I liked this tweet this morning:
https://twitter.com/TaxwriterLtd/status/1335813171307798530
I offered Democracy in Chains by Nancy MacLean in reply.
Any either thoughts?
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Anything by Noam Chomsky. Start with the most recent book and work backwards. Same for Naomi Klein. Oh yeah, and this blog, obviously.
🙂
I’d recommend The Poor Had No Lawyers by Andy Wightman
Well I’d strongly recommend reading Ed Herman and Noam Chomsky’s Manufacturing Consent.
You can’t fight the power if you don’t understand what you’re up against. Noam and Ed explain how the public are again and again tricked into supporting wars and bad policy through a media and political system that self filters in service of power.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Manufacturing-Consent-Political-Economy-Media/dp/0099533111
For a god daughter, if of late teenage years, I’d recommend Pope Francis recent short book, ‘Let us Dream: The Path to a Better Future.’ It’s very readable, whilst being progressive politically and economically (with nicely memorable ideas such as Land, Lodging, Labour, as well as a commendation of UBI).
It really is a treasure. It speaks to the present period, suggesting we take a COVID pause, and rethink our future.
Lot’s of avenues to explore here – including your own Joy of Tax
I think Propaganda Blitz by David Edwards and David Cromwell (Media Lens ) has been quite prescient
https://www.medialens.org/bookshop/propaganda-blitz/
The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist
No point in being in politics unless you understand –
1) money, e.g. Money by Mary Mellor
2) what governments can do with money, e.g. The Deficit Myth by Stephanie Kelton
3) what governments can do with tax, e.g. The Joy of Tax by Richard Murphy.
Gibbons Decline and fall of the Roman Empire,
By the time she had finished the ultimate history in political manoeuvring, she will have had a few years in a job in the real world ,which is the best education for any budding politician.
Utopia for Realists: And How We Can Get There – by Rurger Bregman
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia_for_Realists
Ha-Joon Chang 23 things they don’t tell you about Capitalism
being a creep ‘The Courageous State’ by R. Murphy
one of the recent books by Yanis Varoukakis
No need to creep – and the Courageous State has a tough middle section for anyone
Orwell – Down and Out in London and Paris, Homage to Catalonia, Steinbeck -Grapes of Wrath, Tressel – Ragged Trousered Philanthropist.
I can’t argue with any of them…
I am enjoying the suggestions
Thank you everyone. Very grateful for all the suggestions for MY Christmas reading.
🙂
My son began Democracy in Chains last night and says (he has just emerged) that he slept very little as a result
I would definitely start with your excellent ‘The Courageous State” and “The Joy of Tax”
Two books by William Keegan, decades apart, but great for understanding why we are still in thrall to the ludicrous ideas of the Conservatives are:
“Mrs Thatcher’s Economic Experiment” and “Mr Osborne’s Economic Experiment: Austerity 1945-51 And 2010-“.
As a young woman, I am sure your god-daughter would find the writing of Grace Blakeley of interest, and I would recommend her immediately pre-pandemic “Stolen: How to Save the World from Financialisation”, and the very recent “The Corona Crash: How the Pandemic Will Change Capitalism”.
A daily check-in with this blog, and others, such as Progressive Pulse and Naked Capitalism and associated links should be quite sufficient!
Purely political writing is a minefield. I have my views here, but the question would be “Where to start? At the right time in most people’s lives, I would recommend the majesterial “Conservatism” by Ted Honderich.
By the time he has finished dealing with his subject, you clearly see why the acknowledged father of Tory thinking was (a) Burke !
🙂
I would gently suggest that, if Grace Blakeley read and understood the books on money and tax I recommended above, that she could make an even better job of writing about financialisation and capitalism.
I tend to agree
Marxists argue against MMT because it ha no theory of class implicit within it
I endorse your selection wholeheartedly, but I stand by my recommendation of Grace’s books, from the point oview of encouraging a wider perspective.
As for the issue of class, I am sorry that MMT is not generally supported by Marxist economists, because it is clear that the rightist rejection of MMT and it’s aim of full employment is, in itself, class-based.
I rather like this discussion of Marx and capitalism by Carlos GarcÃÂa Hernández, where he examines Marx’s dictum that “any economic system based on private ownership of the means of production is doomed to disappear”. He finds the flaw in this, and proposes a new kind of socialism – fiat socialism.
https://gimms.org.uk/2020/12/06/paradox-of-the-two-knights/
It’s a very interesting proposal even if you don’t agree with his view of the EU (Spain should get out pronto).
Brideshead Revisited know your enemies I couldn;t believe what I was reading at 19 years old. when they went to London to drive the buses & I;d thought they were off to join the strike
Also I think a bit of economics is good preparation for politics
Tim Jackson Prosperity without growth
Kate Raworth Doughnut Economics
good luck to her
Tim and Kate both very good
Bridehead? I’d watch it….even now
Doughnut Economics by Kate Raworth
Ut’s second recommendation
Two suggestions. To understand the deeper political foundations of why we are here now, first:
CB MacPherson, ‘The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism’ (Oxford: OUP, 2011). First published 1962, but republished after the crash because of its significance, I think.
Second, to understand where capitalism is going, and including the current revolution’s precursor, the dot.com bust, with the best account of the effects of both I know:
Shoshanna Zuboff, ‘The Age of Surveillance Capitalism’ (London: Profile, 2019)
I really must read the second…
Poor old MacPherson …..cruelly dismissed by the devastating delivery of your omission….
He died in 1987, so I guess he will not be too concerned.
It is worth reading! Like Skinner, he is an especially illuminating intellectual historian. The full title, incidentally is ‘The Political Theory of Possessive Individualism: Hobbes and Locke’.
Zuboff’s is hard work but important. There are some good summaries of the book out there. Alternatively, Rana Faroohar’s Do No Evil is excellent on the Silicon Valley giants and how they have abused their power. Important for younger folk who are over enamoured with technology.
From a different angle, Amartya Sen’s Development as Freedom makes a powerful case for the role of the state in providing basic services. Also Good Economics for Hard Times from Esther Duflo and Amijit Banerjee. Looking at ‘developing’ countries helps understand where we have come from (and what we can slip back to), the destructive role of divisive politicians and the importance of strong institutions (hard to build and easily undermined).
Democracy for Sale: Dark Money and Dirty Politics by Peter Geoghagan
Should be at least one book addressing the climate crisis.
Perhaps Naomi Klein – This Changes Everything.
I wasn’t convinced that was her best, to be honest
Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 by Hunter S Thompson. Apart from being hilariously funny and irreverent, it’s the story of how a hard right demagogue can gain political power at the expense of a liberal candidate by the systematic use of lies and black propaganda and tacit support of a supine press corps. Makes uncomfortable reading in the light of what we know has transpired since.
Yanis Varoufakis – talking to my daughter
A Brief History of Capitalism
Good one
‘The Deficit Myth’ By Stephanie Kelton has got to be a must have (fiscal/macro policy based on facts, not received wisdom)
Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea – Mark Blyth (economic/macro policy – put simply, austerity does NOT work)
Debunking Economics – Steve Keen (economics – mud in your eye for ‘orthodox’ economic thinking)
Debt: The First 5000 Years – David Graeber (RIP) (human history as opposed to recent financial sector history that supplanted it)
The Precariat : The New Dangerous Underclass – Guy Standing (the political consequences of state retrenchment on its people and the consequence’s for politicians’ themselves.)
Killing the Host – Michael Hudson (the behaviour of the Financial Sector – how wealth is moved around and not really ‘made’ – someone has to suffer a loss.)
Traders, Guns and Money / Extreme Money – Satyajit Das (Why we really do need to regulate the banks – an insider’s view from the author of many a derivative that brought down the financial system in 2008)
This Blessed Plot – Hugo Young (the UK and Europe – why did it go wrong? – well, here you’ll find out that BREXIT was a risk from day one)..
Tragedy & Challenge – Industrial Decline and BREXIT – Tom Brown (how the UK become so………….crap).
Dancing with Dogma: Britain under Thatcherism – Ian Gilmour (an insider’s view of the birth of Thatcherism – still a lethal stab in the back of this odious mantra today)
The Five Giants: A Biography of the Welfare State: Nicholas Timmins (the commitments we made after the war and how we have been trying to shed them ever since ).
Gross Domestic Problem – The Politics Behind GDP – Lorenzo Fioramonti (everything we measure is wrong)
Capital in the 21st Century – Thomas Piketty (it’s got to be done!! – where has all the money gone? – this tells you using an unprecedented longitudinal study).
The Spirit Level: Why Equality is Better for Everyone – Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett (the human consequences of marketized societies and accepting inequality as a ‘fact of life’).
The Princes of the Yen – Richard A Weiner ( a story about the unreported war between those who wish to issue money as debt (credit) versus those who want a mixture with more sovereign base (‘real’) money and a central bank that went rogue and its consequences – or the consequences of leaving money creation to market based models or the market itself.
License to be Bad: How Economics Corrupted Us – Jonathan Aldred (a thorough and forensic debunking of every piece of neo-liberal crap you have heard of – deserves to be more widely known – less philosophical, more direct than Michael Sandel’s ‘What Money Can’t Buy’).
The Economy under Mrs Thatcher: 1979-1990 – Christopher Johnson (asserts and proves once and for all that the Tories love debt and are the party of debt contrary to what they want you to believe – takes the gloss of Maggie).
The Age of Surveillance Capitalism – Shoshana Zuboff (anyone wanting to go into progressive politics needs to get a grip on the internet and its power to subvert democracy).
Films:
Social Media:
The Great Hack – what really went on with Cambridge Analytica (see Zuboff above).
Screened Out – the impact of social media on young people – we should be worried.
Social Dilemma – a warning from those who helped create Facebook, Twitter, etc., and how extreme capitalism has social media in its grip opening up some very uncomfortable questions for politicians and would be politicians.
Economics/Finance/Policy:
‘The Mayfair Set’ (Adam Curtis, BBC) – as far as I am concerned the best informed history of Britain’s economic woes in the 1970’s that has ever been produced by anyone.
‘Inside Job’ (Charles Ferguson) – this is the only account of the 2008 crash that you need.
‘The Flaw’ – (David Sington) – about one of the real social problems facing modern society – a precipitous drop in income in Western societies for working people, opening up the possibility of the gap being filled by debt/credit and its attendant weaknesses.
That should keep anyone going for a while…
I think she should also read ‘ Putin’s People’ by Catherine Belton – the next generation of politicians need to be wise to where inflows of cash come from.
Pickety is a bit heavy going but if she can take it in in short stretches she is doing well.
I like PSR suggestion of: Debt: The First 5000 Years — David Graeber
I recently suggested it to my 18yo daughter to read.
The book should aid a young person to understand, money, cultures and options for society.
A good foundation for any would be politician.
I think I’ve now got a good half a dozen options for my next book to read 🙂
I gave my 18 year old that book – he loved it
The book that really changed it for me was.
How The World Works by Noam Chomsky.
It lifted the veil from my eyes and answered lots of nagging questions.
“Why are so many developing nations run by dictatorships and not democracies?”
It’s easy to read but be warned, it’s conclusions are very depressing .
The world will never quite seem the same again and not in a good way!!!!!
Better to know than live in ignorance, I guess????
What book changed me?
Small is Beautiful by Fritz Schumacher – way back in the 70s
I have been a green ever since (small g)
But not a book for this list
Also Limits to Growth by the Club of Rome 1972 and Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring for a good grounding in historical green thinking.
I guess that all politics comes down to the distribution of resources.
Who gets access and who does not.
With this in mind, then I would also include
The Deficit Myth.
Stephanie Kelton.
It shows what is possible.
New graphic novel The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by the Rickard Sisters. Great Christmas present.
That sounds interesting….
Tony Crosland by Susan Crosland – It’s a rattling good story that gives a vivid insight into a political career.
Crosland was an idealist but pragmatic too. He was a socialist intellectual who created comprehensive schools and later housing associations. As Foreign Secretary he promoted détente with the Soviet Union but died in office at the age of 58.
I read the book in the early 80’s soon after it was published four of five years after Crosland’s death while he was Foreign Secretary. For the first time I thought – that’s why people want to go into politics. The biography is by his wife – and it gradually emerges that she adored him.
Anther book from long ago in my past
I recommend Victor Frankl “Mans search for meaning”. Read it and you can consider yourself in one way completely formed. You will also never be fully diminished if your arguments are wrong. I also recommend “Spartacus” by Lewis Grassic Gibbon. The struggle against evil is constant and you will understand 90% of all governments that have ever been. Read widely including fiction as politics and economics rest on human behaviours. Hillbilly Elegies by J D Vance is a good example of the changing political economy of the US in the last 25 years and very accessible.
It must be thirty years since I read Victor Frankl
That might need re-reading
Thank you
I’ve just finished reading ‘Divided’ by Tim Marshall.
Its both a timely and exhilarating read about why we are living in an age of walls.
I suggest the young lady should speak to some old trade unionists who’ll remember when they could call a strike and bring employers to the negotiting table.That was politics in action.
It waould then need to be explained that many thousands of folk were engaged in politics at the grass roots. As the number of activists has declined, so too has the calibre of politician.
This process has been ongoing since the 1970s and the result is the political leaders we have today.
When the aspiring politics student hears some of the tales from the “auld yins”, she may realise that politics is a dirty game, for which you need the thickest of skins, and , if you’re honest and truthful, you’ve almost no chance of reaching the top.
I would say Honourable Friends by Caroline Lucas and cast another vote for The Courageous State
Along with The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, The Vote by Paul Foot the centuries struggle for democracy, then some of the suggestions above about the decline/destruction of democracy.
I would like to add The Darker Nations by Vijay Prashad, Jane Gleason-White’s Double Entry and Lewis H Lapham’s Age of Folly. All three have had a big impact on me recently.
Tell me more about Double Entry?
Double Entry: Not much fancier than the title suggests. An accessible and rich account of the history of double entry book-keeping. Some fascinating nuggets in the tale of how a C14th practice still dominates today. She brings it up to date and expands on it in the follow up, Six Capitals.
I will take a look
http://www.janegleesonwhite.com/about
http://www.janegleesonwhite.com/double
Thanks
I have now ordered it
She looks like a very interesting person.
Glad to hear that. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. I’ve been singing her praises for a while so happy to bring her to a wider audience
For a natural science perspective on why we are where we are I would recommend Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond. It’s ground level economics but it explains most of the disparities in the world and what factors really shape things.
Here’s a very recent one
How To Be a Liberal, by Ian Dunt
Is it good?
I like Dunt, swearing and all
Ive read it and would thoroughly recommend it. Its a serious piece of well researched history – no swearing or comedy! Goes back to the English civil war, French Revolution, American revolution amongst others to really dig into what liberalism means. He also looks at the main writers on the subject such as Mill and Burke as well as Hayek and Adam Smith.
Too often I fear liberalism is now conflated with neo-liberalism. For anyone who wants to understand what liberalism really means and how it might be different from other flavours of politics, I’d thoroughly recommend it.
At the risk being a little flippant, there are a couple of television series that provide great insight into politics as practiced rather than the theory in books – House of Cards (the original) for the dark view, and of course Yes Minister for a lighter version. Plus In the Thick of It for the comedic version. Those I know in the political and civil service world would I think recommend them
All three series recommended
I may well add Dunt to my Christmas reading
I would add:
Jason Hickel – The Divide and Less is More
Yes…
I could also add:
Reimaging Capitalism — Rebecca Henderson
Alpha City — Rowland Atkinson
Hate Inc. — Matt Tiabbi
Competition is Killing Us — Michelle Meagher
History thieves — Ian Cobain
The Inner Level — Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett
The Value of Everything — Mariana Mazzucato
Factfulness — Hans Rosling
Propaganda blitz — David Edwards and David Cromwell
The Rise of Meritocracy — Michael Young
Winner Takes All — Anand Giridharadas
The Finance Curse — Nicholas Shaxson
Moneyland — Olivier Bullough
Good Times Bad Times — Sir John Hills
Capitalism: A Ghost Story — Arundhati Roy
House of Debt — Atif Mian and Amir Sufi
Scarcity : why having too little means so much — Eldar Shafir and Sendhil Mullainathan
Economics: The users guide — Ha Joon Chan
Thanks
Naomi Klein – The Shock Doctrine
Thomas Piketty – Capital and Ideology
Michael Sandel – The Tyranny of Merit and Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do?
Stephanie Kelton – The Deficit Myth
Unless I missed it, no one seems to be suggesting the masters of the craft. So anything by either or JMK or JKG.
JKG is the easier
His prose is both more elegant and way more readable. But JMK is worth a good try.
I’ve done quite a lot of JMK
I can’t say it’s an easy read
Wot, no Plato, Machiavelli, Smith??
I would say, note all the suggestions, then ignore them and follow your own instincts, inclinations, interests, hates, likes, despairs and hopes. Do research, question everything, accept nothing (or very little) on trust just because the author is famous – they are always trying to sell you something even if it’s just ideas – read history, how did we get here, a small group out of Africa now dominating the globe, or so we think, and just how different (or, in reality, alike) are we all (so read something on Genomics) and yet still there is racism, othering, war, poverty, famine, inequality, and global warming which may end human dominance, and all of these, at base, political decisions made by (mostly) men, self-absorbed and lacking real political imagination to make things different.
I firmly believe we need more women in politics, women such as Jacinda Adern for example, or dare I say, Nicola Sturgeon (a great reader herself) and other female leaders whose humanity and clarity has shone through during the current crisis. The world could perhaps be a much better place with fewer macho (and deluded) men in charge.
I don’t know if anyone’s written a book about it.
Reading through all these, just a touch of bias to the left?!! I’d hope we’d be offering a slightly broader and more heterodox view of politics and economics. Though I would not inflict Ayn Rand on anyone.
It also says to me that politics is inseparable from economics, society and the environment, so reading needs to cover all three (and more).
Eric Beinhocker deserves a mention and his book The Origin of Wealth would be one of my top 5. One of the few people who brings in complexity and systems thinking as well as the environment, technology and inequality. An American but who has lived in the UK for many years. For a bigger picture and less overtly political view, highly recommended.
Steve Keens ‘Taking the Con out of Economics by Keen’ with its comic book form is also good fun
Varoufakis “Adults in the Room”. I thought when I bought it that It was thick and probably likely to be very boring but turned out to be very vreadable. Quite frightening insights into the operation of the EU and the power dynamics in Europe.
Amazed these two haven’t crept on to the list
Burned by Sam McBride
The story of the Northern Ireland “Cash for ash” scandal. I found it a page-turner, but like 1984, a dystopian warning that what we saw in one corner of the UK is now the norm
Why We Get the Wrong Politicians by Isabel Hardman.
As a biologist, I was impressed by the strength of selective pressure against knowledge or competence
It would partly depend on in what way they were interested – ideas and policy, or ‘politics’ politics as well.
To the many excellent suggestions, I would add:
Peter Frase, Four Futures – highly though-provoking, and short.
Josh Ryan-Collins et al, Rethinking the Economics of Land and Housing – excellent on that very important topic, I think.
For the political nerd interested in ‘politics’, I would suggest the following, though admittedly they are from yesteryear:
Denis Healey, The Time of My Life
Edmund Dell, The Chancellors
Also a coruscating, gripping, and highly entertaining read is Fintan O’Toole, Ship of Fools: How Stupidity and Corruption Sank the Celtic Tiger.
I rate the last, especially
It would partly depend on in what way they were interested – ideas and policy, or ‘politics’ politics as well.
To the many excellent suggestions, I would add:
Peter Frase, Four Futures – highly thought-provoking, and short.
Josh Ryan-Collins et al, Rethinking the Economics of Land and Housing – excellent on that very important topic, I think.
For the political nerd interested in ‘politics’, I would suggest the following, though admittedly they are from yesteryear:
Denis Healey, The Time of My Life
Edmund Dell, The Chancellors
Also a coruscating, gripping, and highly entertaining read is Fintan O’Toole, Ship of Fools: How Stupidity and Corruption Sank the Celtic Tiger.
The Prince by Machiavelli- best on politics
The Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels- best kick up the pants
Our Final Century by Martin Rees- best for perspective
Hero with a thousand faces by Joseph Campbell- best for helping find your own way
Ha-Joon Chang repeatedly sidesteps the effects of cheap labour migration, undermining his work.
Great recommendations here.
From an American point of view, there can be no progress against the Constitution, which is a sacred and spiritual text in this country. Too often, the Constitution is wielded as a weapon against progress and change. But it doesn’t have to be like this. If you want to fight for progress and change with the Constitution in hand, I recommend the books by leading constitutional scholar Akhil Amar. A great starting point is
Akhil Amar: “America’s Constitution: A Biography”.
If you want to watch a video to get an idea of his point of view see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j3XKx8e1ZU0