Wanna get into politics, can you guys recommend me some entry level books?

Dump Naomi Klein. She is a hack, whatever your political posture.

I'm going to save you user. Don't get into politics. Just don't. Don't be that guy. Your life will be much happier if you focus on literature and pick up ideology as you go. Of course try to think if these ideas would work widespread (I'll save you time. they won't) and play devils advocate a lot.

I'm telling you man. You start hating anything and everything once you get political. You stop loving the world and you begin seeing people as just cogs in a machine. Get out in the world to learn your politics. Don't read Communist Manifesto or Wealth of Nations. Don't listen to Rush Limbaugh or NPR.

I've spent the last few years of my life being extremely tied up in it. I was extremely liberal and then extremely conservative. I would get angry at my own family members and would shun new friends because of these things. There is no easier way to become cynical and reclusive than in politics.

...

I would also say that you are making a mistake, as someone who works in a closely-related field and spent their early career working on campaigns. And all those books you read aren't going to mean shit to anyone or help you at all, unless your ambition is to be an academic or work in a think tank.

You want to learn about politics read All the King's Men. All this theory shit can go right into the dumpster.

>She is a hack
why?

Don't listen to him. She is well worth reading.

Anthony de Jasay - Against Politics: On Government, Anarchy, and Order

faggot detected

>being this cinycal...

I read the first few pages of Shock Doctrine after giving it to my mum for Christmas and felt pretty bad because she her style is sensationalist at the expense of argumentation.

How to be a Demagogue by Fyodor Karamazov.

so you calling her a hack because you read 10 pages of one of her books

lit in a nutshell guys

The mass paychology of fascism __ Reich
To have done with the massacre of the body __ Guattari

>Wanna get into politics
I wouldn't bother if you're living in a "democratic" nation. You don't need to read any books to serve the plutocrats.

Start with the Greeks.

>The mass paychology of fascism __ Reich
>Taking anything from Mr "dude orgone energies lmao" seriously.

Don't listen to him. She is not worth reading.
At all.

It only takes ten pages.

He later became a closet christfag anit-feminist. Read his last selection of essays.

nysun.com/arts/shock-jock/63867/

Regarding the shock doctrine:

>Friedman says governments are ineffecient and wants to privatise some utilities on utilitarian grounds.
>Some governments perform privatisation in an unfair/corrupt way
>Therefore Friedman is bad

>Friedman taught people who became economic advisers in Chile to Pinochet.
>Pinochet was bad (true)
>Pinochet choose to listen sometimes to the advisers
>Therefore free markets and Friedman are bad.

>Americans who like markets invaded Iraq
>Therefore they want to create a new state based solely on markets. (Untrue)
>Therefore markets are bad.

>Friedman said "Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around"
>Therefore Friedman wants to make a crisis so his ideas get put into use and Friedman is bad.

>Rapid inflation busting (leading to a short recession but is usually better for long run growth)
Has been called shock therapy ( insinuates Friedman )
>For torture people use shocks
>Therefore Friedman likes torture and is bad

>Some think tanks don't agree with her
>Tanks
>Think tanks want lots of wars ( and don't forget Friedman is bad because he thought and thinking forms part of think tanks which want lots of wars.)

It's full of extremely silly points. Those that are valid are infact the cases where standard "neoliberal" theory ( I.e economic orthodoxy) aren't followed.

marxists.org/archive/bukharin/works/1920/abc/index.htm

Not that user but a SST teacher once suggested the class to read "The Dogma of Christ and Other Essays on Religion, Psychology and Culture " (Well in Italy it was called "The need for belief")

Meme response but true

> Suggesting Friedman didn't set the U.S. economy back 60 years
>Posting a review of a book instead of an excerpt from the actual book
>Over-symplifying the work of a respected author in order to make an argument on a literature forum

Go back to /pol/. You probably enjoyed The Fountainhead too, dipshit

Blatant capitalist horseshit written by Tyler Cowen. Go back to /pol/.

Liking liberty/market system from a utilitarian point of view does not equal ayn rand thanks.f fee markets plus social insurance all the way.

>Naomi Klein
>Respected author

Those are her actual arguments desu

>/Pol/
>Capitalist

Hahahaha.
I though Veeky Forums were smart anyway.

Once you understand pic related you won't need to read anything else.

Go back to /pol/, shitstain.

Friedman was far too socially liberal for /pol/

You mean politics in general, most influential works of political theory, or contemporary political theoretical works? I've been planning to do all three eventally, and am focusing on the second one right now, so here is my advice:
If first, then don't bother reading individual works and read a textbook. I've heard that "Contemporary Political Theory: A Reader" by Colin Farrelly is really good. He also wrote some other textbooks on politics that might suit your interest more.
If second, then these books are arguably the most influential political works:
Republic by Plato
Nicomachean Ethics & Politics by Aristotle
The Prince by Machiavelli (I also suggest it's refutation, Anti-Machiavel by Frederick The Great, and it's fictional adaptation, Mandragola by Machiavelli)
Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes
Two Treatises of Government by John Locke
The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Discourse on the Origin of Inequality by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
The Spirit of the Laws by Montesquieu
A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft (along with The Subjection of Women by John Stuart Mill)
Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville
The Principles of Morals and Legislation by Jeremy Bentham
The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx (along with The Principles of Communism by Frederick Engels)
On Liberty by John Stuart Mill
The Concept of the Political by Carl Schmitt
And, these two works are known for their extreme length and difficulty in understanding, you may or may not want to read them, but anyways:
Elements of the Philosophy of Right by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Capital by Karl Marx
Now, this is a really long list, narrow it down to your interest and read only what you're interested in at first, then read the rest if you're really passionate about politics.
If third, then, as far as I know, contemporary political discourse is focused on three works:
The Open Society and Its Enemies by Karl Popper
A Theory of Justice by John Rawls
Anarchy, State, and Utopia by Robert Nozick
The hottest issue in contemporary philosophical political discussion is probably deliberative democracy. I think that the best book on this subject is "When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation" by James Fishkin, although I am yet to read it myself.
Hope I helped :)

the fuck are archons and aeons

I had to look it up, so I'll explain it to you, or at least try to:

Aeon is essentially an inner state of being, so a servant of the Aeon would be someone who is compelled by an inner belief that they may or may not believe all of humanity holds. Aeon is essentially soul. Archons, on the other hand, are essentially rulers, based on the judges or rulers of ancient Athens. A slave of the Archons is a slave to government, essentially.

I love you user, that's just what i wanted.

Thank you very much

You're welcome :)

Thirded for BTFO from politics. Actual politics, that is. Actual thinking about and trying to understand politics.

All these anons who are naming you books are probably just content that they've """read""" the """classics""" on the subject of politics, but in reality could explain fuck all about actual politics or how the mind of any actual politician works, or be able to foresee any future event based on the past ones that they've read about in great lenght

If you're also just interested in reading all these books in such a manner, your end goal being that you're just able to reiterate the basic gist of them, and talk a bit about the social context, and stuff like that that really makes you feel important for your superior general knowledge -- by all means go ahead and read them.

Begin by thoroughly questioning yourself- why do you want to learn about politics?

Do you have an academic reason to do so? In that case, read philosophy.

Do you want to become an informed citizen in a democracy? Familiarize yourself with politicians (local ones are important too!), their positions, and the historical and social context in which both you and they are situated within. If you'd like to get involved, start by researching advocacy groups or political organizations. That will do you and the people around you more good than reading Adam Smith and occasionally referencing it to your friends.

Do you want to gain limitless political power, or become monarch of the world? Not happening, buddy. If you'd like to try though, try getting involved with a political organization.

As a student in a university, I choose to read both classical and modern works of political theory because I write journal articles using them, and because I pleasure read a lot of political stuff. As others have brought up, studying politics is a notorious way to isolate you from your surroundings, and can lead to feeling pretty fucking dismal. My first reading of the Leviathan so shook my interpretation of the world that I've been "different" ever since, and can't interact with other people when talking about social issues in the way I used to.

>"machiavelli is satire" plebtards.
Are you implying he did not specifically write that to get on the good sides of Medici? Also his vision of reality was warped from seeing a return to the middle ages government in his young years and later seeing his city changing government back and forth without a substantial change due to the nature of man, which he thought would never change, making law a constant through time, on which he was wrong.

keep your shit opinions to yourself.