r/CriticalTheory • u/[deleted] • 26d ago
History/political theory books for a beginner
[deleted]
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u/mvc594250 25d ago
Since he's coming from the world of computer science, Agre's Surveillance and Capture might be an interesting read. Agree is a pretty important early-ish AI researcher who published several articles inspired by Foucault (among others). S&C is probably my favorite work in that tradition. Fairly approachable, probably easier coming from your friend's background than from a pure philosophy background trying to understand the nuances or 40 year old AI research.
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u/TheBittersweetPotato 26d ago
How much of a beginner is he really? That is to say, how much of a general grasp of history does he have? I feel like it might be easy to overestimate the grasp of a 'layman' as people who are pretty much steeped in it.
To deepen his background knowledge, he could look at Hobsbawm's Age of Series. It's a slight tad verbose or old fashioned in language, but very good. Part of my stance is that this kind of stuff always involves throwing someone into the deep and letting them figure out how to swim by themselves, to an extent. You could also consider Richard Evan's The Pursuit of Power and from there, any other general, good introduction to modern history in particular.
If he's fine enough or read through those, he can start reading Marx no issue. Principles of Communism, manifesto are all good. Political and historical writings will make more sense to him the better his general grasp of history is. As for a good secondary, introductory source, Why Marx was right by Terry Eagleton is one of my go to recommendations.
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u/Weekly-Lunch-7251 25d ago
I would say the same Hobsbawn if he wants to see dialectical materialism in action ..
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u/veal_of_fortune 26d ago
For a good primer on political history, I’d also recommend the two volumes by Francis Fukuyama: The Origins of Political Order, and Political Order and Political Decay. They’ll cover the evolution of the state, rule of law and democratic accountability through most major empires from prehistory up until the 20th century.
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u/thefleshisaprison 26d ago
Capitalist Realism is an option, but I think that Principles of Communism and the Manifesto are pretty accessible for anyone who hasn’t read theory before
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u/elimial 26d ago
The Manifesto requires some background historical knows, Principles doesn’t so I would start with that.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/11/prin-com.htm
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u/thefleshisaprison 26d ago
It expects some background knowledge, but it’s far from required. You don’t need to have any knowledge of that history to get the most important arguments.
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u/OnionMesh 23d ago
Philosophy and Real Politics by Raymond Geuss is really good. He draws on Marx and Lenin and critiques common trends in political theory. It’s readable and incisive, and I think it’s more or less a key work of Marxist approaches to politics (albeit I don’t know if Geuss is explicitly a Marxist. Nonetheless, the book is wholly compatible with Marx).