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How the World Swung to the Right: Fifty Years of Counterrevolutions
An examination of the reactionary, individualist, cynical, and belligerent shift in global politics to the right, implemented both by the right and the establishment left.
Systemic, euphemized, insidious and structural violence has increased. It is now objectively measurable by the gulf in revenues, by subjective malaise, or by the menace of ecological apocalypse, and also by their constant exacerbation.
—from How the World Swung to the Right
Despite a few zones of active resistance—the alter-globalization movement, the Chiapas uprisings, the Arab springs, and the recent resistance to racialized police brutality and environmental and genocidal warfare in the United States—the last half-century has been witness to an undeniable global shift to the right. How the World Swung to the Right provides a comprehensive overview of this reactionary, individualist, cynical, and belligerent shift, which often has been cloaked in the guise of entertainment and good intentions. The counterrevolutions began with a first phase of deregulation and ideological counter-attacks, and the fall of the so-called “real” communisms. The 1990s inaugurated a global biopolitical turn and the financialization of the economy; the 2000s hammered in neoliberal gains through the alliance of ultraliberalism with neoconservatism. These policies were implemented, surprisingly, not only by the right but often by the establishment left. Cusset argues that in the face of this betrayal, conflict is the one thing we can still salvage from the notion of the “left.” What we need today, he contends, are new sites of conflict that multiply the causes of struggle and the sites of mobilization, linking socioeconomic struggle with questions of identity and the urgency of ecology.
Systemic, euphemized, insidious and structural violence has increased. It is now objectively measurable by the gulf in revenues, by subjective malaise, or by the menace of ecological apocalypse, and also by their constant exacerbation.
—from How the World Swung to the Right
Despite a few zones of active resistance—the alter-globalization movement, the Chiapas uprisings, the Arab springs, and the recent resistance to racialized police brutality and environmental and genocidal warfare in the United States—the last half-century has been witness to an undeniable global shift to the right. How the World Swung to the Right provides a comprehensive overview of this reactionary, individualist, cynical, and belligerent shift, which often has been cloaked in the guise of entertainment and good intentions. The counterrevolutions began with a first phase of deregulation and ideological counter-attacks, and the fall of the so-called “real” communisms. The 1990s inaugurated a global biopolitical turn and the financialization of the economy; the 2000s hammered in neoliberal gains through the alliance of ultraliberalism with neoconservatism. These policies were implemented, surprisingly, not only by the right but often by the establishment left. Cusset argues that in the face of this betrayal, conflict is the one thing we can still salvage from the notion of the “left.” What we need today, he contends, are new sites of conflict that multiply the causes of struggle and the sites of mobilization, linking socioeconomic struggle with questions of identity and the urgency of ecology.
176 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2016
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333 people want to read
About the author
François Cusset
25 books18 followersFrançois Cusset is Professor of American Studies at the University of Paris-Ouest Nanterre, François Cusset is a writer and intellectual historian. A specialist in contemporary intellectual and political history, he is the author of French Theory: How Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze, & Co Transformed the Intellectual Life of the United States and The Inverted Gaze: Queering the French Literary Classics in America.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
June 26, 2022
This is an interesting book about the trend toward right-wing governments over the last 50 years - that is, since around the 70s to now. The author seems to trace the trend back to the dissipation of left wing activism and/or enthusiasm since the 1970s - as the political counterculture faded away, along with the burning causes that had fueled it, which evidently had been resolved one by one. New causes sprang up to replace the old unitary class struggle (or permutations of it) and those causes were more particularistic in Cusset's view, such as various specific liberation movements (black, women's and gay liberation). The emphasis switched from the entire working class to specific segments within it - a sort of identity politics based on the oppression of specific groups. This fragmented the movement and was somehow more inward looking. In fact, although the liberations movements were needed and produced positive results, they seemed to occur in tandem with a general inward focus - on self-development/self-realization rather than outreach or seeing the holistic picture of the class struggle. As the traditional left was utterly discredited starting with the revelations of mass repression and the existence of political detention centers behind the Iron Curtain - with eyewitness narratives such as the writings of Solzhenitsyn on the subject - it was quite easy to lump any left wing politics under the rubric of hated/ossified Stalinism. Therefore, it was no longer cool to be an overt leftist once the abuses of LW governments (or so called LW governments) came to light. The rhetoric of leftism had been used to subjugate rather than liberate the working class in country after country. This must have further propelled people away from left wing politics or perhaps even politics entirely. Neo-liberalism, the modern iteration of unchecked capitalism, represented a further right wing trend, and the failure of neo-liberalism/globalization to spread prosperity equally around the world has led not to a left ward swing, but to an even further right wing lurch - as country after country embraces nationalism, isolationism, racism, demagogues of all stripes, authoritarianism, usually disguised as democratic regimes, but nonetheless exercising many of the traditional "fascist" levers of power. The capitalists obviously have latched onto the resurgent right wing in order to save the surging money fest of the last few decades, which has resulted in Gilded Age levels of income inequality not just in the US but in a number of other countries such as China. Trump is an example of a "figurehead" the capitalists adore since he appears to be the bulwark against popular discontent - able to actually direct it against the left, although the left - more or less co-opted for the last 50 years, is the only tendency whose policies could counter income inequality and the misery it has produced for so many. Trump plays on themes like racism and xenophobia as "simple" explanations for the lack of good-paying jobs in the setting of rising housing costs, and continuing rising car prices (for example). The "solution" of the neo-liberals is the precarious existence - drive an Uber car to supplement meager wages, rent out a room on AirBnB to supplement income, etc. Steady jobs with good pay and benefits? Hah. The neo-liberal capitalists have decreed that these remnants of the good old days - prior to the 70s - are a thing of the past. Which is why the ACA was seen as vital - since fewer and fewer employers provide health ins benefits, and more and more workers are engaged in "precarious" employment or means of making a living. The market or algorithms have the final say, not the working class. In fact, little by little, the concept of a unified working class was eroded. The traditional working class jobs were mostly exported overseas - to countries with lower wages, fewer environmental and worker safety regulations and if labor unions exist at all, they are usually co-opted by the powers that be, including of course the Communist Party of China, which works hand in glove with the capitalists to exploit Chinese labor. It is neo-liberalism that is the problem, and government in the service of the capitalists, here and everywhere. The Chinese working class is just as screwed as the working class everywhere else.
The author sets forth some ideas - rather vague, actually - as to what can be done to correct the dismal situation. But such ideas are too little too late. The problem is that solidarity was broken a long time ago, as the era of self-liberation rather than communal or class liberation, took hold. Self-actualization, self-expression, anything focused on self-development - think of the meditation and then the ongoing New Age craze - all this replaced any vestige of class struggle or leftism. The author correctly cites the collapse of communism in E. Europe as a further crushing blow to leftism worldwide - given the flood of eyewitness accounts of repression, and so forth, that emerged after the regimes collapsed. That was at around the turn of the 90s. The author states that there was a slight resurgence of left wing activism in the 90s - but that too was crushed by the 9/11 attacks, which according to the author utterly crushed left wing activism for around 20 years. In the interim, we have had the war on terror, the rise of the national security state, and finally the election of Trump as president of the US. Where was the left in all this? It was mostly transmuted into a pro-neo-liberal cheering bloc - if there were any left wing policies, they were lifted from the GOP such as the ACA which was originally thought up by Mitt Romney (Romneycare - in Massachusetts). That is why both parties began to resemble each other more and more. The workers were pushed aside worldwide as the mega capitalists rushed to cash in, their greed facilitated by governments that often contained former corporate executives, as the revolving door of industry and government created incredible opportunities for rapacious greed on a global level and fed the ever-increasing income inequality. Trump is no better than the others - and seeks to further dice and slice the working class with racist rhetoric, as well as divide the global working class nationalist jingoism. After all it wasn't poor penniless Chinese workers that brought jobs to China - it was folks like the CEO of Apple, who located smart phone factories there, to take advantage of the poor penniless Chinese workers, whipped into shape by the ever-helpful Chinese Communist Party. In the face of these depredations, the left - says the author - was co-opted or nowhere to be found (except possibly in a spinning or meditation class) since the 1970s. That is why set upon workers - populations - electorates - turned to the right. Now they know that the right turn - to Trumpism - is also no solution, and the hope is they will perhaps turn to realism. Is moderate government the solution to the neo-liberalism that has resulted in widespread despair? Or is the solution a turn to radical progressive change - such as upping the top marginal tax rate to levels unheard of since the early 1960s? The next US administration will certainly play a major part in how the drama unfolds globally. If Trump is re-elected, the rise of the right world wide will probably continue unchecked. If Trump is stopped either by impeachment or electoral defeat, and is replaced as president by a more progressive politician, there is hope that reforms that produce results in the US, may set an example world-wide and give hope even to the millions of set upon Chinese workers, who may rise to demand better working conditions, safety, and wages. It is only when the differential between pay in the US and Asia/rest of the world is reduced - as world pay rates rise significantly - that capitalists will reconsider locating production overseas.
Here are some quotes from the book:
From the Introduction
"Corrupt governments in Latin America and in Africa, when they aren't brought to justice or toppled by political opponents, instantly flout the electors who brought them to power, and silence legal opposition as much as they can."
"Europe, which is supposedly more "unified" than anywhere, is undergoing an unprecedented crisis of representative democracy. The temptations of populism and extreme-right nationalisms are on the rise. This has spurred the British to leave Europe. It has encouraged the Hungarians to allow their xenophobic leader Viktor Orban to censor them."
From Chapter 1 - A Counterrevolution in three parts
"Throughout the world, an immense shift to the right has taken place."
"Beyond its varied forms and causes, this new era merges from a collective reaction to what is felt to be the fourfold disaster of the contemporary world: the social, economic, geopolitical, and environmental disaster."
"These [democratic] states operate as optimization consultants for the great market, daily management services for an economic order that makes all decisions for them."
"From the 1940s to the late 1960s, half of the known world decolonized."
"[Neo-liberalism's] ... formula for blackmail was the well-known "if you want democracy you have to have the market.""
"...Bill Clinton zealously finalized the work that Ronald Reagan and George Bush had begun prior to his tenure."
"...the 1970s and 1980s also witnessed an unprecedented generational convergence between a liberatory groundswell, linked to youth culture and to the struggles of the 1960s, and Western capitalism undergoing accelerated renewal."
"...from the 1970s onward the Baby Boomer generation would increasingly associate the forces of capital with the depoliticized legacy of the 1960s revolts. The driving force of this convergence-- or rather, of this deliberate misappropriation of the subversive values of the 1960s--was opportunism."
"...Abbie Hoffman...ended up as a Reaganite."
"If we look at the generational story of the Baby Boomers from the 1960s onward, we see that most of them went from anti-establishment enthusiasm and political activism to forms of disarray or depression, existential crisis, disenchantment, or inner exile."
"The pioneering thinkers of the Internet touted it as a kind of collective intelligence, an interconnected global brain that would enable the collective self-regulation of social relations, of emotions, and of all dispersed forms of knowledge."
"...the media revolution was in full swing.... ....the media landscape shifted from a handful of broadcast TV channels in each country to several thousand channels that could be watched anywhere thanks to cable and satellite services. The average time spent watching TV doubled during this period, and has only started lessening very recently due to competition from the Internet."
"Throughout the entire "free" world over the course of the 1980s, market news made its TV and radio debut, a huge absurdity for the majority of the population, as it remains today."
"These changes [since the 1990s] occurred in an atmosphere of permanent ideological blackmail that sought to impose trading and micro-credit as universal solutions to inequality, or to harness parliamentary democracy by refinancing the state with the stock market, as if this were a self-evident solution. For a few years there was't much reaction from the critical Left, since the Left was bearing the brunt of its own critical powerlessness and the terminal shaming of all discourse that remotely referred to social movements, "real" communism, or even, more modestly, the compensatory role of the state."
"The "Clash of Civilizations" doctrine was a way to impose torpor, as detailed by Canadian activist Naomi Klein's description of it as a "shock doctrine.""
"...as always, total warmongering was not without its benefits for the world economy, not only in terms of arms sales, but also because its logic allowed for greater social control, more efficient repression, and a more iniquitous appropriation of natural resources. This initiated capitalism's securitarian turn, which had the additional advantage of providing a welcome ideological diversion. During those [post 9/11] years, even more so than after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the global anti-capitalist movement was presented as criminal and irresponsible."
"This was a period during which political and economic leaders converged, often as the same people, as exemplified, for example, by the shuffle of high civil servants between ministries and investment banks."
"Once the real-estate speculation bubble burst and the global economic machine jammed, states had recourse to unprecedented fundraising to save investment banks and insurance and industry giants. Nothing was asked in return, not even the rhetorical promise of a bit more regulation of speculative activity."
"...the 2008-9 bailout was clearly a blank check made out to those primarily responsible for the economic disaster, and this is absolutely astounding."
"The ease with which elected officials and corporate leaders continued to act post-2008 as if nothing had happened, when they did not simply remove the last remaining protections against speculative folly, led a number of people to a simple and radial conclusion about the historical obsolescence of discussion, negotiation, and elections."
"The ... collusion of interests between the hubris of optimal profit and the model of a repressive security state, a circumstantial but decisive alliance, is what in the end characterizes the right-wing turn."
"Circumstances specific to the 2000s led to the alliance of these two movements [neoliberalism - which is very nonconformist and not backward looking, and traditional, ethnocentric, Christian, and even imperialist or explicitly xenophobic values]. The result was a broad-spectrum rhetorical and ideological Moloch that accelerated the decline of the Left."
"...income disparities are...exponentially growing in the West, where the economy of financial profit and of conspicuous consumption has ballooned out of control, hence the resurgence of national and identity-based values to reassure the ruling classes as well as the disadvantaged victims of this collision course."
"It happened in one or two decades, with the individualization and the globalization of ordinary life, and the appearance of new transnational entities such as the European Union and the Pacific Zone. The nation used to be everything. In some sense it seems to have disappeared into thin air in twenty years. The speed with which these changes occurred opened an avenue to reactionary ideologues theorizing a return to identitarian values."
The author sets forth some ideas - rather vague, actually - as to what can be done to correct the dismal situation. But such ideas are too little too late. The problem is that solidarity was broken a long time ago, as the era of self-liberation rather than communal or class liberation, took hold. Self-actualization, self-expression, anything focused on self-development - think of the meditation and then the ongoing New Age craze - all this replaced any vestige of class struggle or leftism. The author correctly cites the collapse of communism in E. Europe as a further crushing blow to leftism worldwide - given the flood of eyewitness accounts of repression, and so forth, that emerged after the regimes collapsed. That was at around the turn of the 90s. The author states that there was a slight resurgence of left wing activism in the 90s - but that too was crushed by the 9/11 attacks, which according to the author utterly crushed left wing activism for around 20 years. In the interim, we have had the war on terror, the rise of the national security state, and finally the election of Trump as president of the US. Where was the left in all this? It was mostly transmuted into a pro-neo-liberal cheering bloc - if there were any left wing policies, they were lifted from the GOP such as the ACA which was originally thought up by Mitt Romney (Romneycare - in Massachusetts). That is why both parties began to resemble each other more and more. The workers were pushed aside worldwide as the mega capitalists rushed to cash in, their greed facilitated by governments that often contained former corporate executives, as the revolving door of industry and government created incredible opportunities for rapacious greed on a global level and fed the ever-increasing income inequality. Trump is no better than the others - and seeks to further dice and slice the working class with racist rhetoric, as well as divide the global working class nationalist jingoism. After all it wasn't poor penniless Chinese workers that brought jobs to China - it was folks like the CEO of Apple, who located smart phone factories there, to take advantage of the poor penniless Chinese workers, whipped into shape by the ever-helpful Chinese Communist Party. In the face of these depredations, the left - says the author - was co-opted or nowhere to be found (except possibly in a spinning or meditation class) since the 1970s. That is why set upon workers - populations - electorates - turned to the right. Now they know that the right turn - to Trumpism - is also no solution, and the hope is they will perhaps turn to realism. Is moderate government the solution to the neo-liberalism that has resulted in widespread despair? Or is the solution a turn to radical progressive change - such as upping the top marginal tax rate to levels unheard of since the early 1960s? The next US administration will certainly play a major part in how the drama unfolds globally. If Trump is re-elected, the rise of the right world wide will probably continue unchecked. If Trump is stopped either by impeachment or electoral defeat, and is replaced as president by a more progressive politician, there is hope that reforms that produce results in the US, may set an example world-wide and give hope even to the millions of set upon Chinese workers, who may rise to demand better working conditions, safety, and wages. It is only when the differential between pay in the US and Asia/rest of the world is reduced - as world pay rates rise significantly - that capitalists will reconsider locating production overseas.
Here are some quotes from the book:
From the Introduction
"Corrupt governments in Latin America and in Africa, when they aren't brought to justice or toppled by political opponents, instantly flout the electors who brought them to power, and silence legal opposition as much as they can."
"Europe, which is supposedly more "unified" than anywhere, is undergoing an unprecedented crisis of representative democracy. The temptations of populism and extreme-right nationalisms are on the rise. This has spurred the British to leave Europe. It has encouraged the Hungarians to allow their xenophobic leader Viktor Orban to censor them."
From Chapter 1 - A Counterrevolution in three parts
"Throughout the world, an immense shift to the right has taken place."
"Beyond its varied forms and causes, this new era merges from a collective reaction to what is felt to be the fourfold disaster of the contemporary world: the social, economic, geopolitical, and environmental disaster."
"These [democratic] states operate as optimization consultants for the great market, daily management services for an economic order that makes all decisions for them."
"From the 1940s to the late 1960s, half of the known world decolonized."
"[Neo-liberalism's] ... formula for blackmail was the well-known "if you want democracy you have to have the market.""
"...Bill Clinton zealously finalized the work that Ronald Reagan and George Bush had begun prior to his tenure."
"...the 1970s and 1980s also witnessed an unprecedented generational convergence between a liberatory groundswell, linked to youth culture and to the struggles of the 1960s, and Western capitalism undergoing accelerated renewal."
"...from the 1970s onward the Baby Boomer generation would increasingly associate the forces of capital with the depoliticized legacy of the 1960s revolts. The driving force of this convergence-- or rather, of this deliberate misappropriation of the subversive values of the 1960s--was opportunism."
"...Abbie Hoffman...ended up as a Reaganite."
"If we look at the generational story of the Baby Boomers from the 1960s onward, we see that most of them went from anti-establishment enthusiasm and political activism to forms of disarray or depression, existential crisis, disenchantment, or inner exile."
"The pioneering thinkers of the Internet touted it as a kind of collective intelligence, an interconnected global brain that would enable the collective self-regulation of social relations, of emotions, and of all dispersed forms of knowledge."
"...the media revolution was in full swing.... ....the media landscape shifted from a handful of broadcast TV channels in each country to several thousand channels that could be watched anywhere thanks to cable and satellite services. The average time spent watching TV doubled during this period, and has only started lessening very recently due to competition from the Internet."
"Throughout the entire "free" world over the course of the 1980s, market news made its TV and radio debut, a huge absurdity for the majority of the population, as it remains today."
"These changes [since the 1990s] occurred in an atmosphere of permanent ideological blackmail that sought to impose trading and micro-credit as universal solutions to inequality, or to harness parliamentary democracy by refinancing the state with the stock market, as if this were a self-evident solution. For a few years there was't much reaction from the critical Left, since the Left was bearing the brunt of its own critical powerlessness and the terminal shaming of all discourse that remotely referred to social movements, "real" communism, or even, more modestly, the compensatory role of the state."
"The "Clash of Civilizations" doctrine was a way to impose torpor, as detailed by Canadian activist Naomi Klein's description of it as a "shock doctrine.""
"...as always, total warmongering was not without its benefits for the world economy, not only in terms of arms sales, but also because its logic allowed for greater social control, more efficient repression, and a more iniquitous appropriation of natural resources. This initiated capitalism's securitarian turn, which had the additional advantage of providing a welcome ideological diversion. During those [post 9/11] years, even more so than after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the global anti-capitalist movement was presented as criminal and irresponsible."
"This was a period during which political and economic leaders converged, often as the same people, as exemplified, for example, by the shuffle of high civil servants between ministries and investment banks."
"Once the real-estate speculation bubble burst and the global economic machine jammed, states had recourse to unprecedented fundraising to save investment banks and insurance and industry giants. Nothing was asked in return, not even the rhetorical promise of a bit more regulation of speculative activity."
"...the 2008-9 bailout was clearly a blank check made out to those primarily responsible for the economic disaster, and this is absolutely astounding."
"The ease with which elected officials and corporate leaders continued to act post-2008 as if nothing had happened, when they did not simply remove the last remaining protections against speculative folly, led a number of people to a simple and radial conclusion about the historical obsolescence of discussion, negotiation, and elections."
"The ... collusion of interests between the hubris of optimal profit and the model of a repressive security state, a circumstantial but decisive alliance, is what in the end characterizes the right-wing turn."
"Circumstances specific to the 2000s led to the alliance of these two movements [neoliberalism - which is very nonconformist and not backward looking, and traditional, ethnocentric, Christian, and even imperialist or explicitly xenophobic values]. The result was a broad-spectrum rhetorical and ideological Moloch that accelerated the decline of the Left."
"...income disparities are...exponentially growing in the West, where the economy of financial profit and of conspicuous consumption has ballooned out of control, hence the resurgence of national and identity-based values to reassure the ruling classes as well as the disadvantaged victims of this collision course."
"It happened in one or two decades, with the individualization and the globalization of ordinary life, and the appearance of new transnational entities such as the European Union and the Pacific Zone. The nation used to be everything. In some sense it seems to have disappeared into thin air in twenty years. The speed with which these changes occurred opened an avenue to reactionary ideologues theorizing a return to identitarian values."
June 23, 2020
+Very ambitious concept and has some great ideas, such as the parsing out of biopolitics and the suppression of all conflict, addresses many aspects of modern society, such as: social media, mainstream media, the converging of political parties, language surrounding class and struggle, and intersectionality
-Too many ideas given without time to analyze or connect, some claims made without evidence, requires some language of the field, which may defeat the possible purpose of being a shorter, more introductory text
-Too many ideas given without time to analyze or connect, some claims made without evidence, requires some language of the field, which may defeat the possible purpose of being a shorter, more introductory text
January 22, 2020
Quick but solid explication on where we are now. Written in plain language.
March 10, 2020
rather basic analysis in the fashion of all the other optimistic sorta-Deleuzians that semiotext(e) seems to publish or translate, or that you can find associated with the Multitudes journal maybe 10 or 15 years ago, Lazzarato, Raunig, etc., or the various post-Hardt and Negri types who hung around the Social Forum. you probably know the drill, already: just repeat the analysis of "societies of control", but from the perspective of the present. throw in some references to silicon valley, 9/11, Obama, on the one hand, and punks, queers, the Zapatistas, Occupy, on the other...vague left poststructuralism, still French even if there's an acknowledgment that eurocentrism is bad - better throw in references to Spivak and Chakrabarty (seriously, it's 2020!!!!). i'm being a bit facetious, this review is about *me* after all, but i'd like to think i have learned something since i first read this stuff in 2011 or whatever. has no one learned anything from the last 10 years of struggle, or bothered even paying attention? this is not the 90s anymore, or even 2011, sheesh! both the theoretical and political ground has shifted, but not sure the French know about it. also not sure there's a single unexpected idea in this book. don't bother.
December 1, 2025
This was good, though I’m a bit suspicious of the cheery and hopeful optimism at the end, in the same way I’m suspicious of Bifo’s pessimism about the possibility for social organization in the wake of the digital colonization of the mind. This was very polemical and disorganized, often too whimsical with its puns and phrasing and substanceless quotations of theorists, and was written too breezily such that it is either fully coherent to someone who already knows what he’s talking about, or completely unintelligible for someone who doesn’t.
There was an explicit Eurocentrism in this book—Cusset at times overtly writes that he is addressing “we” white, European/Western men, and must learn from “their” (feminist, postcolonial, queer, etc.) struggles. At times he calls for what sound like inclusion politics, roping the previously excluded “them” into the fold of “us,” but at other times he follows these lines of transversal politics, similar to other intersectional concepts like deep coalition and long-distance solidarity, which better envision how diverse and multiplicitous struggles might learn from one another without necessarily subsuming one another under a broader unity.
While this is well-intentioned, I do think this Eurocentrism causes real problems in his analysis, especially in his rather flitting remarks on postcolonial struggles and his overall centering of biopolitics at the expense of necropolitics. Imo, Maurizio Lazzarato’s recent writings on the place of war in the global swing to the right does a slightly better job of grappling with the role of violence and death. Of course, Cusset’s book was published in 2018, and much has changed since then—I’d be interested in an update of this book for the post-pandemic, post-truth era where genocide, civil war, and endless global war have reemerged, the gig economy is collapsing, might-makes-right seems to return to supersede the decentralized techniques of control and modulation that reigned supreme a decade ago, AI and interaction farms have destroyed the lateralizing potential of the internet, microplastics are wilting away at the healthy body biopolitics had worked so hard to optimize, and the drastic cognitive effects of the attention economy are slowly rising over the horizon.
Lastly, Cusset has an interesting concept that the very possibility of violence, as a means of social action, has been foreclosed in the 21st century, to the point that even something as benign as property damage can get you labeled a barbarian or terrorist. I think this is only really true among more privileged parts of populations in the West; the spectre of violence that hangs over minorities in the Global North, and especially over those in the Global South, is as real as ever. He notes briefly that “On a global scale, increasingly deadly local conflicts, intercommunitarian rivalries, and interreligious wars also function as modes of regulating systemic global violence, via catharsis or energetic release”—and doesn’t comment further on it—but I think that reducing the widespread proliferation of global war to a means of catharsis does ourselves a great disservice. Can the Palestinian genocide and Israel’s continual bombing of Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, and other neighbors, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Sudanese civil war, the US’s (im?)pending (and totally arbitrary) military action on Venezuela, etc. be reduced to simple catharsis and libidinal regulation? I dunno, much to think about—again, I think a 2025 update to this book would be fascinating. But generally a great book and concise answer to the titular question.
There was an explicit Eurocentrism in this book—Cusset at times overtly writes that he is addressing “we” white, European/Western men, and must learn from “their” (feminist, postcolonial, queer, etc.) struggles. At times he calls for what sound like inclusion politics, roping the previously excluded “them” into the fold of “us,” but at other times he follows these lines of transversal politics, similar to other intersectional concepts like deep coalition and long-distance solidarity, which better envision how diverse and multiplicitous struggles might learn from one another without necessarily subsuming one another under a broader unity.
While this is well-intentioned, I do think this Eurocentrism causes real problems in his analysis, especially in his rather flitting remarks on postcolonial struggles and his overall centering of biopolitics at the expense of necropolitics. Imo, Maurizio Lazzarato’s recent writings on the place of war in the global swing to the right does a slightly better job of grappling with the role of violence and death. Of course, Cusset’s book was published in 2018, and much has changed since then—I’d be interested in an update of this book for the post-pandemic, post-truth era where genocide, civil war, and endless global war have reemerged, the gig economy is collapsing, might-makes-right seems to return to supersede the decentralized techniques of control and modulation that reigned supreme a decade ago, AI and interaction farms have destroyed the lateralizing potential of the internet, microplastics are wilting away at the healthy body biopolitics had worked so hard to optimize, and the drastic cognitive effects of the attention economy are slowly rising over the horizon.
Lastly, Cusset has an interesting concept that the very possibility of violence, as a means of social action, has been foreclosed in the 21st century, to the point that even something as benign as property damage can get you labeled a barbarian or terrorist. I think this is only really true among more privileged parts of populations in the West; the spectre of violence that hangs over minorities in the Global North, and especially over those in the Global South, is as real as ever. He notes briefly that “On a global scale, increasingly deadly local conflicts, intercommunitarian rivalries, and interreligious wars also function as modes of regulating systemic global violence, via catharsis or energetic release”—and doesn’t comment further on it—but I think that reducing the widespread proliferation of global war to a means of catharsis does ourselves a great disservice. Can the Palestinian genocide and Israel’s continual bombing of Lebanon, Iran, Yemen, and other neighbors, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Sudanese civil war, the US’s (im?)pending (and totally arbitrary) military action on Venezuela, etc. be reduced to simple catharsis and libidinal regulation? I dunno, much to think about—again, I think a 2025 update to this book would be fascinating. But generally a great book and concise answer to the titular question.
July 16, 2019
Not sure how to review this. The author is French, and the reasoning style strikes me as French for some reason. He has some excellent observations, and I like the way he divides up the neoliberal era by decade to illustrate different phases of it.
November 19, 2018
Some good observations and pragmatic suggestions to refocus the progressive/communist project. A pleasure to read.
"However, the simple creed of historical materialism, the uprising of the oppressed as a mechanical consequence of structural class antagonism, is still alive, and is increasingly confirmed with each delocalization and each deregulation. Those who carry it and experience it daily are still here, and the systemic social conflict of capital against labor is more intense than ever: the violence of work, the unprecedented gap between the 1% and the 99%, and the brutality of North-South relations complicated by the rapid rise of a few countries and the migratory consequences of the great pauperization of others" (p.137).
"However, the simple creed of historical materialism, the uprising of the oppressed as a mechanical consequence of structural class antagonism, is still alive, and is increasingly confirmed with each delocalization and each deregulation. Those who carry it and experience it daily are still here, and the systemic social conflict of capital against labor is more intense than ever: the violence of work, the unprecedented gap between the 1% and the 99%, and the brutality of North-South relations complicated by the rapid rise of a few countries and the migratory consequences of the great pauperization of others" (p.137).
May 31, 2019
More like thirty years of counter-revolutions that spill over into the other two. This is a good book for someone who knows the broad strokes of neoliberalism, but wants a more in depth look at the history of it from the end of the 70's to now. The book answers how we got here, and even takes a stab at where we go now.
It is a bit frustrating that the author, despite being French, doesn't seem to know what anarchism is. American-level comprehension. But that's not really central to the argument, just a gripe.
It is a bit frustrating that the author, despite being French, doesn't seem to know what anarchism is. American-level comprehension. But that's not really central to the argument, just a gripe.
June 11, 2022
Very interesting!!!!!! I wasn’t sold at first, but the analysis of segmented leftist movements was very interesting, and the decontextualization of these movements from a traditional Marxist analysis was frankly refreshing. Maybe the intellectual left is too attached to the Marxist analytical framework to be effective. I know that’s not the purpose of the essay, and I’m probably overstating those elements, but it scratched an itch in my brain.
January 15, 2025
Vital reading in many ways, most importantly (to me) to understanding how the left abandoned the causes of progressivism by its desire to hold or obtain power just to maintain a status quo of unfulfilled promises. Even though the work is eight years old now, many of its insights about the right and its appeal to its followers are useful in understanding why Dems lost the last election. An obscure title from a little publisher but one worthy of seeking out.
October 2, 2019
Very interesting and informative view of recent political shifts, especially on the thorough description of the rise of neoliberalism. Some interesting social analysis as well vis à vis modesty, expression of information, privacy etc.
June 12, 2025
zwięzła, dobrze zresearchowana i napisana prostym językiem książka o tym, jak strach przed komunizmem i rozczarowanie liberalizmem doprowadziły do powrotu skrajnej prawicy i faszyzmu na scenę polityczną.
January 27, 2022
If you can get through the academic language there is some really good stuff in here.
December 9, 2023
A great explanation of the politics of my lifetime.
January 10, 2024
The current sociopolitical moment and how we got here in a book. Very thorough analysis, just a little pedantic at times.
March 2, 2024
"L'ubérisation est l'étape ultime de la conquête biopolitique, c'est désormais le temps possible (et non plus réel) qui se trouve capté par l'économie."
July 17, 2019
nothing ya aint thought of already
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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