ABOUT THIS BOOK

This book situates John Locke’s philosophy of knowledge and his political theory within his engagement in British monetary debates of the 17th and 18th century.

Anchored in extensive archival research, George Caffentzis offers the most expansive reading of Locke’s economic thought to date, contextualizing it within the expansion of capitalist accumulation on a world scale and the universality of money as a medium of exchange.

Updated with a new introduction by Paul Rekret, a new foreword by Harry Cleaver and new material by the author, Clipped Coins, Abused Words, and Civil Government continues to make a significant intervention in contemporary debates around the history of capitalism, colonialism and philosophy.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

George Caffentzis is a co-founder of the Midnight Notes Collective and coordinator of the Committee for Academic Freedom in Africa (CAFA). Caffentzis was a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern Maine for over thirty years before retirement. His previous publications include In Letters of Blood and Fire: Work, Machines, and the Crisis of Capitalism (Common Notions, 2013).

REVIEWS

'Caffentzis is a practical philosopher and a pure teacher. His reasoning even at its most abstract always tends to the political. The street is his classroom. This is truly vulgar Marxism, that is, it is a critique by, with, and for the vulgus, or common people (you and I)'
Peter Linebaugh, author of 'The Magna Carta Manifesto' (University of California Press, 2008)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword - Harry Cleaver (University of Texas at Austin)
Editorial Introduction: Cogito Ergo Habo: Philosophy, Money, and Method - Paul Rekret (Richmond American International University)
Author's Introduction
1. Clipped Coins
2. Civil Government
3. Abused Words
Conclusion: Weaving an Organ