Praise forEmpire of Rubber:
Named One of the Best Books of the Fall byBloomberg
Mitman peppers this history with a wealth of fascinating details and interesting characters.
Foreign Affairs
A fascinating and enlightening page-turner that uncovers Liberias often-overlooked importance in U.S. history.
Foreign Policy
Calls into question Western ideas of progress, and powerfully traces the results of the Firestone experiment to the war and poverty that would wrack the nation.
Shelf Awareness
Superbly crafted. . . . Empire of Rubber is primarily a portrait of power as it was and is exercised through American capital.
Africa Is a Country
Gregg Mitman provides an accessible, compelling, and monumental account of the surprisingly American history of Liberia.
Science for the People
"A well-rendered and -documented tale of exploitation in the developing world."
Kirkus Reviews
"[Empire of Rubber] documents the fragile arrangement between Firestone and the Liberian government that has existed for 95 years, surviving civil war and power plays on both sides, proving lucrative for some while causing great devastation with its racism and the depletion of natural resources.
Booklist
A harrowing and richly detailed account of U.S. tire manufacturer Firestones exploitation of Liberian workers in the 20th century . . . Mitman marshals a wealth of material to make his case, which encompasses ecological injustice, racial capitalism, and medical racism. The result is a devastating expose of the tensions between the interests of white capital and the desire for Black self-determination.
Publishers Weekly(starred review)
With the Firestone archives closed to him, Gregg Mitman has to strain for a clear view of how Harvey Firestone transformed a small Liberian rubber plantation into a Goliath that broke a British monopoly on latex. But Mitmans lack of access to company archives makesEmpire of Rubbera better book. He finds plenty of Liberians and Americans, or the archives and accounts left by their predecessors and by dissident scholars, to fill in the blanks. The reader is left with a gem of a social history linking two countries stuck in uncomfortable embrace for well over a century.
Paul Farmer, Kolokotrones University Professor and chair of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard University, and author ofFevers, Feuds, and Diamonds: Ebola and the Ravages of History
Empire of Rubberis at once an iconic story and utterly unique. In Mitmans clear, complex, and compelling narrative, he provides privy to the measured and malevolent workings of the U.S. as an imperial formation. Mitmans account . . . is told with erudition and grace in a powerful narrative that combines the political imaginaries and grounded conditions of racism, capitalism, and visionaries long at the heart of imperial democracies.
Ann Laura Stoler, Willy Brandt Distinguished University Professor of Anthropology and Historical Studies and director, Institute for Critical Social Inquiry, New School for Social Research, and author ofDuress: Imperial Durabilities in Our Times
Gregg Mitman has delivered a brilliant, compelling read.Empire of Rubberdraws together the long history of commodity colonialism, the imperial roots of Liberias recent civil war, and the fraught relations between American medical institutions and racism at home and abroad.Empire of Rubberdramatizes intersectional thinking at its very best.
Rob Nixon, Barron Family Professor of Environment and Humanities, Princeton University, and author ofSlow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor
In this brilliantly rendered, epic tale of American racial capitalism in West Africa, Gregg Mitman details the profound and devastating effects of plantation agriculture. In the process he unearths the political and legal machinations of Firestone rubber in undermining Black sovereignty, and reveals the violence of corporate philanthropy in the guise of development.
Julie Livingston, professor of history, and social and cultural analysis at New York University, MacArthur fellow, and author ofImprovising Medicine
In this brilliant and powerfully moving narrative of the Firestone Tire Companys activities in Liberia, Gregg Mitman provides an unprecedented account of the destructive power of racial capitalism on colonized bodies and ecologies . . . Empire of Rubber is unique in its exposition of the connection between the Firestone company and elite American universities and unrivaled in its account of the valiant fight Liberians put up to maintain their autonomy.
Simon Gikandi, Robert Schirmer Professor of English, Princeton University, and author of Slavery and the Culture of Taste
