Agenda For A New Left: Answering The Free-Market Right

Synopsis

As disillusion sets in with the free market right-- the legacy of Thatcher, Reagan and Geoffrey Sachs--Hiliary Wainwright retrieves and develops what was best in the thinking and practice of the new left. Challenged by the appeal of neo--liberalism to young organizers in the civic movements of Central Europe, she tackles Hayeka s critique of the all--knowing state, and his regonition of a practical knowledgea that no state or party can secind guess. Drawing an alternative view of knowledge from the practice of social movements (from the 1968 student revolt, through militant shop stewards organizations and the womena s movement, to green activism of the 1980a s) as well as from new philosophical currents, Wainwright counters Hayeka s individualism and denial of the legitimacy of the collective action, with a conception of knowledge as fundamentally social.On this foundation she establishes a new understanding of transformative political agengy as well as self--consciously experimental and involving a combination of representative and participatory forms of democracy. Arguments for a new Left is sure to provokr wide discussion.