The Anti-Capitalist Resistance Comic Book
From the WTO to the G20
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
In recent years the world has borne witness to numerous confrontations, many of them violent, between protesters and authorities at pivotal gatherings of the world’s political and economic leaders. While police and the media are quick to paint participants as anarchistic thugs, accurate accounts of their ubsequent treatment at the hands of authorities often go untold—as well as the myriad stories of corporate and government corruption, greed, exploitation, and abuse of power that inspired such protests in the first place. In this startling, politically astute graphic novel, Gord Hill (The 500 Years of Resistance Comic Book) documents the history of capitalism as well as anti-capitalist and anti-globalization movements around the world, from the 1999 “Battle of Seattle” against the World Trade Organization to the Toronto G20 summit in 2010. The dramatic accounts trace the global origins of public protests against those in power, then depict recent events based on eyewitness testimony; they go far to contradict the myths of violence perpetrated by authorities, and instead paint a vivid and historically accurate picture of activists who bring the crimes of governments and multinationals to the world’s attention.
As the “Occupy” movements around the world unfold, The Anti-Capitalist Resistance Comic Book is a deft, eye-opening look at the new class warfare, and those brave enough to wage the battle.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Contextualizing recent civil conflicts, from the "Battle of Seattle" to the G20 in Toronto, by looking at the history of the anticapitalism resistance movement, Hill's book provides perspective on contemporary examples of civil disobedience. After beginning with a brief history of capitalism, Hill gives a rather matter-of-fact account of locations, dates, and casualties, as well as the strategies and tactics employed both by protestors and law enforcement. Whereas this approach worked quite well in The 500 Years of Resistance Comic Book, which details indigenous resistance in the face of colonization, here it is not as successful. Indeed, the book's promise to provide a "startling" and "dramatic" account of the contemporary confrontations it describes is true only for those readers who aren't aware that those who protest have deeply held convictions, that police sometimes resort to excessive force when made to look incompetent, and that capitalism is a system in which the many are dictated to by the few. Hill is a talented illustrator, with a perspective as an activist himself that affords him a unique window into the events he is describing. However, the book seems intended for the kind of reader that won't bother to buy it, and to underestimate the one that will.
