Thoughtful political theory for divisive times.
Longtime national affairs writer Woodard (American Nation: A History of Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America, 2011, etc.) builds on his previous analysis of the country’s regional differences to focus on the conflict between individualism and collectivism that defines our national character.
As in his previous book, the author, currently the state and national affairs writer at the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram, maintains, “our country has never been united, either in purpose, principles, or political behavior. We’ve never been a nation-state in the European sense, but rather a federation of nations” like the European Union. Each region has distinct characteristics: Yankeedom, for example, which spread outward from its Puritan origins in Massachusetts, holds that “collective institutions” ensuring the common good take precedence over individual freedom. Conversely, Tidewater (Virginia, Maryland, southern Delaware, and northeastern North Carolina) historically has been “a country gentleman’s paradise…fundamentally conservative, with a high value placed on respect for authority and tradition, and very little on equality or public participation in politics.” Other regions include Greater Appalachia, Deep South, Midlands, Left Coast, and Far West, each championing individualism or collectivism based on its history. After the historical overview, the author posits some recommendations for present-day political parties. Although we have inherited a legacy of revolution against a king, making us “vigilant against the rise of an overarching government that might deny us our individual potential,” Woodard sees that the vast majority of Americans believe that the “American Way” means “pursuing happiness through a free and fair competition between individuals.” Politicians must reassure voters that fairness is “the central issue of our political discourse” by proposing tax reforms and investments in education that “would help keep the playing field even.” Woodard thinks Democrats are more likely than Republicans to embrace such proposals and therefore to “capture a reliable majority” in the majority of the disparate regions.
Thoughtful political theory for divisive times.Pub Date: March 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-525-42789-6
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Jan. 4, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2016
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorker staff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
For Howard Zinn, long-time civil rights and anti-war activist, history and ideology have a lot in common. Since he thinks that everything is in someone's interest, the historian—Zinn posits—has to figure out whose interests he or she is defining/defending/reconstructing (hence one of his previous books, The Politics of History). Zinn has no doubts about where he stands in this "people's history": "it is a history disrespectful of governments and respectful of people's movements of resistance." So what we get here, instead of the usual survey of wars, presidents, and institutions, is a survey of the usual rebellions, strikes, and protest movements. Zinn starts out by depicting the arrival of Columbus in North America from the standpoint of the Indians (which amounts to their standpoint as constructed from the observations of the Europeans); and, after easily establishing the cultural disharmony that ensued, he goes on to the importation of slaves into the colonies. Add the laborers and indentured servants that followed, plus women and later immigrants, and you have Zinn's amorphous constituency. To hear Zinn tell it, all anyone did in America at any time was to oppress or be oppressed; and so he obscures as much as his hated mainstream historical foes do—only in Zinn's case there is that absurd presumption that virtually everything that came to pass was the work of ruling-class planning: this amounts to one great indictment for conspiracy. Despite surface similarities, this is not a social history, since we get no sense of the fabric of life. Instead of negating the one-sided histories he detests, Zinn has merely reversed the image; the distortion remains.
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1979
ISBN: 0061965588
Page Count: 772
Publisher: Harper & Row
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1979
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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