An involving, often touching story of an admirable people as well as a cautionary tale about the effects of rapid change and...
A photojournalist and wilderness guide explores tensions between the conservation impulse and the lives of imperiled nomadic herders in this sympathetic but balanced account of their arduous days on the trail.
In 2009, Benanav (Men of Salt: Crossing the Sahara on the Caravan of White Gold, 2006) traveled with the Van Gujjars of northern India, a forest-dwelling tribe of water buffalo herders, as they made their seasonal migration from the Shivalik region into the high alpine meadows of the Himalayas. Sharing the simple pleasures and hardships of an extended family, the author came to understand how pressure to abandon their wild grazing lands and freedom for sedentary lives in villages threatens the tribe’s existence. That Benanav is drawn to nomadic peoples is clear, as are his sympathies, but this does not prevent him from investigating complex ethical and environmental issues pitting forest department and national park officials against the traditions of nomads whose stewardship of the contested lands may hold a key to their survival. He compares the Van Gujjars' dilemma to that of peoples displaced worldwide, including those forced to move during the creation of some American national parks. Benanav also reveals a surprisingly egalitarian and tolerant Muslim subculture whose greatest concern is for their animals and how the very publicity supporting their cause has opened them to approaches by Islamic fundamentalists. The author maintains a straightforward journalistic tone, keeping his emotions largely in check but calling out the more abusive forest department figures for disregarding laws ensuring nomadic rights. On three return visits over the subsequent years, he saw progress, yet the conflicts remain unresolved. Benanav’s avoidance of excess description makes his occasional passages of evocative language all the more powerful. In the end, his portrait of the land and its little-known nomads is impressively closely observed.
An involving, often touching story of an admirable people as well as a cautionary tale about the effects of rapid change and counterproductive conservation efforts on traditional societies.Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-68177-622-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Pegasus
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
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
The value of this book is the context it provides, in a style aimed at a concerned citizenry rather than fellow academics,...
A provocative analysis of the parallels between Donald Trump’s ascent and the fall of other democracies.
Following the last presidential election, Levitsky (Transforming Labor-Based Parties in Latin America, 2003, etc.) and Ziblatt (Conservative Parties and the Birth of Democracy, 2017, etc.), both professors of government at Harvard, wrote an op-ed column titled, “Is Donald Trump a Threat to Democracy?” The answer here is a resounding yes, though, as in that column, the authors underscore their belief that the crisis extends well beyond the power won by an outsider whom they consider a demagogue and a liar. “Donald Trump may have accelerated the process, but he didn’t cause it,” they write of the politics-as-warfare mentality. “The weakening of our democratic norms is rooted in extreme partisan polarization—one that extends beyond policy differences into an existential conflict over race and culture.” The authors fault the Republican establishment for failing to stand up to Trump, even if that meant electing his opponent, and they seem almost wistfully nostalgic for the days when power brokers in smoke-filled rooms kept candidacies restricted to a club whose members knew how to play by the rules. Those supporting the candidacy of Bernie Sanders might take as much issue with their prescriptions as Trump followers will. However, the comparisons they draw to how democratic populism paved the way toward tyranny in Peru, Venezuela, Chile, and elsewhere are chilling. Among the warning signs they highlight are the Republican Senate’s refusal to consider Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee as well as Trump’s demonization of political opponents, minorities, and the media. As disturbing as they find the dismantling of Democratic safeguards, Levitsky and Ziblatt suggest that “a broad opposition coalition would have important benefits,” though such a coalition would strike some as a move to the center, a return to politics as usual, and even a pragmatic betrayal of principles.
The value of this book is the context it provides, in a style aimed at a concerned citizenry rather than fellow academics, rather than in the consensus it is not likely to build.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-6293-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
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