The Meaning of Anxiety

Rollo May

Rollo May refutes the assertion that mental health is living without anxiety, proposing instead that anxiety is a necessary condition for creativity, intellect, and freedom.

A Strategy for Labor

André Gorz

“A system that makes people work like zombies to produce useless, destructive, or self-destructive things has outlived its usefulness.”

Burnout

Hannah Proctor

Hannah Proctor visits the concept of burnout as the experience of political defeat—the disappointment, despair, and grief that emerges when one becomes aware that the political project they have committed themselves to may not succeed.

Reclaiming Work

André Gorz

“We must dare to prepare ourselves for the Exodus from ‘work-based society’: it no longer exists and will not return.”

Being Wrong

Kathryn Schulz

Kathryn Schulz posits a vision of wrongness as both the inevitable human condition and a generative source from which creativity, art, brilliance, risk-taking, and so much more arises.

Blood in the Machine

Brian Merchant

“The Luddites understood technology all too well; they didn’t hate it, but rather the way it was used against them.”

You Deserve a Tech Union

Ethan Marcotte

In this, the latest book from Ethan Marcotte (he of responsive web design fame), unions aren’t anachronisms but rather a set of structures for workers to practice mutual aid, solidarity, and democracy with each other and across their workplaces.

Working Identity

Herminia Ibarra

Ibarra argues that successful career transitions emerge from a process of exploration and experimentation, a messy and non-linear experience in which new identities are tried on and adjusted while the old ones are alternately clung to and rejected.

When to Talk and When to Fight

Rebecca Subar

This short and impactful book outlines a concise and clear strategic framework for choosing whether to negotiate, to build power, or to vanquish your opponents.

Saving Time

Jenny Odell

“This book is my panoramic assault on nihilism.”

Just Culture

Sidney Dekker

Drawing from safety practices in transportation and medicine, Sidney Dekker outlines how to (and how not to) create a culture of trust, learning, and accountability.

The Factory

Hiroko Oyamada

Three workers reluctantly take jobs at the factory.

Laziness Does Not Exist

Devon Price

In this well-argued polemic, Devon Price outlines three tenets of what they term the “laziness lie”: that your worth is your productivity, that you cannot trust your own feelings and limits, and that there is always more you should be doing.

Lost in Work

Amelia Horgan

“Our entrance into work is unfree, and while we’re there, our time is not our own.”

The Problem with Work

Kathi Weeks

A provocative and irresistable argument that the need to “work for a living” is not a natural order but rather an invention—and one that can change.

Bullshit Jobs

David Graeber

An expansion of the immensely popular essay of the same title, here David Graeber takes a long hard look at why so many jobs are rank bullshit, and what can be done about it.

Breaking Things at Work

Gavin Mueller

A brisk read that locates echoes of Luddism in current practices like the free software and right-to-repair movements, and makes the case for rescuing Luddism from the dustheap.

Work Won’t Love You Back

Sarah Jaffe

From the title through every chapter, paragraph, and sentence, this book is a deeply researched polemic against the myth of the “labor of love.”

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