I starting in ~anuary, tune in around the globe to These programs will be broadcast nationwide by Public Radio Inter- national, the World Radio Network in Europe and the Armed Forces Radio Network worldwide during ~anuary. Week of~anuary 5-january 11, 1998 "VVhat We Saw at the Summit" WARRISNCOIIISN, Director of the Asia Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center. Program #423 Week of january 12-january 18, 1998 "Ukraine--An Ancient Land in a New Age" ELENA DOUGAL, Associate Professor of Economics at the Kharkov Institute of Humanities of the Peoples' Ukrainian Academy, and a current Regional Scholar of the Kennan Institute and the Woodrow Wilson Center. Program #424 Week of~anuary 19-fanuary 25, 1998 "Thinking About Threat" MIKHAIL ALEXSEEV,Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Henry M. jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington, and a current Title VIII-supported Research Scholar for the Kennan Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center. Program #425 Week offanuary 26-february 1, 1998 A Conversation with Anatol Lieven ANATOLLIEVEN, Correspondent for The Financial Times on Central Europe. Program #426 Week of February 2-February 8, 1998 "America and Canada: Looking across the Border" ROBERTBOTHWELL, Director of the International Relations Program at the University of Toronto and a current fellow of the Woodrow Wilson Center. Program #427 To order cassettes directly call (303) 823-8000. The cost is $10.95 including shipping. Please specify program Ilumber. Dialogue, with host GEORGELISTON SEAY, is broadcast on Sundays in Washington, D.C. on WCMS, FM 103.5 at 6:00 A.M.,and on WGAY, FM 99.5 at 5:00 A.M. For stations in other areas, please telephone (202) 287-3000 ext. 325. For on-line information send mail to: [email protected]. Dialogue is produced in association with Smithsonian Productions. Don't PutYour BB~by'sHealth On The Line, ~~~EE~nmnr~n~~lrs~rmanr~Li·L~,na~nApmml TakeCare of YourselfSo YouCan TakeCare of YourBaby. ~*"'~~ t HAVE YOU VISITED THE ~7~ ~EB $ITE RECENTLY? HTTP: ~~ICS.SI.EDU~~ It's been redesigned and enriched, to include · Summaries of the contents of the current issue · Selected articles in their entirety from previous issues · A generous selection of current Periodical reviews · Book reviews, with convenient ordering links to Amazon.com · Selected short items from the current issue, such as Findings and At Issue · An index to articles from more than 20 years of the W~2 · Direct links to other Woodrow Wilson Center sites, including the Cold War International HistoryProject Bookmarkthe WO web site and use it as pour online link to ideas and information. EDITOR’S COMMENT ost controversies in public life spring from the clash of princi- ples or interests, but in the United States the landscape itself M seems to produce a surprising number. For the better part of three centuries, the thick forests and vast open spaces of the frontier con- fronted Americans with hard questions about justice, wealth, community, and governance. Early in the 19th century, debates about the building of roads, canals, and other “internal improvements” on the land helped define the role of the federal government in American life. And built things have greatly preoccupied us in more recent times: the interstates, the cities and suburbs, the shopping malls. Each of these features of the landscape has acquired a kind of totemic significance, serving as a symbolic reference point for the discussion of larger issues. Think of the small town or, more recently, Disney World, now the subject of a flourishing school of scholarship that finds in the theme park ominous portents of one possible American future. The newest addition to the roster of Debated Places is the gated commu- nity. These controversial enclaves, already numbering perhaps 20,000, are often held up as examples of “privatization” run amuck. Andrew Stark writes in this issue that they are only one of several new kinds of places where Americans, in their dissatisfaction with disorder and incivility in the public realm, are welcoming the resurgence of private efforts and institu- tions. In many cities, for example, privately backed “business improvement districts” are working to revive tattered downtown areas, while city residents battling crime and traffic are winning the right to restrict access to public streets. These unusual efforts raise fundamental questions about what is public and what is private, and about freedom and equality, that cut across many established political lines and promise to play a defining role in our national life. Editor: Jay Tolson The Wilson Quarterly (ISSN-0363-3276) is published in Deputy Editor: Steven Lagerfeld January (Winter), April (Spring), July (Summer), and Managing Editor: James H. Carman October (Autumn) by the Woodrow Wilson International Senior Editor: Robert K. Landers Center for Scholars at 901 D Street S.W., Suite 704, Literary Editor: Stephen Bates Washington, D.C. 20024. Indexed biennially. Subscriptions: Associate Editor: James M. Morris one year, $24; two years, $43. Air mail outside U.S.: one year, Poetry Editors: Anthony Hecht, Edward Hirsch $39; two years, $73. Single copies mailed upon request: $7; Copy Editor: Vincent Ercolano outside U.S. and possessions, $8; selected back issues: $7, Contributing Editors: Linda Colley, including postage and handling; outside U.S., $8. Periodical Denis Donoghue, Max Holland, postage paid at Washington, D.C., and additional mailing Jeffery Paine, Walter Reich, Alan Ryan, offices. All unsolicited manuscripts should be accompanied Edward Tenner, Charles Townshend, Alan Wolfe, by a self-addressed stamped envelope. Members: Send changes of address and all subscription correspondence Bertram Wyatt-Brown with Wilson Quarterly mailing label to Subscriber Service, Researchers: Forrest Norman, Elizabeth Qually The Wilson Quarterly, P.O. Box 420406, Palm Coast, FL Librarian: Zdenek˘ V. David 32142-0406. (Subscriber hot line: 1-800-829-5108.) Editorial Advisers: K. Anthony Appiah, Postmaster: Send all address changes toThe Wilson Quarterly, Robert Darnton, Nathan Glazer, Harry Harding, P.O. Box 420406, Palm Coast, FL 32142–0406. Microfilm Elizabeth Johns, Michael Lacey, John R. Lampe, copies are available from University Microfilms International, Jackson Lears, Robert Litwak Frank McConnell, 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106. U.S. Richard Rorty, Blair Ruble, Ann Sheffield, newsstand distribution by Eastern News Distributors, Inc., S. Frederick Starr, Joseph Tulchin 2020 Superior Street, Sandusky, Ohio 44870 (for informa- Founding Editor: Peter Braestrup tion, call 1-800-221-3148). Visit our World Wide Web site at Publishing Director: Warren B. Syer http://wwics.si.edu/WQ. Direct advertising inquiries to: Publisher: Kathy Read Bob Rosen; Kalish, Quigley & Rosen, Inc.; 850 Seventh Business Manager: Suzanne Napper Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10019 Tel: (212) 399-9500, Circulation: Cary Zel, ProCirc, Miami, Fla. Fax: (212) 265-0986 2 WQ Winter 1998 WINTER 1998 THE WILSON QUARTERLY Published by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars 14 IS EVERYTHING RELATIVE? A Debate on the Unity of Knowledge Edward O. Wilson • Richard Rorty • Paul R. Gross The natural sciences yield countless benefits, but can they provide the basis for a common knowledge? A philosopher and a biologist take opposing views of Edward O. Wilson’s controversial proposal. 58 AMERICA, THE GATED? by Andrew Stark As some scholars see it, the United States is being transformed into a nation of walled-off residential enclaves. Change is afoot, our author says, but gates are only one way Americans are redefining the border between public and private. 50 HOW DAVID CROCKETT DIED by Michael Lind Did the famed Tennessean fall in combat at the Alamo, or did he surrender and die at the hands of Santa Anna? The author recounts a nasty little skirmish in the culture wars. 80 INSIDE THE ISLAMIC REFORMATION by Dale F. Eickelman Obscured by the media preoccupation with fanaticism and fundamentalism, a religious reformation not unlike that of the 16th century is sweeping the Muslim world. DEPARTMENTS 2 EDITOR’S COMMENT 4 CORRESPONDENCE 8 FINDINGS Watergate Weirdness • Phallic Meaning • The Joy of Boondocking 12 AT ISSUE The Many and the One 90 BOOKS The Real Charms of the Bourgeoisie Spycraft and Soulcraft The Reluctant President 110 POETRY Anthony Hecht on Horace 115 PERIODICALS Sizing Up Globalization Shine or Sham? 141 RESEARCH REPORTS Q 144 W FROM THE CENTER cover Something from Sleep III (1988–89), by David Wojnarowicz, courtesy of P.P.O.W., Inc., New York, and the Estate of David Wojnarowicz. Design by Adrianne Onderdonk Dudden. The views expressed herein are not necessarily those of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. USPS 346-670 Volume XXII Number 1 Printed in the U.S.A. CORRESPONDENCE Letters may be mailed to 901 D Street S.W., Suite 704, Washington, D.C. 20024, or sent via facsimile, at (202) 287-3772, or e-mail, at [email protected]. The writer’s telephone number and postal address should be included. For reasons of space, letters are usually edited for publication. Some letters are received in response to the editors’ requests for comment. Private Property, Public Purpose In surveying major events that influenced United States it is common to speak of share- the rise of the corporation during the 19th and holders as the only important stakeholders of 20th centuries [“Living with the Corporation,” public companies. It is certainly true that the WQ, Autumn ’97], Morton Keller effectively rhetoric of business, media, and academic lead- demonstrates the central role of law. His inci- ers leaves the impression that the only concern sive historical review, however, stops short of of America’s corporate leader is “shareholder analyzing recent developments in constitution- value.” Yet inside America’s boardrooms and al law. The corporation’s acquisition of First executive suites there is often a different, and Amendment speech rights in the 1970s coin- more complex, view.