المحتوى الرئيسي
Twilight of the Elites
Twilight of the Elites
America After Meritocracy
من تصميم Chris Hayes
A powerful and original argument that traces the roots of our present crisis of authority to an unlikely source: the meritocracy.
Over the past decade, Americans watched in bafflement and rage as one institution after another – from Wall Street to Congress, the Catholic Church to corporate America, even Major League Baseball – imploded under the weight of corruption and incompetence. In the wake of the Fail Decade, Americans have historically low levels of trust in their institutions; the social contract between ordinary citizens and elites lies in tatters.
How did we get here? With Twilight of the Elites, Christopher Hayes offers a radically novel answer. Since the 1960s, as the meritocracy elevated a more diverse group of men and women into power, they learned to embrace the accelerating inequality that had placed them near the very top. Their ascension heightened social distance and spawned a new American elite—one more prone to failure and corruption than any that came before it.
Mixing deft political analysis, timely social commentary, and deep historical understanding, Twilight of the Elites describes how the society we have come to inhabit – utterly forgiving at the top and relentlessly punitive at the bottom – produces leaders who are out of touch with the people they have been trusted to govern. Hayes argues that the public's failure to trust the federal government, corporate America, and the media has led to a crisis of authority that threatens to engulf not just our politics but our day-to-day lives.
Upending well-worn ideological and partisan categories, Hayes entirely reorients our perspective on our times. Twilight of the Elites is the defining work of social criticism for the post-bailout age.
Over the past decade, Americans watched in bafflement and rage as one institution after another – from Wall Street to Congress, the Catholic Church to corporate America, even Major League Baseball – imploded under the weight of corruption and incompetence. In the wake of the Fail Decade, Americans have historically low levels of trust in their institutions; the social contract between ordinary citizens and elites lies in tatters.
How did we get here? With Twilight of the Elites, Christopher Hayes offers a radically novel answer. Since the 1960s, as the meritocracy elevated a more diverse group of men and women into power, they learned to embrace the accelerating inequality that had placed them near the very top. Their ascension heightened social distance and spawned a new American elite—one more prone to failure and corruption than any that came before it.
Mixing deft political analysis, timely social commentary, and deep historical understanding, Twilight of the Elites describes how the society we have come to inhabit – utterly forgiving at the top and relentlessly punitive at the bottom – produces leaders who are out of touch with the people they have been trusted to govern. Hayes argues that the public's failure to trust the federal government, corporate America, and the media has led to a crisis of authority that threatens to engulf not just our politics but our day-to-day lives.
Upending well-worn ideological and partisan categories, Hayes entirely reorients our perspective on our times. Twilight of the Elites is the defining work of social criticism for the post-bailout age.
A powerful and original argument that traces the roots of our present crisis of authority to an unlikely source: the meritocracy.
Over the past decade, Americans watched in bafflement and rage as one institution after another – from Wall Street to Congress, the Catholic Church to corporate America, even Major League Baseball – imploded under the weight of corruption and incompetence. In the wake of the Fail Decade, Americans have historically low levels of trust in their institutions; the social contract between ordinary citizens and elites lies in tatters.
How did we get here? With Twilight of the Elites, Christopher Hayes offers a radically novel answer. Since the 1960s, as the meritocracy elevated a more diverse group of men and women into power, they learned to embrace the accelerating inequality that had placed them near the very top. Their ascension heightened social distance and spawned a new American elite—one more prone to failure and corruption than any that came before it.
Mixing deft political analysis, timely social commentary, and deep historical understanding, Twilight of the Elites describes how the society we have come to inhabit – utterly forgiving at the top and relentlessly punitive at the bottom – produces leaders who are out of touch with the people they have been trusted to govern. Hayes argues that the public's failure to trust the federal government, corporate America, and the media has led to a crisis of authority that threatens to engulf not just our politics but our day-to-day lives.
Upending well-worn ideological and partisan categories, Hayes entirely reorients our perspective on our times. Twilight of the Elites is the defining work of social criticism for the post-bailout age.
Over the past decade, Americans watched in bafflement and rage as one institution after another – from Wall Street to Congress, the Catholic Church to corporate America, even Major League Baseball – imploded under the weight of corruption and incompetence. In the wake of the Fail Decade, Americans have historically low levels of trust in their institutions; the social contract between ordinary citizens and elites lies in tatters.
How did we get here? With Twilight of the Elites, Christopher Hayes offers a radically novel answer. Since the 1960s, as the meritocracy elevated a more diverse group of men and women into power, they learned to embrace the accelerating inequality that had placed them near the very top. Their ascension heightened social distance and spawned a new American elite—one more prone to failure and corruption than any that came before it.
Mixing deft political analysis, timely social commentary, and deep historical understanding, Twilight of the Elites describes how the society we have come to inhabit – utterly forgiving at the top and relentlessly punitive at the bottom – produces leaders who are out of touch with the people they have been trusted to govern. Hayes argues that the public's failure to trust the federal government, corporate America, and the media has led to a crisis of authority that threatens to engulf not just our politics but our day-to-day lives.
Upending well-worn ideological and partisan categories, Hayes entirely reorients our perspective on our times. Twilight of the Elites is the defining work of social criticism for the post-bailout age.
المراجعات-
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Hayes argues that our society suffers from institutional failure and lack of trust in institutions because our elites, isolated and spoiled, fight against losing privileges; meritocracy has undone itself. He reads with energy and urgency, but, perhaps due to his passion for the topic, he sometimes verges on stridency, as if belaboring the listener, a disservice to an intelligent and thoughtful text. His energy, perhaps, and his familiarity with the text often lead him to read too quickly, making listeners race to keep up, rather than being able to digest his insights and arguments. In his rush, he regularly renders words sloppily or swallows parts of them. Still, he does get this smart and timely book across, and it deserves a hearing. W.M. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine
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Rolling Stone
"Excellent"
- Foreign Affairs "Hayes, an editor-at-large of The Nation and host of the MSNBC talk show Up With Chris Hayes, has written a perceptive and searching analysis of the problems of meritocracy."
- Ta-Nehisi Coates, Baltimore Sun "[A] stunning polemic....Hayes' book is the rare tome that originates from a political home (the left) and yet actually challenges assumptions that undergird the dominant logic in both political parties. This is not mealy-mouthed centrism. It is a substantive critique of the underlying logic of both Barack Obama and Mitt Romney -- the logic of meritocracy."
- The Economist.com "In a very good new book titled Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy, Chris Hayes offers one of the most compelling assessments of how soaring inequality is changing American society."
- Matthew Yglesias, Slate.com "Let's just say that if you like politics and big ideas, you want to buy this book. It's a lot more intellectually ambitious than your typical pundit book and offers a really great blend of writing chops and social theory synthesis."
- Aaron Swartz, Crookedtimber.org "In his new book, The Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy, Chris Hayes manages the impossible trifecta: the book is compellingly readable, impossibly erudite, and--most stunningly of all--correct."
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The Atlantic.com
"Engrossing....thoughtful critiques of what's gone wrong with America's ruling class." -
Tyler Cowen, Marginalrevolution.com
"I was myself very impressed by the level of execution in this book." - Mike Konczal, Dissent "Hayes's book makes for a great read....Twilight uses a wide variety of academic and journalistic work, balancing a deep, systemic critique of society with detailed and empathetic reporting about those most affected by elite failure."
- Commonweal "Twilight of the Elites offers an elegant, original argument that will make both cynics and idealists reconsider their views of how, and whether, our society works. If Americans believe in anything, it's our meritocracy. Hayes is brave to question it so forcefully."
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Washington Monthly.com
"A potent articulation of a society's free-floating angst, Twilight of the Elites stakes its claim as the jeremiad by which these days will be remembered." - Daniel W. Drezner, Foreign Policy.com "I read Chris Hayes' Twilight of the Elites last month and will suggest that you read it too -- it's an engaging read that addresses the question of whether a meritocratic elite can really stay meritocratic over extended periods of time."
- Alexis Goldstein, Livetotry.com "This was a book I found so stimulating and immersive that I cannot wait to be able to discuss it with a larger audience....Even if you think you are aware of the depth of the rot plaguing the highest levels of our society, you will likely earn a new level of outrage by reading this book."
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Salon.com
"Make[s] you think in new ways about why we tolerate such vast and growing income inequality....an extended meditation on why the great hope and change revolution of 2008 has so far left the inequitable status quo a little bit too intact." - Good Men Project.com "Twilight of the Elites by Chris Hayes may change the way you look at the world....[It] almost single-handily undermines virtually every precept we've come to accept about life in the modern age. It also may well turn out to be the seminal treatise for the so-called 'FAIL' generation, a term that loosely connotes everyone who graduated since the beginning of the 21st Century."
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Forbes.com
"Twilight of the Elites is a engaging, insightful book. I finished it in less than 24 hours, and I encourage you to pick up a copy." - Daily Kos "You should really get yourself a copy of Twilight of the Elites"
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The American Conservative
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"A powerful critique of the meritocratic elite that has overseen one of the most disastrous periods of recent history." - Reason "In his new book, Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy, Hayes raises demanding questions about a nation that is both enamored with and troubled by its elites."
- Publishers Weekly (starred) "[L]ively and well-informed....Offering feasible proposals for change, this cogent social commentary urges us to reconstruct our institutions so we can once again trust them."
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Kirkus Reviews (starred)
"[A] forcefully written debut....A provocative discussion of the deeper causes of our
