Captive State: The Corporate Takeover of Britain

The movers and shakers in the modern world are the multinationals. The power of our democratically elected representatives has now been thoroughly usurped by the CEO of blue chip companies. A frightening reality given the rabid blatherings of bodies like the CBI. No wonder we now have no socialists to vote for. Monbiot, of course, panders to my wildest left-leaning sympathies in this fairly repetitive book. As Ani diFranco says "Why don't you just go and turn off the sun. Because we'll never live long enough to undo everything they've done to you". The unrelenting tsunami of commercialism sweeps away compassion, mercy, humility, charity, love and every other element of human dignity you could name in its path. The truism of anti-commercialism is that private companies can only function in their own self-interest; that includes the myth that they respond to customer needs.

Presents an interesting perspective with a lot of case studies - too many or too much detail for my liking. The case studies just went on and on and became quite tiresome. Yea I know, there's an enormous amount of moral corruption out there these days but the message to the masses would be better made with shorter punchier examples that referenced on-line material for those whe need it. ( )