Customer Reviews
Yuck - By: D&D, 03 Oct 2008 
Even though it was valuable for me to learn what is really going on, I read this book with a mixture of revulsion & horror. I was certainly shocked to learn about the tripartite economic recipe - privatisation, deregulation, & cutbacksin social welfare spending - repeatedly used around the world by a so-called democracy via highly non-democratic means.
In the early years, the primary shock vehicle was dictatorial military force & accompanying fear of - & actual mass use of - arrest, torture, disappearance, or death. Over time, new organisations such as the IMF & the World Bank were employed instead, deliberately creating impossible debt burdens to force governments to accept privatisation, removal of trade barriers & tariffs, & widespread layoffs. In more recent years, these policies have been used on peoples already shocked by terrroism or natural disasters like hurricanes & tsunamis.
And more & more information along the lines revealed by this book continues to show up - only recently, for example, "New Scientist" (23 July 2008) carried an article stating that, for each year of a country's involvement with the IMF, the TB death rate increased by four per cent on average. This was not because countries with worsening TB attract more IMF attention since the TB rates had been falling, or at least steady, before receiving IMF "help".
Finally, for a more personal view of the same story, read "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man".
Complex, Compelling, Horrifying, an Important Book - By: THE Music Enthusiast, 29 Sep 2008 
"The Shock Doctrine" is a thoroughly good readin which Naomi Klein sets out to illustrate the spread of the economic doctrine of the late economist Milton Friedman & of the Chicago School of Economics; to illustrate the use of force (backed by U.S governmentin a number of cases) by right-wing governments & exploitation of natural disaster & conflict to push through unpopular economic reforms (based on Friedman's doctrine), & how such governments are putting big business first to line their own pockets & those of the corporate sector, leaving the public sector to deteriorate & their nation to grow poorer & poorer.
The book opens with an introduction of Milton Friedman's view of disaster as an opportunity for the practice of free-market economics; how he longed for the chance to test out his theories & how he finally got the chance. Klein discusses research into the effects of psychological shock & then moves onto how this research was then used & abused by the CIA for interrogation purposes. We are then cited a number of case studiesin which right-wing governments have used repressive measures to pursue with their economic policies, & the concept of 'planned misery' is developed.
It is when Klein turns onto the subject of shock therapyin the U.S., of the homeland security industry & U.S. management of Iraq vis-a-vis shock therapy becomes slightly inconsistent, something she appears to seek a remedy for,in the case of the latter, with the concept of "pre-emptive shock". This inconsistency itself, however, isn't particularly important because the message is clear enough: with all the back-scratching & dirty dealing going on under Bush, the corporate world has never had it so good.
The penultimate chapter looks at how conflict has benefited the Israeli economy & stock markets, & the final chapter is Klein's hope-inspiring conclusion is that capitalism is finally coming to its end as left-wing governments turn their backs on the U.S & on free-market economics ideas & practices, etc.
"The Shock Doctrine" is a complex book, but Klein's style of writing is ever-refreshing & there's not a dull wordin the text, one of the great things about her work. She brilliantly portrays why right-wing big government & big business can be so dangerous. It's a relief to know both have a thornin its side like Naomi Klein. This is an important book, one not to be missed. I'd definitely recommend it.
Scandal: Sometimes people profit when bad things happen. Film at eleven! - By: Dr. P. J. A. Wicks, 21 Sep 2008 
First, disclosure: I enjoyed No Logo a great deal, it informed a lot of the way I think about corporations & changed the way I bought clothes. I read the Guardian when I get a chance, & am addicted to the Daily Show. So please don't think that my review is based on having a radically different philosophy to Ms Klein.
I didn't like this book. The main thrust of the book is that there are theorists who believe that you can only change things when a big shock to the system happens; an earthquake, 9/11, Katrina, etc. In the aftermath the populace are too shocked & confused to notice free marketers runningin to privatize public assets like security or schools. Nowin individual cases, I agree this is something to keep an eye on, particularly with companys like Blackwater. But where the author loses me isin tying this together with a history of torture methods of the CIA around electroshock. I didn't really see the relevance of the comparison & it's a thread that weaves its way through the book. There's also a hint of the paranoia seenin conspiracy theorists, throughout, & here is my fundamental problem with that: most people are not evil. They go about their business, try to be good people, & that's that. If a corporation sees an opportunity to make money it's hardly surprising they will do, it doesn't always need to be interepreted as part of an agenda. Sometimes it's just business.
Personally I found the entire topic much less relevant to me than No Logo; what am I supposed to do about the issues explored here other than gripe about them to other lefties to show off how well read I am? At 550 pages this could also have done with being a lot more concise. Overall I'm disappointed that I didn't like this more.
The second colonial pillage and the essence of dehumanization - By: Luc REYNAERT, 30 Aug 2008 Naomi Klein unveilsin this hard-hitting book (naming names) extremely clearly the economic utopia & the shameful realities resulting from the neo-liberal policies of the Chicago School of Economics, also called `The Washington Consensus'.
What
Its defenders claim that the free market is a perfect scientific system,in which individuals acting on their own self-interested desire, create the maximum benefit for all.
But, as no country or city wanted to implement deliberately their policies, its powerful fundamentalist defenders, together with their long arm, the IMF, used & created shocks (wars, military coups, political upheavals, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, epidemics, energy & resource shortages) to force a second shock of radical social & economic engineering on traumatized populations.
Where
Naomi Klein analyzes brilliantly a long list of victims of the shock doctrine of which the most important are: Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Iraq, Russia, Indonesia, Poland, South-Africa, former Yugoslavia & its republics, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Thailand, New Or leans & the US as a whole.
How
This radical economic cure consisted intentionallyin eliminating the public sphere,in giving total freedom to private interests &in providing only skeletal social spending. Sometimes with the help of the IMF as their obedient mediator, State & corporate wealth was cut into pieces & sold of for a triflein debased currencies to private, mostly foreign, interests: airlines, phone & water systems, oilfields, all kind of corporations & factories (sometimes direct competitors), mineral deposits or farmlands.
Private bonanza, public hell
Those policies created a formidable bonanza for transnational corporations, oligarchs & investment banks.
For the majority of the population, the results were less than bleak, rather hellish:
Not democracy, but dictatorship
Not peace, but war, tortures or simply assassinations (the essence of dehumanizing)
Not freedom for the populations, but for the corporations
Not hiring, but mass unemployment (putting peoplein a starvation position)
Not civil liberties, but aggressive surveillance
Not clean commerce, but rampant corruption
Not broadly based wealth, but turning 25 to 60 % of the population into a permanent underclass
Not clean air & water, but environmental degradation
US
In the US, the core of the governmental tasks (the military, the police, fire departments, power, covert intelligence, disease control, public schools) was subcontracted to private interests.
Future
But the tide is turning against disaster capitalism. The IMF is nearly out of business.
Democratic socialism, always regarded by thosein power as a greater threat than totalitarian communism, is clearly on the march, especiallyin South-America.
Naomi Klein's formidable book is a must read for all those who want to understand the world we live in.
What's really going on - By: Sarah Tomley, 29 Aug 2008 Read & weep - Klein exposes the real power behind the world throne & the shoddy, extraordinary greed of the few who are happy to make money from the world's poor. Oh actually - BY making the rest of the world poor. The compelling story of how Milton Friedman's Chicago Boys realised that catastrophe gave them a vital window of opportunityin which to snatch & grab,in countries worldwide, starting with some "experiments"in Latin America. It's no news to economists, but it is to the rest of us - governmentsin "transition", such as Poland under Solidarity, were forced to seek help from the World Bank & IMF, only to be told that essential loans came with unbearable hardship & economic ruin for their citizens. Forced privatisations of state companies, all price controls lifted, so that essentials like bread & milk became unaffordable, & massive layoffs/unemployment. But the deal was always: accept our terms, or forget about securing loans - which these countries (like S.Africa, like Russia) needed to deal with the inherited debts of previous dictatorships. A rock & a hard place indeed. And guess who was controlling the IMF? And making all the money from buying up ex-state companies, only to sell them on for huge profit, or close them down so there'd be no competition for the American companies coming in? And that's before Klein even gets to discussing Iraq. Essential reading. Especiallyin the Big Brother age, when politicians would like us all to be looking the other way.
