Polly Toynbee Libri

One of the most respected, prolific and razor-sharp voices in social commentary uses the prism of her extraordinary family to examine the true state of class in Britain.

Britain has the lowest social spending and the highest poverty in Europe. As the income gap between top and bottom has widened, so social mobility has shuddered to a halt. The low-paid are caught in an economic double bind that victimises them and shames the rest of us.

What is the state? And what's it ever done for you? In this book, the author travels around Great Britain gathering the voices of the people who make up the state: nurses and patients, teachers and parents, policemen and civilians. It lays bare the deliberate dismantling of the public sector and its consequences.

A thought-provoking classic of political propaganda exposing the excesses of capitalism—entertaining, lucid, and relevant to today's social movements I also made it quite clear that Socialism means equality of income or nothing, and that under socialism you would not be allowed to be poor. You would be forcibly fed, clothed, lodged, taught, and employed whether you like it or not. If it were discovered that you had not character enough to be worth all this trouble, you might possibly be executed in a kindly manner; but whilst you were permitted to live you would have to live well. As a lifelong socialist, Shaw believed that economic inequality was a poison destroying every aspect of human life, perverting family affections and the relations between the sexes. According to him, all British institutions were "corrupted at the root by pecuniary interest"—and idealism, integrity, and any piecemeal attempts at political reform were futile in the face of the gross injustice built into the Empire's economic system. Begun in 1924—the year of the British Labor Party's first period of office under Ramsay MacDonald (who hailed it as "the world's most important book since the Bible")—and first published in 1928, this guide draws on Shaw's decades of activism.

Lange Zeit war es selbstverständlich, daß eine Adoption ein Durchschneiden aller Bindungen an die leiblichen Eltern bedeutete. Aber muss das wirklich sein? Wem nützt das?Die in diesem Buch Berichtenden kommen alle zu dem Ergebnis, daß es besser ist, die Wahrheit über ihre Herkunft zu erfahren, auch wenn sie manchmal recht bestürzend ist, als im ungewissen zu bleiben.