"A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing. And when Humanity lands there, it looks out, and, seeing a better country, sets sail. Progress is the realisation of Utopias."

This quotation is not actually Naomi Klein's, but Oscar Wilde's which she cites in the final section of 'No Is Not Enough.' Although it's odd to start a review at the end, it feels right. Because that's what really feels at the heart of this book. And, as it's non-fiction, it's not as if there's a spoiler.

Anyway, let's rewind. Before this, I'd heard of Klein as a journalist vaguely but had never read any of her work. Seeing this, I grasped upon it; feeling, like many of us, the need for something that could tell us what we can do in this crisis driven world with a 'kleptomaniac thug' leading one of the most powerful countries in the world. Someone to tell us there is hope.

And Klein has done that. 

The book is, broadly, broken into three stages: how the hell did we get here?; what's happening and may happen in the near future; and what we can do.

The first section gave me real insight into how Donald Trump actually became elected. It's something that, as a non-American, I just haven't been able to get my head around. But, Klein's writing explains it very clearly: it's actually something we could have predicted. (In fact, many had.) Trump, with zero political experience, has the one big powerful thing that everyone in the world wants: money. And lots of it. In fact, the name 'Trump' is a brand in itself. There is a lot of depth about the Trump brand representing quality and luxury, whilst in fact it offers that for the very privileged few, leaving the rest to dangerous neglect and abuse. Things like 'Trump Towers' make more sense to me now; Trump attaches his name to things, and lets the companies get on with it. Then, as is often the case, something is discovered that means the company is abusing workers' rights or similar, Trump can raise up his hands in theatrical surprise and say: 'I never knew that was happening. It was all down to other people, I wouldn't have sanctioned it.' No Mea Culpa for Trump.

Klein explains that many of the scandalous policies that have been brought through in the last few decades are because of 'shock politics.' (Indeed, she has an entire book written about it which I'm tempted to read... when I get through everything else on my list!) There is some disaster, whether environmental or human made (or both, because they are becoming increasingly difficult to prise apart) that lets governments make snap rulings that are passed purely because of the 'disaster in action.' When the disaster abates, the policies stand, meaning they have managed to get in some controversial battle won without a fight. It feels like being kicked when you're already down.

I learnt a lot from this book, particularly about the men that Donald Trump has surrounded himself with; looking at his cabinet, they are all rich, white men with huge companies that stand to gain through lower taxes and less public reform. In fact, each of his cabinet members have their own sort of 'brand.' This means that, for the Trump administration, any disaster that happens is actually a blessing. If there's a shooting at a school, that means they can target people and profit from it. I'm making it sound too simplistic, but Naomi Klein is a much better political writer than I! In other words, disasters of any type are opportunities for the American government as it stands. And that is such a frightening prospect. Looking at the things Trump has already done whilst in office just six months leaves little room to hope he is going to be anything but exploitative, whilst putting himself, Trump, as Number One.

I won't go into any more depth of the politics behind this book, because I am truly unable to do so. But also, I'd like people to read it themselves. This should almost be compulsory reading. It's so acutely topical, and the fact that she managed to publish it so quickly is amazing. It's what we need to read right now.

Because, as title says No Is Not Enough. In the final section, Klein tackles this head on. It's all very well to say what we don't want (a dystopian world with a kleptomaniac thug leading the way), but we need to offer an alternative. We need to start saying Yes. 

On finishing the book, I felt a real surge of hope. In Canada (Klein is Canadian, not American) a summit was held with people of all different backgrounds - trade unionists, Indigenous people, Black Lives Matter, marginalised communities, environmentalists, scientists, journalists, Democrats - to unite and come up with an alternative. Because, actually, all these problems are linked. Climate change will mostly effect marginalised communities, Indigenous peoples and black people. Jobs need to be created in a new 'green' way. And not just to do with green energy. They class anything 'green' as something that does not contribute to fossil fuel burning. So, being a nurse, a teacher, a care-worker - all these are 'green' jobs, and these are the jobs that are being held so precariously. Of course, there was a lot of debating and concessions and compromises to be made: no one could be entirely happy. But they came forward with a manifesto, written by the people, not by the politicians: The Leap Manifesto. Because the gap we have before warming creates insurmountable dangers is very small; we can't talk about 'baby steps' any more. We have to make a huge change. 

And, as Klein says, we should refuse 'to be afraid, no matter how much we are tested... How we respond to this crisis is up to us... Let's leap.'

The Postscript contains the entirety of The Leap Manifesto, and don't skip this bit. (It's not long.) It's worth reading.

This was a great book, or journalistic piece of writing, and I implore you to read it. I hope that it is only relevant for a short period of time, that's all we can hope.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing an ARC.

Explosive, at times traumatizing and frustrating but ultimately hopeful - Naomi Klein's extensive knowledge and wealth of experience exudes in this mighty manifesto. Her anecdotes are both heartfelt and moving juxtaposed with endless hard-hitting facts, she's a master in her field and an appropriate figure attempting to initiate a global grassroots movement against ecocidal capitalism and right wing populism. This book, unlike her other works, feels much more personal as she states she didn't spend years researching, but it feels very much like a response to growing anger. That being said, it is still well structured and the arguments are coherent. A truly politically-shifting book.

Naomi Klein’s ‘No Is Not Enough’ is a response to the “global rise of right-wing demagoguery”, with particular reference to Trump’s becoming the 45th President of the United States. The book looks at the past, in an effort to learn its lessons, then looks into the future, imagining what Trump is likely to do, and lastly offers suggestions for building an alternative.

One of the book’s many strengths is that although Klein finds Trump utterly repulsive and provides many wonderful put-downs (his taste in interior décor being likened to “a Russian oligarch’s vision of the United States as filtered through bootleg VHS copies of … Dynasty and Dallas”, for example) she never loses sight of the bigger picture. More specifically, she regards the circumstances  “that allowed a kleptocratic thug to grab the world’s most powerful job as if it were a hostess at a strip club” not as an aberration but rather as a culmination of trends including media coverage of electioneering as ‘infotainment’, “the rise of Superbrands, the expanding power of private wealth over the political system, the global imposition of neoliberalism, … the damaging impacts of corporate free trade, and the deep hold that climate change denial has taken on the right side of the political spectrum.” Notwithstanding those shocked by his political success he is thus “the entirely predictable, indeed clichéd outcome of ubiquitous ideas and trends that should have been stopped long ago.” 

As the author of ‘No Logo’, Klein is ideally placed to dissect the strengths and weaknesses of the Trump brand. The corporate Trump brand theoretically represents a version of quality and luxury, whilst actually representing a tacky version of conspicuous consumption, yet one reason why Trump is able to ride out so much criticism is not only because he hides so many of his questionable economic activities behind contractors and licensees but also because complainants can all too easily feed into the narrative of his own personal brand as the ultimate ‘winner’, skilfully outmanoeuvring ‘losers’. Klein accordingly advocates attacking the Trump brand by exposing him as a puppet and encouraging the boycotting of Trump brands but she is aware that these are pinpricks: the nature of the problem goes much deeper and requires much more radical tactics.

According to Klein, Trump aims not only to exploit the presidency to inflate the value of his brand but also to implement the neoliberal agenda (less an ideology than “a rationale for greed”), which dates back to Reagan’s America, for an “all-out war on the public sphere and the public interest” in the interests of corporate America – “a program so defiantly unjust and so manifestly corrupt that it can only be pulled off with the assistance of divide-and-conquer racial and sexual politics, as well as a nonstop spectacle of media distractions” including “a dramatic escalation of military conflicts on multiple fronts”.

Klein’s ‘The Shock Doctrine’ has already convincingly argued how ‘disaster capitalism’ can exploit the public’s disorientation following a collective shock to implement the more radical parts of the neoliberal agenda and in ‘No Is Not Enough’ she depicts the Trump administration as not only naturally prone to crises, given its skewed priorities and inexperience, but also as willing to exploit economic collapse or some serious domestic terrorist attack to “to start a new war or escalate an ongoing conflict” in order to curb civil rights, drive up the price of oil and generally create more opportunities for corporate profiteering, with the Patriot Act and the invasion of Iraq in the wake of 9/11 providing the template. The new book is subtitled ‘Defeating the New Shock Politics’, so attention should now be given to Klein’s suggestions for fighting back against the current state of affairs. 

In the first place, there is obviously some comfort to be had in the separation of powers, although less than would be the case if the Democrats controlled either the House or the Senate. There is even some benefit to be derived from the fact that the Trump administration is so obviously a corporate takeover – as manifested by his appointments – as it is better to have one’s enemies in plain sight.

Obviously, one is better placed to prevent history being repeated if one understands the past, and this provides the justification for Klein alloting so much space in her book to looking backwards, in order to show “how shock politics work and whose interests they serve” and thus to understand precisely how we’ve arrived at the present. Incidentally, although she says she’s keen not to apportion blame, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and even Bernie Sanders are all robustly criticised by Klein for various failings, of which the most egregious was Obama’s failure radically to transform US politics in the immediate aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis. 

However, Klein’s central insights, are implicit in the title of her book: it is not enough to say ‘No’ to Trump, it is necessary to say ‘No’ to the system of which he is a part. Moreover, saying ‘No’ is not enough – instead of single-issue campaigning a progressive coalition needs to coalesce around a positive vision of a future society, to set against the “corrosive values system that places profit above the well-being of people and the planet”.

But what are the prospects of uniting trade unionists, environmentalists, feminists, indigenous people and the other victims of racism and xenophobia? Klein is encouraged by recent history, particularly the protests at Standing Rock and her own experience in helping to produce the Leap Manifesto (reprinted as a Postscript to the book), which first appeared in Canada and which is now being adopted (sometimes in customised form) in many other parts of the world.

Klein characteristically makes a good case for viewing all ills as stemming from the neoliberal world-view and thus for all those discontented making common cause against the neoliberals, for example, pointing out that "the economic interests pushing hardest for war … are the very same forces most responsible for warming the planet”. 

Despite the above it is nevertheless difficult not to feel that Klein is too sanguine. Standing Rock may have brought protesters of all sorts together but at the time of writing it looks like construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline will after all proceed. Undoubtedly direct action can sometimes be effective - Klein points, for example, to Argentina in 2002, when people successfully took to the streets to resist Fernando de la Rúa’s austerity plans and his order to stay home - yet a million marched in London in protest against military action in Iraq to no avail (unless you count a temporary boost in the popularity of the Liberal Democrats). 

“The left-wing almost-wins of the past two years are not defeats” Klein writes,  rather they are “the first tremors of a profound ideological realignment from which a progressive majority could well emerge.” 

Maybe an ideological realignment is underway, and if so Naomi Klein and ‘No Is Not Enough’ will play an important role in that process but an “almost-win” however you sugarcoat it is still a defeat.

Another brilliant, anry and heartfelt, but thoughtful, cry about how we live our lives and what we can do to change them and the world, for the better.

'The left-wing almost-wins of the past two years are not defeats. They are the first tremors of a profound ideological realignment from which a progressive majority could well emerge - just as geopolitically significant as the rise of authoritarianism and neo-fascism on the right side of the spectrum.'

Although this has been driven locally by Trump's election, Klein's analysis has global relevance outside of the US. While much of the book is a depressing analysis of how neoliberalism has fostered greed, division, hatred, exploitation and the privatisation of the state leading almost inevitably to a Trump (who Klein wonderfully describes as 'dystopian fiction come to life'), the point of her polemic is far more optimistic than this: 'It's becoming possible to see a genuine path forward - new political formations that, from their inception, will marry the fight for economic fairness with a deep analysis of how racism and misogyny are used as potent tools to enforce a system that further enriches the already obscenely wealthy on the backs of both people and the planet'. 

Ultimately, what Klein is advocating (and she's been involved in establishing a groundwork for this to happen) is a progressive alliance that brings together activists whose aims might not necessarily immediately seem to be linked (green activists, campaigners for increased minimum wages, anti-racist and gender/sexuality rights groups, as a few examples) but which, as she shows, all struggle with the manifestations of a dominant and institutionalised system.

Klein, as usual, is loud and angry (and rightfully so) but she channels her rage into something positive. She's also put her finger on something in the zeitgeist: the book was written after the Brexit vote but before the June 2017 General Election and so there's something very prescient in her statement:

'What for decades was unsayable is now being said out loud by candidates who win millions of votes: free college tuition, double the minimum wage, 100 percent renewable energy as quickly as technology allows, demilitarise the police, prisons are no place for young people, refugees are welcome here, war makes us all less safe.' 

What I like about this book is that it moves on from resistance to positive action. As usual, it'll probably be preaching to the converted but the blueprint for a united, progressive alliance is surely the optimistic direction that we need to take, together.

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