Capitalism: A Global History | 誠品線上

Capitalism: A Global History

內容簡介

內容簡介 這是一本《紐約時報》值得關注的書籍「一部學術性強大、引人入勝且生動的故事... 全世界的讀者將會研讀和深思這部劃時代的歷史巨作，他們會對其表示贊同或爭辯，同時肯定其具有跨時代的重要性，並將持續數十年。」—— Marcus Rediker，《紐約時報》「史詩般的鉅作... 閱讀本書，您將會學到無數您以前不知道的事情，這些知識來自您從未去過的地方... 讀者，包括我在內，將會真誠地感謝有機會接觸到如此廣泛的學術研究，並會很高興書架上擁有一部寶貴的參考工具。」—— John Kay，《金融時報》一項醞釀多年、具有里程碑意義的事件，一部傑出的全球性敘事，揭示了過去一千年人類歷史的決定性故事。沒有其他現象能像資本主義一樣，如此決定性地塑造了人類歷史。它建構了我們的生活和工作方式、我們如何看待自己與他人、以及我們如何組織政治。曾榮獲班克羅夫特獎（Bancroft Prize）的《棉花帝國》作者 Sven Beckert，將資本主義的故事置於可想像的最大地理和歷史框架內，追溯了它在過去一千年中橫跨全球的歷史。這部史詩般的成就，帶我們深入亞丁的商業貿易、都靈的汽車工廠、巴巴多斯那令人恐懼的暴力甘蔗種植園，以及今日柬埔寨紡織廠中的女性工人世界。Beckert 認為，資本主義誕生於全球。它源自亞洲、非洲和歐洲的貿易社群，資本主義對經濟生活的根本性重塑是漸進紮根的。但隨後它爆發性地登上了世界舞台，因為歐洲國家和商人之間的強大聯盟推動了他們及其經濟邏輯橫渡海洋。Beckert 指出，這是現代資本主義的宇宙大爆炸，而其中一個震央就是加勒比海的奴隸勞動營。這個至今仍困擾著我們的層級制度，為工業革命的根本性轉變提供了起飛動力。在巨大的生產力提升以及煤炭和石油的推動下，資本主義推翻了舊有的生活方式，加冕自己成為現代世界的決定性力量。這場史詩般的戲劇，由國家支持的機構和帝國擴張所塑造，從未與自由市場的理想化夢想相符。《資本主義》一書，取材於六大洲的檔案資料，在全球各地找到了重要的能動性、抵抗、創新和無情脅迫模式，將視野從國家元首擴展到鄉村耕作者。Beckert 指出，儘管資本主義依賴擴張，但人類生活中總有一些領域是這場資本主義革命尚未觸及的，現在仍然如此。透過編年史般記錄資本主義的全球歷史，Beckert 揭露了這個現在看來「理所當然」的系統的真實面貌。人們常說，人們更容易想像世界的終結，而不是資本主義的終結。如果這本非凡的書籍有一個最終的教訓，那就是如何擺脫這種想法。儘管披著虛假的永恆性和普遍性外衣，但資本主義實際上是人類近期的一項發明。Sven Beckert 不僅僅是列舉了資本主義的優點與缺點。他向我們展示了如何看穿並超越它，從而想像一個不同且更廣闊的世界。A New York Times Notable Book"A learned, formidable and vivid story… Readers around the world will study and ponder this monumental work of history, agreeing and arguing with it, all the while affirming its generational importance, for decades to come." — Marcus Rediker, The New York Times“Epic… Read this book and you will learn innumerable things you did not previously know culled from places you have never been… [Readers], including me, will be genuinely grateful for exposure to this breadth of scholarship and be glad to have a valuable tool of reference on their shelves.” –John Kay, Financial TimesA landmark event years in the making, a brilliant global narrative that unravels the defining story of the past thousand years of human historyNo other phenomenon has shaped human history as decisively as capitalism. It structures how we live and work, how we think about ourselves and others, how we organize our politics. Sven Beckert, author of the Bancroft Prize–winning Empire of Cotton, places the story of capitalism within the largest conceivable geographical and historical framework, tracing its history during the past millennium and across the world. An epic achievement, his book takes us into merchant businesses in Aden and car factories in Turin, onto the terrifyingly violent sugar plantations in Barbados, and within the world of women workers in textile factories in today’s Cambodia.Capitalism, argues Beckert, was born global. Emerging from trading communities across Asia, Africa, and Europe, capitalism’s radical recasting of economic life rooted itself only gradually. But then it burst onto the world scene, as a powerful alliance between European states and merchants propelled them, and their economic logic, across the oceans. This, Beckert shows, was modern capitalism’s big bang, and one of its epicenters was the slave labor camps of the Caribbean. This system, with its hierarchies that haunt us still, provided the liftoff for the radical transformations of the Industrial Revolution. Fueled by vast productivity increases along with coal and oil, capitalism pulled down old ways of life to crown itself the defining force of the modern world. This epic drama, shaped by state-backed institutions and imperial expansion, corresponded at no point to an idealized dream of free markets.Drawing on archives on six continents, Capitalism locates important modes of agency, resistance, innovation, and ruthless coercion everywhere in the world, opening the aperture from heads of state to rural cultivators. Beckert shows that despite the dependence on expansion, there always have been, and are still, areas of human life that the capitalist revolution has yet to reach.By chronicling capitalism’s global history, Beckert exposes the reality of the system that now seems simply “natural.” It is said that people can more easily imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. If there is one ultimate lesson in this extraordinary book, it’s how to leave that behind. Though cloaked in a false timelessness and universality, capitalism is, in reality, a recent human invention. Sven Beckert doesn’t merely tote up capitalism’s debits and credits. He shows us how to look through and beyond it to imagine a different and larger world.e a different and larger world.

作者介紹

作者介紹 Sven BeckertSven Beckert is the Laird Bell Professor of History at Harvard University. Holding a PhD from Columbia University, he has written widely on the economic, social, and political history of capitalism. His book Empire of Cotton won the Bancroft Prize, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and was named one of the ten best books of the year by The New York Times. An elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

商品規格

最佳賣點

最佳賣點 : 橫跨千年與六大洲，追溯資本主義的全球起源。本書揭示一個被忽略的真相：現代資本主義的「大爆發」，並非來自理想的自由市場，而是源於國家權力與加勒比海奴隸營等無情脅迫。這是一部劃時代的巨作，挑戰「資本主義永恆不變」的迷思。閱讀它，看穿這個系統的本質，為想像一個不同的世界做好準備。