economy.
Thus, Parshad’s outdated, mistaken
DS framework leads him to support the expansionist policies of the clerical
capitalist Islamic Republic in the name of “anti-imperialism.”
From Marx’s point of view, capital
is self-expanding value. Thus, capital will outgrow its geographical location,
and each capitalist state would protect its capitalist interests outside its
borders. That is sufficient to explain the economic basis of wars, including
World War I and World War II. In fact,
Hilferding’s claim in Finance Capital (1910) that an era of finance capital
(later called monopoly capital) and Marx’s labor theory of value, his theory of
how the capitalist mode of production functions, is obsolete was based on his
mistaking Marx’s theory of competition as being similar to the neoclassical
theory of Perfect Competition (Nayeri, 2023B, pp. 11-45). Thus, Lenin’s
Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916), based largely on
Hilferding’s work, is also mistaken. At any rate, in the same work Lenin
identifies imperialism with the export of capital from advanced capitalist
states to the periphery and views this as developing the forces of production
there. Thus, DS socialists have been
wrong both in constructing their theories and in claiming they are Marxist.
Questions of program, strategy,
and tactics
Still, many socialists would agree
that the defense of the political prisoners in Iran must be put in the context
of U.S. imperialism and Israeli Zionism to attack Iran. This does not mean that defending
democracy and freedom of political expression is subordinate to requirements of
fighting imperialism and Zionism. In fact, I would argue in a moment that
the two are intertwined and complementary. That is, the Islamic Republic has
for almost half a century undermined effective struggle against imperialism and
Zionism by attacking individual, democratic and political rights in Iran.
The authors of the Open Letter
write: “The Iranian authorities must stop their inhumane practice of death and
incarceration now. And the US and Israel must end their barbaric wars and
brutal sanctions that knowingly devastate our communities.” This formulation in
the Open Letter leaves out the “regime change” agenda of imperialism and
Zionism untouched. Not only was regime change the stated goal of the
U.S./Israeli war against Iran, but it is the active foreign policy of the Trump
administration, as we saw in Venezuela and now see in Cuba. What Trump was able
to achieve in Venezuela was what has been called “the shortest war in history”:
Nicolas Maudura and his wife were abducted, and Delcy RodrÃguez, his vice
president, agreed to govern in accordance with Marco Rubio's instructions in
Venezuela (Pager and Kurmanaev, July 11, 2026). Neither should we stand quiet
when the U.S. and Israelis assassinate leaders of the Islamic
Republic.
The public and the left in the West
have failed to actively oppose Israeli genocide in Gaza backed by the U.S. and
European imperialist powers! Why would it be any different in the case of sanctions
and war against Iran that have been unfolding since the 1979 revolution?
The key question the Open Letter raises
is how can a massive enough anti-war movement be built to stop the U.S./Israeli
war against Iran? At the same time, how can
an effective movement be built to stay the hands of the clerical capitalist
Islamic Republic?
The answer to the first question
depends on mass radicalization among working people and youth. No sign of it on
the horizon, although nobody really knows how and when such radicalizations
unfold.
The answer to the second question
largely depends on the working people and socialist currents in Iran for the
simple reason that the Islamic Republic continues to enjoy a mass base in Iran
that has gone along with its repressive policies.
To overcome this obstacle, a principled
anti-imperialist vision to uphold the sovereignty of the Iranian people is the
necessary framework for advancing the goals of enhancing political space in
Iran and freedom of political prisoners.
Building a movement of the
working people in Iran to challenge the Islamic Republic
The great masses who made the Iranian
revolution of 1979 aspired to democracy, freedom, independence, and social
justice. Ayatollah Khomeini destroyed grassroots movements that aspired to this
vision to install the clerical capitalist Islamic Republic. We need to take up
those aspirations and develop them to address the needs of Iran and the world
in the twenty-first century.
Earlier I argued that the Islamic Republic
is NOT anti-imperialist, that it opposes U.S. imperialism and Israeli Zionism
from the narrow vision of Islamic fundamentalism.
As socialists, we need to oppose
imperialism and Zionism because they are manifestations of capital as
self-expanding value, thus, the capitalist mode of production, mixed with ideologically
backward colonial notions. The United States imperialism is the expression of
Manifest Destiny, and Zionism is the colonial-settler ideology of occupation
and ethnic cleansing of Palestine.
Thus, to defend the sovereignty of
the Iranian working people, socialists in Iran must oppose the U.S./Israeli war
with a program of action of their own in sharp contrast to the current policies
of the Islamic Republic. I would propose the following for discussion among
Iranian working people. A key lesson of
the 1979 revolution was that people were united on what/who they did not want
but not on what kind of society and economy they wanted and how it would be
run.
I propose the following as a
conversation starter.
The future Iranian revolution needs
to be an ecological socialist revolution because of the existential world
ecological crises: catastrophic global warming and climate change, the Sixth
Extinction, recurrent pandemics, and nuclear holocaust. I propose Ecocentric Socialism
as a vision to aspire to (Nayeri, 2023A, especially Chapter 19).
Building a movement to free all
political prisoners in Iran
My experience in a successful campaign
to free political prisoners in Iran dates to the 1970s, as in the Committee for
Artistic and Intellectual Freedom in Iran (CAIFI). Formed in New York in 1973
to defend Reza Baraheni, the well-known Iranian author, poet, and literary
critic of Azeri origin, and a founder of the Writers Association of Iran, who
was arrested, tortured, and held in prison. CAIFI challenged the ultra-left
sectarian view of the Confederation of Iranian Students (dominated by Maoists
and nationalists), who did not believe political prisoners could be freed through
mass work, and in some cases they did not even consider defending political
prisoners they did not hold to be “revolutionaries.” CAIFI, by contrast,
believed in defending all political prisoners regardless of ideology, selecting
a few prominent political prisoners to draw public attention to the plight of
all political prisoners and building the broadest possible coalition through
democratic organizational methods. CAIFI won over the support of some prominent
liberal and leftist Americans, including Kay Boyle, Daniel Ellsberg, Ramsey
Clark, and Angela Davis, a former political prisoner and signer of the Open
Letter, who supported CAIFI. CAIFI gained
momentum when, under international pressure, Baraheni was released, traveled to
the U.S., and agreed to be a keynote speaker at CAIFI-sponsored events,
attracting even more support for its campaigns.
In just a few years, CAIFI became the most successful defender of the
Shah's political prisoners. CAIFI's
mission was finally accomplished when the February 1979 revolution freed all
the Shah's political prisoners.
CAIFI was formed in the United States, the main supporter of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi's dictatorship, where public opinion mattered. The Islamic Republic’s mass base is inside Iran. Thus, it is necessary to build a defense committee inside Iran, building on CAIFI and other successful defense efforts.
References:
Nayeri, Kamran. Whose Planet?
Essays on Ecocentric Socialism. 2023.
___________. Toward a Theory of
Uneven and Combined Late Capitalist Development. 2023.
___________. Between Dreams and
Reality: Essays on Revolution and Socialism. 2025.
Pager, Tyler and Anatoly Kurmanaev. “How
Marco Rubio Is Running Venezuela From Afar.” The New York Times, July 11,
2026.
