Synopses & Reviews
In this collection of trenchant essays and interviews, István Mészáros, the worlds preeminent Marxist philosopher and winner of the 2008 Libertador Award for Critical Thought (the Bolivar Prize), lays bare the exploitative structure of modern capitalism. He argues with great power that the worlds economies are on a social and ecological precipice, and that unless we take decisive action to radically transform our societies we will find ourselves thrust headfirst into barbarism and environmental catastrophe.
Mészáros, however, is no pessimist. He believes that the multiple crises of world capitalism will encourage the working class to demand center stage in the construction of a new system of production and distribution designed to meet human needs rather than serve the relentless pursuit of profit—a struggle which is already underway in places such as Venezuela. As John Bellamy Foster says in the foreword to this indispensable book, “Today the structural crisis of capital provides the historical setting for a new revolutionary movement for social emancipation in which developments normally taking centuries would flit by like phantoms in decades or even years. But the force for such necessary, vital change, remains with the people themselves, and rests on humanitys willingness to constitute itself as both subject and object of history, through the collective struggle to create a just and sustainable world. This, Mészáros insists, constitutes the unprecedented challenge and burden of our historical time.”
Review
“István Mészáros illuminates the path ahead. He points to the central argument we must make in order . . . to take to the offensive throughout the world in moving toward socialism.”
-Hugo Chávez,President of Venezuela
About the Author
István Mészáros is a world-renowned philosopher and critic. He left his native Hungary after the Soviet invasion of 1956. He is professor emeritus at the University of Sussex, where he held the chair of philosophy for fifteen years. Meszaros is author of
The Challenge and Burden of Historical Time,
Beyond Capital,
The Power of Ideology,
The Work of Sartre, and
Marxs Theory of Alienation.
John Bellamy Foster is editor of Monthly Review. He is professor of sociology at the University of Oregon and author of The Ecological Revolution, The Great Financial Crisis (with Fred Magdoff), Critique of Intelligent Design (with Brett Clark and Richard York), Ecology Against Capitalism, Marxs Ecology, and The Vulnerable Planet.