Rating: 
Summary: A hope to solve the rifts around us
Review: This book offers hope, a hope to solve the rift within our nation, the rift between us and the other civilized nations of the world and the rift between civilized nations and the rest of the world. Read other PNM reviews on Amazon - quite a few liberals and conservatives seem to agree with Barnett which is quite a feat and offers important common ground in all of the three arenas mentioned above.
My first praise for the book is that it defies the partisanship that most of us have grown weary of - we want a solution that addresses the real problems and works and not one that gives our 'side' a 'point'. He is unafraid to praise and criticize the administration and its critics as his analysis sees fit. People are now aware of the dangers in this world and want results regardless of who provides them because the stakes are so high.
Along similar lines, Barnett's book is well reasoned and clear but not a dry academic work. He takes us through the background and history we need to put the situation in context. As others on Amazon have stated, through his force of reasoning you end up reevaluating some of your positions that you may have held dear, such as immigration policy, foreign policy, military policy, and outsourcing.
Another area of high praise I have is in his richly human presentation throughout the book. His perspective is not from some detached analyst in an 'ivory tower' but from a person with real feelings and experiences who isn't afraid to share them with you. He offers a profound interconnection between his personal life and his work that reveals the depth of his thinking, for example he shares his experience with battling his young daughter's cancer and how it taught him to never give up the battle for a positive outcome. How often do you read a book about globalization that is inspiring at this level?
I also relished the moments when he waxes philosophical as he reveals the differences between horizontal and vertical thinking. He uses this in describing his own experiences growing up, how his son is learning this and how nations often behave this way. There is a place and role for each of us no matter how we think the trick is to apply the appropriate type of thinking to the roles we choose. (You want a physician who knows his subject deeply but an architect should know his broadly.) As a horizontal thinker he qualifies as a Renaissance Man.
After reading The Lexus and the Olive Tree by Thomas Friedman, I was inspired to believe that globalization was a positive trend, however globalization seemed like little more than noise (such as Seattle anti-WTO & the waves of outsourcing pain) in the events unfolding around us. Now in perspective, globalization takes center stage in all of our lives. Thomas Friedman is about a general concept of globalization whereas Barnett describes the historical context, the practical impact and the hope it offers all.
After seeing Barnett on C-SPAN and reading his blogs I thought his book would simply offer greater insight into his thinking on globalization, however it has become much more than that it has become a textbook that I have filled with notes and questions. His book also offers a glimpse into the future synergy between written copy and online technology. On his website he offers the 'extended DVD' version of his book. You get the 'deleted scenes', the slides, updates and so much more.
Some critics view his work as overly optimistic, and it is typical to hear criticisms without positive solutions but he offers a solution that gives the world hope. Do you prefer to sit paralyzed with fear or move forward with the best answer you have?
I know the book is a success when I find myself continually asking, "What do we need to do to now?" or "How do I apply this in my life?", and then attempt to put issues into the context of the maps Tom has provided.
And my criticisms? They pale in comparison - buy the book and prepare for a complete education.
Rating:
Summary: Good wording. Hmmm...
Review: This is a darn good book because of the great ways the words are strung together in that, uhm, that really good way. Yeah, that good way! So I am bestowing on it five stars because that is exactly what it deserves. I deem it so!Dumb review, huh? But no dumber than a great many you can find on am4zon. The problem, as I've just demonstrated, is that any nut (present company excepted! :-) can write just about any inane thing they want about a book on am4zon, and if it doesn't fall miles outside some vague and inadequate "guidelines," the staff typically refuses to remove it despite complaints from readers, authors, and publishers. If it weren't for our admission that this is a bogus review, it would likely stay up permanently! Here on am4zon you can find one line reviews, meaningless reviews, reviews that say things like, "I didn't read it, but someone said it sucked," and generally clueless reviews that make you wonder what on earth the reviewer was thinking in actually posting publicly such total nonsense. These grossly ill-informed reviews affect sales (a wash for the site as some of these reviews are positive but equally silly), authors' and publishers' reputations, and the quality of information available to book buyers. But the site doesn't care, and its unwillingness to remove even the most absurd reviews means they stay. This is why there was the recent scandal wherein it was learned that many authors had countered ridiculous bad reviews with their own anonymous reviews of their own works. (Could you blame them for being deceptive on a site that the N.Y. Times reported to have accepted payments from publishers to "place" their books near the top of the site's "best seller" list?) Clearly, am4zon needs to improve the policies and methods by which it administers reviews. Please join me in getting this message out in your own reviews. Sadly, nothing else seems to get the attention of the staff here. This "review" should be no reflection on the book listed on this page. We suspect the author would support this effort to reform am4zon's review policies.
Rating: 
Summary: New Map + Vision = Delusion?!
Review: This is a fascinating book that gives you a unique insightful look within one of the sharpest mind to populate our government's Defense department intelligentsia. Barnett is an excellent writer that makes even dry subjects easy to read. Barnett's foreign policy framework is very clear and understandable. He splits the World into two. The first part is the Functioning Core, countries positively engaged in globalization. The second part is the Non-integrated Gap, countries that are not part of globalization. Globalization as implemented by the Core countries (industrialized countries for the most part) is a positive force that promotes democracy, free trade, economic growth, and peace. The countries within the Core have no incentive to combat each other. This explains the détente within the U.S. and Russia relationship. Similarly, China is no more the enemy, as it is becoming a full-fledged member of the Core. The Core countries are increasingly connected by abiding to the same trade rules, global financial markets, and international laws that promote economic growth and democracy over time. The countries within the Gap, on the other hand are disconnected. For Barnett, the more a country is disconnected from the Core, the more dysfunctional and dangerous it is. Quoting the author: "A country's potential to warrant a U.S. military response is inversely related to its globalization connectivity." We are talking here of the usual suspects, including countries in Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia. These countries are often associated with totalitarian and corrupt regimes, rapid demographic growth, declining living standards, rising unemployment rates. These countries often experience the demographic bulge mentioned by Samuel Huntington in "The Clash of Civilizations" whereby a growing young, idle male population, combined with high unemployment rate becomes a recruiting pool for terrorist networks. Per Barnett, the Core and Gap countries trade with each other. But, what they trade is not what you think. The Gap countries export to the Core: terrorism, drugs, and pandemic diseases (including Aids). The Core countries export to the Gap: security services (military interventions), globalization, and democracy. Barnett mentions a third category: the Seam countries. These countries are on the violent borders between the Core and Gap countries. Their prospect is uncertain. They can drift towards the Core or back towards the Gap. Paraphrasing some of Barnett's words, he views the U.S. foreign policy as: 1) increasing the Core's immune system capabilities for responding to September 11-like events; 2) working the Seam states to firewall the Core from the Gap's worst exports (terror, drugs, pandemics); and 3) Shrinking the Gap. Forget the Axis of Evil with just three members (Iraq, Iran, and North Korea). He has developed a long list of troubled spot countries that the U.S. should address while resolving the Iraq situation. To reduce the Gap, the U.S. will have to police the World for a very long time. He believes that the U.S. is the only country capable of such an effort. So, it has no choice but assume that role. In his view, not fulfilling this responsibility will prove disastrous. However, the military component of his theory is highly unrealistic. With Afghanistan and Iraq on its hand, the U.S. resources are exhausted. We don't have a fraction of the military power to occupy and rebuild more countries than we are already taking on right now. We are also exhausted fiscally. We are running record high Budget Deficits. And, the Bush Administration is asking Congress every quarter for extra tens if not hundred of billions to resolve the Iraq situation. More importantly, we seem to be drifting away from the Core into a fourth stand-alone category: the Uniteralist. The more unilateral our military operations will be, the more costly, unsustainable, and ultimately unsuccessful they will be. Last but not least, Barnett's military zealousness calls for a massive tax increase and implementing a permanent draft. The U.S. people won't have either of those. Barnett does not touch on that subject. For a more realistic vision, I recommend Richard Clarke's "Against all Enemies" and Wesley Clark "Winning Modern Wars." Both authors advance a better strategy, which is to address terrorism as a supranational issue that you can't fight State by State (forget the Map). Instead, our intelligence agencies should be more proactive and aggressive in cooperating with their counterparts in Europe, Asia, and everywhere possible to seize and capture terrorists, and treat them accordingly once seized.
Rating: 
Summary: Highly recommended, but read with caution.
Review: Thomas Barnett is a remarkable and very admirable fellow who has written a book that should certainly be read by more Americans. The book is well-written and Barnett comes across as someone who sincerely wants to improve the security of the United States and the world. Barnett has a powerful and inspiring (some may say intoxicating) vision of the role of the US in the 21st century. The only problem is that his approach is not workable. Those who've read the likes of Martin Van Creveld and Thomas Friedman will find some familiar thinking in this book. The author's main contention is that "disconnected" countries, those that aren't connected via information and economic networks to the rest of the world, are a huge source of danger. Such countries are usually run by a nasty elite who essentially tyrannize their populations who are left poor and angry. Having been left poor and angry, these disconnected people are ripe for becoming terrorists and their nations ripe for the location of terrorist networks, crime syndicates, and so forth. Hence, we need to use military force to go in, defeat the nasty people running things, and enforce a new order that will give the oppressed people of these societies hope so they won't need to bomb us. In the process, we'll give them new law enforcement agencies that will crack down on criminal syndicates. Reactionary types will accuse Mr. Barnett of being some kind of neo-imperialist or perhaps a global fascist. Nevertheless, I personally think that Barnett sincerely believes that what he is proposing would be a "good thing" and that it would improve the lives of the people he seeks to liberate. I'll leave the name-calling to someone else, as there are unquestionably lots of people running around who are willing to do just that. While the moral dimension to Mr. Barnett's proposal is fascinating and worthy of serious discussion (far different from the name-calling and character assassination I've heard up until now) my primary concern is whether or not the proposals in this book are cost-effective or even feasible. I'm afraid that what Mr. Barnett is proposing is far more complicated, sophisticated, and expensive than what he leads the reader to believe. Barnett frames the issue in either doing something (what he proposes) or doing nothing. He points out that in light of September 11, 2001, we can't do nothing. And then he implies we're only left with his proposal. But he doesn't fully entertain the consequences of failure. Those consequences would be lots of dead young Americans, even higher levels of anti-American sentiment around the globe, and billions of dollars wasted. And due to the complexity of what Mr. Barnett is proposing, failure is more likely than success. The essential problem here is one of complexity. Mr. Barnett's strategy focuses on the US spending extreme amounts of resources to bring order to troubled lands to harmonize them with current global economic realities. But the universe naturally tends towards disorder. As Mr. Spock pointed out, "Logic suggests that it's easier to destroy than to create." Chaos and disorder come naturally; order takes a significant input of resources. In attempting to create order in disordered places, the United States would be left extremely vulnerable to potential rivals and enemies who would simply try to create or enhance disorder in those places. This process would cost potential rivals very little but could have extremely high costs on the US on a sustained basis. An example would be Iraq, where we are hoping a mere $100 billion will bring about some kind of order. Anyone who wanted to harm us could spend far less money just to destroy that delicate order we've struggled to create. And in looking at Iraq right now, there's no guarantee that we are anywhere close to creating an orderly society. As Mr. Barnett makes a big point about "disconnectedness defines danger" he doesn't really adequately bring the importance of this back to the home-front of American society. In an increasingly interconnected world, the US benefits not just from additional connectedness to others but to additional connectedness to ourselves. Improvements in infrastructure, a better business climate, improved efficiency, and so forth all serve to make the US a more competitive place on the international level and also serve to make the US a more attractive place for international capital and human resources. Barnett wants to put off making the US more connected in a highly dicey proposition to make dysfunctional societies more safe for international capital and human resources. Considering how intractable so many of our own various social problems have been it's rather presumptuous to assume we can go about fixing other places. And the cost/benefit analysis is lacking and, at least on the surface, not all that appealing.
For all my criticisms of Mr. Barnett's proposals I need to stress that I don't necessarily think his approach will lead to catastrophe on a nationwide scale. I just fear it will be exceptionally costly and put tremendous strain on our society, our military, and our economy. All for results that are highly improbable and quite unlikely to be successfully obtained. In short, it's a prescription for a gigantic waste of resources that even if it were successful would be possibly not worth the price. There are arguably more cost-effective and sure-fire ways of achieving a more secure future for the United States. Americans who are interested in the future of US strategy need to be familiar with this book. While I strongly disagree with Mr. Barnett's proposals I also very well realize that they are and will continue to be highly influential. If you don't know what Barnett's talking about you can't even begin to understand the future debates about the US's role in the world. If you want to be a part of the discussion, get your hands on this book and become familiar with one of the most highly influential proposals available for the future of the United States and the world.
Rating:
Summary: This book, in a word: Brilliant
Review: Thomas P.M. Barnett does and incredible job of articulating the events of this world and America's involvement in them. This book provides the context to the world in which we live. I stumbled upon this work on C-SPAN late one night while on vacation. The broadcast of his presentation is available on-demand from C-SPAN, which I'm showing to anyone who is interested in politics.
His entire premise is built upon a solid foundation of common sense, backed by historical facts and figures. From this point on, if you want to argue politics, regardless of what side of the political spectrum you come from, you'll have to have read this book or you'll be left out in the cold.
Mr. Barnett is not some right-wing "talking head" spouting off about something he read about; he's not even a Republican. He is a Harvard Graduated PhD wielding government analyst with a resume that is enough to impress even his staunchest critics. Neither side of the aisle can discredit his work without sounding like a conspiracy theorist.
Overall, this book is a momentous work that will forever change the discussion of politics as we know it. A must read if you're interested on what the future has is in store for our Military, our Government, even the United States of America and the rest of the world.
Only one criticism: The end of the book reads like it was written to meet a deadline. He starts to repeat himself in places but not too badly, only for a paragraph or two.
Rating:
Summary: Thought provoking analysis
Review: Whether you agree with it or not, Barnett's analysis of the current security structure of the United States, and how it should change, will irrevocably affect the way you will think about this subject. The strategic structure Barnett posits is based on his map of the world which divides countries between the Functioning Core and the Non-Integrating Gap. The Core includes North America, Europe, Russia, China, Japan, India, parts of South America, South Africa, and Australia. The Non-Integrating Gap includes those countries we normally think of as being in the third world. The Core is economically developed, offers personal freedom to its inhabitants, and is highly connected with the rest of the Core. The Gap is non-connected, poor, experiences little personal freedom, and has a number of "bad guy" rulers who make trouble for the Core. Barnett's thesis is that the US should prepare for a twenty-first century mission of "shrinking the gap". Unfortunately, he finds us ill-prepared to do so. He points out that our military still has the cold war focus of preparing to engage a "near peer" foe using massed high tech weaponry. What is needed instead is a dual-mission force that can fight actions like Afghanistan and Iraq by applying overwhelming force against relatively unsophisticated foes, as well as provide the nation building expertise now woefully missing in Iraq. Barnett is a Pentagon think tank type who has worked with Wall Street financial analysts to project what the security environment will be in this century. He concentrates on four flows: money, energy, population, and security. He sees the US as an exporter of security to the rest of the world. By the judicious application of force (read: get rid of Saddam, Kim Jong Il, and the ayatollahs) he believes the US can create a world in which poverty is decreased, personal freedom is increased, and connectivity serves as a ballast against disruptions of order. A subtext of the book is Barnett's recounting of how policy is made in the Pentagon and how analysts vie for the "killer brief" as a path to influence and promotion. I seriously doubt that anyone will agree with all, or even most, of what Barnett presents. However, there is little doubt that his ideas are shaping the debate, and informed citizens would do well to acquaint themselves with them.
Rating: 
Summary: the pentagon"s new map hits #1
Review: yesterday i had an interview with thomas p.m. barnett
he is a funny man he writes mystyrey books but some times
hororror action he wrote this book for his wife
|
