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mothmans_mum
I read this book in conjunction with Donny Gluckstein’s The Western Soviets, and it was a brilliant companion. In addition, it filled in gaps in my knowledge, going into detail about Marx’s party building efforts, what the deal is with the Fourth International, and why Gramsci is so great.
An indispensable read for anyone wanting to fight for socialism.
An indispensable read for anyone wanting to fight for socialism.
This book opened my eyes to new possibilities of what science fiction could be
A brilliant debunking of the ideas of innate, unchangeable intelligence, IQ, and the Bell Curve.
Gould narrates a fascinating, horrifying history of the search for a scientific proof of innate, unchangeable, heritable intelligence, featuring many elitist, racist and sexist characters. He makes complex scientific and mathematical ideas simple, understandable, and enjoyable to read.
Well worth a read.
Gould narrates a fascinating, horrifying history of the search for a scientific proof of innate, unchangeable, heritable intelligence, featuring many elitist, racist and sexist characters. He makes complex scientific and mathematical ideas simple, understandable, and enjoyable to read.
Well worth a read.
One of the best books I’ve ever read. The narrator, Mr Stevens, a butler, is incredibly well developed and feels like a real person. He is an unreliable narrator, and the way the truth of the story is painted by the gaps and obvious untruths in what he says is magical. Themes of human dignity, democracy, class, fascism, ideology and much more are discussed, all through the voice and opinions of Mr Stevens. I can’t recommend his book enough.
This is a very useful book, providing a revolutionary Marxist perspective on the struggle against climate change.
What I found particularly interesting and informative was the detailed histories of such things as the use of coil, oil and plastic; detailed discussions of the science of climate change and biodiversity loss; and interventions into debates such as over the term 'Anthropocene'.
There are unfortunately a few downsides to the book. Due to the fact it is mostly a collection of previously published essays, we are treated to the same quotations from Marx and Engels, and the same anecdote about Marx being interested in the science of soil degradation, multiple times. Each chapter starts out at a very introductory level, rather than building on one another; two of the shorter chapters are almost unnecessary, mostly repeating arguments made in more detail in other chapters.
Possibly the biggest problem is that the essays within the book were originally written to inform already convinced Marxists about environmental science and history, not to intervene into climate debates to convince committed environmentalists of the need to be revolutionary socialists. While the environmental science in the book is detailed and well presented, the political arguments are cursory at best. Nowhere in the book is there a comprehensive and convincing discussion of: why capitalism can never be a rational or democratic system; why socialism would be a rational and democratic system; what exactly a revolution is and why it is necessary; the capitalist state and why it will take mass, revolutionary organising to overcome it; why reformism must be overcome and how; why it is necessary to be a committed, organised, revolutionary socialist. One chapter even bizarrely claimed Marx didn't have an answer to capitalist ecological crisis. (Hint: the answer was and is revolution.) Perhaps one of the many invocations of the story of Marx and soil could have been replaced with a discussion of the violence meted out to Standing Rock protestors, including attack dogs and limbs blown off with flash grenades, or the murders of environmental activists such as Berta Caceras, and an intervention could have been made into the question of how Extinction Rebellion should approach the police. For a book seemingly aimed at convincing climate activists to be revolutionary socialists, these drawbacks seem unfortunate and strange.
Nevertheless, this book is still excellent and I recommend it to anyone interested in not dying from climate change.
What I found particularly interesting and informative was the detailed histories of such things as the use of coil, oil and plastic; detailed discussions of the science of climate change and biodiversity loss; and interventions into debates such as over the term 'Anthropocene'.
There are unfortunately a few downsides to the book. Due to the fact it is mostly a collection of previously published essays, we are treated to the same quotations from Marx and Engels, and the same anecdote about Marx being interested in the science of soil degradation, multiple times. Each chapter starts out at a very introductory level, rather than building on one another; two of the shorter chapters are almost unnecessary, mostly repeating arguments made in more detail in other chapters.
Possibly the biggest problem is that the essays within the book were originally written to inform already convinced Marxists about environmental science and history, not to intervene into climate debates to convince committed environmentalists of the need to be revolutionary socialists. While the environmental science in the book is detailed and well presented, the political arguments are cursory at best. Nowhere in the book is there a comprehensive and convincing discussion of: why capitalism can never be a rational or democratic system; why socialism would be a rational and democratic system; what exactly a revolution is and why it is necessary; the capitalist state and why it will take mass, revolutionary organising to overcome it; why reformism must be overcome and how; why it is necessary to be a committed, organised, revolutionary socialist. One chapter even bizarrely claimed Marx didn't have an answer to capitalist ecological crisis. (Hint: the answer was and is revolution.) Perhaps one of the many invocations of the story of Marx and soil could have been replaced with a discussion of the violence meted out to Standing Rock protestors, including attack dogs and limbs blown off with flash grenades, or the murders of environmental activists such as Berta Caceras, and an intervention could have been made into the question of how Extinction Rebellion should approach the police. For a book seemingly aimed at convincing climate activists to be revolutionary socialists, these drawbacks seem unfortunate and strange.
Nevertheless, this book is still excellent and I recommend it to anyone interested in not dying from climate change.
A brilliant (and darkly hilarious) rumination on the violence of the police and the capitalist state, and the necessity of its overthrow.
A truly excellent collection of articles illuminating past struggles, analysing contemporary politics, and intervening into important debates on the left.
First is Tom Bramble's analysis of the recent federal election. He makes the case that, far from a rightward shifting working class recoiling from a too-bold Labor party, the election was only narrowly won by the Coalition, helped by a right-wing labor party that has proved over many years that it has no interest in positive reforms to better the lives of the working class, and if it had won would have ruled in the interests of the rich and powerful.
Next is Liz Walsh's overview of the two elections that the Victorian Socialists have so far contested. It is a wonderful insight into the realities of how a revolutionary socialist group can intervene into electoral politics.
Third is Liam Ward's article revisiting the roots of anti-Chinese racism in Australia. This is an important contribution at the present moment as imperialist tensions between the US and Australia on one side and China on the other continue to grow. Ward makes a clear case that anti-Chinese racism has never come naturally to the working class of Australia, instead being stoked by the ruling class, their servants in parliament (including Peter Dutton's ancestor), the police, and the upper echelons of the union bureaucracy for their own purposes. Indeed, white workers have joined in anti-racist struggles in solidarity with Chinese-Australians, and Chinese-Australians have fought alongside white Australians, including in iconic struggles such as the Eureka stockade. This history must be remembered as anti-Chinese racism is stoked again today.
Mick Armstrong presents a history of the Workers' Party (PT) and the left in Brazil, revealing how a complex array of factors (including a social-democratic orientation by the PT, an confused theorisation of the PT by Trotskyists within it, and economism by activists within the PT's related union) led to the defeat of the PT and the election of Jair Bolsonaro, a fascist, to the head of state in Brazil. This article contains important lessons for how revolutionary socialists should organise, and how they should relate to other forces on the left.
Next, a talk by the late, great Colin Barker on the Marxist theorisation of the state has been transcribed and presented here. In it, Barker presents his interpretation of what a 'book on the state' by Marx might have looked like if Marx had been able to get around to writing one. Barker's idea of starting a theorisation of the state from the same place that Marx started Capital, the commodity, was revelatory and incredibly thought provoking.
The sixth article is a short biography of the late Aboriginal activist, William Ferguson, by Gavin Stanbrook and Diane Fields. Ferguson cuts an inspiring figure, with a life full of radical activism, closely aligned and often working alongside the Communist Party in his anti-racist activism (despite being a member of the ALP for much of his life).
Next, Sagar Sanyal presents a Marxist critique of postcolonial theory. Sanyal presents the case that Marxism, rather than postcolonial theory, is better at allowing an understanding of the economics, politics and culture of postcolonial societies. He counters several myths, including the perennial idea that Marx believed that capitalism was a positive development in colonial societies such as India, and reveals the deeply conservative side of postcolonial theory that propagates the idea that people in the West are inherently racist towards the East, and have been since antiquity. Lastly, he makes a positive argument about the ways in which Marxism is able to analyse and understand the political econmy and culture of post-colonial societies.
The last three articles are book reviews.
Daniel Taylor selflessly put himself through the arduous task of reading Bhaskar Sunkara's truly awful Socialist Manifesto, making the argument that what is needed is organised, revolutionary socialism, not the reformist drivel being vomited out by Sunkara and his associates in Jacobin.
Darren Rosso reviews a new biography of Marx, Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society by Michael Heinrich. Reading this review has, for the first time, made me want to get to grips with Hegel, the better to understand Marx's arguments in the context they were first made, to in turn better recontextualise them today. (Lest I ever come across like one of the internet ultraleftists who, without any context, quote Marx on the necessity of arming the proletariat in order to argue that anyone who doesn't own an AK-47 can't call themselves a Marxist).
Lastly, Steph price reviews how Labor Built Neoliberalism by Elizabeth Humphries. There are many on the left today who still argue that the Accord was a positive development for the Australian working class. This book thoroughly demolishes that argument.
First is Tom Bramble's analysis of the recent federal election. He makes the case that, far from a rightward shifting working class recoiling from a too-bold Labor party, the election was only narrowly won by the Coalition, helped by a right-wing labor party that has proved over many years that it has no interest in positive reforms to better the lives of the working class, and if it had won would have ruled in the interests of the rich and powerful.
Next is Liz Walsh's overview of the two elections that the Victorian Socialists have so far contested. It is a wonderful insight into the realities of how a revolutionary socialist group can intervene into electoral politics.
Third is Liam Ward's article revisiting the roots of anti-Chinese racism in Australia. This is an important contribution at the present moment as imperialist tensions between the US and Australia on one side and China on the other continue to grow. Ward makes a clear case that anti-Chinese racism has never come naturally to the working class of Australia, instead being stoked by the ruling class, their servants in parliament (including Peter Dutton's ancestor), the police, and the upper echelons of the union bureaucracy for their own purposes. Indeed, white workers have joined in anti-racist struggles in solidarity with Chinese-Australians, and Chinese-Australians have fought alongside white Australians, including in iconic struggles such as the Eureka stockade. This history must be remembered as anti-Chinese racism is stoked again today.
Mick Armstrong presents a history of the Workers' Party (PT) and the left in Brazil, revealing how a complex array of factors (including a social-democratic orientation by the PT, an confused theorisation of the PT by Trotskyists within it, and economism by activists within the PT's related union) led to the defeat of the PT and the election of Jair Bolsonaro, a fascist, to the head of state in Brazil. This article contains important lessons for how revolutionary socialists should organise, and how they should relate to other forces on the left.
Next, a talk by the late, great Colin Barker on the Marxist theorisation of the state has been transcribed and presented here. In it, Barker presents his interpretation of what a 'book on the state' by Marx might have looked like if Marx had been able to get around to writing one. Barker's idea of starting a theorisation of the state from the same place that Marx started Capital, the commodity, was revelatory and incredibly thought provoking.
The sixth article is a short biography of the late Aboriginal activist, William Ferguson, by Gavin Stanbrook and Diane Fields. Ferguson cuts an inspiring figure, with a life full of radical activism, closely aligned and often working alongside the Communist Party in his anti-racist activism (despite being a member of the ALP for much of his life).
Next, Sagar Sanyal presents a Marxist critique of postcolonial theory. Sanyal presents the case that Marxism, rather than postcolonial theory, is better at allowing an understanding of the economics, politics and culture of postcolonial societies. He counters several myths, including the perennial idea that Marx believed that capitalism was a positive development in colonial societies such as India, and reveals the deeply conservative side of postcolonial theory that propagates the idea that people in the West are inherently racist towards the East, and have been since antiquity. Lastly, he makes a positive argument about the ways in which Marxism is able to analyse and understand the political econmy and culture of post-colonial societies.
The last three articles are book reviews.
Daniel Taylor selflessly put himself through the arduous task of reading Bhaskar Sunkara's truly awful Socialist Manifesto, making the argument that what is needed is organised, revolutionary socialism, not the reformist drivel being vomited out by Sunkara and his associates in Jacobin.
Darren Rosso reviews a new biography of Marx, Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society by Michael Heinrich. Reading this review has, for the first time, made me want to get to grips with Hegel, the better to understand Marx's arguments in the context they were first made, to in turn better recontextualise them today. (Lest I ever come across like one of the internet ultraleftists who, without any context, quote Marx on the necessity of arming the proletariat in order to argue that anyone who doesn't own an AK-47 can't call themselves a Marxist).
Lastly, Steph price reviews how Labor Built Neoliberalism by Elizabeth Humphries. There are many on the left today who still argue that the Accord was a positive development for the Australian working class. This book thoroughly demolishes that argument.
