Max Haiven
@maxhaiven.bsky.social
Propagandist for an impossible country. Two letters away from a tax haven. Canada Research Chair in the Radical Imagination. Views are probably some else's because that's how ideology works.
NEW EP @maxhaiven.bsky.social joins us for a conversation on how the gamification of US society has led to a new form of 21st-century fascism that has transformed us all into players in an exhausting and unwinnable game
upstream@upstreampodcast.bsky.social · last wk.NEXT WEEK: gamified capitalism and 21st century fascism w/ @maxhaiven.bsky.social
THE CHEATED PLAYER: The core of the argument in my new book is fairly simple. Over the last 50 years of neoliberal financialized capitalism, individuals have been tasked with recasting ourselves as competitive speculative players, striving to make the most judicious investments in a merciless game.
Billionaires & Guillotines Game Night with Max Haiven Join us to play Billionaires & Guillotines with the designer of the game, @maxhaiven.bsky.social! 21 Oct, Pelican House. Doors open at 6pm, game starts at 6:30pm. Free & open to all. Places are limited, please register: tinyurl.com/24m74w8e
Game Night! Billionaires and Guillotines with Max Haiven
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Billionaires & Guillotines: A Game leftwingbooks.net/products/billionaires-guillotines 2-5 players take on the roles of rival plutocrats, competing tooth and nail to accumulate the wealth of the world before their actions trigger a revolution.
An incredible privilege and joy to edit the Vagabond series for @plutopress.bsky.social since 2020. Like the itinerant souls after whom the series is named, each book is a sweet tempestuous experiment in freedom. All are right now on sale until September 30th. www.plutobooks.com/product-cate...
Fascism is back and it's fun. The cheated players of gamed capitalism want revenge. The antifascist game is about more than slaying Nazis. It's a podcast interview with the @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social about my book The Player and the Played (now available open-access from @mitpress.bsky.social )
Tomorrow I will be presenting my book "The player and the played: from game capitalism to 21st-century fascism" at my university. Even if, for some mysterious reason, you don't happen to be in Thunder Bay, Ontario, you can tune in online. 1pm EST. tinyurl.com/lu-played
But the largest direct theft of labour in modern history is obviously the transatlantic slave trade. Millions died. Civilizations were erased. The consequences remain deadly. It shaped our world, including the very ideas of labour and intelligence and freedom at play in these questions around AI.
"Cheating and the fascistic public pedagogy of gamed capitalism: Pyramid schemes, sexist advice, misogynist scams and the perfect perfect bastard" published in the Review of Education, Pedagogy and Cultural Studies - doi.org/10.1080/1071... (I can send you a PDF)
This morning I gave a characteristically dire online talk about fascism. Then, depressed by the lake, I saw crows and seagulls (who usually hate each other) flock together to repel a huge hawk. And I saw a clumsy toddler plant a sapling in the stump of a storm-felled tree. And for just a moment...
Check out @maxhaiven.bsky.social's new book! "A provocative examination of the ways our economy has been rigged by financialization and the importance of games to our dangerous political moment ... it poses the urgent question: What is the antifascist game?" Out now in *open access*!
The Player and the Played
In an age when capitalism feels like an unwinnable game, extreme reactionary ideas and politics are on the rise. The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones, Squid Gam...
mitpress.mit.edu
In "The Player and the Played," @maxhaiven.bsky.social theorizes the connections between the financialization of the capitalist economy, the gamification of our lives, and the rising threat of a uniquely 21st-century form of fascistic politics: mitpress.mit.edu/978026205604... #OpenAccess
It's publication day for my new book, THE PLAYER AND THE PLAYED: From Gamed Capitalism to 21st Century Fascism, now out open access (free) from @mitpress.bsky.social
We're offering open registration to individual sessions of our super popular course, Fighting Fascist Feelings, this time around as it's likely the last time we'll run it for a little while. I'll put links below :) Price is flexible. With @maxhaiven.bsky.social
See you tonight in Berlin? “Radical Imagination, Speculative Futures, and Economic Sci-Fi” Panel discussion with Max Haiven, Isabella Hermann, Alicja Rogalska, and Brett Scott. Moderated by Rok Kranjc. galerienord.berlin/events/count...
Radical Imagination, Speculative Futures, and Economic Sci-Fi - Galerie Nord
Podiumsdiskussion mit Max Haiven, Isabella Hermann, Alicja Rogalska, und Brett Scott (in English). Moderiert von Rok Kranjc. Max Haiven ist Pädagoge und Organisator. Er nutzt Bücher, Vorträge, Spiele,...
galerienord.berlin
With @maxhaiven.bsky.social ! forms.gle/KZoDWpTgppys...
Communicating radical ideas application form
Thank you for your interest in the Communicating Radical Ideas workshop. For more information, please refer to the CFP at https://senseandsolidarity.org/ If you'd prefer not to use this form, please...
forms.gle
Game designer and scholar Max Haiven uses the term “playgrom” for violent mob actions against minorities that are deeply embedded in gaming cultures. GamerGate became a defining example - and a social media playbook for the alt-right. https://f.mtr.cool/uzeafomryb @maxhaiven.bsky.social
Call for Proposals 🔊 Help us shape the Games Transformed Festival by submitting your proposals for the festival programme or exhibition area! The deadline for submissions is July 31st, 2026. Submit now: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
Tech billionaires didn’t misread science fiction. They performed an edit: keeping the frontier, the visionary, the chrome; cutting the public institution, the collective, and the warning. Every. Single. Time. My new piece is now up in Aeon.
Aeon Magazine@aeon.co · 3mo agoTech billionaires like to claim their work is inspired by science fiction, but in truth, they are using its ‘chrome-plated aesthetic’ as a fig leaf to further what the social theorist Ali Rıza Taşkale labels ‘reactionary futurism’
Games Against Borders! A symposium (October 30) In partnership with London's @gamestransformed.bsky.social festival, we present a one-day symposium for game-makers, -players, -thinkers, and organizers. Join us! reimaginingvalue.ca/borders/
Games Against Borders symposium
Join us in London for a day of discussions about games, borders and resistance. In partnership with the Games Transformed 2026 festival, Oct 30 - Nov1
reimaginingvalue.ca
New episode alert! @lagomhygge.bsky.social talks to @maxhaiven.bsky.social about antifascist games, games as tools for organizing, and the connection between play and radical imagination. You don't want to miss this one. soundcloud.com/materialistg...
Märklighetstroget - episode 26: The Antifascist Game
Thom talks to Max Haiven. Recorded at the Organize! Movement Meetup 2026: https://www.organizemovementmeetup.org/ There's a bit of namedropping and referencing in this one, so here's some links. — M
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World! We're back with some burning new episodes! 🔥 First up: @maxhaiven.bsky.social in conversation with @manuelaz.bsky.social about the latter's new book: The Plot is on Fire. A book in fierce metabolism with this podcast! ❤️🔥 Tune in, enjoy, get reading and plotting soundcloud.com/earthcarefie...
19. The Plot is on Fire: Care Struggles after Progress, Plantation and Patriarchy
As myths of progress and modernisation collapse in the relentless polycrisis of our time, how do we strengthen other plots—in community, practice and struggle? How do we come together as movements for
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in my #boardgame COMRADE ORCA you and your friends play a pod of vengeful killer #whales taking out billionaires' yachts. It's kind of like coop Battleship, but you can only use whale sounds to communicate! And yes, you get to wear a salmon on your head. it's in dev now, crowdfunding next year!
My new book THE PLAYER AND THE PLAYED is out this September with @mitpress.bsky.social and it will be open access! Meanwhile, if you would like an advanced reader copy for the purposes of writing a review etc please get in touch. Also please share it with your favorite podcasts and publications.
An author can only dream of such deep and considered engagement with their work. It's quite moving to have one's writing addressed with such comradely rigour. I fear that the reviewer is justified in many of their critiques of Palm Oil: The Grease of Empire. The review thickens the discussion.
New Socialist@newsocialist.bsky.social · 5mo agoMax Haiven's Palm Oil, published by @plutopress.bsky.social, is bracing & engaging. However, the pressure to ascribe agency to palm oil, & all the consumer goods in which it’s an ingredient, leads to some eyebrow-raising claims argues @hereliesjustin.bsky.social. newsocialist.org.uk/missing-the-...
There's now a recording of this great chat! youtu.be/aPch0SLtPhY?... Enormous thanks to @gamestransformed.bsky.social, @maxhaiven.bsky.social & Briar Dickey for organising. Was such a privilege to participate in this with the legendary @mark-bray.bsky.social 🖤
Mark Bray@mark-bray.bsky.social · 5mo agoGames Against Fascism: Online event May 19 W/ @marijamdid.com @maxhaiven.bsky.social @gamestransformed.bsky.social luma.com/5t2ynfu2
Games Against Fascism: Online event May 19 W/ @marijamdid.com @maxhaiven.bsky.social @gamestransformed.bsky.social luma.com/5t2ynfu2
Join @sarahsteinlubrano.bsky.social and me in June and July for 6 online sessions on how fascism organizes itself around foul feelings, misunderstood crises, and revenge. senseandsolidarity.org/summer2026/
