Gelber makes solid work of describing China's past and suggesting what those consequences might be. A readable, sturdy...
A fluent and thorough, though understandably brief, survey of Chinese history.
It is a daunting task for a historian to compress the history of “a collection of tribes in the Yellow River valley” grown to “the largest state of the globe, comprising one-quarter of the human race.” Uncowed, Gelber (Nations Out of Empires, 2001, etc.) traces the rise of a discernibly Chinese state some 3,000 ago, from which emerges his overarching theme: China’s constant negotiation with, and sometimes conquest by or absorption of, a stream of foreigners, from the Hsiung-nu riders beyond the walls to the European concessionaries of Shanghai and, lately, American entrepreneurs. Other constants in his narrative are warfare; the collapse of empires presumed to stand forever, such as the Qin dynasty; and the steadily increasing centralization of power in the hands of the state, as with the tax-and-spend Tang dynasty, which required of landowners “tax in grain, tax in the form of materials like textiles, and tax in the form of labour or military service.” China has seen long periods of rule by non-Chinese; the Mongols, who succeeded the Tang, for instance, kept a careful separation of ethnic groups and conducted their affairs in the Persian language, while influential Jesuits saw to it that the language of the early modern nation was Latin. Today it is likely to be English, and Gelber concludes his able survey, studded with sidebars on such matters as concubinage and silk-making, with a quiet, Taoist-tinged note meant for those Westerners who fear China as a potential rival and enemy: “No pattern or structure of power or of relations lasts very long. America itself will change. . . . How China develops . . . equally depends on myriad decisions not yet made, or even formulated, each of them attended by the inevitability of unintended consequences.” That is to say: There’s history yet to come.
Gelber makes solid work of describing China's past and suggesting what those consequences might be. A readable, sturdy overview, worthy of shelving alongside Joseph Levenson and Franz Schurmann’s China: An Interpretive History.Pub Date: May 1, 2007
ISBN: 0-8027-1591-5
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Walker
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2007
A declaration worth hearing out in a time of growing inequality—and indignity.
Noted number cruncher Sperling delivers an economist’s rejoinder to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Former director of the National Economic Council in the administrations of Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, the author has long taken a view of the dismal science that takes economic justice fully into account. Alongside all the metrics and estimates and reckonings of GDP, inflation, and the supply curve, he holds the great goal of economic policy to be the advancement of human dignity, a concept intangible enough to chase the econometricians away. Growth, the sacred mantra of most economic policy, “should never be considered an appropriate ultimate end goal” for it, he counsels. Though 4% is the magic number for annual growth to be considered healthy, it is healthy only if everyone is getting the benefits and not just the ultrawealthy who are making away with the spoils today. Defining dignity, admits Sperling, can be a kind of “I know it when I see it” problem, but it does not exist where people are a paycheck away from homelessness; the fact, however, that people widely share a view of indignity suggests the “intuitive universality” of its opposite. That said, the author identifies three qualifications, one of them the “ability to meaningfully participate in the economy with respect, not domination and humiliation.” Though these latter terms are also essentially unquantifiable, Sperling holds that this respect—lack of abuse, in another phrasing—can be obtained through a tight labor market and monetary and fiscal policy that pushes for full employment. In other words, where management needs to come looking for workers, workers are likely to be better treated than when the opposite holds. In still other words, writes the author, dignity is in part a function of “ ‘take this job and shove it’ power,” which is a power worth fighting for.
A declaration worth hearing out in a time of growing inequality—and indignity.Pub Date: May 5, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-7987-5
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Penguin Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 25, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
A straightforward tale of kindness and paying it forward in 1980s New York.
When advertising executive Schroff answered a child’s request for spare change by inviting him for lunch, she did not expect the encounter to grow into a friendship that would endure into his adulthood. The author recounts how she and Maurice, a promising boy from a drug-addicted family, learned to trust each other. Schroff acknowledges risks—including the possibility of her actions being misconstrued and the tension of crossing socio-economic divides—but does not dwell on the complexities of homelessness or the philosophical problems of altruism. She does not question whether public recognition is beneficial, or whether it is sufficient for the recipient to realize the extent of what has been done. With the assistance of People human-interest writer Tresniowski (Tiger Virtues, 2005, etc.), Schroff adheres to a personal narrative that traces her troubled relationship with her father, her meetings with Maurice and his background, all while avoiding direct parallels, noting that their childhoods differed in severity even if they shared similar emotional voids. With feel-good dramatizations, the story seldom transcends the message that reaching out makes a difference. It is framed in simple terms, from attributing the first meeting to “two people with complicated pasts and fragile dreams” that were “somehow meant to be friends” to the conclusion that love is a driving force. Admirably, Schroff notes that she did not seek a role as a “substitute parent,” and she does not judge Maurice’s mother for her lifestyle. That both main figures experience a few setbacks yet eventually survive is never in question; the story fittingly concludes with an epilogue by Maurice. For readers seeking an uplifting reminder that small gestures matter.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4516-4251-3
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Howard Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2011
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