Muskism - by Quinn Slobodian & Ben Tarnoff (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

A pyrotechnic examination of Elon Musk as a symptom and avatar of our postliberal age

Everyone's got an Elon take. He's a messiah. He's a menace. He's a genius. He's a clown. The verdicts differ, but they share one theme: they treat him as an individual.

Muskism argues otherwise. Elon Musk isn't a glitch in the system--he is the system. His worldview promises sovereignty through technology: plug in, power up, and become self-reliant. But the more you connect, the more he owns you.

If Fordism defined the capitalism of the twentieth century, Muskism may define the twenty-first. Fordism helped build the welfare state. Musk undoes it. He thrives on dependence while preaching freedom. His rockets run on subsidies; his satellites run the battlefield; his social networks train the AI that trains us.

Muskism sells itself as the future, but entrenches age-old hierarchies. It offers autonomy for some and exclusion for others. It's libertarian but state-fed, pro-natalist but anti-immigrant, futurist but reactionary.

Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff cut through the hype and the hate to reveal what Musk really represents: a new political economy, where to be "free" means to serve a Technoking. Muskism isn't about the man. It's about the machine that made him--and the world he's making next.

Review Quotes

"A whirlwind tour through the plans and inspirations of the world's most self-important man." --Malcolm Harris, author of Palo Alto
"This book is brilliant in all the ways Elon Musk is not: unflinchingly honest, actually humorous, and deeply humane. Unlike their subject, these authors punch up, not down, and they do so with erudition and precision. A wholly original and insightful analysis that deserves to be read by the billions of people impacted by Musk's pathological quest for power and wealth." --Astra Taylor, author of The Age of Insecurity
"Muskism cuts straight to the core of the man and the moment, explaining how a mercurial, conspiracy-prone, vicious bastard can inspire loyalty and billions in other peoples' money, and the nightmare world he wants to build with those billions." --Cory Doctorow, author of Enshittification and editor of Pluralistic
"The bad news is that Elon Musk is the most powerful and influential man alive--the world-soul astride a Cybertruck. The good news is that Ben Tarnoff and Quinn Slobodian have written this sharp, stimulating guide not just to the man and his ideology but to the paradigm and 'operating system' he represents. Forget the hagiographies and conspiracy theories, this is the only book you need to understand Musk and the world he's seeking to usher in." --Max Read, editor of Read Max
"Through the life and work of Elon Musk, this impeccably researched and splendidly written book introduces us to something more than the man: Muskism, the idea of using government to pay for one's entrepreneurship harnessed to ensuring the rise and rule of the new engineering technocracy. It is a world full of promise and fear. Technical prowess no longer seems to work for equality, but for its opposite. Startups are on their way to becoming satraps." --Branko Milanovic, author of The Great Global Transformation
"A searching look into Elon Musk's quest to rule the universe. . . . Muskism is a doctrine of wealth for the few and political and economic domination: SpaceX in space, X and Grok online, Starlink on every phone... Dystopian isn't a strong enough word for the technocratic future the authors prophesy in this bleak but urgent book." --Kirkus