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by specialist 1798 days ago
Maybe start with Utopia of Rules? Even though his books progressively build his world view over time, that might be the most accessible.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Utopia_of_Rules

Last year, I binged on his audiobooks (local library), and own the hard copies to leaf thru.

Sorry, can't vouch for how accessible his ideas are. I'm very primed to hear what Graeber has to say. Chomsky, McLuhan, Postman, etc. And every book about policy work (organizing, lobbying) that I can find.

The Democracy Project might be his best primer on his theory of social change. First part is the back story on Occupy Wall Street. The second part is the Anarchist critique of classical Liberals (today's Democrats and Republicans in the USA). As an active member of the Democratic Party, Graeber is very challenging, hard to hear. But ultimately I agree with his observations. TLDR: The answer is always more participatory democracy, and what that'll look like.

(The Democracy Nerd podcast has an episode on Oregon's citizen juries, for just one example of participatory democracy. https://democracynerd.us/episode/exporting-oregon-style-demo...)

"Debt: The first 5,000" reprogrammed my head. Graeber simply tries to answer the question "What is money?" by listing all the different notions thru our known history. (eg We had "virtual currency" centuries ago.) Any one blathering about money, debt, crypto, spending, currency, etc is hard to take seriously if the omit (ignore) the questions Graeber asks.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debt%3A_The_First_5000_Years

Right now, I totally agree with Graeber's model for advocating change. Based on my own experiences doing policy work, and observing others.

But I don't think his (now decade old) views on money, debt, and power are nearly radical enough. Sadly, Graeber recently passed, so we'll probably never learn his thoughts on modern monetary theory (MMT) and such.

Also, I'm now keen to learn about Marx and Marxism, if only to better understand Graeber's criticisms. I still haven't found anything accessible to noobs like me.

2 comments

His Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology is good and short and findable on the internet as PDF if you're looking for an amuse bouche of Graeber's ideas before tackling Debt
I'd read a book about Marxism or from Saint Marx himself with you. Consider me a quiet fan of how you think and interact with the world (you've been on my list for quite a while: https://philosopher.life/#We%20Could%20Probably%20Be%20Frien...). `/salute`.
Hi h0p3. Thank you. You made my day.

Reviewing your friends list, I agree we're in the same flock. Tangent: I'd love ready access to my personal metrics on HN. Like maybe star or highlight posts from users I've upvoted before. Would definitely like feeds, akin reddit's multireddit feature, so I could easily follow my friend's comments.

I poked around your site, read some of your posts. I think you're a good person who's really trying to be present for your loved ones.

Peace.