{"product_id":"utopia-9781839767654","title":"Utopia","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eUntil the Age of Enlightenment, utopia was a popular literary genre, but without concrete political effects. However, in the decades leading up to 1789, its status gradually changed from an entertaining thought experiment to a socialist project. Imagining the ideal city took on the task of articulating revolutionary transformation of society towards equality and social justice.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eUtopia\u003c\/i\u003e, Stéphanie Roza explores the nascent ideal of a community of property and labour, not yet called communism, and the thinkers who engaged with it in the lead-up to the French Revolution. These philosophers included Étienne-Gabriel Morelly, a fierce critic of private property and the mysterious author of the \u003ci\u003eCode de la Nature\u003c\/i\u003e; the Abbé de Mably, a radical republican and interlocutor of Rousseau; and Gracchus Babeuf, who, from the 1780s onwards, defended the natural right to subsistence and dreamed of a more fraternal world.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eTogether, they laid the foundations for modern socialist movements. In the crucible of the French Revolution, ‘real equality’ became the goal of a handful of conspirators gathered around Babeuf, who had meanwhile become the ‘tribune of the people’. The Conspiracy of Equals was considered by Marx to be ‘the first active communist party’: the hopes and questions that ran through the group prefigured those of the militants of later periods, including today.","brand":"Verso Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51138413855063,"sku":"9781839767654","price":36.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/utopia-9781839767654","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}