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Paul Mason is an interesting figure. UK's former Chancellor, George Osborne, recently described him as 'revolutionary Marxist' and compared him with Micky Mouse in a speech to the House of Commons. Trying to read this positively, Mason is undoubtedly a very progressive and energetic figure on the left in the UK. At a time when journalists claim to be independent and value-free and are simultaneously unable to conduct proper and informative interviews with politicians due to their pseudo-critical and aggressive style, it is refreshing to see journalists like Paul Mason in the arena. He is able to conduct critical, investigative and in-depth journalism and has proven his ability for many years at the BBC and until recently as Economics Editor at Channel 4 News. In order 'to escape the constraints of impartiality rules governing broadcasters' and to engage more fully in the debates of the political left, Mason decided to leave Channel 4 News and now works as a freelance journalist . Mason is quite active and well-known on the political left. He recently produced an independent documentary about the crisis in Greece (#ThisIsACoup), hosts talks with people like Yanis Varoufakis in front of a massive audience, contributes to Labour's new economics series and is followed by more than 400,000 people on Twitter. In short, Paul Mason is an important figure on the political left in the UK who understands how to play the game within corporate media. It is precisely in this context that we should see his new book. ; Output Type: Book Review

Paul Mason is an interesting figure. UK's former Chancellor, George Osborne, recently described him as 'revolutionary Marxist' and compared him with Micky Mouse in a speech to the House of Commons . Trying to read this positively, Mason is undoubtedly a very progressive and energetic figure on the left in the UK. At a time when journalists claim to be independent and value-free and are simultaneously unable to conduct proper and informative interviews with politicians due to their pseudo-critical and aggressive style , it is refreshing to see journalists like Paul Mason in the arena. He is able to conduct critical, investigative and in-depth journalism and has proven his ability for many years at the BBC and until recently as Economics Editor at Channel 4 News. In order 'to escape the constraints of impartiality rules governing broadcasters' and to engage more fully in the debates of the political left, Mason decided to leave Channel 4 News and now works as a freelance journalist . Mason is quite active and well-known on the political left. He recently produced an independent documentary about the crisis in Greece (#ThisIsACoup) , hosts talks with people like Yanis Varoufakis in front of a massive audience , contributes to Labour's new economics series and is followed by more than 400,000 people on Twitter.

This dissertation argues that the major theories of global justice (specifically within the cosmopolitan tradition) have missed an important aspect of capitalism in their attempts to deal with the most pernicious effects of the global economic system. This is not merely a left critique of cosmopolitanism (though it is certainly that as well), but its fundamental contribution is that it applies the insights of Frankfurt School Critical Theorist Theodor Adorno's negative dialectics to offer an internal critique of cosmopolitanism. As it stands, much of the global justice and cosmopolitanism literature takes global capitalism as an unsurpassable and a foundationally unproblematic system, often ignoring completely the relationship between the psycho-socially conditioned ideological aspects of capitalism and the horizon of achievable politics and social development. Using the philosophies and social theories of Adorno and Erich Fromm, I argue that there is a crucial psycho-social dimension to capitalism, or capitalistic mentality—represented in and functionally reproduced by transnational capitalism—that undermines the political aspirations of normative theories of cosmopolitanism, on their own terms. The project concludes with an exploration of Marxist, neo-Marxist, and post-Marxist theories as a potential source of alternatives to address the flaws within cosmopolitanism with respect to its general acceptance and under-theorizing of capitalism. The conclusion reached here is that even these radical approaches fail to take into account the near-pervasive influence of capitalism on the minds of radicals and activists working for progressive change or simply reject the potentials contained in existing avenues for global political and economic change (something which the cosmopolitan theories explored in earlier chapters do not do). Based again on the work of Adorno and Fromm, this dissertation argues that the best path forward, practically and theoretically, is by engaging cosmopolitanism and neo-/post-Marxism productively around this concept of the capitalistic mentality, building towards a praxeological theory of postcapitalist cosmopolitanism framed by a negative dialectical resuscitation of the concepts of class struggle and unlimited democracy. This postcapitalist cosmopolitanism emphasizes non-exploitative economic and political relations, cooperation, compassion, sustainability, and a participatory-democratic civic culture.

This major new manifesto offers a "clear and compelling vision of a postcapitalist society" and shows how left-wing politics can be rebuilt for the twenty-first century (Mark Fisher, author of Capitalist Realism Neoliberalism isn't working. Austerity is forcing millions into poverty and many more into precarious work, while the left remains trapped in stagnant political practices that offer no respite. Inventing the Future is a bold new manifesto for life after capitalism. Against the confused understanding of our high-tech world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams demand a postcapitalist economy capable of advancing standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies that expand our freedoms. This new edition includes a new chapter where they respond to their various critics

"This book provides a lucid, rigorous, and critical account of the commons, its history and its political potentialities as well as its limitations and ambiguities. In particular, The Commons analyses the relations of solidarity and conflict between the commons and public welfare policies, as well as the role the commons can play in the struggle against the global socioecological crisis that is threatening the very future of humanity. Over the past decade, various theories, concepts and political projects connected to the commons have become fundamentally important for social science and numerous social movements around the world. In sociology, economics, political science, history, geography, the law and anthropology, the study of the commons has inspired many important academic innovations. In parallel, community activists, labour unions, ecologists, feminists and cooperativists have discovered in the commons a powerful and thought-provoking toolkit with which to defend public services, guarantee access to cultural goods, organize reproductive and care work, and more generally, fight against commodification and ecological destruction. The first two chapters analyse the dual origin of the academic rediscovery of the commons. On one side, from the realm of political science and economics, the concept of the commons has been used to challenge the dominant paradigms founded on rational choice theory. On the other, from the fields of history, law and anthropology, analysis of the violent destruction of the commons has served to deepen our understanding of the coercive and antidemocratic processes that form the bedrock of capitalism and our current plight. The third and fourth chapters examine the role that the commons can play in emancipatory political projects aiming to deepen democracy in mass industrial societies. As such, The Commons will appeal to scholars across the social sciences and academics with interests in social and political theory, the environment and sustainability, and political sociology"--

Commons as systems -- Common goods -- Systems -- Elements -- From Elinor Ostrom to Karl Marx -- Commons governance -- The money nexus and the commons formula -- Commoning: the source of grassroots power -- Mobilising social labour for commoning -- The production of autonomy, boundaries and sense -- Social change -- Boundary commoning -- Commons and capital/state -- Towards postcapitalism.

2017 marks 45 years since the first English publication of Marx's 'Notes on Machines' in Economy & Society . This paper critiques how Marx's 'Fragment' has subsequently been repurposed in postoperaist thought, and how this wields influence on contemporary left thinking via the work of Paul Mason. Changes in labour lead proponents to posit a 'crisis of measurability' and an incipient communism. I use the New Reading of Marx, which picks up where debates in Economy & Society in the seventies left off, to dispute this. Based on an analysis of value as a social form undergirded in antagonistic social relations, I argue the Fragment's reception runs contrary to Marx's critique of political economy as a critical theory of society, with implications for left praxis today.

Traces the current financial crisis back to the 1970s collapse of the Bretton Woods system & the emergence of the liberalization of financial markets as the way to restructure capitalism. The negative consequences of monetarism as the hegemonic ideology of the neoliberal counter-revolution are explored, along with the link between financial & real markets; the hierarchy of disembedded markets; & the negative impact of the Peso crisis of 1994, the Asian crisis of 1997, & the Argentinean crisis of 2001. Attention is also given to the physical preconditions of neoliberal finance & the resiliency of the real economy. It is maintained that neoliberalism ended with the financial crisis of 2008 which was much deeper than earlier ones. The tendency to remove markets from society & nature has also ended, making it necessary to rethink the relationship of finance to the real economy on a global scale. However, it is argued that postneoliberal strategies still have the ability to restructure capitalism, especially if they are employed by intellectually & politically strong social movements. J. Lindroth

In Omnia Sunt Communia, Massimo de Angelis offers a radical political economy, illuminating the steps necessary to arrive at a post-capitalist world. By conceptualizing the idea of commons not just as common goods but as a set of social systems, de Angelis shows their pervasive presence in everyday life, and he maps out a strategy for total social transformation. From the micro to the macro, de Angelis unveils the commons as fields of power relations—shared space, objects, and subjects—that explode the limits of daily life under capitalism. He exposes attempts to co-opt the commons, through the use of seemingly innocuous words such as "participation" and "governance," and he reveals the potential for radical transformation rooted in the social reproduction of our communities, life, work, and society as a whole.