Rodolfo Maggio – författare

American scholar Jared Diamond deploys his powers of interpretation to great effect in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, which seeks to understand the meaning behind the available evidence describing societies that have survived and those that have withered and died.

Why, for example, did the Norsemen of Scandinavia who colonized Greenland in the early tenth century not survive, while the inhabitants of Highland New Guinea did? With the evidence to hand, Diamond notes that a society’s collapse tends to be preceded by a severe reduction in population and considerable decreases in political, economic and social complexity. Delving even deeper, Diamond isolates five major factors determine the success or failure of human societies in all periods of history: environmental degradation, which occurs when an ecosystem deteriorates as its resources are exhausted; climate change (natural or man-made); hostile neighbors; weakened trading partners; and access or otherwise to the resources that enable the society to adapt its challenges.

The breadth of Diamond’s research provides the springboard from which to reach these definitions, but it inevitably also introduces complications; how can evidence produced by specialists in so many different disciplines be compared? Diamond’s ability to understand the meaning of the evidence at hand – and his readiness to seek and supply clarifications of meaning where necessary – underpin his achievement, and comprise a textbook example of how interpretative skills can provide a framework for strong critical thinking.

Liquidated is a work of anthropology that treats an unusual, despised subculture – that of the Wall Street banker – much as anthropologists have traditionally treated remote ‘savage’ tribes. But using the techniques of ethnography, including interviews, analysis of daily lives, and fieldwork to investigate a modern western culture is not original; what sets Ho''s work apart and gives it value is her mastery of the critical thinking skills of problem-solving and creative thinking to reconceptualize the way in which we understand the bankers'' mindset.

Ho''s great achievement is to ask productive questions, most obviously in drawing a distinction between bankers'' self-image as capitalist warriors, freeing up value for themselves and shareholders by increasing the liquidity of the assets they invest in, and the social consequences of what they do. As Ho points out, not only is Wall Street institutionally inclined to embrace risk, in order to maximise profit; it is also prone to assume that increased liquidity (most often achieved by breaking up and selling off the parts of a large corporation) is a good in itself, irrespective of the outcomes for the workers actually involved in these disposals. Considering alternative possibilities, and generating fresh solutions, Ho determines that the capitalist principles that underpin Wall Street are myths, not the expression of some natural economic law..

American scholar Jared Diamond deploys his powers of interpretation to great effect in Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, which seeks to understand the meaning behind the available evidence describing societies that have survived and those that have withered and died.

Why, for example, did the Norsemen of Scandinavia who colonized Greenland in the early tenth century not survive, while the inhabitants of Highland New Guinea did? With the evidence to hand, Diamond notes that a society’s collapse tends to be preceded by a severe reduction in population and considerable decreases in political, economic and social complexity. Delving even deeper, Diamond isolates five major factors determine the success or failure of human societies in all periods of history: environmental degradation, which occurs when an ecosystem deteriorates as its resources are exhausted; climate change (natural or man-made); hostile neighbors; weakened trading partners; and access or otherwise to the resources that enable the society to adapt its challenges.

The breadth of Diamond’s research provides the springboard from which to reach these definitions, but it inevitably also introduces complications; how can evidence produced by specialists in so many different disciplines be compared? Diamond’s ability to understand the meaning of the evidence at hand – and his readiness to seek and supply clarifications of meaning where necessary – underpin his achievement, and comprise a textbook example of how interpretative skills can provide a framework for strong critical thinking.

Liquidated is a work of anthropology that treats an unusual, despised subculture – that of the Wall Street banker – much as anthropologists have traditionally treated remote ‘savage’ tribes. But using the techniques of ethnography, including interviews, analysis of daily lives, and fieldwork to investigate a modern western culture is not original; what sets Ho''s work apart and gives it value is her mastery of the critical thinking skills of problem-solving and creative thinking to reconceptualize the way in which we understand the bankers'' mindset.

Ho''s great achievement is to ask productive questions, most obviously in drawing a distinction between bankers'' self-image as capitalist warriors, freeing up value for themselves and shareholders by increasing the liquidity of the assets they invest in, and the social consequences of what they do. As Ho points out, not only is Wall Street institutionally inclined to embrace risk, in order to maximise profit; it is also prone to assume that increased liquidity (most often achieved by breaking up and selling off the parts of a large corporation) is a good in itself, irrespective of the outcomes for the workers actually involved in these disposals. Considering alternative possibilities, and generating fresh solutions, Ho determines that the capitalist principles that underpin Wall Street are myths, not the expression of some natural economic law..