Defying the current pessimistic narrative, this book challenges the prevailing assumptions that the political Left is spent, hopeful ideological discourse has collapsed and social media has corroded public debates about politics.

Instead, the book argues that ideological activism remains vibrant on the Left, but there is currently no clear way of recognising and analysing this phenomenon. The book fills this gap by first defining what political social media is and then by taking a morphological approach to investigating political ideologies and revealing the ways in which interconnected concepts are arranged. It concludes by coining the term ‘proto-ideologies’ to approach the construction of concepts that generate ideologies in the making.

"A masterful analysis of left-wing discourse in the age of social media. This book provides an ultimately uplifting account of political social media, contrary to the widespread accusations that it is damaging public debate." Remi Adekoya, University of York

Graham Harrison is Associate Professor of International Political Economy in the School of Government and International Affairs at Durham University.

Part I

1. Introduction

2. Chaos, Crisis, Decline, Contention

3. ‘A Largeness of Vision and Imagination’: Marxism and Socialism

4. Proto-Ideologies

Part II

5. Democratic Marxist Nationalism

6. Identitarian Socialism

7. Contention

8. Conclusion

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