Tory Burch on Shopbop
Buy used:
$14.11
FREE delivery January 9 - 14. Details
Or fastest delivery January 8 - 10. Details
Used: Good | Details
Sold by ThriftBooks-Phoenix
Condition: Used: Good
Comment: Former library book; Missing dust jacket; Pages can have notes/highlighting. Spine may show signs of wear. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less
Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.
Added to

Sorry, there was a problem.

There was an error retrieving your Wish Lists. Please try again.

Sorry, there was a problem.

List unavailable.
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

J. Kirkpatrick Sale
Follow
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

Human scale Hardcover – Import, January 1, 1980

by Kirkpatrick Sale (Author)
4.1 4.1 out of 5 stars 7 ratings
See all formats and editions
Size matters. And "progress", as it translates into sprawl, congestion, resource depletion, overpopulation, the decline of communities and the rise of corporate rule, is quite literally killing us. In his landmark work Human Scale, Kirkpatrick Sale details the crises facing modern society and offers real solutions, laying out ways that we can take control of every facet of our lives by building institutions, workplaces and communities that are sustainable, ecologically balanced, and responsive to the needs of the individual. As relevant today as when it was first published in 1980, this remarkable book provides a fascinating perspective on the last quarter-century of "growth" and anticipates by decades the current movement towards relocalization in response to the end of cheap oil.
Previous slide of product details
  1. Print length
    558 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Coward, McCann & Geoghegan
  4. Publication date
    January 1, 1980
  5. ISBN-10
    0698110137
  6. ISBN-13
    978-0436440908
  7. See all details
Next slide of product details
The%20Amazon%20Book%20Review
The Amazon Book Review
Book recommendations, author interviews, editors' picks, and more. Read it now.

Popular titles by this author

Page 1 of 1 Start overPage 1 of 1
Previous set of slides
  3. Emancipation Hell: The Tragedy Wrought by Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation
    Kirkpatrick Sale
     
    Paperback
    $10.20
    Get it as soon as Tuesday, Jan 7
    FREE Shipping on orders over $35 shipped by Amazon
  5. Dwellers in the Land: The Bioregional Vision
    Kirkpatrick Sale
     
    Paperback
    -19%$24.99
    List: $30.95
    Get it as soon as Wednesday, Jan 8
    FREE Shipping on orders over $35 shipped by Amazon
    Only 5 left in stock - order soon.
  6. The Conquest of Paradise: Christopher Columbus and the Columbian Legacy
    Kirkpatrick Sale
     
    Hardcover
    -37%$18.84
    List: $30.00
    Get it as soon as Wednesday, Jan 8
    FREE Shipping on orders over $35 shipped by Amazon
    Only 1 left in stock - order soon.
Next set of slides

Customer reviews

4.1 out of 5 stars
7 global ratings

Review this product

Share your thoughts with other customers
Write a customer review

Top reviews from the United States

  • dcmason
    5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic look at the modern world
    Reviewed in the United States on February 22, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    Approaching 35 years old, this book is poignant and prescient. Do you feel something is amiss when you think of politics in these United States? Do you feel sort of like Neo in The Matrix? Well, Kirkpatrick Sale would tell you that so much of the life around you from the politics, the government, the thinking, the technology is all too big to succeed and beyond the scope of human management, thus leaving you the individual out of touch the with the forces that control your own life. The act of voting (that great and touted instrument of change!) itself doesn't even translate into any tangible results or meaningful difference, or the difference is contrary to what you voted for. Well, here friend, is the outline of the problem and some viable solutions. A must read.
    7 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • G. Braida
    4.0 out of 5 stars Looking good.
    Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2017
    Verified Purchase
    Still reading. Looking good.
    One person found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • Tee King
    2.0 out of 5 stars Two Stars
    Reviewed in the United States on April 19, 2016
    Verified Purchase
    This book was not for me.
    One person found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • R. M. Williams
    5.0 out of 5 stars a defense of anarchism in all human endeavors
    Reviewed in the United States on February 17, 2004
    This would be on the list of the 100 books that influenced me the most.
    What it is is a wideranging defense of anarchism, not just in the political sphere but in all human endeavors.
    The insight i've carried with me for the 20+ years since i read it is that quantity doesn't scale, there is a point where a teaspoon of water increasing to a cup is useful and necessary, but as it increases to a swimming pool and eventually to the Pacific ocean, something in the quality changes. It becomes not a life essential glass of water, but a life threatening monster. Changes in quantity are qualitative. Seems like such a simple idea, but it isn't, as the book shows.
    An easy but complete read, it talks about how many people you can remember by name, or by shape at a distance. To how technology distorts and maims people and our minds. I am sure that each chapter, and each insight has a number of books now written on the topic, but this is AFAIK the best one volume defense of this cluster of insights about how size really matters.
    16 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • E. Husman
    3.0 out of 5 stars A lot to like, a little to dislike
    Reviewed in the United States on October 13, 2006
    This is a wide-ranging but not closely argued defense of a utopian vision in which the primary value is right-sizedness. Kirkpatrick Sale argues that almost everything in modern America and the West generally is too big, and that our problems in everything - buildings, cities, agriculture, firms, schools, government - can be traced to size. He wants to live in a world where people literally know everyone affected by their actions and decisions.

    It's a tempting argument from a classical liberal (libertarian) point of view. Most would agree that firms are the size they are because government and laws create an environment in which they thrive and florish. Reduce the size and scope of government and the size and scope of corporations will follow. Decentralization is an accepted principle. Few classical liberals will have many problems with the laws and ordinances enforced at the city level: laws against crimes against person and property, traffic ordinances, and the like. Other local issues can be managed in smaller cities: financing schools, managing parks, etc. Local government means people vote on things they understand and can monitor and with which they probably have some interaction. Local tradeoffs are personal: pave a road or build a new library, pay lower taxes or get more services. Either is just as likely to benefit the people paying for it. In contrast, federal tradeoffs are unknowable: build a bridge in Alaska, or a tunnel in Boston. Relatively few people are likely to benefit from those things, much less understand what they do or whether they are done economically or even well. Everyone thinks their own Congressmen is relatively clean and all the others are pork dealers. Sale seems to share this distrust and even dislike of large government. Sale mostly glosses over a problem that he and David Friedman (Machinery of Freedom) seem to agree is the most difficult: defense. Sale's answer is that small, no-growth, stable villages are not likely to be attacked because there is nothing they have that is worth stealing. Perhaps, but that doesn't mean that external aggressors will note that, or that they will understand that they can't have the thriving village's golden eggs if they kill the goose. Brutes have always thought that they could easily steal and emulate the success of capitalist societies.

    I especially enjoyed reading the sections about alternative work organizations such as the Mondragon cooperative. However, some of Sale's examples are impractical. Sure, I admire the Amish and Mennonite communities, but Sale's readers, whom I assume are mostly atheist or agnostic, aren't likely to adopt those lifestyles anytime soon. The same is true of his other examples: kibbutzim, Owenist and other socialist communes of the 19th century, and "hippy" communes.

    As much as I agree with him about size in general and size of government specifically, there were some quaint ideas in this book that I did not agree with. Some of those were related to the time at which he wrote the book (1980), but others are timeless. For one, I don't understand how a man could be considered "anarchist" when he repeatedly returns to a theme of strict democracy in everything. He occasionally pays homage to consensus, but it isn't a recurring theme, so I could only assume that he views direct majoritarian democracy as the answer to governance in everything from workplaces to civil authority. At no time does he suggest that restrictions like the Bill of Rights be established as an exception to direct democracy.

    Two other recurring, quaint themes are the idea that manufactured products are always inferior, and that manufacturers plan obsolescence. Manufactured products are sometimes far superior to what you could create on your own, especially at the same cost. It's easy to see how he would have made that mistake in the late 1970s when GM and Ford were floundering, but today would you prefer a Toyota or a handcrafted car on your budget?

    The claim that appliances could be made to last longer but are intentionally not is based on two mistakes. The first is based on a misunderstanding of statistical quality control (SQC). We can, after analyzing lots of appliances over time, figure out that an appliance will fail in a predictable manner, so we can say that Refrigerator X will last on average Y years. From this, people will infer that the refrigerator was designed to fail in Y years. In a sense, it was, since the refrigerator was designed within certain constraints: existing technology, cost points, market demand, competitive expectations, cost of inputs including capital and materials, etc. The end result of those design choices is a refrigerator that lasts, on average, Y years. But the direction of causality is from the design to the durability, not from a selected goal of durability to the design. This is a misapplication of statistics, and is usually committed either out of malice or ignorance. I'll assume Sale does so out of the latter.

    The other mistake is the idea that people *should* design 50 year refrigerators (or whatever). You can, right now, buy outstanding appliances that are also very expensive. At the same time, technology is changing and that the rate of change is increasing. Given both of those, why would you want to pay extra for something that will be overtaken by scientific and engineering - not design - obsolescence within a few years? For example, the incandescent lightbulb has been overtaken by the CFL and is about to be overtaken by the LED.

    Sale is also vague on the definition of "human" scale. In Human Scale, Sale endorsed the relatively inefficient, silicon-based photovoltaic (PV) solar power technology of the time. Recently, he has been concluding his public talks by destroying a computer with a sledgehammer. Nevermind the waste, the real question is - how is the PC not human scale, but PV electricity is?

    All in all, I would recommend Human Scale to both classical and modern liberals; there are consequences of largeness of which we should all take heed. I doubt if modern conservatives would find anything of interest here. But while I am interested in discovering the underlying causes of the size of particular groups or industries - for example, is there an actual scale economy benefit or a distortion caused by a feature in the Internal Revenue code? - , Sale is more interested in describing a future in which everything is considerably smaller without examining how things got big. I find that a little disturbing, since his favorite remedy, direct democracy, is at least a little likely to be the cause rather than the solution, especially of the largeness of government which he rightfully fears.
    27 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report