The 99 Percent: James A. Robinson, Chris Hedges, Ishmael Reed, and Bryan Mealer
Sunday, Nov. 18, 4:30 p.m., Batten (Building 2, 1st Floor, Room 2106)
Author(s) and Guest(s)
James A. Robinson
James A. Robinson's appearance is cancelled.
Why are some nations rich and others poor? This is the central question addressed by two of the world’s leading experts on development in Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty (Crown Business, $30.00). Using fifteen years of research exploring 400 years of history, Acemoglu and Robinson demonstrate that it is man-made political and economic institutions that underlie economic success or failure. “. . . an intellectually rich book that develops an important thesis with verve.”—Financial Times. Robinson, a political scientist and an economist, is the David Florence Professor of Government at Harvard University. Acemoglu is the Killian Professor of Economics at MIT.
Chris Hedges
Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist and author, who has reported from more than 50 countries and worked for several national publications, including The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years. His most recent book is Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt (Nation Books, $28.00), illustrated by Joe Sacco, which offers up a look at the sacrifice zones, those areas in America that have been offered up for exploitation in the name of profit, progress, and technological advancement. Hedges is the author of 11 other books, including War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction.
Ishmael Reed
How far has America come in its attitudes regarding blacks in popular culture? According to Ishmael Reed’s provocative Going Too Far: Essays About America's Nervous Breakdown (Baraka Books, $19.95) we’re right about where we were in 1850. Politicians, he claims, are raising stereotypes about blacks—that they are lazy and dependent and need people to manage them—reminiscent of those that fugitive slaves had to combat. “Just when you think [he’s] is exaggerating . . . he’ll open another page of American history and show you something new.”—Rover Arts. Reed has taught at University of California (Berkeley) for 35 years, as well as Harvard, Yale, and Dartmouth.
Bryan Mealer
Deep in the Florida Everglades is the town of Belle Glades, the subject of Bryan Mealer’s study of football, poverty, and hope: Muck City: Winning and Losing in Football's Forgotten Town (Crown Archetype, $25.00). Beset by poverty, gangs, violence, and broken homes, Glades Central High School sends an average of eight players a year to NCAA Division I programs, and has had over thirty players reach the NFL in recent years. “A heartbreaking look at poverty in America, with some football on the side.” – Booklist, starred review. Mealer is the co-author of The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind and the author of All Things Must Fight to Live, which chronicled his years covering the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a reporter for the Associated Press and Harper's.
Schedule
Location
Miami Book Fair International * Miami Dade College
300 NE Second Ave., Miami, FL 33132
Batten (Building 2, 1st Floor, Room 2106)
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