Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam

After having finished Hope against Hope which spoke of the condition of Russia in 1930's, I decided to swing in the opposite direction with the next book. In this case, Bowling Alone maps the sociological progression of the American community after World War II by examining the external relationships that Americans have with one and another. In 1930's Russia, no clubs, teams, or organizations could exist except one - the State. On the opposite end of the spectrum is the USA, where people are given the full freedom to take part in any community-based organization that exists. And, if one does not exist, we are entitled to create our own. This freedom of social involvement is one of the most crucial aspects of a vibrant democracy. Unfortunately, it has been in consistent decline since the late 1960's. Putnam attempts to seek out why this is the case and what can be done about.

The first part of the book introduces an important theme running through America. There are more clubs and organizations now than there ever were in the preceding decades. How then can one say that club memberships are down? What Putnam shows is how the dynamics of membership in these clubs are different. Today, there are all types of clubs imaginable. Organizations like Greenpeace, the NRA, or the Sierra Club have millions of members. However, the vast majority of these members will never actually come together to discuss a new approach to recycling or the caliber of their assault rifle. Instead they will rely on these organizations to act as lobbies mainly for political purposes. It is the other type of clubs that Putnam says are at risk: local Kiwanis, Boy Scouts, and Knights of Columbus.

Why have these organizations seen their memberships decline? Putnam plows through piles of data in search for the answer. However, like much in life, there is never just one justification. Instead, he identifies a few key contributors, which come as no surprise. Longer commutes, television viewing, duel income households and a generations shift, e.g. Americans in the 1940s were united by World War II. All of this leads to a reduction in social capital, which along side human and physical capital are crucial components of a successful society.

People that interact with others often are happier, more civic and less likely to commit crimes than those who are isolated. The communities in which social interconnectedness is strong, is a better, safer place to live than a less connected society. And, what I found to be most interesting is that encouraging certain aspects of social capital will lead to positive effects in what, at first glance, would seem not related.

For example, North Carolina scores 41st in the nation on SAT scores in High school while Connecticut scores 8th. According to Putnam, "by controlling for all the other ways in which the two states differ (wealth and poverty, race, adult education, and so on), for North Carolina to see education outcomes similar to Connecticut's, according to our statistical analysis, residents in the Tar Heel state could do any of the following: increase their turnout in presidential elections by 50%; double their frequency of club meeting attendance, triple the number of non-profits per thousand residents." As he goes on to explain, these factors above have a greater effect on test scores than many traditional, and often costly, education policies such as reducing class room size. Social capital is more difficult to measure but its presence in our lives cannot be ignored when attempting to tackle many of the problems facing our schools, inner cities, or entire states.

The question that I kept waiting to be answered is - so what do we do now? It never really was. I have a hard time believing the findings of this book came as a huge surprise back in 2000 when it was written. Has the situation improved since then? Have the I-pod or Facebook done more to worsen the situation? Has September 11th brought us together like World War II did in to previous generations?

On an even more philisophocial level, are these devices and trends simply a reflection of our society and the direction in which we want to go? Is it wrong if we find more satisfaction in isolating ourselves from others than in meeting with others? I, personally, believe it is. However, more importantly, my human instincts often act as my guide pushing me towards interaction with others. For me it is the best guide. However, I am not burdened by many of the damaging factors Putnam atributes to the reduction of our social interaction, namely a grueling commute or excessive TV watching. Eliminating these two factors would certainly open a new world up to hundreds of millions of people throughout the world. It seems like a good start could be to put down the remote. Let's start there.

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Hope Against Hope by Nadezhda Mandelstam

One of the reasons I decided to write this blog was to become a more critical reader. Now as I read a book, I begin to formulate the arguments that are then discussed on this page. My most recent read proved to be a difficult text on a few different levels and as I type these words I am still unsure how to encapsulate the subject matter. Therefore, I now understand why George Steiner of the New Yorker is quoted as saying, "nothing one can say will either communicate or effect the genius of this book. To pass judgment on it is almost insolence-even judgment that is merely celebration and homage." I was not able to fully grasp the genius of this memoir written about Russia in the 1930's but I can relate in the difficulty of actually passing judgment on the work.

A dear friend of mine with a deep knowledge of communism has always told me that Marx's political ideology was never meant for a country like Russia. Certainly the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917 led way to a complete transformation of a society at all levels - from economic to cultural. However the tactics used by Stalin to "pacify" society for the betterment of all led to a nation gripped by fear who saw millions of its citizens sent to the forced labor camps to die.

Within this period any type of expression deemed disruptive to the state was not tolerated. Those involved risked death. The intellectuals who supplied cultural material to the country did so either in a state-sponsored position or underground. The first approach meant that all poems, books and music were subject to government approval while the latter meant living a transitory life with no security, money, or assistance. Many of these individuals were seen as a nemesis to the state and were arrested and sent to camps.

Hope Against Hope could be the best and most humanistic account we have of what life was like during that period for someone who opposed the state. It is the memoir written by the wife of Oris Mandelstam - one of Russia's most famous poets. These two individuals spent their entire marriage on the run mainly due to one poem Mandelstam wrote which included two negative lines about Stalin. A poem! Arrest! What absurdity.

Our history of Russia and the will of man are both richer thanks to this book. Having access to this period cannot be taken for granted because so many millions of pages of text, be it poems, biographies or novels, never made it beyond the eyes of the secret police who confiscated and later destroyed them. The fact that this memoir survived is a miracle in its own right.

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Ghost Wars by Steve Toll

History is fascinating because of its continuous progression through time. Events that have already taken place will combine themselves with events yet to occur. This combination will create future outcomes that will then be discussed and written about as history. Three major, international events are unfolding before our eyes without any foreseeable end in sight. Their story is yet to be completed, their history not yet ready to be declared. The link which connects Iraq, Afghanistan and the financial crisis is how each are in some form a consequence of how the United States has managed itself and viewed the world after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

So much of our past has up until now been condensed into historic episodes - The Great Depression, World War II, Vietnam & 1968, The Cold War. How will the episode we are currently living through be later defined? What overarching conclusions, yet to be drawn, will weave these three events together? These are questions I have been asking myself with greater regularity.

I have found it interesting to see Ronald Reagan's name emerging with greater frequency in the international media when discussing the Financial crisis. An icon of fiscal conservatives, his disdain for government involvement in the market has within the last year been called into question like never before. From a military and foreign policy perspective we have seen how those from the Reagan school, i.e. Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz, struggled to see the world through a Post-Cold War lens when orchestrating their military strategies in the Middle East. This school had viewed the world up until 1989 in terms of good and evil. As a result, it was easier to mount a military and propaganda-based war against a single, devilish individual than it was to understand and make understood the country of Afghanistan. Once again, September 11, 2001 was carried out by the Al-Qaeda members located at camps in Afghanistan. Iraq had no involvement in it.

"Ghost Wars - The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001", will certainly be consulted for years to come as an essential read for those seeking a historic context behind September 11th. The book is laid out in a perfect chronological sequence. It does an excellent job of tying in the numerous individuals who in some way played a significant role in the developments of Afghanistan over the last 30 years. And it does so by adequately introducing the individuals, something that was not accomplished in the book, Paris 1919, for example.

To summarize Afghanistan from the US perspective, the CIA was heavily involved in the country as it was battling the Soviets in the early 1980's. Unable to conquer this incredibly difficult country, the USSR withdrew which led to a decline in US interest in the region. From that point up until September 2001, the US did not take a position on the country due to several complicated relationships it had in place with Pakistani and Saudi intelligence as well as one particular warlord in Northern Afghanistan.

The U.S. was well aware of Bin Laden's presence in the country. Its failure to capture him can be hailed as a truly bi-partisan effort. Clinton was too often bogged down with his own personal issues and with different poorly timed election campaigns. The eight months Bush was in office prior to September 11th, showed a cabinet wide lack of interest in terrorism and Bin Laden even though the CIA was ringing the alarm bells months before the attacks.

However, in the end, Ghost Wars proves that blame cannot be placed on one person. September 11th was a result of a series of mistakes and several instances of bad luck which accumulated over two decades to finally detonate with the attacks on the Twin Towers and Pentagon. the book also hints that "the system" in place regarding international law on such issues as assassination, had been constructed before the rules of war were turned on their head with the introduction of a new, more deadly form of international terrorism.

I fully recommend this book and strongly urge people to read it especially considering the critical juncture we find ourselves at in the start of 2009 with a new president. Obama will be forced to make the decision whether to drastically increase the troop presence, and therefore causalities, or to withdraw from the country all together as the Soviets did thirty years ago. Our current approach is simply not working.

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The Meaning of Everything by Simon Winchester

The Story of the Oxford Dictionary

In modern day and age it is difficult to conceptualize what it means to undertake a project so massive in scale that the person leading it will most likely not live long enough to see its completion. Where do you derive your motivation from when you are aware that the satisfaction of conclusion will probably not be experienced? Yet, it is in these life-devoting undertakings that many of our worldly treasures came to be. While the current global economy is paying dearly for its overfixation on short term results, it is worth reflecting back on the marvels in history that took years, decades, or centuries to complete. The thirteen week business quarter is such a short period of time that many of these accomplishments certainly did not even show any physical change over 91 days. Now careers are ended and projects scrapped if tangible results cannot be demonstrated in this timeframe.

Michaelangelo worked four years on the Sistine Chapel which is equivalent to about an afternoon's worth of time when compared to the seventy years required to assemble the Oxford English dictionary (OED). This dictionary has little in common with the pocket Webster II crammed into many modern home libraries. The objective of this dictionary was to give definition to all words used in the English language and to reference the previous uses of each word. This required a level of research of the endless number of potential texts that is difficult to comprehend as it reached from New Zealand to the United States. A project of this nature demanded collaboration across oceans imaginable in modern times with email and phone, less so at the turn of the 20th century. To further complicate matters, many of the dictionaries most essential collaborators were volunteers whose only connection to the OED was their passion for reading and interest in the project.

Winchester's account of this story is average overall, fascinating in certain places. We are introduced to several interesting characters whose efforts made up the impressive piece of human achievement today called the OED. To become editor of the OED required a certain type of individual, to say the least. A love for the English language was important but not adequate, mainly because our language derives from so many continental European influences. English represents a combination of these languages in many ways and therefore the editors of the OED were fluent in over ten.

So, what is the outcome of this work? It is a masterpiece that documents our complete language. Since its release in 1928 there has been one new edition with several supplements for the new words appearing in the modern form of our language. The third edition is one quarter complete. The OED is currently celebrating its 80th birthday with a commemorative edition of this twenty volume masterpiece. The offer expires in four days - price for the set? $895. Too bad we just missed Christmas.

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Nudge by R. Thaler and C.R. Sunstein

UPDATE: Sunstein has become the "legal czar" for the Obama administration.

Access to nearly endless choice is one of the defining elements of the capitalist world we live in, unless you are one of my North Korean or Cuban followers. Allow any firm the ability to offer their goods or services to the market. Those with the strongest offering will find success, while those not able sell their goods and make a profit will, in their own right, cease to exist. GM not included.

The premise of this book deals with how human beings make decisions in response to these choices and how they can be "nudged" into doing so as to better benefit themselves. For economists all decisions are rational while in reality we know this is not the case. Human instincts are very strong and are weighed down by various biases which prevent a rational decision making process.

A trip to the supermarket confirms that companies are well aware of this irrational decision making and they take all the steps to "nudge" you towards their product by paying more for eye-level shelf space, wafting the smell of baking bread throughout the store, and placing milk at the back of the store.

The gist of the book is built around the following - the placement of a certain, more expensive, yogurt may convince me to buy one I normally would not, but I have hundreds of future opportunities to correct this poorly made decision. However, certain decisions regarding investments, retirement plans, health care, and university are drastically limited. So much so that many of these decisions will be made perhaps only one time in your life. Better not screw it up, to say it mildly. Yet, just like the yogurts in the supermarket, the number of healthcare or pension plans has become endless. How do we nudge people to make the best decision regarding these important long term subjects?

One example of how to nudge effectively without restricting choice is by selecting, well-researched and balanced default options for people while always allowing them the choice to select a plan for themselves. With Medicare, this would mean by default that a selection of prescription medicine plans for the elderly would be made from one of the 60 available plans based on previous prescription records of the recipient. This seams logical enough. In reality, when the overhaul of Medicare took place in 2003, the default option for prescriptions medicine plans was in most cases "non-enrollment" or "random selection". To further complicate matters, the process for selecting the plan (from 60 of them!) was not very clear for various reasons explained in the book.

This is an entertaining and insightful read. It demonstrates how, namely, government and its associated bodies can direct the majority of its citizens, from school lunchrooms to organ donations, to mutually beneficial outcomes without imposing sweeping regulation.

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The Eagle and the Fried Chicken by Vittorio Zucconi

I enjoy Zucconi the journalist, who acts as the US correspondent for La Reppublica newspaper in Italy. Perhaps the enormous letdown of this book was amplified even more because I had expected much more from this author. I guess I will continue to read Zucconi's articles but not his books.

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