Böcker utgivna av Verso Books

Three radical perspectives on the critique of capitalismFor years, the critique of capitalism was lost from public discourse; the very word ';capitalism' sounded like a throwback to another era. Nothing could be further from the truth today. In this new intellectual atmosphere, Sociology, Capitalism, Critique is a contribution to the renewal of critical sociology, founded on an empirically grounded diagnosis of society's ills. The authors, Germany's leading critical sociologistsKlaus Drre, Stephan Lessenich, and Hartmut Rosashare a conviction that ours is a pivotal period of renewal, in which the collective endeavour of academics can amount to an act of intellectual resistance, working to prevent any regressive development that might return us to neoliberal domination. The authors discuss key issues, such as questions of accumulation and expropriation; discipline and freedom; and the powerful new concepts of activation and acceleration. Their politically committed sociology, which takes the side of the losers in the current crisis, places society's future well-being at the centre of their research. Their collective approach to this project is a conscious effort to avoid co-optation in the institutional practices of the academy. These three differing but complementary perspectives serve as an insightful introduction to the contemporary themes of radical sociology in capitalism's post-crisis phase.

A deft and caustic takedown of the new prophets of profit, from Bill Gates to Oprah As severe environmental degradation, breathtaking inequality, and increasing alienation push capitalism against its own contradictions, mythmaking has become as central to sustaining our economy as profitmaking. Enter the new prophets of capital: Sheryl Sandberg touting the capitalist work ethic as the antidote to gender inequality; John Mackey promising that free markets will heal the planet; Oprah Winfrey urging us to find solutions to poverty and alienation within ourselves; and Bill and Melinda Gates offering the generosity of the 1 percent as the answer to a persistent, systemic inequality. The new prophets of capital buttress an exploitative system, even as the cracks grow more visible.

Analysis of the role of ideology in political movements.

Beginning on the eve of the 2008 US presidential election, The Notebook evokes life in Saramago's beloved Lisbon, revisits conversations with friends, and offers meditations on the author's favorite writers. Precise observations and moments of arresting significance are rendered with pointillist detail, and together demonstrate an acute understanding of our times. Characteristically critical and uncompromising, Saramago dissects the financial crisis, deplores Israel's punishment of Gaza, and reflects on the rise of Barack Obama. The Notebook is a unique journey into the personal and political world of one of the greatest writers of our time.

The fall of Communism has been an epoch-making event. The distinguished contributors to After the Fall explain to us the meaning of Communism's meteoric trajectory - and explore the rational grounds for socialist endeavour and commitment in a world which remains dangerous and divided.The contributors include the Italian political philosopher Norberto Bobbio, the British historian Eric Hobsbawm, the French economist André Gorz, and the German social theorist Jürgen Habermas. Eduardo Galeano explains how the now world looks from the South, Diane Elson explores how the market might be socialized, Ralph Miliband writes on the harshness of Leninism, Hans Magnus Enzenberger argues that the capitalist 'bad fairy' granted the Left's wishes in disconcerting ways. Lynne Segal looking at the condition of women sees no reason to abandon her libertarian, feminist and socialist convictions, while Maxine Molyneux considers the implications for women of the fall of Communism. Giovanni Arrighi asks whether Marxism understood the 'American Century', Fredric Jameson pursues a conversation on the new world order, Iván Szelényi explains who will be the new rulers of Eastern Europe, and Robin Blackburn reflects on the history of socialist programmes, with the benefit of hindsight. Fred Halliday and Edward Thompson disagree about how Communism ended but share worries about what is in store for the post-Communist countries. Alexander Cockburn regrets the death of the Soviet Union. And Göran Therborn eloquent proves that it is still possible to imagine a future beyond capitalism... and beyond socialism?

An indictment of the architect of New Labour, Gordon Brown. It shows how Brown came to preside over a bankrupt country on the brink of economic and political breakdown. Taking us on a tour of Britain, it explores the ever-widening disparity between rich and poor, and how manufacturing was replaced by 'retail, entertainment and recreation'.

Challenging many of the values and conceits of Western civilization, the gay socialist writer Edward Carpenter had an extraordinary impact on the cultural and political landscape of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This work situates Carpenter's life and thought in relation to the contemporary social, aesthetic and intellectual movements.

Bringing together young musicians from Palestine, Israel and the other countries of the Middle East, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra is both one of the most acclaimed youth orchestras in the world and a powerful ray of hope in a war-torn region. This book explores the orchestra's journey through the remarkable stories of its members.

One of the worlds most erudite and entertaining film critics on the state of cinema in the post-digitaland post-9/11age. This witty and allusive book, in the style of classic film theorists/critics like Andr Bazin and Siegfried Kracauer, includes considerations of global cinemas most important figures and films, from Lars von Trier and Zia Jiangke to WALL-E, Avatar and Inception.

The impact of the US Civil War on Karl Marx, and Karl Marx on America.

A novel by the Booker prize winning author.

Exiled in London, the Hungarian artist Janos Lavin disappears one day, into thin air. His journal offers his friend John the only clues to where he has gone, and why.

A comprehensive assault on the quietism of contemporary social theory. Building on a work analyzing the class system in the developed world, as well as exploring the problem of the transition to a socialist alternative, it reconstructs the core values and feasible goals for Left theorists and political actors.

Israel's 2009 invasion of Gaza was an act of aggression that killed over a thousand Palestinians and devastated the infrastructure of an already impoverished enclave. The Punishment of Gaza shows how the ground was prepared for the assault and documents its continuing effects.From 2005the year of Gaza's ';liberation'through to 2009, Levy tracks the development of Israel policy, which has abandoned the pretense of diplomacy in favor of raw military power, the ultimate aim of which is to deny Palestinians any chance of forming their own independent state. Punished by Israel and the Quartet of international powers for the democratic election of Hamas, Gaza has been transformed into the world's largest open-air prison. From Gazan families struggling to cope with the random violence of Israel's blockade and its ';targeted' assassinations, to the machinations of legal experts and the continued connivance of the international community, every aspect of this ongoing tragedy is eloquently recorded and forensically analyzed. Levy's powerful journalism shows how the brutality at the heart of Israel's occupation of Palestine has found its most complete expression to date in the collective punishment of Gaza's residents.

Discusses the art's importance in viewing the world in which we live. This title looks at the relationship between art and social reality, arguing that truthful art must both reflect reality in its flaws and imperfections, and help show how change and improvement might be brought about. It focuses on the individual's need to engage with society.

The metropolis is a site of endless making and unmaking. From the attempt to imagine a city-symphony to the cinematic tradition that runs from Walter Ruttmann to Terence Davies, this book traces the idiosyncratic character of the metropolitan city from the nineteenth century to the twenty-first-century megalopolis.

These essays (and a ballad) have their origins in Terry Eagleton’s continuing engagement with the possibilities of a literary criticism that is both materialist and open to diverse currents of thought in the human sciences.Eagleton’s combative intelligence here explores the encounter between Marxism and contemporary European and American literary theory. Included are a survey of the Althusserian contribution to literary analysis; thoughts on the fraught relations between Marxism and poststructuralism; and a brilliant evocation of the affinities and tensions between Wittgenstein, Derrida and Bakhtin.Intellectual figures in this wide-ranging topography include Jacques Derrida; the radical critic Fredric Jameson; the apostle of deconstruction, Paul de Man; the liberal humanist John Bayley; Bertoit Brecht; William Empson and Pierre Machersy. The volume also includes Eagleton’s brilliant reading of Conrad’s The Secret Agent.Against the Grain is an excellent introduction to the range of Terry Eagleton’s thought and his considerable body of work. It is also a useful primer for all readers interested in the vitality of literary theory today.

Few terms in the vocabulary of politics are so confused as "imperialism." Does it refer essentially to colonial rule? Or is it primarily an economic phenomenon, connected to the export of capital? What is its relation to nationalism? Which societies, in the past or present, can be properly described as imperialist?Giovanni Arrighi resolves these ambiguities by the construction of a formal model that integrates all of them into a single structure. He shows how a coherent paradigm of imperialism can be derived from Hobson’s classic study of imperialism at the turn of the century, and illustrates it with a series of geometrical figures. The genesis of English imperialism is traced, from the seventeenth to twentieth centuries. Then the pattern of German and American imperialism are compared and contrasted. Arrighi looks at the consequences of the rise of multinational corporations for the traditional versions of the concept of imperialism and concludes that they transform its meaning.In a new afterword, Arrighi responds to his critics and sketches a reconceptualized theory of "imperialism" as a struggle for world hegemony.

In 1916, in a remote cottage on the west coast of Ireland, an unlikely collection of fugitives gathers. Ludwig Wittgenstein has run away from Cambridge and English insularity. His traveling companion, Nikolai Bakhtin (brother of the Marxist aesthetician), has been through the gamut of revolutionary sects and is now devoting himself to gluttony. Into their retreat stumble James Connolly, now on the run from the British government, and Leopold Bloom, fleeing Ulysses and his broken marriage. Being men of ideas, they begin to talk. And then, being men of principles, they begin to argue ...

A riveting expose of the US-led destruction of democratic government in Haiti.

Starting from the premise that 'everything has meaning', this title analyzes Hitchcock's films, ranging from "Rear Window" to "Psycho", and their ostensible narrative content and formal procedures to discover a proliferation of ideological and psychic mechanisms at work.

Georges Bataille (1897-1962) was a philosopher, writer and literary critic who had an enormous impact on the thinking of Foucault, Derrida and Baudrillard. This book examines Bataille's oeuvre against the backdrop of his life, showing that the essence of his life and work were defined by transience and effacement.

A comprehensive guide to the core recordings of some of the most visionary and inspiring, subversive and radical musicians on the planet. It surveys the musical universe of a particular artist, group or genre by way of a contextualizing introduction and a thumbnail guide to the most essential recordings.

Analyzing the context in which thirty years of war and revolution wracked the European continent, this title emphasizes the backwardness of the European economies and their political subjugation by aristocratic elites and their allies.

The emergence of the book was an event of world historical importance, and heralded the dawning of modernity. This title presents the history of that process, combining technological history, sociology and anthropology, with the study of modes of consciousness to root the development of printing in the ideological struggles of Western Europe.

In September 1910, the human rights activist and anti-imperialist Roger Casement uncovered an appalling catalogue of abuse: nearly 30,000 Indians had died to produce 4,000 tonnes of rubber. This title presents the story of colonial exploitation and corporate greed with contemporary resonance.

Explores the historical experiences and needs out of which the new radicalism arose. Focussing on eighteenth-century Paris, a time and place in which a modern form of society was just coming into its own, this book shows how the ideal of authenticity - of a self that could organize the individual's energy and direct it toward his own happiness.

NATO’s war on Yugoslavia in the spring of 1999 was unleashed in the name of democracy and human rights. This view was challenged by the world’s three largest countries, India, China and Russia, who saw the bombing of Serbia and Kosovo as a naked attempt to assert US dominance in an unstable world.In the West, media networks were joined by substantial sectors of left/liberal opinion in supporting the war. Nonetheless, a wide variety of figures emerged to challenge the prevailing consensus. Their work, gathered here for the first time, forms a collection of key statements and anti-war writings from some of democracy’s most eloquent dissidents—Noam Chomsky, Harold Pinter, Edward Said and many others—who provide carefully researched examinations of the real motives for the US action, dissections and critiques of the ideology of ‘humanitarian warfare’, and chartings of the unnecessary tragedy of a region laid to waste in the pursuance of Great Power politics.This reader presents some of the most important texts on NATO’s Balkan crusade and forms a major intervention in the debate on global geo-political strategy after the Cold War.

Questioning the common belief that Russia is in transition to capitalism, this book looks behind the political and ideological debates to focus on the development of the real lives of the workers. It includes an analysis of the role of trade unions in the former Soviet system.