How to kill a country. US colonialism in Puerto Rico

The essays in this volume address capitalist globalisation and society's resistance - which is international - to financial and military power.Today's global colonialism is curiously similar to the subjugation of the long-dominated Caribbean region, and especially of Puerto Rico, a Hispanic Antillean island trying to survive the domination of US imperialism.A neoliberal totalitarianism diminishes nations - collective spaces with the potential to expand their social and popular solidarity - and not only in the so-called third world, but in Europe and elsewhere. The government is the banks.Instead of social development, indebtedness, individualistic competitiveness and obedience to US policy are imposed.Puerto Rico was the laboratory of such strategies more than a hundred years ago. In its mirror humanity can look today to better understand the challenges of the 21st century.The essays examine events, protests, films, books. They look not only at Puerto Rican history and others in the modern and contemporary world - Cuba, the United States, Korea, the Caribbean - but at ideas about struggle and the possibilities for change.

Autorentext

Héctor Meléndez teaches social and political theory. He has been a teacher and journalist and has reflected in articles and books on the peculiar experience of Puerto Rico and on contemporary culture.

Klappentext

The essays in this volume address capitalist globalisation and society's resistance - which is international - to financial and military power.Today's global colonialism is curiously similar to the subjugation of the long-dominated Caribbean region, and especially of Puerto Rico, a Hispanic Antillean island trying to survive the domination of US imperialism.A neoliberal totalitarianism diminishes nations - collective spaces with the potential to expand their social and popular solidarity - and not only in the so-called third world, but in Europe and elsewhere. The government is the banks.Instead of social development, indebtedness, individualistic competitiveness and obedience to US policy are imposed.Puerto Rico was the laboratory of such strategies more than a hundred years ago. In its mirror humanity can look today to better understand the challenges of the 21st century.The essays examine events, protests, films, books. They look not only at Puerto Rican history and others in the modern and contemporary world - Cuba, the United States, Korea, the Caribbean - but at ideas about struggle and the possibilities for change.