Top Hacker News Book Recommendations in Politics & Social Sciences (all time)

All Time Past 6 Months

Mythos

Stephen Fry and Chronicle Books

4.7 on Amazon

5 HN comments

Precious Little Sleep: The Complete Baby Sleep Guide for Modern Parents

Alexis Dubief

4.7 on Amazon

5 HN comments

State and Revolution

Vladimir Ilich Lenin

4.7 on Amazon

5 HN comments

When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself

Steve Corbett , Brian Fikkert , et al.

4.6 on Amazon

5 HN comments

The Holographic Universe: The Revolutionary Theory of Reality

Michael Talbot

4.7 on Amazon

5 HN comments

Technological Slavery

Theodore Kaczynski

4.6 on Amazon

4 HN comments

HumanKind: Changing the World One Small Act At a Time

Brad Aronson

4.6 on Amazon

4 HN comments

Your Erroneous Zones: Step-by-Step Advice for Escaping the Trap of Negative Thinking and Taking Control of Your Life

Wayne W Dyer

4.6 on Amazon

4 HN comments

American Pastoral: American Trilogy (1) (Vintage International)

Philip Roth

4.2 on Amazon

4 HN comments

How to Live: Boxed Set of the Mindfulness Essentials Series

Thich Nhat Hanh and Jason DeAntonis

4.8 on Amazon

4 HN comments

Intellectuals and Race

Thomas Sowell

4.9 on Amazon

4 HN comments

Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life

William Deresiewicz

4.5 on Amazon

4 HN comments

Their Eyes Were Watching God

Zora Neale Hurston

4.7 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You (10th Anniversary Edition)

John C. Maxwell and Steven R. Covey

4.7 on Amazon

4 HN comments

Live Free Or Die: America (and the World) on the Brink

Sean Hannity

4.8 on Amazon

3 HN comments

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pyraleonJune 11, 2019

On the topic of Lenin, one can read The state and revolution where he defends the need of a strong state in a communist regime, and this quote: "the people don't want freedom, they want power. Freedom ? What would they do with it ?!"

hybridsonJune 11, 2019

I had just reread "State and Revolution" a few months ago and do not remember this quote. Do you mind linking to me where you found it?

steveklabnikonSep 1, 2013

First, read http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/mar/x01.htm . It's only a few pages so it doesn't even count!

If you only want one book, that book is Capital I. I suggest David Harvey's lectures along with it, they'll help out quite a bit. If you have read Smith and Ricardo, that'll make it much easier, too. For bonus points, read the short "Wages, price, and profit" by Marx, it's a bit easier of an intro than the book's.

If you can fit in a second, I'd suggest "the State and Revolution" by Lenin.

Marx identifies a problem and a crude solution, and Lenin provides a good solution. Those two will give you the most of it. Wikipedia, especially on the historical/dialectical materialism stuff, is helpful.

A more full list is here: http://www.reddit.com/r/communism/comments/wisiw/basic_marxi...

Also, /r/communism101 is very good and there to answer questions, if you Reddit.

tehjokeronSep 2, 2020

Like others have said, "The Communist Manifesto" is the easiest entry point. My copy also has "The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte" which some say is the work most descriptive of the US today. "The State and Revolution" by Lenin is a relatively easy and enlightening read as he talks about the nature of the capitalist state, the police, and other topics. "Reform or Revolution" by Rosa Luxemburg is also clarifying as it talks about why reformists have lost the thread. However, there are also many many many leftist podcasts you can listen to that can be easier to digest and will get you the basics, so that way when you read the original works later you have a baseline of understanding.

Capital is a doorstop, but I have heard that past chapter one which talks about the labor theory of value, the reading is much more breezy.

However, while some of these books are dense, even rural peasants have been able to read and metabolize these books, so don't despair!

tehjokeronMay 22, 2019

Try reading "The State and Revolution". It explains why democracy and capitalism are antagonistic forces. A 2014 landmark study showed that a basic assumption of the book, that the rich basically determine policy in a liberal democracy, is essentially correct in America. Unfortunately, the rich cannot be tamed under capitalism because they can perform a coordinated capital strike that brings the economy, and the regulatory system, to its knees. This is the private power that they have.

https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/fi...

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