A hilarious and thorough account of the Amway experience written by a disillusioned “distributor” who is also a professor of English. This is delicious armchair sociology, manna for the conspiracy theorist, and worth the attention of anyone who has sat next to an Excel troglodyte selling pyramid long-distance phone service on a cross-country flight. HJ
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 186 pages
“Explores the alarming silence about toxic Orwellian ‘clean’ rooms and why unions don’t organize their workers; how the work-centered code of the new professional predisposes an entire generation to self-serving and self-destructive lifestyle enclaves; why the computer worker is eminently corruptible by technology, despite the ‘cyberpunk’ antiauthoritarian trappings of teenage hackers. Isolated by structured programming techniques, and at military sites by a gulag of security clearances, computer workers ignore the social implications of their work.”
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 215 pages
“A treatise on what freedom truly means and on the concept that the greatest single obstacle to freedom is the assumption that it has already been attained and need no longer be striven for.”
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 248 pages
An exposé of U.S. foreign policy, separating the myth of an “international terrorist conspiracy” from the reality. Tours the state-sanctioned bloodbaths of U.S.-sponsored dictatorships.
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 252 pages
Leff and Haft collected in-depth interviews from people who weren’t working for various reasons, and presented them in this book with related commentary and statistics. In late-20th-century America, work equals identity. However, the authors, through their research, challenge the very notion of maintaining a work-based identity. Their message is even more compelling now than when Time Without Work was first published, thanks to the current downsizing trend and layoffs in almost every industry. With the very nature of work changing, so are many people’s expectations about work. No longer does one have a single employer or, for that matter, a single career. Consequently, people will have periods of unemployment. How will this new facet of the job market relate to societal ideas about work? The stories given here offer some possibilities. SC
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 403 pages
Focuses on the myth and reality of the current situation in post-war Indochina. Shows the effects of the war and discusses the refugee problem, the Pol Pot regime, the question of human rights, and the role of the media.
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 392 pages
Examines the U.S. role in Central America, focusing on the Iran-Contra scandal. Shows how the real issue of the scandal—continuing terrorism in the world—was ignored to better concentrate on more inconsequential issues. Reveals the role the media played in facilitating a vision of the scandal as a “mistake” committed by high-minded individuals who later saw the error of their ways.
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 269 pages
In a landmark theoretical work which might influence progressive thinking, seven respected activist/scholars from various backgrounds and movements have collaborated to create a new theory of liberation. The authors combine various theories of history (Marxism, anarchism, feminism and nationalism) to develop an alternative conceptual framework that they call “complementary holism,” and apply this theory to questions of economics, politics, gender, race and culture. “Complementary holism” is intended to be used to understand society and create new strategies for its transformation. SC
Publisher: South End
Paperback: 197 pages