The Red Flag and Other Signs: Reconstructing Socialist Identity in Protest as Performance

Abstract

Obituaries of the Left have been written many times over at least since the 1970s, as faith in socialism as a viable ideology or economic system diminished in the West. The ascent of neoliberal globalisation has meanwhile resulted in a democratic deficit and crisis of representation at the level of lived experience. Political movements of the 1990s and early 2000s commonly eschewed hierarchy and homogeneity in their approach to organisation. As such, the vanguard became the multitude, and the march to power the practice of assembly, decentralisation, direct action, and democratic decision making in temporary autonomous zones. Yet recent years have seen significant reclamations of symbols and practices associated with socialism and communism, specifically. Focusing on the appearance of large red flags between 2015 and 2019 at street protests, political rallies, in community theatre projects, on social media sites, and a revolutionary battleground, the essay analyses what this tells us about contemporary politics.