Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Why It's Kicking Off Everywhere

 
This is a book that I just finished. Paul Mason's Why It's Kicking Off Everywhere: The new global revolutions. It was written in the supposedly heady days of 2011, when the "Arab Spring" and "Occupy Wall Street" and the anti-Austerity riots were raging across Europe. Apparently it's based on observations that became his blog. (Or something.)

I find it an excellent, but frustrating book. Excellent because it provides a great summary of the structural causes of the present economic crisis. Frustrating because there's all this self-evidently crapola nonsense about how ordinary people forming these groovy, out-of-sight networks in order to pull together and demand massive, but undefined, changes, are shaking the elites to their core. (Now, of course, it's 2013 and Qaddafi's fall has brought disaster, Mubarak's military deposed the democratically elected Muslim Brotherhood, Syria's dictator has fought the USA's Al Qaeda cat's paws to a standstill, Obama has crushed "Occupy" and continues to bamboozle US-American progressives, and Canadians are swooning over pretty-boy Justin Trudeau.)

I, of course, know what the answer to the failures of democratic capitalism is, but nobody listens to me.

It's a good book. I'd recommend reading it. I thought that I'd be able to write a better review but I honestly don't give a fuck about much anymore.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

if its the same guy im thinking of he wrote a book called 'live working or die fighting' which i found enjoyable...

though, in times like these im thinking john minnery's 'kill without joy' might be more appropriate.

thwap said...

Hmmm. Thanks for the title!

http://www.haymarketbooks.org/pb/Live-Working-or-Die-Fighting

http://www.feastofhateandfear.com/archives/john.html

Where'd you hear of this Brantford boy's book anyhow?