Dialogue of civilizations Book

Due to my current borderline obsession with social collapse, I was intrigued when I saw this recommended on the Multnomah County Library's website. So I placed a hold and received a copy not long after and got to reading.

I liked it. Hence the three stars. I didn't quite love it. Not because of any lack of good information and ideas or a lack of quality writing, but more because I wanted it to be a little more riled up. A bit more emotional. It was very straightforward and even, which is perfectly commendable but doesn't get my blood flowing.

Jacobs basically claims that North America (the U.S. and Canada, that is) is teetering dangerously close on the brink of sliding into a Dark Age. She cites five major reasons why: the continuing degradation of community and family, our higher education system, misuse of science and technology, governmental representation that has become disconnected from local needs, and the failure of self-regulation of the learned professions.

I found all the points really intriguing, with quite a number of viewpoints offered that I hadn't before heard or considered. Her talk of the degradation of community and family was a great section, not focusing on ranting moralistic concerns so much as on the ever-worsening economic brutalities that households face while trying to support themselves, as well as the destruction of community (in its most holistic sense) brought about by those economic hardships as well as poor planning practices. For instance, she takes suburban design to task. Again, this is not in some kind of moralistic view in which she proclaims suburbs evil, but rather she simply points out the ways in which thought-processes behind their planning have been terribly misguided and destructive, often leading to neighborhoods that lack any real sense of community.

Her taking to task of most of the universities in North America was also quite compelling. It comes across as a somewhat more dispassionate version of Wendell Berry's arguments in Life Is a Miracle: An Essay Against Modern Superstition, although the substance of the arguments do have their differences, as well. Still, she quite convincingly argues that universities have become little more than credentialing agencies, rather than institutions that work to create fully formed human beings via comprehensive education (that fosters and creates the ability of critical and independent thought) and mentoring.

Those are just a few of the intriguing arguments Jacobs makes in the book, and if they sound interesting, I certainly would recommend reading it. I perhaps prefer this sort of information to come to me via a more agitated voice--someone railing, though ideally not to the degree of incoherence. That Dark Age Ahead doesn't come in that exact voice is no condemnation of it as a fine bit of writing. Hell, for some, it's probably a much more palatable approach to a topic that can easily become very emotionally charged. For me, I would have preferred a bit more Berry-type anger.

But then, I have Berry for that. Jacobs fulfills her own niche quite nicely.