Why It's Kicking Off Everywhere: The New Global Revolutions

The world is facing a wave of uprisings, protests and revolutions: Arab dictators swept away, public spaces occupied, slum-dwellers in revolt, cyberspace buzzing with utopian dreams. Events we were told were consigned to history--democratic revolt and social revolution--are being lived by millions of people.

In this compelling new book, Paul Mason explores the causes and consequences of this great unrest. From Cairo to Athens, Wall Street and Westminster to Manila, Mason goes in search of the changes in society, technology and human behavior that have propelled a generation onto the streets in search of social justice. In a narrative that blends historical insight with first-person reportage, Mason shines a light on these new forms of activism, from the vast, agile networks of cyberprotest to the culture wars and tent camps of the #occupy movement. The events, says Mason, reflect the expanding power of the individual and call for new political alternatives to elite rule and global poverty.

"A first-hand witness to the protests in Cairo, Mason (Live Working or Die Fighting) dissects the revolutionary events of 2011 in Egypt, Britain, Greece, and America, before moving on to discuss the history, sociology, economics, and politics of unrest. From the 1848 'wave of revolutions' across Europe, to the French, Czechoslovakian, and American protests of 1968, Mason posits a common cause: the disconnect between the masses and the political systems and power structures. At the forefront of these modern uprisings are unemployed youth, the urban underclass, and organized labor. Armed with technology and social media — cell phone video cameras, Twitter, YouTube, etc. — protestors are able to mobilize sans central leadership, broadcast without Big Media mitigating their message, and — perhaps most importantly — use digital space to take to the physical streets. Mason gets bogged down in discussing the sociology of poverty and enumerating individual cases of the poor struggling to succeed, but overall his study stands as a good primer on a young revolution and its predecessors, and where we might go from here. (Jan.)" Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Incisive grassroots account of the new global revolutions by acclaimed BBC journalist.

Paul Mason is the economics editor of the BBC’s flagship current affairs program Newsnight and appears frequently on BBC World News America. He has covered globalization and social justice stories from locations around the world, including Latin America, Africa and China. His book Live Working, Die Fighting was longlisted for the Guardian First Book Award.