A Nation of Adversaries: How the Litigation Explosion Is Reshaping America [Hardcover]

Patrick M. Garry (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1997

"A book on a timely and powerful theme....While others have documented the damage that litigation does to our economy, Garry wants to show us its cost to our character as a nation". -- Walter Olson, Author, The Litigation Explosion

Throughout our history, America has been shaped by a series of transforming events and institutions -- the Pilgrims' Puritanism, the promise of Jacksonian democracy, the staggering rise of corporate capitalism, and the advent of electronic media. Today, a new strain of litigious behavior veers our culture away from the proverbial "melting pot" to one in which fellow citizens become bitter adversaries. Law is becoming the next American frontier where litigious pioneers try to stake out new opportunities for wealth and fame.

A Nation of Adversaries brilliantly examines how the litigation explosion has singed our culture by needlessly crowding courthouses and fueling the growth of the lawyer population. Dr. Patrick Garry, an expert on the effect of the courts on American society, insightfully points out how our increasingly litigant-oriented mindset is reinforcing a self-centered culture of undue expectation and entitlement. He offers a blistering look at litigation's invasion into our once formally mindful society. Anyone interested in new trends of human behavior, as well as professionals in sociology, the legal profession, behavior therapy, and clinical psychology, will find this a shrewd commentary on the creation of a new culture of identity in America.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Legal and constitutional scholar Garry examines America's adversarial culture. Far too many of us, he argues, are always on the lookout for some actionable offense no matter how minor. As a nation, we feel ourselves entitled to whatever settlement we can wrest from a plaintiff because of a growing sense of victimhood. We figure we are owed. America's declining social and personal values are one factor here, although Garry also documents a legal profession bent on litigation because it is so lucrative. He also lays blame on a media apparatus that treats court cases like sporting events, where the point isn't truth but who's winning. Depressingly accurate, although one wonders why Garry's analysis left out some very central players: corporations and organizations that won't do the right thing, making litigation or the threat of it about the only way to achieve some sort of justice. Brian McCombie

Product Details

• Hardcover: 218 pages
• Publisher: Plenum Pr; 1 edition (May 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0306455641
• ISBN-13: 978-0306455643
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 1.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,997,849 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Undocumented "chicken little" book, November 20, 1997

By 

Frank (Stockton CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Nation of Adversaries: How the Litigation Explosion Is Reshaping America (Hardcover)

Author Patrick Garry claims that all events in recent American history are tied to, and usually caused by, the "litigation explosion." Little things like mass communication and advertising, two world wars, the Depression, technology, and urbanization had no impact.

What does Garry list as examples of the evils caused by the litigation explosion? TV shows like "American Gladiators" and "The McLaughlin Group." (believe it or not!) He even blames the litigation explosion on encouraging the fad of tell-all biographies -- you'd think litigation would discourage such writings. Logic does not enter into the claims made by this book.

Garry, Dole-like, wistfully hopes for the perfect days before the litigation explosion. In a sub-chapter titled, "An Unattainable Alternative," Garry goes on and on about the superiority of Japanese society, where in his opinion bliss is achieved by thinking alike, dressing alike, acting alike, and being so influenced by peer pressure that you give no thought to self-expression or "rights."

Garry uses about 300 footnotes, but 95+% of those citations are to current newspaper articles.

Although Garry changes themes and ideas every few pages, one recurrent theme is that Americans exercise their "rights" too much. That's all we think about. Another affect of the litigation explosion. (Those darn revolutionaries. Why couldn't we have been like Canada?)

Although Garry has the paper credentials where you would think he could write a REAL book on how litigation affects American culture, this is not that book. It's written in a "Chicken Little" style to an audience that considers "Hard Copy" an intellectual exercise. (yes, he refers to Hard Copy too!)

Here's a typical argument and "fact" from the book. Garry's fickle mind drifts to the claim that parties in a divorce litigate over picky issues -- like who should have the kids. (Imagine that.) Now, you might expect some discussion of divorce rates. Or whether no-fault is better than the fault system. Or at least what Garry proposes people do if he were made king and disallowed divorces. But no, the "fact" that Garry uses to support his idea that couples in America, generally, litigate over such picky issues, is that Marcia Clark's husband filed a motion for custody because she was consistently working late on the Simpson trial.

If the type of person who believes everything that's written down didn't believe these unsupported conclusions, the book would even be funny.