Z Communications is a radical

Political radicalism

The term political radicalism denotes political principles focused on altering social structures through revolutionary means and changing value systems in fundamental ways...

 left-wing

Left-wing politics

In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...

 media group founded in 1986 by Michael Albert

Michael Albert

Michael Albert is an American activist, economist, speaker, and writer. He is co-editor of ZNet, and co-editor and co-founder of Z Magazine. He also co-founded South End Press and has written numerous books and articles...

 and Lydia Sargent

Lydia Sargent

Lydia Sargent is a longtime radical American feminist. She is a writer, author, playwright, and actor. She was a founder and original member of the South End Press Collective. She organizes the Z Communications Institute every year as well as teaching classes there...

. It advocates participatory

Participatory economics

Participatory economics, often abbreviated parecon, is an economic system proposed primarily by activist and political theorist Michael Albert and radical economist Robin Hahnel, among others. It uses participatory decision making as an economic mechanism to guide the production, consumption and...

 socialism

Socialism

Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

 as a replacement for capitalism

Capitalism

Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...

. Its publications include Z Magazine, ZNet, Z Media, and Z Video.

Z Communications is based outside Woods Hole, Massachusetts

Woods Hole, Massachusetts

Woods Hole is a census-designated place in the town of Falmouth in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. It lies at the extreme southwest corner of Cape Cod, near Martha's Vineyard and the Elizabeth Islands...

. Regular contributors to its publications include Uri Avnery

Uri Avnery

Uri Avnery is an Israeli writer and founder of the Gush Shalom peace movement.A member of the Irgun as a teenager, Avnery sat in the Knesset from 1965–74 and 1979–81...

, Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky

Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

, Alexander Cockburn

Alexander Cockburn

Alexander Claud Cockburn is an American political journalist. Cockburn was brought up in Ireland but has lived and worked in the United States since 1972. Together with Jeffrey St. Clair, he edits the political newsletter CounterPunch...

, Tim Wise

Tim Wise

Timothy Jacob Wise is an American anti-racist activist and writer. Since 1995 he has lectured at over 600 college campuses across the US...

, Amira Hass

Amira Hass

Amira Hass is a prominent left-wing Israeli journalist and author, mostly known for her columns in the daily newspaper Ha'aretz. She is particularly recognized for her reporting on Palestinian affairs in the West Bank and Gaza, where she has also lived for a number of years.-Life:The daughter of...

, Norman Solomon

Norman Solomon

Norman Solomon is an American journalist, media critic, antiwar activist, and current candidate for the United States House of Representatives. Solomon is a longtime associate of the media watch group Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting...

, Robert Fisk

Robert Fisk

Robert Fisk is an English writer and journalist from Maidstone, Kent. As Middle East correspondent of The Independent, he has primarily been based in Beirut for more than 30 years. He has published a number of books and has reported on the United States's war in Afghanistan and the same country's...

, John Pilger

John Pilger

John Richard Pilger is an Australian journalist and documentary maker, based in London. He has twice won Britain's Journalist of the Year Award, and his documentaries have received academy awards in Britain and the US....

, Edward S. Herman

Edward S. Herman

Edward S. Herman is an American economist and media analyst with a specialty in corporate and regulatory issues as well as political economy and the media. He is Professor Emeritus of Finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He also teaches at Annenberg School for...

, Anthony Arnove

Anthony Arnove

Anthony Arnove is a freelance literary editor, agent and activist based in Brooklyn. He is on the board of directors of Haymarket Books, and is active in the National Writers Union and the International Socialist Organization.- Early life :...

, Joshua Frank

Joshua Frank

Joshua Frank, born in Billings, Montana, is a journalist and progressive author living in the United States and covers current political and environmental topics...

, Eleanor Bader, Barbara Ehrenreich

Barbara Ehrenreich

-Early life:Ehrenreich was born Barbara Alexander to Isabelle Oxley and Ben Howes Alexander in Butte, Montana, which she describes as then being "a bustling, brawling, blue collar mining town."...

, Bashir Abu-Manneh

Bashir Abu-Manneh

Bashir Abu-Manneh is an Assistant Professor of literature at Barnard College. He describes himself as "a Palestinian from Israel." He holds a B.A., University of Haifa, Israel; M.A., University of Warwick, U.K.; D.Phil., University of Oxford, U.K....

, Howard Friel

Howard Friel

Howard Friel is a U.S. independent scholar and author who wrote The Lomborg Deception: Setting the Record Straight About Global Warming, , a critique of Bjørn Lomborg's books The Skeptical Environmentalist and Cool It: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming.He also co-authored...

, "Mickey Z

Mickey Z

Michael Zezima is a writer, editor, blogger and novelist living in New York City. He writes a bimonthly column, "Mickey Z. Says", for VegNews magazine and he has also appeared on the C-SPAN network's Book TV program...

", and, formerly, Howard Zinn

Howard Zinn

Howard Zinn was an American historian, academic, author, playwright, and social activist. Before and during his tenure as a political science professor at Boston University from 1964-88 he wrote more than 20 books, which included his best-selling and influential A People's History of the United...

.

Z Magazine

Z Magazine (formerly Zeta) was founded in 1987 by two of the co-founders of South End Press

South End Press

South End Press is a non-profit book publisher run on a model of participatory economics. It was founded in 1977 by Michael Albert, Lydia Sargent, John Schall, Pat Walker, Juliet Schor, Mary Lea, Joe Bowring, and Dave Millikan, among others, in Boston's South End...

, Michael Albert

Michael Albert

Michael Albert is an American activist, economist, speaker, and writer. He is co-editor of ZNet, and co-editor and co-founder of Z Magazine. He also co-founded South End Press and has written numerous books and articles...

 and Lydia Sargent

Lydia Sargent

Lydia Sargent is a longtime radical American feminist. She is a writer, author, playwright, and actor. She was a founder and original member of the South End Press Collective. She organizes the Z Communications Institute every year as well as teaching classes there...

. It is an independent monthly magazine focusing on political

Politics of the United States

The United States is a federal constitutional republic, in which the President of the United States , Congress, and judiciary share powers reserved to the national government, and the federal government shares sovereignty with the state governments.The executive branch is headed by the President...

, cultural

Culture of the United States

The Culture of the United States is a Western culture originally influenced by European cultures. It has been developing since long before the United States became a country with its own unique social and cultural characteristics such as dialect, music, arts, social habits, cuisine, and folklore...

, social

Social

The term social refers to a characteristic of living organisms...

, and economic

Economy of the United States

The economy of the United States is the world's largest national economy. Its nominal GDP was estimated to be nearly $14.5 trillion in 2010, approximately a quarter of nominal global GDP. The European Union has a larger collective economy, but is not a single nation...

 life in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. It is published in print and on-line. The print magazine is fifty pages (having been reduced in size during the summer of 2008), with articles of many lengths and focuses. The on-line magazine, updated monthly, reproduces the print as closely as possible and has two versions—one public (an archive), and the other for subscribers only. The latter appears simultaneously with the print version. The former appears a few months later.

Z Net

Founded in 1995, Z Net is a large website

Website

A website, also written as Web site, web site, or simply site, is a collection of related web pages containing images, videos or other digital assets. A website is hosted on at least one web server, accessible via a network such as the Internet or a private local area network through an Internet...

 updated many times daily to "convey information and provide community," generally focusing on politics

Politics

Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...

 from a left-wing perspective. It claims a readership of over a quarter of a million people a week, and features diverse "watch" context focus on hot-topic issues, sub-sites, translations, archives, links to other progressive

Progressivism

Progressivism is an umbrella term for a political ideology advocating or favoring social, political, and economic reform or changes. Progressivism is often viewed by some conservatives, constitutionalists, and libertarians to be in opposition to conservative or reactionary ideologies.The...

 sites, and a daily commentary program. The website was featured in the movie Shooter starring Mark Wahlberg

Mark Wahlberg

Mark Robert Michael Wahlberg is an American actor, film and television producer, and former rapper. He was known as Marky Mark in his earlier years, and became famous for his 1991 debut as a musician with the band Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch. He was named No. 1 on VH1's 40 Hottest Hotties of...

.

The site offers a comprehensive archive of Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky

Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, and activist. He is an Institute Professor and Professor in the Department of Linguistics & Philosophy at MIT, where he has worked for over 50 years. Chomsky has been described as the "father of modern linguistics" and...

's online materials for its users.

Z Media Institute

Founded in 1994, Z Media Institute provides classes and other sessions in how to start and produce alternative media

Alternative media

Alternative media are media which provide alternative information to the mainstream media in a given context, whether the mainstream media are commercial, publicly supported, or government-owned...

, how to understand mainstream

Mainstream media

Mainstream media are those media disseminated via the largest distribution channels, which therefore represent what the majority of media consumers are likely to encounter...

 and alternative media better, how to enhance organising skills and knowledge

Knowledge

Knowledge is a familiarity with someone or something unknown, which can include information, facts, descriptions, or skills acquired through experience or education. It can refer to the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject...

, and how to better comprehend and develop radical

Left-wing politics

In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...

 theory

Theory

The English word theory was derived from a technical term in Ancient Greek philosophy. The word theoria, , meant "a looking at, viewing, beholding", and referring to contemplation or speculation, as opposed to action...

, strategy

Strategy

Strategy, a word of military origin, refers to a plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. In military usage strategy is distinct from tactics, which are concerned with the conduct of an engagement, while strategy is concerned with how different engagements are linked...

, and vision.

Z Video

Founded in 1998, Z Video produces video

Video

Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...

s about politics

Politics

Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...

, economics

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

, foreign policy

Foreign policy

A country's foreign policy, also called the foreign relations policy, consists of self-interest strategies chosen by the state to safeguard its national interests and to achieve its goals within international relations milieu. The approaches are strategically employed to interact with other countries...

, and the World Social Forum

World Social Forum

The World Social Forum is an annual meeting of civil society organizations, first held in Brazil, which offers a self-conscious effort to develop an alternative future through the championing of counter-hegemonic globalization...

.

Participatory Socialist International

In March 2010, a call was made for a membership organization and a Participatory Socialist International.

External links

• Z Communications, zcommunications.org
• Z Magazine, zcommunications.org
• Z Blogs, zcommunications.org
• Znetitaly (Zcom italian version)