GREENBACK PLANET How the Dollar Conquered the World and Threatened Civilization As We Know It
Brands, H.W. Univ. of Texas (142 pp.) $25.00 | October 1, 2011 978-0-292-72341-2
In this succinct overview, two-time Pulitzer finalist Brands (History/Univ. of Texas; The Murder of Jim Fisk for the Love of Josie Mansfield: A Tragedy of the Gilded Age, 2011, etc.) traces the role of the dollar in shaping America’s rise to global preeminence. The author looks at historical benchmarks beginning with two signal events: the issuance of greenbacks as legal tender in 1862 and the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. The establishment of the Federal Reserve System 50 years later formalized the second pole in the pendulum swings of U.S. financial policy—between emphasis on a balanced budget and tight credit and the liquidity needed to support industrial growth and high employment, both of which are at the forefront of today’s political controversies. Following World War I, the increasingly important international role of the United States led to the establishment of the gold-backed dollar as a global currency, and its replacement by the greenback in 1971 when Richard Nixon decoupled the dollar from gold. Along with an overview of the past 150 years, Brands examines fascinating little-known sidelights. While William Jennings Bryan’s famous pro-silver speech attacked the gold-backed dollar, in the 1870s silver was the scarcer metal and silver dollars a rarity. Contrary to the prevailing opinion that America’s international dominance rests on the country’s military, Brands ascribes it to the “dollar’s power” which enabled the nation to “insist on market-opening measures.” The author suggests that in the 21st century, American financial hegemony will be replaced, leaving America’s international role in the new post-dollar world an open question. A welcome, balanced look at this hotly debated issue, written with the author’s usual flair.
is not the dominant player on the global scene, and in fact is lagging drastically behind most developed nations. Graduation rates are dropping and, even more disturbingly, students that are graduating are often not proficient in basic skills. Which much of this has been blamed on factors such as poverty and lack of community motivation, most reformers agree that it can be almost directly tied to teacher performance. The problem is clear, but the solution is anything but, as teachers are represented by one of the country’s fiercest and tightest unions. Public school teachers are locked into lengthy contracts protecting them but, many argue, often neglecting the students. A bevy of passionate individuals, organizations, philanthropists and even politicians have cropped up with innovative solutions to these problems, and Brill (Journalism/Yale Univ.; After: How America Confronted the September 12 Era, 2003, etc.) follows their efforts closely. From his account, patient zero in the reform movement seems to be Teach for America (TFA), founded in 1990 by Princeton senior Wendy Kopp, which sends outstanding recent college graduates to needy school districts for a two-year stint. Not only has TFA grown exponentially, but it has also produced several other leaders of the reform movement, such as Michelle Rhee, the former controversial Washington, D.C., school superintendent, and David Levin, founder of the massive network of KIPP charter schools. With Obama’s election, the reform movement saw a major boost, as the president championed a plan called Race to the Top, which awarded states with unprecedented funding in exchange for reform. The problem with all this reform, however, is determining whether it actually works. Brill appears to be pro-reform and anti-union, though he concedes in the final pages that real change has to come not from band-aids like TFA and charters, but from the regular teachers that reach the vast majority of students across the country. The author tackles this beast of a topic admirably, creating a lucid, often riveting history that will be invaluable to the next generation of reformers.
JAMES MADISON
Brookhiser, Richard Basic (304 pp.) $28.00 | October 4, 2011 978-0-465-01983-0
CLASS WARFARE Inside the Fight to Fix America’s Schools
Brookhiser (Right Time, Right Place: Coming of Age with William F. Buckley Jr. and the Conservative Movement, 2009, etc.) explores America’s tangled twoparty political system and the man instrumental in creating it, James Madi-
Brill, Steven Simon & Schuster (496 pp.) $28.00 | August 16, 2011 978-1-4516-1199-1
An in-depth, impeccably researched examination of the education-reform movements that have swept America over the last several decades, as well as the obstacles they’ve faced. The last 20 years have seen drastic changes to the American public-education landscape. For the first time, the United States 1310
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son (1751–1836). The author investigates Madison’s transition from ideological framer of the Constitution to a fervent party man who fought against the Federalist party for decades and led his Republican party during its first military foray, the War of 1812. Though he came of age under the influence and tutelage of luminaries like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, Brookhiser’s portrayal of Madison grounds him in the backbiting, often
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inglorious machinations of his contemporary political system; this approach is both significant and refreshing in presenting Madison as a flawed man, rather than a godlike “founding father.” The author focuses exclusively on Madison the politician, and thereby exposes some of Madison’s less respectable motives for tackling his political enemies—one favored strategy was to enlist vocal, if not always reliable, journalists to spearhead political attacks in the rough-and-tumble world of early American periodicals. This practice, coupled with Madison’s lifelong faith in the power of public opinion and his commitment to protect the freedom of the presses, opens an interesting avenue into this early usage of public opinion and blustering journalism to shape public policy. This is a slim volume, noticeably so in a biography of an instrumental man like Madison; as such, there are episodes of both personal and political moment that would greatly benefit from additional context and analysis. How, for example, could two such close allies, Madison and the fiery Alexander Hamilton, find themselves at opposite ends of a bitter political feud over the role of central government? What was at stake, other than a rather parochial land lust, for Madison and Jefferson as they pursued western expansion? How did Dolley Madison, historically recognized as the first “political wife,” contribute to his politics and his personal life? A useful introduction to a man who is often outshone by his presidential predecessors but who nevertheless was instrumental in creating our modern political system. (Author tour to New York, Washington, D.C., Boston, Philadelphia. Agent: Michael Carlisle)
KINK A Straight Girl’s Investigation
Clifford-Smith, Stephanie Allen & Unwin (296 pp.) paper $16.95 | August 1, 2011 9781741759129 Funny, intriguing personal accounts of the kinkier side of sex. Whether readers are into bondage, submission, people dressed up in furry animal costumes or just vanilla sex, the four-year research project undertaken by Aussie Clifford-Smith (A Marvellous Party: The Life of Bernard King, 2004) will evoke pleasure. Interested in the dirty details of the goings-on in other people’s bedrooms, the author placed an ad in a newspaper, trolled Internet fetish chat rooms and attended swinger parties to learn more about what drove people to their personal kinks and how it took shape in their lives. Each chapter introduces a new person and their kink, with the author providing space for them to explain the intricacies of their urges. Fleshing out each anecdote are CliffordSmith’s own thoughts, sometimes heightened by comparisons to artwork or great novels or injected with humorous asides or statistics. The author, a self-proclaimed vanilla-sex enthusiast, was unable to remain entirely on the sidelines, and was eventually pulled into the action by one of her subjects. “That was |
undoubtedly the biggest surprise of them all and, while it was useful, I’m glad it didn’t last,” she writes. Prostitution, bestiality, water sports, scat play, amputees—it’s all here. Clifford-Smith’s first-person observations, blended with the subjects’ various sexual proclivities, results in an intriguing collection of kinks. Beware though—even the author confides, “Who was I kidding when I thought I was unshockable?” Not for the faint of heart, but certainly the inquisitive mind—or libido.
TEACHING AND ITS PREDICAMENTS
Cohen, David K. Harvard Univ. (240 pp.) $26.95 | August 1, 2011 978-0-674-05110-2
An examination of the quandaries surrounding the teaching profession from various angles. Cohen (The Ordeal of Equality: Did Federal Regulation Fix the Schools?, 2009, etc.) discusses the complexity of teaching, and in starting with the task of defining the profession, he illustrates the byzantine nature of the American education system. He explains some underlying problems that are often neglected, such as how teachers “do not play a central part in setting standards of occupational quality,” and he touches upon conflicts concerning testing and controversies surrounding what the results mean. Cohen emphasizes how educators are not practicing in isolation, which further complicates the matter. If there are limited connections between school and real-world experiences, he writes, then students’ investment in the system is compromised. “Teaching in such circumstances is the human improver’s version of unrequited love: the prospect of success is appealing, but its costs can be enormous when students’ and teachers’ work is not framed by contracts to work hard together. The responsibility for improvement is one-sided,” he writes. The author mentions societal influences such as the emergence of “welleducated and engaged young teachers in Teach For America” and charter schools as a positive response to the issues, but he does not explain how or why. Cohen’s focus seems to drift in his exploration of types of instructional discourse. He does not offer solutions to the predicaments of the book’s title, but he does prove that “US public education is not organized to help teachers manage the predicaments of their occupation.” Uneven but ultimately useful for educators and reformers.
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