Zizek analyzes the end of the world at the hands of the “four riders of the apocalypse.” The underlying premise of the book is a simple one: the global capitalist system is approaching an apocalyptic zero-point. Its four riders of the apocalypse are the ecological crisis, the consequences of the biogenetic revolution, the imbalances within the system itself (problems with intellectual property, the forthcoming struggle for raw materials, food and water), and the explosions of social divisions...
Why are cities centres of power? A sociological analysis of urban politics Why are some cities more powerful than others? What makes a capital city different from others in a nation state? In this brilliant survey of urban politics, leading sociologist Göran Therborn looks at what makes a metropolis. Through a historical lens and a global perspective, Therborn questions received assumptions about the source of urban power and how it manifests itself. He looks at the way that architecture and...
Tidings of a shrinking middle class in one part of the world and its expansion in another absorb our attention, but seldom do we question the category itself. We Have Never Been Middle Class proposes that the middle class is an ideology. Tracing this ideology up to the age of financialisation, it exposes the fallacy in the belief that we can all ascend or descend as a result of our aspirational and precautionary investments in property and education. Ethnographic accounts from Germany, Israel,...
A radical history of squatting and the struggle for the right to remake the city The Autonomous City is the first popular history of squatting as practised in Europe and North America. Alex Vasudevan retraces the struggle for housing in Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen, Detroit, Hamburg, London, Madrid, Milan, New York, and Vancouver. He looks at the organisation of alternative forms of housing—from Copenhagen’s Freetown Christiana to the squats of the Lower East Side—as well as the official...
Judith Butler’s new book shows how an ethic of nonviolence must be connected to a broader political struggle for social equality. Further, it argues that nonviolence is often misunderstood as a passive practice that emanates from a calm region of the soul, or as an individualist ethical relation to existing forms of power. But, in fact, nonviolence is an ethical position found in the midst of the political field. An aggressive form of nonviolence accepts that hostility is part of our psychic...
Becoming the primary caregiver for a spouse, family member, friend, or loved one can be a tremendously rewarding and equally challenging experience.How do you know if you’re the right person to be a caregiver? What important conversations should you have beforehand to make sure that you’re starting off on the right foot? What aspects of care should you manage personally and how do you assemble the best support team to handle the rest? How do you deal with doctors, hospitals,...
The Grasinski Girls were working-class Americans of Polish descent, born in the 1920s and 1930s, who created lives typical of women in their day. They went to high school, married, and had children. For the most part, they stayed home to raise their children. And they were happy doing that. They took care of their appearance and their husbands, who took care of them. Like most women of their generation, they did not join the women's movement, and today they either reject or shy away from...
Ob Extremreporter Jenke von Wilmsdorff in der gefährlichsten Stadt der Welt unterwegs ist, oder von Afrika nach Lampedusa mit einem Flüchtlingskahn übersetzt – von Ängsten lässt er sich nicht beherrschen. Das hat er in seinen bekannten Experimenten, in denen er sich riskantesten körperlichen und geistigen Herausforderungen stellte, immer wieder bewiesen. Doch das war nicht immer so, ganz im Gegenteil. Der Journalist kennt die Ängste, die ausbremsen und eingrenzen, die Neues im Leben verhindern...
In a moment of rising authoritarianism, climate crisis, and ever more exploitative forms of neoliberal capitalism, there is a compelling and urgent need for radical paradigms of thought and action. Through interviews with key revolutionary scholars, Bhandar and Ziadah present a thorough discussion of how anti-racist, anti-capitalist feminisms are crucial to building effective political coalitions. Collectively, these interviews with leading scholars including Angela Y. Davis, Silvia Federici,...
What if we took sex out of the box marked ‘special’, either the worst or best thing that a human person can experience, and considered it within the complexity of reality? In this extraordinary book, despite longstanding tabloid-style sexual preoccupations with villains and victims, shame and virtue, JoAnn Wypijewski does exactly that.From the HIV crisis to the paedophile priest panic, Woody Allen to Brett Kavanaugh, child pornography to Abu Ghraib, Wypijewski takes the most famous sex panics of...
Die Lesebücher der Sozialen Demokratie bieten die Möglichkeit, sich den Themenfeldern selbständig anzunähern. Sie sind klar in der Sprache, fundiert in der Analyse und bieten Zugänge aus Theorie und Praxis. In knapper und verständlicher Form finden Sie hier eine solide Einführung zu den großen Linien und Kontroversen der einzelnen Seminarthemen. Die Lesebücher eignen sich nicht nur zur Vor- und Nachbereitung der Seminare, sondern gerade auch für eine eigenständige Annäherung an das jeweilige...