This is my first exposure to Mike Davis. I’ve been surprised that so far it’s been almost entirely just a litany of human horrors with very little analysis to accompany it. The analysis that there has been has been very good and interesting but I’m finding this text particularly hard to muscle through because it’s mostly just a series of facts, and the facts are absolutely terrible to read.
I don’t mind the human horror part and can get through it if the balance tilts more towards analysis in the latter half of the text. Has anyone else read it and have any thoughts?
I’m planning to reread it so I guess that gives away my feelings about the book.
I think he’s initially trying to establish the scale of the problem in a way his opponents can’t just dismiss before moving on to how and why these things happened. It’s very depressing subject matter though, a lot of the less dark parts are when he goes into the weather patterns that create these widespread effects, I dunno if I would say those parts were necessarily more engaging or interesting though.
Ultimately he’s trying to prove that these famines were inflicted on these regions by capitalism, it’s gonna be pretty bleak. But I recall extended discussion of indigenous systems of resilience, the politics and economics of the situation etc. I think it helped me see the damage in a new light, it politicizes the famines and gives a cogent argument for why they were violence, not just tragic misfortune.
Ymmv but it left me wanting to read more of Davis’ work.
My first instinct was to call the author a lib, until I checked his biography. Ya not a lib.
No, it does not get better in the way you hope. The most interesting section was about the discovery of the El Niño phenomenon. Reminded me of the Three Body Problem series. I wish he had just stuck with the couple famines in India instead of covering an endless cavalcade of horrors in countries I have never heard of.
