How to Blow up a Pipeline

No cover

Andreas Malm: How to Blow up a Pipeline (AudiobookFormat)

Audiobook

3 stars (8 reviews)

4 editions

Maybe better suited to newcomers

2 stars

My number one critique of this book is that it had so many opportunities to share and relate revolutionary movements throughout history to the climate movement, and it did not. Even worse, there were parts of the book that critiqued attacks on oil pipelines in the SWANA region that were connected to local anti-imperialist movements, without drawing the connection between anti imperialism and the climate movement (embarrassing, frankly).

That said, I think the book is a fine introduction to the idea that violence in the form of property destruction is a legitimate action to take, although I wish the book made a stronger case to the idea of armed resistance in the pursuit of national democracy and socialism. I also think the last chapter of the book was the strongest, since it offered good critiques of climate doomerism.

Anyway, I shouldn't be surprised lol, but whatever, it was fine.

Made me start believing in a positive change… again

4 stars

I went into this book being a bit negative about climate change and the climate movement worldwide. I thought we “lost” and wouldn’t be able prevent enormous damage to the planet. I saw myself in a situation similar to the ending of the movie “Don’t look up” but I don’t think of that anymore.

The book gives you a decent amount of history of the different climate movements (pacifist and not so pacifist) and compales them to other social movements and the type of violence or lack there of that they used in order to achieve their goals.

I really recommend this book a lot!

a book with all the right pieces and some very weird conclusions

2 stars

for a book i should ostensibly agree with on all points i found this deeply dull and fairly insipid. it goes to great lengths to categorize property damage as violence, dedicating only a few paragraphs around page 100 to the "ridiculous" idea that inanimate property maybe can't be subject to violence in the same way that living things can. it then uses this framework of property damage as violence to argue for the necessity of violence in protest, but jumps through incredible hoops to advocate for some sort of violence scale, from damaging luxury vehicles on one side to murder on the other, and is vehement that although the climate movement needs violence to achieve results (it argues against pacifism for almost half the book, albeit it itself is more pacifist than it knows), this can only mean - to malm- damage to fossil fuel infrastructure and luxury goods. it …

rethinking malm

2 stars

i've read the book two months ago - initially i've been pretty convinced by it (with the exception of apporving eco-leninism) esp because i think he's generally right with the case of property destruction. however, as somebody already pointed out, he does not give any information on how to do that. additionally, while he aims to critizise overly moralistc arguments for liberal peacefulness, he's pretty moralistic himself. prperty destruction alone won't make a revolution. he also never acknowledges that the climate movement in europe already faces state repression, and in other parts of the world even more so. he doesn't ever speak of the nessecity of support systems and care structres. his focus on property destruction alone, while ignoring everything else, stinks of having patriachal hero figures in movements which undervalue care work even more (bc you know, that's liberal pacifism /sarcasm). there should be an realistic approach to property …

should be titled "Why Blow Up a Pipeline"

4 stars

This is a nice book. The author gives the rundown of climate movements of the past few years, focusing on Ende Gelände, Extinction Rebellion, and Fridays for Future. He's clearly actually been part of a lot of those actions and, as far as I can tell, he gets them pretty right. The tone is hopeful all in all and the central idea – that there should be a more militant flank focused on destruction of fossil fuel emitting devices like SUVs and pipelines – is made well, in particular the clear but charitable case against ideologues of pacifism in activism.

However, and this bugs me deeply, the author does not actually answer the question posed in the title. Nowhere in the book is there any kind of guideline of tactical advice or even finger-point to resources on how to go about this. There is no map of pipelines in Europe, …

avatar for ember

rated it

5 stars
avatar for TakeV

rated it

4 stars

Lists