Skip to main content
Donate to the 95 years appeal
Radhika Desai’s Marxist lens illuminates the path to a post-capitalist future
ROGER McKENZIE explores how the political economist’s work on geopolitical economics and involvement with the International Manifesto Group offer crucial insights into global power shifts as US hegemony fades

ECONOMICS has sometimes been described as “the dismal science.” These people have clearly never had the pleasure of listening to Professor Radhika Desai.

To be precise Desai is a political economist — the discipline that she told me also more accurately describes the work of Karl Marx.

Desai, to be even more precise, puts forward geopolitical economics as part of a Marxist framework for developing a better understanding of how the international relations of capitalism integrate politics, history, class and nation.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
More from this author
Chinese President Xi Jinping gestures during a reception following a military parade to commemorate the 80th anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender held in front of Tiananmen Gate in Beijing, September 3, 2025
BRICS / 9 September 2025
9 September 2025
France's Prime Minister Francois Bayrou leaves the weekly cabinet meeting, March 19, 2025 at the Elysee Palace in Paris
France / 8 September 2025
8 September 2025
Israeli police and rescue teams inspect the scene of a shooting attack carried out by two Palestinian gunmen, in which several people were killed and others injured at a bus stop in Jerusalem, Sept ember 8, 2025
Middle East / 8 September 2025
8 September 2025
Similar stories
The front of the Marx Memorial Library
Features / 23 August 2025
23 August 2025

From hunting rare pamphlets at book sales to online panels and courses on trade unionism and class politics, the MML continues connecting archive treasures with the movements fighting for a better world, writes director MEIRIAN JUMP

IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST:
Thousands of protesters march
aga
Opinion / 24 February 2025
24 February 2025
Lenin’s theory of the weakest link shifted the centre of gravity of the proletarian revolution towards peoples’ struggles in the developing world, contrary to the expectation of Marx and Engels. The effect was to hinder the cause of socialism by decades. Time bring it back to its natural home, argues FAWZI IBRAHIM
RESISTANCE: An anti-Trump protest at the White House, Washin
Features / 8 February 2025
8 February 2025
Trump’s return when we already see a world at war, breathtaking inequality and climate catastrophe confirms Engles’ famous dichotomy, writes MATT WILLGRESS
Features / 14 November 2024
14 November 2024
ELAINE MCFARLAND and JIM WHISTON introduce a collection of essays published in honour of Professor John Foster