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Social Decay and Transformation: A View from the Left, by Samuel Farber. Landham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2000. $55.00. Pp. xxii, 177.
This book, written by a political scientist, born and raised in Marianno, Cuba, is well-written and of great interest.
Farber examines first the problem of social decay in terms of the left; the problems of civility and civic participation; the question of civility and manners; the issue of the working class and its attitude towards alcohol and temperance movements; and the question of positions on the Black Panther Party. In his second part, the author looks at the question of social transformation and reason in the light of James Scott's work on domination; the essays of Robin D. G. Kelley; and the ultra-revolutionist positions taken during the "cultural revolution" in the 1920s following the Russian Revolution.
Farber argues that the left is often elitist and undemocratic in its view of questions of decay and transformation. The left all too often unwillingly allows the right to pose reactionary answers to questions which the left ought to take seriously and tackle; thus, problems raised by the majority in society deserve democratic analysis and rational answers, even if the majority act in ways that radicals of the left find disappointing and naive.
The argument is persuasive and well done. We should resist the temptation, Farber urges, to romanticize the oppressed,...