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Friday, September 4
 

9:00am CDT

Historic Bike Tour: Chicago Race Riot 1919 Commemoration Project
Friday September 4, 2026 9:00am - 12:00pm CDT
The Chicago Race Riot of 1919 Commemoration Project (CRR19) commemorates the worst incident of racial violence in the city’s history. The event has been long forgotten despite its impact on the subsequent shape and development of the city. Our 2.5-hour historic bike tour allows people to see, first-hand, some of the locations related to the events of 1919, the long shadow of residential segregation, as well as the incredible resilience of the local Black community. Our slow-paced ride will travel about 8 miles and features many stops along the way in Bronzeville and Bridgeport, two adjacent Southside neighborhoods with quite distinct, albeit interlinked, histories and demographics. Sign up here!
Friday September 4, 2026 9:00am - 12:00pm CDT

9:30am CDT

Marxism Education Series
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30am - 4:00pm CDT
Grant Park AB
The Marxism Education Series at Socialism 2026 is a cluster of courses on Marxist theory designed to introduce and deepen the understanding of Marxism for activists and organizers. The four classes (Class, State, Crisis, Socialism) present key concepts of Marxist theory in a capacious way, and build on each other throughout the full MES program. Participants are expected to do the readings (included in a reader to be sent to those registered for the MES) and participate in all four courses starting in the morning on September 4.

Classes will have limited capacity and require registration through a special form (available here). You will still need to register for Socialism 2026 in order to access the conference. 

Schedule

9:30am - 10:45am: Class
with Michael A. McCarthy
This course will present the basics of what capitalism is and how class works. Topics we will cover include capitalist competition and exploitation, as well as how racial, gender, and migrant status shape the labor market and class position.  

11am - 12:15pm: State
with Amna Akbar
This course aims to explore the role that the state plays in reproducing capitalism and class exploitation. We will explore the ways that capitalists directly shape the state and the ways that capitalism itself indirectly constrains democratic politics, as well as the role of states in imperialism and colonialism. 

1pm - 2:15pm: Crisis
with Michael A. McCarthy
In this course we will explore the ways that capitalism drives crises. First, we will examine the ways economic crisis are products of capitalism. Then we will examine the ways that environmental, social, and political crises are also created by capitalist dynamics. 

2:30pm - 4pm: Socialism
with Eman Abdelhadi
This course aims to understand what Marxists are fighting for. We will explore different experiments in socialism and the anti-capitalist principles, such as freedom, democracy, and equality, that they aim to produce. 

Readings will be sent out a few weeks before the conference.




Speakers
MA
AA
EA

Eman Abdelhadi

Eman Abdelhadi is a scholar, organizer and writer. She is an assistant professor and sociologist at the University of Chicago, writes a column for In These Times Magazine and is co-author of Everything for Everyone: An Oral History of the New York Commune, 2052-2072, a sci-fi novel... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30am - 4:00pm CDT
Grant Park AB
  Socialist and Marxist Theory

10:00am CDT

Reproductive Justice Strategy Session
Friday September 4, 2026 10:00am - 1:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
Join activists from around the country to discuss what’s next for the movement for abortion access and reproductive justice. Learn more and register here.
Sponsors
avatar for Chicago For Abortion Rights
Friday September 4, 2026 10:00am - 1:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
  Gender-Sexuality-Liberation

10:00am CDT

Organizing Social Workers for Abolition Summit
Friday September 4, 2026 10:00am - 2:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
Join the Network to Advance Abolitionist Social Work for a pre-Socialism conference summit for social workers to come together toward organizing for abolition. Learn more and register here.

Sponsors
avatar for Network to Advance Abolitionist Social Work
Friday September 4, 2026 10:00am - 2:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
  Abolition

2:30pm CDT

Abolitionist Campaigns in Hostile Terrains: Fighting Against Immigrant Detention in NY
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
We will be looking at the NY Dignity Not Detention (DND) campaign as a case study on abolitionist organizing that builds the power of migrant communities. We will discuss the hostile conditions of the moment and how we worked with communities & groups resisting ICE to achieve victory. Join us to learn about DND and develop and strengthen your abolitionist anti-deportation campaigns.
Speakers
VM

Viju Mathew

Viju is a member of Critical Resistance and has been fighting abolitionist campaigns in coalitions across California & New York for the past few years. Viju & Critical Resistance see the abolition of ICE as Part and Parcel of prison industrial complex abolition.
SG

Sophia Gurule

Sophia Elena Gurulé (she/her/ella) is a member of Critical Resistance based in Brooklyn, New York with experience organizing at the intersection of prison industrial complex (PIC) abolition, migrant justice, and organized labor. A long-time member of the Dignity Not Detention coalition, Sophia has... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for Critical Resistance
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
  Abolition

2:30pm CDT

The Threat of Geoengineering and the Socialist Response
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
As the climate crisis intensifies, capital is turning to geoengineering, technologies capable of directed perturbation of Earth systems. Here, we’ll explain what geoengineering is and why socialists should be opposed to its development. We will also discuss large-scale visions of ecosocialist transformation that challenge the urgency of intentional climate modification.
Speakers
AS
TC

T Callahan

T Callahan is a freelance science writer based in Chicago and author of The Stranded Asset on Substack. An editor of the forthcoming third edition of the Ecological Economics textbook and passionate advocate for eco-socialism, T strives to reveal capital's root-level complicity and... Read More →
AS

Ashwin Shantha

Ashwin Shantha (they/them) is a Ph.D. student at York University in Toronto, CA. They are a scholar of political economy, focused on exploitation and development in the Global South. Ashwin also maintains the Journal of International Solidarity Substack and podcast.
Sponsors
avatar for Science for the People
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
  Climate Justice

2:30pm CDT

Sing, Struggle, Organize: Movement Songs, Political Education, and Collective Power
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park C
From picket lines to protest movements, songs have always been weapons of struggle. This interactive workshop teaches movement songs while unpacking their histories and political function, showing how culture builds consciousness, collective identity, and power. Participants will actively practice using culture as a tool for organizing.
Speakers
avatar for Steff Reed

Steff Reed

Steff Reed is an award-winning musician, cultural organizer, scholar, and liberation theologian whose work uses music and faith as tools to build cultural resistance, political consciousness, and collective liberation. Reed is a GRAMMY-nominated music educator whose collaborations... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park C
  Culture and Art

2:30pm CDT

Community Lessons for Fighting Fascism: In Honor of Amisha Patel
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Erie
Organizers and storytellers from across Chicago’s movements speak to what our people will need to carry into the fights against fascism: deep relationships, courage to act amidst uncertainty, self-reflection and healing, and a long-arc strategy to move us past the short-term pain. This session is held to honor the legacy of our sister and comrade, Amisha Patel.

Attendees will receive a free zine (by Tanuja Jagernauth) distilling the highlights of the last piece Amisha Patel wrote, sharing wisdom and resources for facing down fascism together.
Speakers
MS

Maya Schenwar

Maya Schenwar is director of the Truthout Center for Grassroots Journalism. She is also Truthout’s board president. She is the co-editor of We Grow the World Together: Parenting Toward Abolition; co-author of Prison by Any Other Name: The Harmful Consequences of Popular Reform... Read More →
JD

Juliet DeJesus Alejandre

Juliet De Jesus Alejandre is executive director of the Logan Square Neighborhood Association.
avatar for Tanuja Jagernauth

Tanuja Jagernauth

Tanuja Devi Jagernauth is an Indo-Caribbean prison-industrial-complex abolitionist, writer, theater maker, conflict tender, and yoga educator who believes in the necessity of creation during times of destruction. Tanuja's writing is inspired by healing justice, caste abolition, and... Read More →
KJ

Katelyn Johnson

Katelyn Johnson is executive director of the Chicago Racial Justice Pooled Fund. Previously, she was executive director of the Blackroots Alliance.
RG

Rocío García

Rocío García is currently the Senior Organizing Director at Grassroots Collaborative, a coalition of community and labor groups across Chicago and Peoria. She leads the People’s Unity Platform–created to bring together the people’s agenda ahead of the 2024 municipal... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for Truthout
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Erie
  Fighting the Right

2:30pm CDT

From a Marxist Feminist Point of View: Freedom, Rationality and Human Nature
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Adler ABC
This panel explores the fruitfulness of approaching key philosophical questions from a Marxist-feminist perspective. It will examine how different modes of production (such as capitalism or feudalism) have structures which shape and limit potentials for human emancipation, particularly women’s freedom. In the process, panelists will articulate how capitalism should be understood as a framework within which other relations of oppression are structured and hierarchized.
Speakers
NH

Nancy Holmstrom

Nancy Holmstrom, Prof Emerita Philosophy Rutgers, New Politics Editorial Board
PG

Phil Gasper

Phil Gasper is co-editor of New Politics, editor of an annotated edition of The Communist Manifesto, and a member of the Tempest Collective.
AH

Alex Holmstrom-Smith

Alex Holmstrom-Smith, labor lawyer
RL

Rose Lenehan

Rose Lenehan, PhD Philosophy, tenant organizer
Sponsors
avatar for Daniel Singer Foundation
avatar for New Politics
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Adler ABC
  Gender-Sexuality-Liberation

2:30pm CDT

From Prairie to Poppy: How Struggles for Land, War, and Farming Are Connected from Chicago to Palestine
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park B
You're walking through the produce section and spot your favorite fruit! But how did it get to this grocery store? Whose labor, land, and future is tied up in the farming, packaging, and shipping of that fruit? In this workshop, participants will learn about how the struggles for food sovereignty are intertwined with struggles against imperialism and militarism. Join Chicago Dissenters and Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) for an interactive session where participants will discuss, research, and leave with tools for how to divest from capitalist food systems.
Speakers
HA
AF
RS
Sponsors
avatar for Dissenters
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park B
  Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism

2:30pm CDT

Inside Organizing 101
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Superior
Are you interested in organizing your workplace? Join Jaz Brisack, co-founder of Starbucks Workers United, for an inside look at the skills, tactics, and practices that make inside organizing most effective, and gain hands-on practice in mapping a workplace and untangling workplace dynamics.
Speakers
JB

Jaz Brisack

Jaz Brisack is a union organizer and the co-director of the Inside Organizer School, which trains workers to unionize their workplaces. They have worked on campaigns at companies ranging from Nissan to Starbucks to Tesla to Ben & Jerry's. They are the author of Get on the Job and... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Superior
  Labor Movement

2:30pm CDT

Mother Jones and the Early Socialist Movement: Lessons for Today
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park D
Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, one of the Socialist Party's most successful organizers, a founder of the Industrial Workers of the World and the most successful labor organizer of the early 20th century constantly turned to her socialist beliefs in constructing innovative organizing strategies and tactics. What lessons does she leave us for struggle today?
Speakers
RF

Rosemary Feurer

Rosemary Feurer is Distinguished Professor of History at Northern Illinois University specializing in labor and social movements. A key organizer in the effort to successfully organize the faculty at her university, Feurer was a founding member of DSA and is the Director of the Mother... Read More →
JR

Joseph Rathke

Joe Rathke is a PhD student in labor history at the University of Chicago. He was a lead organizer in the successful effort to organize the 3000 member Graduate Students United-UE Local 1103, on the bargaining team for the groundbreaking first contract and is serving his second term... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for Mother Jones Heritage Project
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Jackson Park D
  Radical History

2:30pm CDT

We Keep Us Safe: De-Escalation Training
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Clark ABC
With growing political turbulence making the future unpredictable, now more than ever it is crucial that we take responsibility for developing the skills and knowledge to protect our communities. This workshop is an active training in de-escalation skills for social movement activists, and all are encouraged to attend.
Speakers
BB

brian bean

brian bean is a Chicago-based socialist organizer, writer, and agitator originally from North Carolina. They are one of the founding editors of Rampant magazine. Their work has been published in Truthout, Jacobin, Tempest, Spectre, Red Flag, New Politics, Socialist Worker, International... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for Haymarket Books
Friday September 4, 2026 2:30pm - 4:00pm CDT
Clark ABC
  Skill Sharing

4:30pm CDT

Life After Death Row
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Clark ABC
In the late 1990s, death row prisoners and their supporters hosted a series of live unscripted conversations between death row prisoners and audience members in forums around the country, reshaping the national debate on capital punishment and helping to force the overturning of capital punishment in IL, MD, and CA. Join two former death row prisoners who spearheaded the historic campaign and their “outside” allies for a conversation on their remarkable story and how their struggle for justice continues after death row.
Speakers
MA

Mumia Abu-Jamal

Mumia Abu-Jamal is an African-American journalist, advocate for racial and economic justice, and former Black Panther. He is currently serving life without parole in Pennsylvania.
KC
SH
MS
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Clark ABC
  Abolition

4:30pm CDT

Confronting Zionism: Decolonizing Palestine and Building the World Anew
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Grant Park AB
For over one hundred years, Palestinians have struggled for liberation in their homeland. This session will take direct analytical aim at the ideology and institutional structures animating Israel’s brutal rule over Palestinian lives, and argue that Zionism is colonial and racist in essence and practice and that decolonization in Palestine predicated on redistribution, reparations and refugee return remains the only just way forward.
Speakers
NE

Noura Erakat

Noura Erakat is Professor of Africana Studies and Criminal Justice at Rutgers University, New Brunswick. She is the author of Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine (Stanford University Press, 2019), which received the Palestine Book Award and the Bronze Medal for... Read More →
BA
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Grant Park AB
  Anti-colonial Politics

4:30pm CDT

Introduction to Theatre of the Oppressed
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park C
Play Time! Brazilian Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed provoked director Augusto Boal to develop the Theatre of the Oppressed. He wanted a theatre that the working class could use as community building and as a weapon for revolution. This workshop invites all to participate in TO’s very fun game structures that create instant working relationships. No experience in performance or theatre is required.
Speakers
DP
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park C
  Culture and Art

4:30pm CDT

Why Does Capitalism Suck and Why Does it Fail? An Introduction to Marxist Economics
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
Why does capitalism produce lousy jobs, long hours, unemployment, racism, sexism, homo/transphobia, xenophobia and periodic economic crises that make things even worse? Marx's analysis of capitalism provides some key answers.
Speakers
CP

Charlie Post

Charlie Post is a long-time revolutionary socialist and writer, and a member of the Tempest Collective.
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Burnham ABC
  Economics

4:30pm CDT

Femme-inism Against Cisness: Bread, Roses, and Hormones, Too
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Field ABC
Why must our struggles against capitalism combat “cisness” (the naturalization of assigned sex), and how can the political distinction between femininity and the “femme” assist us in this task? Join Sophie Lewis for a conversation about “femmunism,” life-making labor, whorish artifice, gender-maximalism, transfeminist abolitionism, and the class war from above waged upon us by contemporary misogynist and femmephobic enemy feminisms.
Speakers
AB

A.J. Bohrer

A.J. Bohrer is a theorist, activist, and translator based in Chicago. Their first book, Marxism and Intersectionality: Race, Gender, Class, and Sexuality under Contemporary Capitalism (Transcript Verlag, 2019) was short-listed for the Deutscher Prize and has been translated into Spanish... Read More →
SL

Sophie Lewis

Sophie Lewis is a writer, utopian, feminist, and ex-academic scholar based in Philadelphia, hailing originally from the UK, France, and Germany. She is the author of Femmephilia, Enemy Feminisms, Abolish the Family, and Full Surrogacy Now. Lewis’s essays and articles appear routinely... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Field ABC
  Gender-Sexuality-Liberation

4:30pm CDT

How Veterans & Labor Are Fighting VA Union Busting And Privatization
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Erie
The murder of VA nurse member Alex Pretti drew national attention to federal worker resistance to Trump. On this panel, a VA care-giver, VA patient, and healthcare activist will report on labor/community campaigning to keep our best working model of socialized medicine from being privatized and dismantled.
Speakers
SH

Stuart Hall

Stuart Hall is a native of central Florida, a 22-year resident of Chicago, and a veteran of the United States Navy.As a Navy veteran, Stuart was a systems operator aboard the s3a Viking, a carrier-based anti-submarine warfare aircraft. His most significant area of operation was Beirut... Read More →
DB

Dan Blough

Daniel Blough leads recruiting relationships as a member of Loyola University Chicago's Career Services. He works with non-profit and mission driven organizations, education, arts and culture, media, government, and law. Dan is a Loyola alum, earning his BA and MA in Philosophy here... Read More →
GN

Grace Neudek

Grace Neudek is a union organizer with SEIU Healthcare Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Kansas (HCIIMK), where she works alongside VA hospital workers to build power and advocate for quality public healthcare. A graduate of Earlham College, she holds a master's degree in Peace and Social... Read More →
LD

Lisa Dadabo

Lisa Dadabo is a Vice President at AFGE Local 789 at the Jesse Brown VA, (Chicago, Illinois) and a Licensed Clinical Social Worker/Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor who focuses on the treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.    She also maintains a small private therapy... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for Veterans Healthcare Policy Institute
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Erie
  Labor Movement

4:30pm CDT

Unveiling the Prophet: Anti-Labor Secret Societies and Their Activist Enemies
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park A
Every December, St. Louis elites crown one of their daughters the Queen of Love and Beauty in a ceremony that celebrates the breaking of strikes and the enforcement of racial hierarchies. The Veiled Prophet Society has shaped the course of American history, and is an important example of how shadowy elites organize themselves against working-class power. Join Devin Thomas O’Shea as he explores the history of the secret society that has controlled St. Louis for over a century, and the lessons learned by the local activists who have pushed back against its power.
Speakers
KK
DT

Devin Thomas O'Shea

Devin Thomas O’Shea is the author of The Veiled Prophet: Secret Societies, White Supremacy, and the Struggle for St. Louis. His writing has appeared in The Nation, Slate, The Iowa Review, Jacobin, Boulevard, and elsewhere.
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park A
  Labor Movement

4:30pm CDT

Transformative Rural Organizing
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Hyde Park A
Rural communities are often written off as politically unreachable, but organizers across the country are building power through relational networks, trusted institutions, and local leadership. This session explores practical strategies for rural organizing and introduces a toolkit designed to help organizers build trust, grow a base, and develop leaders in rural communities.
Speakers
BB

Bo Belotti

Bo Belotti is a community organizer from Virginia and first year Masters of Public Policy student at Georgetown University.  Bo has spent the last 10 years engaged in movement work, starting with their local school board while they were still in high school.  They attended Virginia... Read More →
VR

Vida Rangel

Vida is a community organizer and public servant with a long history of working to improve the lives of those in her communities and improving the systems we all live under. As an autistic queer nonbinary transgender Latina woman, her commitment to community and to working families... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Hyde Park A
  Left Strategy

4:30pm CDT

Workers Deserve More! A Program for a Future Beyond Capitalism
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Adler ABC
This summer, DSA released “Workers Deserve More,” our political program for a free, equal, and democratic society that prioritizes human flourishing and peace instead of exploitation, oppression, and war. We’ll discuss how we developed Workers Deserve More, its contents, the reactions so far, and its role in organizing for democratic socialism in our current moment, and for our future. program.dsausa.org
Speakers
avatar for Hasan Piker

Hasan Piker

Wielding sharp political insight and a characteristically irreverent sense of humor, Hasan Piker is redefining what political commentary looks like in the digital age. A journalist and wildly-popular content creator on the streaming platform Twitch, Piker has become an authoritative... Read More →
AS

Ashik Siddique

Ashik Siddique is national co-chair of Democratic Socialists of America, and has served on DSA's National Political Committee since 2021. He has organized with DSA’s campaign for Bernie in 2020, for campaigns against the climate crisis and for labor rights, with protests at the... Read More →
MB

Michaela Brangan

Michaela Brangan is an educator and researcher, chair of DSA’s National Political Education Committee, and a member of North New Jersey DSA. She cochairs DSA’s Workers Deserve More program committee.
FG

Frances Gill

Frances Gill is cochair of DSA’s Workers Deserve More program committee, and a member of DSA’s National Political Committee from Los Angeles. She is a health care worker and rank-and-file member of the Union of American Physicians and Dentists (UAPD).
MR

Megan Romer

Megan Romer is a mom, a writer, a PTA volunteer and an erstwhile Sunday School teacher from rural Central New York. She's been organizing with DSA since 2018, is a former co-chair of Southwest Louisiana DSA, and served three terms on steering of the DSA national Mutual Aid Working... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for DSA
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Adler ABC
  Left Strategy

4:30pm CDT

What We Saw in Chicago: From Midway Blitz to New Forms of Community Defense
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park B
When hundreds of Border Patrol agents came to Chicago to carry out warrantless arrests and racialized sweeps, Illinoisans mobilized to protect their neighbors and document abuses. But the response from Chicago and its suburban neighbors did not begin with the raids. It was built through decades of organizing, relationship building, and community infrastructure. As immigration enforcement continues to evolve, this panel explores what Chicago’s experience offers organizers confronting expanding state repression and building collective power in their own communities.
Speakers
JD

Juliet DeJesus Alejandre

Juliet De Jesus Alejandre is executive director of the Logan Square Neighborhood Association.
AG
T
RW
Sponsors
avatar for ICIRR
avatar for OCAD
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park B
  Migrant Justice

4:30pm CDT

People Over Mega-Events: Organizing for Housing, Workers, and Communities Beyond the World Cup
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Hyde Park B
Cities increasingly chase global events like the Olympics and World Cup while working-class communities face displacement, policing, and exploitation. This session explores how organizers in Atlanta built Play Fair ATL to fight back—and how socialists can organize coalitions that turn mega-events into battlegrounds for housing justice, labor rights, and community power.
Speakers
KB

Kelsea Bond

Kelsea Bond, Atlanta City Councilmember.
MN

Matthew Nursey

Matthew Nursey, Housing Justice League
MP

Mariah Parker

Mariah Parker is an emcee and labor organizer born and raised in the South. Their cultural work and organizing have been featured in The New York Times, Rolling Stone, Teen Vogue, SPIN, Al Jazeera, Scalawag and Hammer & Hope.

... Read More →
MC

Michael Collins

Michael Collins, Director, Play Fair ATL.
Sponsors
avatar for Play Fair ATL
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Hyde Park B
  Organizing

4:30pm CDT

Why Eugene Debs Matters
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Superior
Eugene V. Debs died 100 years ago, but the radical vision of this five-time Socialist presidential candidate, is more relevant than ever. This session is a conversation with Shawn Gude, the author of a new biography of Debs, who in 1920 received a million votes while running from prison.
Speakers
AD

Allison Duerk

Allison Duerk has served as the director of the Eugene V. Debs Museum since 2016. Originally from rural northeast Indiana, Allison studied political science and music at Indiana State University in Terre Haute. Allison's work at the museum connects the Debs legacy to ongoing movements... Read More →
SG

Shawn Gude

Shawn Gude is the author of American Socialist: The Life and Legacy of Eugene V. Debs (October 2026, Simon & Schuster).
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Superior
  Radical History

4:30pm CDT

Abolition Judaism: The Revolutionary Possiblities of Diaspora
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park D
Everyone is made in the image of the divine—even (maybe especial)y) when you don't believe in God, or aren't sure. To take this seriously, to explore ira imication for a revolutionary horizon - we are making Abolition Judaism, continuing the proud tradition finding spiritual sustenance for our solidarity in our religious practice. Come co-create it, and hear what we are learning about sifting through the ashes of the old.
Speakers
RA

Rabbi Andrue Kahn

Rabbi Andy Kahn (he/they) is a Brooklyn-based rabbi and the executive director of the American Council for Judaism (ACJ). The ACJ was founded in 1942 to uphold Reform Judaism as a tradition dedicated to universal ethics and justice at a time when many Jewish institutions began centering... Read More →
DR

Dania Rajendra

Dania Rajendra (she/her), an organizer and a writer, has worked at the intersection of racial and economic justice for twenty-five years. She is now the interim managing director of the In Our Name Fund and works with the American Council on Judaism. Dania was the founding director of Athena and has worked in unions, worker centers, academia, social enterprise, philanthropy, think tanks, and the arts. Her career-long commitment is to thinking and working across boundaries, disciplin... Read More →
BB

Benjamin Balthaser

Benjamin Balthaser's (he/him) critical and creative work explores the connections among radical U.S. social movements, racial and class formation, internationalism, and culture. He is the author of Citizens of the Whole World: Anti-Zionism and the Cultures of the American Jewish... Read More →
MB

Maurice BP-Weeks Balthazar

Maurice BP-Weeks (he/him) is a distinguished corporate campaigner, organizer, and advocate for economic and racial justice. Co-founder and former Co-Executive Director of The Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE), Maurice has collaborated with community organizations, labor... Read More →
Sponsors
avatar for JVP
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Jackson Park D
  Religion & Spirituality

4:30pm CDT

Political Education 1: What Are We Up Against?
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
Political education begins from reality: we need to first understand the world in order to change it. This workshop provides a basic grounding in principles of participatory education, the dynamic relationship between our ideas and material reality, and an understanding of Gramsci’s concept of hegemony before inviting participants to collectively map the interlocking repressive and carceral structures we confront every day.
Speakers
GM
CR
AS
Sponsors
avatar for B-REAL
avatar for Center for Political Education
avatar for W.E.B. Du Bois Movement School
Friday September 4, 2026 4:30pm - 6:00pm CDT
Dusable ABC
  Socialist and Marxist Theory

6:00pm CDT

New People Meet-Up, Find a Friend
Friday September 4, 2026 6:00pm - 7:30pm CDT
Grant Park AB
First time at Socialism? Or do you want to get to know others while you are here at the conference? Come to Grant Park AB on the first day of the conference to meet up with others like you and find some buddies for Socialism 2026!
Friday September 4, 2026 6:00pm - 7:30pm CDT
Grant Park AB
  Meet-up

6:00pm CDT

Welcome Happy Hour
Friday September 4, 2026 6:00pm - 7:30pm CDT
Bar/Patio
First time at Socialism? Stop by the Welcome Happy Hour to connect with new comrades and get excited for the weekend. Join us on the hotel patio (or at the bar, weather-depending), across the skyway from registration and downstairs.

Conference attendees will get a discount on beer and wine by showing their conference badge at the ARC Bar!
Friday September 4, 2026 6:00pm - 7:30pm CDT
Bar/Patio
  Meet-up

7:30pm CDT

Freedom is a Constant Struggle: Palestine, Internationalism, Abolition
Friday September 4, 2026 7:30pm - 9:00pm CDT
W190
The struggle against state terror extends from the occupied lands and bombed homes of Palestine to the prisons and detention camps of Trump’s America. Join Angela Y. Davis for a conversation on Palestine solidarity, Black feminism, and the abolitionist fight for the future.
Speakers
avatar for Angela Y. Davis

Angela Y. Davis

Angela Y. Davis is Professor Emerita of History of Consciousness and Feminist Studies at UC Santa Cruz. An activist, writer, and lecturer, her work focuses on prisons, police, abolition, and the related intersections of race, gender, and class. She is the author of many books, f... Read More →
avatar for Naomi Murakawa

Naomi Murakawa

Naomi Murakawa is an associate professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. She is the author of The First Civil Right: How Liberals Built Prison America and the editor of the Abolitionist Papers book series at Haymarket Books... Read More →
Friday September 4, 2026 7:30pm - 9:00pm CDT
W190
  Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism

9:30pm CDT

Radical Game Night!
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30pm - 11:00pm CDT
Michigan/Huron
Join comrades for board games after the opening plenary! Presented by the TESA Collective.
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30pm - 11:00pm CDT
Michigan/Huron
  Activity

9:30pm CDT

Radical Trivia Night!
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30pm - 11:00pm CDT
Lobby Concourse
Join comrades for an evening of radical trivia! Winning team will receive a prize!
Sponsors
avatar for Chicago For Abortion Rights
Friday September 4, 2026 9:30pm - 11:00pm CDT
Lobby Concourse
  Activity
 

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Friday, September 4
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Adler ABC
Bar/Patio
Bronzeville Winery
Burnham ABC
Clark ABC
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Erie
Field ABC
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Huron
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Lake Shore Drive Boardroom
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Michigan/Huron
Outside on the lawn (weather-permitting)
Reggies Chicago (2105 S State St)
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Superior
W190
W190A
W190B
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