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Decline of the American Empire #2
Edad oscura americana: La fase final del imperio (Ensayo Sexto Piso)
Based on a detailed historical analysis showing how, from its very beginnings, the United States harbored the seeds of individualism and imperialism, the author argues that cultural, social, political, and economic massacre is the trademark of an America imperialistic project dead set on exporting its vision and way of life to all corners of the world.
Basándose en un minucioso análisis histórico que muestra cómo desde sus orígenes los Estados Unidos albergaba las semillas individualista e imperialista, el autor alega que la masacre cultural, social, política y económica es el colofón de un proyecto imperial americano empeñado en exportar su visión y su modo de vida a todos los rincones del planeta.
Basándose en un minucioso análisis histórico que muestra cómo desde sus orígenes los Estados Unidos albergaba las semillas individualista e imperialista, el autor alega que la masacre cultural, social, política y económica es el colofón de un proyecto imperial americano empeñado en exportar su visión y su modo de vida a todos los rincones del planeta.
505 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2005
40 people are currently reading
788 people want to read
About the author
Morris Berman
77 books119 followersDistinguished cultural historian and social critic Morris Berman has spent many years exploring the corrosion of American society and the decline of the American empire. He is the author of the critically acclaimed works The Twilight of American Culture, a New York Times Book Review "Notable Book," and Dark Ages America."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 57 reviews
September 20, 2019
This is my second time through this extraordinarily robust book that details the United States' march toward imperialism, the management and attainment of which will be the country's demise, according to Berman. Well and carefully sourced, Berman writes about how the US economic policy drives its foreign policy; how our foreign policy has become less of diplomacy and more on militarism, thus stretching our forces soon too thin to deal with all responsibilities. Berman reminds us of the legal governments and duly elected officials the US overthrew like the popularly elected prime minister Mossadegh of Iran because he wouldn't play ball with the oil industry. Also despicable is the US role in the overthrow of the governments of Chile and Guatemala causing the death of hundreds of thousands of people. But also edifying is how the Carter administration baited the Soviets to invade Afghanistan because they feared Islam's influence in their satellites. The US spent billions each year in military supplies and training to the Afghanies. When the Soviets pulled out, the US pulled out. A million Afghans dead, 3 million wounded, and several more millions displaced and turned into refugees; about half of the population. Gratifying to read the truth about events in history not given from the perspective of the victor. As observed: our terrorist, their freedom fighter. An objective disinterested observation that is documented soundly is nicely received to the curious and skeptical reader of current affairs.
October 3, 2022
"The death of America rides in on the smog".---Norman Mailer
"The Devil doesn't carry a gun. He comes at you with cheap appliances and bad television."---Judy Davis, CHILDREN OF THE REVOLUTION
"The Devil doesn't carry a gun. He comes at you with cheap appliances and bad television."---Judy Davis, CHILDREN OF THE REVOLUTION
April 2, 2024
In his seminal work, "Dark Ages America," Morris Berman offers a penetrating analysis of the cultural, social, and political decline of the United States. Berman's book challenges conventional narratives of progress and exceptionalism, arguing instead for a sobering examination of America's trajectory towards what he terms a "dark age."
Berman begins by deconstructing the myth of American exceptionalism, contending that the nation's obsession with perpetual growth and materialism has led to a spiritual and moral bankruptcy. Drawing on a diverse array of sources from history, sociology, and philosophy, he traces the roots of this decline to the country's founding principles and its relentless pursuit of power and wealth.
One of the central themes of "Dark Ages America" is the erosion of community and the rise of individualism, which Berman sees as symptomatic of a broader cultural malaise. He argues that the breakdown of social bonds and the commodification of human relationships have contributed to a sense of alienation and despair among Americans, leading to widespread social fragmentation and dysfunction.
Moreover, Berman explores the role of technology and consumerism in perpetuating this cycle of decline, highlighting the corrosive effects of mass media, advertising, and digital distractions on the human psyche. He warns against the dangers of a society driven by mindless consumption and instant gratification, urging readers to reclaim their humanity and reconnect with deeper sources of meaning and fulfillment.
Throughout the book, Berman offers incisive critiques of American politics, economics, and culture, exposing the contradictions and hypocrisies that lie at the heart of the American dream. He challenges readers to confront uncomfortable truths about the nature of power and privilege in the United States, and to imagine alternative paths towards a more sustainable and humane future.
While Berman's analysis is unapologetically bleak, his writing is marked by a rare blend of intellectual rigor and moral clarity. He marshals an impressive array of evidence to support his arguments, and his prose is lucid and compelling throughout. Even readers who may disagree with his conclusions will find much to ponder in his provocative insights and keen observations.
“Dark Ages America" is a timely and provocative meditation on the state of the nation and the prospects for its future. Berman's searing critique of American society challenges readers to confront uncomfortable truths about the perils of unchecked capitalism, rampant consumerism, and corrosive individualism. While his vision of a "dark age" may seem pessimistic, it is ultimately a call to action—a plea for Americans to awaken from their collective slumber and reclaim their humanity before it is too late.
GPT
Berman begins by deconstructing the myth of American exceptionalism, contending that the nation's obsession with perpetual growth and materialism has led to a spiritual and moral bankruptcy. Drawing on a diverse array of sources from history, sociology, and philosophy, he traces the roots of this decline to the country's founding principles and its relentless pursuit of power and wealth.
One of the central themes of "Dark Ages America" is the erosion of community and the rise of individualism, which Berman sees as symptomatic of a broader cultural malaise. He argues that the breakdown of social bonds and the commodification of human relationships have contributed to a sense of alienation and despair among Americans, leading to widespread social fragmentation and dysfunction.
Moreover, Berman explores the role of technology and consumerism in perpetuating this cycle of decline, highlighting the corrosive effects of mass media, advertising, and digital distractions on the human psyche. He warns against the dangers of a society driven by mindless consumption and instant gratification, urging readers to reclaim their humanity and reconnect with deeper sources of meaning and fulfillment.
Throughout the book, Berman offers incisive critiques of American politics, economics, and culture, exposing the contradictions and hypocrisies that lie at the heart of the American dream. He challenges readers to confront uncomfortable truths about the nature of power and privilege in the United States, and to imagine alternative paths towards a more sustainable and humane future.
While Berman's analysis is unapologetically bleak, his writing is marked by a rare blend of intellectual rigor and moral clarity. He marshals an impressive array of evidence to support his arguments, and his prose is lucid and compelling throughout. Even readers who may disagree with his conclusions will find much to ponder in his provocative insights and keen observations.
“Dark Ages America" is a timely and provocative meditation on the state of the nation and the prospects for its future. Berman's searing critique of American society challenges readers to confront uncomfortable truths about the perils of unchecked capitalism, rampant consumerism, and corrosive individualism. While his vision of a "dark age" may seem pessimistic, it is ultimately a call to action—a plea for Americans to awaken from their collective slumber and reclaim their humanity before it is too late.
GPT
August 2, 2008
Cultural and social historian Morris Berman exposes what many of us who still read have known all along, i.e. that the life of the mind in a mindless America has been drowned by a huge consumeristic fantasy. Arnold Toynbee observed that it is precisely in the declining phase of a civilization that it beats the drums of self-congratulation most fiercely. Similarly Berman points out that the dominant public voice in reaction to the destruction of our culture and civility is one of insistent celebration, which is exactly why there is no hope in avoiding the immanent collapse. In this globalized distopia, Berman argues that the repeal of the Bretton-Woods Agreement in 1971 set the stage for the current predatory economy, eroded real democracy, and destabilized the American empire both at home at abroad. The fact that this book was written prior to the scandals - legal, political, and economic - of the second Bush administration shows just how prescient, and frightening (to me at least), Berman's take on modern American 'life' is. "We are knee-deep in Orwellian waters, my friends," concludes Berman. "I don't think the future bodes well for our much transformed experiment in democracy."
Quite interestingly, Berman, convinced that the US is already in serious decline, posits that the EU, and not China, may be the next world hegemon in a generation. "Micky Mouse and Coka Cola will continue to have their allure...but in the end, the sheer sensibility of the European approach, its savvy internationalism, and perhaps more solid currency are going to look a lot better than American arrogance and violence.... [and] Europe may come closest to offering its citizens the best lifestyle currently available on the planet."
This is not an anti-Bush rant (though Berman gets his digs in), as 'W' is more symptom than cause, but rather a piece of personal catharsis by a modern Cicero who knows the end approacheth but will be damned to go under without pointing a finger at our own collective stupidity. And lest we forget the Roman pattern, by the time Caligula came along the rot had already taken hold.
Quite interestingly, Berman, convinced that the US is already in serious decline, posits that the EU, and not China, may be the next world hegemon in a generation. "Micky Mouse and Coka Cola will continue to have their allure...but in the end, the sheer sensibility of the European approach, its savvy internationalism, and perhaps more solid currency are going to look a lot better than American arrogance and violence.... [and] Europe may come closest to offering its citizens the best lifestyle currently available on the planet."
This is not an anti-Bush rant (though Berman gets his digs in), as 'W' is more symptom than cause, but rather a piece of personal catharsis by a modern Cicero who knows the end approacheth but will be damned to go under without pointing a finger at our own collective stupidity. And lest we forget the Roman pattern, by the time Caligula came along the rot had already taken hold.
July 28, 2020
4.5
Okay so I know this book is outdated at this point since it is focusing in on 9/11 and Bush's second term, but honestly, it still felt so real and relevant to me. In fact, even though the message of the book might be a bit pessimistic, I found it kind of reassuring that we've been here before. I shouldn't find that reassuring, but I did. I like Berman's writing. It has a lot of personality and I like how he tells a story, while being really informative. He explains the Bretton Woods Agreement, he goes into what failed with Carter's administration, he analyzes anti-intellectualism and he connects dots in a way that I found very captivating. I also feel like I needed to read his message about the end, when he posed the question of where we do we look for home, quality, and humanism. It resonated with me so I'm glad I read it and took away so much from it.
Okay so I know this book is outdated at this point since it is focusing in on 9/11 and Bush's second term, but honestly, it still felt so real and relevant to me. In fact, even though the message of the book might be a bit pessimistic, I found it kind of reassuring that we've been here before. I shouldn't find that reassuring, but I did. I like Berman's writing. It has a lot of personality and I like how he tells a story, while being really informative. He explains the Bretton Woods Agreement, he goes into what failed with Carter's administration, he analyzes anti-intellectualism and he connects dots in a way that I found very captivating. I also feel like I needed to read his message about the end, when he posed the question of where we do we look for home, quality, and humanism. It resonated with me so I'm glad I read it and took away so much from it.
June 26, 2014
Morris Berman second book expanding his thesis in regards a decline and end of American society is both interesting and, to use a cliche, thought provoking.
His central idea is that the core values and cultural assumptions that have developed in the US over the past two centuries have now, almost cyclically, become the very institutions that calcify America into an Empire and prevent it from avoiding what he see's as a cultural, economic and military decline, a 'Dark Age' as it were.
Some of Berman's work seems to rest in hyperbole. He obviously represents a certain cultural elite, and while careful to distance himself from certain charges of elitism, there are parts of the book where he takes as standard values that not all his readers may share. For example a discussion of his disdain for cell-phones without a discussion of their utility to the people who use them. This isn't to suggest these arguments are without merit. Indeed I think his broader points in regards how the hollowing out of the public sphere and the focus on the market as supreme generates what in the end fare horrible social values, rings very true.
His look at the foreign policy of the United States, how it evolved, how domestic concerns influence it, and how it's actions become divorced from it's citizenries understanding of those actions is pretty spot on. The Book looks at the historical developements of US relations with the middle east for example, and how support for Coup's, Dictators, Torture and mass-murder have lead to the complete degeneration of the American brand in those places. Also how the events of 9/11, far from being random, or acts of 'madness' logically follow in reaction to events orchestrated by the United States itself.
A good book, if not an excellent one, with an interesting thesis to consider. While there are particulars I disagree with Mr. Berman on, his general idea that the US has passed the Zenith of it's influence and culture and is now on a downward spiral do seem to hold some merit.
His central idea is that the core values and cultural assumptions that have developed in the US over the past two centuries have now, almost cyclically, become the very institutions that calcify America into an Empire and prevent it from avoiding what he see's as a cultural, economic and military decline, a 'Dark Age' as it were.
Some of Berman's work seems to rest in hyperbole. He obviously represents a certain cultural elite, and while careful to distance himself from certain charges of elitism, there are parts of the book where he takes as standard values that not all his readers may share. For example a discussion of his disdain for cell-phones without a discussion of their utility to the people who use them. This isn't to suggest these arguments are without merit. Indeed I think his broader points in regards how the hollowing out of the public sphere and the focus on the market as supreme generates what in the end fare horrible social values, rings very true.
His look at the foreign policy of the United States, how it evolved, how domestic concerns influence it, and how it's actions become divorced from it's citizenries understanding of those actions is pretty spot on. The Book looks at the historical developements of US relations with the middle east for example, and how support for Coup's, Dictators, Torture and mass-murder have lead to the complete degeneration of the American brand in those places. Also how the events of 9/11, far from being random, or acts of 'madness' logically follow in reaction to events orchestrated by the United States itself.
A good book, if not an excellent one, with an interesting thesis to consider. While there are particulars I disagree with Mr. Berman on, his general idea that the US has passed the Zenith of it's influence and culture and is now on a downward spiral do seem to hold some merit.
August 3, 2014
It's essentially the non-fiction companion to the movie, Idiocracy. But seriously, while I say that somewhat in jest, it's not too far from the truth. It's an examination of our cultural, political, and social fabric, from our inner and outer lives, from the microcosm and the macrocosm. Berman covers impressive ground and gets to the root of something that's been bothering me likewise for some time -- that many of the ills we are experiencing in our modern world, exist, well, because we want them to. The notion that if only the common people would be exposed to the truth they would then take up a right cause and restore a more open and free republic to what it used to be, is at its heart, an idealist vision that is beyond realization.
This is worth the read, but if you're of a frantically optimistic type, this isn't for you; it has no easy, pre-packaged answers. As I have a good deal of friends who are writers, I often hear them deplore the industry they're in. They are horrified by the quality of work they find on the shelves. Dark Ages America provides the answer. We get the culture we want. We get the government we deserve.
This is supposed to be a review; I'll depart only briefly to explain that, I long ago came to this conclusion that Berman presents and found a lot of solace in the validation, be it of a bitter type. And there is only one answer to Berman's hair raising portrait of the American people -- if you are dissatisfied with the culture you find yourself in, change it. I realize that seems insurmountable, but honestly, did you have much else to do while the dark ages descends? Berman makes a compelling case that this too, is an impossibility. And that's probably the stark truth.
Clever readers, take note of the date of publication, as it makes a number of predictions and information even more interesting -- particularly in this age of spying scandals.
This is worth the read, but if you're of a frantically optimistic type, this isn't for you; it has no easy, pre-packaged answers. As I have a good deal of friends who are writers, I often hear them deplore the industry they're in. They are horrified by the quality of work they find on the shelves. Dark Ages America provides the answer. We get the culture we want. We get the government we deserve.
This is supposed to be a review; I'll depart only briefly to explain that, I long ago came to this conclusion that Berman presents and found a lot of solace in the validation, be it of a bitter type. And there is only one answer to Berman's hair raising portrait of the American people -- if you are dissatisfied with the culture you find yourself in, change it. I realize that seems insurmountable, but honestly, did you have much else to do while the dark ages descends? Berman makes a compelling case that this too, is an impossibility. And that's probably the stark truth.
Clever readers, take note of the date of publication, as it makes a number of predictions and information even more interesting -- particularly in this age of spying scandals.
January 24, 2010
Well written and researched. However he has a few assumptions that support his conclusion which is still well proven. I disagree with him about his views of the unfettered free market being a part in America's decay. The free market and crony capitalism are mutually exclusive and our economy is centrally managed by government protected cartels, which is not the free market. In a free market we would have more choices than coke or pepsi, walmart or target. I also disagreed with him trying to assert that European socialism is all that great. He lacked any research whatsoever into how european social programs work or contrasting them to other systems. Granted he tried to keep the focus of his book on point but side assertions annoy me, personally. His lack of expertise or research in economic history bleeds through as he ignores the disappearance of the free market as government regulation began to protect entitled industrial influences from competition under the guise of mythological progressivism. I still give it a 5 because his conclusion is well argued and not dependent on his economic assertions. He draws from a variety of sources from the media, to academic studies to other knowledgeable authors to demonstrate that our decline is the product of choices past and present.
April 4, 2008
Well, now it is true a lot of what Morris says; but how are we different than the Europeans? I mean, every time I've been there, the populace is just as hooked on shopping, cell phones, and other gadgets. We are all iSheep now; those who are going to suffer the most are the children today. Their standard of living will be nowhere near what their parent's was. But these doomsday books are getting so old; by that I mean the books that consistently refer to Americans as unaware and vapid, while Europeans are cultured and so intelligent. Crazy. Visit some of the places I have in the south of France, Spain and Italy; yeah, you'll see some cultured people there. Such a specious argument.
The US is headed for an important economic correction; when China and Japan stop buying our T-bills, there will be trouble. Those people (read: baby boomers) who think that social security and medicare will be there for them are fooling themselves. There is going to be pain. We'll make it, but be much more humbled. One good thing is that there won't be enough money for the US to play the world's policeman, finally Europe will have to pick up the pieces in garden spots like Bosnia, et. al.
The US is headed for an important economic correction; when China and Japan stop buying our T-bills, there will be trouble. Those people (read: baby boomers) who think that social security and medicare will be there for them are fooling themselves. There is going to be pain. We'll make it, but be much more humbled. One good thing is that there won't be enough money for the US to play the world's policeman, finally Europe will have to pick up the pieces in garden spots like Bosnia, et. al.
January 9, 2014
Let me start out by saying that I am a born pessimist. Not only that, but I loathe the events that are taking place in present-day America: the deification of wealth; the spitting on the poor; the continued virulent racism; the NSA's regime of spying. Still, I did not entirely buy Berman's premise that this is the end of the country as we know it and that we are going to wind down the decades losing all sight of knowledge and devolving into brutes a la the real Dark Ages.
Berman cites other pundits for his argument, but he uses their broad assertions in lieu of actual statistics/facts. I could probably say that we're heading to a 2nd Renaissance and find enough talking/writing heads to support me. But mere repetition doth not a premise make.
The parallel with the Fall of Rome is compelling but ultimately unconvincing: the main reason was not so much the Visigoths et al but the refusal of the populace to continue paying huge taxes to support the military. Soldiers didn't want to fight // end of Empire.
Berman's theory is interesting and certainly well worth a read. But this pessimist is going to err on the side of optimism by not building a survivalist shelter just yet. . .
Berman cites other pundits for his argument, but he uses their broad assertions in lieu of actual statistics/facts. I could probably say that we're heading to a 2nd Renaissance and find enough talking/writing heads to support me. But mere repetition doth not a premise make.
The parallel with the Fall of Rome is compelling but ultimately unconvincing: the main reason was not so much the Visigoths et al but the refusal of the populace to continue paying huge taxes to support the military. Soldiers didn't want to fight // end of Empire.
Berman's theory is interesting and certainly well worth a read. But this pessimist is going to err on the side of optimism by not building a survivalist shelter just yet. . .
July 8, 2007
Most American do not want to read Morris Berman's conclusions about the fate of the United States, but I believe every American needs to understand Berman's perspective. Unfortunately, we are either too self-indulged or ignorant to recognize that America is not what we think we are or probably what we want to be.
Berman does something in this book that few of us our willing to do and that is use introspection to dissect the problems that our individualistic nature has brought. Our militaristic/consumeristic nature has left us without a moral center and direction. Berman reflects on the American century (20th) and what led up to the events of 9/11 and after.
It will make you mad but also make you think and eventually start to understand that Berman is on to something. Our culture (if we ever had one) is in decline, whether we want to admit it or not.
Berman does something in this book that few of us our willing to do and that is use introspection to dissect the problems that our individualistic nature has brought. Our militaristic/consumeristic nature has left us without a moral center and direction. Berman reflects on the American century (20th) and what led up to the events of 9/11 and after.
It will make you mad but also make you think and eventually start to understand that Berman is on to something. Our culture (if we ever had one) is in decline, whether we want to admit it or not.
March 31, 2010
This book is a remarkably succesful attempt at synthesizing the development and the causes of the early 21st-century political, social, cultural and economic situation in the United States. It certainly will not be particularly pleasing for any one who voted for Bush or has a positive opinion of Palin, but this is certainly a book written by someone who is far from "un-American". This is not only a must-read for Americans, but for anyone interested in the state of the world at large, given the political, military, economic and cultural influence that mainstream American culture still has over most of humanity. Maybe Berman doesn't seem to offer a clear way out (that would exceed the scope of the book), but sometimes it's necessary to look straight ahead into the darkness.
July 27, 2007
Depressing. Despite this, it is a cogent and thorough overview of US foreign relations; unforgiving in its derision and polemic. Berman gets so angry it’d be comical if it weren’t so well deserved. Even the “positive stuff” (read: his analysis of Portland, OR) is heartbreaking.
I disagree with his assessment that there’s no hope, and I consider myself neither delusional nor optimistic. I also think that his stated purpose for writing the book, i.e. so that future generations see that at least some of us understood “the fall” for what it was while it was happening, is flawed.
Love,
Stephen
I disagree with his assessment that there’s no hope, and I consider myself neither delusional nor optimistic. I also think that his stated purpose for writing the book, i.e. so that future generations see that at least some of us understood “the fall” for what it was while it was happening, is flawed.
Love,
Stephen
January 7, 2008
This book is a good picture of an intelligent guy trying to understand what's happening in America without paying any attention to (1) the Kennedy Assassination, (2) US complicity in 9/11, (3) the peak of world oil production, (4)the narco-economy and Wall Street. To his credit, he does realize that the end of Bretton Woods was a big deal.
The book is also hobbled by a few persistent errors of grammar (John's dog was bigger than that of Bob's --- what the hell?).
His heart's in the right place, but he is the same cranky, adjective-driven writer he was in 1981 with "The Reenchantment of the World," which said that everything sucks here because we are all "alienated." True, but: duh.
The book is also hobbled by a few persistent errors of grammar (John's dog was bigger than that of Bob's --- what the hell?).
His heart's in the right place, but he is the same cranky, adjective-driven writer he was in 1981 with "The Reenchantment of the World," which said that everything sucks here because we are all "alienated." True, but: duh.
September 18, 2007
A dark and forbodding future awaits the citizens of the United States, according to the author of this book. Indeed, there appears to be no turning back as we plunge downward like our distant ancestors of Rome. Decadence, oppulence, ignorance, unhealthy living, and a host of other issues plague Americans, and all appears on the verge of lost. Is there hope? Read on to find out. Not a bad book because it scares you into action, or at least it forces you to think for a minute about our future.
April 12, 2008
Berman writes that America has begun to enter a "Dark Ages" like thos experinced by Europe at the end of the Roman Empire. Interesting read.
While I'm also a cynic, I don't agree with Berman that we've gone by any "turning point". Since the 1980s, I've read books from the Right and the Left, that America will soon follow the fate of Rome.
The American century is coming to a close, and that's okay. It's not the end of America.
While I'm also a cynic, I don't agree with Berman that we've gone by any "turning point". Since the 1980s, I've read books from the Right and the Left, that America will soon follow the fate of Rome.
The American century is coming to a close, and that's okay. It's not the end of America.
October 31, 2012
Brilliant observations of the state of the United States in the twenty-first century, with the prognosis of its coming collapse. The author describes a nation where a "Manichean-imperial" Cold War mentality continues to rule its foreign policy, where tribalism is overtaking secular rationalism in thought and culture, and where ignorance is increasingly seen as a virtue. I am looking forward to his third volume in the series, "Why America Failed."
May 19, 2011
Potente análisis sobre la decadencia terminal de Estados Unidos. Argumenta cómo se transformó en un imperio "blando" y cómo el gobierno de Bush fue una consecuencia de una política esbozada ya desde el siglo XIX. Escrito en 2004, sigue vigente, aún cuando la victoria de Obama de la impresión de lograr revertir la tendencia. No apto para gente depresiva, pues es fuerte, contundente y oscuro.
March 13, 2019
Mixed feelings. It has interesting ideas, but the logic used looked very thin to me. Based on many anecdotal facts and lacking good research, in my opinion. As is usual in this kind of books, it tends to be too long for what is to be said and, more importantly, many times I was wondering where was the relationship between what was being told and the title.
December 20, 2021
Un libro fundamental para comprender los motivos que han llevado a Estados Unidos a su declive. Las tendencias que enuncia siguen años después, lo que nos obliga a pensar su pertinencia para comprender y afrontar el mundo que vivimos y aquel por venir.
August 27, 2007
Eye opening. If most what he says is true, and I think much of it is, then there's not a lot of room for optimism when it comes to the future of US society. Don't blame Canada.
January 22, 2008
Book is exhaustive in its treatment of the history of the nation's slide, but much less so in its proposed remedies.
August 17, 2008
A little redundant in the face of his older stuff, and a little solipsistic in his view of the world. Lots of litte interesting observations and tidbits hidden throughout.
June 6, 2016
I just couldn't finish this because I found the author's writing style beyond annoying.
December 5, 2008
http://archive.boulderweekly.com/0420...
This review originally appeared in the BOULDER WEEKLY
The End of Empire
Historian Morris Berman outlines the fall of the American Empire in Dark Ages America
by Vince Darcangelo
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Morris Berman's Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire probably won't make anyone's Best Books for the Beach list this summer. Let's just say it doesn't have a happy ending—or beginning or middle. What Dark Ages America does have is a heavy helping of facts and commentary concerning the modern-day United States—and the news isn't good. Berman offers a hard, honest look in the mirror many Americans aren't willing to take, declaring that America's global supremacy has reached its end.
Putting us in historical context, Berman draws comparisons between 21st-century America and the latter days of the Roman Empire, concluding that America is entering a dark age that will reduce us to second- or third-rate status by 2040, and that it is too late to reverse course.
A cultural historian, Berman first garnered attention with his 2000 book The Twilight of American Culture, in which he predicted that America would soon come under attack as a counter-response to our corporate- and military-driven global policies. In Dark Ages America, Berman says that we've yet to learn the lessons of 9/11 and have set a course for cultural collapse and global irrelevance. He does so by discussing the moral decay of American culture, the blundering invasion of Iraq, the near-comical political missteps of the Bush administration, and an in-depth exploration of America's global policies in the 20th century, examining our postwar rise and our post-Vietnam fall.
Vince Darcangelo: What was the motivation for writing Dark Ages America, and what sort of response do you hope the book elicits?
Morris Berman: I never expected to write it. I had written The Twilight of American Culture, and it appeared 15 months before 9/11... After 9/11, something was staring at me so obviously. In Twilight, I had done a comparison of the contemporary United States and Rome in the late-empire period. I compared the two in terms of structural factors that were doing each civilization in and arguing that they were the same factors.
But there was one point of comparison that I completely overlooked, and that became apparent only after 9/11—that was that Rome was invaded and then fought a long war of attrition that was finally lost. That's what happening to us. There is no way we're going to defeat terrorism. It's an elusive technique. How can you defeat terrorism?
Not that al Qaeda can win, but they've got lots of time and lots of anger. They're going to keep doing what they're doing, and we're going to keep disintegrating.
There was the motivation. As far as my guess of what difference it will make, I would say none at all... I expect to be vilified and ignored.
VD: Which would you prefer?
MB: There is this saying that bad press is better than no press. I don't know if that's true. Part of the problem of being vilified is that it usually involves a distortion.
VD: If what you're saying is true and there's nothing we can do about it, shouldn't I be stockpiling weapons for the coming Dark Age instead of reading this book?
MB: The question is what you would use the weapon on. Maybe we should just shoot ourselves. In Twilight I talked about the one thing people could do was cultural preservation... I saw that as the only solution, but it's not really a solution. When finally the only thing that can be done is what individuals can do, that means the system has completely broken down. Our problems are structural, and if problems are structural, then the solutions have to be structural. That's Sociology 101. Individual solutions are nice, but they're not solutions, they're responses. It would be nice if people preserved things, but I don't believe there's a hope in turning this situation around. It's not a question of whether optimism is good and pessimism is bad. It's a question of, alright, if you don't believe what I'm saying when I say there is no way of turning things around, show me the levers of social change, point to them, tell me how this is gonna happen.
And don't point to the Democratic Party, because the Democratic Party is intellectually bankrupt and politically impotent. Don't talk to me about Hillary, for God's sake. She's rattling the sabers against Iran. What a joke. The Democratic Party has essentially bought into the Republican Party. We saw that during the Clinton years; he was just a Republican in Democratic clothing. The choice between the Republicans and Democrats is the choice between empire and empire-lite.
We do not have a large section of this country up in arms. They just aren't. They may give Bush a low approval rating, but the truth is that if we were winning the war in Iraq his approval rating would be very high. It's not a moral objection or a political objection—most Americans have no understanding of the war in Iraq; they don't even understand what happened except that it didn't work out well. We're in a situation where we can torture people. To my knowledge, we're the first modern nation that has made torture legal. On top of that, we put the guy who legalized it head of the Department of Justice. George Orwell move over. This is surreal.
And Americans aren't upset about that. They're not upset about Abu Ghraib. I would even argue that Bush got reelected because of Abu Ghraib, not in spite of it. It's not like Americans are upset that people can be detained indefinitely without trial and the right to an attorney. They're not upset that the NSA is spying on them. I don't know what it would take to get the American people upset. You could probably herd Iraqis into gas chambers and Americans would say, "Gee, we shouldn't be doing that." The days of Vietnam protests are definitely not here. We don't have a similar situation. We don't have a public that's aware, outraged or even upset. We have a public that basically is drugged, apathetic and interested in shopping.
VD: In the book you say that America "may be only one more terrorist attack away from a police state." Should this occur, how do you think the American public would respond? Do you think people would have this moment of recognition that they were complicit in the erosion of civil liberties that permitted the institution of a "police state"?
MB: I don't think so. After all, there's a large section of statistics about American awareness, including American attitudes toward the erosion of civil liberties. Something like a third are opposed to the Bill of Rights. I have to say this is true even of people that are very intelligent... The truth is that very bright people in large numbers voted for George W. Bush, supported the war and continue to think that he's even wise. And these are quite intelligent people. You have to ask how is that happening. There's something going on with this enormous blind spot that comes out of fear and a preconceived framework and so on. It's not like people are turning around and saying there's something horribly wrong, we're on the wrong track. When you have bright people supporting these policies and the erosion of civil liberties and so on, the comparison, it's a bit of a strain, but 10 percent of the Nazi party held Ph.Ds. This is not merely about the ignorance or stupidity of the American people in terms of a blue-collar ignorance of the Bill of Rights or something like that. It's bright people saying that this is OK. What could be more powerful in terms of digging ourselves into a grave? So when I say we might be one terrorist attack away from a police state, it seems pretty obvious because we're going to respond by rallying around repressive policies, not by saying that somehow we're exacerbating the whole problem. Even bright people are going to say that. I don't see what hope there is.
After all, after 3/11—when 200 people were killed in the bombings of Madrid—three days later there was an election and they voted out Aznar, who backed Bush, and they voted in a socialist government. This is what I call an intelligent populace.
VD: Do you think that all this could get so awful that it could lead to a second American Revolution?
MB: Yeah, I think it would, but if a revolution occurs in the United States, it can only happen from the Right. It can't happen from the Left. We don't have a tradition of that... It's not like we have this enlightened public. We're not like Europe. We don't have their understanding of things. Americans don't make those kinds of connections; we're not trained historically. In order to understand what's going on right now with the American Empire, you have to figure out—and this is the crucial point—that 9/11 did not emerge out of a political vacuum. It had a history. We did certain things over a long period of time in the Middle East and to Arab people. Since they could never get a hearing, finally that's what occurred. That doesn't justify the death of 3,000 civilians—I'm not saying that. But how do you justify the death of a half million Iraqi children over the sanctions? How do you justify the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis now? The butchery that we've visited upon that nation, what they did to us was nothing compared to what we've done to them, but Americans don't make those kinds of connections.
It was the same thing with the Ayatollah Khomeini revolution. After all, we put the Shaw in power in 1953. That regime was brutal; it tortured people. We supplied the torture equipment and the torturers and everything else. Then the American people, when that revolution takes place and they take our hostages, instead of the American people saying, "Well, what would you expect?" They react with horror and outrage and their feelings are hurt. This is really bright. Boy, that's really thinking historically.
When I say hopeless, I'm talking hopeless. How many books have I read? Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam. There's so many that have shown that the nation's going to hell in a basket, let me give you the data, and then in the last 10 pages somehow they pull a rabbit out of a hat. I mean, optimism is a great thing, but if it's not based in reality it's called stupidity. My question to Putnam or any of those folks is, well, that's great, but show me the mechanism of how that's going to change. Show me who it is. In order for that to happen, Americans have to make certain types of connections. And to sit around and say the people that precipitated 9/11 are simply evil and insane, this is not an analysis. We're not going to have that analysis. It's not going to happen.
VD: What's interesting to me is that you look at Jimmy Carter and his role in current events. While you applaud some of the stuff that he did, you point out in the book that even he made diplomatic errors, in particular the Carter Doctrine in 1980 that started the military buildup in the Persian Gulf. You attribute both 9/11 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq to Carter and his response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. If the most levelheaded president of my lifetime can screw up this badly, then what hope is there? Carter was the alternative. What alternative is left?
MB: Yeah, it's a tragic story. I have to tell you, if there's one person I'd like to sit down and have a beer with, it's Jimmy. I wonder what's in his mind in the sense that he was the person who really understood that we were causing our problems. The whole business about spiritual malaise and soul searching and having to cut back on energy and how we were engaged in human-rights violations, he saw it all. And then, under the pressure of losing popularity and the influence of [Carter's National Security Advisor] Zbigniew Brzezinski—who, after all, is a Pole who hated the Soviet Union—the Carter Doctrine emerged. Not only that, Brzezinski, in 1998, did an interview in Paris in which he admitted that he and Carter started training the Muhjadeen planning to draw the Soviet Union into Afghanistan six months before they invaded. They set a trap for them. 9/11 is the blowback from Carter's policies. What an incredible irony.
The real problem is that we've never been able to get out of the Cold War mentality. As much as Carter tried, he couldn't do it. He couldn't see that what the Soviet Union was doing with Afghanistan was a defensive move against the Arab world, which we then, of course, got into later on.
So it's very, very hard to break that grip of this Cold War belief that there's this great evil out there and our goal is to combat it. It's now quite clear from KGB documents that have been opened up that the Soviet Union was risk-averse. They were not interested in engaging us. We were the ones goading. In fact, their greatest fear was Germany, not the United States. That whole war is now being rewritten. When I see in the National Security Statement of 2002, written by Condoleeza Rice, when I see her writing that during the Cold War we faced a risk-averse adversary, this is a statement that could never have been uttered during the Cold War. Now it's OK to say it because we have replaced the enemy with another one—and this one, of course, is different and completely black and dark and horrible. We've always got to have a Hitler.
VD: It would appear that the Cold War was largely an invention designed to maintain the U.S. and U.S.S.R. as superpowers. However, this battle of gestures led to proxy wars, such as Afghanistan, that mobilized the Arab world, in turn creating a fervent enemy that is real.
MB: Finally, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. That's essentially what really happened. I'm not saying to our readers that I think 9/11 was imaginary or that it didn't occur. I'm saying that finally you do enough crummy things to a certain segment of the world and, you know what, they're going to get angry.
VD: Going back to Jimmy Carter for a moment, you quote historian Gaddis Smith regarding Carter, saying that he failed "because he asked the American people to think as citizens of the world with an obligation toward future generations." You then ask, rhetorically, who really failed, Jimmy Carter or the American people. Looking at that moment in U.S. history—that hiccup of reason and perceived failure in U.S. diplomacy—do you think this was the point at which America was lost? Was Carter our last shot of getting out of that Cold War mentality?
MB: I think so. If we wanted to think not solely in terms of personality but in structural terms, George Modelski, a political scientist, wrote a book Long Cycles in World Politics. He distinguished in every civilization four phases. The final phase, the serious bit of decline, he assigned to the period 1971-1975. What he really said was in 1971 you had the repeal of Bretton Woods, and that was the launching of finance capitalism—in other words globalization really took off at that time. The second thing that occurred was Vietnam, which bled us incredibly—not only morally, but it cost roughly two-thirds of a trillion dollars in 1967 dollars. That was so debilitating to us, and we lost the war on top of it.
It was only at a point like that, where we were so weakened, that the patient is willing to turn to the therapist when they're about to have a nervous breakdown. That's what happened to the United States. By 1974 you had [Sen.] Frank Church doing all those hearings about all the crummy things the CIA was doing. There was Watergate. There was a crisis of nerve. Then Jimmy comes along from a Christian point of view that I admire. Bush sits around reading the gospel of death. Jimmy Carter's kind of Christianity was not necessarily turn the other cheek, but that the world was more complicated than just the enemy being out there. In classic terms, original sin exists across the board. What's ours? He really wanted us to do some soul searching. By 1976, when he got elected, I think we needed that. The American people were willing to listen to someone who was talking in those terms.
The only problem is that's to swim against the tide of American history. Our whole history, from the revolution, has been posited about defining ourselves in terms of opposition. It was about not being someone else. There's a problem with that. If you're going to define yourself in terms of what you're not, in a certain sense you're never going to figure out who you are. That's the Achilles heel in American history, that we don't know. As a result you're always going to be nervous, you're always going to be on edge, and you're always going to be projecting the problem outward. Jimmy comes along at the right time and says lets not look outward and look at ourselves. For a couple years we were willing to do that, but it was something so out of step with the rest of American history that it couldn't be sustained.
Then finally you had the Hollywood version of what the future of America would be in the person of Ronald Reagan... He weaved a story, a "Morning in America" and how great it was going to be. It was based on no reality whatsoever, and that's exactly what people wanted to hear. They took the Hollywood version, and we're living the consequences of that now. All the vilification of George W. Bush is entertaining—and I'm certainly willing to pitch in and help—but the truth is that Bush didn't come out of nowhere any more than 9/11 came out of nowhere. We have a history too. It takes a nation of ignorance and violence to produce a president like Bush.
VD: You state at the end of Chapter Four that for us to reverse course "requires a grace, a flexibility and an imagination" that you believe Americans don't have. What do you think it would take for Americans to acquire this grace, flexibility and imagination?
MB: Well, in a dramatic sense, an act of God, because it's not going to happen. To take the examples of two nations that were on a supremely self-destructive course—Germany and Japan in the '30s and '40s—what it took to get them to turn around was that they were utterly and totally destroyed...
I don't believe that al Qaeda is going to destroy us. They're going to erode us, but it's not like they're going to be firebombing Minneapolis. It's not going to happen in the same way, but what will happen—the appropriate model is not Germany or Japan but ancient Rome. It basically died from a thousand cuts.
VD: You pose the question: Who will take over for us, China or the European Union? Who would you say is the frontrunner right now? Could you see a third possibility, such as a Middle Eastern power, say Saudi Arabia, rising to take the place of the American Empire?
MB: I don't think that the Arab nations have it to get their act together. Those regimes are terribly corrupt. They also are very oppressive of their people. I think that the Arab nations will play... the role of the source of attrition that weakens us beyond belief and beyond repair. Their historic role is that they will be the thousand cuts that debilitate us.
While we're wasting all our money, time and energy fighting this shadow enemy, the money is piling up in China and the E.U. ... They're busy building their economies and doing the types of things that intelligent civilizations do. So, it's hard to know in that contest what will happen. But I have no doubt in my mind that by 2040 we will be taking our marching orders from other people.
This review originally appeared in the BOULDER WEEKLY
The End of Empire
Historian Morris Berman outlines the fall of the American Empire in Dark Ages America
by Vince Darcangelo
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Morris Berman's Dark Ages America: The Final Phase of Empire probably won't make anyone's Best Books for the Beach list this summer. Let's just say it doesn't have a happy ending—or beginning or middle. What Dark Ages America does have is a heavy helping of facts and commentary concerning the modern-day United States—and the news isn't good. Berman offers a hard, honest look in the mirror many Americans aren't willing to take, declaring that America's global supremacy has reached its end.
Putting us in historical context, Berman draws comparisons between 21st-century America and the latter days of the Roman Empire, concluding that America is entering a dark age that will reduce us to second- or third-rate status by 2040, and that it is too late to reverse course.
A cultural historian, Berman first garnered attention with his 2000 book The Twilight of American Culture, in which he predicted that America would soon come under attack as a counter-response to our corporate- and military-driven global policies. In Dark Ages America, Berman says that we've yet to learn the lessons of 9/11 and have set a course for cultural collapse and global irrelevance. He does so by discussing the moral decay of American culture, the blundering invasion of Iraq, the near-comical political missteps of the Bush administration, and an in-depth exploration of America's global policies in the 20th century, examining our postwar rise and our post-Vietnam fall.
Vince Darcangelo: What was the motivation for writing Dark Ages America, and what sort of response do you hope the book elicits?
Morris Berman: I never expected to write it. I had written The Twilight of American Culture, and it appeared 15 months before 9/11... After 9/11, something was staring at me so obviously. In Twilight, I had done a comparison of the contemporary United States and Rome in the late-empire period. I compared the two in terms of structural factors that were doing each civilization in and arguing that they were the same factors.
But there was one point of comparison that I completely overlooked, and that became apparent only after 9/11—that was that Rome was invaded and then fought a long war of attrition that was finally lost. That's what happening to us. There is no way we're going to defeat terrorism. It's an elusive technique. How can you defeat terrorism?
Not that al Qaeda can win, but they've got lots of time and lots of anger. They're going to keep doing what they're doing, and we're going to keep disintegrating.
There was the motivation. As far as my guess of what difference it will make, I would say none at all... I expect to be vilified and ignored.
VD: Which would you prefer?
MB: There is this saying that bad press is better than no press. I don't know if that's true. Part of the problem of being vilified is that it usually involves a distortion.
VD: If what you're saying is true and there's nothing we can do about it, shouldn't I be stockpiling weapons for the coming Dark Age instead of reading this book?
MB: The question is what you would use the weapon on. Maybe we should just shoot ourselves. In Twilight I talked about the one thing people could do was cultural preservation... I saw that as the only solution, but it's not really a solution. When finally the only thing that can be done is what individuals can do, that means the system has completely broken down. Our problems are structural, and if problems are structural, then the solutions have to be structural. That's Sociology 101. Individual solutions are nice, but they're not solutions, they're responses. It would be nice if people preserved things, but I don't believe there's a hope in turning this situation around. It's not a question of whether optimism is good and pessimism is bad. It's a question of, alright, if you don't believe what I'm saying when I say there is no way of turning things around, show me the levers of social change, point to them, tell me how this is gonna happen.
And don't point to the Democratic Party, because the Democratic Party is intellectually bankrupt and politically impotent. Don't talk to me about Hillary, for God's sake. She's rattling the sabers against Iran. What a joke. The Democratic Party has essentially bought into the Republican Party. We saw that during the Clinton years; he was just a Republican in Democratic clothing. The choice between the Republicans and Democrats is the choice between empire and empire-lite.
We do not have a large section of this country up in arms. They just aren't. They may give Bush a low approval rating, but the truth is that if we were winning the war in Iraq his approval rating would be very high. It's not a moral objection or a political objection—most Americans have no understanding of the war in Iraq; they don't even understand what happened except that it didn't work out well. We're in a situation where we can torture people. To my knowledge, we're the first modern nation that has made torture legal. On top of that, we put the guy who legalized it head of the Department of Justice. George Orwell move over. This is surreal.
And Americans aren't upset about that. They're not upset about Abu Ghraib. I would even argue that Bush got reelected because of Abu Ghraib, not in spite of it. It's not like Americans are upset that people can be detained indefinitely without trial and the right to an attorney. They're not upset that the NSA is spying on them. I don't know what it would take to get the American people upset. You could probably herd Iraqis into gas chambers and Americans would say, "Gee, we shouldn't be doing that." The days of Vietnam protests are definitely not here. We don't have a similar situation. We don't have a public that's aware, outraged or even upset. We have a public that basically is drugged, apathetic and interested in shopping.
VD: In the book you say that America "may be only one more terrorist attack away from a police state." Should this occur, how do you think the American public would respond? Do you think people would have this moment of recognition that they were complicit in the erosion of civil liberties that permitted the institution of a "police state"?
MB: I don't think so. After all, there's a large section of statistics about American awareness, including American attitudes toward the erosion of civil liberties. Something like a third are opposed to the Bill of Rights. I have to say this is true even of people that are very intelligent... The truth is that very bright people in large numbers voted for George W. Bush, supported the war and continue to think that he's even wise. And these are quite intelligent people. You have to ask how is that happening. There's something going on with this enormous blind spot that comes out of fear and a preconceived framework and so on. It's not like people are turning around and saying there's something horribly wrong, we're on the wrong track. When you have bright people supporting these policies and the erosion of civil liberties and so on, the comparison, it's a bit of a strain, but 10 percent of the Nazi party held Ph.Ds. This is not merely about the ignorance or stupidity of the American people in terms of a blue-collar ignorance of the Bill of Rights or something like that. It's bright people saying that this is OK. What could be more powerful in terms of digging ourselves into a grave? So when I say we might be one terrorist attack away from a police state, it seems pretty obvious because we're going to respond by rallying around repressive policies, not by saying that somehow we're exacerbating the whole problem. Even bright people are going to say that. I don't see what hope there is.
After all, after 3/11—when 200 people were killed in the bombings of Madrid—three days later there was an election and they voted out Aznar, who backed Bush, and they voted in a socialist government. This is what I call an intelligent populace.
VD: Do you think that all this could get so awful that it could lead to a second American Revolution?
MB: Yeah, I think it would, but if a revolution occurs in the United States, it can only happen from the Right. It can't happen from the Left. We don't have a tradition of that... It's not like we have this enlightened public. We're not like Europe. We don't have their understanding of things. Americans don't make those kinds of connections; we're not trained historically. In order to understand what's going on right now with the American Empire, you have to figure out—and this is the crucial point—that 9/11 did not emerge out of a political vacuum. It had a history. We did certain things over a long period of time in the Middle East and to Arab people. Since they could never get a hearing, finally that's what occurred. That doesn't justify the death of 3,000 civilians—I'm not saying that. But how do you justify the death of a half million Iraqi children over the sanctions? How do you justify the deaths of 100,000 Iraqis now? The butchery that we've visited upon that nation, what they did to us was nothing compared to what we've done to them, but Americans don't make those kinds of connections.
It was the same thing with the Ayatollah Khomeini revolution. After all, we put the Shaw in power in 1953. That regime was brutal; it tortured people. We supplied the torture equipment and the torturers and everything else. Then the American people, when that revolution takes place and they take our hostages, instead of the American people saying, "Well, what would you expect?" They react with horror and outrage and their feelings are hurt. This is really bright. Boy, that's really thinking historically.
When I say hopeless, I'm talking hopeless. How many books have I read? Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam. There's so many that have shown that the nation's going to hell in a basket, let me give you the data, and then in the last 10 pages somehow they pull a rabbit out of a hat. I mean, optimism is a great thing, but if it's not based in reality it's called stupidity. My question to Putnam or any of those folks is, well, that's great, but show me the mechanism of how that's going to change. Show me who it is. In order for that to happen, Americans have to make certain types of connections. And to sit around and say the people that precipitated 9/11 are simply evil and insane, this is not an analysis. We're not going to have that analysis. It's not going to happen.
VD: What's interesting to me is that you look at Jimmy Carter and his role in current events. While you applaud some of the stuff that he did, you point out in the book that even he made diplomatic errors, in particular the Carter Doctrine in 1980 that started the military buildup in the Persian Gulf. You attribute both 9/11 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq to Carter and his response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. If the most levelheaded president of my lifetime can screw up this badly, then what hope is there? Carter was the alternative. What alternative is left?
MB: Yeah, it's a tragic story. I have to tell you, if there's one person I'd like to sit down and have a beer with, it's Jimmy. I wonder what's in his mind in the sense that he was the person who really understood that we were causing our problems. The whole business about spiritual malaise and soul searching and having to cut back on energy and how we were engaged in human-rights violations, he saw it all. And then, under the pressure of losing popularity and the influence of [Carter's National Security Advisor] Zbigniew Brzezinski—who, after all, is a Pole who hated the Soviet Union—the Carter Doctrine emerged. Not only that, Brzezinski, in 1998, did an interview in Paris in which he admitted that he and Carter started training the Muhjadeen planning to draw the Soviet Union into Afghanistan six months before they invaded. They set a trap for them. 9/11 is the blowback from Carter's policies. What an incredible irony.
The real problem is that we've never been able to get out of the Cold War mentality. As much as Carter tried, he couldn't do it. He couldn't see that what the Soviet Union was doing with Afghanistan was a defensive move against the Arab world, which we then, of course, got into later on.
So it's very, very hard to break that grip of this Cold War belief that there's this great evil out there and our goal is to combat it. It's now quite clear from KGB documents that have been opened up that the Soviet Union was risk-averse. They were not interested in engaging us. We were the ones goading. In fact, their greatest fear was Germany, not the United States. That whole war is now being rewritten. When I see in the National Security Statement of 2002, written by Condoleeza Rice, when I see her writing that during the Cold War we faced a risk-averse adversary, this is a statement that could never have been uttered during the Cold War. Now it's OK to say it because we have replaced the enemy with another one—and this one, of course, is different and completely black and dark and horrible. We've always got to have a Hitler.
VD: It would appear that the Cold War was largely an invention designed to maintain the U.S. and U.S.S.R. as superpowers. However, this battle of gestures led to proxy wars, such as Afghanistan, that mobilized the Arab world, in turn creating a fervent enemy that is real.
MB: Finally, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. That's essentially what really happened. I'm not saying to our readers that I think 9/11 was imaginary or that it didn't occur. I'm saying that finally you do enough crummy things to a certain segment of the world and, you know what, they're going to get angry.
VD: Going back to Jimmy Carter for a moment, you quote historian Gaddis Smith regarding Carter, saying that he failed "because he asked the American people to think as citizens of the world with an obligation toward future generations." You then ask, rhetorically, who really failed, Jimmy Carter or the American people. Looking at that moment in U.S. history—that hiccup of reason and perceived failure in U.S. diplomacy—do you think this was the point at which America was lost? Was Carter our last shot of getting out of that Cold War mentality?
MB: I think so. If we wanted to think not solely in terms of personality but in structural terms, George Modelski, a political scientist, wrote a book Long Cycles in World Politics. He distinguished in every civilization four phases. The final phase, the serious bit of decline, he assigned to the period 1971-1975. What he really said was in 1971 you had the repeal of Bretton Woods, and that was the launching of finance capitalism—in other words globalization really took off at that time. The second thing that occurred was Vietnam, which bled us incredibly—not only morally, but it cost roughly two-thirds of a trillion dollars in 1967 dollars. That was so debilitating to us, and we lost the war on top of it.
It was only at a point like that, where we were so weakened, that the patient is willing to turn to the therapist when they're about to have a nervous breakdown. That's what happened to the United States. By 1974 you had [Sen.] Frank Church doing all those hearings about all the crummy things the CIA was doing. There was Watergate. There was a crisis of nerve. Then Jimmy comes along from a Christian point of view that I admire. Bush sits around reading the gospel of death. Jimmy Carter's kind of Christianity was not necessarily turn the other cheek, but that the world was more complicated than just the enemy being out there. In classic terms, original sin exists across the board. What's ours? He really wanted us to do some soul searching. By 1976, when he got elected, I think we needed that. The American people were willing to listen to someone who was talking in those terms.
The only problem is that's to swim against the tide of American history. Our whole history, from the revolution, has been posited about defining ourselves in terms of opposition. It was about not being someone else. There's a problem with that. If you're going to define yourself in terms of what you're not, in a certain sense you're never going to figure out who you are. That's the Achilles heel in American history, that we don't know. As a result you're always going to be nervous, you're always going to be on edge, and you're always going to be projecting the problem outward. Jimmy comes along at the right time and says lets not look outward and look at ourselves. For a couple years we were willing to do that, but it was something so out of step with the rest of American history that it couldn't be sustained.
Then finally you had the Hollywood version of what the future of America would be in the person of Ronald Reagan... He weaved a story, a "Morning in America" and how great it was going to be. It was based on no reality whatsoever, and that's exactly what people wanted to hear. They took the Hollywood version, and we're living the consequences of that now. All the vilification of George W. Bush is entertaining—and I'm certainly willing to pitch in and help—but the truth is that Bush didn't come out of nowhere any more than 9/11 came out of nowhere. We have a history too. It takes a nation of ignorance and violence to produce a president like Bush.
VD: You state at the end of Chapter Four that for us to reverse course "requires a grace, a flexibility and an imagination" that you believe Americans don't have. What do you think it would take for Americans to acquire this grace, flexibility and imagination?
MB: Well, in a dramatic sense, an act of God, because it's not going to happen. To take the examples of two nations that were on a supremely self-destructive course—Germany and Japan in the '30s and '40s—what it took to get them to turn around was that they were utterly and totally destroyed...
I don't believe that al Qaeda is going to destroy us. They're going to erode us, but it's not like they're going to be firebombing Minneapolis. It's not going to happen in the same way, but what will happen—the appropriate model is not Germany or Japan but ancient Rome. It basically died from a thousand cuts.
VD: You pose the question: Who will take over for us, China or the European Union? Who would you say is the frontrunner right now? Could you see a third possibility, such as a Middle Eastern power, say Saudi Arabia, rising to take the place of the American Empire?
MB: I don't think that the Arab nations have it to get their act together. Those regimes are terribly corrupt. They also are very oppressive of their people. I think that the Arab nations will play... the role of the source of attrition that weakens us beyond belief and beyond repair. Their historic role is that they will be the thousand cuts that debilitate us.
While we're wasting all our money, time and energy fighting this shadow enemy, the money is piling up in China and the E.U. ... They're busy building their economies and doing the types of things that intelligent civilizations do. So, it's hard to know in that contest what will happen. But I have no doubt in my mind that by 2040 we will be taking our marching orders from other people.
March 31, 2025
This is an especially poignant book, describing much of what America has become for the past forty or so years: an empire in dire need to showcase itself as the vibrant, energetic and glorious country that it once was. Berman finds some similarities to the fall of the roman empire: the need of empires in their last stages to showcase their "strength" towards (much more) weaker states/nations, because they simply cannot compete with anyone else.
I would guess that this would be a hard-to-swallow pill to most Americans as they are described as empty, alienated, violent and ignorant. And this goes to show that one has the government that they wish for.
Writing this as a second Trump term is practically starting, orange man's actions seem to simply continuate what the second Bush administration did (as these were mostly the focus of this book). The erosion of scientific trust, the creation of "enemies" to have someone to wage a war on, the attempt to find technological solutions to social or political problems aiming to not have to deal with the underlying cause, the complete lack of self-examination that would make americans realise all of this.
A key simple ideas that stuck to me even without writing them in all the notes I wrote: there is no being "un-British", "un-Italian", but there is something as being unamerican, and that means you are against whatever "America" wants, such as rampant individuality at the cost of the community, a fixation with war, a need to demonstrate how strong America is.
During the Great Depression, with all the government subsidies and help, people were driving to get their benefits. In an America where an increasing amount of people are left without jobs, and are sometimes forced to live in their car, what does that say about the empathy that americans can display? I can only assume that empathy is one of the things that makes you very unamerican.
And while some of the counterarguments that he considers for his own position, mainly, the pendulum description, he seems to give credit to and could be possible that americans tend to shift to the right and then there will be a movement towards the left that will counter it, the right shifts have been increasingly stronger, will the left shifts have been barely noticeable (if they have existed) to the point where we are now. Think about Obama saving the bankers instead of the common folks, think about the killings during his administration, the free money given to the health insurance companies, etc.
At the end of the day, as Berman argues, it seems that it is inescapable what America is and will go through: whoever wants to be president of US of A will necessarily have to agree to be in charge of an empire, which means using military force as it has been used for the past years.
One could argue that Europe (what he concludes will be the next power) also went through a similar process last century (think Benito, Adolf, etc.), and that they are not so different than us, as some of the critics of this book seem to point to, they had a cultural background to which fall back to. American exceptionalism excels at pointing out that America is different than the rest of the world, and maybe it is different in that it does not have a cultural past, something to be proud of beyond the military victories.
The cities and their design is one of the last subjects Berman touches on this book and that also seems to matter here: what is a city if not an attempt to make a community? But America has barely any of those existing today, for most of them are suburban constructions that also do not give a sense of belonging to a given space. One of the things Europeans are most proud of are architectural designs: living, vibrant cities that give rise to communities in which people flourish beyond their economic development. Oh boy, where are americans living?
Berman quotes "Shine, Perishing Republic", and I think it makes sense to do the same:
While this America settles in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily thickening to empire
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops and sighs out, and the mass hardens,
I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make fruit, the fruit rots to make earth.
If one thinks in hegelian terms, then it makes sense that this is one step towards the realisation of the Spirit, and in such, America will likely give place to a better, freer, more beautiful, more realised society.
I would guess that this would be a hard-to-swallow pill to most Americans as they are described as empty, alienated, violent and ignorant. And this goes to show that one has the government that they wish for.
Writing this as a second Trump term is practically starting, orange man's actions seem to simply continuate what the second Bush administration did (as these were mostly the focus of this book). The erosion of scientific trust, the creation of "enemies" to have someone to wage a war on, the attempt to find technological solutions to social or political problems aiming to not have to deal with the underlying cause, the complete lack of self-examination that would make americans realise all of this.
A key simple ideas that stuck to me even without writing them in all the notes I wrote: there is no being "un-British", "un-Italian", but there is something as being unamerican, and that means you are against whatever "America" wants, such as rampant individuality at the cost of the community, a fixation with war, a need to demonstrate how strong America is.
During the Great Depression, with all the government subsidies and help, people were driving to get their benefits. In an America where an increasing amount of people are left without jobs, and are sometimes forced to live in their car, what does that say about the empathy that americans can display? I can only assume that empathy is one of the things that makes you very unamerican.
And while some of the counterarguments that he considers for his own position, mainly, the pendulum description, he seems to give credit to and could be possible that americans tend to shift to the right and then there will be a movement towards the left that will counter it, the right shifts have been increasingly stronger, will the left shifts have been barely noticeable (if they have existed) to the point where we are now. Think about Obama saving the bankers instead of the common folks, think about the killings during his administration, the free money given to the health insurance companies, etc.
At the end of the day, as Berman argues, it seems that it is inescapable what America is and will go through: whoever wants to be president of US of A will necessarily have to agree to be in charge of an empire, which means using military force as it has been used for the past years.
One could argue that Europe (what he concludes will be the next power) also went through a similar process last century (think Benito, Adolf, etc.), and that they are not so different than us, as some of the critics of this book seem to point to, they had a cultural background to which fall back to. American exceptionalism excels at pointing out that America is different than the rest of the world, and maybe it is different in that it does not have a cultural past, something to be proud of beyond the military victories.
The cities and their design is one of the last subjects Berman touches on this book and that also seems to matter here: what is a city if not an attempt to make a community? But America has barely any of those existing today, for most of them are suburban constructions that also do not give a sense of belonging to a given space. One of the things Europeans are most proud of are architectural designs: living, vibrant cities that give rise to communities in which people flourish beyond their economic development. Oh boy, where are americans living?
Berman quotes "Shine, Perishing Republic", and I think it makes sense to do the same:
While this America settles in the mould of its vulgarity, heavily thickening to empire
And protest, only a bubble in the molten mass, pops and sighs out, and the mass hardens,
I sadly smiling remember that the flower fades to make fruit, the fruit rots to make earth.
If one thinks in hegelian terms, then it makes sense that this is one step towards the realisation of the Spirit, and in such, America will likely give place to a better, freer, more beautiful, more realised society.
July 30, 2017
If you pick up a book with a title like Dark Ages America, you pretty much know what you're going to get...and Berman delivers it in spades. When he wrote the book in 2006, there was a lot of evidence to support the idea that the American empire was paralleling late-phase Rome. The Iraq war was in full swing, George W Bush had been re-elected, and Americans seemed uninterested in honestly addressing what was going on at home or what was being done in their name abroad. And this all _before_ the market crash of 2008 and the election of Trump. It is, to say the least, a thoroughly depressing read...especially when you know what happened after the book was published. So, if you want to understand what's been happening culturally and politically in America for the last 50 years or so, this is the book for you. Just be prepared to be brought down. Way down.
June 22, 2023
Frightening, enlightening, and correct. A brutal and unflinching look at America from the early aughts...many of the predictions have come true and hint and a continuing decline regarding what it means to be an American. Horrifying in its implications, humbling in its revelations. Certainly one of the best Current Events histories that I have ever read.
September 27, 2019
car culture + suburbia = oil dependence = war culture
July 13, 2022
From 2024
A very reversed and truncated treatment of recently passed events. It just didn't pass muster. A product of its time.
A very reversed and truncated treatment of recently passed events. It just didn't pass muster. A product of its time.
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