https://countercurrents.org/2025/11/new-book-rejecting-the-ideology-of-progress/
The open access book The Agrarian Imagination Development and the Art of the Impossible is a critique of the dominant global economic and political model often termed ‘development’ and based on a warped notion of ‘progress’. In it, through 16 essays, it is argued that this system, driven by the needs of private (finance) capital, leads to widespread injustice, war and ecological destruction.
The book uses real-world examples to expose the enduring human cost of top-down policies, citing the devastating Bhopal disaster and the Green Revolution as concrete proof of the system’s violence and negligence.
The narrative proposes the Agrarian Imagination as a robust ethical and philosophical framework for rethinking human progress. This concept goes far beyond mere farming, advocating for a way of life rooted in soil, community permanence and the dignity of labour over endless consumption and centralised control. In the urban context, the book argues that the city is not a purely post-agrarian space by highlighting how communities, informal economies and enduring networks remain vital in the face of neoliberal capitalism, commodification and consumerism.
Book Review by Colin Todhunter
21/11/2025