Times change. But history, it seems, is speeding up.

The Progressive International was founded just a little over three years. Our declared mission was simple: To make solidarity more than a slogan.

With Covid-19 rampaging across the world, that mission acquired burning urgency. As Samir Amin set out in his prescient call for a new International, our conjuncture is defined by three awful trends: the destruction of democracy by a consolidated oligarchy; the persistence of imperial relations across the world system; and the “extreme fragmentation” of progressive forces despite the increasing coordination of their reactionary opponents. The intersection of these trends propelled the formation of the Progressive International.

The urgency was made all the more apparent by the inhumanity of the capitalist world’s response to the pandemic. Billionaire wealth soared. Big banks came to collect. The poor lost jobs, housing, and health. Large swarths of humanity were declared unworthy of life as vaccine apartheid was brutally enforced — and budget cuts imposed by the so-called “international institutions” decimated public health services. Through the trauma and death shone a painful clarity: global institutions, designed to serve the interests of the old imperialist powers, would not serve the interests of the great majority.

These confusing and rapidly changing conditions necessarily created many contradictions.

Resurgent progressive political forces claimed power through the ballot box, supported by powerful and organised social forces, in Brazil, Colombia, Bolivia, Chile, Peru and Honduras; at the same time, the hard right gained strength all over the world, speaking the language of a challenge to the ‘system normal’ while buttressing it.

The era of capitalist globalization, already on the decline with challenges to the United States dollar hegemony, and rising economies like China and India, came to a close in these years. The war in Ukraine accelerated this development, but it alone did not create it.

In this maelstrom, the Progressive International completed its first three-year mandate. Over the coming weeks, we hope to share and celebrate our successes over the past years. But, for now, we must continue to move — and move quickly.

History has entered a new strategic era, with its borders, narratives and forces still coming into view. In this context, we are announcing a renewed International — with a renewed mission.

Our Council, whose new members we announced this week, met this weekend. They shared perspectives from their respective struggles — representing millions on every continent and carrying the hope of the world — and deliberated on our present conjuncture.

The urgency was perhaps more palpable than when our International launched. Council members urged the International to tackle head-on the major questions of our time: unjust debt, oppressive patriarchy, the resurgent far-right, destructive development policies, and the New Cold War that increasingly threatens to turn hot, incinerating entire regions in its reckless path.

The Progressive International, armed with new Council members, a new co-General Coordinator, enhanced internal governance and new powerful member organizations set to be announced next week, is increasingly prepared to face this moment in history.

In it, we will continue to advance the mission with which we launched: to make solidarity more than a slogan.

Latest from the Movement

The Nakba isn’t over

This week, we presented Episode #1 of “The International,” a world-spanning new video series brought to you by Jacobin Magazine and the Progressive International.

In the first episode, we travel to Ramallah to hear from PI Council member Dr. Yara Hawari on the past, present, and future of Zionist settler colonialism — and the ongoing struggle of the Palestinian people for freedom and justice.

Watch the video here and please share it widely. We hope the series can be an important resource for progressive forces everywhere.

Bangladesh’s workers demand a minimum wage

Last weekend, over 20,000 workers flooded the streets of Gazipur, an industrial town just north of the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka, to demand a minimum wage of 23,000 Bangladeshi Taka. PI Council member Nazma Akter, a Bangladeshi garment workers’ union leader, addressed her fellow workers and described the crowds as “like an ocean” filling the city’s streets.

African counter COP

The Africa Climate Justice Collective (ACJC) - made up of 27 movements’ based, allied organisations is holding the African People’s COUNTER COP 2023 from 18-29 September 2023.

The COUNTER COP is a gathering of movements, allies, partners, and other progressive groups to share knowledge and perspectives on the climate and ecological crisis by building a common ground for understanding and united advocacy towards real solutions to the crisis. Speakers includes PI Council emeritus member Nnimmo Bassey.

New World Embassy: Kurdistan

One hundred years ago, the signatories of the Lausanne Treaty dismantled the Ottoman Middle East and refused a nation to the Kurdish people by dislocating its traditional territory into the new entities that would become Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq. This weekend in Laussanne, artist Jonas Staal and Nilufer Koç, member of the National Congress of Kurdistan and member of the Council of the PI are creating a world embassy for Kurdistan, featuring workshops, roundtables, a concert and speeches by the PI’s Co-general coordinators. For more information, please click here.

Art: Polar print by Todd Anderson, whose work focuses on polar landscapes, demonstrating resilience, change and beauty in nature through climate breakdown. For more of Anderson’s work, please visit his website.