transition capitalism materialism colonialism

books:

Blood on the Forge: Voices of Resistance

4 reviews
William Attaway, John Killens, ...

Monthly Review Press, 1987

Among the Very Best "Unknown" American Novels
William Attaway's BLOOD ON THE FORGE powerfully depicts both the Black migration to the industrial north after WWI and the startling hell-like environment of the vast iron & steel works of the era. No other writer--novelist, sociologist, historian--has ever captured so well the compelling, visceral experience of the humans working these sacrificial jobs. As Attaway walks us through the vast ...

Days and Nights of Love and War

3 reviews
Eduardo Galeano

Monthly Review Press, 2000

A gorgeous book --- heart-wrenching and inspiring.
This book is for anyone immersed in the human condition, waging a war internally and silently stuggling externally. Galeano's collection of thoughts and essays and stories stirs the emotions of the reader and forces them to consider the entirety of the Latin American canon of literature as a formidable one. It encompasses genres such as autobiography, biography, testimony, prose, and short ...

Last Resorts: The Cost of Tourism in the Caribbean

4 reviews
Polly Pattullo

Monthly Review Press, 1996

Paradaise might be a victim of its own success
- Everyone's tropical paradaise might be a victim of its own success. This book reviews the tourism industry and explores how to bring greater benefits to the region. Excellent! Ron Mader / El Planeta Platica

China Shakes the World

4 reviews
Jack Belden

Monthly Review Press, 1970

A book that explains why Mao (at the beginning) was good....
This is a really powerful book..... It is an account of China under the government of the Nationalist Chinese written by an American journalist who, in the end, fell under the spell of Mao's PLA not for ideological reasons-- but because of a personal affinity for the Chinese people.... who were suffering.... I was advised to read this book in college by a professor who claimed that "if you ...

Discourse on Colonialism

9 reviews
Aime Cesaire

Monthly Review Press,U.S., 1972

good perception
I read Cesaire's 'discours sur le colonialisme' in one afternoon at a coffe place and it was captivating in how intellectually he wrote, with tinges of attitude in the words. A lot of the things he wrote about I already knew from studying a lot about Africa before and what ethnocentricism vs. ethno relativism means when applying yourself and perceptions of other cultures. This book is as ...

Immigrants: Materialism and Nature

6 reviews
John Bellamy Foster

Monthly Review Press, 2000

Marx as ecologist
In "Marx's Ecology," John Bellamy Foster defies conventional green thinking by raising the banner of materialism rather than spirituality in the fight to save the planet and humanity from ecological ruin. In addition to restoring materialism to its proper place, Foster also shows that ecological questions were central not only to Marx, but other Marxists such as Bebel and Bukharin. By ...

The Ecological Revolution: Making Peace with the Planet

5 reviews
John Bellamy Foster

Monthly Review Press, 2009

Thoughtful, Systematic, Critical and Hopeful
Before starting John Bellamy Foster's The Ecological Revolution, I had just read A New Green History of the World: The Environment and the Collapse of Great Civilizations by Clive Ponting. Ponting's historical account of ecological degradation is frighteningly insightful. While reminding us that humans have been destroying their environments for millennia, Ponting rightly emphasizes the threat ...

Man's worldly goods: The story of the wealth of nations

5 reviews
Leo Huberman

Monthly Review Press, 1952

Magnificent in scope and understanding of economics!
Leo Huberman's masterpiece is a fantastic work, unfortunately out of print abroad but published in India and available in select bookstores. In an age where belief in the Left is scorned and the free market rules supreme, this book is as relevant as ever, reminding one of the perils that can arise when a market is too free. Huberman explains economics in its historical background and shows ...

The Scalpel and the Sword: The Story of Doctor Norman Bethune

5 reviews
Ted Allan, Sydney Gordon

Monthly Review Press, 1974

Norm Bethune -- Genius combined with relentless effort.
There are simple people and there are complicated people. Norm Bethune was definitely of the latter strain. Independent, erratic, gifted, persistent-ever searching for the next direction, or "mission." His parents were great admirers of D.L. Moody. His father was a pastor at various small towns throughout Ontario, Canada, and his mother was a missionary. Bethune himself didn't seem to ...

Karl Marx's Theory of Revolution, Vol. 1: The State and Bureaucracy

3 reviews
Hal Draper

Monthly Review Press, 1978

Thank you Hal Draper
This books clarity and precision - two conditions often forgone by writiers in the Marxist theoretical tradition - in no way sacrifice the absolute richness and substance that it presents the reader. In this multi-volume work Draper gives a sweeping assesment of Marx's analysis. But instead of doing it through economic theorems and proofs he does it via an exploration of Marx politics from his ...

Dispersed City of the Plains

2 reviews
Harris Stone, Joan Stone, ...

Monthly Review Press, 1998

Poignant, provocative thoughts on the Great Plains
This is a challenging, original analysis of the meaning of the built environment of the Great Plains. The author begins much the way that Walter Prescott Webb did in his pioneering work on the same subject, by analyzing the building blocks that organize space and the economy of the region, in this instance grain elevators, barbed wire, and windmills. He then moves through types of housing, ...

The Taming of the American Crowd: From Stamp Riots to Shopping Sprees

3 reviews
Al Sandine

Monthly Review Press, 2009

The Dynamics, Significance, and Value of Crowds in America
Although The Taming of the American Crowd is primarily an historical investigation, it's also a study in social dynamics, political persuasion, mass psychology, governmental regulation, and corporate exploitation. The initial conception--asking what are the roles of crowds in areas as diverse as economics, leisure activity, religious worship, and political expression--is intriguing, and the ...

Capital Crimes

2 reviews
George Winslow

Monthly Review Press, 1999

Solid, fascinating, well-written analysis of U.S. Crime
This is one of the best books on American crime that I have ever read. It is excellent because it illustrates the connections between street crime, drugs, U.S. foreign policy and --above all -- corporate greed and amorality. From the jungles of Burma to Miami, from the woods of Oregon to the S and L scandal, this book is sweeping in its analysis, and highly accessible. Clearly written. ...

Ecology Against Capitalism

2 reviews
John Bellamy Foster

Monthly Review Press, 2002

A Positive Alternative to Capitalism
John Bellamy Foster's "Ecology Against Capitalism" is a collection of essays that addresses some of the various aspects of capitalism's crisis of accumulation and the environment. Importantly, the author compares and contrasts the failures of the ecological economics model with the more promising ecosocialist paradigm, arguing that the latter is humanity's best chance to create a stable, healthy ...

Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays

3 reviews
Louis Althusser

Monthly Review Press, 1972

One of the best!
This is an excellent text if you are interested in having your reality turned on its head. I have used this reference in almost every paper I have written since beginning my path down the winding road of critical theory. I recommend it to anyone who thinks about why we think the way we do, anyone interested in hegemony, and anyone who thinks something is wrong with our world but s/he feels s/he ...

Unity and struggle: Speeches and writings

3 reviews
Amilcar Cabral

Monthly Review Press, 1979

Review of Amilcar Cabral's Seminal Work on Liberation
This book is currently out-of-print, it details the thoughts of Amilcar Cabral a central leader of the revolution in Guinea-Bissau. I was personally introduced to this book by a comrade who spent a number of years in the Long Kesh prisons in Belfast. The Republican prisoners studied this book and he still reads a little most mornings to give him daily inspiration.

The Education of Black People: Ten Critiques, 1906 - 1960

2 reviews
W. E. B. DuBois

Monthly Review Press, 2002

Required Reading
Thankfully this book has been reprinted, along with a new 2001 introduction by Herbert Aptheker (who puts in a gentle "slam" of David Levering Lewis's two Pulitzer Prize winning biographies for good measure). The picture of Du Bois on the new cover is another one of those "I am God and You are not worthy" type of pictures. I've gone and made it one of my screen savers. Du Bois's prescient and ...

Beyond Capital: Toward a Theory of Transition

2 reviews
Istvan Meszaros

Monthly Review Press, 2000

our instrumentality in the sickness of the totality
If the author isn't a genius, and I'll say he is, he at least has the elements of genius at his disposal. He has read, of both the good and the bad, and this book is an expression of his bioligical and spiritual drive to let us know about the variables we are dealing with in our project to kill pain and feel pleasure, enhance cognition and engage sensuality. Everyone who's brain's structure is ...

The Unknown Cultural Revolution: Life and Change in a Chinese Village

3 reviews
Dongping Han

Monthly Review Press, 2008

Shandong Province County Prospers in the "Lost Decade"
The standard image of the Cultural Revolution is red guard hooliganism, economic disruption, factional wars, violent army repression, closed schools, extreme emperor worship, persecution of intellectuals, and ideological rigidity. These are all true, for most areas and in certain periods of the CR. However, there was a wide variety of experiences, and all such experiences must be examined for an ...

Coming to Terms with Nature: Socialist Register 2007

2 reviews
Colin Leys

Monthly Review Press, 2006

Envisioning real environmental and social justice
"Coming to Terms with Nature: Socialist Register 2007" by Leo Panitch and Colin Leys (Editors) delivers a high-quality anthology about the contemporary environmental crisis. The seventeen articles are written by leading thinkers associated with the socialist movement. Collectively, the articles make it clear that capitalism's perpetual growth imperative cannot help but push the world towards ...

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