Critique Influence Change – serie

'It is my thesis that this general production of life, or subsistence production - mainly performed through the non-wage labour of women and other non-wage labourers as slaves, contract workers and peasants in the colonies - constitutes the perennial basis upon which "capitalist productive labour" can be built up and exploited.'First published in 1986, Maria Mies’s progressive book was hailed as a major paradigm shift for feminist theory, and it remains a major contribution to development theory and practice today.Tracing the social origins of the sexual division of labour, it offers a history of the related processes of colonization and 'housewifization' and extends this analysis to the contemporary new international division of labour. Mies's theory of capitalist patriarchy has become even more relevant today.This new edition includes a substantial new introduction in which she both applies her theory to the new globalized world and answers her critics.

In this groundbreaking work, two world-renowned scholars argue that ecological destruction and industrial catastrophes constitute a direct threat to everyday life, the maintenance of which has been made the particular responsibility of women. In both industrialized societies and the developing countries, the new wars the world is experiencing, violent ethnic chauvinisms and the malfunctioning of the economy also pose urgent questions for ecofeminists. Is there a relationship between patriarchal oppression and the destruction of nature in the name of profit and progress? How can women counter the violence inherent in these processes? Should they look to a link between the women's movement and other social movements?Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva offer a thought-provoking analysis of these and many other issues from a unique North-South perspective. They critique prevailing economic theories, conventional concepts of women's emancipation, the myth of 'catching up' development, the philosophical foundations of modern science and technology, and the omission of ethics when discussing so many questions, including advances in reproductive technology and biotechnology.In constructing their own ecofeminist epistemology and methodology, these two internationally respected feminist environmental activists look to the potential of movements advocating consumer liberation and subsistence production, sustainability and regeneration. They argue for an acceptance of limits and reciprocity and a rejection of exploitation, the endless commoditization of needs, and violence.

In this hugely influential book, originally published in 2001 but just as - if not more - relevant today, Mark Duffield shows how war has become an integral component of development discourse. Aid agencies have become increasingly involved in humanitarian assistance, conflict resolution and the social reconstruction of war-torn societies. Duffield explores the consequences of this growing merger of development and security, unravelling the nature of the new wars and the response of the international community, in particular the new systems of global governance that are emerging as a result.An essential work for anyone studying, interested in, or working in development or international security.

Samir Amin remains one of the world's most influential thinkers about the changing nature of North-South relations in the development of contemporary capitalism. In this highly prescient book, originally published in 1997, he provides a powerful analysis of the new unilateral capitalist era following the collapse of the Soviet model, and the apparent triumph of the market and globalization.Amin's innovative analysis charts the rise of ethnicity and fundamentalism as consequences of the failure of ruling classes in the South to counter the exploitative terms of globalization. This has had profound implications and continues to resonate today. Furthermore, his deconstruction of the Bretton Woods institutions as managerial mechanisms which protect the profitability of capital provides an important insight into the continued difficulties in reforming them. Amin's rejection of the apparent inevitability of globalization in its present polarising form is particularly prophetic - instead he asserts the need for each society to negotiate the terms of its inter-dependence with the rest of the global economy.A landmark work by a key contemporary thinker.

Someone once said that it is easier to imagine the end of the world than to imagine the end of capitalism. Michael Albert would disagree.Realizing Hope offers a speculative vision of a future beyond capitalism - an alternative to the exploitation of human labour, the unchecked destruction of the earth, and the oppression of all for the benefit of the few. Participatory economics - parecon for short - is Albert’s concrete proposal for a classless economy, developed from anarchist principles first introduced by Kropotkin, Bakunin, Pannekoek and others. In this classic text, Albert takes the insights and hopes of parecon and enlarges them to address all key aspects of social life and society - gender, culture, politics, science, technology, journalism, ecology, and others. Realizing Hope provides vision to help us all together conceive a world that might be just over the horizon, a world we can begin building today.

With the publication of this remarkable book in 1998, Gustavo Esteva and Madhu Suri Prakash instigated a complete epistemological rupture.Grassroots Post-modernism attacks the three sacred cows of modernity: global thinking, the universality of human rights and the self-sufficient individual. Rejecting the constructs of development in all its forms, Esteva and Prakash argue that even alternative development prescriptions deprive the people of control over their own lives, shifting this control to bureaucrats, technocrats and educators. Rather than presuming that human progress fits a predetermined mould, leading towards an increasing homogenization of cultures and lifestyles, the authors argue for a ‘radical pluralism’ that honours and nurtures distinctive cultural variety and enables many paths to the realization of self-defined aspirations.This classic text is essential reading for those looking beyond neoliberalism, the global project and the individual self.

The fear and anxiety aroused by Islamism is not a myth, nor is it simply a consequence of terrorism or fundamentalism.Writing in 1997, before 9/11 and before the austerity that has bred a new generation of far right groups across Europe and the US, S. Sayyid warned of a spectre haunting Western civilization. This groundbreaking book, banned by the Malaysian government, is both an analysis of the conditions that have made ‘Islamic fundamentalism’ possible and a provocative account of the ways in which Muslim identities have come to play an increasingly political role throughout the world.This is a pioneering, provocative and intricately crafted study, which shows the challenge of Islamism is not only geopolitical or even cultural but also epistemological.

In the wake of the uprisings which rocked the Arab world, Maxime Rodinson’s work has taken on a new and powerful resonance. Dating from 1958, the time of his expulsion from the French Communist Party, to 1972, the assembled articles, papers and essays which form this book outline his vision of the role of Marxist politics in Muslim history and society. By applying a materialist approach to Islam, which encompassed its social and economic history rather than simply studying it in terms of belief, Rodinson reclaimed the field of Islamic studies from Orientalism.Rodinson’s work was both pioneering and provocative. Today, when an increasingly virulent Islamophobia is taking hold across the West, Rodinson’s work provides a vital counterweight to reductionist depictions of Islam and remains just as indispensable to those seeking to understand the Muslim World as it was when it was first published.

All effects of human action will inevitably be played out within our planet’s limits; any hope of infinity is an illusion. And yet, as Wolfgang Sachs warned almost twenty years ago, environmental concerns have been assimilated into the rhetoric, dynamics and power structures of development.This classic collection of trenchant and elegant explorations addresses the crisis of the Western world’s relations with nature and social justice. Examining the notions of efficiency, speed, globalization and development, Sachs shows that sustainability, truly conceived, is incompatible with the worldwide rule of economism.Planet Dialectics reveals that the Western development model is fundamentally at odds with both the quest for justice among the world’s people and the aspiration to reconcile humanity and nature.

When European explorers went out into the world to open up trade routes and establish colonies, they brought back much more than silks and spices, cotton and tea. Inevitably, they came into contact with the peoples of other parts of the world and formed views of them occasionally admiring, more often hostile or contemptuous.Using a stunning array of sources - missionaries' memoirs, the letters of diplomats' wives, explorers' diaries and the work of writers as diverse as Voltaire, Thackeray, Oliver Goldsmith and, of course, Kipling - Victor Kiernan teases out the full range of European attitudes to other peoples. Erudite, ironic and global in its scope, The Lords of Human Kind has been a major influence on a generation of historians and cultural critics and is a landmark in the history of Eurocentrism.