The Utopia of Rules, David Graeber
The Utopia of Rules, David Graeber
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The Utopia of Rules
On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy

Author: David Graeber

Narrator: Mike Chamberlain

Unabridged: 8 hr

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 10/23/2018


Synopsis

From the author of the international bestseller Debt: The First 5,000 Years comes a revelatory account of the way bureaucracy rules our lives

Where does the desire for endless rules, regulations, and bureaucracy come from? How did we come to spend so much of our time filling out forms? And is it really a cipher for state violence?

To answer these questions, the anthropologist David Graeber—one of our most important and provocative thinkers—traces the peculiar and unexpected ways we relate to bureaucracy today, and reveals how it shapes our lives in ways we may not even notice . . . though he also suggests that there may be something perversely appealing—even romantic—about bureaucracy.

Leaping from the ascendance of right-wing economics to the hidden meanings behind Sherlock Holmes and Batman, The Utopia of Rules is at once a powerful work of social theory in the tradition of Foucault and Marx, and an entertaining reckoning with popular culture that calls to mind Slavoj Zizek at his most accessible.

An essential book for our times, The Utopia of Rules is sure to start a million conversations about the institutions that rule over us—and the better, freer world we should, perhaps, begin to imagine for ourselves.

About David Graeber

David Graeber teaches anthropology at the London School of Economics. He is the author of Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Towards an Anthropological Theory of Value, Lost People: Magic and the Legacy of Slavery in Madagascar, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology, Possibilities: Essays on Hierarchy, Rebellion, and Desire, and Direct Action: An Ethnography. He has written for Harper's, the Nation, the Baffler, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the New Left Review.


Reviews

Goodreads review by ☘Misericordia☘ on August 14, 2018

Loved it! Now, where exactly ARE: 🎲 my flying cars & 🎲 clones & androids & their electric sheep & 🎲 teleportation & 🎲 the (anti)gravity fields & 🎲 the era of time & space travel & 🎲 the era of space-travelling societies & 🎲 all the visits to other galaxies & 🎲 all the other miracles things I was promise......more

Goodreads review by Kevin on February 02, 2015

I want to nominate David Graeber as national treasure. Not only was he responsible for planning the Occupy Wall Street movement and coining the slogan, "We are the 99%," but Graeber is one of those rare academic writers who writes clearly and entertainingly. Unlike many high profile intellectuals an......more

Goodreads review by Prerna on November 23, 2022

The first thing you need to take away from this book is that Graeber wrote an essay on The Dark Knight Rises, Nolan, and superhero movies in general. It's a very poignant and hilarious essay too. Anyway, hello from the other side of the screen. When was the last time you weren't reduced to looking a......more

Goodreads review by Andrew on March 12, 2015

I thought this would be a soggy cornflakes sort of book: comforting, full of history and anecdote, and a bit of superficial social theory thrown in to demonstrate the author's intellectual credentials. It was a full English breakfast - with the black pudding! This is a densely packed series of essays......more

Goodreads review by Michael on September 16, 2015

I feel disappointed, and a little betrayed. Debt was my most important book of the decade; A sequel on bureaucracy could be an equally ground breaking contribution. Unfortunately, this is a wandering and disconnected series of weakly researched essays that, while making a few interesting points, bur......more