Book Launch: Market and Violence The Functioning of Capitalism in History

Join us for a book launch celebrating The 2023 Isaac & Tamara Deutscher Prize winning "Market and Violence: The Functioning of Capitalism in History" by Heide Gerstenberger ——————————————————————————————— Heide Gerstenberger discusses her Winner of the 2023 Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize 2023 winning book with David McNally and Rob Knox, with Esther Leslie Chairing. Despite their many disagreements when it comes to the subject of capitalism, Marxist and market-liberal perspectives seem to agree about one thing: the economic structures of capitalist market society have made direct violence against the person not only superfluous, but economically counterproductive. Heide Gerstenberger's Market and Violence does not contest the thesis that there has been, in many places, a decline in the use of violence in the pursuit of profit. But it demolishes the assumption that this can be put down to the evolution of economic rationality. By means of a deep engagement with the concrete historical reality of capitalist economies, Gerstenberger establishes that, wherever capitalism has been tamed, this has been achieved only by a combination of energetic social contestation and political intervention. First published in German in 2018, the present English-language edition makes a sweeping history of capitalist violence by one of the preeminent theorists of capitalist society working today available to a wider readership. Order a copy of the book from Haymarket: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/2115-market-and-violence ——————————————————————————————— Speakers Heide Gerstenberger was Professor of “Theory of the bourgeois state and of society” at the University of Bremen from 1974 to 2005. She has worked on the political economy of capitalist societies, on state theory, on poverty and the administration thereof, as well as on seafaring, especially on seafaring labor. Previous publications include Impersonal Power: History and Theory of the Bourgeois State, Auf den Wogen von Meeren and Machten, and Staatsgewalte. She has also published numerous social-theoretical and historical-sociological articles in specialist journals and is co-editor of the Theory and History of Civil Society series published by the Westfälisches Dampfboot publishing house. David McNally is Cullen Distinguished Professor of History & Business. He specializes in the history and political economy of capitalism. The author of seven books and over 60 scholarly articles, his research has addressed issues of race, migration, gender and social reproduction in the development of global capitalism. McNally has won the Paul Sweezy Award for his book, Global Slump: The Economics and Politics of Crisis and Resistance, and the Deutscher Memorial Award for Monsters of the Market: Zombies, Vampires and Global Capitalism. McNally's latest book, Blood and Money: War, Slavery, Finance, and Empire is now being translated into German. Robert Knox is Senior Lecturer in Law University of Liverpool. He is a member of the Editorial Boards of Historical Materialism: Research in Critical Marxist Theory and the London Review of International Law. He is also a member of the Isaac and Tamara Memorial Prize Prize Committee, and sits on the board of the Left Book Club. Robert's research interests broadly encompass the relationship between law and the political-economic structures of capitalism. He has specific expertise on public international law, particularly on its relationship to race and empire; public law, with a focus on its relationship to neoliberalism, and legal theory, especially critical and Marxist approaches to the law. Esther Leslie (chairing the session) is Professor of Political Aesthetics at Birbeck College, London. Her research interests are in political theories of aesthetics and culture and the poetics of science and technology. She has a particular focus on thinkers associated with the Frankfurt School, including Benjamin, Adorno, Kracauer and Bloch. Her books include Walter Benjamin: Overpowering Conformism, Hollywood Flatlands, Animation, Critical Theory and the Avant Garde (Verso 2002), Walter Benjamin, Derelicts: Thought Worms from the Wreckage(Unkant, 2014) and Liquid Crystals: The Science and Art of a Fluid Form. She is a Fellow of the British Academy.She is also frequently engaged to work with and in museums and galleries and is academic lead for a museum in Somers Town that focuses on histories of locality and questions of social justice Recent work includes a thorough and experimental history of Weimar radio and BBC exile history through the figure of Ernst Schoen. She is a Fellow of the British Academy. ——————————————————————————————— Please consider subscribing to the Historical Materialism journal, published by BRILL. www.brill.com/hima You can also find paperback copies of all HM Books published by Haymarket Books, and a subscribers offer, at https://www.haymarketbooks.org/series_collections/1-historical-materialism