ELLIOTT BAY GLOBAL ISSUES & ETHICS BOOK GROUP |
Our Global Issues & Ethics Book Group is devoted to discussing books that cover the most relevant topics of our everyday lives. Our selection this month is The Value of Nothing: How to Reshape Market Society and Redefine Democracy by Raj Patel. Opening with Oscar Wilde's observation that "nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing," Patel shows how our faith in prices as a way of valuing the world is misplaced. He reveals the hidden ecological and social costs of a hamburger (as much as $200), and asks how we came to have markets in the first place. Both corporate capture of government and our current financial crisis, Patel argues, are a result of our democratically bankrupt political system. Naomi Klein said of the book, "With great lucidity and confidence in a dazzling array of fields, Patel reveals how we inflate the cost of things we can (and often should) live without, while assigning absolutely no value to the resources we all need to survive. This is a deeply thought-provoking book about the dramatic changes we must make to save the planet from financial madness—argued with so much humor and humanity that the enormous tasks ahead feel both doable and desirable. This is Raj Patel's great gift: he makes even the most radical ideas seem not only reasonable, but inevitable. A brilliant book."
- Street:
- The Elliott Bay Book Company
- Additional:
- 1521 Tenth Avenue
- City:
- Seattle ,
- Province:
- Washington
- Postal Code:
- 98122
- Country:
- United States
