Book Club: Peter Phillips with Titans of Capital: How Concentrated Wealth Threatens Humanity
In December 2024, World BEYOND War will be holding a weekly discussion each of four weeks of Titans of Capital: How Concentrated Wealth Threatens Humanity, with the author Peter Phillips.
When you register for the club, we'll mail you a hardcopy of the book.
We'll let you know which parts of the book will be discussed each week along with the Zoom details to access the discussions.
When: For one hour on four Fridays, December 6, 13, 20, and 27, 2024 at 21:00 UTC.
That's
Friday at 11 a.m. in Honolulu, 1 p.m. in Los Angeles, 3 p.m. in Mexico
City, 4 p.m. in New York, 10 p.m. in Yaounde and Berlin, and Monday at 8
a.m. in Sydney and 10 a.m. in Auckland.
Where: Zoom (details to be shared upon registration).
This is a small group series with limited space of up to 18 people.
Sign up to reserve your spot. We look forward to reading and discussing this important book with you!
About the Book:
A fascinating examination of the rapid concentration of global capital, with chapters that focus on China and Russia. Explores
how fewer and larger investment companies now manage the excess
financial wealth of the world’s 40 million richest people, to the
detriment of everyone else and the global environment.
Political
sociologist Peter Phillips examines the global economy to demonstrate
how networks of wealthy individuals have evolved since the COVID-19
pandemic—and how the financial investments of transnational elites
threaten human rights and the future of the planet. Focusing on private
capital investments, military spending, and the propaganda machine, he
poses three key research questions:
- To what extent do the wealthy influence—or even dominate—decision making that affects all of us in society?
- Who are the most powerful people?
- How does the accumulation of capital work?
Titans of Capital examines
changes in the global economy during the past five years that
demonstrate how networks of wealthy individuals have evolved since the
COVID-19 pandemic, and how the financial investments of transnational
elites threaten human rights and the future of the planet.
-
Private capital investments
serve as the primary operating funds for international arms sales,
private prisons, and other socially negative activities. These
investments fuel the continued use of carbon-based energy leading to
amplified global warming and climate change.
-
Military spending
is a critical component of continued wealth concentration and political
power in the world. Spending on arms and intelligence is a required
aspect of maintaining global power and control. Dealing with Russia,
China, Iran and other “rogue” states is a continuing agenda for agents
of the world power elites.
-
Propaganda machines
in Western capitalist governments serve to protect elite wealth by
promoting military conflicts to open new regions for economic
investment.
Phillips warns that while continued
concentration of global capital increases the profits enjoyed by the
global economy’s “Titans,”, it also increases global inequality,
starvation, and civil unrest, threatening the lives of the hundreds of
millions of people living in extreme poverty. It is imperative to ask
how we can reverse the concentration of Titan wealth and revitalize
grassroots democracy unbridled by extreme wealth. Identifying 117 global
Titans by name and exposing the networks and interests that unite them
provides readers opposed to militarism and committed to economic
equality with crucial tools to directly engage the power elite who
endanger life on earth.
RESERVE YOUR SPOT HERE.
As always, you can sign up for any future monthly book club before it sells out, and give yourself months to read the book, by going to
https://worldbeyondwar.org/bookclubs
World BEYOND War is a global network of volunteers, chapters, and affiliated organizations advocating for the abolition of the institution of war.
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