The original moon race captured imaginations because it seemed to represent a dramatic leap into the future, even though it was fundamentally driven by Cold War rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union. By contrast, today’s moon missions present a far more muted and divided public response, with many people more concerned about economic hardship and crises on Earth than space exploration. Scientists and commentators themselves disagree about whether crewed lunar and Mars missions are worthwhile or merely expensive vanity projects.

Modern space exploration is shaped less by scientific curiosity than by capitalist competition and geopolitical rivalry, particularly between the US and China. Governments and corporations are motivated by strategic and economic interests, including access to lunar resources and potential military advantages, rather than purely humanitarian or scientific goals. NASA’s efforts to justify the enormous cost of Artemis are contrasted with urgent global social problems such as poverty and hunger. This episode concludes on a pessimistic note, warning that the militarisation and commercial exploitation of space could extend the destructive logic of capitalism beyond Earth itself.

Taken from the May 2026 edition of The Socialist Standard.

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Featuring music: ‘Pushing P (Instrumental)’ by Tiga Maine x Deejay Boe. Source: Free Music Archive, licensed under Creative Commons CC BY 4.0