editor Ian Angus presents six new books on neoliberal ideology, oceans in crisis, Michigan’s water wars, and the corrupt food industry.
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By George Monbiot & Peter Hutchison
Penguin Random House
Neoliberalism, the dominant ideology of our time, is widely presented as some kind of natural law: that unregulated capitalist competition produces the best possible results for all. But neoliberalism is neither inevitable nor immutable. Monbiot and Hutchison argue that it was conceived and fostered as a deliberate means of changing the nature of power, subordinating democracy to the power of money and preying on people’s hopelessness and desperation.
By Helen Czerski
WW Norton
All of Earth’s oceans are a single engine powered by sunlight, driving huge flows of energy, water, life and raw materials. Physicist and oceanographer Helen Czerski shows how temperature, salinity, gravity and tectonic plates interact in a complex dance, to support life — from tiny plankton to gigantic whales. Understanding the ocean’s vital role in the Earth system is an essential part of protecting the planet from catastrophe in the Anthropocene.
By Austin Frerick
Island Press
The deregulation of the United States food industry has consolidated wealth in the hands of a handful of tycoons, and hollowed out rural towns and local businesses. Frerick paints a stark portrait of the consequences of corporate consolidation, and argues that a fair, healthy and prosperous food industry is possible, if we take back power from the barons who have stolen it.
By Olive Heffernan
Greystone Books
Home to some of the richest and most biodiverse environments on the planet, the oceans are also home to massive exploitation. Heffernan uncovers the truth behind deeply exploitative fishing practices, and the potentially devastating impact of deep-sea mining. A powerful and deeply researched manifesto calling for the protection and preservation of this final frontier.
By Yanis Varoufakis
Melville House Publishing
“Cloud serfs, cloud proles and cloud vassals of the world unite!” Varoufakis argues that big tech has replaced capitalism’s twin pillars — markets and profit — with platforms and rents, reshaping our lives and the world. In his view this revolutionary transformation enslaves our minds and rewrites the rules of global power, and must be reversed. “We have nothing to lose but our mind-chains!”
By Michael Mascarenhas
University of California Press
Drawing from three years of fieldwork in Flint and Detroit, Mascarenhas exposes how an authoritarian state fought to maintain white supremacy at any cost — including poisoning an entire city and shutting off water to thousands of people. A powerful account of the ties between urban austerity policies, environmental harm, and white supremacist agendas in predominantly Black and brown cities.
[Reprinted from . Inclusion of a book does not imply endorsement.]