105-799: The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism is a 2007 book by Canadian author and social activist Naomi Klein . In the book, Klein argues that neoliberal economic policies promoted by Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics have risen to global prominence because of a deliberate strategy she calls "disaster capitalism". In this strategy, political actors exploit the chaos of natural disasters, wars, and other crises to push through unpopular policies such as deregulation and privatization . This economic " shock therapy " favors corporate interests while disadvantaging and disenfranchising citizens when they are too distracted and overwhelmed to respond or resist effectively. The book challenges
210-614: A laissez-faire capitalist movement committed to creating free markets that are even less regulated than those that existed before the Great Depression . Part 2 discusses the use of the "shock doctrine" to transform South American economies in the 1970s, focusing on the 1973 coup in Chile led by General Augusto Pinochet and influenced by the Chicago Boys , a group of Chilean economists who had studied under Friedman at
315-414: A straw man by claiming that her book is about one man, Friedman, but that it is in fact about a "multifaceted ideological trend". Norberg again responded that Klein "actually defends only one of her central claims that I criticized. Instead, she gives the impression that I have just tried to find small mistakes here and there in her book." He went on to say that the numbers Klein supplied in her reply reveal
420-481: A "climate criminal." She presented the Angry Mermaid Award (a satirical award designed to recognize the corporations who have best sabotaged the climate negotiations) to Monsanto . Writing in the wake of Hurricane Sandy , she warned that the climate crisis constitutes a massive opportunity for disaster capitalists and corporations seeking to profit from crisis. But equally, the climate crisis "can be
525-595: A 2004 petition titled "We would vote for Hugo Chávez ". In 2007, she described Venezuela under the Chávez government as a country where "citizens had renewed their faith in the power of democracy to improve their lives," and described Venezuela as a place sheltered by Chávez's policies from the economic shocks produced by capitalism. Rather, according to Klein, Chávez protected his country from financial crisis by building "a zone of relative economic calm and predictability." According to reviewer Todd Gitlin , who described
630-728: A Love Story . Her father, Michael Klein, is a physician and a member of Physicians for Social Responsibility . Her brother, Seth Klein, is an author and the former director of the British Columbia office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives . Before World War II, her paternal grandparents were Communists , but they began to turn against the Soviet Union after the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact in 1939. In 1942, her grandfather, an animator at Disney ,
735-474: A child and teenager, she found it "very oppressive to have a very public feminist mother," and she rejected politics, instead embracing "full-on consumerism ". She has attributed her change in worldview to two catalysts. One was when she was 17 and preparing for the University of Toronto , her mother had a stroke and became severely disabled. Naomi, her father, and her brother took care of Bonnie through
840-610: A compelling and important work. The book served as the main source of a 2009 documentary feature film with the same title directed by Michael Winterbottom . The book is divided into seven parts with a total of 21 chapters. Part 1 begins with a chapter on psychiatric shock therapy and the covert experiments conducted by the psychiatrist Ewen Cameron in collusion with the Central Intelligence Agency . The second chapter introduces Milton Friedman and his Chicago school of economics , whom Klein describes as leading
945-462: A critical analysis of the history of neoliberal economics, solidified her standing as a prominent activist on the international stage and was adapted into a six-minute companion film by Alfonso and Jonás Cuarón , as well as a feature-length documentary by Michael Winterbottom . Klein's This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate (2014) was a New York Times nonfiction bestseller and
1050-607: A historic moment to usher in the next great wave of progressive change," or a so-called "People's Shock." In November 2016, following the election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States , Klein called for an international campaign to impose economic sanctions on the United States if his administration refuses to abide by the terms of the Paris Agreement . In October 2022, Klein published an article on The Intercept that addressed COP27 and
1155-600: A huge impact all over" and that the World Bank was "starting work on this". The book won the 2014 Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction , and was a shortlisted nominee for the 2015 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing . Klein's fifth book, No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump's Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need was published in June 2017. It has also been published internationally with
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#17327938420751260-460: A large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence—economic, political, even spiritual—is felt in every city, every statehouse, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society. In
1365-487: A list of the world's top 100 public intellectuals compiled by the Prospect magazine in conjunction with Foreign Policy magazine. On Google Scholar which tracks academic articles, Klein has an overall h-index of 53 and her publications have been cited in the scholarly literature over 49,000 times as of May 2023. She was involved in 2010 G-20 Toronto summit protests , condemning police force and brutality. She spoke to
1470-445: A rally seeking the release of protesters in front of police headquarters on June 28, 2010. In October 2011, she visited Occupy Wall Street and gave a speech declaring the protest movement "the most important thing in the world". On November 10, 2011, she participated in a panel discussion about the future of Occupy Wall Street with four other panelists, including Michael Moore , William Greider , and Rinku Sen , in which she stressed
1575-525: A student newspaper, where she served as editor-in-chief. After her third year at the University of Toronto, she dropped out of university to take a job at The Globe and Mail , followed by an editorship at This Magazine . In 1995, she returned to the University of Toronto with the intention of finishing her degree but left to pursue an internship in journalism before acquiring the final credits required to complete her degree. In 1999, Klein published
1680-504: A study of how Nazism came into a position of power in a democratic state. Within decades of its inception, the idea of the military–industrial complex gave rise to the ideas of other similar industrial complexes , including: Virtually all institutions in sectors ranging from agriculture, medicine, entertainment, and media, to education, criminal justice, security, and transportation, began reconceiving and reconstructing in accordance with capitalist, industrial, and bureaucratic models with
1785-659: A useful analytical framework. Although the MIC was bound up in its origins with the bipolar international environment of the Cold War, some contended that the MIC might endure under different geopolitical conditions (for example, George F. Kennan wrote in 1987 that "were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military–industrial complex would have to remain, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented."). The collapse of
1890-450: A vested interest which influences public policy . A driving factor behind the relationship between the military and the defense-minded corporations is that both sides benefit—one side from obtaining weapons, and the other from being paid to supply them. The term is most often used in reference to the system behind the armed forces of the United States , where the relationship is most prevalent due to close links among defense contractors,
1995-423: A writer who is often mistaken for Klein and vice versa. In her 10-page introduction, Klein explains how she has been mistaken for the "other Naomi", with whom she "has been chronically confused for over a decade... I have been confused with Other Naomi for so long and so frequently that I have often felt that she was following me". For this reason, she started to follow what she calls Wolf's "new alliances with some of
2100-481: Is a collection of her articles and speeches written on behalf of the anti-globalization movement (all proceeds from the book go to benefit activist organizations through The Fences and Windows Fund). The Take (2004), a documentary film collaboration by Klein and Lewis, concerns factory workers in Argentina who took over a closed plant and resumed production, operating as a collective. The first African screening
2205-600: Is a senior contributor for The Intercept . She is a former Miliband Fellow and lectured at the London School of Economics on the anti-globalization movement. Her appointment as the inaugural Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University–New Brunswick began in October 2018 and ran for 3 years. Klein ranked 11th in an internet poll of the top global intellectuals of 2005,
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#17327938420752310-549: Is argued as contributing to the insurgency, since many of the unemployed became embittered toward the US as a result and joined insurgent groups afterward. Part 7 is about winners and losers of economic shock therapy – how small groups will often do very well by moving into luxurious gated communities while large sections of the population are left with decaying public infrastructure, declining incomes and increased unemployment . Klein describes economic policy after Hurricane Katrina ,
2415-496: Is even stronger than the one Klein makes" and that the book contains "a rich description of the political machinations required to force unsavory economic policies on resisting countries." Shashi Tharoor in The Washington Post says that The Shock Doctrine takes Klein's criticism of capitalism an important step further. He also said Klein "is too ready to see conspiracies where others might discern little more than
2520-509: Is identified as beginning with the coining of the term by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. This era continued through the Cold War period, up to the end of the Warsaw Pact and the collapse of the Soviet Union . A 1965 article written by Marc Pilisuk and Thomas Hayden says benefits of the military–industrial complex of the United States include the advancement of the civilian technology market as civilian companies benefit from innovations from
2625-670: Is most blind to is the necessary role of entrepreneurial capitalism in overcoming the inherent tendency of any established social system to lapse into stagnation." Jonathan Chait wrote in The New Republic that Klein "pays shockingly (but, given her premises, unsurprisingly) little attention to right-wing ideas. She recognizes that neoconservatism sits at the heart of the Iraq war project, but she does not seem to know what neoconservatism is; and she makes no effort to find out." Robert Cole from The Times said, "Klein derides
2730-475: Is not welcome would be pointing out this enormous lucrative network of deals that the military itself is engaged in that are linked to fossil fuels, that are linked to destroying remaining green space in cities like Cairo”. Klein also stressed the release of prominent political prisoner and activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah . Klein contributes to The Nation , In These Times , The Globe and Mail , This Magazine , Harper's Magazine , and The Guardian , and
2835-492: Is now tied directly to the success of the MIC which has led to concerns of repression as Cold War-era attitudes are still prevalent among the American public. Shifts in values and the collapse of communism have ushered in a new era for the military–industrial complex. The Department of Defense works in coordination with traditional military–industrial complex aligned companies such as Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman . Many former defense contractors have shifted operations to
2940-562: Is reporting and history-writing in the tradition of Izzy Stone and Upton Sinclair . Klein upends assumptions and demands that we think – her book is thrilling, troubling and very dark." Stephen Amidon of the New York Observer affirmed the applicability of Klein's thesis to the Iraq War and argued, "Seen through the lens of Naomi Klein's analysis, [it] makes horrifying sense, right down to Mr. Rumsfeld's decision to allow
3045-412: Is that when a society experiences a major 'shock' there is a widespread desire for a rapid and decisive response to correct the situation; this desire for bold and immediate action provides an opportunity for unscrupulous actors to implement policies which go far beyond a legitimate response to disaster. The book suggests that when the rush to act means the specifics of a response will go unscrutinized, that
3150-402: Is the moment when unpopular and unrelated policies will intentionally be rushed into effect. The book appears to claim that these shocks are in some cases intentionally encouraged or even manufactured. Klein identifies the "shock doctrine", elaborating on Joseph Schumpeter , as the latest in capitalism's phases of " creative destruction ". The Shock Doctrine was adapted into a short film of
3255-629: The San Francisco Chronicle praised Klein's prose and wrote that the author "may well have revealed the master narrative of our time." In The Irish Times , Tom Clonan reported that she "systematically and calmly demonstrates to the reader" the way in which neoconservative figures were intimately linked to seismic events that "resulted in the loss of millions of lives." In the Los Angeles Times , Richard Rayner opined, "Not everybody's going to agree with her, but this
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3360-597: The 2004 Sri Lanka Tsunami , and the apartheid-style policy of the Israeli government toward Palestinians . The Conclusion details the backlash against the "shock doctrine" and economic institutions which, in Klein's view, encourage it – like the World Bank and IMF . South America and Lebanon post-2006 are shown in a positive light, where politicians are already rolling back free-market policies, with some mention of
3465-526: The 2020 U.S. election stating: "The stakes of the election are almost unbearably high. It's why I wrote the book and decided to put it out now and why I'll be doing whatever I can to help push people toward supporting a candidate with the most ambitious Green New Deal platform—so that they win the primaries and then the general." Released in September 2023, Doppelganger is a memoir and social critique that contrasts Klein's worldview with Naomi Wolf 's,
3570-564: The Holocaust , which is why force alone is presented as the only conceivable response to any and all threats. The Israeli state's current murderous leveling of Gaza is the latest, unspeakably horrific manifestation of this ideology, and there will be more in the coming days. At a “Seder in the Streets" event April 23, 2024, held near Senator Chuck Schumer's residence, Klein spoke about the contemporary meaning of Passover and its relation to
3675-594: The defense industrial base (the network of organizations, facilities, and resources that supplies governments with defense-related goods and services). U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower originally coined the term in his Farewell Address to the Nation on January 17, 1961: A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction... This conjunction of an immense military establishment and
3780-555: The fascist government ties to heavy industry. It can be defined as, "an informal and changing coalition of groups with vested psychological, moral, and material interests in the continuous development and maintenance of high levels of weaponry, in preservation of colonial markets and in military-strategic conceptions of internal affairs." An exhibit of the trend was made in Franz Leopold Neumann 's book Behemoth: The Structure and Practice of National Socialism in 1942,
3885-444: The "most perverse of aspersions on Jews, an age-old stereotype of Jews as intrinsically evil and malicious." Klein was also a spokesperson for the protest against the spotlight on Tel Aviv at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival , a spotlight that Klein said was a very selective and misleading portrait of Israel. She has also served on the advisory board of the organization Jewish Voice for Peace . In October 2023, in
3990-645: The "spectacle of disasters". In the London Review of Books , Stephen Holmes criticizes The Shock Doctrine as naïve, and opines that it conflates "'free market orthodoxy' with predatory corporate behaviour." John Willman of the Financial Times describes it as "a deeply flawed work that blends together disparate phenomena to create a beguiling – but ultimately dishonest – argument." Tom Redburn in The New York Times states that "what she
4095-457: The 'disaster capitalism complex' and the profits and privatisations that go with it but she does not supply a cogently argued critique of free market principles, and without this The Shock Doctrine descends into a muddle of stories that are often worrying, sometimes interesting, and occasionally bizarre." Economist Tyler Cowen , who called Klein's arguments "ridiculous" and the book a "true economics disaster", wrote on The New York Sun that
4200-460: The American left—what Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky were thirty years ago." On February 24, 2009, the book was awarded the inaugural Warwick Prize for Writing from the University of Warwick in England. The prize carried a cash award of £50,000. Klein's fourth book, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate , was published in September 2014. The book puts forth the argument that
4305-667: The Chicago School and were funded by the CIA . Klein connects torture with economic shock therapy. Part 3 covers attempts to apply the shock doctrine without the need for extreme violence against sections of the population. Klein says that Margaret Thatcher applied mild shock "therapy" facilitated by the Falklands War , while free market reform in Bolivia was possible due to a combination of pre-existing economic crises and
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4410-547: The Disaster Capitalists covers what San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz refers to as "a fight for our lives. Hurricanes Irma and María unmasked the colonialism we face in Puerto Rico, and the inequality it fosters, creating a fierce humanitarian crisis." In April 2019, Simon & Schuster announced they would be publishing Klein's seventh book, On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal , which
4515-497: The MIC and vice versa. In 1993, the Pentagon urged defense contractors to consolidate due to the fall of communism and a shrinking defense budget. In the third era, defense contractors either consolidated or shifted their focus to civilian innovation. From 1992 to 1997 there was a total of US$ 55 billion worth of mergers in the defense industry, with major defense companies purchasing smaller competitors. The U.S. domestic economy
4620-534: The Math" tour in 2013, encouraging a divestment movement. In an interview by Graeme Greene in New Internationalist , Klein rejected criticism that This Changes Everything politicized the climate issue and that the issue should be apolitical, asserting that such criticism reflected "how blind so many within the mainstream climate discussion are to the fact that they themselves are fully immersed within
4725-402: The Pentagon , and politicians. The expression gained popularity after a warning of the relationship's detrimental effects, in the farewell address of U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower on January 17, 1961. Conceptually, it is closely related to the ideas of the iron triangle (the three-sided relationship between Congress , the executive branch bureaucracy, and interest groups ) and
4830-549: The Tiger Nations were forced to sell off numerous state enterprises to private, foreign companies. Part 5 introduces the "Disaster Capitalism Complex", a complex series of networks and influence employed by private companies that allows them to profit from disasters. She mirrors this new Disaster Capitalism Complex with the Military Industrial Complex and explains that both employ the blurring of
4935-649: The UBC Professorship in Climate Justice, joining the University of British Columbia 's Department of Geography. She has been the co-director of the newly launched Centre for Climate Justice since 2021. Klein first became known internationally for her alter-globalization book No Logo (1999). The Take (2004), a documentary film about Argentine workers' self-managed factories, written by her and directed by her husband Avi Lewis , further increased her profile. The Shock Doctrine (2007),
5040-541: The USSR and the resultant decrease in global military spending (the so-called ' peace dividend ') did in fact lead to decreases in defense industrial output and consolidation among major arms producers, although global expenditures rose again following the September 11 terror attacks and the ensuing global war on terror , as well as the more recent increase in geopolitical tensions associated with strategic competition between
5145-542: The United States federal government intentionally paid a higher price for these innovations to serve as a subsidy for civilian aircraft advancement. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), total world spending on military expenses in 2022 was $ 2,240 billion. 39% of this total, or $ 837 billion, was spent by the United States. China was the second largest spender, with $ 292 billion and 13% of
5250-495: The United States increased its market share, accounting for a whopping 53 percent of the trade that year. Last year saw the United States on pace to deliver more than $ 46 billion in foreign arms sales." The military and arms industry also tend to contribute heavily to incumbent members of Congress. The datagraphic represents the 20 largest US defense contractors based on the amount of their defense revenue. Among these corporations, 53.5% of total revenues are derived from defense, and
5355-412: The United States, Russia , and China . Some sources divide the history of the military–industrial complex into three distinct eras. From 1797 to 1941, the government only relied on civilian industries while the country was actually at war. The government owned their own shipyards and weapons manufacturing facilities which they relied on through World War I . With World War II came a massive shift in
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#17327938420755460-504: The World Bank Joseph Stiglitz wrote a review of The Shock Doctrine for The New York Times calling the parallel between economic shock therapy and the psychological experiments conducted by Ewen Cameron "overdramatic and unconvincing" and claiming that "Klein is not an academic and cannot be judged as one. There are many places in her book where she oversimplifies." He also said, "the case against these policies
5565-470: The aim of realizing profit, growth, and other imperatives. According to Steven Best , all these systems interrelate and reinforce one another. The concept of the military–industrial complex has been also expanded to include the entertainment and creative industries as well. For an example in practice, Matthew Brummer describes Japan's Manga Military and how the Ministry of Defense uses popular culture and
5670-408: The all-too-human pattern of chaos and confusion, good intentions and greed ." Sociologists as Ulrich Beck envisioned the society of risk as a new cultural value which posed risk as a commodity to be exchanged in globalized economies. As Klein observed, this suggested that disasters and capitalist economy was inevitably entwined. Some voices have praised the contributions of Klein to the study of
5775-609: The alternative subtitle Defeating the New Shock Politics . Writing in Geographical , Chris Fitch described this book as arguing for "radical change, and for bold, ambitious policies, to provide a credible alternative to the world vision of the Trump White House, and avert the worst effects of climate change." Released in June 2018 as paperback and e-book, The Battle for Paradise: Puerto Rico Takes on
5880-530: The analysis, such as with the Chinese government crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 . He argues that, rather than crushing opposition to pro-market reforms (as Klein would have it), the crackdown itself caused liberalization to stall for years. Klein responded on her website to both Norberg and Chait, stating that both had misrepresented her positions. Klein wrote that Norberg had erected
5985-565: The book No Logo , which for many became a manifesto of the anti-globalization movement . In it, she attacks brand-oriented consumer culture and the operations of large corporations. She also accuses several such corporations of unethically exploiting workers in the world's poorest countries in pursuit of greater profits. In this book, Klein criticized Nike so severely that Nike published a point-by-point response. No Logo became an international bestseller, selling over one million copies in over 28 languages. Klein's Fences and Windows (2002)
6090-557: The book "as gripping as the best murder mystery, as well researched as the best investigative journalism – on a par with the work of a Seymour Hersh ." The Shock Doctrine was named one of the best books of 2007 by the Village Voice , Publishers Weekly , The Observer , and the Seattle Times . In 2019, The Guardian ranked it the 18th greatest book since 2000. The Nobel Laureate and former Chief Economist of
6195-477: The book contains "a series of fabricated claims, such as the suggestion that Margaret Thatcher created the Falkland Islands crisis to crush the unions and foist unfettered capitalism upon an unwilling British public." Johan Norberg of the libertarian Cato Institute criticizes the book, saying that "Klein's analysis is hopelessly flawed at virtually every level." Norberg finds fault with specifics of
6300-557: The charisma of Jeffrey Sachs . Part 4 reports on how Klein thinks the shock doctrine was applied in Poland , China , South Africa , Russia , and the Four Asian Tigers . In Poland she discusses how the left-leaning trade union Solidarity won the country's 1989 legislative elections , but subsequently employed the shock doctrine due to IMF pressure. The section on China discusses the 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests , and
6405-469: The citizens of these countries were in shock from disasters, upheavals, or invasion. The book became an international and New York Times bestseller and was translated into 28 languages. Central to the book's thesis is the contention that those who wish to implement unpopular free market policies now routinely do so by taking advantage of certain features of the aftermath of major disasters, be they economic, political, military or natural. The suggestion
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#17327938420756510-456: The civilian market and sold off their defense departments. According to the military subsidy theory, the Cold War–era mass production of aircraft benefited the civilian aircraft industry . The theory asserts that the technologies developed during the Cold War along with the financial backing of the military led to the dominance of U.S. aviation companies . There is also strong evidence that
6615-463: The confines of neoliberalism; ... It's a fantasy that you could fundamentally shift the building blocks of your economy without engaging with politics." She encouraged the Occupy movement to join forces with the environmental movement , saying the financial crisis and the climate crisis are similarly rooted in unrestrained corporate greed. She gave a speech at Occupy Wall Street where she described
6720-406: The context of the 2023 Israel–Hamas war , she wrote: For Zionist believers (I'm not one of them), Jew hatred is the central rationale for why Israel must exist as a nuclear-armed fortress . Within this worldview, antisemitism is cast as a primordial force that cannot be weakened or confronted. The world will always turn away from us in our hour of need, Zionism tells us, just as it did during
6825-429: The councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military–industrial complex . The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists, and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel
6930-677: The crucial nature of the evolving movement. Klein also made an appearance in the British radio show Desert Island Discs on BBC Radio 4 in 2017. Klein was a key instigator of the Leap Manifesto , a political manifesto issued in the context of the 2015 Canadian federal election focused on addressing the climate crisis through restructuring the Canadian economy and dealing with issues of income and wealth inequality, racism, and colonialism. The manifesto has been noted as an influence in
7035-696: The demonstration against the Keystone XL pipeline outside the White House and was arrested. Klein celebrated Obama's decision to postpone a decision on the Keystone pipeline until 2013 pending an environmental review as a victory for the environmental movement. She attended the Copenhagen Climate Summit of 2009 . She put the blame for the failure of Copenhagen on President Barack Obama , and described her own country, Canada, as
7140-480: The development of the Green New Deal and eventually led to the establishment of The Leap, an organization that works to promote the realization of the principles behind the original manifesto. Military%E2%80%93industrial complex The expression military–industrial complex ( MIC ) describes the relationship between a country's military and the defense industry that supplies it, seen together as
7245-675: The economy as protecting poor people from harm caused by globalization. In 2017, Mark Milke and conservative writer James Kirchick criticized Klein for her support of Chávez. In March 2008, Klein was the keynote speaker at the first national conference of the Alliance of Concerned Jewish Canadians (now Independent Jewish Voices ). In January 2009, during the Gaza War , Klein supported the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel , arguing that "the best strategy to end
7350-473: The global share. The privatization of the production and invention of military technology also leads to a complicated relationship with significant research and development of many technologies. In 2011, the United States spent more (in absolute numbers) on its military than the next 13 countries combined. The military budget of the United States for the 2009 fiscal year was $ 515.4 billion. Adding emergency discretionary spending and supplemental spending brings
7455-482: The hegemony of neoliberal market fundamentalism is blocking any serious reforms to halt climate change and protect the environment. Questioned about Klein's claim that capitalism and controlling climate change were incompatible, Benoit Blarel, manager of the Environment and Natural Resources global practice at the World Bank, said that the write-off of fossil fuels necessary to control climate change "will have
7560-468: The inaugural Women's Prize for Non-Fiction . Klein has written about the Iraq War . In "Baghdad Year Zero" ( Harper's Magazine , September 2004), Klein argues that, contrary to popular belief, the George W. Bush administration did have a clear plan for post-invasion Iraq: to build a completely unconstrained free market economy. She describes plans to allow foreigners to extract wealth from Iraq and
7665-567: The increased campaigning by community-minded activists in South Africa and China. Paul B. Farrell from the Dow Jones Business News argued that The Shock Doctrine "may be the most important book on economics in the 21st century." In The Guardian , John Gray hailed it as one of the "very few books that really help us understand the present", describing the work as "both timely and devastating". William S. Kowinski of
7770-661: The increasingly bloody occupation is for Israel to become the target of the kind of global movement that put an end to apartheid in South Africa." In summer 2009, on the occasion of the publication of the Hebrew translation of her book The Shock Doctrine , Klein visited Israel, the West Bank , and Gaza , combining the promotion of her book and the BDS campaign. In an interview to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz , she emphasized that it
7875-483: The liberalization of China's economy. In South Africa she explains that the negotiations to end apartheid resulted in economic policy that went against the core of the Freedom Charter . In Russia she describes how Boris Yeltsin took power after the collapse of the Soviet Union and crafted an economic policy that turned Russia into an oligarchy . Finally, she says that during the 1997 Asian financial crisis
7980-424: The line between private and public, through tactics like the revolving door . Part 6 discusses the use of " shock and awe " in the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the subsequent occupation of Iraq , which Klein describes as the most comprehensive and full-scale implementation of the shock doctrine ever attempted, with mass privatization of Iraqi state-owned enterprises (including thousands of men being laid off) which
8085-422: The looting of the nation's cultural identity." Shashi Tharoor noted the work's "meticulous endnotes" and stated, referring to globalization , that Klein "has established herself as its principal naysayer." Katy Guest of The Independent praised the book as "a compelling account of the way big business and politics use global disasters for their own ends." Juan Santos , winner of the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize, called
8190-592: The median proportion is 63.4%; 6 firms derive over 75% of their revenue from defense. According to the Misplaced Pages entries for the companies, the headquarters of 11 of these corporations are located in the Washington metropolitan area , of which 5 are in Reston, Virginia . A thesis similar to the military–industrial complex was originally expressed by Daniel Guérin , in his 1936 book Fascism and Big Business , about
8295-547: The methods used to achieve those goals. Her "Baghdad Year Zero" was one of the inspirations for the 2008 film War, Inc. Klein's "Bring Najaf to New York" ( The Nation , August 2004) argued that Muqtada Al Sadr 's Mahdi Army "represents the overwhelmingly mainstream sentiment in Iraq" and that, if he were elected, "Sadr would try to turn Iraq into a theocracy like Iran," although his immediate demands were for "direct elections and an end to foreign occupation". Klein signed
8400-616: The most dangerous men on the planet", and wrote the book with the intention of using her doppelganger experience "as a guide into and through what I have come to understand as our doppelganger culture". Klein suggests that the Western world has fractured along political and ideological lines to such an extent that each side feels the other exists in a "mirror world". The book received primarily positive reviews and debuted at number 8 on The New York Times hardcover nonfiction weekly best seller list. On June 13, 2024, Doppelganger won Klein
8505-406: The narrative that free market capitalist policies have been welcomed by the inhabitants of regions where they have been implemented, and it argues that several man-made events, including the Iraq War , were intentionally undertaken with the goal of pushing through these unpopular policies in their wake. Some reviewers claimed the book oversimplifies political phenomena, while others lauded it as
8610-434: The overall argument of Klein's book The Shock Doctrine (2007) as "more right than wrong," Klein is "a romantic," who expected that the Chávez government would produce a bright future in which worker-controlled co-operatives would run the economy. The Shock Doctrine was consistent with her prior thinking about globalization , and in that book she describes Chávez' policies as an example of public control of some sectors of
8715-430: The period in hospital and at home, making educational sacrifices to do so. That year off prevented her "from being such a brat". The next year, after she had begun her studies at the University of Toronto , the second catalyst occurred: the 1989 École Polytechnique massacre of female engineering students, which proved to be a wake-up call to feminism. Klein's writing career began with contributions to The Varsity ,
8820-459: The preponderance of power in the contemporary West. However, following its coinage in Eisenhower's address, the MIC became a staple of American political and sociological discourse. Many Vietnam War –era activists and polemicists, such as Seymour Melman and Noam Chomsky employed the concept in their criticism of U.S. foreign policy, while other academics and policymakers found it to be
8925-435: The proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals so that security and liberty may prosper together. [emphasis added] The phrase was thought to have been "war-based" industrial complex before becoming "military" in later drafts of Eisenhower's speech, a claim passed on only by oral history. Geoffrey Perret , in his biography of Eisenhower, claims that, in one draft of
9030-538: The repression of the Egyptian government; the conference took place in Egypt, a country widely seen as repressive and autocratic. She goes on to state " Sisi's Egypt is making a big show of solar panels and biodegradable straws ... but in reality, the regime imprisons activists and bans research. The climate movement should not play along." calling it 'greenwashing'. In an interview with Democracy Now! , she says “what
9135-570: The same name, released onto YouTube . The original is no longer available on the site; however, a duplicate was published in 2008. The film was directed by Jonás Cuarón , produced and co-written by his father Alfonso Cuarón . The original video was viewed over one million times. The director Michael Winterbottom , alongside Mat Whitecross , also produced a documentary on the book which premiered in 2009. The publication of The Shock Doctrine increased Klein's prominence, with The New Yorker judging her "the most visible and influential figure on
9240-507: The speech, the phrase was "military–industrial–congressional complex", indicating the essential role that the United States Congress plays in the propagation of the military industry, but the word "congressional" was dropped from the final version to appease the then-currently elected officials. James Ledbetter calls this a "stubborn misconception" not supported by any evidence; likewise a claim by Douglas Brinkley that it
9345-618: The statistics in her central argument to be "rubbish". In a piece related to the COVID-19 pandemic , Klein wrote in 2020 that a "Pandemic Shock Doctrine" was beginning to emerge and called it the "Screen New Deal". Naomi Klein Naomi Klein (born May 8, 1970) is a Canadian author, social activist, and filmmaker known for her political analyses; support of ecofeminism , organized labour , and criticism of corporate globalization , fascism and capitalism . In 2021, Klein took up
9450-408: The subject of her book This Changes Everything (2014). According to her website in 2016, the book and its accompanying film (released in 2015) would be about "how the climate crisis can spur economic and political transformation." She served on the board of directors of the non-profit group 350.org from April 7, 2011, through the fiscal year ending September 2018, and took part in their "Do
9555-535: The sum to $ 651.2 billion. This does not include many military-related items that are outside of the Defense Department's budget. Overall, the U.S. federal government is spending about $ 1 trillion annually on military-related purposes. President Joe Biden signed a record $ 886 billion defense spending bill into law on December 22, 2023. In a 2012 story, Salon reported, "Despite a decline in global arms sales in 2010 due to recessionary pressures,
9660-415: The term is generally agreed to have emerged during or shortly after World War II . For example, a similar phrase was used in a 1947 Foreign Affairs article in a sense close to that it would later acquire, and sociologist C. Wright Mills contended in his 1956 book The Power Elite that a democratically unaccountable class of military, business, and political leaders with convergent interests exercised
9765-527: The three policy pillars of the neoliberal age—privatization of the public sphere, deregulation of the corporate sector, and the lowering of income and corporate taxes, paid for with cuts to public spending—are each incompatible with many of the actions we must take to bring our emissions to safe levels. And together these pillars form an ideological wall that has blocked a serious response to climate change for decades. By 2009, Klein's attention had turned to environmentalism, with particular focus on climate change ,
9870-423: The war. Using The Exodus story of Israelites worshipping the golden calf as an idol, she drew parallels to what she called "the false idol of Zionism." She said "It is a false idol that takes our most profound biblical stories of justice and emancipation from slavery, the story of Passover itself, and turns them into brutalist weapons of colonial land theft, roadmaps for ethnic cleansing and genocide." Indeed
9975-708: The way that the U.S. government armed the military. With the onset of World War II President Franklin D. Roosevelt established the War Production Board to coordinate civilian industries and shift them into wartime production. Throughout World War II arms production in the United States went from around one percent of annual GDP to 40 percent of GDP. Various U.S. companies, such as Boeing and General Motors , maintained and expanded their defense divisions. These companies have gone on to develop various technologies that have improved civilian life as well, such as night-vision goggles and GPS . The second era
10080-647: The winner of the Hilary Weston Writers' Trust Prize for Nonfiction . In 2016, Klein was awarded the Sydney Peace Prize for her activism on climate justice. Klein frequently appears on global and national lists of top influential thinkers, including the 2014 Thought Leaders ranking compiled by the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute , Prospect magazine's world thinkers 2014 poll, and Maclean's 2014 Power List. She
10185-577: The world as "upside down", where we act as if "there is no end to what is actually finite—fossil fuels and the atmospheric space to absorb their emissions," and as if there are "limits to what is actually bountiful—the financial resources to build the kind of society we need." She has been a particularly vocal critic of the Athabasca oil sands in Alberta, describing it in a TED talk as a form of "terrestrial skinning." On September 2, 2011, she attended
10290-594: Was an architect and leader of the federal New Democratic Party , while his father, Stephen Lewis , was a leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party . Avi Lewis works as a TV journalist and documentary filmmaker. He is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at the University of British Columbia . The couple have one son, Toma. Klein spent much of her teenage years in shopping malls , obsessed with designer labels . As
10395-428: Was fired after the 1941 strike , and had to switch to working in a shipyard instead. By 1956, they had abandoned communism. Klein's father grew up surrounded by ideas of social justice and racial equality, but found it "difficult and frightening to be the child of Communists", a so-called red diaper baby . Klein's husband, Avi Lewis , was born into a political and journalistic family. His grandfather, David Lewis ,
10500-544: Was formerly a member of the board of directors of the climate activist group 350.org . Naomi Klein was born in Montreal , Quebec , into a Jewish family with a history of peace activism . Her parents were self-described hippies who emigrated from the United States in 1967 as war resisters to the Vietnam War . Her mother, documentary filmmaker Bonnie Sherr Klein , is best known for her anti-pornography film Not
10605-564: Was important "not to boycott Israelis but rather to boycott the normalization of Israel and the conflict." In a speech in Ramallah on June 27, she apologized to Palestinians for not joining the BDS campaign earlier. Her remarks, particularly that "[some Jews] even think we get one get-away-with-genocide-free card" were characterized by Noam Schimmel, an op-ed columnist in The Jerusalem Post , as "violent" and "unethical", and as
10710-642: Was in the Kennedy Road shack settlement in the South African city of Durban , where the Abahlali baseMjondolo movement began. An article in Z Communications criticized The Take for its portrayal of the Argentine general and politician Juan Domingo Perón arguing that he was falsely portrayed as a social democrat. Klein's third book, The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism ,
10815-417: Was originally "military–industrial–scientific complex". Additionally, Henry Giroux claims that it was originally "military–industrial–academic complex". The actual authors of the speech were Eisenhower's speechwriters Ralph E. Williams and Malcolm Moos . Attempts to conceptualize something similar to a modern "military–industrial complex" did exist before 1961, as the underlying phenomenon described by
10920-428: Was published on September 17, 2019. On Fire is a collection of essays focusing on climate change and the urgent actions needed to preserve the world. Klein relates her meeting with Greta Thunberg in the opening essay in which she discusses the entrance of young people into those speaking out for climate awareness and change. She supports the Green New Deal throughout the book and in the final essay she discusses
11025-514: Was published on September 4, 2007. The book argues that the free market policies of Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics have risen to prominence in countries such as Chile under Pinochet , Poland, and Russia under Yeltsin . The book also argues that policy initiatives (for instance, the privatization of Iraq's economy under the Coalition Provisional Authority ) were rushed through while
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