'La cuarta socialdemocraticia' (The Fourth Social Democracy) by Agustín Basave

Agustín Basave (DPhil in Politics, 1985) has published a book entitled 'La cuarta socialdemocraticia' (The Fourth Social Democracy).

One of the causes of the democratic crisis currently crossing the world is an identity crisis relating to social democracy. From this perspective, Agustín Basave sets out a brief history of the social democratic idea and outlines what he calls ‘the fourth social democracy’. This is a framework to reinvent the ideology that built the welfare state which, from the 1980s, for pragmatic reasons has been gradually pushed towards the right, giving way to a hemiplegic democracy. In this essay , the author offers us several challenges. Not only does he attack the impregnability of the reigning neoliberal model, but he also questions the unquestionable, from the most deep-rooted paradigms surrounding globalisation to the idea that competition is the sole driver of development. He questions Smith and Marx and defends Bernstein; he quotes Berlin and Hobsbawn and invokes Nietzsche; he draws from the work of historians, economists, political scientists and even evolutionary biologists to argue for the imperative of a new civilization.

For the full description of the book (in Spanish), visit the publishers' website: http://www.catarata.org/libro/mostrar/id/1076