international

Back in 1993, Huntington's seminal article in Foreign Affairs "The Clash of Civilizations" was prescient about the violent clash between Islam and the West. It better explained the causes of 9/11 than most books written after 9/11!

Now, Huntington's focus has turned inward to the changing identity of American society. He considers that the demographic explosion of Mexicans within the U.S. is causing a Clash of Civilizations within our borders. This is not going to be a destructive clash as the one with Islam. Nevertheless, Huntington suggests it may alter the identity of the U.S.

Huntington states that the U.S. identity is the result of an Anglo-Protestant culture characterized by the English language, the rule of law, work ethic, education, and upward mobility. This entails that each generation has aspired to achieve a higher standard of living. Immigrants from all over the World have adopted this Anglo-Saxon creed as their own road to success. Generations of Europeans, and Asians adopted the English language as a mean to thrive within American society.

However, according to Huntington, Mexicans are different. Mexican immigration differs from past immigration due to a combination of factors, including: proximity, scale, regional concentration, and historical presence.

Mexico is a large country contiguous to the U.S. with a huge population of 100 million. Mexicans infiltrate the porous U.S. border in unprecedented numbers. Thus, Mexicans dominate the influx of emigrants to the U.S. They also tend to settle in Border States. By 2050 Hispanics are projected to represent 25% of the U.S. population. Today they already account for over 32% of the population in California and Texas. Many Mexicans view their infiltration within the U.S. as their regaining territorial claims they had lost to the U.S. in the mid 1800s.

Huntington states there are serious implications to the Mexicanization of parts of the U.S. Hispanics, including Mexicans, unlike other immigrants, do not buy into the Anglo-Protestant creed of our founding settlers. Asians moved to the U.S. and faced formidable linguistic barriers, as their mother tongue was so different from a Western language. But, they did not think this was a problem. However, Hispanics thinks it is. They promote a bilingual country. Over time, they will demand bilingual education, and bilingual political access and power.

Huntington's arguments are challenging because they are well founded. Huntington mentions that Mexicans do not believe in the Anglo-Protestant creed on several counts. Contrary to other minorities, Mexicans do not buy into education as a road to success. He has studied the educational profile of Mexicans. He noticed that Mexicans' education levels across generations are actually declining. The fourth generation descendents of Mexican immigrants (the great grand children of the first immigrants) are less well educated than the third generation. Only 9.6% of Mexicans earn a college degree. This is about half the rate of African Americans, commonly considered the most underprivileged minority group in the U.S. As a result of their declining academic achievement, the fourth generation also experiences lower income and a dramatically lower level of homeownership (only 40.3% vs. 55.1% for their parents' generation; and 64.1% for the U.S. average).

Huntington quotes members of the Latino business community who recognize the difference between the cultures. These businessmen indicate that several cultural features keep their respective community behind, including: mistrust of people outside the family, lack of initiative, self-reliance, and ambition; little use for education; and acceptance of poverty as a virtue necessary for entrance into heaven.

If you want to further study this topic, I recommend David Heer's "Immigration in America's Future"; Richard Alba's "Remaking the American Mainstream"; and Barry Edmonston's "Immigration and Ethnicity."

I bought this book because I had read his former book, "The Clash of Civilizations". At the time I was very impressed by his unusual stand and fresh look on world affairs. In "The Clash of Civilizations" he described the importants that cultural difference have in world politics. And the consequences of these differences after the end of the cold war for the world affairs (it turned into a classic). In "Who Are We" Huntington concentrates on the cultural identity of the United States of America that made it what it is today. In a way this is book is a follow up on the "Clash of Civilizations", but this time not directly for the world affairs but for the internal affairs of the USA. Although, as a European reader, I recognized the same trends described in the book in Europe. After reading this book, I was quite shocked to see, how indifferent the American elite can be over their own cultural identity. Shocked to see, that in some ways it can supersede even European policies. In my view the books presents a compelling case against the over the top multi culturalisme (and not only in the USA), that made us forget who we are and hence made it impossible to act on what is need to survive in a multi cultural world.

I noticed that there was a lot of bad press on this book (just as "clash of civilizations"), every self respecting source needed to comment on the book, that sounds as an instant classic to me! As happens always when a book is not telling the already accepted, many reviewers reject the new ideas presented to them in loud words.

What ever side your on, if you buy this book, you buy a classic and have a nice view on the battle of ideas that will shape tomorrow.

This book has so greatly increased my appreciation for truly good beer. The more I read, the more my taste buds danced with giddy delight on my happy tongue. A pale ale, an IPA, another IPA (hops truly are tops!), a dark ale, Chapter Two, a wassail, a porter, two more porters (I spilled most of another), Chapter Three, ahhh sweet stout how I love thee though I don't recall how many times, a skip through Chapter Four on Anglo-Protestant Culture trying to find any mention of beer (none, sad), and finally, a foolish attempt (successful) at chugging an imperial stout while I read the ending cross-eyed.

This book opened my eyes before I fell asleep.