Cannibal Capitalism

How Our System Is Devouring Democracy, Care, and the Planet – and What We Can Do About It

By: Nancy Fraser

Narrated by: Kate Udall

A trenchant look at contemporary capitalism's insatiable appetite—and a rallying cry for everyone who wants to stop it from devouring our world

Capital is currently cannibalizing every sphere of life-guzzling wealth from nature and racialized populations, sucking up our ability to care for each other, and gutting the practice of politics. In this tightly argued and urgent volume, leading Marxist feminist theorist Nancy Fraser charts the voracious appetite of capital, tracking it from crisis point to crisis point, from ecological devastation to the collapse of democracy, from racial violence to the devaluing of care work. These crisis points all come to a head in Covid-19, which Fraser argues can help us envision the resistance we need to end the feeding frenzy.

What we need, she argues, is a wide-ranging socialist movement that can recognize the rapaciousness of capital-and starve it to death.

©2022 Nancy Fraser (P)2022 Tantor

A Work of Art!

Wow! So captivating that I listened to the entire book in 1 day. This is the kind of insight, analysis and brilliance the world needs. Thank you Nancy Fraser!!!

A manifesto for the converted only

This book is not nonfiction; rather, it is a manifesto, which generally is a genre of fiction written as a particularly assertive kind of faux realism. If you already agree with the author's recommended political movement (here, a slightly updated Marxism), you may like the book. If you are curious about what a Marxist socialist society might be like, you have to look elsewhere. Instead, the book is basically a extended riff on the ills of capitalism in general, and neoliberalism in particular. The author takes a broad view of what capitalism is – basically it is the culture of capitalism, which is close to all-encompassing. Except, that is, for the various good things that have appeared as a result of the culture of capitalism, such as Marxism itself, feminism, anti-racism, and concern for the environment -- i.e., the values of the author, who with an exertion of heroic individualism worthy of an Ayn Rand character has been able to escape from the culture of capitalism. The ills described in the book are a result of, and in the author’s view often actual requirements of, capitalism. All of this is simply stated in manifesto form, and few if any empirical, logical, or scientific arguments are marshalled in its favor. The reader is simply asked to accept the author’s point of view.

Somehow, with the advent of socialism, and in particular a democratic form of socialism, all of these ills will begin to disappear. Scout’s honor. In this way, the book resembles one of the more dubious capitalist business practices – that is, advertisements that show the pleasure, harmony, happiness, and wealth that will follow upon consumption of the business’s product. The author of this book is circumspect about describing the socialist paradise in any more than the vaguest terms, perhaps because the Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist product of actually existing socialism was described and indeed instantiated in the most gruesome detail in the former USSR. That product, as is well known, did not lead to pleasure, harmony, happiness, and wealth, as advertised. Instead the product killed millions. Let the buyer beware.