Rajeev "Raj" Patel (born 1972) is a

British Indian British Indians are citizens of the United Kingdom (UK) whose ancestral roots are from India. This includes people born in the UK who are of Indian origin as well as Indians who have migrated to the UK. Today, Indians comprise about 1.4 mil ...

academic,

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

, activist and writer who has lived and worked in

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozam ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

, and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

for extended periods. He has been referred to as "the rock star of social justice writing."

Early life and education

Born to a mother from

Kenya ) , national_anthem = "Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"() , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Nairobi , coordinates = , largest_city = Nairobi , ...

and a father from

Fiji Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists ...

,About himself at ''21 minuti''
''(Retrieved on 9 February 2010.)'' he grew up in

Golders Green Golders Green is an area in the London Borough of Barnet in England. A smaller suburban linear settlement, near a farm and public grazing area green of medieval origins, dates to the early 19th century. Its bulk forms a late 19th century and ea ...

in north-west London where his family ran a

corner shop A convenience store, convenience shop, corner store or corner shop is a small retail business that stocks a range of everyday items such as coffee, groceries, snack foods, confectionery, soft drinks, ice creams, tobacco products, lottery tick ...

. Patel received a BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE), from

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

, and a master's degree from the

London School of Economics , mottoeng = To understand the causes of things , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £240.8 million (2021) , budget = £391.1 millio ...

, and gained his PhD in Development Sociology from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 2002. As part of his academic training, Patel worked at the

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and grants to the governments of low- and middle-income countries for the purpose of pursuing capital projects. The World Bank is the collective name for the Interna ...

World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an intergovernmental organization that regulates and facilitates international trade. With effective cooperation in the United Nations System, governments use the organization to establish, revise, and e ...

, and the United Nations. He has since become an outspoken public critic of all of these organisations, and reports having been tear-gassed on four continents protesting against his former employers.Citizine
''(Retrieved on 8 February 2010.)''

Career

Patel is an educator and academic. He has written articles and books. He is possibly best known for his 2008 book, ''Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System''. In 2009, he published '' The Value of Nothing'' which was on ''The New York Times'' best-seller list during February 2010. In 2017, he published, with co-author , ''

A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things ''A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of he Planet'' is a book by Raj Patel and Jason W. Moore published in 2018. Premise The book considers the development of Capitalism and the Anthr ...

: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet'' (University of California Press). He has been a visiting scholar at

Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...

, the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

, and the

University of Texas at Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

. Patel is listed as a Research Professor at the

LBJ School of Public Affairs The Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs (or LBJ School of Public Affairs) is a graduate school at the University of Texas at Austin that was founded in 1970 to offer training in public policy analysis and administration for students that ar ...

of the University of Texas at Austin.

Activism

Patel was one of many organizers in the

1999 protests File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoo ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

, and has organised in support of food sovereignty. More recently he has resided and worked extensively in Zimbabwe and in South Africa. He was refused a visa extension by the

Mugabe Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the Z ...

regime for his political involvement with the pro-democracy movement. He is associated through his work on food with the

Via Campesina La Vía Campesina (from es, la vía campesina, ) is an international farmers organization founded in 1993 in Mons, Belgium, formed by 182 organisations in 81 countries, and describing itself as "an international movement which coordinates peas ...

movement, and through his work on urban poverty and resistance with

Abahlali baseMjondolo Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM, , in English: "the residents of the shacks") is a socialist shack dwellers' movement in South Africa which organises land occupations, builds communes

and the now defunct

Landless Peoples Movement The Landless People's Movement was an independent social movement in South Africa. It consisted of rural people and people living in shack settlements in cities. The Landless People's Movement boycotted parliamentary elections and had a histor ...

in South Africa. Patel has written a number of criticisms of various aspects of the policies and research methods of the World Bank and was a co-editor, with Christopher Brooke, of the online leftist webzine ''The Voice of the Turtle''.

Film appearances

In 2012, he appeared in the

National Film Board of Canada The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; french: Office national du film du Canada (ONF)) is Canada's public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary f ...

documentary ''

Payback Payback may refer to: * Revenge, a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance Payback may also refer to: Art, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * Payback, a member of the fictional comics superhero team Shadow ...

'', based on

Margaret Atwood Margaret Eleanor Atwood (born November 18, 1939) is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, teacher, environmental activist, and inventor. Since 1961, she has published 18 books of poetry, 18 novels, 11 books of non-fiction, nin ...

's '' Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth'', which premiered at the

2012 Sundance Film Festival The 2012 Sundance Film Festival took place from January 19 until January 29, 2012 in Park City, Utah. 64 short films were selected for the festival from 7,675 submissions, including 27 international shorts from 3,592 submissions. Non-competition ...

. He appears in the documentary film '' A Place at the Table'' which opened in the US on 1 March 2013.

Honours and awards

In 2007 he was invited to give the keynote address at the University of

graduation ceremony. He administers the organisation's website. In 2008 he was asked to testify on the global food crisis before the House Financial Services Committee in the USA. In 2009 he joined the advisory board of

Corporate Accountability International Corporate accountability is the acknowledgement and assumption of responsibility for the consequences of a company's actions. It can be defined in narrowly financial terms, e.g. for a business to meet certain standards or address the regulatory re ...

's Value the Meal campaign. In January 2010 some adherents of

Share International Share International Foundation is a non-profit religious organization founded by Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) with its main offices in London, Amsterdam, Tokyo and Berkeley, California. Melton J. Gordon, Gale Research Inc, Jerome Clark, Aidan A. ...

, following an announcement by

Benjamin Creme Benjamin Creme (5 December 1922 − 24 October 2016) was a Scottish artist, author, esotericist, and editor of ''Share International'' magazine. He asserted that the second coming, prophesied by many religions, would come in the form of ''Ma ...

, concluded that Patel could be the Maitreya. Patel denied being the

Maitreya Maitreya (Sanskrit: ) or Metteyya (Pali: ), also Maitreya Buddha or Metteyya Buddha, is regarded as the future Buddha of this world in Buddhist eschatology. As the 5th and final Buddha of the current kalpa, Maitreya's teachings will be aimed at ...

Political views

Patel is a

libertarian socialist Libertarian socialism, also known by various other names, is a left-wing,Diemer, Ulli (1997)"What Is Libertarian Socialism?" The Anarchist Library. Retrieved 4 August 2019. anti-authoritarian, anti-statist and libertarianLong, Roderick T. (201 ...

and has described himself as "someone who has very strong anarchist sympathies." In his book '' The Value of Nothing'' he praised the grassroots

participatory democracy Participatory democracy, participant democracy or participative democracy is a form of government in which citizens participate individually and directly in political decisions and policies that affect their lives, rather than through elected rep ...

practised in the Zapatista

Councils of Good Government Rebel Zapatista Autonomous Municipalities (Spanish: ''Municipios Autónomos Rebeldes Zapatistas'', ''MAREZ'') are ''de facto'' autonomous territories controlled by the neo-Zapatista support bases in the Mexican state of Chiapas, founded follow ...

in southern Mexico and has advocated similar decentralist models of

economic democracy Economic democracy is a socioeconomic philosophy that proposes to shift decision-making power from corporate managers and corporate shareholders to a larger group of public stakeholders that includes workers, customers, suppliers, neighbour ...

and confederal administration as templates to go by for

social justice Social justice is justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society. In Western and Asian cultures, the concept of social justice has often referred to the process of ensuring that individuals fu ...

movements in the

global north Global means of or referring to a globe and may also refer to: Entertainment * ''Global'' (Paul van Dyk album), 2003 * ''Global'' (Bunji Garlin album), 2007 * ''Global'' (Humanoid album), 1989 * ''Global'' (Todd Rundgren album), 2015 * Bruno ...

. He described himself in 2010 as "not a communist r socialist... just open minded". Nonetheless, the analysis of ''A History of the World in Seven Cheap Things: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet'', published seven years later, locates its concept of "cheapness" within a Marxist framework. According to the authors, "Capitalism values only what it can count, and it can count only dollars. Every capitalist wants to invest as little and profit as much as possible. For capitalism, this means that the whole system thrives when powerful states and capitalists can reorganize global nature, invest as little as they can, and receive as much food, work, energy, and raw materials with as little disruption as possible." This extrapolates a key formulation by Marx: “The battle of competition is fought by the cheapening of commodities.”

Quotes

Personal life

Patel became a

US citizen Citizenship of the United States is a legal status that entails Americans with specific rights, duties, protections, and benefits in the United States. It serves as a foundation of fundamental rights derived from and protected by the Constituti ...

on 7 January 2010. In an interview with ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

s Lauren Collins, he considers himself an atheist Hindu.

Books

*'' Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System'' (2008) *''Food Rebellions! Crisis and the Hunger for Justice'', Eric Holt Giménez, Raj Patel (2009) *''Food Rebellions!: Forging Food Sovereignty to Solve the Global Food Crisis'' (2009) *'' The Value of Nothing: How to Reshape Market Society and Redefine Democracy'' (2010) *Forward to ''

No Land! No House! No Vote! Voices from Symphony Way ''No Land! No House! No Vote! Voices from Symphony Way'' is an anthology published in 2011 of 45 factual tales written and edited by the Symphony Way Pavement Dwellers. The foreword to the book is written by activist and author Raj Patel and the ...

'' by the

Symphony Way Pavement Dwellers Symphony Way Informal Settlement was a small community of pavement dwellers (shack dwellers who live on the pavement) that lived on Symphony Way, a main road in Delft, South Africa, from February 2008 until late 2009. They were a group of famili ...

(2011) *''

: A Guide to Capitalism, Nature, and the Future of the Planet'' (2017), with Jason W. Moore *''Inflamed: Deep Medicine and the Anatomy of Injustice'' (2021), with Rupa Marya

References

External links

Raj Patel's websiteStuffed & Starved WebsiteA list of journalism available online by Raj Patel
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Patel, Raj 1972 births Living people Abahlali baseMjondolo members Alumni of the London School of Economics Alumni of the University of Oxford Anti-consumerists Anti-globalization activists Anti-globalization writers British anarchists British atheists British democracy activists 21st-century British economists British food writers British Hindus British political writers British social commentators British socialists British sociologists Cornell University alumni Criticism of capitalism Deified people English people of Indian descent Gujarati people Libertarian socialists Writers from London