Gar Alperovitz | Historian, political economist, activist, writer (original) (raw)

Gar Alperovitz is the author of What Then Must We Do?, America Beyond Capitalism, and The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, and an advocate for a new, community-sustaining economy.

Gar and Martin Sherwin in the LA Times: “U.S. leaders knew we didn’t have to drop atomic bombs on Japan to win the war. We did it anyway”

admin | Published: August 11, 2020

(Toru Yamanaka / AFP/Getty Images)

Gar Alperovitz and Martin Sherwin write in the LA Times:

At a time when Americans are reassessing so many painful aspects of our nation’s past, it is an opportune moment to have an honest national conversation about our use of nuclear weapons on Japanese cities in August 1945. The fateful decision to inaugurate the nuclear age fundamentally changed the course of modern history, and it continues to threaten our survival. As the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Doomsday Clock warns us, the world is now closer to nuclear annihilation than at any time since 1947.

For the full piece, visit this link.

75th anniversary of the US atomic bombing of Japan: A discussion

By admin | Published: July 28, 2020

Gar Alperovitz joins with other scholars to discuss the US atomic bombing of Japan 75 years ago.

In this first webinar – found here – Barbara Cochran moderates a discussion with Gar Alperovitz, Kai Bird, Peter Kuznick, and Martin Sherwin. For information on the participants and other material, refer to the following link.

In this second webinar, Carolyn Forche, Gar Alperovitz, Kai Bird, Peter Kuznick, and Martin Sherwin discuss the decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan, that decision’s consequences, and what it means for the US today.

A conversation with Gar Alperovitz and John McKnight

By admin | Published: July 28, 2020

On July 22, 2020, the Schumacher Center for a New Economics hosted a virtual conversation with Gar Alperovitz and John McKnight. The conversation was moderated by Jodie Evans.

They reflected on their original talks [at the Schumacher Center] given current political, economic, and social realities and commented on each other’s work

For more information on this conversation, see this link.

Gar interviewed in openDemocracy

Gar Alperovitz speaks with Michaela Collord at openDemocracy:

The veteran political economist talks crisis, community ownership and the next system.

Read the full piece, published June 5, 2020, here.

Read Gar’s new essay, “Building a Democratic Economy: Sketch of a Pluralist Commonwealth”

Published in the spring 2020 edition of Nonprofit Quarterly, Gar writes in his new essay,

For a time, after the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and the retreat of social democracy at the hands of neoliberalism in the West, it was proclaimed that unencumbered corporate capitalism—with all its inequality and environmental costs—was the only game in town, the last system left standing.

Especially since the Great Recession, this judgment has begun to change. We see hints of this in the rise of Senator Bernie Sanders as a serious candidate for president and the prominence of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in Congress.

At the same time, there has been an explosion of on-the-ground experimentation and new institutional development that includes worker cooperatives (and public support for their development), community land trusts, and rising activism around a range of proposals that would expand the scope of the public sector, such as Medicare for All and public banking.

Read the full essay in Nonprofit Quarterly here.