The Electoral Gambit
The Electoral Gambit
The Left and the Crisis of Liberal Democracy
What role can elections play in a socialist strategy rooted in grassroots movements from below? The left has often offered two answers: embrace electoral activity as the primary arena of political activity or reject it as a diversion from mass organizing. Mooers charts a path beyond this divide. He argues that socialism cannot be achieved through elections alone or by piecemeal reforms of the capitalist state. But he also challenges the left’s casual dismissal of electoral participation.
The Electoral Gambit ranges across left insurgencies North and South, with particular attention to Latin America’s Pink Tide. Mooers examines how it is that the separation of the economic and political spheres under modern capitalism has limited the horizons of the left and impoverished our conception of socialism. He explores movements from below, imperialism, citizenship, the rise of neoliberalism and recent experiments which combine electoralism and mass organizing. Bringing these themes together he develops a rich account of “insurgent parliamentarism” offering a new strategic path for anti-capitalist politics in the twenty-first century.
Colin Mooers is a Canadian political theorist, author and professor emeritus in the Department of Politics, Toronto Metropolitan University. Born in Fredericton, New Brunswick, he attended the University of New Brunswick and University of Ottawa, where he was awarded an Honours B.A. in Philosophy; the University of Toronto, where he completed a Master of Arts in Philosophy; York University, where he completed his doctorate in Social and Political Thought in 1987, under the guidance of the late Marxist political theorist, Ellen Meiksins Wood. He taught in the Politics Department at Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson) from 1987 until his retirement in 2019. His work explores the intersections of capitalism, citizenship, and imperialism, and the dynamics of popular democratic movements. His scholarship is grounded in critical Marxist theory and rooted in the tradition of “socialism from below.”
- ISBN-13
- 9781773638898
- Publisher
- Fernwood Publishing
- Imprint
- Fernwood Publishing
- Format
- Paperback
- Pages
- 196
- Dimensions
- 229 x 152 mm
- Language
- English