![]() |
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
|
Your cart is empty |
||
|
Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political activism > General
With this timely commitment, Jacques Bidet unites the theories of arguably the world's two greatest emancipatory political thinkers. In this far-reaching and decisive text, Bidet examines Marxian and Foucauldian criticisms of capitalist modernity. For Marx, the intersection between capital and the market is crucial, while for Foucault, the organizational aspects of capital are what really matter. According to Marx, the ruling class is identified with property; with Foucault, it is the managers who hold power and knowledge that rule. Bidet identifies these two sides of capitalist modernity as 'market' and 'organization', showing that each leads to specific forms of social conflict; against exploitation and austerity, over wages and pensions on the one hand, and against forms of 'medical' and work-based discipline, control of bodies and prisons on the other. Bidet's impetus and clarity however serve a greater purpose: uniting two souls of critical social theory, in order to overcome what has become an age-long separation between the 'old left' and the 'new social movements'.
The courageous few Zimbabweans who dared to stand up to President Robert Mugabe and his Zanu PF party in the election campaigns of 2008 were persecuted, assaulted and in many cases brutally murdered. Should I Forgive? is based on the experiences of a young wife and mother, Nyasha Gapa, who was raped and beaten for daring to campaign for Morgan Tsvangirai's opposition party MDC (Movement for Democratic Change). While many of the details of the story have been changed to protect Nyasha's family and friends from further violence, all the events related in this tragic story, from the sadistic beating of Nyasha's husband to their flight to South Africa, their exploitation by a white farmer, the racist persecution the refugees experienced there and the catastrophic fire, actually happened. Should I Forgive? is a heartbreaking story of staggering courage, endurance and love.
This provides with a stunningly comprehensive compilation of materials, from public statements to engaged reportage, essays focused on analysis and strategy, and documentation of the visual culture of the movement. Neither a narrative of the events nor an observer analysis but an assembly of primary sources - the 'raw materials' that developed within the movement. Created by two New York-based Occupy movement participants, Amy Schrager Lang and Daniel Lang/Levitsky, the book includes contributions from a wealth of protagonists, including Barbara Kingsolver, Naomi Klein, Sara Paretsky, Lemony Snicket, and Staughton Lynd. This collection will be essential in classrooms in a wide variety of the social sciences - sociology, history, political science - as well as in the humanities and in interdisciplinary fields like American Studies.
During the 1990s, as widespread perception spread of declining state sovereignty, activists and social movement organizations began to form transnational networks and coalitions to pressure both intergovernmental organizations and national governments on a variety of issues. Research has focused on the formation of these transnational networks, campaigns, and coalitions; their objectives, strategies and tactics; and their impact. Yet the issue of how participation in transnational networks influences national level mobilization has been little analyzed. What effects has the experience of social movement organizations at the transnational scale had for the development at the national scale? This volume addresses this significant gap in the literature on transnational collective action by building on approaches that stress the multi-level characteristics of transnational relations. Edited by noted Latin American politics scholar Eduardo Silva, the contributions focus on four distinct themes to which the empirical chapters contribute: Building a Transnational Relations Approach to Multi-Level Interaction; Transnational Relations and Left Governments; North-South and South-South Linkages; and The "Normalization" of Labor. Bridging the Divide will add considerably to empirical knowledge of the ways in which transnational and national factors dynamically interact in Latin America. Additionally, the mid-range theorizing of the empirical chapters, along with the mix of positive and negative cases, raises new hypotheses and questions for further study.
Recently, American youth have demonstrated en masse about a variety of issues ranging from economic injustice and massive inequality to drastic cuts in education and public services. Youth in Revolt chronicles the escalating backlash against dissent and peaceful protest while exposing a lack of governmental concern for society's most vulnerable populations. Henry Giroux carefully documents a wide range of phenomena, from pervasive violent imagery in our popular culture to educational racism, censorship, and the growing economic inequality we face. He challenges the reader to consider the hope for democratic renewal embodied by Occupy Wall Street and other emerging movements. Encouraging a capacity for critical thought, compassion, and informed judgment, Giroux's analysis allows us to rethink the very nature of what democracy means and what it might look like in the United States and beyond.
Recently, American youth have demonstrated en masse about a variety of issues ranging from economic injustice and massive inequality to drastic cuts in education and public services. Youth in Revolt chronicles the escalating backlash against dissent and peaceful protest while exposing a lack of governmental concern for society's most vulnerable populations. Henry Giroux carefully documents a wide range of phenomena, from pervasive violent imagery in our popular culture to educational racism, censorship, and the growing economic inequality we face. He challenges the reader to consider the hope for democratic renewal embodied by Occupy Wall Street and other emerging movements. Encouraging a capacity for critical thought, compassion, and informed judgment, Giroux's analysis allows us to rethink the very nature of what democracy means and what it might look like in the United States and beyond.
Augusto Boal saw theatre as a mirror to the world, one that we can reach into to change our reality. This book, The Theatre of the Oppressed, is the foundation to 'Forum Theatre', a popular radical form practised across the world. Boal's techniques allowed the people to reclaim theatre, providing forums through which they could imagine and enact social and political change. Rejecting the Aristotelian ethic, which he believed allowed the State to remain unchallenged, he broke down the wall between actors and audience, the two sides coming together, the audience becoming the 'spect-actors'. Written in 1973, while in exile from the Brazilian government after the military coup-d'etat, this is a work of subversion and liberation, which shows that only the oppressed are able to free themselves.
'Mind-blowing, gut-wrenching, shocking' - Chris Atkins 'Gripping . . . this is one not to miss' - Irish Times For two years, Donna McLean lived a life of bliss with her boyfriend, Carlo. But her great love story wasn't just built on lies - it was one. Because Carlo wasn't a bike-obsessed Italian locksmith at all; he was a British police officer, part of a unit that had worked undercover for years to infiltrate activist groups across the country. More than twenty of those officers deliberately targeted women and duped them into relationships, posing as socialists, environmental campaigners and union reps, before vanishing without a trace. Small Town Girl is Donna's shattering story of a life turned upside down overnight, and her reclamation of a truth that was shamelessly buried by those who should be protecting the most vulnerable in society.
Radical activist, thinker, comrade of Walter Rodney, Andaiye was one of the Caribbean's most important political voices. For the first time, her writings are published in one collection. Through essays, speeches, letters and journal entries, Andaiye's thinking on the intersections of gender, race, class and power are profoundly articulated, Caribbean histories emerge, and stories from a life lived at the barricades are revealed. We learn about the early years of the Working People's Alliance, the meaning and impact of the murder of Walter Rodney and the fall of the Grenada Revolution. Throughout, we bear witness to Andaiye's acute understanding of politics rooted in communities and the daily lives of so-called ordinary people. Featuring forewords by Clem Seecharan, Robin DG Kelley and Honor Ford-Smith, these texts will become vital tools in our own struggles to 'overturn the power relations which are embedded in every unequal facet of our lives'.
Groundswell: Grassroots Feminist Activism in Postwar America offers an essential perspective on the post-1960 movement for women's equality and liberation. Tracing the histories of feminist activism, through the National Organization of Women (NOW) chapters in three different locations: Memphis, Tennessee, Columbus, Ohio, and San Francisco, California, Gilmore explores how feminist identity, strategies, and goals were shaped by geographic location. Departing from the usual conversation about the national icons and events of second wave feminism, this book concentrates on local histories, and asks the questions that must be answered on the micro level: Who joined? Who did not? What did they do? Why did they do it? Together with its analysis of feminist political history, these individual case studies from the Midwest, South, and West coast shed light on the national women's movement in which they played a part. In its coverage of women's activism outside the traditional East Coast centers of New York and Boston, Groundswell provides a more diverse history of feminism, showing how social and political change was made from the ground up.
Groundswell: Grassroots Feminist Activism in Postwar America offers an essential perspective on the post-1960 movement for women s equality and liberation. Tracing the histories of feminist activism, through the National Organization of Women (NOW) chapters in three different locations: Memphis, Tennessee, Columbus, Ohio, and San Francisco, California, Gilmore explores how feminist identity, strategies, and goals were shaped by geographic location. Departing from the usual conversation about the national icons and events of second wave feminism, this book concentrates on local histories, and asks the questions that must be answered on the micro level: Who joined? Who did not? What did they do? Why did they do it? Together with its analysis of feminist political history, these individual case studies from the Midwest, South, and West coast shed light on the national women s movement in which they played a part. In its coverage of women s activism outside the traditional East Coast centers of New York and Boston, Groundswell provides a more diverse history of feminism, showing how social and political change was made from the ground up. "
For the first time in a decade, leaders and citizens across the political spectrum are celebrating dissent. The reappearance of dissent in town hall meetings and on street corners brings new promise for improved democratic life and citizen participation. But this promise cannot be fulfilled if schools do not cultivate the skills necessary for our citizens to engage in political dissent. Indeed, this book reveals troubling practices in schools, resulting from the testing atmosphere and the hidden curriculum, that omit or suppress students ability to dissent and voice ideas that stand in opposition to the status quo. In this exciting book, Stitzlein investigates the historical and philosophical foundations of dissent in the work of the American Founders and the pragmatist philosophers who followed them. She examines the ways in which dissent is understood as a negative right and then proposes instead that dissent should be seen as a positive right. This book calls for a realignment of curriculum and the practices of schooling with both a guiding vision and a realistic interpretation of democracy as it is currently invoked in the era of Tea Party protests."
The famous 1962 Port Huron Statement by the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) introduced the concept of participatory democracy to popular discourse and practice. In Inspiring Participatory Democracy Tom Hayden, one of the principal architects of the statement, analyses its historical impact and relevance to today's movements. Inspiring Participatory Democracy includes the full transcript of the Port Huron statment and shows how it played an important role in the movements for black civil rights, against the Vietnam war and for the Freedom of Information Act. Published during the year of Port Huron's 50th anniversary, Inspiring Participatory Democracy will be of great interest to readers interested in social history, politics and social activism.
Created by Students for a Democratic Society in a small Michigan town in 1962, the Port Huron Statement has been called "the most ambitious, the most specific, and the most eloquent manifesto in the history of the American Left." Now, fifty years after its drafting, principal architect Tom Hayden and the other SDS contributors revisit this seminal document and provide an original and comprehensive analysis of its historical impact andits increasing relevance to today's movements. Central to legacy of the Port Huron Statement is the fact that it introduced the concept of participatory democracy to popular discourse and practice. It made sense of the fact that ordinary people were making history and not waiting for parties or traditional organizations. That vision of a half-century ago is at the core of today's social movements. In fact, the first principle declared by the Occupy Wall Street was for a "transparent and direct participatory democracy." Along with the full transcript of the Port Huron Statement, chapters written by the original framers tie its genesis to the direct action of the Freedom Riders in the segregated South and explore its influence in numerous social movements that have arisen since its creation. Including themes and events ignored by popular history and journalism, Inspiring Participatory Democracy illustrates how the PHS played a catalytic role in democratic reforms such as the expansion of civil and voting rights, ending the Vietnam War and military draft, oversight of the CIA and FBI, enacting environmental protection legislation, and the Freedom of Information Act. Published during the year of Port Huron's 50th anniversary and celebrated at campuses nationwide, Inspiring Participatory Democracy will be of great interest to readers interested in our social history, politics, and social activism.
Centered on the trajectory of the emancipation of Roma people in Scandinavia, Romani Liberation is a powerful challenge to the stereotype describing Romani as passive and incapable of responsibility and agency. The author also criticizes benevolent but paternalistic attitudes that center on Romani victimhood. The first part of the book offers a comprehensive overview of the chronological phases of Romani emancipation in Sweden and other countries. Underscoring the significance of Roma activism in this process, Jan Selling profiles sixty Romani activists and protagonists, including numerous original photos. The narrative is followed by an analysis of the concepts of historical justice and of the process of decolonizing Romani Studies. Selling highlights the impact of the historical contexts that have enabled or impeded the success of the struggles against discrimination and for equal rights, emphasizing Romani activism as a precondition for liberation. The particular Swedish framework is accentuated by a stimulating preface by the international activist Nicoleta Bitu, and afterwords by two prominent Romani advocates, the politician Soraya Post and the singer, author, and elder Hans Caldaras.
This book highlights how online networking offers potential for new forms of activist mobilizing, repertoires, participatory democracy, direct action, fundraising, and civic engagement. It calls for a re-conceptualization of some of the main tenets of contentious and electoral politics, which were originally constructed to describe and analyze face-to-face forms of mobilization, in order to more accurately analyze contemporary forms of protest, electoral processes, and civil society organizing.
Social Activism in Southeast Asia examines the ways in which social movements operate in a region characterized by a history of authoritarian regimes and relatively weak civil society. It situates cutting-edge accounts of activism around civil and political rights, globalization, peace, the environment, migrant and factory labour, the rights of middle- and working-class women, and sexual identity in an overarching framework of analysis that forefronts the importance of human rights and the state as a focus for social activism. Drawing on contemporary evidence from Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Timor-Leste, the book explores the ways in which social movement actors engage with their international allies, the community and the state in order to promote social change. As well as providing detailed and nuanced analyses of particular movements in specific areas of Southeast Asia, the book addresses difficult questions about the politics, strategies and authenticity of social movements.
Identity movements, based on ethnicity, caste, language, religion and regional identity, have become increasingly significant in Nepal, reshaping debates on the definition of the nation, nationalism and the structure of the state. This book analyzes the rapid rise in ethnic and nationalist mobilization and conflict since 1990, the dynamics and trajectories of these movements, and their consequences for Nepal. From an interdisciplinary perspective, the book looks at the roots of mobilization and conflicts, the reasons for the increase in mobilization and violent activities, and the political and social effects of the movements. It provides a historical context for these movements and investigates how identities intersect with forms of political and economic inequality. Nepal's various identity groups - Dalits, indigenous nationalities, Madhesis and Muslims - have mobilized to different extents. By examining these diverse movements within the same time period and within a unitary state, the book illuminates which factors are more salient for the mobilization of identity groups. Bringing together empirical contributions on key issues in identity production in a comparative perspective, the book presents an interesting contribution to South Asian studies as well as studies of nationalism and identity more broadly.
Based on empirical evidence derived from university and national archives across the country and interviews with participants, British Student Activism in the Long Sixties reconstructs the world of university students in the 1960s and 1970s. Student accounts are placed within the context of a wide variety of primary and secondary sources from across Britain and the world, making this project the first book-length history of the British student movement to employ literary and theoretical frameworks which differentiate it from most other histories of student activism to date. Globalization, especially of mass communications, made British students aware of global problems such as the threat of nuclear weapons, the Vietnam War, racism, sexism and injustice. British students applied these global ideas to their own unique circumstances, using their intellectual traditions and political theories which resulted in unique outcomes. British student activists effectively gained support from students, staff, and workers for their struggle for student s rights to unionize, freely assemble and speak, and participate in university decision-making. Their campaigns effectively raised public awareness of these issues and contributed to significant national decisions in many considerable areas.
As peace activists have faced increased government repression and accusations of being unpatriotic since 9/11, Toussaint examines how current attempts to control dissent impact the peace movement. This study offers an analysis of self-identified peace activists in terms of their demographic characteristics, motivation for activism, political opportunities, and views of the peace movement. It also discusses the processes involved in successfully mobilizing an increasingly diverse constituency and how broad-based support can be sustained beyond reacting to crises.
Voicing Dissent presents a unique and original series of interviews with American artists (including Guerrilla Girls on Tour, Tony Shalhoub, Shepard Fairey, Sean Astin, and many others) who have voiced their opposition to the war in Iraq. Following Pierre Bourdieu's example, these discussions are approached sociologically and provide a thorough analysis of the relationships between arts and politics as well as the limits and conditions of political speech and action. These painters and graphic artists, musicians, actors, playwrights, theatre directors and filmmakers reveal their perceptions of politics, war, security and terrorism issues, the Middle East, their experiences with activism, as well as their definition of the artist's role and their practice of citizenship. Addressing the crucial questions for contemporary democracies - such as artists' function in society, the crisis of political legitimacy and representation, the rise of new modes of contestation, and the limits to free public speech - this book will be of interest to scholars in sociology, politics, and the arts.
This book explores how the World Social Forum (WSF) has developed in response to the current period of profound crisis and transition in the history of Western capitalist modernity. The WSF has been thrown up by social forces as a laboratory of practices for other possible worlds; it is at a leading edge of the transition, where other possible futures are being imagined and constructed, but it is also firmly rooted in the order that is passing. Based on ten years of field work on three continents, this book examines social movements as knowledge producers. It pays attention to specific movements and their praxis-based knowledges and its arguments are grounded in sustained empirical attention to what movements are doing and saying on the terrain of the WSF over time and from place to place. Engaging with several strands of social and political thought, global civil society, autonomism, and transnational feminism, each chapter outlines a set of contestations and contributions with relevance beyond debates about the WSF.It will be of strong interest to students and scholars of social movement studies; international politics; gender studies; sociology; political theory and social work.
The growing influence of Russia on the Western far right has been much discussed in the media recently. This book is the first detailed inquiry into what has been a neglected but critically important trend: the growing links between Russian actors and Western far right activists, publicists, ideologues, and politicians. The author uses a range of sources including interviews, video footage, leaked communications, official statements and press coverage in order to discuss both historical and contemporary Russia in terms of its relationship with the Western far right. Initial contacts between Russian political actors and Western far right activists were established in the early 1990s, but these contacts were low profile. As Moscow has become more anti-Western, these contacts have become more intense and have operated at a higher level. The book shows that the Russian establishment was first interested in using the Western far right to legitimise Moscow's politics and actions both domestically and internationally, but more recently Moscow has begun to support particular far right political forces to gain leverage on European politics and undermine the liberal-democratic consensus in the West. Contributing to ongoing scholarly debates about Russia's role in the world, its strategies aimed at securing legitimation of Putin's regime both internationally and domestically, modern information warfare and propaganda, far right politics and activism in the West, this book draws on theories and methods from history, political science, area studies, and media studies and will be of interest to students, scholars, activists and practitioners in these areas.
|
You may like...
Cognitive and Affective Growth (PLE…
Shapiro Edna, Evelyn Weber
Paperback
R1,666
Discovery Miles 16 660
|