Friedman was not just an academic. He was a revolutionary with a plan for a radically different social order.Naomi Klein
Decisions taken in crisis tend to be both irrational and wish fulfilling, a kind of deep sleepwalking through the policy landscape.Naomi Klein
It's the pervasive violence churning just below the surface of daily life, exploding at regular intervals.Naomi Klein
Countries are shocked by wars, terror attacks, coups d’état and natural disasters. Then they are shocked again by corporations and politicians who exploit the fear and disorientation of this first shock to push through economic shock therapy.Naomi Klein
For free market fundamentalists, moments of crisis did not challenge this worldview. Quite the reverse. It was in periods of disaster, when people were panicked and disoriented, that they were able to push through their boldest pro-corporate policies.Naomi Klein
Indeed the three trademark demands of the shock doctrine—the large-scale privatizations, extensive deregulation, and deep cuts to social spending—are all about stripping the state bare.Naomi Klein
The propaganda campaign began in earnest during the second devastating shock, the hyperinflationary spiral, which, as in Russia, was predictably triggered by lifting price controls in a monopolized economy.Naomi Klein
Such policies would never have been agreed to in non-crisis circumstances.Naomi Klein
The extraordinary levels of instability and corruption have made Russia and Argentina very risky places for foreign investors, with the result that the countries have both been stuck in a pattern of booms and busts.Naomi Klein
Simply put, Americans did not hate their famously despised state because it offered them too little; they hated it because it offered a great deal, only not to them.Naomi Klein