- Hardcover: 415 pages
- Publisher: Macmillan (22 Sep 2000)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0333901649
- ISBN-13: 978-0333901649
- Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 13.7 x 3.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 300,157 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
If both George Monbiot's Captive State and Naomi Klein's No Logo are the two Zeitgeist books of the beginning of the 21st century, then it is good old-fashioned late-20th century capitalism that has put them there. While Klein investigates how the counter-culture has been bought out by big business, Monbiot takes a close look at how this green and pleasant isle has been delivered into unaccountable corporate control with disastrous results for local communities and for democracy itself. The project of investigating this process is vast and strewn with problems, not least that a great deal of the material Monbiot needed was not in the public domain. Thus, the book itself is the result of "stargazing on a cloudy night": an impassioned attempt to understand what stellar corporate influence is brought to bear on which governmental constellation before the clouds close over again. Depressingly, he demonstrates how New Labour has smoothly transitioned from anti-corporate opposition to big business bedfellow. Like Klein, Monbiot celebrates grassroots action, but his local heroes are more likely to be drawing up battle lines in Skye, rather than Seattle. In his evocative dealings with those at the rump end of corporate mismanagement and greed, the sense of betrayal is palpable, and Captive State can be seen as a warning shot across New Labour's bows. The devil, though, is in the details. Anonymous brown paper parcels arrive full of classified documents and Monbiot is to be applauded for bringing together a wealth of material and rendering it intelligible and intelligent, if sometimes he doesn't shy away from big theatrical deliveries, especially at the end of chapters. Ironically, it seems from reading Captive State that one of the victims of the corporate infiltration of the government is choice as well as voice. Whereas some resistance has come from consumer power--for, as Monbiot reminds us, the things that join us together are the things we are sold, he goes on to make the pertinent point that consumer power is diluted when choice is restricted to a local superstore or one hospital on the edge of town. Monbiot asks the right questions, but his answers remain elusive and caught up in a foggy democratic rhetoric that is less effective and inspiring than the tales of local activists clogging up the system that was supposed to work for them in the first place. Captive State is the first big ideas book of this decade. Let's hope it goes out of date before the next. --Fiona Buckland
Product Description
George Monbiot seeks to uncover what many have suspected but few have been able to prove: that big business is taking over Britain. "Captive State" documents the end of representative government in Britain. The traditional business of government - economic and development planning, law and order, protection of the workforce, consumer and environment - is rapidly being twisted out of its hands. The state is no longer the initiator of policy but an increasingly helpless bystander. Quietly, the state, the police, academia and the nominally independent media are falling into the hands of private business. And as institutional corruption strikes at the heart of public life, in a contrast between the desires of big business and the needs of the electorate, the electorate loses out every time.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
38 of 39 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Essential reading for residents of the UK. Using real life examples of exploitation and deception, Monbiot unsparingly illustrates how the government is by-and-large more interested in serving its own needs and those of the corporations that support it than those of the British people and environment. The stories he uncovers are truly shocking and disturbing, and detail very worrying levels of corruption, apathy and corporate control in politics today.
36 of 37 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The Dome, the lottery, the Scottish Parliament, the Manchester tram scam, the destruction of the railways and London Underground: these are all scandals we know about and which make us think the lunatics are running the asylum. We feel bewildered disempowered, ripped off and plain scared for the future of our country and the world.
None of these episodes is covered in this book. Yet through its coverage of the Skye Bridge, the Coventry hospitals, the “regeneration” of Southampton, genetic engineering in agriculture and medicine, the takeover of our universities - and much, much more it explains everything about the decline in quality of life, accelerating gap between rich and poor, and the total destruction of anything remotely resembling “democracy” which is going on all around us while we sit there swigging Special Brew and watching reality tv.
If Monbiot never wrote another thing he would have entirely justified his existence with this book which is quite simply THE most important book on politics in Britain this century. In reading it you realise that you are not mad after all and neither are “they”!
Quick! We have only a few months to save the world. The single most useful thing each of us can do is to buy TWO COPIES of this book right now. Send one to your local MP with a note saying you are waiting for her/his response before casting another vote.
47 of 49 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I read this book in one sitting, completely transfixed - not so much at the greed of the businesses and corporations concerned (which one takes as a given) as the complicity of government officials in nuturing it. Having read it as I did a day after going through Eric Schlosser's "Fast Food Nation" I found myself slowly losing the will to live...
"Captive State," throroughly researched, well-written, and engaging, leads me to conclude that we are not far off the sort of lifestyle grimly portrayed by the likes of Orwell - only it won't be the State whose control we're under, but rather the multinationals. Everything needs to make a profit - our taxes, it seems, are not intended to enhance our quality of life but to assist in "driving commerce forward", "expanding into new markets" and other supercilious corporate-speak. For shame!
I held back one star because I was expecting a bit more from Monbiot as to how we, the Great Unwashed, can turn this horrible juggernaut around. There seems little point in voting for a change in government (he points out that New Labour has actually lowered the corporate tax rate - Maggie Thatcher would no doubt approve), and changing our habits as consumers means in most cases merely shifting our credit card bills from one set of greedy ogres to another.
Corporations certainly have an important role to play in a modern society, and are a necessary evil of any free enterprise system; it would seem governments have taken advantage of voter apathy and couch-potato behaviour to let them ride roughshod over the world.
I hope Mr. Monbiot will continue to enlighten us with further relevations in future books.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
captive state - george monbiot
This is a book that everyone should read. Read, be afraid - very afraid - and take appropriate action to end this insanity and the disintegration of the whole world.
Published 1 month ago by Mr. C. Chesterman
Book
Great book , found it hard to put down and will buy the others in the series also.
would recomend.
would recomend.
Published 1 month ago by djgomaz
Some very good points, but too imbalanced
The first thing to note is that this book is out of date now, and is best looked at with historical perspective in mind. Read more
Published 15 months ago by S. Meadows
Great book, if you love a good conspiracy then you'll love the facts...
Fantastically written and full of factual information (I checked some of it out) that disgusts me. A very inspiring book that will almost certainly concern you with every large... Read more
Published on 14 Oct 2009 by Mr. S. J. O'connor
Animal Farm
When George Orwell wrote Animal Farm, he must have been able to see into the future, as it seems a perfect character template exists.
Published on 5 Sep 2009 by London Reviewer
READ AND BE FREE
If you don't want to be trapped in a captive state or a captive mind for that matter, read this book. Like i said with my title for this review:
READ AND BE FREE
READ AND BE FREE
Published on 25 July 2009 by Mr. T. E. Samad
A wake up call to every voter
From the first chapter regarding the Skye bridge fiasco, through The Fat Cats Directory and ending with Government in Exile, this book demonstrates just how much Labour has been... Read more
Published on 18 Jan 2009 by F. G. Lelliott
A Wealth of Facts, But ...
The main areas addressed by this book are : the PFI issues surrounding the contract to build Skye Bridge, corporate involvement in new-hospital builds, how businesses and... Read more
Published on 15 Feb 2006
The British thinking-person's Michael Moore
"Captive State" is an eye-opener for anyone who still believes New Labour has anything to do with socialism. Read more
Published on 15 July 2004 by "timdreid"
Interesting, but over-rated and under-sourced...
This is undoubtedly a very important book, highlighting many of the 'innovative' ways in which British servies have become run in recent years. Read more
Published on 28 Dec 2003
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