Reading list

Ellen Meiksins Wood: Groundbreaking Marxist Historian and Political Thinker

From her classic historical work, The Origin of Capitalism, to her sharp criticism of the Post-Marxist milieu in The Retreat from Class, Ellen Meiksins Wood was a Marxist thinker with major contributions to history, sociology, and theory. 

Verso Books 2 September 2025

Ellen Meiksins Wood: Groundbreaking Marxist Historian and Political Thinker

"Wood was an extraordinarily rigorous and imaginative thinker, someone who breathed life into Marxist political theory and made it speak—not to just to me but to many others—at multiple levels: historical, theoretical, political." — Corey Robin, Jacobin

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  • The Retreat from Class
    In this classic study, which won the Isaac Deutscher Memorial Prize, Ellen Wood provides a critical survey of influential trends in “post-Marxist” theory. Challenging their dissociation of politics...
    Paperback
  • Peasant-Citizen and Slave
    The controversial thesis at the center of this study is that, despite the importance of slavery in Athenian society, the most distinctive characteristic of Athenian democracy was the unprecedented ...
    Paperback
  • Empire of Capital
    Capitalism makes possible a new form of domination by purely economic means, argues Ellen Meiksins Wood. So, surely, even the most seasoned White House hawk would prefer to exercise global hegemony...
    Paperback
  • Democracy Against Capitalism
    Historian and political thinker Ellen Meiksins Wood argues that theories of “postmodern” fragmentation, “difference”, and contingency can barely accommodate the idea of capitalism, let alone subjec...
    Paperback
  • Citizens to Lords
    In this groundbreaking work, Ellen Meiksins Wood rewrites the history of political theory. She traces the development of the Western tradition from classical antiquity through to the Middle Ages in...
    Paperback
  • Liberty and Property
    The formation of the modern state, the rise of capitalism, the Renaissance and Reformation, the scientific revolution and the Age of Enlightenment have all been attributed to the “early modern” per...
    Paperback

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