In this seminar to be hosted at the University of Wollongong, we discuss our new book Global Capitalism, Global War, Global Crisis (Cambridge University Press, 2018) and the rejuvenation of historical materialist literature in political economy, historical sociology, geographical studies and international studies addressing the constitution and restructuring of ‘the international’.
For those not able to make the event on the day, a discount code on the full price of the book is available at the end of this post, which will also enable free shipping to Australia and New Zealand.
Our aim is to identify the necessity of historical materialist dialectics in rethinking ‘the international’ and, specifically, its attempt to grasp the inner connections of Global Capitalism, Global War, Global Crisis. We discuss how we have developed a dialectical focus on these themes to go beyond the violence of abstraction, as Derek Sayer distinctively argued. We do so by addressing capital’s internalisation within 1) the states-system of uneven and combined development, 2) geopolitics, and 3) the global crisis conditions facing humanity. We also discuss how we have tried to grapple with these challenges and problems in our own recent research on struggles in lived spaces of everyday life ─ one of us (Bieler) in the context of water struggles and social reproduction, the other (Morton) in the context of social struggles over space against state power.
Participants are expected to read all three articles. To start the discussion, we will briefly introduce each article, followed by a group debate on the respective key themes covered.
Location: Research Hub, 19.2072, University of Wollongong
Date and time: 10 December, 11:00am-12:30pm
Readings:
- Andreas Bieler and Adam David Morton, ‘Interlocutions with Passive Revolution’, Thesis Eleven, 147:1 (2018): 9-28.
- Andreas Bieler, ‘Fighting for Public Water: The First Successful European Citizens’ Initiative “Water and Sanitation are a Human Right”’, Interface: A journal for and about social movements, 9(1): 300-26.
- Adam David Morton, ‘The Architecture of “Passive Revolution”: Society, State and Space in Modern Mexico’, Journal of Latin American Studies, 50:1 (2018): 117-52.
Between 2:00pm and 4:30pm in the afternoon on the same day and same room location there will also be a roundtable presentation and discussion on Global Capitalism, Global War, Global Crisis involving both authors and faculty members from the School of Humanities and Social Inquiry.
For further details please contact: Dr Susan Engel <sengel@uow.edu.au>
Comments