
Inventing the Future
Postcapitalism and a World Without Work
Verso Books (Publisher)
Published on 25. October 2016
Book
Paperback/Softback
272 pages
978-1-78478-622-9 (ISBN)
Description
Neoliberalism isn't working. Austerity is forcing millions into poverty and many more into precarious work, while the left remains trapped in stagnant political practices that offer no respite.
Inventing the Future is a bold new manifesto for life after capitalism. Against the confused understanding of our high-tech world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams demand a postcapitalist economy capable of advancing standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies that expand our freedoms.
This new edition includes a new chapter where they respond to their various critics.
Inventing the Future is a bold new manifesto for life after capitalism. Against the confused understanding of our high-tech world by both the right and the left, this book claims that the emancipatory and future-oriented possibilities of our society can be reclaimed. Instead of running from a complex future, Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams demand a postcapitalist economy capable of advancing standards, liberating humanity from work and developing technologies that expand our freedoms.
This new edition includes a new chapter where they respond to their various critics.
Reviews / Votes
A powerful book: it not only shows us how the postcapitalist world of rapidly improving technology could make us free, but it also shows us how we can organise to get there. This is a must-read. * Paul Mason, author of Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future * Inventing the Future is exactly what we need right now. With immense patience and care, it sets out a clear and compelling vision of a postcapitalist society. Equally importantly, it lays out a plausible programme which can take us from 24/7 capitalist immiseration to a world free of work. -- Mark Fisher, author of Capitalist Realism: Is There No Alternative? Neoliberalism and austerity seem to reign supreme - the idea of a society not run for profit seems impossible. Or does it? The fascinating Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work by Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams argues for a radical transformation of society. -- Owen Jones * New Statesman * Inventing the Future is unapologetically a manifesto, and a much-overdue clarion call to a seriously disorganized metropolitan left to get its shit together, to start thinking - and arguing - seriously about what is to be done.It is hard to deny the persuasiveness with which the book puts forward the positive contents of a new and vigorous populism; in demanding full automation and universal basic income from the world system, they also demand the return of utopian thinking and serious organization from the left. * Los Angeles Review of Books * Srnicek and Williams demonstrate how a sustainable economic future is less a question of means than of imagination. The postcapitalist world they envision is utterly attainable, if we can remember that we have been inventing the economy all along. -- Douglas Rushkoff, author of Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now Nick Srnicek and Alex Williams' project dares to propose a different way of thinking and acting. Given the fizzling of the Occupy moment, a radical rethinking of the anarchic approach is badly needed but just not happening. This book could do a lot of work in getting that rethink going. -- Doug Henwood, author of Wall Street A conceptual launch pad for a new socialist imagination. -- Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums The most important book of 2015. -- Aaron Bastani, co-founder of Novara Media They argue that, in the future, the workplace won't exist in anything like the form we have now, and in any case it will have very few permanent workers. Assuming this position, they ask: What would be the social vision appropriate to a jobless future? * n+1 * Inventing the Future may be the shrewdest, sanest pipe dream of a book published since the recession. -- Nathan Heller * New Yorker *More details
Edition
Revised, Updated ed
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 129 mm
Width: 197 mm
Thickness: 20 mm
Weight
226 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-78478-622-9 (9781784786229)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
10/2015
Verso Books
€19.49
Available for download
Previous edition

Book
09/2015
Verso Books
€36.08
Article exhausted; check for reprint
Persons
Nick Srnicek is the author of Postcapitalist Technologies and the co-editor of The Speculative Turn.
Alex Williams teaches at the University of East London.
Alex Williams teaches at the University of East London.