Having read Robert Putnam before I was not surprised to find his insights and analysis thought-provoking and wise. As previously he is a keen observer of life and society and the Upswing is no exception to the excellence I have come to expect from reading Robert Putnam.

THE UPSWING by Robert D. Putnam and Shaylyn Romney Garrett is subtitled "How America Came Together a Century Ago and How We Can Do It Again." These authors use graphs (simplified on the cover) to look at patterns in America of political polarization, economic inequality, social isolation, and cultural self-centeredness over the past 100+ years. They discuss an "I/WE/I" paradigm, illustrating the power of people coming together and hypothesize as to whether or not the country is at a "pivot moment." I always feel like Putnam can look at a situation which I have been struggling to understand and succinctly and memorably explain it. He and Romney Garrett have succeeded again in this text which discusses factors like a moral lens, the possibility of youth driven change and role of association as both an end and a means. THE UPSWING received a starred review from Kirkus and the authors participated in a recent Family Action Network event that was moderated by our own Spiro Bolos. Several students attended virtually and all had positive reaction; here is a recording, if you would like to see it also:
Embedded video from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfOH5xKNYeE&feature=emb_logo

Putnam and Romney Garrett also recently co-authored a New York Times Op-Ed piece which is worth a look: "Why Did Racial Progress Stall in America?"

Robert Putnam has built quite a reputation for big ideas and reflections on American democracy and society. Upswing adds to this well-deserved reputation. It’s fairly common to analyze American society from the 1960s to show a downfall in various measures: social trust, community involvement and countless others. In Upswing, Putnam takes instead as his unit of analysis the period from the Gilded Age to present. Based on what I know about the Gilded Age: tremendous inequality, racism/social segregation, etc. I wasn’t feeling hopeful.

But Putnam is able to convincingly show that the Gilded Age was actually the beginning of creating a more egalitarian communitarian society. Putnum simplifies this transformation as moving from an I to We society. This upswing started in the 1920s and continued into the 1960s before the trends reversed themselves. While there’s something heartening of the idea that we’ve been here before, it’s hard not to be downcast that we’re back here at all.

While the results are mixed leaving the reader feeling somewhere between hope and despair this hundred year look at American society and culture was certainly thought provoking.