Søren Mau

Mute Compulsion is available in Danish from Klim, in German from Karl Dietz Verlag, and will be available in English from Verso Books in January 2023.

“Not a day goes by without a question imposing itself on the minimally sane mind: how can all this shit around us just go on? In this masterful study, Søren Mau methodically drills into the core of the matter: the deeply entrenched power of some people over others, and of capital over everyone. It is this power that drives the disasters of our time, and it is a specific form of power, one rooted in the most basal layers of existence—the economy, where human bodies are (supposed to be) sustained. Written with verve and clarity, analytically sharp and dialectically shrewd in equal measure, Mute Compulsion reinvigorates historical materialism for the mid-twenty-first century. Through close readings of Marx and critical dialogues with contemporary theory, it throws up fresh insights for a new generation of Marxists, as well as for long-time connoisseurs. A big red book to cherish.” – Andreas Malm, author of Fossil Capital (Verso, 2016), The Progress of this Storm (2018) and How to Blow Up a Pipeline (2021).

With a preface by Michael Heinrich, author of The Science of Value (1991) and Karl Marx and the Birth of Modern Society (2018).

Read a summary of the book in the journal Historical Materialism (in English), or in the journal PROKLA (in German).

See the list of contents, Michael Heinrich’s preface and the introduction here: Danish/German. Read the conclusion in Danish here, and in Swedish here.

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