[aschearer]

To offer some alternatives here are three books which I believe are relevant given these challenging times:

* Enlightenment Now (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35696171-enlightenment-n...): Offers a defense that our current institutions have delivered the goods and should be defended. The left doesn't need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We should continue improving the system we've got -- especially urgent today as they're under seige.

* Your Money or Your Life (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/78428.Your_Money_or_Your...): Philosophy masquerading as personal finance. Challenges the reader to ask "What is enough?" and honestly evaluate whether they are living an integrated life that is consistent with their values. Lays out one way to help answer these questions and course correct as necessary.

* Stand Up! (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35989237-stand-up): A hand book and call to action to answer the "knock at the door" and step up to address "a world on fire". Especially useful for those interested in or actively leading volunteers.

If, like me, you're upset about the current state of affairs and unsure where to go from here I recommend the above as a small tonic and, hopefully, stepping stone.

[dalbasal]

This is Vis a Vis your first recommendation, and how it's associated with "left wing" politics. Its fascinating to me that I have a fairly sepcific idea of what you are talking about, without being able to specifically define the key concepts. Wtf is left/eight anyway, and how come we can classify politics this way in polities and topics that are novel to us?

Anyone got a "history of the left and the right" thats a good read?

[nolantait]

Thomas Sowell splits it down collectivist lines:

"If we attempt to define the political left by its proclaimed goals, it is clear that very similar goals have been proclaimed by people whom the left repudiates and anathematizes, such as Fascists in general and Nazis in particular. Instead of defining these (and other) groups by their proclaimed goals, we can define them by the specific institutional mechanisms and policies they use or advocate for achieving their goals. More specifically, they can be defined by the institutional mechanisms they seek to establish for making decisions with impacts on society at large. In order to keep the discussion manageable, the vast sweep of possible decision-making mechanisms can be dichotomized into those in which individuals make decisions individually for themselves and those in which decisions are made collectively by surrogates for society at large." [1]

[1] https://theindependentwhig.com/haidt-passages/sowell-the-lef...

[dragonwriter]

Thomas Sowell is, on at least this issue, completely detached from reality.

“If we attempt to define the political left by its proclaimed goals, it is clear that very similar goals have been proclaimed by people whom the left repudiates and anathematizes, such as Fascists in general and Nazis in particular.”

The central unifying, defining goal proclaimed by leftists since the origin of the left is the achievement of a radical egalitarianism in the distribution of power in society.

To say that fascists in general and Nazis in particular did not proclaim such goals is, well, a massive understatement.