Z Books
Recent Z Books
Fridell: Fair Trade
Apr 09, 2013
Is fair trade a radical movement aiming to transform global systems of production and exchange, or is it a marketing niche that delivers small benefits to Southern farmers and a clean conscience to Northern consumers? Schisms currently opening between the US-based Fair Trade USA and the rest of the international fair trade movement are reflective of this choice. This book evaluates the extent to which fair trade is likely to be a transformative movement. The authors show that fair trade's most significant, and threatened, contribution is its potential to reveal to otherwise 'blinded' consumers the qualitative aspects of labour and nature embodied in commodities. Integrating insights from economic and sociological theory and research, the book sheds new light on this potential of the movement, its role in producing social change, and, given the recent strategic trajectory of the movement, the serious problems it now faces.
Donohoe: Public Health and Social Justice
Jan 01, 2013
see http://phsj.org/public-health-and-social-justice-reader/
Marqusee: Street Music
Nov 02, 2012
A new book of more than 60 poems written between 2009-2012, with a prose introduction by the author.
McElroy: Dissenting Electorate
Oct 14, 2012
"Dissenting Electorate: Those Who Refuse to Vote and the Legitimacy of Their Opposition" BOOK DESCRIPTION: It's the same message every election year: "Get out and vote--It's your civic duty." Those who audit the sound bites of the candidates, read headlines about the debates and finally pull the lever at their local precinct are touted as moral, upstanding citizens; those who find among the candidates no agreeable representative, no platform worthy of espousal, and who then refuse to turn out on election day, on the other hand, are labeled apathetic and the legitimacy of their opposition is denied. This book is an anthology of articles and excerpts from a variety of sources that deal with the topic of nonvoting. In presenting the minority view that important moral and political reasons abound for not voting, the book unfolds four general arguments: voting is implicitly a coercive act because it lends support to a compulsory state; voting reinforces the legitimacy of the state; and existing nonpolitical, voluntarist alternatives better serve society. Many people do not agree with the concept of nonvoting--but the serious and well thought through underpinnings of such a belief are of crucial importance to an understanding of modern American politics. LINK http://www.amazon.com/Dissenting-Electorate-Refuse-Legitimacy-Opposition/dp/078640874X
Ruin: Paths toward Utopia
Oct 09, 2012
"Writing-speaking differently is part of the struggle for the world we want to create and are creating, a world that moves against-and-beyond capitalism. These picture-essay-poems break the existing world both in what they say and how they say it. A fabulous book". —John Holloway, author of Crack Capitalism
Cromwell: Why Are We The Good Guys?
Sep 28, 2012
A provocative challenge to the standard ideology that Western power is a benevolent force in the world.
Girdner: Sweet Home Mississippi (Part 1)
Sep 17, 2012
Ted Grover's life in Mississippi.
Kreider: Student Power
Sep 03, 2012
Based on the student power/democracy ideology of Students for a Democratic Society and the latter short-lived Movement for Democracy and Education - 180. Pamphlet/booklet.
Smith: Voting in the USA
Sep 03, 2012
Voting in US elections accomplishes exactly the opposite of what most voters want. These essays explain why it is better not to vote than to consent to tyranny.
Smith: Consent To Tyranny: USA Voting
Sep 03, 2012
Voting in US elections accomplishes exactly the opposite of what most voters want. These essays explain why it is better not to vote than to consent to tyranny.
O'Rourke: Representing Jihad
Aug 09, 2012
This timely book argues that Muslim theory and fiction has been significantly commodified to cater to the needs of western ideology.
Wignesan: Poietics
Jul 03, 2012
The book deals with the science and/or the art or philosophy of creation. Here, for the first time in English, the author attempts to lay the foundation either for the formulation of a theory or, contrariwise, for the impossibility at arriving at any such formulaic circumscription on poietics.
Zepeda: Drug War Mexico
Jun 14, 2012
Mexico is a country in crisis. Capitalizing on weakened public institutions, widespread unemployment, a state of lawlessness and the strengthening of links between Mexican and Colombian drug cartels, narcotrafficking in the country has flourished during the post-1982 neoliberal era. In fact, it has become one of Mexico's biggest source of revenue, as well as its most violent, with over 12,000 drug-related executions in 2011 alone. In response, Mexican president Felipe Calderón, armed with millions of dollars in US military aid, has launched a crackdown, ostensibly to combat organised crime. Despite this, human rights violations have increased, as has the murder rate, making Ciudad Juárez on the northern border the most dangerous city on the planet. Meanwhile, the supply of cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine has continued to grow. In this insightful and controversial book, Watt and Zepeda throw new light on the situation, contending that the 'war on drugs' in Mexico is in fact the pretext for a US-backed strategy to bolster unpopular neoliberal policies, a weak yet authoritarian government and a radically unfair status quo.
Dabashi: The Arab Spring
May 10, 2012
A pioneering explanation of the Arab Spring that will define a new era of thinking about the Middle East.
Leech: Capitalism
Apr 26, 2012
The nature of contemporary capitalism, and how it inherently generates inequality and structural violence.
Lavalette: Life in the West Bank
Apr 01, 2012
Over 60% of the Palestinians living in the West Bank are under 20 years old. It is from their experiences and stories that this book explores this extraordinarily besieged society and the Palestinians' enduring resistance to a ruthless occupation.
Lavalette: Life in the West Bank
Apr 01, 2012
Over 60% of the Palestinians living in the West Bank are under 20 years old. It is from their experiences and stories that this book explores this extraordinarily besieged society and the Palestinians' enduring resistance to a ruthless occupation.
ricketts: The Activists Handbook
Mar 08, 2012
'The Activists' Handbook' is a powerful guide to grassroots activism. A priceless resource for everyone ready to make a difference, environmental activist Aidan Ricketts offers a step-by-step handbook for citizens eager to start or get involved in grass-roots movements and beyond. Providing all essential practical tools, methods and strategies needed for a successful campaign and extensively discussing legal and ethical issues, this book empowers its readers to effectively promote their cause. Lots of ready-to-use documents and comprehensive information on digital activism and group strategy make this book an essential companion for any campaign. Including case studies from the US, UK, Canada and Australia, this is the ultimate guidebook to participatory democracy.
Hughes: Dialogues and Reflections of Indigenous Activism
Feb 10, 2012
Provocative and original, The Politics of Indigeneity explores the concept of indigeneity across the world - from the Americas to New Zealand, Africa to Asia - and the ways in which it intersects with local, national and international social and political realities. Taking on the role of critical interlocutors, the authors engage in extended dialogue with indigenous spokespersons and activists, as well as between each other. In doing so, they explore the possibilities of a 'second-wave indigeneity' - one that is alert to the challenges posed to indigenous aspirations by the neo-liberal agenda of nation-states and their concerns with sovereignty. Timely and topical in its focus on global indigenous politics, and featuring a variety of first-hand indigenous voices - including those of indigenous activists, scholars, leaders and interviewees - this is a vital contribution to an often contentious topic.
Parenti: Tropic of Chaos
Feb 02, 2012
From Africa to Asia and Latin America, the era of climate wars has begun. Extreme weather is breeding banditry, humanitarian crisis, and state failure. In Tropic of Chaos, investigative journalist Christian Parenti travels along the front lines of this gathering catastrophe--the belt of economically and politically battered postcolonial nations and war zones girding the planet's midlatitudes. Here he finds failed states amid climatic disasters. But he also reveals the unsettling presence of Western military forces and explains how they see an opportunity in the crisis to prepare for open-ended global counterinsurgency. Parenti argues that this incipient "climate fascism"--a political hardening of wealthy states-- is bound to fail. The struggling states of the developing world cannot be allowed to collapse, as they will take other nations down as well. Instead, we must work to meet the challenge of climate-driven violence with a very different set of sustainable economic and development policies.
