Episode · The Ezra Klein Show · 2023-06-09
Books mentioned on What Communes and Other Radical Experiments in Living Together Reveal
Kristin Godsey recommended Pirate Enlightenment by David Graeber, The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin, and Gender and the politics of history by Joan Wallach Scott, and discussed Utopia for Realists by Rutger Bregman, Abundance by Peter H. Diamandis and others, Utopia by Thomas More, and Saving Time by Jenny Odell. Ezra Klein discussed Fully Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani.
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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Utopia for Realists
Utopia for Realists by Rutger Bregman is an imaginative economic and social policy book that challenges conventional political wisdom by advocating for transformative ideas such as a universal basic income and a drastically shortened workweek.
Discussed“so I'm thinking of like Rutger bregman's Utopia for realist right where he talks about a 15-hour work week”
Where to get it
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Abundance
Abundance by Peter H.
Discussed“diamantis and kotler have this book called abundance you know the future is better than you think”
Where to get it
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Fully Automated Luxury Communism
Fully Automated Luxury Communism by Aaron Bastani is a radical leftist manifesto envisioning a post-scarcity future enabled by automation, renewable energy, and advanced artificial intelligence.
Discussed“Aaron bastani wrote a book called fully automated luxury communist the best of the titles”
Where to get it
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Utopia
Utopia by Thomas More is a foundational 1516 satirical and philosophical work that famously coined the term utopia and describes an imaginary island society.
Discussed“so if we look at like Thomas Moore's Utopia he talks exactly about how when the utopians shared their resources all people in this Society even though they are in biparental families”
Where to get it
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Saving Time
Saving Time by Jenny Odell is an insightful cultural critique examining how modern society constructs, commodifies, and relentlessly stresses over time, advocating instead for a deeper, more ecological relationship with the natural rhythms of existence.
Discussed“and you know Jenny O'Dell's recent book about saving time and the way that we have come to think of time as this fundamentally sort of fungible asset”
Where to get it
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Pirate Enlightenment
Pirate Enlightenment, or the Real Libertalia by David Graeber explores the egalitarian and democratic societies created by pirates in Madagascar.
Recommended“the first one is pirate Enlightenment by the late David Graber the subtitle is the real libertalia”
Where to get it
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The Dispossessed
The Dispossessed by Ursula K.
Recommended“the second book is Ursula greens the dispossessed which I have been teaching for 25 years”
Where to get it
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Gender and the politics of history
Gender and the Politics of History by Joan Wallach Scott is a critical work of feminist theory and historical methodology that examines how gender operates as a constitutive element of social relationships and historical analysis.
Recommended“and then the third book is gender in the politics of History by Joan Wallach Scott Who as a grad student many years ago kind of broke my brain”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (1) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
“This is like putnam's bowling alone argument right the the fraying of Civil Society in so many ways”