"This fascinating and informative study, rich in novel insights, treats money not as an abstraction from its social base but as deeply embedded in its essential functions and origins in brutal violence and harsh oppression." —Noam Chomsky
"McNally casts an unsparing light on the origins of money—and capitalism itself—in this scathing, Marxist-informed account.... McNally builds a powerful, richly documented argument that unchecked capitalism prioritizes greed and violence over compassion....[T]his searing academic treatise makes a convincing case." —Publishers Weekly
"David McNally's new book makes an important contribution to the growing critical literature on such basic components of contemporary capitalism as markets and money. His historical perspective makes the contribution especially insightful." —Richard D. Wolff, Democracy at Work
"Blood and Money is an ambitious and challenging account of the nexus between money, war, slavery and, eventually, capitalism—across vast swathes of history. At the heart of the book lies a crucial argument about the pivotal role of war finance in the emergence of modern banking, carefully laid out both in McNally’s superlative chapter on the early decades of the Bank of England and in the condensed and fascinating synopsis of American capitalism with which the study concludes. These chapters alone should make the book indispensable reading for anyone seriously interested in the longer-term sources of modern capitalism as we know it today." —Jairus Banaji, SOAS, University of London
Winner of the 2012 Isaac and Tamara Deutscher Memorial Prize
"This outstanding new work from David McNally is indispensable for serious monster fans and radicals both and almost giddyingly so for those of us who are both.”—China Miéville, author of Embassytown
"McNally delivers a tour de force analysis of global capital from the upper registers of derivatives trading down to popular fables of African monsters Monsters of the Market is one of the best books I’ve read in years and it will definitely stimulate thinking about the nature of globalization, the labor theory of value and the relationship between commodities and speculative objects, collective fantasy, and other nebulous problems confronting historical materialism in the future." —Mark Worrell, Marx and Philosophy Review of Books
"The most vicious of monsters are those with human faces. Monsters of the Market: Zombies, Vampires, and Global Capitalism explores Marx's consistent use of folklore and monster as metaphor in his criticism of capitalism. From Frankenstein and the dissection of the market, vampires that feed off the misery of others, among other ideas ... Monsters of the Market is an intriguing way of explorig economics, very much recommended reading."
—Midwest Book Review
"David McNally ... has written an excellent book. [He] approaches the topic from a more comprehensive framework. Unlike other works of "monsterology," he links the production of meaning with the economic mode of production while also researching its manifestations across the world ... Monsters of the Market is well worth reading: it demonstrates that the marginalizedthose who inevitably become the misshapenhave a long history across different cultures of articulating narratives of resistance to the various modes of night thrown up by a pitiless global system."
—Thomas Ponniah, rabble.ca
Winner of the 2012 Paul Sweezy Award
"In this book, McNally confirms – once again – his standing as one of the world's leading Marxist scholars of capitalism. For a scholarly, in depth analysis of our current crisis that never loses sight of its political implications (for them and for us), expressed in a language that leaves no reader behind, there is simply no better place to go." —Bertell Ollman, NYU, author of Dance of the Dialectic: Steps in Marx’s Method
“David McNally's tremendously timely book is packed with significant theoretical and practical insights, and offers actually-existing examples of what is to be done. Global Slump urgently details how changes in the capitalist space-economy over the past 25 years, especially in the forms that money takes, have expanded wide-scale vulnerabilities for all kinds of people, and how people fight back. In a word, the problem isn't neoliberalism–it's capitalism.” —Ruth Wilson Gilmore, University of Southern California and author of Golden Gulag
“Standard accounts of the present crisis blame the excesses of the financial sector, promising that all will be well when the proper financial regulations are in place. McNally’s path breaking account goes far deeper. He documents in great detail how the roots of the crisis are found in the systematic failings of capitalism. At this moment in world history the case for a radical alternative to the capitalist global order needs to be made as forcefully as possible. No one has done this better than McNally.” —Tony Smith, Iowa State University and author of Globalisation: A Systematic Marxian Account
"...a helpful guide to global justice activists and a useful introductory text for undergraduate level globalization studies." —Elaine Coburn, Socialist Studies Bulletin
"I was brought up during the revolutionary movements of 60–70s in West Bengal (India) ... I concluded that capitalism is bad, globalization is bad and that we need to change these for a better world. However, I was confused about the path to reach there. David McNally’s Another World is Possible: Globalization and Anti-Capitalism has shown the way forward."— Kanchan Sarkar, University of British Columbia (Okanagan) and author of A World to Win
"McNally performs not only the service of 'supplementing' the recent discussion of the body, but in fact he completely reframes the question--to the point where, I would argue, the relevance of postmodern theories of the body will need to be shown in relation to McNally's argument, not the other way around. This book is thoroughly compelling, very well written and argued, and indeed a pleasure to read." —Bill Martin, author of Matrix and line: Derrida and the possibilities of postmodern social theory
"McNally's argument that the body as configured in postmodern theory is really the 'other' of a new idealism is provocative and well grounded." —Diane Raymond, author of Existentialism and the Philosophical Tradition
"By exposing the historical and theoretical roots of ‘market socialism,’ David McNally demonstrates in a particularly lucid and powerful way the fundamental flaws and contradictions in that concept.”—Ellen Meiksins Wood, author of Democracy Against Capitalism: Renewing Historical Materialism
ORDER FROM VERSO"An extremely judicious and penetrating examination of the intricate relationship between political reality and economic theory in early modern Britain and France. . . . Its subtle exploration of the relationships between human action and economic abstraction is often stunning. . . . A very bold book.”—John Dwyer, Scotia
"McNally has developed a powerful interpretation that sheds a mass of new light… This is a superb book.” —Robert Brenner, author of The Economics of Global Turbulence
"Clearly and usefully summarizes the results of a wide range of research and is based on an illuminating reading of the early economists.”—Joseph Melling, History of Political Thought
