Austerity Creates Fascism

See perhaps Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea by Mark Blyth:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austerity:_The_History_of_a_Da...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Blyth

The US does not respond with austerity during a crisis, it responds with ever larger economic stimulus by printing money at the central bank. The next crisis will be no different. There is zero political appetite for austerity so it will not happen in the US.

That is quite a sentence "...if we teach the word-guessing program enough words, it will take all the jobs. That's some next-level underpants-gnomery"

Oh boy, we'll step on this rake again and again. It will get much much worse before we could make it better.

Fascism's causes are many and situational; economic depression is one risk among many. "X causes Y" is too often an oversimplification most times, especially when lacking overwhelming quantitative supporting evidence.

That's weird Canada had austerity in the 90s and we didn't get fascism.

Austerity does not create fascism. The examples in the article are just all wrong. Even if you call Trump and Orban fascists, they did not follow austerity. The reaction to the financial crisis was the largest fiscal and monetary interventions in history. Orban consolidated power by spending and state expansion, not austerity. True austerity in Greece, Spain, Portugal of recent times led to new parties, but those countries are politically doing surprisingly well.

I'm confused, is Cory under the impression that the fascism isn't already here? America is well underway on the that project. Frankly the fascism was plenty apparent after 9/11, when the Bush years entrenched a permanent security state through endless-war powers (AUMF), mass surveillance (Patriot Act/NSA spying), expansive detention and torture regimes (CIA black sites like Guantanamo), a huge domestic enforcement bureaucracy (DHS/ICE), and tax cuts that concentrated wealth upward, cuts to education and healthcare. These are the exact things the current-day fascists are using to choke us now.

People are only upset today because it's affecting white folk more directly, when back then it was aimed at Muslims. We warned you all back then about this, we warned again in 2016, we warned again in 2024, and yet here we are, knee deep in fascism. Maybe we'll be neck deep soon but let's not pretend this is just starting or about to start because of AI.

See perhaps Austerity: The History of a Dangerous Idea by Mark Blyth:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austerity:_The_History_of_a_Da...

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Blyth

Oh boy, we'll step on this rake again and again. It will get much much worse before we could make it better.

That is quite a sentence "...if we teach the word-guessing program enough words, it will take all the jobs. That's some next-level underpants-gnomery"

Inflation is arguably a causal driver of fascism, like in the Weimar Republic, which is made worse by loose fiscal policy. Biden's ARP added significantly to inflation according to a central bank analysis and inflation was one of the main reasons he lost the election to a populist.

That's weird Canada had austerity in the 90s and we didn't get fascism.

Yes but economic stimulus where? Wealth inequality has risen so much because of huge government spending in the wrong areas that transfers wealth to the wealthy, it happened in 2008 and in COVID.

That is only mostly true. In practical terms the opposite of austerity is inflation, and consumers really don't like paying more for things knowing they are becoming dramatically poorer. Austerity is challenging to measure, but debt and inflation are not.

At some point the music stops and a lot of people will be left without a chair. That's when austerity becomes a rally cry.

The NHS study cited in the post is pretty strong evidence that precarity can increase support for proto-fascist politics.

But that rationale falls flat in the US context, as many analyses show that the median income of MAGA supporters is quite high. Right-wing extremism in the US isn't really about revolting peasants, it's about an alliance among multiple groups up and down the security-precarity spectrum, with very strong support from the top 5% and even more support from the top 0.1%.

Just because precarity can be a causal factor doesn't mean it's the only factor or even the dominant factor in the US.

And I wouldn't be surprised to see the US regime move into full money-printer stimulus mode to finance its wars of choice and give its base a little financially security before this year's midterm elections.

Words have meaning, I don't think any serious scholar would agree with you that the US in the early 2000s was a fascist state. It lacked the societal regimentation, the autocracy, the personality worship, the aesthetics of order, the totalitarianism of the state, the subservience of religion and the individual to the state. It's an absurd proposition.

I think the article confuses "austerity" with lack of social programs. Canada has a huge safety net compared to the US:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_programs_in_Canada

Essentially all the "warning conditions" that come out of austerity are also require a serious lack of safety net. Lack of savings, difficulty of childcare and healthcare, etc.

I think ya'll should count yourselves very very lucky America became such a prolific visible rake stepper.

There were scary scary things abrew, a rapid falling sentiment, festering under the all-too-common Fear Uncertainty and Doubt antagonist politics that is the hallmark of the the conservatism to fascism pipeline.

I'm definitely applying some recency bias here, am not super atuned to the historical zeitgeist of the Canadian people. But there has been, over the years, a lot of strongmen esque not good things. And it seems like last year's election really avoided a very perilous further drop to madness by seeing what all a couple months of madness across the border looked like. Page with some polling numbers, brief in rundown, thar is at least directionally correct: https://www.statista.com/chart/amp/34363/polling-average-can...

But it would be nice to have some retellings of Canada's austerity & how that affected the people over the past two three decades! For sure!

Fascism rise is also associated with perceived inequality rising. So if Canada didn't have a class of folks profiting immensely while others were hit, less fascism.

Yes but economic stimulus where? Wealth inequality has risen so much because of huge government spending in the wrong areas that transfers wealth to the wealthy, it happened in 2008 and in COVID.

At some point the music stops and a lot of people will be left without a chair. That's when austerity becomes a rally cry.

> That is only mostly true. In practical terms the opposite of austerity is inflation

Weimar says inflation creates fascism too. Not surprising because scientifically speaking, any sufficiently developed inflation is austerity by another name.

The NHS study cited in the post is pretty strong evidence that precarity can increase support for proto-fascist politics.

Just because precarity can be a causal factor doesn't mean it's the only factor or even the dominant factor in the US.

Fascism rise is also associated with perceived inequality rising. So if Canada didn't have a class of folks profiting immensely while others were hit, less fascism.

I think ya'll should count yourselves very very lucky America became such a prolific visible rake stepper.

But it would be nice to have some retellings of Canada's austerity & how that affected the people over the past two three decades! For sure!

Oh really? Just ask any Black person.

Did we have the segregation well into the 50's? Did we bomb entire city blocks? Do we regularly have police swarm, main, and kill protesters?

We weren't a fascist state at that point, but we sure have been laying the groundwork since then.

Marcuse wrote in the 1960s that the only way to prevent another Hitler from rising is to give the left free rein and cage and muzzle the right. So by extension, anyone who supports rightists being able to spread their ideas freely, let alone implement them with real political power, is a fascist in effect even if they disclaim identification with Hitler's or Mussolini's political philosophy.

Fascism is absolutely here today, there's no question about that.

There's also a direct line to the fascism we see today emanating from proto-fascist project the GOP was engaged in standing up during the early 2000s.

That GW was not the fascist leader everyone wanted him to be doesn't really push back against the idea that this group of people has largely fascist leanings. Trump gave them the final missing ingredient which was the cult leader. But every other feature you listed as missing I find were actually present, and we can debate that if you want.

But we can see how the Bush admin and voters are reacting to abject fascism. They applaud it, support it, amplify it, excuse it, or they stay silent and never push back (like Bush himself). A lot of them are the same people from back then. So really, to me the absurd proposition here is that the people who stood up the CIA torture black sites, warrantless wiretaps, homeland security, ICE, etc. who are now turning these things against all Americans, weren't at least latent fascists or fascist-leaning in their ideology.

I think the article confuses "austerity" with lack of social programs. Canada has a huge safety net compared to the US:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_programs_in_Canada

Essentially all the "warning conditions" that come out of austerity are also require a serious lack of safety net. Lack of savings, difficulty of childcare and healthcare, etc.

Usually austerity means cuts to social programs and the consequences depend on the country's starting position.

> That is only mostly true. In practical terms the opposite of austerity is inflation

Weimar says inflation creates fascism too. Not surprising because scientifically speaking, any sufficiently developed inflation is austerity by another name.

Oh really? Just ask any Black person.

Did we have the segregation well into the 50's? Did we bomb entire city blocks? Do we regularly have police swarm, main, and kill protesters?

We weren't a fascist state at that point, but we sure have been laying the groundwork since then.

Usually austerity means cuts to social programs and the consequences depend on the country's starting position.

Fascism is absolutely here today, there's no question about that.

There's also a direct line to the fascism we see today emanating from proto-fascist project the GOP was engaged in standing up during the early 2000s.

I think the other way to say this is every time the right is given free reign to implement their ideas with real political power, they end up implementing fascism. Therefore, we might prefer to temper that by not allowing them to have free reign. This does not imply giving the left free reign (as you could say the same about them), as there's ample room for consensus under this model.

Today's links

Austerity creates fascism: We can't afford to not afford nice things.
Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
Object permanence: The Server of Amontillado; Flapper's Dictionary; Mastercard v rec.humor.funny; Philippines electoral data breach; A front page from the Trump presidency; Spike Lee x Bernie Sanders; France v password hashing; Algorithms as Central European folk-dances; Save Comcast; Lex Luthor v export controls; Zuckerberg in the dock.
Upcoming appearances: Toronto, San Francisco, London, Berlin, NYC, Hay-on-Wye, London.
Recent appearances: Where I've been.
Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
Colophon: All the rest.

A line of Nazis at the Nuremburg rally, throwing Nazi salutes. Their backs are to us. Facing them is a hand-tinted group of child laborers from the early 20th century, squinting suspiciously at them.

Austerity creates fascism (permalink)

I'm worried about AI psychosis. Specifically, I'm worried about the psychosis that makes our "capital allocators" spend $1.4T on the money-losingest technology in the history of the human race, in pursuit of a bizarre fantasy that if we teach the word-guessing program enough words, it will take all the jobs. That's some next-level underpants-gnomery:

https://pluralistic.net/2026/03/12/normal-technology/#bubble-exceptionalism

The thing that worries me about billionaires' AI psychosis isn't concern for their financial solvency. No, what I worry about is what happens when the seven companies that comprise a third of the S&P 500 stop trading the same $100b IOU around while pretending it's in all of their bank accounts at once and implode, vaporizing a third of the US stock market.

My concern about a massive collapse in the capital markets isn't that workers will suffer directly. Despite all the Wonderful Life rhetoric about your money being in Joe's house and the Kennedy house and Mrs Macklin's house, the reality is that the median US worker has $955 saved for retirement. You could nuke the whole financial system and not take a dime out of most workers' pockets:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/955-saved-for-retirement-millions-are-in-that-boat-150003868.html

No, the thing that has me terrified about AI is that when it craters and takes the economy with it, that we will respond the same way we have during every financial crisis of the 21st century: with austerity, and austerity breeds fascism.

There's a direct line from every K-shaped recovery to every strong-man who's currently sending masked gunmen into the streets. The Hungarian dictator Viktor Orban rose to power after people who'd been suckered into denominating their mortgages in Swiss francs lost their houses when the currency markets moved suddenly, because the swindlers who'd sold them those mortgages took the position that wanting to live somewhere automatically made you an expert in forex risk, so caveat fuckin' emptor, baby.

Back in America, Obama decided to bail out the banks and not the people. His treasury secretary Tim Geithner told him the banks were headed for a catastrophic crash and could only be saved if he "foamed the runways" with everyday Americans' mortgages. Millions of Americans lost their homes to foreclosure as banks, flush with public cash, threw them out of their homes and then flipped them to investment banks who became the country's worst slumlords:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/08/wall-street-landlords/#the-new-slumlords

Americans were understandably not entirely happy with this outcome. So when Hillary Clinton replied to Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" with "America is already great," her message was, "Vote for me if you think everything is great; vote for Trump if you think everything is fucked":

https://www.politico.com/blogs/2016-dem-primary-live-updates-and-results/2016/03/clinton-america-is-already-great-220078

"Austerity begets fascism" is one of those things that makes a lot of intuitive sense, but it turns out that there's a good empirical basis for believing it. In "Public Service Decline and Support for the Populist Right" four economists from the LSE and Bocconi provide an excellent look at the linkage between austerity and support for fascists:

https://catherinedevries.eu/NHS.pdf

Here's how they break it down. Political scientists have assembled a large, reproducible body of evidence to show that "public service provision is crucial to people’s perceptions of their quality of life and living standards." Good public services are the basis for "the social contract between rulers and the ruled" – pay your taxes and obey the laws, and in return, you will be well served.

When public services go wrong, people don't always know who to blame, but they definitely notice that something is going wrong, so when public services fail, people stop trusting the state, and that social contract starts to fray. They start to suspect that elites are lining their pockets rather than managing the system, and they "withdraw their support" for the system.

Fascists thrive in these conditions. Fascists come to power by mobilizing grievances. By choosing a scapegoat, fascists can create support from people who are justifiably furious that the services they rely on have collapsed. So when you can't get shelter, or health care, or elder care, or child care, or an education for your kids, you become a mark for a fascist grifter with a story about "undeserving migrants" who've taken the benefits that should rightly accrue to "deserving natives."

(This is grimly hilarious, given that the wizened, decrepit rich world is critically dependent on migrants as a source of healthy, working-age workers who pay massive amounts into the system while barely making use of it, many of whom plan on retiring to their home countries when they do reach the age where they're likely to extract a net loss to the benefits system.)

Enter the NHS, a beloved institution that is hailed as the pride of the nation by both the political left and the right. The majority of Britons use the NHS, with only 12-14% of the population "going private," so when the NHS declines, everybody notices (what's more, even people with private care use the NHS for many of their needs).

Britons love the NHS and they want the government to spend more on it. There's "a broad public consensus that the government is not going far enough when it comes to funding." That's because generations of cuts to the NHS have left it substantially hollowed out, with major parts of the service handed over to for-profit entities who overcharge and underserve.

The most tangible and immediate evidence of this slow-motion collapse comes when your local general practitioner ("family doctor" or "primary care physician" in Americanese) shuts down. The UK has lost 1,700 GP practices since 2013.

Reasoning that a GP closure would make people angry at the system, the economists behind the paper wanted to see what happened to people's political beliefs when their GP's office shut. They relied on the GP Patient Survey, a longitudinal study run by NHS England and Ipsos Mori. The survey asks a statistically significant random sample of patients from every GP practice in the NHS and then weights the results "to reflect the demographic characteristics of the local population according to UK Census estimates." It's good data.

The researchers cross-referenced this with various high-quality instruments that measured the political views of Britons, like the U Essex Understanding Society Panel, drawing on 13 years' worth of surveys from 2009-2022, gaining access to a protected version of the dataset with fine-grained geographic information about survey respondents, which allowed them to link responses to the "catchment areas" for specific GPs' office. They combined this data with the British Election Study panel, which has surveyed voters 29 times since 2014.

Most of the paper describes the careful work the researchers did to analyze, cross-reference and validate this data, but what interested me was the conclusion: that people who see a severe degradation in the quality of the services they rely on switch their political affiliation to one of Britain's fascist parties – UKIP, the Brexit Party, or Reform – parties that have called for ethnic cleansing in Britain.

This is what has me scared. We can see the looming economic crises in our near future. If it's not the AI crash that triggers the next wave of austerity, it'll be the oil crisis created by Trump's bungling in the Strait of Epstein. And of course, we could always get a twofer, because the Gulf States that were pouring hundreds of billions into AI data-centers now need every cent to rebuild the LNG shipping terminals and oil refineries that Iran blew up after Trump, Hegseth and Netanyahu started murdering all the schoolgirls they could target. Once they nope out of the AI bubble, that could trigger the collapse.

This is a study about the NHS, but it's not just about the NHS. It's perfectly reasonable to assume that people react this way when they experience cuts to their road maintenance, their schools, their community centers, and any other service they rely on. Fascism – what Hannah Arendt called 'organized loneliness' – can only take root when people stop believing that their society will reward their lawfulness with an orderly and humane existence.

The crisis is coming, but whether we do austerity when it gets here is our choice. Everywhere we turn, political leaders are rejecting generations of failed austerity in favor of "sewer socialism" – the idea that you get people to trust their government by earning that trust. Zohran Mamdani is fixing 100,000 potholes in the first 100 days, despite the multi-billion dollar deficit that outgoing Mayor Eric Adams created by "running the city like a business":

https://prospect.org/2026/04/10/zohran-mamdani-getting-new-york-city-believe-in-government/

In Canada and the UK, party leaders like Avi Lewis (NDP) and Zack Polanski (Greens) are vowing to fight the coming crises by spending, not cutting. Compare that with UK fascist leader Nigel Farage, who says that if he's elected, he'll create a "paramilitary style" British ICE, building concentration camps for 24,000 migrants, with the hope of deporting 288,000 people per year:

https://www.thenerve.news/p/reform-deportation-operation-restoring-justice-data-surveillance-palantir-uk-labour

"Socialism or barbarism" isn't just a cliche – it's actually a choice on the ballot.

Hey look at this (permalink)

France's government is ditching Windows for Linux, calling US tech dependence a strategic risk https://www.xda-developers.com/frances-government-ditching-windows-for-linux/
The Indie News Queen Who’s Not Done Pissing Off the Powerful https://www.wired.com/story/the-indie-news-queen-whos-not-done-pissing-off-the-powerful/
Another Court Rules Copyright Can’t Stop People From Reading and Speaking the Law https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/04/another-court-rules-copyright-cant-stop-people-reading-and-speaking-law
EFF is Leaving X https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/04/eff-leaving-x
Seven countries now generate 100% of their electricity from renewable energy https://www.the-independent.com/tech/renewable-energy-solar-nepal-bhutan-iceland-b2533699.html

A shelf of leatherbound history books with a gilt-stamped series title, 'The World's Famous Events.'

Object permanence (permalink)

#25yrsago The Server of Amontillado https://web.archive.org/web/20070112024841/http://www.techweb.com/wire/story/TWB20010409S0012

#25yrsago Mastercard threatens the moderator of rec.humor.funny https://www.netfunny.com/rhf/jokes/01/Apr/mcrhf.html

#15yrsago Sweden exports sweatshops: Ikea’s first American factory https://web.archive.org/web/20190404035900/https://www.latimes.com/business/la-xpm-2011-apr-10-la-fi-ikea-union-20110410-story.html

#15yrsago Canada’s New Democratic Party promises national broadband and net neutrality https://web.archive.org/web/20110412064952/https://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5734/125/

#15yrsago Flapper’s dictionary: 1922 https://bookflaps.blogspot.com/2011/04/flappers-dictionary.html

#15yrsago Toronto’s Silver Snail to leave Queen Street West https://web.archive.org/web/20110409181737/http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/970520–the-silver-snail-comics-icon-sold-to-move

#15yrsago WI county clerk whose homemade voting software found 14K votes for Tea Party judge is an old hand at illegal campaigning https://web.archive.org/web/20110412121323/http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/article_7e777016-62b2-11e0-9b74-001cc4c002e0.html

#15yrsago Canadian Tories’ campaign pledge: We will spy on the Internet https://web.archive.org/web/20110412125250/https://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5733/125/

#15yrsago France to require unhashed password storage https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-12983734

#15yrsago Central European folk-dancers illustrated sorting algorithms https://www.i-programmer.info/news/150-training-a-education/2255-sorting-algorithms-as-dances.html

#10yrsago Save Comcast! https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2016/04/save-comcast

#10yrsago Goldman Sachs will pay $5B for fraudulent sales of toxic debt, no one will go to jail https://web.archive.org/web/20160412155435/https://consumerist.com/2016/04/11/goldman-sachs-to-pay-5b-to-settle-charges-of-selling-troubled-mortgages-ahead-of-the-financial-crisis/

#10yrsago How could Lex Luthor beat the import controls on kryptonite? https://lawandthemultiverse.com/2016/04/11/batman-v-superman-and-import-licenses/

#10yrsago Congresscritters spend 4 hours/day on the phone, begging for money https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ylomy1Aw9Hk

#10yrsago Philippines electoral data breach much worse than initially reported, possibly worst ever https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/every-voter-in-philippines-exposed/

#10yrsago A cashless society as a tool for censorship and social control https://web.archive.org/web/20260311032317/https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/04/cashless-society/477411/

#10yrsago Boston Globe previews a front page from the Trump presidency https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/2797782/Ideas-Trump-front-page.pdf

#10yrsago Spike Lee interviews Bernie Sanders: Vermont, Trump, Clinton, guns and Brooklyn https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-features/bernie-sanders-interviewed-by-spike-lee-thr-new-york-issue-880788/

#5yrsago Youtube blocks advertisers from targeting "Black Lives Matter" https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/10/brand-safety-rupture/#brand-safety

#5yrsago Google's short-lived data-advantage https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/11/halflife/#minatory-legend

#1yrago Zuckerberg in the dock https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/11/it-is-better-to-buy/#than-to-compete

#1yrago The most remarkable thing about antitrust (that no one talks about) https://pluralistic.net/2025/04/10/solidarity-forever-2/#oligarchism

Upcoming appearances (permalink)

A photo of me onstage, giving a speech, pounding the podium.

Toronto: DemocracyXchange, Apr 16
https://www.democracyxchange.org/news/cory-doctorow-to-open-dxc26-on-april-16
San Francisco: 2026 Berkeley Spring Forum on M&A and the Boardroom, Apr 23
https://www.theberkeleyforum.com/#agenda
London: Resisting Big Tech Empires (LSBU), Apr 25
https://www.tickettailor.com/events/globaljusticenow/2042691
NYC: Enshittification at Commonweal Ventures, Apr 29
https://luma.com/ssgfvqz8
NYC: Techidemic with Sarah Jeong, Tochi Onyibuchi and Alia Dastagir (PEN World Voices), Apr 30
https://worldvoices.pen.org/event/techidemic/
Berlin: Re:publica, May 18-20
https://re-publica.com/de/news/rp26-sprecher-cory-doctorow
Berlin: Enshittification at Otherland Books, May 19
https://www.otherland-berlin.de/de/event-details/cory-doctorow.html
Hay-on-Wye: HowTheLightGetsIn, May 22-25
https://howthelightgetsin.org/festivals/hay/big-ideas-2
SXSW London, Jun 2
https://www.sxswlondon.com/session/how-big-tech-broke-the-internet-b3c4a901

A screenshot of me at my desk, doing a livecast.

Recent appearances (permalink)

The internet is getting worse (CBC The National)
https://youtu.be/dCVUCdg3Uqc?si=FMcA0EI_Mi13Lw-P
Do you feel screwed over by big tech? (Ontario Today)
https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-45-ontario-today/clip/16203024-do-feel-screwed-big-tech
Launch for Cindy's Cohn's "Privacy's Defender" (City Lights)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuVCm2PUalU
Chicken Mating Harnesses (This Week in Tech)
https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tech/episodes/1074
The Virtual Jewel Box (U Utah)
https://tanner.utah.edu/podcast/enshittification-cory-doctorow-matthew-potolsky/

A grid of my books with Will Stahle covers..

Latest books (permalink)

"Canny Valley": A limited edition collection of the collages I create for Pluralistic, self-published, September 2025 https://pluralistic.net/2025/09/04/illustrious/#chairman-bruce
"Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It," Farrar, Straus, Giroux, October 7 2025
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/
"Picks and Shovels": a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2025 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels).
"The Bezzle": a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (thebezzle.org).
"The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org).
"The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).
"Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com.
"Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com

A cardboard book box with the Macmillan logo.

Upcoming books (permalink)

"The Reverse-Centaur's Guide to AI," a short book about being a better AI critic, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, June 2026 (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621568/thereversecentaursguidetolifeafterai/)
"Enshittification, Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It" (the graphic novel), Firstsecond, 2026
"The Post-American Internet," a geopolitical sequel of sorts to Enshittification, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2027
"Unauthorized Bread": a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2027
"The Memex Method," Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2027

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources:

Currently writing: "The Post-American Internet," a sequel to "Enshittification," about the better world the rest of us get to have now that Trump has torched America. Third draft completed. Submitted to editor.

"The Reverse Centaur's Guide to AI," a short book for Farrar, Straus and Giroux about being an effective AI critic. LEGAL REVIEW AND COPYEDIT COMPLETE.
"The Post-American Internet," a short book about internet policy in the age of Trumpism. PLANNING.
A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING

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Bluesky (no ads, possible tracking and data-collection):

https://bsky.app/profile/doctorow.pluralistic.net

Medium (no ads, paywalled):

https://doctorow.medium.com/

Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising):

https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic

"When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla" -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

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