In the centenary year of the infamous Bread and Roses strike, the Alliance of Radical Booksellers is proud to announce the winner of the first annual Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing. David Graeber’s ‘Debt: The First 5,000 Years’ clinched the prize in the final hour, following a reported deadlock between the guest judges.

Nina Power making the announcement

Guest judge Nina Power announced the winner, saying that the judges all felt that this brilliantly researched book was “engaging, readable, relevant, motivated by a clear political will, and utterly indispensable, not only for understanding the terms of the world we live in, where they came from, but also for what we do about changing them”.

Although academic in its scope and scale, the judges commended Graeber for the quality of the language, and effort to make the ideas accessible and readily comprehensible.

Graeber’s book narrowly came through after judges struggled to pick a winner between it and Nicholas Shaxson’s ‘Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and the men who stole the world’, which they commended for its thoroughness of research, and ‘usefulness’ in the current political climate.

Although based in London and holding the position of Reader in Social Anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London, David Graeber was unable to collect the prize as he is currently on a research trip in the United States. Bill Godber from Turnaround distributors collected the award and the prize money of £1,000 on his behalf.

Bill Godber accepting the prize on David Graeber's behalf

The winner was announced at a ceremony on International Workers’ Day, 1st May 2012, at the trade union-run Bread and Roses pub in Clapham.

The Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing aims to promote the publication of radical books, to raise the profile of radical publishing, and to reward exceptional work. Without being too prescriptive in defining ‘radical’, the shortlisted books are informed by socialist, anarchist, environmental, feminist and anti-racist concerns, and primarily will inspire, support or report on political and/or personal change. They may relate to global, national, local or specialist areas of interest. To be eligible books must have been published in 2011, and the author’s or editor’s primary residence
must be in the UK.

This year’s Bread and Roses award was judged by children’s novelist and poet Michael Rosen, lecturer and feminist author Nina Power, and Festival Director of Liverpool’s annual Writing on the Wall Festival, Madeline Heneghan.

Tim Gee, author of the shortlisted book 'Counterpower', with friend.

Alex Nunns and Nadia Idle, editors of shortlisted book 'Tweets from Tahrir: Egypt's Revolution as it Unfolded, in the Words of the People Who Made it'

Nik Gorecki of Housmans Bookshop, guest judge Nina Power, and Mandy Vere of News From Nowhere bookshop.

The crowd go wild!

We are happy to announce the shortlist for the ARB’s first ever Bread and Roses Award for Radical Publishing. For more information, please visit the Bread and Roses website: http://www.bread-and-roses.co.uk/

The shortlist consists of seven books:

‘Counterpower: Making Change Happen’ by Tim Gee
New Internationalist, £9.99

What makes some campaigns succeed while others fail? In this accessible primer on power and rebellion, Tim Gee encourages us to think critically about the forces at work in struggles as diverse as the women’s suffrage movement and the Arab Spring. Counterpower provides today’s activists with inspiration for the future.

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‘Debt: The First 5,000 Years’ by David Graeber
Melville House, £21.99 (Hardback)

Contrary to the fairytales told in economic textbooks, human beings didn’t start with barter, discover money, and then develop credit systems. In fact, as anarchist and anthropologist David Graeber argues in this wide-ranging work, drawing on a vast panoply of evidence, exactly the reverse is true. Moreover – and whether we recognise it or not – debt has been at the heart of our political and moral systems ever since. ——————————————————————————————–

‘Tweets from Tahrir: Egypt’s Revolution as it Unfolded, in the Words of the People Who Made it’ edited by Nadia Idle and Alex Nunns
OR Books, £8.00

The story of the Egyptian uprising – through the toppling of Mubarak – by the people who made it, told in 140-or-fewer-character Tweets. Editors Nadia Idle and Alex Nunns have created an inspiring and coherent narrative that not only explains the evolving strategies of both sides but also allows the participants’ personalities to shine through.

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‘Chavs: The Demonization of the Working Class’ by Owen Jones
Verso, £14.99

In order to deflect blame from their own role in increasing inequality and decreasing social mobility, Britain’s political and media elites have wilfully promoted the notion of the working class as an object of fear and ridicule. Expertly researched and highly topical, Owen Jones’ book is already a bestseller in radical bookshops around the UK.
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‘Magical Marxism’ by Andy Merrifield
Pluto Press, £17.99

Urban theorist Andy Merrifield imagines a Marxism that moves beyond the stale debates about class and the role of the state, drawing inspiration from – and connections between – The Invisible Committee’s ‘The Coming Insurrection’, Guy Debord’s ‘Society of the Spectacle’ and Gabriel García Márquez’s ‘Hundred Years of Solitude’. Highly readable.

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‘Penny Red: Notes from the New Age of Dissent’ by Laurie Penny
Pluto Press, £12.99

Whether filing a report from inside a police kettle in Whitehall or analysing the feminist implications of Stieg Larsson’s ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’, Laurie Penny’s writing is always sharp as a knife. Angry and articulate, this is essential reading for anyone wanting to understand and engage with the new generation of UK activists.

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‘Treasure Islands: Tax Havens and the Men who Stole the World’ by Nicholas Shaxson
Vintage, £8.99

Nicholas Shaxson’s exposé of the mechanics of tax havens reveals a collusion between governments and the wealthy that perverts democracy, sidesteps the law, and leaves the poorest paying the price. Clear, gripping and incendiary, this is an essential primer for anyone trying to understand today’s global economy.