Audiobook16 hours
Heaven on Earth: The Rise, Fall, and Afterlife of Socialism
Written by Joshua Muravchik
Narrated by Bob Souer
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
Socialism was man's most ambitious attempt to supplant religion with a doctrine claiming to ground itself in "science." Each failure to create societies of abundance or give birth to "the New Man" inspired more searching for the path to the promised land: revolution, communes, social democracy, communism, fascism, Arab socialism, African socialism. None worked, and some exacted a staggering human toll. Then, after two centuries of wishful thinking and bitter disappointment, socialism imploded in a fin de siecle drama of falling walls and collapsing regimes. It was an astonishing denouement but what followed was no less astonishing. After the hiatus of a couple of decades, new voices were raised, as if innocent of all that had come before, proposing to try it all over again.
Joshua Muravchik traces the pursuit of this phantasm, presenting sketches of the thinkers and leaders who developed the theory, led it to power, and presided over its collapse, as well as those who are trying to revive it today. Heaven on Earth is a story filled with character and event which at the same time gives us an epic chronicle of a movement that tried to turn the world upside down-and for a time succeeded.
Joshua Muravchik traces the pursuit of this phantasm, presenting sketches of the thinkers and leaders who developed the theory, led it to power, and presided over its collapse, as well as those who are trying to revive it today. Heaven on Earth is a story filled with character and event which at the same time gives us an epic chronicle of a movement that tried to turn the world upside down-and for a time succeeded.
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Reviews for Heaven on Earth
Rating: 4.357142857142857 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
28 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I bought this book over a decade ago, but never felt like reading it. Somehow, Iook at it and I think "textbook". My mistake. This is one of the better histories off socialism. I like his method of telling the history through short biographies of major players. Each chapter corresponds to one or two actors who exemplify that period.