Benjamin R. Barber Livres

Jihad contre McWorld est une œuvre novatrice, une analyse élégante et éclairante du conflit central de notre époque : le capitalisme consumériste face au fondamentalisme religieux et tribal. Ces forces diamétralement opposées mais étrangement entrelacées déchirent et unissent le monde tel que nous le connaissons, sapant la démocratie et l'État-nation dont elle dépend. D'une part, le capitalisme consumériste à l'échelle mondiale dissout rapidement les barrières sociales et économiques entre les nations, transformant les diverses populations en un marché uniformément terne. D'autre part, les haines ethniques, religieuses et raciales fragmentent le paysage politique en unités tribales de plus en plus petites. Jihad contre McWorld est le terme que l'écrivain et politologue Benjamin R. Barber a inventé pour décrire l'interdépendance puissante et paradoxale de ces forces. Dans ce livre important, il explore les répercussions alarmantes de cette dialectique sur la démocratie. Une œuvre d'originalité persuasive et d'insight pénétrant, Jihad contre McWorld offre un prisme clair sur le chaos dangereux du monde post-Guerre froide.

Offers liberal society a way of thinking about and of practicing democracy. This title argues that an excess of liberalism has undermined our democratic institutions and brought about the set of crises we find ourselves struggling against: cynicism about voting, alienation, privatization, and the growing paralysis of public institutions.

" Fear's Empire lays the foundation for a principled opposition based on America's truest and best values."--Senator Gary Hart The author of Jihad vs. McWorld analyzes how American foreign policy has gone wrongand how it could go right. In this hard-hitting but pragmatic new critique of the Bush administration's foreign policy, Benjamin R. Barber exposes in detail the folly of an agenda of preventive war, placing it in the context of two hundred years of American strategic doctrine (including the recent history of deterrence and containment). He shows how chosen "rogue states" have been made to stand in for terrorists too difficult to locate and destroy, and how the United States continues to support dictatorship in nations it regards as friends, while still believing we can impose democracy on vanquished enemies at the barrel of a gun. Barber argues for an America that promotes cooperation, multilateralism, international law, and pooled sovereignty. For as law and citizenship alone secure liberty within nations, law and citizenship alone can secure liberty among them, freeing them from fear.

"Powerful and disturbing. No one who cares about the future of our public life can afford to ignore this book." —Jackson Lears

"In the face of the most perilous challenges of our time--climate change, terrorism, poverty, and trafficking of drugs, guns, and people--the nations of the world seem paralyzed. The problems are too big for governments to deal with. Benjamin Barber contends that cities, and the mayors who run them, can do and are doing a better job than nations. He cites the unique qualities cities worldwide share: pragmatism, civic trust, participation, indifference to borders and sovereignty, and a democratic penchant for networking, creativity, innovation, and cooperation. He demonstrates how city mayors, singly and jointly, are responding to transnational problems more effectively than nation-states mired in ideological infighting and sovereign rivalries. The book features profiles of a dozen mayors around the world, making a persuasive case that the city is democracy's best hope in a globalizing world, and that great mayors are already proving that this is so"--

Although the conflict and the bloodshed in the name of democracy have given us some of our noblest moments, democracy itself remains one of the most flawed, confusing, threatened, and complex of human institutions. By examining the paradoxes and perplexities, The Struggle for Democracy provides a clear understanding of the origin and nature of democracy, including the extraordinary idea of citizenship, the tremendous achievement of free speech, and the enormous power placed in the hands of ordinary men and women. The book includes commentary on monumentally historic events such as the destruction of the Berlin Wall, the infamous student demonstrations in Tiananmen Square, and the collapse of communism in the former Soviet Union. In an inspiring introductory chapter, Patrick Watson reflects on the challenges facing world democracy as it enters the new millennium. In a concluding chapter, Benjamin Barber examines the future of democracy and the impact that globalization and technology will have on both emerging and established democracies.