愚蠢的進行曲：從特洛伊到越南
她沒有測試她為自己設定的假說
于 2011年7月11日 在美国（US）发表评论
Tuchman是一个有才华的故事讲述者和流畅的作家。她扮演的是公共知识分子的角色，她认为聪明的、受过良好教育的、即使不是专家的观众是理所当然的。
根据我的理解，她的基本论点是，"愚政 "发生在以下情况：
（1）一个国家走了一条明显违背其当时自身利益的道路；
（2）有一条可行的替代道路。
她认为，以这种方式定义，愚政是人类历史的一个持续部分，并以特洛伊战争的 "原型 "和新教改革、美国革命和越南战争的例子来证明这一点。在我看来，她对这些演示的介绍未能以一种足够有序的方式来检验她的假设。
我的主要问题是，她采取了一种非常老式的观点，认为当权者如果以不促进国家利益的方式行事，就会犯傻。
实际上，她认为 "好 "男人--在她的例子中几乎都是男人--有道德义务支持他们国家的利益而不是他们自己的利益。
然后，她一再证明男人是如何从他们自己的利益出发，就像他们当时所认为的那样，并在这样做的过程中把他们的国家引向不受欢迎的道路。
她建议，即使一个行动会伤害到采取该行动的人，但如果这个人没有看到他的道德义务，没有为更大的利益而行动，他就犯了愚政的错误。
(道德義務的對象:國家、團體、個人？)
当个人必须否认自己的利益以确保一个国家走这条路时，是否存在真正的 "可行的替代道路"？
我接受的是经济学家的培训，所以在我看来这样的道路不可行也许并不奇怪，特别是当许多 "好人 "必须否认他们的自我利益以使替代道路获胜。
她所说的 "愚政"在我看来是人们在日常生活中，在一个国家的各个层面进行的非常复杂的游戏所带来的不可避免的后果。
说没有英雄我们就无法避免 "愚政"，让我怀疑 "愚蠢 "到底有什么有用的、可操作的意义。只有英雄才能执行的计划很少被视为现实或有用，除非在最绝望的时候。
我很想认为，她是在东北富人的旧会所里说话，这些人曾经认为他们有道德义务和权利来领导国家，并且按照他们所看到的正确方向来做。
这不是我们今天所处的世界，也不是她所描述的那些时期的人所处的世界。
因此，她讲述了关于她深入研究的四个案例中的每一个的引人入胜的故事。这些故事就其本身而言可能值得一读。但她讲的故事并没有提供坚实的分析。她未能以令人信服的方式将这四个案例联系起来。因此，她没能提出更广泛的案例，即每个案例都为我们自己的时代提供了一面遥远的镜子，*这些案例可以帮助我们从历史中学习，避免过去的愚蠢行为。我希望这个世界是如此的平易近人。
She fails to test the hypothesis she sets for herself
於 2011年7月11日 在美國 (US) 發表評論
Tuchman is a talented story teller and fluent writer. She plays the role of the public intellectual who takes an intelligent and well-educated, if nonspecialist, audience for granted. As I understand it, her essential argument is that "folly" occurs when (1) a country follows a path that is demonstrably counter to its self interest at the time and (2) a feasible alternative path is available. She argues that, defined in this way, folly is a persistent part of human history and sets out to demonstrate this with a Trojan War "prototype" and examples from the Protestant Reformation, American Revolution, and Vietnam War. For my money, her presentation of these demonstrations fails to frame her hypothesis in an orderly enough way to test it.
My principal problem is that she takes a very old fashioned view that individuals in power commit folly if they act in ways that do not promote their country's interests. In effect, she argues that "good" men--and it is almost always men in her examples--have a moral obligation to favor the interests of their countries over their self interests. She then demonstrates over and over how men have acted in their own self interests, as they perceived it at the time, and in so doing directed their countries down undesirable pathways. She suggests that, even if an action will hurt a man who takes it, the man commits folly if he does not see his morale obligation and act for the greater good.
Does a truly "feasible alternative path" exist when individuals must deny their self interest to ensure that a country follows that path? I am trained as an economist, so perhaps it is not surprising that such a path does not appear feasible to me, especially when many "good men" must deny their self interests for the alternative path to prevail. What she calls "folly" looks to me like the unavoidable consequences of the very complex games that people play in their every day lives, at all levels in a country. Saying that we cannot avoid "folly" without heroes leaves me wondering what useful, operational meaning "folly" really has. Plans that only heroes can execute are rarely viewed as realistic or useful, except in the most desperate times.
I am tempted to think that she is speaking inside the old clubhouse of the the well-to-do Northeasterners who once thought they had the moral obligation and the right to lead the nation and to do so in the right direction as they saw it. That is not the world that we live in today or that anyone lived in during the periods that she describes.
So, she tells engaging stories about each of the four cases she examines in depth. These stories may be worth reading for their own sakes. But her story telling does not provide solid analysis. She fails to link the four cases in convincing ways. And so, she fails to make her broader case that each offers a distant mirror of our own time *and* that these cases can help us learn from history and avoid the folly of the past. I wish the world were so tractable.
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