Building a bridge for us all

Born in 1930, his compulsory military service took him to Algeria in 1955 and it was his experience there that triggered his life-long political activism until his death in 2001.

Political Interventions is a chronologically ordered selection of his essays, beginning at time of the Algerian revolution up until 1999.

He tackles many themes, ranging from left-wing ideologies, racism, education and anti-capitalism, always analysing power relations and placing the issues in a global context.

Education is a theme that he returns to throughout the book. He criticises the education system and its role as a conveyor belt for the needs of the capitalist economy.

He also has harsh words for intellectuals on both left and right, arguing that right-wing academics are mere servants of the powerful, providing theoretical justification for their abuses.

However, some on the left are also in his sights, particularly those who see themselves as somehow removed from the masses and who build their own careers and reputations on the back of popular struggles without ever really engaging with the people involved.

Bourdieu did believe that intellectuals have a role to play and he personally felt that he could do something to build a bridge between the trade unions and social movements across the globe today, something which he correctly identified as a very damaging rupture in what he called the struggle against the "neoliberal counter-revolution."

I would recommend anyone to pick up a copy of this intellectually stimulating book, which discusses many more themes than this review has space for.

At times, it talks in unnecessary academic gobbledegook, but, that aside, dip into it at any chapter and Bourdieu offers the reader a new in-depth perspective of an important theme. A must read.

STEVE MATHER