BooksErgoSum
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26w
The perfect one is Talking to My Daughter About the Economy by Varoufakis! It’s more fun than its title suggests. Varoufakis is a great writer and also a badass leftist political economist (who became Europe’s number one enemy when he became the outspoken Finance Minister of Greece during the Greek debt crisis). It covers all the basics with a leftist perspective and it’s just lovely ❤️
anti-capitalism for babies
books to inspire your anti-capitalism; a mix of short introductory economics nonfiction and books that bridge anti-capitalism with your other interests
I expected this to be a great explanation of global wealth inequality—and it was.
Because here’s the reality: forget all the bs about “aid,” the Global North receives way more wealth (in the trillions!) from the Global South than it gives. The Global South has been developing us—and it has been since the 15th century. The Global North is the thief, the welfare recipient, and the world’s bully. And if you live in the Global North, you benefit from this arrangement. A LOT.
This book also helps understand a lot of the international relations drama currently going on. Venezuela, Greenland, Cuba—it all comes down to extracting as much wealth as possible.
Jason Hickel has a gift: he writes very intro-friendly yet comprehensive descriptions of economic policy. It’s kinda magical, tbh.
And he did something I didn’t expect. Because there was a whistleblower-y memoir element to this, as well. Hickel grew up in Eswatini and then he (naively) went to the US for an education in the very thing that props up this whole system: “Development Economics.” So this isn’t an external critique—Hickel’s been there, done that.
BooksErgoSum finished a book
35w
Black Skin, White Masks
Frantz Fanon
A major influence on civil rights, anti-colonial, and black consciousness movements around the world, Black Skin, White Masks is the unsurpassed study of the black psyche in a white world. Hailed for its scientific analysis and poetic grace when it was first published in 1952, the book remains a vital force today.
BooksErgoSum started reading...
35w
Black Skin, White Masks
Frantz Fanon
A major influence on civil rights, anti-colonial, and black consciousness movements around the world, Black Skin, White Masks is the unsurpassed study of the black psyche in a white world. Hailed for its scientific analysis and poetic grace when it was first published in 1952, the book remains a vital force today.
I’m sorry, incoherent gushing about this eco-socialism book, incoming…
Half of this book explains why “more is less,” aka what we’re doing wrong: ✨ why our current growth-reliant economic systems suck ✨why “green capitalism” will never be a thing—in theory or in practice ✨ the neo-colonialism and imperialism baked into mainstream environmental “solutions”
Half of this book explains why “less is more,” aka the solutions: ✨ guys!! HALF of the book is devoted to solutions?! ✨ global climate justice, wealth redistribution, and an eco-socialism that is just as fair as it is environmentally friendly ✨ real world successes ✨ connecting economics to environmentalism, climate science, and indigenous ecologists like Robin Wall Kimmerer
Like, hello?! This is the greatest environmentalism + socialist economics book of all time!
Hickel has a writing super power: he cites all the best ideas (there’s ~30 pages of citations in here, I’m in love 🥰 ), he synthesizes those ideas into something cohesive, and he’s somehow able to explain these ideas more clearly than the original author. WHAT IS THIS SORCERY?!
And then—this was just the most Amanda-iest Amanda Book of all time. Because he connected eco-socialism to philosophy: specifically the monistic metaphysics of Aristotle and Spinoza (rather than the dualistic metaphysics of Descartes, Francis Bacon, the foundation of liberalism, and even the metaphysics underpinning modern science itself). But please don’t let that scare you off—I swear this part was perfectly intro-friendly for non-philosophers.
I’ve never felt so seen by a book. If you want to know what I think about eco-socialism, this is it. This book is my holy grail book of all my thoughts.
BooksErgoSum finished a book
36w
Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent
Eduardo Galeano
Since its U.S. debut almost fifty years ago, this brilliant text has set a new standard for historical scholarship of Latin America. It is also an outstanding political economy, a social and cultural narrative of the highest quality, and perhaps the finest description of primitive capital accumulation since Marx. Rather than chronology, geography, or political successions, Eduardo Galeano has organized the various facets of Latin American history according to the patterns of five centuries of exploitation. Thus he is concerned with gold and silver, cacao and cotton, rubber and coffee, fruit, hides and wool, petroleum, iron, nickel, manganese, copper, aluminum ore, nitrates, and tin. These are the veins which he traces through the body of the entire continent, up to the Rio Grande and throughout the Caribbean, and all the way to their open ends where they empty into the coffers of wealth in the United States and Europe. Weaving fact and imagery into a rich tapestry, Galeano fuses scientific analysis with the passions of a plundered and suffering people. An immense gathering of materials is framed with a vigorous style that never falters in its command of themes. All readers interested in great historical, economic, political, and social writing will find a singular analytical achievement, and an overwhelming narrative that makes history speak, unforgettably. This classic is now further honored by Isabel Allende’s inspiring introduction. Universally recognized as one of the most important writers of our time, Allende once again contributes her talents to literature, to political principles, and to enlightenment.
BooksErgoSum started reading...
36w
The Savage Detectives
Roberto Bolaño
New Year’s Eve, 1975: Arturo Belano and Ulises Lima, founders of the visceral realist movement in poetry, leave Mexico City in a borrowed white Impala. Their quest: to track down the obscure, vanished poet Cesárea Tinajero. A violent showdown in the Sonora desert turns search to flight; twenty years later Belano and Lima are still on the run. The explosive first long work by “the most exciting writer to come from south of the Rio Grande in a long time” (Ilan Stavans, Los Angeles Times), The Savage Detectives follows Belano and Lima through the eyes of the people whose paths they cross in Central America, Europe, Israel, and West Africa. This chorus includes the muses of visceral realism, the beautiful Font sisters; their father, an architect interned in a Mexico City asylum; a sensitive young follower of Octavio Paz; a foul-mouthed American graduate student; a French girl with a taste for the Marquis de Sade; the great-granddaughter of Leon Trotsky; a Chilean stowaway with a mystical gift for numbers; the anorexic heiress to a Mexican underwear empire; an Argentinian photojournalist in Angola; and assorted hangers-on, detractors, critics, lovers, employers, vagabonds, real-life literary figures, and random acquaintances. A polymathic descendant of Borges and Pynchon, Roberto Bolaño traces the hidden connection between literature and violence in a world where national boundaries are fluid and death lurks in the shadow of the avant-garde. The Savage Detectives is a dazzling original, the first great Latin American novel of the twenty-first century.
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36w
On Practice and Contradiction (Revolutions)
Mao Zedong
These early philosophical writings underpinned the Chinese revolutions, and their clarion calls to insurrection remain some of the most stirring of all time. Drawing on a dizzying array of references from contemporary culture and politics, Žižek’s firecracker commentary reaches unsettling conclusions about the place of Mao’s thought in the revolutionary canon.
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36w
Royal Assassin
Robin Hobb
Fitz has survived his first hazardous mission as king’s assassin, but is left little more than a cripple. Battered and bitter, he vows to abandon his oath to King Shrewd, remaining in the distant mountains. But love and events of terrible urgency draw him back to the court at Buckkeep, and into the deadly intrigues of the royal family. Renewing their vicious attacks on the coast, the Red-Ship Raiders leave burned-out villages and demented victims in their wake. The kingdom is also under assault from within, as treachery threatens the throne of the ailing king. In this time of great danger, the fate of the kingdom may rest in Fitz’s hands—and his role in its salvation may require the ultimate sacrifice.
BooksErgoSum started reading...
36w
Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent
Eduardo Galeano
Since its U.S. debut almost fifty years ago, this brilliant text has set a new standard for historical scholarship of Latin America. It is also an outstanding political economy, a social and cultural narrative of the highest quality, and perhaps the finest description of primitive capital accumulation since Marx. Rather than chronology, geography, or political successions, Eduardo Galeano has organized the various facets of Latin American history according to the patterns of five centuries of exploitation. Thus he is concerned with gold and silver, cacao and cotton, rubber and coffee, fruit, hides and wool, petroleum, iron, nickel, manganese, copper, aluminum ore, nitrates, and tin. These are the veins which he traces through the body of the entire continent, up to the Rio Grande and throughout the Caribbean, and all the way to their open ends where they empty into the coffers of wealth in the United States and Europe. Weaving fact and imagery into a rich tapestry, Galeano fuses scientific analysis with the passions of a plundered and suffering people. An immense gathering of materials is framed with a vigorous style that never falters in its command of themes. All readers interested in great historical, economic, political, and social writing will find a singular analytical achievement, and an overwhelming narrative that makes history speak, unforgettably. This classic is now further honored by Isabel Allende’s inspiring introduction. Universally recognized as one of the most important writers of our time, Allende once again contributes her talents to literature, to political principles, and to enlightenment.
I’m sorry, incoherent gushing about this eco-socialism book, incoming…
Half of this book explains why “more is less,” aka what we’re doing wrong: ✨ why our current growth-reliant economic systems suck ✨why “green capitalism” will never be a thing—in theory or in practice ✨ the neo-colonialism and imperialism baked into mainstream environmental “solutions”
Half of this book explains why “less is more,” aka the solutions: ✨ guys!! HALF of the book is devoted to solutions?! ✨ global climate justice, wealth redistribution, and an eco-socialism that is just as fair as it is environmentally friendly ✨ real world successes ✨ connecting economics to environmentalism, climate science, and indigenous ecologists like Robin Wall Kimmerer
Like, hello?! This is the greatest environmentalism + socialist economics book of all time!
Hickel has a writing super power: he cites all the best ideas (there’s ~30 pages of citations in here, I’m in love 🥰 ), he synthesizes those ideas into something cohesive, and he’s somehow able to explain these ideas more clearly than the original author. WHAT IS THIS SORCERY?!
And then—this was just the most Amanda-iest Amanda Book of all time. Because he connected eco-socialism to philosophy: specifically the monistic metaphysics of Aristotle and Spinoza (rather than the dualistic metaphysics of Descartes, Francis Bacon, the foundation of liberalism, and even the metaphysics underpinning modern science itself). But please don’t let that scare you off—I swear this part was perfectly intro-friendly for non-philosophers.
I’ve never felt so seen by a book. If you want to know what I think about eco-socialism, this is it. This book is my holy grail book of all my thoughts.
This book was a fascinating critique of inequality.
👉 Basically, high inequality causes civilizational collapse.
And he's got receipts. This (~950 page) book was a detail-heavy history examining societies all over the world going back to Neanderthal times. Comparing:
▪️ "Goliath" societies: social hierarchy, wealth inequality, extractive practices, environmentally destructive (pro tip: they tend to have pyramids; think Egypt, the Aztecs, Babylon, Cahokia, etc), to
▪️ Egalitarian societies: highly reciprocal, non-hierarchical, communal, non-extractive, environmentally friendly (think most indigenous North American communities and Germanic tribes)
In our popular imagination, these "Goliath" societies are the height of civilization. But actually, they sucked. Sure, the elites were buried in golden sarcophagi. But for regular people: they lived shorter lives, weren't as tall, had lots of war injuries, endured sexist oppression, had smaller homes, enslaved others, and destroyed their local environment.
And. Their civilizations didn't last. Soo 👀
I read this alongside Necropolitics by Achille Mbembe and I can’t help but compare them, so—
Fascinating how a difference in one definition—liberal society—creates such different books (I have a fav). ▪️ Both books ask the same question: why do our contemporary liberal societies feel so unfree? ▪️ Look for the solution in the same place: Foucault’s idea of Biopolitics and Agamben’s analysis of the concentration camp as a “state of exception”
And have similar pub dates: ▪️ Psychopolitics: 2014 in German; 2017 in English ▪️ Necropolitics: 2016 in French; 2019 in English
PSYCHOPOLITICS argues that we feel unfree in today’s society because capitalism no longer just optimizes our bodies while we’re clocked-in at work. Instead, it wants to optimize our minds all the time—through self-help, hustle culture, and gaslighting us into believing that the mental exhaustion we feel from capitalist exploitation is a health issue we can overcome through self-improvement (very crypto bro, clean girl aesthetic, dude podcast, MAHA, and self-help grifts).
NECROPOLITICS argues that we feel unfree in contemporary liberal society because… we’re not free. And we have BEEN not free. He argues that Gaza is the paradigm for our future politics and challenges the link between liberal society and freedom when, for the vast majority of the people on the planet, this liberal age has involved colonialism, exploitation, and being invaded and controlled by the West (very Palantir, imperial boomerang, anti-migrant, genocidal, totalitarian).
Why are they different? Or, why is NECROPOLITICS more complete? (because Mbembe also discusses capitalism’s attempt to optimize our ‘mental health’ for its own greed) ▪️ PSYCHOPOLITICS discusses capitalism, neoliberalism, and our democratic institutions as if it’s all one consistent worldview ▪️ NECROPOLITICS conceives of “liberal society” as two (increasingly opposing) ideas in a trench coat: capitalism (and all of the billionaire-serving social, political, and environmental destruction it’s doing) vs. liberal democracy (and its commitment to freedom and equality). Guess which idea Mbembe thinks is losing 😬
This cartoon cover had me fooled, ngl. I wouldn’t have picked this one up without Justine telling me to read it. And she was right!
This story was annnggsty. Our heroine was married. And the love interest was her husband’s friend. And the villain?! I wanted to strangle him!!
This writing was great, the setting was great. But I think there were two especially good elements of this book:
1️⃣ I genuinely had no clue how everything would get resolved. Between the angst-iness of the plot and a few well-placed red herrings, this book was unputdownable.
2️⃣ The character development in here was god-tier. Our heroine had to learn some hard lessons. And our hero—I don’t know how else to explain it except that he begins the book thinking he’s progressive… but he’s the kind of guy who’d listen to Ezra Klein podcast. You know? 🫠 And then he becomes genuinely progressive. And it was a balm to my soul.
Okay, and a third thing—
3️⃣ This book was hot. Between the plot-induced yearning and how emotional the character development was… the spice was just really emotional.
Why did this vampire's mind sound like a chronically online American millennial lady and not an 8th century immortal? And nonsensically, even in the Berlin Wall times prologue??
Vampire vibes, where?
Also, this book assumed I don't understand late stage finanacialized capitalism and I took offense to that 😆 Because this line seems cool... "My motto is: If I have to suck someone dry every few weeks, why not make it a Goldman Sachs executive?"
... until you realize that Goldman Sachs executives (who are evil) merely manage the wealth of the (truly evil) wealth holders passively accumulating wealth by off the backs of the working class. And SHE'S one of those (truly evil) people who are passively accumulating what she calls her "vast amounts of generational wealth" thanks to investment banks like Goldman Sachs. Soo?
A sleep paralysis demon. So fun.
But it felt like a lost kinkatunity (kink opportunity) to make this guy a male sub. Just saying.
This little book is jam-packed with insight after insight. Into how fascism operates, why it antagonizes socialism, its history, and its future in the US.
The fact that it was written in 1997 yet has an such a good grasp of 2025 rightwing politics?? Both kinda eerie (did he have a 🔮?) and had me PAYING ATTENTION ✍️
Parenti made one argument in particular that’s stuck in my mind: 👉 “What distinguishes fascism from ordinary rightwing patriarchal autocracies is the way it attempts to cultivate a revolutionary aura. Fascism offers a beguiling mix of revolutionary-sounding mass appeals and reactionary class politics.”
Aka, fascism co-opts socialist / populist language in order to protect wealthy elites…. And yeah. Unfortunately, can confirm 🫠
