Join The Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform The World (2011) - Plot & Excerpts
Rosenberg's thesis revolves around the social and affective dimensions of making the world better. She argues that many recent campaigns for social change have made use of grassroots, person-to-person action instead of tired techniques. Top-down threats, scare tactics, and logocentric arguments don't work, in many cases. One of her key examples is anti-smoking efforts. Intellectually, we know smoking's bad for you, so the effort can't foreground informing people. And heavy-handed threats often backfire by promoting the mystique and edginess. Interesting "lay study" of the rhetoric of social change. Probably a bit long-winded, and occasionally Rosenberg pauses too long over the obvious and self-evident, but thoughtful. The title is a bold claim, but she gives examples of how peer pressure can change the world. From toppling dictatorships to raising the standard of living for untouchables in India to helping students obtain better calculus grades, she gives concrete examples of positive peer pressure. I found the idea that we are so reliant on group action a bit disturbing (can we ever really act independently?) but I see the good that peer pressure can facilitate. The most interesting chapters were about Optor, the resistance group in Yugoslavia. Basically a group of youths making it seem cool to resist. They used tactics as simple as limited-supply resistance t-shirts to stimulate interest. The difficulty in getting them made the shirts a prized commodity, plus it was free advertising. The end of the book gives productive examples of how to use positive peer pressure to prevent terrorism and assist ex-prisoners in re-entering society without reoffending. This was a fast and good read.
What do You think about Join The Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform The World (2011)?
Interesting topic, but way too drawn out. Boring. I didn't finish it, but I AM finished.
—mpuluks
couldn´t finish it. Too dry, too many statistics....nothing that really interests me.
—bella
