The Prosperity Agenda: What the World Wants from America--and What We Need in Return (Hardcover)

~ Nancy Soderberg (Author), Brian Katulis (Author)
Key Phrases: prosperity agenda, United States, President Bush, North Korea (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This is an interesting, insightful and readable book, with clear analysis and compelling arguments." (The Oxford Times, October 30th 2008)

Product Description

Praise for Nancy Soderberg's

The Superpower Myth

"A sensible, hard-headed, realistic alternative to the excesses of America's Iraq-era dealings with the world."
-James Fallows, National Correspondent, The Atlantic Monthly

"One of the greatest strengths of Soderberg's book is her insider's account of many of the seminal events of the 1990s. Soderberg [gives us] a bird's-eye view of such critical issues as intervention in the Balkans and Haiti and U.S. efforts to combat al Qaeda and hunt down Osama bin Laden."
-Charles A. Kupchan, The Washington Post Book World

"Does America Need a Foreign Policy? by Henry Kissinger, The Choice by Zbigniew Brzezinski, and The Superpower Myth by Nancy Soderberg-all of these authors have firsthand experience in government, and it shows. The Superpower Myth, which doubles as a memoir of Soderberg's years in the Clinton administration, is a history told from inside meeting rooms, full of detail about how government bureaucracies actually function-and why sometimes they don't."
-Jonathan D. Tepperman, The New York Times Book Review

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Wiley (July 21, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470105291
• ISBN-13: 978-0470105290
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,104,603 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars How To Be a Democratic Candidate for Office, August 15, 2008

By	Joseph Geni (Evanston, Illinois United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"The Prosperity Agenda" is a catchy name for the book, but a more accurate name would be "The Year In 2007 New York Times Op-Ed Pieces." Basically, this is a classic center-left collection of talking points, replete with sympathetic anecdotal examples, a convenient cocktail-party smorgasbord of interesting statistics, etc. etc. Salient points include:

- Promoting prosperity abroad and building democratic institutions over the long term makes a heck of a lot more sense than overthrowing badly run regimes, occupying them, and hoping for the best.
- Yes, we need to hunt down bin Laden, but if we can find it in our hearts to give more aid to the Muslim world than Hezbollah does, that will go much further towards stopping the threat of terrorism.
- We should spend money fighting preventable diseases.
- Free trade benefits the US, but it has to be smart and we have to have programs to help lower-income workers, because they're the ones who get screwed by free trade.
- We should work to get rid of nuclear weapons, because the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty is on the verge of complete collapse.
- Nativist know-nothing militant Minutemen are idiots.

"The Prosperity Agenda" is a worthy read, particularly if you feel underinformed on any of the issues the book covers. It's also a quick read. It's very broad in its scope, though it doesn't have time to be very deep. By far the most controversial idea here is that democracy without basic economic prosperity doesn't mean beans, because people without resources will care about that rather than about electing the best or wisest leader. (An aside: the very fact this idea is even controversial displays the depths to which our foreign policy thinking and our conception of democracy promotion has sunk in the Bush years.) But the scope here is too broad to go into comprehensive analysis of, say, why Latin American countries keep voting populist ideologues in. The answer is pretty obvious: the previous guys weren't giving them running water, electricity and a living wage. In our current political climate, I guess it's audacious of the authors to say so (rather than simply waving garlic at Hugo Chavez and hoping it'll drive him away).

Anyway, it's a good book and if you're a Democratic candidate running for major office, you should read it because it's a blueprint of how to make good, smart policy SOUND good. Hint hint: Barack Obama should probably peruse this before the Presidential debates, if he hasn't already. (I know John Kerry's read it, 'cos he recommended it.) Nice book. I just found I'd read much of it already.

0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Too Liberal, October 23, 2008

By	Astonished (Brunswick, ME United States) - See all my reviews

I found that Ms. Soderberg's sweeping generalizations simplified the subject matter to the lowest common denominator, which destoyed the topic completely. Ms. Soderberg views herself as an expert on political matters, however, a true expert is capable of viewing both sides of the political arena and present each with equilibrium and fairness, thereby allowing the reader to come to his own conclusions. No true author ever tries to force his view on the reader.