illustration : Books

Books

The Books heading gathers critical reviews of selected social-sciences books.

La Covid-19 ou le retour de l’État social ?

Robert Boyer. 2020. Les capitalismes à l’épreuve de la pandémie. Paris : La Découverte.

Michel Carrard | 08.02.2022

In this book published in 2020, Robert Boyer keeps a diary of the Covid-19 pandemic in order to make its effects on societies intelligible. The author emphasizes that the pandemic has completely overturned the dogmas erected for several decades by liberal economists. It has accelerated the transformation of capitalism by reinforcing the opposition between a transnational platform capitalism and a state-driven capitalism. Moreover, the pandemic sheds a harsh light on the weaknesses of the European Union. The book concludes [...]

L’humain augmenté, ou les six faces du smartphone.

Nova, Nicolas. 2020. Smartphones, une enquête anthropologique. Genève : MétisPresses.

Léopold Lucas | 27.01.2022

The smartphone has infused our lifestyles to become a ubiquitous actant. As a true spatial technology, it has also transformed how individuals cope with space. But what meaning do we give to this object? How do its uses change our lives? What does it make us do (or not do)? These are the research questions at the heart of Nicolas Nova’s book. [...]

Les citoyens-artisans dans la ville.

Thomas Riffaud. 2020. L’espace public artisanal. Grenoble : Elya Éditions.

Kevin Clementi | 11.10.2021

This article reviews the book L’espace public artisanal by Thomas Riffaud (2020). The book offers an interesting point of view by focusing on the figure of the « artisan », a citizen who by his appropriation of public spaces participates in their production. The volume is composed of three parts that describe this ideal-type, and the contours of his action in the contemporary city. Three case studies are also proposed in the last chapter. In this article, we review [...]

La guerre de l’habiter aura-t-elle lieu ?  

Bruno Latour. 2021. Où suis-je ? Leçons du confinement à l’usage des terrestres. Paris : La Découverte.

Olivier Lazzarotti | 28.09.2021

Reading the book “Where am I?” by Bruno Latour convinces that, at least as much as the ecological stake of the planet, it is indeed, in its fullness, the question of inhabiting it which is posed. Can ecological considerations, in particular the apocalyptic announcement of the end, be the exclusive inputs to this issue for all of humanity, that is, each and every one of its members, and well beyond? [...]

Le rythme : une des formes concrètes du temps. 

Manola Antonioli, Guillaume Drevon, Luc Gwiazdzinski, Vincent Kaufmann et Luca Pattaroni. 2021. Manifeste pour une politique des rythmes. Lausanne : EPFL Press.

Alain Guez | 02.08.2021

Rhythm is certainly one of the concrete shapes of time. The Manifesto for a Politics of Rhythm develops a convincing argument on the power of the rhythmic approach to confront the pathologies of capitalism and, more broadly, to build an emancipatory choreopolitics. In an attempt to extend the reflection, the "wager of rhythm" is discussed here on the basis of one of the Manifesto's hypotheses: rhythm is a notion that allows for the articulation of space and time. Ethnographies [...]

La République écologique.

Projet politique et utopie ?   

Philippe Rozin | 30.06.2021

Political ecology has gained considerable ideological and intellectual ascendancy in contemporary Western democracies. Having brought about a devastating, and perhaps irreparable, destruction of the earth's ecosystems, leaving the most terrible ecological footprint in the history of the world, humanity is left to ask a real question of a metapolitical nature to state governments. It is the whole relationship of life to republican and democratic political models that is being asked. The possibility of a political model of rupture, changing [...]

Malthus en Afrique.

Christian Bouquet | 04.06.2021

John May and Jean-Pierre Guengant have been producing and exploiting the demographics of sub-Saharan Africa for more than 20 years. In this book, they synthesize the results of their investigations and research in the most neutral and objective way, without alarmism or denial. [...]

De la société de consommation à la société marchande.

Romain Grandinetti | 25.05.2021

How did we become consumers ? Athony Galluzzo explores the conversion of Westerners to consumerism during the 19th and 20th centuries. In this transdisciplinary approach, he highlights the significant social mutations induced by this change in the relationship of men to materiality which results in the constitution of a merchant society. The author also points how the merchants enforce their power in this type of society. [...]

Great good third place?

Le coworking fait-il tiers-lieu ?

Pierre-Mathieu Le Bel | 12.04.2021

Geographer, researcher and trainer at CREFAD Auvergne as well as Associate researcher at the UMR Territoires of Clermont-Ferrand, he is specialized in social and cultural geography. He is currently interested in questions related to the construction of commons, access to land, food governance, participatory mechanisms, power relations between individuals and social groups as well as the spatial expression of these power relations, heritage, and food sovereignty. He mostly adopts a critical perspective as well as collaborative or action research [...]

Encore une fois, Bruce Begout casse l’ambiance…

Nacima Baron | 07.04.2021

Bruce Begout is a philosopher but also a novelist. Lecturer at the University of Bordeaux, member of the Sciences, Philosophie, Humanités Department (EA 4574), he has written several books on the exploration of urban worlds, everyday life and "common" places. He is also a specialist in Wittgenstein and Husserl. He carries out research on phenomenology, the philosophy of action, analytical philosophy, the philosophy of science, language and logic. [...]