Abstract
As people reach for social justice and better lives, they create public goods-- free education, public health, open parks, clean water, and many others-- that must be kept out of the market. When private interests take over, they strip public goods of their power to lift people up, creating instead a tool to diminish democracy, further inequality, and separate us from each other. Cohen and Mikaelian chronicle the efforts to turn our public goods into private profit centers. They show how privatization has touched every aspect of our lives, from water and trash collection to the justice system and the military-- and how citizens can, and are, wresting back what is ours.