The historian Victor Davis Hanson has written an absolutely devestating review of Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.
Excerpt:
"The main problem, however, with this book is that Diamond’s well-meaning, environmentally correct storytelling cannot impart any coherent lesson of why in fact societies fail. Environmental degradation, climate change, hostilities, political and cultural failures, and trade are cited as the roots of collapse, but are used so interchangeably that we never learn to what degree mismanagement of nature or of people brings on doom. As a result, when Diamond ventures into systematic analysis of historical questions that he knows nothing about, he has a predictable propensity to say things that are not simply wrong but hilarious."
William Bouguerau L'elegie
