Product Description

The latest hard-hitting investigative book from John Pilger, the bestselling author of Heroes, Hidden Voices and A Secret Country.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #241528 in Books
• Published on: 2006-06-05
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 352 pages

Synopsis
John Pilger is one of the world's pre-eminent investigative journalists and documentary film-makers. His best-selling books of reportage, which include "Heroes and Hidden Voices", have in the words of Noam Chomsky 'been a beacon of light in often dark times'. In "Freedom Next Time", he looks at five countries, in each of which a long struggle for freedom has taken place; in each the people, having shed blood and dreams, are still waiting. In Afghanistan, Iraq and South Africa there has been the promise of hope, and even an 'official' freedom, but the reality of these divided societies is that they are still waiting for real freedom. In Palestine, the cycle of violence continues with no resolution in sight. And the island of Diego Garcia, in the Indian Ocean, is a microcosm of the ruthlessness of great powers. The island was sold by the British to the American military in the 1960s. The indigenous population, descended from slaves, were forcibly removed to the slums of Port Louis in Mauritius. They have continued to fight for the return of their homeland ever since - three years ago the High Court granted them the right of return, but this has subsequently been blocked.

The island remains the US's third biggest military base; a base from which they are able to launch attacks against the Middle East. Once again John Pilger gives a voice to the people living through these momentous times and, in gripping detail, shows us the lives behind the headlines.

From the Inside Flap
When Nelson Mandela stepped out of prison to freedom in 1990, the elation in South Africa and around the world was palpable. But true freedom for his people remains a distant dream. Why?From South Africa to India and beyond, a rapacious economic system condemns millions to poverty while men in decorous offices far away impose a ruthless political order with tariffs and embargoes, bombs and bullets, distorting the very language of freedom, causing suffering they never know, spilling blood they never smell.

In Freedom Next Time, renowned journalist and film-maker John Pilger describes how courageous people battling to free themselves often glimpse freedom, only to see it taken away. He challenges us in the West to ‘look in the mirror’ at the actions of ‘our’ governments for the true source of much of the world’s fear and insecurity – and terrorism. In our name, often duplicitously, they operate a secret agenda, as in Diego Garcia, a paradise island in the Indian Ocean whose entire population was expelled clandestinely and brutally by the British government to make way for a huge American military base.

In Palestine, India, South Africa, Afghanistan, Britain and the United States, John Pilger’s vivid eyewitness reporting and tenacious interviews, backed by meticulous research, blow away the secrets and lies of our rulers and turn a searchlight on to events consigned to the shadows by an unrecognized yet virulent censorship. With humanity, wit and passion, he salutes people who refuse to be victims and defiantly demand their freedom. They could soon be us.

0593055527
9780593055526

From the Back Cover
‘John Pilger unearths, with steely attention to facts, the filthy truth and tells it as it is. I salute him.’ Harold Pinter

‘Pilger’s gift is for finding the image, the instant, that reveals all – he is a photographer using words instead of a camera.’ Salman Rushdie

‘John Pilger is the antidote to easy, comfortable thinking, to smugness, to ignorance.’ Daily Telegraph

‘Pilger is the closest we have to the great correspondents of the 1930s . . . The truth in his hands is a weapon, to be picked up and brandished and used in the struggle against evil and injustice.’ Guardian

‘What makes John Pilger a truly great journalist is his conscience and bravery.

Customer Reviews

Freedom Next Time by John Pilger Reviewed by Sarah Markworth
In his book Freedom Next Time, reputed journalist John Pilger uncovers the real reasons behind British and American interest in Palestine, India, South Africa and Afghanistan. Backed up with hard facts, interviews and eyewitness accounts, Pilger has exposed that: under the guise of freeing these people from the `terrorism of their oppressors', our leaders have planted a new political order, obtaining power over assets and plunging millions of people further into poverty and suffering.

Within the pages of this powerful book, the goal of global domination by the United States, aided by British Imperialistic groundwork, is revealed. We are shown how our rulers instigate internal wars, manipulate facts and censor our news to justify our army invasions as they replace one form of terror for another.

This book is not a comfortable read and nor should it be. Pilger shows us that fascism never went away, the `Orwellian state' is reported to already be here and corporate corruption aids the United States of America in its dream of worldwide dominance.

Page after page urges our sleeping nation to wake up before it is too late, to take a look behind the scenes and see who really controls our news, our governments, and where our taxes are going. Revelation after revelation is poured out as we realize that lifestyles in the west are only sustainable because millions of hidden people are suffering.

The latest edition of this book was printed in 2007 and has been published by Black Swan. The recommended price is £8.99. In my opinion this book is worth the money as it offers you over 20 years of research into the economics and politics of these invisible communities. If you want to know the truth, this book is packed with it.

Excellent investigative journalism exposing the truth of current atrocities
Freedom next time is an excellent read. Thought provoking and puts new light on the crimes of the west on developing countries. John Pilger narrates a harrowing tale of betrayal and deceit with well-sourced interviews on both sides of a myriad of important injustices that currently plague our world. He starts with the little known plight of the Chaogisans: a people who were evicted from their Island at the same time as the Falklands war. This was because the British government `sold' it for a discount on a Nuclear Trident submarine and the 2500 people forgotten and ignored. The US consequently turned the Island paradise into one of their largest overseas bases from which they would later launch air attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Pilger then discusses the increasing stratification of society in India, reveals the true results of the end of apartheid in South Africa. He gains access to many influential parties involved in the current genocide of Palestine by Israel and exposes the barbarism of Governments, the complicity of the media in suppressing the true nature of how the Palestinians are being treated.

This is an excellent companion to Naoim Kleins, `Shock Doctrine' which goes into more detail into the involvement of the IMF, world bank, corporations and military industrial complex in many of the same issues that Pilger discusses from the human contact and investigative journalism he has undertaken.

Essential reading.

Many of the interviews from this book can be seen in a series of BBC documentaries available by searching google video.

A truly shocking and vitally important expose
This book gets to the very heart of the way injustice is perpetrated in the world. In the best traditions of investigative journalism, Pilger examines in depth a number of ongoing situations in the world involving exploitation and injustice. The first of these relates to the plight group of islanders evicted from their Chagos island home using blatant deceit and brute force and given so little compensation that they were consigned to a life of penury in Mauritius. Why? So the British could give their American allies an island paradise as a new military base. The fact that most of us have never even heard of the Chagos islanders demonstrates the complicity of the world media in selectively reporting the news we often naively assume to have at least a modicum of impartiality.

The true shock of the book comes with the following chapters, however, where we are systematically shown the perspectives of those who have suffered most in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the war in Afghanistan and since the end of the apartheid regime in South Africa. Did you think the average black South African has more opportunities to get ahead since the end of apartheid? or that the average Afghan woman is much better off since the ousting of the Taliban? I did - but completely erroneously as it turns out.

Pilger combines a concise summary of the facts with vivid snapshots of the situation on the ground in each location. He gives us excerpts from interviews with the victims that allow the reader to get a very personal perspective and juxtaposes these with excerpts from interviews with those responsible for the decisions that brought about the suffering. The combination is powerful and enlightening.

If I were to criticize the book it would be to say firstly that the chapter in India does not have the depth of the other chapters and adds little to the book. Secondly, Pilger very occasionally commits the same sin of telling only part of the truth that he accuses other journalists of. For example, he relates that the US has intervened 72 times in the affairs of other nations, including the overthrow of democratically elected social democracies such as in Guatemala, Brazil, Iran and Chile. I doubt that some of those governments would really have qualified as having been democratically elected by the standards that Pilger himself would apply to democracy. To be fair, this is a rare occurrence in the book and does not in any way detract from the substance of what Pilger has to say.