“I am grateful to Lucia Hulsether for writing the book that pounds the nail in the coffin of corporate humanitarianism. It is essential reading for everyone who refuses to be swayed by the happy talk of ‘fair trade,’ ‘conscious capitalism,’ and ‘ethical investing.’ In brilliant case studies, Hulsether shows how time after time corporate humanitarianism translates critiques of capitalist violence into neoliberalism’s raison d’être. Wry, witty, and heartbreaking, Capitalist Humanitarianism does not flinch from exposing the killing that is the disavowed cost of delusional presentations of ‘good’ capitalism.” - Jodi Melamed, Associate Professor, Marquette University
“In an utterly original and individual voice, Lucia Hulsether returns ‘progressive’ Christianity to its rightful place as a handmaiden of the cruel optimisms binding us to irremediable structures. Writing against the simplistic narrative that sees right-wing evangelicalism and neoliberalism locked in a marriage of convenience, Hulsether shows instead how a wistfully leftist ‘capitalist humanitarianism’ generates powerful dreams of reconciliation amid the ruins of neoliberalism. Despite the relentless demand for hope and for redemption from our inevitable complicity, morning does not come; we are not saved. And yet, Hulsether argues, we must learn to use existence ethically.” - Bethany Moreton, author of To Serve God and Wal-Mart: The Making of Christian Free Enterprise
"Hulsether combines reportage, ethnographic research, personal narrative, and social theory to look at the ways in which the 21st-century global economic system has absorbed the very movements that seek to resist it. . . . [A] stance of constant resistance to an unjust system, even in the seeming absence of alternatives, is what Hulsether—who is a union activist as well as a teacher and scholar—calls us to take on. . . . Hulsether’s book models this approach beautifully, urging us to “write a history of the impossible” in which 'survival is not the end.'" - Jeannine Marie Pitas, Christian Century
"Shifting between ethnography and history, between global systems and their material impact, [Capitalist Humanitarianism] shows how easily leftist critiques are coopted to allow well-meaning elites to feel good about themselves even as they facilitate the economic exploitation that lies at the heart of our global order." - Tisa Wenger, Reviews in American History
"Capitalist Humanitarianism is a fundamental book to understand how capitalism weaponises leftist critiques, especially in its neoliberal phase. Critiques are mobilised as new business opportunities rather than breaking with the system. As expected, these new strategies do not result in ending oppression or exploitation, but simply in reshaping capitalist discourses around its practices." - Carolina Flores Gusmão, Bulletin of Latin American Research
"Capitalist Humanitarianism brings together religious studies, critical theory, and rich ethnographic observations to study liberal and Leftist projects that seek to work with, rather than against, free markets. Her case studies point to the limits of such reform approaches, cautioning us against resigning ourselves to the inevitability of the present." - Barbara Sostaita, Religious Studies Review
"For many years, missionaries, social entrepreneurs, microfinance bankers, and venture capitalists have been reforming neoliberal capitalism by attaching ethical and humanitarian reasons, hopes, and ideals to capitalistic projects. Lucia Hulsether’s theoretically rich and insightful book, Capitalist Humanitarianism, is a critique of this self-critique of capitalistic reforms that unfolds through a remarkable cultural history of these projects." - Esra Tunc, Religious Studies Review
"Hulsether’s critique of the cultural politics of capitalist reform seeks to avoid repeating or at least to forestall, the conventions of exposure that are already fully factored into neoliberal institution building. In this sense, the book offers examples of how capitalist humanitarian projects imbricate their patrons, sponsors, and enablers more deeply into the strictures of neoliberalism while often seeking to afford the freedom to produce (though this freedom remains illusory) rather than freedom from systems of exploitative production." - Dheepa Sundaram, Religious Studies Review
"Lucia Hulsether’s Capitalist Humanitarianism is a brilliant and much-needed book. Hulsether writes a remarkably interdisciplinary, sharply argued, and deeply felt text supported by a creative assemblage of evidence. This book was persuasive; it often surprised me; and it left me with more new questions at its conclusion. It also moved me—and these four criteria, I’ve found, let me know when I’ve found a book I’ll keep returning to." - B. Alex Beasley, Religious Studies Review
"One of the most striking interventions Hulsether makes to the study of religion is her argument that leftist social theory should be scholars’ primary resource for the study of religion and capitalism." - Deonnie Moodie, American Religion
"The strength of Capitalist Humanitarianism lies in the combination of rich theoretical perspectives and dozens of ethnographic case studies. . . . Capitalist Humanitarianism provides insightful knowledge for scholars and students interested in understanding philanthropy’s meaning and learning about its responsibilities and promises, defending philanthropy against its recent criticisms, and improving and supporting it for its inherent values." - Massumeh H. Toosi, Journal of Muslim Philanthropy & Civil Society
“Lucia Hulsether’s Capitalist Humanitarianism is a remarkable book. . . . The book is wonderfully well written, with a prose that is honest, clear, and at times deeply moving. Theory, ethnography, storytelling, and even confession organically blend into a powerful argument to provide a critique of the cultural politics of capitalist reform.”
- Raúl E. Zegarra,
Journal of Religion
