Book Reviews

Ideas. Ideas.As John MaynardKeyneshimself, the champion of deficit spending and demand management, the supposed colossusof economic thoughtin the 20thcentury-when that colossusis properlyMises-noted in a flashofdiscernmentat the tail-end of his otherwise misguided major opus, The General Theory of Employment, Inter estand Money (1936):"Practicalmen,who believe themselvesto be quite exemptfromanyintellectu al influences, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist.... It is ideas,not vestedinter ests' whichare dangerousfor good or evil." Or as Bettina Bien Greaves puts this matter in the foreword of this remarkable book: "One re curring theme throughout Mises' writingsis that men act on the basisof ideas.Todayis the product of past ideas.And the ideas of today will produce tomorrow. The idea that government has the power to cure almost any socialill permitted big governmentto triumph throughout the world. To reversethistrend,to createa worldoffreemarkets, to changegovernments,to repeal governmentpro grams,the ideasmen hold mustbe changed."

Amen. D INVISIBLE VICTIMS:WHITE MALES AND THE CRISIS OF AFFIRMATIVE ACTION by Frederick R. Lynch Greenwood Press, 88 Post Road West, Box 5007, Westport, CT 06881 • 1989 • 237 pages • $37.95cloth Reviewed by Steven Yates H as "affirmative action"brought us closer to an equal opportunitysociety?Or hasit limited opportunities for younger white males by reverse discrimination?Is it compatible withthe principlesof a free society-or doesit run counter to them? For a key part of this new study, sociologist Frederick R. Lynch interviewed 34 white males who blamedreverse discriminationfor havinglost out on jobs or promotions.Their politicscrossed the spectrumfrom conservativeRepublicanto lib eral Democrat (though some found their views shiftingrightwardas a result of their experiences). Theirbackgroundsrangedfrommiddleto working class. Many taught or were administratorsin col leges and universities-unsurprisingly, since the schools have long been hotbeds of affirmative action.Others includedFederal and state employ ees, corporate analysts,correctionalofficers,fire fighters,cameramen,and so on.

Their reactions to reverse discrimination ranged from confusedacquiescenceand cognitive dissonance,to resigned acceptance,to anger and hostility-and in a few cases, emotional devasta tion. Manyquit their jobsor even changedcareers out of frustration, though a few were clever enough to circumventthe systemthrough various ruses.Severalfiledreverse discriminationlawsuits, some stillpending.None, so far,.hasbeen success ful. White males,they discoveredto their surprise and dismay,have littlein the way of legalrecourse in discriminationcases. Whatever the originalintent of calls for "affir mative action," obviouslysomething went badly wrong.Lynchspellsout perhaps more clearlythan anyone before him just what. First, affirmative action has generally been imposed from the upper echelonsof government downward,usuallythroughthe courts.Privatecor porations have often "voluntarily" implemented affirmative action plans to avoid discrimination investigations at the hands of bureaucrats and Federal judges.Second, theseplanshavebeen car ried out mostlyby word of mouth-word "comes down but does not go out," as Lynch describes it.

Third, institutions implementing such plans were on shaky legal ground from the start-after all, the Civil Rights Act of 1964openly repudiated prefer ential treatment. Fear of lawsuits further explains the secrecy. Fourth, this secretive aspect of affir mative action has often kept its victims in the dark, and indeed has made it difficult to determine the extent of reverse discrimination. In those cases where white males knew they were victims, there was little in the way of "paper trails" or other evi dence that would hold up in court. Fifth, and per haps most important, a taboo on all open discus sion of the subject-a New McCarthyism, Lynch calls it-has created a climate of deception and intimidation and led to a "spiral of silence." The deception is that affirmative action has public sup port, when in fact over 80 percent of the public opposes quotas. The victims, though, have hesitat ed to say anything for fear of being labeled racists.

An important tenet of the New McCarthyism is that white males should "bite the bullet"-they are a numerical majority in a society with a racist and sexist past, so by definition they can't be vic tims. They must be covering up for their own fail ures. Because of such ideologically rooted but widely promoted doctrines, wouldbe critics, too, have found themselves under pressure to keep silent; Lynch himself reports reluctance to discuss his research when it was in progress. He singles out both the mass media and aca demic sociology for special criticism. UntiI the Bakke case, affirmative action was blacked out by the media; even afterward, public discussion was fraught with tension and evasion. Conservatives who have long accused the media of a left-liberal bias will find their views vindicated, on this issue at least. Lynch tells of an even worse bias deeply rooted in academic sociology, and, indeed, throughout academe, where collectivism has long flourished and bred intense pressures to conform to an official party line. Tenure has been almost a must for vocal critics; those who speak out often find themselves facing open hostility.

What emerges from Invisible Victims is a dis turbing portrait of left-liberal social engineering run amok, carried out in open disdain for the pub lic and for merit-oriented values, and surrounded by a campaign of distortion, intimidation, and silence. Lynch, if he is reviewed at all in academic journals, will be accused of generalizing from too OTHER BOOKS 39 small a sample. He may, of course, be accused of far worse, e.g., of being a "racist" himself (or in league with the "racist status quo"). This, though, would be unacceptably ad hominem. Independent evidence confirms widespread reverse discrimination; polls cited by Lynch such as that of Gordon Black Associations (1984) indicate that at least one white male in ten has had at least one such experience. From the years 1980-83,over 1,500complaints against public institutions alone were filed with the EEOC. Lynch's discovery of the reluctance of white males to speak out suggests that the problem is in fact much worse than what direct statistical evidence reflects.

Invisible Victims belongs in the library of every one concerned about the impact of affirmative action on American society. It should be read by Federal bureaucrats, university administrators, and media moguls. Despite the left's belligerent denials, the suspicion is unavoidable that runaway preferential treatment is a major cause of racial unrest on college campuses and elsewhere. Young white males, after all, in general have committed no offenses against blacks and women, and realize instinctively that justice is not being served when they are routinely sacrificed in the name of ill defined social goals instead of treated as individu als and judged on their own merits. Lynch's research suggests a growing body of "under ground" resentment against affirmative action, and I predict a real donnybrook somewhere down the road if the problems it has created are not faced. D Dr. Yates teachesphilosophyat Auburn University.

ECOLOGY IN THE 20TH CENTURY: A HISTORY by Anna Bramwell Yale University Press, 92A Yale Station, New Haven, CT 06520 1989 • 292 pages • $40.00cloth; $16.95paper Reviewed by Ben Bolch A nna Bramwell's Ecology in the 20th Cen tury: A History is the single most enlight ening, and frightening, thing that I have yet to read about the radical environmentalist movement. It is a book that can be recommended without reservation to anyone who has become concerned with the excesses of this movement.

40 THE FREEMAN • JANUARY 1991 Bramwell points out that while environmental ists are now on the extreme left of the political spectrum, the movement apparently began in late 19th century Germany as a science-based anti democratic crusade which found its first coherent political expression in Nazi Germany. In fact, she notes, the Third Reich was the first government to be dominated by extreme environmentalists. Bramwell documents the rise in power of the Greens. This movement, of course, does not derive from any actual environmental difficulty, but rather from a gathering of a whole host of the dis contented, including anti-nuclear pacifists, anti Semites, anti-Christians, sun-worshippers, and simple haters of technology and the market pro cess. It is a movement which cloaks itself in scien tific rhetoric, a kind of public relations rationality which masks deep-seated irrationality: in "Green science," for example, conclusions (such as global warming) are announced before the research is done.

But even more fundamental to the Green movement is the paradox of mankind's being at the same time one with nature and the destroyer of nature. The Green movement's muddy thinking extends to the presumed capability of mankind to care for nature only when coerced from above by massive government programs. This stance ignores a clear history which shows that govern ment-controlled economies such as those in East ern Europe have been more ecologically harmful than have those with greater market orientation. Bramwell points out that the shift from right to left, or from Nazi to currently respectable brands of socialism, was necessitated by the outcome of World War II. Such a seemingly bizarre switch is surprising only to those who remain ignorant of F. A. Hayek's admonition concerning the corre spondence of all forms of totalitarianism. Bramwell notes that the witch cult of PAN (Pagans Against Nukes) continues to worship at the same standing stones as were revered by the pagans of the Third Reich and that the tree fetish of today serves to remind us of the tree-planting obsession of the Nazis (a large part of conquered Poland was devoted to tree planting, and the oak leaf was the symbol of the SS). In historical context, the grow ing violent streak in the Green movement as exhibited by such organizations as Earth First! is quite easy to understand.

Technology and the marketplace are showcased by the Greens as the major culprits of man's fall from natural grace. Interestingly enough, Bramwell points out, technology is more accept able if applied in a rural rather than an ur~an set ting, but the complaint against the marketplace is absolute:·any trade at all is a symptom of "lack of balance." If, it is argued, we were balanced and self-sufficient, no trade would be necessary. What we must do, say the Greens, is to define balanced geographic zones where trade is allowed solely within each zone. Who is to establish these zones of autarky is, of course, never specified. Bramwell correctly concludes that much of this new nature worship is nothing less than a death wish. One cannot help but be reminded of ancient stone carvings such as those of the Maya which show the blood of human sacrifice pouring upon the ground to nurture the soil, or, for that matter, of the "Blood and Soil" aphorism of the Third Reich. Mankind is expendable, which is why little or no thought is given to the ability of five billion or so people to live on this planet in the absence ,of continuing high levels of technology, trade, and economic growth. The human sacrifice of ancient nature cults, or of Nazi Germany itself, pale in comparison with what can be contemplated here.

A recent poll by the National Association of Business Economists found that a large fraction of its membership is highly concerned over the increased stringency of environmental regulations, restrictions which as often as not make no sense from either the environmental or the economic point of view. Economists need to understand that the Green movement willnot go away.On the con trary it willsurely grow in size not because of wors ening environmental problems (especially in the U.S.) but because the movement appears to be almost infinitely flexible in accommodating the discontented of all points of the political spectrum. It is to Bramwell's credit that she points out to us that those who profess a superior concern over nature are not necessarily morally better than those of us who are less fanatical. We need not con tinue to bestow upon this group the kind of mind less political homage that it has enjoyed in the recent past. A renewed insistence upon economic rationality is long overdue. D Ben Bolch is Professor of Economics at Rhodes Col lege, Memphis, Tennessee.