It was an ordinary mugging. The bastard had a gun, a swagger, a gang and didn’t seem to want to me to take his photo when he was roughing someone up. So he came up to me and told me to hand over the camera. Timid as I am, and not wanting much further trouble, I handed it over. There were witnesses.| Raj Patel
Speaking at Curries Fountain this weekend, twenty years after Abahlali baseMjondolo emerged from the shack settlements of Durban, I was reminded of what genuine popular democracy looks like when it refuses co-option.| rajpatel.org
Speaking at Curries Fountain this weekend, twenty years after Abahlali baseMjondolo emerged from the shack settlements of Durban, I was reminded of what genuine popular democracy looks like when it refuses co-option. | Raj Patel
Original at the Boston Review| Raj Patel
Decades ago, Richard Pithouse and I were reading Alain Badiou’s Being and Event, and discussing his ideas with our comrades in Abahlali baseMjondolo. If you’re picking up a trace of Badiou’s set-theory-as-ethics in this quote by the organisation’s General Secretary – “Every human being, everywhere, must be counted as a human being” – then this might explain it. Thapelo Mohapi, who offered this counter to the xenophobia of South Africa’s Operation Dudula, wasn’t part of ou...| Raj Patel
I’m excited, as many are in the US, by Zohran Mamdani’s resurgent bid to be New York City’s next Mayor, and unsurprised that the Democratic Party has left no pearl unclutched at his proposals. There is one idea, however, that might benefit from a bit more vision: the idea of the public grocery. There’s more … Continue reading "Mamdanimania"| Raj Patel
A few years ago, I was invited to join a meeting to think through the polycrisis. It happened a few weeks after the assassination of Lindokuhle Mnguni, one of the most startlingly wise and visionary leaders I’d ever met – he was 28 years old. The polycrisis – understood as climate emergency, democratic decline, pandemic … Continue reading "Care and Resistance"| Raj Patel
Inflamed: Deep Medicine and the Anatomy of Injustice with Rupa MaryaThe Value of NothingFood Rebellions! co authored with Eric Holt-Gimenez and Annie ShattuckPromised Land edited with Peter Rosset and Michael Courville| Raj Patel
One of the reasons I’ve been quiet recently is because of the reading demands for The National Book Awards this year, which \ come with a requirement that keep quiet about anything published this year, lest I tip the hand of the jury in our deliberations. Also, I’m finishing a couple of books, which means most of my writing time is at the service of my editors. | Raj Patel
The pig lies in its own waste, pressed against the metal grating of an industrial gestation crate in Duplin County, North Carolina. It’s March 2025, and she’s running a fever. Her lungs burn with two different viral infections—H1N1, the seasonal swine flu that routinely sweeps through factory farms, and a version of highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1, which arrived via wild birds roosting in the ventilation system. The combination is killing her and, while it does, it’s mutating. ...| Raj Patel
You can tell I’m looking for excuses not to knuckle down and finish my next book project, because I’m catching up with posting things here. I’m very pleased to have put together a bit of research on the Andhra Pradesh Community-Managed Natural Farming programme with Vijay Kumar Thallam, just out in Nature Food. The reason … Continue reading "Agricultural Subsidy Transition Bonds"| Raj Patel
The Alameda Institute, whose research director is the excellent Sabrina Fernandes, has put together a fantastic dossier on food sovereignty called Seeds of Sovereignty: Contesting the Politics of Food. There’s a lot of confusion about what food sovereignty is, and isn’t. (I wrote a short introduction a few years ago, and it holds up.) Many … Continue reading "Food Sovereignty in the 2020s"| Raj Patel