John Mueller (1)

I really wanted this book to make its case well because I think it has an important thesis. The central idea of this book is that capitalism tends to have a worse reputation than it deserves and democracy had a better. In particular, "capitalism actually tends, all other things being equal, systematically, thought not uniformly, to reward business behavior that is honest, fair, civil, and compassionate" and "actual democracy, [is] notable chiefly for discord, inequality, apathy, hasty compromise, political and policy ignorance, and manipulative scrambling by 'special interests'". Yet despite capitalism's negative perception and democracy's less-than-ideal implementation, Mueller argues that they are still the best system we've found for maximizing good outcomes, and they both do this by emphasizing individual freedom for people to act in their own broadly defined interests.

Mueller also makes an important psychological claim. That both of these systems do pretty well despite a lack of the ideal citizen (for democracy) and in spite of acquisitional greed (for capitalism) is a good thing: "It seems to me that an institution is likely to be fundamentally sound if it can function adequately when people are rarely, if ever, asked to rise above the ignorance and selfishness which with they have been so richly endowed by their creator. Or, putting it a bit more gently, since human beings are a flawed bunch, an institution will be more successful if it can if it can work with human imperfections rather than requiring first that the race be reformed to impossible perfection."

If these arguments could be made well, this would be an excellent work. The problem is that Mueller's arguments were not even bad. They were laughable. A small part of this is because the book was published in 1999[1] and some of the points are dated. Much more importantly, the argument was not substantial. Mueller's main evidence for the positive outcomes of capitalism rely mainly on business advice, not on an analysis of real company outcomes and whether or not they're correlated with moral behavior (à la [b:Good to Great|76865|Good to Great Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't|James C. Collins|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1435813395s/76865.jpg|1094028]). It is certainly compelling that the advice the business leaders give to each other points toward moral behavior being a competitive advantage, but it's hardly evidence that the whole system leans toward moral behavior.

His argument for the imperfections of democracy are even more muddled. He mixes up an argument that democracy is the best possible system (via cherry picked examples) with an argument that focusing on how democracy falls short of the ideal is harmful. His argument borders on Panglossian: democracy has lasted for a couple hundred years now, so how we are doing it must be pretty close to the best it can be and trying to improve things will just make people cynical and so it's bad.

Overall, Mueller shows a lack of robust historical or business analysis. Thus, in the end, he has an interesting thesis -- one that I agree with much of -- but he argues it so badly that I found myself arguing against points I agreed with.


[1] This is, in fact, why I read the book without doing too much background research. In general, I've found that if someone I trust (in this case a newsletter) recommends a book that is a decade or more old, it's probably pretty good. My heuristic was wrong in this case.… (plus d'informations)

"War... is merely an idea, an institution, like dueling or slavery, that has been grafted onto human existence. It is not a trick of fate, a thunderbolt from hell, a natural calamity, or a desperate plot contrivance dreamed up by some sadistic puppeteer on high. And it seems to me that the institution is in pronounced decline, abandoned as attitudes toward it have changed, roughly following the pattern by which the ancient and formidable institution of slavery became discredited and then mostly obsolete."―from the Introduction

War is one of the great themes of human history and now, John Mueller believes, it is clearly declining. Developed nations have generally abandoned it as a way for conducting their relations with other countries, and most current warfare (though not all) is opportunistic predation waged by packs―often remarkably small ones―of criminals and bullies. Thus, argues Mueller, war has been substantially reduced to its remnants―or dregs―and thugs are the residual combatants.

References to East Timor, Aveh and Papua. Mueller is sensitive to the policy implications of this view. When developed states commit disciplined troops to peacekeeping, the result is usually a cessation of murderous disorder. The Remnants of War thus reinvigorates our sense of the moral responsibility bound up in peacekeeping. In Mueller's view, capable domestic policing and military forces can also be effective in reestablishing civic order, and the building of competent governments is key to eliminating most of what remains of warfare.… (plus d'informations)

A useful volume, but one that leaves many obvious approaches untouched:

1) American militarism (imperialism is all but absent in the book, though it makes an oblique appearance in discussing a discussion of the effects of the Iraq war). Mueller appears to have isolationist and anti-imperial views but does not assert them.

2) The U.S.'s state propaganda machinery.

3) Skepticism about 9/11 is offhandedly dismissed, despite the propagandistic character of the 9/11 Commission and the role of Philip Zelikow.

4) The psychology of fear is not analyzed.

5) The impact in civil liberties is only mentioned but is not explored at all; the Patriot Act is not even mentioned.

6) The military-industrial complex is not mentioned.… (plus d'informations)

This is an interesting, valuable and important book, and I'm fairly sure almost no-one has or, for that matter will, read it. I will do what I can to change that.

John Mueller is from a venerable but sadly rare tradition of Academic commentators: the skeptics. It's that perspective he lends to our "troubled times" and over this course of this tidily executed, thoroughly sourced and entertaining book, Mueller systematically demolishes much of the public hype which holds us up in airport terminals, eats up our tax dollars and does its level best to prevent us sleeping soundly in our beds.

He makes, and repeats, a point which many otherwise perfectly sensible and well-informed commentators can't fathom: The biggest source of terror in our lives is not terrorists in Afghan caves, but our own politicians and media pundits constantly blathering about them. The terrorists themselves cause sporadic but, in fact, very limited mayhem.

The thousands of hungry mouths who comprise the "terrorism industry" on the other hand - the politicians, civil servants, defence contractors, security analysts and media commentators - each of whom is primarily interested in justifying his own existence or convincing us to open our wallets - each has a vested interest in persuading us we should be soiling rather than sleeping in our beds. Their statements, therefore, we should take with a pinch of salt.

But even though we all know we ought to, we don't. We acquiesce: we put up with speculative, unsourced, unattributed, and frequently credulous nonsense - we tolerate queues and being unneccesarily fondled at airports, hikes in tax rates and restrictions on our civil liberties. John Mueller's book sets out to provide us a reality check and ask, pointedly, why we are so easily prepared to do that.

By way of preface Mueller lists a series of items which ought to be - but aren't - conventional wisdom. They're all very big points, among them:
* Terrorism just doesn't do much damage considered in any reasonable context (nine times as many Americans are struck by lightning in the average year as are killed by terrorists)
* Even where Terrorism has horrendous results, it tends to be one-off events (despite six years of anxiety, there has not been another terrorist attack in the U.S. *at all*, let alone one on the scale of 9/11)
* Catastrophic events are by their nature are hard to repeat (never again will a plane full of unsuspecting passengers sit and allow unarmed men to fly them to their deaths without intervening, since the assumption "we'll be used as hostages so we're safe for now" no longer holds)
* Terrorist actions tend to be counterproductive on almost every level any way: far from throwing New York into chaos, panic and Hobbesian brutality, the direct and immediate result of 9/11 was the sudden blossoming of compassion, cooperation and cohesion in the city on a completely unprecedented scale - a place not usually known for its neighborliness or Samaritan spirit
* The cost (both human and economic terms) of the "War on Terror" has been far greater than the cost of Terrorist actions themselves (even taking into account the financial losses sustained in the capital markets)
* The "War on Terror", being as it is a war on an idea, is utterly unwinnable. There is no practical way of eradicating the possibility of individuals, for whatever reason, engaging in entirely destructive acts of violence. Like road fatalities (of which there are tens of thousands each year in the US) the risk of terrorist attacks are a fact of life in built up areas which we should take reasonable, dispassionate, measures to minimise bearing in mind the opportunity costs of doing so.

Mueller doesn't take an (overtly) political position - his arguments are not based on views about foreign policy nor the moral rights and wrongs of the situation, but an statistical analysis of the costs and risks of the terrorist threat, and acknowledgment of the personal agendas which inevitably inform those who shout loudest. "If it bleeds it leads" - people don't buy newspapers to read good news, so in a competitive market it is no surprise if newspapers tend to dwell on worst case scenarios. Yes, terrorism is dreadful, Mueller says, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't keep it in perspective.

In short, this book is a long overdue and much needed dose of common sense.… (plus d'informations)