Peter Gowan (1946 - 2009) was one of the most prominent intellectuals of the so-called New Left of the sixties. Professor of International Relations at the London Metropolitan University, he was also an important member of the writing of the New Left Review, as well as of the American Discussion Group of the Royal Institute of International affairs, and was a leader, along with Tariq Ali, of the Section Brtánica of the Fourth International. His academic contributions to Marxism on imperialism and globalization, international relations or the nature and crisis of the so-called Eastern Bloc are undoubtedly the most important of the 68 generation. More recently, his research focused on the analysis of Transatlantic relations and global capitalism. Along these lines, in 1999 he published The commitment to globalization, and recently, a few months before his death, he published an analysis of the situation of the global financial crisis in his article "Crisis at the heart of the system" [New Left Review, 55].