miscellaneous factZ – The online home of Rufus Pollock

7.5/10. Spare, stark and beautifully written but hampered by a plot (and characters) that seem but weakly thought out.

7/10. Good but not more than that. It has the promise of developing into something more, something epic, but obviously, was cut short before that promise could be realized — or shown to be misplaced.

7/10. Extensive in its imagination but losing some of its power by this very fact as the stories start to blur and something of its early intensity is lost as we head into the closing sections. Overall a very dark (and probably correct) vision of the immigrant experience in the US: all prejudice, death and broken families — at least as I can remember, there was not one happy relationship or family recorded in these 380 odd pages.

Interesting, disarmingly honest, but not, ultimately, entirely convincing that ’self-organized criticality’ is the key to “How Nature Works”.

7/10. Having now finished the final volume of Skidelsky’s trilogy it is clear that the first volume was the best. This is not necessarily a reflection on Skidelsky’s efforts but on the nature of the subject matter — the first section of Keynes’ life, with its natural intertwining of life, friends and work, is the most suited to the biographical form. Here instead, by the nature of Keynes own activities he is forced to confine attention almost entirely to the work, and to work that was almost entirely of a bureaucratic or diplomatic nature.

It can be difficult in such to circumstances to sustain interest over long narrations of a particular policy debate within the British Government or the progress of a particular negotiation with the United States (which formed the main part of Keynes activities). The form of the book (a biography) in these circumstances exacerbates the problem. As biography one needs to keep things ‘personal’ focusing on Keynes’ personal experience together with the sketches of the personalities he encountered. This often may result in the underlying issues getting lost. If on the other hand one takes a more analytical, historical, approach in which the issues under discussion are made central with appropriate background supplied and analysis provided then one is rapidly leaving the realm of biography for that of (economic) history. Not only is this departing from the book’s ‘core mission’ but also may make things rather dry for the non-specialist. To my mind this tension is not adequately resolved, and, just as with Vol. 2, in my view, a more detailed historical/analytical treatment would have been better — along the lines of the masterly section in the book’s concluding chapter where Skidelsky summarizes Keynes (Economic) legacy and its impact on post-war posterity (conclusion: ‘Keynesianism’ was of little importance).

Comments on previous volumes:

• http://www.rufuspollock.org/2006/10/30/john-maynard-keynes-hopes-betrayed-1883-1920-by-robert-skidelsky/
• http://www.rufuspollock.org/2006/12/05/john-maynard-keynes-the-economist-as-saviour-1920-1937-by-robert-skidelsky/

7/10. Well written and fascinating, particularly in its clear demonstration of the way the French just ‘gave up’ (both generally in the inter-war period and in 1940 itself). I would have preferred more analytical clarity regarding exactly when things went wrong and why — at some moments Horne seems to be suggesting that a sufficiently active response by the French in the first few days (between the 12th and the 14th of May) might have made a decisive difference in reversing the tide, at others that the Germans superiority in weapons, tactics and men (quality, not necessarily quantity) meant that France was doomed from the start. The relative success of the few British salleys against the Germans make me incline more towards the former possibility. I also think this view may be warranted by the concerns evinced so frequently by those within the German General Staff (and Hitler himself) about the vulnerability of their flanks, as well as the huge convoys through the Ardennes, in the first few decisive days of the battle. If this is the case, it shows that what is today considered one of the greatest and most brilliant military victories of all time might well have ended up as another failed Schlieffen plan.

5.5/10. Disappointing though perhaps because of the high expectations engendered by the book’s reputation. To my mind, the book has not dated well and the general insights regarding working practices set out in the afterword seem debatable (the Machine referred to in the title is not the computer but the organizationthat built it).

6/10. Interesting though, as usual with these things, the book is long on personality, anecdote and rumour, and a bit too short on factual details of what exactly happened (roughly LTCM made ever more leveraged bets on ever less liquid and well understood products and got mashed up when a crisis came along and everyone ran for the door).

Interesting side points that are alleged (but not confirmed) include Goldman Sachs using their position as potential buyer/rescuer to gain privileged access to LTCM’s position and then front-running them (i.e. selling those positions out from under LTCM thereby helping Goldman and harming LTCM).

6/10. Death in Hamburg: Society and Politics in the Cholera Years, 1830-1910 by Richard Evans

This book promises much but ultimately rather disappoints, largely because of its tendency to lose focus, sprawling into this of that side-avenue. Partly this must be due to a lack of clarity as to what the book is about — an impression strongly reinforced by the book’s afterword which does much to illuminate the intentions and the author.

Is this a narrative history? An analytic investigation of the of public health provision, focusing especially on the 1892 epidemic? A wide-ranging overview of Hamburg society and the mentality of its dominant classes, a marxist-influenced study of class tension and conflict or …? The author does not seem to be sure. The result is rather a mish-mash.

At some points we seem to be investigating the political and social reasons for Hamburg’s poor public health outcomes, in particular the constant fighting between the different ‘fractions of capital’ (in particular the merchant/lawyer senators and the property-owners) over the provision of public goods, at others having a detailed description of working class living conditions, and at another a history of medical approaches to cholera and other diseases in the 19th century, and at another describing in detail how the ‘dominant’ classes used charitable support both in general, and after the 1892 epidemic, to exercise social and moral ‘control’.

Of course, it is possible these different approaches and angles could have been woven together to produce a single rich and compelling whole. But this is not so. To take the main focus of the book — which I take to be the Cholera epidemic of 1892 together with its causes and outcomes. By the time I had finished the more than 700 pages I was still unsure as to what, in Professor Evan’s view, were the main reasons for Hamburg’s terrible performance in comparison with other German (or European) cities. To pick just a few of the possible ones:

1. The failure to develop sand-filtration for the public water supply. Was this in turn due to:
   • The form of the Citizens’ Assembly, in particular the ability of the property owners to block improvements that might result in reductions in their profits.
   • Early investment in a new water system which then made it relatively more costly to upgrade later (Hamburg was one of the first cities in Germany to develop an external resevoir).
   • Ideological opposition (see next items)
2. The ideological commitment of Hamburg’s ruling groups to ‘Trade’ and ‘Laissez Faire’
   • Reinforced, perhaps, by direct self-interest in the case of ship-owners and others for whom quarantine meant serious disturbance to their work or enterprise
3. The inefficient governance structures (in particular the operation and make-up of the Senate and Burgomaster)
   • Hamburg’s governance compared particularly poorly with the more efficient, though also more, authoritarian action of the Imperial government (particularly that of the Imperial Health Office and Koch).
4. Continuing support in medical circles (and in administrative positions) for ‘miasmatist’ rather than ‘contagionist’ theories of disease (especially in relation to Cholera)
5. The inadequate living conditions of the poor especially in the ‘Alley Quarters’.
6. Incorrect medical treatment either due to lack of medical knowledge or incompetence.
7. The (in)ability of different socio-economic groups to follow the medical instructions provided — whether because of wealth (e.g. ‘rich’: able to have their servant boil all their water, ‘poor’: unable to resist the fruit which is suddenly cheaply available because normally denied it), literacy (can one read the instructions distributed), respect for ‘authority’, etc.

One would not expect to have a single explanation put forward but it would be useful to have some indication of which of these items were the more important, particularly where different reasons are substitutes not complements. For example, at several points Evans appears to indicate that the water-supply was the single biggest determinant of death by far (he cites a particularly illuminating comparison of a set of apartments that drew its water from two different sources). But if this is so then almost all of the focus should be on the water-supply question and why this public good was not present in Hamburg when it was elsewhere. No doubt, in answering this, one will be lead onto many of the other items as secondary causes but it an important step will have been made in stratifying, and thereby clarifying, the analysis. Furthermore, from this perspective an explicit comparative analysis with other localities becomes essential. While Evans does perform this to some extent, it is largely in terms of the behaviour of the localities in 1892 (e.g. re. imposition of quarantine) rather than the more important investigation of why those localities had sand filtration while Hamburg did not — in particular why had they found the political will to provide this important public good while Hamburg had not? In particular, why were the property-owners in Bremen, Berlin and elsewhere not able to block these same kinds of public infrastructure projects?

Once lead down this route the reader must be increasingly concerned about the weight, and attention, Evans focuses upon socio-ideological explanations (made particularly noticeable by the frequent intrusion of Marxist historiographical language and approach — an influence made explicit in the afterword). As Evans acknowledges in respect of most other disease outcomes Hamburg did little worse than elsewhere in Germany. If this is so how much does the 1892 epidemic really tell us about the society and politics of Hamburg (and vice-versa)? Perhaps if Hamburg had not invested early in its water supply, it would have had an ‘out-of-date’ one by 1892? Perhaps if Veresman had been Burgomaster more rapid and effective steps would have been taken early on that would have dramatically reduced the impact? Perhaps if Hamburg had been more authoritarian (rather than more democratic) the Senate would have been able to improve the water-supply earlier?

This brings me on to my final comment. The contemporary relevance of the book is emphasized in several places, for example on the back-jacket text and in several of the blurbs — Gordon Craig’s NYRB review extract quoted on the cover reads “… about the contemporary relevance of this book there can be no question”. Of course, we should allow for the fact that this was published in 1987 when the AIDS epidemic was receiving very widespread attention. But one does need to ask exactly what one does learn from this book regarding public health? That we should invest in public goods projects? That it is good for medical science to be accurate and correct? That one should respond rapidly to an outbreak of a contagious disease?

Surely the answer to all of these is yes. The devil, of course, is in the detail. how do we trade off the benefits of rapid and sharp response, which is likely to involve sharply restricting movement of persons and goods, against the costs of such restrictions both socially and commercially? What institutional structures will result in adequate investment in public goods and rapid response to public concerns? Are there tensions between responsiveness to concerns (e.g. via full representative government!) and effectiveness in action (which might necessitate a single executive office with significant power and autonomy)? Finally, if the answers to these questions are reasonably obvious (e.g. its Democracy stupid!) then what prevents a polity, whether today or in the 19th century, from acting in the correct way? (Answer: entrenched powers and vested interests — but how did these come into being and how are they overcome?).

The test then of Evans’ book is whether it supplies us with interesting answers to these, more nuanced, questions. In this regard the book, I feel, comes up short. Without a comparative analysis at the social, and more importantly, political level in other German (or European) cities how can we know whether Hamburg’s terrible experience was the result of a common generalizable pattern or mere historical accident?

In sum this an interesting book albeit a little lengthy and heavy-going in places. Confused as to its structure and purpose it largely fails to deliver on its promise to answer the main question posed on its jacket: “Why were nearly 10000 people killed in six weeks in Hamburg while most of Europe was left almost unscathed?” As such it is also limited in the light it can throw on public health problems today. Nevertheless the reader will have been left with a wide-ranging coverage of a whole variety of 19th century topics, most significantly the two items explicitly mentioned in the title: Hamburg and Cholera.

8/10. It’s hard to write good feel-good novels and this is one of them — beautifully done.