2025
“Social Movement Targeting and Policy Outcomes: Black Mobilization and the War on Poverty in the U.S. South, 1965–68.” Social Problems, advance online version, September 2025. https://doi.org/10.1093/socpro/spaf035. With Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz.
“Iran: The Things It Won’t Do to Say.” Common Dreams, July 1, 2025.
“Want to Stop Trump’s Attacks on the NLRB? History Shows Strikes Are the Answer.” Truthout, May 10, 2025.
“What It Will Take to Stop Trump’s Assault on Coal Miners (and the Rest of Us).” Common Dreams, May 2, 2025.
“With US War Crimes, the Only Crime Is Breaching Secrecy Protocols.” Counterpunch, March 27, 2025.
“Social Movements Constrained Trump in His First Term – More Than People Realize.” The Conversation, March 18, 2025.
“‘Serán sus propios dueños’: Dos proyectos de democracia económica en Estados Unidos.” In La emergencia de la democracia comunal, ed. Saúl Curto López, 219–238. Valencia: tirant lo blanch, 2025. With Atenea Jiménez and Mikel Ángulo.
“’The Administration Acted Reasonably’ in Repressing Protest: Investigators Hired by UMass Chancellor Exonerate UMass Chancellor.” Amherst Indy, January 21, 2025. Short version in Daily-Hampshire Gazette, February 7, 2025.
2024
“12 Ways We Can Exploit Fossil Fuel Industry Vulnerabilities – Even under Trump.” Truthout, December 29, 2024.
“The UMass Foundation ‘Respectfully Denies’ Our Right to a Future.” Massachusetts Daily Collegian, December 10, 2024. With Brendan Post.
“The Historian Kevin A. Young, Author of ‘Abolishing Fossil Fuels,’ on Why the Fight for the Climate Isn’t Over.” Against the Grain (podcast), December 3, 2024.
“No, the Fight for the Climate Isn’t ‘Over.'” Jacobin, December 2, 2024.
“Confronting Capitalism in Twentieth-century Latin America.” In Socialism, Internationalism, and Development in the Third World: Envisioning Modernity in the Era of Decolonization, ed. Su Lin Lewis and Nana Osei-Opare, 257–282. London: Bloomsbury, 2024.
“Smoothing the Contradictions: The Political History of Fossil Fuels.” In The Struggle for Natural Resources: Findings from Bolivian History, ed. Carmen Soliz and Rossana Barragán, 170–195. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2024.
“The Heavy Cost of Blocking the Energy Transition.” The Daily Review (Towanda, PA), August 3, 2024. (non-paywall version here)
“The Scapegoating of Immigrants Relies on Lies.” The Daily Review (Towanda, PA), July 24, 2024. (non-paywall version here)
“Black Economic Boycotts of the Civil Rights Era Still Offer Lessons on How to Achieve a Just Society.” The Conversation, July 1, 2024.
“The Threat of Democracy on Campus at UMass.” The Nation, May 21, 2024.
(Review): Democracy on the Ground: Local Politics in Latin America’s Left Turn, by Gabriel Hetland. Hispanic American Historical Review 104, no. 2 (2024): 352–353.
“What the Climate Movement’s Debate about Disruption Gets Wrong.” Humanities & Social Sciences Communications 11, no. 25 (2024). With Laura Thomas-Walters.
(Review): Keeping the March Alive: How Grassroots Activism Survived Trump’s America, by Catherine Corrigall-Brown. Contemporary Sociology 53, no. 1 (2024): 35–36.
2023
“The Selective Silencing of Campus Speech.” Amherst Indy, December 11, 2023.
“(Re)making Revolution.” Interview. Against the Grain, August 7, 2023.
“Brandon Johnson Will Have to Beat Capital Strikes in Chicago.” Interview. This Is Hell! April 20, 2023.
“Brandon Johnson Won in Chicago. Now His Movement Will Have to Beat Capital Strikes.” Jacobin, April 12, 2023.
“Our Vietnamese Compañeros: How Salvadoran Guerrillas Adapted the ‘People’s War’ Strategy.” In Transnational Communism across the Americas, ed. Marc Becker, Margaret M. Power, Tony Wood, and Jacob A. Zumoff, 215–232. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2023.
“Fossil Fuels, the Ruling Class, and Prospects for the Climate Movement.” Political Power and Social Theory 39 (2023): 127–57.
“Trump, Biden, and Why Elections Don’t Bring Bigger Policy Changes.” Political Power and Social Theory 39 (2023): 7–29.
“Introduction: Trump as Symptom.” Political Power and Social Theory 39 (2023): 1–6.
(Review): South-South Solidarity and the Latin America Left, by Jessica Stites-Mor. Hispanic American Historical Review 103, no. 1 (2023): 199–200.
(Review): The Impasse of the Latin American Left, by Frank Gaudichaud, Massimo Modonesi, and Jeffery R. Webber. Hispanic American Historical Review 103, no. 4 (2023): 740–742.
2022
“Our Social Conquests Will Be Respected: Peasants and Military Dictatorship in Cochabamba, Bolivia.” Hispanic American Historical Review 102, no. 3 (2022): 481-512.
“Beyond the Comandantes: Revolutions and Revolutionaries since 1959” (review essay based on eight books). Latin American Research Review 57, no. 2 (2022): 504-14.
(Review): Toward a Global History of Latin America’s Revolutionary Left, edited by Tanya Harmer and Alberto Martín Álvarez. Hispanic American Historical Review 102, no. 2 (2022): 366-68.
2021
“Stop Calling Them Conservatives.” Counterpunch, October 22, 2021.
“Here’s How to Fight Climate Destruction and Environmental Racism Simultaneously” (interview with James K. Boyce). Truthout, June 2, 2021.
“Georgia’s Voter Suppression Is Sparking Boycotts. History Shows They Can Work.” Truthout, April 9, 2021.
“Smarter Empire.” Sidecar, March 8, 2021.
(Review): No Barrier Can Contain It: Cuban Antifascism and the Spanish Civil War, by Ariel Mae Lambe. The Volunteer 39, no. 2 (2021): 18-19.
(Review): Landscape of Migration: Mobility and Environmental Change on Bolivia’s Tropical Frontier, 1952 to the Present, by Ben Nobbs-Thiessen. Mennonite Quarterly Review 45, no. 2 (2021): 265-67.
2020
“When Black Movements Win, Everybody But the 1% Wins.” Truthout, December 24, 2020. With Megan L. Jordan, Joshua Murray, and Michael Schwartz.
“No Co-Sponsor of ‘Medicare for All’ Has Lost Reelection in the Past Decade (Even in GOP-Leaning Districts).” Common Dreams, December 21, 2020. With Richard Lachmann and Michael Schwartz.
“A Tipping Point for the Defeat of Fossil Fuels? How to Stop Big Energy in Its Tracks (Quite Literally).” TomDispatch, December 10, 2020. With Richard Lachmann and Michael Schwartz.
“To Push Biden Left, We Must Build Movements to Challenge His Corporate Backers.” Truthout, November 21, 2020.
“Leveraging Power.” Interview. Against the Grain, November 3, 2020.
“The Bolivian Left’s Election Win Is a Positive Sign, But It Inherits a Dire Situation.” Guardian, October 21, 2020.
“Workers and Consumers Have Forced Republican Governors to Mandate Masks.” Jacobin, September 13, 2020. With Michael Schwartz.
“How Local Civil Rights Protests Produced an Increase in War on Poverty Spending.” Jacobin, September 10, 2020. With Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz. (Excerpted from Levers of Power)
“Reforms Are Won When Social Movements Inflict Real Costs on the Economic Elite.” Interview by Justin Vassallo. Truthout, August 23, 2020.
“How the 99% Can Force the 1% to Defeat COVID-19.” Salon, July 12, 2020. With Michael Schwartz.
“History Shows That Sustained, Disruptive Protests Work.” YES! Magazine, July 8, 2020.
“The Cops Can Be Defeated – But Not By Taking Obama’s Advice.” Jacobin, June 17, 2020.
“Letting Latin Americans Live.” NACLA Report on the Americas 52, no. 1 (2020): 93-99. With Atenea Jiménez Lemon. (Spanish version also available)
(Review): Sorting Out the Mixed Economy: The Rise and Fall of Welfare and Developmental States in the Americas, by Amy C. Offner. The Americas 77, no. 4 (2020): 670-71.
2019
“HAHR Forum on Contemporary Bolivia and History.” Hispanic American Historical Review blog, December 18, 2019.
“Our Debt to Central American Refugees.” Published by Democratic Socialists of America and Historians for Peace and Democracy, September 9, 2019.
“Liberating the Left’s History.” Fifteeneightyfour (Cambridge University Press blog), August 27, 2019.
“Washington Intensifies Its Collective Punishment of Venezuelans.” NACLA, August 14, 2019.
“El Salvador’s FMLN and the Constraints on Leftist Government.” Oxford Encyclopedia of Latin American Politics, ed. Harry Vanden and Gary Prevost (October 2019). DOI: 10.1093/ acrefore/9780190228637.013.1768.
- Spanish translation published as “El FMLN de El Salvador y las restricciones sobre el gobierno de izquierda.” Cuadernos Inter.c.a.mbio sobre Centroamérica y el Caribe(San José) 17, no. 1 (2020).
“Introduction: Revolutionary Actors, Encounters, and Transformations.” In Making the Revolution: Histories of the Latin American Left, ed. Kevin A. Young, 1-18. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019.
(Review): The Bolivia Reader: History, Culture, Politics, edited by Sinclair Thomson, Rossana Barragán, Xavier Albó, Seemin Qayum, and Mark Goodale. The Historian 81, no. 4 (2019): 716-17.
(Review): USAID in Bolivia: Partner or Patrón? by Lawrence C. Heilman. Journal of Latin American Studies 51, no. 1 (2019): 222-24.
2018
“Will Climate Change Make Family Separations the Norm?” Truthout, August 25, 2018.
(Review): Where Are the Unions? Workers and Social Movements in Latin America, the Middle East and Europe, edited by Sian Lazar. Labor: Studies in Working-Class History 15, no. 3 (2018): 120-22.
(Review): Oil and Nation: A History of the Bolivian Petroleum Sector, by Stephen C. Cote. Hispanic American Historical Review 98, no. 1 (2018): 158-59.
“Capital Strikes As a Corporate Political Strategy: The Structural Power of Business in the Obama Era.” Politics & Society 46, no. 1 (2018): 3-28. With Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz.
2017
“Who Wants the Iran Deal Canceled?” Counterpunch, November 27, 2017. With Richard Lachmann and Michael Schwartz.
“The Huddled Masses Were Never Welcome.” Counterpunch, September 5, 2017.
“A Partial Peace in Colombia.” Against the Current 187 (March-April 2017): 9-11.
“Who’s Calling the Shots?” Jacobin, February 6, 2017. With Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz.
“When Capitalists Go on Strike.” Jacobin, February 3, 2017. With Tarun Banerjee and Michael Schwartz.
(Review): “Stimulating a Cooperative Spirit? Public Health and U.S.-Bolivia Relations in the 1950s,” by Nicole Pacino. H-Diplo, December 6, 2017.
(Review): Rhythms of the Pachakuti: Indigenous Uprising and State Power in Bolivia, by Raquel Gutiérrez Aguilar. Ethnohistory 64, no. 2 (2017): 322-23.
“Alianzas revolucionarias del siglo XX en Bolivia: Entre la coalición y la ruptura.” Fuentes (La Paz, Bolivia) 11, no. 49 (2017): 6-18.
“From Open Door to Nationalization: Oil and Development Visions in Bolivia, 1952-1969.” Hispanic American Historical Review 97, no. 1 (2017): 95-129.
- Abridged Spanish translation published as “De ‘Puertas Abiertas’ a la nacionalización: Los hidrocarburos y el choque de visiones económicas en Bolivia, 1952-1969.” Historia (La Paz, Bolivia) 40 (2017): 59-90.
2016
“The Making of an Interethnic Coalition: Urban and Rural Anarchists in La Paz, Bolivia, 1946-1947.” Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies 11, no. 2 (2016): 163-88.
- Revised version published as “Total Subversion: Interethnic Radicalism in La Paz, Bolivia, 1946-1947.” In Making the Revolution: Histories of the Latin American Left, ed. Kevin A. Young, 129-55. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2019.
“When You Say ‘Lesser Evil,’ Do You Mean It?” ZNet, October 20, 2016.
“Economic Growth, Climate Change, and Capitalism” (interview with Robin Hahnel), Truthout, July 7, 2016, and ZNet (extended version), July 9, 2016.
(Review): Corporate Social Responsibility in a Globalizing World, edited by Kiyoteru Tsutsui and Alwyn Lim. Contemporary Sociology 45, no. 4 (2016): 506-08.
(Review): “Dividing the Waters: How Power, Property, and Protest Transformed the Waterscape of Cochabamba, Bolivia, 1879-2000” (Ph.D. diss.), by Sarah Thompson Hines. Dissertation Reviews, April 4, 2016.
2015
“Why They Hate the Deal with Iran.” Counterpunch, July 15, 2015. With Richard Lachmann and Michael Schwartz.
“Targeting the Corporations, Not the Politicians: Social Movement Strategy for a Plutocratic Era.” Jacobin, May 18, 2015. With Michael Schwartz.
“War by Other Means in El Salvador.” NACLA, March 16, 2015.
“Hillary Clinton and Corporate Feminism: ‘Something That Might Be Called Neocon.’” Against the Current 175 (March-April 2015): 18-22. With Diana Sierra Becerra. Reposted at Jacobin as “Hillary Clinton’s Empowerment.” (Spanish version also available)
“Drug War Winners and Losers” (review of Dawn Paley, Drug War Capitalism). Against the Current 177 (July-August 2015).
2014
“A Neglected Mechanism of Social Movement Political Influence: The Role of Anticorporate and Anti-Institutional Protest in Changing Government Policy.” Mobilization 19, no. 3 (2014): 239-60. With Michael Schwartz.
“How ‘Partnership’ Weakens Solidarity: Colombian GM Workers and the Limits of UAW Internationalism.” WorkingUSA 17, no. 2 (2014): 239-60. With Diana C. Sierra Becerra.
“Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise: How Corporate Power Shaped the Affordable Care Act.” New Labor Forum 23, no. 2 (2014): 30-40. With Michael Schwartz.
“Community Democracy Confronts Mining in El Salvador.” Upside Down World, December 2, 2014. With Diana C. Sierra.
“Inside Venezuela’s Proceso” (review of Sujatha Fernandes, Who Can Stop the Drums? Urban Social Movements in Chávez’s Venezuela). Against the Current 171 (July-August 2014): 33-34.
“GM’s New CEO Is Not a Feminist.” ZNet blog, May 1, 2014. With Diana Sierra Becerra.
“Venezuela and the Global Left: What We Might Learn from Our Venezuelan Counterparts.” ZNet blog, February 27, 2014.
“Negroponte’s War Crimes.” The Michigan Daily (Ann Arbor, MI), February 26, 2014. With Diana Sierra Becerra.
“Demolishing the Mythology around the Vietnam Antiwar Movement” (review of Penny Lewis, Hardhats, Hippies, and Hawks: The Vietnam Antiwar Movement as Myth and Memory). Waging Nonviolence, January 13, 2014.
“Democracy in Latin America: The Latinobarómetro Poll.” Venezuelanalysis.com, January 2, 2014.
2013
“Washing U.S. Hands of the Dirty Wars: News Coverage Erases Washington’s Role in State Terror.” NACLA Report on the Americas 46, no. 2 (2013): 58-61. Expanded version at ZNet and NYTimes eXaminer.
“Indians, Leftists, and Rebellion in Bolivia” (review of Jeffery Webber, Red October: Left-Indigenous Struggles in Modern Bolivia). Against the Current 163 (March-April 2013): 37-38, 42.
“Chávez’s Real Venezuela.” The Michigan Daily (Ann Arbor, MI), March 14, 2013.
(Review): The Bolivian Revolution and the United States, 1952-Present, by James F. Siekmeier. Bulletin of Latin American Research 32, no. 2 (2013): 242-44.
“Purging the Forces of Darkness: The United States, Monetary Stabilization, and the Containment of the Bolivian Revolution.” Diplomatic History 37, no. 3 (2013): 509-37.
“The Good, the Bad, and the Benevolent Interventionist: U.S. Press and Intellectual Distortions of the Latin American Left.” Latin American Perspectives 40, no. 3 (2013): 207-25.
- Revised version published in Latin America’s Radical Left: Challenges and Complexities of Political Power in the Twenty-First Century, ed. Steve Ellner, 249-69. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.
- Spanish translation published as “Buena izquierda, mala izquierda e intervenciones benevolentes: Periodismo al servicio de una agenda neocolonial.” In La izquierda latinoamericana en el poder: Cambios y enfrentamientos en el siglo XXI, ed. Steve Ellner, 321-53. Caracas: Fundación Celarg/Fundación Centro Nacional de Estudios Históricos, 2018.
2012
“The Real Enemy in the Middle East: Why U.S. Leaders Fear Arab Democracy.” Z Magazine 25, no. 9 (September 2012): 41-44.
“Turning Michigan Into Colombia: The Global Assault on Workers and the Prospects for Solidarity.” ZNet, December 26, 2012.
Review of Richard Seymour, American Insurgents: A Brief History of American Anti-Imperialism. ZNet, May 26, 2012.
“The Propaganda of False Trade-Offs: Pitting the Public against Social Spending, Good Wages, and Environmental Protection.” NYTimes eXaminer, March 27, 2012.
“Contempt for International Law: A Survey of New York Times and Washington Post Editorials on Iran.” NYTimes eXaminer, March 16, 2012. Summary available here.
“Can Prefigurative Politics Prevail? The Implications for Movement Strategy in John Holloway’s Crack Capitalism.” Journal of Classical Sociology 12, no. 2 (2012): 220-39. With Michael Schwartz.
2011
“Restoring Discipline in the Ranks: The United States and the Restructuring of the Bolivian Mining Industry, 1960-1970.” Latin American Perspectives 38, no. 6 (2011): 6-24.
“The Last, Best Hope on Earth: The Popular Uprisings of 2011 and the ‘Optimism of Uncertainty.’” ZNet blog, December 28, 2011.
Review of Anthony DiMaggio, The Rise of the Tea Party: Political Discontent and Corporate Media in the Age of Obama. ZNet/Counterpunch, December 26, 2011.
“The Violence That Never Happened: Occupy Wall Street and the Selective Outrage of the New York Times.” NYTimes eXaminer/ZNet blog, November 18, 2011.
“To Repress or Co-Opt? OWS Media Coverage Mirrors Splits within the 1 Percent.” The Indypendent (November 2-22, 2011), 15.
“US Opposition to Arab Democracy, in Iraq and Beyond.” The Indypendent, November 7, 2011.
“Latin American Opinion and US Policy.” Venezuelanalysis.com, October 30, 2011.
“167 Million People Support Occupy Wall Street: The Time Is Ripe for a Mass Movement.” ZNet/Indypendent blog, October 15, 2011.
“The Impact of Occupy Wall Street: Some Early Indicators.” The Indypendent, October 11, 2011.
“Kumbaya and Bullets: The Few Winners and Many Losers with the US-Colombia Free-Trade Agreement.” ZNet blog, October 7, 2011.
“Bolivia Dilemmas: Turmoil, Transformation, and Solidarity.” ZNet blog, October 1, 2011.
“Laboratorio boliviano: Intervención norteamericana y la economía política de la contrarrevolución, 1952-1969.” Análisis Político (La Paz) 15 (2011): 87-108.
“Deficit Myths: The Six Most Prevalent Lies About Budget Deficits and Economic Recovery.” ZNet, July 25, 2011.
“Shock Doctrine: New York.” ZNet, April 1, 2011.
“The Power of Disobedience and the Value of Solidarity.” THINK magazine (Stony Brook University), March 28, 2011. See also photos available here.
2010
“Two, Three, Many Colombias: The Logic and Consequences of the US Vision for Latin America.” Foreign Policy in Focus, December 29, 2010. Expanded version posted on ZNet.
“Latinobarómetro 2010: Latin American Public Opinion.” ZNet/Venezuelanalysis.com, December 7, 2010.
“Discrediting Alternatives to Neoliberalism.” NACLA Report on the Americas 43, no. 5 (2010): 45-48. Expanded version posted on ZNet.
“War Preparedness 101” (review of David Swanson, War Is a Lie). ZNet, November 25, 2010.
“The Democrats’ Choice, and Ours.” ZNet blog, October 10, 2010.
“Listening to the Generals.” ZNet blog, September 25, 2010.
“Army Enlistment Drops, Again.” ZNet, October 20, 2010.
“Counter-Recruitment Season.” ZNet blog, August 14, 2010.
“Good Left, Bad Left: Compliance and Defiance in US Press Coverage of Latin America.” ZNet, July 17, 2010.
“Honduras, Iran, and the Propaganda Model.” ZNet/Upside Down World, July 5, 2010.
“Democratic Deficits, Disillusion, and the Decline of the Democrats.” ZNet blog, January 25, 2010.
“Nurturing the ‘Healthy Nucleus’: Thoughts on How to Engage with the White Working Class.” ZNet blog, January 22, 2010.
Review of Rebecca Solnit, A Paradise Built in Hell: The Extraordinary Communities That Arise in Disaster. ZNet, January 4, 2010.
“Patria, progreso y héroes: Una crítica del currículo de historia.” Revista Mexicana de Investigación Educativa 15, no. 45 (2010): 599-620.
(Review): A Revolution for Our Rights: Indigenous Struggles for Land and Justice in Bolivia, 1880-1952, by Laura Gotkowitz. Journal of Latin American Studies 42, no. 4 (2010): 863-65.
2009
“The 2009 Latinobarómetro Poll.” ZNet blog, December 15, 2009.
“Morally Right, Politically Popular, Economically Advantageous: Medicare for All.” ZNet blog, October 11, 2009.
“Listening to the Radicals: US History’s Lessons on Compromise and the ‘Politically Impossible.’” ZNet, September 10, 2009.
“Obama and Latin America: The First Six Months.” NACLA, July 23, 2009.
Review of Ha-Joon Chang, Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism. ZNet, June 10, 2009.
“US Policy and Democracy in Latin America: The Latinobarómetro Poll.” ZNet/Venezuelanalysis.com, May 29, 2009.
“The US Antiwar Movement: Toward a Critical Self-Assessment.” ZNet blog, February 23, 2009.
(Review): Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq, by Dahr Jamail, and Blind into Baghdad: America’s War in Iraq, by James Fallows. Peace & Change 34, no. 3 (2009): 282-89.
2008
“Colombia and Venezuela: Testing the Propaganda Model.” NACLA Report on the Americas 41, no. 6 (2008): 50-52. Expanded version posted on ZNet.
“Targeting Civilians: The Path to Hiroshima and Nagasaki.” ZNet, August 8, 2008.
“The Atomic Bombing of Japan: Tsuyoshi Hasegawa Re-examines the Japanese Surrender.” Counterpunch, August 6, 2008.
“The Achievements of War Propaganda: Selling Military Intervention to a Reluctant Public.” ZNet, June 9, 2008.
“The March of the Dead.” Z Magazine (May 2008).
“Good Veterans and Bad Veterans.” ZNet blog, May 26, 2008.
“Our ‘Good Intentions’ in Iraq: More Imperialist Assumptions in Liberal Criticism of the Invasion/Occupation.” ZNet blog, April 17, 2008.
“The Irrelevance of International Law: Imperialist Assumptions in Liberal Criticism of the War.” ZNet blog, April 9, 2008.
“Iraq the ‘Mistake’: The Pitfalls of Pragmatic Criticism of the War in Iraq.” ZNet blog, April 9, 2008.
“Orientalism in Full Force: Edward Said, Liberals, and Iraq.” ZNet blog, April 9, 2008.
“Neutralizing Radicalism: Capitalism, War, and the Legacy of MLK.” ZNet blog, January 25, 2008.
“The Effects of the US Occupation: Tracking Violence and Instability in Iraq.” ZNet, January 10, 2008. (similar version published in online version of Z Magazine, March 2008)
“What Would a Withdrawal Mean? The US Occupation and Popular Opinion in Iraq.” Counterpunch, January 5/6, 2008.
2007
“U.S. Cuba Policy Is Immoral, Illegal” (letter to the editor). Baltimore Sun, September 1, 2007.
Kevin A. Young 