Other People's Politics: Populism to Corbynism

by J.A. Smith

How did Trump and Brexit go from laughable impossibilities to everyday reality? Why did digital media stop being cool and progressive, and become a reactionary, brainwashing nightmare? And, how did the Left get its act together and start winning again? From right to left, Other People's Politics is the indispensable guide to post-2016 life. 'Other People's Politics is to contemporary political debates what Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own was to early feminism: a call for progressives to work tirelessly so that everyone is granted the material conditions necessary for reading a difficult book like James Joyce's Ulysses, if they choose to.' Yanis Varoufakis, former Minister of Finance in Greece's SYRIZA government

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction

176 pages, Paperback

Published July 26, 2019

Reviews

[Surface Envy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Overall, a compelling book. It identifies and offers insights re: many of the currents in politics, culture and the 'online' world in the last 3-4 years (the period which people are coming to refer to as 'the end of the end of history'). Smith has a number of important ideas for about how the left can grasp the populist moment we are living through and delivers them in a nuanced, articulate yet accessible way.

Bonus features include an evisceration of Jordan Peterson and Steven Pinker (which had me chuckling along).

The quote of the book for me was this one, when Smith articulates the thread which runs through traditional conservatism, Bush-era hawkism, 'Trump culture' and the alt-right: 'Conservatism is being virtuously resigned about the sacrifices other people are going to have to make for the greater good'

[Jake · Rating 2 out of 5]

Other People's Politics is a meandering stream of analysis that discusses the rise of populism and the significance of Jeremy Corbyn. Ideas such as the politics of desire, horizontal left-wing organization/social movements, and neoliberalism's narrowing of capitalist criticism are fascinating. That said, not enough space is committed to how these ideas impact the political climate or contribute to the book's overarching themes. Upon completion, the book felt as if J.A. Smith frantically put a massive list of bullet-points into prose form with the whole being weaker than the some of its parts.