John Micklethwait

Someone needs to tell the authors that Reagan isn’t gonna f*ck them. This book is 80% shitting on big government and 80% fawning over Reagan and his eponymous economic policy Reaganomics. Yes, there is 160% of book crammed in here and it is not good.

I cannot overstate how hyperfocused on “big government” this book is. Early in the book they nickname it Leviathan like its some sort of eldritch beast to be slayed and they are so proud of themselves for coming up with this analogy they show more use it for the rest of the book. There is certainly a discussion to be had about the inefficiencies of our governments as well their purpose but the authors are mostly focused on how economically inefficient it is to *checks notes* tax the rich to support basic needs of the poor. Which is what this entire book comes down to – they want to pare down the state significantly and all that it does for it’s citizens in some trickle-down effort to get the rich richer (this is obviously not how they would phrase it but I can read between the lines)

Now this book is ostensibly about Covid, right? They are pursuing an East v. West comparison wherein “Asia” (the monolith) has done better than Europe America in dealing with Covid. Well, no. That takes up so little of the book it’s embarrassing they sold the book this way (it was clearly a book they were already writing and they just shoved a chapter about Covid into it and changed the title). This book is first and foremost, about the best states, the west states, and how to Make Them Great Again*
*the authors do look down on Donald Trump and populists of his ilk while simultaneously spouting very similar rhetoric show less

I was reading this book more or less alongside "[Stealing Jesus]", and it was a most odd experience. Often the two books were covering the exact same ground and yet their perspectives were vastly different.

This book, however, is less concerned with questions of the merit of faith as to describing what is actually happening on the ground. As such it was an extremely interesting read, from authors who are not particularly wedded to any of the world views they are describing.

The fundamental show more thesis is that the assumption that modernity leads to secularism is in fact incorrect - that as countries are developing, they are becoming more religious, and that Europe here is an exception. What is more there is a thesis as to why this should be the case. The argument is made that US style separation of church and state, and the resulting pluralism this produces creates a need for religions to compete in a religious marketplace. This commoditisation of religion is well described, with historical examples of how churches have become more outward focussed and keyed into the winning of converts as they have found themselves unable to rest on the laurels of state establishment.

The result is a kind of tailored religion that people such as Bruce Bawer have clearly reacted against, and yet has proved incredibly durable. The result is that religion has prospered.

The book looks at issues for the future. It also discusses how some policy makers have radically misunderstood the place of faith in foreign policy, and also deals with issues of tension in the major religions themselves.

All in all this is an excellent work - not least because it avoids any triumphalism in the information it presents. This book is about numbers, but it is fundamentally an analysis of the current situation. It nowhere propounds a view that a numbers game is actually what the issue should be all about, and this then lends credence to the findings.

The analysis is so wide ranging it is going to be wrong in places. I detected a few places where I felt the authors had simplified issues (for instance in the summary of Robert Pape's work in "[Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism]". But read with an open mind, I think this book provides a convincing thesis. show less

I read this book in 2023, so my impressions are through that prism.
'The Right Nation', published in 2004, in the middle of the George W.Bush presidency, concludes by suggesting that the Republican Party will be in control for the foreseeable future, as the American left has capitulated to the better organised right. Remembering when this was published (so, excuses), none of the following are mentioned in this book: Obama, Biden, Trump, Palin, Pence. Nor of course is there any discussion of show more QAnon, or insurrections, or the power of Twitter (X). Curiously, post Bush, Democrats have been in the White House for 12 of the next 16 years.
As an outsider who has only become interested in US politics in recent years, it was interesting to learn that the distrust, and at times hatred, between the two major parties has been around for a long time; political rhetoric has been toxic for ever - it's not a modern phenomenon.
The book made for interesting reading, as it provides an excellent discussion of post-Cold War politics in the USA.
It does reinforce the fact that for all the surface similarities, the USA is definitely different to the rest of the "western" world. show less

A nicely told history, but far too pro business to be seen a objective. Each criticism of corporations raised by the authors is slapped away in a condescending manner. The contention that the corporation is overwhelmingly a positive thing for the world seems supported, but while the authors dismiss faulty anti-corporation exaggerations they greatly downplay some points. They make it sound as if the genocide of the Belgian Congo was ended by a single protest, not a decades long struggle, and show more use hostage taking not murder or mutilation as the example of corporate brutality. Later when pointing out that corporations do more good than bad they go back to the Congo and point out one corporate official built schools and roads and failed a turn a profit in his corner of the Congo. This a really shocking downplaying of one of histories great tragedies. show less