Being America: Liberty, Commerce, and Violence in an American World

by Jedediah Purdy

Book Overview

Having risen to national attention with his first book, For Common Things , Jedediah Purdy now cements his claim to being one of the most arresting public intellectuals of his generation. In Being... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0375413073
• ISBN13: 9780375413070
• Release Date: February 2003
• Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf
• Length: 337 Pages
• Weight: 1.20 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.1" x 8.7"

Customer Reviews

It's More Complicated Out There Than You Think

Purdy is best at describing the complexities of ancient/old/nearly new nations and cultures that have come together in an age of media and marketing. Sometimes the threads are a little hard to follow, but it's clear that is because there are so many stories to tell. The two best things about this book are: (1) it is refreshing in the "fer us er agin' us" attitude in our leadership to see a young scholar be so adept at describing the nuances of the real world - I hope he sent a copy to the President; and (2) referring to Madison's Federalist No. 10 again points us to the messy, frustrating business of democracy with a backdrop of good old human nature, and the zealots of our day are not likely to succeed in their vision of the perfect world they think they can have if they just get us all to agree to their agenda. Purdy does mostly a good job of not identifying with the right nor the left nor any prevailing point of view - while giving if not credence at least plausible explanations as to why people adhere to various competing ideologies, philosophies, or theories. Given that he had the good fortune to land an opportunity where he could devote many months to such a study, it makes one wonder, if everyone could go on some sort of sabbatical and contemplate the world we live in, might we all be the wiser for it. So many people are wrapped up in the demands of their daily lives, they barely have time for TV news, let alone truly educating themselves in history and cultures. If they could read one book, Being America would be a great start to understanding current events and why it's not likely to be smooth sailing any time soon. The latter part of the book seems to bog down some, overall less satisfactory than the first half which is almost a page-turner. Overall a great read, though - worth sticking to through to the end.

Counseling Moderation in an Immoderate World

For those who may have found Purdy's "Common Sense" entirely too earnest, and too impressed with his own high moral seriousness, "Being America" may come as something of a welcome surprise. Purdy's earnestness is still there, but it has apparently been tempered by its more complex and confounding subject: the American Empire. Taking Edmund Burke as his philosophical muse, believing Burke's positions on the American colonies and India are appropriate for today (pro-independence for the American colonies, and against the British exploitation of India), he uses Burke as a compass to help guide him through the confusing and sometimes dangerous waters created by American foreign policy over the past generation. Giving voice both to those who have been bounced around and/or sunk in the wake of America's exercise in gunboat and cultural diplomacy, as well as those who have been manning the bridge, Purdy does achieve useful insights. He clearly hopes his readers will find this view unusual, an antidote to the noisome cheerleading of the pro-globalization crowd who, he says, believe that all nations and cultures, for their own eventual good, should stop throwing up sandbags against the flood tide of the liberal economic system and instead, welcome its flows of capital and the disciplinary virtues of the commerce that come along with it. Or their opposites who maintain that cultural and political diversity are being ravaged by the imposition of the liberal economic ethos through agency of the WTO and its powerful sponsors, who see globalization as just the latest version of colonialism as practiced by a new public relations conscious class of blood-sucking imperialists. Purdy does steer a steady course between these extremes, partly because he has a searching, almost novelistic perspective that attempts to see the essential humanity of those who are not American and who are attempting to come to terms with the new "American" world they inhabit. In one instance, for example, he talks a member of an environmentalist group in Indonesia which has taken up the strategies of Green Peace to expose logging firms' illegal harvesting in the rain forest, who admits that he likes Osama Bin Laden because he is "confident" -- the kind of personal quality that a pundit here in the States might use to describe a presidential candidate. More and more, Purdy seems to be suggesting, image politics, born in the U.S.A., has become the politics of the world. Another riveting interview is with Beka Economopoulos, who works for the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), and who thinks of herself in the same way a McKinsey consultant might think about corporate branding, except of course, that she and her associates wish to turn the power of the brand against itself. By using the media to spread the word about Home Depot's purchase of timber from old growth forests, RAN forced Home Depot to swear off such purchases and institute new policies. These kinds of guerilla attacks, Pu

read with an open mind

I was hesitant to purchase this book because a) Purdy is often lambasted as the pseudo-intellectual soundbite guy of Gen X/Y, and b) savage reviews of his first book (which I have not read) implied that it was irredeemably awful.After reading some of his articles in The Atlantic and other publications, I was convinced that Mr. Purdy wasn't an idiot, but I still wasn't completely sold. In shorter articles, I found his prose to be somewhat stilted. Purdy's voice is much more suited to the longer format of a book. One adapts to his idiosyncratic syntax fairly quickly, and afterward the book flows quite well.Purdy discusses liberalism in this book in a fairly broad and classical sense. While he is interested in exploring ideas, the book never becomes too dry or theoretical because the more philosophical musings are interspersed with descriptions of his encounters with people in various parts of the world.While it would be specious to draw too many conclusions from such a limited sample, Purdy amply illustrates the dangers of oversimplification; the views of those he encounters are more nuanced and conflicted that one might expect, especially as they pertain to U.S. power.

Finally, someone has addressed the great divide.

Purdy is a brilliant writer who obviously has the compassion of the world in his heart. He tries to make sense of the questions that surround those who travel outside this country, especially to the third world, and see what role America plays everywhere. This book is important to all, and will withstand the test of time.

The Finest Book on Globalization Available

I read Jedediah Purdy's first book, For Common Things, with great interest and admiration a few years ago, so naturally I was intrigued to see what he would produce for his second work. Being America is a magnificent book, and by far the best single work on globalization that I've read. Purdy's depth and sophistication are outstandingly clear, and his observations on American empire, modernity, nationalism and reaction all bear close consideration and careful scrutiny. The book is particularly timely given the events of the moment, which Purdy does not address directly--I assume it was written well before the Iraq showdown--but which he can nevertheless help us think through. Needless to say, the focus of this book is much broader than these current issues, however, and Purdy analyzes deep, perennial concerns in a humane and insightful manner. With this second book, Purdy has shown that he is much more than the one-book wonder that some commentators took him to be during the media splash that accompanied the publication of For Common Things. Instead, Purdy has proven that he is a careful thinker, a beautiful writer, and a sensitive commentator whose maturity and insight are a welcome addition to the public discourse, and will remain so for many years to come.