The best books to find out what we can do to fix the USA

Its central thesis is that the deficiencies and environmental harm of major efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are being ignored, so that the privileged and elite can continue to live in comfort and affluence. The authors present evidence that advocates for alternative energy such as wind and solar greatly overestimate the potential of these sources to replace fossil fuel energy. At the same time, the development of wind and solar power has harmful environmental impacts, including the mining necessary to obtain rare earth minerals, the decimation of wilderness both in the process of obtaining minerals, and widely implementing wind and solar installations. The undue optimism associated with these activities makes it unnecessary for those who are already privileged to consider adopting a much less consumptive lifestyle.

Hawken would agree with the authors of the book Bright Green Lies that we need people to adopt a sustainable lifestyle that does not contribute to the destruction of the environment. But the book describes dozens of ways in which we could significantly stop and indeed reverse the accumulation of greenhouse gasses. I had not realized the extent to which we could promote diverse ways of regeneration, nor have I appreciated how moving away from industrial agriculture and adopting forms of agriculture can increase the sequestration of carbon in the soil at the same time that it replenishes the water table and helps to cool the planet.

Robert Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett provide an analysis of the past 125 years of American history that makes a significant contribution to the growing movement to reform American Society. They carefully analyze trends in American life in a way that delineates the tangle of problems we are currently experiencing while at the same time offering hope that we can overcome them. The essence of their analysis is that across a wide variety of societal indicators, the past century and a quarter has involved an upswing in prosocial or communitarian norms and practices, beginning in the progressive era of the early twentieth century. That was followed by a reversal toward less communitarian and more individualistic and self-centered norms and practices.

Hacker and Pierson make an important contribution to understanding the mess that the promotion of unbridled capitalism has made America. They argue the elites (society’s wealthiest and most influential) have a dilemma. Being outnumbered, there is always a risk that a democratic society will vote to diminish/confiscate their wealth. They describe two ways in which this dilemma has been addressed; ensuring the needs of less affluent members of society are met, so they’re not motivated to confiscate the wealth of the elites; the other strategy for guarding their wealth is by getting poor people to blame minority groups for difficulties they may be experiencing. Sadly, they make a convincing case for the foreseeable future. Conservative elites will have control of the federal government and a significant number of states.

This is the definitive book on racism in America. It provides the 400-year history of the ways in which we have exploited and undermined the well-being of black people. The book makes clear how slavery was central to the very development of the United States. Slavery was a critical component of the economic development of the nation. Throughout our history, disadvantaged white people have supported slavery and later forms of racist control of Black people and thereby maintained the power of the white elites. The book convinces me that we must get a significant portion of the white population to address the continuing inequities of racism and that it will be very challenging to do so.