Max Haiven’s central idea is that revenge is inherent to capitalism, particularly late capitalism, which he describes as a “vengeful tyrant”. While Marx and Engels recognise the legitimate vengeful violence of the working class against capitalism, they see no strategic advantage in the concept of revenge, he argues.
Jamaica was the main source of sugar in Britain’s food, drink and pantries for three centuries. Roughly 860,000 kidnapped Africans survived the middle passage between 1600 and 1807.
These slaves and their progeny laboured in fertile soils to sow, nurture, harvest and trim cane, then squeeze its sweet juices as muscovado into hogsheads bound for refineries in London, Bristol, Liverpool and Glasgow. Planters themselves had to wait for the stuff to cross the Atlantic twice to put it on their fine dining tables.
Marxist geographer David Harvey’s latest offering promises to be a ‘handbook for activists’ in the crisis-ridden landscape of 2020. Compiled from a series of podcasts, Harvey’s accessible use of Marxist concepts and language to investigate and categorise the intersecting crises of economic and environmental collapse is wide-ranging and promising.
As a theorist of neoliberalism he takes readers on a tour of the world and highlights the revolts of 2019, characterised as uprisings against neoliberalism and diminishing economic expectations.
The year 2020 marked the 50th anniversary of two important events in the struggle for women’s liberation: the first women’s liberation conference at Ruskin College, Oxford, and the disruption of the Miss World contest at Albert Hall.
Although the main focus of the book is the planning and disruption of the beauty contest, the ideas and demands of the women’s liberation movement (WLM) form the backdrop.
The Israeli Defense Force’s (IDF) bombing of Gaza in 2014 killed thousands of civilians. Some 95 percent of Israelis justified and supported the operation. Such atrocities by the state disturb world opinion, but are accepted, even glorified, by Israelis. This book goes a long way to explaining this mindset.
This is a must-read for anyone looking to develop a deeper understanding of European history. Most of us are aware that it has been whitewashed to some degree, but this book will definitely give you a whole new appreciation of history and how it relates to the modern day.
Whether you’re an expert historian or simply a curious leisure reader this book will bring you new priceless knowledge, while being an easy read.
Rentier Capitalism is an autopsy report for a decomposing corpse. Christophers clinically dissects a corrupted body, before arriving at a probable cause of death. Of course, capitalism is still with us, but for those wanting to understand the system more, the better and sooner to end it, this book is essential reading.
In the Autumn Statement, chancellor Rishi Sunak made it clear that working-class people will be expected to pay the financial as well as the health price for Covid-19. But, the real money is thriving.
“The only reason why the negro has not been killed off, as the Indians have been, is that he is so close under your arm, that you cannot get at him.” So said Frederick Douglass, fugitive slave and anti-slavery campaigner.
Unworthy Republic is a timely reminder — following the explosion of the Black Lives Matter movement — of the dispossession of Native Americans and how it relates to the enslavement of black Africans.
A Promised Land, the first volume of former US president Barack Obama’s memoirs, reveals a politician determined to preserve the US’s global power. Brian Richardson praises Obama’s eloquence, but damns his record in office; one which saw the birth of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Mario Cuomo, the long-term governor of New York, famously suggested that politicians “campaign in poetry but govern in prose”. That could hardly be said of the outgoing US president who both campaigned and governed with a combination of racist populist rhetoric and bellicose Tweets. By comparison however, his predecessor is a renowned wordsmith.
All Against All: The Long Winter of 1933 and the Origins of the Second World War, Paul Jankowski Profile £20
I don’t want to give this work a bad review, because I suspect it just isn’t written for me. But All Against All is an unrelenting tsunami of facts which totally overwhelmed me. At no point could I pick out an underlying narrative or ideological point. According to the dust jacket, the book tells the story of the global political scene from November 1932 to April 1933 when a number of currents combined to tip the world into a grim spiral that led to the Second World War.
