AKOMISMO by Martin Perez

This weekend has been great for reading. I’m currently juggling three books. I usually read a chapter or two, then move on when the author begins to get predictable. I switch to another one for a while so that when I get back to the previous book it feels fresh again. When I get tired of reading I either write or sleep. Then I read again. I’m such a geek sometimes.

Good and Bad Power by Geoff Mulgan reads like an introduction to a political history course on crack. This book is all about government. It talks about the state from how it forms to how it falls. I am simply envious of Mulgan’s grasp of political history. In explaining the state, he draws insights from not just the liberal traditions of Western Europe (particularly France) but also from the treatises of Kautilya, Ibn Khaldun, Confucius and The Buddha. I’m enjoying this book on another level: with everything happening in our country right now, I appreciate the view from a larger lens. This is simply a well-rounded account and this already has a place in the reserve shelf for that undergraduate political science class I hope to teach in the future.

The White Man’s Burden by William Easterly is a stinging rebuke (among other things) of one of my favorite books of all-time, The End of Poverty by Jeffrey Sachs. And guess what? I’m loving this one very quickly. William Easterly is simply one of the most entertaining writers yet. He’s incredibly erudite and witty as he slams the notion of having a Big Plan to eliminate poverty. Easterly’s plan is to have no plan; and his answer to poverty is to have no answer. Instead, he advocates for what he calls “Searching” to determine exactly what we can do with foreign aid. I can see why Sachs responds to Easterly by calling him a pessimist, although I can also see how their two seemingly radically approaches can actually be combined to respond to the needs of the impoverished. This only makes me look forward to Sach’s “Common Wealth” next month to see what rebuke he offers against this one. Fun times.

What Terrorists Want by Louise Richardson is a book I’m reading to prepare for a special session on Tuesday where I teach my classes about terrorism. My previous students can attest that in the past school years, this was my favorite topic. This year however, not so much (this year it’s History, with a capital ‘H’). Nonetheless, this book is a much needed update and, if I dare say it, this is the book on terrorism that I’ve been waiting for since 9/11. Louise Richardson is uncompromising in her view. She debunks a lot of popular notions such as “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter” and puts forward a definition of terrorism that works in its simplicity. Yet, it is this simplicity that allows her to face terrorism head on and argues that not only was the United States mistaken in invading Iraq, it was mistaken in calling for a global war on terror in the first place.