Naomi Klein
On Fire
The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal
- Special Announcements:
- *Naomi's new book On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal will be released in the US, UK and Canada on September 17, 2019.
- * Naomi has been appointed the Inaugural Gloria Steinem Chair for Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ)
- * The Battle for Paradise: Puerto Rico Takes on the Disaster Capitalists is available in bookstores and to order now
- * PARA LA EDICIÓN ESPAÑOL
- * All royalties from the sale of The Battle for Paradise in English and Spanish go directly to JunteGente, a gathering of Puerto Rican organizations resisting disaster capitalism and advancing a fair and healthy recovery for their island. For more information, visit juntegente.org.
Interviews
Outside Agitator: Naomi Klein and the New New Left
Larissa MacFarquhar, New Yorker, December 8, 2008
The marquee outside the Bloor Cinema, in Toronto, advertised “The Last Mistress” at four, “Naomi Klein—the Shock Doctrine” at seven, and “Little Shop of Horrors” at nine-thirty. It was a warmish night. The falafel shop next door was doing a brisk business. A line of people holding tickets to the Naomi Klein event stretched to the end of the block and around the corner. Outside the entrance to the cinema, a middle-aged man and an elderly woman paced up and down selling copies of Socialist Action for a dollar. (The September issue included articles about capitalism’s contradictions, class war in Bolivia, and a commentary by Mumia Abu-Jamal—a regular feature.)
The marquee outside the Bloor Cinema, in Toronto, advertised “The Last Mistress” at four, “Naomi Klein—the Shock Doctrine” at seven, and “Little Shop of Horrors” at nine-thirty. It was a warmish night. The falafel shop next door was doing a brisk business. A line of people holding tickets to the Naomi Klein event stretched to the end of the block and around the corner. Outside the entrance to the cinema, a middle-aged man and an elderly woman paced up and down selling copies of Socialist Action for a dollar. (The September issue included articles about capitalism’s contradictions, class war in Bolivia, and a commentary by Mumia Abu-Jamal—a regular feature.)
Under Surveillance: Q&A With Naomi Klein
Rolling Stone, May 29, 2008
In Issue 1053, Naomi Klein examines China's surveillance industry and how with the help of U.S. contractors, China is building the prototype for a high-tech police state. Here she speaks with Rolling Stone's Tim Dickinson about her experiences writing and reporting the story and its implications for America.
How did that trip to China come about and what was it like to be able to report on the security industrial complex of China while being in the heart of it?
In Issue 1053, Naomi Klein examines China's surveillance industry and how with the help of U.S. contractors, China is building the prototype for a high-tech police state. Here she speaks with Rolling Stone's Tim Dickinson about her experiences writing and reporting the story and its implications for America.
How did that trip to China come about and what was it like to be able to report on the security industrial complex of China while being in the heart of it?
Out of Shock
Lee Randall, The Scotsman, May 21, 2008
Easy, frequent laughter and juddering sentences born of difficult births aren't what I'm expecting from Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine, a deeply upsetting book that novelist John Le Carré has called "impassioned, hugely informative, wonderfully controversial, and scary as hell".
Klein, a 38-year-old Canadian journalist, author and film-maker based in Toronto, came to our attention in 2000 with No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies, an international bestseller attacking the globalisation movement.
She's been called a combative theorist and a polemicist, and while insisting it's not her intention, she polarises people like no one else. Reviews praise her to the skies – one called Shock Doctrine "lucid, calm, impeccably researched, gorgeously readable" – or denigrate her as a confused leftie with weak arguments. Thus I'm warily expecting a lecture, and disarmed by the mixture of strength and sweetness that Klein evinces during our conversation.
Easy, frequent laughter and juddering sentences born of difficult births aren't what I'm expecting from Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine, a deeply upsetting book that novelist John Le Carré has called "impassioned, hugely informative, wonderfully controversial, and scary as hell".
Klein, a 38-year-old Canadian journalist, author and film-maker based in Toronto, came to our attention in 2000 with No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies, an international bestseller attacking the globalisation movement.
She's been called a combative theorist and a polemicist, and while insisting it's not her intention, she polarises people like no one else. Reviews praise her to the skies – one called Shock Doctrine "lucid, calm, impeccably researched, gorgeously readable" – or denigrate her as a confused leftie with weak arguments. Thus I'm warily expecting a lecture, and disarmed by the mixture of strength and sweetness that Klein evinces during our conversation.
A System Built on Crisis and Violence
Anthony Arnove, Socialist Worker, December 14, 2007
When you look at how the disaster of the U.S. occupation of Iraq is portrayed these days, the emphasis now is always on the mistakes the Bush administration made and its incompetence in planning for the occupation. In The Shock Doctrine and your essay “Baghdad Year Zero,” you paint a very different picture of the underlying reasons for the invasion and occupation. Why do you think that the framework of “mistakes” and “mismanagement” is still the primary way people analyze the war, despite the evidence?
When you push people about what they believe the broader mission is, they don't really have an answer, because all of the “official” stories have fallen away.
When you look at how the disaster of the U.S. occupation of Iraq is portrayed these days, the emphasis now is always on the mistakes the Bush administration made and its incompetence in planning for the occupation. In The Shock Doctrine and your essay “Baghdad Year Zero,” you paint a very different picture of the underlying reasons for the invasion and occupation. Why do you think that the framework of “mistakes” and “mismanagement” is still the primary way people analyze the war, despite the evidence?
When you push people about what they believe the broader mission is, they don't really have an answer, because all of the “official” stories have fallen away.
Body Shock: A 40th Anniversary Conversation with Naomi Klein
Greg Grandin, NACLA, November/December 2007
Naomi Klein is a Canadian journalist and regular contributor to The Nation and the London Guardian. Beginning with No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies (1999), Klein’s work has explored the two major forces that have shaped the post–Cold War world: the extension of radical free-market capitalism and, after 9/11, the resurgence of imperial militarism. More than just investigating the excesses, abuses, and popular resistances to neoliberalism and war, Klein’s journalism consistently links them, exploring how the corporate globalism of the Clinton years flowed seamlessly into the neoconservatives’ preemptive warfare doctrine. Latin America, the first region where neoliberalism was imposed and the first to produce a sustained resistance movement to it, has long been a central focus of Klein’s work, which includes, in addition to her writings, The Take, a 2004 documentary she produced with her husband, Avi Lewis, documenting the takeover of La Forja, a Buenos Aires auto plant, by its workers following Argentina’s 2002 economic meltdown. NACLA editorial committee member Greg Grandin interviewed Klein on the occasion of NACLA’s 40th anniversary.
Naomi Klein is a Canadian journalist and regular contributor to The Nation and the London Guardian. Beginning with No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies (1999), Klein’s work has explored the two major forces that have shaped the post–Cold War world: the extension of radical free-market capitalism and, after 9/11, the resurgence of imperial militarism. More than just investigating the excesses, abuses, and popular resistances to neoliberalism and war, Klein’s journalism consistently links them, exploring how the corporate globalism of the Clinton years flowed seamlessly into the neoconservatives’ preemptive warfare doctrine. Latin America, the first region where neoliberalism was imposed and the first to produce a sustained resistance movement to it, has long been a central focus of Klein’s work, which includes, in addition to her writings, The Take, a 2004 documentary she produced with her husband, Avi Lewis, documenting the takeover of La Forja, a Buenos Aires auto plant, by its workers following Argentina’s 2002 economic meltdown. NACLA editorial committee member Greg Grandin interviewed Klein on the occasion of NACLA’s 40th anniversary.
Naomi Klein -- Shocking the World Bank and IMF Crowd With Her Analysis of 'Disaster Capitalism'
Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash, October 16, 2007
The window of opportunity opens up, and it is deliberately exploited, whether it's using a window of opportunity in New Orleans to close down housing projects, or using the chaos of civil war in Iraq to ram through an oil privatization law.
-- Naomi Klein, author, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
Ever since we read Naomi Klein's "No Logo" -- about the relationship between globalized "branding" and the exploitation of workers and national economies -- we have a been a huge fan of her writing.
Klein (a Canadian, born of American parents) is a serious writer. She is more interested in getting it right than being a celebrity. In fact, her exhaustively researched body of work on the havoc caused by "disaster capitalism" is roundly ignored by the American mainstream press -- and generally used for target practice by the corporate Canadian media.
The window of opportunity opens up, and it is deliberately exploited, whether it's using a window of opportunity in New Orleans to close down housing projects, or using the chaos of civil war in Iraq to ram through an oil privatization law.
-- Naomi Klein, author, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism
Ever since we read Naomi Klein's "No Logo" -- about the relationship between globalized "branding" and the exploitation of workers and national economies -- we have a been a huge fan of her writing.
Klein (a Canadian, born of American parents) is a serious writer. She is more interested in getting it right than being a celebrity. In fact, her exhaustively researched body of work on the havoc caused by "disaster capitalism" is roundly ignored by the American mainstream press -- and generally used for target practice by the corporate Canadian media.
The Bono-ization of Activism
Brigid Delaney, CNN, October 12, 2007
Naomi Klein's 2000 book No Logo galvanized a generation to resist the lure of brands and corporatization.
Direct action such as protests and guerilla tactics such as culture jamming and graffiti were encouraged. Back then the movement had teeth and energy, but very quickly it has not just deflated but sharply turned into a world of hyper consumption, according to Klein.
Welcome to the Pro-Logo generation that is more likely to buy a wristband and ticket to Live Earth than hit the streets in protest. Speaking this week at the Cheltenham Literature Festival in the UK, to promote her new book The Shock Doctrine, Klein attacked the "Bono-ization" of the protest movement, referring to U2 frontman Bono who is also an active anti-poverty campaigner.
Naomi Klein's 2000 book No Logo galvanized a generation to resist the lure of brands and corporatization.
Direct action such as protests and guerilla tactics such as culture jamming and graffiti were encouraged. Back then the movement had teeth and energy, but very quickly it has not just deflated but sharply turned into a world of hyper consumption, according to Klein.
Welcome to the Pro-Logo generation that is more likely to buy a wristband and ticket to Live Earth than hit the streets in protest. Speaking this week at the Cheltenham Literature Festival in the UK, to promote her new book The Shock Doctrine, Klein attacked the "Bono-ization" of the protest movement, referring to U2 frontman Bono who is also an active anti-poverty campaigner.
After Shock
Oscar Reyes, Red Pepper Magazine, October/November 2007
From Poland to Iraq and from China to New Orleans, neoliberalism has risen on the back of what Naomi Klein calls ‘disaster capitalism’. She spoke to Oscar Reyes about her new book, The Shock Doctrine, and new forms of resistance
What trajectory took you from writing about brand culture and documenting the recovered factories in Argentina to the reporting of ‘disaster capitalism’ in Iraq and elsewhere?
I was living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and we were shooting a scene on the roof of an occupied factory when the Iraq war began. This was the root of The Shock Doctrine. The analysis of the war in Argentina and many parts of Latin America was ‘this is what happened to us’ – neoliberalism came to Latin America with blood and fire and was now being brought to the Middle East by the same means. Being there in that moment and seeing the war through a Latin American lens is what drew me to this historical look at the very real use of shocks to impose shock therapy.
From Poland to Iraq and from China to New Orleans, neoliberalism has risen on the back of what Naomi Klein calls ‘disaster capitalism’. She spoke to Oscar Reyes about her new book, The Shock Doctrine, and new forms of resistance
What trajectory took you from writing about brand culture and documenting the recovered factories in Argentina to the reporting of ‘disaster capitalism’ in Iraq and elsewhere?
I was living in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and we were shooting a scene on the roof of an occupied factory when the Iraq war began. This was the root of The Shock Doctrine. The analysis of the war in Argentina and many parts of Latin America was ‘this is what happened to us’ – neoliberalism came to Latin America with blood and fire and was now being brought to the Middle East by the same means. Being there in that moment and seeing the war through a Latin American lens is what drew me to this historical look at the very real use of shocks to impose shock therapy.
