The Shock Doctrine
The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
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4.4 • 90 Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
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, 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.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
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, 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.
Customer Reviews
Eye-opening
This book is as eye- opening as it gets. It truly shows the terrible depths our government is willing to sink to. But I think most importantly it shows how we as a society have let the profiteers hijack our country. It's time that this stuff stops. Isn't about time we stand up and say something to the Rumsfelds of the world.
There’s no plan-et B…
Eye opener… Widens your criteria and expands your definition of neoliberalism. Towards the bad. Programmed misery, anyone…? A true Damocles two edged sword waiting to fall and destroy it all. Sinister up to the hilt.
Must Read
If you believe in democracy as much as you claim, you owe it to yourself to read this book!