"""In this highly original study of contemporary free-trade liberalism, Jean-Claude Michea develops and brings to a conclusion his decade-long duel with the bankrupt thinking of the institutionalized Left. The originality of Michea's approach consists in his strenuous effort to discover and unravel the original populist themes in Marx's work, themes that return - recycled and somewhat refashioned - in present-day liberal individualism. This allows him to rewrite, in a controversial yet fascinating manner, the history of modernity. The result is a book that should be widely read and discussed and should stir up debate across the social sciences, drowning as they now are in a stale concoction of yesterday's intellectual fashions."" Zygmunt Bauman, Emeritus Professor of the University of Leeds"