An inspiringly hopeful book.
A distinguished social entrepreneur offers insights on how to responsibly transform the interconnecting worlds of technology, business, and politics to elevate “individual and collective dignity."
The early 21st century is an era characterized by increasing economic inequality, crumbling sociopolitical systems, and the looming threat of climate catastrophe. Drawing on her experience working with change-makers and lessons learned from her own humanitarian efforts, Novogratz outlines a set of principles grounded in the idea that a better world can only emerge when individuals seek to serve others rather than themselves. She begins by highlighting the need to cultivate a moral imagination, the ability to “view other people’s problems as if they were your own." This kind of sensitivity helped a young Japanese entrepreneur build meaningful relationships with Colombian cacao farmers who had suffered through decades of political violence and who also wanted to maintain natural balance in the lands they farmed. The process took time, but, in the end, the entrepreneur was able to launch a business that was both socially conscious and sustainable. Listening to “voices unheard”—especially those belonging to the poor—is also critical, as is making a conscious effort to transform oneself into “a bridge…that others might walk across." To help break down the polarities that have come to define our modern age, the author suggests the need to “reach across the wall of either-or and acknowledge the truths that exist in opposing perspectives." The courage to act independently is also necessary for a moral revolution. Novogratz’s story of a privileged female entrepreneur who created a clothing company that trained and employed poor Indian women shows how one person avoided the “conformity trap" while also bearing witness to the value of those shunted to the margins. Wise and optimistic, the author provides a benevolent tonic for those looking to rise above the troubled waters of the age and embrace the “beautiful struggle” of rebuilding our broken world.
An inspiringly hopeful book.Pub Date: May 5, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-22287-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Feb. 23, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A master class in how gender has been weaponized in support of conservative values and authoritarian regimes.
A deeply informed critique of the malicious initiatives currently using gender as a political tool to arouse fear and strengthen political and religious institutions.
In their latest book, following The Force of Nonviolence, Butler, the noted philosopher and gender studies scholar, documents and debunks the anti-gender ideology of the right, the core principle of which is that male and female are natural categories whose recognition is essential for the survival of the family, nations, and patriarchal order. Its proponents reject “sex” as a malleable category infused with prior political and cultural understandings. By turning gender into a “phantasmatic scene,” they enable those in positions of authority to deflect attention from such world-destroying forces as war, predatory capitalism, and climate change. Butler explores the ideology’s presence in the U.S., the U.K., Uganda, and Hungary, countries where legislation has limited the rights of trans and homosexual people and denied them their sexual identity. The author also delves into the ideology’s roots among Evangelicals and the Catholic Church and such political leaders as Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán. Butler is particularly bothered by trans-exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs), who treat trans women as “male predators in disguise.” For the author, “the gap between the perceived or lived body and prevailing social norms can never be fully closed.” They imagine “a world where the many relations to being socially embodied that exist become more livable” and calls for alliances across differences and “a radical democracy informed by socialist values.” Butler compensates for the thinness of some of their recommendations with an astute dissection of the ideology’s core ideas and impressive grasp of its intellectual pretensions. This is a wonderfully thoughtful and impassioned book on a critically important centerpiece of contemporary authoritarianism and patriarchy.
A master class in how gender has been weaponized in support of conservative values and authoritarian regimes.Pub Date: March 19, 2024
ISBN: 9780374608224
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 5, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2024
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
SEEN & HEARD
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