Coming Apart, by Charles Murray

I know Mr. Murray didn't mean to be a downer with this book, but it sort of depressed me.  I guess his most famous book, Losing Ground, isn't a ray of sunshine either, but man, his take on the state of the U.S. is bleak.  In Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, Murray traces the precipitous decline of the cultural values that made America what it is.

Murray doesn't seem to sad about the state of the U.S. . . .

Murray identifies four founding virtues, based on his observations and writings from the first century of life in the U.S.: marriage, industriousness, honesty, and religiosity.  These virtues provide the substance of community life and create an atmosphere in which the American way of life can continue.  He then demonstrates, through a variety of surveys and secondary sources, that over the five decades from 1960 to 2010, these values have all been in decline.  Further, he separates the data into two groups: college-educated, upper-income whites, and working class whites with a high-school education or less.  (He does not include other races in his analysis; I think he wanted to avoid some of the flak he got from The Bell Curve.)

What troubles Murray is this: these two groups are more geographically separated than ever before.  Not only that, but the separation in their exercise of the four virtues has grown tremendously.  While in 1960 there may have been a little difference between the two, in most cases the differences are vast now.  Furthermore, in an observation reminiscent of Theodore Dalrymple's theme in Life at the Bottom, Murray notes that, whereas in the past the lower classes looked to the upper classes for models of lifestyle and behavior, now, more and more, people from the upper classes take on the affectations and behaviors traditionally associated with lower classes.

Is there hope for America?  Murray says, Of course!  This is America, after all!  We do have a major advantage: we are heading down the same road as Europe toward a total social welfare state.  The advantage is that Europe is a at least a generation or two ahead of us, so as we watch their economic and social collapse in the coming decades (or maybe weeks!), we can attempt to avoid their mistakes.  We also have a long tradition of civic involvement, which has never been seen to the same degree elsewhere.  To the extent that we can keep that alive and expand it, we can turn things around.

I keep trying to buy into Murray's optimism, but I'm not so sure.  I pray that my children will embrace the founding virtues.  More specifically, I pray that I will live my life in such a way that they will see those virtues modeled.  More broadly, I pray that our nation will again be a place where those virtues are seen among rich and poor alike.  I mentioned that Losing Ground wasn't a ray of sunshine.  However, it did serve as a spotlight, drawing attention to failed welfare policies, and was instrumental in the development of major, highly successful welfare reforms.  Perhaps Coming Apart will likewise inspire a reformation of our culture.

Thanks to Waterbrook Multnomah for the free review copy of this book.