This is your blogger as a curmudgeonly book reviewer
I reviewed Gregg Easterbrook’s Sonic Boom: Globalization at Mach Speed today in the New York Times. The opening paragraph: America could use a truly Whiggish book right about now. More than a year into the Great Recession, it has become much harder to believe in the idea of inexorable progress. The moment is ripe for ...
I reviewed Gregg Easterbrook's Sonic Boom: Globalization at Mach Speed today in the New York Times. The opening paragraph:
America could use a truly Whiggish book right about now. More than a year into the Great Recession, it has become much harder to believe in the idea of inexorable progress. The moment is ripe for a counterintuitive, optimistic perspective that shows, despite appearances to the contrary, that the world is getting better and better every day, in every way. Gregg Easterbrook tries hard to satiate our inner optimist with “Sonic Boom.”
You'll have to read the rest of the review to gauge how well Easterbrook did at this task. Here's a small hint, however -- I'd really like to read a persuasive book that advances this argument, because I think it can be done.
I reviewed Gregg Easterbrook’s Sonic Boom: Globalization at Mach Speed today in the New York Times. The opening paragraph:
America could use a truly Whiggish book right about now. More than a year into the Great Recession, it has become much harder to believe in the idea of inexorable progress. The moment is ripe for a counterintuitive, optimistic perspective that shows, despite appearances to the contrary, that the world is getting better and better every day, in every way. Gregg Easterbrook tries hard to satiate our inner optimist with “Sonic Boom.”
You’ll have to read the rest of the review to gauge how well Easterbrook did at this task. Here’s a small hint, however — I’d really like to read a persuasive book that advances this argument, because I think it can be done.
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner
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