November 14, 2022
The alliance between democracy and free market capitalism is breaking down, thus opening the door to antidemocratic populism, according to this scattershot manifesto. Financial Times associate editor Wolf (The Shifts and the Shocks) surveys the growth of populist, xenophobic, and illiberal politics in the West, blaming these developments on upheavals of globalization, rising inequality, and economic insecurity, and a corrupt “rentier capitalism” rigged for corporate elites who focus on tax avoidance and inflating share prices instead of productive investment. Exploiting these stresses is a disingenuous right-wing “pluto-populism” that woos working-class voters abandoned by the “Brahmin Left,” which fixates on identity politics and challenging traditional values. Wolf’s analysis of political economy is often trenchant and packed with facts and figures that he distills into pithy prose. (“When frightened and insecure, humans go angrily tribal.”) He also discusses a grab bag of policy options for shoring up and reconciling democracy and capitalism, from strengthening welfare benefits and instituting a land tax to establishing time-limited “citizen juries,” chosen by lottery, to look into “specific contentious issues.” Elsewhere, Wolf’s diagnoses and solutions run counter to his calls for moderation, as when he compares the Republican Party’s obedience to Trump to the Nazis’ “Führerprinzip” and suggests banning anonymous commenting online. This mixed-bag zigzags between astute and overwrought.
December 1, 2022
Thunberg was just eight years old when she became existentially aware of environmental distress. By 15, she was leading protests outside Sweden's Parliament and speaking to the UN. At 16, she received her first Nobel Peace Prize nomination. Thunberg's commitment to global education regarding the perils of climate change manifests itself in this sweeping compendium of essays contributed by more than 100 academicians, authors, environmentalists, and journalists whose specific professional expertise or profound humanitarian concern amplifies the existing science surrounding this crisis of sustainability and ecology. Yet among this esteemed roster of recognized voices, it is Thunberg's own eloquence that elevates the collection with introductory essays for each section that convey a sense of urgency that is genuine, grounded, and unimpeachable. Thunberg has often been accused of idealism, but here that idealism finds its counterpart in irrefutable facts, studies, charts, and graphs. The contributors to this multifaceted and vast source of climate knowledge offer irreproachable statistical analyses and impassioned altruistic assessments, making it a definitive book on climate change now. Its brief but precise essays are well suited for argument-buttressing and myth-busting, and teem with mind-blowing new approaches to, sadly, an old, ongoing threat.
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January 1, 2023
A close look at the push-and-pull, often dysfunctional workings of democracy and capitalism. Distinguished financial journalist Wolf, author of The Shifts and the Shocks, opens by noting his generally pessimistic outlook, which enables him to be pleasantly surprised when things don't go down in flames. "I have never taken peace, stability, or freedom for granted and regard those who do as fools," he writes. Considering the rise of authoritarianism and the supremacy of predatory capitalism, he has reason to be glum, but while he seldom brightens from his starting point, neither does he write off the democratic experiment as dead. Even so, he notes, "a liberal democracy is a competition for power between parties that accept the legitimacy of defeat." A healthy capitalist economy is one that values things other than profit, which, the author argues, should not be the sine qua non of the reigning ideology but instead "a by-product of pursuing other goals, such as making excellent cars or providing reliable advice." While the autocracies of Orb�n, Erdogan, Xi, Putin, and Trump are essentially mediocre, combining "the vices of populism with the evils of despotism," they can still prevail. But as long as capitalism does not slide into autarky and democracy does not devolve into authoritarianism, the joined system of democratic capitalism has a chance of thwarting the ambitions of, say, China, which by Wolf's account represents the greatest existential threat to the West. Chinese officials do not necessarily want military dominance; rather, they seek to "make trade, commerce, and investment the foundation of a Chinese-led global order." In order to maintain a functioning system of democratic capitalism, Wolf argues for the renewal of a social contract that renounces nationalism and extends citizenship as "the tie that binds people together in a free and democratic society," creating a true level playing field. A vigorous defense of democratic capitalism worthy of the name.
COPYRIGHT(2023) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.