Problems Of Socialist Renewal

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The Idea of Socialism

Author : Axel Honneth
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1509512152
Total Pages : 88 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (95 download)

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Book Synopsis The Idea of Socialism by : Axel Honneth

Download or read book The Idea of Socialism written by Axel Honneth and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2016-12-27 with total page 88 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The idea of socialism has given normative grounding and orientation to the outrage over capitalism for more than 150 years, and yet today it seems to have lost much of its appeal. Despite growing discontent, many would hesitate to invoke socialism when it comes to envisioning life beyond capitalism. How can we explain the rapid decline of this once powerful idea? And what must we do to renew it for the twenty-first century? In this lucid, political-philosophical essay, Axel Honneth argues that the idea of socialism has lost its luster because its theoretical assumptions stem from the industrial era and are no longer convincing in our contemporary post-industrial societies. Only if we manage to replace these assumptions with a concept of history and society that corresponds to our current experiences will we be able to restore confidence in a project whose fundamental idea remains as relevant today as it was a century ago the idea of an economy that realizes freedom in solidarity. The Idea of Socialism was awarded the Bruno Kreisky Prize for the Political Book of 2015.

Renewing Socialism

Author : Leo Panitch
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000309657
Total Pages : 311 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (3 download)

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Book Synopsis Renewing Socialism by : Leo Panitch

Download or read book Renewing Socialism written by Leo Panitch and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-06-18 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Renewing Socialism opens with an exploration of the contemporary meaning of revolution and reform, beginning by stressing the appropriation of both terms into the rhetoric of the political right. Panitch examines the failure to realize socialisms revolutionary promise through an analysis of social democratic parties and the politics of compromise t

In the Ruins of Neoliberalism

Author : Wendy Brown
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231550537
Total Pages : 181 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (315 download)

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Book Synopsis In the Ruins of Neoliberalism by : Wendy Brown

Download or read book In the Ruins of Neoliberalism written by Wendy Brown and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2019-07-16 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Across the West, hard-right leaders are surging to power on platforms of ethno-economic nationalism, Christianity, and traditional family values. Is this phenomenon the end of neoliberalism or its monstrous offspring? In the Ruins of Neoliberalism casts the hard-right turn as animated by socioeconomically aggrieved white working- and middle-class populations but contoured by neoliberalism’s multipronged assault on democratic values. From its inception, neoliberalism flirted with authoritarian liberalism as it warred against robust democracy. It repelled social-justice claims through appeals to market freedom and morality. It sought to de-democratize the state, economy, and society and re-secure the patriarchal family. In key works of the founding neoliberal intellectuals, Wendy Brown traces the ambition to replace democratic orders with ones disciplined by markets and traditional morality and democratic states with technocratic ones. Yet plutocracy, white supremacy, politicized mass affect, indifference to truth, and extreme social disinhibition were no part of the neoliberal vision. Brown theorizes their unintentional spurring by neoliberal reason, from its attack on the value of society and its fetish of individual freedom to its legitimation of inequality. Above all, she argues, neoliberalism’s intensification of nihilism coupled with its accidental wounding of white male supremacy generates an apocalyptic populism willing to destroy the world rather than endure a future in which this supremacy disappears.

The Problem with Socialism

Author : Thomas J. DiLorenzo
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1621575977
Total Pages : 241 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (215 download)

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Book Synopsis The Problem with Socialism by : Thomas J. DiLorenzo

Download or read book The Problem with Socialism written by Thomas J. DiLorenzo and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-07-18 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "DiLorenzo's book is a pleasure to read and should be put in the hands of every young person in this country - and elsewhere!" —FORMER CONGRESSMAN RON PAUL "It is a worthwhile investment for parents with college-age children to buy two copies of The Problem with Socialism -one for their children and one for themselves." —WALTER E. WILLIAMS, John M Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics, George Mason University and nationally syndicated columnist "Ever wonder what one book you should give a young person to make sure he doesn't fall for leftist propoganda? You're looking at it." —THOMAS E. WOODS, JR., host of The Tom Woods Show, author of the New York Times bestseller The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History What’s the Problem with Socialism? Let’s start with...everything. So says bestselling author and professor of economics Thomas J. DiLorenzo, who sets the record straight in this concise and lively primer on an economic theory that’s gaining popularity—with help from Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders—despite its universal failure as an economic model and its truly horrific record on human rights. In sixteen eye-opening chapters, DiLorenzo reveals how socialism inevitably makes inequality worse, why socialism was behind the worst government-sponsored mass murders in history, the myth of “successful” Scandinavian socialism; how socialism is worse—far worse—for the environment than capitalism, and more. As DiLorenzo shows, and history proves, socialism is the answer only if you want increasing unemployment and poverty, stifling bureaucracy if not outright political tyranny, catastrophic environmental pollution, rotten schools, and so many social ills that it takes a book like this to cover just the big ones. Provocative, timely, essential reading, Thomas J. DiLorenzo’s The Problem with Socialism is an instant classic comparable to Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson.' In the words of Thomas E. Woods - "Dance on socialism's grave by reading this book."

A World to Build

Author : Marta Harnecker
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 1583674683
Total Pages : 224 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (836 download)

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Book Synopsis A World to Build by : Marta Harnecker

Download or read book A World to Build written by Marta Harnecker and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2015-01-09 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Harnecker offers a useful overview of the changing political map in Latin America, examining the trajectories of several progressive Latin American governments as they work to develop alternative models to capitalism.--Provided by publisher.

Socialism - An Economic and Sociological Analysis

Author : Ludwig von Mises
Publisher : VM eBooks
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 766 pages
Book Rating : 4./5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Socialism - An Economic and Sociological Analysis by : Ludwig von Mises

Download or read book Socialism - An Economic and Sociological Analysis written by Ludwig von Mises and published by VM eBooks. This book was released on 2016-11-24 with total page 766 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Socialism is the watchword and the catchword of our day. The socialist idea dominates the modem spirit. The masses approve of it. It expresses the thoughts and feelings of all; it has set its seal upon our time. When history comes to tell our story it will write above the chapter “The Epoch of Socialism.” As yet, it is true, Socialism has not created a society which can be said to represent its ideal. But for more than a generation the policies of civilized nations have been directed towards nothing less than a gradual realization of Socialism.17 In recent years the movement has grown noticeably in vigour and tenacity. Some nations have sought to achieve Socialism, in its fullest sense, at a single stroke. Before our eyes Russian Bolshevism has already accomplished something which, whatever we believe to be its significance, must by the very magnitude of its design be regarded as one of the most remarkable achievements known to world history. Elsewhere no one has yet achieved so much. But with other peoples only the inner contradictions of Socialism itself and the fact that it cannot be completely realized have frustrated socialist triumph. They also have gone as far as they could under the given circumstances. Opposition in principle to Socialism there is none. Today no influential party would dare openly to advocate Private Property in the Means of Production. The word “Capitalism” expresses, for our age, the sum of all evil. Even the opponents of Socialism are dominated by socialist ideas. In seeking to combat Socialism from the standpoint of their special class interest these opponents—the parties which particularly call themselves “bourgeois” or “peasant”—admit indirectly the validity of all the essentials of socialist thought. For if it is only possible to argue against the socialist programme that it endangers the particular interests of one part of humanity, one has really affirmed Socialism. If one complains that the system of economic and social organization which is based on private property in the means of production does not sufficiently consider the interests of the community, that it serves only the purposes of single strata, and that it limits productivity; and if therefore one demands with the supporters of the various “social-political” and “social-reform” movements, state interference in all fields of economic life, then one has fundamentally accepted the principle of the socialist programme. Or again, if one can only argue against socialism that the imperfections of human nature make its realization impossible, or that it is inexpedient under existing economic conditions to proceed at once to socialization, then one merely confesses that one has capitulated to socialist ideas. The nationalist, too, affirms socialism, and objects only to its Internationalism. He wishes to combine Socialism with the ideas of Imperialism and the struggle against foreign nations. He is a national, not an international socialist; but he, also, approves of the essential principles of Socialism.

The Contradictions of "Real Socialism"

Author : Michael A. Lebowitz
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 1583672567
Total Pages : 223 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (836 download)

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Book Synopsis The Contradictions of "Real Socialism" by : Michael A. Lebowitz

Download or read book The Contradictions of "Real Socialism" written by Michael A. Lebowitz and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2012-08 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What was “real socialism”—the term which originated in twentieth-century socialist societies for the purpose of distinguishing them from abstract, theoretical socialism? In this volume, Michael A. Lebowitz considers the nature, tendencies, and contradictions of those societies. Beginning with the constant presence of shortages within “real socialism,” Lebowitz searches for the inner relations which generate these patterns. He finds these, in particular, in what he calls “vanguard relations of production,” a relation which takes the apparent form of a social contract where workers obtain benefits not available to their counterparts in capitalism but lack the power to decide within the workplace and society. While these societies were able to claim major achievements in areas from health care to education to popular culture, the separation of thinking and doing prevented workers from developing their capacities as fully developed human beings. The relationship within “real socialism” between the vanguard as conductor and a conducted working class, however, did not only lead to the deformation of workers and those elements necessary for the building of socialism; it also created the conditions in which enterprise managers emerged as an incipient capitalist class, which was an immediate source of the crises of “real socialism.” As he argued in The Socialist Alternative: Real Human Development, Lebowitz stresses the necessity to go beyond the hierarchy inherent in the relation of conductor and conducted (and beyond the “vanguard Marxism” which supports this) to create the conditions in which people can transform themselves through their conscious cooperation and practice—i.e., a society of free and associated producers.

It Didn't Happen Here

Author : Seymour Martin Lipset
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 9780393322545
Total Pages : 388 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (225 download)

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Book Synopsis It Didn't Happen Here by : Seymour Martin Lipset

Download or read book It Didn't Happen Here written by Seymour Martin Lipset and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2000 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why socialism has failed to play a significant role in the United States - the most developed capitalist industrial society and hence, ostensibly, fertile ground for socialism - has been a critical question of American history and political development. This study surveys the various explanations for this phenomenon of American political exceptionalism.

State of Crisis

Author : Zygmunt Bauman
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 0745685293
Total Pages : 151 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (456 download)

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Book Synopsis State of Crisis by : Zygmunt Bauman

Download or read book State of Crisis written by Zygmunt Bauman and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2014-07-17 with total page 151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today we hear much talk of crisis and comparisons are often made with the Great Depression of the 1930s, but there is a crucial difference that sets our current malaise apart from the 1930s: today we no longer trust in the capacity of the state to resolve the crisis and to chart a new way forward. In our increasingly globalized world, states have been stripped of much of their power to shape the course of events. Many of our problems are globally produced but the volume of power at the disposal of individual nation-states is simply not sufficient to cope with the problems they face. This divorce between power and politics produces a new kind of paralysis. It undermines the political agency that is needed to tackle the crisis and it saps citizens’ belief that governments can deliver on their promises. The impotence of governments goes hand in hand with the growing cynicism and distrust of citizens. Hence the current crisis is at once a crisis of agency, a crisis of representative democracy and a crisis of the sovereignty of the state. In this book the world-renowned sociologist Zygmunt Bauman and fellow traveller Carlo Bordoni explore the social and political dimensions of the current crisis. While this crisis has been greatly exacerbated by the turmoil following the financial crisis of 2007-8, Bauman and Bordoni argue that the crisis facing Western societies is rooted in a much more profound series of transformations that stretch back further in time and are producing long-lasting effects. This highly original analysis of our current predicament by two of the world’s leading social thinkers will be of interest to a wide readership.

The Socialist Manifesto

Author : Bhaskar Sunkara
Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1786636921
Total Pages : 325 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (866 download)

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Book Synopsis The Socialist Manifesto by : Bhaskar Sunkara

Download or read book The Socialist Manifesto written by Bhaskar Sunkara and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2019-04-30 with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The success of Jeremy Corbyn's left-led Labour Party and Bernie Sanders's 2016 presidential campaign revived a political idea many had thought dead. But what, exactly, is socialism? And what would a socialist system look like today? In The Socialist Manifesto, Bhaskar Sunkara, editor of Jacobin magazine, argues that socialism offers the means to achieve economic equality, and also to fight other forms of oppression, including racism and sexism. The ultimate goal is not Soviet-style planning, but to win rights to healthcare, education, and housing and to create new democratic institutions in workplaces and communities. The book both explores socialism's history and presents a realistic vision for its future. A primer on socialism for the 21st century, this is a book for anyone seeking an end to the vast inequities of our age.

Reconstructing Lenin

Author : Tamás Krausz
Publisher : NYU Press
ISBN 13 : 1583674616
Total Pages : 564 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (836 download)

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Book Synopsis Reconstructing Lenin by : Tamás Krausz

Download or read book Reconstructing Lenin written by Tamás Krausz and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2015-02-27 with total page 564 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Vladimir Ilyich Lenin is among the most enigmatic and influential figures of the twentieth century. While his life and work are crucial to any understanding of modern history and the socialist movement, generations of writers on the left and the right have seen fit to embalm him endlessly with superficial analysis or dreary dogma. Now, after the fall of the Soviet Union and “actually-existing” socialism, it is possible to consider Lenin afresh, with sober senses trained on his historical context and how it shaped his theoretical and political contributions. Reconstructing Lenin, four decades in the making and now available in English for the first time, is an attempt to do just that. Tamás Krausz, an esteemed Hungarian scholar writing in the tradition of György Lukács, Ferenc Tokei, and István Mészáros, makes a major contribution to a growing field of contemporary Lenin studies. This rich and penetrating account reveals Lenin busy at the work of revolution, his thought shaped by immediate political events but never straying far from a coherent theoretical perspective. Krausz balances detailed descriptions of Lenin’s time and place with lucid explications of his intellectual development, covering a range of topics like war and revolution, dictatorship and democracy, socialism and utopianism.Reconstructing Lenin will change the way you look at a man and a movement; it will also introduce the English-speaking world to a profound radical scholar.

Karl Polanyi

Author : Gareth Dale
Publisher : Polity
ISBN 13 : 0745640710
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (456 download)

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Book Synopsis Karl Polanyi by : Gareth Dale

Download or read book Karl Polanyi written by Gareth Dale and published by Polity. This book was released on 2010-06-21 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation is generally acclaimed as being among the most influential works of economic history in the twentieth century, and remains as vital in the current historical conjuncture as it was in his own. In its critique of nineteenth-century ‘market fundamentalism’ it reads as a warning to our own neoliberal age, and is widely touted as a prophetic guidebook for those who aspire to understand the causes and dynamics of global economic turbulence at the end of the 2000s. Karl Polanyi: The Limits of the Market is the first comprehensive introduction to Polanyi’s ideas and legacy. It assesses not only the texts for which he is famous – prepared during his spells in American academia – but also his journalistic articles written in his first exile in Vienna, and lectures and pamphlets from his second exile, in Britain. It provides a detailed critical analysis of The Great Transformation, but also surveys Polanyi’s seminal writings in economic anthropology, the economic history of ancient and archaic societies, and political and economic theory. Its primary source base includes interviews with Polanyi’s daughter, Kari Polanyi-Levitt, as well as the entire compass of his own published and unpublished writings in English and German. This engaging and accessible introduction to Polanyi’s thinking will appeal to students and scholars across the social sciences, providing a refreshing perspective on the roots of our current economic crisis.

The Road to Wigan Pier

Author : George Orwell
Publisher : Modernista
ISBN 13 : 9180948650
Total Pages : 226 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (89 download)

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Book Synopsis The Road to Wigan Pier by : George Orwell

Download or read book The Road to Wigan Pier written by George Orwell and published by Modernista. This book was released on 2024-04-26 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: George Orwell provides a vivid and unflinching portrayal of working-class life in Northern England during the 1930s. Through his own experiences and meticulous investigative reporting, Orwell exposes the harsh living conditions, poverty, and social injustices faced by coal miners and other industrial workers in the region. He documents their struggles with unemployment, poor housing, and inadequate healthcare, as well as the pervasive sense of hopelessness and despair that permeates their lives. In the second half of the The Road to Wigan Pier Orwell delves into the complexities of political ideology, as he grapples with the shortcomings of both socialism and capitalism in addressing the needs of the working class. GEORGE ORWELL was born in India in 1903 and passed away in London in 1950. As a journalist, critic, and author, he was a sharp commentator on his era and its political conditions and consequences.

How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century

Author : Erik Olin Wright
Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1788739558
Total Pages : 177 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (887 download)

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Book Synopsis How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century by : Erik Olin Wright

Download or read book How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century written by Erik Olin Wright and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2021-04-13 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is wrong with capitalism, and how can we change it? Capitalism has transformed the world and increased our productivity, but at the cost of enormous human suffering. Our shared values—equality and fairness, democracy and freedom, community and solidarity—can provide both the basis for a critique of capitalism and help to guide us toward a socialist and democratic society. Erik Olin Wright has distilled decades of work into this concise and tightly argued manifesto: analyzing the varieties of anticapitalism, assessing different strategic approaches, and laying the foundations for a society dedicated to human flourishing. How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century is an urgent and powerful argument for socialism, and an unparalleled guide to help us get there. Another world is possible. Included is an afterword by the author’s close friend and collaborator Michael Burawoy.

Karl Polanyi

Author : Gareth Dale
Publisher : Columbia University Press
ISBN 13 : 0231541481
Total Pages : 394 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (315 download)

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Book Synopsis Karl Polanyi by : Gareth Dale

Download or read book Karl Polanyi written by Gareth Dale and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2016-05-31 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Karl Polanyi (1886–1964) was one of the twentieth century's most original interpreters of the market economy. His penetrating analysis of globalization's disruptions and the Great Depression's underlying causes still serves as an effective counterargument to free market fundamentalism. This biography shows how the major personal and historical events of his life transformed him from a bourgeois radical into a Christian socialist but also informed his ambivalent stance on social democracy, communism, the New Deal, and the shifting intellectual scene of postwar America. The book begins with Polanyi's childhood in the Habsburg Empire and his involvement with the Great War and Hungary's postwar revolution. It connects Polanyi's idealistic radicalism to the political promise and intellectual ferment of Red Vienna and the horror of fascism. The narrative revisits Polanyi's oeuvre in English, German, and Hungarian, includes exhaustive research in five archives, and features interviews with Polanyi's daughter, students, and colleagues, clarifying the contradictory aspects of the thinker's work. These personal accounts also shed light on Polanyi's connections to scholars, Christians, atheists, journalists, hot and cold warriors, and socialists of all stripes. Karl Polanyi: A Life on the Left engages with Polanyi's biography as a reflection and condensation of extraordinary times. It highlights the historical ruptures, tensions, and upheavals that the thinker sought to capture and comprehend and, in telling his story, engages with the intellectual and political history of a turbulent epoch.

The American Newness

Author : Irving Howe
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780674182677
Total Pages : 99 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (826 download)

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Book Synopsis The American Newness by : Irving Howe

Download or read book The American Newness written by Irving Howe and published by . This book was released on 2013-10 with total page 99 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is the Emersonian spirit? What inspired it, what propelled it? And what does it mean to us today? Howe lays before us the intellectual and personal tragedy of the first great American man of letters, yet also shows that Emerson's belief in the untapped power of free men pervades not only the lives and works of his contemporaries but is also a permanent part of the American psyche.

A Socialist Defector

Author : Victor Grossman
Publisher : Monthly Review Press
ISBN 13 : 1583677380
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (836 download)

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Book Synopsis A Socialist Defector by : Victor Grossman

Download or read book A Socialist Defector written by Victor Grossman and published by Monthly Review Press. This book was released on 2019-03-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rise and successes, the travails, and the eventual demise of the German Democratic Republic told in personal detail by activist and writer Victor Grossman The circumstances that impelled Victor Grossman, a U.S. Army draftee stationed in Europe, to flee a military prison sentence were the icy pressures of the McCarthy Era. Grossman – a.k.a. Steve Wechsler, a committed leftist since his years at Harvard and, briefly, as a factory worker – left his barracks in Bavaria one August day in 1952, and, in a panic, swam across the Danube River from the Austrian U.S. Zone to the Soviet Zone. Fate – i.e., the Soviets – landed him in East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic. There he remained, observer and participant, husband and father, as he watched the rise and successes, the travails, and the eventual demise of the GDR socialist experiment. A Socialist Defector is the story, told in rare, personal detail, of an activist and writer who grew up in the U.S. free-market economy; spent thirty-eight years in the GDR’s nationally owned, centrally administered economy; and continues to survive, given whatever the market can bear in today’s united Germany. Having been a freelance journalist and traveling lecturer – and the only person in the world to hold diplomas from both Harvard and the Karl Marx University – Grossman is able to offer insightful, often ironic, reflections and reminiscences, comparing the good and bad sides of life in all three of the societies he has known. His account focuses especially on the socialism he saw and lived – the GDR’s goals and achievements, its repressive measures and stupidities – which, he argues, offers lessons now in our search for solutions to the grave problems facing our world. This is a fascinating and unique historical narrative; political analysis told with jokes, personal anecdotes, and without bombast.