Book Profile

Book Profile, Organization Trends
The Left’s “Secret Science”: Winning Ugly
"The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns" by journalist Sasha Issenberg describes the evolution of voter microtargeting and behavioral science research tactics, and the arms race between high-level…
by Ken Braun on July 23, 2021

Book Profile, Organization Trends
The Left’s “Secret Science”: Victory on the Margins
As pure entertainment, Victory Lab is a well written and fascinating history of the get-out-the-vote (GOTV) and messaging innovations developed by partisan Democrats, partisan Republicans, and academic researchers. On a…
by Ken Braun on July 23, 2021

Book Profile, Organization Trends
The Left’s “Secret Science”: Breaking the Law?
During the Obama administration the IRS discriminated against right-of-center organizations, such as local Tea Party groups, that were seeking nonprofit status. During a 27-month stretch, according to USA Today, “perhaps…
by Ken Braun on July 23, 2021

Book Profile, Organization Trends
The Left’s “Secret Science”: The Mystery of the Rio Grande
Even as Victory Lab portrays the advantage that sketchy partisan turnout machines operating as nonpartisan nonprofits might give to the Democratic Left, the book is not a relentless ride into…
by Ken Braun on July 23, 2021

Book Profile
Philanthropy in George Packer’s “Four Americas”
For his new Last Best Hope: America in Crisis and Renewal, George Packer—“the quintessential establishment liberal intellectual,” as aptly described by David Klion—has put together a survey of four different…
by Michael E. Hartmann on July 12, 2021

Book Profile, Philanthropy
Philanthropy, Charity, and The Wealth Hoarders
In 1983, when Chuck Collins was 23, he attended a weekend conference for 30 people with inherited wealth co-sponsored by a local family office and private foundation. The grandson of Oscar Meyer…
by Michael E. Hartmann on June 14, 2021

Book Profile, Philanthropy
Money, Morality, and Musea
“Given that many museums are so obviously a manifestation of private wealth, made possible by the accumulation of riches often spent for private as well as public benefit,” according to…
by Michael E. Hartmann on May 24, 2021

Book Profile, Philanthropy
Elites, Barstools, Raw Beauty, and a (Philanthropic) “George Option”
In an excerpt from his 2019 book Where the Light Divides that he published on his blog last month, The Gathering founder Fred Smith—with his typical warmth, charm, and thought-provoking insight—writes, For many…
by Michael E. Hartmann on March 22, 2021

Book Profile, Philanthropy
Ken Dayton on Good Nonprofit-Board Governance
John Tuso’s new book recalls his advice succinctly: simply support and supervise management. CEOs shouldn’t surrender, and boards shouldn’t usurp, power. In the nonprofit context particularly, directors should also be…
by Michael E. Hartmann on March 15, 2021

Book Profile, Organization Trends
The Dictatorship of Woke Capital and the Politicization of American Business
Anyone concerned by an increasingly political corporate America will find little to assuage their worry in The Dictatorship of Woke Capital: How Political Correctness Captured Big Business. Yet there’s still…
by Robert Stilson on March 10, 2021