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The Common Good
"How adroitly he cuts through the crap and really says something, " describes The Village Voice of world-famous political writer and lecturer Noam Chomsky. In his latest report on the state of the world, Chomsky discusses a breathtaking variety of topics, ranging from Japan's trade policies to the "war" on drugs, corporate welfare, and much more.
192 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1996
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1273 people want to read
About the author
Noam Chomsky
981 books17.4k followersAvram Noam Chomsky is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is a laureate professor of linguistics at the University of Arizona and an institute professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Among the most cited living authors, Chomsky has written more than 150 books on topics such as linguistics, war, and politics. In addition to his work in linguistics, since the 1960s Chomsky has been an influential voice on the American left as a consistent critic of U.S. foreign policy, contemporary capitalism, and corporate influence on political institutions and the media.
Born to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants (his father was William Chomsky) in Philadelphia, Chomsky developed an early interest in anarchism from alternative bookstores in New York City. He studied at the University of Pennsylvania. During his postgraduate work in the Harvard Society of Fellows, Chomsky developed the theory of transformational grammar for which he earned his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, and in 1957 emerged as a significant figure in linguistics with his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which played a major role in remodeling the study of language. From 1958 to 1959 Chomsky was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. He created or co-created the universal grammar theory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program. Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of linguistic behaviorism, and was particularly critical of the work of B.F. Skinner.
An outspoken opponent of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which he saw as an act of American imperialism, in 1967 Chomsky rose to national attention for his anti-war essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". Becoming associated with the New Left, he was arrested multiple times for his activism and placed on President Richard M. Nixon's list of political opponents. While expanding his work in linguistics over subsequent decades, he also became involved in the linguistics wars. In collaboration with Edward S. Herman, Chomsky later articulated the propaganda model of media criticism in Manufacturing Consent, and worked to expose the Indonesian occupation of East Timor. His defense of unconditional freedom of speech, including that of Holocaust denial, generated significant controversy in the Faurisson affair of the 1980s. Chomsky's commentary on the Cambodian genocide and the Bosnian genocide also generated controversy. Since retiring from active teaching at MIT, he has continued his vocal political activism, including opposing the 2003 invasion of Iraq and supporting the Occupy movement. An anti-Zionist, Chomsky considers Israel's treatment of Palestinians to be worse than South African–style apartheid, and criticizes U.S. support for Israel.
Chomsky is widely recognized as having helped to spark the cognitive revolution in the human sciences, contributing to the development of a new cognitivistic framework for the study of language and the mind. Chomsky remains a leading critic of U.S. foreign policy, contemporary capitalism, U.S. involvement and Israel's role in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and mass media. Chomsky and his ideas are highly influential in the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements. Since 2017, he has been Agnese Helms Haury Chair in the Agnese Nelms Haury Program in Environment and Social Justice at the University of Arizona.
Born to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants (his father was William Chomsky) in Philadelphia, Chomsky developed an early interest in anarchism from alternative bookstores in New York City. He studied at the University of Pennsylvania. During his postgraduate work in the Harvard Society of Fellows, Chomsky developed the theory of transformational grammar for which he earned his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, and in 1957 emerged as a significant figure in linguistics with his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which played a major role in remodeling the study of language. From 1958 to 1959 Chomsky was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. He created or co-created the universal grammar theory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program. Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of linguistic behaviorism, and was particularly critical of the work of B.F. Skinner.
An outspoken opponent of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which he saw as an act of American imperialism, in 1967 Chomsky rose to national attention for his anti-war essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". Becoming associated with the New Left, he was arrested multiple times for his activism and placed on President Richard M. Nixon's list of political opponents. While expanding his work in linguistics over subsequent decades, he also became involved in the linguistics wars. In collaboration with Edward S. Herman, Chomsky later articulated the propaganda model of media criticism in Manufacturing Consent, and worked to expose the Indonesian occupation of East Timor. His defense of unconditional freedom of speech, including that of Holocaust denial, generated significant controversy in the Faurisson affair of the 1980s. Chomsky's commentary on the Cambodian genocide and the Bosnian genocide also generated controversy. Since retiring from active teaching at MIT, he has continued his vocal political activism, including opposing the 2003 invasion of Iraq and supporting the Occupy movement. An anti-Zionist, Chomsky considers Israel's treatment of Palestinians to be worse than South African–style apartheid, and criticizes U.S. support for Israel.
Chomsky is widely recognized as having helped to spark the cognitive revolution in the human sciences, contributing to the development of a new cognitivistic framework for the study of language and the mind. Chomsky remains a leading critic of U.S. foreign policy, contemporary capitalism, U.S. involvement and Israel's role in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and mass media. Chomsky and his ideas are highly influential in the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements. Since 2017, he has been Agnese Helms Haury Chair in the Agnese Nelms Haury Program in Environment and Social Justice at the University of Arizona.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
December 20, 2012
Most Amazing Chomskisms from this book
“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum....” (p43)
'The goal is a society in which the basic social unit is you and your television set. If the kid next door is hungry, it's not your problem. If the retired couple next door invested their assets badly and are now starving, that's not your problem either.' (p29)
'You need something to frighten people with, to prevent them from paying attention to what's really happening to them.' (p41)
'... the best defense against democracy is to distract people.' (p53)
...........and many many more....
“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum....” (p43)
'The goal is a society in which the basic social unit is you and your television set. If the kid next door is hungry, it's not your problem. If the retired couple next door invested their assets badly and are now starving, that's not your problem either.' (p29)
'You need something to frighten people with, to prevent them from paying attention to what's really happening to them.' (p41)
'... the best defense against democracy is to distract people.' (p53)
...........and many many more....
February 10, 2019
"We have to gain the insight and understanding that allows us to move step by step toward the end. Just as in any other aspect of life, as you do more, you learn more."
"So I just try to describe as best as I can what I think is happening. When you look at that, it's not very pretty,and if you extrapolate it into the future, it's very ugly. (...) The future can be changed. And we can't change things unless we at least begin to understand them."
It's really depressing, but I'm glad I took this trip to the obscur world, to have an idea about how hideous and chaotic things are :(
Right now, I'm speechless..and since music is one of the best ways to translate emotions, I'll take that opportunity and let "five finger death punch's song "wash it all away" speak on my behalf.
"So I just try to describe as best as I can what I think is happening. When you look at that, it's not very pretty,and if you extrapolate it into the future, it's very ugly. (...) The future can be changed. And we can't change things unless we at least begin to understand them."
It's really depressing, but I'm glad I took this trip to the obscur world, to have an idea about how hideous and chaotic things are :(
Right now, I'm speechless..and since music is one of the best ways to translate emotions, I'll take that opportunity and let "five finger death punch's song "wash it all away" speak on my behalf.
December 15, 2018
“Aristotle felt that if you have extremes of poor and rich, you seriously can’t talk about democracy. Any true democracy has to be what we would call today a welfare state.” Aristotle saw two solutions for government: reducing poverty or reducing democracy. While Aristotle chose reducing poverty, our esteemed James Madison in the same position, chose reducing democracy. “He discussed this quite explicitly at the Constitutional Convention, expressing his concern that the poor majority would use its power to bring about what we would now call land reform. So, he designed a system that made sure democracy couldn’t function.” Wow, it’s not just Madison Avenue execs that want to screw the people over, it’s the Avenue’s famous namesake himself! Noam says that even Milton Friedman knew capitalism has never existed, what you are seeing is actually a protected/subsidized market and 40% of US trade is internal shipping (within the corporation). Those who have wanted free markets throughout history, when the ink is dry, have only wanted it for “the poor and middle-class”, but not for themselves. “Conservatives” want power shifted to the state because they know power won’t go to the people but goes to those “powerful enough to ask for subsidies with one hand and pocket them with the other.” Business knows if you aren’t part of the Pentagon candy train, it’s harder to get subsidies at the government level.
The end of the Democratic Party’s commitment to the poor happened in 1996 when “President Clinton signed something called the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, which eliminated the federal government’s 61-year commitment to the poor. It says seven-year old children have to take personal responsibility. It gives them opportunities they were deprived of before – like the opportunity to starve.” This is the book, where Noam says, “The last liberal president was Richard Nixon. Since him, there’ve been nothing but “conservatives”. “The military system has been partially a scam, a cover for ensuring that advanced sectors of industry can continue to function at public expense. This is a part of the underpinnings of the whole economic system.” Crime in the streets costs $4 billion a year, while crimes in the suites costs $200 billion per year. Meanwhile, another $250 billion of narco money comes through US banks each year. After the fall of communism, Reagan switched the focus to “international terrorism” and the first punching bag was Libya. They actually surrounded the White House with tanks comically feigning danger from Libya.
Asked about the “liberal media”, Noam wisely reminds the reader that “liberal” rarely implies the Left and bluntly states why he is my favorite human mind: “Most of my writing has been a criticism of the liberal end of the media, the ones who set the leftmost boundary for acceptable opinion.” If the liberal and right boundaries of acceptable opinion both morally suck; that’s not acceptable. The Trilateral Commission, for example, is on the left-liberal boundary and its report Crisis of Democracy is still a terrifying read for lovers of democracy. “I don’t much like the terms left and right. What is called the left includes Leninism, which I consider ultra-right in many respects.” Noam recalls a Brazilian general in the 70’s who said, “The economy is doing fine – it’s just the people who aren’t.” Noam goes into details about the colossal waste of money building suburbia and the national highway system forcing people away from their jobs and food sources. When you minimize the state (Argentina mentioned in this case), you maximize private power. Norman Finkelstein points out that the Occupied territories aren’t like South Africa’s Bantustans because South Africa gave much more support to them than Israel does their territories.
“In the early 1800’s, Bengal produced more books per capita than any place on earth.” “As late as the 1820’s, the British were going to India to learn how to make steel.” But, Britain assured that India experienced no growth under British rule. Want to see the British dark-side exposed? Check out ‘blowing from a gun” on google images involving the Indian Mutiny of 1857, you will see lots of pictures of the “civilized” tea-drinking British blowing apart darker skinned people for the cameras. Contrast that with this act of U.S. benevolence: Right after Indian independence there is a huge famine in India but –no problem - U.S. records show we had a huge surplus at the time. But - problem - well-fed church-going Truman consciously chose to let them starve at the time, because he did not like Nehru’s independence. Later, charmer Eisenhower (who was never a doctor) called Nehru, a “schizophrenic” and, without a twinge of colonialist mindset, said Nehru “had a terrible resentment [of] domination by whites (really surprising given how the British treated India).” In 1948, U.S. planner George Kennan saw the communist threat worldwide would clearly not be by conquest but by example. Comic Noam aplenty in this book: “If you don’t footnote every word, you’re not giving sources – you’re lying. If you do footnote every word, you are a ridiculous pedant.” “To say that this is a low point is short-sighted. Is it any lower than 1961, when John F. Kennedy sent the Air Force to bomb South Vietnam and you couldn’t get a single person to think about it?” Elite audiences after talks ask Noam, “So, what is the solution?” Non-elite audiences after talks, tell Noam their solutions. “It’s not inevitable. The future can be changed. But we can’t change things unless we at least begin to understand them.” “Speaking truth to power makes no sense”, Noam says, because those in power already know the truth. Proof how sweet Noam is: “I feel it’s none of my business to tell people want they ought to do – that’s just for them to figure out. I don’t even know what I ought to do.” Another amazing book by Noam.
The end of the Democratic Party’s commitment to the poor happened in 1996 when “President Clinton signed something called the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, which eliminated the federal government’s 61-year commitment to the poor. It says seven-year old children have to take personal responsibility. It gives them opportunities they were deprived of before – like the opportunity to starve.” This is the book, where Noam says, “The last liberal president was Richard Nixon. Since him, there’ve been nothing but “conservatives”. “The military system has been partially a scam, a cover for ensuring that advanced sectors of industry can continue to function at public expense. This is a part of the underpinnings of the whole economic system.” Crime in the streets costs $4 billion a year, while crimes in the suites costs $200 billion per year. Meanwhile, another $250 billion of narco money comes through US banks each year. After the fall of communism, Reagan switched the focus to “international terrorism” and the first punching bag was Libya. They actually surrounded the White House with tanks comically feigning danger from Libya.
Asked about the “liberal media”, Noam wisely reminds the reader that “liberal” rarely implies the Left and bluntly states why he is my favorite human mind: “Most of my writing has been a criticism of the liberal end of the media, the ones who set the leftmost boundary for acceptable opinion.” If the liberal and right boundaries of acceptable opinion both morally suck; that’s not acceptable. The Trilateral Commission, for example, is on the left-liberal boundary and its report Crisis of Democracy is still a terrifying read for lovers of democracy. “I don’t much like the terms left and right. What is called the left includes Leninism, which I consider ultra-right in many respects.” Noam recalls a Brazilian general in the 70’s who said, “The economy is doing fine – it’s just the people who aren’t.” Noam goes into details about the colossal waste of money building suburbia and the national highway system forcing people away from their jobs and food sources. When you minimize the state (Argentina mentioned in this case), you maximize private power. Norman Finkelstein points out that the Occupied territories aren’t like South Africa’s Bantustans because South Africa gave much more support to them than Israel does their territories.
“In the early 1800’s, Bengal produced more books per capita than any place on earth.” “As late as the 1820’s, the British were going to India to learn how to make steel.” But, Britain assured that India experienced no growth under British rule. Want to see the British dark-side exposed? Check out ‘blowing from a gun” on google images involving the Indian Mutiny of 1857, you will see lots of pictures of the “civilized” tea-drinking British blowing apart darker skinned people for the cameras. Contrast that with this act of U.S. benevolence: Right after Indian independence there is a huge famine in India but –no problem - U.S. records show we had a huge surplus at the time. But - problem - well-fed church-going Truman consciously chose to let them starve at the time, because he did not like Nehru’s independence. Later, charmer Eisenhower (who was never a doctor) called Nehru, a “schizophrenic” and, without a twinge of colonialist mindset, said Nehru “had a terrible resentment [of] domination by whites (really surprising given how the British treated India).” In 1948, U.S. planner George Kennan saw the communist threat worldwide would clearly not be by conquest but by example. Comic Noam aplenty in this book: “If you don’t footnote every word, you’re not giving sources – you’re lying. If you do footnote every word, you are a ridiculous pedant.” “To say that this is a low point is short-sighted. Is it any lower than 1961, when John F. Kennedy sent the Air Force to bomb South Vietnam and you couldn’t get a single person to think about it?” Elite audiences after talks ask Noam, “So, what is the solution?” Non-elite audiences after talks, tell Noam their solutions. “It’s not inevitable. The future can be changed. But we can’t change things unless we at least begin to understand them.” “Speaking truth to power makes no sense”, Noam says, because those in power already know the truth. Proof how sweet Noam is: “I feel it’s none of my business to tell people want they ought to do – that’s just for them to figure out. I don’t even know what I ought to do.” Another amazing book by Noam.
October 8, 2018
Mr. Chomsky doesn’t paint a pretty picture of our social and economic struggles but he does gives you the knowledge of who’s to blame and the input to maybe immerse yourself in some of the solutions that might lead to a better society.
October 1, 2025
It does what it says on the tin! Noam is a well-spoken intelligent guy who has something to say about a LOT of topics and that's where it falls flat. It's a series of transcribed interviews that grazes lots of ideas but can't sink its teeth into anything substantial. The best thing it can do I make you want to read something more complete.
April 2, 2024
This is the fourth and final of what are billed as the "real story" series, which are books where Chomsky is interviewed by David Barsamian about current events and his answers are transcribed and edited into short books. This one, at just under 200 pages, is the longest of the four. They were all put out in the mid to late 1990s.
The concept here is to make Chomsky's work more accessible to people that might not read a lot of more academic, full-length books. The trouble is that it is pretty tough to condense the entirety of his scholarship into bite-size chunks that can be quickly consumed. Understanding Chomsky, just like understanding the work of any complex thinker, takes a lot of time and dedication. I'm not sure that these books a) are really very successful in popularizing his ideas and b) that any book of this nature can really accomplish this goal.
Part of the problem with all these books is that they just sort of flit from topic to topic. Maybe if they were focused on a single part of Chomsky's critique: US imperial policy, media criticism, anarchist philosophical ideas, etc., they could at least gain a head of steam. Instead we just jump all over as Barsamian asks Chomsky to respond to whatever is on the front page that day.
So if these aren't very good for the more dedicated Chomsky reader, and aren't very good for the new initiate, well, who exactly are they good for?
The concept here is to make Chomsky's work more accessible to people that might not read a lot of more academic, full-length books. The trouble is that it is pretty tough to condense the entirety of his scholarship into bite-size chunks that can be quickly consumed. Understanding Chomsky, just like understanding the work of any complex thinker, takes a lot of time and dedication. I'm not sure that these books a) are really very successful in popularizing his ideas and b) that any book of this nature can really accomplish this goal.
Part of the problem with all these books is that they just sort of flit from topic to topic. Maybe if they were focused on a single part of Chomsky's critique: US imperial policy, media criticism, anarchist philosophical ideas, etc., they could at least gain a head of steam. Instead we just jump all over as Barsamian asks Chomsky to respond to whatever is on the front page that day.
So if these aren't very good for the more dedicated Chomsky reader, and aren't very good for the new initiate, well, who exactly are they good for?
September 21, 2025
“The future can be changed. But we can’t change things unless we at least begin to understand them. We’ve had plenty of successes; they’re cumulative, and they lead us to new peaks to climb. We’ve also had plenty of failures. Nobody ever said it was going to be easy.”
I cannot sing the praises of this book enough. Concise information. Ample citation. Ending in a call to action with resources pre-assembled.
I cannot sing the praises of this book enough. Concise information. Ample citation. Ending in a call to action with resources pre-assembled.
October 16, 2020
"You have to make use of the state, all the time recognizing that you ultimately want to eliminate it. Rural workers in Brazil have an interesting slogan, their immediate task is "expanding the floor of the cage". They understand they're trapped inside a cage, but that protecting it from even worse predators on the outside (ex. unaccountable private corporations/tyrannies) and extending limits on what the cage will allow are both essential preliminaries to dismantling it."
September 26, 2021
The more I read of Chomsky the less I like him. Chomsky is a fantastic critic of US Imperialism and the tyranny of our economic system. But his gradualist anarchist take on progress is completely flawed and I think has been by now absolutely proven wrong. Things are not gradually improving as Chomsky has suggested they are being dismantled.
Public utilities are being sold off and privatised, more and more resources are extracted from the poor and handed over to the mega-wealthy. Inequality is now at possibly the worst it has ever been in human history.
Chomsky prefers to enter the fantasy land of anarcho-syndicalism as an ideological safe room from the only successful emancipatory political programme- Marxism. Despite being a biting critic of western media and propaganda he is still hostage to the red-scare anti-communist hysteria. He even falls into the old trap of equating Bolshevism and Nazism (ignoring the inconvenient fact that bolshevism won the Second World War for the Allies).
Michael Parenti in his largely ignored but far better work on propaganda than 'Manufacturing Consent', 'Inventing Reality' has a brilliant chapter on left-wing anti-communism which describes Chomsky perfectly. The left wing in the US (or the segment on the left of the extreme right wing US bubble), has to make repeated and often denouncements of communism to even be heard, lest they themselves be accused in McCarthyite fashion of being a child murdering communist.
Chomsky is typical of this breed. He isn't really an anarcho-syndicalist, he's just another liberal, a relatively radical one, but a liberal nonetheless.
Public utilities are being sold off and privatised, more and more resources are extracted from the poor and handed over to the mega-wealthy. Inequality is now at possibly the worst it has ever been in human history.
Chomsky prefers to enter the fantasy land of anarcho-syndicalism as an ideological safe room from the only successful emancipatory political programme- Marxism. Despite being a biting critic of western media and propaganda he is still hostage to the red-scare anti-communist hysteria. He even falls into the old trap of equating Bolshevism and Nazism (ignoring the inconvenient fact that bolshevism won the Second World War for the Allies).
Michael Parenti in his largely ignored but far better work on propaganda than 'Manufacturing Consent', 'Inventing Reality' has a brilliant chapter on left-wing anti-communism which describes Chomsky perfectly. The left wing in the US (or the segment on the left of the extreme right wing US bubble), has to make repeated and often denouncements of communism to even be heard, lest they themselves be accused in McCarthyite fashion of being a child murdering communist.
Chomsky is typical of this breed. He isn't really an anarcho-syndicalist, he's just another liberal, a relatively radical one, but a liberal nonetheless.
December 8, 2011
What a great book! The editor suggests that "if this book doesn't anger or depress you, you should check your pulse"; I couldn't agree more!
August 28, 2015
J'aurai bientôt oublié ce livre, mais je n'oublierai pas la façon dont j'en ai terminé la lecture: en marchant. C'est malade.
December 29, 2017
None of this was boring and all of it was pretty useful to my general political knowledge I guess. The only thing I didn't like is that there are a few things that were touched on and referenced that could have been important but there wasn't sufficient context or explanation of what is was or why it was useful?
September 24, 2023
Pas tellement aimé
December 23, 2013
If you're unhappy about something, start doing something about it and solve the problems that arise as they come.
October 24, 2023
Une série d'entretiens entre Chomsky et un journaliste. Un livre qui date (paru en 1998) mais nombre des points discutés (distraction de masse, asservissement des travailleurs, pirouettes d'évasions des multinationales, domination des entreprises sur les gouvernements, liberté très relative de la circulation des idées...) sont malheureusement toujours d'actualité.
Chomsky est bon à résumer sa pensée et le moins qu'on puisse dire c'est qu'il a le sens de la formule, ce livre est rempli de punchlines, par ex :
"Les conseils d'administration sont autorisés à travailler de concert, de même que les banques, les investisseurs et les grandes entreprises peuvent s'allier les uns aux autres ou à de puissants États. Cela ne pose pas de problème. Seuls les pauvres sont tenus de ne pas coopérer."
Sur un autre aujet j'ai aussi été surpris d'y apprendre que la théorie de la gravitation d'Isaac Newton était très troublante pour lui et ses contemporains :
"Dans l'édition finale de son oeuvre phare, les Principia, Newton affirme que le monde est constitué de trois éléments : la force active, la matière passive et une force semi-spirituelle (qu'il identifie pour diverses raisons à l'électricité) jouant le rôle d'intermédiaire entre les deux". Fascinant.
J'y ai aussi trouvé une perspective sur la publicité qui ne m'avait jamais sauté aux yeux mais qui, expliqué dans les mots de Chomsky, paraît soudain limpide :
"[la publicité] est déductible du revenu imposable, si bien que nous payons tous pour avoir le privilège d'être manipulés et contrôlés.". Bref même si ce livre a 25 ans, il fait réfléchir.
Chomsky est bon à résumer sa pensée et le moins qu'on puisse dire c'est qu'il a le sens de la formule, ce livre est rempli de punchlines, par ex :
"Les conseils d'administration sont autorisés à travailler de concert, de même que les banques, les investisseurs et les grandes entreprises peuvent s'allier les uns aux autres ou à de puissants États. Cela ne pose pas de problème. Seuls les pauvres sont tenus de ne pas coopérer."
Sur un autre aujet j'ai aussi été surpris d'y apprendre que la théorie de la gravitation d'Isaac Newton était très troublante pour lui et ses contemporains :
"Dans l'édition finale de son oeuvre phare, les Principia, Newton affirme que le monde est constitué de trois éléments : la force active, la matière passive et une force semi-spirituelle (qu'il identifie pour diverses raisons à l'électricité) jouant le rôle d'intermédiaire entre les deux". Fascinant.
J'y ai aussi trouvé une perspective sur la publicité qui ne m'avait jamais sauté aux yeux mais qui, expliqué dans les mots de Chomsky, paraît soudain limpide :
"[la publicité] est déductible du revenu imposable, si bien que nous payons tous pour avoir le privilège d'être manipulés et contrôlés.". Bref même si ce livre a 25 ans, il fait réfléchir.
December 10, 2025
Le bien commun (Das Gemeinwohl)
Das Buch geht zentralen Fragen nach: Sollte man gleiche Einkommen für alle Bürger fordern? Ist die Globalisierung unvermeidlich? Haben die Begriffe links und rechts heute überhaupt noch eine klare Bedeutung?
Entstanden aus Interviews mit dem unabhängigen Journalisten David Barsamian, bietet das Werk ein komprimiertes Porträt von Noam Chomskys politischem Denken. Es deckt ein breites Spektrum ab – von Aristoteles’ Philosophie über den Aufstieg multinationaler Konzerne bis hin zur politischen Korrektheit der amerikanischen Linken. Getreu seiner rationalistischen Haltung sieht Chomsky die analysierten Phänomene nicht als Ergebnis geheimer Verschwörungen, sondern als logische Konsequenz eines „gewöhnlichen Staatskapitalismus“, gegen den er zum Widerstand aufruft.
Das Buch, ursprünglich im englischen Original zur Jahrtausendwende erschienen, hat bis heute nichts an Brennpunktaktualität verloren.
Das Buch geht zentralen Fragen nach: Sollte man gleiche Einkommen für alle Bürger fordern? Ist die Globalisierung unvermeidlich? Haben die Begriffe links und rechts heute überhaupt noch eine klare Bedeutung?
Entstanden aus Interviews mit dem unabhängigen Journalisten David Barsamian, bietet das Werk ein komprimiertes Porträt von Noam Chomskys politischem Denken. Es deckt ein breites Spektrum ab – von Aristoteles’ Philosophie über den Aufstieg multinationaler Konzerne bis hin zur politischen Korrektheit der amerikanischen Linken. Getreu seiner rationalistischen Haltung sieht Chomsky die analysierten Phänomene nicht als Ergebnis geheimer Verschwörungen, sondern als logische Konsequenz eines „gewöhnlichen Staatskapitalismus“, gegen den er zum Widerstand aufruft.
Das Buch, ursprünglich im englischen Original zur Jahrtausendwende erschienen, hat bis heute nichts an Brennpunktaktualität verloren.
April 9, 2021
A great series of discussions about everything under the sun having to do with politics, foreign policy, economics, poor leadership internationally, the media, and everything else. It's funny to read about how Chomsky and his interviewer think passing around cassette tapes is a great method of spreading information and affecting change. It would be interesting to read a new series of these interviews to see what Chomsky thinks about the internet, social media, and the billions being made off of them.
October 27, 2023
Au travers d’échanges avec un journaliste, Noam Chomsky développe sa pensée. Ces échanges datent de 1998, mais leurs pertinences et similarités avec l’état du monde actuel est criant.
La dernière partie sur l’engagement et les solutions pour faire bouger les choses est particulièrement intéressante.
Seul bémol à cette lecture, ses critiques des intellectuels postmodernes et des mouvements qu’il qualifie d’identitaires qui ne sont pas développées.
La dernière partie sur l’engagement et les solutions pour faire bouger les choses est particulièrement intéressante.
Seul bémol à cette lecture, ses critiques des intellectuels postmodernes et des mouvements qu’il qualifie d’identitaires qui ne sont pas développées.
July 9, 2020
Chomsky is brilliant. This is a highly readable, slim volume that provides a nice overview of some of the most important challenges worldwide in the late 20th century. It discusses various regions of teh world, as well as issues that are common to us all.
January 8, 2020
A little depressing to read and realize things have just gotten worse since the 90’s....but also I can also see a recent shift in ideas and hope this slow build could see change in 2020!
November 14, 2022
Muy buen libro, sobre todo el último capítulo muy alentador. Uno de los mejores libros que he leído este año
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June 14, 2023Hard comparative opinion of Noams Chomsky on USA version of Democratic outlook worldover.
February 17, 2025
Easy read. Very interesting to look at his thoughts 30 years ago and see how much still applies and the places we’ve grown as a society.
September 1, 2010
Chomsky's analysis was very insightful and extraordinarily helpful in explaining how elites in the US media and political establishments advance their own agendas under the rhetoric of a fictional "common good." On the other hand, I found the format in which it was presented, transcripts from interviews, extremely irritating to read. Still, in the end, the knowledge gained was worth the irritation.
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December 8, 2012I have been looking for a good place to start with Chomsky, since I have waded into the work of other thinkers and become discouraged when I got lost. This has been recommended as a good intro, so here goes.
update upon finishing. Like Zinn, this writer/speaker activist has joined my
A List. I'll get into more of his work now.
update upon finishing. Like Zinn, this writer/speaker activist has joined my
A List. I'll get into more of his work now.
January 16, 2013
A great analysis of why our political system fails to serve the majority of its citizens. Also provides a good list of trustworthy news sources and progressive organizations. Noam Chomsky keeps it real, as usual.
August 18, 2016
Short and sweet. It was a good read and had me asking more questions about the politics of the world prior to Bush II (when I could not vote) that lead to the political situations in which I have a voice.
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September 18, 2016Je devais lire ce livre pour un cours en français. Je ne l'ai pas lu au complet, car je devais lire simplement la première partie et un intertitre pour cette classe. C'est la raison pour laquelle je ne donnerai pas de classement jusqu'à ce que je le lise au complet (si je finis par le lire).
September 1, 2007
Such a small book packed with so much power!
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