Publication Type. More Filters. View 2 excerpts, cites background. The crisis in thinking about the crisis. View 1 excerpt, cites background. The Roots of Vampire Capitalism. Until the s, the impact of two world wars, the s Great Depression, the rise of Soviet Communism, the power of organized labour and the national basis of economic life centred partly on … Expand.
A Canadian's Perspective on Disaster Capitalism. Was Nicholas alive, dead, or injured in the earthquake in Nepal? Discovery or uncovering has to do with what already existSj actually or virtually it was therefore certain to happen sooner or later.
Highly Influenced. View 3 excerpts, cites background. A Tale of Two Cities is saturated with violence: execution, mutilation, rape, and mass slaughter abound; broken, discarded, forgotten, nameless bodies are everywhere. Thinking beyond the liberal peace: From utopia to heterotopias. Beyond the spectacle: slow-moving disasters in post-Haiyan Philippines.
For all its insight and timeliness, the turn toward biopolitical analysis in the last decade of critical theory and cultural studies has been paradoxically hindered by its historical trigger, the war … Expand. Liquid Modernity. Liquid Modernity Polity Press. Beyond Capital. The ongoing shock treatments around the world culminated in a disturbing realization at the World Economic Forum. For many years, people had believed that stability and peace were necessary for steady economic growth.
The Forum, however, was puzzled by a global trend that seemed to buck this common knowledge. The world had been rocked by a near-constant series of shocks, beginning with the stock market crash of and the terrorist attacks on September 11, Despite that, the global economy was growing at an incredible rate. The logical conclusion was that the economy no longer relies on stability—quite the opposite, in fact.
Corporate profits all over the world are actually increasing in the face of sustained conflict and repeated disasters. This conclusion correlates directly with the rise of the massive, multipurpose disaster capitalism complex of the s, where massive contracts were granted to private firms in every industry from fuel to construction—and, of course, security and defense.
However, by its very nature, shock eventually wears off. Lebanon similarly rejected foreign aid—and the economic shock therapy attached to it—in Despite being deeply in debt and desperate for funds, Lebanese economists and some political leaders recognized that all of the profit would go to the disaster capitalism complex, while all of the hardship would fall upon their own people. General strikes and protests erupted all over the country in response to the proposed shock therapy, and the economy came to a screeching halt.
However, even as people recover, they face daunting obstacles in reclaiming their countries. Perhaps the biggest problem of all is that they now have to rebuild entire communities from the rubble that economic shock therapy left behind, and they have to do it largely without foreign aid. For example, Thailand was hit by a tsunami similar to the one that devastated Sri Lanka. However, unlike Sri Lanka, the Thai people rebuilt their own settlements and fishing communities, often within mere months.
Therefore, rebuilding their own communities is an expression of their personal power and a rejection of that helplessness. The reconstruction efforts also wholly reject the endless quest for clean slates upon which to build model civilizations. They make do with whatever tools and materials they can salvage, and their only ideologies are community and practicality.
Unlock the full book summary of The Shock Doctrine by signing up for Shortform. Shock therapy is traditionally known as a treatment for mental disorders. It was pioneered in the s and s by Dr. Ewen Cameron. In his day, Dr. Cameron was a renowned psychiatrist—for a time, he was even the president of the World Psychiatric Association. However, Dr. Cameron developed and practiced treatments that we would now consider torture. He also gave his patients massive doses of stimulants, depressants, or hallucinogens, and subjected them to isolation and sensory deprivation.
In short, he tried to break their minds in any way he could. He believed that, once their current thoughts and memories were wiped away, he could easily reprogram his patients with new, healthy thought patterns.
Rather, he despised those who sought a mix of capitalism and government intervention, such as social democrats or Keynesians described below. John Maynard Keynes was a hugely influential economist in the early s. Keynesian economics is based on increasing demand in the economy by increasing government spending and economic intervention, while at the same time cutting taxes.
In simple terms, this school of thought suggests bolstering the economy by giving average people more spending money. Keynesians favored capitalism in some aspects of the economy but demanded government-controlled education, government ownership Soon, copies of The Brick were on the desks of those military officers who would be running the new government.
It called for deregulation, privatization, and few-to-no social programs run by the government. The economists assured Pinochet that the market would naturally govern itself, and would find its proper balance shortly after he withdrew government interference. These were exactly the same ideas that the Chicago School had tried to implement peacefully, only to be soundly rejected. However, this time, anyone who would have resisted was either dead, imprisoned, or terrified into submission.
Their extreme free-market experiment was a disaster. Inflation skyrocketed, jobs were lost as the market was flooded with imports, and starvation quickly spread. Even Pinochet himself seemed concerned about how badly his people were This is the best summary of The Shock Doctrine I've ever read. I learned all the main points in just 20 minutes. Letelier published a highly controversial article detailing all of the above points.
Less than a month later, on September 21, , he was assassinated with a car bomb. Chicago economists believed that the market had to be absolutely free of what they called distortions , such as social programs and government regulations. This meant that the juntas needed to crush not just an opposing ideology, but the dominant ideology of the Southern Cone. They did so with scientific precision and religious fervor, using a combination of Trying to implement free-market policies would practically guarantee that Thatcher who was already losing popularity would be soundly defeated in the next election.
While the conflict was trivial from a military standpoint, from a political standpoint it was exactly what Thatcher needed to Solidarity turned to the IMF for help, which by this point was firmly controlled by Chicago School economists.
In other words, another perfect target for shock therapy. Meanwhile, the US government congratulated Solidarity on its decisive victory against the Communist party, but still insisted that the Polish people would still have to pay the debts they had inherited from their former oppressors.
While Poland was being denied aid on all fronts, Jeffrey Sachs began working as an advisor for Solidarity. In the s a new generation of freedom fighters picked up the Charter. This younger generation was fearless, militant, and ready to do whatever it took to topple the white supremacist state.
They marched and protested relentlessly, refusing to back down even when met with tear gas and bullets. One key player in this struggle was Nelson Mandela. He was a South African revolutionary who was imprisoned in on charges of treason. He spent 27 years in prison, but never backed down from his beliefs or gave up hope that the country could be free. He was, in many ways, both the face and the heart of the ANC. In , Mandela wrote a simple two-sentence letter to his supporters outside the prison stating that the ANC was still committed to nationalizing banks, mines, and monopoly industries for the good of the people, and that it always would be.
Officially, it was a policy statement from the ANC. However, in reality, it was reassurance that he was still fighting after almost three decades in prison. On February 11, , just two weeks after sending that letter, Nelson Mandela walked free.
People all over South Africa celebrated his release, Gorbachev was unwilling to go to those extremes, but Boris Yeltsin—one of his political opponents—had no such reservations.
Three painful shocks followed that fateful G7 summit: one political, one economic, and one psychological. Boris Yeltsin, who by had abandoned the Communist party and run as an independent, was the current president of Russia.
However, his power was overshadowed by Gorbachev, who was president of the entire Soviet Union. Thus, in order to realize his dream of becoming the Russian Pinochet, Yeltsin needed to increase his own power and get Gorbachev out of the way.
His opportunity came in August of , when the deposed Communist party unsuccessfully tried to depose him. A group of party members drove tanks up to the Russian parliament building and threatened to attack the democratically-elected parliament. Yeltsin, along with a large group of Russians determined to protect their new democracy, faced down the tanks from the steps of the Parliament building.
Eventually, the tanks turned and drove away without harming anyone. We're the most efficient way to learn the most useful ideas from a book. Ever feel a book rambles on, giving anecdotes that aren't useful?
Often get frustrated by an author who doesn't get to the point? We cut out the fluff, keeping only the most useful examples and ideas. We also re-organize books for clarity, putting the most important principles first, so you can learn faster. Other summaries give you just a highlight of some of the ideas in a book.
We find these too vague to be satisfying. At Shortform, we want to cover every point worth knowing in the book. Learn nuances, key examples, and critical details on how to apply the ideas. You want different levels of detail at different times. That's why every book is summarized in three lengths:. They still viewed Russia as an enemy—even though the conflict was officially over—so they had no interest in helping.
In one sense, simple free-market ideology had held back aid to Russia. Basically, with the Soviet Union gone, capitalism had a monopoly on the world.
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