On December 19, 2020, socialist intellectual and friend of the show Leo Panitch passed away from COVID-19. Today, we honor his legacy by speaking with his longtime friend and colleague Sam Gindin, a Canadian scholar and activist who co-authored The Socialist Challenge Today and other volumes with Panitch.

He and Esty reflect on the past forty-eight hours in American politics—how we got here, what it means for the future—and how we can build on Leo Panitch’s work.

Sam Gindin is a scholar, activist, and co-author of In and Out of Crisis (PM Press, 2010), The Making of Global Capitalism (Verso, 2012), and The Socialist Challenge Today, which was recently re-released by Haymarket. He was research director of the Canadian Auto Workers from 1974–2000.

Leo Panitch was a professor of political science at York University and co-editor of The Socialist Register. He wrote many books, including Renewing Socialism: Democracy, Strategy, and Imagination and The Making of Global Capitalism with co-author Sam Gindin. His most recent work is The Socialist Challenge Today: Syriza, Sanders, Corbyn, co-authored with Sam Gindin (Merlin Press, 2018; Haymarket, 2020).