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kareds's review against another edition
As with the Dawn of Everything, I know I will be returning to this in the future. There’s simply too much here to get into a review in any economical (hah) way, so I’ll just tell you to read it.
lakmus's review against another edition
4.0
Graeber's books seem to have the unfortunate tendency to be fascinating but completely evasive to my memory – it seems world-changing while you are reading them, and then you put it down and you entirely forget everything, because there is just so much goddamn detail. I hope something sticks to the subconscious, or something.
Graeber presents an argument that our understanding of what is debt and what it means has shifted over the millenia. The key transformation that happened a number of times is between the state where debt is understood as something inevitable in human life but in an unquantifiable way, so that these debts can't all really be payed off – to a state where debts *are* very much quantified, so quantified in fact that we can buy and sell anything and everything, ourselves and others included, and the payment of debt is expected and enforced. Math and violence are a bad combination. The idea that the notion of personal rights and liberties descend from the same school of thought that justified chattel slavery is disturbing.
There are a few chapters focused on laying out this argument, supported by a mix of history and anthropology, and a few more reviewing the history of money in a few key stages since its invention.
Graeber presents an argument that our understanding of what is debt and what it means has shifted over the millenia. The key transformation that happened a number of times is between the state where debt is understood as something inevitable in human life but in an unquantifiable way, so that these debts can't all really be payed off – to a state where debts *are* very much quantified, so quantified in fact that we can buy and sell anything and everything, ourselves and others included, and the payment of debt is expected and enforced. Math and violence are a bad combination. The idea that the notion of personal rights and liberties descend from the same school of thought that justified chattel slavery is disturbing.
There are a few chapters focused on laying out this argument, supported by a mix of history and anthropology, and a few more reviewing the history of money in a few key stages since its invention.
rhubarbpi3's review against another edition
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.5
I really liked this! I think I will reread to really grasp onto/commit his argument to memory, but at the core it is a very insightful investigation into debt and obligation and a re-examination into the method of the marketplace.
gauss96's review against another edition
5.0
à lire (et à relire) !
Un footnote qui m'a marqué : " [...] c'est parce que les gens ne peuvent mettre en attente les relations humaines aussi facilement que les "dépenses de consommation" imaginaires: leur fille n'aura cinq ans qu'une fois dans sa vie et leur grand-père n'a plus qu'un certain nombre d'année à vivre. "
Un footnote qui m'a marqué : " [...] c'est parce que les gens ne peuvent mettre en attente les relations humaines aussi facilement que les "dépenses de consommation" imaginaires: leur fille n'aura cinq ans qu'une fois dans sa vie et leur grand-père n'a plus qu'un certain nombre d'année à vivre. "
peer_pastinakel's review against another edition
4.0
Main points of the book (e. g. money originates to keep track of debt) arr clearly presented and backed up by a convincing line of reasoning, some solid research and plenty of anecdotes, but get lost in chapters belabouring less convincing circumstantial arguments and sidetracks. Halfway it starts to feel like it would have worked better as a series of blog posts linking to academic publications.