HRF Chief Strategy Officer Alex Gladstein has published a new book called “Check Your Financial Privilege,” detailing the intersection of money, human rights, and financial repression inside authoritarian regimes around the world.
The book details how people are using Bitcoin and cryptocurrency to shield themselves from government abuse everywhere from Cuba to Sudan to Afghanistan.
“Gladstein shows how this novel money is defying traditional wealth-building methods by working with humanity rather than against it.”
– Farida Nabourema, Togolese writer, human rights defender, and Pan-Africanist
“‛Cash Rules Everything Around Me.’ This incredible Wu-Tang hook references everything Alex explores in these chapters on the control exerted by governments and corporations through monetary policy, and how the Bitcoin protocol will help free us all.”
– Jack Dorsey, Co-founder and former CEO, Twitter; Founder and CEO, Block, Inc.
“In Zimbabwe our biggest note became an astonishing but useless one hundred trillion dollar note. We lost everything because of a brutal and corrupt government took it all. Alex Gladstein reveals what Bitcoin can and is doing for people who are at the mercy of political looting gangs in designer suits backed by the military. He shows how Bitcoin is a genuine chance at freedom for billions of people trapped in financial oppression.”
– Evan Mawarire, Zimbabwean Pastor and Pro-Democracy Advocate
“The use of Bitcoin by people throughout the developing world remains poorly understood, which is what makes Alex’s detailed work on the topic so useful.”
– Lyn Alden, Founder, Lyn Alden Investment Strategy
“Alex is one of the few experts who truly understands what Bitcoin can mean for the billions living under dictatorship – but also, how the current system creates and sustaing inequality, authoritarianism, and imperialism.”
– Iyad el-Baghdadi, Arab Spring activist and President, Kawaakibi Foundation
Proceeds from the sale of this book support the Human Rights Foundation.