Introduction: From Liberation to Identity
The Left was once another name for hope—hope for a world in which humanity would be freed from class domination, economic exploitation, and social inequality. From the 19th century to the mid-20th century, the Left was the driving force behind the world’s greatest social movements—from workers’ revolutions to anti-colonial and civil rights struggles. But today, that same historical force no longer possesses the power to mobilize. In many countries, leftist parties have either turned into bureaucratic and lifeless institutions or been pushed to the margins of politics. What remains of the Left is now more a collection of cultural and moral concerns than a political program aimed at changing the world.
Understanding this decline is only possible through a rereading of the Left’s historical trajectory: once a project for collective human emancipation, the Left has now been reduced to defending fragmented individual identities. This shift—from liberation to identity, from class politics to cultural politics, and from social justice to symbolic morality—is the very path that has taken us from Marx to Wokeism.
Marx and the Classical Left: The Politics of Collective Emancipation
In Marx’s thought, liberation was not a feeling but a historical project. The emancipated human being was one freed from the domination of economic structures and from alienation in labor. Leftist politics was founded on the belief that the working class, as the social majority, could—through collective consciousness, organization, and class struggle—transform relations of domination.
In that era, the Left spoke a language people understood: bread, work, housing, and equality. These simple yet universal concepts gave the Left a moral and popular power unmatched by any other force in the 19th and 20th centuries.
But from the late 20th century onward—especially after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the failure of state socialism—the Left fell into a crisis of meaning. The world achieved neither the collective emancipation it had been promised nor freedom from capitalist exploitation. The result was disillusionment and fragmentation. In this void, a kind of cultural and academic Left emerged, which shifted its focus from critiquing economics to critiquing language, gender, and identity.
What Is Wokeism? From Awareness to Ideology
The word “woke” originally had noble and emancipatory roots. In African American vernacular, to be woke meant “to be aware”—aware of racial injustice and the necessity of resisting it. In the 1960s, the term was linked to civil rights and social justice movements. But in recent decades, Wokeism has transformed from a form of social awareness into a cultural ideology—one that, instead of fighting to change power structures, focuses on language, symbols, and cultural representations.
In Wokeism, the measure of justice is no longer the distribution of wealth or economic equality but rather the degree of sensitivity toward individual identities: gender, race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, and even language. As a result, Wokeism has become known in the public sphere less for real political action and more for cancel culture, political correctness, and moral judgment of others.
More precisely, Wokeism is the product of the Left’s shift from political economy to cultural morality. The Left no longer seeks to change structures—it seeks to correct words and attitudes. This relocation of politics from the economic to the cultural arena has caused the Left to lose much of its traditional base among the working and lower classes—the very people who once constituted its historical backbone.
From Emancipatory Politics to the Morality of Exclusion
Today’s Left—especially in the West—speaks less of the people’s material suffering and more of cultural disputes on social media. A project that once sought the “liberation of humankind” is now preoccupied with “correcting people’s behavior.” In this context, Wokeism has replaced politics with a form of moral puritanism: exclusion instead of dialogue; the cancellation of symbols instead of the transformation of structures; and identity fragmentation instead of class unity.
This gradual metamorphosis has hollowed out the Left from within. If Marx saw the world as inhuman and sought to change it, the modern Left now sees the world as immoral and seeks to correct its discourse. What appears to be a small difference is, in reality, a vast historical and civilizational gulf—a path that may rightly be called the journey from Marx to Woke.
Problem Statement
Hence our central question: Why does the Left no longer possess the power to mobilize the masses?
Is it because of the failure of Marxist economics, or because cultural politics has taken over? Has the Left become a victim of its own moral success? And most importantly, can a new form of Left emerge from this crisis—one that can once again speak the language of the people?
Answering these questions requires returning to the historical and ideological trajectory of the Left from the 19th century to the present—a path that began with the ideal of emancipation and ended with the politics of identity. In the following sections, we will see how this discursive and class shift transformed the Left from a global force into an academic and, at times, exclusionary phenomenon.
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The Classical Left and the Ideal of Emancipation
Understanding the decline of today’s Left is impossible without recognizing the grandeur of its past. The Left was once the standard-bearer of the ideal of emancipation—not individual liberation from cultural constraints, but collective liberation from class domination. In the 19th century, the concept of “the Left” was intertwined with words such as worker, justice, equality, and revolution. The classical Left, unlike today’s cultural and academic variant, was born from suffering, not from theory.
1.1 Marx and the Emancipated Human
In Marx’s political philosophy, emancipation had a deeper meaning than liberal freedom. Freedom in liberalism means the individual’s freedom from state interference; but in Marx’s thought, emancipation meant freedom from the conditions that alienate human beings. He believed that under capitalism, humans become alienated from the product of their labor, from other people, and from their own human essence. The goal of emancipatory politics, therefore, was to return humanity to its true self—a human being who finds meaning and creativity in production and labor.
Within this framework, Marx did not view politics as the arena of party competition but as the field of class struggle—a historical conflict between the class that owns the means of production and the working class. Thus, the classical Left was founded on a collective understanding of the human subject. For Marx, the human being was not an isolated individual but a social creature who could become free only in relation to others.
1.2 Workers’ Movements and the Voice of Justice
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the Left succeeded in connecting the ideal of emancipation with tangible social movements. Labor unions, socialist parties, and the miners’, steel, and textile workers’ syndicates in Europe and America were living manifestations of this connection. Through organizing strikes and protests, they demanded not only higher wages but also the human dignity of labor.
During this period, the Left spoke a simple and inclusive language. Slogans such as “Bread, Work, Freedom” or “A world in which man is not a wolf to man” carried a moral and human meaning that resonated beyond classes and borders.
The Left succeeded in translating the ethics of justice into the language of ordinary people—an ethics that did not arise from the academy but from the factory and the street.
1.3 Emancipation as a Historical and Universal Project
The classical Left believed that emancipation must be universal. Marxism, in its original sense, was internationalist—not because of imperial ambition, but because it held that the fate of workers in one country was tied to that of workers everywhere. The famous slogan “Workers of the world, unite!” stemmed precisely from this moral universalism.
In this view, the pain of humanity was one and the same: exploitation. Skin color, religion, or gender were secondary in this equation. Emancipation meant rejecting all forms of domination and economic inequality—not focusing on differences and individual identities. It was precisely this universalism that made the Left a powerful and mobilizing global force.
1.4 The Left and the Ethics of Liberation
At the heart of Marx’s thought and that of the early socialists lay a deep humanist ethic—one grounded in equality, solidarity, and human dignity. This ethic, unlike liberal morality, emphasized collective responsibility. In the world of the classical Left, the freedom of the individual was impossible without the freedom of the collective.
For this reason, the Left in the 20th century inspired anti-colonial movements, anti-apartheid struggles, and global peace campaigns. In the minds of millions, the Left was the voice of the oppressed and the defender of the downtrodden.
1.5 The Left as a Social Faith
At its height in the 20th century, the Left was no longer merely a school of thought—it had become a social faith. The promise of justice carried a quasi-religious dimension: a world without oppression, poverty, or exploitation. This faith endured even after political defeats and the failures of socialist regimes; it remained embedded in the popular consciousness. The Left fought not only for bread but also for meaning.
Yet this dual nature—emancipatory idealism on one hand and faith in the laws of history on the other—eventually made the Left vulnerable. When history failed to unfold as it had predicted, faith in collective liberation collapsed as well.
1.6 The Seeds of Crisis within Victory
Although the Left achieved great victories in the mid-20th century—from labor rights to the expansion of social welfare and universal education—it was during this very era that the seeds of its future crisis were sown.
Gradually, the Left transformed from a movement into an institution, and from an ideal into bureaucracy. The Labour Party in Britain and the social democrats in Europe, the more they participated in governance, the further they drifted from their working-class base.
Social justice was reduced to welfare policy, and human emancipation became a matter of economic indicators.
In other words, when the classical Left entered the structures of power, it lost the language of ideals. From this point, the ground was prepared for the emergence of the cultural and post-Marxist Left—a Left no longer born in the factory or the street, but in the university and the media.
The classical Left, for all its contradictions, carried a universal and populist spirit. It became a real force in people’s lives because it arose from their suffering and spoke the language of justice. But when the Left distanced itself from labor and the streets and settled into official institutions, it lost its emancipatory soul.
As a result, when the world entered the post-industrial and global capitalist era, the Left no longer had the conceptual or linguistic tools to comprehend the new order.
In this very void, the new Left was born—a Left that set aside economic justice and placed identity politics at its core.
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The New Left, Wokeism, and Identity Politics — The Left Against Itself
The 1960s and 1970s marked a turning point in the history of the Left. The gradual collapse of colonialism, the Vietnam War, the rise of student and feminist movements, and the civil rights struggle in the United States drew the Left into a new arena. Yet this new arena—though dynamic and creative—fundamentally altered the Left’s historical trajectory.
The New Left, instead of analyzing the economy, began critiquing culture; instead of class, it spoke of identity; and instead of social revolution, it focused on individual liberation.
2.1 From the Street to the University
The student movements of 1968 in Europe and the United States were emblematic of the New Left. But unlike the 19th-century workers, this new Left arose from the middle classes—students and intellectuals. They opposed capitalism, imperialism, and war, yet their theoretical tools came not from political economy but from psychoanalysis, structuralism, and the philosophy of language.
Thus, the Left migrated into the cultural and academic domains. The result was that the Left’s discourse shifted from “bread and labor” to “identity and meaning.” Universities became the strongholds of leftist theorizing—but at the same time, the Left grew increasingly distant from social reality.
2.2 From Class to Identity
In the post-industrial world, the traditional working class—the Left’s historical foundation—no longer possessed its former cohesion. Heavy industries declined, factories closed, and workers were transformed into a fragmented service class. In this context, the Left, seeking to preserve the meaning of oppression and resistance, transferred these concepts to new domains: race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and language.
In this new view, liberation no longer meant transforming economic structures but recognizing differences. This shift initially carried moral and humanistic value—it sought to bring marginalized groups back into the center of society.
But gradually, identity replaced solidarity. The politics of the Left shifted from “we” to “I.”
2.3 Wokeism as the New Religion of the Left
In recent decades, out of this identity politics emerged the phenomenon we now call Wokeism. As noted earlier, the term “woke” originally meant being aware of racial injustice. But by the 2010s, it evolved into a set of cultural attitudes and behaviors aimed at eliminating all forms of discrimination—even linguistic or symbolic ones.
Wokeism, in appearance, continues the ideal of equality, but in practice it functions as a new moralism that turns politics into a theater of moral judgment. In this view, a person who uses the “wrong” word is guilty of a kind of political sin.
Cancel culture—the exclusion or erasure of those who fail to meet new moral standards—is a natural outcome of this logic.
In this sense, Wokeism plays for the Left the same role religion once played in premodern societies: a system of values, sins, and penance. But the crucial difference is that religion offered forgiveness, whereas Wokeism offers cancellation.
2.4 Woke Capitalism: The Contradictory Alliance
One of the most striking phenomena of our time is the coexistence of capitalism and Wokeism. Large technology corporations, global fashion brands, and liberal media networks all present themselves as defenders of “diversity” and “inclusion.” Rainbow flags are raised above multinational headquarters—yet those same companies exploit workers in poor countries for minimal wages.
This strange coexistence—an alliance between capitalism and Wokeism—is what critics call Woke Capitalism. In this system, cultural justice replaces economic justice, and symbolic concern substitutes for real struggle.
Wokeism is profitable for capitalism because it diverts political energy away from criticizing structures and toward endless cultural battles.
2.5 The Divide Between the Left and the People
The outcome of this shift is a profound divide between the Left and the lower classes.
Whereas the classical Left once spoke for workers, the New Left in many countries has become an urban, intellectual movement more concerned with the correct terminology for gender and ethnicity than with housing prices, inflation, or inequality.
Meanwhile, right-wing and populist forces have managed to appropriate the very social discontent that once fueled the Left. From Trumpism in the United States to the far right in Europe, all have adopted slogans that once belonged to the Left: defending workers, opposing elites, and supporting economic nationalism.
In other words, by focusing on identity politics, the New Left has left the field open for the return of the populist right.
2.6 The Moral Language in Place of the Political Language
The New Left and Wokeism, instead of asking structural questions about power and wealth, now ask moral questions: Who causes harm? Which word is right or wrong? Who should be canceled?
This shift has moved the Left from politics to psychology, and from economics to morality.
In the past, the Left sought to change the world; today, it seeks to correct it. But correction cannot replace change. Individual correction without structural transformation is merely a form of moral discharge—a feeling of righteousness without action.
2.7 The Left Against Itself
Thus, the New Left has, in a tragic sense, turned against itself.
The ideal of collective emancipation has given way to identity fragmentation; the politics of solidarity has become a competition of victims; and the ethics of equality has been reduced to endless moral judgment on social media.
In a world suffering from poverty, inequality, and environmental crisis, the modern Left, instead of organizing resistance, is busy editing newspaper language and removing historical statues.
Wokeism, precisely understood, is not a deviation from the Left but the final stage of the cultural Left—a Left that has lost the tools of liberation and retained only a sense of guilt.
The New Left, despite its good intentions, shifted politics from the collective to the individual.
Identity politics, instead of building bridges between people, created new boundaries. The result was the fragmentation of the world of justice and the Left’s inability to mobilize the public.
Today’s Left speaks of justice more than ever before—yet it possesses less power than ever to bring about change.
Here is the full, detailed English translation of your text — rendered faithfully and precisely, with no omissions or summarizing:
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The Crisis of Meaning and the Inability to Mobilize the Masses
Once, the Left was the language of passion and change. From the French Revolution to the labor movements of the nineteenth century, from anti-colonial struggles to the socialist revolutions of the twentieth century, the word “Left” was always synonymous with the future.
But today, that word is less inspiring than it is confusing. The Left has become detached from the people, emptied of its foundational concepts, and in the public sphere has turned into a purely critical voice without any horizon. The central question is:
Why is the Left no longer able to mobilize the masses?
3-1. The Crisis of Meaning: From Justice to Morality
At the heart of the contemporary Left’s crisis lies a crisis of meaning.
In the twentieth century, social justice was a tangible concept: the fair distribution of wealth, collective ownership of the means of production, free education and healthcare.
But in the age of wokeism and cultural politics, justice has become something subjective and moral. Today, justice means “respecting differences” or “avoiding harmful speech.”
This seemingly moral shift has, in practice, detached the Left from economic reality. The Left no longer addresses systems of production, ownership, and distribution; instead, it debates language, symbols, and feelings. More precisely, the Left has retreated from social justice to individual morality.
But politics without collective meanings degenerates into mere slogans. When justice is reduced to words, it loses its mobilizing power. People do not take to the streets for refined language; they come out for bread and dignity.
3-2. Liberal Individualism in Leftist Disguise
One of the fundamental contradictions of the contemporary Left is its unconscious absorption into the logic of liberal individualism.
Whereas the historical Left once fought against capitalist individualism, today it reproduces the same logic under the banner of defending individual identities.
In identity politics, each person is the bearer of a unique pain, and the ultimate authority of truth lies in their personal experience.
But this outlook, instead of building community, turns society into a collection of separate islands.
As a result, the Left no longer possesses a unified language for dialogue. Each small group views itself as the central victim of oppression and speaks from its own perspective of suffering. The Left, which once sought to unite the world, is now trapped in a multiplicity of disconnected voices.
And this is precisely what the capitalist system desires: individuals separated from one another, devoid of class bonds or collective solidarity. The Left, unintentionally, has contributed to the atomization of society by promoting excessive cultural individualism.
3-3. From Ideal to Brand
In today’s media-saturated and consumerist world, even ideologies become commodities.
The Left is no exception. Political and cultural brands that present themselves as “progressive” sell goods adorned with leftist symbols and the language of justice.
A T-shirt with Che Guevara’s image, a beverage with a feminist slogan, or films carrying anti-racist messages — all demonstrate how the Left has been degraded from ideal to cultural brand.
In such circumstances, political passion has been replaced by ethical consumption. Instead of fighting, individuals engage in “responsible shopping” and feel liberated.
This is precisely the condition Žižek calls “the costless Left” — a Left that fears transforming structures but delights in the signs of transformation.
3-4. The Loss of a Grand Narrative
The mobilizing power of the twentieth-century Left stemmed from its grand narrative — a story of history, oppression, and a just future.
Marxism and socialism, despite all their flaws, offered a global vision — a world in which the human being could see himself as part of a process of liberation.
But today’s Left is devoid of that narrative. Postmodernism, which once served as a tool to critique domination, has discredited all grand narratives.
The result is that the Left no longer knows what future it is fighting for.
If there is no truth, no value, no universal horizon — then how can justice have meaning?
In the absence of a grand narrative, the Left has become purely reactive: against discrimination, against racism, against capitalism — but without any clear vision of what is to be built in their place.
3-5. Academic Left vs. Popular Left
Another defining divide is the separation between the academic Left and the popular Left.
While universities are filled with theories of power, language, and gender, workers and the lower classes struggle with issues of livelihood.
The academic Left often speaks a language incomprehensible to ordinary people — words like “discourse,” “constructivism,” “heteronormativity,” and “postcolonialism” mean nothing to them.
As a result, the people no longer see themselves reflected in the Left’s language.
The same Left that once captured millions of hearts with the simplest words — work, bread, dignity — is now lost in specialized academic jargon.
In the absence of a shared language, the emotional and political bond between the Left and the people has disintegrated.
3-6. Politics Without Risk
One reason for the Left’s inability to mobilize the masses is its lack of political risk.
Unlike its predecessors, today’s Left operates within the safe confines of universities, social media, and cultural institutions. Struggle has been reduced from the street to posts and hashtags.
But politics without risk generates no passion.
In the twentieth century, the Left symbolized danger — danger to the existing order, to empires, to capitalists.
Today, the Left symbolizes sensitivity — monitoring words, removing improper symbols, and policing others’ behavior.
The Left has turned, not into a force of liberation, but into a moral police — and no police ever inspires a movement.
3-7. From Collective Mobilization to Collective Performance
In the age of social media, the Left believes that “tweets,” “posts,” and “likes” can change public opinion.
But these activities often become performances of empathy rather than real action.
Users join short-term campaigns, but after a few days, a new topic emerges.
This emotional volatility prevents the formation of sustained organization.
Without real institutions — such as unions or councils — the Left exists only as a digital presence.
Yet digital politics, though loud, remains detached from the silent masses.
3-8. The Left Without the People
All these trends ultimately lead to one conclusion: a Left without the people.
Today, more than at any other point in history, the Left is alienated from the lower classes.
Not only are its language and concerns different, but even its lifestyle, values, and sensitivities contradict those of ordinary people.
While the academic Left emphasizes third genders and inclusive language, ordinary people grapple with inflation, rent, and unemployment.
It is precisely from this gap that right-wing populism draws its strength. The Right speaks in simple, concrete language, identifies tangible enemies (elites, immigrants, Brussels, Washington), and promises the restoration of national dignity.
The Left, by contrast, speaks in moral and abstract terms, without naming clear enemies or outlining a concrete horizon.
In our time, the Left has become the victim of its own successes.
The cultural and moral freedoms it achieved over the past half-century have ultimately led to its separation from its social base.
Wokeism, identity politics, cultural individualism, and the academic Left are all symptoms of this crisis.
Today’s Left cannot mobilize the public because it no longer possesses a shared meaning capable of gathering people around it.
Of justice, only a moral image remains;
of revolution, only a pose.
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The Future of the Left — Reconstructing Meaning and Returning to the Human
In the twenty-first century, the Left faces not so much an external struggle as an internal one: a battle between historical legacy and new morality, between politics and culture, between liberation and sensitivity.
If the Left wishes to be reborn, it must reinvent itself — not by rejecting its past, but by rereading its roots in the light of today’s world.
4-1. Return to the Human, Not to Identity
The first step is to return to the human being as a social being.
The Left once held power because it spoke of humanity as suffering, laboring, and yet hopeful — a humanity whose meaning and dignity were reflected in collective work and justice.
But today’s Left has reduced the human being to a checklist of identities: woman, Black, immigrant, queer, minority, and so on.
As a result, “the human” has ceased to be a political concept and has instead been fragmented into a set of biological and cultural attributes.
The reconstruction of the Left requires a return to a critical humanist perspective — one that places human suffering above the boundaries of identity.
The Left must once again learn to speak of the human, not of categories.
As long as justice is defined within the confines of identity, every group will pursue justice only for itself, not for all.
4-2. Reconstructing the Meaning of Justice
Justice is the backbone of leftist thought. Yet in today’s world, this concept has become worn and ambiguous.
The Left must once again distinguish between moral justice and structural justice.
Moral justice concerns the behavior and intentions of individuals; structural justice concerns the systems that reproduce poverty and inequality.
The new Left, by focusing excessively on morality, has reduced justice to the level of personal intentions.
But justice, as Marx, Rousseau, and even Christ have said, is realized not in intentions, but in structures.
Rebuilding the Left means returning to structure: to discussions of ownership, labor, wages, public services, education, and the environment.
The Left must once again show that justice is not a moral word but a material concept — a relationship between the human being and the world.
4-3. A Simple Language, Not a Cryptic One
One of the prerequisites for reviving the Left is the reconstruction of its language.
Today’s Left speaks in terms too theoretical, academic, and abstract — yet politics, above all, is the act of communication.
The Left must relearn how to speak with the people, not only with its fellow intellectuals.
Marx’s Communist Manifesto was not a philosophical essay but a revolutionary text, written in clear, passionate language. It was this simplicity and faith in humanity that made him a universal voice.
If the contemporary Left wishes to become popular again, it must move beyond theoretical, self-referential discourse and return to the language of experience, suffering, and hope.
Otherwise, it will echo endlessly within the ivory towers of academia — not cry out in the public squares.
4-4. Moving from the Morality of Cancellation to the Morality of Dialogue
Wokeism has trapped the Left in a moral snare — the trap of cancellation, erasure, and exclusion.
But authentic politics is built on dialogue and understanding, not on anger and condemnation.
The future Left must move from a culture of cancellation to a culture of dialogue.
It must learn that disagreement is not enmity; that truth belongs to no single group; and that liberation is possible only through free dialogue among human beings.
If the Left wishes to transform the world, it must move beyond moral outrage and return to an anthropological understanding of suffering.
The Left must learn to listen — to the worker, to the woman, to the immigrant, to the farmer, and even to its opponents.
The politics of listening is more radical than the politics of cancellation.
4-5. Rebuilding Organization and Institution
One of the greatest weaknesses of the contemporary Left is its lack of organization.
In the twentieth century, the party, the union, the syndicate, and the council were the tangible instruments of power.
Today, the Left exists mainly within virtual networks and cultural circles — dispersed, reactive, and lacking continuity.
If the Left is to regain its capacity for mass mobilization, it must build real and enduring institutions.
A social network can ignite a flame, but only an institution can keep it burning.
Organization is what separates momentary enthusiasm from historical movement.
Rebuilding institutions means returning to the ground — to neighborhoods, factories, schools, and local communities.
The Left must once again be among the people, not merely online.
4-6. A Global Left Against Global Capital
Today’s capitalism is global; capital knows no borders.
But the Left remains confined within the limits of nations and cultural identities.
The Left of the future must be able to cross national boundaries, just as capital has done.
In a world where environmental crisis, poverty, and migration bind millions of people together, only a global, human, and solidaristic Left can have meaning.
This new Left must, instead of relying on the ideologies of the twentieth century, emphasize the liberation of human beings in today’s interwoven, multicultural world.
A return to justice-based universalism — rather than cultural universalism — may be the only viable horizon for the Left’s revival.
4-7. Hope as Resistance
Ultimately, if the Left is to regain meaning, it must reconstruct hope.
In a world where right-wing populism feeds on anger and liberalism feeds on fear, the Left must be the bearer of hope — not naïve hope, but hope rooted in the possibility of transformation.
As Ernst Bloch said: Hope is not a dream, but an awareness of what is still possible.
If the Left wishes once again to become a historical force, it must renew its belief in possibility — in the belief that human beings can still change structures.
Final Summary
From Marx to woke, the Left’s trajectory has run from a politics of liberation to a politics of sensitivity.
Wokeism represents both the culmination and the crisis of this trajectory: a Left whose language is moral, whose tools are digital, and whose base is cultural.
Yet, as history has shown time and again, crisis can be the source of rebirth.
The Left of the future — if it wishes to rise from its current decline — must return to three principles:
- The Human, instead of Identity;
- Structure, instead of Intention;
- Dialogue, instead of Cancellation.
Only then can the Left rediscover its meaning — not as a historical relic, but as a living possibility for the twenty-first century.
If the Left wishes to return, it must relearn how to love the world before it seeks to change it.
