Exposing the Corporate Gulag Bernard Mbeki The Rise and Fall of Economic Liberalism: The Making of the Economic Gulag by Frederic F Clairmont; Southbound Press and Third World Network, 228 Macalister Road, Penang, Malaysia, 1996; pp 356. $ 20, THIS sustained historical and analytical critique of international capitalism, permanently leaves its impress on our lives, our perceptions of the world and how we intend to change it. There is no such thing as an 'objective* evaluation of any work of art, of political currents and ideologies. As Hegel said: what is objective for some is subjective for others. The masters and slaves in South Africa have always accepted this truism. Objectivity is an absolute goal that we should strive for but can never be attained. Indeed, I think I speak for many critics, when 1 say that we measure the impact of a book's power through our subjective experiences. To a much greater extent than Tawney's Acquisitive Society, this book in its earlier incarnation, now fulsomely revamped, has been an ideological battering ram for thousands of activists like myself in the third world and beyond. It indubitably will remain so.
