Progress - by Samuel Miller McDonald (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

For readers of Thomas Piketty, David Graeber, and Jared Diamond: A bold, provocative, wide-ranging argument about the human idea of progress that offers a new vision of our future

Progress is power. Narratives of progress, the stories we tell about whether a society is moving in the right or the wrong direction, are immensely potent. Progress has built cities, flattened mountains, charted the globe, delved the oceans and space, created wealth, opportunity, and remarkable innovation, and ushered in a new epoch unique in our planet's 4.5-billion-year history.

But the modern story of progress is also a very dangerous fiction. It shapes our sense of what progress means, and justifies what we will do to achieve it--no matter the cost. We continue to subscribe to a set of myths, about dominion, growth, extraction, and expansion, that have fueled our success, but now threaten our--and all species'-- existence on a planet in crisis.

In Progress, geographer Samuel Miller McDonald offers a radical new perspective on the myths upon which the modern world is built, illuminating its destructive lineage and suggesting an urgent alternative. Drawing on interdisciplinary research across anthropology, history, philosophy and geography, McDonald argues that if humanity is to thrive, then we must dismantle, reimagine, and create anew what progress means.

Review Quotes

Praise for Samuel Miller McDonald

"Geographer McDonald debuts with a sweeping reappraisal of the notion of historical progress. ... The result is a provocative interrogation of the very foundations of modern society." --Publishers Weekly, starred review

"There is an idealism to this book that refreshes readers jaded by the claims of 'techno-futurism' and the aspirations of oligarchs. You read this book and want to love the earth rather than reach for stars." --Kirkus Reviews

"This is a wise book, and hopefully its wisdom will rub off. We need somehow to take the human traits that fixated on 'more' and turn them towards 'better, ' with a rich definition of that blessed state!" -- Bill McKibben, author of The End of Nature

"From debunking creation myths to arguing for a deeper happiness, Progress upturns shibboleths and warns of a potentially dire future. Without new understandings of our past, such as that given here, chaos may be inevitable." --Danny Dorling, author of Slowdown and Shattered Nation

"Progress explodes the great myth of our time. Spanning cultures, continents and millennia, Samuel Miller McDonald shows how the pursuit of progress has always been a zero-sum game, and dares to imagine something better might be possible. Lucid and wise." --David Farrier, author of Footprints: In Search of Future Fossils

"If you think progress will take us to the promised land, this is a must-read." --Alpa Shah, author of The Incarcerations

"This book shatters the ideological foundation of liberalism and capitalism, which is a myth that is older than both: the notion that a better future, just around the corner, justifies or even requires the atrocities of the present. Samuel Miller McDonald could not have chosen a timelier moment to reveal the violent and ecologically catastrophic underbelly of the myth we call "progress." The rousing implication is that each and every day of our precarious lives on this precious planet must be seized for collective struggle and worldbuilding. The future will not save us." --Thea Riofrancos, author of Extraction and co-author of A Planet to Win

About the Author

SAMUEL MILLER MCDONALD is a geographer focusing on human-ecology, theory, and history. He holds a
doctorate from Brasenose College, University of Oxford and degrees from Yale University and College of the Atlantic. He has written essays and analysis for The Nation, The Guardian, The New Republic, Current Affairs, Boston Review, and elsewhere, and has contributed interviews to BBC Ideas, VICE News Tonight, and various radio and podcast programs. Progress is his first book.