Alienated America

Why Some Places Thrive While Others Collapse

By: Timothy P. Carney

Narrated by: Charles Constant

Respected conservative journalist and commentator Timothy P. Carney continues the conversation begun with Hillbilly Elegy and the classic Bowling Alone in this hard-hitting analysis that identifies the true factor behind the decline of the American dream: It is not purely the result of economics as the left claims, but the collapse of the institutions that made us successful, including marriage, church, and civic life.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald J. Trump proclaimed, “the American dream is dead”, and this message resonated across the country.

Why do so many people believe the American dream is no longer within reach? Growing inequality, stubborn pockets of immobility, rising rates of deadly addiction, the increasing and troubling fact that where you start determines where you end up, heightening political strife - these are the disturbing realities threatening ordinary American lives today.

The standard accounts pointed to economic problems among the working class, but the root was a cultural collapse: While the educated and wealthy elites still enjoy strong communities, most blue-collar Americans lack strong communities and institutions that bind them to their neighbors. And outside of the elites, the central American institution has been religion.

That is, it’s not the factory closings that have torn us apart; it’s the church closings. The dissolution of our most cherished institutions - nuclear families, places of worship, civic organizations - has not only divided us, but eroded our sense of worth, belief in opportunity, and connection to one another.

In Alienated America, Carney visits all corners of America, from the dim country bars of Southwestern Pennsylvania, to the bustling Mormon wards of Salt Lake City, and explains the most important data and research to demonstrate how the social connection is the great divide in America. He shows that Trump’s surprising victory was the most visible symptom of this deep-seated problem.

In addition to his detailed exploration of how a range of societal changes have, in tandem, damaged us, Carney provides a framework that will lead us back out of a lonely, modern wilderness.

©2019 Timothy P. Carney (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers

Very detailed data analysis

This is an unbiased assessment of the different parts American society with fair-minded comparison to history and constructive suggestions to make this country more universally thrive again.

Roadmap to MAGA

Carney describes the institutions that made America great and how in the 60’s the elite left started to tear them down. As Charles Murray pointed out our elite adopted these values and institutions while destroying them for the lower classes. We thus have 2 societies. Carney does a great job in describing this process. He then describes how America can be rebuilt from the bottom up. It is an easy and fun read. Well documented. It is worth everyone’s time to read.

Better than expected!

A full rundown on what is wrong in American society - in a nutshell, we’ve lost our community and the institutions that bound us together. Now, the hyper-individualist attitude combined with consumerism, and enabled by technology addictive technology has us living in a time of isolation and loneliness. Small (and often wealthy) communities with common culture are going strong while the rest of America creeps toward the precipice of final destruction.

Everyone Must Read

This is one of the most entertaining, insightful and interesting books I have encountered in the last decade. It is based not on conjecture but on careful analysis and pain-staking research and interviews. Through this, it brings us face to face with the deepest challenges facing our culture, the challenge of love grown cold and alienation in substantial portions of our country. What’s more, it proposes difficult yet attainable solutions that those, on the right and left, minded to see a more civil and flourishing society can and should devote themselves to. I leave it feeling reminded, hopeful, and pressed to devote myself to the love of my neighbor. Thank you Timothy Carney (and Charles Constant).

Worth it...

A long listen with lots of data, but worth it. Like taking a advanced social studies course on current America. Full of insight. My take away... why some have hope and others don’t... God.

Great Read

In today’s current climate, this book provides such a great insight to why we are all so different yet quite the same!

why did Trump win and what should be done.

A look at Trump in the 2016 primaries is far more insightful than the general election where it is impossible to parse those who voted for Trump from those that voted against Clinton. The conclusion is not to vote Republican or Democrat but to do Community.

A good companion to Murray's Coming Apart

Mr. Carney is making the podcast rounds to hawk his book. What I heard in those interviews was a story about America's social ties coming apart, like in Charles Murray's Coming Apart. What I got was a bit of that as well as a dose of "why did Trump win in 2016," which I had 0, negative zero interest in.
Despite the intrusion of Trump as a topic, the book was very interesting to listen to and gave me and my spouse (for the parts I shared) something to think and talk about. I'm sure there are a zillion reviews about what is in the book, so I'll keep mine simple. It is a good social studies book about social capital and its importance. In my own studies, I do local history and note the change in my own ethnic community and its downward spiral in some areas due to the loss of organizational and church involvement. It also made me think about work in a different way and why a universal basic income is foolhardy.

Excellent sociological analyis of what ails US.

Lays out the local community basis for US decline, driven by centralizing and thus depersonalizing support.

Interesting, but a mix of research and speculation

Very interesting, but the careless mingling of speculation with research based conclusions renders it less useful than it might have been.