The Shock Doctrine

[Struggle]

Hello people,

I anticipated some of you may find the following video interesting.
My university professor, who is a Harvard graduate and somewhat on the Left (In a certain sense), showed me it last week.

The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein and Alfonso Cuaron
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSF0e6oO_tw

[blake 3:17]

I don't have time to watch the video right now.

I read the book last year and found it deeply moving and very true. Many of us in the Toronto Left have had ups and downs with Klein, but she seems to have moved consistently to the left. She's been great on Palestine and the G20 defendants.

The basic thesis of the book is simple but accurate. Older Trotskyist friends were blown away by it -- the details of economic re-organization in Chile and Russia and New Orleans and Iraq are stunning and saddening. I know she covers more, but I don't have a copy of the book, and it doesn't really matter, there are massive injustices all around the world, and they shouldn't happen. But they do.


On the Marxist Left we often make mistakes about over generalizing -- the value of The Shock Doctrine is the nasty details of the overlap of the activist ideology of the Chicago (or, here, Calgary) School, specific social and natural disasters, and greeedy blood sucking business interests.

[Widerstand]

I've only read No Logo, and I gotta say it's still one of my favorite analytical books.

[Leonid Brozhnev]

There was a full 80 minute documentary on this last year, aired on Channel 4. Last time I checked it wasn't on 4 On-Demand, but it is now -

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/the-shock-doctrine/episode-guide/series-1/episode-1

Unfortunately, I think its only available to people in the UK, but it was a very good documentary.
I may try and get the full thing on Youtube if I get the time.