Carbon Democracy
Political Power in the Age of Oil
Timothy Mitchell
- 224 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
Carbon Democracy
Political Power in the Age of Oil
Timothy Mitchell
About This Book
With the rise of coal power, the producers who oversaw its development acquired the ability to shut down energy systems, a threat they used to build the first mass democracies. Oil offered the West an alternative, and with it came a new form of politics. Oil created a denatured political life the central object of which-the economy-appeared capable of infinite growth. What followed was a Western democracy dependent on an undemocratic Middle East. We now live with the consequences: an impoverished political practice, incapable of addressing the crises that threaten to end the age of carbon democracy - namely, the disappearance of cheap energy and the carbon-fuelled collapse of the ecological order.For the updated edition of this classic title, Timothy Mitchell has written a new preface, reassessing its arguments in the light of recent political events.