Kruse Kronicle

The Rule of Law -- Not!

Greg Mankiw's Blog: The Rule of Law -- Not!

Via the WSJ, here is the view from a "secured (sic) creditor" of Chrysler:

"Like many others I made the mistake of buying what I believed was 'value,'" Mr. Gwin says, adding that investors who bought at the time believed the loans were worth more than their market price. "We did not contemplate having our first liens invalidated by a sitting president," he adds.

As the President intervenes in more and more industries, a key question is how he does it and what he is trying to achieve. Is he trying to reorganize insolvent firms while, as much as possible, preserving the rights of stakeholders as established under existing contracts? Or is he trying to achieve a "fair" outcome as he judges it, regardless of preexisting rules and agreements? I fear it may be the latter, in which case politics may start to trump the rule of law.

Big Sort: Final Thoughts

(Link to Part 11)

As we wrap up this series on Bill Bishop’s The Big Sort, I’ll have to say that I think he makes a pretty convincing case that sorting has happened. One of the questions I have is whether or not this sorting indicates a significant cultural shift or whether it is part of some cyclical process that we will cycle out of.

If you are familiar with the work of William Strauss and Neil Howe, then you know that they see a recurring cycle of four cultural “seasons” replaying themselves over about an eighty year period. (See The Fourth Turning) First comes the High when there is great unity and conformity. Second comes the Awakening where people begin to shake off what has become a stale reality and explore their inner world. Third comes the Unraveling where people become more and more individually focused, institutions and traditions crumble, and rancor over competing visions escalates. Fourth comes the Crisis that climaxes in some great secular event like a war or economic collapse that (usually) brings people together and results in a High. Strauss and Howe would say the most recent High was 1946-1964 (post WW II), Awakening was 1964-1984, and Unraveling was 1984-2001(?). We are presently in a Crisis era that will continue into the next decade.

Bishop’s notion of bi-partisanship from 1948-1965, followed by a period of growing partisanship, dovetails perfectly with Strauss and Howe’s schema. I don’t know whether there is four cycle pattern but I do think there is a tendency for an emerging cultural pattern to spawn its antithesis. The writer of Ecclesiastes recognized that there is, “A time to tear down and a time to build up,” so I suspect some of what we are witnessing is the natural ebb and flow of generational shifts.

That said, I think there is something unique happening as well. Over the past century or so, we’ve been witnessing the emergence of one post-materialist society after another; post-materialism being the circumstance where the great majority of the population has moved beyond the quest for basic material needs. These societies tend to exhibit similar patterns of decaying social institutions, hyper-individualism, and fertility rates well below replacement rate. There frequently seems to be cultural malaise and a quest for spirituality.

Conservative responses to post-materialism often blame government and various political forces for not conserving, if not intentionally destroying, social institutions and traditions. The answer is less government and more personal freedom. Liberal responses tend to appeal to a need for joint efforts (i.e., government action) to resolve problems, especially equitable distribution of society’s goods and amenities so individuals are free to become all they can be. The answer is more “joint action” so people can live with more freedom.

When we need food, shelter, and clothing for ourselves and our loved ones, we have a mission in life. Material need causes us to focus. But what about when are material needs are meet? What is the meaning of our possessions, our work, our very lives?  Christian ethics and theology has been forged over two thousand years in societies where material survival has been the all consuming task of most people in society. Post-materialism presents a challenge and a spiritual crisis. Conservatives blaming big government for destroying institutions won’t answer these questions and neither will idealistic crusades against poverty or for the environment. In short, I do believe there is something more than a purely cyclical effect.

On the topic of consensus, one thing the book doesn’t sufficiently acknowledge is that bi-partisanship frequently doesn’t create the rosiest of worlds either. Let’s remember that the period of 1948-1965 was a time of tremendous peer pressure and conformity. Men and women were locked into artificial roles. Minorities were locked out of society’s major institutions and made invisible in the face of the great consensus. It was also this era of great consensus that gave us the likes of Joseph McCarthy and the persecution of the nonconformists. Dissent is needed to correct excesses. Consensus for consensus sake can be every bit as dangerous as partisanship.

Finally, I thought about the role the church plays in all of this as I read the book. I was particularly interested in the three elements Gordon Allport mentioned that needed to be present for opposing groups to constructively engage each other (see previous post):

Mutual regard as equals.

One the defining marks of the New Testament was that everyone was considered family – brothers and sisters with God as the father. Much to the concern of the Roman authorities, this resulted in slave and free, Jew and Gentile, and man and woman, all worshiping together.

Regular pursuit of shared goal.

Greg Ogden did a study of the Greek word koinonia in the New Testament. We usually translate this as “fellowship.“ Ogden learned that the New Testament never talks about fellowship or community for its own sake. Rather, in every instance, koinonia is something that comes from participation together toward a common end.

Authentic engagement.

The early Christians had their problems but one of their most compelling testimonies to the Roman Empire was the way the loved and cared for one another.

The church has embedded in its very DNA the means to heal division and heal strife. It has done it in times past. The question is whether or not it can come to terms with the post-materialism it has become captive to and rediscover what it’s mission is.

[Index]

What Are We Doing Here?

I don't know anything about this group or their agenda but I love the vid. I'd love to see the whole documentary. (HT: Virgil)

Francis Collins' New Site and Blog

Famed scientist and Christian Francis Collins has a new website, The Bio Logos Foundation, and a new blog at Beliefnet, Science and the Sacred. Check it out!

Hunting for the secrets of a happy marriage

CNN: Hunting for the secrets of a happy marriage

(CNN) -- No one can truly know what goes on inside a marriage except the two people involved, but researchers are getting increasingly good glimpses at what makes couples tick, how relationships are stressed and what factors can keep the spark alive.

The goal: To find out what keeps love alive and couples together.

Putting marriage under a microscope has resulted in new long-term studies that are showing better than ever how a birth or simple boredom can drain a union.

More surprisingly, old photographs might help predict your chances of getting a divorce, new research suggests.

All of the findings can help couples learn lessons about their relationships and their spouses, said Nadine Kaslow, a professor at Emory University School of Medicine who specializes in couples and families and also serves as chief psychologist at Grady Health System in Atlanta, Georgia. ...

12 Reasons To Be (Economically) Optimistic

Wall Street Journal: 12 Reasons To Be (Economically) Optimistic

Ed Yardeni, the loquacious economist offers a dozen happy thoughts about the economy “while we are waiting to see how the swine flu pandemic plays out.”

His list, distributed in his daily email to clients:

1. In the U.S., consumer confidence rebounded during April.
2. The percentage of consumers who say that jobs are hard to get edged down in April after rising thirteen of the previous fourteen months. This tends to confirm the recent downticks in weekly initial unemployment claims.
3. The home price story isn’t all bad news recently. Indeed, after more than a year and a half of declines, California’s median home price finally managed a meager gain, rising 2.2% month over month.
4. Corning is bringing back some laid off workers on stronger-than-expected demand for glass used in making flat-screen televisions.
5. Sharp is forecasting a strong recovery in profits and sales in all its business divisions during the second half of the year.
6. IBM said Tuesday that it will increase its quarterly dividend by 10% and will repurchase an additional $3bn of its stock.
7. The 4/28 Financial Times reported that the high yield bond market may be starting to open up again. About $7 billion was raised in April, the highest volume since last July.
8. The stock market held up remarkably well on Monday and Tuesday despite nervousness over bank stress tests, swine flu, and the forced downsizing of the U.S. auto industry.
9. The first quarter earnings season is off to a good start as 64% of the 235 S&P 500 companies reporting so far have a positive surprise and all 10 sectors are beating their first-quarter forecast too.
10. Our Fundamental Stock Market Index rose during the week of August 18 as jobless claims edged lower and the Consumer Comfort Index moved higher.
11. Condé Nast has decided to shutter Portfolio after two years of struggle. The introduction of the glitzy magazine about Wall Street launched in the spring of 2007 marked the end of the bull market. Now its demise may mark the end of the bear market.
12. Confidence in the Euro Zone rose in April from a record low in March. The European Commission’s economic sentiment indicator jumped up to 67.2, from a revised 64.7 in March, but remains well below its long-term average of 100. Households and firms are less pessimistic about the outlook.

When it comes to religion, U.S. is a nation of shoppers, study finds

Sacramento Bee: When it comes to religion, U.S. is a nation of shoppers, study finds

To say that Brenda Boles is a spiritual seeker is an understatement.

As a teenager, she was baptized in a Chinese Baptist church. Then she married an Episcopalian and became a mainstay at Sunday services. Now she is a member of Sacramento's Spiritual Life Center, an Interfaith Unity church.

"This is what I have been looking for," said Boles of Sacramento, who was raised by non-churchgoing parents. "I've found my church home."

The United States has become a nation of spiritual shoppers. More than half of Americans have changed their religious affiliations at least once in their lifetime and that's a "conservative" estimate," said Luis Lugo, director of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life.

Monday, the forum released "Faith in Flux," the most in-depth study ever undertaken on why people leave religious affiliations.

According to the survey, reasons for leaving childhood affiliations varied. Catholics are likely to leave because they disagree with church teachings or doctrine. Protestants switch because of lifestyle choices such as moving or marrying a person of another religion.

"The reasons for leaving their affiliation or changing are as diverse as the religious marketplace," said John Green, a University of Akron political scientist and senior fellow with the Pew Forum.

The study follows up the Pew Forum's 2007 study on the U.S. religious landscape, which noted that 44 percent of people left their childhood religious affiliation. ...

Big Sort: Unsorting?

(Link to Part 10)

Over the last half century we’ve witnessed a sorting phenomenon in American life. As noted in a earlier post, gathering of like-minded people tends to intensify and make more extreme the views of individuals. Sorting intensifies group norms and values which draws in more like-minded people who give stronger reinforcement to norms and values.

If sorting has been the problem, then surely mixing would be the solution? We mix people together, they become acquainted with each other, they learn to appreciate differences, and then they all get along better. This has been the driving force behind so much of the diversity movement. Does it work?

In The Big Sort, Bill Bishop points to social psychology experiments that show that simply bringing differing groups (not even necessarily opposing groups) together creates competition and opposition. Robert Putnam, author of Bowling Alone, concludes from a study of 31,000 people in 41 communities that diversity has social capital erodes with diversity and people tend to have less to do with each other. (See here , and here, and also here.)  Simply mixing folks together doesn’t get it done.

Summarizing psychologist Gordon Allport’s  (writing in the 1950s)necessary conditions for bringing opposing groups together constructively, Bishop writes:

First, the social psychologist wrote, the groups had to see themselves as equals. Second, meetings between the groups should take place as regular pursuit of an ordinary and shared goal. And above all, Allport wrote, meetings should “avoid artificiality.” It was best, Allport wrote, if the groups worked as a team, since “the deeper more genuine the association, the greater its effect.” (285)

This was also the key finding of Putnam, that there had to be a common mission or point of unity that integrated people together for diversity be productive. When such unity existed, diversity became an advantage.

Another key point Bishop makes points to the work of an anthropologist named Max Gluckman, also writing in the 1950s, who believed that, “Societies were successful and longstanding so long as they could devise mechanisms that kept simple conflicts from becoming cataclysmic.” (295) This usually happened by developing patterns of relating that made ndividuals friends in one context and enemies (or at least opponents) in the next. “Societies that controlled disputes ‘are so organized into a series of groups and relationships, that people who are friends on one basis are enemies on another,’ Gluckman wrote.” (296-297)

So does Bishop see signs of community developing that overcomes the sorting effect? He seems to believe that emerging churches are one venue. For purpose of illustration, he identifies Bluer, an Emergent congregation in Minneapolis, as one place where people are getting beyond the narrow identities that have divided red and blue communities. I’m not in agreement with Bishop here.

Emergent congregations, from what I can observe, are overwhelmingly white, middle class, twenty to thirty somethings, and with a decided bent toward intellectual and artistic pursuits. That doesn’t make them good or bad, but I don’t think it makes them emblematic of a new post-partisan world. It makes them another niche into which folks have sorted themselves.

Interestingly enough, one of the examples that Putnam gave of an integrating institution are some (and “some” is the operative word) evangelical megachurches. In his study, he found large congregations with several nationalities and ethnic groups represented, with people of varying economic status, united by a common vision of being the church. The point isn’t whether the vision is correct but rather the integrative power a common vision has.

In short, Bishop seems to realize that there needs to be some common value or vision that unites us and that there must be public venues where we partner with each based on these values and visions. I don’t find many solutions offered but I also don’t think that was the purpose of his book. He is holding up a mirror to who we are now.

Some final thoughts on the book tomorrow.

[Continued] [Index]

Top Emerging Markets for the Last Three Months

Carpe Diem: Pakistan Tops Emerging Markets for 3-Mo. Returns

March home sales increased 63.8 percent (California)

California Association of Realtors:  March home sales increased 63.8 percent

LOS ANGELES (April 27) – Home sales increased 63.8 percent in March in California compared with the same period a year ago, while the median price of an existing home declined 39 percent, the CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® (C.A.R.) reported today. ...

...“The statewide median price showed the first monthly increase since August 2007, and has remained in the $250,000 range over the past three months,” said C.A.R.’s Chief Economist Leslie Appleton-Young. “A number of regions around the state also have registered monthly gains for one or more months since the beginning of this year. While these are welcome signs, it remains to be seen whether home prices have stabilized. ...

What Book Should Come Next?

I’m approaching the end of my series on Bill Bishop’s The Big Sort and I have two books lined up that I’d like to “stroll” through next. My problem is that I can’t decide which one I should do first. What do Kronicle readers think?

The first option is John Stackhouse’s Making the Best of It: Following Christ in the Real World. This is an amazing book. Everyone so often I come across a book that articulates thoughts I’ve been mulling over for years and pulls them together into a coherent package in a compelling way. This is one of those books.

The book really is a two books about Christian social ethics. The first part of the book reviews some mid-twentieth century perspectives on Christian Realism. He begins with Richard Niebuhr’s Christ and Culture typology and then takes a quick glance at C. S. Lewis, Reihold Niebuhr, and Dietrich Bonheoffer. The second part of the book is Stackhouse’s effort to develop an ethic that can genuinely guide the Christian’s relationship to culture.

The book is 355 pages long and contains considerable fodder for discussion. I don’t plan on doing a complete summary but would rather skim across some of the central points. I expect this book will take weeks to discuss.

The second option is John Stapleford’s Bulls, Bears, and Golden Calves: Applying Christian Ethics in Economics. The second edition of this book just came out a couple of months ago. The book is designed to be read either of two ways. It is organized so that it can be read as a supplement to standard college introductory economics textbooks or as a standalone primer on Christian ethics and economics. It has nineteen chapters organized into five parts:

1. Laying the Foundation
2. Reflections on the Basic Assumptions of Economics
3. Macroeconomic Issues
4. Microeconomic Issues
5. International Issues

I’m probably biased (Stapleford was a professor of mine at Eastern University back in the ‘80s) but I think this is the best comprehensive primer I’ve read on the topic. It is almost 100 pages shorter than Stackhouse’s book but it too is meaty and I expect it will take weeks to cover.

I welcome your feedback, either by comments here or by email. Should there be no clear indication from readers, the choice will be made by Isaac, my seventeen year old tabby. I’ll lay a book on either side of the monitor and whichever one he curls up on will be the choice.  :-)

Colleges offer no-frills degrees

Christian Science Monitor: Colleges offer no-frills degrees

A less-expensive education is the appeal at stripped-down satellite campuses.

Salem, N.H. - Kaileen Crane was hardly interested in the hefty price tag that comes with the traditional college experience. So she's paying $10,000 a year for the Advantage Program offered by Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), a private college.

Forget about campus housing. Or a meal plan, or a gym with a climbing wall. This program is about the basics – core courses at a bare-bones satellite campus. But the price is less than one-third of what it costs for tuition and room and board at the main campus in Manchester.

"It's close to where I live, it's close to where I work, and the cost is just so much cheaper than a lot of other places," says Ms. Crane during a break from classes in an office building in Salem.

Shopping for value is "in" these days – especially when it comes to big-ticket items like a college education. Public universities and community colleges traditionally have represented low-cost options. But now, some private colleges – and at least one state's public program – are trying to come up with cheaper pathways to a degree.  ...

Are Child Carseats Safer?

Interesting TED presentation by Steve Levitt (Freakonomics)about why we believe child carseats are necessary. (HT: Victor Claar)

The Paradox of Thrift

I found this at a site Victor Claar put me on to. (Though Claar doesn't endorse this clip's view.)

Update: Two related articles that critique the Paradox of Thrift.

BBC: The paradox of thrift
Cato Journal: The Paradox of Thrift: RIP

 

From the "Not So Bright Idea" File

Wall Street Journal: Low-Flying Plane Over Manhattan Was a 'Photo Op'

A jumbo jetliner that serves as Air Force One, escorted by a military jet, flew over Lower Manhattan Monday morning, frightening office workers and causing evacuations in what turned out to be a publicity operation approved by a unit of the U.S. Air Force.

At around 10 a.m. EDT, a Boeing 747 was seen accompanied by an F-16 fighter jet flying low over the southern tip of Manhattan and at one point seen circling the Goldman Sachs Tower in nearby Jersey City, N.J.

The circling planes were part of a "photo op," a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman said. ...

...The low-flying 747 sent workers worried about a repeat of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks fleeing their offices in the New York City area.

Traders bolted from the floor of the New York Mercantile Exchange after seeing the jets. The exchange, which sits on the east bank of the Hudson River in lower Manhattan and is blocks from the site of the terrorist-destroyed World Trade Center, didn't order an evacuation.

People trading oil, natural gas and other commodities on the Nymex floor apparently took no chances. A Nymex security official was "literally standing, holding his hands up in a calming gesture. Guys were running right past him," said Pete Donovan, a vice president at Vantage Trading in the crude-futures ring.

But several buildings in the area were ordered evacuated, although workers quickly returned after it became clear that the flyover was a planned event. ...

Big Sort: Idea Segregation

(Link to Part 9)

In chapters 10 and 11 of The Big Sort, Bill Bishop delves into the political consequences of sorting. Forty years ago there were a variety of community oriented organizations groups that included people from a broad range of backgrounds and views; groups like the Elks, Masons, Eastern Star, and veterans groups. Mainline denominations could be added to this list to. With the collapse of faith in social institutions that began in the late 1960s, these entities went into decline. New groups with specific agendas began to take their place in the 1970s.

The real growth in organizations seemed to come from the conservative world in the 1970s because, as Bishop notes, conservative had become all but excluded from “mainstream” political organizations and think tanks. Groups like the Heritage Foundation, John M. Olin Foundation, the Federalist Society, the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, and the American Legislative Exchange Council, all emerged around this time to give voice to conservative ideas. In the meantime, the left was creating Common Cause, the Environmental Defense Fund, and the Natural Resources Defense Council. The advantage the conservatives developed was that many voters perceived that establishment ideas had failed to address pressing problems and the intensity of dissatisfaction with these “liberal” ideas was strong.

Since at least 1970s, there has been a strong tendency by both extremes to attribute the ascendancy of their adversary’s views to political gurus and think tanks that masterfully manipulate and deceive the public. In the 1990s, the Clintons could talk about the “vast right-wing conspiracy” while conservatives saw James Carville, and other Democratic operatives, skillfully deceiving the public. Fast forward a few years and it is the puppet master George Soros creating a “vast left-wing” conspiracy while Svenagli-like Karl Rove mesmerizes people into divisive camps.

Fifty years ago, people shared relatively similar ideological filters and then quibbled about specific policies offered by candidates. As time has gone by, ideological differences have grown in both depth and intensity, sorting us into echo-chambers. Bishop writes:

People certainly change parties when their beliefs conflict with party platforms or leaders. But Layman and Carsey have found the opposite happening as well. People are changing their minds to align with their parties’ positions. “Even on issues as divisive and emotion-laden as abortion and racial equality,” they wrote, “there is evidence of individuals bringing their attitudes into line with their party ties.” People don’t methodically take an inventory of their political beliefs and then cast about for the political party that best matches their ideology. … Party membership is not simply an affiliation. It’s a screen that filters and shapes the way people perceive the world. Again, politics is working both top-down, as people pick up and follow signals from party activists, and bottom-up, as people pick majorities in legislative districts push elected official to the extremes. (231)

Further, he writes:

Today the division in the country isn’t about part allegiance. It’s about how we choose to live. And as the parties have come to represent lifestyle – and as lifestyle has defined communities – everything seems divisible, Republican or Democratic. (232)

Bishop demonstrates how this sorting process has worked to bump moderate politicians from congress in this graph (page 247):

There are a variety of interesting details in these two chapters concerning how sorting has affected politics. I won’t recount them all here. One of note was Bishop’s observation about the Democrats perception that, in the 2004 and 2006, Republicans were wining over voters on values issues. Closer analysis does not confirm this. What appears to have happened is that Republicans better segmented their constituencies and fired up the intensity of support. I suspect Obama learned this lesson and that, along with the timely collapse of the financial markets, this propelled him to victory.

Something I’ve noted concerning the sorting effect is the way people receive this book’s storyline. You need to know that Bishop considers himself an Austin, TX, liberal. When the book first came out last spring, liberals I encountered tended to praise the book and used it as evidence of the need for a new bipartisan era being touted by Obama. Conservatives tended to see the present political order as the natural way of the world and preferred to hold to the idea of a “vast left-wing conspiracy” as the source of discord. Now that Obama is president everything has switched. For liberals who know of the sorting idea, they’ve come to reject the thesis. To them, Obama’s election signals a return to the natural order of things with a few right-wing nut cases running around. While some conservatives I know have awakened to a parallel world of liberals and see Bishop’s analysis as insightful. Even the “The Big Sort” is affected by the big sort.

[Continued] [Index]

India listens after a child bride says 'I won't.'

Christian Science Monitor: India listens after a child bride says 'I won't.'

Bararola, India - When Rekha Kalinda was nearing age 12, her parents told her they were planning to marry her off. Rekha's response would reverberate all the way up to the president of India: "No."

Nearly half of all Indian females get married before turning the legal minimum age of 18. The requirement has been in place for more than three decades, but centuries of custom don't change overnight – and that's especially true in Bararola, a land carved up into small farm plots and crisscrossed by dirt paths that takes at least a day's journey to reach from Calcutta. But even here, some people are taking a stand.

Many locals eke out a living making beedis, a leaf-wrapped Indian cigarette. Rekha was rolling beedis with her parents inside their mud-hut home when they broached her nuptials.

"I was very angry," says Rekha. "I told my father very clearly that this is my age of studying in school, and I didn't want to marry."

With the help of friends, teachers, and administrators, Rekha accomplished what the law alone has not. No child marriages have taken place in the surrounding villages where she and two other girls refused to marry last summer, and similar approaches are meeting some success in other regions.

"We have a strong law and we need to find the people who can advocate for [it]," says Sunayana Walia, a senior researcher at the Delhi office of the International Center for Research on Women. "All the [successful] interventions are tapping the girls ... so they are able to campaign on this issue, along with community participation." ...

Royals Lead?

After 16 games (1/10 of the season) the Royals are 9-7 and leading the division. Dare we Kansas Citians dream?

Big Sort: Lifestyle

(Link to Part 8)

Writing in the early years of the twentieth century, sociologist Emil Durkheim described traditional culture in terms of “mechanical solidarity.” Like pieces of machine, the parts were interchangeable. Everyone did similar work, shared similar values, and lived in stable relatively isolated communities. Bill Bishop draws on the image of the Borg from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Each member is part of a collective that is cybernetically connected to all the others.

In The Big Sort, Bill Bishop writes:

“… Americans lived on Borg-like “islands” in the nineteenth century, the isolated towns circumscribed by shared work, a common church, and traditional families. Industrial society flooded these islands, and the division of labor in modern mass production systems separated people. They no longer lived according to tradition or lineage, but by their place in the labor market. According to Durkheim, industrial society was held together through “organic solidarity,” the interdependence of people through an economic system based on a division of labor.”(215-216)

Durkheim predicted that this transition to organic solidarity would result in a general sense of emptiness and disorientation. He called this “anomie.” People would seek out new ways to orient their lives. Some later sociologists, like Daniel Bell, expected that corporations would become the focal point of integrating life but with collapse of trust in institutions in the late 1960s that idea was abandoned. Instead, what we have seen with the advent of greater freedom and greater resources is that people are sorting themselves into like-minded communities to create the mechanical solidarity they have lost. Bishop observes, “Americans still depend on organic solidarity in their economic lives in their mixed and mixed-up workplaces. But in their social, religious, and political lives, they are seeking ways to rejoin the horde.” (217)

Bishop spends Chapter 9 highlighting a number of ways in which this impetus to find like-minded communities has evidenced itself. He offers an analysis of how Oregon politics has moved from being a state where there was widespread identification with environmental issues to being a state of heavily Democratic, more educated, and environmentally conscious cities, with a heavily Republican, less educated, environmentalism unfriendly rural population.

Bishop writes about population density and party affiliation. Places that vote heavily Republican tend to be the least densely populated areas and those that vote Democrat are the most densely populated. Thirty years ago the spatial arrangement was more balanced.

Then there is George Lakoff’s notion that parenting models divide by party affiliation. Republicans tend toward the “strict father” model (valuing respect, obedience, good manners, good behavior) and Democrats toward the “nurturing parent” (valuing independence, self-reliance, curiosity, being considerate). As recently as 1992, Bishop says there was little difference between parties on this issue. By 2004, how one answered on these issues was a better indicator of party than was income.

A study by Belgian demographer Ron Lesthaeghe is also mentioned. Lesthaeghe noted a trend in western European nations, where post-materialism arrived first, of women to have fewer (if any children) and to have them later in life than in previous generations. Reproduction fell below replacement levels, more people lived as singles, and marriage became optional. Bishop writes:

The people in these changing, more fluid families were less concerned with traditional institutions, such as old-line church denominations (Episcopalian, Catholic) and civic clubs (Masons, Rotary). Gender roles were getting squishy, and people forgot to get married. They were less interested in material success and more interested in experiences and individual freedom. (214)

While Bishop doesn’t go into it in his book, this pattern is repeating itself all over the world where widespread prosperity emerges. Bishop notes that in the U. S., the more a location resembles western European nations in family formation the more Democratic they vote.

One observation I would add concerns the topic of globalization. The world is clearly becoming economically integrated. The fear by many is that this will result in the destruction of indigenous cultures, resulting in one bland homogenous world culture. In fact, the opposite appears to be happening. With greater economic strength, people seem to become more intensely connected to their culture and sub-cultures. They begin to assert themselves often leading to new cultural conflicts. Sorting may be on its way to becoming a global phenomenon.

[Continued] [Index]

Is a purpose-driven company more likely to profit?

Statesman: Is a purpose-driven company more likely to profit?

Let's say you decide to start a company. And this company could do anything: sell shoes or medical devices, develop computers or give financial advice.

But there's one ingredient this company must have to be successful: a purpose. Never mind your corporate structure or even your business model.

Formerly relegated to the self-help section in bookstores, the purpose movement has found new life in the business world. Fueled in part by books such as business guru Jim Collins' "Good to Great," the idea is that successful companies often have a deeper purpose beyond making a profit.

"If you build a business solely to make money, that is a recipe for failure," said John Moore, a marketing consultant who used to work at Starbucks and Whole Foods. A business has to have a reason for existing, otherwise its customers will go somewhere else, Moore said. The recent bankruptcies of Linens N Things and Circuit City, he said, are examples of what happens to purposeless companies. ...

Jesus Versus Empire?

Did Jesus come to defeat empires? A variety of scholars and activists seem to think so, ranging from John Dominic Crossan, to Walter Bruggeman, to N. T. Wright, to emergent types like Brian McLaren and Brian Walsh. I hear it frequently among some of my PCUSA sisters and brothers. A number of my cyber friends who congregate at Scot McKnight’s Jesus Creed also share this perspective. I’m not persuaded and here is why.

Which of the two following characterizations is more accurate?

1. God's mission in the world is to unmask idolatrous empires and the Kingdom of God is the means through which it is done.

2. God' mission is to establish Kingdom of God and pursuit of that Kingdom unmasks idolatrous empires.

I reject 1 in favor of 2. The difference is subtle but it has profound consequences for our discipleship. The focal point must be on what is to be created, not that which is being opposed.

The oneness of the New Testament church resulted in Jews, Greeks, slaves, free persons, people of different classes, women and men, all worshiping together. This was not a tactical challenge to the empire. It was the people of God simply being the people of God. Yet it deeply disturbed Roman authorities. I'm sure Paul and the others were well aware that it would do just that, but that was not their motivation in behaving that way. The driving energy was to be the Kingdom of God, not combat empires. Yet being the Kingdom of God would expose the idolatry of empires.

There is an adage that says the best criticism of the bad is the practice of the better. All idolatry is a mixture of truth and deception. When the Kingdom of God is authentically present it unmasks deception but it also confirms and preserves the truth that is present in the idolatry.

When the starting point is the empire and its defeat, then the empire becomes the measure (by antithesis) of our Christian discipleship. To the degree we bear the image of the empire we are failing. To the degree we do not bear its image we are the Kingdom of God. Yet because all idolatry is a mixture of truth and deception, we reject both the deception and the truth. By making ourselves unwitting opponents of some aspects of truth we merely swerve into another idolatry that is oppositional to the idolatry we are rejecting.

This in no way suggests that we should be ignorant of empires and use our influence for opposition of evil and seeking justice. However, the way I typically see the “Christ vs. Empire” mentality working out is in terms iconoclastic anti-capitalist, anti-Western critique. This is the present empire by which we should antithetically measure our discipleship. Too often, the “Christ vs. Empire” hermeneutic is an attempt to claim biblical legitimization for trendy intellectual critiques of contemporary culture.  It’s pretty heady stuff to be among the elite who really know the score and to know that you are on the frontlines of bringing down evil empires ... just like the fundamentalists know they are protecting the Kingdom of God from corrupting influences and opposing evil empires.

When we read the gospels and Paul and other New Testament writers we find almost no mention of direct opposition to Rome. Nor do I believe inferred attacks are as pervasive as advocates of the framework claim. To the contrary, we find admonitions to get along with others, to obey the authorities, and even to pray for enemies. While the consequences of being the Kingdom of God as aliens in a strange land are never far from mind, the empire simply isn’t the focus. The Kingdom of God is ... and no empire can withstand its prophetic witness.

How American Congregations are Changing (and Staying the Same)

Bradley Wright's Weblog: How American Congregations are Changing (and Staying the Same)

From 1998 to 2006-2007

... 1) Churches use a lot more technology than they used to. They are much more likely to use e-mail to communicate with their members and web pages to advertise themselves in the community. ...

2) Worship services have become more informal. Services are now less likely to have choirs and to use written programs. Instead, they are more likely to have services featuring drums, jumping, shouting, dancing, raised hands in praise, applause, and calling out “amen.” ...

3) Clergy age. From 1998 to 2006, the average age of the American adults has increased by 1 year, but the average age of pastors has increased by 5 years! The median age of the head clergy in the study went from 48 years to 53 years old. ...

4) The demographic make-up of congregations is changing. Overall, the average age of congregation members is increasing faster than the general population. For example, in 2006, 30 percent of the congregants were over age 60, but in 1998, only 25% were. Also, the racial and ethnic make-up of congregations is becoming more diverse. For example, from 1998 to 2006 the number of completely white congregations dropped from 20% to 14%. ...

Big Sort: Advertising

(Link to Part 7)

Another area of life that has been affected by the sorting phenomenon is advertising. In The Big Sort, Bill Bishop writes that until the 1950s, most advertising for consumer products was through mass advertising. This applied to political campaigning as well. But by the summer of 2006, advertising and campaigning had become exercises in social segmentation and niche marketing.

“Between 1898 and 1902, in a massive wave of mergers, 2,653 firms consolidated into just 269.” (185) Large scale corporate capitalism has arrived. The focus was on large scale national advertising to develop brand loyalty. Advertising emphasized product features and price. Politics followed a similar model of developing a national bandwagon approach to garner support.

Donald McGavran begun writing about targeted models of evangelism in 1955 and a year later an adman named Wendell Smith introduced the idea of “market segmentation.” The old model tried to bend demand to the supply being offered by the big national brands. The new Segmentation model meant determining the demand of smaller subgroups and orienting supply to that demand.

Bishop writes, “The assumption at the time was that a rich person was simply a poor person with money.” (186) But research began to show that people at different income levels have distinct purchasing patterns. The shift began to move away from price and features toward presenting the product in a way that would connect with different social-class identities. Stores began to focus on developing identities that were welcoming to particular demographics. This consumer behavior was no doubt connected with the emergence of an affluent middle-class as the nation transitioned into post-materialism. (i.e., an era where basic material needs are no longer the central concern.) Thus was born the market research industry and its endless quest to subdivide consumers by various demographic variables. Aided by computer technology, advertising departments were capable of making ever more precise delineations.

Americans were turning into a nation of “hunter and gatherer” communities unified by common interests and identities. While marketing experts knew that consumers are drawn to materials that hone in on their likes and dislikes, beginning in the 1990s, a growing number of people became increasingly uncomfortable with trade-offs. Not only did they want information targeted at them but they did not want to hear about alternative points of view. They did not want to compromise with other people’s concerns. Thus, information sources that screened out “static” they didn’t want to hear have emerged as preferred information channels.

Bishop writes:

Advertisers, however, were, like pastors in the church growth movement simply following their consumers – and Americans were sorting themselves into more homogeneous groups without any help from Madison Avenue. Marketers didn’t make these groups, but they did take advantage of them. (190-191)

People have increasingly come to make their economic (and political) decisions based on lifestyle identities. As a result, psychographics has replaced demographics. This segmenting has deeply touched church life as well. Bishop writes:

The Hartford Institute’s David Roozen searched for the secret of church growth in a survey of more than 11,000 Protestant congregations in 2000. He found that churches with a defined “niche” grew faster than those with broader, more general missions. (Segmenting worked with religion as well as with Tide detergent.) Churches with a variety of programs (mass customization) grew faster too. But the most important feature of growing churches, Roozen found, was absence of conflict. Marketers, ministers, and, soon, politicians learned that people wanted both conformity in interests and agreement in opinions. They wanted the society they lived in to be just like the cars they bought – customized. (194)

[Continued] [Index]

The Susan Boyle phenomenon: redefining beauty, grace, and success?

Christian Science Monitor: The Susan Boyle phenomenon: redefining beauty, grace, and success?

Commentators find deeper meaning in British singer's YouTube popularity.

London - It was to her elderly mother, sometime before she passed away, that Susan Boyle pledged she would "do something" with her life.

Two years on from that loss, she honored that promise with a now almost legendary appearance on a British television talent show.

A video clip of the Scot winning over skeptical judges and a cynical crowd with a rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream." from the musical "Les Misérables" has been viewed more than 40 million times, making it one of the most popular YouTube videos ever posted.

The youngest of nine, Ms. Boyle is an unlikely global star. Or is she? ...

Use Energy, Get Rich and Save the Planet

New York Times: Use Energy, Get Rich and Save the Planet

... Those projections make it easy to assume that affluence and technology inflict more harm on the environment. But while pollution can increase when a country starts industrializing, as people get wealthier they can afford cleaner water and air. They start using sources of energy that are less carbon-intensive — and not just because they’re worried about global warming. The process of “decarbonization” started long before Al Gore was born.

The old wealth-is-bad IPAT theory may have made intuitive sense, but it didn’t jibe with the data that has been analyzed since that first Earth Day. By the 1990s, researchers realized that graphs of environmental impact didn’t produce a simple upward-sloping line as countries got richer. The line more often rose, flattened out and then reversed so that it sloped downward, forming the shape of a dome or an inverted U — what’s called a Kuznets curve. (See nytimes.com/tierneylab for an example.)

In dozens of studies, researchers identified Kuznets curves for a variety of environmental problems. There are exceptions to the trend, especially in countries with inept governments and poor systems of property rights, but in general, richer is eventually greener. As incomes go up, people often focus first on cleaning up their drinking water, and then later on air pollutants like sulfur dioxide.

As their wealth grows, people consume more energy, but they move to more efficient and cleaner sources — from wood to coal and oil, and then to natural gas and nuclear power, progressively emitting less carbon per unit of energy. This global decarbonization trend has been proceeding at a remarkably steady rate since 1850, according to Jesse Ausubel of Rockefeller University and Paul Waggoner of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station.

“Once you have lots of high-rises filled with computers operating all the time, the energy delivered has to be very clean and compact,” said Mr. Ausubel, the director of the Program for the Human Environment at Rockefeller. “The long-term trend is toward natural gas and nuclear power, or conceivably solar power. If the energy system is left to its own devices, most of the carbon will be out of it by 2060 or 2070.” ...

America's Newest Profession: Bloggers for Hire

Wall Street Journal: America's Newest Profession: Bloggers for Hire

In America today, there are almost as many people making their living as bloggers as there are lawyers. Already more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers or firefighters.

Paid bloggers fit just about every definition of a microtrend: Their ranks have grown dramatically over the years, blogging is an important social and cultural movement that people care passionately about, and the number of people doing it for at least some income is approaching 1% of American adults.

The best studies we can find say we are a nation of over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income. That's almost 2 million Americans getting paid by the word, the post, or the click -- whether on their site or someone else's. And that's nearly half a million of whom it can be said, as Bob Dylan did of Hurricane Carter: "It's my work he'd say, I do it for pay."

This could make us the most noisily opinionated nation on earth. The Information Age has spawned many new professions, but blogging could well be the one with the most profound effect on our culture. If journalists were the Fourth Estate, bloggers are becoming the Fifth Estate. ...

Jesus Declares he Hates Economics

Well, it took me months but I finally got around to reading The Shack: Where Tragedy Confronts Eternity by William Paul Young. I found it moving at some points and problematic at other points. Any book that puts words in the mouth of God is running dangerous line. Overall, I wasn’t that enthralled with book.

But my intention here is not to give a full-blown review. Rather, I want to focus on one passage that gave me a “phonograph needle across the record moment.” The following statement was made to Mack, the lead character in the story, by Jesus:

“Marriage is not an institution. It’s a relationship.” Jesus paused, his voice steady and patient. “Like I said, I don’t care much for institutions; that’s an occupation for those who want to play God. So no, I’m not too big on religion,” Jesus said a little sarcastically, “and not very fond of politics or economics either.” Jesus’ visage darkened noticeably. “And why should I be? They are the man-created trinity of terrors that ravages the earth and deceives those I care about. What mental turmoil and anxiety does any human face that is not related to one of these three?” (179)

This is about the most inane piece of commentary I’ve read in awhile … and it’s placed in Jesus’ mouth. It is sadly a widely shared sentiment among many in more emergent forms of Christianity.

The Christian tradition has understood that the mandate to multiply and fill the earth would necessarily lead to large communities. The need to coordinate human action in terms of community priorities and economic activity would entail the development of human institutions. Thus, the development of these traditions and institutions are part of the creation mandate. 

Because of sinful human nature, every aspect of human existence, individual or corporate, is corrupted. Therefore, every institution has a measure of corruption. Sinful human nature has to be factored into how these institutions function. These institutions are in need of Christ’s transforming work. But to suggest that institutions are intrinsically evil is patently absurd.

Young’s image of heaven as revealed in the book appears to be a “back to Eden” model where we all live in bucolic bliss, as we skip stones on the lake and play in the garden. The biblical image of the New Creation is not Eden. It is a garden city, the New Jerusalem. To the ancients, the city symbolized the epitome of human culture with all its institutions related to governance, economics, religion, learning and the arts. These are incorporated into God’s new creation. Furthermore, the early chapters of Genesis reveal that, ontologically, God’s image bearers were destined for dominion and co-creative stewardship over the earth with God, not endless unproductive play. Apparently the institutions of the city are a piece of how that dominion is exercised.

I think Young does some good in trying to address the problem of evil but I found his rustic paradise free of human cooperative arrangements a major detraction.

Three Myths About Christians and Divorce

Rev.org:  Three Myths About Christians and Divorce (HT: Bradley Wright)

... In fact, it is part of three larger myths that scholars reveal to be dead wrong.

1) Christians divorce as often as non-Christians. According to the General Social Survey, the gold standard of scientific survey data because of its high response rates, 41 percent of Christians who have ever been married have divorced at some point in time. This is compared to 48 percent of non-Christians.* Of course, we’re not going to celebrate the fact that two in five married Christians experience the pain of divorce. At the same time, there is a statistically significant difference between Christians and non-Christians in terms of divorce, and church leaders ought to recognize that.

2) Church attendance makes no difference. Quite the opposite; differences are amplified when we take church attend-ance into consideration. Among weekly churchgoing Christians, the divorce rate drops to 32 percent. Looking at particular traditions, church attendance decreases the likelihood of divorce even more so. Among Catholics who attend weekly, for example, the divorce rate drops to 23 percent.

3) Things are only getting worse. Although the divorce rate has grown a great deal during the last century, the overall divorce rate in this country peaked about 25 years ago. Pundits who suggest that overall divorce rates could jump to as much as 60 percent are not in touch with reality. Instead, a growing number of experts believe the divorce rate could drop as low as 25 percent among certain groups. One likely subpopulation is churchgoing Christians. Several factors may be at work, but chief among them is premarital counseling and marriage preparation courses. These do wonders for helping couples set realistic expectations for married life and for handling challenges as they arise. Among the general population we also see that young people are getting married later in life, and this appears to be lowering overall rates of divorce. ...

Oregon's 12.1% Unemployment, 2nd Highest in US: Is The $8.40 Per Hour Minimum Wage to Blame?

Carpe Diem (Mark Perry): Oregon's 12.1% Unemployment, 2nd Highest in US: Is The $8.40 Per Hour Minimum Wage to Blame?

Is Oregon's high minimum wage partially to blame for the state's 12.1% unemployment rate, second highest in the nation (only Michigan is higher at 12.6%, see chart above of Oregon's jobless rate in blue vs. US rate in red)? The major business organizations in Oregon think so, and so do some members of the Legislature: Lawmakers are considering a bill that would override a 2002 citizen initiative and block future minimum wage increases indexed to inflation. ...

Big Sort: Segmenting Religion

(Link to Part 6)

Bill Bishop writes in The Big Sort:

American Churches today are more culturally and politically segregated than our neighborhoods. This happened partially because we prefer to worship in like-minded congregations. But churches also grew more homogeneous because ministers took what was learned nearly a century ago by Christian missionaries trying to overcome the caste system and language barriers in India and applied those lessons to the American villages appearing on the subdivided plains outside the central cities – neighborhoods where the castes consisted of taste, culture, lifestyle, and, in the end, political belief.

The strategy was as simple as like attracts like. The new and crowded megachurches were built on the most fundamental of human needs: finding safety within the tribe. … (159)

Bishop relates a narrative that begins with 20th Century church growth guru, Donald McGavran. McGavran was as Disciples of Christ missionary who held degrees from Yale and Columbia University and spent most of his years in India. While the missions he was a part of often offered wonderful social services, he wasn’t saving many souls. He began applying anthropological/sociological insights to church evangelism in a culture deeply divided by economic class and caste, and he was successful. Upon returning to the United States in the 1950s, McGavran become convinced that his insights were needed to deepen and grow the American church. He was widely ignored.

The 1950s and early 1960s were the pinnacle of bi-partisan homogeneity. McGavran’s insights seemed pointless in a cultural that was unified behind Public Protestantism (church as a means of cultural transformation and cohesion) and Private Protestantism (church as a means saving souls and transforming individuals) was marginalized. But as we have seen, the cultural consensus began to break apart around 1965. Many became disillusioned with societal institutions, including the Mainline churches, and the previously isolated Private Protestants became sufficiently distressed that, after decades of exile, they began to make themselves known in the public square.

Suddenly McGavran’s ideas came into vogue. Drawing on aspects of McGavran’s teaching, notable pastors like Saddleback’s Rick Warren began employing McGavran’s insights to develop and grow his church. In Purpose Driven Church you will find Saddleback Sam and Saddleback Samantha described. These are fictional characters that exhibit lifestyle traits that would be typical of the people Saddleback wants to reach. This couple is to be kept firmly in mind in developing and executing every bit of work Saddleback does. This is, of course, borrowed directly from market segmentation efforts in the marketing world. Others predated Warren in this strategy and countless others have followed but without out a doubt it has created a large number of churches that are well attended.

Bishop writes:

Members of the “disappearing middle” objected to McGavran’s tactics. To some, the goal of the church was the diversity (a Public Protestant virtue), not growth (Private Protestantism as defined by the Great Commission.) “The church is called by Christ to be a transformer of culture,” wrote Robert Evans, a theologian at Hartford Seminary Foundation. “I can find no emphasis in the New Testament on a self-conscious strategy for growth.” Jesus’ kingdom was a feast, and those “at a table would be Samaritans and Jerusalemites, Pharisees and slaves, harlots understood the image correctly, the greatest breaking down of homogenous units we will ever know.” (171)

The disappearing middle kept on disappearing over the last forty years and congregations in Mainline denominations began to succumb to the same segmenting principles. Many now gather around a collection of social justice causes (with politically left solutions), gay inclusion, or being green. I find that many of these congregations and their denominations hold themselves out to be ecumenical and to be seeking diversity, yet the only partners they seek out are those who also share these values and share a similar politically left orientation toward societal transformation. Ironically, embrace of “ecumenism” and “diversity” has become one more social segment around which to create a politically left homogenous community. And not being politically left means (in their eyes) you are opposed to God’s mission of societal transformation.

“Churches were once built around a geographic community, [Martin] Marty said. Now they are constructed around similar lifestyles.” (173) Bishop points to Martin Luther King’s observation that 11 o’clock on Sunday morning is the most racially segregated hour of the week and declares that now it is also the most politically segregated as well. He isn’t suggesting that most people look for a political position held by the congregation but rather they are looking for a church that comports will with their lifestyle; and political views correlate highly with lifestyle factors.

Bishop cites Eddie Gibbs in noting that McCavran’s views were never fully understood in North America. Bishiop writes, “Whereas McGavran was a missionary building bridges from castes or villages to Christ, today’s churches define tribes in the same way people are attracted to different sections of a shopping mall.”  (179) Bishop also notes political scientist James Gimpel’s observations:

“I find very little evidence that churches are really transforming their congregations … It’s rather quite the reverse. Ministers depend on pleasing a particular congregation for their longevity. The last thing they want to do is offend those people or try to transform their viewpoint … It’s conformity all the way.” (180)

Bishop closes Chapter 7:

“The church needed to be birthed within … indigenous cultures and take on that indigenous expression,” Eddie Gibbs told me. “It was a missional principle, and when it came to the U. S., it became a marketing principle: how to gather more people like us. [Churches] picked up the tactical parts, but I’m not sure they understood the deeper mission implications. And they didn’t really address the cultural implications, because mission morphed into marketing.” (182)

I might phrase Gibbs last observation a little differently. The church competes in a marketplace of idolatries and communities based on those idolatries. The church has no choice but to “market” itself in the world … not in the mistaken sense of equating marketing with advertising, but rather in the sense of being cognizant about the market and being strategic within the market. To do this well you must be crystal clear about the “product” you are promoting. If the product is Kingdom communities where there is “neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, and male and female,” then a marketing strategy that segments the church and intensifies divisions isn’t going to be successful. The church has had no choice but to market, but the American church (both Public and Private versions) has not understood the product it was to bring to market.

[Continued] [Index]

Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder

There are those who would say the following describes me perfectly and, having just turned 50, it is a sure indicator of my advancing years. Nonsense!

 Anyone who truly knows me would know that I've behaved this way all my life. Mrs. Kronicle, and the Kronicler's mother, are persuaded that this trait is carried on the Y chromosome in the Kruse line as all male Kruses seem to suffer from the same malady.

This is how it goes: I decide to wash the car; I start toward the garage and notice the mail on the table. OK, I'm going to wash the car. But first I'm going to go through the mail. I lay the car keys down on the desk, discard the junk mail and I notice the trash can is full. OK, I'll just put the bills on my desk and take the trash can out, but since I'm going to be near the mailbox anyway, I'll pay these few bills first. Now, where is my checkbook? Oops, there's only one check left. My extra checks are in my desk.

Oh, there's the coke I was drinking. I'm going to look for those checks. But first I need to put my coke further away from the computer, oh maybe I'll pop it into the fridge to keep it cold for a while.

I head towards the kitchen and my flowers catch my eye, they need some water. I set the coke on the counter and ooh oh! There are my glasses. I was looking for them all morning! I'd better put them away first.

I fill a container with water and head for the flower pots - - Aaaaaagh! Someone left the TV remote in the kitchen. We'll never think to look in the kitchen tonight when we want to watch television so I'd better put it back in the family room where it belongs. I splash some water into the pots and onto the floor, I throw the remote onto a soft cushion on the sofa and I head back down the hall trying to figure out what it was I was going to do?

End of Day: The car isn't washed, the bills are unpaid, the coke is sitting on the kitchen counter, the flowers are half watered, the checkbook still only has one check in it and I can't seem to find my car keys!

When I try to figure out how come nothing got done today, I'm baffled because I KNOW I WAS BUSY ALL DAY LONG!!! I realize this is a serious condition and I'll get help, BUT FIRST I think I'll check my e-mail...  (Source)

If It’s in the Ground, It Can Only Go Down

Newsweek: If It’s in the Ground, It Can Only Go Down

Note: One of the most persistent and frustrating economic misconceptions I encounter is the notion that we are running out of natural resources. It is integral to the new environmental leftism and it is center stage in books like Brian McLaren's Everything Must Change.

From a superficial intuitive perspective it seems obvious that there are a fixed number of resources in the ground.  We are using them at certain rate. At some point they run out. Get more people using the same resources and you speed up the time at which you run out. Right? Wrong! What the reasoning fails to capture is human adaptability.

I've written about this before as the Linear Projection fallacy in my Economic Fallacies Christians Believe series so I won't repeat it here, but I thought this article did a good job of explaining these issues.

As playwright Arthur Miller once observed, "An era can be said to end when its basic illusions are exhausted." And most of the illusions that defined the late global economic boom—the notion that global growth had moved to a permanently higher plane and housing prices from Miami to Mumbai would rise indefinitely—are now indeed exhausted. Yet one idea still has the power to capture imaginations and markets: it is that commodities like oil, copper, grains and gold are all destined to rise over time. Lots of smart people believe that last year's swoon in commodities prices represented a short pause in a long-term bull market.

It's a view rooted in powerful and real trends, like the growth of China and India, the decline in global reserves (many of the world's biggest and best oilfields are tapped out), fears over resource nationalization (independent oil firms now control only 20 percent of global reserves) and long-term underinvestment in energy and agriculture, which hampers supply.

Yet the fact is that the world has faced all these issues before, and for the past 200 years, commodity prices have been trending downwards, thanks to new technologies, greater efficiency in extraction and the substitution of one commodity for another (which explains the high correlation between commodities prices). Bank Credit Analyst, a research firm based in Montreal, has data showing major industrial commodity prices are 75 percent below where they were in the year 1800, after adjusting for inflation. Despite all the worries over "peak oil," the fact is that the major bear markets in oil have been demand, rather than supply led. And when demand eventually picks up, there's usually some new alternative (nuclear energy, natural gas, green technologies) waiting to pick up some of the slack. The real price of oil today is now at the same level as in 1976 and, before that, in the 1870s, when oil was first put to mass use in the United States. This long-term price decline is due mainly to the constant discovery of new fields and greater energy efficiency, making nonsense of the idea that the world is rapidly running out of oil. The experience of the 1980s is instructive in the current context as well.

Japan and Europe continued to grow strongly in the 1980s, and yet oil consumption remained essentially flat through that decade as both the regions strived to achieve better fuel efficiency and switched to alternative sources of energy, such as nuclear power. Similarly, 90 percent of the growth in new oil capacity since 2004 has come from biofuels, synthetic oil and natural-gas liquids. As countries get richer, their per capita consumption of commodities declines. It's a myth, then, that the boom in China and India will inexorably drive up oil and other commodity prices. ...

Big Sort: Economic Consequences

(Link to Part 5)

The U. S. A. has been undergoing decades of urbanization. First the migration was into densely populated urban areas. Then folks begin migrating out the suburbs, some by “white flight” as white upper and middle class families left ahead of the in-migration of ethnic minorities. In The Big Sort, Bill Bishop sees a new type of migration in recent years. People are sorting according to types of cities. Here are some of the sorting features.

Education

The number of people earning a college degree has been steadily increasing. While cities have always had disproportionately higher numbers of college educated folks compared to rural areas, the percentage of folks who were college educated from one city to the next was not radically different. In 1970, 11.2% of the population had a college degree. For Austin, TX, it was 17% and for Cleveland it was 4%. Certainly a disparity but nothing like 2004 when the percentages were 45% for Austin and 14% for Cleveland. There are 62 metro areas where less than 17% have a college education and 32 where 34% have a college education. When you look at the concentration of young adults with college degrees, the sorting effect is even more striking from one city to the next. Not surprisingly, those cities with high-tech industries have been the magnates for the college educated.

Race

Whites have left the older factory cities of the North and Midwest, as well as the largest metro areas like L. A., Chicago, and Philly, and headed for high-tech cities like Atlanta, Phoenix, Austin, Seattle, and Minneapolis, or retirement/recreational cities like Las Vegas, West Palm Beach, Orlando, and Tampa. Blacks have moved to cities with strong black communities like Atlanta, Washington, New York, Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Fort Lauderdale, Baltimore and Philadelphia. “Only 9 out of 320 cities lost black residents.”

Age

“In 1990, young people were evenly distributed among the nation’s 320 cities. By 2000, twenty- to thirty-four-year-olds were concentrated in just a score of cities. … Eighty percent of the non-Hispanic whites ages twenty to thirty-four who moved during the 1990s relocated to the twenty-one highest in technology and patent production. “ (133)

Ideas

Bishop examines patents filed per capita for metropolitan areas. High-tech cities have seen 100-200% increases in patents filed from the 1970s to the 1990s. Meanwhile, Cleveland saw a decrease of 14% and Pittsburgh 27%.

Wages

As you might guess, the high-tech cities have seen greater increases in wages than low-tech cities.

Occupation

“Instead of people moving to corporations, corporations had begun moving to where pools of talent were deepening.” (135) The iterative effect of high-tech corporations concentrating in one area leads creative-class workers to locate in the area, which draws more high-tech corporations.

The result is that people are sorting into two general categories of cities:

High-Tech Cities (Compared to Low-Tech Cities)

More interested in other cultures and places
More likely to “try anything once”
More likely to engage in individualistic activities
More optimistic
More interested in politics
Volunteering increasing, but less than in low-tech cities
Church attendance decreasing
Community projects decreasing
Club membership decreasing

Low-Tech Cities (Compared to High-Tech Cities)

More likely to attend church
Club membership decreasing, but less than in high-tech cities
Community projects increasing
Volunteering increasing
More active participation in clubs, churches, volunteer services, and civic projects
More supportive of traditional authority
More family oriented
More feelings of isolation
More feelings of economic vulnerability
More sedentary
Higher levels of stress
Political interest decreasing
More social activities with other people (143)

What does all this mean in terms of worldviews and politics?

… Bob Cushing and I divided the U.S. metro areas into five groups with descending levels of high-tech and patent production and then compared how these groups of cities voted in the six presidential elections from 1980 to 2000. In the earliest election, all the city groups voted much the same. The twenty-one high-tech areas were slightly more Democratic than the nation as a whole. Suburban cities adjacent to these high-tech areas (places such as Boulder outside of Denver, Orange County outside Los Angeles, and Galveston outside Houston) were slightly more Republican than the national average. But in 1980, the vote in all these areas approximate how the nation voted as a whole.

As time passed, voting patterns in the city groups diverged. The high-tech group tilted increasingly Democratic, so that by 2000, these twenty-one cities were voting Democratic, at a rate 17 percent about the national average. (Take out the Texas tech cities – Austin, Houston, and Dallas – and the remaining eighteen metro areas were voting Democratic at a rate 21 percent about the national average.) The cities adjacent to the high-tech hubs flipped altogether, turning strongly Democratic as group. (This was true even with the inclusion of still-Republican Orange County.) The low-tech cities and rural America grew increasingly Republican. … (154)

[Continued] [Index]

The "in order to" Problem

Jesus Creed: The "in order to" Problem

What is fasting? Try defining it, and I'll make a suggestion. Go ahead -- in your mind define it.

Here's my suggestion: If, in defining fasting, we are tempted to define fasting as something we do "in order to" get something, I suggest we need to look again at the deepest wells of the Christian fasting tradition: the Bible. In Fasting: The Ancient Practices I suggest that in the Christian tradition we somehow got sidetracked.

Instead of seeing fasting as a discipline we use "in order to" get answers to prayers, "in order to" become more attuned to God, or "in order to" become more spiritual, the Bible's focus is on fasting as a response to life's sacred, grievous moments. ...

Scot's book is coming up on my list pretty quick. I'm looking forward to what his reflection on this.

Wedding Sermon Advice

So here is my story. My niece is getting married in August and she has asked uncle Mike to give the wedding eulogy ... er, I mean ... sermon. (I always get that confused.) I've done preaching and teaching in the past but never a wedding. I've been developing my best imitation of the bishop conducting the wedding in The Princess Bride. "Mawege. Mawege is what bwings us together today. ..." See clip below. (Mrs. Kronicle is not amused.)

I have some thoughts on what I should say but I realize there are some pastors among my readers who do this stuff all the time. Any tips you would give a novice? (I'm guessing that keeping the remarks to less than an hour is good. I'm also guessing I might want to lose the Power Point and video clips.) What themes do you emphasize? To readers in general, what would you say at a wedding?

An Analysis of Reasons for the Disparity in Wages Between Men and Women

Consard Research Corporation and the Department of Labor: An Analysis of Reasons for the Disparity in Wages Between Men and Women

I discovered this report a few weeks ago and never got around to posting it. From the reports Foreward:

During the past three decades, women have made notable gains in the workplace and in pay equity, including increased labor force participation, substantial gains in educational attainment, employment growth in higher paying occupations, and significant gains in real earnings.

In 1970, about 43 percent of women aged 16 and older were in the labor force; by 2007, over 59 percent were in labor force.

In 1970, only 17.9 percent of women aged 25 and older had gone to college; by 2000, almost half had gone to college; and by 2006 one-third of the women in the labor force held a college degree.

In 2007, women accounted for 51 percent of all workers in the high-paying management, professional, and related occupations. They outnumbered men in such occupations as financial managers, human resource managers, education administrators, medical and health services managers, and accountants and auditors.

In 1970, the median usual weekly earnings for women working full-time was only 62.1 percent of those for men; by 2007, the raw wage gap had shrunk from 37.9 percent to just 21.5 percent.

However, despite these gains the raw wage gap continues to be used in misleading ways to advance public policy agendas without fully explaining the reasons behind the gap. The purpose of this report is to identify the reasons that explain the wage gap in order to more fully inform policymakers and the public.

The following report prepared by CONSAD Research Corporation presents the results of a detailed statistical analysis of the attributes that contribute to the wage gap and a synopsis of the economic research that has been conducted on the issue. The major findings are:

There are observable differences in the attributes of men and women that account for most of the wage gap. Statistical analysis that includes those variables has produced results that collectively account for between 65.1 and 76.4 percent of a raw gender wage gap of 20.4 percent, and thereby leave an adjusted gender wage gap that is between 4.8 and 7.1 percent. These variables include:

A greater percentage of women than men tend to work part-time. Part-time work tends to pay less than full-time work.

A greater percentage of women than men tend to leave the labor force for child birth, child care and elder care. Some of the wage gap is explained by the percentage of women who were not in the labor force during previous years, the age of women, and the number of children in the home.

Women, especially working mothers, tend to value “family friendly” workplace policies more than men. Some of the wage gap is explained by industry and occupation, particularly, the percentage of women who work in the industry and occupation.

Research also suggests that differences not incorporated into the model due to data limitations may account for part of the remaining gap. Specifically, CONSAD’s model and much of the literature, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics Highlights of Women’s Earnings, focus on wages rather than total compensation. Research indicates that women may value non-wage benefits more than men do, and as a result prefer to take a greater portion of their compensation in the form of health insurance and other fringe benefits.

In principle, more of the raw wage gap could be explained by including some additional variables within a single comprehensive analysis that considers all of the factors simultaneously; however, such an analysis is not feasible to conduct with available data bases. Factors, such as work experience and job tenure, require data that describe the behavior of individual workers over extended time periods. The longitudinal data bases that contain such information include too few workers, however, to support adequate analysis of factors like occupation and industry. Cross-sectional data bases that include enough workers to enable analysis of factors like occupation and industry do not collect data on individual workers over long enough periods to support adequate analysis of factors like work experience and job tenure.

Although additional research in this area is clearly needed, this study leads to the unambiguous conclusion that the differences in the compensation of men and women are the result of a multitude of factors and that the raw wage gap should not be used as the basis to justify corrective action. Indeed, there may be nothing to correct. The differences in raw wages may be almost entirely the result of the individual choices being made by both male and female workers.

Charles E. James, Senior
Deputy Assistant Secretary for Federal Contract Compliance

Tea Party in Kansas City

It was beautiful sunny day in Kansas City today and I decided I needed to outdoors for a little while. Turns out there was one of the Tax Day Tea Parties happening at the Liberty Memorial, not far from where I live, so I grabbed my camera and roamed around the event for almost an hour. I took some of my pictures and video clips and assembled them into a YouTube video. Nothing fancy. Just some sights and sounds. Here it is.

Decline in blacks in prison for drug crimes reverses 25-year trend

Christian Science Monitor: Decline in blacks in prison for drug crimes reverses 25-year trend

New York - For the first time in a quarter century, the number of African-Americans incarcerated for drug offenses in state prisons has declined more than 20 percent while the number of white imprisoned drug offenders has increased more than 40 percent.

The decline took place over a six year period from 1999 to 2005 and reflects fundamental changes in the so-called "war on drugs" – how it's targeted and prosecuted – as well as the waning of the crack epidemic in predominantly minority urban areas and the increase in methamphetamine abuse in largely white rural neighborhoods.

The trends were identified in an analysis of Justice Department statistics released Tuesday by The Sentencing Project, a criminal justice and reform nonprofit in Washington, D.C. The study found that an increase in the number of drug courts and state-level efforts to find alternatives to incarceration may have played a role in bringing about the change.

"Over the last year or two, largely because of the fiscal crisis, states around the country are reconsidering many of their sentencing and incarceration policies, particularly for lower level drug offenses," says Marc Mauer, executive director of The Sentencing Project and author of the study. "So it seems reasonably likely that we could see some decline in the overall number of people incarcerated for drug offenses."

According to the study, the number of blacks in state prisons on drug-related charges dropped from 144,700 in 1999 to 113,500 in 2005. The number of white drug-offenders in prison increased during the same time from 50,700 to 72,300.  ...

The Death of Consumer Segmentation?

Advertising Age: The Death of Consumer Segmentation?

Rethinking a Traditional Marketing Tool

One of the most important paradigms governing today's marketing world is the constant drive to better segment a brand's customer and prospect base. Conventional wisdom says that the better we segment consumers, the better we can market to them. Consumer segmentation is viewed as a "best-in-class" practice across the marketing world.

But are we on the right track? ...

...I am challenging that belief based on three observations. The first is that the rather static definition of consumer segments is becoming less reliable in our extremely volatile society, especially in today's economic climate. ...

...Second, consumers are never just part of one segment. Rather, they feel, rightfully, that they belong to a multitude of segments. ... This is particularly true for the growing multicultural groups in the U.S. who are moving through several segment identities every single day.

Finally, consumers are gaining more control of any marketing activity. And they like it. Yes, they like to receive relevant information, but even more, they prefer to choose their own relevant information. And in truth, it's easier to let them choose and decide what is relevant for them than to predict relevance based on any expensively calculated segment identity. This is a plea to marketers for a stronger focus on enabling the consumer to self-segment. ...

It's not surprising that two of the most successful product and retail companies, Apple and Amazon, are not masters of consumer segmentation but experts in building relevant products that consumers choose. Their marketing communication is segment-based but does not depend on pursuing an ever-increasing level of micro-segment-specific relevance. They are far more focused on building and communicating relevance relationships than in micro-segmenting consumers by any kind of attributes. Facebook, MySpace and even Google are behaving similarly. They are enablers of self-segmentation and self-identification through group and interest identities. They do not place targeted, direct communications at the center of their marketing activities, but rather enable consumers to self-target by their own individual choices and network preferences. ... [emphasis is mine]

Welcome to the big sort.

Big Sort: Seeds of the New Partisanship

(Link to Part 4)

During the fall of 1974, in Kanawha County, West Virginia, a war broke out. Not a shooting war exactly but certainly major conflict. Schools were shut down and people went to jail for conspiracy to blow up school buses and burn down schools. The issue? Textbooks.

Fundamentalist pastor Marvin Horan led a crusade against what he saw as the local school district’s attempts to use anti-American and anti-religious school books. Scholars researching the events discovered that there was more to this conflict that than met the eye. Those who favored the new school books broadly shared similar views on a lengthy checklist of issues ranging from education, social services, the role of government, national security, and school prayer. Those that opposed the textbooks shared opposing views. The most telling finding? When asked to rank a list of values, those that favored the textbooks ranked the importance of a “saved, eternal life” at the bottom, and those that opposed to the textbooks ranked it at the top.

Bill Bishop uses this incident in The Big Sort to illustrate the emergence of the new partisanship. He writes about Martin Marty’s observation on how America became divided between two types of Protestantism.

Private Protestants promoted individual salvation and promised that personal morality would be rewarded in the next life. On the other side of that great divide was “Public Protestantism,” a conviction that the way to God required the transformation of society. The latter laid the foundation for Democratic liberalism. The former provided the moral footing and rationale for Republican conservatism. (110)

Bishop sees the Kanawha County episode as an initial flashpoint of Private Protestants re-entering the arena to battle with what they saw as their oppressive dismissive treatment at the hand of the dominant culture, with the Mainline denominations as its handmaiden, and its New Deals, New Frontiers and Great Societies. Values, particularly religious values, began to emerge as the dividing line for partisan identification. As that division intensified over the years, people in our highly mobile society began to seek out (consciously or not) others who shared their views on life and sorted according to those values.

Bishop points out that conservative political activists didn’t create the Kanawha uprising but they did see an opportunity. By marrying this new activist distrust of intrusive government by Private Protestants with small-government, free market advocates, they could create a potent political force. The rest is pretty much history. I think one of Bishops most important observations on this topic is as follows:

Democrats tend to blame the division of Jerry Falwell, Rush Limbaugh, the Heritage Foundation, Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and Karl Rove. Republicans tend to blame it on the 1960s, welfare, drugs, Jimmy Carter and Bill and Hillary Clinton. Looking back at the split between Public and Private Protestants and the Kanawha County textbook strike, one can see that the divide Francia uncovered wasn’t foisted on Americans in a conspiracy of the right or the left. The conservative movement of the 1980s and 1990s was successful because it orchestrated – then amplified – the politics emerging from communities as different as Orange County, California, and Kanawha County, West Virginia. Polarization did not come from politicians or the media. Indeed, according to Francia, “elites may be responding to the polarization that exists within the electorate rather than the other way around.” It’s just that in the past three decades, Republicans responded better than Democrats. (126-127)

A final side observation. Bishop points out that regular church goers vote conservative in large majorities in the U. S. But it is not only in America that we have seen the alignment of regular church goers with conservative politics. Bishop says studies show that every industrialized nation shows the same phenomenon. However, in highly agrarian societies the relationship is reversed. Bishop writes that this is the answer to Thomas Frank’s book, What’s the Matter With Kansas? In the 1890s, Kansas was agrarian. Today it is not. Bishop does not explain the relationship but I would expect that agrarian societies (using Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs) are more preoccupied with economic outcomes while industrialized post-materialist societies are focused on identity and values.

[Continued] [Index]

An Amazaing Late Bloomer

The amazing Susan Boyle.

Is the Christian Right Dead?

John H. Armstrong: Is the Christian Right Dead?

Kathleen Parker asks, in her Washington Post syndicated column of April 5, this question: "Is the Christian right finished as a political entity?" By asking this question Ms. Parker is not asking if Christian involvement in moral issues is dead but rather "Is the Christian right finished as a viable movement and force in politics?" She thinks that it is. I have agreed with this premise since at least 2004, if not sooner. ...

... I believe the following negatives are the direct result of the Christian right: ...

Great post. I was raised in the Church of the Nazarene and had my doubts about certain tenets of belief as a teenager. But it was while being subjected to a Jerry Falwell (c. 1980) Moral Majority campaign stop during a required chapel service at a Nazarene college that pushed me over the edge toward looking for a new home. I became PCUSA three years later while in grad school.

I don't know that the Religous Right is dead. I expect a resurgence with new faces in the not too distant future. Don't know if it will succeed. What I do mourn is that many of the policy positions which I share with Religious Right have been deeply harmed by their tatics and anti-intellectualism. Those poitions deserved better advocacy and I think the nation will be poorer for not being persuaded of their legitimacy. That, I think, will be the near term legacy.

Did “Save Darfur” Lose Darfur?

Aid Watch: Did “Save Darfur” Lose Darfur?

I have long been a fan of Mahmood Mamdani. His new book Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics, and the War on Terror is very critical of the Western approach to Darfur. In brief, he accuses advocacy campaigns like Save Darfur of making the achievement of peace in Darfur more difficult by portraying the conflict simplistically between “bad Arabs” and “good Africans,” and by advocating foreign military intervention.

I’ll repeat just a few points from Mamdani that stuck in my mind, but I encourage you strongly to pick up the book. ...

...None of this is to deny the enormous human tragedy in Darfur. But Mamdani’s analysis makes one wonder: is it possible that ill-informed outsiders with the threat of military power on their side can make things worse rather than better?

Study: Mainline clergy growing even more liberal

Presbyterian Outlook: Study: Mainline clergy growing even more liberal

(RNS) Over the last decade, mainline Protestant clergy have inched leftward, with more identifying as Democrats, supporting gay rights, and calling on the government to solve social problems, according to a recently released survey.

The “Clergy Voices” survey published on March 6 builds on similar studies conducted in 1989 and 2001, according to scholars at Public Religion Research in Washington.

Sometimes called the “quiet hand of God” for their social justice work outside the media’s glare, mainline Protestants make up 18 percent of the country, according to researchers. But they are “arguably the most neglected of the major religious groups in the American religious landscape,” said Robert P. Jones, president of Public Religion Research, who co-authored the survey.

Mainline Protestant clergy have shown “remarkable consistency over the last 20 years in political ideology and party affiliation,” said Jones. Fifty-six percent of the 1,000 clergy surveyed identified as Democrats, compared to 53 percent in 2001 and 1989.

Meanwhile, more than seventy-five percent of mainline clergy say the federal government should be more involved in solving problems like poverty, low-income housing, and unemployment. Sixty-eight percent said the same in 2001.

Nearly 70 percent of mainline clergy called for more environmental protection, up from 60 percent in 2001. And two-thirds favor outlawing capital punishment, a jump of 8 percentage points from 2001.

At the same time, clergy support for gay rights — an issue that has vexed almost all mainline denominations — has steadily increased. In August 2008, when the survey was conducted, nearly eight in 10 clergy said gays and lesbians should have the same rights and privileges as other Americans, up 9 percentage points from 2001. ...

A texting entrepreneur embodies spirit of a new Rwanda

Christian Science Monitor: A texting entrepreneur embodies spirit of a new Rwanda

Jeff Gasana's goal is to make his award-winning company the leading cellphone-banking service in East Africa.

Kigali, Rwanda - Jeff Gasana is a man on a texting mission.

The soft-spoken 20-something tycoon thumbs his sleek cellphone, firing off SMS messages to associates, his deadpan calm belying the ferocity of his drive for success.

His goal is to make SMS Media, the text-messaging firm he co-founded six years ago, the leading cellphone banking service in East Africa, where cellphone-to-cellphone finance is emerging as an enormous business opportunity.

In Rwanda, SMS Media is already an award-winning industry leader in allowing customers to purchase and activate prepaid amounts of electricity via cellphone. A full 40 percent of Rwandans now buy electricity using the company's services.

Mr. Gasana embodies the spirit of a new Rwanda. Just 15 years ago this week, Hutu extremists here began slaughtering Tutsis and moderate Hutus, killing more than 800,000 in less than 100 days, the worst ethnic killing since the Holocaust. The genocide tore apart the country's social fabric and institutions and destroyed its economy; Rwanda survived on emergency food aid until 2000. But the past few years have seen remarkable economic progress – skyrocketing Rwanda from a regional backwater to a can-do hub for technology and trade.

The Singapore of Africa

Now, Rwanda's butter-smooth roads are the envy of Africa, investors are pouring money in, and modern glass office buildings line the hills of the capital, Kigali, helping the country earn its status as the "Singapore of Africa."

But there's a dark side to the success. Few outside the highly educated circles in Kigali are benefiting from the prosperity. More than 80 percent of the population is still getting by on less than $2 a day, struggling as the cost of living leaps. The boom is also the result of a tightly controlled, Tutsi-dominated government that critics say stacks the deck in favor of Tutsis and stifles all dissent. ...

Big Sort: Post-Materialism

(Link to Part 3)

Earlier in this Big Sort series we noted Bill Bishop’s observation that the first half of the 20th Century had been about economic specialization and the second half about social specialization. What drove this social specialization? Bishop calls it post-materialism. He writes:

The new politics was molded by post-materialist realities. Tradition, economic class and occupation, religious denomination, civic structures, and party politics – the ways of life that had molded the country over the previous century – were losing significance. The new society was more about personal taste and worldview than public policy. It was as much or more concerned with self-expression and belief as with social class and economics. (104)

While a high percentage of people identified with either of the two major political parties in the 1950s, there was such a bipartisan ethos that it really made little difference. (Both parties recruited Eisenhower to run for president.) Barely half of the electorate knew what “liberal” or “conservative” meant in the political arena. The era from 1948 to 1965 was the least partisan era of the modern Congress according to Bishop.

Beginning in 1965, people began disassociating from both major political parties; a trend that accelerated into the 1970s. This abandonment of politics was part of a larger disillusionment with social institutions including volunteer organizations and the church. There was a bipartisan anti-government feeling fomenting on the back of civil rights issues, the Vietnam War and corruption in politics. The old glue that had held the civic order together was crumbling.

Simultaneous to these events, Americans were becoming more affluent. As matters relating to basic material needs began to recede in importance, other concerns became more prominent. Using a Maslow Hierarchy of Needs framework, more attention shifted toward esteem and self-actualization at the top of pyramid.

A new ethos of political identification began emerging based more on self-expression and identity than on public policy. In the next post, we will see how Bishop characterizes this emergence, but now I want to make two observations.

First, Bishop’s analysis that 1948 to 1965 was a time minimal partisanship in terms of actual policy, sits well with other analyses of the era. However, it is important to reflect the means by which such an ethos was created. As Bishop points out, not everyone, including contemporaries of that era saw this state of affairs as healthy. Remember that this was the era of Joseph McCarthy, suppression of minority ethnic voices, and rigid gender roles. To be honest, this was the dark side of Tom Brokaw’s “Greatest Generation” (born 1901-1924) who assumed the reins of power during this era. They had the ability to mobilize the masses toward big ideas (including big corporations, big government, big denominations, etc.) through rigid standardization of beliefs and behaviors, enforced by peer pressure and group solidarity. The inclination to think and act as one is a dual-edged sword. If you buy Strauss and Howe’s model of a repeating cycle of four generational archetypes, then the generation born about 1981-2001 (sometimes called the “Millennials” or “Gen Y”) will exhibit similar tendencies.

Second, I know that the idea of post-materialism is not without controversy. Yet the more I study the changes of the past fifty years, the more persuaded I become of this thesis. It has enormous implications for the life of the church. Most of recorded human history (and that includes the biblical context) has transpired in the context of societies where there was a tiny minority with great wealth and the masses living at, or barely above, subsistence. That context has shaped our values, traditions, and institutions in countless ways. How do we live in the midst of widespread affluence?

Nations that have achieved widespread affluence seem to follow a similar path toward the collapse of social institutions, fertility rates well below replacement rate, physical and health problems stemming from sedentary lives, and other maladies. Yes, there are always likely to be “the poor” in some relative sense, but poverty in terms of people living at subsistence is likely to become an increasingly small problem. Assuming that over the next century or two this affluence becomes a completely globalized phenomenon, what will it mean to Christian discipleship? I think we are in the early stages of wrestling with these questions.

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By focusing only on covering the uninsured, are we solving the wrong problem?

KeithHennessey.com: By focusing only on covering the uninsured, are we solving the wrong problem?

... The traditional Beltway logic on health care reform goes like this:

• The problem is that 46 million Americans lack health insurance.  (I addressed why this number is incorrect and misleading last Thursday.)
• Government should provide health insurance to those 46 million people, or at least pay for it.
• Let’s expand a taxpayer-subsidized health insurance program to cover the 46 million, or maybe create a new program. * (Alternately:  Let’s mandate that everyone has to buy/have health insurance.)
• This means everyone will have health insurance.  We have solved the problem. ...

... Here is my alternate logic:

• The problems are (a) health insurance is expensive, and (b) the cost of health insurance grows faster than compensation.
• These two factors (expensive and getting more so) mean that:

1. Private health insurance gets more expensive each year for the 202 million Americans who have it.  This directly squeezes wages when health insurance is provided by an employer, and household budgets no matter how it is purchased.
2. Uninsured people cannot afford health insurance.  Those who can just barely afford it this year risk losing it next year and becoming uninsured as their premiums grow faster than their wages.
3. Public health insurance expenditures for Medicare, Medicaid, S-CHIP, and FEHBP roughly track private health insurance expenditures over time.  High and rapidly-growing health insurance costs therefore crush federal and state government budgets.

• If we can figure out ways to make health insurance less expensive, and/or slow the growth of health insurance premiums, we will solve all three of these problems.
• If our solution slows the growth rate of health insurance premiums, we will have a lasting solution, unlike those solutions which just shift costs from one payor to another (usually, the taxpayer). ...

From his previous post, How many uninsured people need additional help from taxpayers?

He is Risen!

Mission Yearbook Rebuttal

Presbyterians have a long tradition of praying for ministry around the nation and around the world using something called The Mission Yearbook for Prayer and Study. Today’s entry is about ministry in Asia and the Pacific. The entry includes the following:

In the last decade, the Asia and Pacific region has experienced major shifts in both international and ecclesiastical contexts. Their effects will certainly continue to impact the mission and ministry of world mission in the coming years. The world economy has faltered. Asia’s great successes have come at the expense of the poor and the middle class. Gaps between rich and poor, capitalists and laborers, grow ever wider across the globe. (Go here.)

So over the last decade we have seen a decline in the plight of the poor and middle class. Here is some United Nations data from Gapminder for some emerging nations in the Asia with substantial populations.

Life expectancy at birth and the infant mortality rate (children who die prior to first birthday per 1,000 births) are considered two of the most important indicators of overall societal well-being.

 

Concerning China, with more than 1.3 Billion people, the World Bank reports:

China's record over the last quarter century in reducing extreme poverty has been remarkable. Between 1981 and 2004, the fraction of the population consuming less than a dollar-a-day fell from 65% to 10%, and more than half a billion people were lifted out of poverty

Between 2001 and 2004 the pace of poverty reduction accelerated, and there are indications that poverty has continued to decline rapidly up to 2007.

The Christian Science Monitor offered this graph a couple of years ago:

Concerning India, with more than 1.1 Billion people, the World Bank offers this graph:

We have a long way to go toward dealing with global poverty but "poor are getting poorer" idea is simply not accurate about Asia. There are some very wealthy people emerging, but unless you take a zero-sum view (i.e., an increase in one person's wealth is at someone eles's expense) of the economy, it is not obvious in what way the are becoming wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle class.

If you want a quick twenty minute education in what has been happening to income and well-being in recent years, then you need to visit Hans Roslings TED presentation below.

Big Sort: The Psychology of the Tribe

(Link to Part 2)

We’ve seen in The Big Sort that over the past fifty years people have been geographically sorting themselves into likeminded communities. What are the social psychological consequences of such a phenomenon?

Bishop presents something called the “Risky Shit” effect. People have an innate need to find safety in groups. He reviews studies like the one where subjects are asked to consider options when a competent chess player draws the top ranked competitor for his chess match. He has a choice between a risky move that, if successful, will result in certain victory but, if unsuccessful, will result in certain defeat, or he could adopt a more conventional strategy. At what odds of success should the player take the risky option? (i. e., 10%?, 20%?, 30%? …)

Studies consistently point out that the group, after discussing the issue, will chose a more risky approach then the average of the answers the individuals privately reported before interacting. When the scenario is revisited from the standpoint of the chess champion, subjects privately take a conservative approach but after group discussion take a more conservative approach than the average of the individuals. Either way, subjects became more extreme in the direction of the average group opinion.  You got group polarization.

Bishop writes:

Social psychologists have proposed several theories to explain group polarization. Two have survived scrutiny. The first holds that people in single-minded groups are privy to a large pool of ideas and arguments supporting the dominant position of the group. If there are good arguments in favor of the group’s inclination, everyone hears them, and hears them often. Moreover, as the group talks about these ideas and arguments, individuals feel more strongly about them. People are more committed to a position once they voice it. The second theory holds that people are constantly comparing their beliefs and actions to those of the group. When a person learns that others in the group share his or her general beliefs, he or she finds it socially advantageous to adopt a position slightly more extreme than the group average. It’s a safe way to stand out from the crowd. It brings notice and even approbation. (69)

Bishop doesn’t explicitly raise the issue but I would add that single-minded groups create shared narratives complete with heroes, villains, and storylines about the underlying forces driving events. This narrative becomes the lens through which all information is received (or rejected) and interpreted. 

The consequences of homogenized regions are significant. For instance, with political parties, when one party becomes dominant in the community, those in the minority drop out of community involvement and may physically remove themselves from the community. The majority is decreasingly exposed to any contrary views. They become more committed and radical in their views. Often, a higher percentage of people vote in homogenous areas than in contested areas simply because it gives them feelings of solidarity with the group. Thomas Jefferson wrote 200 years ago that social isolation is the seedbed of extremism and social science is proving him right.

Other studies Bishop writes about showed that when it comes to news reporting people simply “… don’t believe what they see or hear if runs counter to their existing beliefs.” (75) Even if both sides of an issue are presented, people only give credence to the information that matches their views. This inclination is called confirmation bias; people look only for information that confirms their views. One researcher “… found that voters watch debates in order to reinforce what they already believe,” not to learn about issues. (75)

Thus, we end up with a baffled American public. So many of us live in our own echo chambers that when events that don’t conform to our narrative and our shared community experience, we conclude there must be some conspiracy or some minority radical element at work. “No one we know thinks like that and we’re normal.”

My experience has been that sometimes people become aware that they are living in an echo chamber and they’re no longer in congruence with the community. They break out of that community to find another that accepts them and makes them feel comfortable. They declare they no longer live in a narrow-minded echo chamber like the one they escaped. In reality, they’ve just swapped echo chambers and the only reason they don’t realize they are in a new one is because everything around them now tells them their perspective is “normal.” In the church world, I see this with mainliners who join evangelical mega-churches, evangelicals who become emergent, and with host of other switches as well. I see it with politics and other aspects of life as well.

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