Methodology: I use a rigorous statistical method to rank each book. Each book is given a score from 1-100 in the following categories; literary style, information presented, analysis, originality, how appealing I think they would be to other people (the point of the list is to make recommendations, a few books dropped out of the list even though I enjoyed them immensely because I didn’t feel that they would have a very broad appeal) and relevance. I then turn the crank, crunch the numbers, and out pops the list.
Disclaimers: Some of the books could have been written 20 years ago, so this is not the top 10 books of 2006, just books that I have read in 2006. Secondly, the list actually has 20 entries, but I cheat and call it a top 10 list anyway because “Top 10” is pithier. Thirdly, I cheat again and list more than one book for some of the entries. This is because I felt some books deal with very similar subject matter and it allows me to put even more books on the list. I cheat a fourth time with an honorary mention list that expands the list to 25 entries. I will not apologize for these things, just as I don’t think that Tom Selleck should have to apologize for his 1980s era mustache; the benefits are far greater than the costs. Finally, I estimate that I read over 80 books this year, which is easy enough to catalogue because I get most of my books from Amazon and they keep records of your orders. I probably list about 30 books here with my double entries and such, so this is really a top ~37% list. (I reasoned that this is relevant, because if I had only read 40 books and list 30 here, well, that is not very selective.)
I weight the comments toward the top of the list, so the first entries get a sentence or two, the top 10 books get several paragraphs, and the top 5 get even lengthier treatment. Hope you find a couple of titles that pique your interest.
Honorable Mentions
25. Just War
by Moises Saman, Gino Strada, & Howard Zinn
(This entry narrowly edged out “When Nothing Else Matters: Michael Jordan’s Last Comeback” because I felt it was more relevant. MJ’s struggles during his last two years were interesting, but stale.)
This is simply Zinn speaking about the contradiction in terms Just War. Zinn questions the very idea that such a thing is possible and touches on history and his experience as a WWII bombadier.
24. Censored 2007: The Top 25 Censored Stories (Censored)
edited by Peter Phillips
Find out what you haven’t been finding out about in the news.
23. Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail
by Hunter S. Thompson
I have always enjoyed Thompson’s style. His drug addled loser shtick barely conceals a burning core of moral outrage and sensitivity for justice. This is a classic work of political journalism.
22. The Age of War: The United States Confronts the World
by Gabriel Kolko
Another anti-America hating son of a bitch.
21. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
by Barbara Ehrenreich
Barbara Ehrenreich’s already classic undercover journalism gives you a personal look at the minimum wage working class in America. This is “The Jungle” for our modern, service oriented economy.
The Top Ten
20. The Misbehavior of Markets
by Benoit Mandelbrot
I found this extraordinarily interesting, but I imagine it has a limited appeal so it ended low on the list. Mandelbroit is simply a genius.
19. IBM and the Holocaust
by Edwin Black
Ever wonder how the Nazis were able to acheive the level of effeciency necessary to exterminate millions of people? Black noticed something curious while going through a Holocaust museum with his concentration camp surviving parents: a piece of machinery made by IBM. An investigation three years in the making reveals IBM’s profound complicity with Nazi pogroms.
An IBM subsidiary in Germany, Dehomatag, helped keep IBM’s Hollerith machines constantly running and tabulating the census data gathered by the Nazi regime. This early computer system helped the Nazi systematically exterminate an estimated 12 million people in their death camps. The Nazi death machine in part turned on a cog manufactured and serviced by IBM. In every death camp, and in every territorial acquisition, there sat an IBM Hollerith machine, whirling and tabulating census punch cards to keep track of both the living and the dead. And each machine required maintenance from IBM about once every month. After the war, IBM made sure that they recovered all the profits they made from the Nazis in Europe. IBM was not motivated by anti-Semitism; their concern was the same as it is for all corporations, to maximize shareholder wealth through profitable operations whatever the moral implications may be. If Watson literally had to dine with Nazis, including Hitler, to keep his enterprise going then so be it, pogrom was profitable. (Note: Keep this in mind when reading the number one review.)
18. The State Of Working America, 2004/2005
by Lawrence Mishel
This biennial study of the American workforce is essential for understanding our economy. If you pay close attention, your bullshit radar will improve dramatically. The next time you read or hear some pundit saying that U.S. citizens have an unwarranted pessimism about the economy, remember that we are the most overworked nation in the world, finally surpassing Japan, productivity and corporate profits are skyrocketing, wealth and income are concentrating toward the top 1%, and working class wages are stagnating.
17. Whiteout: The CIA, Drugs and the Press
by Alexander Cockburn
Drugs, Oil, and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Colombia, and Indochina
by Peter Dale Scott
Lost History
by Robert Parry
These three books are essential for understanding why the War on Drugs is a farce.
16. A Question of Torture : CIA Interrogation, from the Cold War to the War on Terror
by Alfred McCoy
McCoy details the use of torture by the CIA and CIA trained forces around the world over the last several decades. His point is that the horrors at Abu Ghraib and other torture stories related to Iraq and Afghanistan are nothing new; these are well established techniques that we have been using since the Cold War. McCoy also takes on the argument that torture is necessary, and thoroughly debunks the ticking time bomb scenario. You wouldn’t think this would be necessary, but Hollywood and 24 have probably done much to make us believe that these scenarios are far more likely than they are. If you doubt me, read some of Alan Dershowitz’s recent work up to and including his proposal for torture warrants.
15. Armed Madhouse : Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats, Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08,No Child's Behind Left, and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War
by Greg Palast
Palast is an acerbic investigative reporter from the IF Stone school of journalism. He presents a number of detailed findings from his investigations into corporations and government, including State Department planning documents about how best to divide up Iraqi oil from immediately before the Iraq war.
14. Misquoting Jesus : The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why
by Bart Ehrman
Ehrman is scriptural scholar that alleges the bible is full of inaccuracies and fabrications. He charges that history has distorted a number of accounts through translation mistakes and conscious engineering. Ehrman is not some anti-religious heretic either; he spent his youth and higher education steeped in religious training. At one point in his rigourous studies he found a discrepancy that forced him to challenge his previously held belief that the bible had no inaccuracies. This had a profound impact on him and changed the trajectory of his scholarly focus. Aside from the passages he discusses from the bible, his explanation of techniques that historians use to track down texts and figure out which of several differing accounts is correct is very interesting.
Ehrman also notes that the King James Bible is widely considered the most inaccurate version of the bible. It is fitting that that is probably the most popular version in the U.S.
13. Bitter Fruit : The Story of the American Coup in Guatemala
by Stephen Schlesinger, Stephen Kinzer, John H. Coatsworth, and Richard A. Nuccio
All the Shah's Men : An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror.
By Stephen Kinzer
Overthrow : America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq
by Stephen Kinzer
Bitter Fruit and All The Shah’s Men are remarkably similar accounts. Both events occurred in 1953, both involved CIA engineered coups of popular democratic leaders on behalf of corporate interests, and both resulted in unpopular dictatorships that left legacies of violence and sorrow that continue until today. Perfect holiday gifts for anyone looking for some Christmas cheer and thinks the U.S. acts on behalf of the idealistic values espoused in high school civics classrooms.
Overthrow is a much shallower book, only giving the cliff’s notes version of a number of U.S. engineered changes in government around the globe. The value in that book is that it creates an impression that such meddling is systemic rather than isolated anomalies. Kinzer notes that in each case, the real motivations were economic or military interests, but they were all cloaked in language we would recognize in any of George W. Bush’s speeches about Iraq today.
12. Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence
by Sonali Kolhatkar, James Ingalls
This is a terribly tragic story about a people caught between tidal forces during the Cold War and left to cannibalize each other on a deserted island. Ingalls and Kolhaktar trace Afghanistan’s rich history prior to the Russian-U.S. proxy war of the 1980s, the rise of fundamentalist extremists in the 1990s, and the U.S. invasion post 9.11. The country once had a stable society, political freedom, and some measure of wealth. Those are distant memories today.
The people have suffered for several decades now largely as a consequence of what happened in the 1980s when the Russians invaded to prop up their satellite government and the U.S. saw the chance to make Afghanistan Russia’s Vietnam. The U.S. and Pakistan funneled billions of dollars into the antecedents of the Taliban and Al Qaeda to fight the Russians, who were then using eerily similar justifications for why they had to remain in Afghanistan as we use for staying Iraq today. Russia was eventually beaten into retreat, and the Russian empire collapsed shortly thereafter, bankrupted by asymmetrical warfare. When the Russians left so did American dollars and attention.
Afghanistan was by then a devastated country awash in weapons and extremists. The well armed, battle hardened extremists fought it out for political control in the vacuum and the Taliban eventually emerged with a tenuous victory. The Northern Alliance was marginalized until the U.S. invasion, and the rest is history.
11. Empire's Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism
by Greg Grandin
Greg Grandin’s (definately a stage name, methinks) draws a line from the Reaganite aggression in Latin America to Iraq. The same policy makers, agendas, and justifications are found in both conflicts. This is an important book for understanding the rise of neoconservative ideology and the destructive violence its adherents would/have unleashed on the world.
10. The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time
by Antonia Juhasz
I don’t know why Juhasz attached Bush’s name to the title of this book, because it is not really about Bush. This book is an extensively documented account of the motivations underlying U.S. foreign policy, Iraq is one example she cites. If you are interested in what policy moves accompany the high flying rhetoric flowing out of politician’s mouths, then read this book. It might make you uncomfortable and a bit angry, but you wont ever again embarrass yourself by saying that the U.S. invaded Iraq to spread democracy and liberty.
9. American Empire: The Realities and Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy
by Andrew Bacevich
Bacevich is a very conservative ex-military man. He is a conservative in the traditional sense, not in the faux-conservative, statist reactionary Newt Gingrich sense that is mistaken for conservatism. This means that Bacevich has a number of harsh criticisms for militarism and empire building.
8. Failed States : The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy
by Noam Chomsky
Pirates and Emperors, Old and New : International Terrorism in the Real World
by Noam Chomsky
Failed States is the follow up to Hegemony and Survival. Chomsky argues that the U.S. is a failed state based on the following criteria; a failure to protect its citizens, a lack of real democratic function, and a complete disregard for law. He adopts the same criteria the U.S. uses for designating other countries failed states, only in typical Chomsky fashion he turns the spear point back onto the accuser.
On the first account, Chomksy discusses environmental catastrophe and terrorism. Our government under George Bush is ignoring the emerging scientific consensus on global warming at our peril. Their foreign policy is increasing the chances of a major terrorist attack on the U.S. Moreover, they know this and knew it before taking those actions. The dynamics of this are well understood, and he cites voluminous reports from our intelligence agencies and analysts that predicted a rise in terrorism as a result of our invasion of Iraq. His point is that whatever the rhetoric, our government doesn’t place a high priority on stopping terrorism. Other interests take precedence. (For example, the government has assigned 4 analysts to watch the financial flows of terrorist networks around the world, by contrast, there are 24 devoted to Cuba.)
On the second account, the lack of democracy, Chomsky points out how narrow the range of discussion and options are in our political process. And it narrows considerably as you go further up the government. One prerequisite is that you have to be wealthy, accept neo liberal ideology, and internalized American exceptionalism. He also demonstrates that U.S. policy, foreign and domestic, is sharply at odds on a number of issues with what U.S. citizens want it to be as documented in a number of polls. We have democratic forms but not much function.
The final charge, that the U.S. considers itself above the law, is almost too trivial to discuss. See Iraq, for example. But Chomsky reaches back to show that this lawlessness is not unique to Bush citing on other historical examples of unchecked and illegal U.S. aggression from Nicaragua, Panama, Serbia, etc.
Pirates and Emperors is an older book, and almost wholly deals with the international law issues. Both of these together make an interesting case, although one wonders whether there could be any successful states in the world under the minimum requirements outlined. This doesn’t discredit Chomsky’s argument, but causes one to reflect on how our leaders want us to misperceive the world and the sorry state of humanity in general.
7. Tiger Force : A True Story of Men and War
by Michael Sallah and Mitch Weiss
In the early 1970s, an army investigator heard rumors of terrible atrocities committed by U.S. troops in Vietnam. He pursued the story, but faced opposition from senior officers that felt it was more important to move past Vietnam than open up new sores.
Years later, the investigation is discovered and continued by a couple of Los Angeles Times reporters. A series of articles published in the Times culminated in this book. It is a gruesome, horrific account of what happens to men during war. The brutality of Tiger Force is unimaginable, and it eats away at many of the veterans after the war.
6. 1491 : New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
by Charles C. Mann
This is a remarkable book that challenges the stereotypes and commonly held beliefs of Indians and the pre-Columbus Americas. Mann argues that Indian civilizations were remarkable advanced, more so than most European sciences. Some Indian cultures had achieved architectural and farming advances far beyond the capabilities of the Europeans. New research indicates that the bountiful food crops found in the Amazon rain forest was likely the result of native agriculture. Mann also cites new research that shows the population of the Indians was far higher than previously thought.
For all of their advances, the natives could not match European weaponry, which was ultimately the decisive variable in the clash of civilizations. An unknowable holocaust ensued after contact with Europeans because of diseases that the natives had no immunities for. This wiped out large populations well ahead of the Europeans expansion across the American continents, and led to the belief that most of it was unoccupied prior to their arrival.
5. False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism
by John Gray
Gray is a former Thatcherite economic advisor from England. This is a short and somewhat economics oriented critique of capitalism. Gray notes the failed promise of capitalism and the Washington Consensus. The remarkable thing is that Gray predicts many of the economic collapses that happened early in the 21st century, such as Argentina’s fall in 2001. (The book was written in the late 1990s and published in 200.) Gray warns that the increasingly fluid flows of capital and aggregation of wealth and power in private hands threatens human freedom and creates much suffering and instability. Among other things, this is a clean break from Milton Friedman’s belief that free markets reinforce political freedom.
4. The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb
by Gar Alperovitz
At present, in accordance with the Imperial will, there is unanimous determination to seek the good offices of the Russians in ending the war…I have briefly discussed some of the key findings of this book, here.Intercepted missive
Foreign Minister Togo to Ambassador Sato
August 2, 1945
His Majesty the Emperor… desires from his heart that [war] may be quickly terminated.Intercepted missive
Prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.
Foreign Minister Togo to Ambassador Sato in Moscow
July 12, 1945United States Strategic Bombing Survey
We believe that a considerable portion of the Japanese population now consider absolute military defeat probably... An entry of the Soviet Union into the war would finally convince the Japanese of the inevitability of complete defeat.U.S. British Combined Intelligence Committee
For anyone who thought that the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was necessary to force Japan to surrender without invasion and saved countless casualties on both sides, as I was taught in school, this book will force you to reassess those beliefs. Alperovitz’s work is an excellent piece of historical work, he cites primary evidence that has either leaked or been declassified over the last 50 years from the leading military and political figures of that time period.
3. The Lemon Tree : An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East
by Sandy Tolan
Tolan’s book is, quite frankly, a literary achievement. Tolan traces the lives of a Palestinian man whose family was expelled from his home in 1948 and the Israeli settler from Bulgaria whose family settled there. Dalia is a young Jewish girl who grows up believing that the Palestinians left their home willingly until a young man Bashir comes knocking at her door, asking if he can see the inside of the house his grandfather built.
Bashir and Dalia remain in touch throughout their lives and come to a nuanced understanding about their respective ordeals. Throughout this personal narrative Tolan seamlessly integrates a broader historical perspective. You simultaneously get a micro and macro look at the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I enjoyed this book so much that in spite of its narrow focus, it comes in at number 3.
2. The Great War for Civilisation : The Conquest of the Middle East
by Robert Fisk
This is a 1000+ page book that took me about two months to complete, so summarizing its contents would be too much of a challenge for what I want to do here. Instead, let me just say that this is required reading for anyone who wants to understand the Middle East.
Fisk has years and years of experience covering the Middle East; he has interviewed Bin Laden several times, he was there during the Iran-Iraq war, when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, Israel’s invasion of Lebanon in 1982, both U.S. invasions of Iraq, the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, and on. He also has a gripping chapter on the Armenian Holocaust in the early 1900s, which Turkey is still denying. I used to be impressed by the allies foresight in forcing the Germans to clean up concentration camps after defeating the German military. Part of the reason they did this was to make it much harder for the Germans to deny the horror and scale of atrocity. Well, it turns out that Hitler cited the Armenian genocide at one point when responding to someone who questioned whether or not they could get away with implementing his final solution. Turkey is still denying this bloody past, and western countries are giving them a pass for the sake of military and economic integration.
I could go on like this for much longer, retracing the steps of his experiences, but you should get the point. This is a powerful, gripping, invaluable source for the Middle East. Here is a talk Fisk gave at MIT to give you a taste of what you are in for.
1. Gangs of America: The Rise of Corporate Power and the Disabling of Democracy
by Ted Nace
The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power
by Joel Bakan
Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights
by Thom Hartmann
America Beyond Capitalism : Reclaiming our Wealth, Our Liberty, and Our Democracy
by Gar Alperovitz
Wealth and Democracy : A Political History of the American Rich
by Kevin Phillips
One Market Under God: Extreme Capitalism, Market Populism, and the End of Economic Democracy
by Thomas Frank
These six books all take on various aspects of our corporate-capitalist model. They differ slightly in their remedy to the malaise they describe; reform, abolishment, or nothing.
I am currently pursuing my MBA and will be finished in May of 2007. Much of my education has taken place within the context of the corporate framework. I began studying for an MBA because I wanted to give myself the credentials and skills necessary to tackle more design oriented and project management level issues in the software industry instead of the low level coding, where I am at now. More generally, W.E. Dubois presciently warned that the question facing America in the 20th century was one of race, I believe that the questions facing the human race in the next century are issues of economics and resources. Our current model assumes that the earth is an infinite sink and source. This has worked well for quite some time and led to remarkable advancements in human development, even if those advancements have disproportionately benefited a tiny slice of humanity. But at some point we are going to run up against the limits of our environment, and having an understanding of business and economics will help us reform or change our current system. I believe those are the questions facing our race, and I felt (and still do) that education will help me personally see and understand the complexity of the issues involved.
One significant barrier is the corporate model and incredible concentration of wealth and power in a few hands. Corporate managers are legally obligated to have one and only one priority: maximizing shareholder wealth. There are no concerns about the environment, worker, community, etc. (The ultimate destructive effects of this warped value system can be seen in many of the numerous corporate alliances with Nazi Germany, such as Ford or IBM, and innumerable dictators throughout the 20th century.) Any money spent on corporate social responsibility can only be justified on the premise that public relations will improve the bottom line. This is not controversial in the business world.
The capitalist concept that justifies the single-minded focus on maximizing shareholder wealth is Adam Smith’s invisible hand, whereby the self interested actions of the individual will benefit society as if guided by an unseen hand. For example, a clothing company might only be interested in profits, but their actions provide people with affordable clothing to keep warm in the winter. The problem with this theory is that reality contradicts many of its assumptions. I have discussed the problem this poses with respect to externalities, stakeholders, and other business issues here. One other thing I would note is that Smith explicitly warned that his theory would only hold if the interests of the private business were firmly rooted in their local community. In today’s world, multinational corporations have revenues that exceed the GNP of many countries and have divisions the world over; this premise bears little relation to reality. I’ll briefly list a few examples of what happens when a business has no interests in a local community and leave it to the reader to pursue the details if interested:
- Bechtel’s ownership of water in Cochabamba Bolivia (note: after Bechtel took over Cochabamba’s water, it was illegal for peasants to collect rainwater. True story.)
- Various corporations fighting human rights in China
- Newmont Mining in Peru
- Unocal's involvement with horrendous human rights abuses in Burma
At one time in this country, corporations were temporary institutions. Corporate charters would specify a limit to the lifespan of a corporation, which would be formed for a temporary task such as building a road, bridge, or building. After their given task was completed, they were dissolved. A series of judicial decisions and changes during the late 19th and early 20th century changed all of this. This was a concentrated effort by moneyied interests. For example, of the 300+ legal cases brought before the Supreme Court under the 14th amendment, over 280 were on behalf of corporations. (Recall that the 14th amendment was supposed to give blacks equal rights.) Nace’s Gangs of America and Hartmann’s Unequal Protection documents the legal evolution of corporations. Hartmann discusses at length the California v. Santa Clara Railroad decision, which is widely recognized to give the status of legal personhood to corporations. Both accounts are well done, detailed, and are eye opening reads. Corporations are such a ubiquitous part of our world today, that many conflate criticism of corporations with criticism of capitalism. (That has been my personal experience in school.) I believe the first step in solving some of our pressing economic problems is understanding how we got here, and these books go a long way to that.
The other books are mostly criticisms and explanations of the current situation rather than the historical background. Alperovitz’s book is more focused on the way forward, with some prescribed remedies. His specific remedies are not the most important thing, the real value is in opening ones eyes and heart to understanding that there are problems and that we are in control of our world. These are not forces of nature beyond our understanding or ability to change.
1 comments:
Did you take a speed reading class? Pretty impressive, I'd never have enough time to read all those books and work on my masters at the same time.
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