The deadline for abstracts for this year’s Historical Materialism London Conference has been extended one FINAL time to 30 May, midnight GMT.
This the final dealine.
There will be NO FURTHER EXTENSIONS.
This is your last chance!
Read the CfP and the Stream CfPs and submit your paper and panel proposals before the final deadline.
And come to London in November, to a conference that brings together comrades, enables the Marxist debate we desperatly need, helps disseminate new and original research, creates research networks and communities, and builds solidarity.
Resurgent Reaction: Marxist Strategies at the End of the Liberal Order
This year seems to mark the high point, or rather the low point, of the right-wing turn of the last five years. The victory of Donald Trump, the election of Javier Milei, and the advance of the AfD are just some examples of the rapid rise of the forces of the racist, anti-migrant, ‘anti-woke’ right. Beyond the electoral sphere, we have witnessed a larger backlash against even basic liberal achievements – anti-racism, feminism, gender and sexuality, with most mainstream parties (‘centre-right’ and ‘centre-left’) embracing the rhetoric and strategy of the far right.
At the same time, capitalism appears to have become more vulgar than the wildest dream of any Marxist. The state no longer seems to require a complex analysis of its connections with class power, rather certain factions of the bourgeoisie simply turn the state apparatus to their own ends. Inter-imperialist rivalries are conducted brazenly in the open, murderous racial violence in service of imperialist accumulation is barely hidden, and capitalist states have abandoned even the veneer of fighting the ecological crisis. Rather, big tech and monopoly capital assert their social power and interest with uninhibited immediacy. The more than obvious contradictions of accumulation – economic stagnation, the persistence of inflationary tendencies, the absence of productivity leaps – are dealt with simply by treating the global workforce as fully expendable.
The left appears to be defeated on almost all fronts. Despite the persistence of movements and forms of resistance, above all the global movement against the genocide in Gaza, many organisations of the left seem to be disoriented, oscillating between the supposed safety of theoretical purism and misguided attempts to coopt the right’s agenda on issues of migration, culture and identity. What is lacking is a clear strategic path.
How do we respond to this? Faced with such horror, the temptation is simply to fight back. But fighting back is not enough. The enduring lesson of the Marxist tradition – from Marx’s work in the reading room of the British Museum, to Lenin’s readings of Hegel in exile, through Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks – is of the need to analyse. We cannot develop strategies to tackle new conjunctures without understanding their logics, their class configurations and their changing material circumstances.
It is to this task that the 2025 Historical Materialism London Conference turns its attention – how can we understand the deeper logics and complexities behind a capitalism which seems to stand before us shorn of all illusion and artifice? How can we chart the new configurations of racialisation, migration and imperialism? To what extent are we witnessing the birth of new regimes of accumulation – and are these changing the very nature of capitalism? How can we map out the shifting patterns of fossil capitalism and planetary destruction? And, above all, how might we put this understanding in the service of revolutionary transformation, of new strategies and tactics for fighting, organising and building alternatives to the barbarism that surrounds us?
In line with the central theme of this year’s conference, we particularly want to invite contributions that address the following non-exclusive questions:
- The continuous rise of the far right and new forms of fascism
- Race, racism and racialisation in relation to changing capitalist social relations
- Marxist theories of the authoritarian transformation of capitalist states
- The contemporary backlash against feminism, gender, sexual and reproductive rights
- Marxist critiques of sexism, patriarchy, heteronormativity and cisnormativity
- Contemporary forms of imperialist aggression
- Marxist responses to the climate catastrophe and fossil capital
- The dynamics of capitalist accumulation and the new attacks on the working-class
- Questions of left strategy and tactics in the current conjuncture
- Contemporary resistances and the lessons for organising
Whilst we encourage papers and panels that address these themes, as always, the Historical Materialism conference seeks to provide a space for critical Marxist theory and research across the globe and a range of disciplines and interests, so submissions on other themes are welcome.
The following streams will each also be issuing individual CFPs:
- Workers and Capital Stream
- Marxism and Culture Stream
- Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Struggles Stream
- New Technologies Stream
- Imperialism Stream
- Philosophy and Fascism Stream
- Postgraduate Pre-Conference Day (5 Nov)
We still believe that the format of the in-person conference offers a unique and irreplaceable form that brings together comrades, enables discussion, helps disseminate new and original research, creates research networks and communities, and builds solidarity. Therefore, we will not accept online presentations, except in exceptional and specific cases. Throughout the rest of the year, we also engage in online broadcasts and podcasts.
As in the past, the conference ethos is strictly egalitarian. We invite everyone to contribute in a comradely and collaborative spirit. The conference is open to all currents of critical Marxist theory. We expect all presenters to attend the entire conference (from Thursday noon to Sunday evening), not just their own session. Whilst we recognise that, for health, care and accessibility reasons, this may not always be possible, we believe it is incumbent on all presenters to engage in critical and comradely discussions throughout the conference. There should be no ‘cameo’ appearances. We generally expect all speakers to make themselves available for the whole of the conference, as tailoring a conference of this size around individuals’ preferences and desires is neither feasible nor desirable. The conference is an essential part of the broader Historical Materialism project – including the journal, the book series, the podcast, the broadcasts, and the global network of HM conferences – and we enjoin all conference participants to get involved with these different elements, for example, by subscribing to the journal and submitting their conference paper to us for consideration.
We invite proposals for individual papers as well as for panels, which can be made in response to the general conference call for papers or in response to a particular stream’s call for papers.
For individual papers, we require a paper title and an abstract of no longer than 300 words, up to five relevant keywords, as well as the name, email address, phone number and institutional affiliation of the primary author. For papers with more than one author, we require the name and email address of every corresponding author.
For panel proposals, you can submit either:
a) a pre-constituted panel of 3-4 papers;
b) a roundtable discussion; or
c) a book launch. Panels should usually have a minimum of three participants.
A panel proposal requires a title and an abstract of no longer than 300 words, plus the names and emails of all presenters/participants. For pre-constituted panels, we also require individual paper titles and abstracts of no longer than 300 words.
Precise submission requirements are specified in the online submission forms.
Please note, this is an in-person conference only. Online presentations will not be permitted. It is advised that you do not submit an abstract unless you know you can attend, and, if you have to travel to London from abroad, that you have a valid passport – including those travelling from the EU. We will, of course, help with visa applications but these should be made at the earliest possible moment.
For any inquiries contact conference@historicalmaterialism.org
For inquiries contact: conference@historicalmaterialism.org
