Synopses & Reviews
In this groundbreaking alternative history of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free-market economic revolution, Naomi Klein challenges the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory. From Chile in 1973 to Iraq today, Klein shows how Friedman and his followers have repeatedly harnessed terrible shocks and violence to implement their radical policies. As John Gray wrote in The Guardian, "There are very few books that really help us understand the present. The Shock Doctrine is one of those books." Naomi Klein is the award-winning author of the acclaimed international bestseller No Logo and the essay collection Fences and Windows. An internationally syndicated columnist, she co-created with Avi Lewis, The Take, a documentary film. Winner of the Warwick Prize for WritingFinalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize
Finalist for the New York Public Library Bernstein Award for Journalism
A San Francisco Chronicle Notable Book of the Year
A Chicago Sun-Times Favorite Book of the Year
A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year
Winner of the Libris Award for Best Non-fiction Book of the Year (Canada)
Finalist for the National Business Book Award (Canada)
A Guardian and Observer Favorite Book of the Year (U.K.)
The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global "free market" has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq. In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term "disaster capitalism." Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic "shock treatment," losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movements peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years. Also available on CD as an abridged audiobook. Please email [email protected] for more information. The Shock Doctrine is Kleins ambitious look at the economic history of the last 50 years and the rise of free-market fundamentalism around the world . . . Klein provides a rich description of the political machinations required to force unsavory economic policies on resisting countries, and the human toll. She paints a disturbing portrait of hubris, not only on the part of Friedman but also of those who adopted his doctrines, sometimes to pursue more corporatist objectives. It is striking to be reminded how many of the people involved in the Iraq war were involved earlier in other shameless episodes in United States foreign policy history.”Joseph E. Stiglitz, The New York Times Book Review The Shock Doctrine is Kleins ambitious look at the economic history of the last 50 years and the rise of free-market fundamentalism around the world . . . Klein provides a rich description of the political machinations required to force unsavory economic policies on resisting countries, and of the human toll. She paints a disturbing portrait of hubris, not only on the part of Friedman but also of those who adopted his doctrines, sometimes to pursue more corporatist objectives. It is striking to be reminded how many of the people involved in the Iraq war were involved earlier in other shameless episodes in United States foreign policy history. She draws a clear line from the torture in Latin America in the 1970s to that at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo Bay . . . Klein ends on a hopeful note, describing nongovernmental organizations and activists around the world who are trying to make a difference. After 500 pages of The Shock Doctrine, its clear they have their work cut out for them.”Joseph E. Stiglitz, The New York Times Book Review
"With the publication seven years ago of No Logo, in the wake of the anti-World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, Klein demonstrated that the 'just do it' triumphalism of Nike and other global brands masked serious inequities and injustices. Her new book, The Shock Doctrine, takes the argument an important step further. Neoliberal capitalism, she argues, thrives on catastrophe: Not only are fortunes made from the misfortunes of the masses, but the global dominance of free-market capitalism is built on the infliction of disasters on the world's less fortunate. Klein developed her position over 460-some closely argued pages of text, plus meticulous endnotes . . . The Shock Doctrine is a valuable addition to the corpus of popular books that have attempted to rethink the big ideas of our post-Cold War age."Shashi Tharoor, The Washington Post
"The connections are daring in journalist Naomi Klein's new book, The Shock Doctrine, but the result is convincing. With a bold and brilliantly conceived thesis, skillfully and cogently threaded through more than 500 pages of trenchant writing, Klein may well have revealed the master narrative of our time. And because the pattern she exposes could govern our future as well, The Shock Doctrine could turn out to be among the most important books of the decade . . . Klein's book is well researched and reported, with a mixture of sharp first-person observations, compelling narrative based on sources and absorbing writing . . . The story she tells so very well is very dark, howeverdarker than we'd like to believe. In the Harry Potter books, creatures called dementors steal souls and suck all the hope out of the air. Therapy for a dementor encounter is eating chocolate. Though this book is superbly constructed and written, and in that sense is easy to read, the content is relentlessly harrowing. It deserves to be widely read, but readers may want frequent access to a handy supply of chocolate."William S. Kowinski, San Francisco Chronicle
Those of us who imagine economists to be mild souls preoccupied with tedious abstractions are in for a shock from The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Kleins stunning, polemic re-examination of the last 30-plus years in the history of free-market capitalism. If we bought the myth of corporate globalization as a benign and bloodless process, Klein has more jolts in store . . . Her research is massive, meticulously documented and laid out in fluid, accessible and intriguing stories . . . The Shock Doctrine is serious and exhilarating with buzz of inside information and revealed connections. The book is ultimately hopeful because, as Klein points out, the shock wears out.”Katherine Dunn, The Oregonian (Portland)
A work of extraordinary synthesis, The Shock Doctrine is required reading for anyone who wants to know the roots of our current political and economic landscape and prepare for the shocks that await us.”Ronnie Steinberg, Ms.
In her explosive counterhistory of global capitalism, against the glib accounts offered by mainstream economists and celebrity journalists, Naomi Klein argues that the answer lies in a simple two-step strategy, honed over three decades by an international cabal of freemarket fundamentalists . . . Her new book is a broad survey of its rise as a mode of development imposed on unwilling populations throughout the world. It is also a searing indictment of its practitioners, from the Chicago School juntas of Friedman acolytes who collaborated with murderous dictators so long as they professed enthusiasm, for free markets, to the international-development organizations that demanded shock therapy and showed little regard for the welfare of those who absorbed it, to the corrupt officials who profited from what they benignly labeled structural adjustment . . . The heart of Kleins is her arresting claim that the shock doctrine not only operates according to the logic of torture but also leads to the enactment of brutal repressionincluding detention, disappearances, torture, and murderagainst its critics . . . The Shock Doctrine is a massive, courageous undertaking, and Kleins impassioned critique of the violence that accompanies American economic imperialism is not merely necessary but urgent.”Eric Klinenberg, Bookforum
"Klein explodes the myth that the global free market triumphed democratically. Exposing the thinking, the money trail and the puppet strings behind the world-changing crises and wars of the last four decades, The Shock Doctrine is the gripping story of how America's 'free market' policies have come to dominate the worldthrough the exploitation of disaster-shocked people and countries."AlterNet: Best Progressive Books of 2007
"The neo-liberal economic policiesprivatization, free trade, slashed social spendingthat the Chicago School and the economist Milton Friedman have foisted on the world are catastrophic in two senses, argues this vigorous polemic. Because their results are disastrousdepressions, mass poverty, private corporations looting public wealth, by the author's accountingtheir means must be cataclysmic, dependent on political upheavals and natural disasters as coercive pretexts for free-market reforms the public would normally reject. Journalist Klein (No Logo) chronicles decades of such disasters, including the Chicago School makeovers launched by South American coups; the corrupt sale of Russia's state economy to oligarchs following the collapse of the Soviet Union; the privatization of New Orleans's public schools after Katrina; and the seizure of wrecked fishing villages by resort developers after the Asian tsunami. Klein's economic and political analyses are not always meticulous. Likening free-market shock therapies to electroshock torture, she conflates every misdeed of right-wing dictatorships with their economic programs and paints a too simplistic picture of the Iraq conflict as a struggle over American-imposed neo-liberalism. Still, much of her critique hits home, as she demonstrates how free-market ideologues welcome, and provoke, the collapse of other people's economies. The result is a powerful populist indictment of economic orthodoxy."Publishers Weekly
Both admires and detractors agree that the late Nobel Prize laureate Milton Friedman was an extraordinary influential economist. Canadian Klein assails Friedmans free-market percepts as their exponents have applied them to a series of formerly state-dominated economies since 1975, when Friedman persuaded Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to adopt his program. Kleins entirely negative interpretation of the results of shock therapy only lays the foundation for her books thesis: that Friedmans prescriptions require a crisis and are ineluctably bound with the application of violence. This perspective informs her criticismcondemnation, in factof reform programs in the last three decades that have aimed to separate that state from the economy in Bolivia, Poland, Russia, China, the UK, and elsewhere. The process of market liberalization, Klein maintains, has created a disaster capitalism complex, consisting of corporations that thrive on catastrophe; the author particularly arraigns security and logistics firms in the U.S. and Israel. Assiduously researched, energetically expressed, Kleins report bears an ideological perspective that wont leave readers neutral about her economic interpretations.”Gilbert Taylor, Booklist
Review
"Klein's book incorporates an amount of due diligence, logical structure and statistical evidence that others lack. As a result, she is persuasive when she links past and present events, including the war in Iraq and trashing of its economy, to the systematic march of laissez-faire capitalism and the downsizing of the public sector as both a worldview and a political methodology." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Klein gives a freshness to examples that feel familiar US oil companies in Iraq, tourist resorts in tsunami-destroyed beaches, privatisation after hurricane Katrina by placing them in a wider context that includes Pinochet's coup in Chile in 1973 and the Falklands conflict in 1982." The Observer
Review
"[A] book that has the potential to become a lightning rod of controversy and debate." Toronto Star
Review
"[S]uperbly constructed and written....It deserves to be widely read." San Francisco Chronicle
Review
"While Naomi Klein's new book may paint a cartoonish portrait of Milton Friedman and his impact on American foreign and economic policy, this nonetheless is a deeply researched, profoundly passionate and highly readable left-wing screed that everyone would benefit from reading." Chauncey Mabe, the National Book Critics Circle's Most Recommended list, winter 2008
Synopsis
In
The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein explodes the myth that the global free market triumphed democratically. Exposing the thinking, the money trail and the puppet strings behind the world-changing crises and wars of the last four decades, The Shock Doctrine is the gripping story of how America's "free market" policies have come to dominate the world- through the exploitation of disaster-shocked people and countries.
At the most chaotic juncture in Iraq's civil war, a new law is unveiled that would allow Shell and BP to claim the country's vast oil reserves.... Immediately following September 11, the Bush Administration quietly out-sources the running of the "War on Terror" to Halliburton and Blackwater.... After a tsunami wipes out the coasts of Southeast Asia, the pristine beaches are auctioned off to tourist resorts.... New Orleans's residents, scattered from Hurricane Katrina, discover that their public housing, hospitals and schools will never be reopened.... These events are examples of "the shock doctrine": using the public's disorientation following massive collective shocks wars, terrorist attacks, or natural disasters to achieve control by imposing economic shock therapy. Sometimes, when the first two shocks don't succeed in wiping out resistance, a third shock is employed: the electrode in the prison cell or the Taser gun on the streets.
Based on breakthrough historical research and four years of on-the-ground reporting in disaster zones, The Shock Doctrine vividly shows how disaster capitalism the rapid-fire corporate reengineering of societies still reeling from shock did not begin with September 11, 2001. The book traces its origins back fifty years, to the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman, which produced many of the leading neo-conservative and neo-liberal thinkers whose influence is still profound in Washington today. New, surprising connections are drawn between economic policy, "shock and awe" warfare and covert CIA-funded experiments in electroshock and sensory deprivation in the 1950s, research that helped write the torture manuals used today in Guantanamo Bay.
The Shock Doctrine follows the application of these ideas though our contemporary history, showing in riveting detail how well-known events of the recent past have been deliberate, active theatres for the shock doctrine, among them: Pinochet's coup in Chile in 1973, the Falklands War in 1982, the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989, the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Asian Financial crisis in 1997 and Hurricane Mitch in 1998.
Synopsis
The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global "free market" has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term "disaster capitalism." Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic "shock treatment," losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years.
Synopsis
The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global free market has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term disaster capitalism. Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic shock treatment, losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years. Naomi Klein is the award-winning author of the acclaimed international bestseller No Logo and the essay collection Fences and Windows. An internationally syndicated columnist, she co-created with Avi Lewis, The Take, a documentary film. A Finalist for the New York Public Library Berstein Award for JournalismA Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global free market has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq. In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term disaster capitalism. Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic shock treatment, losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years. Also available on CD as an abridged audiobook. Please email [email protected] for more information. The neo-liberal economic policies--privatization, free trade, slashed social spending--that the Chicago School and the economist Milton Friedman have foisted on the world are catastrophic in two senses, argues this vigorous polemic. Because their results are disastrous--depressions, mass poverty, private corporations looting public wealth, by the author's accounting--their means must be cataclysmic . . . Klein (No Logo) chronicles decades of such disasters.--Publishers Weekly
The Shock Doctrine is Klein's ambitious look at the economic history of the last 50 years and the rise of free-market fundamentalism around the world . . . Klein provides a rich description of the political machinations required to force unsavory economic policies on resisting countries, and the human toll. She paints a disturbing portrait of hubris, not only on the part of Friedman but also of those who adopted his doctrines, sometimes to pursue more corporatist objectives. It is striking to be reminded how many of the people involved in the Iraq war were involved earlier in other shameless episodes in United States foreign policy history. She draws a clear line from the torture in Latin America in the 1970s to that at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay . . . Klein ends on a hopeful note, describing nongovernmental organizations and activists around the world who are trying to make a difference. After 500 pages of The Shock Doctrine, it's clear they have their work cut out for them.--Joseph E. Stiglitz, The New York Times Book Review
With the publication seven years ago of No Logo, in the wake of the anti-World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, Klein demonstrated that the 'just do it' triumphalism of Nike and other global brands masked serious inequities and injustices. Her new book, The Shock Doctrine, takes the argument an important step further. Neoliberal capitalism, she argues, thrives on catastrophe: Not only are fortunes made from the misfortunes of the masses, but the global dominance of free-market capitalism is built on the infliction of disasters on the world's less fortunate. Klein developed her position over 460-some closely argued pages of text, plus meticulous endnotes . . . The Shock Doctrine is a valuable addition to the corpus of popular books that have attempted to rethink the big ideas of our post-Cold War age.--Shashi Tharoor, The Washington Post
The connections are daring in journalist Naomi Klein's new book, The Shock Doctrine, but the result is convincing. With a bold and brilliantly conceived thesis, skillfully and cogently threaded through more than 500 pages of trenchant writing, Klein may well have revealed the master narrative of our time. And because the pattern she exposes could govern our future as well, The Shock Doctrine could turn out to be among the most important books of the decade . . . Klein's book is well researched and reported, with a mixture of sharp first-person observations, compelling narrative based on sources and absorbing writing . . . The story she tells so very well is very dark, however--darker than we'd like to believe. In the Harry Potter books, creatures called dementors steal souls and suck all the hope out of the air. Therapy for a dementor encounter is eating chocolate. Though this book is superbly constructed and written, and in that sense is easy to read, the content is relentlessly harrowing. It deserves to be widely read, but readers may want frequent access to a handy supply of chocolate.--William S. Kowinski, San Francisco Chronicle
Those of us who imagine economists to be mild souls preoccupied with tedious abstractions are in for a shock from The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein's stunning, polemic re-examination of the last 30-plus years in the history of free-market capitalism. If we bought the myth of corporate globalization as a benign and bloodless process, Klein has more jolts in store . . . Her research is massive, meticulously documented and laid out in fluid, accessible and intriguing stories . . . The Shock Doctrine is serious and exhilarating with buzz of inside information and revealed connections. The book is ultimately hopeful because, as Klein points out, the shock wears out.--Katherine Dunn, The Oregonian (Portland)
Over the last seven years, the young Canadian author has become the Noam Chomsky of her generation. A poll conducted in 2005 by England's Prospect magazine put her at number eleven on the list of top 'global intellectual.' But like other anti-globalization activists, Klein faced a quandary after the attacks of 9/11. How was she to square her convictions with the demonstrated reality that Islamofascism is a greater threat to our well-being than, say, McDonald's or Wal-Mart? In her new book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Klein finesses this question in an original and ambitious way.--Jonathan Kay, Commentary
In her explosive counterhistory of global capitalism, against the glib accounts offered by mainstream economists and celebrity journalists, Naomi Klein argues that the answer lies in a simple two-step strategy, honed over three decades by an international cabal of freemarket fundamentalists . . . Her new book is a broad survey of its rise as a mode of development imposed on unwilling populations throughout the world. It is also a searing indictment of its practitioners, from the 'Chicago School juntas' of Friedman acolytes who collaborated with murderous dictators so long as they professed enthusiasm, for free markets, to the international-development organizations that demanded 'shock therapy' and showed little regard for the welfare of those who absorbed it, to the corrupt officials who profited from what they benignly labeled 'structural adjustment' . . . The heart of Klein's is her arresting claim that the shock doctrine not only operates according to the logic of torture but also leads to the enactment of brutal repression--including detention, disappearances, torture, and murder--against its critics . . . The Shock Doctrine is a massive, courageous undertaking, and Klein's impassioned critique of the violence that accompanies American economic imperialism is not merely necessary but urgent.--Eric Klinenberg, Bookforum
According to economists in the University of Chicago school of thought, free-market ideas spread across the planet in a series of natural if sometimes painful historic developments. And the unprecedented (and highly lucrative) access Western capital enjoyed to these emerging markets is essential to kick-starting democratic reform. In this towering polemic, Naomi Klein demolishes t
Synopsis
The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global free market has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term disaster capitalism. Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic shock treatment, losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years. Naomi Klein is the award-winning author of the acclaimed international bestseller No Logo and the essay collection Fences and Windows. An internationally syndicated columnist, she co-created with Avi Lewis, The Take, a documentary film. A Finalist for the New York Public Library Berstein Award for JournalismA Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global free market has exploited crises and shock for three decades, from Chile to Iraq. In her groundbreaking reporting over the past few years, Naomi Klein introduced the term disaster capitalism. Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic shock treatment, losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia, and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years. Also available on CD as an abridged audiobook. Please email [email protected] for more information. The neo-liberal economic policies--privatization, free trade, slashed social spending--that the Chicago School and the economist Milton Friedman have foisted on the world are catastrophic in two senses, argues this vigorous polemic. Because their results are disastrous--depressions, mass poverty, private corporations looting public wealth, by the author's accounting--their means must be cataclysmic . . . Klein (No Logo) chronicles decades of such disasters.--Publishers Weekly
The Shock Doctrine is Klein's ambitious look at the economic history of the last 50 years and the rise of free-market fundamentalism around the world . . . Klein provides a rich description of the political machinations required to force unsavory economic policies on resisting countries, and the human toll. She paints a disturbing portrait of hubris, not only on the part of Friedman but also of those who adopted his doctrines, sometimes to pursue more corporatist objectives. It is striking to be reminded how many of the people involved in the Iraq war were involved earlier in other shameless episodes in United States foreign policy history. She draws a clear line from the torture in Latin America in the 1970s to that at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay . . . Klein ends on a hopeful note, describing nongovernmental organizations and activists around the world who are trying to make a difference. After 500 pages of The Shock Doctrine, it's clear they have their work cut out for them.--Joseph E. Stiglitz, The New York Times Book Review
With the publication seven years ago of No Logo, in the wake of the anti-World Trade Organization protests in Seattle, Klein demonstrated that the 'just do it' triumphalism of Nike and other global brands masked serious inequities and injustices. Her new book, The Shock Doctrine, takes the argument an important step further. Neoliberal capitalism, she argues, thrives on catastrophe: Not only are fortunes made from the misfortunes of the masses, but the global dominance of free-market capitalism is built on the infliction of disasters on the world's less fortunate. Klein developed her position over 460-some closely argued pages of text, plus meticulous endnotes . . . The Shock Doctrine is a valuable addition to the corpus of popular books that have attempted to rethink the big ideas of our post-Cold War age.--Shashi Tharoor, The Washington Post
The connections are daring in journalist Naomi Klein's new book, The Shock Doctrine, but the result is convincing. With a bold and brilliantly conceived thesis, skillfully and cogently threaded through more than 500 pages of trenchant writing, Klein may well have reveal
Synopsis
The bestselling author of No Logo shows how the global "free market" has exploited crises and shock for three decades from Chile to Iraq
Synopsis
In her ground-breaking reporting Naomi Klein introduced the term "disaster capitalism." Whether covering Baghdad after the U.S. occupation, Sri Lanka in the wake of the tsunami, or New Orleans post-Katrina, she witnessed something remarkably similar. People still reeling from catastrophe were being hit again, this time with economic "shock treatment", losing their land and homes to rapid-fire corporate makeovers.
The Shock Doctrine retells the story of the most dominant ideology of our time, Milton Friedman's free market economic revolution. In contrast to the popular myth of this movement's peaceful global victory, Klein shows how it has exploited moments of shock and extreme violence in order to implement its economic policies in so many parts of the world from Latin America and Eastern Europe to South Africa, Russia and Iraq.
At the core of disaster capitalism is the use of cataclysmic events to advance radical privatization combined with the privatization of the disaster response itself. Klein argues that by capitalizing on crises, created by nature or war, the disaster capitalism complex now exists as a booming new economy, and is the violent culmination of a radical economic project that has been incubating for fifty years.
Synopsis
In Corporate Dreams, James Hoopes combines a historianandrsquo;s careful eye with an insiderandrsquo;s perspective on the business world. This provocative volume tracks changes in government economic policy, changes in public attitudes toward big business, and changes in how corporate executives view themselves. Whether examining the rise of Leadership Development programs or recounting JFKandrsquo;s Pyrrhic victory over U.S. Steel, Hoopes tells a compelling story of how America lost its way, ceding authority to the policies and values of corporate culture.
Synopsis
Public trust in corporations plummeted in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, when andldquo;Lehman Brothersandrdquo; and andldquo;General Motorsandrdquo; became dirty words for many Americans. In Corporate Dreams, James Hoopes argues that Americans still place too much faith in corporations and, especially, in the idea of andldquo;values-based leadershipandrdquo; favored by most CEOs. The danger of corporations, he suggests, lies not just in their economic power, but also in how their confused and undemocratic values are infecting Americansandrsquo; visions of good governance.
Corporate Dreams proposes that Americans need to radically rethink their relationships with big business and the government. Rather than buying into the corporate notion of andldquo;values-based leadership,andrdquo; we should view corporate leaders with the same healthy suspicion that our democratic political tradition teaches us to view our political leaders. Unfortunately, the trend is moving the other way. Corporate notions of leadership are invading our democratic political culture when it should be the reverse.
To diagnose the cause and find a cure for our toxic attachment to corporate models of leadership, Hoopes goes back to the root of the problem, offering a comprehensive history of corporate culture in America, from the Great Depression to todayandrsquo;s Great Recession. Combining a historianandrsquo;s careful eye with an insiderandrsquo;s perspective on the business world, this provocative volume tracks changes in government economic policy, changes in public attitudes toward big business, and changes in how corporate executives view themselves.
Whether examining the rise of Leadership Development programs or recounting JFKandrsquo;s Pyrrhic victory over U.S. Steel, Hoopes tells a compelling story of how America lost its way, ceding authority to the policies and values of corporate culture. But he also shows us how itandrsquo;s not too late to return to our democratic idealsandmdash;and that itandrsquo;s not too late to restore the American dream.
and#160;
About the Author
Naomi Klein is the award-winning author of the acclaimed international bestseller No Logo, which The Literary Review of Canada named one of the hundred most important Canadian books ever published. She is also the author of the essay collection Fences and Windows. With Avi Lewis, she co-created the documentary film The Take, which was an Official Selection of the Venice Biennale and won the Best Documentary Jury Prize at the American Film Institutes Film Festival in Los Angeles. She is a contributing editor for Harpers, a reporter for Rolling Stone, and writes a regular, internationally syndicated column. She has won the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism. She is a former Miliband Fellow at the London School of Economics and holds an honorary Doctor of Civil Laws from the University of Kings College, Nova Scotia. Born in Montreal, she now lives in Toronto.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Part I. The Corporate American Dream at Its Height and in Its Origins
1. The Corporate American Dream
2. Corporate and National Character
3. From Public Purpose to Private Profit
4. Corporations as Enemies of the Free Market
Part II. Corporate Failure and Government Fix
5. Corporate Crashes
6. Managers versus Markets
7. Corporations Blow Their Chance to End the Depression
8. Roosevelt's Confused Anticorporatism
Part III. The Corporation Strikes Back
9. The Right toand#160;Manage
10. Corporations Recover Their Moral Authority
11. Killing the Unions Softly
12. Creating Reagan and His Voters
Part IV. What Manner of Man(ager)?
13. Masking the Arrogance of Power
14. Responsibility versus Profit at General Motors
15. Critics of Managerial Character
16. JFK's Pyrrhic Victory over U.S. Steel
Part V. The Corporation in the Wilderness Again
17. McNamara and the Staffers
18. The False Confidence of the Anticorporatists
19. Corporate America Loses World Supremacy
20. Laying the Groundwork for the Corporation's Cultural Comeback
Part VI. Leadership
21. Managing by Values
22. Creating the Concept of Corporate Culture
23. Inventing the Leadership Development Industry
24. Reagan Aids Corporations by Bashing Government
Part VII. Entrepreneurship
25. Supply-Siders versus the Big Corporation
26. Reengineering the Corporation
27. George W. Bush, Enron, and the Great Recession
28. Can the Corporate American Dream Be Saved?
Notes
Index