Thread by @dimmerwahr

On Jared Diamond’s Godawful Upheaval: A History Professor’s Indisputably Correct Views 1/x

I’ll start by saying there’s a lot to like about Diamond. He’s tackled tough topics and avoided the usual traps. Guns, Germs, and Steel: a blazingly erudite book with virtually no “characters” that got millions conversant in a non-racist explanation of European conquest. 2/

Collapse, the 2nd in his trilogy, was more meh. Got folks reading about non-industrial cultures, but seems to have confused adaptation for collapse and ended (why?) with a weird celebration of Chevron’s environmental stewardship. 3/

Upheaval, 3rd in the trilogy, is simply a mess. Had I tried to publish it, I suspect I would have been laughed at. By scholars, by publishers, probably by my students, too. 4/

Diamond’s psychologist wife briefly worked with patients in crisis. Diamond’s BRILLIANT idea: Maybe the qualities that help individuals in crisis (he chose 12 of them) might also help nations. 5/

Translation: Maybe that psychology thing I heard about once is . . . actually really good sociology?

People, I cannot stress enough the dorm-room level of this thinking. 6/

But the cool thing about theories is we can test them, even when they sound unpromising. Diamond’s into testing theories. He edited a book about it. 7/

Diamond tried testing this theory but realized it would require a “large project.” So this MacArthur-winning bestselling UCLA prof decided he didn’t have the resources and would instead just, you know, write some stuff. 8/

Fine, whatever. We’ve got our 12 Habits of Highly Effective Nations, and we’re going to see if they work. Diamond examines countries he’s lived in. He also includes Japan because, uh, he has Japanese nieces and cousins by marriage. Really. 9/

But wait, what is “success” here? No definition or measure. And some of these success stories sound kinda shaky, for example Indonesia under the corrupt dictator Suharto, whose reign started with a massacre of 500,000. 10/

Diamond gets his info, he keeps saying, from “friends.” It’s painfully clear that he’s friends with the upper crust. They tell him good things about Suharto and Chile’s Pinochet, bad things about Sukarno and Allende, the ousted left-leaning presidents. 11/

His “friends” in the USA are senators and venture capitalists (whose “bold” strategies are why they “succeed so well”). Okay, but maybe branch out? Maybe chatting with the elite is not the firmest foundation for useful social theory? 12/

By the time Diamond gets to the USA, you see just how empty and vapid his takes are. Political polarization is bad, too few people vote, leadership matters, and we don’t pay teachers enough. All true, but c’mon man. 13/

Guns, Germs was fun. Upheaval isn’t. It’s a well-paid writer lazily shoehorning some stories his rich friends told him into an implausible framework, resulting in unconvincing explanations for the “success” of societies, some of which are dictatorships. 14/

Diamond’s last paragraph: “Crisis have often challenged nations in the past. They are continuing to do so today.”

Forget the comically bland sentiment, it’s the baggy writing that kills me. An edit: “Crises challenged nations in the past. They still do today.” 15/

Final sentence: “Familiarity with changes that did or didn’t work in the past can serve us as a guide.”

Are you even trying, sir? My undergrads consistently end their papers with more grace. And, I’m proud to say, with more substance, too.

B-. Harrumph. 16/16

Good scholarly considerations of Diamond are Errington and Gewertz, Yali’s Question and McAnany and Yoffee, Questioning Collapse. Both showcase work of social scientists taking themselves and their subjects far more seriously than Diamond does in his latest.