Z Books

This book came about as a result of the public debate about the direction of United States trade policy. In September of 1989, the Brookings Institution put together a conference entitled An American Trade Strategy: Options for the 1990s. The three main papers presented at the conference each defended an alternative policy approach, namely multilateral free trade, aggresive bilateralism and managed trade. This tome contains revised versions of these three documents, along with the remarks of the official discussants of each paper and the comments of a panel of three experts. As a bonus, the volume also includes two introductory chapters in which the editors, Robert Lawrence and Charles Schultze, both affiliated with the Brookings Economic Studies Program, sum up and evaluate the strategies at hand, which, by the way, are spoused by Anne Krueger (free trade), Rudiger Dornbusch (bilateral trade) and Laura Tyson (managed trade).

Lawrence and Schultze, in assessing the different arguments and proposals put forth in regards to the aforementioned central issue of the book, first evaluate the two chief objectives -- improvement in the terms of trade and strategic industrial policy -- and then turn their attention to the various means suggested for their attainment.

Traditional economic analysis suggests that free trade is the best approach to raise global welfare. Given the importance of the US in the global economy, this country's actions are likely to have systemic repercussions. Protectionist policies by the US might prompt other nations into taking defensive and retaliatory actions.

As long as other countries help companies that produce goods America imports, the US gains. But if countries subsidize their exports to third markets or protect domestic firms against US exports, they can lower US living standards.

On the other hand, Dornbusch believes that the informal, mainly nongovernmental, barriers to imports into Japan have biased the terms of trade against the US. He claims that the negotiation of free trade areas with other US trading partners might put pressure on Japan to agree to trade concessions in the form of increasing its imports of US goods. Dornbusch is not explicitly concerned about the specific composition of US exports. Therefore, when he proposes the negotiation of numerical goals for the expansion of imports into Japan, he envisages an aggregate target for manufactured goods.

Tyson contends that some industries are more important than others. She voices two concerns: that market forces left to their own devices will not channel enough resources into the critical high-technology industries, and that the trade and industrial policies of other countries will drive US producers out of these key sectors and thus lower US living standards.

According to Tyson, there are three principal kinds of departures from the scenario of efficiently functioning markets that make some industries ''more equal than others'' and that warrant interventionist policies. One, because of the nature of their products and production processes, some markets are necessarily imperfectly competitive and can generate, for a limited number of firms in the world market, surplus profits (rents) -- profits higher than the necessary to induce investment in the sector. If a country can somehow secure a place for its firms in such markets, it can earn rents -- its capital investments would make more than could be earned in other uses. Two, some industries pay workers surplus (premium) wages, more than their experience and skills could earn elsewhere in the economy. Expansion of those industries will increase real wages and living standards. Three, the production of certain goods creates ripple benefits for the rest of the economy, that is, the benefits to the economy from the production of the goods in question are greater than the revenues earned by the producers.

In recent years the analysis of trade has moved to take into account the widespread reality of imperfect competition. The new trade theories suggest that in imperfectly competitive situations a country may be able to use government intervention to enrich itself at the expense of other nations.

However, the circumstances under which these monopoly-promoting policies might pay off are difficult to detect in practice. They depend on the behavioral features in the market, the degree to which other countries retaliate and the supply response of other firms to the government intervention. Moreover, the government must know the full consequences in the industries from which the resources are drawn. Redirecting scarce resources into a particular sector could produce losses elsewhere in the economy that outweigh the gains in the sector being promoted.

Since the ability of economists to estimate demand and costs' curves with precision is very low, to predict the response of other firms to the market changes induced by government intervention is lower still and to calculate the general equilibrium effects from the drawdown of resources elsewhere in the economy is virtually nil, there is slim chance that the government could know in advance whether any particular policy of subsidy or protection will add to or substract from national income.

Some have advocated using trade policies to enhance employment in sectors with premium wages. If what appear to be rents are in fact payments for skills, abilities or other characteristics of jobs, a governmental policy that subsidized the expansion of these industries could have damaging consequences, for instance, a regresive distributional impact.

The view that some industries provide productivity-enhancing spillover effects to the rest of the US economy lies at the heart of the arguments of many proponents of policies for managed trade. One unresolved problem is how are these industries going to be identified and favored.

Although published ten years ago, this book addresses issues that are still current. Trade policy is a topic that is likely to surface in every presidential and congressional election for years to come. In addition, there are sufficient theoretical concepts thrown around in this tome to make it a good read.

When Alistair Cooke died a short while ago at age 95 he was working on his latest Letter from America, a BBC radio series that started in 1946, and followed on from his weekly broadcasts from America during the war. This book of selections covers the decade 1969-79. Its content relates largely but not wholly to American politics, and predictably the latter phases of the Vietnam war and the Watergate scandal are covered in a number of the items given here.

The words that characterise Cooke's approach are `civilised' and `urbane'. He was an Englishman born in Manchester who took up residence in New York in 1937. He was Cambridge-educated and at one time president of the Dramatic Society there, in which position he had the dubious distinction of turning down James Mason at an audition. There is not much in this book about the theatre other than one piece about a visit by president Carter to the opera and a particularly sensitive and appreciative piece about Stephen Sondheim. There were so many references in his broadcasts to his sporting passion of golf that I expected to find a certain amount about it here just on a statistical basis, and so it turns out, but a broadcaster of his skill and taste knows better than to be any club-house bore on air. He was clearly a lover of music, and besides the pieces about Sondheim and Jimmy-at-the-opera I was pleased and relieved to find that the broadcast entitled `The Duke' related to Duke Ellington and not to John Wayne. There is an affectionate and touching item about Christmas with his family in the snowdrifts of Vermont, there is an ironic and humorous piece on public attitudes to health generally and smoking in particular in which he reads the future wrongly as things have turned out, there is a very amusing one on the geological fault-lines in southern California and the religious prophets of doom, and there are a couple of others specifically about life at the far end of Long Island. Inevitably I suppose, some of the political reportage is much what one would expect from a commentator in one of the weeklies, but there are also thoughtful and informative obituaries on Earl Warren and Dean Acheson.

Perhaps nobody ever personified better than Cooke did the BBC's motto `Nation shall speak unto nation'. Like any of us, he is the product of his background and personal circumstances. He was a comfortably-off New Yorker, he knew who he was and talked like who he was, not like someone from the Bronx or Malibu or Newport, Rhode Island. He speaks the language of common sense and rationality, and he takes no particular political stance, not even one of studied impartiality. He has an obvious affection for and fascination with America, as I do myself, but he is no propagandist or publicist. When his series started as a 13-week trial and then lasted 58 years he had been given only a rough remit and job-description by the BBC. He defined his job for himself, and defined it brilliantly. He was talking to the whole world, not just to England, and he was speaking for and as himself. Speaking for and as myself, it was not just that I wanted to hear about America, I wanted to hear it specifically from Alistair Cooke. I felt that way about his broadcasts as a child, and I felt that way about them to the end, in my own seventh decade and his tenth.

His use of English is polished and relaxed, with a love of the language that shows through in some gentle and elegant mockery of certain up-to-date usages. I find more Cambridge than Harvard in it, just as I found his pleasant speaking voice basically English with an east coast overlay. He was a reporter and columnist by trade, not a pundit or analyst, and it could be that he was just a touch too rational to appreciate fully the extent to which others are nothing of the sort and have no wish to be. Nature gave him a fine long innings, the powers that be had the good sense not to interrupt or obstruct it, and I have been one of the many privileged to have enjoyed it.

Harlan Levy developed his expertise in DNA evidence while working in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office. Chapter 1 explains how detectives elicit confessions from suspects. They cause the subject to abandon all hope and make the suspect think they must confess. [Psychological conditioning? If a person is convinced of their guilt won't they confess?] This technique is explained on pages 2 and 3. Three kinds of evidence are needed to convict (p.12); one alone is insufficient to convict. False confessions are the result of coercion or the susceptibility of a weak or frightened suspect. Pressure can result in a confession (p.13). Details of a crime can be fed to a suspect (p.14). But the corroboration of DNA evidence can overcome doubts (p.15).

"DNA evidence can promote a more just society" in punishing the guilty and exonerating the innocent (Chapter 2). Levy explains how he was drawn to public service. It is "profoundly idealistic and socially redeeming" and emotionally rewarding (p.23). There was an explosion of violent crime from the 1980s. [No mention of Reagan's economic policies and growing gun prohibition.] DNA can help solve murders and rapes. [Isn't prevention better than a cure?] Levy explains the reason for regulating police and prosecutorial behavior (p.24): it protects people from the power of the state. Is a trial "a search for the truth" (p.25)? Levy resigned from the DA's Office to write this book and tell about DNA analysis. Most human genes are identical, less than 1% is different. Research into genetic diseases led to knowledge about DNA. A person's DNA pattern is found in all the cells of the body (p.29). The repetitive pattern of DNA was discovered in 1984 and patented (p.31). Can an innocent suspect confess to a murder? Yes (p.35)! [This case was described by Joseph Wambaugh in his book "The Blooding".]

Chapter 3 tells of the conflicts in setting the standards for reliable DNA testing (p.68). There was a problem with the DNA evidence in the Central Park Jogger case: it did not match the suspects, a group of teenagers out to commit crimes. But only a few of the gang were caught, there were unknown suspects. [Years later there would be new revelations on this crime.] Chapter 5 tells how DNA freed the innocent and convicted the guilty. Chapter 6 discusses the FBI's racial breakdown of DNA evidence and its assumptions (p.128). Would a Federal official try to suppress scientific knowledge (p.136)? Chapter 7 tells how DNA solved other crimes. Chapter 8 explains Polymerase Chain Reaction and its use in DNA testing. It was used to convict a modern "Jack the Strangler" (p.178). A newer form of PCR led to a pardon of an innocent man (p.185).

Chapter 9 discusses the formidable challenge to O. J. Simpson because of the blood evidence found in his car and home (p.187). This case seemed foolproof. The best defense lawyers create a theory that supports the client's innocence better than the prosecution's theory of guilt. This is harder to do than say (p.189). It all comes down to credibility of the witnesses (p.190). The missing blood sample could account for the blood found at the crime scene (p.193). DNA can identify blood but could not tell if it had been planted (p.194). There is the problem of contamination (p.195) from improper procedures (p.199). DNA laboratories did not follow the recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences (p.203). There were problems with some swatches (p.206). Levy points out the problems for the defense (p.207). Was blood planted on the socks (p.217)? Levy explains the rules for circumstantial evidence (p.222). The defense provided inferences of innocence. Chapter 10 warns about the National Research Council. It didn't require the accreditation of DNA laboratories (p.232)! Or even blind testing of proficiency! Would they accept "racial groupings" to concoct statistics? Yes (p.233). High quality DNA testing provides accurate identification (p.235).

Chapter 9 does not mention other undisputed evidence. The limo driver picked up OJ at 11pm for a trip to the airport. The Medical Examiner who did the autopsies said the murders occurred after 11pm. The red liquid blood found at 12:15am said the murders occurred after 11:30; else the blood would be black and clotted. Hence all the DNA evidence against OJ had to be planted. The book "Tainted Evidence" covers related topics.

My 2 1/2 year old daughter loves this book. She has come into our bedroom with it every morning for over two weeks now wanting it read to her. (She has gotten so good with it she reads it to her Pooh Bear.) The pop-ups can be delicate, so we tell her it is a "family book" to read together, just like all the Sabuda books she loved over the holidays. To date there has been no damage but for a folded Ibis beak, even with curious little fingers. My main reason for writing a review is this...SHE HAS LEARNED THE ALPHABET from this book. Not just singing the song, but actually recognizing the letters now on signs, other books, everywhere. We've got other books, Dr. Suess's ABC's, Eating the Alphabet, etc. but THIS is the one that held her interest day after day. The contrast between the bold letters and the page without embellishments makes character recognition easier for her.

This book is insanely graphical and a complete charm. An excellent compliment ones collection of pig related items.

My husband like to collect all of her article out of the Washington Post, so i figure I would get the book and give to him for Xmas. a big surprise. No I haven't read it. A Coworker brought this book in to work the copy right was 1978

A fascinating novel about a group of Jewish, Sufi, and Christian mystics practicing amidst the terror and prejudice of the Spanish Inquisition of the late fifteenth century

As a children's librarian I recieved an email about this book and on a lark, purchased it. It turned out to be a real treasure - an excellent learning tool for children, as well as a captivating story designed to hold a child's attention. I would recommend this to anyone looking for a good book for their child!

Warning: You may have to get them a dog afterwards - it is just that GOOD!

This being my third Antiques Roadshow book, it did not disappoint me. It consists of the language of collecting and evaluating treasures from our past in alphabetical order. A quick read and useful book for quick reference if you can use a dictionary. I highly recommend this book for your library.

Written by Donald Woods, a white South African who was editor of the Daily Dispatch until he was forced into exile, Apartheid: A Graphic Guide is a great introduction to the history of Apartheid in South Africa. Woods is famous for his biography of Steve Biko which was made into the feature film "Biko." While not a graphic novel each page is illustrated with black and white drawings by Mike Bostock, mostly depictions of the major historical figures.

This book follows the complicated history of the region starting from the first contact with white Europeans. The first Dutch settlers are described, including their strange corruption of Calvinist beliefs that they use to deny the rights of the non-white population. Their transition into a separate group, Afrikaners, with a unique language and culture, is also detailed.

The conflicts with the British over diamond and gold mines, which culminate in the Boer War are described, as well as the strange Anglo-Afrikaner white people collaboration that comes into existence after the war to suppress the non-whites of the area.

The history of black and non-white opposition to the infringements on their rights is also described. Their attempts at non-violent solutions, and the brutal massacres by the white government in response are presented.

The book is limited because, having been written 20 years ago, it doesn't portray the final ending of Apartheid and the aftermath. However, for someone trying to come to grips with how such a despicable policy existed into the late 20th century, this is a great place to start.

I found out that the British general Kitchener developed the first Concentration Camps during the Boer War to "concentrate" the Afrikaner women, children, and servants so he could burn and raze the farms that were the source of enemy supplies. Many thousands died in these camps from unsanitary conditions and overcrowding. Also, I learned that Ronald Reagan's policy of constructive engagement in the 1980's actually encouraged the white regime to continue in their doomed course of continued Apartheid. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the roots of racial discrimination.