verso books london (Over 3,700 results)

Soft cover. Condition: Good. Soft cover in good condition. Former owner name on ffep; some pages have underlining; some pages have corners folded down.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Silicon Valley titans, politicians, techno-futurists and social critics have united in arguing that we are living on the cusp of an era of rapid technological automation, heralding the end of work as we know it. But does the much-discussed 'rise of the robots' really explain the jobs crisis that awaits us on the other side of the coronavirus? In Automation and the Future of Work, Aaron Benanav uncovers the structural economic trends that will shape our working lives far into the future. What social movements, he asks, are required to propel us into post-scarcity, if technological innovation alone can't deliver it? In response to calls for a universal basic income that would maintain a growing army of redundant workers, he offers a counter-proposal. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Twenty-two million people have died from AIDS-related illnesses since AIDS was first discovered almost 25 years agomore people than died in Europe during the Black Death of the Middle Ages. And 42 million people are now infected, two-thirds of them in sub-Saharan Africa. Already across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, HIV/AIDS threatens to erode fragile economies and set back development for decades. But this may be the tip of the iceberg: the HIV virus is poised to explode in Asia and the former Soviet Union. Meanwhile, in the West, sophisticated drugs have given people with AIDS new hope. This No-Nonsense Guide tells the story so far, looking at the origins of the disease, the way it spreads, the profits made by drug companies, the special vulnerability of women, and the positive action being taken by people and communities to fight back. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Water sustains life: without it, humans cannot survive for more than a few days. And yet this precious fluid is becoming increasingly politicized as the debates about control and ownership of water itself, and of the many organizations which govern its use, gain force. Maggie Black explores the many roles water plays in human life and, as the defense of water rights looks set to become an explosive issue, provides a clear overview on the vital issues of distribution, technology, irrigation, land use and commodification. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. "Our country has borne a special burden in global affairs. We have spilled American blood in many countries on multiple continents . Our cause is just, our resolve unwavering. We will go forward with the confidence that right makes might." -Barack Obama, West Point, December 1, 2009 What has really changed since Bush left the White House? Very little, argues Tariq Ali, apart from the mood music. The hopes aroused during Obama's election campaign have rapidly receded-the honeymoon has been short. Following the financial crisis, the "reform" president bailed out Wall Street without getting anything in return. With Democratic Party leaders and representatives mired in the corrupt lobbying system, the plans for reforming the healthcare system lie wrecked on the Senate floor. Abroad, the "war on terror" continues: torture on a daily basis in the horror chamber that is Bagram, Iraq occupied indefinitely, Israel permanently appeased, and more troops to Afghanistan and more drone attacks in Pakistan than under Bush. The fact that Obama has proved incapable of shifting the political terrain even a few inches in a reformist direction will pave the way for a Republican surge and triumph in the not too distant future. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Johns, Emily (illustrator). War Plan Iraq brings together the arguments that can shake President Bush and Prime Minister Blair's determination to start an illegal war with Iraq. Despite Washington's claims that the only options are inaction or invasion and that 'inaction is not an option', War Plan Iraq demonstrates that inspection is an option, and that inspection and monitoring are the only way to ensure real disarmament in Iraq. For the Bush Administration, UN weapons inspectors are an obstacle to war; they are part of the problem, not part of the solution. War Plan Iraq uncovers Washington's hidden role in the collapse of the first UN weapons inspection agency, UNSCOM, and the paralysis of UNSCOM's successor, UNMOVIC. Based on the popular 'ARROW Anti-War briefings', War Plan Iraq rigorously dissects official propaganda and exposes government lies. This book demonstrates that the Bush's claims to change the regime in Iraq, despite intentions to impose another Sunni general to replace Saddam Hussein, are not in fact a 'regime change', but a 'leadership change'. It also shows that the war would be in violation of international law; that there is no hard evidence that Iraq possesses any weapons of mass destruction; that there is no substantiated connection between the Government of Iraq, September 11th, and the al Qaeda network; that the proposed war carries a high risk of triggering a humanitarian disaster in Iraq, especially for the Kurds of northern Iraq; and that the war could precipitate a world recession with dire consequences for the world's poor. Iraq's neighbors, the ones most at risk from Iraq's weapons, are against the proposed war, as are top military professionals in Britain and the US, many international organizations and countries around the world, and a great majority of people in the US and the UK. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Since the upsurge of the Arab Spring in 2011, the Syrian civil war has claimed in excess of 200,000 lives, with an estimated 8 million Syrians, more than a third of the country's population, forced to flee their homes. Militant Sunni groups, such as ISIS, have taken control of large swathes of the nation. The impact of this catastrophe is now being felt on the streets of Europe and the United States. Veteran Middle East expert Charles Glass combines reportage, analysis, and history to provide an accessible overview of the origins and permutations defining the conflict. He also gives a powerful argument for why the West has failed to get to grips with the consequences of the crisis. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. As severe environmental degradation, breathtaking inequality, and increasing alienation push capitalism against its own contradictions, mythmaking has become as central to sustaining our economy as profitmaking. Enter the new prophets of capital: Sheryl Sandberg touting the capitalist work ethic as the antidote to gender inequality; John Mackey promising that free markets will heal the planet; Oprah Winfrey urging us to find solutions to poverty and alienation within ourselves; and Bill and Melinda Gates offering the generosity of the 1 percent as the answer to a persistent, systemic inequality. The new prophets of capital buttress an exploitative system, even as the cracks grow more visible. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Big challenges lie ahead for our society: increased automation of work, and the threat of catastrophic climate change. But so, too, are the huge possibilities presented by new technology and better ways of organising our economy in the wake of neoliberalism's failure. With the election of Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader, and the extraordinary turnaround in Labour's fortunes in the 2017 election, the possibility has opened up to build an economy in Britain that is radically fairer, radically more democratic, and radically more sustainable. But we need ideas and strategies on how to get there. Economics for the Many, edited and introduced by Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, John McDonnell, features contributions from the participants in McDonnell's New Economics conferences, including Faiza Shaheen, Barry Gardiner, Prem Sikka, Ann Pettifor, Paul Mason, Rebecca Long-Bailey and covers topics from housing, public ownership and fairer international trading systems to industrial policy for the 21st century and how to tackle tax avoidance and regional imbalances. Together, the essays in this volume lay out the vision for a new economics; one that works for the many, not the few. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Since the great recession hit in 2008, the 1% has only grown richer while the rest find life increasingly tough. The gap between the haves and the have-nots has turned into a chasm. While the rich have found new ways of protecting their wealth, everyone else has suffered the penalties of austerity. But inequality is more than just economics. Being born outside the 1% has a dramatic impact on a person's potential: reducing life expectancy, limiting education and work prospects, and even affecting mental health. What is to be done? In Inequality and the 1% leading social thinker Danny Dorling lays bare the extent and true cost of the division in our society and asks what have the superrich ever done for us. He shows that inquality is the greatest threat we face and why we must urgently redress the balance. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. "The essential public good that Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and now Cameron sell is not power stations, or trains, or hospitals. It's the public itself. it's us." In a little over a generation the bones and sinews of the British economy - rail, energy, water, postal services, municipal housing - have been sold to remote, unaccountable private owners, often from overseas. In a series of brilliant portraits the award-winning novelist and journalist James Meek shows how Britain's common wealth became private, and the impact it has had on us all: from the growing shortage of housing to spiralling energy bills. Meek explores the human stories behind the incremental privatization of the nation over the last three decades. He shows how, as our national assets are sold, ordinary citizens are handed over to private tax-gatherers, and the greatest burden of taxes shifts to the poorest. In the end, it is not only public enterprises that have become private property, but we ourselves. Urgent, powerfully written and deeply moving, this is a passionate anatomy of the state of the nation: of what we have lost and what losing it cost us - the rent we must pay to exist on this private island. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. School Wars tells the story of the struggle for Britain's education system. Established during the 1960s and based on the progressive ideal of good schools for all, the comprehensive system has over the past decades come under sustained attack from successive governments. From the poorest comprehensives to the most well-resourced independent schools, School Wars takes a forensic look at the inequalities of our current system, the damaging impact of spending cuts, the rise of "free schools" and the growth of the private sector in education. Melissa Benn explores, too, the dangerous example of US education reform, where privatization, punitive accountability and the rise of charter schools have intensified social, economic and ethnic divisions. The policies of successive British governments have been muddled and confused, but one thing is clear: that the relentless application of market principles signals a fundamental shift from the ideal of quality education as a public good, to education as market-controlled commodity. Benn ends by outlining some key principles for restoring strong educational values within a fair, non-selective public education system. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Every week young children are hospitalized on the playing fields of Britain. Yet this data is never collected, nor is there any concerted attempt to work out how to make sport safer. Using meticulous, peer-reviewed research, the book sets out the true risks associated with the sport, raising uncomfortable questions for politicians and the educational authorities. Would parents be so willing to let their children play rugby if they knew that the average risk of serious injury over the course of a season could be at least 17 percent, or nearly one in six? The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Today, media commentators, intellectuals and politicians declare that western science and rationality are threatened by irrational enemies. Evangelicals, postmodernists, and Islamists are on the march, they say. The Rome that science built is under siege. But there's a problem with these stirring attempts to defend the truth. They aren't true. In this urgent new book, Dan Hind confronts the great machinery of deception in which we live, and which now threatens to destroy our civilization. In particular, he takes to task a group of prominent intellectuals who have exaggerated the threat posed by the so-called forces of unreason-religion, postmodernism and other "mumbo-jumbo." The commentators, says Hind, distract us from much more pressing threats to an open democratic society based on freedom of speech and inquiry. This book shows that the real threats to reason aren't wacky or foreign or stupid; they reside in our state and corporate bureaucracies - and, one way or another, they probably pay your salary. In recovering the idea of Enlightenment, Hind explores its vital importance and reveals how it can help us to achieve a truly democratic politics, in which we have a genuine say in the decisions that are taken on our behalf. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Participants in the worldwide citizens' movement for social change and global justice like to proclaim that 'Another World Is Possible.' But is it? To this popular slogan, Susan George adds a cautionary 'If' and suggests how we can indeed reach that other world. Whether you are a seasoned campaigner and confirmed 'world-changer,' someone who wonders how you can join in the growing citizens' movement, or someone who simply wants to know what this movement is about, this book is for you. You will discover that we are not condemned to glaring North-South inequalities, obscene wealth gaps, environmental destruction or inordinate power remaining in the hands of a small minority, if. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. What is the relationship between capitalism and mental health? Through an exhilarating mix of philosophical and psychoanalytical theory and reportage - from the suicide epidemic in Korea to the wave of American mass murders - the prominent Italian thinker Franco Berardi Bifo traces the social roots of the mental malaise of our age. His darkest and most unsettling book to date, Berardi proposes dystopian irony as a strategy to disentangle ourselves from the deadly embrace of the neoliberalism. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Today, our lives are dominated by an ideology of extreme competition and individualism. It misrepresents human nature, destroying hope and common purpose. But we cannot replace it without a positive vision, one that reengages people in politics and lights a path to a better world. Urgent and passionate, George Monbiot shows how new findings in psychology, neuroscience and evolutionary biology cast humans in a radically different light: as the supreme altruists and cooperators. He shows how both democracy and economic life can be radically reorganised from the bottom up, enabling us to take back control and overthrow the forces that have thwarted our ambitions for a better society. Out of the Wreckage explains just how communities can be rebuilt with the help of a new "politics of belonging". The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Winner of the 2015 Orwell Prize for Books "The essential public good that Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and now Cameron sell is not power stations, or trains, or hospitals. It's the public itself. it's us." In a little over a generation the bones and sinews of the British economy - rail, energy, water, postal services, municipal housing - have been sold to remote, unaccountable private owners, often from overseas. In a series of brilliant portraits the award-winning novelist and journalist James Meek shows how Britain's common wealth became private, and the impact it has had on us all: from the growing shortage of housing to spiralling energy bills. Meek explores the human stories behind the incremental privatization of the nation over the last three decades. He shows how, as our national assets are sold, ordinary citizens are handed over to private tax-gatherers, and the greatest burden of taxes shifts to the poorest. In the end, it is not only public enterprises that have become private property, but we ourselves. Urgent, powerfully written and deeply moving, this is a passionate anatomy of the state of the nation: of what we have lost and what losing it cost us - the rent we must pay to exist on this private island. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Soft cover. Condition: Fine. Reprint.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. In modern Britain, the working class has become an object of fear and ridicule. From Little Britain's Vicky Pollard to the demonization of Jade Goody, media and politicians alike dismiss as feckless, criminalized and ignorant a vast, underprivileged swathe of society whose members have become stereotyped by one, hate-filled word: chavs. In this acclaimed investigation, Owen Jones explores how the working class has gone from "salt of the earth" to "scum of the earth." Exposing the ignorance and prejudice at the heart of the chav caricature, he portrays a far more complex reality. The chav stereotype, he argues, is used by governments as a convenient figleaf to avoid genuine engagement with social and economic problems and to justify widening inequality. Based on a wealth of original research, Chavs is a damning indictment of the media and political establishment and an illuminating, disturbing portrait of inequality and class hatred in modern Britain. This updated edition includes a new chapter exploring the causes and consequences of the UK riots in the summer of 2011. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The Body in the Library provides a nuanced and realistic picture of how medicine and society have abetted and thwarted each other ever since the lawyers behind the French Revolution banished the clergy and replaced them with doctors, priests of the body. Ranging from Charles Dickens to Oliver Sacks, Anton Chekhov to Raymond Queneau, Fanny Burney to Virginia Woolf, Miguel Torga to Guido Ceronetti, The Body in the Library is an anthology of poems, stories, journal entries, Socratic dialogue, table-talk, clinical vignettes, aphorisms, and excerpts written by doctor-writers themselves. Engaging and provocative, philosophical and instructive, intermittently funny and sometimes appalling, this anthology sets out to stimulate and entertain. With an acerbic introduction and witty contextual preface to each account, it will educate both patients and doctors curious to know more about the historical dimensions of medical practice. Armed with a first-hand experience of liberal medicine and knowledge of several languages, Iain Bamforth has scoured the literatures of Europe to provide a well-rounded and cross-cultural sense of what it means to be a doctor entering the twenty-first century. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. In this short and accessible book, Len McCluskey, General Secretary of Unite the Union, presents the case for joining a trade union. Drawing on anecdotes from his own long involvement in unions, he looks at the history of trade unions, what they do and how they give a voice to working people, as democratic organisations. He considers the changing world of work, the challenges and opportunities of automation and why being trade unionists can enable us to help shape the future. He sets out why being a trade unionist is as much a political role as it is an industrial one and why the historic links between the labour movement and the Labour Party matter. Ultimately, McCluskey explains how being a trade unionist means putting equality at work and in society front and centre, fighting for an end to discrimination, and to inequality in wages and power. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. By turns witty and profound, The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is a novel in the spirit of Gulliver's Travels or Animal Farm. Telling the story of the travels of a Professor Caritat, who is in search of the perfect world, Steven Lukes us on an irreverent romp through the history of western political philosophy. Doing for that discipline what Sophie's World did for philosophy in general, The Curious Enlightenment of Professor Caritat is both a refreshing humorous introduction to the clasing ideologies of our time, and a passionate defence of the much-abused Enlightenment and its core values of reason, freedom and tolerance. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Widely-researched and fast-paced, Private Warriors surveys the generals, gun-runners and national security staffers who were cast adrift at the end of the Cold War and who now operate in the private sector. In these pages we encounter Ernst Werner Glatt, a right-wing German who was for many years the Pentagon's preferred gun-runner; ex-Secretary of State Alexander Haig who now lobbies for China and assists in selling weapons to Turkey; and Frank Gaffney, an ex-Pentagon official who has grown rich by promoting the biggest boondoggle of them all, Star Wars. Today's private warriors have a direct financial interest in war and the connections to push for the maintenance of bloated military budgets. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. United Students Against Sweatshops heads a wave of anti-sweatshop organizing that has reached over two hundred American college campuses in the past four years. From the northeast to the southwest, at public and private, large and small universities, their campaigns have wreaked havoc on the corporate campus and ruffled multinational companies whose profits depend on young consumers; they have also led to a more broadly based engagement with issues of social justice and provide a potential model for transnational student/worker solidarity. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. A new Cold War has developed between competing blocs of countries over the role of financial markets versus the state in the provision of pensions and the financing of the economy generally. An Anglo-American bloc, which has spread into South America, Australia, Canada and Japan, favors private pension investment on stock markets. Proponents of this approach argue that it will be much more efficient and provide capital for corporate growth. A European bloc, which covers most European countries other than the UK, favours state provision and a much smaller role for stock markets in pensions' provision and in corporate relations with the financial sector. This model is, unsurprisingly, under threat from the World Bank, financial markets, and many senior academics in the US and Britain. This book is the first to analyse comprehensively this situation. It argues that social provision and corporate relationships with the financial sector are inextricably linked, and moreover that the expansion of private pensions through stock markets has all the attendant consequences for the control of companies by investors on those markets who want to maximize individual financial returns as opposed to corporate growth. Indeed, the book comes to the conclusion that many of the arguments used in support of the Anglo-American approach are based not on improving pensions and economic growth but rather on how to promote stock markets themselves, a decidedly different matter. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. How can we reduce inequalities? How can we make work get better recognition and better pay?Philippe Askenazy in this new book shows that the current share of wealth is far from natural; it results from rising rents and their capture by the actors best endowed in the economic game. In this race for rents, the world of work is the big loser: while many workers feed capital rents by increased productivity and worsened working conditions, they are stigmatized as unproductive and their earnings stagnate. By proposing a new description of the capital-work relationship, calling for a remobilization of the world of work, and particularly poorly paid employees, Askenazy shows that there is a more radical alternative to neoliberalism beyond simply redistribution. A new perspective on the neoliberal world through the prism of rents and rentiers Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The seventeenth century saw the brief flowering of tragic drama in western Europe as a whole and in England in particular. It was, argues Victor Kiernan, the artistic expression of the consciousness of change which permeated every aspect of life during this period. In this companion volume to Shakespeare: Poet and Citizen Kiernan sets out to rescue Shakespearean studies from the increasingly solipsistic terrain of literary criticism, focusing instead on historical location as a means to understanding Shakespeare's writing. Kiernan contends that the deep and accelerating changes in economy and society, brought about by the development of modern capitalism, drew the underlying tragic tensions of the History plays to the forefront. Other writers were feeling similar influences and across Western Europe, especially in France and Spain, tragic drama became a popular form. Kiernan shows how England's supremacy in this genre was both a mirror and a result of the profound nature of its social and economic development and the uncertainty and anxiety which it created. Opening with a sketch of the progress of the theatre, Kiernan goes on to provide a portrait of Shakespeare as a professional. He then considers each of the eight tragedies from Julius Caesar to Coriolanus, drawing out their contrasts and recurring themes. In a final section he analyses the group as a whole and explores attitudes to the monarchy, political life, war, religion and philosophy and the relationship between the sexes. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. George Monbiot is one of the most vocal, and eloquent, critics of the current consensus. How Did We Get into this Mess?, based on his powerful journalism, assesses the state we are now in: the devastation of the natural world, the crisis of inequality, the corporate takeover of nature, our obsessions with growth and profit and the decline of the political debate over what to do. While his diagnosis of the problems in front of us is clear-sighted and reasonable, he also develops solutions to challenge the politics of fear. How do we stand up to the powerful when they seem to have all the weapons? What can we do to prepare our children for an uncertain future? Controversial, clear but always rigorously argued, How Did We Get into this Mess? makes a persuasive case for change in our everyday lives, our politics and economics, the ways we treat each other and the natural world. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Pedro Almodovar . winner of a BAFTA for Best Director, 2000 All About My Mother . Oscar winner for Best Foreign Film, 2000 The huge international success of his latest feature, All About My Mother, has finally granted Pedro Almodovar the recognition he deserves, as the most artistically ambitious and commercially consistent film-maker in Europe. Frequently comic, often deadly serious, always visually glorious, his films range from the screwball comedy Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and the SM melodrama Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! to the almost classically austere Live Flesh. And, while questions of gender, nationality and sexuality have always been Almodovar's concern, new subjects have been addressed in his more recent work: the corrosive effects of a deregulated Spanish media, the transition from dictatorship to democracy and, in All About My Mother, uncompromising explorations of the process of mourning. This new edition includes four new chapters, among which is a rare interview with Almodovar himself, a new preface and additional illustrations. Still the only study of its kind in English, it vigorously confirms its original argument, that beneath Almodovar's genius for comedy and visual pleasure lies a film-maker whose work deserves to be taken with the utmost seriousness. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.