by Dominic Sandbrook ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 17, 2011
The author’s frequent allusions to the era’s films, TV shows, books and music lend color and context to an already...
A British historian revisits the politics and culture of a miserable American decade.
Tom Wolfe famously dubbed the 1970s “The ‘Me’ Decade,” when anything hopeful or noble about the ’60s either curdled or congealed. Three undistinguished presidencies—Nixon, Ford and Carter—presided over an angry, resentful, self-absorbed populace reeling from Vietnam and Watergate and suffering from high unemployment, inflation and taxes. At the same time, liberalism dozed, either unaware or dismissive of the gathering conservative reaction to a corrupt establishment that, to them, fostered permissiveness, lawlessness and regular assaults on the traditional family. Against this backdrop of cultural decay, working-class discontent and middle-class resentment arose the populist right. Scorned by opponents as kooks and racists, derided as poorly educated and fearful of modernity, these activists helped prepare the ground for the Reagan Revolution. Sandbrook’s principal cast includes characters like James Dobson and his Focus on the Family pressure group; Howard Jarvis, the California anti-tax crusader; Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Oral Roberts and Robert Schuller, evangelists who moved boldly into the political arena; singer Anita Bryant, who campaigned against a gay-rights ordinance in Florida; Louise Day Hicks, who led demonstrations against busing in South Boston; Phyllis Schlafly, who spearheaded opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment; Richard Viguerie, who invented direct-mail fundraising on behalf of conservative causes; and Paul Weyrich, who helped bring big money to the movement and whose Heritage Foundation offered ideological guidance. Sandbrook (Never Had It So Good: A History of Britain from Suez to the Beatles, 2005, etc.) also surveys a multitude of ’70s phenomena, including redneck chic, the booming of the Sunbelt, the revival of country music, the surprising nostalgia for the ’50s, Bobby Riggs v. Billy Jean King, Norman Mailer v. Germaine Greer, New York as Fear City and California Dreaming becoming the Golden State Nightmare.
The author’s frequent allusions to the era’s films, TV shows, books and music lend color and context to an already penetrating and evenhanded political analysis.Pub Date: Feb. 17, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4000-4262-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2010
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BOOK REVIEW
by Erin Meyer ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 27, 2014
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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by Abhijit V. Banerjee & Esther Duflo ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 12, 2019
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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