The Great Transformation

The Great Transformation is a good title for a book - there are, in fact, no fewer than 3 books which bear the title of “The Great Transformation” – the first by Bessant (in 2021 subtitled History for a Techno-Human Future), the second by Karen Armstrong in 2006 (subtitled The Beginning of our (religious) traditions ) and the final by Karel Polyani – written in 1944 and subtitled The political and economic origins of our time). Four if you include Milanovic who add “Great” to his title of 2025 - The Great Global Transformation Branko Milanovic 

My recent reading

Generation Left Keir Milburn 2019 68pp
American Fascists – the American Right and the war on America Chris Hedges (2006) 

to which I was brought by this post
The Problem of Pain CS Lewis (1947)
Labour in Contemporary Capitalism – what next? Ursula Huws (2019) looks excellent. 

I particularly liked the way her Introduction summarises the texts produced in the 

last few decades. More authors should be doing this
The Death of Distance Francis Cairncross (1997) One of the early books about the great 

transformation
The Coming Storm – power, conflict and warnings from history Odd Westad (2026)

We are entering a phase where multiple Great Powers jostle for supremacy within regions 

and within human endeavors such as nuclear technology, artificial intelligence, or space 

exploration. Trade, which was becoming freer for two generations, almost back to where it 

was before World War I started, is increasingly more restricted and fragile, and trade wars 

are breaking out among major powers. This world is unlike anything any of us have 

experienced in our lifetimes. But it does look quite a bit like the world of more than a 

hundred years ago, from the late nineteenth century to 1914. Back then we also had a 

world of many Great Powers that clashed with one another and sought to dominate their 

neighborhoods. Nationalism and populism were on the rise, and many people felt that the 

globalization of the day had not worked for them.

The Moon is Down John Steinbeck (1942)
Anarchists Never Surrender – essays, polemics and other correspondence on Anarchism 

ed Victor Serge and Mitchell Abador (2015)
Concept of the Mind Gilbert Ryle (1957)
Democratic Elitism: The Founding Myth of American Political Science Natasha Piano (2025)

My alternative narrative questions whether we should continue to identify modern democracy as synonymous with free and fair elections. Reviving the Italian School’s original contributions unearths a theory of democracy that might help us disassociate these two concepts in our political vocabulary. The point of this endeavor is not to eliminate elections from democratic theory.

Rather, I maintain, deflating the democratic expectations of electoral politics can help restore the legitimacy of elections and actually revive their proper role in modern popular government.

Today, when the future of contemporary democracies appears murky, the definition of democracy as free and fair elections no longer maintains the clarity that it once promised. Retracing the genealogy of democratic elitism might not only purge us of old bad habits; it might also lead us to a fresh conception of modern democracy following the Italian tradition of buon governo—democracy as part and parcel of good government.

Elites and Democracy Hugo Drochon (2026)

What’s Left? How the Left Lost its Way Nick Cohen (2007)

The Web of Meaning Jeremy Lent 2021 An important book to which I need to dedicate some patience

The Great Global Transformation Branko Milanovic 2025 199 pages
After Nations Rana Dasgupta (2026)
The Lomborg Deception – setting the record straight about global warming Howard Friel (2010)
The Language of Climate Politics, fossil-fuel propoganda and how to fight it 

G Guenther (2024)

This propaganda is spun out of six key terms that dominate the language of 

climate politics: alarmist, cost, growth, “India and China,” innovation, and 

resilience. Together these terms weave a narrative that goes something like this:

“Yes, climate change is real, but calling it an existential threat is just alarmist—and anyway phasing out coal, oil, and gas would cost us too much. Human flourishing relies on the economic growth enabled by fossil fuels, so we need to keep using them and deal with climate change by fostering technological innovation and increasing our resilience. Besides, America should not act unilaterally on the climate crisis while emissions are rising in India and China.”

On The Calculation of Volume – vol 1 Solvej Balle (2024) a novel
China’s Twentieth Century Wang Hui (2016)
Capital Rules – the construction of Global Finance  R Abdelal (2007)
Lies, Spies and Exile – the extraordinary story of the Russian Spie, Robert Blake Simon Kupar (2021)
The Writer and the Traitor Robert Verkaik (2026)
Irregular Army -how the war on terror brought neo-nazis, gang members and criminals 

 

into the US military  Matt Kennard (2012)

On September 10, 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld stood in front of the assembled great and good of the Pentagon and delivered an expansive lecture entitled Bureaucracy to Battlefield.2 Its prescriptions were extremely radical—among the most portentous in US military history —but thanks to the terrorist atrocities the following day his words remain buried deep in the memory hole, while their consequences are buried under the sands of Iraq and Afghanistan. “The topic today is an adversary that poses a threat, a serious threat, to the security of the United States of America,” Rumsfeld began, before revealing the threat to be not Al-Qaeda, but the “Pentagon bureaucracy.” “Not the people, but the processes,” he added reassuringly. “Not the civilians, but the systems. Not the men and women in uniform, but the uniformity of thought and action that we too often impose on them.” In essence, Rumsfeld’s speech that day was designed to lay the ground and soften up his workers for a massive privatization of the Department of Defense’s services.

The Long 1989 – decades of global revolution ed Kockiki and Kal (2019)

Reflections on the Revolution in Europe Ralf Dahrendorf (1990)
Reflections on the Revolution of our time Harold Laski (1947)
Episode of Maigret with Rowan Atkinson
Toynbee’s A Study of History ed Somervell (1947)
Artful Truths – the philosophy of memoir Helena de Bres (2021)
The Great Awakening – new modes of life amongst capitalist ruins ed A Grear and 

D Bollier (2020)
Radical Republicanism – recovering the traditions of popular heritage ed Stuart White 

et al (2020)
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?  Film with Spencer Tracey
Dismantling Solidarity – Capitalist politics and American pensions since the new 

deal Michael McCarthy (2017)
War and Power – who wins wars and why Philips O’Brien (2025)

EASTER IN ROMANIA

Orthodox countries celebrate Easter this weekend – today is Easter Monday and most shops – even the chemists’ are closed. I went out to buy some vitamin B1 and C3 only to find all 5 chemists I tried closed.

The saving grace is that I lunch on the famous drob whose ingredients remind 
me of those of the Scottish delicacy, haggis – namely sheep stomach contents. 
And lunch on Sunday was fish  

Confession - another 15!

I confess – another 15 books

Statecraft – the new rules of power in a divided world Jack Watling (2026) 

This book is about how states compete in a dynamic contemporary environment. 
It is about how they exert leverage and influence, how they can plan and manage 
contingencies, when they may or may not be the most powerful actor, but do not 
hold a majority of the power within the environment. 
Crucially, this book is about how states can protect their interests and advance 
their prosperity – partially at one another’s expense –without driving competitors 
to escalate. 
In short, it is hoped that the following chapters provide observations that are useful 
in allowing NATO members to achieve better strategic outcomes through their 
statecraft. 

The Beginning Comes After the End – notes on a world of change Rebecca Solnit (2026)
 – reviewed in The Guardian
To Catch A Fascist – the fight to challenge the radical right Chris Mathias (2026) 
A British journalist interviewed here    
World Builders – technology and the new geopolitics Bruno Macaes (2025) a Minister in 
the Portugese government more than a decade ago and now a “geo-strategist” 
– whatever that is
Capitalism – a global history  Sven Beckert (2025) Be warned - a 1,900 page tomb!!
The Great Global Transformation – national market liberalism in a multi-polar world 
Branko Milanovic (2025) a copy which lacks a bibliography
A Theory of Complex Democracy – governing in the 21st Century D Innerarity (2025) 
A Spanish political scientist
The Age of Diagnosis – how our obsession with medical labels is making us sicker 
Suzanne O’Sullivan (2025) A neurologist from the UK explains
Crude Capitalism – oil, corporate power and the making of the world market 
Adam Hannieh (2024). Looks very useful
The Web of Meaning – integrating science and traditional wisdom Jeremy Lent (2021). 
A book I want to spend some time with
The Economic Naturalist – why economics explains almost everything Robert Frank (2008). 
Looks my sort of text
My Stroke of Insight – a brain scientist’s personal journey Jill Taylor (2006) 
A very personal account
Essays on the Garrison State Harold Lasswell (1997) 
The US political scientist famous in the 1950s
Simple Rules for a Complex World Richard Epstein (1995) A book predicated on the 
assumption that there are, in the US, too many lawyers and too may laws.
The World As I Found It  Bruce Duffy (1987) a novel which explores the life of Moore, 
Russell and Wittgenstein.

ALL THE LATEST

This was the week I renewed my Romanian citizenship, entitling me to live in the country for the next three years. Anticipating a long wait - with gigantic queus at the HQ of the Immigration Ministry in Strada Militarie - we had first sought an interview with the Head of the Immigration Authority to plead our difficulties with downloading the relevant papers (some 8 in number). 

In the event, it proved to be a very useful decision – the whole process took about 
half an hour, although it will be a month before I receive the relevant certificate. 

NEW READING

My latest -

Virtue Hoarders – the case against the PMC Catherine Liu (2021) The Professional Middle 
Class is a concept which continues to fascinate me
The Alibi of Capital – how we broke the earth to steal the future to build a better 
future Timothy Mitchell (2026). A fascinating title for a fascinating book
The fragmentationist grand strategy Nel Bonilla - interesting article which covers 
the next 2 books
The Grand Chessboard – american strategy and its socio-strategic imperatives 
Z Brzezinski (1997)
American Empire – the realities and consequences of US diplomacy Andrew Bacewich 
(2002)
The Search for Modern China Jon Spence (2012) Any book on the subject is worth reading 
Jan Morris – a life Sarah Wheeler (2026). about a fascinating travel writer
The Aristocracy of Talent – how meritocracy made the modern world  Adrian Wooldridge 
(2021). Novara interviews Adrian Wooldridge  on his latest book “Centrists of the World, 
Unite” (2026)
Twenty First Inequality and capitalism – Pikety, Marx and beyond ed L Langman (2018) 
Promises great things
Antonio Gramsci – Beyond Marxism and Postmodernism R Holub (1992) 
This Is For Everyone - the unfinished story of the WWW  Tim Berners-Lee (2025) the 
great man of the web. review by Nik Carr 
Zbig – the life of Brzezinski, America’s great power prophet Edward Luce (2025)
On Strategists and Strategy – essays 2014-24 Lawrence Freedman (2025) Freedman 
senior – author of “on Strategy” - is always worth a read
Ukraine and the Art of Strategy Lawrence Freedman (2019)
Escape from Capitalism – an intervention Clara Mattei (2026) interview here 
with Mattei
Stephen Fry on his manic depression 

Recent books downloaded

Still a sense of ennui – although I should be pleased that, for the second time in the blog’s history, monthly clicks in March surpassed the 100,000 mark! (The previous month it was 33,000)

I’ve been doing a lot of viewing recently – mainly on the dangerous war on Iran 
in which Israel has embroiled the USA


Recent books downloaded
Just Transitions – a roadmap to the Century ahead ed L Byrne (2020)
31
Network Propoganda, Manipulation, Disinformation and radicalization in US Politics  
Y Binkler et al (2019)

30
Damn You, England – collected prose John Osborne (1994) 
Enough Said Alan Bennett (2026)
My Diaries - 1888-1900 Wilfrid Blunt (1919)
Travelling to Work - Diaries 1988-98 Michael Palin (2014)
50 Economics Classics Tom Butler-Bowen (2017)  
50 Politics Classics Tom Butler-Bowen full book (2021)
50 Politics Classics - a summary Tom Butler-Bowen (2021) 
Triumph of the Will https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n15Uj6-vffI 1934
Haywire – the best of Craig Brown (2022)

29
Difference and Orientation – an Alex Kluge Reader ed LANGSTON (2019)
The Revolutionary Temper – Paris 1748-89 Robert Darnton 2023
The Revolutionary Temper Robert Darnton (2023) sample

28
Democracy at Work – a cure for capitalism Richard Wolff (2012)
Reverence – renewing a forgotten virtue Paul Woodruff (2001)
The Room  Where it Happened – a White House Memoir John Bolton (2020)
The Economics of Poverty Martin Ravaillon (2016)
Washington is Burning – corruption and lies in the age of Trump Andrew Cockburn (2026)

26
AJP Taylor – radical historian of Europe Chris Wrigley (2006) 
Notes Toward the Definition of Culture TS Eliot (2008)

RECENT READING

I have to confess to some ennui – as will be obvious to the long delays in recent posts. These are the recent book downloadings

• Society Despite the State – reimagining geographies of order Anthony Ince 

and Geronimo de la Torre (2024)

The fall of the Soviet Union was hailed as the end of history. The onset of globalisation was hailed as the end of geography. The growth of artificial intelligence is being hailed as the end of human labour. The identification of the Anthropocene has become a warning for the end of humanity itself. When epochs are labelled and called into being, even if arbitrarily or retrospectively, it is always followed by claims of a crisis or death of something. Why, then, does the state seem to endure all these crises and deaths, sometimes coming out of them even stronger and more assured than before? The same state whose actions and inactions are at the very centre of so many crises and deaths, both literal and figurative? We live in a present era marked by a seemingly endless stream of crises that should, in principle, be solvable by states, but which are not; crises caused by economic crashes, environmental catastrophes, wars, famines, as well as everyday crises of culture, health or quality of life. The state is not singularly to blame for most of such crises, but it plays a central role in causing, exacerbating, or responding to them (often a combination of these roles).

That the state, with its vast resources and coercive power, seems unable or unwilling to substantially address the systemic problems that beset present society, yet still remains at the centre of our political imaginations, is evidence of its remarkable endurance and resilience. The many leftwing and decolonial projects that have attempted to reform the state across the globe in recent years are testament to the enchantment of the state as a space of political action, as well as its ability to quash radical change within its framework of ordering our worlds. This is not to say that they have not made positive material changes, but that those changes invariably fall far short of their intentions and very quickly become enveloped within its logics.

This is a book about how the idea of the state survives and maintains its ubiquity as the pivot of territorial organisation and order. However, it is also about how other stories of our world exist, and persist, in spite of it.

As anarchists have said for at least the last 150 years, we need a different imagination of how society could be governed if we are to save humanity and make our lives truly liveable, and the so-called ‘disaster anarchy’ of mutual aid and spontaneous self-organisation that erupts at times of crisis is testament to how this can feel so tantalisingly close. Even those who wish to reform the state, rather than overthrowing it, are already looking to new forms of governance that move beyond its limits. We therefore look to ‘other’ accounts of life that highlight ways of being and organising – forms of order amidst the disorder of state power – that can be used to decentre the state from our political and geographical imaginations and envision much wider future horizons that may include the state as one option but also vastly exceed it. We draw from otherwise very different disciplines – geography, archaeology, anthropology, cultural studies, philosophy and more – as well as multiple different cosmovisions and worldviews, some of which might even conflict or contrast with each other, to highlight the endurance and inventive resourcefulness of orders despite the state. The academic quest for perfect theoretical unity is rarely reflected in the messy realities of life.

Therefore, this book begins by asking: what if the state had never existed?

10

• Peak Oil – environmentalism and libertarian political culture Schneider-Mayerson (2015)

• Bestsellers of the Third Reich – readers, writers and the politics of literature 

Christian Adam (2021) 

• The World Turned Upside Down – a history of the Chinese cultural revolution 

Y Jisheng (2020)

• Strongmen – how they rise, why they succeed, how they fall Ruth Ben-Ghiat 

(2020)

9 

• Essays in honor of Nancy Fraser ed Bargu and Battici (2018)

• Rethinking Capitalism 2022

• What the Future Looks Like ed El-Khalilih 2017

• Nomad Century – how climate migration will reshape our world Gaia Vince 

• (2022)

With every degree of temperature increase, roughly a billion people will be 

pushed outside the zone in which humans have lived for thousands of years. 

We are running out of time to manage the coming upheaval before it becomes 

overwhelming and deadly. Migration is not the problem; it is the solution. 

8

• War and Power Philip O’brien 2026 sample

Yet, even then, at the height of its power, with the world seemingly at its feet, 

the ability of the US to achieve clearly stated goals at the end of the war, 

in countries that it thought were of vital interest, such as China, was shown to be 

shockingly weaker than expected. So, there was certainly no one standard of 

great power in World War II that might help us understand the power relationship 

between the states involved, and nor could the greatest of the   so-  called great 

powers in many   centuries –  the United   States –  achieve many of its goals.

6

• Labour Forces – from Ernest Bevin to Gordon Brown ed Kevin Jefferys (2002)

• Broken Vows – Tony Bliar, the tragedy of power Tom Bower (2016)

• Scottish Nationalism – history, ideology and the question of independence 

Richard Finlay (2022)

• Gordon Brown – power with purpose James Macintyre (2026)

• Another World is Possible – how to reignite social and political imagination 

Geoff Mulgan (2022)

• Big Mind – how collective intelligence can change our world Geoff Mulgan (2017)

• Political Advice – past, present and future Colin Kidd and Jackie Rose (2021)

• Governing in Turbulent Times Geoff Mulgan 2026  

• Words that Work – it’s not what you say, it’s what people hear you say  Frank Luntz (2007) 

This book is about the art and science of words that work. Examining the strategic and tactical use of language in politics, business, and everyday life, it shows how you can achieve better results by narrowing the gap between what you intend to convey and what your audiences actually interpret. The critical task, as I’ve suggested, is to go beyond your own understanding and to look at the world from your listener’s point of view. In essence, it is listener-centered; their perceptions trump whatever “objective” reality a given word or phrase you use might be presumed to have. Again, what matters isn’t what you say, it’s what people hear.

• Lying for Money – how legendary frauds reveals the workings of our world 

Dan Davies (2018)

• The Unaccountability Machine – why big systems make mistakes and how 

the world lost its mind Dan Davies (2024)

• Orwell’s Politics and the English Language in the age of pseudocracy 

Hans Ostrom and William Haltom (2019)

In our book as in this chapter we enter that meeting place to converse precisely, clearly, and honestly about “Politics and the English Language.”

To be honest, clear, and precise, we contend that the essay is a muddle—something its status and that of its author often obscure. In this chapter we show that most of the famed parts of the essay do not suit the whole as tightly as they might and that many parts entertain more than enlighten. The essay’s most momentous major claim is served poorly when it is served at all by such features as Orwell’s five “specimens,” by his catalogue of four “swindles and perversions,” by his six “rules,” and by his unnumbered gibes and gripes.

• Remoralising Britain – political, ethical and theological perspectives on New 

Labour Chris Baker et al (2009)

• Complicit – Britain’s role in the destruction of Gaza Peter Oborne (2025)

• March of the Moderates – Bill Clinton, Tony B liar and the rebirth(?) of 

progressive politics Richard Carr (2019)

• Open Democracy – reinventing popular rule for the 21st Century 

H Landemore (2020)

• Democracy without Politics A Oleart (2023)

• Thomas Merton’s Paradise – journey writings on contemplation 

Thomas Merton and William Shannon (2000) 

MISSING FINANCIAL READING

I toiled during my studies in the early 1960s to make sense of its focus on marginal calculations and “indifference curves” but can remember only the following lessons from my four years engrossed in economics books

• the strictness of the various preconditions which governed the idea of (perfect) competition – making it a highly improbable occurrence;

• the questionable nature of the of notion of “profit-maximisation”;

• the belief (thanks to the writings of James Burnham and Tony Crosland) that management (not ownership) was the all- important factor

• trust (thanks to Keynes whose work was dinned into me) in the ability of government to deal with such things as “exuberant expectations”  

• the realization (through the report of the 1959 Radcliffe Commission) that cash was but a small part of money supply. Financial economics was in its infancy then.

For someone with my education and political motivation and experience, however, my continued financial illiteracy is almost criminal but not, I feel, in any way unusual. Most of us seem to lack the patience to buckle down and take the time and discipline it needs to understand the operation of the system of financial capitalism which now has us all in its thrall.
We leave it to the "experts" and have thereby surrendered what is left to us of citizenship and political power. Like many people, I’ve clicked, skimmed and saved – but rarely gone back to read thoroughly. The folders in which they have collected have had various names – such as “urgent reading” or “what is to be done” – but rarely accessed. Occasionally I remember one and blog about it.

There are, however, a couple of short books which I heartily recommend for anyone wanting to beat the (w)ankers in the banks - The Production of Money – how to break the power of bankers by Ann Pettifor (2017) and Just Money – mission-driven banks and the future of finance Kaufer and Stepanopolous (2021)