Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering
Sometimes, it takes a quarter century. Such is the case of Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering. Malcolm Gladwell wrote his first book, The Tipping Point, just over 25 years ago, and many suggested that he come back and do a revision or update. However, he recognized that the world has changed, and a more substantial look at the same dynamics would require different stories and different perspectives. That’s what Revenge of the Tipping Point is. To provide some context, I didn’t just read The Tipping Point. I’ve also read Blink and Outliers. I’m familiar with his style of writing and with its strengths and limitations.
Broken Windows
Before I start with the new, it’s appropriate to review the old. One of the theories from The Tipping Point was that the crime rate in New York decreased due to a focus on smaller crimes. The theory goes that broken windows send a signal that crime is accepted, which ultimately leads to more violent crime. Gladwell credits a focus on cleanup and smaller infractions for turning the tide on violent crime.
The problem is that there are alternate theories that are even more probable. On his blog, he acknowledged the work of Freakonomics authors and their alternate proposal that the decrease in crime corresponded to the 18 years following Roe v. Wade and the legalization of abortion. The theory is that the reduction of unwanted or under-supported children led to fewer criminals and less crime.
This starts my review, because in much of The Revenge of the Tipping Point, I was left concerned that there were alternative theories that were left out – and a richness of the story that was left out.
Gay Marriage
With regard to gay marriage, Gladwell oversimplifies the change to a single television show, Will & Grace, that features the relationship of a gay man and a heterosexual woman. There’s no doubt that the show made an impact on attitudes towards gays. However, simplifying it in this way dismisses the hard work that led to that point. It ignores the groundwork laid down by After the Ball and the work of advocates to push for normalization and acceptance.
Opioid Epidemic
Gladwell’s story is that the Sadler family and Purdue Pharmaceuticals are exclusively to blame for the opioid epidemic. It ignores the reality that people turn to pharmaceuticals when there is pain or suffering in their life. (See The Globalization of Addiction, Chasing the Scream, and Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism.) He explains how the reformulation that solved the crushability problem with OxyContin made things worse as people transitioned to heroin. It ignores the fact that the heroin supply lines had been perfected by the time this was accomplished. (See Dreamland.)
He does share the challenges with some physicians who are willing to prescribe indiscriminately. He identifies a great public policy that requires state notification of narcotics prescriptions as a way of causing physicians to think about opioids differently than any other kind of prescription. That’s a good recognition of how there were other factors besides a money hungry family and organization.
Suicide Clusters
Perhaps my gravest concern about simplification is his discussion of suicide clusters. He bases his information on the work shared in Life Under Pressure, the research of the authors, and some personal conversations. I was concerned about the body of work failing to represent the situation in a way that led to solutions.
Gladwell’s coverage was worse. He explained away the suicide cluster in “Poplar Grove” as being caused by a monoculture – that is, a lack of variation in the city. That is just wrong. It’s wrong, because there are monocultures with protective factors against suicide that will show lower rates. It ignores the central thesis of Life Under Pressure, which argues that it’s pressure that causes the problems.
Perhaps the best way to understand monoculture is the work of Nassim Taleb in Antifragile. In it, Taleb explains that we’ve optimized all the resiliency out of our systems – but those systems are very effective at the one thing that they do. It’s not specifically that the monoculture is the problem. The problem is that the monoculture didn’t include any protective factors any longer.
A monoculture can have cultural components that inhibit suicide just as well as it can have components that encourage it. In the monoculture of a commune (now called “intentional communities” according to Dr. Ruth’s book, The Joy of Connections), the nature of the community would naturally reject the factors that tend to drive people towards suicide.
In a bit of crazy irony, Gladwell uses the work of Rosabeth Moss Kanter to make the point about magic ratios – seemingly ignoring her earliest work. Commitment & Community: Communes and Utopias in Sociological Perspective explains how the internal characteristics can lead to success or failure. In other words, how the characteristics of the group lead to outcomes – even inside a monoculture.
Ratios
Kanter’s work evolved and spoke to the problem of “token” members of groups. That is what happens when there are too few of any category of people such that the one person must become the representative for their entire group. The answer is that they’re not effective, because they’re too connected to the group identity to make a difference. Gladwell calls it the “Magic Third,” implying that the ratio needs to be roughly 1/3 of the overall population. While some of his supporting examples hold this ratio, others note the tipping point is as low as about 25%.
Certainly, there’s a minimum threshold where members of a category of people do feel on edge, because they’re representing their groups. I can speak from personal experience when I was the “old white guy” added to a diversity panel at the last moment. However, the conclusion about the ratio needed to not feel like a representative for the category seems murkier.
Social Engineering
Gladwell has a different definition from the one I most commonly experience for social engineering. I think of it from the perspective of hacking, as in the book Social Engineering. However, Gladwell is talking about how people manipulate systems to create the outcomes they want. It moves us towards the territory of Nudge and the choice architects who create structures that lead to the outcomes that someone else wants.
He explains how he believes Ivy League colleges maintain their ratios of students. They sort athletes, legacies, Dean’s interest list, and children of faculty differently. In short, there’s a pathway that leads to greater acceptance. You can be a good athlete, a child of an alumni, someone the Dean is recruiting for future donations, or children of faculty.
Of these, athletes seem the oddest until you realize that, natural ability aside, it takes a great deal of money to be the best at almost any sport. (See Peak for the required coaches and training.) What selecting for the very top athletes does is filter the list to those families with money quite effectively.
Gladwell makes a bold claim, “If you don’t think that social engineering has quietly become one of the central activities of the American establishment, you haven’t been paying attention.” It’s bold in part because of the proposed reach and in part because of the jab that you don’t believe him.
At the time I’m writing this, there are conspiracy theorists that say that the government has a weather machine that has been creating hurricanes to devastate the southeastern United States. This is ludicrous on its face partially because it makes no sense to do. In addition, if it were ever proven, there would be serious repercussions. People have died in the hurricanes’ aftermath, and it’s unlikely that families will just say, “Oh well.” It’s much more likely they’d organize to dethrone whomever unleashed a hurricane on their families.
My point isn’t that there isn’t some degree of manipulation in the establishment. The Years that Matter Most explains what it is about college attendance that matters – and the answer is connections to others. It’s not that I don’t believe that there is manipulation happening – I’m sure there is.
My point is that the degree of control implied by this is far in excess of what’s possible with what we know about influence, power structures, and nudges. In short, does it happen – yes. However, like many things, we find that the real power is somewhat limited.
The Overstory
Gladwell’s perspective is that there’s an overstory that colors how we see everything. He speaks about how the Holocaust wasn’t discussed until the miniseries on NBC. He speaks of both the power of the overstory and the degree to which it’s possible to change the overstory with seemingly little force. I’m not convinced it’s as easy as it can sometimes appear. While acknowledging the power of framing on the way that people think, I’m not sure that there’s the capacity to control the masses. I’ve seen too many change initiatives at every level fail.
In the end, perhaps the answer is that tipping points are impossible to find. Maybe that’s the Revenge of the Tipping Point.