History Books

Afterthoughts: The title could have been "The Wisdom of One Man" because author James Surowiecki impressively exemplifies his theory - that large groups of people are collectively smarter than the smartest individuals themselves - through countless examples from past and present world affairs. Diverse and thought-provoking, Surowiecki's selection takes us from ocean floor to outer space, from a New Mexico bar to a field goal post, Detroit's first car to Zara's latest shipment, gangster films, traffic jams - the list goes on and on. This actually creates a conflict - you're learning so much from each paragraph that it's hard to remember what you read on the page prior. The reading experience is best described as "fleeting factual fun."

Takeaway: The knowledge must sink into the subconscious somehow because it can be applied instantaneously. For instance, barely into chapter three, I found myself jogging around Washington DC. Normally, I cross streets wherever and whenever I want. Citing the pedestrian's right of way, I basically run amuck with everyone else. But I quickly noticed that on these streets, no one else's feet were as arrogant as mine. Everyone was standing at the crosswalks waiting for the little white man to light up for permission to go. Were they just an obedient bunch of tourists OR were police officers in DC more likely to ticket jaywalkers? I opted to wait and walk with the wisdom of this crowd. I'll never know what could have happened had I chose to walk my way but I definitely felt like I had championed my inner intellect in knowing why I acted like I did. At the very least, it balanced out the feeling of inadequacy that resulted when I tried to pronounce the author's last name...

Kristen Zatina
[...]

I have a confession to make. I started reviewing this book before reading it, based purely on the rather lengthy subtitle `Why the Many Are Smarter than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations'. First, I planned to make a sneering reference to the dotcom bubble as evidence of this collective wisdom. Then, point to Charles Mackay's classic Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds. How sad that this ignorant journalist had pinched the title but absorbed none of the content. Finish with a brief summary of the theory of information cascades, which shows how it can be individually rational to follow the crowd instead of your own opinion.

I thought all this, and suffered terrible embarrassment, if only in the privacy of my own home. For James Surowiecki, of course, covered all these bases and more. The book is not a mindless hymn to the virtues of the marketplace but a nuanced analysis, supported by many historical and contemporary examples, of the conditions under which groups can and can't make better decisions than even the most brilliant individuals.

He argues that there are

"four conditions that characterize wise crowds: diversity of opinion . . . independence . . . decentralization . . . and aggregation"

Unfortunately, the meaning of these terms is not entirely clear. And later in the book the necessary conditions are whittled down to three, aggregation for some reason being left out. Similarly, his classification of cognition, coordination and cooperation problems is not well explained. Since the entire first half of the book is based on these distinctions, it can be a little hard to follow. The second half, which applies these concepts to real world problems like traffic jams, peer reviewed science, committees, company organization, markets, and democratic government, is much better.

So much for the form of the book. Fortunately, the content is excellent. The pages are crammed with humorous and illuminating tales. My own favorite: In the wake of the Challenger disaster, the stock of the four major contractors involved with the shuttle program all lost value. By the end of the day, Thiokol (who built the solid fuel boosters) was down 12%, the other three only 3%. The next day, the New York Times reported two rumors unconnected with Thiokol and declared there were "no clues". Six months later the Presidential Commission revealed its findings: the O-ring seals on the boosters were responsible. There was no evidence of any insider trading.

If this story does not take your fancy, there are dozens of others to choose from (many from more systematic if less memorable studies). Failures of rationality are given space along with successes: stock bubbles, intelligence failures, the Columbia disaster. Some of the conclusions are commonplace to economists and possibly surprising to those who are not: seemingly "wasteful" competition can be a valuable discovery procedure, central planning fails because those who have the information lack the power and incentive to act on it, fund managers tend to underperform market indexes, prediction markets (which were so strongly rejected when proposed for terrorism) are the way of the future. And some may be shocking to economists and commonplace to everyone else: sometimes the collective good is served by individually irrational decisions, such as voting or paying taxes.

Like Freakonomics, The Wisdom of Crowds is based on a wealth of informative and amusing material that is partly spoiled by its presentation. Unlike Freakonomics, it is a book which is unashamedly devoted to one central theme. As such, the sheer abundance of information is sometimes a distraction. It also lacks an index, which can be a considerable nuisance. A little pruning, combined with clear and consistent terminology and organisation, would have lifted this book into the five-star category.

Originally published in the Economic Record, September 2006.

There's a reason why democracy is the crappiest form of government, except all others (to paraphrase somebody famous).

The theme of this book is that groups of people are smarter than individual people. It's sort of counterintuitive to the American spirit of individualism, but James Surowiecki does a creditable job of providing a good case to support his thesis in a very readable format. Anyone who regularly works in problem-solving groups will immediately recognize the fundamental truth of the author's message.

It contains excellent (and entertaining) historical examples that should provide plenty of food-for-thought for any student of government, economics or history. Which means, in a perfect world, it should provide something of interest for just about any participant in any collaborative, collective or power-sharing structure (ie, any effective organization, and a double-dose for every ineffective organization).

My only problem with this volume (and it's not really a problem) is that Surowiecki didn't go far enough. He could have productively doubled the size of this book, and given many more prescriptive formulas for effective group participation and leadership. It would provide a great counter-weight to a number of existing works that seem to suggest the same thing (but are far more tedious). A good updating would be helpful as well (considering the plethora of abundant, and more recent, examples of the disasters of individual [or 'siloed'] decision-making).

In its current form, the book is a great primer on the subject; in an expanded format it could be enormously powerful. His basic thesis, however, could not be more relevant. I strongly recommend it.

This author has done an outstanding job of proving his thesis that groups of people are smarter than the smartest person in the group. The book touches on markets, juries, and economics, and many more topics, furthering his main point. This book will persuade the reader that experts and loners do not make the best decisions, but groups of informed people do.

This fascinating book it based on a simple, but counterintuitive premise--that a crowd of diverse people will almost always be smarter than any single expert. That is, take a group of people, some who may be educated, some who may be experts, and some who may be completely misinformed, and let them each independently solve a problem. Then, if you can take the average solution, it will be close to correct. Moreover, it will be closer than almost everyone else in the group. It's basically a bell-curve of knowledge, in which the exact center point would be the best guess.

Surowieki gives numerous examples, from betting markets, stock markets, psychological experiments, game theory, nature, artificial intelligence, economics and business. Two of the cases that really stand out to me are the search for a missing submarine, the Scorpion, in 1968, and the stock market's reaction to the Challenger disaster in 1986. In the case of the Scorpion, an enterprising naval officer named John Craven assembled a diverse team of men with a wide range of knowledge and had each guess, without consulting with one another, where the sub was. He then averaged their guesses. The sub was found 220 feet from that location. Similarly, after the Challenger crash, the stocks of most companies involved in the space program predictably took a quick nosedive. Most also quickly recovered, with the exception of Thiokol, the company that produced the O-rings on the rocket boosters. The stock market seemed to say that Thiokol was responsible, though all news at that point was that the cause was unknown. It wasn't until six months later, when the Presidential Commission released a report that the stock market was proven correct. It had been the O-rings.

Surowieki discusses different types of group decisions and how the theory applies to each. He also covers the many dangers that often befall groups making decisions leading to things like groupthink and stock market bubbles.

The Wisdom of Crowds is a radical theory, one that runs counter to much of what we believe in a democratic society and an economy based on the hierarchical org chart--namely in the power of the individual, the knowledge of our experts, and the wisdom of our leaders. Its implications for the way we manage our companies and our government is enormous. But after reading this book, it's hard to doubt its wisdom.

I grew up on a farm in southern Idaho, homesteaded by my grandparents in 1903, The stories are very@simular to the way@we lived, but with the addition of electrcity, I think I shall write a book. But most of all I am reading it om m y Kindle| Marilyn Dakan. Ruidoso, NM

I am sooooo glad that this book was mentioned to me. My husband loves it as he learned a good trick: he wears expensive leather work gloves, the right hand ALWAYS wore out first, he had 9 left handed gloves laying around. The book told the story of a family that 'made do' with what they had during hard times. Turn the left hand glove inside out and you have a right hander. So many little things that this family did, I can still turn a shirt collar like my gramma taught me. A great and fine story during the Great Depression of an Iowa farm family with several children. I can remember polishing my little Patent leather shoes with Vaseline etc. I can see myself reading this again later on. It is a joy to read.

This book was so comforting to read. I'd fix a cupof tea, grab the book and go hide in a quiet room to read. With all the hardships she faced on the farm, I still am envious. What a wonderful way to remember your childhood. I'd recommend this to anyone!

To me this well written book was so enjoyable from beginning to the end; it is the way it was and I almost found myself envying this family. It took me back to basics and a time I remembered so well and identified with their way of life.

I know everyone loved this book. The New York Times Book Review named it one of the 10 best books of 2007. I just don't get it. There are chapters on frugality and outhouse pranks and nut gathering. Cold winters and back-breaking chores abound, but none of it held my interest. Despite the slimness of the volume, I struggled to finish. This memoir reads like an disjointed collection of encyclopedia entries pertaining to country life rather than a living, breathing experience.

This book is not only insightful, important, and educational, it's also entertaining. I got it at about 3PM and by 8PM I had finished it. I had planned for it to last me several weeks.

More importantly, get copies of this book into the hands of your younger siblings, your children, your young friends, and anyone else you know who has yet to be crushed into conformity by the pressures of corporate life, family, and years of kneeling before The Man. You might just save them, and the world.

I had already downloaded and read the free ebook version of the book and found it so good, so filled with ideas (techy, political, social...) that I had to buy the dead-tree version just so I could lend it to people that would benefit from the knowledge therein. So far, all have enjoyed it.
Just go on and get it, I guarantee you'll be entertained... at the very least you'll come out a little wiser

There's no question that terrorists (of various stripes) pose a threat to free societies. The real question is whether the anti-terrorist measures work. This book explores how a young man and his friends run headfirst into that question.

While I am one who believes that much of what we've done in the US has made us less free as a people, I would hope that those who disagree with me will have read through a book like this to test their own conclusions. (Don't get me wrong--I'm not pro-terrorist, and I'm all for *smart* security measures.)

Buy it for yourself. Buy it for the neighbor's kids. Buy it for your local library. Buy it as an act of protest, an act of patriotism, an act of loyal dissent. Heck, just buy it because it's a book you won't want to put down.

A very timely, and realistic portrayal of how our civil liberties are on their death bed - a 'what if' story that predicts, believably, what would happen after another 9/11 style attack, in a manner that should strike home with its readers. Our country doesn't have a problem with torture and secret prisons, this we have learned - what comes next?
Very like some of Scott Westerfeld's books, in theme, pacing and writing style.
The book started out like gangbusters - a 5(6!), but the pace slowed for me considerably. I felt that some repetition seemed sloppy.
I was distracted by whether or not the characters were trustworthy, not an inappropriate train of thought for the story - but one that didn't ultimately satisfy in my reading. Some of the characters didn't seem very dimensional.
These things not withstanding, the importance of this subject at this time in our nation's history is paramount - and I sincerely hope that many people are reading it and taking it to heart. Our future freedoms may well depend on it.

What started out as an enjoyable book about a group of "hackers" took an extreme left turn.

The city in which this book takes place, San Francisco, is already filled with anti-war and anti-government and it is not a far stretched idea that the events in this could only happen there.

The author does a good job in portraying the student and teacher who are in favor of government, essentially not liberal; seem unintelligent, timid and unable to discuss opinions in a calm manner. A student in Marcus' class, who deems what DHS is doing is for their protection, is made to be an anger filled child who is unable to express himself without interrupting others and shouting.

A reporter from Fox News is shown as hateful and is described as acting superior to others. Fox News as a whole is portrayed as "evil". I should not be surprised that a book dripping with liberal bias and spin is being marketed to children but I find that I am. This book takes place in a world where NONE of the events would EVER or could EVER happen but it is reviewed as a very real and very possible future for the U.S.

I feel sorry that liberal books like this are being passed off as real literature. I would NEVER recommend this book to ANYBODY for it does nothing more than to reinforce the stereotypes that are being spouted by the left.
The fact that an author would write a book about undermining the United States government and in sense acting like terrorists because you're being tracked or photographed is disturbing to say the least.

One character in Little Brother refers to America as "Gulag America" and this did nothing more than to enforce that the author has no shame. To compare the U.S to a Gulag is despicable.

In short the book has such a liberal spin, by the time you finish it you'll be dizzy.

Considering that the basic premise of the book is that a large portion of the USA is actively anti-intellectual, I'm unsure whether it's an intentional irony or a subconscious hypocrisy that makes this the most anti-rational, anti-scientific piece of what I hesitate to call literature that I've ever had the displeasure of picking up. The only thing that kept me reading to the end was that it was _so_ poorly researched and documented that I was sure it was a joke of some kind, and that at some point there would be a chapter saying "surprise! I've just tricked you into exactly the same rejection of logic and empiricism that I've been ostensibly complaining about!"

More specifically, the book makes numerous claims which are simply not true at all, often about things for which a large body of research exists which the author could have easily accessed via any number of commonly-available resources. As early as the second chapter, for instance, she's making multitudinous attacks on visual media in general via bare assertion, and makes no reference to any actual scientific studies, probably because most of the thousands upon thousands of experiments done regarding the effect of television and games on the mind prove precisely the opposite of the claim she's pushing.

This is the hallmark of the book: assertion, assertion, assertion with nothing to back any of it up. In the cases where my personal knowledge actually covered the subject and I could judge the veracity of said assertions, they almost invariably demonstrated an amazingly complete disconnect from reality and the scientific and rational communities. It's telling that no scientific studies are among the rather sparse footnotes and references, which are reserved for other op-ed pieces, usually quoted out of context.

This book is useless to anyone trained in the principles of research and logical argument, and actively dangerous to the mind of anyone untrained enough to take it as a serious piece of research. Intellectually dishonest and a picture-perfect representative of the actual forces involved in the phenomena the author is attempting to describe. Don't bother with this claptrap, if you want a clever and well-thought out critique of anti-intellectualism, go read The Wizard of Oz. It's better referenced and more relevant to modern society.

Jacoby uses her deep and nuanced knowledge of American history to lay out where we are falling well short of America's most cherished goals. Some reviews have complained the book is too long. But Jacoby's survey is so broad, and to do it justice strikes me as worth this level of detail. There's a lot of real gold in this book, and I did not find my mind wandering. One of my takeaways: it confirms for us that the vast sums of money we've chosen to pay for the education for our children (private school, I'm afraid) seems well spent. This book is an inexpensive and very modest substitute for the mediocre education most people received in the last 20-30 years, the author of this review included.

I enjoyed this book tremendously. I liked best Jacoby's critique of today's newspapers for reporting at face value patently false statements by politicians, as if actual facts made no difference at all.

I did disagree with a few of Jacoby's points. She is too cavalier about dismissing the idea that the U.S. is overpopulated. To provide some balance to this, I would encourage reading Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update.

Overall, though, the book is great. Don't miss it.

This is a good start. But I was disappointed that Jacoby doesn't dig deeper. A lot of her "answers" just beg the question. I found she was good at diagnosing the problem--as are many pundits and observers these days--but short on understanding their true depth.

She gives us the laundry list of ills inflicting us right now--failed political systems, endemic rudeness, the death of civic responsibility, our vile popular culture--and does not see the thread that links it all. That thread is the complete dominance of unfettered capitalism. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, our sole purpose in America has been to make money, at a faster and faster rate. "Values," such that they are, are only taught when they're seen to further expedite the chase of the buck.

No, there's nothing wrong with capitalism, but there is something wrong when capitalism is our only national goal, and it is now, no matter what some apologists may claim. People who think about nothing except how to acquire more material things are not going to be civil-minded, learned, courteous, moral or ethical. There's no reason to be. In fact, those things are just impediments to the pursuit of happine$$.

This is happening everywhere, of course, but nowhere as much as the U.S. Europe is struggling to keep a lid on rampant, unchecked capitalism--their blend of "soft socialism" with regulated capitalism seems to be working better than any other model, so far at least. Countries that most eagerly follow the U.S. down the road to free market mania--Singapore, Japan, South Korea, and now China and India--are starting to have the same social ills of the United States.

Rather than chapter after chapter reciting ills we already know about and citing his columnist peers and their skin-deep "analyses," I would have like to have been a deeper social-economic analysis, as well as discussions from historians and yes, philosophers. For a deeper look at our nation's ills I guess we have to turn to the likes of Thomas Frank, whose unblinking look at our national soul can be depressing, but accurate.

It's hard not to give five stars to a book when I am in such sympathy and empathy with the author. And Ms. Jacoby is a very engaging writer, and clearly intelligent and dedicated to the pursuit of intellectual activities. So why she couldn't have taken the next step and seen more into the reasons for the problems inherent in our system (hint: read de Tocqueville) surprises me. This book is worth your time, but with a little more depth it could have been so much more.

The basic premise is correct, that we need to study more, read more, think more clearly. When hasn't that been true? I agree with her that people spend too much time on TV, video games and other liesurely activities that don't stimulate the intellect. Many seem to be addicted or perhaps too tired/lazy to do something that takes effort. I liked the book from that standpoint.

But, she seemed stuck in the past, constantly telling the reader how wonderful it was when.... I kept getting the nagging feeling I was listening to a church sermon in which the pastor kept praising the "family values" of the past....Yah, like racism, sexism, discrimination against people because they held different religious beliefs? Sure, the glorious past when people were all so smart and pleasant. The past of fiction.

Then, despite some effort to point the finger equally at conservatives and liberals, she fell into what seemed her natural tendancy to associate smart with liberal and dumb with conservative. That was frequent in the book, particularly toward the end.

She talked about poor academics in the South, but didn't analyze the school systems to see what was driving some of the poorly performing schools. I've lived in the South for several years and found some sectors of Southern society to be very well educated, while others were sorely neglected. Saying that Southern public schools are funded less than other states misses a key issue, namely strong tendancy of whites in the South to send their kids to private schools. The blacks are left in the underfunded, voluntarily segregated public schools. Not such a problem in towns where many whites stayed in the public schools, but the county schools were all black and had very poor performances. I don't pretend to understand or like the social/political dynamics of schools down there (my kids hated Southern schools because of the reverse discrimination and jumped for joy when we moved out), but I do know that white parents didn't want to send their kids to these underperforming county schools where their kids were treated to reverse discrimination.

My point is that a lot of the educational dollars are avoiding the public school system as whites avoid the underperforming schools. This caused a spiral effect where parents, both black and white, sent their kids elsewhere to avoid schools with poor academics. I believe the author could have addressed this issue better and might have found more intelligence in the South than she gave it credit for.

(As an aside, I worked with an African American woman who sent her kids to a county school where the percentage of blacks was about 98%. The daughter requested this because she wanted to "get back to her roots" after attending predominantly white schools elsewhere in the states. After one year, the daughter wanted out because in her words, "These blacks aren't my people. I don't think like they do. They don't care about education. All they care about is acting tough and insulting people who want to study.")

Back on topic, Jacoby couldn't get past her love of Al Gore either. Lord have mercy. She claims to be an intellectual, but can't see past her blind liberalism to see just how many non-partisan climatologists say Al Gore has been promoting the biggest scam in history by blaming humans for what is actually nothing more than natural, long-term climate cycles!! Susan, if you read more, you'd see that there is no consensus!! Perhaps the Internet could help you find some of that information. :-)

And the Internet is such a terrible thing! Yah sure. Except that thanks to the Internet I can instantaneously get various intellectual viewpoints and studies on both sides of most issues, whereas before the nasty technology came along....I had to spend hours searching for books in the library and they probably didn't have anything relevant to my topic of interest.

Then, how about book reviews she went on and on about? I can now read solid book reviews on the Internet by many, many smart readers, whereas under her preferred method I would have been stuck reading the one lame book review in the New York Times or whatever biased newspaper I was limited to in my hometown.

Susan, I'm with you on the need for more of us to study, but please change your condescending attitude against conservatives. In case you didn't notice, there are about as many smart/ignorant Democrats as there are smart/ignorant Republicans.

She also seemed confused about whether she liked communism or not. She'd praised a number of intellectuals of the hippie era who were involved in the Communist party and I never understood whethere she thought that was a good or bad thing.

And Bush is just a moron to her. Granted, he isn't my favorite guy and he has a very country style, but that doesn't make him stupid. To equate dumb with country as she seemed to be doing is just evidence of elitism. But on Bush, yep Suan, he's so stupid he just stumbled into the White House. And during the debate with those intellectual giants, Al Gore and Mr Swift Boat Kerry, he won only because they were, what, smarter than he? Uh, right. Her theme of conservatives being morons was just so intellectually vacuous that I just started laughing.

Bottom line: Good premise that people should read more. She should do just that without the prejudice against conservatives. She's stuck in the past, unable to see the good in many modern things. Blinded by her liberal bias. OK book overall. Made me want to read more, but that idea without the bias would have been a pamphlet.

To say that Amy Goldman's The Heirloom Tomato is a stunningly beautiful book is, for anyone familiar with Goldman's earlier masterworks on squash and melons, merely to state the obvious. But the tomato which is, as the subtitle indicates, "the world's most beautiful fruit," turns out to be an incomparable seductress of the camera. Any reader who settles, however, for making this a coffee-table book and neglects a serious engagement with the text will have missed at least half the delight. The pleasure begins with photographer Victor Schrager's loving description of how these luscious photos were set up and Amy's surprising story of her life-long link to tomatoes including a cousin Tillie who brought Italy's famous San Mazano (see page 137) to America. Then--after the instructions for growing them yourself, and some help in understanding shapes, colors, flavors, textures, foliage and the like--come the tomato portraits, each accompanied by any technical detail you might need to know, plus a bit of absorbing history personal or otherwise. The recipes that end the book are, as you would expect, about celebrating these fruits for their versatility and flavor as well as their looks. A glorious book. Joan Dye Gussow

The Heirloom Tomato, Amy Goldman's new book on everyone's favorite fruit-vegetable, is an eye-popping , mouth-watering delight. On page after delicious page, the 258-page book provides offers up a cornucopia of history, etymology, botanical description and elegant, taste-teasing recipes, all of it served up through elegant writing and erudite scholarship, and ornamented richly with Victor Schrager's magnificent photographs.

My only regret is that the book is so pretty that it is hard to imagine abusing it in the two settings - the kitchen, and the garden -- in which it will surely find its highest and best use. Despite all the elegance, the publisher (Bloomsbury) has managed to keep the base price of the book at a very modest $35.

Robin Anthony Elliott, Tomatophile
New York City

August 26, 2008

Amy Goldman so captures the magic of heirloom tomatoes the reader almost inhales that distinct summer fragrance with every turn of the page. Each tomato has a carefully researched history and sometimes even a romance shared with the reader. I especially value the detailed notes on each variety for sweetness, flavor, texture and general growing information.
Victor Schrager's tomato photographs are extraordinary and used lavishly throughout the book. This is a book to share and show every friend who gardens or enjoys good food. And, yes, there are some fine recipes included.

Amy Goldman's passion for fruits and vegetable will certainly gain new enthusiasts who will share that passion after viewing the wonderful pictures taken by Victor Schrager and reading all the well researched histories of selected heirloom tomato varieties which Amy has gathered.

This reviewer is obviously enthralled with the book. Some of my more notable tomato variety creations such as Green Zebra are featured in this new publication. I feel like I am a living Heirloom Tomato Breeder! Amy has listed 200 varieties in the index and my breeding work has contributed directly or indirectly to about 10% of those! So as you read through the book, you just might see why I feel she has partly written a book about me! I just wish I could find a way for folks to see my hundreds of new tomato varieties in my current breeding work.

However much I feel like I am part of the book, Amy is the real heroine. She actually grew these tomatoes and matches the varieties to fantastic recipes!

This is a book that can be read many times over. Leave in on your coffee table for your guests to marvel over! This is the book to give you Spring Fever in all seasons! Thank Amy by buying this book.

Tom Wagner

All the abuses discussed in this book are accurate, and the author does a fine job in bringing them to life. But the books leaves the reader with the impression that all black workers in the South were virtual slaves, who were forced to stay with the same employer year after year. This is simply not true. Many African Americans switched jobs year after year, to the frustration of planters. Others migrated, sometimes alone, sometimes en masse (e.g., the Kansas Exodus, the Edgefield Exodus) to other parts of the South. Labor agent Peg-Leg Williams moved over 80,000 people from the Carolina southwest all by himself. And so on. The real history is bad enough, no need to exaggerate it. For the relevant sources, see the footnotes to David E. Bernstein, Only One Place of Redress ch. 1 (Duke U. Press 2001), which discusses one way planters tried to limit black mobility, through laws banning labor recruitment.

I am pleased that the book came in a reasonable amount of time.

-Not what I learned in school. But this book opened my eyes to the truth of our American History, and caused me to think about what I see in society today, differently. I would recommend it highly!

There were times when I read this book I was in a fury with rage, when I was completely dumbfounded, flummoxed, horrified, disturbed (deeply) by another chapter of our good country's history. Yet there were also times when I was proud of those portrayed here who were moral and just -- folk who sought to cleanse the countryside of those who thought nothing of life, except to take advantage of it until there was nothing more to give. This richly researched, sharply written book is an essential read.

As an historian, I have long been aware that slavery did not end the evils perpetrated on black people in this country, but I never realized the full extent. Although this book is at times repetitious and disjointed, it is a powerful narrative of a period in American history arguably more disturbing than ante bellum slavery. It's as though all the humane slave masters have been replaced by Simon Legrees and Bull Connors. The complicity of corporate America and the emergence of industrial slavery make the situation even more problematic. This book needs to be read by all who want to fully understand the ramifications of history on race relations in this country and should be required reading in high school and college classrooms.

Paul Hawken has a wonderful gift of pattern recognition that enables him to draw from diverse sources and sew together a patchwork of information that is compelling in its message: We must work together if life on this planet as we know it today is going to survive the threats of devaluation of individual life, depleted resources, pollution and global heating. (Heating is my term. I feel that `warming' is an unacceptable euphemism!)What is most appealing to me after the excellent summary of facts and issues is Hawken's positive spin on the situation.

When asked at colleges if I am pessimistic or optimistic about the future, my answer is always the same: If you look at the science that describes what is happening on earth today and aren't pessimistic, you don't have the correct data. If you meet the people in this unnamed movement and aren't optimistic, you haven't got a heart. What I see are ordinary and some not-so-ordinary individuals willing to confront despair, power, and incalculable odds in an attempt to restore some semblance of grace, justice, and beauty to this world. (p. 4)

Healing the wounds of the earth and its people does not require saintliness or a political party, only gumption and persistence. It is not a liberal or conservative activity; it is a sacred act. (p. 5)

In total, the book is inadvertently optimistic, an odd thing in these bleak times. I didn't intend it; optimism discovered me. (p. 8)

Hawken points out that the roots of our problems lie in our concepts and attitudes about our world. For instance, production and acquisition of material goods has become the primary focus and goal of the modern world, to the point that they are more important than people. This has shaped our mentality in self-destructive ways. Mass production and distribution of products become more economical and profitable through uniformity. Living systems thrive best on diversity, which provides a gene pool that can adapt to external challenges. However, in the name of enhancing efficiency of food production, distribution and sales, our diversity has been sacrificed and the biological pool of genetic resources has been systematically whittled down to the cheapest and most marketable varieties of edibles. This mind-set is core to the struggles of our modern world between the interests of business and industry and the interests of people and the environment.

In the pursuit of industrial and economic growth that has assumed the proportions of an ideology, natural resources have been over-exploited to the point that they are depleted. Our fish, trees, land and waters have been wantonly exploited, with little if any thought to the needs of tomorrow, much less to those of future generations. Similarly with people:

Slaves, serfs, and the poor are the forests, soils, and oceans of society; each constitutes surplus value that has been exploited repeatedly by those in power, whether governments or multinational corporations. (p. 22)

Trade is not the salient issue; the critical question is, Who sets the rules and who enforces them? There can be no sustainability when institutions whose primary purpose is to create money are dictating the standards. (p. 135)

As a uniform trading system sweeps over the world, the monetary gains are called GDP, but the losses that are suffered, even in the industrialized West, much less in the Third World, are not tallied, as if one were recording sales at the cash register but ignoring thefts at the back of the warehouse. (p. 118)

The World Trade Organization (WTO) seeks to establish commerce as the basis for governing the world. It is set up without checks and balances, as a dictatorial institution that can override local populations' wishes and needs.

The purpose of the organization could not be simpler: the eliminations of constraints on the flow of trade, including how a product is made, by whom it is made, or what happens after it is made. By doing so, WTO removes individual countries; and regions; ability to set standards, to express values, or to determine what they do or do not support if those standards conflict with WTO rules. (p. 120)

In all WTO rulings one common denominator prevails, and the denominator is money. (p. 129)

The severity of the challenges has spawned both awareness and action groups. Hawken gives brief discursive summaries of several dozens of these, and many more as annotated references.

The exponential assault on resources and the production of waste, coupled with the extirpation of cultures and the exploitation of workers, is a disease as surely as hepatitis or cancer. It is sponsored by a political-economic system of which we are all a part, and any finger-pointing is inevitably directed back to ourselves. There may be no particular they there, but the system is still a disease, even if we created and contracted it. Because a lot of people know we are sick and want to treat the cause, not just the symptoms, the environmental movement can be seen as humanity's response to contagious policies killing the earth, while the social justice movement addresses economic and legislated pathogens that destroy families, bodies, cultures, and communities. (p. 145)

Action groups work at different levels to promote a saner, sustainable world:
· Watch organizations - monitor governmental institutions, corporations and geographically sensitive areas
· Keeper groups - advocate for the preservation of waters and all their users
· Networks - combine the information, knowledge and action focus of like-minded groups

For example:
· The US Green Building Council (USGBC) promotes awareness of, use, and distribution of building materials that do not deplete or harm the environment.
· "Slow Food (alimento lento) is the long overdue response to dead food, processed food, fast food, agribusiness..." (p. 155)
· Microloans help to bring hardworking people out of poverty. Kiva.org brokers loans on line.

Hawken points out that every one of us bears a responsibility to participate in addressing these problems. The two basic rules to guide us must be the Golden Rule and the Sacredness of All Life. We must aim for a `zero-waste society" or better, a restorative one.

We will either come together as one, globalized people, or we will disappear as a civilization. To come together we must know our place in a biological and cultural sense, and reclaim our role as engaged agents of our continued existence. (p. 165)

I cannot recommend this book highly enough - to anyone interested in contributing to healing our modern societal illnesses and insanities and saving our world.

This is a wonderfully documented guide about groups working for social justice and for bringing balance and restoring our planet's seriously damaged environment.

Among many issues, Paul Hawken tells us that fighting for those important objectives, ideology or partisan politics play a secondary role, because civilization survival is on the balance and people's direct involvement is vital.

Saving Earth and bringing social justice to all must have priority over short term goals, such as profit maximizing via externilizing costs to society.

The road for the largest social movement in history is long and full of powerful obstacles. That is why social and ecological education along with democratic participation are crucial. After all, real democracy is built from the bottom up and not the other way around, as the political establishment wants us to believe.

I heard about Paul Hawken few weeks ago and I decided to buy his book. I just feel that I learnt so much, the information is clear, the writing is great. Loved the image of the immune system as a comparison of the reaction of people who fight for Human Rights, Environment, Culture, Language, etc. I just want to read more now about these subjects. (sorry for the mistakes)

Some of my friends found this book really inspiring. I tend to look for things like detailed and balanced analysis of issues, in-depth descriptions of the work of political groups, and sophisticated understanding of the way in which voluntary organizations interact with elite politics and economic factors. This book is weak on all of those - but it DOES have a lot of inspirational rhetoric.

A few years ago, activist author Paul Hawken set out to create a database of every non-profit in the world categorized into a taxonomy, which is now on the web in a sort of Wikipedia community format at wiserearth (dot) org - This had never really been done before and he was surprised by the sheer number of organizations working independently to make the world a better place. He found a common thread that all were concerned about the environment and human justice. From this he concluded that there is a global "movement" (a word with many qualifiers) the likes of which have never been seen. He compares it to the "Industrial Revolution" - at the time everyone knew something different was happening, but no one had a name for it or even described it as a unique event, it was both everywhere and unrecognized. Likewise, according to Hawken, this global movement is from the ground up, with no core ideology or leadership, it's an historical mass movement that has snuck up on us and only now being recognized as a major shift.

I think Hawken's message is a powerful one and will appeal to the millions of people working in small groups in isolation against large and powerful forces. Hawken does in fact describe a new trend that has been observed by others: the recent rise, proliferation and influence of NGOs. Hawken contends top-down organizations led by ideologies are old school 20th century, the future is distributed small organic holistic, sort of like how Wikipedia is made, millions of individuals (small and large NGOs) contributing expertise on a local basis that has the net effect of global human and environmental justice.

I had some problems with the book, it is clearly a one-sided manifesto and much of it is historical anecdote of well known incidents (the Bolivian water wars, the India coke pesticide case, etc..) and presents a single side. These issues are extremely complex, it is rarely so easy to say there are good and bad guys, it is harmful IMO to present these controversial issues so one-sided and hold them up as poster children for reform. Why not look at the real undisputed success stories that everyone can get behind? He does in some cases such as Rachel Carson's fight against DDT. Overall I was touched by Hawken's passion,
vision and (ironically) his idealism.

I bought this for my (12-year-old) daughter's summer required reading assignment. Once she got into it, she asked many great questions about the era itself. She was constantly making exciting guesses as to who the father was.

I literally just finished reading this novel about ten minutes ago. I found myself just staring at the last page, waiting for some grand explanation to pop out and make it all better, but, of course, that did not happen.

This book is deep, and it really makes you think. What would you do in Bruno's situation? Though the vocabulary and style of writing makes it appear as a book for young readers, the topic is definitely of a different matter.

As others said, the author really botched it with the main character: to imagine that any able-minded German 9-year-old, and a son of a high ranking SS commander to boot, would not have heard of Jews (and hated them) and would not know who the Fuhrer was, or how to pronounce it, is completely preposterous.

Furthermore, I found it offensive that the plot went as far as to suggest that two boys could have frequent conversations for almost a year along the unguarded fence. The Jewish boy would have been sent to the gas chamber upon arrival.

The result is a "Holocaust-lite" book that I find extremely objectionable.

This is an excellent addition to Holocaust literature for young adults. When nine-year old Bruno and his family move to "Off with" because of the "Fury", he is confused and angry- throughout the book, Bruno never really learns what is happening next door. Showing the camps through the eyes of a child on the outside of the fence was a novel technique and allowed for spare descriptions that underlined the looming horror. Once Bruno befriends a young Jewish boy, the reader knows the story isn't going to end well. Despite that knowledge, and the fact that the actual friendship is so unrealistic, Boyne's writing is so powerful that I still found myself tearing up at the end. I highly recommend this book for adults and teens alike.

In 2009, I intend to teach John Boyne's "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" as part of an undergraduate Holocaust education class. However, I will be including the novel in the syllabus because it is an excellent example of a highly flawed Holocaust text, of which educators need to be wary. A text, by the way, that has been very well received by critics and the general reading public.

Boyne's "fable" is certainly well written, it is accessible (to both teenagers and adults), it is memorable, and it is even profound. But these attributes are overshadowed by Boyne's carelessness; the plot has problematic historical inaccuracies that are incredibly misleading and - I believe - damaging to the goals of Holocaust education.

(1) We discover that Shmuel, the title character and a prisoner at Auschwitz, is nine years old. However, it is extremely well documented that, upon arrival at Auschwitz (and other Nazi death camps), almost all children under 15 years old were sent immediately to be gassed, as the Nazis could not (or would not) use them as slave labor. The few exceptions to this rule were children who were either slightly younger than 15 and survived by lying about their age or children (of all ages) who were used in forced pseudo-medical experiments, confined to the camp laboratories, and rarely survived. Nine year olds did not wander around Auschwitz. And they certainly could not wander, "for several weeks... almost every afternoon" (p. 150), to the same place by the camp fence, to meet their new friend, who just happened to be the son of a high-ranking Nazi officer.

(2) Which brings us to Bruno, the protagonist, the son of the Kommandant of Auschwitz. Bruno is also nine years old (he and Shmuel, they discover quickly, were born on exactly the same day). Bruno's age is also highly problematic. We realize quickly that Bruno is naïve to what his father does for a living and where he and his sister have been brought to live. Bruno is also ignorant to the existence of the Jews - until he meets his new friend, Shmuel. Again, history - and common sense - would reveal this to be practically impossible. All German children were educated, from an early age, about the Jews. Children were taught - through carefully designed books and school lessons - that the Jews were the "parasites" of society; sub-humans to be loathed, oppressed, and discarded. Children joined youth groups and attended rallies that made the Nazis' perceptions of the Jews very clear. It is practically impossible for a nine year old German boy in 1940s Nazi Europe - the son of the Kommandant of Auschwitz, no less! - to have entirely missed what was considered a vital piece of German education.

Now, you might ask: If the story is so compelling, accessible, and thought-provoking, then does it really matter that there are these inaccuracies? Yes. It does. It matters a great deal. If a goal of Holocaust education is to try to understand how and why the Holocaust occurred, so as to help us prevent current and future genocides, then we must try our best to understand how and why the Nazis did what they did to distinct groups of people that they considered "unworthy of life." To truly understand the Nazis' intentions and methods, it is imperative that we include in our considerations their policies of (a) gassing all Jewish children under 15 years old and (b) teaching all German children to hate Jews. If these two policies become distorted - or even ignored - when teaching about the Holocaust, then we might never learn the core lessons of these world-changing events.

It is important to point out that my problem is not necessarily with historical inaccuracies alone (Jane Yolen's time-travel fantasy "The Devil's Arithmetic" comes to mind as another impossible tale); my problem lies in an author's intentions and misadventures. Yolen uses time-travel as a tool to engage her young readers in Holocaust content, while keeping historical accuracy intact. But Yolen knows, just as well as her readers, that time-travel is entirely and so obviously unfeasible. Unfortunately, by the end of his fable, Boyne comes across just as unaware about the problems in his own writing as the naïve enthusiasts who claim that "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" is an important Holocaust text. I still encourage adults (and only adults) to read this book, but to read it only because it reminds us to be wary of badly researched historical fictions that, in the end, teach us little about the true lessons of history.

This books is practically amazing. My school scheduled the AP US History course first semester (one semester only) and the class was a disappointment. Massive curving on tests and incompetent students abounded. I read AMSCO for the January SAT subject test and scored a 760. Then I read it again for the May AP test and scored a 5. Simply amazing.

This book was recommended to my class by my APUSH teacher who was a former college professor. She was right in her assertion that this book is better than any other review book out there for AP US History. This book will give you a concise explanation of events and their significance, give you sample questions, and practice DBQ's and FRQ's for each individual section. Me being the procrastinator I am, I crammed with this book the day before the exam. Lo and behold, I got a 5. Now, I'm not saying this book will get you a 5, but using this book properly with all it has to offer will increase your chances infinitely. I'd recommend this book over any other out there on the market.

My AP US History class was way behind schedule - only reaching WWI in the week before the test.

Luckily, I had AMSCO to prepare me for the AP test.

This book summarizes everything you will need to know for the test, and keeps it interesting. There are many maps and charts to visually display the information talked about, and historical documents from each time period that help you to understand historical context. Every chapter has 10 multiple-choice review questions that force you to remember what you just read, sample essay questions, and vocabulary words. Some of the multiple-choice questions were almost exactly the same as questions I saw while taking the AP test. At the end of the book is a practice test that closely models the real thing.

It has sections on Writing the DBQ and FRQ essays. The sections on the DBQ were invaluable to me, because they explained how to write a good essay much better than my teacher did. It goes over structure, how to know what the question is specifically asking you, and shows you how to get a high score using analysis.

This book is also almost indestructible. I took it to many track meets where it was stepped on, thrown across the team tent, and got rained on. It is still in great condition!!

The only downside to this book is that the answers to the questions aren't in the back of it. However, just use Google, and you can find the answers in seconds.

AMSCO is best used over a period of at least two weeks - a month is best. If you are looking for a quick cram book, this one isn't for you.

This book is too long to be a useful review book.

I had this same book (previous edition) as an accompanyment to our American Pageant main text. I think the pageant had like 2220 pages which I real all of in 1 semester.

It's interesting that someone mentioned that they did the course in 2 years (4 semesters). If you follow the rule of 2 high school semesters = 1 college semester, this is correct since you get 2 college semesters credit of history for this course, and we had to do it all in 1 high school semester (so we learned it in quadruple speed, no wonder I was up till 1AM everyday!!!)

Anyway, since we took this 1st semester, and took other courses the 2nd, I forgotten ALOT of the material. The teacher had weekly review sessions for 1 hour every week at library at school at like 8 pm, but my dad wasn't going to take me after a long shift at work.

Though I vaguely remember we were allowed to keep the AMSCO until the test in May the following semester, I remember trying to review with this, but it was just too much information.

It is basically another textbook, and the information is not "summarized" in a useful way for review (as opposed to the Barron's AP European history text I have commented about previously). You basically have to reread the entire thing, which, if you are doing by yourself with no assignments to help reinforce the info (not to mention the fact you already read this), you won't retain anything, at least i didn't

I couldn't afford to pick and choose books at the time and went with what was free, but if you can find some review book that is only about 300-400 pages (i think this one was like 900), that would be the one to get.

However, if the pageant is too long for you, and you can get by in the class without the pageant, i would recommend reading this as a textbook.

I took the AP US exam in 2004, after a 2-year long AP US History class offered by my high school. I was terrified that I'd fail, but this book saved my butt! It's comprehensive, easy to understand, and the review questions and quizzes in the back are fantastic - I even saw a question from the book on the exam! This tome is intimidatingly thick, but don't let that daunt you. I studied 3 chapters per week in the 2 months leading up to the test, and there wasn't a single thing I didn't know. It could use a bit more post-1970 foreign policy information, but you can probably cover that with your teacher/textbook/class. Oh, and a whole chapter devoted to important Supreme Court cases & their significance would be great, but all that information is scattered throughout the book as well.

My AP teacher recommended _not_ writing the practice essays & DBQ, but I don't see why. Any practice writing in the style of the AP exam is critical to scoring well.

In all, if you are taking the AP US History exam (or just want a concise US history reference book!), I highly recommend this one. I still consult my AMSCO from time to time.

Product arrived quickly and in the condition advertised. Seller also included extra study material for no additional cost. I would recommend purchasing from this seller.

Very fast delivery, great price (for a textbook- all of which are rediculously overpriced anyway)and arrived in excellent condition. Thanks.

The book I bought from Eric was in excellent condition, plus it arrived only 3 days after I had purchased it! Great service, perfect product!

I ordered the book and requested to receive it on the next day. I recieved it the next day!! It doesn't get any better than that!! Thanks Amazon!

I have never been too crazy about or never been good at economics, but after reading this book, I feel I understand the real-world economics better. For a novice like me, it is relatively easy to follow the contents because it's full of examples from real business world. I assume this book will be satisfactory to more "academic" readers too because the book still doesn't fail to cover real economic materials like graphs and theories.