folk-politics

The 'Preamble' introduces the book's central concern: the lost capacity of the political left to envision and build a transformative future despite unprecedented technological potential. It critiques 'folk politics'—a defensive, localized, and fragmented approach to political struggle—and argues for a new, ambitious left politics that harnesses technological advances to overcome capitalism and achieve universal prosperity and emancipation. The chapter diagnoses the failures of neoliberalism and social democracy, emphasizing the need to reclaim control over the future through a collective and modern political project.

Chapter 1 critiques the contemporary left's reliance on ritualistic protest tactics that yield minimal systemic change despite large mobilizations. It identifies a pattern of repeated resistance followed by apathy, attributing this failure partly to 'folk politics'—a set of intuitive but limiting strategic assumptions that hinder the left's ability to scale up and enact lasting transformation. The chapter also highlights the problematic privileging of affect and emotion over strategic analysis in current political activism.

Chapter 2 critiques the contemporary left's strategic limitations, focusing on the dominance of folk politics, particularly horizontalism, in recent radical movements such as Occupy. It argues that while horizontalism advances important commitments like rejecting domination and embracing direct democracy, its reliance on immediacy, prefigurative politics, and direct action often fails to build sustained political power necessary to challenge global capitalism. The chapter uses the Occupy movement as a case study to illustrate both the appeal and the shortcomings of these folk-political strategies in core capitalist countries.

Chapter 7 of 'Inventing the Future' argues that achieving a post-work society requires a long-term counter-hegemonic strategy to overturn the dominant neoliberal common sense that normalizes work and capitalism. The authors emphasize the need to build new social, cultural, and intellectual conditions that challenge existing power structures, rather than relying on traditional revolutionary or reformist approaches. They highlight the concept of hegemony as the engineering of consent by ruling classes and propose that the left must develop a new common sense to mobilize diverse social groups towards postcapitalism.