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SPECIAL SECTION: THE BEST CIVIL WAR BOOKS

T HE M IDDLE E AST

The WILSON QUARTERLY SURVEYING THE WORLD OF IDEAS What Next?

The WikiLeaks Illusion

SUMMER 2011 Teddy Roosevelt, Father of Spin $7.95 The Case for Commissions WQCov2 6/28/11 11:44 AM Page 2

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SCHOLAR THE WOODROW WILSON INTERNATIONAL CENTER ADMINISTRATION FOR SCHOLARS ANNOUNCES ITS 2012-2013 FELLOWSHIP COMPETITION. OFFICE The Center awards academic year residential fellowships to men One Woodrow Wilson Plaza and women from any country with outstanding project proposals on policy-relevant topics in national and/or international affairs. The 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW Center welcomes proposals in the social sciences and humanities Washington, DC 20004-3027 and other fields of study. [email protected] Fellows are provided stipends, private offices with computers, access to the Library of Congress, and research assistants. Tel: 202-691-4170 The application deadline is October 1, 2011. For eligibility Fax: 202-691-4001 requirements and application guidelines, please contact the Center. If you wish to download the application or apply online, please visit www.wilsoncenter.org FELLOWSHIPS INFORMING PUBLIC POLICY WQ1 6/28/11 11:37 AM Page 1

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The WILSON QUARTERLY

Summer 2011 volume xxxv, number 3 The Wilson Quarterly Published by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars FEATURES www.wilsonquarterly.com

COVER STORY 16 The WikiLeaks Illusion 35 The Middle East By Alasdair Roberts | When WikiLeaks published WHAT NEXT? thousands of confidential government documents Since this spring’s eruption of demands for change last year, most Americans hardly batted an eye. in the Arab world, uncertainty reigns everywhere. 22 Beyond the Bully Pulpit In some countries, long-ruling autocrats still fight By David Greenberg | With his outsize personality viciously for power, while in others, leaders scram- and zest for media attention, Theodore Roosevelt ble to reach a new accommodation with their sud- transformed the American presidency forever. denly rebellious people. Egyptians and Tunisians, 30 Three Cheers for Blue-Ribbon Panels meanwhile, struggle to make good on the promise By Jordan Tama | Launching a new government of democracy. Where did this wave of change commission filled with eminent figures has come from? And where is it going? become Washington’s stock answer to national For America, An Arab Winter | problems. What’s surprising is that such groups By Aaron David Miller often get the job done. The Long Revolt | By Rami G. Khouri

The Pink Hijab | By Robin Wright ON THE COVER: Tahrir Square on February 12, after Egyptian president Writing the New Rules of the Game | Hosni Mubarak announced his resignation. ABOVE: A young protester on February 7, the 14th day of the demonstrations calling for Mubarak’s ouster. By Donald L. Horowitz The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

2 Wilson Quarterly ■ Summer 2011 WQ2-3 6/28/11 11:33 AM Page 3

DEPARTMENTS

4 EDITOR’S COMMENT Putting Free Will to the Test, from 84 Best Civil War Military Science Books 5 LETTERS By Joseph Glatthaar 68 ARTS & LETTERS 8 AT THE CENTER Beauty, the Ultimate Survivor, from 87 Four Essential Books Salmagundi About Abraham Lincoln 12 FINDINGS No RIP for Print, from McSweeney’s By Andrew Ferguson Quarterly Concern and The Chronicle Review 89 Best Books on Slavery and Race Relations Graffiti Gets the Glory, from IN ESSENCE By Ira Berlin our survey of notable City Journal articles from other journals and magazines 71 SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY 92 My Favorite Civil War Novels An Internet for All Time, from By David S. Reynolds 55 FOREIGN POLICY & DEFENSE IEEE Spectrum 95 America Aflame: If North Korea Falls, from A Reason for Reason, from How the Civil War World Affairs Behavioral and Brain Sciences Created a Nation. Latin America Rising, from How Maps Made the World, from By David Goldfield Foreign Affairs International Organization Reviewed by W. Barksdale How Stuxnet Changed the World, Maynard from Strategic Studies Quarterly 74 OTHER NATIONS The Origins of the Sunni Say Yes to Nukes, from Awakening, from Security Studies 96 1861: Claremont Review of Books The Civil War Awakening. India’s Vulture Void, from Virginia By Adam Goodheart 59 POLITICS & GOVERNMENT Quarterly Review Reviewed by Christopher Clausen No Thanks, Mr. Kant, from Stingless Authoritarianism, from National Affairs Journal of Democracy 98 Fighting Chance: Merit Pay for Congress? from The Little Island That Could, from The Struggle Over Woman Boston Review National Bureau of Economic Suffrage and Black Suffrage . No Small Wonder, from Research Digest in Reconstruction America The Yale Law Journal By Faye E. Dudden Reviewed by Nina Silber 61 ECONOMICS, LABOR & BUSINESS Comparing the Tippy Tops, from 67 CURRENT BOOKS 99 A World on Fire: Journal of Economic Literature Britain’s Crucial Role in Best Books About the Civil War the American Civil War. What Economists Can Learn From By Amanda Foreman History, from Business History In recognition of the Civil War Reviewed by Don H. Doyle Review sesquicentennial, leading histori- Good Fences Make Good Farms, ans and writers single out their 101 The Union War. from The Quarterly Journal of favorite books about the war, its By Gary W. Gallagher Economics aftermath, and its hold on the public imagination. We also Reviewed by Kevin Adams 63 SOCIETY review the most notable Civil 102 The Civil War: Who Wants a Tax Break? from War books published this season. The First Year Told by American Economic Journal: Those Who Lived It. Economic Policy Edited by Brooks D. Simpson, Parenthood’s Second Wind, from Stephen W. Sears, and Aaron Population and Development Sheehan-Dean Review Reviewed by Tim Morris Homeownership and Race, from The American Economic Review 78 My Road to the Civil War 66 RELIGION & PHILOSOPHY By James M. McPherson Philosophy for the Few, from The Philosopher’s Magazine 81 What Like a Bullet Can Big Religion, from Undeceive! 104 PORTRAIT Church History By Brenda Wineapple Letting Go

Summer 2011 ■ Wilson Quarterly 3 WQ4 6/28/11 11:34 AM Page 4

The WILSON QUARTERLY EDITOR’S COMMENT

EDITOR Steven Lagerfeld

MANAGING EDITOR James H. Carman

LITERARY EDITOR Sarah L. Courteau

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Rebecca J. Rosen

ASSISTANT EDITOR Megan Buskey

EDITORIAL INTERNS John Cheng, Molly Kozel

EDITORS AT LARGE Ann Hulbert, James Morris, First Look Jay Tolson COPY EDITOR Vincent Ercolano

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Daniel Akst, This is an issue of firsts. Never before has the WQ’s Current Books Stephen Bates, Martha Bayles, Max Byrd, Linda Colley, Denis Donoghue, Max Holland, section been devoted entirely to a single subject, as it is with this Walter Reich, Alan Ryan, Amy E. Schwartz, Edward Tenner, Charles Townshend, Alan Wolfe, issue’s focus on the Civil War in observance of the war’s sesqui- Bertram Wyatt-Brown centennial. Literary editor Sarah Courteau has created a delightful BOARD OF EDITORIAL ADVISERS K. Anthony Appiah, Cynthia Arnson, Amy Chua, and informative assemblage of reviews and short essays covering Tyler Cowen, Harry Harding, Robert Hathaway, Elizabeth Johns, Jackson Lears, Robert Litwak, everything from the war’s great leaders and battles to novels that Wilfred M. McClay, Blair Ruble, Peter Skerry, S. Frederick Starr, Martin Walker, Samuel Wells capture the trials and tribulations of the anonymous millions who FOUNDING EDITOR Peter Braestrup (1929–1997)

were caught up in the conflict. Best of all, to my mind, the section is BUSINESS DIRECTOR Suzanne Napper

much like a battlefield itself in a rare moment free of smoke and CIRCULATION Laura Vail, ProCirc, Miami, Fla. haze, with the many contending arguments about the origins and The Wilson Quarterly (ISSN-0363-3276) is published in January (Winter), April (Spring), July (Summer), and consequences of America’s great war visible to all. October (Autumn) by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars at One Woodrow Wilson Plaza, 1300 There’s another first in this issue: All of our feature articles are Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20004–3027. Complete article index available online at authored by current or past scholars and staff members of the www.wilsonquarterly.com. Print subscriptions: one year, $24; two years, $43. Air mail outside U.S.: one Woodrow Wilson Center. That doesn’t mean we’re becoming a year, $39; two years, $73. Single issues and selected back issues mailed upon request: $9; outside U.S. house organ—it’s just a happy coincidence that testifies to the and possessions, $12. Periodical postage paid at Washington, D.C., and additional mailing offices. extraordinary intellectual breadth and strength of the Center. All unsolicited manuscripts should be accompanied by These writers treat subjects ranging from American history to for- a self-addressed stamped envelope. MEMBERS: Send changes of address and all subscrip- eign affairs, and their perspectives often clash. In our cover cluster tion correspondence with The Wilson Quarterly mailing label to: on the Middle East, “What Next?” you will read four extremely The Wilson Quarterly knowledgeable authors with different takes on what to expect in P.O. Box 16898 North Hollywood, CA 91615 the wake of the Arab Spring. CUSTOMER SERVICE: The Center’s new director, president, and CEO, Jane Harman, (818) 487-2068 has inaugurated a series of debates and discussions called The POSTMASTER: Send all address changes to The Wilson Quarterly, P.O. Box 16898, National Conversation with the goal of promoting more informed North Hollywood, CA 91615. Microfilm copies are available from Bell & Howell Infor- and civil discourse about our national challenges. That’s very much mation and Learning, 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, MI 48106. U.S. newsstand distribution through CMG, in the spirit of what the WQ has sought to do for 35 years. It’s a great Princeton, N.J. For more information contact Kathleen conversation. Join it. Montgomery, Marketing Manager (609) 524-1685 or [email protected]. ADVERTISING: Suzanne Napper, Business Director, Tel.: (202) 691-4021 /Fax: (202) 691-4036 —Steven Lagerfeld E-mail: [email protected]

4 Wilson Quarterly ■ Summer 2011 WQ5-11 6/28/11 11:35 AM Page 5

LETTERS

THE CITY—IT’S ALIVE white gentrifier living in a predomi- blacks (and other persons of color) An official from a sizable nantly black low-income neighbor- having the opportunity to move foundation told a Florida crowd a hood [“New to the Neighborhood,” into predominantly white areas few months ago that people no Spring ’11] underscores a number of and whites moving into neighbor- longer live in “places.” They spend dramatic changes taking place in U.S. hoods with a black identity. A bal- their time in “spaces”—particularly cities today. Perhaps none are more anced flow of whites and blacks the virtual space of the Internet. I dramatic than the willingness of into neighborhoods is the only way need to send the speaker your clus- whites to move into previously all- that areas can remain integrated. ter on cities and their comeback black neighborhoods. Will this be the case for neighbor- [“The City Bounces Back,” Spring During the 20th century, hoods like Rosedale? The answer to ’11]. The evidence in your articles American cities became so racially this question will go a long way and elsewhere tells us that the con- segregated that descriptors such toward clarifying whether we are cept of place still matters, maybe as “apartheid” were apt. In Amer- truly approaching a postracial era more than ever. ican Apartheid (1993), the sociol- in the United States. Overlooked in the idea of space is ogists Douglas Massey and Nancy Lance Freeman the new social function cities play. Denton ably document the myriad Director and Associate Professor Cities are the places where most discriminatory forces that created Urban Planning Program Americans construct their iden- “chocolate” cities such as Wash- Graduate School of Architecture, tities—whether it’s by joining a ington, D.C. Just as important to Planning, and Preservation marching band, shopping for arti- the creation of segregated cities, Columbia University sanal grains, or patronizing particu- however, was white flight to the New York, N.Y. lar coffee shops. If family, class, occu- suburbs and white avoidance of pation, and religion once guided us neighborhoods with a substantial The editors’ introduction to through life, today each of us cob- black presence—neighborhoods Sarah L. Courteau’s article high- bles together a life of one’s own with that inevitably became all black. lights the mixed feelings she has the people and activities we discover To the extent that residential inte- about the term “urban pioneer.” in the cities where we choose to live. gration occurred in the post–civil Missing from her well-intentioned Bill Bishop rights era, it almost always meant reflection is a consideration of the Author, The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of a few blacks moving into white power dynamics that create urban Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart (2009) communities. frontiers in the first place. In fact, Austin, Texas Courteau’s experience suggests a discussion of power is virtually a new chapter in the life of the absent from all four articles on the Sarah L. Courteau’s thought- American city. This is a chapter of city, despite the long history of ful essay on her experiences as a a more integrated metropolis with inequality that the unbalanced distribution of power has pro- LETTERS may be mailed to The Wilson Quarterly, 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W., Washington, D.C. duced in urban America. This 20004–3027, or sent via facsimile, to (202) 691-4036, or e-mail, to [email protected]. The writer’s telephone number and postal address should be included. For reasons of space, letters are usually edited for oversight could allow the reader to publication. Some letters are received in response to the editors’ requests for comment. uncritically assume that cities are

Summer 2011 ■ Wilson Quarterly 5 WQ5-11 6/28/11 11:35 AM Page 6

LETTERS

“bouncing back” to the benefit of We must recognize that such does not displace longtime resi- all. changes in our cities are by no dents that Courteau cites, the jury As Courteau notes, the word means “natural,” but reflect a con- is still out on this question. But “pioneer”—particularly in the his- glomeration of powerful forces demographic and cultural shifts torical context of the United that clearly favor the perceived are clear. The 2010 U.S. Census States—implicitly suggests that desires of one group over those of shows more white residents living the place to which the pioneer has others. in historically black urban neigh- traveled is, at best, a blank slate Michael McCoyer borhoods. More affluent families ready to be “improved” and, at Washington, D.C. are moving to or choosing to stay worst, a primitive backwater in- in cities. From New York to Dallas habited by unenlightened people Sarah L. Courteau’s grace- to San Francisco, “arts districts” that needs to be civilized. In either ful account of moving into an are expanding while low-income case, the modern pioneer is African-American community in areas contract. expected to improve her new sur- Washington, D.C., weaves an all- Do cities gain or lose from roundings, with the help of pri- too-common narrative of gentrifi- these changes? To the extent that vate developers and the state. cation. Whatever the race, ethnic- they become safer, cleaner, and One might ask why longtime ity, or occupation of gentrifiers, more attractive, they win. Increas- residents should have a greater say once they achieve a critical den- ing the tax base raise revenue to pay than newcomers about their sity, they undermine the authen- for city services. But gentrifiers, neighborhood. As the H Street ticity of the urban experience they especially single homeowners such N.E. developer Courteau cites crave. as Courteau, tend to support pri- said, hasn’t the corridor been Sometimes they do this directly vate, market-based services that dominated by different demo- by bidding up housing prices, separate them from low-income graphic groups throughout its his- offering a windfall fortune to low- groups. tory (first Jewish, then black, and income homeowners and pushing Together with the demolition now white young professional)? renters out. In Courteau’s new of public housing projects, gentri- Yes—but not all change is equal. neighborhood, gentrifiers reno- fication dilutes the strong social The gentrification of H Street N.E. vate homes, marking their pres- solidarity and authentic cultural did not occur on its own (in con- ence and establishing the mar- identity of poor parts of cities trast to the neighborhood’s previ- ketability of an area that was once overwhelmingly inhabited by ous demographic changes). It was considered too economically mar- minorities. sparked by the state, and followed ginal or dangerous. Sharon Zukin a tradition of public-private rede- Improvement brings develop- Author, Naked City: The Death and Life of velopment that is often inherently ers and more gentrifiers. The new Authentic Urban Places (2010) prejudiced. arrivals encourage entrepreneurs Professor of Sociology As David Zipper’s article to open restaurants, bars, inde- Brooklyn College and City University [“Stores and the City,” Spring ’11] pendent bookstores, organic gro- Graduate Center shows, developers act according ceries, and boutiques—all of the Brooklyn, N.Y. to preconceived notions of what “interesting” amenities that fasci- will be successful. It just so hap- nate men and women who culti- David Zipper’s article on the pens that the largely white, edu- vate their role as cultural con- opening of the Yes! Organic Mar- cated, middle-class demographic sumers. As a result, multicultural ket in the Fairlawn neighborhood that is usually seen as the key to urban diversity evolves into a of Washington, D.C., offers a wel- success for such redevelopment is monoculture. come look at the often unsung also a boon to Washington, D.C.’s Despite the quantitative stud- story of neighborhood economic tax base. ies showing that gentrification development. Revitalizing cities is

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LETTERS

not always about big, high-profile industry and the job market while Extreme waste is endemic in projects. Incremental changes are creating products it can sell the American way of life, and it is necessary to make neighborhoods around the world. If the products time for policymakers to render more likely to attract and retain don’t sell, the ideas are worth a the sprawling suburbs of Phoenix, residents. lot less. Arizona, and Charlotte, North D.C. is on the upswing again Vanderbilt also focuses on Carolina, unaffordable. The net after decades of decline in which manufacturing as a means to cost savings from enacting such the population shrank, businesses boost competitiveness. But it can policies would be enormous. closed, and tax revenue dropped. be a path to equity as well. Many Health care costs alone would The challenge of people with jobs of the country’s poorest cities are drop by billions if Americans were such as Zipper’s is to manage mar- ones where manufacturing jobs forced out of their cars. Policy- ket forces to preserve neighbor- were lost in the past half-century makers who are serious about hood character in some areas, and never restored. Organizations curbing the nation’s dependence spur investment interest in other such as SFMade in San Francisco on foreign energy supplies and areas, and provide economic op- support local manufacturers in an moving toward a healthier, more portunities for all residents. As effort to grow a diverse work force sustainable future need to make the article shows, it’s a tough but and restore a job sector that is cru- calculated decisions that promote important balancing act. cial to the social sustainability of dense, livable cities. Martha Ross any great city. For cities to truly Nicholas Mansfield Deputy Director bounce back, a whole host of crit- Posted on wilsonquarterly.com Greater Washington Research ical urban sectors—such as man- The Brookings Institution ufacturing, housing, and infra- After reading your com- Washington, D.C. structure—need to enjoy a lift. mendable cluster on the social and Diana Lind economic resurrection of the city, Like so many urban think- Editor at Large, Next American City I was struck by something absent ers, Tom Vanderbilt believes that Philadelphia, Pa. from the four featured articles: innovation and ideas, rather than animals. goods and jobs, drive the economy The federal government An awareness—or ignorance— [“Long Live the Industrial City,” needs to get serious about “smart of urban ecology can have a pow- Spring ’11]. But the Great Reces- growth” policies and take correc- erful influence on the lives of city sion taught us that our economy tive action to combat the sprawl dwellers, human and not. In the cannot survive on ideas and algo- described by Witold Rybczynski Pacific Northwest, transportation rithms alone. We need to produce in “Dense, Denser, Densest” infrastructure is being redesigned, actual goods to build a strong [Spring ’11]. For starters, remov- at no small expense, to facilitate foundation for continued growth. ing the home mortgage interest wildlife corridors; bears, moose, Innovative ideas exist in abun- deduction will discourage subur- mountain lions, and other animals dance. The cities that thrive will ban sprawl. State and federal gov- will be able to migrate through be the ones that best harness these ernments should remove indirect developed regions unharmed. ideas, turn them into tangible subsidies by ending the construc- Cairo recently experienced an products, and move them effi- tion of roads and other infra- emergency when Egyptian author- ciently. One great organization structure serving these outlying ities unwisely culled the city’s pig devoted to these aims is the areas. Increasing taxes on auto- population, hoping to diminish Greater Philadelphia Innovation mobiles, raising the fuel tax, and the threat of swine flu—but inad- Cluster, which researches energy- instituting congestion pricing are vertently eliminated a prime efficient construction components all necessary to encourage people source of waste disposal in the

and is revolutionizing the building to modify their behavior. process. The Nat- [ Continued on page 10 ]

Summer 2011 ■ Wilson Quarterly 7 WQ5-11 6/28/11 11:35 AM Page 8

AT THE CENTER

THEN: LEADER OF THE FREE WORLD. NOW: ?

The U.S. intervention in Libya in March Brent Scowcroft, national security advisor to Pres- added new urgency to a long-simmering debate in Wash- idents Gerald Ford and George H. W. Bush, saw merit ington over America’s role in world affairs. In April, The in the argument for reinventing the national strategic National Conversation, a new signature series of the narrative. “Technology has politicized the world’s peo- Woodrow Wilson Center designed to provide a civil, ple in a way they never have been,” he contended, point- nonpartisan forum for the discussion of overarching pol- ing to the ease with which people can organize or par- icy concerns, brought together a group of policy lumi- ticipate in political acts, such as the Arab Spring. naries to focus on the issue, with New York Times colum- Slaughter echoed Scowcroft’s assessment and called nist Thomas Friedman acting as moderator. attention to three phenomena that make today’s global Anne-Marie Slaughter, formerly director of policy environment new: the opportunity for individuals to planning at the U.S. Department of State and now a wield power previously available only to nation-states professor of politics and international affairs at Princeton, (viz. the 9/11 plotters), the growing importance of the summed up the white paper written for the occasion. ability to attract and mobilize people, and the role of During the Cold War, she said, the United States was fairly emerging international institutions such as the Euro- certain of its purpose: It was, as every civics student pean Court of Human Rights in “enforcing the rules of knew, “the leader of the free world.” The global power global order.” structure is no longer so simple. A new national strate- Even if consensus were to be reached about the gic “narrative” is needed that acknowledges the changing global paradigm, making good on a new vision might global landscape and reaffirms the country’s commitment not be practical. Representative Keith Ellison (D- to leadership and competitiveness. Minn.) voiced concern about the difficulty of aligning The white paper was written by Captain Wayne Porter a new national strategic narrative with the United of the U.S. Navy and Colonel Mark Mykleby of the States’ resources. “We have a military structure that’s Marines. The pair wrote as “Mr. Y,” in a nod to George still in the Soviet era,” he charged. Were the priorities Kennan’s famous 1947 “X” essay arguing for a policy of the participants were discussing realistic given the containment toward the Soviet Union. (Read Porter and pressure on the economy? Should military spending Mykleby’s paper online at http://bit.ly/MrYpaper.) be cut to balance a budget whose deficits were grow- Some panelists questioned the assertion that for- ing due to entitlements such as health care? Steve eign-policy challenges are more complex today than they Clemons, founder of the American Strategy Program were before 9/11. Robert Kagan, senior fellow at the at the New America Foundation, argued that the Brookings Institution, argued that there has rarely been United States’ future rested on a more abstract basis— an “easy paradigm for American foreign policy.” its ability to “recapture the imagination” of the world, Nineteenth-century Americans grappled with many of to be seen as “the Google of nations” rather than “the the challenges that are familiar to us—globalization, General Motors of nations.” labor market shifts, and mind-boggling advances in tech- The National Conversations are not meant to end nology and communication. If the world hasn’t radically at the Wilson Center’s doors. A few weeks after the changed, Kagan reasoned, the methods by which we panel, the killing of Osama bin Laden removed a major engage with the world should not drastically morph. threat to the United States. Will this development “You can’t quite get rid of deterrence,” he said. Nation- change U.S. policy? In an interview with The New York states still dominate international relations. “I’m not at all Times after the Abbottabad raid, Mykleby said, “This is convinced that we’ve left either the 20th or 19th cen- a critical moment to talk about a narrative that isn’t just tury...in terms of power.” focused on threats.”

8 Wilson Quarterly ■ Summer 2011 WQ5-11 6/28/11 11:35 AM Page 9

Jane Harman, Director X MARKS THE SUBJECT BOARD OF TRUSTEES Joseph B. Gildenhorn, Chair Sander R. Gerber, Vice Chair Think of the notion of EX OFFICIO MEMBERS: James H. Billington, Librarian of Congress, Hillary R. Clinton, “territory”, and tangible images come to Secretary of State, G. Wayne Clough, Secretary, Smithsonian Institution, Arne mind: geographers peering at clearly Duncan, Secretary of Education, David Ferriero, Archivist of the United States, defined countries on maps, defiant ani- James Leach, Chair, National Endowment mals growling at intruders. According for the Humanities, Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of Health and Human Services. to Charles Maier, the Leverett Salton- Designated Appointee of the President from Within the Federal Government: stall Professor of History at Harvard Melody Barnes University, the concept of territory has defined landscape features such as river PRIVATE CITIZEN MEMBERS: Timothy Broas, John T. Casteen, III, Charles E. Cobb, Jr., not always been so fixed. “It has con- mouths. When territory came to be Thelma Duggin, Carlos M. Gutierrez, Susan Hutchison, Barry S. Jackson tinually changed along with the other understood as the province of elites ani- major variables of human history,” he mated by specific political ideologies, THE WILSON COUNCIL Sam Donaldson, President says. In January, Maier arrived at the however, the importance of drawing Elias Aburdene, Weston Adams, Cyrus Ansary, Theresa Woodrow Wilson Center to spend six and securing borders became more Behrendt, Stuart Bernstein, James Bindenagel, Melva Bucksbaum, Amelia Caiola-Ross, Carol Cartwright, months working on a book on the sub- pronounced. By the late 19th century, Mark Chandler, Holly Clubok, Charles E. Cobb, Melvin ject, which, he explains, is not about demarcated territory “seemed the over- Cohen*, William Coleman, Elizabeth Dubin, Ruth Dugan, F. Samuel Eberts, Ginny and Irwin Edlavitch, nationalism but about what one “can do riding index of measuring national wel- Mark Epstein, Suellen and Melvyn Estrin, Joseph Flom*, Barbara Hackman Franklin, Norman Freidkin, Morton with a nation.” fare,” and was strongly associated with Funger, Donald Garcia, Bruce Gelb, Sander R. Gerber, Maier was chosen as the Wilson political decision-making and collec- Joseph B. and Alma Gildenhorn, Charles Glazer, Michael Glosserman, Margaret Goodman, Raymond Center’s first Distinguished Scholar, a tive identity. In the 20th century, terri- Guenter, Carlos M. Gutierrez, Robert Hall, Edward Hardin, Marilyn Harris, F. Wallace Hays, Claudia and new fellowship reserved for renowned tory became an even more prominent Thomas Henteleff, Laurence Hirsch, Susan Hutchi- academics who have made lasting con- aspect of how nations were defined, son, Osagie Imasogie, Frank Islam, Maha Kaddoura, Nuhad Karaki, Stafford Kelly, Christopher Kennan, tributions to the worlds of scholarship with the Cold War initiating the “terri- Mrs. David Knott, Willem Kooyker, Markos Kounalakis, and public policy. Maier, who also had torialization of ideologies.” Richard Kramer, Muslim Lakhani, Daniel Lamaute, Raymond Learsy, Harold Levy, James Lieber, Genevieve a research stint at the Center in 1989, Now, Maier claims, the meaning Lynch, Beth Madison, Frederic and Marlene Malek, B. Thomas Mansbach, Daniel Martin, Anne McCarthy, has enjoyed an illustrious career as a of territory is changing once again. Lydia Funger McClain, Thomas McLarty, Donald historian, having authored and edited Since the 1970s, modern territorial- McLellan, Maria Emma and Vanda McMurtry, John Kenneth Menges, Linda and Tobia Mercuro, Jamie volumes on political economy, empire, ity has been “severely buffeted” as Merisotis, Ann and Robert Morris, Kathryn Mosbacher Wheeler, Stuart Newberger, Paul Hae Park, Jeanne the effects of the Marshall Plan, the col- globalization has remade capital Phillips, Edwin Robbins, Wayne Rogers, David Ruben- lapse of East Germany, and other top- flows, migratory patterns, and com- stein, Sonja and Michael Saltman, Ignacio E. Sanchez, B. Francis Saul, Steven Schmidt, William Seanor, George ics since he completed his PhD at Har- munications structures. These are Shultz, Raja Sidawi, David Slack, William Slaughter, vard in 1966. not easy transitions, and the conse- Diana Davis Spencer, Juan Suarez, Mrs. Alexander J. Tachmindji, Norma Kline Tiefel, Annie and Sami Totah, Maier began his study of territory by quences can be seen in the heated Anthony Viscogliosi, Michael Waldorf, Graham Whal- ing, Deborah Wince-Smith, Herbert Winokur, Leo looking at how the concept has evolved debates about financial competitive- Zickler, Nancy Zirkin over time. Imperially controlled terri- ness, immigration, and social values *Recently deceased tory was the norm in Europe after that are occurring in many countries, The Wilson Center is the nation’s living memori- antiquity, until emerging national states including the United States. Maier al to Woodrow Wilson, president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. It is located at One Woodrow organized more cohesive domains. hopes that the work he will complete Wilson Plaza, 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20004–3027. Created by law in When they expanded overseas, Euro- at the Wilson Center “will provide 1968, the Center is Washington’s only independent, wide-ranging institute for advanced study where vital pean empires were initially content to some perspective” as the world nav- cultural issues and their deep historical background base their territorial authority on trad- igates this “transformative moment are explored through research and dialogue. Visit the Center at http://www.wilsoncenter.org. ing rights and control of broadly of territoriality.”

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LETTERS

[ Continued from page 7 ] ural History increasingly worried. Tolerance selves—see, for instance, the dis- Museum of Los Angeles has put for Venezuela’s secrecy is waning, cussion of civil disobedience in urban ecology to use by embark- especially in Congress. Soon, there Sophocles’ Antigone—and single ing upon a cutting-edge urban will be pressure for the White works can elicit completely differ- “spider survey,” crowdsourcing House to be more confrontational. ent interpretations. Moreover, the data from city residents to learn The developments highlight classics have no monopoly on more about the area’s arachnids, the main paradox conveyed by virtue. History is sprinkled with whose numbers far exceed LA’s Kucera’s article. Making U.S. for- dubious projects inspired by human population and include eign policy toward Venezuela Greek and Roman culture. The poisonous and invasive species. more Goliath-like could very well 1936 Olympics, Benito Mussolini’s In short, cities are not only a be the only goal of Chávez’s for- building program, and—as Howe human story. Any future issue on eign-policy ambitions. A wounded reminds us—the political theories the city would do well to include and reduced nationalist such as of slavery apologist John C. Cal- vibrant, nonhuman perspectives, Chávez knows that nothing can houn are but a few. as we have a growing population revive his fortunes more than a Instead, the decline of classics of neighbors we live beside with- political confrontation with a in the undergraduate curriculum, out quite managing to see. giant such as the United States. If along with the rest of the human- Geoff Manaugh all Venezuela gets from its secret ities, comes from the increasing Blogger, BLDGBLOG dealings is a provoked and aggres- tendency to view a bachelor’s Contributing Editor, Wired UK sive Uncle Sam, then one could degree as a vocational qualifica- Los Angeles, Calif. conclude, somewhat differently tion. This trend may have begun from Kucera, that its foreign- with the founding of land grant policy investments have been colleges in the 1860s, but it has HUGO’S HUBRIS worth every drop of oil that went gathered strength amid the eco- There is no question, after into them. nomic uncertainties of recent reading Joshua Kucera’s excellent Javier Corrales decades. piece “What Is Hugo Chávez Up Professor of Political Science Its inadequacy, however, is To?” [Spring ’11], that Venezuela is Amherst College starting to be recognized. As spending far too much economic Amherst, Mass. Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa and political capital on its foreign describe in their recent book, Aca- policy. Almost every economic demically Adrift: Limited Learn- deal that Venezuela has recently THE CLASSICS ing on College Campuses, students signed seems to be embarrassingly IN AETERNUM adhering to a liberal arts curricu- lopsided, benefiting the other Daniel Walker Howe [“Clas- lum tend to derive greater benefit party more than Venezuela. More- sical Education in America,” from their college education than over, the deals seem to have little Spring ’11] suggests that classical those majoring in allegedly more effect on the success of President languages and literatures lost practical fields. Liberal arts stu- Hugo Chávez’s efforts to create a their preeminence in the Ameri- dents learn to read and write global anti-U.S. coalition. can curriculum because “moral about a wide variety of subjects Many of Venezuela’s new for- relativism undercut trust in the and wrestle with difficult ques- eign-policy ties, as Kucera tells us, standards the classical authors tions. They are better equipped to involve secret pacts with shadowy had long embodied.” Classical be the 21st century’s nimble regimes such as Iran’s. We cannot authors regularly inspire, inform, “knowledge workers” who move know for certain what the stipula- and delight, but they do not easily between projects. tions of these agreements are. One embody a single standard. They Among the humanities, the thing is sure: U.S. officials are do not even agree among them- classics remain sturdy. While the

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LETTERS

University of Albany has closed its suggests. Among studies using tional School Lunch Program. classics program, others have nationally representative data, two “How did a program that was expanded or even started ab find that school lunch consumption designed to improve the nutrition initio—notably at the University has no effect on obesity risk; one of the nation’s children,” she asks, of Miami, whose president, a finds a negative association, and the “become a culprit in the scourge of political scientist, considers a two finding a positive association childhood obesity?” major research institution incom- report modest effects. While Hinman’s piece overlooks two plete without the classics, and at improved school nutrition is still a important issues. First, the school Grand Valley State University in worthy goal with likely health ben- lunch program as we know it is Michigan, which had no classics efits, it can’t single-handedly blunt the product of social movements department a dozen years ago but the obesity epidemic. and political compromise. During now has seven tenure-track fac- Schools can do more than just the 1970s, under intense pressure ulty members. regulate lunches. Evidence shows from civil rights and antihunger The American Philological Asso- that children are easily influenced by activists, a program designed ciation exists and thrives because the ads. Government could ban the pro- essentially to control farm prices Greek and Roman cultures of dis- motion of low-nutrient, high-calorie became the nation’s most popular tant millennia still speak to people. foods on public school property. welfare program, feeding millions We also exist and thrive because we National security is the main rea- of poor children each day. The have learned to avoid the hubris of son given for public interest in child- offering remains the single most thinking that classical culture is the hood obesity, but there are others. important nutrition program for only one with such power. Advocates The public pension system relies on school-age children, though its for classics do not need to recover younger working people for its administrative structure and their former place of privilege in the financing. Obesity is associated with menu have always reflected the curriculum. In the 21st century, no higher employer health-insurance competing goals of the farm bloc discipline—not even business—is costs, greater absenteeism, and and child welfare advocates. entitled to that privilege. greater disability—all hindrances Second, Hinman underempha- Adam D. Blistein that make the obese less able to sup- sizes the nature of the nation’s Executive Director port retirees as well as themselves. food system. The food most Amer- American Philological Association Patricia K. Smith icans buy in the grocery store is Philadelphia, Pa. Professor of Economics processed, packaged, and shipped Kathleen M. Coleman University of Michigan, Dearborn by food industry giants—the same President Dearborn, Mich. kind of corporations that deliver American Philological Association large numbers of unhealthy meals Cambridge, Mass. Kristen Hinman writes that for the school lunch program at a school lunch “war” is raging relatively low cost. The current between food activists (enlight- obesity crisis springs as much NO MORE NUGGETS ened reformers and celebrity chefs from the nature of America’s food Kristen Hinman raises the who understand nutrition) and system and our collective politi- important question of how policy recalcitrant food service directors, cal choices as from individual can best address high childhood ignorant parents, and teachers decisions about “good” and “bad” obesity rates[“The School Lunch “who snort, How can you serve food. Wars,” Spring ’11]. School lunches beets to students?” The reformers, Susan Levine constitute a major component of the she argues, are fighting a losing Professor of History and Director school food environment, but the battle against childhood obesity Institute for the Humanities evidence on their association with and its root cause, the U.S. University of Illinois, Chicago obesity risk is more mixed than she Department of Agriculture’s Na- Chicago, Ill.

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FINDINGS brief notes of interest on all topics

Boys Rule educated parents—those with the pearing from the Caucasus and the Earth needs women knowledge and wherewithal to get Balkans, too. ultrasound tests, which can deter- There’s no simple explanation. Are girls vanishing? In India, the 2011 mine fetal sex, and abortions. “Sex selection happened among census found about 7.1 million fewer India isn’t unique, Mara Hindus, Muslims, and Christians; girls than boys below age six. The Hvistendahl reports in Unnatural among ethnic and political rivals; cause, Prabhat Jha and eight co- Selection: Choosing Boys Over in economic powerhouses and in authors write in The Lancet (June 4), Girls, and the Consequences of a countries just on the cusp of devel- is a level of sex-selective abortion World Full of Men (PublicAffairs). opment,” Hvistendahl writes. Some that’s rising at a “remarkable” rate. The planet faces a growing shortage countries with girl shortages have The researchers note that the boy- of girls. In China, one town has 176 histories of female infanticide, but girl ratio for firstborn children in boys for every 100 girls under age others don’t. India is about normal. (Generally, four. Demographer Christophe Although some economists posit around 105 boys are born for every Guilmoto estimates that sex- that a boy surplus will cause societies 100 girls. Males die younger, so the selective abortion has brought to place a greater value on girls, Hvis- sexes even out.) But when the first- about a cumulative shortage of 163 tendahl disagrees. So far, an excess of born child is a girl, the second-born is million females across Asia—more males has led to lawbreaking—in far more likely to be a boy, particu- than the total female population of China, researchers have found that a larly among well-off and well- the United States. Girls are disap- one percent increase in the male-to- female sex ratio at birth produces at least a five percent increase in crime—as well as sex trafficking of women, forced marriages, polyandry, and legions of potentially restive mateless men. In response, some countries are starting to enforce long-dormant laws against using ultrasound to deter- mine fetal sex. PR campaigns are being deployed, too. Posters in India say, “Indira Gandhi and Mother Teresa: Your daughter can be one of them.” But even if every nation’s male- female birth ratio returned to normal tomorrow, the excess male births thus far would skew the global population India has seen a rise in male births, particularly among parents whose first child was a girl. for decades to come.

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FINDINGS

Stealing the Revolution of additional copies shoplifted. But in Miller-McCune magazine Like Nehru jackets, stealing Follow that title (May–June), Norman H. Nie and briefly became chic. The New York three coauthors argue that the His- “Ripping off . . . is an act of revolution- Times Magazine ran an article panic vote is still up for grabs. ary love,” Abbie Hoffman wrote headlined “Ripping Off: The New According to their analysis, the high in Steal This Book in 1971. Predict- Lifestyle,” which quoted Hoffman vote for Democrats in 2010 and ear- as saying, “All our rip- lier years reflects demographic fac- offs together don’t equal tors other than ethnicity. Younger one price-fixing scheme voters tend to vote Democratic, as do by General Electric.” less educated voters. Hispanics are For a dissenting view, currently younger and less educated the Times writer con- than blacks or non-Hispanic whites. sulted Harvard sociolo- Controlling for age and education, gist Seymour Martin the authors find that Hispanics aren’t Lipset, who said, “Steal- yet rooted in either party. ing is stealing even if you “Hispanics don’t have the gen- call it revolution.” erational partisan ties that most of Jerry Rubin, Hoff- us inherit along with our religious man’s fellow yippie, also affiliation,” says Nie, a political sci- advocated rebellion entist at Stanford University. The through thievery. Then next few years may be crucial, he his own apartment observes in an interview. “On the was burglarized. “In one hand, Republicans are stupidly advocating stealing as a shutting themselves off from a seg- revolutionary act,” he re- ment of the population that shares marked, “I guess I didn’t a lot of their values. They come off make clear the differ- sounding like they just want to Abbie Hoffman poses with a copy of Steal This Book in 1971. ence between stealing send [undocumented immigrants] from General Motors back home. But for blacks and His- ably, the how-to guide to thievery and stealing from me.” panics to share leadership in the proved controversial, Rachel Shteir Democratic Party—I don’t see that recounts in The Steal: A Cultural Party Time as a long-lasting, easy marriage. . . . istory of Shoplifting (Penguin). There are some very big differences After more than two dozen pub- Hispanics on the fence in core values, having to do with lishers turned down the manu- At first glance, the growing num- notions of strong families and script, Hoffman raised $15,000 ber of Hispanics in the United notions of entrepreneurship as and published it himself, with Grove States looks like great news for the opposed to dependence upon the Press as distributor. Democrats. In last year’s elections state.” The book got almost no main- for Congress, Democrats attracted What’s next? “The Democratic stream reviews. Except for The some 60 percent of the Hispanic Party will try to convince Hispanics San Francisco Chronicle, news- vote, while Republicans got just 38 that they share an interest in a papers refused to advertise it. Only a percent. Hispanics now represent larger and more caring federal gov- hand-ful of bookstores stocked it. around 15 percent of the American ernment, and the Republicans will Nevertheless, Steal This Book sold population. They’re projected to try to communicate that they can more than 100,000 copies in four account for as much as one- help small businesses thrive,” Nie months—with an unknown number quarter by 2050. says. “But for now, Hispanics aren’t

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FINDINGS

comfortable on either side of the the name of one of Angelina Jolie 1,000 high school students enrolled aisle.” and Brad Pitt’s twins. in Washington-based leadership con- Heidi Vandebosch, a communi- ferences or internships—“the next Identity Theft cation scholar at the University of generation of American leaders,” Antwerp, has studied the influence according to the think tank’s Febru- Who’s in a name? of media on baby names. “Names ary report on the study. Nearly 58 In choosing baby names, many associated with famous persons, percent said that the United States is soon-to-be parents take who parents might admire or too involved in global affairs. Just inspiration from pop culture. think are good looking or sympa- under a third thought that the nation According to the Social Security thetic, often gain popularity,” she had achieved the right balance, and Administration, the two names says, “while the names of notor- only a tenth supported greater that gained the most popularity ious people might lose popularity, involvement. In a poll last year spon- as in the decline of the sored by the Chicago Council on name Adolf after World Global Affairs, by contrast, two- War II.” (Adolf lost its thirds of American adults said the luster earlier in the United States ought to play an active United States: It last role in world affairs. appeared in the top Peter W. Singer, who oversaw the 1,000 in 1928.) Par- Brookings study, says that many ents also often want young people believe that foreign names that are unusual, engagements, particularly the Iraq Vandebosch says, and war, have diverted attention and the mass media bring resources from domestic troubles, new names to public such as the damage wrought by attention. Before long, Hurricane Katrina. “This isolation of course, they’re no narrative . . . is something that one longer unusual. often hears if you actually talk to But like pop culture youth, something too few people in figures themselves, foreign policy do,” he says. “But I names inspired by pop wasn’t expecting to see such high culture come and go. numbers.” Singer finds the response Last year, for the first troubling: “This level of isolationism Actor Brad Pitt carries his son Knox—whose name is now a time since 1954, Elvis echoes back to the 1920s and ’30s— popular one for boys—on a recent stroll in New Orleans. wasn’t among the top and the trend back then didn’t work 1,000 boys’ names in the out so great.” last year were Bentley (for boys) United States. In a press release, and Maci (for girls). Though nei- Social Security commissioner Suspicious Minds ther name broke the top 100, both Michael J. Astrue says the Elvis rose more than 400 places. Maci news leaves him “all shook up.” Birthers, truthers, Bookout and her son, Bentley, and blind faith were stars of the MTV reality show Domestic Warriors Before President Obama released his Teen Mom in 2010. The second- long-form birth certificate in April, fastest-rising name for boys was Rebuilding Fortress America polls found that nearly half of Repub- Kellan; Kellan Lutz stars in the A new era of American isolationism licans believed that he had been born Twilight movies. Another newly may be dawning. The Brookings outside the United States. But the popular name for boys was Knox, Institution surveyed more than Right doesn’t hold a monopoly on

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FINDINGS

In the United States, Hollander examines ads from The New York Review of Books, Harvard Maga- zine, and Yale Alumni Magazine. Most of the advertisers seem to be over 50, but they stress their youth- ful qualities. They’re fun-loving, adventuresome, and athletic, often with a mischievous streak or a touch of whimsy. And a surprising number of the women turn out to resemble actresses: “a younger Faye Duna- way,” “Grace Kelly good looks,” “a A 9/11 “truther” poster raised questions on the fifth anniversary of the attacks. younger, dark-haired, more radiant Jane Fonda.” wacky conspiracy theories, Ben Smith show you all sorts of elaborate flow Some of the similarities may stem writes in Politico. To an extent, the charts to try to prove this,” Jonathan from common authorship, Hollander 9/11 “truthers” among Democrats Kay, author of the newly published observes. Susan Fox of the Boston- mirror the Obama “birthers” among Among the Truthers: A Journey based company Personals Work esti- Republicans. Through America’s Growing Conspir- mates that she has written thousands In 2006, Scripps Howard and acist Underground (Harper), writes of ads for the lovelorn since the early Ohio University asked Americans, in an e-mail. “Of course, if this com- 1990s. She now generally charges “How likely is it that people in the mission ever were formed, as they $160 an hour. federal government either assisted in demand, and if it were to reach the Fox-style puffery isn’t evident in the 9/11 attacks or took no action to same conclusion as the first 9/11 com- The London Review of Books. Com- stop the attacks because they wanted mission, the conspiracy theorists pared with the Americans, Hollander the United States to go to war in the would immediately reject it, making writes, LRB advertisers come across Middle East?” Nearly 23 percent of up new reasons for why all the mem- as “less individualistic, less narcissis- Democrats called that scenario very bers were pawns of big oil or what- tic, less competitive, and less anxious likely, and another 28 percent called ever, and then demanding a third to make a favorable impression—or it somewhat likely. So, writes Smith, 9/11 commission—in exactly the their notion of what makes a favor- more than half of Democrats consid- same way that hardcore birthers able impression is very different from ered it at least plausible that 9/11 claim the long-form birth certificate that of the American writers.” Alter- stemmed from a conspiracy within that Obama released was actually a natively, he notes, Britons may be the U.S. government. (For the nation fraud.” using LRB personals to showcase as a whole, 16 percent said it was their wit rather than to search for very likely and 20 percent said it was Between the Love Lines love. One LRB ad says, “Bald, short, somewhat likely.) fat, and ugly male, 53, seeks short- Whereas the birthers demanded Different strokes sighted woman with tremendous sex- to see Obama’s birth certificate, the To judge by their quests for romance, ual appetite.” Another declares, truthers demand a new 9/11 commis- Americans and Britons are worlds “Mature gentleman (62), aged well, sion. “The truthers claim the last one apart. In Extravagant Expectations: noble grey looks, fit and active, sound was tainted because everyone on the New Ways to Find Romantic Love in minded and unfazed by the fickle commission had some sort of com- America (Ivan R. Dee), Paul Hollan- demands of modern society, seeks— promising tie to the Washington/Wall der deconstructs upscale personal ads damn it, I have to pee again.” Street power structure—and they will from both sides of the Atlantic. —Stephen Bates

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THE WILSON QUARTERLY

The WikiLeaks Illusion

WikiLeaks’ tsunami of revelations from U.S. government sources last year did not change the world, but it did change WikiLeaks.

BY ALASDAIR ROBERTS

Late last November, the antisecrecy group casualties and “friendly fire” incidents. In October came WikiLeaks achieved the greatest triumph in its short his- a similar but larger set of documents—almost tory. A consortium of major news media organizations— 400,000—detailing U.S. military operations in Iraq. including The New York Times, The Guardian, Der WikiLeaks’ boosters said that the group was waging Spiegel, Le Monde, and El País—began publishing a war on secrecy, and by the end of 2010 it seemed to be excerpts from a quarter-million cables between the U.S. winning. The leaks marked “the end of secrecy in the old- State Department and its diplomatic outposts that Wiki- fashioned, Cold War–era sense,” claimed Guardian jour- Leaks had obtained. The group claimed that the cables nalists David Leigh and Luke Harding. A Norwegian constituted “the largest set of confidential documents politician nominated WikiLeaks for the Nobel Peace ever to be released into the public domain.” The Prize, saying that it had helped “redraw the map of Guardian predicted that the disclosures would trigger information freedom.” “Like him or not,” wrote a Time a “global diplomatic crisis.” magazine journalist in December, WikiLeaks founder This was the fourth major disclosure orchestrated by Julian Assange had “the power to impose his judgment WikiLeaks last year. In April, it had released a classified of what should or shouldn’t be secret.” video showing an attack in 2007 by U.S. Army helicop- ters in the streets of Baghdad that killed 12 people, including two employees of the Reuters news agency. In id the leaks of 2010 really mark the end of “old- July, it had collaborated with the news media consortium fashioned secrecy?” Not by a long shot. Certainly, on the release of 90,000 documents describing U.S. D new information technologies have made it eas- military operations in Afghanistan from 2004 through ier to leak sensitive information and broadcast it to the 2009. These records included new reports of civilian world. A generation ago, leaking was limited by the need to physically copy and smuggle actual documents. Now it is a Alasdair Roberts, a former Woodrow Wilson Center fellow, is Rappa- port Professor of Law and Public Policy at Suffolk University Law School. matter of dragging, dropping, and clicking Send. But there His books include Blacked Out: Government Secrecy in the Information are still impressive barriers to the kind of “radical trans- Age (2006) and The Logic of Discipline: Global Capitalism and the Archi- tecture of Government (2010). parency” WikiLeaks says it wants to achieve. Indeed, the

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compared it to perhaps the most famous leak in history. “The Pentagon Papers was about 10,000 pages,” he told the United Kingdom’s Channel 4 News, alluding to the secret Pentagon history of America’s involvement in Vietnam that was leaked in 1971. By contrast, there were “about 200,000 pages in this material.” The Afghan war logs did not hold the record for long. In October, they were supplanted by the Iraq disclo- sures, “the greatest data leak in the history of the United States military,” according to Der Spiegel. Within weeks, WikiLeaks was warning that this record too would soon be shat- tered. It boasted on Twitter that its next release, the State Department cables, would be “7x the size of the Iraq War Logs.” Indeed, it was “an astonishing mountain of words,” said the two Guardian journalists. “If the tiny memory stick containing the cables had been a set of printed texts, it would have made up a library con- taining more than 2,000 sizable books.” Gauging the significance of leaks based on document volume involves a logical fallacy. The reasoning is this: If we are in possession of a larger WikiLeaks leader Julian Assange stares out from a poster championing the organization’s cause. number of sensitive documents than ever before, we must also be in pos- WikiLeaks experience shows how durable those barriers are. session of a larger proportion of the total stockpile than ever Let’s begin by putting the leaks in proper perspective. A before. But this assumes that the total itself has not changed common way of showing their significance is to emphasize over time. the sheer volume of material. In July 2010, The Guardian In fact, the amount of sensitive information held within described the release of the Afghan war documents as “one the national security apparatus is immensely larger than it of the biggest leaks in U.S. military history.” Assange, an Aus- was a generation ago. Technological change has caused an tralian computer programmer and activist who had founded explosion in the rate of information production within gov- WikiLeaks in 2006 (and is currently in Britain facing extra- ernment agencies, as everywhere else. For example, the dition to Sweden on rape and sexual molestation charges), leaked State Department cables might have added up to

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WikiLeaks

about two gigabytes of data—one-quarter of an eight- friendly to the United States. In fact, the reaction was neg- gigabyte memory card. By comparison, it has been esti- ligible. “No one cared,” writes Domscheit-Berg, “because the mated that the outgoing Bush White House transferred 77 subject matter was too complex.” terabytes of data to the National Archives in 2009. That is As the British journalist John Lanchester recently almost 10,000 memory cards for the White House alone. observed, WikiLeaks’ “release of information is unprece- The holdings of other agencies are even larger. dented: But it is not journalism. The data need to be inter- The truth is that a count of leaked messages tells us noth- preted, studied, made into a story.” WikiLeaks attempted to do this itself when it released the Baghdad helicopter video. Assange unveiled the WHEN WIKILEAKS released vast quanti- video at a news conference at the National Press Club in tites of undigested information, the public Washington, D.C., and pack- aged it so that its significance could not absorb it. would be clear. He titled it Collateral Murder. The edited video, WikiLeaks ing about the significance of a breach. Only six percent of the said, provided evidence of “indiscriminate” and “unpro- State Department cables that were leaked last year were clas- voked” killing of civilians. sified as secret. And the State Department has said that the Even with this priming, the public reaction was muted. network from which the cables were extracted was not Many people turned on WikiLeaks itself, charging that it even the primary vehicle for disseminating its information. had manipulated the video to bolster its allegations of mil- In the period in which most of the quarter-million Wiki- itary misconduct. “This strategy for stirring up public inter- Leaks cables were distributed within the U.S. government, est was a mistake,” Domscheit-Berg agrees. “A lot of people a State Department official said, “we disseminated 2.4 mil- [felt] . . . that they were being led around by the nose.” lion cables, 10 times as many, through other systems.” The release of the Afghan war documents in July 2010 The 2010 disclosures also revealed fundamental prob- gave WikiLeaks further evidence of its own limitations. lems with the WikiLeaks project. The logic that initially The trove of documents was “vast, confusing, and impossi- motivated Assange and his colleagues was straightforward: ble to navigate,” according to The Guardian’s Leigh and WikiLeaks would post leaked information on the Internet Harding, “an impenetrable forest of military jargon.” Fur- and rely on the public to interpret it, become outraged, thermore, the logs contained the names of many individu- and demand reform. The antisecrecy group, which at the als who had cooperated with the American military and start of last year had a core of about 40 volunteers, had great whose lives could be threatened by disclosure. WikiLeaks faith in the capacity of the public to do the right thing. recognized the need for a “harm minimization” plan but Daniel Domscheit-Berg, who was WikiLeaks’ spokesman lacked the field knowledge necessary to make good decisions until he broke with Assange last fall, explained the reason- about what should be withheld. ing in Inside WikiLeaks, a book published earlier this year: “If you provide people sufficient background information, they are capable of behaving correctly and making the right y last summer, all of these difficulties had driven decisions.” WikiLeaks to seek its partnership with news This proposition was soon tested and found wanting. Bmedia organizations. The consortium that han- When WikiLeaks released a series of U.S. military coun- dled the disclosures last fall provided several essential terinsurgency manuals in 2008, Domscheit-Berg thought services for the group. It gave technical assistance in there would be “outrage around the world, and I expected organizing data and provided the expertise needed to journalists to beat down our doors.” The manuals described decode and interpret records. It opened a channel to gov- techniques for preventing the overthrow of governments ernment officials for conversation about the implications

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of disclosing information that WikiLeaks itself was Iraq war documents. But these hopes were again disap- unable to establish. Finally, of course, the news media pointed. In some polls, perceptions about the conduct of organizations had the capacity to command public atten- the Afghan war actually became more favorable after the tion. They were trusted by readers and possessed a skill WikiLeaks release. Meanwhile, opinion about American in packaging information that WikiLeaks lacked. engagement in Iraq remained essentially unchanged, as By the end of 2010, it was clear that WikiLeaks’ it had been for several years. modus operandi had fundamentally changed. It had There are good reasons why disclosures do not nec- begun with an unambiguous conception of its role as a essarily produce significant changes in policy or politics. receiver and distributor of leaked information. At year’s Much depends on the context of events. When the Pen- end, it was performing a different function: It still hoped tagon Papers came out in 1971, they contributed to pol- to serve as a trusted receiver of leaks, but it was now icy change because a host of other forces were pushing working with mainstream news media to decide how— in the same direction. The American public was or if—leaked information ought to be published. For exhausted by the Vietnam War, which at its peak WikiLeaks, this involved difficult concessions. “We were involved the deployment of almost four times as many no longer in control of the process,” Domscheit-Berg later troops as are now in Iraq and Afghanistan. Many Amer- wrote. The outflow of leaked information was now con- icans were also increasingly skeptical of all forms of strained by the newspapers’ willingness to invest money and time in sifting through more documents. For the newspapers that participated in the consor- tium, the rationale for pub- lishing leaked information was simple. As The New York Times explained in an editorial note when the State Depart- ment cables were released in November, Americans “have a right to know what is being done in their name.” The cables “tell the unvarnished story of how the government makes its biggest decisions.” WikiLeaks was forced to collaborate with traditional news organizations that could make sense of This is the conventional jour- its revelations for the public. The Web, it discovered, is not an information utopia. nalistic argument in defense of disclosure, and there is no doubt that the WikiLeaks established authority. The federal government’s status revelations provided vivid and sometimes disturbing was further tarnished by other revelations about abuses illustrations of the ways in which power is wielded by the of power by the White House, CIA, and FBI. United States and its allies. We live in very different times. There is no popular WikiLeaks itself wanted bigger things to flow from movement against U.S. military engagement overseas, its work. It continued to expect outrage and political no broad reaction against established authority in Amer- action. Assange told Britain’s Channel 4 News last July ican society, no youth rebellion. The public mood in the that he anticipated that the release of the Afghan war United States is one of economic uncertainty and phys- documents would shift public opinion against the war. ical insecurity. Many Americans want an assurance that There was a similar expectation following release of the their government is willing and able to act forcefully in

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the pursuit of U.S. interests. In this climate, the incidents lated its terms of service. The same day, a smaller revealed by WikiLeaks—spying on United Nations diplo- firm that provides online graphics capabilities, mats, covert military action against terrorists, negotia- Tableau Software, discontinued its support. The firm tions with regimes that are corrupt or guilty of human that managed WikiLeaks’ domain name, rights abuses—might not even be construed as abuses of EveryDNS.net, also suspended services, so that the power at all. On the contrary, they could be regarded as domain name wikileaks.org was no longer operable. proof that the U.S. government is prepared to get its On December 20, Apple removed an application from hands dirty to protect its citizens. its online store that offered iPhone and iPad users Indeed, it could be said that WikiLeaks was doing the access to the State Department cables. All of these actions complicated WikiLeaks’ ability to distribute leaked MANY OF WIKILEAKS’ revelations only information. Decisions by other organizations also confirmed things Americans already undermined its financial viability. Five days after suspected and were prepared to tolerate. the State Department dis- closures, PayPal, which manages online pay- one thing Americans least wished for: increasing insta- ments, announced that it would no longer process bility and their sense of anxiety. The more WikiLeaks dis- donations to WikiLeaks, alleging that the group had closed last year, the more American public opinion hard- violated its terms of service by encouraging or facili- ened against it. By December, according to a CNN poll, tating illegal activity. MasterCard and Visa Europe almost 80 percent of Americans disapproved of Wiki- soon followed suit. Leaks’ release of U.S. diplomatic and military docu- Critics alleged that these firms were acting in ments. In a CBS News poll, most respondents said they response to political pressure, and many American thought the disclosures were likely to hurt U.S. foreign legislators did in fact call on businesses to break with relations. Three-quarters affirmed that there are “some WikiLeaks. But direct political pressure was hardly things the public does not have a right to know if it necessary; cold commercial judgment led to the same might affect national security.” decision. WikiLeaks produced little revenue for any As WikiLeaks waited fruitlessly for public out- of these businesses but threatened to entangle all of rage, it began to see another obstacle to the execution them in public controversy. A public-relations spe- of its program. WikiLeaks relies on the Internet for the cialist told Seattle’s KIRO News that it was “bizarre” rapid dissemination of leaked information. The for Amazon to assist WikiLeaks during a holiday sea- assumption, which seemed plausible in the early days son: “I don’t think you mix politics with retail.” Worse of cyberspace, is that the Internet is a vast global still, businesses were exposed to cyberattacks by commons—a free space that imposes no barrier on the opponents of WikiLeaks within the hacker commu- flow of data. But even online, commercial and politi- nity that disrupted their relationships with other, cal considerations routinely compromise the move- more profitable clients. ment of information. These business decisions hurt WikiLeaks signifi- This reality was quickly illustrated after the release cantly. Assange said they amounted to “economic cen- of the State Department cables on November 28. sorship” and claimed that actions by these financial Three days later, Amazon Web Services, a subsidiary intermediaries were costing WikiLeaks $650,000 per of Amazon.com that rents space for the storage of week in lost donations. digitized information, stopped acting as a host for The leaks also provoked a vigorous reaction by the WikiLeaks’ material, alleging that the group had vio- U.S. government. The Army came down hard on Pri-

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vate Bradley Manning, the apparent source of all ines are secrets are not really secrets at all. It may be four of the 2010 disclosures, bringing 34 charges that what WikiLeaks revealed when it drew back the against him. The most serious of these, aiding the curtain is more or less what most Americans already enemy, could result in a death sentence, although suspected had been going on, and were therefore pre- prosecutors have said they will not seek one. The pared to tolerate. government is also investigating other individuals To put it another way, much of what WikiLeaks has in connection with the leaks. Some in Congress have released might best be described as open secrets. It used the episodes to argue for strengthening the law would have been no great shock to most Americans, on unauthorized disclosure of national security infor- for example, to learn about the United States’ covert mation, and federal agencies have tightened admin- activities against terrorists in Yemen. “The only sur- istrative controls on access to sensitive information. prising thing about the WikiLeaks revelations is that These steps, which may well produce a result pre- they contain no surprises,” says the noted Slovenian cisely the opposite of what WikiLeaks intends by philosopher Slavoj Zizek, a professor at the European reducing citizens’ access to information about the Graduate School. “The real disturbance was at the government, have been taken by an administration level of appearances: We can no longer pretend we that promised on its first day in office to “usher in a don’t know what everyone knows we know.” new era of open government.” In a sense, it was odd to expect that there would be great surprises. The diplomatic and national secu- rity establishment of the U.S. government employs ikiLeaks is predicated on the assumption millions of people. Most of the critical decisions about that the social order—the set of struc- the development of foreign policy, and about the W tures that channel and legitimize power— apparatus necessary to execute that policy, have been is both deceptive and brittle: deceptive in the sense made openly by democratically elected leaders, and that most people who observe the social order are sanctioned by voters in national elections over the unaware of the ways in which power is actually used, course of 60 years. In broad terms, Americans know and brittle in the sense that it is at risk of collapse how U.S. power is exercised, and for what purpose. once people are shown the true nature of things. The And so there are limits to what WikiLeaks can unveil. primary goal, therefore, is revelation of the truth. In Even New York Times executive editor Bill Keller the past it was difficult to do this, mainly because conceded that the disclosures did not “expose some primitive technologies made it difficult to collect and deep, unsuspected perfidy in high places.” They pro- disseminate damning information. But now these vide only “texture, nuance, and drama.” technological barriers are gone. And once informa- None of this is an argument for complacency about tion is set free, the theory goes, the world will change. government secrecy. Precisely because of the scale We have seen some of the difficulties with this and importance of the national security apparatus, it viewpoint. Even in the age of the Internet, there is no ought to be subjected to close scrutiny. Existing over- such thing as the instantaneous and complete reve- sight mechanisms such as freedom of information lation of the truth. In its undigested form, informa- laws and declassification policies are inadequate and tion often has no transformative power at all. Raw should be strengthened. The monitoring capacity of data must be distilled and interpreted, and the atten- news media outlets and other nongovernmental tion of a distracted audience must be captured. The organizations must be enhanced. And citizens should process by which this is done is complex and easily be encouraged to engage more deeply in debates about influenced by commercial and governmental inter- the aims and methods of U.S. foreign policy. All of ests. This was true before the advent of the Internet these steps involve hard work. There is no technolog- and remains true today. ical quick fix. A major difficulty with the WikiLeaks Beyond this, there is a final and larger problem. It project is that it may delude us into believing may well be that many of the things WikiLeaks imag- otherwise. ■

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THE WILSON QUARTERLY

Beyond the Bully Pulpit

TR famously used the “bully pulpit” of the White House to advance his agenda. By the time he left office, “spin” had become a fundamental part of the American presidency.

BY DAVID GREENBERG

When President William McKinley led the bat. “My power for good, whatever it may be, would be United States to war against Spain in the spring of 1898, gone if I didn’t try to live up to the doctrines I have no one was keener to see battle than Theodore Roosevelt. tried to preach,” he declared to a friend. Newspaper edi- Scion of an upper-crust New York City family and a torialists demanded that he remain at the Navy Depart- Harvard graduate, the ambitious, brash assistant Navy ment, where they said his expertise was needed, but secretary had, at 39, already built a reputation for Roosevelt quit his desk job, secured a commission as a reformist zeal as a New York state assemblyman and as lieutenant colonel, and set up a training ground in San Gotham’s police commissioner. Lately, from his perch in Antonio, Texas. Along with his friend Leonard Wood, an the Navy Department, he had been planning—and Army officer and the president’s chief surgeon, he read- agitating—for an all-out confrontation with the dying ied for battle an assortment of volunteer cavalrymen that Spanish Empire. In his official role, he drew up schemes ranged from Ivy League footballers and world-class polo for deploying the U.S. fleet, which he had done much to players to western cowboys and roughnecks. The New strengthen. Privately, he mocked the president he served, York Sun’s Richard Oulahan dubbed the motley regi- who, to the exasperation of TR and his fellow war hawks, ment the “Rough Riders.” Others called them “Teddy’s had been temporizing about military action. “McKinley Terrors,” even though Wood, not Roosevelt, was the has no more backbone than a chocolate éclair,” Roosevelt unit’s commander. told his friend Henry Cabot Lodge, then the junior As competitive as he was patriotic, Roosevelt meant Republican senator from Massachusetts. for his men to vanquish the Spanish in Cuba. But he also McKinley soon bowed to political pressure and opted wanted the Rough Riders to seize the imagination of for war. Most Americans applauded. Roosevelt resolved Americans at home. While still at camp in Texas, TR not to validate the sneers that he was just playing at com- wrote to Robert Bridges, the editor of Scribner’s maga- zine, offering him the “first chance” to publish six install- David Greenberg, currently a Woodrow Wilson Center fellow, is a professor of history and of journalism and media studies at Rutgers ments of a (planned) first-person account of his University. The author of numerous books and articles about political (planned) war exploits—a preview of what would be a history, both scholarly and popular, he is writing a history of U.S. presi- dents and spin. full-blown book and, in Roosevelt’s assessment, a “per-

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War” for the feverish journalistic interest it provoked, had been grist for the papers ever since the Cuban insurrection against the Spaniards’ repressive rule began in 1895. Playing on—and playing up—the widespread American sympathy for the Cubans, the mass-circulation newspapers and magazines, led by William Ran- dolph Hearst’s New York Journal and Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World, covered the rebellion avidly. Western Union telegraph cables connecting Havana with Key West—and hence the whole of the United States—gave Amer- icans news of the battles with unprecedented speed.

o the journalistic en- tourage accompanying T the American soldiers, the charismatic Roosevelt was an obvious draw. His reporter As a lieutenant colonel during the Spanish-American War,Theodore Roosevelt dazzled reporters such companions lavishly recorded as Stephen Bonsal (center) and Richard Harding Davis (right) with his heroics on the battlefield. instances of his courage, which by all accounts was genuine. manent historical work.” Bridges accepted. (Published The celebrated reporter Richard Harding Davis, a the following year, The Rough Riders was an immediate starry-eyed admirer, described Roosevelt speeding bestseller.) Once TR set off for Cuba, he made sure his into combat at the Battle of San Juan Hill with “a blue favorite reporters would be joining him. And though the polka-dot handkerchief” around his sombrero— vessel that shoved off from Tampa, Florida, was too “without doubt the most conspicuous figure in the small to accommodate all of the Rough Riders com- charge. . . . Mounted high on horseback, and charg- fortably, TR insisted that they make room for a passel of ing the rifle-pits at a gallop and quite alone, Roosevelt journalists. According to one oft-told account, Roo- made you feel that you would like to cheer.” Newsreels sevelt even escorted onboard two motion-picture cam- also seared Roosevelt’s stride into the public mind as eramen from Thomas Edison’s company. Though likely audiences lapped up shorts starring the Rough Rid- apocryphal, the story captures Roosevelt’s unerring ers. According to The World, the young lieutenant instinct for publicity, which was entirely real. colonel had become “more talked about than any The conflict in Cuba, dubbed the “Correspondents’ man in the country.”

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Beyond the Bully Pulpit

President Theodore Roosevelt holds court at his summer home, Sagamore Hill, on Long Island in 1912. Thanks to the gregarious Roosevelt, subsequent chief executives would never enjoy the calm and privacy of a press-free vacation.

Within weeks, this “splendid little war,” as Secre- benefited, of course, from timing: He took office as a tary of State John Hay described it to TR, was over. new century dawned, when social and economic That fall, captivated by the hype of his heroism, New injustices were crying out for redress from Washing- York voters elected Roosevelt their governor. Two ton and America was assuming a leading role on the years later, McKinley, seeking reelection, chose TR as world stage. No longer could presidents dissolve into his new running mate; surprising no one, they won obscurity like the “lost” chief executives of the Gilded handily. Then, in September 1901, a gunman took Age, of whom Thomas Wolfe cruelly asked, “Which McKinley’s life, and the American presidency had, in had the whiskers, which the burnsides: Which was this 42-year-old gamecock, its first full-fledged which?” celebrity. Unlike most of his predecessors, TR grasped that More than any other U.S. president, Theodore effective presidential leadership required shaping Roosevelt permanently transformed the position of public opinion. This insight was not wholly novel. For chief executive into “the vital place of action in the example, Abraham Lincoln, in his debates with system,” as his contemporary Woodrow Wilson put it. Stephen Douglas in 1858, said, “Public sentiment is What had been largely an administrative position, everything. With public sentiment nothing can fail; subordinate in many ways to Congress, grew into the without it nothing can succeed.” But the boldness of locus of policymaking and the office everyone looked Lincoln’s wartime leadership as commander in chief to for leadership on issues large and small. Roosevelt obscures the fact that he was not a legislative leader.

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Besides, Lincoln’s embrace of executive power in the ternatural confidence in himself. Mark Twain saw TR as name of the public was unusual for 19th-century one of his own parodic creations come to life—a juvenile, presidents, most of whom accepted the firm consti- showboating ham, “the Tom Sawyer of the political tutional limits on their capacities, rarely even deliv- world of the 20th century; always showing off; . . . he ering speeches that amounted to more than ceremo- would go to Halifax for half a chance to show off and he nial statements. Roosevelt, in contrast, spoke to the would go to hell for a whole one.” public often, usually with high-flying confidence and To defenders such as Dewey, though, such carping an unconcealed point of view. It was significant, too, that by Roosevelt’s day public opinion no MARK TWAIN GRUMBLED that TR longer meant, as it once had, the view of “the class “would go to Halifax for half a chance to which wears black coats and lives in good houses,” show off” and “to hell for a whole one.” as the British political sci- entist James Bryce wrote; it now signified the mass opinion of a surging, diverse, was misdirected, for Roosevelt was merely succeed- and increasingly interconnected populace. Appreci- ing on the terms of his age. “To criticize Roosevelt for ating this change, Roosevelt sought to shape the way love of the camera and the headline is childish,” the issues and events were presented to the clamorous philosopher wrote, “unless we recognize that in such hordes in whom political power increasingly resided. criticism we are condemning the very conditions of To do so, Roosevelt capitalized on changes in jour- any public success during this period.” Dewey toler- nalism and communications. The old partisan press ated Roosevelt’s grandstanding, which he noted was was giving way to a more objective, independent a prerequisite for political achievement in the 20th journalism that valued reporting, and TR realized the century, particularly for those seeking to impose sig- advantage in making news. He took the bold step of nificant change. As journalist Henry Stoddard traveling the country to push legislation and other- explained, the power of the Gilded Age conserva- wise used what he called the “bully pulpit” to seize the tives was so entrenched that it would have been futile public imagination. Perhaps most important, he cul- for Roosevelt to use the methods “of soft stepping and tivated the Washington press corps as none of his whispered persuasion” to try to implement his predecessors had. The presidential practice of using reformist vision. the mass media to mold public opinion—what today More than a strategy for governing, Roosevelt’s we call spin—was in its embryonic state, and no one dedication to publicity thoroughly informed his con- did more to midwife it into being than Theodore ception of the presidency—a conception that was as Roosevelt. bold, novel, and purposeful as Roosevelt himself. Rejecting the view of the executive as chiefly an administrative official, TR considered the president ith his zest for the spotlight, Roosevelt was the engine and leader of social change—and fused this as well equipped as any occupant of the idea to that of an activist, reformist state. Over the W office to carry out this transformation. “One previous half-century, the unchecked growth of cannot think of him except as part of the public scene, industrial capitalism had raised the critical question performing on the public stage,” wrote the philosopher of whether government could be enlisted to preserve John Dewey, who was Roosevelt’s junior by one year and a modicum of economic opportunity and fairness in an unlikely enthusiast. Many Americans, to be sure, society. Roosevelt thought it could, and he equated found it hard to stomach Roosevelt’s antics and his pre- the drive to reform the rules of economic life—to use

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state power to counter the trusts—not with radical- reform also produced a misguided—and to a later ism or socialism, but with responsible governance era’s sensibility, hopelessly retrograde—faith in the in the name of the whole nation. In The Promise of superiority of his own race, class, and sex to assume American Life (1905), Herbert Croly, the theorist of the burdens of leadership. (He justified both the con- progressivism, called Roosevelt “the first political quest of the West and the United States’ acquisition leader of the American people to identify the national of imperial holdings in the Pacific in nakedly racial principle with an ideal of reform.” terms.) Impatient with the faint of heart, he mistook The national principle that Roosevelt believed in ambivalence for weakness. “I don’t care how honest a man is,” he asserted. “If he is timid he is no good.” But if his zeal could yield FOR ROOSEVELT, fashioning a popular a misplaced righteous- ness, and if his restless- image was not an ego trip but an aspect of ness blinded him to the virtues of slow reflection, modern presidential leadership. he did correctly see that rousing America at a crit- ical juncture in the transcended factional concerns. Unlike most of his nation’s economic history demanded a raucous, predecessors, Roosevelt saw himself as an instru- relentless, and even messianic rhetoric, aimed at the ment not of the party that elected him or of a coali- democratic masses. tion of blocs, but of the will of the people at large. The activism inherent in Roosevelt’s theory of the Deriving his power from the general public, how- presidency has been often noted. Less remarked upon ever, did not mean slavishly following mass senti- is how the idea also bade him to think broadly about ment; TR, like Wilson after him, wanted to discern the public. Roosevelt believed that the president with his own judgment which policies would truly should be the duty-bound agent of the American serve the electorate as a whole. “I do not represent people; but, equally important, he was also the repos- public opinion,” he wrote to the journalist Ray Stan- itory for their hopes and fears. Again, publicity nard Baker. “I represent the public. There is a wide counted: The people’s interest in the president as a difference between the two, between the real interests personality allowed him to dramatize himself, to take of the public and the public’s opinion of these inter- advantage of his role not just as a programmatic ests.” He spoke of the common good as if such a uni- leader but as a symbol of the nation. “It is doubtful if tary thing were not hard to identify, at least for him. any power he has over us through his office or To the project of galvanizing public opinion, TR through his leadership of a party is so great as this brought the boundless force of his personality, chan- which he exercises directly through his example and neling it into a moral message. Later generations of character,” wrote William Garrott Brown, a Harvard liberals, starting with the New Deal, disdained the historian. moralism of progressives in favor of pragmatic polit- TR was acutely conscious of this symbolic role. ical problem-solving. But TR, the quintessential pro- After one tour of the West, he wrote about his inter- gressive, saw political questions as spiritual ones: actions with those who had come to hear him. His His advocacy of social improvement was high- remarks, at first glance condescending, actually minded and hortatory. In his speeches he denounced reflected a keen appreciation of why the presidency greedy corporations, excoriated corruption, implored mattered. “Most of these people habitually led rather his audiences to improve their character, and called gray lives,” he wrote of his crowds. “And they came in for a restoration of the manly virtues he held dear. To to see the president much as they would have come in be sure, the moralism that served as a wellspring of to see the circus. It was something to talk over and

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remember and tell their children about. But I think burst upon the Georgetown social scene, to the three- that besides the mere curiosity there was a good feel- year-old Quentin, the six exuberant Roosevelt offspring ing behind it all, a feeling that the president was proved irresistible to society page editors. Roosevelt ini- their man and symbolized their government, and tially opposed the attention and never stopped com- that they had a proprietary interest in him and plaining, but he also had to see that more ink for the wished to see him and that they hoped he embodied their aspira- tions and their best thought.” The president’s persona was not a dis- traction from substantive policy; nor was it a superficial veneer that concealed a different, more au- thentic inner self. Rather, it was an expression and focal point of public sentiment, a source of inspi- ration and connection to the democracy. Fashioning a popular image, accordingly, was not an ego trip, or a detour from governing, but an aspect of modern presiden- tial leadership.

y the time he became pres- ident, Roosevelt had been Bpracticing the art of pub- licity for so long that it was second nature. As soon as he entered pol- itics, at age 23, he cultivated reporters, whose company he manifestly enjoyed. In the 1890s, as New York City police commis- sioner, he conscripted reform- minded reporters Jacob Riis and In 1927, President Calvin Coolidge donned a full-length feathered headdress for the cameras. Lincoln Steffens to guide him Despite his taciturn nature, “Silent Cal” cultivated photo-ops and public-relations stunts, believing, as Theodore Roosevelt did, that the press was essential to advancing his agenda. through the urban demimonde of cops and criminals; in return, he burnished their reputations and helped them publish president was an unintended side effect and benefit. their work. In New York’s statehouse, Roosevelt had Roosevelt surrendered another bastion of presiden- initiated twice-daily sessions with the Albany corre- tial privacy by turning family retreats into working vaca- spondents, serving up a rapid-fire stream of tidbits, tions. When McKinley had escaped Washington’s fish- judgments, and jokes. bowl with visits to his native Canton, Ohio, reporters His ascension to the presidency meant that even seldom followed. But in 1902, after the Roosevelts more of his life would be on view. Without planning to, launched a renovation of the Executive Mansion and he placed his family in the media’s crosshairs. From repaired to his Sagamore Hill estate in Oyster Bay, Long Alice, his daughter from his first marriage, who at 17 Island, TR announced that he would be conducting offi-

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Beyond the Bully Pulpit

cial business all the while—in one stroke, a reporter “trial balloons,” by whispering to select reporters, under noted, “transfer[ring] the capital of the nation to this vil- the protection of anonymity, of possible future plans; the lage by the sound.” A horde of correspondents tagged reporters would then gauge the fallout without the pres- along. When the reporters filled the news lulls with gos- ident having to declare his course publicly. TR also mon- sipy accounts of the first family’s antics, the president itored the presence—or absence—of cameras at events. protested, oblivious to his own role in having whetted the He once delayed signing a banal Thanksgiving Day proclamation until the Associated Press photog- rapher arrived; without a PRESIDENTS WHO HAVE mastered the picture, such a story would be far less likely to make machinery of spin have merely succeeded the front page. Antagonists were quite on the terms of their own age. correct in identifying Roo- sevelt’s sweeping efforts to promote his agenda and appetite for presidential news. Presidential vacations himself—efforts that understandably offended the were never the same again. guardians of the old order. One vocal detractor, “Pitch- If TR drew notice when he didn’t seek it, far more fork Ben” Tillman, a six-foot-tall Democratic senator numerous were the times when he pursued it actively— from South Carolina known for once threatening to and strategically. To be sure, Roosevelt was building on spear President Glover Cleveland with a farm tool, com- a foundation laid by others. McKinley, for example, had plained, “Theodore Roosevelt owes more to newspa- made the first campaign film, shown in theaters just pers than any man of his time, or possibly of any other months after Thomas Edison’s original projectors were time.” But Tillman and his kind were mistaken in deem- up and running—a rudimentary newsreel of the candi- ing the president’s public support illegitimate; enthusi- date pacing around his Ohio homestead that, despite its asm for such initiatives as railroad-rate regulation, pure simplicity, sent audiences into frenzied reactions. In his food and drugs, and antitrust actions was widespread, as first days in the White House, McKinley hosted an East was admiration for these policies’ full-throated cham- Room reception for reporters that won him lasting favor. pion in the White House. What TR understood that Most important, he allowed the self-effacing George Tillman did not was that in the new landscape of mass Cortelyou, the White House secretary—a chief of staff media, a president’s campaign for publicity—whether and aide-de-camp rolled into one—to begin to organize fueled by ego or not—constituted a key part of presi- the handling of press requests for information, which dential leadership, an indispensable means to an end. spiked during the Spanish-American War. For the first This was a crucial insight of Roosevelt’s, and under- time, the president had a formal system for dealing with standing it as more than self-justification requires rec- inquiries from White House correspondents, whose onciling the two seemingly contradictory meanings of ranks were growing every year. the word publicity in early-20th-century America, both Wisely retaining Cortelyou, who would become his of which meant “making something public.” Originally, unsung partner in many of his ventures, Roosevelt the word’s chief connotation wasn’t the self-aggrandizing expanded the White House press operation significantly. pursuit of attention, though that usage was becoming Some of TR’s methods would become staples in the more common. Rather, it meant a commitment to lay- presidential bag of tricks. He discovered that releasing ing bare the facts, something like transparency or sun- bad news on Friday afternoons could bury it in the little- light. It signified an objective—not subjective— read Saturday papers, while offering good news on tor- presentation of previously secluded facts. As overtly pid Sundays could capture Monday’s headlines. He partisan journalism fell into disfavor, reporters—like leaked information to reporters, sometimes floating their counterparts in a host of new academic social

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Beyond the Bully Pulpit

sciences—placed increasing weight on the discovery of lege professor lecturing his class,” Wilson scorned his data and evidence. Even the so-called muckrakers, predecessor’s theatrics—even looking askance at the remembered for their political activism, stressed the popular use of the nickname “Teddy” as a sign of the disclosure of information as the key to effecting reform. unfortunate return of the “old spirit of Andrew Jackson’s Likewise, progressive politicians such as Roosevelt time over again, the feeling of disrespect and desire to believed that if the wrongdoing of backroom politics or make everything common property.” corporate malfeasance were exposed to the light of day, U.S. political culture retains more than a touch of the the ensuing popular outcry would force the powerful to Wilsonian disdain for personalities in politics. Americans change their ways. When a journalist at The New York regularly hear—and tend to endorse—the notion that for World wrote that TR’s strategy as police commissioner politicians to trade on image and style, or for the news was “Publicity! Publicity! Publicity!” it wasn’t simply to media to dwell on such things, is to divert public atten- mock his love of the headlines; it meant that he was lay- tion from more pressing business. Every successful pres- ing open his department’s workings for public consid- ident has suffered imputations that he has in sinister eration. As president, Roosevelt often called for public- fashion charmed the press or used a new medium of ity as a mechanism for checking the rapacity of the communication (radio, television, the Internet) to claim trusts. “The first essential in determining how to deal an undeserved standing. But the insights of John Dewey, with the great industrial combinations,” he said in his ini- an apologist for neither public-relations agents nor sen- tial presidential message to Congress in 1901, “is knowl- sationalist journalism, bear recalling. Presidents who edge of the facts—publicity.” have mastered the machinery of spin, from TR’s cousin Franklin to Ronald Reagan to Barack Obama, have merely succeeded on the terms of their own age. If not ithin a few years, the emergence of public- all of them have shared Roosevelt’s taste for relations professionals in business (and grandstanding, they have consciously or intuitively W soon thereafter in government) would set appreciated how his talent for self-dramatization helped these two meanings of publicity in seeming conflict. him gain the attention and favor of reporters and voters. The hired professionals would gain a reputation for Today, presidents have no choice but to constantly spinning information to put the best face on it, or oppor- tend their images and refine their messages to sus- tunistically promoting events that lacked intrinsic news tain public support for themselves and their agendas. value; in so doing, they transformed publicity from a syn- From Teddy’s rudimentary if nonetheless ground- onym for full disclosure into something like an breaking system of White House press management antonym—a term for selective, self-serving disclosure. has evolved a vast apparatus of spin—an apparatus For Roosevelt, however, the meanings were never fully that has come to include press secretaries, advertis- distinct, and what his critics might see as the latter prac- ing professionals, public-relations gurus, speech- tice he justified under the virtuous aura of the former. writers, pollsters, image consultants, media mavens, Theodore Roosevelt was not alone in developing the and now Web masters, social media directors, and machinery of spin that would come to be an indispen- videographers. sable part of the presidency. Not only had his predeces- Americans may resent the powerful influ- sors taken baby steps toward creating mechanisms for ence these people exert over the words and images influencing public opinion, but several of his the president directs their way, and it’s understand- contemporaries—most notably Woodrow Wilson—did able that they might wish to see the number of arguably just as much to direct presidential energies these message shapers reduced. But at the same time, toward the general citizenry. And Wilson would also do just as TR required new techniques to promote the pro- much as president to enlarge the office. Both men sought gressive reforms he sought, so did his successors. Indeed, to simplify things for public consumption, but where TR it’s hard to imagine how, without the vast machinery of liked to dramatize, Wilson aimed to distill. If Roosevelt presidential spin that has developed in the last century, any belittled Wilson’s “academic manner . . . that of the col- political change of consequence could ever be achieved. ■

Summer 2011 ■ Wilson Quarterly 29 WQ30-34 6/28/11 11:38 AM Page 30

THE WILSON QUARTERLY

Three Cheers for Blue-Ribbon Panels

It is easy to scoff at the prestigious commissions that constantly sprout in Washington as empty exercises in buck passing—until you take stock of all they have accomplished.

BY JORDAN TAMA

A stunning page-one warning led off the Governmental Affairs Committee, which Lieberman January 2001 report of the U.S. Commission on National chaired. Lieberman then introduced legislation based on the Security/21st Century. The rise of terrorism and uncon- commission’s principal proposal, and in November 2002 the ventional weapons, it said, “will end the relative invulnera- Department of Homeland Security was born, bringing bility of the U.S. homeland.... A direct attack against some 22 organizations and 180,000 employees under one American citizens on American soil is likely over the next umbrella. One congressional aide told me, “If the commis- quarter-century.” sion hadn’t existed, the department wouldn’t exist.” Needless to say, the document landed with a thud, barely reported by the news media and largely ignored by the new administration of President George W. Bush. Eight his story is not unique: In researching more than 50 months later, terrorists brought down the twin towers of the commissions that have dealt with national security World Trade Center. That sad tale seems to confirm yet again T policy over the past three decades, I found that a the conventional wisdom that blue-ribbon commissions are surprisingly large number of them catalyzed or influenced toothless and expensive political ornaments. important reforms, from the Reagan-era reorganizations of But there is more to the story. In the days after the 9/11 the Defense Department and National Security Council to attacks, influential journalists resurrected the report and President Barack Obama’s plan for winding down the Iraq Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) called the commis- war. Yes, the president and members of Congress often sion’s cochairmen, former senators Gary Hart (D-Colo.) create commissions to avoid dealing with contentious issues and Warren Rudman (R-N.H.), to testify before the Senate and to escape or reduce the political costs of difficult deci- sions, but with surprising frequency these underappreciated Jordan Tama is an assistant professor at American University’s School of panels spark significant changes. International Service and a research fellow at the university’s Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies. He served as special assistant to Commissions succeed because of their unique political the director of the Woodrow Wilson Center from 1999 to 2002. He is the credibility. Their authority stems from their independence author of the newly published book Terrorism and National Security Reform: How Commissions Can Drive Change During Crises. from the president and Congress, the stature of their mem-

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Published in 2004, the report of the 9/11 Commission landed on bestseller lists and sparked a restructuring of the U.S. intelligence community.

bers, and—especially—their bipartisan makeup. As the ing the 1960s and ’70s, Presidents Lyndon B. Johnson and American political system becomes more and more polar- Richard M. Nixon relied on commissions as they struggled ized, the value of commissions is increasing. Although the to deal with domestic turmoil and rapid social change. frequent resort to such bodies reflects a disheartening fail- Theodore Roosevelt was the first president to make sig- ure of the permanent institutions of government to solve nificant use of commissions, appointing panels on public problems, commissions have long been one of the country’s lands, inland waterways, conservation, meat production best tools for forging bipartisan consensus on particular practices, and monetary policy (the last of which played an issues. Moreover, at a time when the number of Americans important role in the creation of the Federal Reserve Sys- who identify with neither major political party is growing, tem in 1913). In 1947, the legislative branch entered the com- commissions can serve an important democratic function mission business when a Republican-led Congress by promoting ideas that do not have a home in either camp. appointed former president Herbert Hoover to head a The history of commissions has followed the changing panel tasked with finding ways to shrink a federal govern- contours of American political life. During the Progressive ment that had ballooned during the New Deal and World Era, they were instrumental in generating ideas for regu- War II. (Ironically, Hoover wrote in his memoirs that he had lating the economy and protecting the environment. Dur- created commissions during his presidency chiefly as a

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device to keep administration gadflies occupied.) Reorga- mission, it’s like watching a hog learning to ice-skate. That nization, rather than reduction, was the chief result. Over- hog is going to go wherever it wants to go.” all, with a few notable exceptions, such as the 9/11 Com- Two trends have emerged during the last few decades. mission, congressional commissions have been less First, foreign policy has become a major focus of commis- influential than those created by presidents, in part because sions, reflecting the rise of conflict in an arena where politics Congress takes much longer to establish a panel and appoint was once said to stop at the water’s edge. This trend began its members—delays that may allow a window of opportu- in 1983 with President Ronald Reagan’s success in using a nity for reform to close. panel led by former national security advisor Brent Scowcroft Most of the early panels focused on relatively dry mat- to gain congressional backing for the MX intercontinental ters pertaining to government operations, but during the ballistic missile, a bitterly contested step in the nuclear arms 1960s commissions took on many of the era’s hot-button race with the Soviet Union. Second, Congress has become the issues, galvanizing public attention. The Warren Commis- most prolific creator of new commissions, despite the poor sion famously examined the assassination of President track record of the bodies it has created, establishing 29 of the John F. Kennedy, while other panels probed urban vio- 45 national security panels born since President Bill Clinton took office in 1993. Many have been the products of frustrated centrist legislators. “RUNAWAY” COMMISSIONS are like a As Virginia Representative Frank Wolf, a moderate hog on ice skates—and can be politically Republican, lamented to me, “Overall, Congress is dys- hazardous to those who create them. functional, partisan, and polarized, and it isn’t getting anything done. We need lence, pornography, and drug use. Some bit the hands of the commissions to break out of divisive partisanship.” presidents who had created them. Today the president and Congress use commissions for After riots devastated Detroit in 1967, President John- a variety of purposes, from investigating the causes of dis- son created a commission on civil disorders, headed by Illi- asters such as the Gulf of Mexico oil spill to seeking con- nois governor Otto Kerner. The Kerner Commission’s sensus on national challenges such as the federal debt. Per- report, which sold more than two million copies, was a haps surprisingly, most panels manage to achieve consensus. searing indictment: “White society is deeply implicated in More than two-thirds of those I studied issued unanimous the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions final reports. maintain it, and white society condones it.” The commis- sion embarrassed Johnson by implying that his Great Soci- ety social programs were not working: “Our nation is mov- ow is such accord possible in a political world ing toward two societies, one black, one white—separate and rent by ever more vehement disagreement? While unequal.” For all the publicity it received, though, the report Hblue-ribbon panels are often mocked for being did not produce any significant changes in policy. stocked with political graybeards, these wizened pros can be LBJ learned a lesson that his successors have been a great asset. “It helps to have ‘has-beens’ on commissions acutely sensitive to: Far from being an empty gesture, because they have no political ax to grind,” former secretary appointing a commission is full of political risk. Presidents of state and Iraq Study Group cochairman James Baker may appoint such bodies, but they cannot control them, and told me. a “runaway commission” such as Kerner’s can be a political The five Republicans and five Democrats on the Iraq disaster. As Rhett Dawson, who served as the staff director Study Group (average age: 74) were able to set aside their dif- of commissions on defense management and the Iran- ferences on other issues to agree in 2006 on a comprehen- contra scandal, colorfully put it, “Once you create a com- sive Iraq strategy. While President Bush rejected the princi-

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pal proposals—a change in the U.S. mission from combat to of staff Rahm Emanuel famously distilled this piece of polit- training and counterterrorism, a gradual withdrawal of U.S. ical wisdom during the financial crisis when he said, “You troops, and direct engagement with Iran and Syria—then- never want a serious crisis to go to waste.” senator Obama embraced them as his own, and they have Even after such an event, reformers may not carry the day guided his administration’s policy. (One element of the gray- without the political credibility provided by an independent, beard critique is valid, though: We would be better served by bipartisan report. An overhaul of the nation’s intelligence greater gender diversity on commissions.) agencies only became possible when the 9/11 Commission Another reason commissions are able to produce issued its proposals in July 2004—nearly three years after the consensus—perhaps the rarest of Washington commod- terrorist attacks. Having found that failures to share infor- ities—is the simple opportunity they provide for intense pri- mation prevented the agencies from detecting the 9/11 plot, vate deliberations. Members often spend dozens of hours the commission proposed creating the new post of director together in hearings, discussions, and debates. Some even of national intelligence and a national counterterrorism become friends. It may sound corny, but that time spent center. The changes were initially opposed by President together is precious, and contrasts sharply with the con- Bush and the powerful leaders of the congressional intelli- temporary practice on congressional committees, whose gence committees, but strong public support turned the members rarely deliberate or socialize with one another. tide. The resulting Intelligence Reform Act of 2004 was the Indeed, most are not even in Washington for large parts of most important intelligence legislation since the creation of the week. Former senator Slade Gorton (R-Wash.), who the Central Intelligence Agency after World War II. served on the 9/11 Commission, recalled to journalist Kris- Almost without anybody noticing, commissions have ten Lundberg that over the course of the 18-month investi- been central to the American response to terrorism during gation, “the associations inside the group became more the past three decades. Following Hezbollah’s 1983 bombing important than those outside.” When Bush administration of a Marine barracks in Beirut, which killed 241 U.S. ser- attorney general John Ashcroft charged that Jamie Gorelick, vicemen, sharp criticism of U.S. policy by a commission a former Clinton administration official, was responsible chaired by retired admiral Robert Long hastened President for failed counterterrorism policies, Gorelick’s fellow 9/11 Reagan’s decision to withdraw American troops. After attacks commissioners, and especially the Republicans, passion- on U.S. embassies in the early 1980s and in 1998, commis- ately came to her defense. sion reports guided an overhaul of the State Department’s There were plenty of disagreements on the 9/11 Com- security operations and built support for a dramatic increase mission. But Gorton said that he and others decided not to in funding for diplomatic security. write minority opinions that would diminish the final report’s Looking back as we approach the 10th anniversary of the impact, out of “this immense feeling of satisfaction and 9/11 attacks, it is striking how strongly commissions have respect for one another.” shaped the response to that catastrophe. Congress has Gorton didn’t say it, but commissioners have self- enacted three major pieces of counterterrorism legislation interested reasons to reach consensus: Legislators on con- since 9/11: the Patriot Act in 2001, which gave the Justice gressional committees can reap valuable publicity and polit- Department and other agencies new counterterrorism pow- ical advantage from loudly breaking ranks. They also have ers; the Homeland Security Act of 2002, which established ways other than their committee work of exerting influ- the Department of Homeland Security; and, two years later, ence. Most commission members, however, have little to gain the Intelligence Reform Act. Two of these landmark laws by going off the reservation. They know that their work will were spurred by commissions. be far more influential if their report is unanimous. If commissions are so powerful, why haven’t President Unanimity sends a powerful signal to policymakers and Obama and Congress adopted the recommendations of last the public, but it is not enough to ensure success. Political con- year’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and ditions must also be ripe for reform. In the absence of a cri- Reform, with its far-reaching proposals for spending cuts and sis, the status quo in Washington is more or less set in tax increases? cement, as advocacy groups and turf-conscious government First, the commission did not issue a unanimous report— officials are able to thwart change. Obama White House chief only 11 of the 18 members approved the final proposals. A

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Blue-Ribbon Commissions

sense of crisis takes hold, many more politicians might endorse the only plan that has strong bipartisan credibility. Every new commission is greeted with the same complaint: Why can’t Congress and the presi- dent solve the problem at hand with- out outsourcing it to an unelected body? But partisanship, turf battles, and the need to gain the support of 60 senators to pass most significant legislation mean that it is very diffi- cult to enact reform—and the com- plexity of the problems confronting us is only growing. The challenge is exacerbated by today’s extreme ide- Launched early last year amid high spirits, the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and ological polarization. As recently as Reform, chaired by Erskine Bowles (center) and Alan Simpson (right), failed to reach consensus. the 1960s, dozens of members of Congress frequently crossed the aisle divided outcome was predictable, since 12 of the commis- to vote with a majority in the other party. Now there is only sioners were members of Congress subject to the same par- a handful of such moderates, and they are a dying breed. tisan pressures that confront legislators all the time. Obama Middle-of-the-road solutions with broad support among the made these appointments in the hope that they would give American people often wither on the vine. the commission a foothold in Congress, but he might have One of the paradoxes of our time is that unelected com- better served this purpose by naming highly respected for- missions may improve democratic governance. Even as the mer members. polarization of political elites grows, more voters are reject- Second, despite widespread concern about the federal ing the two major parties. Some 40 percent of Americans deficit, there is still no sense of crisis. By contrast, when the now call themselves independents, outnumbering Democ- Social Security program faced a near-term financing short- rats and Republicans. Commission proposals, which typically fall in 1982, a commission headed by Alan Greenspan pro- transcend partisan divides, tend to be supported by most of vided valuable political cover that allowed the Reagan White this enormous constituency. By helping to overcome the House and congressional Democrats to reach a compromise. parochial pressures that often prevent Republicans and Finally, the fiscal commission dealt with issues that have Democrats from agreeing, commissions can make govern- major consequences for Americans’ standard of living. It was ment more responsive. They are an instrument, rather than inevitable that its proposals would stir passionate opposition. a betrayal, of democracy. Efforts to change foreign policy or reform national security Commissions cannot forge agreement on solutions to all institutions do not usually affect most Americans so directly, of the serious challenges facing the United States, and inde- a reality that simplifies the task of spurring reform. pendents are not going to rally around the banner of “com- Yet it would be premature to declare the fiscal commis- mission power” in any future election. But these unique sion a failure. Sixty-four senators signed a letter in March call- bipartisan bodies can provide a critical boost to reformers ing on the president to support measures along the lines of seeking to update our government’s institutions and policies. the commission’s proposals, and Obama’s own April deficit Instead of disparaging them, supporters of productive and reduction proposals drew heavily on the commission’s ideas. effective governance should recognize the value of commis- It remains a long shot that a commission-inspired grand bar- sions as institutions that help grease the gears of our often gain will be enacted before the 2012 election. But if a real creaky democracy. ■

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THE MIDDLE EAST W HAT N EXT?

he giddy opti- T mism is gone, and the portentous phrase “Arab Spring” is already falling out of use. This year’s revolts have created new challenges for the Arab world, and for the United States and its allies. Yet in the deeper social and political undercurrents that drove the Arab up- heavals, there are signs of a new era struggling to be born.

Aaron David Miller on the new Robin Wright on one young

reality facing America ...... p. 36 woman’s political odyssey ...... p. 47

Rami G. Khouri on the political roots Donald L. Horowitz on Egypt’s

of the Arab revolts ...... p. 43 constitutional struggle...... p. 52

Summer 2011 ■ Wilson Quarterly 35 WQ36-42 6/28/11 11:39 AM Page 36

THE WILSON QUARTERLY

For America, An Arab Winter

The fall of Arab autocrats creates more risks than opportunities for the United States. As Arab political horizons expand, the space for America to pursue its interests may well contract.

BY AARON DAVID MILLER

Mark Twain once observed that history to state repression (Bahrain and Syria) or civil war (Libya doesn’t repeat; it rhymes. As America reacts to the dramatic and Yemen). Elsewhere, in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United changes sweeping the Arab world, it would be wise to keep Arab Emirates, Oman, Kuwait, Jordan, and Lebanon, Twain’s insight in mind. there’s been much less change so far or none at all. These aren’t quite secular revolutions like those of 1789 The broader point is that America has never been here and 1917, and they certainly aren’t Islamic ones, like Iran’s in before. Whatever rhythmic patterns link the current politi- 1979, at least not yet. They more resemble popular uprisings cal turmoil to the past are trumped by the reality that the like those in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union United States finds itself in terra incognita in a part of the between 1989 and 1991. world vital to its national interests, without a unified doctrine But even here the differences eclipse the similarities. The to guide it. But the absence of such a lodestar is actually for- Arab world is not shaking off domination by a great impe- tuitous. No single strategy could possibly accommodate the rial power that has entered into decline. And it includes a differences and variations in play or harmonize America’s val- much wider range of polities than did Eastern Europe ues, interests, and policies. The last thing the United States ca. 1990—monarchies, republics, and authoritarian regimes needs right now is ideological rigidity. Great powers at times of various complexions. The amount and nature of change behave inconsistently—even hypocritically—to protect their varies dramatically from country to country. In some cases interests. It’s part of their job description. (Egypt and Tunisia), the uprisings have left many established During most of the time it has been engaged with the governmental institutions and political parties in place. In Arab world, the United States has dealt either with others, efforts to change the status quo have failed and led acquiescent authoritarians who were its allies (in Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia) or with Aaron David Miller, a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson adversarial authoritarians (in Syria and Libya). Iraq was Center, served for two decades as an adviser to the U.S. secretary of state on Arab-Israeli negotiations. He is the author of The Much Too Promised for a time an ally, then an adversary. Land: America’s Elusive Search for Arab-Israeli Peace (2008). His new All of this (or a great part of it) has now come undone. book, Can America Have Another Great President? will be published next year by Bantam. With some exceptions, most notably Saudi Arabia, every

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In dealing with each Arab ruler, the United States has struck a different balance between its values and interests. Several key figures gathered at a 2006 summit, including Libya’s Muammar al-Qaddafi (right), with Syria’s Bashar al-Assad at his side and Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh (far left).

major U.S. ally or adversary in the Arab world has faced dis- press the Khalifa monarchy in Bahrain or Ali Abdullah ruptive change. On balance, when President Barack Obama’s Saleh in Yemen quite as hard. That the administration’s 3 am phone call came, his first real-time foreign-policy cri- approach to these different situations where values and sis, he responded pretty well under tough circumstances. He interests collided came to resemble a giant game of Whac- made no fatal mistakes or galactic stumbles. And despite the A-Mole is a result less of the administration’s failings than of criticism from liberal interventionists and neoconservatives the impossible situation it faced. It also reflects another key who demanded a more muscular American response, the reality: The Arab Spring was not primarily an American story. administration got the big issues right. It has been roundly The United States’ capacity to shape events was always quite criticized for its half-in/half-out approach to military inter- limited. vention in Libya, but even that may prove to have been the As America watches these events unfold, it should be best of bad alternatives if Muammar al-Qaddafi falls. The humble and respectful of history’s power and uncertainty. president will have been judged to have accomplished his goal The fall of the Arab dictators in Libya and Syria would be a without heavy American involvement, even though for many good thing. Even the stability offered by the acquiescent in Congress it seems too much. autocrats (in Egypt and Tunisia) was always at best a false What abound in America’s policy aren’t failures so much one. The long arc of history may smile kindly on the Arab as contradictions and anomalies. The president has called for world and over time bring better governance, gender equal- the removal of one cruel dictator (Qaddafi) but not another ity, and greater respect for human rights to a region that is (Syria’s Bashar al-Assad). His administration helped to ease in desperate need of them. Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak out of power, but couldn’t or wouldn’t But the short term will prove to be a difficult period

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A Changing Middle East

for the Arabs, and the United States too. Democracy, or freeze in 2009 and lost. With no negotiations and no whatever strange hybrid of popular government, weak freeze, a good deal of American credibility has been lost as institutions, and elite control replaces the autocrats, well. will be a double-edged sword. And American policies, The sum total of the difficulties—those inherited and already marked by contradiction and challenge, won’t those self-inflicted—had left President Obama’s image much escape its cutting edge. The gaps separating American diminished relative to the expectations (inflated to be sure) values, interests, and policies could actually grow, and the when he entered office. Words had also outstripped deeds on both the peace process and democratization. Obama’s 2009 speech in Cairo calling THE ARAB UPHEAVALS have narrowed for a “new beginning” in rela- tions between the United the space in which the United States can States and the Muslim world was brilliant, but his pursue its policies. actions—such as backing off from pressing Mubarak and other autocrats for reforms— space available to the United States to pursue its poli- betrayed his words. Wary of the impracticability of his pre- cies—from Iran to Gaza to the Arab-Israeli peace decessor’s freedom agenda, the president had all but dropped process—could contract. The growing influence of Arab it. public opinion on the actions of Arab governments and The main event in the Arab upheavals was the fall of the absence of strong leaders will make it much tougher Mubarak in Egypt. And the main problem for the United for the United States to pursue its traditional policies. For States was that for 30 years, Mubarak had been one of the America, the Arab Spring may well prove to be more an good guys—supporting U.S. policy on Iran, Gaza, countert- Arab Winter. errorism, and the peace process. Egypt was no democracy, In late April, a new poll on Egyptian attitudes toward the and Mubarak was an authoritarian whose security services United States told the story. Only 20 percent of those sur- arrested, tortured, and imprisoned his people, but for every veyed had a favorable view of the United States, with little American president since Ronald Reagan he had been a part- more than a third expressing confidence that President ner and friend. Obama could be expected to do the right thing in world Mubarak was the epitome of the acquiescent autocrat, the affairs. kind of leader with whom America had cut bargains decades To put it simply, when the Arab uprisings occurred, earlier. In exchange for a pass on questions of governance, America wasn’t in the most favorable position to cope. It was such leaders supported U.S. war- and peacemaking policies. neither admired and respected nor feared as much as it Sure, the Department of State issued tough human rights needed to be in a region that is vital to its national interests. reports every year, and for a time the George W. Bush admin- For at least 18 years, under Presidents Bill Clinton, istration actually took its freedom agenda seriously. But George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, America’s approach there was no sustained pressure on issues of human rights to war and peace had produced very mixed results—some or political reform. The Bush administration needed would argue failure. In two wars (in Iraq and Afghanistan), Mubarak’s support for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and victory seemed to be measured not in terms of when the its efforts to contain Iran. United States would prevail but by when it would be able In Egypt, the Obama administration actually got lucky. to leave. Sanctions and cyberworms launched against Iran The Egyptian military understood history’s moment, forced took a toll on its nuclear program, but high oil prices and Mubarak out, and refused to launch a massive crackdown on an Iranian commitment to uranium enrichment kept the the opposition. With the public’s support, it took over the centrifuges spinning. On Arab-Israeli peacemaking, the country to oversee a transition until parliamentary and pres- Obama administration pushed for an Israeli settlements idential elections could be held. Still, the issues at stake—the

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role of the military in an emerging democracy, the influence to face. In this regard, most of the monarchies (Saudi Ara- of the Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood, how Egypt’s bia, Jordan, and Morocco) had weathered the winds of economy would fare, what the Egyptian-Israeli relationship change far better than the presidencies and republics. would look like—remained unresolved. The United States Change visited not only America’s friends but also its maintained its close ties with the military and was viewed as adversaries. In Libya, violence even triggered a U.S.-led (for a key partner. But it was clear that with the rise of more pop- a time) NATO military intervention, and in Syria, quite to the ular voices, Islamist and secular nationalist alike, the politi- surprise of many political analysts, the Assad family faced the cal process would be more open and dynamic. That would most serious threat to its rule in 40 years. In both instances, almost certainly mean a foreign policy more independent of there would be clear gains for the United States if the regime the United States, and more critical of Washington’s policies, fell, though in the case of Syria, the Obama administration not to mention Israel’s. It seemed all but certain, as Egypt acted as if the risks of Bashar al-Assad’s departure out- moved to reach out to Iran and open the border with Hamas- weighed the advantages. Like a Wall Street heavyweight, ruled Gaza, that the space for U.S. influence in Cairo would Syria was too big and important to fail. contract. That it was Egypt that brokered the Fatah-Hamas The differences in the way the United States reacted to Palestinian unity agreement signed in May, without con- the situations in Libya and Syria pointed up the contradic- sulting with Washington, was a telling sign of how much tions in its responses to this incipient Arab Winter—situa- things had already changed. tions in which repression rather than regime change or Elsewhere, the United States wasn’t so lucky. In Bahrain, reform carried the day. Moreover, both situations reflected the ruling Khalifas, encouraged and abetted by Saudi Ara- the limits of U.S. influence and ability to shape the out- bia, cracked down on the Shia opposition. American efforts comes quickly, easily, or, perhaps in the case of Syria, at all. to mediate were rebuffed. The Obama administration, fear- In Libya, the United States, pushed by the French and ful of losing invaluable access to naval and air base facilities, fearing regime atrocities, found itself involved in a strange backed off pressuring the regime—at least publicly. kind of civil war that pitted poorly organized, underarmed In Bahrain and again in Yemen, unlike in Egypt, Amer- rebels controlling much of the east against Qaddafi’s forces ica’s interests (port facilities, air bases, counterterrorism in Tripoli and the west. cooperation) were clearly in conflict with its values (allowing The U.S. response in Libya was a lowest-common- peaceful opposition and pressing hard for reform). The denominator effort to protect civilians and encourage the Saudis, worried about the specter of an Iranian presence in opposition in the face of a brutal dictator’s harsh repression. a neighboring country with a Shia majority and the restive- The not-so-subtle subtext was that President Obama was ness of their own Shia minority, pushed for and supported determined to avoid heavy American military involvement, the repression in Bahrain. Angry about Obama’s decision to let alone boots on the ground and overt efforts at regime abandon Mubarak, the Saudis drew the line on the Arab change. The United States already occupied Iraq and Spring in Bahrain. And there was little the United States was Afghanistan; it didn’t want to own Libya too. The focus prepared to do about it. from the outset was on getting others to carry the load. The result—a UN Security Council resolution, a NATO military operation, and an Arab League buy-in for an aug- t was striking that of all the countries in the region mented no-fly zone—produced what one might have imag- exposed to pressures for change, Saudi Arabia seemed ined: a military stalemate in which NATO bucked up the Ileast affected. Plentiful oil money to buy off discontent, rebels largely through airpower. The rebels (even with NATO the public’s respect for the king, the conservative nature of the support) weren’t strong enough to defeat Qaddafi. And society, and a weak tradition of street opposition seemed to NATO wasn’t prepared to do what was necessary to accom- make the Saudis different and almost unassailable—at least plish that end. America’s turning over leadership to NATO for the moment. For the Obama administration, it was just was further evidence that for President Obama, Libya was as well. How Washington would have responded to serious not a front-burner issue. Qaddafi’s arc, however, seemed unrest and a crackdown in the Arab world’s most important headed downward, and given Libya’s relatively minor impor- oil producer was a challenge the White House was glad not tance in the American scheme of things, the partial U.S.

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response, however painful some of its consequences were to on the ground, and regime change were tropes, policies, watch, may well prove to have been the best one possible. and outcomes the Obama administration strongly wished to On the other hand, in Syria, a country of much greater avoid. consequence to American interests in the region, the United The administration also understood that America was States didn’t even have bad options. Military intervention was still very much caught up in a devil’s bargain with a number out of the question, since Syria possesses real air defenses and of authoritarian regimes (Bahrain, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and chemical and biological weapons. Nor was it possible to Jordan), and had to be cautious in what it said and did construct a coalition to pressure Assad to reform or to resign. about reform. The United States might argue for democratic This was partly because the Turks, Saudis, and Israelis were change, but its interests might nonetheless demand a strong all wary of what might follow Assad should he fall. regard for the status quo. Strikingly, there were no repeats of the assertive “Qaddafi must go” speech from the White House for Bahrain, Yemen, THE SWEEPING CHANGES in the Arab or Syria. One of the most notable world were a reminder to the Palestinians of developments in a region traditionally obsessed with how little their own situation had changed. the Israeli-Palestinian issue was how little this subject fig- ured in the political turmoil Driven partly by fear of what would come after Assad that swept through it. Missing were the traditional anti- (Sunni extremists, civil war) and partly by a lack of capacity Zionist, anti-Semitic tropes, burning of Israeli and American to influence events, President Obama settled on a limited flags, and demonstrations for Palestinian rights. None of this response—tougher rhetoric and targeted sanctions. But meant that the Arab world had given up the cause of Pales- there was no doubt where the administration’s bottom line tine, but it did reflect changing priorities and a focus on lay. Though there might be considerable benefits to top- domestic matters. It wasn’t until mid-May, largely in response pling Assad (a cruel regime ended and Syria’s ties with Iran to al-Naqba day (the “day of catastrophe,” when Palestinians loosened, along with a weakening of Syrian clients Hamas mark the anniversary of Israel’s creation and their exile), that and Hezbollah), there were also risks. violence erupted, as Palestinian protesters—their actions The administration’s limited response to both the Arab orchestrated by Syria—tried to cross Israel’s borders with Spring and the Arab Winter reflected certain realities that Syria and Lebanon. would likely continue to define U.S. policy. The Israelis might have taken heart from the fact that they First, the Middle East upheaval wasn’t primarily an weren’t the center of attention amid all these changes had the American story. Even if the United States had desired a uncertainties created in the process not shaken their confi- stronger role, it would have only made matters worse by inter- dence. Within the space of two months, Mubarak, Israel’s key vening. The historic changes loosed this year throughout the partner, was gone, and another friend, King Abdullah of Jor- Arab world represented a legitimate and authentic response dan, was under pressure. By May, Syria’s Assad was facing the by the Arabs to the need to reshape their own societies with- worst-ever challenge to his regime, a development that could out much in the way of external reference points. This was have major implications for Israeli security interests in as it should have been. Lebanon and the Golan Heights, where Assad had scrupu- Second, even if the Arabs had wanted more intervention lously maintained the 1974 U.S.-brokered disengagement by the United States, the Obama administration had little agreement. For Israel’s tough-minded and suspicious prime desire to push its way in. Iraq and Afghanistan cast long shad- minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, these developments only ows. Obama’s foreign policy had already begun to mirror reinforced his caution about making a deal with the Pales- many of the elements of his predecessor’s. As Libya demon- tinians. Whatever hopes the long arc of history held out for strated, owning Arab countries, putting American forces democratic change in the Arab world and Arab-Israeli peace,

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logical, youthful, secular char- acter of much of the opposition in the Arab street, unity seemed even more urgent. It was also important for Hamas to keep Egypt, the broker of the unity accord, happy, partly because Cairo controlled the border crossing at Rafah, a lifeline for Gaza. Abbas too saw unity as a chance to ally with Egypt and gain a better position for his UN statehood recognition campaign. After all, it would be easier to argue for statehood in front of the international com- munity with Palestinians at peace rather than at war with one another. For a U.S. administration that had yet to find an effective Still standing: The Arab monarchies, particularly those in the Persian Gulf, have survived without serious chal- strategy to promote Israeli- lenges. Here the Saudi (right) and United Arab Emirates (left) finance ministers meet during the Arab Spring. Palestinian negotiations, Israeli wariness and Palestinian unity the immediate future was fraught with uncertainty. made an already complex situation trickier. If Hamas were For Palestinians, the political changes sweeping the Arab to abandon struggle and recognize Israel, there might be a world were a painful reminder of how little their own situa- real chance for substantive talks, but that’s not what the tion had changed. Even before the events in Tunisia and unity effort was about. What unity did do—in the short Egypt, Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas term—was raise the threat of a congressional cutoff of U.S. had concluded that Palestinians needed to break out on aid to the Palestinian Authority and give Israelis who didn’t their own and not count on Israel or the Obama adminis- want to negotiate with Abbas a perfect excuse not to do so. tration. Toward this end, he and his prime minister, Salam Worried about drift and the approaching debate over Fayyad, had begun to develop institutions on the ground and the UN initiative in September, the administration looked a diplomatic initiative for recognition of Palestinian statehood for a way to respond. In May, as part of his Arab Spring at the United Nations in the fall. speech—largely in an effort to demonstrate that he was still Turmoil in the Arab world only seemed to validate this committed to a solution and to persuade key European strategy. Regimes that couldn’t deliver what their publics countries not to support the Palestinian initiative—Obama wanted were swept away or faced intense opposition. And to laid out a U.S. position on borders based on those in place say the least, neither Abbas in Ramallah nor the Hamas lead- before the 1967 Arab-Israeli war with mutually agreed ership in Gaza had delivered. The two sides had been talk- land swaps. The speech sparked an intensely negative ing unity ever since their bloody split in 2007. To preempt dis- reaction from the Israelis, and not much of a positive one content and to broaden their legitimacy, both Hamas and from the Palestinians, and reflected the reality that the Abbas now seemed more open to reconciliation. administration really didn’t have the strategy, capacity, or For Hamas, whose base of material support in Syria was opportunity to translate any of its ideas into serious nego- increasingly tenuous as a result of Assad’s repression and tiations, let alone an agreement. whose Islamist trope seemed out of step with the non-ideo- By early summer, there appeared to be no way out of this

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conundrum. Neither Abbas nor Netanyahu was willing or Second, as public opinion becomes more influential in able to get into serious negotiations. And the United States shaping domestic and foreign policies in the Arab countries, seemed powerless to affect matters. The default scenario the space available for U.S. policies and influence may con- seemed to be drift as the Palestinians geared up for their UN tract. The acquiescent autocrats have acquiesced, albeit often statehood initiative in September, leaving the United States grudgingly, in our approach to Iran, Gaza, Israel, and coun- isolated in opposing them. Even if the administration man- terterrorism. The new regimes won’t, or at least not as eas- ages to relaunch the talks, the odds against an agreement ily. Since most of our policies won’t change quickly, or at all, appeared overwhelming. the United States will likely be in for a rough ride, with both emerging governments and old ones. Indeed, our traditional friends and adversaries are already harles de Gaulle, paraphrasing Sophocles, once worried about our reliability. The Saudis were stunned at how reflected that one must wait until the evening to quickly we acquiesced in and aided Mubarak’s fall, and they C see how splendid the day was. Time will indeed be were also angered by our support for reforms in Bahrain. The the ultimate arbiter of what the changes unleashed this Israelis probably are concerned as well that we plan to year will mean for the future of the Arab world. It’s a long squeeze them on the peace process to accommodate the new movie that will take years to play out, and the story will Arab democrats and carve out greater space for our interests. develop in fundamentally different ways in each country And in traditionally pro-American monarchies such as Jor- depending on local circumstances. Some popular upris- dan and Morocco that have been spared disruptive change, ings have changed regimes; some haven’t; others have pro- the kings may wonder how America will react if they too are duced civil war and state repression. The lesson of history pressed hard by their publics. is that you never quite end up where you thought you Events in the Arab world may also complicate U.S. pol- would. We can hope with some confidence that the future icy toward Iran. There are new pariahs now—Syria and holds the prospect of better governance, more accounta- Libya—to divert the international community. Egypt will bility, gender equality, and respect for individual rights. But continue to fear Iranian influence, but will likely improve ties in the summer of 2011, who can make authoritative pre- and shed the personal animus that influenced Mubarak’s dictions about where Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, Syria, or approach to the mullahs. And while the Arab Spring has been those countries yet untouched (Jordan and Saudi Arabia) a setback for Iran’s model for change and governance in the will be in the summer of 2012? Middle East, Iran will be a beneficiary if reforms falter, par- We can, however, say with greater confidence how Amer- ticularly in Bahrain and Yemen. ica will fare. It will be wise as we deal with the region’s Finally, if the tumultuous changes in the Arab world changes to keep both our hopes and our fears under control. reveal anything, they should be a painful—or happy— When it comes to this part of the world, Americans (me reminder that America doesn’t run the world. Reinhold included) indulge too much in each. Several trend lines Niebuhr said it best decades ago: America can’t manage his- seem clear. tory. This doesn’t mean the United States is a potted plant or First, the gap between America’s values and its policies is in decline, or even that it lacks influence in this region. in the region may narrow but will remain. In Bahrain, The Arab uprisings have important consequences for Yemen, and Syria, the United States will be constrained by American interests to be sure, but they are not our story. We its interests from pushing too hard for reform and is likely to can support change through economic and technical aid and be cautious in its support for the opposition. In Egypt, as it by looking for opportunities to defuse political tensions and becomes clear that a powerful military functioning inde- work toward solutions (when real ones exist), particularly in pendently of civilian authority isn’t really compatible with the Arab-Israeli arena. But there are real limits to our power democratic values, the United States (because of its close ties and influence, particularly in a region where our values and to the military) will find itself in a dilemma. Similarly, it will interests will continue to collide and where our policies may be reluctant to embrace groups such as the Muslim Broth- by definition be at odds with the rising currents of public erhood whose views on democracy, gender equality, and opinion. But such is the fate of a great power engaged in a Israel are fundamentally different from our own. region it cannot remake and from which it cannot retreat. ■

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THE WILSON QUARTERLY The Long Revolt

The Arab world’s wave of change was a century in the making. Why expect its effects to become clear in the space of months?

BY RAMI G. KHOURI

We are witnessing today the culmination ing that it is not surprising that we have a hard time find- of a century of Arab popular struggle for freedom and sover- ing a name for it. “Arab Spring” is the tag used in the West. eignty. That struggle was interrupted by many decades of often “Revolution” (thawra) is the preferred name among those illusory statehood under the reign of autocrats who were enthu- protesting and sometimes battling in the streets in Egypt, siastically supported by foreign powers. Today’s struggle is the Tunisia, Libya, Syria, and Yemen. In some countries people single most significant movement of Arab citizens and citi- speak of their “intifada” (uprising), the name popularized by zenries since the modern Arab world was created in the early the two Palestinian intifadas against Israeli occupation. 20th century. Others speak of a “citizen revolt,” the “Arab Awakening,” or That world was born amid revolts against the region’s the “Arab Renaissance.” Ottoman and European overlords. When the European colonial powers finally retreated, the Ottomans having been swept aside by their defeat in World War I, they left behind alf a year after the overthrow of the Tunisian a collection of Arab countries they essentially had manu- and Egyptian regimes that launched this factured for their own convenience out of their particular Hrevolt, two important patterns have dominions. Twenty-two nominally sovereign Arab states emerged. First, there is a common set of basic mate- ultimately emerged, and they limped into the 21st century rial and political grievances that citizens in most Arab battered and tattered by a combination of forces: their own countries share. Second, each regime’s response to economic mismanagement and corruption; regional wars the protests has been determined by the intersection and occupations involving Israel, Iran, and recurring inva- of two factors: the nature and legitimacy of the regime sions by the United States and Britain; severe income dis- itself and the intensity of popular grievances. This is parities resulting from the misuse of oil and gas wealth; and why the region is marked by such a variety of revolts a stunning record of sustained autocracy and authoritari- and regime responses. There have been two regime anism unmatched by any other region of the world. changes to date, while active warfare and low-intensity Now Arab countries finally are being born of their own violence continue in a few countries. In others, the volition rather than through the false-birth handicraft of national leaders, perhaps feeling themselves on firmer audacious European officials. The momentous process that ground, are attempting to mute demands for change is under way today is so complex and was so long in the mak- with a combination of massive cash handouts to the

Rami G. Khouri, a former public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson hard-pressed populace and negotiations, or at least Center, is an internationally syndicated columnist and the director of the dialogue, with those demanding changes in how Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut. power is exercised and citizens are treated.

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Understanding what is happening now and how things and other countries. Arabs’ confidence in the legitimacy of might evolve requires, above all, grasping the nature of the national elections was low. Dozens of other indicators grievances that have caused people to go into the streets, affirm this picture of mass citizen discontent across the knowing they risk death. For decades, the average Arab cit- region, with the general exception of the wealthy Persian izen suffered multiple hardships and injustices. These Gulf oil-producing states. included rampant corruption, poor wages, a lack of jobs, The Arabs who now challenge their governments share low-quality education, occupation by foreign powers, secu- a common desire to achieve both personal and political rity service abuses, and curbs on personal freedoms. By the goals. They want all the normal rights of citizenship, includ- ing meaningful voting rights, access to a credible judicial system, and freedom THE ARABS WHO NOW challenge their of the press. They want the ability to exercise their governments want meaningful voting human faculties to read and write as they wish, enjoy arts rights, access to a credible judicial system, and culture without dracon- ian censorship, discuss pub- and freedom of the press. lic issues, travel and invest as they see fit, wear the clothes and listen to the music they 1990s, the Arab order could be defined as one of continu- prefer, and participate in the world of ideas that helps shape ous wars and internal violence, increasingly militaristic and their society as well as define their public policies. corrupt security states, and burgeoning disparities in citi- When Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in Tunisia zen well-being as a small, wealthy minority became increas- last December, inspiring the Arab revolt, he was driven to his ingly distanced from masses of lower-income and poor desperate gesture by a terrible combination of material want Arabs. Average people were willing to endure as long as and homegrown political humiliation felt by Arabs across the they felt that the future held out the hope of a better life for region. The intensity of the resulting demonstrations for themselves or their children. From the 1930s to the late serious change and the speed with which they spread ’80s, the future did indeed promise a better life for most throughout the Arab world suggest that these national rebel- Arabs. But the upward curve of promise flattened and in lions, and the common regional trend they represent, will not some cases reversed during the two decades before the cur- wither away or be permanently suppressed by police actions. rent revolt erupted in Tunisia last December. This revolt is very different from the upsurge of Arab In Tunisia, Gallup surveys showed that the percentage nationalism in the 1950s and ’60s, when young Arab states of those who were “thriving” (a composite measure of well- still being born were caught up in a mass emotional and polit- being developed by the polling firm) fell by 10 points ical response to a stultifying combination of what many saw between 2008 and 2010. In Egypt, it fell by 17 points over as Israeli and Western aggression. That period of Arab a slightly longer period of time. (Last year, only 14 percent nationalism was perhaps the last gasp of the anticolonial of Tunisians and 12 percent of Egyptians were classified as struggle that charismatic leaders such as Egypt’s Gamal “thriving,” compared with 43 percent of Saudis and some- Abdel Nasser tapped into so effectively. The mere idea of what higher percentages of those in other Persian Gulf Arabs with shared identities, rights, and interests fighting for states.) At the same time, both countries had growing their sovereignty and building new countries electrified economies, which created a wealthy elite even as the major- masses across the region for a fleeting decade, until the ity of citizens felt that their prospects were declining. Last debacle of the 1967 Arab-Israeli war revealed the structural year, Gallup found that more than a quarter of all young weaknesses of Arab nationalist regimes. people in Arab states wanted to emigrate—and the pro- The current revolt is anchored much more solidly in the portion reached more than 40 percent in Tunisia, Yemen, fierce determination of millions of citizens to live decent

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and normal lives, free of material desperation and politi- Soviet Union’s collapse and a serious economic crisis that cal indignity. The revolt’s intensity and broad scope also brought widespread hardship and forced bankrupt author- reflect the fact that it did not emerge from a vacuum. It is, itarian states to open up their systems enough to allow cit- rather, the culmination of decades of activism by scores of izens to air their frustrations and grievances. Roughly groups small and large that have struggled unsuccessfully between 1986 and 1992, Arabs in the tens of millions for civil and political rights. Those battles erupted in many embraced the possibilities of a more open press and the countries but did not achieve regional momentum, and ability to create political parties and civil society organiza- consequently received little attention abroad. The chal- tions. Flocking to vote and speak their minds, they force- lenges to the Arab order came from a variety of civil soci- fully expressed their long-pent-up demand for real ety initiatives, democracy and human rights movements, citizenship. © Jon Berkeley The last of the line? Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak was the third in a series of long-reigning “pharaohs”who have led the nation in modern times.

more specialized campaigns to promote the rights of Islamist movements emerged in the 1980s as the most women and workers, and thousands of individual writers important challengers of Arab state power, and in most cases and academics. Professional associations of lawyers, engi- they were beaten down by the state’s security forces, their neers, and doctors in many Arab countries have long members jailed en masse or forced into exile. The important fought for greater rights anchored in the rule of law, and thing about these movements—including the Muslim business associations in recent years have also pushed for Brotherhood in Jordan, Egypt, and Syria; Al-Nahda in change, especially in education and the judiciary. Tunisia; Amal and Hezbollah in Lebanon; and the Islamic The Arab region enjoyed a brief spell of liberalization Salvation Front in Algeria—is that in almost every case beginning in the late 1980s as a result of fallout from the they grew primarily on the strength of their status as local

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groups demanding more citizen rights and empowerment, change, while in others, citizens’ democratic aspirations are better government, and less corruption, rather than their frozen by the heavy hand of a ruling security state. New criticisms of the United States and Israel. Today’s revolt is actors are emerging or reasserting themselves, including built on the same foundation, with demands centered on cit- youth groups, formerly exiled or banned political parties, izen rights and constitutional changes, while foreign-policy labor unions, private-sector–led political parties, and issues take, at least for now, a back seat. reform-oriented civil society organizations. Other actors, One American scholar who has long studied Arab polit- notably the military, Islamists, and traditional political ical economy, former American University of Beirut presi- parties, are repositioning themselves. The Arab political dent and Princeton University professor John Waterbury, stage has now been repopulated with a rich array of new noted in a private communication some months ago, “Qui- and reinvigorated actors. It will be some time before they escence has never been a consistent feature of the Arab sort themselves out, determining which will lead and world. Citing only from memory, I note the following: cost which will play niche roles. Most Arab countries have not of living riots in Casablanca, 1965; food riots in Egypt, 1977; engaged in public politics for half a century; they should not the Hama massacres of 1982 in Syria; cost of living riots in be expected to transform themselves instantly. Jordan, Sudan, Algeria in the late 1980s; the Shia uprising in Iraq in 1991; the long-smoldering Islamist insurrection in Algeria after 1991; Houthis and others fighting the regime ven as they are experiencing these momentous in Yemen; civil war continuously in the Sudan since the early changes, Arab countries must deal with four enor- ’80s; the Lebanese civil war, 1976–89; the Palestinians E mous and simultaneous challenges: maintaining against the Israelis seemingly forever, and so on. security, rekindling economic growth, creating legitimate “We should not confuse police states with political and participatory governance systems, and preventing mass docility. There have been at least three other civilian-led discontent sparked by unfulfilled expectations from push- protest movements that led to real change, but not to ing countries back toward autocratic rule. The liberated lasting change. In 1964 and again in 1985 civilian demon- Arab lands that are able to slowly establish more democratic strations led to the downfalls of General [Ibrahim] political governance systems will each take on a different Abboud and Jaafar Numeiry of the Sudan, leading to tone and color as they create their own formulas from the years of civilian government, until 1989 when General possibilities before them: tribal values, pan-Arab senti- Omar Bashir seized power and remains in power. In the ment, narrow nationalism, corporate globalism, Islamist spring of 2005 a million mostly young Lebanese went to influences, and roles for the military. Arab democracies Martyrs’ Square in Beirut and brought about the down- will look very different from Western ones, and the world fall of the Karami government and the withdrawal of Syr- should have the patience and composure to let the people ian military forces from Lebanon.” of this region find their own sustainable balances between Egypt alone in recent years has witnessed the rise of the religiosity and secularism, state-centered and pan-Arab Kefaya movement, which challenged Mubarak family rule nationalism, and traditional and modern forms of in the years before the election of 2005; the judges’ move- governance. ment for the rule of law; human rights and voters’ rights The key to success will be the ability of reconfigured movements that included brave pioneers such as Saad democratic Arab systems to institutionalize citizen rights and Eddin Ibrahim and the Ibn Khaldoun Center; the April 6 limits to state power in enforceable constitutional systems, Movement, which emerged from the 2008 labor strikes; with the rule of law protected by an independent judiciary. the vibrant opposition press led by the start-up newspaper These are the common elements of the rallying cry across the Al-Masry Al-Youm and others; and thousands of young region. In every single country where Arab citizens have bloggers who spoke on the Web when they were not revolted against their regime, the main demand is for con- allowed to speak in public. Such determined activism for stitutional changes that protect the rights of individuals. freedom, democracy, and the rule of law has occurred in Arab democratization will need time to succeed. It will almost every Arab country over the past two generations. take at least a decade to show if the change now under way Some Arab countries are now moving toward radical is irreversible—as I believe it is. ■

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THE WILSON QUARTERLY The Pink Hijab

The Arab revolts of 2011 have transformed the image of the Islamic world. One young Egyptian woman’s struggle reflects the scope of change—and shows how long it has been in coming.

BY ROBIN WRIGHT

The greatest wave of empowerment in the early 21st century has produced a new political chic. It has been shaped by conditions conspicuously ripe for unrest. A youth bulge altered the generational balance of power. Rising literacy spurred aspirations beyond daily survival, especially among women. And new technology tools—cheap cell phones with video capabilities, Internet access, social media, and some 500 independent satellite channels launched since 1996—gave ordinary Arabs a larger sense of the world and then allowed them to connect at a crucial juncture. The new chic has been fashioned by a yearning for change that is at once demo- cratic and indigenous. The restless young chafe at old ways and old leaders, but many who turned out in Cairo’s Tahrir (“Libera- tion”) Square this year do not aspire merely to imitate the West. They reject militant jihad and the rigid formulas of the Salafis, yet they fervently embrace their faith as a defining force in their future. They want new systems that are both fully representative and true to their religious values. Their quest, which began quietly long before the so-called Arab Dalia Ziada, shown here in March at the Women in the World Summit in New York Spring, also helps illuminate what lies ahead. City, has been a leading activist among the rising pink hijab generation. The 21st-century believers are establishing

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their voice in hip-hop lyrics and bold comedy, subversive “We talked most of the night. He was shocked at the poetry and satirical plays. The cultural uprising is as crit- blunt discussion,” she recalled. “I told him that he had no ical as the political upheaval. The young in particular right to circumcise her. I said I’d cut off Shaimaa’s fin- have been encouraged by a new generation of popular ger if he went through with it. He looked at me with sur- televangelists who preach a softer and more flexible prise and said that would ruin her life—and I said, ‘Now form of Islam. The militant Muslim Brotherhood and its you get it.’ I thought I’d lost. But he called me the next allies may play a powerful role in the new Egypt and else- day and said I’d convinced him. That’s when I realized where in the Arab world, but they will face strong coun- I could do things, because I had been able to save some- tercurrents among young Muslims who have their own one,” she said. “I decided to see what else I could do.” ideas. They will encounter people like Dalia Ziada. Ziada, who comes from a traditional family, does not look the part of sex educator. She is doe eyed and wears no makeup, so her pale, chubby cheeks and col- alia Ziada was 29 when she joined the revolt orless lips make her appear younger than she is. In pub- against President Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. lic, she wears hijab coverings in bright florals, rich pat- D She had a particularly long journey to Libera- terns, or fake designer prints; she changes her scarf tion Square. It started when she was a little girl. daily. She is an observant Muslim, so not a wisp of hair “I am a survivor of female genital mutilation,” Ziada told shows. Judging from her eyebrows, her hair must be me as she stirred a steamy espresso in a Cairo café. “In dark brown. 1990, when I was eight years old, my mother told me to put “Hijab is part of my life,” she told me. “I would feel on my best party dress. It was supposed to be some kind of naked without it.” She often jokes, with a robust laugh at her- surprise, a celebration. I found myself instead in a doctor’s self, that her scarves are the most interesting part of her office. I shouted and refused, but the doctor gave me a shot. wardrobe. Yet her religious commitment defines her life. I woke up in terrible physical pain.” Her goal, she wrote when she began her new blog in Ziada’s first protest was within her family. As a teenager, 2006, “is derived from the ultimate goal that any Muslim she tried to prevent the genital mutilation of her sister and seeks; which is to please Almighty Allah.” cousins. No female in her family had ever fought back. Ziada soon became a leading activist among the pink “And mostly,” she conceded, looking up from her coffee, “I hijab generation, young women committed to their faith, failed.” firm in their femininity, and resolute about their rights. With In Egypt, the practice of female genital mutilation spans three college classmates, she launched a campaign to edu- millennia, dating back to the pharaohs. In 2005, a United cate women about genital mutilation and domestic violence. Nations report found that 97 percent of Egyptian females Then she moved on to human rights. And she ended up at between the ages of 15 and 49 had undergone one of four Liberation Square. types of genital mutilation—clitoridectomy, excision, infibu- “When I grew up,” she explained on her blog, “my per- lations, or the miscellaneous pricking, piercing, incising, sonal interest in having more equal rights as a woman scraping, or cauterizing of the genital area. The practice is expanded to my country.” cultural rather than religious in origin, more African than Her first big project was translating a comic book called Middle Eastern. Many Christian girls in Egypt have also The Montgomery Story, which recounts Martin Luther been genitally mutilated. King Jr.’s civil disobedience campaign against racial segre- In 2006, when she was 24, Ziada had a long debate with gation in 1955. King famously mobilized a bus boycott in an uncle about her seven-year-old cousin Shaimaa, the Montgomery, Alabama, after Rosa Parks was arrested for family’s youngest female child. refusing to give up her seat to a white man. Dozens of the boycott’s leaders were arrested; a bomb was thrown into Robin Wright, the U.S. Institute of Peace–Woodrow Wilson Center King’s home, narrowly missing his wife and child. Yet the Distinguished Scholar, is a journalist who has reported from abroad for The Washington Post and many other publications. This article is drawn from movement remained nonviolent. The Supreme Court ulti- her new book, Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World. mately ruled that bus segregation was illegal. Her other books include Dreams and Shadows: The Future of the Middle East (2008) and The Iran Primer: Power, Politics, and U.S. Policy (2010). “When I read this story, I learned that someone must

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take the risk for others to follow,” Ziada told me. “I wanted ital mutilation that shows ragged pinking shears slowly to be the Martin Luther King of Egypt!” snipping off the tops of dozens of beautiful flowers, one by The Montgomery Story, originally an educational tool to one by one, just as they’re blooming—each producing a promote civil rights among the young or mildly literate, ends piercing scream from an unseen girl child or baby. with tips on nonviolent activism. One of several groups As the pink hijab generation gradually chisels away at Ziada worked with distributed copies of her Arabic version centuries of restrictions, the young women are also redefin- across the Middle East. ing what it means to wear hijab—as a declaration of activist “Finding a way to explain civil disobedience was very intent rather than a symbol of being sequestered. The exciting. It was something new for ordinary people,” she said. change is visible in virtually every Muslim country. The “Then I started looking for other ways to use nonviolence young are shedding black and gray garb for clothing more and civil disobedience for my own campaigns.” colorful and even shape-revealing, albeit still modest. Pink Her next major project was organizing the first human is the most popular hue. Women in their teens, twenties, and rights film festival in the Arab world. The Mubarak regime thirties also flavor their faith with shades of pastel blue, tried to block her. “The government reacted as if we were bright yellow, and rustic orange, occasionally trimmed with planning a terrorist attack,” she said. sparkles, tassels, or even feathers. Hijab stores from Gaza to The authorities imposed a stiff fee for showing each film, Jakarta now carry everything from long denim dresses which Ziada and her backers could not afford. So she cut with rhinestone designs to frilly frocks with matching back from dozens of films to seven. Then government cen- scarves. Hijab Fashion, an Egyptian monthly magazine, was sors denied approval of the films, even though she had launched in 2004 for the pink hijab generation. It has avoided movies about Egypt. Undeterred, Ziada went to the nothing to do with religiosity. But it is also not just about censorship board’s offices, waited by the elevator for its direc- fashion or vanity. tor, then rode up with him to plead her case. “I think he was shocked that I would dare stop and question him,” she told me with a chuckle. “We talked all the he Veiled—or al-Motahajiba—is one of Cairo’s way up the elevator. In the end, he was laughing and he gave new fashion centers combining Islamic femi- me approval. Security didn’t believe it.” T nism and cool. When I visited the shop in 2009, The harassment was not over, however. The authorities hijab ware was as elegantly displayed on the glass shelves shut down the theater that had agreed to show the films. as designer scarves at Nieman Marcus. Shaimaa Hassan, Ziada then hastily arranged for various nongovernmental a 20-year-old salesclerk, told me that her favorite color organizations to host a different film and panel discussion was turquoise. She handed me a booklet of fashionable every night for a week. “We stopped letting them always tell new hijab styles. The latest fad was the Spanish wrap, so us no. We started making decisions for ourselves,” she said. called because the scarf is tied with a large knot at the In 2009, facing the same obstacles, Ziada managed to back, in an allusion to the hairstyles worn by flamenco sneak in 20 movies for the second Cairo human rights film dancers. As she demonstrated how to wrap it, Hassan festival. To get around official obstacles, she provided the explained that she had just finished vocational school in wrong schedule and imaginary venues. In a country with commerce and intended to open her own business one of the region’s most autocratic regimes, Ziada showed someday. films such as Orange Revolution, about the 2004 uprising Sabaya, which means “young girls” in Arabic, is a in Ukraine, and, most daringly, four Egyptian films. One salon, boutique, and café in Cairo’s trendy Heliopolis dis- dramatized a well-known incident in which police used a trict. It was launched in 2008 by Hanan Turk, a famous broomstick to sodomize a young man who had intervened Egyptian ballerina who was recruited for the cinema in when his cousin refused to pay the police a bribe. Another 1991. The glamorous young actress appeared in more was a Romeo-and-Juliet tale about a young Christian boy than 20 major films, both comedies and dramas, in who falls in love with a Muslim girl he can never marry. The which she often wore racy dresses or exposed ample most potent movie, however, was also the shortest. Please décolletage. In 2005 she starred in the controversial Spare Our Flowers is a one-minute film about female gen- film Dunia (“World”), about a young dancer who

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explores her sexual identity and resists pressures to hide told me. “It’s a deal between a Muslim girl and society. her femininity. The director struggled to get it past I agree that I will wear hijab in order to have more space Egypt’s censorship board. and freedom in return.” Shortly after finishing the film, however, Turk opted In its many forms, hijab is no longer assumed to sig- to don hijab. The reaction in Egypt’s arts world was nal acquiescence. It has instead become an equalizer. It electric. “She must have gone crazy,” said Yusef Chahine, is an instrument that makes a female untouchable as she the director who gave Turk her early break in cinema. makes her own decisions in the macho Arab world. It is a stamp of authenticity as well as a symbolic demand for change. And it is a FOR MANY YOUNG WOMEN, hijab is weapon to help a woman resist extremism’s pull into now about liberation, not confinement. the past. Militants cannot criticize or target her for being corrupted by West- Turk was unfazed. “I had intended to take this ern influence. step a long time ago,” she declared, “but I never had the “The veil is the mask of Egyptian women in a power guts before.” A year later, she announced plans to struggle against the dictatorship of men,” explained launch a religious magazine with a noted singer. They Nabil Abdel Fattah, author of The Politics of Religion called it Hajj, after the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. (2003), when I stopped to see him at Cairo’s al-Ahram Two years later, she opened Sabaya for fashionable Center for Political and Strategic Studies. “The veil gives hijabis. A sign in neon lights outside called it a place women more power in a man’s world.” of “veiled beauty.” And Muslim women are increasingly assuming those Turk remained a fashion plate, devising ways to dra- powers as basic rights. matically drape her curves in stunning colors—and Education has been a key to the transformation. A replicate them for other women. In many pictures, she 2008 Gallup poll not only found that literacy is the rule looked even more exotic than she did before hijab. The rather than the exception among Muslim women, but wares in her store reflected her style. that they are a growing proportion of university stu- “There’s a tendency among people who don’t know dents even in countries with strong religious senti- Islam to think of the veil as a sign of conservatism, igno- ment. In Iran, 52 percent of women told Gallup they rance, or backwardness,” Nagwa Abbas, the store man- had at least some postsecondary education, while in ager, told me over lattes at Sabaya’s café. “It’s just iden- Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon about one-third tification. Underneath, we wear what everyone else did. Surprisingly, Gallup also reported that more wears. We’re all for women having every opportunity. women had postsecondary educations in Pakistan (13 Our aspirations don’t change just because our clothing percent) and Morocco (eight percent) than in Brazil is different.” (four percent). For many young women, hijab is now about libera- “Now, it’s hardly something worth noting that in tion, not confinement. It’s about new possibilities, not the Egypt, universities are filled with women, in some past. It provides a kind of social armor that enables cases more than men, and they are excelling,” one Muslim women to chart their own course, personally or highly educated Egyptian woman told the Gallup professionally. For Ziada, hijab provides protective cover researchers. “The valedictorians of Cairo’s elite medical and legitimacy for campaigns she considers to be the school are famously known to almost always be female.” essence of her faith—human rights and justice. Attitudes about female education have shifted “Families feel much more comfortable allowing their markedly across the Muslim world, according to a girls to be active, to get higher education, or jobs, or even 2009 Pew Global Attitudes survey, apart from obvious to go out alone at night when they are wearing hijab,” she exceptions such as Afghanistan. In Egypt, 71 percent

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of those surveyed said it is as important to educate girls around the vast plaza distributing copies of The Mont- as it is boys (and to educate both sexes equally). In gomery Story. Lebanon, 96 percent agreed. One result of this broad “It was a good time,” she told me, “to remind people change in attitudes is that young women entering uni- of the techniques—and to remind them that there were versities across the Islamic world are no longer neces- people who did it before us, and we can do it too.” sarily English-speakers or the children of Western- In every country, the message of the Arab street ized families. Young women in their pastel hijabs are movements has been the same. “We want democracy. We highly visible on every Egyptian campus, including want freedom,” said a Libyan protester shortly after the the prestigious American University of Cairo. uprising began against Moammar Qaddafi. “I want to go Like many of the pink hijabis, Ziada has little taste on the street feeling like nobody is looking after me, not for Islamist politics. She rejects the Muslim Brother- looking over my shoulder.” hood, the Islamic movement founded in Egypt in 1928 But in Arab countries where rebellion has suc- that now has more than 80 offshoots around the world. ceeded in ousting leaders (or will), painful makeovers She considers the group hypocritical for promising to still lie ahead. None will get through the change improve life for all Egyptians while also issuing a draft quickly. Most will stumble over daunting political and manifesto that said women and Christians should not economic challenges. Some may fail. All will grapple to be allowed to seek the presidency. find the right blend of freedom and faith. Global- “So the only person who can run is a Muslim man,” ization—or the traumatic transition to it—may also she told me angrily. “What the hell is this? They talk intensify personal affiliations with faith, and back- about democracy all the time, but look at the party’s own ward-looking groups may profit from the change. Yet structure. They don’t have elections for leaders. There are the uprisings are among the many signals that the no women, except in a women-only branch. And when Islamic world is no longer an exception to history’s people make petitions to challenge them on something, forces. A new generation is taking the helm. And the they don’t get answers. vast majority of Muslims are not attracted to the three “You know, ordinary people are not stupid,” she said. major models that until recently defined political “We discovered that they’re working for their own goals, Islam’s spectrum: Al Qaeda’s purist Salafism, Iran’s not our interests. They don’t understand the duality of Shiite theocracy, and Saudi Arabia’s rigid Wahhabism. young people who want to be faithful to their religion All three have a singular vision. All three have no room and live a modern life.” for anything else. The new movements are about pluralism and tol- erance. The alternatives they create over time—perhaps ast year, Ziada started organizing workshops for a great deal of time—may not be liberal in the Western young Egyptians to encourage civil disobedi- mode. Alcohol and pornography, for example, are not L ence rather than confrontation. “Debate, don’t on the list of freedoms endorsed even by liberal Mus- hate,” the promotion poster advised. Working with a lims (though hypocrisy is hardly unknown). But most Muslim civil society group, she coached activists from of those who swept away the old order do want to end other Arab countries on moving from online activism to political monopolies and open up space—to play what- on-the-street action. Among the trainees were two ever music they want as well as to have a genuine Tunisian bloggers who, only months later, played criti- choice of political parties. cal roles in flashing the story of Mohamed Bouazizi’s self- “I’m worried about our future. There are not enough immolation in Tunisia across the Internet and beginning signs that tell you liberalism will be achieved or free- the Arab Spring. dom is guaranteed,” Ziada said shortly after she “You can see,” she told me in a phone call later, with returned from a “protect the revolution” rally at Lib- great excitement, “it’s paying off!” Ziada continued her eration Square six weeks after Mubarak’s ouster. campaign at Liberation Square earlier this year. After “But I’m not afraid. I know now that I have power,” protesters set up a permanent camp there, she walked she told me. “And I know what to do with it.” ■

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Writing the New Rules of the Game

In Egypt, the next important battles over the political future will be waged with law books and computer keyboards.

BY DONALD L. HOROWITZ

The fledgling democracies in Egypt and The short timetable, protested by the liberal-demo- Tunisia that emerged from the Arab Spring face extraordi- cratic forces that helped bring down the Mubarak dicta- nary challenges in the months and years ahead. In democ- torship, virtually ensures that the well-organized Muslim ratizing countries, the institutions you start out with and the Brotherhood and some reconstituted version of the old process you use to reform them can take on inordinate regime’s National Democratic Party will win a large share importance. The electoral system, the method of revising the of the 508 seats in the all-important lower house of parlia- constitution, and the sequencing of the reform agenda all ment, the People’s Assembly. The more democratically ori- affect which forces will be advantaged and which disad- ented parties are probably too young and poorly organized vantaged, and whether the outcome is likely to be demo- to compete strongly. (In Tunisia, their counterparts won a cratic or not. significant delay in the electoral timetable.) To make mat- The prospects are much brighter in Tunisia, where the ters worse, the New Wafd Party, a rare survivor of the transitional regime has been consulting widely with the Mubarak years and one of the strongest organizations in the country’s contending political groups as it charts a way for- center, announced in June that it was forming a coalition ward. Egypt, the largest Arab country and traditionally the with the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. center of the Arab world, is the cause of far more anxiety. The Yet the strength of political parties and the timing of elec- Egyptian military has been calling the shots since jubilant tions are not the only important factors that will influence crowds cheered President Hosni Mubarak’s departure in the fate of Egyptian democracy. That is why the smaller par- Tahrir (“Liberation”) Square in February, and it is off to an ties are furiously contesting the rules that will govern how inauspicious start. It has made important decisions without the elections are structured. The elections are crucial because consulting with parties and people from the full political the new parliament will select a 100-member committee to spectrum, scheduling legislative elections for September, draft the constitution. Here, in crafting the rules of the with presidential elections to follow in November. game, is where the die will largely be cast for the future of Egyptian politics. Choose one electoral system, and the Donald L. Horowitz, a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center, is the James B. Duke Professor of Law and Political Science at Duke University. small and poorly organized democratic parties will likely be He is the author of several books, including Ethnic Groups in Conflict doomed to insignificance. Choose another, and they will (2000) and The Deadly Ethnic Riot (2001). His new book, Indonesia’s Path to Constitutional Democracy, will be published next year. have a fighting chance.

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Many countries have written new constitutions in the through what is called a list system of proportional repre- past several decades, and the political scientists who study sentation. There are many possible variations in the design and often help draft them have learned a great deal about of such a system, but essentially each party puts up a list of how different choices can shape the politics of new democ- candidates, with its most preferred at the top. Voters cast a racies. In those experiences, there are important lessons ballot for one party list, and that fraction of the list is elected about what to look (and hope) for as Egypt crafts its fun- that corresponds to the fraction of votes the list received. damental institutions. Ordinarily, proportional representation has a centrifugal At this writing, Egypt’s interim military government effect, because it allows many parties, some of them extreme, seems poised to announce that the September parliamentary to win a few seats and enter the legislature. Israel, with its elections will be governed by a modified version of the coun- fragmented party system and a contingent of extremists in try’s existing electoral law. This is bad news. The law provides the Knesset, is the classic example of the pitfalls of such a sys- for a common variation on the first-past-the-post system tem. In Egypt, however, the small parties are concentrated familiar to American voters: In the Egyptian system, candi- in the liberal, secular center. This kind of system (or at least dates from various parties compete in each district, and if no candidate wins a major- ity, a runoff is held between the top vote-getters. In many cases, that kind of system is a boon to democ- racy, since it often forces can- didates to reach across group and party lines to build a majority. But the Egyptian story is different. The two largest parties may well be the least inclined of the seri- ous contenders to secular, lib- eral democracy, and they face a fragmented liberal-demo- cratic opposition. The bigger A grim electoral past: Egyptian authorities whisked away ballot boxes after the polls closed last year. parties would likely be able to win a large number of seats without reaching out to liberal most versions of it) would help them in two ways: It would voters. The result of 50-percent-plus-one elections is that the allow them to win a level of representation they could not larger parties get a seat bonus. In each contest, those in the achieve in individual, majority-runoff constituencies, and it minority—whether it is a minority of 100 voters or a near would confine the Muslim Brotherhood and remnants of the majority of 50 percent minus one—are effectively denied old regime to a share of seats proportional to the fraction of representation. If the bigger parties win runoff elections votes they win, denying them a seat bonus. again and again, they could receive, say, 70 percent of the A key question is how many of the People’s Assembly’s seats while receiving only 55 percent of the votes. seats will be filled through proportional voting. One-third There is, however, a bit of good news in the modified is the proportion currently being proposed, but the parties electoral rules: Thanks to one of the military government’s of the democratic center are protesting loudly. They have alterations, some of the seats in parliament will be filled been demanding that the entire legislature be elected in this

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fashion. If that were to occur, and if competing lists were to the task of constitution writing upon itself, involving all of run for seats in provincial-level districts, as the military has the country’s major groups in the process: militantly secu- proposed, rather than the smaller districts of the past, small lar nationalists and non-Muslim minorities, secularists parties would benefit. As a rule, the more members a dis- with some ties to observant Muslims, explicitly Muslim trict can elect, the more proportional the outcome. Perhaps parties, and avowed Islamists. Over the course of several 10 to 20 members may be elected in some of Egypt’s larger years, they thrashed out a new constitution through endless provinces. back and forth, with hardly a vote taken. Since the revised Another feature of proportional systems is the thresh- constitution was put into effect, Indonesia has held two suc- old of exclusion: Each party is required to win a certain per- cessful national elections, including one in which an incum- centage of the national vote before it is awarded any seats. bent president was defeated and peacefully handed over It would obviously help the smaller parties if Egypt’s thresh- power to her successor. Indonesians tell pollsters they are old were set at a low level, perhaps even one percent. quite satisfied with their democracy even as they object to Of course, the smaller parties could help themselves a corruption and other flaws. great deal by amalgamating and urging their followers to The Indonesians had a unique incentive to reach a con- vote for a new consolidated democratic party. The problem sensus. The old constitution could only be amended by a is not merely that these parties have been slow to get organ- two-thirds vote, and the party most wedded to it held ized. Several of them are led by men who would like to run enough seats to veto changes. So the other parties were for president. These parties are reluctant to merge because forced to talk and bargain. Yet there is also a lesson here for it might prevent them from nominating their favored pres- Egypt. If a majority on the committee selected to draft the idential candidates. constitution believe they can ride roughshod over other A list system of proportional representation with a low members, the resulting sense of exclusion will bode ill for threshold could, however, carry some risk for the liberal- acceptance of new institutions. democratic parties. It could encourage splits among them— The lessons from Indonesia and other emerging democ- and among Islamists, too. In the worst-case scenario, racies are clear. The greater the number of individuals and Egypt could be left with a parliament so fragmented that groups involved in drafting a constitution, the higher the both forming governments and governing would be very resulting level of democracy, the greater the constitutional difficult for any party. In other words, even the best system constraints on government, and perhaps the greater the one could design would still be full of risks for democrats durability of the resulting constitution. Both the constitu- and for Egypt. tion and the everyday politics that come in its wake are improved by the long simmering of a new fundamental law. In Egypt, some political activists now argue that the new ne final lesson that has emerged from the experi- constitution should be completed before legislative elections ence of constitution makers around the world, are held. But a strong case can be made for not rushing this O however, is that design is not everything. How a process, particularly as the military has already, by decree, constitution is written can sometimes matter almost as abrogated some of the more authoritarian features of the much as what it contains. Mubarak-era constitution. No matter what kind of system Consider the success of Indonesia. In 1998, when it the Egyptians design, it will probably work better if the emerged from decades of authoritarian rule under Suharto, constitution-drafting process is used to create understand- it had important similarities to contemporary Egypt. Its ings among secular liberals, Islamists, former supporters of political elites did not know or necessarily trust one another. the old regime, the Christian minority, and other groups There were significant divisions among secularists, obser- about their intentions, their fears, and their aspirations. vant Muslims, and Islamists. The country was home to a To accomplish this large objective, it is important to get Christian minority equal to roughly 10 percent of the pop- the technical aspects of elections and the constitutional ulation, as Egypt is today, with its Copts. And the old process right. These seemingly small details are likely, in the regime’s political party still enjoyed popular support. end, to have a large formative influence—one that may Indonesia’s new democratically elected parliament took well determine whether a democratic Egypt emerges. ■

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reviews of articles from periodicals and specialized journals here and abroad

55 Foreign Policy & Defense // 59 Politics & Government // 61 Economics, Labor & Business // 63 Society // 66 Religion & Philosophy // 68 Arts & Letters // 71 Science & Technology // 74 Other Nations

FOREIGN POLICY & DEFENSE erupt if they weren’t united under an international occupying force. And if the military fractured, “who would control nuclear facilities, If North Korea Falls biological weapons sites, missile production facilities, dual-use Kim Jong Il or his son will fall chemical production sites, chemical THE SOURCE: “The Long Goodbye: The Future North Korea” by Robert D. Kaplan apart. The country faces severe storage facilities, and weapons and Abraham M. Denmark, in World challenges at the same time that research centers?” Kaplan and Affairs, May–June 2011. North Koreans have gained more Denmark ask. access to the wider world. Mobile If the regime did fall apart, the Over the last 50 years, phones have become popular, population of 22 million would Northeast Asia has been trans- Korean-language broadcasts of become the responsibility of the formed from a remote backwater Voice of America and Radio Free international community—in devastated by war into the cross- Asia are available 24/7, and there practical terms South Korea, the roads of the 21st century, eco- is a black market in pornography United States, and China. It’s not nomically, politically, and militar- and South Korean soap opera clear their three armies could ily. One vestige of the old days DVDs. Yet despite increased work together. South Korea offi- remains: North Korea. Impover- media availability, many people cially seeks reunification but ished and isolated, it is neverthe- are so poor that some are said China benefits from division, pre- less the keystone on which the to be surviving on little more ferring a buffer between it and fragile architecture of the region’s than grass. But the regime has democratic South Korea. Beijing power relations rests. A North withstood decades of extreme might oppose reunification even Korean collapse—a possibility but poverty. Could the Arab Spring after a collapse. Above all, it fears not a certainty—could drag affect North Korea? “It would be instability, which could send mil- China, South Korea, Japan, and more likely...to spread to the lions of North Korean refugees possibly the United States into next galaxy,” says one unnamed streaming into Manchuria. South conflict. Robert D. Kaplan and expert. Korea has its own worries about Abraham M. Denmark, both fel- More than one crumbling coun- refugees. lows at the Center for a New try has been saved from chaos by its Given all these conflicting inter- American Security, warn that military, as Romania was after the ests in the region, one thing is clear, these powers are not prepared for collapse of communism in 1989. the authors write: If North Korea the challenge. North Korea’s army might not be ruptures, “someone is going to lose.” It’s a fool’s errand to predict up to the job. It is organized around The three powers plus Japan and whether or when the regime of regional commands. Civil war could Russia should be talking now about

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what they would do in the event of homegrown powers such as region, as demonstrated by its key a collapse that’s well within the Brazil, Colombia, and Chile have role in creating the Union of realm of possibility. Alas, say the become ascendant. South American Nations in 2008. authors, there’s no sign they’re Latin America is flourishing. In But Colombian, Mexican, and doing that. recent years it has enjoyed unpre- Peruvian officials complain cedented economic, political, and privately about Brazil’s “arrogant” FOREIGN POLICY & DEFENSE diplomatic success. Brazil stands diplomacy. One official said, “The out, with an economy that grew 7.5 new imperialists have arrived, Latin America percent last year, but the average and they speak Portuguese.” for the region was an impressive 5.6 Without the United States Rising percent. More than 40 million aggressively policing them, the Latin Americans escaped poverty region’s authoritarians— THE SOURCE: “The Post-American Hemi- between 2002 and 2008. Free elec- Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, Cuba’s sphere” by Russell Crandall, in Foreign Affairs, May–June 2011. tions and active civil societies are Fidel and Raul Castro, and the new normal, and “armed revo- Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega—have Why has there never been a lution is now dead in the region sought to play a larger role in military coup in Washington? that was once its cradle.” The recent regional affairs. But they have Because there’s no U.S. embassy global economic calamities were been “the biggest losers” in Latin there. not enough to knock Latin America America’s realignment, Crandall So goes an old Latin American off its promising trajectory. Even says. “Nothing hurts [them] more joke. But according to Russell most leftist governments, disposed than when other Latin American Crandall, a professor of inter- to “fiscal profligacy,” reacted with governments, especially leftist national politics at Davidson Col- prudent, market-friendly policies. democratic ones, opt for and suc- lege, it’s a joke whose time has But present successes could ceed with capitalist, democratic, passed. U.S. influence in Latin breed fresh challenges, Crandall or U.S.-friendly policies.” America has been ebbing for the warns. New alliances and enmities The United States, long used last decade, as Washington’s at- may emerge that could threaten the to being Latin America’s “master,” tention has turned toward the balance of power. must adapt to the new realities. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and Brazil is now the leader of the So far, Crandall thinks President

innovations travel, and they make trouble when they EXCERPT do. Saudi conservatives know that whatever geopolitical arrangements the Saudi princes make with the American government, the American people are busily undermining The Accidental the core principles of Saudi society. It’s not just our NGOs educating Saudi women and civil society activists; it’s not Revolutionaries just the impact of American college life on the rising genera- Like it or not, the United States is a revolutionary tion of the Saudi elite. We change the world even when we power. Whether our government is trying to overthrow aren’t thinking anything about global revolution—when foreign dictators is almost irrelevant; American society is the Hollywood and rap musicians are just trying to make a buck, most revolutionary force on the planet. The Internet is more they are stoking the fires of change around the world. subversive than the CIA in its prime. The dynamism of American society is constantly creating new businesses, —WALTER RUSSELL MEAD, professor of foreign new technologies, new ideas, and new social models. These affairs at Bard College, on his blog, Via Meadia (June 12, 2011)

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Barack Obama is on the right nations took note. sored cyberattacks. In 2008, Swe- track. His administration’s Once a virtually borderless den passed a controversial law emphasis on mutual respect and world, the Internet is being fenced allowing police to monitor all equal partnerships has pulled the in. Chris C. Demchak and Peter Internet traffic in and out of the rug out from under the anti- Dombrowski, both professors at country. Britain’s new Conserva- American authoritarians. A strat- the Naval War College, compare tive government has “declared egy of “patience and understated the process to the epoch-making cyberthreats to be a top-tier leadership” will allow the United Peace of Westphalia in 1648, national security issue.” And the States to quietly pursue its inter- which not only ended the Thirty United States recently established ests and will enable regional pow- Years’ War but also established a new Cyber Command that, sig- ers to cooperate without the the nation-state, with clearly nificantly, is under military rather appearance of subservience. demarcated territories under its than civilian control. control, as the dominant institu- Of course, some countries have FOREIGN POLICY & DEFENSE tion, along with a new system of other motives for restricting the interstate relations. Internet. In China, the govern- How Stuxnet Stuxnet was only the most dra- ment has channeled all Web traf- matic of a series of developments fic in and out of the country to Changed the that are leading to a new West- three gateways and is developing World phalian cybersystem. Mysterious a new version of the Internet that hackers briefly shut down Eston- will label every Chinese computer THE SOURCE: “Rise of a Cybered West- ia’s government and banking sites with its own unique Web address. phalian Age” by Chris C. Demchak and Peter in 2007. Daily attacks on U.S. That will make it much easier for Dombrowski, in Strategic Studies Quar- terly, Spring 2011. “.gov” and “.mil” sites “numbered Beijing to control debate and dis- in the millions” by 2008. sent within China. If the Internet ever truly Policing the Internet is no Not long ago, the authors say, existed as a free and open global longer a matter of punishing indi- there was much optimistic talk of commons, that era vanished forever vidual hackers and other domes- governing the Internet through last year with the launching of the tic miscreants. Now governments some new kind of international ar- Stuxnet worm. Infected thumb are fighting organized crime and rangement. No longer. The Inter- drives and printer spooler software protecting against state-spon- net will recapitulate the world of were used to nation-states. bypass Iranian Even nations that computer security do not choose to measures, allowing erect cyberborders Stuxnet to reach will be forced to its target: the cen- do so. “Attacks trifuges at the across borders will heart of Iran’s nu- become state re- clear program. The sponsibilities, crippling attack, whether or not the whose source state approves or remains unknown, guides the at- reportedly set the tacks,” the authors Iranians back by write. The Inter- months, if not net will soon have years. Other Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was not in a dancing mood after the Stuxnet attack. a new world order.

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FOREIGN POLICY & DEFENSE Helprin. Under the New Strategic nuclear stockpiles could actually Arms Reduction Treaty (NSTART), invite trigger-happy nations to Say Yes to Nukes which came into force this year, coun- launch a first strike, he says. That’s tries including the United States, because they would have a better THE SOURCE: “Thinking About the Russia, and China will shrink their chance of taking out enough of an Unthinkable, Again” by Mark Helprin, in arsenals to achieve an agreed-upon opponent’s arsenal to preclude retali- Claremont Review of Books, Winter 2010–Spring 2011. parity. But parity is a pipe dream, ation. At the Cold War’s end, Helprin Helprin says. The strategic balance writes, an enemy would have had to For decades, the world has constantly shifts as new alliances are factor in more than a thousand U.S. lived with the threat of nuclear war, formed and countries that once were land-based missile targets and 17 but the dreaded mushroom clouds unarmed join the game. Stability isn’t nuclear-armed submarines. In the haven’t appeared. Now the Obama attainable. near future, an aggressor will need to administration is seeking to dispel the In the past, the superpowers pos- take out only 89 fixed land targets threat completely, by reducing and sessed such a vast advantage that it and six submarine targets. perhaps eventually abolishing alto- made no sense for other countries to To make matters worse, the Uni- gether America’s nuclear arsenal. compete. At most, they might build a ted States is weakening its conven- This is exactly the wrong thing to nuclear weapons arsenal sufficient to tional forces, Helprin says, increas- do, argues Mark Helprin, a senior fel- deter opponents. Today, with the ing the likelihood that it might have low at the Claremont Institute. Get- number of warheads dwindling and to resort to nuclear weapons in a ting rid of all of America’s nuclear technological advances deliberately crisis. And the Obama administra- weapons will increase the likelihood frozen, “anyone, no matter how small, tion is seeking to blunt U.S. ballistic of a catastrophic nuclear, biological, missile defenses. Such a system or chemical attack—and of conven- can’t be completely effective, but it Is it a mistake to tional wars, too, he says. That’s can preserve the country’s capacity because deterrence—the threat of reduce—even eventu- to retaliate, and thus provides signi- retaliation that has maintained inter- ally abolish—America’s ficant deterrence. national equilibrium since the end of nuclear arsenal? What should the United States World War II—will disappear. In a do instead? Helprin recommends nuke-free world, the threshold of con- that it (1) continue to develop safety flict between major powers would be can get in the game, and will.” And measures such as open-ocean tar- “vastly lowered.” that, Helprin points out, is prolifer- geting systems designed to guide Furthermore, abolition can’t ation—the opposite of what treaties launched missiles into water rather work unless all parties know defini- such as NSTART are seeking to than onto inhabited land, (2) main- tively that it is universal. That’s im- achieve. tain missile shields, and (3) focus on possible. Even today, no one has a Reducing the number of war- keeping weapons out of the hands of complete inventory of the world’s heads also puts small and rogue states “dictatorships, crazy states, lunatics, nuclear weapons. And disarmed on more equal footing with great nu- and medieval theocracies,” using nations will always have the knowl- clear powers, Helprin points out. This force if necessary. edge to secretly rebuild their nu- invites “lesser state adventurism,” as American officials, Helprin clear arsenals. would-be aggressors (for example, concludes, need to carefully con- Well, then, the conventional wis- Iran) are tempted to start regional sider the complex doctrines and dom goes, if abolition isn’t imme- wars and use a nuclear threat to pre- practices that have prevented diately practical, let’s diminish the vent outside intervention. “even a single detonation either in threat of nuclear war by severely Helprin characterizes the idea anger or by accident” in more reducing the number of warheads in that fewer nukes means a safer world than 60 years before casting them our arsenal. Wrong again, says as a “careless orthodoxy.” Diminished aside.

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POLITICS & GOVERNMENT order to restore peace and stabil- ity to conflict-ridden situations.” In the absence of a political education in the classroom, Smith No Thanks, Mr. Kant recommends picking up some old books, from Aristotle’s Politics and Smith asks, “is the Shakespeare of The Federalist to the works of fine THE SOURCE: “In Defense of Politics” by Esperanto?” psychological novelists such as Steven B. Smith, in National Affairs, Spring 2011. A world without local culture Jane Austen, Henry James, and and traditions “can lead only to Leo Tolstoy. They will do a politic- The dream of a world with- moral decay, an inability or unwill- ally minded person far more good out politics lives on. It would be a ingness to dedicate one’s life to than any of the mathematical world without national govern- ideals, to the relatively few things peregrinations of today’s political ments, ruled by international law. that matter and that give life whole- scientists, he says. German philosopher Immanuel ness and meaning,” Smith writes. Kant (1724–1804), who did much to “The cosmopolitan state would be a POLITICS & GOVERNMENT shape this ideal, believed that the world where nothing really matters, application of universal moral law where there is nothing left worth Merit Pay for would create a world in which “our fighting for—a world of enter- moral duties and obligations respect tainments, of fun, of shopping, a Congress? no national boundaries or other world void of moral seriousness.” THE SOURCE: “Fixing Congress” by Jim parochial attachments such as race, Even Kant said such a world state Cooper, in Boston Review, May–June 2011. class, or ethnicity,” writes Yale politi- would be a “soulless despotism,” but cal scientist Steven B. Smith. it would be at peace. Congress is broken. This Leaving aside the fact that our Smith blames political thinkers, little piece of political analysis is a limited experience with interna- especially political scientists, for favorite of the chattering class. But tional organizations does not invite the prevalence of the cosmopolitan do things look so bad to someone on confidence, Smith contends that the ideal. Instead of teaching and the inside? At least to Representa- quest for a depoliticized world is a studying the all-important quality tive Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), they do. dangerous delusion. Such a quest of political judgment, they have Cooper first won election to the would seek to strip the world and its applied empirical scrutiny to every House of Representatives in 1982. people of the particular—local tradi- aspect of political life, squeezing Congress was very different then, he tions, habits, and proclivities—in all the soul out of it. The discipline remembers, “imperfect but func- the name of an abstract cosmopoli- is in thrall to “ ‘game theory,’ which tional.” Speaker of the House Tip tan ideal. regards politics merely as a mar- O’Neill (D-Mass.) saw himself as Smith allows that all these ketplace in which individual pref- leader of the entire House, not just things—which are what make hu- erences are formed and utilities the Democratic caucus. “O’Neill’s mans political beings—do have a maximized.” was a House intent on making pol- dark side. But the cost of Kant’s Smith thinks this is a terrible icy, not partisan mischief,” Cooper world without politics would be too mistake. “The purpose of political recalls. He left the wrangling over high. It would be as if everyone were science is not to stand above or vote tallies to the majority and asked to give up their native tongues outside the political community minority leaders and, in the end, and speak only Esperanto. The gain as an entomologist observing ant members were “expected to vote in increased communication would behavior, but to serve as a civic- their conscience and their district.” be outweighed by the losses. Who, minded guardian of disputes in Representatives were thought of as

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party loyalists if they voted their Cooper agrees that two pet causes preme court. That decision in effect party’s line 70 or 80 percent of the of reformers—limiting gerrymander- gave George W. Bush the presidency. time. ing and restricting corporate political Breyer writes, “Despite the strong In those good old days, a group spending—would help, but deeper opposition to the decision, and of elite staffers known as the Demo- reform is needed. He calls for chang- despite the fact that it might well have cratic Study Group provided au- ing how members of Congress are been wrong, Americans did not riot thoritative memos before each paid—tying their compensation to in the streets, they did not resort to important vote listing the pros and performance. He recommends pay- violence, they reacted peacefully and cons of the bill. The quality of these ing members a commission for cut- then followed the Court.” Breyer reports was so high that even some ting spending or repealing obsolete acknowledges that many may wish Republicans subscribed. laws. The details of such a proposal that people had protested more, per- Members from both sides of the would be contentious, but “surely haps even violently. To them he aisle would often interact socially there’s a way to measure and reward responds, “I would ask you to turn on outside work. They brought their high-quality legislative work.” the television and look at what families to live with them in Wash- Congress has gone through other happens in countries that solve their ington, D.C. Few representatives periods of decline and has always problems through violence. Three were members of what O’Neill bounced back. But this time is dif- hundred million Americans have called the “Tuesday-Thursday ferent because, as the world’s only decided to resolve their differences Club”—those who went to their dis- superpower, the United States has under law instead—even though tricts over the weekend to see their less room for error, Cooper says. courts can decide in ways that are families and constituents. unpopular and even though courts All this changed in the 1990s POLITICS & GOVERNMENT may be wrong when they do so.” under the leadership of Newt Gin- Breyer says that judges from grich (R-Ga.), Cooper says. Gingrich No Small Wonder around the world ask him, “What is centralized power in the office of the the secret?” Unfortunately, there Speaker and politicized the position. THE SOURCE: “Making Our Democracy isn’t one. What lie behind the Work: The Yale Lectures” by Stephen Breyer, Committee chairs, powerful under in The Yale Law Journal, June 2011. authority of the Supreme Court are O’Neill, were “emasculated, their 200 years of battles over race, slav- authority redirected to the Speaker.” Judicial review—the doc- ery, Native Americans, taxation, and Gingrich told incoming Republican trine that gives the Supreme Court other issues. Judicial review was not members not to move their families the power to invalidate unconstitu- finally solidified in America through to town; he wanted everyone home tional laws and actions—may seem flawless legal reasoning or eloquent campaigning on weekends. “Soon like a natural, common feature of a judicial opinions, but because in the everyone belonged to the Tuesday- system of divided government. It’s middle of the 20th century, Presi- Thursday Club. Members became anything but, writes Justice Stephen dent Dwight D. Eisenhower was strangers, the easier for them to Breyer. Despite widespread distrust of willing to send troops to Little Rock, fight.” The Democratic Study Group government, Americans accept and Arkansas, to enforce the Court’s 1955 ceased to exist. respect the dicta of the Supreme order to desegregate the schools, When Democrats recaptured Court. Breyer calls this attitude “a knowing that if he didn’t, “rule of law the House in 2006, they “quietly treasure.” itself was at stake.” adopted” the changes. Freshman Perhaps the most remarkable Just because judicial review today Democrats knew no other way. example of the Court’s standing is seems enduring, judges should not “The truth is that the [Gingrich] Americans’ reaction to the 2000 deci- take it for granted, Breyer warns. In model works . . . if you are only sion in Bush v. Gore, which stopped a order to preserve this power, judges interested in partisan control of recount of votes that had been or- should follow a judicial philosophy Congress.” dered in Florida by the state’s su- that will “build confidence in the

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courts” by “bring[ing] about de- matism, which is premised on a purpose based, taking into account cisions that work better for Ameri- notion of common values and seeks how government actually works, not cans.” He recommends judicial prag- to make legal interpretations that are just the words that are on the books.

ECONOMICS, LABOR & BUSINESS one percent of earners more than doubled their share of income be- tween 1976 and 2007, from nine to 24 percent. (To be in the top one per- Comparing the Tippy cent in 2007, a family had to bring in more than $398,900.) For the top 0.1 Tops percent of earners, the concentration was even more extreme: They quad- reduction in income disparities, rupled their share, from three to 12 THE SOURCE: “Top Incomes in the Long Run of History” by Anthony B. Atkinson, with the super-rich claiming a percent. Southern European and Thomas Piketty, and Emmanuel Saez, in Jour- shrinking percentage of total Nordic countries have seen a small nal of Economic Literature, March 2011. income. The cause? The two world uptick in the share of income going wars and the Great Depression. to the top earners, but nothing like The ebb and flow of income Wars in particular are powerful lev- what has occurred in English- inequality over the last century is a elers, as capital—both physical and speaking countries. France, Ger- well-examined feature of the U.S. financial—is destroyed, wages and many, the Netherlands, and Japan economy. How the American expe- employment drop, and some coun- have seen very little, if any, increase rience fits in with the global picture tries lose territory. But even in top income shares. is another matter. New research by countries that did not fight in the Atkinson and his coauthors say economists Anthony B. Atkinson of wars experienced a decline in the that examining income distribution Oxford University, Thomas Piketty concentration of income. across countries can change our pic- of the Paris School of Economics, In recent decades, however, the ture of which countries are prosper- and Emmanuel Saez of the Univer- English-speaking world has seen a ing most. For example, between 1975 sity of California, Berkeley, pulls dramatic increase in the share of and 2006, average incomes grew together data on income inequality income going to the top one percent markedly faster in the United States in more than 20 countries, of earners. In America, for example, than they did in France. in some cases as far back the income distribution is now simi- But if you exclude the top as World War I. The lar to what it was in the years before one percent of earners authors find that for the Great Depression. The top and calculate the the first half of the average using “only” 20th century, coun- the bottom 99 per- tries generally fol- cent in each country, lowed similar France has a much paths, but in more better record. There, recent years their the non–super-rich trajectories have enjoyed a 26 percent diverged. increase in income, Before mid- while in the century, most United States countries experi- Warren Buffett and Bill Gates are two well-loved members of the burgeoning billionaire class.Much they gained only enced a general of America’s economic growth since World War II has been concentrated among the very rich. 18 percent.

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ECONOMICS, LABOR & BUSINESS plain, are overly focused on making particular would benefit from study- each individual paper internally con- ing the histories of poor countries, as What Economists sistent and not enough on fitting researchers will need to understand their ideas within the broader con- colonialism in order to understand Can Learn from text of their field. Even papers in the the persistent poverty in such places. History same issue of a given journal can be One of the most significant premised on conflicting assump- strengths of historical analysis is THE SOURCE: “Economics, History, and Caus- tions. Historians, in contrast, are that it takes into account the ation” by Randall Morck and Bernard Yeung, in Business History Review, Spring 2011. interested in developing “external characteristics of individuals, consistency.” To establish its validity, such as leadership, psychology, Contemporary economics is “a good historical narrative must emotions, personal ties, compul- totally in the thrall of advanced math- connect the ‘dots’ of all relevant his- sions, and ambition—factors that ematical techniques. Economists torical events with causal links.” economics cannot capture. should break the spell, argue Randall An example of the sort of histor- Economists may not welcome Morck, a professor of finance at the ically rooted economic analysis Morck and Yeung’s recommend- University of Alberta School of Busi- Morck and Yeung want to see more ation, convinced as they are of data’s ness, and Bernard Yeung, a professor of is Charles Kindleberger’s 1978 superiority to historical vagaries. of economics and management at the book Manias, Panics, and Crashes. Many may argue that historians are National University of Singapore In the decades since its publication, inclined to see the world in ways that Business School. In particular, econo- purely data-driven theories on the agree with their “favored narratives.” mists should mine the field of history, nature of booms and busts have But the authors aren’t so concerned: both for the information it can provide been shown to be weak, and Kindle- Data may seem neutral, but econo- and for the methods its practitioners berger’s historically rooted research mists are “hardly immune” to their employ, Morck and Yeung say. remains the “narrative to beat.” The own methodological biases and ideo- Economists, the authors com- field of development economics in logical callings.

AT&T speak of the importance of “vigorous EXCERPT competition” even when it is being eliminated. Anything that might sound like the advocacy of monopoly has fallen into the same category as the advocacy of Monopolies, Our eugenics. But take a look around. What do you actually see, in so many important markets? The answer, quite Secret Love obviously, is rule by either a single dominant firm or a Once upon a time, some thought it obvious that small group. This is particularly true in the information competition was a bad thing, particularly in communi- and communications industries. Search engines? cations. As Theodore Vail, the president of AT&T, put Google. Social networking? Facebook. Operating it in 1913, “The public as a whole has never benefited” systems? Microsoft (mostly). Cell phones? Verizon, from competition. Monopoly, he said, was the better AT&T, and Sprint. . . . Could it be that Americans choice. The reason, he argued, is that “all costs of actually like communications monopolists? Do we want aggressive, uncontrolled competition are eventually dominant firms to run our world? borne, directly or indirectly, by the public.” Nowadays corporate executives carefully avoid —TIM WU, author of The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of expressing such sentiments. Instead, firms such as Information Empires (2010), in The New Republic (June 9, 2011)

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ECONOMICS, LABOR & BUSINESS around 200,000 tons in 1900. Dur- On the American plains, ing the intervening two decades, Good Fences barbed wire kept live- regions of the country with the least woodland saw the greatest increases stock from roaming, Make Good Farms in settlements, land improvements, was cheap to produce, land values, productivity, and crops THE SOURCE: “Barbed Wire: Property and was easy to put up Rights and Agricultural Development” by such as corn, wheat, and oats. Horn- Richard Hornbeck, in The Quarterly Jour- and maintain. beck estimates that the increase in nal of Economics, May 2010. land values due to the availability of In the middle of the 19th barbed wire was equal to nearly one century, farmers on the American was scarce, wooden fences were percent of gross domestic product. plains had a problem: If cows and prohibitively expensive. The few By 1910, fencing stock on the prairie other livestock from neighboring farmers who eked out a living there had increased more than 10-fold properties trampled their crops, it did so by planting mostly hay, which and wooden fences had all but was the farmers themselves, not could withstand a bit of trampling. disappeared. the owners of the roaming ani- Then, in 1874, Joseph Glidden, a Economists have long believed mals, who were responsible for farmer in DeKalb, Illinois, came up that reliable property rights are an the damage. The solution was with an idea that gave rise to Amer- essential ingredient of economic fences, and farmers who lived ica’s breadbasket: barbed wire. growth. In places where property near woodlands that could supply Barbed wire solved the farmers’ rights are shaky, people hold back cheap timber built lots of them. In problem: It kept out roaming live- on investing in the productivity of 1872, the value of America’s fenc- stock, was cheap to produce and their land and other assets, knowing ing stock was roughly equal to the easy to put up, and required little they may not be able to reap the value of all livestock in America, maintenance. In 1876, writes Har- rewards. The story of barbed wire the national debt, or the railroads. vard economist Richard Hornbeck, on the American plains shows that Annual fencing repair costs were large-scale production of barbed technological improvements, not greater than the total tax revenue wire began, and it was a nearly just legal agreements, can help of all levels of government. immediate hit, going from just secure property and thus foster Out on the plains, where timber 1,500 tons produced in 1876 to investment and prosperity.

SOCIETY Americans tend to point to laziness and are reluctant to support such policies. Is the gap the product of dif- ferent economic institutions and sit- uations, or is it something economics Who Wants a Tax Break? can’t account for—culture? Two economists have now come

THE SOURCE: “Culture, Context, and the their self-interest. But researchers up with a strategy to tease out those Taste for Redistribution” by Erzo F. P. Luttmer have long noted variations from differences. Erzo F. P. Luttmer of and Monica Singhal, in American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, Feb. 2011. country to country in citizens’ Dartmouth College and Monica feelings about redistribution: Euro- Singhal of Harvard’s Kennedy In the hyper-rational world peans are more likely to believe that School of Government looked at described by neoclassical economists, poverty is the consequence of bad immigrants’ political beliefs to see individuals prefer tax and redistribu- luck and support more extensive whether newcomers respond to the tive policies that are in concert with redistribution policies, whereas economic incentives of their

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adopted homelands or maintain show that moms and dads are less preferences more in line with the cul- happy than childless adults. Rachel New moms and dads ture of their countries of origin. They Margolis, a PhD candidate in find that culture plays a significant demography and sociology at the who feel overwhelmed role. While people are influenced by University of Pennsylvania, and by their babies can their income, the effect of the culture demographer Mikko Myrskylä of take comfort in the of their home country is just as great, the Max Planck Institute for Demo- fact that almost all persisting even after 20 years in a graphic Research in Rostock, Ger- parents feel happier new land. Additionally, the children many, scrutinized the self-rated as they get older. of immigrants retain the policy pref- happiness of more than 200,000 erences of their parents’ home coun- people from 86 countries and con- try, but to a lesser extent. cluded that the story of parental ered that the welfare regime and The authors find that in coun- happiness is far from straight- economic health of parents’ country tries with greater cultural diversity, forward. of residence also played a role in immigrants tend to more strongly On the whole, Margolis and happiness. Young parents were maintain the outlook of their home Myrskylä found that parenthood about as happy as their childless country. In places that are more does correlate with a lower degree counterparts in countries such as homogenous, new arrivals must of self-reported happiness. But France and Germany, where parents assimilate faster, and immigrants the subjective well-being of par- receive some subsidies from the are more strongly shaped by the ents changes dramatically with state and don’t struggle too much to culture around them. age. Parents aged 15 to 19 were make a living. In southern Europe Even if the newcomers them- the unhappiest of all the individu- and former communist countries, selves have little impact on policy, als surveyed, not surprisingly, and however, where wages are low, that their values are transmitted parents in their twenties didn’t unemployment high, and child- to their children means there may fare much better. In fact, young rearing assistance from the state be longer-term policy implica- parents’ dispiritedness grew with practically nonexistent, young par- tions of large immigrant influxes. each child they had. ents reported being much more But of course, it’s not only for- By their thirties, however, par- down than their childless peers. eigners who are influenced by ents were about as happy as people Among older moms and dads, culture—everyone is. It’s just without children. In their forties however, it was a different story when looking at immigrant popu- and onward, parents reported once again. Parents aged 40 and lations that it’s possible to see cul- greater happiness levels than child- older were markedly happier than ture’s influence clearly. less adults, with each additional childless people in countries in child enhancing the parents’ sense southern Europe and in former SOCIETY of well-being. (Having four or more communist countries such as Russia children seemed to put a damper on and Bulgaria. In continental Europe Parenthood’s that joy, however, among all age and Anglophone countries, older groups.) The authors surmise that parents were only about as content Second Wind as children grow and become more as their childless peers. The authors THE SOURCE: “A Global Perspective on independent, the burdens of parent- believe that in poorer countries chil- Happiness and Fertility” by Rachel Margolis ing lighten and benefits such as dren often “act as insurance for old and Mikko Myrskylä, in Population and Development Review, March 2011. companionship and greater finan- age,” providing valuable financial cial security become more pro- and social support when the state Many people think of par- nounced, leading to a greater sense offers peanuts at best. enthood as one of the defining joys of well-being. For new parents despairing at of their lives. But lots of studies Margolis and Myrskylä discov- the shrieks of their little one, relief

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may be found in the news that they percentage point in the past time, white homeownership fell, probably won’t always feel so belea- century. chiefly because many whites guered. “Parenthood changes lives There have been two distinct moved from farms to cities, where in both positive and negative ways, periods during which African they were more likely to rent. many of them unexpected by the Americans increased their home- About two-thirds of the conver- parents themselves,” Margolis and ownership: the decades after the gence during the period can be Myrskylä write. Civil War (1870–1910), when the explained by the gains of African rate increased by 16 percentage Americans. SOCIETY points, and the decades after the The black homeownership rate Depression (1940–80), when it stagnated after 1910, partly be- Homeownership shot upward by 37 percentage cause of the Great Migration to points. However, note economists northern cities, where most blacks and Race William J. Collins of Vanderbilt became renters. Both races lost

THE SOURCE: “Race and Home Ownership University and Robert A. Margo ground during the Great Depres- from the End of the Civil War to the Present” of Boston University, during that sion of the 1930s. by William J. Collins and Robert A. Margo, in latter period white homeowner- From 1940 to 1980, new gov- The American Economic Review, May 2011. ship increased by an equal ernmental efforts such as the It’s unsurprising that amount, so the two rates did not Federal Housing Administration homeownership rates for blacks converge. helped boost homeownership. So and whites have converged since The only real convergence oc- did postwar prosperity. Whites the Civil War. What is surprising curred between 1870 and 1910. increasingly owned homes in the is that nearly all of the conver- Black homeownership increased suburbs, which often excluded gence happened before 1910. The as freed slaves and their children black families; many African gap has narrowed by only one bought small farms. At the same American families bought into

extolling his prowess at the used-tire business. Existen- EXCERPT tial boredom is thought to be the result of existence itself, caused by modern culture and therefore inescap- able. Boredom even has some class standing, and was On Boredom once felt to be an aristocratic attribute. Ennui, it has been said, is the reigning emotion of the dandy. Some people claim never to have been bored. They When bored, time slows drastically, the world seems lie. One cannot be human without at some time or other logy and without promise, and reality itself can grow having known boredom. Even animals know boredom, shadowy and vague. Truman Capote once described the we are told, though they are deprived of the ability to novels of James Baldwin as “balls-achingly boring,” complain directly about it. Some of us are more afflicted which conveys something of the agony of boredom yet is with boredom than others. Psychologists make the inaccurate—not about Baldwin’s novels, which are no distinction between ordinary and pathological boredom; stroll around the Louvre, but about the effect of boredom the latter doesn’t cause serious mental problems but is itself. Boredom is never so clearly localized. The vague- associated with them. Another distinction is that be- ness of boredom, its vaporousness and its torpor, is part tween situational boredom and existential boredom. of its mild but genuine torment. Situational boredom is caused by the temporary tedium everyone at one time or another encounters: the dull ser- —JOSEPH EPSTEIN, essayist, short-story writer, and for- mon, the longueur-laden novel, the pompous gent mer editor of The American Scholar, in Commentary (June 2011)

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the urban neighborhoods whites white rate in 1870. In recent ply who owns the roof over a per- had fled. decades, white homeownership son’s head. With income and edu- In 2007, only 54 percent of has averaged about 77 percent. cational inequalities persistent, African Americans owned their Because homes are a major there is little prospect for a quick own homes. That rate is two per- form of wealth in the United reduction in the racial homeown- centage points lower than the States, more is at stake than sim- ership gap.

RELIGION & PHILOSOPHY fact that the unschooled find it easier to believe that they aren’t missing out on anything impor- tant than to do the hard work Philosophy for the Few that is needed to understand modern philosophy. mology and methodology. But in THE SOURCE: “Philosophy That’s Not for the Masses” by James Ladyman, in The Philoso- order to do so, philosophers must RELIGION & PHILOSOPHY pher’s Magazine, Second Quarter 2011. master these obscure, technical fields, and it is this specialization Big Religion It’s a common charge that that makes their work so unintel- THE SOURCE: “American Postwar ‘Big philosophers do little of practical ligible to the layperson. Religion’: Reconceptualizing 20th-Century value and fail to make their work Philosophy should not be held American Religion Using Big Science as a relevant and accessible to the to a different standard than other Model” by Benjamin E. Zeller, in Church History, June 2011. general public. University of Bris- fields of academic inquiry, Lady- tol philosophy professor James man argues: “Who understands The 20th century saw the Ladyman has had quite enough of the terms in which mathema- rise of the “bigs”: big business, big gov- this sort of rubbish. “I do not see ticians and theoretical physicists ernment, and big science. Benjamin why all philosophers, or even communicate, other than those E. Zeller, a professor of religion at Bre- most, should be interested in with sufficient training in the rel- vard College, wants to add one more communicating their thoughts . . . evant technical areas?” The pub- to the list: big religion. to the world,” he writes. lic is simply not equipped to Although no one has attached the The masses generally want understand the intricacies of “big” narrative to religion before, answers to big questions: What is these disciplines. “To these Zeller says that American religion the meaning of life? Does a re- people, much of the dictionary since World War II has the same hall- spect for animal life require me to will be impenetrable jargon,” he marks as “big science”—heightened be a vegetarian? But any answer asserts, “so philosophical journals institutionalization and professional- philosophy could provide has pose no unique problems.” ization, increased entanglement with long since been offered by genera- And with so many popular the government, a growth of popular tions of wise men past. Today’s books on philosophy by writers support, and, of course, critics. philosophers immerse themselves who specialize in mediating After the war, church member- in fields such as physics and com- between academia and the ship jumped, growing from 90 mil- puter science that push the outer general population, why should lion in 1950 to more than 114 mil- limits of human knowledge. academics have to translate their lion in 1960. The National Council There they can do the work of the work themselves? of Churches (NCC) was established gadflies Socrates exalted, apply- Perhaps, Ladyman suggests, in 1950 (the same year as the ing their philosophical tools to the charge that philosophy does National Science Foundation), expose flaws in scientists’ episte- nothing of value stems from the bringing 25 Protestant denomina-

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Billy Graham speaks at Madison Square Garden in 1957.Mainline Protestants and evangelicals alike took to “big religion” in the postwar years.

tions and four Eastern Orthodox linked America’s faith with the fight the bigs, religion and science were patriarchies under one umbrella. against communism in public unlikely partners in defining the What the NCC was to mainline and speeches. American way of life. liberal American Christians, the Like big science, which was criti- Billy Graham Crusade was to evan- cized for its elitism and its commit- RELIGION & PHILOSOPHY gelicals and conservatives. Though ment to research over teaching, big different in style and substance, the religion had its detractors, who Putting Free Will NCC and Graham’s institution were established alternatives such as both large, bureaucratic organiza- small nondenominational churches to the Test tions swarming with administrative and Christian house meetings. THE SOURCE: “Experimental Philosophy professionals. Ironically, Zeller notes, some of the and the Problem of Free Will” by Shaun Nichols, in Science, March 18, 2011. A fundamental marker of big dissident currents grew to be so science is its relationship with the successful over time that they be- Do humans have free will? federal government, which feeds it came part of the fabric of big The question is as old as dirt. Now billions of dollars in exchange for religion themselves. experimental philosophers are research on military, communica- In some ways, big religion and big trying to gain insight into the tion, and energy technologies. The science are both products of the Cold issue in a new way: by using tech- First Amendment prohibits govern- War. Anticommunist sentiment niques borrowed from the social ment support for religion. Never- fueled America’s participation in the sciences to uncover the intuitions theless, Zeller explains, during the space race, and at the same time gave that drive ordinary people to give postwar period, religion became rise to religious political rhetoric that different answers to questions increasingly enmeshed with public contrasted Americans’ faith with about free will. life—the words “under God” were “godless” communists. In one experiment, writes Univer- added to the Pledge of Allegiance, Today, religion and science can sity of Arizona philosophy professor the motto “In God We Trust” seem at loggerheads, in opposite Shaun Nichols, participants are told to appeared on paper currency, and camps of an endless battle over imagine a “determined” universe in Presidents Harry S. Truman and truth. But it’s worth remembering which “every decision is completely Dwight D. Eisenhower routinely that not too long ago, in the era of caused by what happened before the

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decision.” Study participants tend to many scientists believe that our own The divided responses people give respond that people in such a universe world is determined, people are much in experimental philosophy tests should not be held responsible for less forgiving of wrongdoing than they pretty accurately reflect a centuries- their actions. But if they are asked are when the world under considera- old division among traditional philos- whether someone in such a world tion is determined but imaginary. ophers. Some thinkers have argued could be held responsible for killing Finally, human responses vary that even a determined universe is his own family, participants say yes. depending on the kind of wrongdo- “compatible” with the concept of “Concrete cases of bad behavior lead ing being discussed. Imagining a moral responsibility, others that it’s people to attribute responsibility,” determined world, people are less not. Nichols says that the new philoso- Nichols observes. This pattern seems likely to hold a tax evader to blame phy will shed light on the “psychologi- to hold true across cultures. than they are someone who has com- cal mechanisms” behind each The answer also changes when the mitted a more emotionally charged approach, and ultimately on the old- scenario is less distant. If told that act, such as rape. as-dirt question itself.

ARTS & LETTERS capture “the spiritual” in his abstract canvases. What could that mean besides beauty? Such evasions are just descriptions of beauty in “more Beauty, the Ultimate acceptably sophisticated terms.” The attack on beauty has been of a Survivor piece with a larger cultural assault on anything elitist, Boyers observes.

THE SOURCE: “The Attack on Beauty” ing whether beauty is anything more Beauty required discrimination. In its by Robert Boyers, in Salmagundi, than a personal preference shaped by place, “interesting” came into vogue, a Spring 2011. a particular cultural outlook at a par- more inclusive standard. “The inter- Beauty has never had an ticular moment in time. esting seems to us more reliable if easy time, whether under scrutiny Yet while there may be something only because it entails a verdict that from suspicious Puritans or picky to these arguments, beauty won’t go regards issues of value as naive or Renaissance critics, but the attack on away. It crops up in the least likely spurious,” Boyers remarks. beauty over the last century by mod- places, the same pieces of art meant to Such evasions point to a basic con- ernist artists is the “most serious and repudiate the very notion. Marcel Du- cern: our limited ability to pin down sustained,” writes Salmagundi found- champ’s 1917 urinal (which he titled what we mean by beauty. To get at ing editor Robert Boyers. They “have Fountain), an early example in a long that question, Boyers suggests turn- dismissed all things relaxing, easy to line of such modernist works, may ing not to masterpieces but to a sort take in and enjoy, and therefore inim- even seem “beautiful by virtue of its of beauty “more modest in scale and ical to the spirit of an art intended to form or the pristinity of its gleaming ambition”: the aphorism. be rigorous, difficult, unpopular. To be surface,” Boyers says. Duchamp “could A beautiful aphorism is “its own impressed by what passed for beauty not [have imagined] how inventive reason for being”—it is eloquent, it was felt by many modernist writers artists would be in clinging to improb- exhibits what the critic Denis Don- and artists to be philistine.” able versions of the beautiful.” oghue calls “the dancing of speech,” it In past generations, quarrels with Artists “have often found it useful carries a thrill. (Boyers cites Austrian beauty have mostly been concerned to deny or to disguise their predilec- writer Karl Kraus’s “My language is with what beauty was or how it ought tion for the beautiful.” Wassily Kan- the universal whore whom I have to to be valued, but the attack of dinsky, for example, said he sought to make into a virgin” as an example.) modernists differs in kind, question- “apply the methods of music” and to “Interesting” works, such as Du-

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champ’s urinal, are “essentially po- ations that the printed word is dead: borders: China and Brazil are expe- lemical, persuasive. [They] have no phooey! They declare we have ar- riencing publishing booms as well. reason for being other than the points rived at a “Golden Age of Reading Worldwide, one million new titles they aim to make.” But a thing of and Writing.” will be released this year. beauty is “its own reason for being,” Over the last year, McSweeney’s Libraries are similarly feeling the and thus “wants for nothing, and researchers delved into data from effects of the public’s appetite for inspires in us nothing more than the Nielsen’s Bookscan, which monitors print. The McSweeney’s editors write desire for further instances of beauty, book sales to the general public. The that circulation of library books has for the satisfaction we feel in the pres- results paint a surprisingly positive reached record levels, and library ence of objects or expressions that are picture of the printed word’s health. memberships have increased, with completely themselves.” In recent years, the United 68 percent of Americans currently States touted record-setting num- holding library cards. Darnton adds ARTS & LETTERS bers of published authors, publish- that libraries remain vital, not just ers, and original book titles. because they lend books but because No RIP for Print Although there was a slight decline they assist people in wading through from the all-time high in 2009, the information wilderness. This is THE SOURCES: Introduction to volume 37, by the editors, McSweeney’s Quarterly Con- book sales comfortably topped one nothing new, he says. Libraries have cern, Spring 2011, and “Five Myths About the billion volumes last year despite a always been more than “warehouses ‘Information Age’ ” by Robert Darnton, in The lackluster economy and continuing of books.” Chronicle Review, April 17, 2011. mass unemployment. Robert Darn- It’s only a hoary myth that people The editors of McSweeney’s ton, director of the Harvard in the past had a greater appre- Quarterly Concern have a one-word University library, notes that this ciation of the printed word, the response to apocalyptic proclam- trend extends beyond America’s McSweeney’s editors snort. While in

“Yes,” agreed another, “but choosing texts and films”— EXCERPT (here a snort from Barry, who read books, watched movies) —“that are not comparatist but destabilize the traditional concept of literature as an isolatable aesthetic Barry Hannah (1942–2010) object.” “Agreed,” added a third, “privileging the historicity of There was a puncturing quality to Barry’s zingers, such discourses and the cultural phenomena they set out to darts that pop the overblown balloon and send it, investigate. Of course, this re-envisioned course deserves a whining and deflated, on its pitiable trajectory. I saw new name.” this at Oxford restaurants, on panels at the Sewanee The critics paused, thinking of a course designation Writers’ Conference, and, most appreciated where worthy. most needed, in the English Department faculty meet- Barry broke the silence. “How about calling it, ‘The ings at the University of Mississippi, where we were Death of Joy as We Know It’?” colleagues. I remember several young hotshot critics Whooosh. I miss having someone around who could do were attempting to amp up the introductory class for that. new grad students. “We need more investiture in critical theory which —BETH ANN FENNELLY, associate professor of assumes apprenticeship more than it does doctrinal or English at the University of Mississippi, on Southern writer methodological instruction,” said one. Barry Hannah, in The Oxford American (Issue 72)

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the glory year of 1787 only 60 per- (MOCA). But visitors with an eye cent of American adults were con- for the ironic will note that the Is graffiti an under- sidered literate, today that number museum sports a fresh coat of paint appreciated art form or has jumped to 98 percent. Instead of on its back wall, covering up some simply a criminal activ- lamenting golden ages past, we unwelcome artistry outside, writes ity that often goes hand should be encouraged that “more City Journal contributing editor people are reading than at any time Heather Mac Donald. This fresh in hand with drug use in human history.” paint encapsulates the hypocritical and truancy? stance of graffiti’s admirers, who ARTS & LETTERS celebrate street art in the confines of museums and galleries but never 96th Street that delightful frisson Graffiti Gets on their mansions, and who turn a of proximity to the underclass,” blind eye to its real and pernicious Mac Donald tartly observes. the Glory effects in inner cities. Tellingly, most of the graffiti The Geffen show is the debut artists who are venerated by elite art THE SOURCE: “Radical Graffiti Chic” by Heather Mac Donald, in City Journal, exhibit of MOCA’s new director, dealers are white and middle class. Spring 2011. Jeffrey Deitch, a former New York If art dealers and patrons were to gallery owner and art agent with leave their comfy world and interact The vogue for street art a long history of glorifying street with young black and Hispanic graf- among elite gallery owners and art art and its creators. Deitch once fiti artists in the inner city, they collectors recently reached its transformed his gallery into a would find that graffiti often goes apotheosis in a major museum faux ghetto street, a “Disneyesque hand in hand with drug use and tru- exhibit at the Geffen Contem- barrio [that] gave New Yorkers ancy. By many graffitists’ own porary, a satellite of Los Angeles’s who would never dream of accounts, their pastime encouraged Museum of Contemporary Art getting off the subway north of them to skip school and led to their

At a new exhibit at the Geffen Contemporary in Los Angeles, visitors can enjoy a bit of street art without ever having to venture to an untidy street.

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dropping out altogether, Mac Don- spray paint is sold only by mail in admits. Some show an “intuitive” ald reports. order to prevent its theft from store knack for graphic design. “In the- She contends that the hypocrisy shelves.) One graffiti artist, Saber, ory,” Mac Donald believes it could exhibited by those who glorify graf- said in an interview that “there is be possible to have a show about fiti is exceeded by that of the artists no room for empathy when there is wall-painting “without legitimat- themselves, “who wage war on a motive for profit.” He has sold ing a crime. . . . Such an exhibit property rights until presented with designs to Levi’s, Hyundai, and would include only authorized the opportunity to sell their work or Harley-Davidson. murals, whether past or present, license it to a corporation.” (Steal- All this is not to say there’s and would unequivocally con- ing is so rampant in the graffiti nothing of artistic value in some demn taking someone else’s prop- world that one popular brand of graffiti murals, Mac Donald erty without permission.”

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY thousand other sites whose ad- ministrators have voluntarily consented. And there are technological hur- dles. Digital archivists track content An Internet for All Time with the help of “crawlers”—com- puter programs that scour the Web.

THE SOURCE: “A Memory of Webs Past” interact with friends. Crawlers cannot see the “hidden” by Ariel Bleicher, in IEEE Spectrum, The Web’s size defies compre- Web: password-protected sites, iso- March 2011. hension. The number of URLs lated pages not connected to the indexed by search engines has broader Web, and “form-fronted” Ever since humans learned exploded from 50 million in 1997 databases that require users to to write, they have collected their to about three trillion now, but enter search terms in order to pull works into archives, seeking to con- that’s just a small part of the en- up information. Existing crawlers vey their wisdom and history to tire Web. Some people estimate have difficulty recognizing “rich future generations. The rise of the that the total “surface” of the Web media”—anything that moves when Internet poses a daunting new accessible to archivists’ tools may a user interacts with it—and other challenge, and not only because of be six times as large as the in- new forms of content. the huge quantity of information it dexed areas, and that the “deep” Finally, who is going to do all of contains. Web, which includes password- the work of archiving? Google The very nature of the Web protected sites and certain types hasn’t made digital archiving a pri- poses a problem, notes Ariel of databases, may be 500 times ority, and many of the nonprofit Bleicher, a writer living in New larger than that. foundations and government offices York City. Anything published Beyond the sheer magnitude of that have sprung up to fill the void online “exists in a perpetual state of the archival task there is the are too small and too resource being updated, and it cannot be thorny question of legality. Only a strapped for such a large project. considered complete in the absence few countries have laws that per- Part of the difficulty is knowing of everything else it’s hyperlinked mit archivists to copy and save what will be of interest to future to.” As many as two billion people virtual documents. In the United historians. Indexes of goods that regularly go online, and many of States, much of what appears on- have been sold on eBay may seem them do a lot more than passively line is copyright protected. The trivial today, but they’re just the absorb content: They comment, Library of Congress archives only sort of data that can help illuminate create their own videos, play games, government Web sites and several our culture in future centuries.

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SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY the Jean Nicod Institute in Paris. The skilled at making arguments and problem is that we’ve misunderstood evaluating those of others. One study A Reason for why reason exists and measured its found that participants got only strengths and weaknesses against the about 10 percent of the answers in a Reason wrong standards. tough logic test correct on their own.

THE SOURCE: “Why Do Humans Reason? Mercier and Sperber argue that When they worked in a group, the Arguments for an Argumentative Theory” by reason did not evolve to allow indi- scores soared to 80 percent. In the Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber, in Behav- ioral and Brain Sciences, April 2011. viduals to think through problems absence of a challenge from others, and make brilliant decisions on people tend to reach for the most For all its stellar achieve- their own. Rather, it serves a funda- readily available (and often wrong) ments, human reason seems partic- mentally social purpose: It pro- conclusion. But in groups, better ularly ill suited to, well, reasoning. motes argument. Research shows arguments will win out over time. Study after study demonstrates rea- that people solve problems more That the human mind works son’s deficiencies, such as the oft- effectively when they debate them best when prodded by others noted confirmation bias (the ten- in groups—and the interchange also should come as no surprise. Over dency to recall, select, or interpret allows people to hone essential the centuries, groups and pairs of evidence in a way that supports social skills. Supposed defects such people working together have pro- one’s preexisting beliefs) and peo- as the confirmation bias are well fit- duced some of the greatest scien- ple’s poor performance on straight- ted to this purpose because they tific achievements and philosophi- forward logic puzzles. Why is reason enable people to efficiently marshal cal dialogues. Even geniuses are so defective? the evidence they need in arguing quick to say they stand on the To the contrary, reason isn’t defec- with others. shoulders of giants. Social animals tive in the least, argue cognitive scien- Most people make a lot of mis- that humans are, it takes partners, tists Hugo Mercier of the University takes when reasoning solo, but in colleagues, and friends to make of Pennsylvania and Dan Sperber of group settings they tend to be quite the most of the mind.

certing result that the totality occasionally appears EXCERPT more like Bruegel’s Tower of Babel as dreamt by a modern slumlord, a ramshackle structure of compartmentalized models soldered together into a Physics’ Black Holes skewed heap of explanations as the whole jury-rigged monstrosity tumbles skyward. Physics is the most fundamental of the natural sci- Of course many grand issues remain unresolved at ences; it explains Nature at its deepest level; the the frontiers of physics: What is the origin of inertia? edifice it strives to construct is all-encompassing, free Are there extra dimensions? Can a Theory of Every- of internal contradictions, conceptually compelling thing exist? But even at the undergraduate level, far and—above all—beautiful. The range of phenomena back from the frontlines, deep holes exist; yet the physics has explained is more than impressive; it subject is presented as one of completeness, while the underlies the whole of modern civilization. Neverthe- holes—let us say abysses—are planked over in order less, as a physicist travels along his (in this case) to camouflage the danger. career, the hairline cracks in the edifice become more apparent, as do the dirt swept under the rug, the —TONY ROTHMAN, a lecturer in physics at Princeton fudges and the wholesale swindles, with the discon- University, in American Scientist (May–June 2011)

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SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY by its very nature that maps geomet- political practices”—for nearly a rically correlate with the on-the- century, treaties and other sources How Maps ground geography. The gaps between of political authority would con- power centers could no longer be tinue to demarcate sovereignty Made the World magically shrunk to insignificance. using text.) Color, added by hand By happenstance, this shift came just after printing to boost a map’s THE SOURCE: “Mapping the Sovereign State: Technology, Authority, and Systemic as the printing press was drama- value, only reinforced the notion of Change” by Jordan Branch, in Inter- tically increasing the quantity of complete, undisturbed sovereignty national Organization, Winter 2011. maps in circulation, from a few thou- within borders. It’s hard to imagine a sand in the late 15th century to “mil- Over time, elites, many of whom world without modern nation- lions” in the 16th century. collected maps as a hobby, began to states as we know them—their power, relationships, and, perhaps most of all, borders. But according to Jordan Branch, a political scien- tist at the University of California, Berkeley, the modern state may be something of a historical accident, an inadvertent byproduct of 15th- century advances in map-making technologies. During the later medieval period, various authorities ranging from small-time aristocrats to the Holy Roman emperor claimed power over collections of discrete places, not contiguous territories. Sovereignty centered in cities, towns, and villages and radiated outward, with periph- eries often ambiguously defined and little heeded. Medieval maps reflected this reality, emphasizing “the importance of places such as cities over the spaces in between them.” During this time, rulers and A 15th-century map of “all of the realm of France”pays little mind to the spaces separating towns. travelers used texts for many of the purposes maps serve today, such as The new maps were not ideal see the world as the map-makers providing travel directions and for depicting the old mishmash of drew it, focusing not on where demarcating sovereignty in treaties. authorities that text had ably con- power centered but where it ended. The conceptual shift toward the veyed. Instead, mapmakers simpli- Political reality lagged behind: modern state began in the 15th cen- fied sovereignty’s bounds by draw- Branch argues that it wasn’t until tury, when Ptolemy’s Geography, ing clear lines of demarcation the post-Napoleonic treaties and which showed how to create maps between powers. By the mid-17th negotiations of 1814–15 that based on a coordinate grid of latitude century, nearly all atlas maps borders—and undisturbed sover- and longitude, was translated into showed boundary lines. (However, eignty within them—became the Latin. This new technology required these lines did not reflect “actual law of the lands.

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OTHER NATIONS away from Al Qaeda. It wasn’t so much that the alternative channels directly persuaded anyone, Lynch believes, but that the proliferation of The Origins of the choices meant that new ideas and Sunni Awakening opinions could emerge and spread. OTHER NATIONS government–backed al-Iraqiya was THE SOURCE: “Explaining the Awakening: received skeptically, but Arab options Engagement, Publicity, and the Transforma- India’s Vulture tion of Iraqi Sunni Political Attitudes” by from outside Iraq, particularly the Marc Lynch, in Security Studies, Jan. 2011. Saudi-supported al-Arabiya, gained Void

popularity. Launched in 2003 to THE SOURCE: “India’s Vanishing Vultures” From 2005 to 2007, a change compete with al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya by Meera Subramanian, in Virginia Quar- in sentiment rippled across Iraq—the was no friend of Al Qaeda. One pro- terly Review, Spring 2011. Sunni population turned against Al gram, Death Makers, showcased “an It’s not easy to muster em- Qaeda and started working with U.S. endless series of exposés featuring pathy for eaters of the dead. But in forces. Many analysts believe this hitherto unknown [Al Qaeda] defec- India, a precipitous drop in the native transformation is what turned the tors, stories about their extremism vulture population, from 50 million war around and gave the 2007 Amer- and brutality, allegations about their in the mid-1990s to fewer than ican military surge the legitimacy sources of funding,” and other revela- 60,000 today, has created an environ- among Iraqis it needed to succeed. tions. Sunni leaders who had turned mental and cultural catastrophe. What kindled this transformation? against Al Qaeda were al-Arabiya’s Gone are the creatures that once The surge can’t be the cause; it began go-to sources and commentators. “scoured the countryside, clearing after the Awakening was already At the same time, al-Jazeera’s por- fields of dead cows and goats,” writes under way. Other common explana- trayal of Al Qaeda began to shift. The Meera Subramanian, a widely pub- tions include Al Qaeda’s extremism, network now refused to air videos of lished journalist who is also an editor which repelled Sunnis, and America’s Al Qaeda’s beheadings and often of the online literary magazine counterinsurgency strategy, which at- hosted critical discussions about Iraqi Killing the Buddha. And while other tracted them. But to understand how jihadists. Jihadists came to hate al- animals, notably wild dogs, have anger at Al Qaeda’s violence spread Jazeera, calling it “al-Khanzeera,” a taken over some of the carrion-eating and how the United States was able pun meaning “pig station,” and on land, no scavengers can fill the role to communicate its good intentions, regarding it as part of the “Zionist- vultures once performed for the Par- says George Washington University Crusader media.” sis, the small, ancient religious sect political scientist Marc Lynch, it’s nec- In this changing media environ- who give their dead “sky burials” in essary to examine an overlooked ment, public opinion rapidly tipped sacred “Towers of Silence.” The mas- force: Arab-language news media. sive vultures, their wingspans some- Television is the primary source of times reaching eight feet, used to con- news for an estimated 80 percent of Jihadists have come to sume the bodies left on open-air Iraqis. Until 2004, there was really scaffolds in a matter of days, but now hate al-Jazeera. They only one channel available: al-Ja- it can take months for the Parsi dead call it “al-Khanzeera,”a zeera. Its “close and often emotional to decompose. coverage” sparked outrage against the pun that means “pig American microbiologist Lind- U.S. occupation. But in 2004, com- station.” say Oaks finally pinpointed the petitors began emerging. The Iraqi cause of the vultures’ demise in

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ritual,” one Parsi leader laments. “To replace them is a unique challenge.” His words are echoed by Asad Rahmani, head of the Bombay Nat- ural History Society, India’s largest and oldest wildlife conservation organization. “There were so many vultures then that you can’t even think they could decline,” Rahmani said. “What have we done with them? Now there are dogs. They eat any- thing, live or dead. There are dogs on

OTHER NATIONS Indigenous vultures, India’s indispensable sanitation workers, are now on the brink of extinction. Stingless 2003: diclofenac, a painkiller given camels” brought from nearby Bika- to farm animals for discomfort ner, a city of half a million. Migrant Authoritarianism from cracked hooves. Vultures birds—“mostly Eurasian griffons, THE SOURCE: “Paradoxes of the New gorging on animals treated with bulky steppe eagles, and Egyptian Authoritarianism” by Ivan Krastev, in Journal of Democracy, April 2011. diclofenac suffered massive kidney vultures”—come there to feed, but the failure. The government banned indigenous Gyps vultures, “hardest In the 20 years since the the substance in 2005, but Subra- hit by diclofenac,” are nowhere to be collapse of communism, democracy manian says the law is toothless. seen. Wild dogs, though, are every- has not exactly flourished in the post- The three prominent species of where, feeding on the rotting car- Soviet lands. Instead, a new variety of indigenous vultures, all from the casses and, especially when in heat, authoritarianism has arisen in many Gyps genus, were once able to con- roaming away from the dumping countries, one that exists in the space sume cattle infected with tuberculo- ground to attack local children. between old-style iron-fist author- sis, brucellosis, foot-and-mouth dis- India’s dog population is thought to itarian rule and Western democracy. ease, and anthrax with no ill effects. have increased by nearly a third, to The new authoritarianism is a para- But with the birds gone, humans now some 30 million. It is no accident that dox, writes Ivan Krastev, who chairs must dispose of such animals them- India accounts for 70 percent of the board of the Center for Liberal selves, Subramanian writes. The fear human rabies deaths in the world. Strategies in Bulgaria. The current is that “these diseases could spread And dogs can’t solve the dilemma government of Russia is a para- among both animal and human pop- posed by the Parsi Towers of Silence. digmatic example. Russians in all ulations.” The sect has struggled to find an walks of life tend to see the state as a Attempts to rebuild the vulture alternative for their burial rituals, failure, yet it is more resilient than population, chiefly at the Pinjore Vul- from installing solar reflectors to help the strong-handed regime that pre- ture Conservation Breeding Center speed the rate of natural decay, to ceded it. north of Delhi, have met with limited planning for enormous aviaries The Russian government “is only success. Only 17 vultures have been stocked with captive vultures. Unfor- moderately repressive,” Krastev bred in the past three years. tunately, there is no guarantee that says. Russians can travel, surf the In the northwestern Indian state the effect of other painkillers in Web, and do business freely (but for of Rajasthan, Subramanian visited a human corpses would not be lethal to a “corruption tax”). Almost 10 mil- carcass dump, a five-acre pile of “dead vultures, too. “Vultures play such a lion of them travel abroad every cows, water buffalo, goats, and beautiful, natural role in our death year. In the early 1990s, many politi-

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cal scientists believed such freedoms OTHER NATIONS navigate economic shocks over the were incompatible with authoritar- years. ian rule, that a regime that made The Little Island But still this answer doesn’t such allowances would be “inher- satisfy. What made those achieve- ently fragile.” But Krastev argues That Could ments possible? Frankel points to five factors: the lack of a standing that this openness actually weakens THE SOURCE: “Mauritius: African Success opposition and dissent. Story” by Jeffrey A. Frankel, in National army, which has allowed the coun- Open borders have enabled Bureau of Economic Research Digest, try to put more money into educa- May 2011. dissatisfied citizens—potential tion and health; the establishment activists—to leave the country for Tiny Mauritius, an island of a special export zone that has greener shores, Krastev says. “Why nation in the Indian Ocean, is one of protected domestic businesses try to turn Russia into Germany, the richest, healthiest, and best- from high taxes and high mini- when there is no guarantee that a governed sub-Saharan African coun- mum wage requirements; the lifetime is long enough for that mis- tries. Its per capita gross domestic good luck of receiving trade pref- sion, and when Germany is but a product grew at an average rate of erences from several rich former short trip away?” One Russian econ- more than five percent annually colonial powers (in part due to omist recently estimated that more from 1970 to 2010. (Africa’s average Mauritius’s location en route to than “two million Russian demo- was about one percent.) It is consis- East Asia); astute diplomacy in crats have left the country in the last tently at the very top of regional early trade negotiations; and a decade,” Krastev notes. rankings for governance and rule of competitively valued currency. At first glance, the new authori- law. Its life expectancy tops 70 and Frankel says that Mauritians also tarianism’s lack of a defining ideol- its literacy rate hovers around 90 have capable leaders to thank— ogy seems a weakness, but the percent. What is the secret to Mauri- particularly the first prime minister, absence of a driving vision is actu- tius’s success? Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, who held ally a source of strength. The Russ- It’s not too hard to name sound office from 1968 to 1982—for smart ian government has no ideology institutions as important, but that choices, in addition to a parliamen- beyond an insistence on not being answer doesn’t go deep enough, tary system that has ensured minor- lectured by the United States. Dis- says Jeffrey A. Frankel of the Ken- ity representation. sidents have nothing to attack, no nedy School of Government, at Still, there may be more to the “ideal against which the regime can Harvard. How did those institu- Mauritian puzzle. Before the Dutch be measured and found wanting.” tions come to be? landed there in 1598, Mauritius was In fact, Krastev observes, many He cites two key achievements: completely uninhabited. Frankel post-Soviet elites view “communist the establishment of a strong manu- says that the lack of an indigenous ideology as one of the old regime’s facturing sector following inde- population has spared the country weaknesses,” rather than a unifying pendence in 1968 and the ability to the ethnic conflict that can emerge force. Moreover, Western powers when a native group must grapple do not fear the export of a Russian with colonists and other immi- ideology as they once did, and thus grants. It may be no accident that they too do not try to undermine The tiny island of Mau- two other African countries that the Russian regime. ritius is one of sub- often rank highly are Seychelles and Krastev says that the new Russian Saharan Africa’s great Cape Verde—both island states authoritarianism won’t implode the success stories, but the lacking an indigenous population. way communism did, but will in- reasons are not easy to That’s not to say, though, that stead slowly decline. “It is not,” he describe—or duplicate. Mauritius’s policies can’t be repli- says, “ ‘after [Vladimir] Putin, the cated elsewhere in Africa, only that deluge,’ but ‘after Putin, the dry rot.’ ” it could be hard to do so.

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In this Civil War issue:

James M. McPher- son on becoming a CURRENT Civil War historian

Brenda Wineapple on great writing of BOOKS the war reviews of new and noteworthy nonfiction Joseph Glathaar on military books

Andrew Ferguson on Abraham Lincoln Best Books About the Civil War A special section on books past and present Ira Berlin on slavery and race relations One hundred and fifty years ago, in Shaara’s 1974 novel about the Battle of David S. Reynolds the wee hours of April 12, a mortar shell Gettysburg.) Brenda Wineapple describes on historical novels exploded above Fort Sumter, and the Ameri- the powerful writing that came out of the can Civil War began. As more than one of war itself, and Pulitzer Prize–winning his- Book reviews by the contributors to this special edition of torian James M. McPherson gives a per- W. Barksdale May- Current Books remarks, the four years of sonal account of the rewards and hazards nard, Christopher bloody conflict that followed have transfixed of studying a conflict that still resonates Clausen, Nina Silber, historians and the general public today. In addition, six scholars Don H. Doyle, Kevin like no other period in the review some of the most note- Adams, and Tim country’s history. Many tens of worthy new books in a year that Morris thousands of books have been has seen an outpouring of publi- written on the war, its meaning, cations about the Civil War. and the larger-than-life figures it Though so much has been writ- thrust upon the national imagina- ten about the Civil War, many of tion. This sesquicentennial year us draw our knowledge from two seemed to require a wide-angle view of the sources, both of which have done as much to best writing about the war. distort the war as to commemorate it. We asked several prominent writers I first learned about the clash of North and historians to single out some of their and South at the knees of Scarlett O’Hara favorite books on subjects ranging from and Rhett Butler. As a girl, I was blissfully the war’s military campaigns and leaders oblivious to all that was misrepresented or to the figure whose long shadow falls left out in Gone With the Wind, Margaret across it, Abraham Lincoln. We included Mitchell’s epic historical novel. Since its a list of the best novels written about the publication in 1936 and the release three Civil War. (Ken Burns has said that he felt years later of the Hollywood film, historians inspired to undertake his immensely pop- and others have scorned, with good reason, ular documentary series The Civil War Mitchell’s romantic and decidedly Southern after reading The Killer Angels, Michael tilt and her crude depictions of plantation

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slaves. But their outrage can’t diminish the thing as a truly definitive account—even the appeal of the ripping good yarn that Gone With multivolume works by great historians such as the Wind undeniably is. Foote and Bruce Catton must omit much, and Ken Burns’s documentary The Civil War, bear the marks and limitations of their authors’ which initially aired in 1990, has done much to personalities. To avoid being held captive to any educate the public and renew interest in the war. single vision, it’s important to rely on a multitude Somberly narrated by historian David McCul- of voices, calling to us from the past and speaking lough and accompanied by bittersweet fiddle to us in the present. Our contributors point to music, it leaves viewers with an amber-tinged works both well known and obscure, of varying sense of the war’s tragedy and inevitability (and it sympathies and schools of thought, that, taken turned prominently featured novelist-cum-histo- together, offer a powerful portrait of America rian Shelby Foote, with his deep Southern drawl, during the most traumatic period in its history. I into a celebrity before his death in 2005). But, as a hope you enjoy reading and learning from these history professor recently complained in Slate, pieces as much as I did. “notions about the war’s transcendent meaning —Sarah L. Courteau forged in the sentimental fires of the film” make it difficult to talk about the conflict’s “knotty and The images in this section were taken from complex history of violence, racial conflict, and “The Last Full Measure: Civil War Photographs disunion.” from the Liljenquist Family Collection,” an exhi- Distortion of one kind or another is inevitable bition on display at the Library of Congress in any treatment of an event as profound and until August 13, 2011. Most of the people in these photographs remain unidentified. contentious as the Civil War. There’s no such

My Road to the Civil War By James M. McPherson

As we begin moving through the sesqui- My senior year in high school, nine black centennial commemoration of the American Civil students integrated Little Rock Central High War, my mind returns to the time more than a half- School under the protection of the U.S. Army. I century ago when I decided to become a historian was well enough acquainted with history and of the Civil War era. Unlike many of my friends and current events to know that the constitutional colleagues, I did not have a youthful fascination basis for the black students’ presence at Central with the war. When I arrived at Baltimore in 1958 High was the Fourteenth Amendment, one of the for graduate study at Johns Hopkins University, I most important products of the Civil War. In ret- had not read anything specifically on the subject, rospect, it seems apparent that this awareness apart from a couple of books by Bruce Catton. I had planted the seed of my professional interest. not taken a college course on the Civil War because my college did not offer such a course. hat seed germinated within days of my I had a vague and rather naive interest in the arrival at Johns Hopkins when, like history of the South, in part because, having been T other incoming graduate students, I born in North Dakota and brought up in Minne- met with a prospective adviser. Mine was C. sota, I found the South exotic and mysterious. Vann Woodward, the foremost historian of

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the events, boycotting them until President John F. Kennedy offered the integrated facilities at the Charleston Naval Base. This offer provoked the Southern del- egations to secede from the national commission and hold their own events at the hotel. It all seemed like déjà vu. Apart from this incident, the civil rights movement eclipsed the centennial observations. These were the years of sit-ins and freedom rides in the South, of massive resistance to national laws and court decisions by Southern political leaders, of fed- eral marshals and troops trying to protect civil rights demonstrat- ors, of conflict and violence, of the March on Washington in August 1963, when Martin Union soldier wearing 4th Infantry kepi hat Luther King Jr. stood before the the American South, whose book The Strange Lincoln Memorial and launched his “I have a Career of Jim Crow (1955) became almost the dream” speech with the words, “Five score bible of the civil rights movement. My years ago, a great American, in whose sym- appointment was postponed for a day because bolic shadow we stand today, signed the Vann had been called to Washington to testify Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous before a congressional committee about decree came as a great beacon light of hope to potential problems in Little Rock as a second millions of Negro slaves who had been scarred year of school desegregation got under way. in the flame of withering injustice.” Here was a revelation: a historian offering It was these parallels between the 1960s counsel on the most important domestic issue and the 1860s, and the roots of events in my of the day. If I had not seen the connection own time in events of exactly a century between the Civil War and my own times earlier, that propelled me to become a his- before, I certainly discovered it then. torian of the Civil War and Reconstruction. I That consciousness grew during my four wrote my doctoral dissertation—which in years in Baltimore. The last two of those years 1964 became my first book, The Struggle for were also the opening phase of the commem- Equality: Abolitionists and the Negro in the oration of the Civil War centennial. But that Civil War and Reconstruction—on the civil made little impression on me except for the rights activists of the 1860s, the abolitionists initial events in Charleston, South Carolina, who followed through after the demise of in April 1961 when a black delegate from New slavery by working for civil and political Jersey’s centennial commission was denied a rights and education for freed slaves. After room at the Francis Marion Hotel. In protest, writing three books on these subjects, I grew several Northern delegations walked out of more and more interested in the political and

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military events of the antebellum, war, and While preserving the nation and abolish- reconstruction years that provided the context ing slavery, the Civil War also radically altered for the themes that had formed the focus of the balance of power between the federal and my early work. state governments. Eleven of the first 12 In recent decades, my writings have dealt with amendments to the Constitution had con- broader developments in the political and military tained a litany of limitations on the powers of history of the era. As Abraham Lincoln expressed it the federal government. But the Thirteenth, in his second inaugural Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments address, after almost (1865, 1868, and 1870), which abolished slav- Two percent of the popula- four years of war, “all else ery and mandated civil and political equality tion died in the Civil War, a chiefly depends” on “the for freed slaves, set a precedent whereby six of huge loss of life that has progress of our arms.” the next seven amendments provided that echoed down the genera- That “all else” included Congress “shall have the power” to enforce tions since 1865. the abolition of slavery them by appropriate legislation. However and the reconstruction imperfectly Congress has sometimes exercised of the Union on the basis these powers, especially in the case of the of the “new birth of freedom” Lincoln had invoked at Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, the Gettysburg—the issues that had engaged my interest Constitution that emerged from the Civil War in the Civil War in the first place. vastly strengthened the nation at the expense of the states. hat war was the most profound and Many of the issues over which the Civil traumatic event experienced by any War was fought still resonate today: matters Tgeneration of Americans. Two percent of race and citizenship; regional rivalries; the of the population lost their lives in the Civil relative powers and responsibilities of federal, War. If the same percentage of the population state, and local governments. Controversies were to die in a war fought today, the number over the symbolism of the Confederate battle of American deaths would exceed six million. flag continue to arouse passions among Such a huge loss of life has echoed down the Southern whites, many of whom consider it a generations since 1865. Of even greater signif- symbol of a proud heritage, and among blacks icance, perhaps, the Civil War and Recon- and white liberals, for whom it has become a struction did more to shape and reshape symbol of slavery and white supremacy. The American institutions than anything else in centrality of slavery in the causes of secession our history, even the Revolution of 1776 that and war generates sometimes angry debates gave birth to the nation. That revolution left between the die-hard minority of Southern unresolved two questions that festered deep historians who wish to deny that centrality in the body politic for more than half a and the mainstream who insist on it. century: Could this radical experiment in Because writing and teaching history is a republican government survive as one nation, dialogue between the present and the past, a indivisible; and could the United States, historian who writes about the abolition of founded on a charter of freedom, continue to slavery and the enactment of civil rights legis- endure half-slave and half-free? Four score lation and constitutional amendments by the and seven years after the Declaration of Inde- victorious North is also, implicitly and some- pendence, Abraham Lincoln answered both times explicitly, entering into the current questions: The United States must have a new debate about these issues. The use of federal birth of freedom to ensure that the nation power to bring about radical social and politi- would not perish from the earth. cal change in the 1860s carries important

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implications for the use of federal power to once described it, “the crossroads of our bring about change in matters of race, citizen- being.” ship, and social welfare today. So long as this James M. McPherson is emeritus professor of history at remains true—and there is no sign that these Princeton University and the author or editor of nearly 30 books issues will go away anytime soon—the Civil on Lincoln and on the Civil War. His books include Battle Cry of Freedom (1988), which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for History, War will remain, as historian Shelby Foote and, most recently, Abraham Lincoln (2009).

What Like a Bullet Can Undeceive! By Brenda Wineapple

“How slowly our literature grows up!” which perhaps it had; certainly, Harriet Nathaniel Hawthorne groused in 1845, never Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) imagining that soon a bloody conflagration was calling it into question. And her polemi- would catapult the country’s literature out of cal bestseller appeared just as Herman Mel- a protracted adolescence. Gertrude Stein, ville was cracking open the novel with a far- writing almost a hundred years later, saw the reaching, far-sighted story about whaling in Civil War as having pushed the fledgling which the main character drily asks, “Who nation smack into the 20th century, thereby ain’t a slave?” making the United States the “oldest country Yet the war also goaded writers into a new, in the world.” Stein’s perspicacious hyper- bole aside, the great writing that came out of the Civil War had its roots in the period just before it, a period of violence, dissent, dis- comfiture, and fear. As early as 1845, Frederick Douglass was proving Hawthorne right; Narra- tive of the Life of Frederick Dou- glass was a book very much about the difficulty—and neces- sity—of growing up in a country that kept an entire people igno- rant, childlike, subjugated. Then the pacifist Quaker poet John Greenleaf Whittier, in one of his best and tightest lyrics, “Icha- bod,” decried Massachusetts sen- ator Daniel Webster’s treacher- ous support of the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law. It was as if an era of presumed integrity had ended, Sisters Lucretia Electa and Louisa Ellen Crossett, possibly millworkers

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unsentimental understanding of form, of con- kind and, more precisely, the Northern reader- tent, and of the country. For America was a ship of the Atlantic, this unequivocal and corro- scribbling nation, never more so than during sively antiwar tour de force incorporates within the war, and not just because of the upsurge it the objections of Hawthorne’s editor, James T. in cheaply printed books, illustrated weeklies, Fields, in a series of editorial footnotes, written magazines, telegraphic dispatches, and patri- by Hawthorne in the voice of a dull-witted Mass- otic poems, but because of the countless jour- achusetts patriot who misunderstands the nals kept by those who tended the sick and author’s satire or condemns it as improper. Had wounded, the innumerable letters of soldiers Hawthorne lived until the end of the war, and to family and friends, the reports of generals had he continued to write essays, the New Jour- in the field and of politicians on the stump, nalism of the next century would have seemed and the printed casualty lists that read like a tame beside them. doomed inversion of the catalogue of Amer- icans Walt Whitman had celebrated in his mily Dickinson was also ahead of the 1855 poetry collection Leaves of Grass. curve, for her lyrics were already a “The old forms rattle,” Ralph Waldo Emer- EKafkaesque distillation of beauty, horror, son said in 1861; this and unremitting candor. Though for many years was especially true she was regarded as the New England recluse Wartime journals, with for writers such as who didn’t hear the distant pop of gunfire or, their Balzacian reach, Melville. Turning from another point of view, deign to incorporate supplanted the novel from fiction to poetry it into her protomodernist verse, war came to during the Civil War. to encapsulate what Amherst, as it did to every village and town, and war had wrought—its Dickinson published several poems during this flickering confusions, period in newspapers that ideologically horrors, and menda- supported the Union cause or helped raise funds cities—Melville now sought the “plain” phrase for it. Yet she skeptically computed the high and “apt” verse, as he wrote in Battle-Pieces human cost of war, which was also Hawthorne’s and Aspects of the War (1866), “More ponder- point: “Unto like Story—/Trouble has enticed ous than nimble; / For since grimed War here me—/ How Kinsmen fell—/ Brothers and Sis- laid aside / His Orient pomp, ’twould ill ters—/ who preferred the Glory—” she wrote befit / Overmuch to ply / The rhyme’s circa 1862. barbaric cymbal.” The consolations of In 1867, Dickinson’s friend Thomas Went- Longfellow’s rhymes were not for him. Or, as worth Higginson—an Atlantic Monthly con- Melville exclaimed in the poem “Shiloh: A tributor, an abolitionist, and the leader of the Requiem,” “What like a bullet can undeceive!” first federally authorized regiment of former Hawthorne, too, was vexed to nightmare by slaves during the war—published “Negro the conflict ushered in with the shots at Fort Spirituals,” an essay that included song lyrics Sumter. These were the last years of his own life, he had scrupulously transcribed while serving though he did not know that; what he did sense with black troops in South Carolina. This was that he could not write a new novel, as he essay plus those collected in his Army Life in told his publisher, William Ticknor. In 1862, he a Black Regiment (1870) constitute some of and Ticknor went to Washington, D.C., to see the minor masterpieces that came directly out the war firsthand; the result was not a book but of the war. Higginson could hear the voices of rather Hawthorne’s Swiftian essay “Chiefly unheralded women and men who would, in About War Matters,” published in The Atlantic the future, contribute in no small measure to Monthly. Satirizing the foibles both of human- an American literature. Of course there was a

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political agenda here; Higginson’s was the “Who is guilty of this Civil War?” emancipation of people as well as form. Yet a remarkable novel did appear, albeit 20 years after the war’s end. Though rearily jingoistic writing filled the set in the antebellum South, Mark Twain’s pages of Confederate, Union, Repub- The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is Dlican, and Democratic newspapers, unthinkable without the war or Twain’s though partisanship could ripen the work, as youthful experiences in a conflict-ridden was partly true of Henry Timrod, the so- Missouri, so divided in its loyalties, as Twain called Poet Laureate of the Confederacy, who once said, that “we couldn’t really tell which served briefly in the army, whose home was side we were on.” But Huckleberry Finn is a burned by William Tecumseh Sherman, and book about taking a side, the side of who died from tuberculosis just a year after conscience. the war’s end. His “Ethnogenesis” welcomed The mordant Twain began his career as some- the new Confederate nation born of nature— thing of a platform speaker. Unfortunately, much that is, cotton, or the “snow of Southern sum- of what the Civil War orators produced (vide mers.” Though in the South, poetry such as Anna Dickinson or Sojourner Truth) has disap- this often seemed the last, elegiac gasp of a peared from view. Not so with the speeches of failed romanticism, in no elegy did any poet Frederick Douglass, whose wartime writing still excel more than Walt Whitman, whose empa- rings with clarity, concision, and a gemlike bril- thetic, gripping war verse provided comfort liance of intellect and moral passion. But then, where there was none. In poems such as “The violence had early disabused him of illusion, as it Wound Dresser,” he sings of amputated had the fanatical John Brown, whose courtroom hands and perforated shoulders, and in his address and last written words sent a shock of grand and poignant “When Lilacs Last in the recognition through the nation: “I, John Brown, Dooryard Bloom’d,” written after Abraham am now quite certain that the crimes of this Lincoln’s assassination, the poet recalls the guilty land will never be purged away but with hymn “of the gray-brown bird, / With pure blood. I had, as I now think vainly, flattered deliberate notes spreading filling the night.” myself that without very much bloodshed it The critics Edmund Wilson and Daniel might be done.” Aaron have argued that the Civil War Years later, Thomas Higginson observed produced no major novel. Mary Boykin Ches- that Brown, and then the war, helped produce nut, the Samuel Pepys of the South, inadver- in America a style of simplicity, directness, tently suggested why. “I like pleasant, kindly and unadorned expressiveness. Cooler tones stories now,” she wryly commented in 1864. allowed for more complex shades of feeling, “We are so harrowed by real life. Tragedy is even in the letters of Sherman, usually quoted for times of ease.” Yet as Wilson notes, Ches- only to expose the type of warfare he cruelly nut’s nuanced characters and Chekhovian practiced. Yet these letters bristle with doom make her diary into the war’s premier conflict, sorrow, outrage. “To those who sub- novel. Indeed, wartime journals, with their mit to rightful law and authority, all Balzacian reach, seem to have supplanted the gentleness and forbearance; but to the petu- novel: Chesnut’s many-mooded diary is a lant and persistent secessionists,” Sherman case in point, as is young Baton Rouge native announced, “why, death is mercy, and the Sarah Morgan’s and that of the ferocious quicker he or she is disposed of the better.” record keeper George Templeton Strong. These emotions are as large, violent, and diffi- Insatiably curious about the direction of peo- cult as war, and rendered with the same ple and things, Strong wondered ceaselessly, ferocity.

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More subdued, more famous, and no less pellu- pretentiousness of Sherman and Grant with cid are Ulysses S. Grant’s Personal Memoirs, which the fresh ingenuities of Dickinson and Melville; Twain, who published them, called “a model nar- the teleological lyricism of Whitman, Timrod, rative” that “will last as long as the language lasts.” Brown, and Douglass with the caustic, tragic For like the diarists, the memoirists composed vision of Hawthorne and Chesnut. It contained something that approximated the elusive novel the sorrow and faith of the spiritual; it could that war made impossible. (Consider, for instance, inspire, cajole, reason. Pointed and precise, it Ambrose Bierce’s 12-part essay “What I Saw of seemed to come from nowhere, rattling old Shiloh,” his account of fighting in that great battle forms, sweeping them aside, revising, recon- as a sergeant in the 9th Indiana Regiment.) Walt structing, articulating in pure, deliberate words Whitman famously said that the real war would great horror and great hope. never get into the books, but he was wrong; think Brenda Wineapple is the author, most recently, of White Heat: of its nonfiction, think of its poetry. The Friendship of Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Hig- And these two forms were conjoined by Lin- ginson, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle award for biography in 2008. Currently, she is at work on a book coln, whose eloquence often blended the un- about America in the years 1848 to 1877.

Best Civil War Military Books By Joseph Glatthaar

When I was asked to choose five great Civil War? Nearly all of us named The American books on military aspects of the Civil War, I was Heritage Picture History of the Civil War. It has initially thrilled, then perplexed. The Library of wonderful photographs, fascinating, hand-drawn Congress, which by no means houses all Civil battle maps, and, best of all, a terrific text by War volumes, has at least 100,000 books on the Bruce Catton. For more than five decades, this subject in its collections. Attempts to narrow the book and Catton’s words have inspired readers, list to five proved to be an impossible chore. young and old alike. His single best book is A Still- Where would I be able to find room for Douglas ness at Appomattox, which won both the Pulitzer Southall Freeman’s three-volume Lee’s Lieu- Prize and the National Book Award in 1954. tenants (1946), James M. McPherson’s Battle Cry Catton (1899–1978) was a newspaperman of Freedom (1988), and the many other great and government press secretary turned histo- Civil War military books? Ultimately, I chose a rian who eventually became the editor of Amer- handful of very different titles that have had a ican Heritage magazine. In 1951, he published lasting influence on me. I cannot imagine five the first in a trilogy about the Union Army of books more insightful than these. the Potomac. A Stillness at Appomattox is the concluding volume. The book begins in early 1864, with a bizarre plan conceived by an even A Stillness at Appomattox (1953) more bizarre man named Judson Kilpatrick to Several years ago, the University of North Caro- rescue Union prisoners held on Belle Isle in lina, Chapel Hill, where I teach, hosted a Civil Richmond, and concludes with Ulysses S. War conference. At dinner one evening my Grant’s arrival to accept Robert E. Lee’s surren- department chair, Lloyd Kramer, posed a der at Appomattox Court House. No Civil War question to the scholars assembled around the historian ever painted a more vivid canvas with table: What book first piqued your interest in the words than Catton, and in A Stillness at

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empathy for— Johnny Reb that Wiley, a native Tennessean, did not display when writing of Union soldiers. He drew on extensive research into soldiers’ letters and diaries for the book, which is chock- full of marvelous anecdotes, humorous tales, colloquial expressions, and charm- ing and creative orthography. It covers enlistment to medical care to combat to camp life, all from the perspective and in the words of Confederate “common sol- diers.” The Life of Johnny Reb is a social portrait of Confederate soldiers that was a full generation ahead of its time.

Personal Memoirs (1885–86) I first read Personal Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant in college, when a history professor suggested the two volumes to me. I was immediately Confederate soldier entranced. How could this dogged fighter with such a sanguinary reputa- Appomattox he is at his best. The character tion write so simply and clearly? Now I recom- sketches, colorful anecdotes, and sheer drama mend them to students with writing problems. are all here. Some have researched campaigns He teaches the great gift of simple, effective more thoroughly, and others have offered more prose. exceptional insights and analysis, but to my The writing also provides us with a wonder- mind, no one has ever told a Civil War story ful glimpse of Grant the soldier. He retells better. dangerous episodes as if he were merely an observer who could not be injured. His ability to recall such extraordinary detail demon- The Life of Johnny Reb (1943) strates just how calm Grant was in a crisis. Bell Irvin Wiley’s classic study of the common sol- Personal Memoirs also offers insights into the dier in the Confederate army, The Life of Johnny workings of the great general’s mind. Amid the Reb, was path breaking when it was published in chaos and overload of war, Grant had the rare 1943. A professionally trained historian with a ability to sort through everything and focus on doctorate from Yale, Wiley (1906–80) later wrote the one, two, or three truly important factors. a companion volume, The Life of Billy Yank He grasped problems in all their simplicity (1952), which is substantively a better book. Dur- and did not worry much about the rest. ing World War II he wrote histories for the U.S. From a historical standpoint, Personal Army Center for Military History, where he Memoirs is almost unfalteringly accurate. gained a comprehensive grasp of how armies Grant’s memory fails him only when he writes functioned and were administered, and that about capturing Vicksburg. He claims that all knowledge is reflected in The Life of Billy Yank. along he planned to wait until the spring, But there is a deep understanding of—even when the roads had dried. He would then

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march along the west side of the Mississippi he could see personally. Without boasting, he River, shuttle across, and campaign from the took great pride in his military service, and south. The contemporary record suggests that, the reader finishes Soldiering with the knowl- after several unsuccessful attempts to take edge that Rice Bull and a couple of million Vicksburg in the winter, he was completely more like him restored the Union and stumped and had planned a frontal assault, destroyed slavery. when the alternative idea finally came to him. The last section of volume 2, encompassing When the World Ended (1957) the campaigns of 1864 and 1865, is a rehash of the report Grant submitted to the War Depart- Emma LeConte, a 17-year-old resident of Colum- ment at the end of the war. Having fallen into bia, South Carolina, whose geologist father worked bankruptcy, the former president was racing for the Confederate government, personally against the grim reaper to complete the mem- witnessed the occupation and destruction of her oirs and provide a nest egg for his wife, Julia. city and recorded it in her diary. As Sherman’s He died a few days after their completion. army marched through Georgia and into South Carolina, Emma’s father was cut off from the fam- ily. For days she lived with fearful uncertainty over Soldiering (1977) his fate, until he was reunited with the family 10 I stumbled upon Soldiering as I researched my days before the Northern forces arrived. dissertation on William T. Sherman’s army dur- The strain on residents as Union troops ing the March to the Sea and through the cam- approached was palpable. Emma’s mother was paign in the Carolinas. Edited by naval historian terrified, and could barely maintain her compo- K. Jack Bauer, it is the Civil War journal of Ser- sure. “What a degradation!” Emma exclaimed geant Rice C. Bull of the 123rd New York Volun- when she described the raising of the Union flag teer Infantry. Bull (1842–1930) kept a detailed over the capitol. That night, cotton embers, diary during the war. Nearly 50 years after he Union firebugs, and high winds transformed returned to his home near Hartford, New York, Columbia into an inferno. “Imagine night turned he completed the “journal” based on the diary into noonday,” she wrote in her extraordinary and his wartime letters. Copies passed through depiction of that horrific experience. Emma the hands of family members, until his daughter refused to be cowed, and to the end cheered for shared one with Bauer. Lee and his army. She was crushed by the Soldiering is the most earnest and charm- Confederate defeat. ing postwar writing I have ever read. An intel- Brilliant and tough-minded, Emma LeConte ligent yet humble farm lad, Bull enlisted in survived the war, married, and, when her hus- 1862. He did so from a “sense of duty,” assert- band died, raised two children on her own. The ing that he and his comrades “felt that if our diary, copied by Emma herself, was one of the country was to endure as a way of life as first acquisitions of the Southern Historical Col- planned by our fathers, it rested with us chil- lection after its establishment in 1930 at the Uni- dren to finish the work they had begun.” versity of North Carolina, where historian Earl Wounded twice at the Battle of Chancellors- Schenck Miers later came upon it and edited it ville, Bull was captured and soon paroled. He for publication. It’s a remarkable account by a returned to the Army five months later and young woman robbed of the last of her youth by marched through Georgia and the Carolinas. the Civil War.

With candor and charm, Bull brings to life his Joseph Glatthaar, the Stephenson Distinguished Professor of comrades and their experiences, never stray- History at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, is the author of several books about the Civil War, including General Lee’s ing to speculate about matters beyond what Army: From Victory to Collapse (2008).

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Four Essential Books About Abraham Lincoln By Andrew Ferguson

No figure looms over the Civil War as beautiful biography, written by Lincoln’s final law Abraham Lincoln does, and some 17,000 partner, William Herndon. books—from “spiritual biographies” to busi- They were an odd couple. Lincoln called his ness management guides—have been pub- partner Billy and Herndon called him Mr. Lin- lished to attest to the fact. The greatest of coln. Where the senior partner was cool and these were written by Lincoln himself: I mean reserved and ironical, Herndon was high- the countless collections of his speeches, spirited and earnest and easily swayed. Lincoln notes, and letters that have appeared regular- never tipped his hand in matters of religion and ly and redundantly since 1865. theology; Herndon shocked the locals of Spring- But the vast majority of lesser books can be field, Illinois, by loudly declaring himself an infi- traced back to a single volume. Biblical scholars del and free-thinker. Lincoln was a teetotaler like to talk about “Q,” a long-vanished compil- and Herndon drank—episodically but heroically. ation of the sayings and stories of Jesus that the Their difference in character was well illus- Gospel writers evidently used as source material trated when a young man came to their law in composing their separate accounts. Herndon’s office bearing a new autograph book. Lincoln Lincoln: The True Story of a Great Life (1889) is wrote simply, “Today, Feb. 23, 1858, the owner the Q of Lincoln literature, the wellspring of honored me with the privilege of writing the first much of what we know, or think we know, about name in this book—A. Lincoln.” Herndon auto- Lincoln’s character and pre-presidential life. It is a graphed the page in a much larger hand: “The rambling, eccentric, ill-proportioned, and oddly struggles of this age and succeeding generations

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for God and man—Religion—Humanity and with Herndon in his great biography Abraham Liberty with all their complex and grand Lincoln (1952), for example, he rejected the story relations—may they triumph and. . . .” It went on of Lincoln’s romance with Ann Rutledge as fanci- from there. ful. Today, several biographers accept Herndon’s Herndon loved Lincoln extravagantly, as both account as too good not to be true. Whoever gets friend and statesman. When news of his partner’s the best of the argument, it’s a fact that Thomas murder reached wrote a masterpiece, the most readable and reli- Springfield, where the able one-volume Lincoln biography. He aimed at shingle of “Lincoln and a general audience, “the Lincoln beginner,...the Herndon” still hung person who can devote only a small portion of his You can’t understand outside his law office, time to learning about Lincoln.” The beginner Abraham Lincoln without he embarked on a jour- should begin here. Thomas wore his learning understanding the country nalistic endeavor lightly, with a literary flair. And he was probably that has loved him so. unique in American right about Ann and Abe. historiography: He Scholarly entanglements make up a large part interviewed or of Merrill D. Peterson’s Lincoln in American corresponded with Memory (1994). The book is a history of history: everyone he could find an account of how Lincoln the man and Lincoln who knew Lincoln, traveling from Chicago to the god got all mixed together, from the moment southern Indiana and countless hamlets between. of his martyrdom to the present day. I told myself Eventually he lapsed into a prolonged period of I would get through this essay without using the depression and penury, but with the help of a cliché “magisterial,” but I’m at a loss otherwise. friendly journalist he was at last able to fashion You can’t understand Lincoln without under- the mountain of notes and recollections into a standing the country that has loved him so, and book that was published two years before his Peterson had the gentle touch, wry humor, and death in 1891. From it we get the foundational scholarly command to tell such a peculiar love images of Lincoln: the backwoods boy repulsed by story. In all of American historiography there’s his first sight of slavery, the dreamy romantic nothing else quite like this book, unless it’s heartbroken by the early death of his friend and another work by Peterson, The Jefferson Image in maybe-sweetheart Ann Rutledge, the folksy the American Mind (1960). It’s magisterial, too. lawyer with the steel-trap mind. Some of Herndon’s material has been de- ndeniably great, these three books have bunked in its particulars, but with its telling per- earned a place on the top shelf not sonal details and flavorsome accounts of frontier U merely of Lincoln books but of Ameri- life—it reads in parts as vividly as a forgotten can literature. So you might catch your breath chapter from Mark Twain’s Life on the Missis- reading the claim made by the historian Allen sippi—no reader will doubt the enduring value of Guelzo that Harry Jaffa’s Crisis of the House “the essential book,” as the Lincoln scholar David Divided (1959) is “incontestably the greatest Lin- Herbert Donald called it. It is impossible for biog- coln book of the 20th century.” But Guelzo is cor- raphers to take on Lincoln without filtering their rect, incontestably. Jaffa, who’s still ticking at age work through Billy Herndon, whether they know 93, is a philosopher, not a historian. It was his it or not. mission, as one of his followers (he has followers) Most of them do know it, of course; indeed, put it, to “rescue Lincoln from the historians.” Let the disputes about the contradictions and incon- the scholar-squirrels tug poor Ann Rutledge this sistencies in Herndon’s source material are likely way and that like a wishbone: What make Lincoln to be endless. When Benjamin Thomas wrestled Lincoln—what make him inexhaustibly fascinat-

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ing and supremely important to America and the of humanity and the other the divine right of world—are the ideas that moved him to do what kings.” Jaffa’s triumph is to make this grand claim he did. of Lincoln’s a matter of immediate importance. In Jaffa’s book is that rare Lincoln volume that is pursuit of facts, historians can detach themselves untouched by Herndon’s mountain of material. from their subjects until a reader is left to wonder His text instead is the transcript of the great what all the fuss was about. Jaffa doesn’t let us off debates between Lincoln and Stephen Douglas the hook so easily. “If the issue between Lincoln during the Illinois senatorial campaign in 1858. and Douglas was a mere talking point,” Jaffa When Jaffa wrote, in the late 1950s, fashionable wrote, “then what justification did Lincoln have to historians saw the debates as mere political oppose Douglas and bring on such an angry and maneuvering between two ambitious pols; many deep-seated struggle?” still do. Jaffa saw something more: a 19th-century In Crisis of the House Divided, Harry Jaffa res- version of an argument begun 2,300 years ago, cued Lincoln’s greatness and, for some of us any- between Socrates and Thrasymachus in Plato’s way, made it unassailable. And he did this because Republic. Justice, said Thrasymachus, was simply he believed that ideas are the motive force in “the advantage of the strong over the weak.” Lin- human affairs—the ideas that Socrates pursued, coln saw the same wicked principle in Douglas’s that the Founders embodied, that Lincoln redis- “popular sovereignty.” covered in giving his country a new birth of “Two principles,” Lincoln said, “have stood face freedom. to face from the beginning of time, and will ever Andrew Ferguson, a senior editor at The Weekly Standard, is the continue to struggle. The one is the common right author of Land of Lincoln: Adventures in Abe’s America (2007).

Best Books on Slavery and Race Relations By Ira Berlin

History is about arguments, arguments has emerged as the central cause of the war, as that we have about the past. The best history well as the primary determinant of its course tells us something about ourselves as well as and the terms of its settlement. Although the something about bygone times. This is particu- general public still seems fixed on the matter of larly true of the new history of the American states’ rights—nearly half of Americans, accord- Civil War that has emerged—and is emerging— ing to a recent Pew Research Center survey, with the sesquicentennial of the great conflict. believe it was the reason the war was fought— During the past generation, one matter— the focus on slavery has inspired a raft of new slavery—has transformed the history of the Civil scholarship. That, in turn, tells us something War. Once thought a minor aspect of a contest about the American people at the beginning of that was rooted in a dispute about the locus of the 21st century. political power (that is, the issue of states’ With this emphasis on slavery has come a new rights), or, at best, a subterfuge for evading the interest in the question of race, a focus no doubt real issues of sectional differences respecting reinforced by the election of America’s first black banks, railroads, tariffs, and land policy, slavery president. The meanings of both whiteness and

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blackness have the critical role come under scrutiny black people— as historians have particularly black investigated the soldiers—played in causes of the war, this transfor- the transformation mation. As Foner of the conflict from describes the a war to maintain development of national unity into a Lincoln’s beliefs, war of liberation, he gives a sense of and the nature of how the nation Reconstruction, the itself changed postwar arrange- between 1857, ment that even- when Chief Justice tually affirmed the Roger Taney demise of slavery issued his opinion but preserved and in the Dred Scott enhanced the case (which held doctrine of white that black people racial supremacy. Union soldier were not citizens Perhaps nowhere of the United do the new history of the Civil War and the States and “so far inferior that they had no renewed interest in the history of race come rights which the white man was bound to together better than in Eric Foner’s Pulitzer respect”) and the ratification, in 1868, of the Prize–winning book The Fiery Trial: Abraham Fourteenth Amendment (which broadly Lincoln and American Slavery (2010). Foner, defined American citizenship to include all whose histories of the origin of the Republican born in the United States, black people among Party and Reconstruction have informed Ameri- them). can political history for more than a generation, If the war recommitted the nation to its traces Lincoln’s evolution from a small-town founding egalitarian principles—Lincoln’s “new racist—that is, a believer in the inferiority of birth of freedom”—what happened to that com- people of African descent—to the Emancipator mitment? In Race and Reunion: The Civil War who, in the last year of the war, signaled a in American Memory (2001), a powerful study willingness to extend suffrage to black men. of the struggle over the memory of the war, Yale Among the achievements of The Fiery Trial historian David Blight explains how the wartime is that it provides a sense of how deeply and revolution was rolled back. For those who thoroughly the view that black people were infe- cheered the final demise of slavery and the rior to whites pervaded American society. From advances of universal equality, the story of the this perspective, Lincoln’s embrace of emancipa- postwar retreat from civil rights was not a pretty tion and his willingness to imagine—however one. It is, however, every bit as gripping as the hesitantly and incompletely—an interracial war itself. America are all the more striking. Lincoln’s Enlisting an extraordinary array of sources, transformation, however, was neither direct nor Blight shows how the fight against slavery was easy. Foner’s genius is in exposing the process by written out of the history of the Civil War. In which the president peeled away his old ideas its place stood the myth of a gallant struggle and embraced new ones and in emphasizing between principled white men, North and

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South, whose shared belief in white supremacy white—associated with white people, joined in overcame differences that once rankled the the white community’s social and political life, nation. As they wrote Jim Crow into law, pur- and behaved in a manner that white men and veyors of sectional reconciliation largely women characterized as respectable—he or she erased the campaign for black equality—and would be deemed white, even in the face of evi- often black people themselves—from the his- dence to the contrary. In short, whiteness was a tory books. As Blight makes clear, while the matter of performance new racial dispensation spoke of sectional and not a product of comity, the process—both the sectional recon- heredity or a quotient As they wrote Jim Crow into ciliation and the new history that fostered it— of blood. In the United law, purveyors of sectional was contested, as black people and their States, despite the reconciliation largely erased emancipationist allies resisted the new regime. numerous prohibitions the campaign for black In the end, the old racial order of white on racial mixing and equality—and often black supremacy appeared with a new face. Race— screeds against misce- people themselves—from the meaning of blackness and whiteness— genation (a word of which had been remade by the war, was American invention), the history books. remade again in the war’s aftermath. white people did not In emphasizing the fluidity of racial ideas treat race as a fact of during the Civil War era, Foner and Blight raise nature but as a product of social interaction. the question of what exactly race meant to white Other studies of the Civil War era that focus Americans in the 19th century. For most schol- on the matter of race support Gross’s findings. ars, the principle that embodied the American One of the most telling is Joshua Rothman’s definition of race could be found in a rigid Notorious in the Neighborhood: Sex and Fam- adherence to the one-drop rule, the notion that ilies Across the Color Line in Virginia, any measure of African ancestry made an indi- 1787–1861 (2003). In a series of brilliant, icono- vidual black. For most white Americans, this clastic essays, Rothman, a history professor at truism, enshrined in law as well as custom, the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, provides became the signature of the racial regime in the an eye-opening view of race as it was regarded in United States and the rule that distinguished it antebellum Virginia. In one of his most notable from other racial regimes in the Americas and pieces, he focuses on Charlottesville, then a elsewhere. small town just down the road from Thomas Recent work, however, casts doubt on the Jefferson’s Monticello. Nancy West, proprietor of salience of the one-drop rule. In an ingeniously the town’s largest bakery during the first decades constructed study of judicial decisions involving of the 19th century, was—like several other racial identity—cases that determined if a per- Charlottesville residents, including a number of son was legally white or not—Ariela J. Gross, a Jefferson’s children by Sally Hemings—the professor of law at the University of Southern descendent of a white planter and a black slave California, argues that 19th-century white woman. West lived openly with David Isaacs, a Americans cared far less about the one-drop rule Jewish dry-goods merchant, with whom she had than has been commonly thought. Her book seven children, one of whom married Eston What Blood Won’t Tell: A History of Race on Hemings, the man whose DNA would even- Trial in America (2008) reveals that time and tually confirm Jefferson’s relationship with Sally again, in cases of disputed racial identity, white Hemings. American jurists chose to ignore evidence of The presence of West and Isaacs clearly black ancestry in favor of common reputation grated on some of the town’s white residents, in the community. That is, if a person acted who were particularly irked by their practice of

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shuttling money back and forth between them to the absurdity of racial divisions, as Richmond elude creditors. But when the couple were courts formally denominated those who fell below brought to court, charged with living in a lewd the official threshold “not-a-Negro.” and lascivious relationship, the case quietly dis- The works of Ariela Gross and Joshua Roth- appeared from the docket. Another charge, that man provide a suitable backdrop for an age West and Isaacs were engaged in an illegal when the black president of the United States common-law marriage—perhaps self-evident travels to Ireland to celebrate his Irish ancestors given their seven children—likewise disap- and recover his lost apostrophe. In openly char- peared, suggesting that most white residents of acterizing himself as a “mongrel,” President Charlottesville had no objection to the presence Barack Obama reflects a willingness of the of these two productive property holders, despite American people to address the complexity of West’s color. Again, performance, not blood, their country’s racial history and the war that, as determined race. Eric Foner and David Blight demonstrate, set it That is not to say that the laws respecting on a new course. blood quotient—in Virginia, one black ancestor in four—were not of significance. The one-drop rule Ira Berlin, a professor of history at the University of Maryland, Col- lege Park, has written extensively about slavery in America. His books clashed constantly with the on-the-ground reality include Generations of Captivity: A History of African-American of race. As the sectional conflict heightened in the Slaves (2002), Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America (1999), and Slaves Without Masters: The 1850s, these laws tangled in ways that revealed Free Negro in the Antebellum South (1975).

My Favorite Civil War Novels By David S. Reynolds

“The real war will never get into the The Red Badge of Courage (1895) books.” So wrote Walt Whitman, who witnessed the Civil War close up as a volunteer nurse in Stephen Crane (1871–1900), a minister’s son war hospitals in Washington, D.C. As effective as born several years after Appomattox, wrote his war writings are, one can read them and yet one of the great war novels of all time when acknowledge the truth of his point about the war he was scarcely more than a boy. In The never being fully represented in words. Tens of Red Badge of Courage, he produced powerful thousands of Civil War books later, his declara- war scenes by imaginatively embellishing sto- tion still holds true. But fiction gives us a visceral ries he had heard and read. His brother Wil- understanding of what Whitman called “the liam, with whom he lived for several years, seething hell and black infernal background” of was an attorney who had schooled himself on the war. Well-crafted novels bring alive the the Battles of Chancellorsville and Gettys- richly textured atmosphere and varied personal- burg, and young Stephen had studied books ities of the war in a way that even the best jour- such as Battles and Leaders of the Civil War nalism and history books can’t. A number of (1887–88). masterly fiction writers have used the bleak con- The hero of The Red Badge of Courage is text of the Civil War to offer profound insights Union Army private Henry Fleming, whom into the human condition. Here are my favorite Crane refers to as “the youth.” Tossed by Civil War novels. moods and emotions in the campground and

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on the battlefield, Fleming works his way through cowardice and terror, gaining a sense of manhood after being tried in the crucible of combat. The battle described in the novel is commonly thought to be that of Chancellorsville, but, like the Army officers who appear briefly, it is not named. Crane was uninterested in the specifics of history. The battle he portrays—a murky chaos of smoke, whistling bullets, and soldiers dropping “like bundles”—could be any Civil War engagement, and Henry Fleming is the universal soldier.

The Killer Angels (1974) In The Killer Angels, Michael Shaara (1928–88) dramatizes Confederate soldier the activities of well-known par- ticipants in the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863. and the sensitivity to human thought patterns He etches detailed portraits of the Confederate reflected in the works of James Joyce and generals, including Robert E. Lee, James Long- William Faulkner. street, J. E. B. Stuart, George Pickett, and Jubal After Shaara’s death from a heart attack in Early, and, on the Union side, officers such as 1988, his son, Jeffrey, wrote Gods and Generals, Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, John Buford, a prequel to The Killer Angels, as well as a and George Meade. sequel, The Last Full Measure, and other war Shaara strips the generals of their mythic novels. All of them were bestsellers, but none trappings and makes them accessibly human. approach the magnificence of the original. The reserved, blunt Lee has a surprising aver- sion to slavery and is guided by a Christian con- Love and War (1984) science. An aggressive warrior who believes in well-organized frontal assaults, he differs from John Jakes’s entertaining popcorn epic is part his second in command, Longstreet, who prefers of a sprawling trilogy that spans the entire defensive maneuvers, and from Pickett, a dandy- Civil War as it follows the lives of two ish tyro whose hunger for military action fuels families: the Mains, South Carolina rice his famous, doomed charge across an open field. planters, and the Hazards, Pennsylvania steel A stickler for fact, Shaara provides maps that manufacturers. Linked by friendship and show the positions of the opposing armies on marriage, the families serve as windows on successive days of the battle. His style has the sectional tensions that escalated in the ante- understated directness of Ernest Hemingway bellum period (the subject of North and

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South, the first novel in the trilogy), flamed The March (2005) into bloody conflict (Love and War), and per- sisted during Reconstruction (Heaven and My choice of a fourth favorite Civil War novel Hell). Jakes has turned his historical family is a tossup between The March, by E. L. Doc- sagas into something of a cottage industry— torow, a virtuoso writer who once served in he’s written 18 consecutive New York Times the U.S. Army, and the similarly titled and bestsellers—but his Civil War trilogy has a nearly contemporaneous March, by former dramatic, human quality that even those who journalist Geraldine Brooks. Brooks spins an turn up their noses at popular fiction find imaginary tale around the war experiences of compelling. Mr. March, the father in Louisa May Alcott’s All three novels in the trilogy are terrific, Little Women, who leaves his family to serve but Love and War is the most obvious choice in the Union Army. I tip the scales toward for war buffs. Its cast Doctorow because he cleverly turns the tables of characters in- on that staple of Civil In The March,E.L.Doctorow Gone With the Wind, cludes the famous— War literature, by depicting William Tecum- turns the tables on Gone Lincoln, Lee, and seh Sherman’s historic march through Geor- With the Wind, that staple Jefferson Davis gia and South Carolina from an anything- of Civil War literature, by among them—as well but-romantic angle. depicting William Tecumseh as the unfamiliar and Doctorow renders the Union Army as Sherman’s historic march the purely fictional. a gargantuan, slug-like creature moving from an anything-but- Jakes has said in inexorably along as Sherman deploys his romantic angle. interviews that he scorched-earth tactics—stealing livestock, toured battle sites, pillaging homes, and burning cities and plan- read scores of history tations. Sherman himself, the “small brain” of books, and pored over The War of the Rebel- this monster, is far from general-like. A tall, lion, a mammoth collection of primary docu- bristle-chinned, ungainly plebian whose legs ments of both the Union and Confederate almost touch the ground when he sits on his armies. Even his flights of fancy—as in his horse, Sherman justifies his actions on the whimsical account of a radical secessionist principle that war is hell. plot to assassinate Davis and establish a Given this outlook, Doctorow could have Pacific Confederacy—come across as credible. produced a predictable tale about war’s grim Although Jakes’s stated goal of chal- determinism. But part of his novel’s magic lenging romanticized renditions of the war lies in how its unusual characters—including such as Gone With the Wind (1936) is dis- two comical Southern stragglers who save ingenuous—after all, many writers have themselves by donning enemy uniforms, a revealed the war’s horror and banality—the proud ex-slave who captivates a Union book has the feel of history experienced at soldier, and a prim Georgia socialite who ground level. Jakes interweaves graphic ren- gives herself to a charismatic Union field derings of Civil War battles with a plot that surgeon—provide fresh perspectives on the involves corruption, betrayal, and illicit sex. devastating campaign that was the death Small wonder that this thousand-odd-page blow to the South. novel was adapted into an ABC miniseries, North and South, Book II, starring marquee David S. Reynolds is an English professor at the City Uni- versity of New York Graduate Center. His books include Walt actors such as Hal Holbrook, Patrick Swayze, Whitman’s America (1995), John Brown, Abolitionist (2005), and Lesley-Anne Down. Waking Giant: America in the Age of Jackson (2008), and Mightier Than the Sword: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Battle for America, which has just been published.

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Sympathy for the Devil Jefferson had heroically established. South- Reviewed by W. Barksdale Maynard erners “were Americans too,” Goldfield reminds us, even though “the North came to Since the 1960s, histor- believe that only by excluding the South ians have heartily con- AMERICAAFLAME: would there be a future for America.” demned the antebellum How the Civil War Goldfield even hints that something other Created a Nation. white Southerner as racist, than blood lust for slavery lay at the heart of reactionary, un-American, By David Goldfield. Southern motivations: “Throughout the Bloomsbury. even genocidal. So it is 632 pp. $35 increasingly acrimonious debates of the surprising to find a new 1850s, this was at the core of the South’s con- account of the Civil War era—by an academic, cerns: to be treated equally in a confederation no less—that dares give this stock villain a of equals.” In this assertion is audible a faint new hearing. In America Aflame, David Gold- echo of the old “states’ rights” thesis— field, a historian at the University of North relegated to the academic wastebasket in Carolina, Charlotte, tries in a sincere way to recent decades—that argued that Confed- get inside the mind of the slave owner, to erates fought for the democratic right to gov- understand what he was thinking and why he ern their own destiny more than they fought felt so threatened by the North that he was to defend slavery. Many Southerners still ready to go to war. believe this. In a January Harris poll, two- Without condoning slavery for a second, thirds of whites surveyed in the former Con- Goldfield paints a portrait of white Southern- federate states indicated that the preservation ers as rightfully proud of the role their ances- of states’ rights, not slavery, was the main rea- tors had played in forging a new nation, even as they watched in dismay as the political clout of their region diminished before an expanding North. Worse, they endured no end of verbal abuse for participating in the slave economy—an economy they had found themselves heirs to, and dependent upon, without easy alternatives; that remained perfectly legal under federal law; and in which Northerners themselves participated abun- dantly by buying cotton goods. From the white Southern per- spective, none of this seemed fair. As abolitionists grew increas- ingly belligerent in the 1840s, slave owners foresaw nothing but humiliation for themselves in the country that Virginians George Washington and Thomas Confederate soldier

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son that the South fought in the Civil War. A is rare to find a book that doesn’t instantly reader of Goldfield might feel inclined to give and utterly condemn it. Surely Goldfield is these numerous dissenters a second hearing. gutsy to attempt a balanced look at the Civil Provocatively, Goldfield points an accusing War era from a perspective he calls “neither finger at Protestant evangelism for self- pro-Southern nor pro-Northern.” He is no righteously pushing the nation toward a holo- Southern apologist, mind you, but a fair- caust that killed more than 620,000. And he minded scholar trying to understand the past concludes that the Old South was more on its own terms, not ours—and so he gives an sinned against than sinning in this regard. He ear to the grievances of those old cardboard- opens his book with a scene in which a mob cutout devils, the antebellum whites who torches a Catholic convent in Boston in the whistled “Dixie.” 1830s. With apocalyptic rhetoric, Northern evangelicals ferociously assailed not only slave W. Barksdale Maynard is the author of five books on Ameri- can history and architecture. He designed the Delaware Memorial owners but the one million new immigrants at Gettysburg. from Ireland putatively beholden to Rome, evidence of many American Protestants’ all- consuming obsession with “individual free- A Moral Question dom as a threatened legacy from the Revolu- Reviewed by Christopher Clausen tionary era.” An alarmed Daniel Webster Readers of the New York warned against politicization of “religious 1861: sentiments,” only to find himself branded a Times and Washington Post The Civil War “fallen angel.” online op-ed pages were sur- Awakening. Then God told John Brown to invade Vir- prised late last year when the By Adam Goodheart. ginia in 1859. This act of terrorism at Harpers two newspapers began blog- Knopf. 481 pp. $28.95 Ferry (in what is now West Virginia) triggered ging a series of events that a revulsion in the South akin to what many had taken place a century and a half earlier, Americans felt toward Al Qaeda after 9/11— starting with the secession of South Carolina and imagine if we learned that Mohamed Atta in December 1860 and leading within a few had been cheerfully bankrolled by six up- months to the Civil War’s first shots at Fort standing citizens of our own country, as Sumter. Although mostly written by profes- Brown was by a secret committee in Massa- sional historians, these blogs resembled their chusetts. Adding to the insult, the new Re- political counterparts in the sense that they publican Party sent “shock troops of younger tended to be militantly one-sided. Their voters” called Wide-Awakes into Northern authors seemed to feel the need to stand with streets in quasi-military midnight demonstra- the North against disunion and, above all, tions to the martial strains of “The Freedom against slavery. Battle Hymn.” Caught up in this evangelical It may seem a quaint moral affectation for tide, Lincoln himself grew portentously “mes- historians to line up indignantly against a sianic,” Goldfield says. In debate with Stephen long-vanished and thoroughly discredited Douglas, he uncompromisingly declared the institution at this late date, but academic his- sectional dispute “not less than a contest for toriography of the Civil War has been moving the advancement of the kingdom of Heaven in that direction since the civil rights move- or the kingdom of Satan.” ment of the early 1960s, which coincided with Among today’s professoriate, the Old the war’s centennial. Many older historians South is generally about as popular as George believed that eventual reconciliation between W. Bush, Fox News, and waterboarding, so it North and South had led to the United States’

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and a wrong side in our own Civil War. It is difficult to fathom that millions of Amer- icans could have fought as enemies of America.” It’s hardly surprising that “most people” in the 1860s saw the war in terms of right and wrong; people engaged in warfare generally do. The problem for anyone who aspires to historical perspec- tive is that Southerners saw the rights and wrongs, includ- ing the all-important issue of freedom, in the opposite way from Northerners. For us to approach the Civil War with the same reflexes we bring to contemporary politics (with the exception that we think radical Republicans back then were the good guys instead of Union soldier the bad) obscures the pastness of the past, and success as a society and world power in the allows us to adopt a smug pose toward one 20th century, and therefore tried to give both side. By the standards of today, after all, both sides their due while recognizing their histori- North and South had huge moral blind spots. cal distance from us. The newer tendency is to Correctly emphasizing that without slavery see the war solely in terms of slavery and eval- there would have been no secession and no uate the combatants in the light of today’s war does not mean that no other important racial attitudes. issues were at stake. Yet the Civil War, Good- One of the Times’ regular bloggers is Adam heart insists, “is a story of how some people Goodheart, director of the C. V. Starr Center clung to the past, while others sought the for the Study of the American Experience, at future; how a new generation of Americans Washington College on the Eastern Shore of arose to throw aside the cautious ways of its Maryland, the most “Southern” region of that parents and embrace the revolutionary ideals border state. In his new book about the war’s of its grandparents.” It may be one sign of his first months, Goodheart goes so far as to distaste for ambiguity that he fails to notice declare, “Americans today find it fairly easy to how the second part of this statement applies fathom the idea that there was a right side at least as well to the seceding South as to the and a wrong side in World War II, a side that Unionist North. stood for freedom and a side that stood Like other tillers of overworked historical against it. . . . We find it harder, though— fields, Goodheart tries to make a familiar much harder than most people did in the story new by writing about (and, as much as 1860s—to accept that there was a right side possible, quoting from) individuals whose

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varied experiences add new perspectives. gate College, attempts to shed new light on this While these novelistic passages are well episode in Fighting Chance. Hers is a tale of the sourced and sometimes absorbing, Good- ideological, political, and often intensely per- heart’s relentless stress on his moralistic the- sonal disputes that pitted former political allies sis narrows the range of unfamiliar voices. All in the abolitionist cause—including Wendell the characters he dwells on at length are anti- Phillips, Lucy Stone, Frederick Douglass, Eliza- slavery Northerners, from future president beth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony— James Garfield to Elmer Ellsworth, a young against one another. As they organized and cam- friend of President Abraham Lincoln, to paigned for suffrage reforms around the country, Thomas Starr King, an abolitionist clergyman these ardent activists eventually divided over the who helped save California for the Union. Fifteenth Amendment, which Stanton and Though the story is filled with foreshadow- Anthony did not support because it failed to give ing, Goodheart’s main account ends porten- women the vote. tously on July 4, 1861, a few weeks before the Indeed, the two women ended up espous- war’s first major battle at Manassas. The ing a racist agenda that denigrated African- transformation of the Northern cause from American and immigrant men in order to merely restoring the prewar Union into advance the cause of white womanhood. launching a frontal assault on slavery still lay “Think of Patrick and Sambo and Hans and in the future, which gives the book a curiously Yung Tung,” Stanton wrote in her newspaper, prefatory feel. The Revolution, as she editorialized in 1868

Christopher Clausen, the author of Faded Mosaic (2000) and about the folly of allowing such ignorant men other books, writes frequently about the Civil War and historical to make laws for educated women. Dudden memory. His most recent contribution to the WQ was “America’s Changeable Civil War,” in the Spring 2010 issue. seems interested in at least partly exonerating Stanton and Anthony, portraying their racist rhetoric as a response to those she believes Free-for-All were most to blame for upending the fighting chance for women’s suffrage—chief among Reviewed by Nina Silber them Boston abolitionist Wendell Phillips, For a moment amid the who in 1865 succeeded William Lloyd Garri- ferment after the Civil War, it FIGHTING son as president of the American Anti-Slavery CHANCE: seemed possible to at least The Struggle Over Society. some Americans that women Woman Suffrage Money is a central thread in Dudden’s story. would win the right to vote. and Black Suffrage In a legal and economic system that limited The abolition of slavery in Reconstruction women’s access to property and wage-earning put broad questions of voting America. opportunities, women reformers encountered rights and citizenship on the By Faye E. Dudden. onerous financial obstacles in funding their Oxford Univ. Press. table, and legislators were 285 pp. $34.95 campaigns. Phillips was the trustee of an eager to act. Women suf- important bequest that both women’s rights fragists hoped their time had come. Instead, and antislavery activists could potentially they saw their “fighting chance” evaporate with draw upon. Believing that “antislavery” work the ratification in 1870 of the Fifteenth Amend- would remain unfinished until blacks were ment, which outlawed disenfranchisement on accorded the ballot and full rights, he directed the basis of race but not of sex. Women would the money toward that goal and froze the have to wait half a century before they secured women out. the vote in 1920. Lack of funding was indeed an important Faye E. Dudden, a professor of history at Col- factor in women’s failure to secure the vote, but

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conflicting and racist ones, so long as she could gain some ground. And Dudden recounts other expressions of racial intol- erance, including those of Lucy Stone, a supporter of black suf- frage, perhaps in an effort to make Stanton and Anthony’s bigotry appear less conspicuous. All this gives readers a vivid sense of the intensely emotional and rancorous political land- scape in which reformers worked immediately after the Civil War. Yet too much in this account hinges on highly per- sonal developments that cannot be considered the most telling aspects of the story. Ultimately, the “fighting chance” for win- ning women’s suffrage was lost not because of Wendell Phillips’s Union sergeant and companion arrogance or Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s lawyerly style of argu- Dudden’s focus on it constrains her analysis. Did mentation, but because Americans remained Stanton really launch racist diatribes because immersed in a climate of intense racial conflict. Phillips deprived her cause of money? Surely the This volatile atmosphere convinced Phillips and pervasive racism of 19th-century America had other reformers that a campaign to advance vot- something to do with Stanton’s attitude, as did ing rights for women was a liability in the critical her position of relative privilege and her dis- work of securing, in the fullest sense, black tance—she lived in New York City—from the emancipation.

turmoil of the postwar South. Dudden insists Nina Silber, a professor of history at Boston University, has that Phillips, in making the antislavery cause written extensively about gender relations in the Civil War era. primary even after chattel slavery was declared dead, upheld a “pretense that ‘slavery’ was still at issue.” But she acknowledges that immediately Battle Over Britain after the war President Andrew Johnson Reviewed by Don H. Doyle “warned that emancipation was only an experi- ment.” Can Phillips honestly be accused of During the 1860s, the AWORLD ON FIRE: upholding a mere “pretense” in the face of what world watched with tremen- Britain’s Crucial appeared a genuine threat to the cause he and dous interest as the United Role in the others had worked so hard for? States descended into a frat- American Civil War. In her eagerness to play down Stanton’s ricidal war that seemed to By Amanda Foreman. racism, Dudden emphasizes Stanton’s lawyerly doom the young country to Random House. 956 pp. $35 tendency to argue “in the alternative”—her pen- fragmentation and prove the chant for trying out different arguments, even experiment in democratic self-government a

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failure. There were two conflicts: the land war tion, might bring the South into patriotic soli- and the diplomatic duel over the recognition darity against an alien enemy. “If any Euro- of the Confederacy as a sovereign nation. pean Power provokes a war,” he told William British historian Amanda Foreman has writ- Howard Russell, war correspondent for the ten a splendid book that weaves the war in hugely influential Times of London, “we shall America together with the diplomatic contest not shrink from it. A contest between Great in Britain, the most crucial foreign battle Britain and the United States would wrap the zone. world in fire.” Some thought Seward was com- A century and a half ago, Britain was the ing unhinged from the strain of the secession world’s mightiest maritime power. It also pos- crisis, but he deliberately and repeatedly sessed a large industrial economy that issued the same warning to members of the depended heavily on cotton from the South. Washington diplomatic corps. The South’s fire-eaters dashed into secession Foreman’s book, despite its ominous title, confident that Britain would recognize the is about how the highly combustible relations Confederacy’s independence and aid its strug- between these “uneasy cousins” came close to gle with loans, ships, and arms, perhaps even igniting but did not. In November 1861, two outright military intervention. This confi- Confederate agents were apprehended by dence derived not only from Britain’s eco- crewmen of a U.S. warship who had come nomic interests but from Southerners’ knowl- aboard a British mail packet, the Trent, in the edge that Britain feared that a “cotton famine” Bahama Channel. The resulting dispute might ignite revolutionary social unrest brought the two nations dangerously close to among its workers. King Cotton “waves his war before Seward agreed to let the agents go. scepter . . . over the island of Great Britain,” That Anglo-American relations survived had one of the secessionists boasted. much to do with Britain’s self-interest—it valued Britain’s government and its people were at wheat from the North as much as cotton from odds over which side to support. Though the the South. British leaders also feared a third public was strongly antislavery, at the outset costly war with the United States, this time with of the war it was not clear that the North Britain’s tenuous possession of Canada at risk. intended to end the institution, nor that it Most important, by early 1863 Lincoln had had any higher moral purpose than to pre- transformed the conflict into a war for emanci- serve national boundaries. Diplomats and pation, and the British public rallied to the cause propagandists for North and South worked of the “Union and Liberty,” forcing Britain not diligently, often in secret, to persuade politi- only to remain neutral but to halt the secret con- cians, the press, and the public of the right- struction of Confederate ships in British ports. eousness of their respective sides’ causes. The Union’s victories at Gettysburg and Vicks- Foreman deftly shifts among the blood- burg in July 1863 coincided with the changing soaked battlefields in America, the marble perception abroad that the Confederacy’s cause halls of government, and the grungy offices of was to perpetuate human slavery and the diplomatic legations abroad, building sus- Union’s was to end it. pense as the fortunes of war and international Foreman fills her pages with a large cast of politics changed by the day. fascinating characters, many of them promi- Abraham Lincoln’s secretary of state, nent public figures and many more of whom William H. Seward, thought secession was all most readers will never have heard: Benjamin bluff. Even after shots had been fired, he Moran, a disgruntled underling in the U.S. entertained a scheme to foment a war against legation in London, poured out his tortured Spain, France, or Britain that, in his imagina- soul in a richly detailed diary. Frank Vizetelly,

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an artist covering the war for The Illustrated lagher has been an establishment stalwart. He is London News, seems always to have been on the editor of a respected series on significant the scene with his keen eye and facile pen. Civil War battles and campaigns; author of a Confederate soldier Francis Dawson, one of number of books on the conflict and its cultural some 50,000 Britons who participated in the legacies, including The Confederate War (1997); war on both sides, provided keen observations and a mentor to many of the field’s most promi- at every stage of the conflict. nent young scholars. Foreman, who made a splash several years The premise of The Union War is simple: ago with Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, Preserving the Union, rather than abolishing which was made into a movie starring Keira slavery, “remained the paramount goal” for the Knightly, has produced a book that is solidly North. Recent generations of Civil War scholars grounded in a prodigious amount of research. have completely missed the boat, Gallagher Eminent historians have gone before her, but argues. In their quest to resurrect the reputa- she breaks new ground in telling this vastly tions of abolitionists, emancipationists, and complicated story through the eyes of myriad “Radical” Republicans—that is, folks whose val- characters. She is also remarkably even- ues seem more in accord with our own—and handed. She brings partisans of North and uncover the agency of American slaves, they South, American and British, on stage to tell have marginalized the central actors in the great their story, but in the end she upholds the drama, sullied the federal government and its British tradition of neutrality. representatives with charges of racism, and com-

Don H. Doyle, a professor of history at the University of South pletely misread the social cum political cum cul- Carolina, was a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Cen- tural milieu of the 1860s. He rightly castigates ter earlier this year. He is at work on a book about the international context of the Civil War. historians of the Civil War who treat it as “a

At War Over the War Reviewed by Kevin Adams

Many historians who specialize in other periods of THE UNION WAR. U.S. history regard the Civil By Gary W. Gallagher. Harvard Univ. Press. War as the bastion of antiquar- 215 pp. $27.95 ians. Their irritation is in- flamed by the public’s unending fascination with the war, reflected in the impressive sales figures for academic studies in the field (which swamp those of books in other domains of his- tory) and in the tendency of ordinary Americans to ask historians questions about Chancellors- ville rather than their own work. So it is surprising that leading Civil War his- torian Gary W. Gallagher, in his book The Union War, gives aid and comfort to his schol- arly enemies by launching his own attack on other specialists in the Civil War era. A profes- sor of history at the University of Virginia, Gal- Union soldier in dress uniform

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drama largely devoid of armies, battles, and gen- stubborn, and retrograde. Gallagher’s pointed erals,” blaming this omission on a “dismissive reminders can be forceful and some hit the mark attitude” toward military history cultivated by precisely. More often, however, his analysis and many in the larger historical profession. angst not only seem misplaced, but unnecessary. This is heady stuff. And yet The Union War Few specialists would deny that “union” mattered— is frequently marred by a lack of analytical just as Gallagher frequently concedes the centrality subtlety. Gallagher tends to depict scholarly of slavery (and its abolition) to the Civil War era. It’s disagreements over points of emphasis as a question of emphasis—and in his insistence that intractable—and mutually exclusive—conclu- the only way to study the period is to recapture the sions. In the 1970s, Gallagher writes, histori- notion of the Union that appealed to many North- ans began a “massive re-evaluation” of the war erners, Gallagher marginalizes the new research that placed emancipation and black military questions, methods, and outlooks that define the participation at the center of the Union war. In historian’s craft.

time, a new “overarching consensus” emerged Kevin Adams teaches history at Kent State University and is that to understand the Civil War, one had not associate editor of the journal Civil War History. He is the author of Class and Race in the Frontier Army: Military Life in the West, only to start with slavery, but to treat slaves as 1870–1890 (2009). important historical actors. There are some grounds to quibble with Gallagher here, but this is a fair summation of the field’s evolution. They Were There Not so his conclusion, which is that modern Reviewed by Tim Morris histories distort the war when they propose “the emergence of emancipation as an overrid- The Civil War: The First Year THE CIVILWAR: ing Northern goal.” Told by Those Who Lived It is The First Year Told In mounting this argument, Gallagher flattens the first of a projected four- byThose Who out the complicated motives of loyal Northerners, volume series from the Library Lived It. and pays insufficient attention to change over time. of America, to be released annu- Edited by Brooks D. There is no doubt that the preservation of the ally during the war’s sesquicen- Simpson, Stephen W. Sears, and Aaron Union was important at the war’s onset. But what tennial. The series will include Sheehan-Dean. kind of Union? Harper’s Weekly editorialized as journalistic accounts, state Library of America. 814 pp. $37.50 early as May 1861, “Whatever may be the intentions papers, speeches, diaries, letters, of the Government, the practical effect of a war in sermons, and even poetry and songs, all of which the Southern States, waged by Northern against are meant, the editors say, to offer a narrative of the Southern men, must be to liberate the slaves. This war years. But if it’s narrative in conception, the first should be well understood.” Gallagher is correct to volume is largely rhetorical in content. It hovers remind us that many Northerners at the time did somewhere between academic source book and the not understand the war as a march toward univer- old educational TV series You Are There. Serious sal liberty, that the course of the war was not pre- collectors of Civil War books will want to own it, determined, and that many advances in civil rights and teachers of Civil War history will want to assign for African Americans emerged only because it. But the reader looking for a true narrative might Andrew Johnson’s disastrous Reconstruction poli- be better off staying with one of the many excellent cies transformed moderate Republicans into “radi- secondary and analytical histories, such as James cals.” But to insist that a static “Union” should sup- M. McPherson’s Battle Cry of Freedom (1988). plant emancipation as the war’s defining feature is We like to think that going back to primary precipitous. sources gives us an unbiased, unmediated look at By its end, The Union War strikes the reader as the past. Of course, Americans of 150 years ago idiosyncratic and tendentious, by turns incisive, were no strangers to editorial bias. Every opinion,

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even every sensory perception, recorded in the doc- have diarhea [sic] & several are in the hospital uments in The Civil War: The First Year is filtered quite sick”: That was the overwhelming daily reality through a writer’s ideologies. “Most of these docu- of Civil War armies. Yet in these pages Haydon ments were not written for publication,” observe the never leaves Michigan, never bears witness to what editors. But these private thoughts often bear the we’ve come to regard as the great historical events stamp of public rhetoric, showing how conscious of the war. the writers were of the narratives they were In contrast to Haydon’s unselfconsciousness, spinning. North Carolinian Catherine Edmonston, there’s former Union officer Abner Doubleday’s who witnessed Union attempts to resupply Fort account of the fall of Fort Sumter. Doubleday pub- Sumter, wrote in her diary, “The North is sowing lished his memoirs in 1876, by which time the the wind; see that ere the next generation she does defense of Sumter had passed into legend. “In aim- not reap the Whirlwind!” ing the first gun fired against the rebellion I had no That is not to say that the texts collected in The feeling of self-reproach, for I fully believed that the Civil War: The First Year are uniform in genre or contest was inevitable, and was not of our seeking,” style. They are highly eclectic, ranging from public he wrote. In all likelihood, the Doubleday of 1861 pronouncements to intimate family letters, from was more concerned about artillery technique than as-it-happened reporting to decades-later recollec- justifications for deadly force. But he wasn’t tion, from calculating persuasive addresses to journaling while he was firing. matter-of-fact life records. The Civil War: The First Year shows us actors Charles Haydon’s diary for May 1861 falls into who knew they were onstage, some of whom had this last category. Haydon was a sergeant in a been scripting their parts for years. “The enemy Michigan volunteer unit, and the extracts from his carried out their programme” is Doubleday’s curi- diary reproduced here concern his initial deploy- ous way of putting it. Theatrics are history too. ment to a camp outside Detroit. In these few pages we get a spare sketch of the dull tension of life Tim Morris teaches American literature at the University of Texas, Arlington, and compiles the online bibliography Guide to Civil War among men going off to war. “Nearly all the men Novels.

Credits: Cover, Corentin Fohlen/Sipa Press; p. 2, Mohammed Abed/AFP/Getty Images; p. 12, Deshakalyan Chowdhury/AFP/Getty Images; p. 13, John Shearer/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images; p. 14, Elizabeth Pantaleo/ABACAUSA.COM/Newscom; pp. 15, 70, Giulio Marcocchi/Sipa Press, Copyright © 2006 by Giulio Marcocchi; p. 17, Raymond Salvatore Harmon—raymond harmon.com; p. 19, Robert Schlesinger via Newscom; p. 23, Copyright © The Granger Collection, New York/The Granger Collection; p. 24, Reproduced from the Collections of the Library of Congress; p. 27, © Corbis, All Rights Reserved; p. 31, AP Photo/Seth Perlman; p. 34, AP Photo/Charles Dharapak; p. 35, Imago/Xinhua; p. 37, AFP Photo/Awad Awad; p. 41, Karim Sahib/AFP/Getty Images; p. 45, Illustration © Jon Berkeley; p. 47, Rodin Banica/PatrickMcMullan.com/Sipa Press/dailybeast; p. 53, EPA/Khaled el Fiqi; p. 57, Cam Cardow/Ottawa Citizen/Caglecartoons.com/ Syndicam.com; p. 61, Yan Sheng/CNImaging; p. 67, © Cornell Capa, © International Center of Photography/Magnum Photos; p. 73, Bibliothèque Nationale de France; p. 75, EPA photo; pp. 79, 81, 85, 87, 90, 93, 95, 97, 99, 101, all reproduced from the Liljenquist Family Collection of Civil War Photographs, from the exhibition The Last Full Measure: Civil War Photographs from the Liljenquist Family Collection, at the Library of Congress until August 13, 2011; p. 104, © Philippe Halsman/Magnum Photos.

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PORTRAIT

Letting Go

The celebrated photographer Philippe Halsman (1906–79) was best known for his sober, iconic portraits of legendary figures such as Albert Einstein and John F. Kennedy. In a 1959 collection, The Jump Book, he took a leap into the lighthearted, charm- ing almost 200 midcentury luminaries, including Marilyn Monroe, the Duke of Windsor, and politician Adlai Stevenson, into being photographed at their most discomposed: while jumping. “Everybody hides behind a mask. In a jump . . . the mask falls. The real self becomes visible,” Halsman declared playfully in the book’s preface. Pictured sans masque is one of Halsman’s illustrious subjects, the eminent jurist Learned Hand, of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, then age 87.

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The WQ Goes Digital!

We are delighted to announce the debut of the all-new WQ Digital Edition. Now you can download a digital replica of the WQ that has been optimized for your PC or iPad. And it will be available a week before you receive your print edition in the mail.

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