The Sociological Imagination


C. Wright Mills - 1959
    Wright Mills is best remembered for his highly acclaimed work The Sociological Imagination, in which he set forth his views on how social science should be pursued. Hailed upon publication as a cogent and hard-hitting critique, The Sociological Imagination took issue with the ascendant schools of sociology in the United States, calling for a humanist sociology connecting the social, personal, and historical dimensions of our lives. The sociological imagination Mills calls for is a sociological vision, a way of looking at the world that can see links between the apparently private problems of the individual and important social issues.

How to Bomb the U.S. Gov't


Sam Hyde
    This is our protestation against Toxic Hellworld Culture™, including but not limited to: nihilism, people who don't know what to do with debt/money, BPA incl. touching receipts and plastic water bottles, new music genres, cybernetic private-part-augmentation, women who *actually* deserve ~it~ (you know what I mean), and Bad Sex Play™.It's everything you know and love about MDE, and more, in traditional 2D format, so you can print it out and have something to look @ after the inevitable "Russian" EMP attack. Cheers gents.744 Extremely Funny Pages. You will laugh out loud more than once--we guarantee it. This is the product of four years hard labor: raw primo content that is too unchained and unshackled for sketches or video format. It's our magnum opus and best work and we are damn proud. Fourteen dollars is a high price especially since you have less than a thousand dollars in your checking account and you eat noodles and McDonald's every night, but you will be provided with HOURS of CLEAN laughs and smiles. Not to mention you will be really and truly supporting the hell out of independent comedy.I think that's enough text but this thing is so fowcking good I just have to write another paragraph. Every time I touch it is like my first kiss. Charls had tears in his eyes flipping through it last night. We hope you like it man--we hope you find something in here to believe in, to bite into, to use against your enemies, to uplift all Mankind (the wrestler).

How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future


Steven Levitsky - 2018
    Democracy no longer ends with a bang--in a revolution or military coup--but with a whimper: the slow, steady weakening of critical institutions, such as the judiciary and the press, and the gradual erosion of long-standing political norms. The good news is that there are several exit ramps on the road to authoritarianism. The bad news is that, by electing Trump, we have already passed the first one.Drawing on decades of research and a wide range of historical and global examples, from 1930s Europe to contemporary Hungary, Turkey, and Venezuela, to the American South during Jim Crow, Levitsky and Ziblatt show how democracies die--and how ours can be saved.

The Anarchist Handbook


Michael MaliceEmma Goldman - 2021
    Since the term itself—anarchism—is a negation, there is a great deal of disagreement on what the positive alternative would look like. The black flag comes in many colors.The Anarchist Handbook is an opportunity for all these many varied voices to speak for themselves, from across the decades. These were human beings who saw things differently from their fellow men. They fought and they loved. They lived and they died. They disagreed on much, but they all shared one vision: Freedom.

War! What Is It Good For?: Conflict and the Progress of Civilization from Primates to Robots


Ian Morris - 2014
    . . . / What is it good for? / Absolutely nothing," says the famous song—but archaeology, history, and biology show that war in fact has been good for something. Surprising as it sounds, war has made humanity safer and richer.In War! What Is It Good For?, the renowned historian and archaeologist Ian Morris tells the gruesome, gripping story of fifteen thousand years of war, going beyond the battles and brutality to reveal what war has really done to and for the world. Stone Age people lived in small, feuding societies and stood a one-in-ten or even one-in-five chance of dying violently. In the twentieth century, by contrast—despite two world wars, Hiroshima, and the Holocaust—fewer than one person in a hundred died violently. The explanation: War, and war alone, has created bigger, more complex societies, ruled by governments that have stamped out internal violence. Strangely enough, killing has made the world safer, and the safety it has produced has allowed people to make the world richer too.War has been history's greatest paradox, but this searching study of fifteen thousand years of violence suggests that the next half century is going to be the most dangerous of all time. If we can survive it, the age-old dream of ending war may yet come to pass. But, Morris argues, only if we understand what war has been good for can we know where it will take us next.

Neoconservatism: Why We Need It


Douglas Murray - 2005
    Douglas Murray takes a fresh look at the movement that replaced Great-Society liberalism, helped Ronald Reagan bring down the Wall, and provided the intellectual rationale for the Bush administration's War on Terror. While others are blaming it for foreign policy failures and, more extremely, attacking it as a Jewish cabal, Murray argues that the West needs Neo-conservatism more than ever. In addition to explaining what Neo conservatism is and where it came from, he argues that this American-born response to the failed policies of the 1960s is the best approach to foreign affairs not only for the United States but also for Britain and the West as well.

The Revolt of the Masses


José Ortega y Gasset - 1930
    Continuously in print since 1932, Ortega's vision of Western culture as sinking to its lowest common denominator and drifting toward chaos brought its author international fame and has remained one of the influential books of the 20th century.

Fascism: Comparison and Definition


Stanley G. Payne - 1980
    “An impressive review of reputed fascist movements, at once setting them apart from other authoritarian nationalist organizations and bringing them together within a qualified generic category.  Running throughout the volume, and valuable to readers at every level, is a careful critique of the major debates that divide scholars on this most unintelligible ‘ism’ of them all.  Payne precisely defines issues, cites the best literature in the major European languages, and offers with moderation and intelligence his own conclusions on the question.”—Gilbert Allardyce, American Historical Review

The Good Society: The Humane Agenda


John Kenneth Galbraith - 1996
    No one else explains the interplay of economic and political forces with Galbraith's exquisite clarity.

Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government


Glenn Beck - 2009
    FRIGHTENING. TRUE. It happens to all of us: You're minding your own business, when some idiot informs you that guns are evil, the Prius will save the planet, or the rich have to finally start paying their fair share of taxes. Just go away! you think to yourself -- but they only become more obnoxious. Your heart rate quickens. You start to sweat. You can't get away. Your only hope is...this book. Glenn Beck, author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers An Inconvenient Book and Glenn Beck's Common Sense, has stumbled upon the secret formula to winning arguments against people with big mouths but small minds: knowing the facts. And this book is full of them. The next time your Idiot Friends tell you how gun control prevents gun violence, you'll tell them all about England's handgun ban (see page 53). When they tell you that we should copy the UK's health-care system, you'll recount the horrifying facts you read on page 244. And the next time an idiot tells you that vegetable prices will skyrocket without illegal workers, you'll stop saying "no, they won't" and you'll start saying, "actually, eliminating all illegal labor will cause us to spend just $8 a year more on produce." (See page 139.) Idiots can't be identified through voting records, they can be found only by looking for people who hide behind stereotypes, embrace partisanship, and believe that bumper sticker slogans are a substitute for common sense. If you know someone who fits the bill, then Arguing with Idiots will help you silence them once and for all with the ultimate weapon: the truth.

How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century


Erik Olin Wright - 2019
    Our shared values - equality and fairness, democracy and freedom, community and solidarity - can both provide the basis for a critique of capitalism, and help to guide us towards a socialist and democratic society.In this elegant book, Erik Olin Wright has distilled decades of work into a concise and tightly argued manifesto - analyzing the varieties of anti-capitalism, assessing different strategic approaches, and laying the foundations for a society dedicated to human flourishing. How to Be an Anticapitalist in the 21st Century is an urgent and powerful argument for socialism, and a unparalleled guide to help us get there. Another world is possible.

Wingnuts: How the Lunatic Fringe is Hijacking America


John P. Avlon - 2004
    They are the unhinged activists, professional partisans and paranoid conspiracy theorists on both the far right and far left of the political spectrum, whose hate and hyper-partisanship since Obama's inauguration threatens to mock the promise upon which he was elected. In "Wingnuts", journalist John Avlon travels to the outer-reaches of American politics to explain how far-left and far-right extremists came to dominate the nation's political dialogue. From the revolutionary-inspired "Tea Party" protests to the healthcare town hall 'hijackings', principled policy opposition to government spending has taken a sharp right turn into Crazytown. Not to mention Sarah Palin's rants about administration 'death panels', attacks like Obama-as-Hitler/Communist/Antichrist and actual death threats against elected leaders. For those with a vested interest in stirring the crazypot - like the hyper-partisan talk-show radio and cable news hosts - all of this has been good for business: hate is a cheap and easy recruiting tool. But it can be murder on a democracy...

The Fountainhead : A Fiftieth Anniversary Celebration


David Kelley - 1993
    Stephen Cox, professor of literatureat the University of California at San Diego, spoke on "The LiteraryAchievement of The Fountainhead" and David Kelley, executive director of TheObjectivist Center, discussed "The Code of the Creator." This commemorativemonograph contains the text of both lectures and other material about AynRand's classic novel.

The Discourses & Other Early Political Writings (Texts in the History of Political Thought)


Jean-Jacques Rousseau - 1997
    Volume I contains the earlier writings such as the First and Second Discourses. The American and French Revolutions were profoundly affected by Rousseau's writing, thus illustrating the scope of his influence. Volume II contains the later writings such as the Social Contract. The Social Contract was publicly condemned on publication causing Rousseau to flee. In exile he wrote both autobiographical and political works. These volumes contain comprehensive introductions, chronologies, and guides to further reading, and will enable students to fully understand the writings of one of the world's greatest thinkers.

The People Vs Tech: How the Internet Is Killing Democracy (and How We Save It)


Jamie Bartlett - 2018
    But have we unwittingly handed too much away to shadowy powers behind a wall of code, all manipulated by a handful of Silicon Valley utopians, ad men, and venture capitalists? And, in light of recent data breach scandals around companies like Facebook and Cambridge Analytica, what does that mean for democracy, our delicately balanced system of government that was created long before big data, total information and artificial intelligence? In this urgent polemic, Jamie Bartlett argues that through our unquestioning embrace of big tech, the building blocks of democracy are slowly being removed. The middle class is being eroded, sovereign authority and civil society is weakened, and we citizens are losing our critical faculties, maybe even our free will.The People Vs Tech is an enthralling account of how our fragile political system is being threatened by the digital revolution. Bartlett explains that by upholding six key pillars of democracy, we can save it before it is too late. We need to become active citizens; uphold a shared democratic culture; protect free elections; promote equality; safeguard competitive and civic freedoms; and trust in a sovereign authority. This essential book shows that the stakes couldn’t be higher and that, unless we radically alter our course, democracy will join feudalism, supreme monarchies and communism as just another political experiment that quietly disappeared.