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State and Revolution

Fully Annotated Edition
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EUR4,99

Product description

State and Revolution is an indispensable guide to confronting the political and bureaucratic structures that protect the power and position of the world's elites and suffocate the lives of the vast majority of humanity. It has been considered essential reading for generation after generation of revolutionaries, and this fully annotated edition offers an essential guide to contemporary activists trying to work through and adapt its conclusions to our present conditions.

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Much of Valdimir Ilyich Lenin's most famous-and most misunderstood-book was written in July of 1917 while its author was on the run and plagued by fears that the revolution would be swallowed by the forces of reaction waging a war to restore Russia's Tsar. By 1918, when this small 'notebook on Marxism and the State' was first published, the autocracy was no more, and the centuries old apparatus of repression it had used to sustain its rule had been smashed to bits by the collective power of Russia's working class and peasantry.

In part because it was forged in the crucible of revolutionary foment, and in part because the state continues to be the guardian of the same inhumane systems of exploitation and oppression that Lenin thundered against, State and Revolution has offered inspiration and invaluable lessons to anti-capitalists the world over. But this small book was very much a product of its time, written for a specific context with a focus on certain questions over others. Because of this, any contemporary reader attempting to absorb State and Revolution's numerous lessons without a guide travels a perilous road.

This new edition from Haymarket Books features an extensive introduction, hundreds of explanatory annotations, and an invaluable glossary of key figures and terms by Todd Chretien, all of which help place Lenin's work in its historical context. Chretien deftly offers an accessible account of the most important people, parties, and debates within the socialist movement of Lenin's time, and provides a map to navigating the book's most controversial points.
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Details

Additional ISBN/GTIN9781608465170
Product TypeE-book
BindingE-book
FormatEPUB
FormatReflowable
Publishing date19/01/2015
LanguageEnglish
File size411903 Bytes
Article no.7023202
CatalogsVC
Data source no.927508
Product groupBU730
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This book has had something of a miraculous resurrection. A few months ago, it looked like it could well be pulped and its author sued for libel after one of his subjects took offence at a less than flattering portrait. British libel laws are such that a writer facing an oligarch in court is not felt to stand much of a chance and there was a strong feeling in the publishing world that Tom Burgis would be required to cough up a considerable sum of cash. For once however, the British courts sided with the little guy and dismissed the case, allowing this excellent book to continue its life out in the wild. Although technical and at times a bit opaque on financial detail, it is an extremely well put together account of how dodgy money (very often channelled through London) can be moved around the world and continuing enriching both its very questionable owners and their willing accessories.
Ein Freund sagte einmal, nachdem er sich durch einen Text von Zizek gearbeitet hatte, dass es doch erstaunlich sei, in welchen Regionen sich manche Menschen bewegen und trotzdem noch in der Lage seien, feste Nahrung zu sich zu nehmen: Zizek-Lektüre ist harte Arbeit. Zizek ist Psychoanalytiker, Philosoph, Filmtheoretiker und Kommunist. Er macht es einem wahrlich nicht leicht, schreibt komplex, meinungsfreudig und erfreut sich an der Provokation. Sein neuestes Buch lässt jedoch kaum Raum für Missverständnisse zu und ist ausgesprochen klar und pointiert. Er fordert eine tatkräftigere Linke, die sich neu formieren muss, um den drängenden Problemen der Zeit zu begegnen. Von der kapitalistischen Weltordnung seien angesichts der globalen Bedrohungen keine Lösungen zu erwarten, von den diversen populistischen Bewegungen schon gar nicht. Ohne eine neue Wirtschaftsordnung sei die Zukunft nicht zu bewältigen. Keine neuen Töne von Zizek, aber selten mit einer solchen Klarheit formuliert.
When the draft to her first novel gets stolen in a robbery, Lasley impulsively upends her life in London and moves to Aberdeen to talk to men in Scotland, who work on oil rigs. Her long year of pub interviews with these workers is shot through by the story of her obssessive affair with Caden, the first oil rig worker she interviews.
The strongest part by far are the snippets of insights into life on the oil rig, the specific lingo and rythm of life offshore in an all male environment. In her own words, Lasley wanted to find out what men are like with no women around. This query gives the book, especially in the passages about the affair, a curiously misogynist angle. At times I found myself reminded of Lisa Taddeo's chronicles of love lives of three American women. Books like these are often heralded for showing 'female desire' when in fact it more often depicts are certain type of needy, unhealthy attachment style. Personally, less pining and more reporting would have pleased me.
There are a number of books one could read to try and make sense of the current situation but this one is definitely a good place to start. Originally published seven years ago, it chronicles Pomerantsev's experiences in the early noughties, when he was pursuing a career in Russian TV production. His highly readable account focuses on several cultural phenomena, such as the gangster turned film producer, the rise of Russia Today and the deeply ingrained corruption. I suspect this was once a more light-hearted read but in the light of recent events, it is almost scarily prescient and underlines once again the argument, that the war on Ukraine shouldn't really be a surprise but is rather the result of a development that someone could already knowledgably write about in 2014.

Author


V.I. Lenin was a leading member of the Bolshevik party in Russia from 1912 until his death in 1924, and is widely considered to have founded a distinct tradition in the struggle for revolutionary socialism, built from below. He is the author of celebrated works of theory such as State and Revolution, as well as widely misunderstood polemics like What is to be Done?

Todd Chretien is a frequent contributor to Socialist Worker and the ISR.

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